Kendall finds him outside the ballroom, in a side hallway off the main entrance, slouched against one of the lounge sofas with a half-empty (half-full?) champagne flute, thin and delicate, perched between fingers of the same description. He's so still, so unobtrusive, it might look like he's merged with the cushions, but he smiles when their eyes meet because if anyone could find him, it would be Kendall.

"Hey you."

"Hey."

"What are you doing out here?"

Logan gestures vaguely toward the ballroom, the distant sounds of music, voices, and clinking crystal soft in his ears. "Noise."

Kendall nods. Logan is grateful that he understands, even if it makes little sense even to himself, how he can play night after night in the midst of pounding amps and thousands of screaming kids, but an overly animated wedding reception sends him off into the wings with a creased forehead and tense shoulders.

"You want to be alone?"

Logan shakes his head, patting a square of sofa beside him, and Kendall accepts.

"Can't believe Gustavo got married," Kendall muses.

"Yeah. I thought he was gay for like two years."

Kendall chuckles. "I know, right?"

"Speaking of gay, where is your boyfriend?" he prods with a grin, poking Kendall's leg.

"Uh." Kendall smiles down at his clasped hands before looking up at Logan. "Dancing with your girlfriend."

Logan grins. "We should've seen it coming."

"Yeah. Actually, he, uh." Kendall wrinkles his nose, scratches nervously at the back of his neck. "He said if I don't ask you to dance, he and Camille are gonna run off together."

"I see," Logan nods thoughtfully, if a little lazily from the champagne buzz. "Well, I guess you'd better ask me, then."

"Are you serious? I actually have to ask?"

"Hey, Guitar Dude set the rules, not me."

"You're an asshole." Kendall grins, pinching what little flesh there is at Logan's hip.

"Yeah. Dance with me."

Logan drags himself off the couch, slipping his hand into Kendall's so he pulls them both to their feet, instantly curling his hand around Kendall's waist.

"Hey, who says you get to lead?" Kendall smirks.

"Because I'm older, and you're gay, now shut up."

"I hate you."

"You're a very impolite dance partner. Behave."

"Yes, sir," Kendall whispers, trying to bite back his grin as he leans in, the side of his face just barely touching Logan's.

Logan's relieved, because he doesn't think he could spend a whole song staring into Kendall's eyes. They'd either start laughing, or Kendall would start making weird faces or wouldn't stop talking, or Logan would end up staring at Kendall's mouth.

His heart skips a beat at that last thought, specifically at the fact that he just

thought it.

Fuck alcohol, and all the fucking honesty that breaks out with it.

"How have we known each other all our lives and I've never conned you into a dance until now?" Kendall whispers suddenly, each breathy syllable tickling Logan's ear as their bodies sway slowly together, lightly in contact, but holding back the slightest bit, if they'd be willing to admit it.

Because I know what it means to you, Logan doesn't say.

And I'm afraid of what it means to me, he definitely,

definitely doesn't think.

"Because I hate slow dancing," Logan says, and at least it's not a lie. "This is the most depressing song in the world. Why do they always have to play it at weddings?"

"'Unchained Melody'? It's beautiful, you dickhead."

"Whatever, dude, didn't you ever see Ghost? He fucking dies, man."

Logan feels Kendall turn into his neck, just enough for Logan to feel his smile. "But it's not about death, Logie. It's about love."

"That is like, right out of Moulin Rouge."

Kendall snorts. "You would know."

"Shut up, it's a good movie."

"Yeah, if you're a thirteen-year-old girl."

"You talk too much."

"You step on my feet too much."

Logan almost wishes they were face to face now, just to see the smile he knows Kendall is sporting, same as the smile stretched across Logan's own lips. They're silent, then, once they discover how sweet this silence is, letting Logan focus on the small, liquid movements of their bodies together, the smell of Kendall's cologne, the solid warmth of his hands, his breath. They never do this, but it's like they've done it for years. A lifetime, even. After a minute Kendall starts humming along to the song, quiet and soft in Logan's ear, only evolving to a spoken whisper of one lyric as the song reaches its climax.

"And time can do so much... are you still mine?"

Logan can practically feel his insides freeze solid while his body temperature steadily rises, and maybe it's just the alcohol, only it's not, he knows it's not, and when he pulls away enough to see Kendall's face, he can tell Kendall knows, too.

Years of unspoken words are reflected in Kendall's eyes, dark and scared, all jokes over and bets off, and Logan catches himself in the urge to just lean forward, search out and swallow all those words Kendall's never said, take away that burden Kendall's been carrying as long as he can remember, just take it and wash it away and say for once exactly what he wants to say, and he's not even entirely sure what that is, but in his head it sounds something like,

I've always been yours.

