Chapter Four

"It was amazing," Bianca told Jane the next day, reliving every moment in great, graphic detail – far more detail than Jane needed or wanted. "The look on her face!" She took a drag of her cigarette, and Jane wondered who, in this day and age, took up smoking – especially someone who knew better than most how unhealthy it was. "Way out of her league, that girl."

Jane turned her head away so Bianca couldn't see the look of disgust on her face. The girl was taking far too much pleasure in Gabrielle's heartbreak that any decent human being ought to. She got that Bianca had a skewered view on fidelity because of her parent's unhappy marriage, but still, did that give her the right to take such pleasure out of someone else's misery over being cheated on? After all, Jack was the product of a pretty miserable marriage, too, and he didn't see it as his right to go around breaking up relationships? "And you think he'll be interested in you?" she asked. "Now that you've broken them up?" Not that either of them knew for certain that Jack and Gabrielle had broken up, but something told Jane that that was the reality. Girls like Gabrielle didn't stand for infidelity.

"Of course he will. Sexually, intellectually – we're a perfect match."

That might have been so, Jane though, but emotionally, Jack was a far better person than Bianca – and he had to know it. He might have slept with Bianca, but it had been an indiscretion committed when he had been drunk – whereas Bianca had planned it for weeks. Jane felt sick to think that she had gone along with Bianca's plans. Jack hadn't deserved it, and Gabrielle certainly hadn't. "I think you underestimate how he feels about her," Jane said. "He didn't like you much to begin with. But from now on, he's going to see you as the one who broke them up."

Bianca looked at Jane with irritation, then blew a smoke ring in her face, knowing how much she disliked the smell. "If you can't say something supportive then don't say anything at all."

"I don't know what you did or said, but she's gone," Gabrielle's aunt informed Jack with open hostility. Whatever hospitality he had enjoyed from the Jaegers had evaporated; they didn't take kindly to people hurting their own. She didn't give Jack the chance to say anything else; she slammed the door in his face.

Shit, Jack thought. So she had gone back to Widgee. Well, that hadn't taken her long – less than forty-eight hours had passed since Gabrielle had seen him with Bianca... his stomach churned to think about it. He couldn't believe he had been so stupid. He couldn't believe he had gotten so worked up with the issues he had with Gabrielle that he had allowed himself to think that cheating on her OK, that it was OK because it was his birthday, because he was drunk... all the excuses that his dad had used to cheat on his step-mother.

The best thing that had ever happened to him, and he had screwed it up. And for what? A woman he could barely stand, a woman he wouldn't date if she was the last woman on earth – a woman who didn't seemed to be in possession of a heart, who didn't give a damn but anything other than herself and what she wanted.

He had to explain to Gabrielle. He had no idea what he was going to say, how he was going to explain being caught screwing someone else, but he needed to explain nonetheless. He needed to talk to her. Maybe once she saw him and knew how contrite he was –

He decided to go to the Jaeger farm. It took him over a day's worth of detours to find the place – he had only gone there once, after all – before he got there. Russel Jaeger, apparently having a sixth sense when it came to boys who broke his daughter's heart, was waiting on the front porch for him. "I was wondering whether or not you'd have the nerve to show your face," he growled.

"I need to see her," Jack said. He wondered where she was. She couldn't have gone far – Widgee wasn't that big. If he knocked on every door in town –

"No you don't. In fact, I would say what you need is to go back to that den of iniquity of yours," Russel said, making every city in the world sound like the playground of the devil.

"Please... can you at least give this to her?" Jack asked, holding out a letter he'd written her.

Russel took in gingerly and grudgingly pocketed it. "Now will you get off my property before I shoot you?" he asked in a tone that told Jack he was more than capable of shooting the man who had broken his daughter's heart. Jack left and Russel went into the house, having no qualms about opening the letter.

Dear Gabrielle,

I'm so, so sorry. I was drunk and frustrated although I know that's no excuse for the way I behaved. I was selfish and acted like my father, which is something I never wanted to do. I have no excuse for what I did and I have no right to ask you to forgive me, but I'm going to anyway, because you're the best thing that ever happened to me and I don't want to lose you. Please forgive me. Please let me try again.

Jack.

With a grunt of disgust, Russel tossed the letter into the fire.

Jack tightened his jaw when he saw Bianca waiting outside his house. "I thought I told you to fuck off," he spat at her.

