Everything's different now.

They never knew their parents, and thoughts tinged with almost imagined fondness pertaining to them following glimpses of photographs were only that, thoughts, not memories.

They were used to that. Were never really sad about the loss of the people they didn't really know besides the fact that they'd never really known them.

She doesn't think any of them had ever been this ruined before, because that's what they were.

They were ruined.

Irrevocably, irreversibly, permanently ruined.

They'd always been the five of them, and with the introduction of Cassie they became the six of them. They'd shifted seamlessly into the Circle of witches they were all born to be and it was tearing them apart at those apparently tight seams to be so abruptly pushed back to five.

A Circle was six.

Faye didn't know what to do.

This was infinitely worse than when she thought she'd killed somebody; the feeling of helplessness of right now far outweighed the helplessness of back then.

Then it was a girl she didn't like. This, this was Nick.

Melissa's Nick. Her best friends not-really but totally boyfriend. (Annoyingly broken Nick whom they had all been silently grateful they weren't like).

Her best friend, the only person she would ever, ever put before herself was ruined but Faye was a smart girl, very, very smart sometimes. She knew this wasn't just Melissa and Nick and Faye.

This was them.

This was the remains of a Circle, a once-whole. This wasn't just half of that circle. This affected them all, in a way it could only affect them, because they were the only people to know him, to be a part of him in a way his aunt could never be, in a way they were all for each other.

But Faye was also selfish (mean, stubborn, utterly, utterly helpless Faye) and her best friend needed her more than the other fractions of their group so she tells them to fuck off as she focuses only on Melissa.

And when she made a broken promise to her mother that everything would be fine because she'd fix it, even if it meant giving up the only thing that made her who she was (flawed, proud, nasty girl that she was, is, would always be), she followed it through because her mum had always told her that her father was the type to never break a promise and she always imagined she would have been a daddy's girl if things hadn't turned out so wrong.

The promise she makes to Melissa far outweighs that broken promise. She would give anything and anybody to fix her best friend, even herself.

"It'll be okay, I promise."

And she'll make sure it is. She just doesn't know what to do.

They're all more than a little bit lost.

They can't visit his grave because every time they stand so close to his body, just six feet under them, their hearts break and their hands shake and their very blood calls out to him in a way they'd never noticed before but all realised had always been there.

Their magic wanted him back.

And so his room has become their place of mourning for him.

His aunt left it exactly how it's always been and Faye is appreciative in that way only she can be, where she expects it anyway and so gets it and only very vaguely realises maybe it wouldn't have happened that way if it was anybody but them.

Nevertheless it was them, cracked and broken and missing a very, very important part, but it's still them.

Faye has to believe that.

And only a small part of her hates Nick for leaving them like this because she knows it was him or Melissa and she knows only he loved her best friend like she did, in that way where she was the sun and the stars and really her only friend.

Faye saw it, had seen it. Melissa had been Nick's sun and stars and his only real friend too.

She forgives him before the thought can properly manifest itself, unconsciously letting go of that small sliver of hate that had begun to blossom in her chest before it could fully bloom.

Because he'd left her, left them all, and she had never realised how much she needed him until he was gone and it was so cliché but she didn't care.

She would have made the same choice if it came down to it. Nick or Melissa. Her or Melissa.

The sun and stars and all the light in the world, or one of them, the broken.

It wasn't even a hard choice.

When they're in his room Melissa breaks a little more and Faye doesn't take the time to wonder at how impossible that thought was.

Melissa was ruined, she shouldn't still be able to crumble, it seemed illogical that her best friend still had parts of her left to break, and a part of her is a little exasperated, ("I don't mind being alone. Unlike you Melissa, I actually like myself.") but she pushes away those thoughts, (the selfish, vindictive witchy thoughts), and curls her best friend protectively against her chest.

She doesn't even mind that her favorite shirt is getting tears all over it because they're tears for Nick and she's ruined enough of her own shirts for the same reason to feel angry about Melissa ruining this particular one, even if Nick had once said she looked especially pretty in it, back when he thought they'd be good together even when she knew they wouldn't have, could never have,(because they were both too what she had then thought of as broken, back before he died and she realised what it really meant to be broken).

Faye still doesn't know what to do, as she rocks her best friend back and forth and ignores the pictures on the desk of them all (minus Cassie) as children, or as pre-teens and later teens. Nick's entire room is dark and masculine and very, very Nick and the only thing about it that shocks her are those photos.

She hopes that maybe he loved the rest of them even a smidge of the way he loved Melissa, and she thinks maybe he did, in the same way she loves them all.

Melissa is so much smaller than herself, and Faye is reminded of this yet again as the smaller girl sobs into her arms.

Melissa was the small one, the pretty and weak one.

(Faye was the mean, bitchy, oftentimes cruel one and Diana and Cassie weren't all that interesting considering their hero-complexes and general niceness)

She was the baby of the group, had been excited to meet Cassie in hopes that title would pass along but no, Melissa was, is, would always be the baby. The youngest and sweetest and most easily hurt.

And Faye had never realised this until now, but while she's so much smaller than the rest of them, her hands, (her shaking, trembling hands) are strong and sure as they hold onto the comfort Faye is giving. She's grasping and needy and Faye isn't thinking derogatory thoughts for once because her best friend was strong.

She'd get through this.

And if she could, so could the rest of them.

Faye didn't know what to do. Would never, ever, be able to think of a way to fix things, because they were ruined, weren't they?

But it was a simple fact that revibrated though her mind each day as Melissa cries and screams and begs and then later rages and promises revenge and as Faye runs her fingers through her best friends hair, pulls her out of drunken stupors and fits of catatonia this thought keeps her going.

Nick had chosen Melissa over himself.

Had died, for Melissa.

And when she (vindictive, mean, bitchy, helpless, uncomfortable, uncertain, totally sure, positive this is what needs to happen, she) finds Melissa tearing through an old diary with hers and Nick's name in hearts, and each day she sees Melissa breaking over and over even when there's seemingly nothing left to give, and she too dies a little as the sun and the stars fade from her best friend's eyes, she's still sure she's got a hell of a lot more to give, would never, ever stop giving.

Because she made a fucking promise.

And Nick never did, but look how good he was at protecting their best friend.