His body is a split second past making the decision, he's already learning in and it's slow motion, it's like falling, it's like he's thirteen and it's all the clichés, and when they're close enough for him to smell the chocolate icing lingering on Kendall's lips, his eyes actually flutter shut. The point of no return.

"Mind if I cut in?"

They jerk apart at Guitar Dude's voice, and it's the one tiny pebble rippling the pond, just like that the moment's over, the stillness, the sanctity. The chance. The chance they know, they know they couldn't have taken.

They waited too long.

Guitar Dude's smile is light, easy, amused, but Logan's not blind and there's a flash of darkness behind it; fear. A fear Logan recognizes all too well: the fear of loss.

"He's all yours," Logan smiles, releasing Kendall and making sure to keep his eyes from Kendall's face.

But Kendall's not as young as Logan remembers, nor so helpless, and he falls instantly into place, smiling as he drops Logan's hand. "Yeah, he keeps stepping on my feet anyway."

Guitar Dude chuckles, leading Kendall back down the hall, but before they disappear altogether, Kendall turns his head, barely a movement at all and easily missed, but Logan doesn't miss it. Kendall's eyes lock with his for the smallest instant, but it's more than enough. It says everything. It says,

I won't forget.

And for a moment, Logan wants to hate him, wants to scream back,

We have to.

But he doesn't - and they don't.

Everyone looks weirdly tall from where Logan's lying. Weirdly tall and... really a lot more naked than he's used to, even living with them for the better part of the last three years. Tall and almost-naked-but-for-underwear, with three matching expressions wavering somewhere between shocked, disbelieving, and ecstatic. And maybe a little more than half-dead.

And James's hair is really, really tremendously spastic, in a Kendall way. Logan thinks it's kind of precious, but is scared at the same time.

That's about as deep as his thoughts go at the moment, because right now his head kind of feels like he's been playing a sixteen-hour set with no earplugs.

And they're all fucking staring at him, and Logan hates when they do that. It means he's done something wrong and they're afraid to tell him.

"Um." He tries to swallow, but his throat is drier than he'd realized - than he'd ever thought was humanly possible, to be honest. "What - "

Then Carlos squeaks - squeaks, practically teleporting himself to Logan's side, close as if it's killing him to be anywhere else; warm and sweeping as he scoops Logan into his arms. And maybe Logan can't feel most of his muscles very well right now, and maybe it's been awhile since Carlos's hugged him like this, full and unabashed, but he's pretty sure there's something set in Carlos's body, a taut, scared sort of reservation that Logan can't recognize, can't place or pinpoint.

That's the first thing that scares him, because there hasn't been anything unrecognizable about Carlos in fifteen years.

Then there's air, salty and humid and teetering on that dusky brink between warm and cool; he can smell it on Carlos's skin, his chest, heated and soft beneath Logan's cheek, and then James, James's here, there, somewhere, everywhere, pressed awkwardly against Logan's back, embracing him from behind and Logan can feel the shudder that tells him James's crying.

That's the second thing that scares him: James doesn't cry.

He wants to tell him don't cry, wants to say I'm okay, I'm okay, but something tells him the tears may not just be for him - like maybe he doesn't have the right to ask James to stop just for Logan's sake.

The salty wet air is stronger now as it's etched into the skin enveloping him on both sides, and his head is still pounding and there's so much skin, and they don't dothis, not like this - granted they're tactile as a group, always have been (and Kendall, where's Kendall?) but this is different, and it's been awhile.

(Carlos emerging from the hotel shower with a towel around his waist, and Logan still trembling from the phone call, not having had the chance to get properly dressed himself, just hearing the far-off words from the other line bouncing off the walls in his head until his vision starts to go splotchy, Sorry to inform you... passed away last night in his sleep... wasn't in any pain... And Carlos somehow just knowing, barely having to utter the questioning "Logan...?" before Logan flings himself into Carlos, who's still wet and over-warm from water and steam, and Carlos holds him tight like he's trying to pull Logan inside him to keep him safe, and there's no one to narrow their eyes or quirk an eyebrow at them and it feels just as natural as it did when they were ten in their swim trunks and Carlos would give him piggy-back rides through the sprinklers in the backyard and then wrestle him into the mud, and his mom would show up with lemonade and watermelon slices and wide smiles and never complained about the mud stains on her towels.)

And. Yeah. It's been awhile.

It would feel right somehow, Logan thinks, if it weren't for that salty, wet air that's just getting saltier and wetter by the moment, and that really feels like nothing he remembers. Nothing that's supposed to be, right now. Logan gets flustered when things aren't as they're supposed to be, and he's pretty sure right now they're supposed to be on a plane, and -
And he's equally pretty sure that they're not.

