Jade hated Beck. No, no that was wrong. She didn't hate Beck. She just didn't see him anymore; her Beck. There was an impostor lurking around these days. Or maybe her Beck was the impostor and this was the real Beck Oliver. All she knew was that the Beck in the picture, the one with the dark eyes that looked so lovingly at her, the one in her hands, was gone. Jade laid back on the bed, the soft sheets provided her no comfort. She reached towards her iPod dock and turned it up. She bought this song when they broke up. It didn't make her feel any better. Nothing did these days, except for Tori. Tori who had the same dark eyes, filled with the same dark love. She wasn't a carbon copy of Beck. Her eyes also held a inescapable pain that Jade knew she was causing. But she couldn't stop. Not yet. Not when he was gone, and she was never sure if he was even real. She closed her eyes and tried to forget.
Now and then I think of when we were together
Like when you said you felt so happy you could die
Told myself that you were right for me
But felt so lonely in your company
But that was love and it's an ache I still remember
Now and then didn't cover it. It was all she thought about sometimes. Those moments of joy they had. Sitting together. Laying in his bed, running her fingers though his hair while he slept. She remembered being content in those moment. She doesn't think there was a moment when they were happy. The best they had was content. It didn't matter. They were in love. It had seemed worth it, in those moments. Beck had told her that they fit like a glove. They didn't. Beck kept clipping her wings, and Jade wanted to fly. She wanted Beck to soar with her but, he was happy on the ground. So Jade convinced herself that she was happy there too. She pretended not to notice the way he would look at her sometimes, when she would say or do something that wasn't quite grounded. The way it seemed to hurt him, as if she was personally attacking him just because she wanted something more. She was an actress, but she was also a writer. She didn't want to be another pretty face, smiling too bright for the limelight. Beck had always been built for those moments. As chill as he seemed, he was really always meant for a crowd. He was built to be the center of everyone. Her own joy was found in the background, interviewing people whose names weren't wildly known, hiding in holes in the wall. Other people who got high by being in the background. He needed her to be in the light with him, he couldn't stand the way she hid, not when what he wanted so badly was to shine. The feeling of loss when she was with him was so great, so impossibly pressing, she wasn't sure she could stand it. So she didn't.
You can get addicted to a certain kind of sadness
Like resignation to the end, always the end
So when we found that we could not make sense
Well you said that we would still be friends
But I'll admit that I was glad it was over
Beck was the dark one in the relationship. Beck Oliver was very moody. When things didn't go his way, when he was no longer the center of the universe, he sulked. Jade didn't mind his moping to much. Only when it interfered with her own,when she knew something amazing was happening in her own world, but the light was too blinding for her to see it. That's when the fighting started. The screaming matches. When it got so bad, that it was easier not to talk. Beck came to her, that night. They talked. Jade was trying, she swore she was. Beck just patted her knee and said that she didn't want to have to try anymore. She was relieved more then anything. She was sick of trying. She was done being tethered to the ground. Beck had been her best friend. She just wanted her friend back.
But you didn't have to cut me off
Make out like it never happened and that we were nothing
And I don't even need your love
But you treat me like a stranger and that feels so rough
No you didn't have to stoop so low
Have your friends collect your records and then change your number
I guess that I don't need that though
Now you're just somebody that I used to know
She had been surprised when Beck treated her so coldly. Beck didn't seem to mind the soft confusion. He turned his back to her. He treated her as if they had never been, like her didn't even know her. She wanted to know what happened to her friend. She called him, leaving messages on a phone he wouldn't pick up for her. He didn't have a excuse. He knew her number by heart. He was just as hurt as she was. She gave up too easy. He loved her and he didn't understand how she didn't even try. She was a totally different person. She wasn't the girl who would put up with the crowd for him. She wasn't the girl that would give for him anymore. And if there as one thing Beck needed, it was to take. He didn't mean to hurt her. He wasn't trying to. But she wasn't who he needed her to be. She wanted so bad to sink into that underground world. The screen writers whose names he had never know, he had never tried to learn. The people who wrote the movies weren't stars, they weren't important. It was all about who was in them. She never got that. He turned the radio off, and put the picture back on the night stand. He closed his eyes and said his goodnight to his Jade.