So this is just a little oneshot I thought of whilst listening to the song 'Alive Again' but Matt Maher. Y'all should check it out, it's lovely. This fic may be a little confusing at first, or maybe not, but it should all become clear at the end. Enjoy!
i woke up in darkness, surrounded by silence
oh where, where have i gone?
/
Nick hates the quiet. He spends his whole life trying to fill the silence with melodies and lyrics, because to him music is the most important thing. If the world is quiet, it has nothing to celebrate, nothing to say.
The silence of the Lucas household is eerie. The firehouse is never quiet; usually there is the soft tinkling of piano keys to occupy the tranquillity. But now Nick can't form a coherent sentence. He stares at the piano, willing the songs to pour from his mind onto the black and white keys. His index finger absently trickles across the notes; hoping one will jump out and surprise him. It is a routine he has come to learn by heart as the days pass by.
Usually, his brothers join him. Kevin sits on his desk, strumming away on his guitar and Joe lounges on his bed, tapping his fingers as he waits for a text from Stella. But now it seems they're never around, as if their mind is somewhere else. Nick tells himself they're just growing up and suddenly JONAS just isn't as important as graduating or having a girlfriend anymore.
Macy helps sometimes. She props herself on the chair beside his, a notebook in hand full of her scrawls of quotes or ideas, anything to inspire Nick. He finds it sweet and as they spend more time together, he realises that maybe she's his best friend.
/
It's as if one day, someone flicked a switch and everything is different. Everyone is isolated in their own worlds, and Nick doesn't know why. He knows he's been busy with working on the new album, but he hasn't pushed people away this much before.
Macy tells him not to worry. Joe and Stella have been going through a rough patch, what with the tour coming up and Stella stressing about the outfits, and Kevin's just knuckling down with his school work before he has to say goodbye to Horace Mantis. He's happy she's around, because without her he feels like nothing is right.
/
Nick and Macy take a walk in the park. He is fed up of being cooped inside, his mind whirling with words and chords.
They sit on the swings, giggling like they're five years old again. As the sun slips from the sky, the temperature cools and Nick is mesmerized by the clouds billowing from her mouth. She laughs breathlessly, curling a gloved hand around the cool chains and adjusting the woolly beret shoved messily on top of her hair. She's so perfectly imperfect.
Slowly he grasps that he's falling in love with her.
She glances over, throwing him a smile that could break a heart. He takes a chance and leans over, pressing his cold lips against hers. He feels her lose her balance on the swing slightly as she moves her hand into his hair.
He doesn't know how long they sit there, wrapped in each other. All he knows is that he doesn't want to let go. When they finally break, he notices a tear has trickled from his eye.
"Happy tears," He assures her. But something in the back of his mind tells him it's something else entirely.
He's too scared to figure out what it is.
/
When things get too much, he can only rely on one thing, and that's Macy. Whether his diabetes is getting to him, or his writers block is causing sleepless nights, or even just a bad grade at school, she's always there, her hand wrapped around his; strong and resilient, binding his fingers together.
Sometimes he wonders if it wasn't for this hold, he'd spin off into space and never come back.
/
Stella has changed. Nick is surprised when she turns up at the firehouse, her hair limp and hanging, her frail body dressed in baggy clothes and scruffy trainers. She's not the Stella Malone he knows, the girl that'd turn up to a doctor's appointment looking flawless.
When Nick enquires to Macy why this is, the petite brunette tells him that she has no clue why she's acting like she is either. Maybe it has something to do with Joe? The two are drifting, as Stella prepares to start her fashion apprenticeship and Joe focuses on his career.
But she is vague and disinterested in anything Nick has to say. He sits by his piano every day for an hour, waiting for inspiration to strike, and often Stella'll walk past, mumbling something about checking their clothes for that interview with those annoyingly cheerful hosts. It's like a ritual, but she still manages to catch him off gaurd.
"Aren't you sad?" She asks suddenly one day, stopping by his piano.
He looks up at her, staring at her watery eyes and says he has nothing to be sad about. But honestly?
His heart feels like it's breaking, and he doesn't know why.
/
His dad asks him if they'd like to cancel the tour. Nick is bemused; it's only a spot of writers block, he declares, he can still go on tour with his brothers. He decides that getting away from Jersey will be the perfect cure.
He feels guilty. He hasn't even written a song for Macy, his girlfriend. He was sure she'd give him all the inspiration in the world, but the feelings he has for her only made him more confused. Maybe she was too good for him? A break from her would give him some material for a teenage angst song. But then he remembers that love can't take breaks, and he'd only miss her.
She tells him it doesn't matter that he hasn't written a swelling love song, because she only needs him.
/
Nick is having dreams that he can't understand. They are frantic and erratic, always splashed with red and orange tints, flames licking at the edges. He can hear a scream, and he can see a hand reaching out for him, but he can't quite get to it.
He puts the dreams down to his writers block and doesn't mention it when he wakes up.
/
When tour rehearsals begin, Macy turns up to every session. He loves her for doing that; she has better things to do like school work or her sports, but she sits with them, every 4 hour rehearsal, smiling. Joe and Kevin just aren't bothered by the music anymore, and Nick is annoyed. If they don't want to be in JONAS anymore, then why can't they just come out and say it?
"How are we gonna put on a show in a week?" Joe asks one rehearsal, carelessly twirling his microphone about. Stella and Macy perch on the edge of the stage, Stella hurriedly sewing Kevin's pants back together. Macy exchanges an anxious look with Nick.