"Logie."

It comes out sounding more as a broken, choked squeak than Carlos's name, and Logan's thoughts compress into one:water.

"Get him some water," he hears James say softly behind him, and Logan thinks I love you, James Diamond; would rather be able to say it, but he settles for reaching behind him and squeezing James's hand. His fingers are stiff, weak, but James squeezes back as Carlos reaches behind the blanket for a bottle.

Carlos's still supporting him on one side, James on the other; hard, unfamiliar lines set into their faces. Logan's halfway through the bottle when he chokes, sputtering and lowering the bottle from his mouth as his eyes fixate on Carlos's face, one side illumined in the moonlight.

"Litos, you're hurt - you've got - "

He reaches out involuntarily, but Carlos gently lowers his hand. "I'm okay."

"No, your face! It's - "

"I know, man. It's cool, I'm okay. It's okay."

"What the fuck happened? Why - where - "

And the questions are coming faster than he can think them now, faster than he can even formulate possible answers in his own head, and it's not until his fingers tighten anxiously on the bottle, feeling the rough, itchy granules of sand pressing into his fingers, that the rest of his senses finally kick in, letting in the sound of waves, light and steady against the shore, invisible now in the darkness but for the occasional undulation of white crests in the distance, spotlighted by the moon.

He turns back to Carlos, who's now staring at James, like he doesn't know the answer himself, but Logan's not stupid. When he turns to James, James has got the same expression, turning it right back on Carlos, but Logan at least thinks that's fair. Logan is Carlos's. Logan's always been his, since they were seven. Maybe even before. It's Carlos's job, now.
A sharp pain shoots through Logan's head, dropping his vision momentarily to black, and in that instant, a face flashes before him, frozen and pale, and words in a nameless voice sound through his mind, Logan... Logan... take my place, don't move.

When the moment lifts, Carlos is watching him, worried and freaked and scared and Carlos's never any of those things, and to see them in tandem written across his face is something a bit horrifying.

"Litos."

"May-maybe you should lie back down."

"Litos."

Carlos surrenders, embarrassment clear in his eyes at his own insulting attempt to patronize. "We. Uh." He looks down at his hand, still joined with Logan's on the scratchy blanket that's half damp from their clothes. "The plane, we. Uh."

"We crashed," Logan finishes.

Logan's never been one for bullshit or nonsense. Much better to face these things with a sense of... and so on.

It seems to affect Carlos more than Logan, his hand beginning to tremble under Logan's even while his other arm is firm around Logan's shoulders, holding him up. "Yeah. We did."

Right. Okay. Yeah.

"Into the water." It's not a question, not really.

Carlos nods. "Close to shore though. It's..." He gestures vaguely into the blackness behind them.

Okay. The water. It's better than land. It's softer. It's safer.

Logan starts a mental head count: Carlos. James. He doesn't have to look far to find Kendall, and oh god. Kendall. He looks smaller than Logan's ever seen him (might have something to do with how quiet and still he is; Kendall always seems biggest to Logan when he's on stage, jumping all over to entertain the fans), standing glued to the spot a few feet away, eyes on Logan and mouth half-open, still processing.

"Kendall."

Logan doesn't know quite what he wants the word to convey, but his free hand creeps a few inches across the blanket toward Kendall, and Kendall watches it like it's got answers. He inches forward, matching the hand's movement. He looks cautious. He looks like he has secrets. He looks like he doesn't want to say anything, and that terrifiesLogan, because it's Kendall.

"Kendall, come here."

It's whisper-soft, a request, not a demand, but Kendall follows it like an order. His eyes drop steadily with the rest of him as he crouches down on his knees beside the others, tentatively reaching out and closing his fingers over Logan's splayed hand.

Suddenly Logan wants to hear this from Kendall, if only to get Kendall to speak.

"Ken."

There's a second of hesitation, that sort of time-stopping silence, when Logan remembers the head count, and he's about to start running through the rest of it in his mind when Kendall fucking breaks.

There's no other word for it, really; he just falls forward into Logan, knocking them both to the ground as he clings, his body convulsing in sobs too all-consuming to make any sound. Logan closes his eyes but doesn't know why; he can hear Carlos, "Ken, be careful - " and James, "He might be - "

But Logan isn't. Logan's fine, except for the fact that the plane clearly crashed on his fucking head, if the pounding is any indication.

"I'm okay," he assures them, still working to find his voice as he pulls Kendall closer, stroking his hair, his back, anything he can get his hands on. "Ken. Hey. Ken. I'm okay. Hey, I'm here. Baby, I'm here."