"You can't ignore me forever," she said.

"Watch me."

"You can't pretend it didn't happen, Jack. You can't pretend you didn't want me."

"No, I can't. And you know what? You can't forget that the only time I would ever look twice at you is when I'm drunk... so don't think hanging outside my house is going to change that."

Bianca flinched at the words. It was true; she couldn't forget that the only time Jack had looked twice at her was when he had been drunk. Hell, Jane had managed to strike up a friendship with him, but he had nothing but indifference or contempt for her. It wasn't the way she had planned it. She had meant for Jack to see how much better he was with someone as smart as he was, as sexually experienced as he was... but instead, all he could think about was that silly schoolgirl who had run back to her father. Her expression changed to one of hatred. "You men are all alike," she spat. "You blame me for what happened when you were the one who cheated."

"I don't blame you, Bianca," Jack said flatly, although he would love to be able to. After all, nothing would have happened if she hadn't come onto him - twice now - when he was drunk. But at the heart of it, he knew he couldn't blame her for what had happened, at least not entirely. If he hadn't been so full, of himself and how hard his life was because of his relationship with Gabrielle, he would never have done it. He had seen sex as an entitlement, just like his father did, and he hated himself for it. He certainly couldn't hate Bianca more. "But if you hadn't been there, if you hadn't come onto me... none of this would have happened. So I don't want to see you. I don't want you in my house, I don't want to see you around campus if I can help it, and I certainly don't want to have sex with you."

Bianca looked at him with cold hate. She knew he was serious. For reasons that were completely unfathomable to her, he would rather have that country hick virgin than her. She reached out and slapped Jack with all the force she could muster. He took the blow as if it were his due; after all, it was only what he deserved - not even - for what he had done to Gabrielle. "Would you go now?" he asked with quite resignation that was worse than hate. At least if he hated her, he would feel something for her.

Vowing revenge, Bianca stormed off. Jack let himself into the house and made a beeline for the fridge, pulling out lemonade and vodka from the pantry, then he reconsidered it and poured a hefty serve of vodka straight into a class and downed it. He could get drunk quicker if he skipped the mixer.

He knew he was drinking too much. He knew Pamela would pitch a fit if she knew how much he was drinking. But what the hell - uni hadn't started yet, and besides, he was twenty years old, he could drink if he wanted to.

Twenty, he thought miserably. He had been so looking forward to the milestone as a symbolic farewell to the teenage years that he had hated so much. But being twenty without Gabrielle was far more miserable than being nineteen with her.

He poured himself another vodka.

"I can't believe he gave me the brush-off!" Bianca fumed to Jane.

Jane was getting a little tired of Bianca's anger when it came to the way Jack treated her - actually, a lot tired. "What did you expect?" she asked. "He would just say, by the way, thanks for making my girlfriend leave me, why don't we get together sometime?"

Bianca's eyes glittered in that way they did when she felt she was being challenged. "I didn't make her leave," she said with haughty indignation. "I wasn't the one who cheated."

The problem with Bianca, Jane thought, was she had no idea about the reality of cheating. She thought that, since her father had left her mother for his mistress, than the same trick would work for her. But Jack wasn't some immoral philanderer - he had been deeply in love with Gabrielle - no doubt still was - who had made a mistake. OK, two mistakes. Both of which when he was drunk. With someone who had been determined to cause whatever trouble between them that she could. That was hardly the same as a woman who was a compulsive cheat. "You can't make him love you," Jane said. Although I'm sure you've made him hate you.

"I hate him," Bianca declared suddenly. "He can't just - sleep with me and dump me. He'll regret it."

I'm sure he will, Jane thought. Just not in the way you think.

She went to see Jack that day. He glared hatefully when he saw her and went to slam the door in her face, but she was too quick for him. "Get the fuck out," he growled at her.

"It's not good to drink alone," she said gently. She could smell the alcohol like he'd showered in it.

"Haven't you heard? I'm not a good person."

"You're a better person that you give yourself credit for. You're certainly a better person that Bianca is." It occurred to Jane that Bianca didn't understand why Jack didn't want her because she didn't understand how upset Jack was over Gabrielle leaving, because she didn't understand what it was to be crazy about someone and remorseful about hurting the, and destroyed that you'd lost them. "Have you tried to talk to her?" Jane asked.

"Her dad won't let me see her. I wrote her a letter but I don't think he gave it to her."