"It's for the fans," Nick reasons.
Kevin just stares ahead. "But it's different."
"What, because Joe and Stella can't get their act together, and you're moping around all the time?" Nick flips, causing Kevin to recoil. "It's not like I've been having an easy time either! You all expect me to magically write thirteen songs for an album you guys don't even want to do, and I've got school work, and a life of my own. I'm not Superman, OK?"
Mr Lucas, who has been busy fumling about on his Blackberry, jumps on the stage towards his son. "Nick, calm down, OK, buddy?"
Nick pulls his guitar from his shoulder and hands it to his dad. "I'm out," He says coolly, stomping off the stage. He can hear the footsteps of Macy behind him, but he just wants to be alone.
/
He finally lets Macy in after ten minutes of her knocking on his dressing room door. He is embarrassed that she had to see his diva act, but he is fed up and tired and for some reason completely miserable.
But she doesn't say a word. She enfolds her arms around him and just lets him cry.
/
The first show manages to go OK. Nick forgets his lines to 'Give Love a Try', as he is too busy trying to swallow the lump developing in his throat. What is wrong with him? Must be his puberty throwing him completely out of whack.
As the boys sing their final number, 'Feelin' Alive', he glances at the sideline of the stage. There is Macy, throwing her arms in the air wildly, her eyes shining. He'd forgotten she was still their biggest fan, and for some reason he just wants to hold her in his arms forever.
/
One night, when they are playing cards in the tour bus, Stella breaks. Kevin has told her to go fish, and a gush of tears stream from her eyes, as if a dam has been opened.
"I can't do this anymore," She announces, throwing her cards down and pushing her chair away from the table.
"Stell-" Joe starts, placing an arm on his girlfriend. Stella pulls away, nearly losing her balance as the bus takes a sudden left. Macy reaches out to help steady her.
"How can you all just sit there and pretend like everything's OK? How could you just..forget everything?"
"We haven't forgotten everything, Stell. We just..we need to get on with our lives," Joe says gently.
"No, no, you need to get on with your life, not me," Stella says angrily. She spins on her heel, looking for somewhere to go. When you're stuck on a tour bus that's moving 60 miles an hour, there aren't many places to escape. Eventually, she makes her way through the chairs and pushes the door to the girls bedroom open. The boys wince when the door slams. Nick arches an eyebrow at Macy.
"I'll go talk to her," She says dejectedly, forcing herself from her seat.
"Thanks Mace," Nick smiles, earning odd looks from Joe and Kevin.
"What did you just say?" Kevin asks.
Nick leans back in her chair. "Um, I just thanked Mace for going to talk to Stella? See, this is what you get when you bring your girlfriend on tour, Joe. OK, well, this is what you get when you bring Stella on tour," He remarks with a smirk.
Silence descends on the bus. "Macy isn't here," Joe says quietly.
Nick frowns. "I know that, she's just gone to talk to Stell-"
"Nick," Kevin speaks with a hushed tone, "Macy's not here because.." Kevin clears his throat, "She's dead, Nick."
Nick's mouth gapes open in shock, "But...but she was here, with me...you saw her Joe, right?"
"I'm sorry," Joe whispers.
Kevin continues, "She's not here. She died in a fire two months ago, do you remember? She's just been at our house, and she came home to find that someone had set her house alight. She tried to get her parents out but..." He didn't need to finish. "I'm sorry Nick. I just...I didn't know you..."
The walls crumble from around Nick. He'd fallen in love with a ghost, with a figment of his imagination, and he was the happiest he'd ever been.
/
Nick still doesn't really know why he'd seen Macy. The psychiatrist his parents made him see told him that he was suffering with depression over losing Macy, the devastation in reality becoming too much to bear. So he chose to live in a world where he was able to spend time with the girl he'd finally found, when it was already too late.
He avoids his piano for months after the sessions with his psychiatrist. Music makes him happy, but he doesn't want to feel happy. Sitting by his piano only reminds him on the days he and Macy had sat together, humming out a tune to see if any words would match the notes. It hurts when he remembers that she wasn't even really there.
He doesn't want to talk about it anymore. Now all he wants to hear is the silence.
/
Slowly, things improve. Joe and Stella start dating again, and Nick's school work is back on track. Kevin takes up travelling around the world; every week the Lucas household would receive a postcard from a different country, letting them know that he was OK and that he hadn't eaten anything deadly yet.
Mrs Lucas flips through the photo albums one day, when she stumbles across a group shot. It is the five of them, laying across a wobbly stitched picnic blanket, tangled in each other. Macy is grinning her signature smile and Nick is looking at her, eyes thick and happy. She shows this to her younger son, and Nick wonders if maybe he'd been in love with her all along without even knowing. Mrs Lucas frames the photo and hangs it by the stairs, letting the world know that they were never going to forget about Macy Misa.
Nick looks at that picture before he sits on his piano and writes. Just seeing her face again gave him the inspiration he needed to reel off enough songs to fit an album, one that goes straight to number one, and he is forever grateful for that. He writes about heartbreak, and loneliness, and love, and how you really don't know what you've got until it's gone.
Everyday, the music spills from Nick's hands, as he finally remembers what he believes in. Because Macy will always be a part of him; her spirit mixed in his words and in his music. He takes her with him, wherever he goes.
/
you shattered my darkness
washed away my blindness
now i'm breathing in and breathing out
i'm alive again
There you have it! You can make up your own mind as to whether Macy was really there or Nick was just imagining her, if that makes sense. Thanks for reading!