And so, okay, that's maybe the first time he's ever called Kendall baby, and clearly he's suffering from fucking brain damage now, because, seriously, Mitchell.

It scares him more, because if he'd slipped like that any other time, Kendall would have gawked at him with theatrically wide eyes, jaw dropped and grin wide; might've even grabbed Logan and planted one on him for the hell of it (and for other reasons, so many others). But Kendall doesn't even react, just buries himself into Logan, and it's unnerving because he's not making any noise but Logan can feel the tears spilling into his neck, a steady stream, and Kendall's trembling like he's going to explode.

Logan's eyes open then, because there are too many horrible images flying before him when they're closed. He looks at James first, and James looks like how Logan imagines Kendall would look if he were strong enough to hold it together.
And. And it's, it's fucking James, and just, what.

He looks to Carlos then, and Carlos's still got that worried-freaked-scared thing going on, and Logan is a bit terrified of letting that go any further.

"Where's Freight Train?" he asks, trying to keep his voice light, as though that could alter whatever reality might contradict his hope, because seriously, Freight Train will take care of them, and he'll know things, Freight Train always knows things, everything, like precisely where they are and how long it's going to take the rescue plane to get to them and where the nearest hospital will be once they land, and how funny Gustavo's freak-out voice sounded on the phone when he heard the news.
The expression fades from Carlos's face, and it's almost a relief, until it's replaced with a complete fucking blankness, a kind of surrender almost, like Carlos's done trying to protect Logan from any of this.

Slowly, so slow Logan's wondering if he's starting to black out again, Carlos shakes his head to one side, then the other, and returns to frozen.

And. Okay.

Poise and rationality and.

And.

And holy - fucking - no, no, no.

Logan can't tell if he's started shaking himself, because Kendall's still trembling against him.

And then the questions all just pour, like if they just keep asking themselves in his head, the answers won't get a chance to get through.

He turns back to James, fighting all the thousands of words in his head (and Logan's not used to fightingwords, it's the one thing he's never had to fight), but before he can ask, Carlos adds hastily, "It's - Logan."

And it's Carlos, and Logan knows what the words are going to be before they're out, and he doesn't want them out because then they'll be real and Logan is really fucking starting to hate reality, not just current, but as a fucking concept, because anything that could create this, this(no names, no labels, nothing that'll make it more real), just can't fucking be.

Carlos's voice, eyes, head, all drop. "It's. It's just us, Logan."

The words hit harder, for some reason, simply because they'd been anticipated.

His first thought is they haven't been away from home without Freight Train in over three years, and it makes his eyes prickle and his heart sink a few miles down.

His second thought is, for the last time, head count.

"Jett. Guitar Dude."

He doesn't ask, because he isn't even sure what he's asking or if he wants the answer.

Kendall's breath hitches at Guitar Dude's name, but Logan can tell himself he imagined it.

He could almost tell himself he's imagining just about everything right now.

Almost.

But with the look on Carlos's face... maybe not.

He turns to James, like he hopes to find a different expression, a better one, but James is staring at the ground, all life, all energy having been drowned, suffocated from him, leaving his face pale, too pale; an empty hospital-white that's not at all from the moonlight.

The saddest Logan's ever seen James was at the Palm Woods, the first and only time Logan ever yelled at him, and it made Logan's chest hurt for ten whole seconds until he was sputtering breathless apologies and blinking back tears and James had still hugged him afterwards, dropping a whispered, "Still love you, man" into his ear and it was over just like that.

Logan has a feeling this, this(no names, no names), isn't going to be over any time soon, with hugs or whispers or even a nuclear meltdown.

Still fuzzy from waking, his head still feeling like Carlos had been pounding on it with drumsticks for the better part of a week, it takes him a second to connect James with Logan's words and Carlos's face and - oh.

Oh.

"Oh god," Logan croaks, but it doesn't sound like words when it comes out, which doesn't surprise him because he's honestly more surprised he's got a voice left at all, that he's got thoughts left, that his heart hasn't just pounded everything coherent right out of his head. "James. James."

James is reactionless, but when Logan reaches one hand away from Kendall to close around James's, James allows it, squeezing back with twice the conviction but still somehow holding back, like he's too scared to hold onto anything too tight, put too much faith in anything solid, lest it slip away from him again, just like -

And - then. Then.

It's then his mind finally recovers, shifts. Centers.

Kendall.

And now he knows he's himself again, that this is real and his mind's intact, because Kendall is solidly here, infiltrating his thoughts as overwhelmingly as ever, and the chaos begins to make sense - sick, twisted sense.

