Hey, all, so this is another experiment with a more stream of consciousness style of writing, so I hope you guys like it! I also don't really write a lot of tragedy like this... fluff is usually more my style, so I hope you'll let me know how it is!

Title: like the burning end of a midnight cigarette

Pairing(s): DirkRoxy

Universe: No SBurb Session

Warnings: Major Character Death, References to Suicide, Suicide

Inspired rather heavily by the song Whiskey Lullaby by Brad Paisley ft. Alison Krauss. I definitely recommend listening to the song.

Disclaimer: Homestuck belongs to Andrew Hussie

She was laughing between the wet, slobbering kisses, clearly drunk off her ass, cheeks bright with the warmth only several tequilas bring.

Diiiirk… Dirk, baby, come on… hic… come join us, there's room for three!

Drunk, she was like a different person, all scorn and giggles and dirk, babs, did you really think we were exclusive instead of the smart-as-hell beauty you'd fallen so desperately in love with, but what fucking hurt like a knife through the ribs was that you'd only been overseas for a couple of months and suddenly your whole relationship was crashing down around your ears.

She fixed you with that gaze, her eyes startlingly clear for the number of empty bottles littering the table in front of her, and her mouth, so beautiful in a smile, now slick with the shiny wet spit of some other guy, turned down at the corners.

Diiiirk why ya gotta ruin all my fun?

You lasted a year, one long, painful, awful year where your mouth tasted of ash and the whiskey you'd turned to, wondering what the fuck was so fantastic about the stuff that had drawn Roxy like a moth to flame until finally, with the slick, sick spin of alcohol in your gut and dull, fumbling fingers, you found the pistol Jake had given to you for your birthday all those years ago.

Don't be daft, Dirk old boy, every man's got to have at least one good weapon lying around the house!

At least it was going to finally be of some use. Your last thought was almost incoherent, just a sense of light perfume and a smooth, easy half smile, the smile she'd give you when she was about to school your ass in chess, and you knew you'd love her until you died.

You heard what he'd done from Janey, clear accusation in her red-rimmed eyes as she told you how he'd been found, face down in his pillows on his bed, and how the room stank of the alcohol he'd despised and you excused yourself to go vomit, shaky and between heaving sobs, wondering how the hell things had fallen apart so badly.

You couldn't stand to see Jane or Jake anymore because no matter how often they said it wasn't your fault, there were still the moments you caught them whispering behind your back, faces closed and tight, and your throat would close, a hard, tight knot blocking your air passages. You spent more and more time inside, alone, drinking whiskey almost exclusively. You despised the stuff, but it was the only thing that could lessen the sick, heavy weight in your mind and chest.

You lived your days in a foggy gray haze of guilt, self-loathing, and whiskey, always whiskey. Sometimes you saw him, when your mind was so far gone you couldn't remember why you hated yourself, there he was.

RoLal, hey, come on, what're you doing? You know I hate that shit.

"I'm sorry." You'd whisper into the dark, trembling and shaking and sucking snot into your throat to mix with the hot sting of whiskey.

Sometimes he'd be angry, running his fingers through his hair agitatedly.

Fucking hell, Roxy, get some help, you look like shit.

"I know, I'm sorry."

You stopped eating, stopped going out, stopped answering phone calls, emails, text messages until finally, one day late at night you stumbled your bleary way to the bathroom, bottle sloshing in hand, and filled the tub with water.

You knew you were drunk, far too drunk to be doing this, but you just desperately wanted to feel clean again, wanted to scrub yourself inside and out, wanted Dirk to be here, to be alive, so you could tell your best friend that you loved him and that you were so so so sorry.

… it was a mistake, a stupid fucking mistake, I was drunk, I was stupid, I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry, I love you, please, Dirk, please just forgive me, please…

You arranged for them to be buried together, beneath the willow tree that the four of you used to screw around trying to climb when you were kids, pretending you were saving an ancient race of aliens from destroying their world.

Jake didn't go with you to see her– he said he couldn't do it, not again, not so soon, but you couldn't bear to let your best friend be hidden away under the ground, covered in dirt, alone and broken without someone there.

You placed two bouquets of flowers you'd gotten at the flower shop around the corner from your bakery down, one on each grave and no, damn it, this wasn't supposed to happen, not to them, not when they had been so happy, jokingly talking about flowers at their wedding and 'til death do they part, damn it, what were you going to do without your two best friends, how were you going to survive when they were so fucking far away?

As though in recognition of your pain, the sun began to set as you knelt in the dirt in front of their graves and cried yourself hoarse, cried for Dirk's shattered and broken heart and Roxy's heavy, sickening guilt, cried for Jake and the tight, angry way he now held himself and cried for yourself, and for the friends you'd lost and the hole in your heart, and for four kids who'd just been working their way through life together and who were now two members short.

Thanks for reading, guys!

Pom