I DID actually write this prequel before, but… it wasn't finished. Thank you to Shrink To Be for inspiring me to get it done.

It had begun innocently enough. A drunken kiss here and there, maybe, and if he got handsy enough it would develop into something slightly larger.

Oh, it would develop, though; suddenly their stupid secret handshakes and gossip looked less and less like the kind that should be shared between friends and more like that of a married couple.

So, they sucked at hiding it. What of it? No one (really) suspected a thing.

It hadn't even occurred to him that Turk would ever want to let go of that. Not even after the wedding was over and their "innocent relationship" became an affair.

"'N-nilla' bear," he gasped one evening, sitting back on his haunches and pushing JD slightly away, "we can't keep doing this."

And that was when reality came crashing down.

Of course he wouldn't want to screw around like that anymore. Turk was a grown man; he had Carla to make love to whenever he wanted. He and JD could still remain friends, right?

And they did, at first. Even though every time he watched him lick his lips to dry them he thought about it and whenever they were alone he couldn't help but wonder, Who could one little kiss hurt? Although the answer to that was clear: Carla.

And quite suddenly he found himself spiraling, his mind an utter twist of confusion and selfish "need".

And of course, you couldn't discount the fact he would soon destroy, regain and/or befuddle two relationships (one with a woman he maybe kind of loved, another with a woman who mothered his child). And still, through the janitor's meddlings and patients dying, he still thought about Turk – though, thankfully, not nearly as much.

But Turk's decision was but one event that led to a chain reaction; and it was all JD had needed to get his thoughts into turmoil.

He smiles. They yell. He waits. They apologize. He makes a mistake. Things get worse before they're better. They're okay. Cox refuses him. Turk both neglects and hangs out with him too often for it to be healthy. Take Sam for the weekend. Avoid looking in Kim's eyes. Next week, start over again.

It was a useless, useless, useless cycle he desperately needed to break out of, a seemingly never-ending spin of stress that made him want to scream, Leave me the fuck alone, already! And he did, though the only answer he ever got for his effort was a hangover and what was most likely an imagined crash of thunder. (It had been raining, but then again he had also been drunk.)

He came home one afternoon from a particularly lousy day, exactly four weeks after the incident in the rain, to realize an empty, painful pit in his stomach. He froze, having not, in the course of work and trying not to get into a car crash on the freeway, the terrible, bottomless feeling that nestled there. And it ached.

And suddenly he was grinding his teeth and his eyes were wide and blinking away tears and he was so very small and so very vulnerable. And he was empty, except for the overwhelming feeling of being empty and without any reason to be going on. Because he could keep going and going but what would be the point and these thoughts were terrifying him because he never used to bother with such ridiculous, ungodly things before.

And as his thoughts crashed like a train wreck, he stumbled blindly into his apartment, clutching his keys to his chest, the cold metal leaking through his fingers and leaving deep imprints in his skin. He unconsciously held them tighter, until he almost bled.

He fell onto his sofa and pried his hands open, depositing the car keys on the floor. Head in his hands, he rocked back and forth, softly moaning as he did what he could to soothe the oncoming stress-migraine.

In the end, he was forced to stop squeezing his face this way and that in an attempt to dull the pain to grab a few ibuprofens. (That Tylenol crap rarely worked.)

He spent the afternoon face-down on his bed and wallowing in the lack of his once abundant mirth.