His vision blacks again, for an instant, the pattern already falling into dreaded familiarity, and the same face flashes behind his eyes, variations of the same words, and he knows.

How they're here, how he's here, here with eyes open and heart beating instead of being one more name crossed off the head count.

He knows.

What's worse, and better all at once, something tells him he's the only one who does.

And now Kendall's -

Oh god.

Oh fucking god.

"Ken."

But Carlos's there, never missing a beat, fingers tightening slightly around Logan's hand, and when Logan looks at him, Carlos shakes his head, slow but tense, unequivocal. Logan wishes it were unreadable but it's Carlos.

It says, don't.

So Logan doesn't. He fights it. He fights the words that finally, finally want to tumble out, the stupid endearments they haven't used in years (Ken, Kenny Bear, I've got you, I've got you), not since Logan had begun to realize they meant something to Kendall that they absolutelycould notmean.

It didn't matter, eventually. Because, Guitar Dude. Guitar Dude could say them, and they could mean everything Kendall needed them to mean.

Except that Guitar Dude's not -

He's not here - not gone, Logan won't say gone, just not here.

(They weren't official yet, but Logan had known. Kendall had started calling Guitar Dude "Padfoot," some Harry Potter reference, god only knows, no doubt James had a hand in it, but Kendall told Guitar Dude he needed a nickname for him too. "You're Kenny Bear, aren't you?" he'd offered, pinching Kendall's leg, and before Kendall could respond, Logan had voiced a soft, but insistent, "No," from behind his magazine on the other side of the lounge. He could feel both sets of eyes on him, and tried to school his expression into something casual, light, even smiling, before he looked up. "That's mine," he'd gently informed Guitar Dude, unable to meet Kendall's eyes when he realized how close he'd been to saying he's instead of that's. Guitar Dude had smiled down at his hands, clearly knowing more than Logan thought he should. "True, I'm afraid," Kendall had chirped, faking a dramatic sigh, and Logan admired his diplomacy, because they both knew Logan allowed Carlos and James to use the name too, but this was different. They were lost to him, all the words that should've struck Logan, the fucking writer, but all he could manage was, different. And Kendall knew, and that somehow made it even harder for Logan, though he'd never let himself come to solidify what "it" precisely was.

When Logan had finally thought it safe to look, Guitar Dude had turned back to his guitar and Kendall was watching Logan with the smallest but brightest smile Logan had seen in months.)

Logan fights it, but he feels like he's already lost - having to watch this, having to feel this, Kendall falling apart in his arms and James's hand still clenched tightly in his and Carlos, Carlos, just trying to hold everyone together and somehow not lose himself along the way.

When Kendall's sobs trickle down to weak, sporadic convulsions, the stream of tears dwindling to an occasional drop, Carlos finally lies down on Logan's other side, and Logan realizes for the first time that Carlos hasn't broken contact with him since the moment his eyes opened, and Logan wants to acknowledge him - wants to say something, I love you or even just his name, but he's afraid if he opens his mouth, the wrong words will spill out or tears will follow.

He settles for turning his head until his forehead brushes Carlos's, and he leaves it there until Carlos kisses his cheek, aiming blindly and landing somewhere by his ear, his breath a hot, solid comfort despite its intrinsic lack of solidity.

When he turns back to Kendall, James is curled up on Kendall's other side, spooning him, head nestled in the warm, perfect curve of Kendall's neck, his arm curled around Kendall's waist, their fingers laced tight. Logan cups one hand over their joined fingers and Carlos nestles against his other side, and Logan is momentarily shut downby how completely right this feels (how anything could feel this right, now), the four of them holding each other up, holding each other down, just fucking holding. None of them alone is the glue that keeps them together, but rather each an integral ingredient in the glue: individually, they're just entities, useless; together, they're solid. Adhered.
Together, they're fucking magic.

Logan holds his breath until his ears identify three separate breathing patterns, before letting his eyes fall shut.
It's not until they close that a splash of tears trails a jagged path down his cheek, landing in Kendall's hair.
He doesn't remember falling asleep, but he dreams of three months ago, Guitar Dude's birthday, when Kendall asked with no explanation if they could cover Elton John's "Your Song" the following Thursday, and then proceeded to dedicate it, in front of an audience five thousand strong, to "someone special". Guitar Dude had had no idea, just stood sidestage, lowering his phone when the song had started, his mouth dropping half open and his eyes glistening visibly even from the stage, glued to Kendall with his guitar the entire time, his camera phone, limp in his hands.

