Freezing Arms

Maybe somewhere else will not be half as cold as me

Squib stared at the small glass of pills in front of him. Would anyone really miss him? No. They'd find new friends.

Sure, maybe not right away. But look at him. Look at Adena. Look at Cody. New roommates, new friends, new crushes. At the time, he had sworn he'd never have another roommate (as soon as he figured out how to get rid of Rick) and he'd certainly never have another best friend.

So what did that make Cameron?

Exactly.

They'd get over it.

He sighed rather loudly and rolled off his stomach. Picking himself up off the floor, he grabbed his cup of pills and walked over to his dresser, nestling the glass under his socks once more. He'd had enough emo whining for the day.

Were the pills even any good anymore? It had been…what? Years?

Who was he kidding? It had been two and a half years. Ever since he'd come to Cascadia.

And it was all Ryan's fault.

Why should he have to be just like his brother? Why should he have to go to the same school? Be just as popular? Be just as good? How was that fair?

And so, in a moment that even he could admit was oozing with melodrama, he had swiped the key to the nurse's office, picked through all the lovely little pills she kept locked up, and made himself a cocktail of sorts.

Of course, it had only taken about twenty minutes of staring at all those pills, waiting for him in a small, clear tumbler, to chicken out like the pansy he was.

But why throw them out? He had gone to all that work. And what if he decided to go for it one day? So he hid them in his sock drawer; a place so cliché that he was quite sure no one would ever suspect it.

And wasn't it a nice thought, really? The fact that he could kill himself whenever he wanted. Like that. There'd be no struggle. He could pop them before bed, go to sleep, and just never wake up. It wasn't that he had some sick fantasy of suicide. It was that he could take his own life whenever he chose.

He was in control.

"Late night, Squib?" Cody asked in her usual cheerful tone as she took a seat next to him.

He shrugged, barely pausing as he ate, "Not really."

"You coming to play cards in the Open?"

He shrugged again, "Maybe."

Of course, he did go. Where the hell else was he supposed to go? He didn't have any other friends; being in Group A had alienated him nicely. Practice? Laughable.

But it was one of those days. Those days where you just know all your friends hate you. That they laugh at you behind your back, and would never, say, give you a kidney. Was crappy, crappy friends he had.

What a crappy, crappy life he had, come to think of it. It was so much worse than theirs, really. Take Adena. Sure, her father was a nut job (Yeah. He said it.), but he still came to visit. He was escorted away by security, but he had come.

Cody freaking lived with her dad. Her sister came to visit and, from what he could tell, her mom wrote often. Nate may have hated his dad with every fiber of his being, but if he needed him, he'd be there. Even Tanis and Cameron got letters. Birthday cards.

And what about him? His only brother was dead. So now he had to be just as good as some dead guy. His dad didn't care about him, because he wasn't that dead guy. And his mom? He was quite sure that at this very moment his mother was drunk. How did he know that? Because at any given moment, one could assume that Ellie Furlong was drunk.

So why should he have to sit there with all these perfect children who were loved by their parents? He shouldn't.

"SQUIB!"

"What?" Squib blinked a few times, looking around.

Adena sighed, "For the fourth time, do you have any twos?"

"Uh, no," he answered without looking at his cards. "You know what, I think I'm out."

"You sure?" Cameron asked.

"Yeah," he placed his cards on the table (there was, in fact, a two in his hand) and stood up. "If I don't finish that paper, Wiley will eat me." The group chuckled and said goodnight as he walked out of the Open.

"Hey, Squibey-,"

"Get bent, Rick."

Rick's parents probably wrote to him.

When Sebastien and Megan died, he'd stared at the pills a whole lot. And, really, who wouldn't? Megan was so beautiful, and so smart, and so talented, and so special. And for all he teased her, he knew that they all wanted to be just like Megan.

And Sebastien? Sebastien was like a brother to him. More than a brother. He could never just hang out with Ryan. He was always secretly competing with Ryan. But Seb was so dedicated, yet so cool.

And then that plane hit the ground.

Two brothers and a sister. Dead.

And he wished he could say that he didn't do it because of his friends. That he couldn't put them through that. That it wasn't fair to them.