Logan never even remembered singing, can't recall formulating words at all. He vaguely remembers the speed of his heartbeat, the stiffness in his fingers, and a mischievous grin from Carlos (Logan had maybe possibly serenaded him with that song once when he was sixteen and drunk for the first time - a grand, uncharacteristically theatrical performance that had concluded with him straddling Carlos on the couch and using the TV remote as a mic. They'd laughed so hard afterwards Logan had collapsed in his lap, nuzzling against Carlos's hip until sleep claimed him, and Logan never thought to ask why Carlos allowed it.)

But what he remembers most is the look in Guitar Dude's eyes (the same look Kendall had set on Logan for years, forever), the way Kendall kept sneaking looks and secret smiles in Guitar Dude's direction, and the way he sang it with a kind of gorgeous abandon Logan hadn't seen in some time. Kendall met Logan's eyes once, but he looked terrified when it happened, like he was going to lose his place or forget the words, and he looked away just as fast.

That. That was the reality.

The dream is better, and worse.

In his dream, Kendall walks across the stage at the end to where Logan has safely planted himself, far away. Their instruments have somehow vanished, as have the audience, Guitar Dude, even the stage. There are smiles - James's, Carlos's, warm and blinding and beautiful - but what he sees most clearly is Kendall, walking toward him and never stopping until their mouths are locked, with Kendall's hands fisted in Logan's hair and Logan's hands on Kendall's hips like they've been there forever, like they were born to fit against the curves. But the instant their tongues touch, they're ripped apart, being pulled further and further away until all Logan can see is darkness, all he can feel are hands, and all he can hear is the roar of the airplane as it drops, and the voice, the same voice, beckoning him into safety.

He wakes up in darkness, blanketed by his sleeping bandmates, the sounds of insects and ocean soft in his ears and nothing like the roar of the plane, their songs offering a comfort he's not ready to accept.

There are tears on his face and for a tiny, glorious instant, he can't remember why.

When Carlos wakes up, he knows immediately where he is - and it's the first chance has to be truly afraid.

With the heaviest weights of their chaos lifted, he can finally settle, breathe, think, and he's starting to miss being too shellshocked to do any of those things, because they'd kept him moving, kept him working. Kept him hoping. Kept him thinking if he just went on moving and working, he wasn't giving in, he wasn't surrendering to the reality.

But just... stopping like this - sleeping and waking up and knowing where he is and just taking it - it makes him sick. Irrationally, it makes him feel like he's given up; like he's failed.

But the rest of his senses kick in soon enough, the still-sleeping warmth radiating off Logan's skin beneath Carlos's arm, his closeness, his aliveness - and he knows: As long as he has this, Logan, all of them - he hasn't failed.

Maybe even, as long as he's got all of them - he can't fail.

He spends a good thirty seconds working carefully to disentangle himself from Logan without waking him up, and he's practically breathless by the time he accomplishes it, pushing himself up on the blanket and wincing at the stiffness that doesn't seem to have missed a single muscle in his body. He can see Logan properly now, still fitted snug against Kendall, their legs draped over one another and their arms folded up against their chests, hands joined, with Kendall's head tucked under Logan's chin. It's strange seeing them like this, in a million ways. Logan's never been one for cuddling with Kendall (alone with Carlos or James is another story, one that Carlos knows better than to question), and the only thing separating their bodies is their underwear, Logan's charcoal gray boxer briefs and Kendall's fire engine-red American Apparels. The part of Carlos that still remembers who he was two days ago wishes everything were different so he could take a picture of them, leave it for Logan to find, watch him go crimson and bitchy and mortified so Carlos could laugh at him, and James would pretend not to take sides, but Carlos would catch him grinning when Logan looks away.

He almost feels guilty watching them, like he's intruding on something intimate, not meant for him to see.

He doesn't watch long, once his eyes catch sight of James, seated on a corner of the blanket with his back slouched against the base of the nearest palm tree. His eyes are unfocused, just pointed out into the ocean, not watching anything in particular as he traces aimless patterns in the sand with one finger.

When Carlos crosses over to him, crouches down and sits back on his heels, James looks up, a brief acknowledgment before averting his eyes to the ground, watching his fingers sift through the same sand over and over, like he's ever going to uncover something new.

"What time is it?" Carlos whispers.

James shrugs. "I dunno, afternoon I think."

"Shit."

"You sleep okay?"

"Yeah, you?"

James nods.

"You been up long?" Carlos asks.

"An hour, I guess. I was gonna go out, but. Y'know. Didn't want you to worry." He says it a little awkwardly, like he thinks it presumptuous to assume Carlos would worry about him, and it still amazes Carlos, how after all this time, James still has those rare moments when he doubts how much he is loved - and seriously, there couldn't be anything more fucking ridiculous.

"You should've woken me up." It sounds harsher than Carlos intended, but shit, they've lost half the day.

James shrugs again. "You looked so peaceful... all of you. Perfect." His voice drops, and, "I didn't want - I just. Wanted it to stay. I don't know."

But Carlos knows. James's mind works through images, photographs, moments that he can freeze and hold onto, or at least try. Looking back over at Kendall and Logan now... he gets it. Right now they are perfect. It's the only perfection in any of this, the only thing that isn't chaos.

"It's okay." Carlos reaches down, closes his fingers around James's in the sand, feeling the grains shift and grind between their skin. "You want to go look for water?"

James nods. "'M gonna make one more trip out first. I think I saw another suitcase yesterday."

"Okay."

James picks up one of the snack bags lying on the ground, ripping it open with his teeth and scarfing down two tightly packed miniature doughnuts before offering the last four to Carlos.

"Eat," James orders before Carlos can decline.

Carlos does, slowly and silently, trying not to think of how many snacks they've got left, or of the time he and Stephanie went to the beach and he'd tried to climb a palm tree to fetch a coconut and only succeeded in scraping up his entire front half so bad he'd looked kind of like a burn victim for days.

Even without looking directly into James's eyes (he would, if James would let him, he would), Carlos can tell there's something missing. The life, the vibrance and shine that he'd assumed was just part of the James Diamond magic, an intrinsic constant - has seeped out, replaced by nothing, diminishing the once sparkling hazel to dull, lifeless brown.
Carlos wants to say a thousand words, if only he could figure out what they are.

He wants to say, maybe, I'm here, but he knows that's not enough. James doesn't care that he's there. Carlos is just Carlos. He's not snarky smirks and overcompensation, gelled blond hair on top of a perfect face, saying things only James would understand. He's not enough. He's not Jett.

Carlos wonders dangerously if James would disappear inside himself this way if Carlos had been the one who'd gone.
A thousand words, and none of them right. None of them enough.

He wants to say, Let me take care of you, the way James has been taking care of him, all of them, since they moved to California to follow his dream, his way of saying thank you. Probably even before, after a night of over-indulgence in high school, when he'd show up at Carlos's house carrying Kendall, a pack of Sour Patch Kids, and a box of Raisinets, Carlos and Logan's favorites respectively, because somehow James knew.

Somehow, James always knows.

Carlos gives up on words, they're Logan's territory after all, and settles for a soft, "James," a hand on his knee.

It's the wrong word, apparently, because James is easing himself to his feet, heading out to the water without any indication for Carlos to follow him.

Carlos does though, splashing more than necessary to make sure James knows he's there, to give James a chance to send him away if he doesn't want him there.

James doesn't send him away, but he doesn't acknowledge him either, and Carlos thinks that kind of feels worse.

He's seen the wreckage a dozen times, more probably; it's easier now, and Carlos hates that. It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be easier to know exactly where the bodies are and how to avoid them. He doesn't want to know what sections he has to be careful of because parts of the plane are jutting out like blades. He doesn't want to feel the broken seats under pools of idle water, knowing who took their last breaths where.

It all looks just as he remembers, and he doesn't fucking want to remember this.

He watches as James works like it's nothing, stumbling over piles of unnamed items, useless bits of plane, pushing his way through all the hanging yellow oxygen masks that had dropped uselessly during the fall.

"There was some stuff floating over by the right side emergency exit - or what's left of it," James says without turning around, and Carlos takes it as instruction. At least it gives him something to do, makes him useful. Valuable, maybe.
What's left of the emergency exit is a shapeless hole in the side of what's left of the plane - really, everything here is defined in terms of what's left of, because nothing is whole anymore.

Metaphors start converging in Carlos's head, and he's definitely spent too many years with Logan.

He spends awhile half underwater, trying to reach (what's left of) the floor of the plane, all the things he can feel with his feet but is afraid to step on, lest he break anything waterproof and valuable. A small slip and something starts to crunch under his foot before he catches himself, but it's not quick enough to keep the sharp edge of the object from jabbing his heel.

"Shit, fuck, what the fuck."

He stumbles backward a bit but James is abandoning a newly retrieved (albeit badly beaten) suitcase and racing to his side, as fast as possible through the uneven water and stray items.

"You okay?" James asks, suddenly alert. "What happened?"

"Just stepped on something sharp. I'm good, it's not bleeding or anything."

But James is already reaching down, the water level at the very top of his shoulder as he fumbles around for the culprit, and Carlos winces a bit at the sharp cut that reaches from James's shoulder down his chest, and the way it's forced to stretch as he reaches. His arm stills suddenly and something flashes across his face, and when he begins to pull out of the water, it's slow, dreading, as though he doesn't want to see what's in his hand.