Truthfully? In the wake of their deaths, he didn't think anyone would notice if the whiny, mediocre rich kid killed himself. And that would kind of sting.

Because he'd still be able to see them, right? And hear them? All the people on Earth?

Like, Megan and Sebastien could see and hear them, right?

If not, he spent an awfully lot of useless time talking to his ceiling.

Squib grunted as he sent the ball flying back towards his opponent. He could hear his friends cheering as it sailed past the boy at the other end of the court.

Who cared?

Did they know what it was like? To have to be your older brother? Sure, fine, they knew pressure. If Adena's father was any indication, they knew a lot of pressure.

But put a face to it, and everything changes.

And fine, okay, he had 'gotten over it'. He'd accepted that he was Squib and Ryan was Ryan and that's just the way things were. He'd accepted that Ryan was gone and it was rather silly to be competing with a dead guy.

But it still sucked when his father called every six months and lectured him about how good his brother was.

"Hey, man," Cameron greeted him as he walked off the court, "nice game."

"Thanks," Squib nodded, still slightly out of breath.

"You gonna come hang out in the Open?"

"Uh, nah," he shook his head, "I don't think so. I'll see you at dinner."

"Gosh," Adena huffed, coming up to Cam as they watched their friend's retreating back, "what is up with him lately?"

Cameron shrugged, "You know Squib. He'll calm down in a few days."

"Hey, Squib," Tanis greeted him as she saw Squib approach from the other direction, "You okay? You look…out of breath."

"Fine," he said, "just had a tough match."

"Oh, yeah," she nodded, ponytail bobbing up and down, "sorry I missed it."

"No worries…Hey, Tanis," he asked at length, just as she was turning to leave, "do you have any siblings?"

"No…why?"

"Just wondering."

His life wasn't that hard. Why couldn't he get that through his own dumb head? So what if his parents didn't know he existed? It was better that way. He could have it worse. Nate fought with his dad all the time. At least Squib's meetings with his father were just…icy.

He wouldn't go grab those pills. He wouldn't. Because that was it. When you grab the pills, all the thoughts buzzing around in your head fade away and it's just 'to swallow, or not to swallow?'. Once you pick up the pills, you're either as good as dead, or you're a pansy. And Gary Furlong was no pansy.

So what did that make him?

It made him a God damn insomniac, that's what he was. Sighing, he flipped the covers off his body and slid on a pair of jeans and sneakers before grabbing his jacket and tiptoeing quietly past Cameron's bed and out the door.

"Squib?" He froze and turned on his heels, coming face to face with Cody.

"Oh, hey," he let out a relieved sigh, "what are you doing breaking curfew?"

She rolled her eyes, "I needed a book from the library; my dad told me to make it quick," she smirked.

"Ah," he nodded.

"So, are you coming into town with us this weekend?"

"Um, I d-,"

"We haven't seen a lot of you lately," she continued as if he'd never spoken, "we kinda miss you."

"Really?" He cocked an eyebrow.

"Don't let it go to your head," she warned lightly.

"Well, I suppose if you guys miss me that much, I may have to…"

"You're hilarious. But seriously, Adena's started coming up with crazy theories about where you run off to all the time. Even Nate's been asking where you are," she smiled, shivering slightly.

"Cold?"

"A little."

"Want my jacket?"

"It's okay. My house is closer," she smiled. "You need it more than I do."

Squib slid off his shoes silently as he returned to his dorm. Creeping over to his dresser, he gently extracted his glass of pills and headed into the bathroom.

He told himself not to think about it. To just do it.

Because maybe just this once, he could be selfless. He didn't have delusions of hero worship, he knew that if he left, if he died, they would all move on at one point. But he remembered how it felt, losing Ryan, losing Seb, losing Meg. And for something he eventually got over, it sure hurt a lot.

And, in his one selfless moment, at two minutes past twelve in the morning, in his dark bathroom, standing before a slightly aged porcelain sink, he decided he couldn't to that to them.

He watched silently as every last pill slid down the drain.

Hold me in your freezing arms before we have to go

I hate angsty!whiny!Squib. I think he's melodramatic. So don't ask me where the heck this came from. I can only hope it was good enough to make angsty!whiny!Squib likeable.

Listen to Snow Patrol's new album, y'all. It freaking inspires.