It's waterlogged, useless with a cracked screen and bits broken off, scratched to hell and back - but it's unmistakable.

James stares at Jett's phone like a death sentence, his jaw slack and eyes brimming with a shine that has nothing to do with vibrance or magic.

"Fuck," Carlos hisses, but James is a statue, still as stone and just as wordless.

In the silence but for the water lapping gently at their legs, Carlos can hear James's breath start to quicken, shorten, and he doesn't fucking know what to do anymore because James's shut himself off so hard.

"James... James, please."

He doesn't even know what he's pleading for until he steps forward, carefully circling his arms around James, pulling himself toward James instead of trying to pull James to him - and then, he knows. He knows what he's been after all along, when James finally breaks in his arms, choked sobs rattling his frame as he lets Carlos hold him up, hold him impossibly close, and finally, finally, he responds in kind, his arms clinging so tight that Carlos doesn't know how he's managing to breathe, but as long as James's in his arms, letting him do this, oxygen can fucking wait.

He knows well enough to keep quiet until James's breaths are steady again, but James never lets go.

"Hey," Carlos whispers into his hair, "do you want to bring it back? To camp? We'll keep it safe, and we'll take it home with us, yeah?"

For a second James simply freezes, and Carlos is terrified he's said completely the wrong thing, again - but James finally nods, quick and jerky against Carlos's shoulder.

"Okay," Carlos breathes, and the relief in the syllable is clear, but he knows he's speaking now mostly for himself. "Okay."

"Litos."

"Yeah."

James holds his breath like he's going to say something, but he doesn't. He lets it out after a few seconds, and holds onto Carlos a little tighter.

"Don't go anywhere," James says against his skin.

"I'm not, man. "

"I can't do this without you."

"You don't - "

"I can't, Litos."

"Look at me."

Carlos is a little nervous, knowing it's all thin ice right now, trying to give James orders, but James obliges, gazing up at him, scared and jittery.

"You won't have to," Carlos says. "I'm here."

James stares at him a long time, almost like he's waiting for the life to drift back into his eyes, as if for some reason Carlos would be the one to bring it back. And just like that, two years have dropped off, and Carlos is zooming back to then, that one second when he knew, knew that if he had to live a single day the rest of his life without James Diamond in it, the world would shine a little less.

"One more time?"

"Yeah."

"Okay." Carlos adjusts his position on the dressing room floor, trying to keep his knees out of the way as he scoots closer to James, one finger pointed to the setlist in front of them. They had quickly gotten used to their positions without James in the group, when he had decided to become a solo artist. Carlos indicates two places on the crappy pencil drawing of the stage where Kendall has written the letter "J" surrounded by hearts.

He stops only from the feeling of being watched, and it's not an irrational assumption, when he looks up to find James looking at him, not the paper, with bright, beaming eyes and a smile to match.

"What?"

James shrugs, still smiling. "I couldn't do this without you."

Carlos smiles back. "You won't have to."
James glances down at the page, pretending to study the list of tracks. "I hear you're the one who convinced them you weren't Big Time Rush without me."

"Dude, we all wanted you back."

James looks up again, and something in Carlos's stomach does a little flip-flop to find that James's smile is intact, brighter than ever. "But you were the mastermind behind it."

Carlos shrugs as casually as he can physically manage, hoping it negates the blush he feels rising in his cheeks. "Maybe."

"Why - I just. I mean, we're in L.A., even Gustavo could've done it. Or y'know, anyone else who tried out and didn't abandon his friends. Why me?"

Carlos rolls his eyes, because, seriously. "Because you're James Diamond," he states, as if this explains everything.

But really, it kind of does.

It didn't take him long after to realize he would've paid any price in the world to make James come back.

What he never realized was, James had never left.

"We can do this," Carlos insists, shivering as a few drops of water spill from his hair down his face. "We can, I promise."

James nods, and it's probably Carlos's imagination, but James's eyes don't look quite as empty.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Carlos urges, tugging on James's wrist.

It's not the easiest task in the world, lugging the suitcase and the rest of their collection through the maze of wreckage and back through the water, but it's good; it gives them something to do, and they don't have to speak through it, no more fears of wrong words or tense silence.

Once they hit the beach, the items are dropped, arranged, jammed firmly into the sand lest they roll or blow away, and Carlos is even poised to zip open the suitcase when it hits, his eyes moving slowly toward their camp, toward the makeshift roof (which, secretly, Carlos is really quite proud of), toward the mess of blankets that's become their bed, the massive shade leaves and bottles of water and plastic snack packs, toward -

"...James."

Toward Kendall and Logan, who aren't there at all.