"Jack, I'm so sorry."

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"I knew she wanted you. I knew how good you and Gabrielle were together. I should have said something."

He stared at a fixed position on the wall, his brain working slowly through the alcohol in his head, realising some truths about himself. "Even if you had... that wouldn't have stopped me feeling like I was entitled to do it," he said, and Jane was deeply struck by the fact that while both Jack and Bianca had lived lousy childhoods in broken homes, the difference was that Jack hadn't twisted his experience into a sense of entitlement. He didn't go around thinking the world owed him every convenience and every desire because he hadn't had the kind of privileged upbringing that Jane had. Jane was suddenly awed that Jack both thought that way and thought it being three years younger than him.

No wonder he had no interest in Bianca. Bianca was way beneath him.

"You made a mistake," Jane said, although she knew that would be of no comfort to Jack. She reached out to him, but he shrugged her off.

"Leave me alone," he said thickly.

"Jack – you shouldn't be alone," she said, reiterating her first comment.

Jack's eyes flashed, the hatred he felt for himself tunnelling outward, and Jane shivered. She had known that Jack was capable of anger and violence, but to actually see that side of him coming through. "Leave," he said again. "Leave before I throw you out," he spat, and Jane had no doubt that Jack was capable of physically throwing her out.

She left him to it, hoping that she would catch him at some later date when he was sober. After all, uni went back in a few weeks, and Jack couldn't continue to piss away his life like this.

When she was gone, Jack hit the vodka again. He knew what he was doing was unproductive, but he didn't care. All that mattered was that enough alcohol could dull the pain of Gabrielle leaving him – not by much, but it was better than the stone-cold reality of knowing that she had left him and that he had no-one but himself to blame for that fact. He couldn't even blame Bianca, he knew, although he would love to be able to. He had slept with someone else – although 'sleeping with' was a kind euphemism for what they had done – because he had been drunk and full of entitlement. He had resented the aggro that had come from Gabrielle being seventeen, and thought that gave him the right to betray her like that.

And it had even been the only time. Perhaps if it had, he would feel better about it. But he had done it before. Drunk that time as well, but still –

Was it because he was his father's son? Was he incapable of fidelity, even though he knew how much heartache it caused? Was he destined to go through life, screwing around and treating women like objects? No sense in telling himself that if he was like his father, he wouldn't feel so awful about Gabrielle. All he could think about was that he had done something he had sworn he would never do.

The vodka went down well, hardly burning at all, and blurred the edges of his pain.

If Bianca had been angry in the face of Jack's initial disinterest in her, now she was furious. That he seemed to be making an attempt to drink himself to death didn't matter to her; what did was that he had rejected her.

Jane wasn't sure exactly what she had hoped to achieve. After all, in the history of infidelity, how many 'other women' had actually ended up with the men they had been cheating with? And Bianca wasn't even the other woman – she had been a two-time distraction when Jack had been drunk and horny. What did she think she would achieve? That she would become like one of her father's many mistresses – no, one in particular. The one who had usurped her mother as his wife.

Instead, he was drinking constantly and didn't seem to care much about how it was affecting everything around him. Pamela Hastings had already gone to see him (at Bianca's urgings, Jane suspected) and he had told her that he was doing nothing wrong. Which was true enough; there was no uni for him to be falling behind on, although Pamela had made some noises about 'abuse of university accommodation'. The truth was, Pamela – and the university – didn't want to lose him, but neither did she want to see her prized student doing this to himself... it reflected badly on the university.

Jack had told her they were welcome to throw him out; he knew damn well that they wouldn't. Besides, Jane suspected that he truly didn't care – and that was the most worrying thing. People got their hearts broken all the time, but Jack was taking it far worse than she had ever seen. He had really loved her, she realised – still loved her.

And she had helped Bianca – or at least condoned her actions. And comparing Jack's distress with Bianca's arrogant fury only made Jane more aware of that. "He's upset," Jane said.

"Upset? Why? I did him a favour." Jane stared at her so-called friend, wondering if Bianca truly believed what she was saying. Was she really that full of herself that she thought Jack was better off without someone he was obviously crazy about – and who was good for him, far better than Bianca could ever be. Was she so entitled that she thought nothing of breaking a happy couple up so long as it got her what she wanted?

Jane had thought Bianca acted the way she did because of her crummy childhood. She was beginning to think that she acted the way she did because she was a first-class bitch.

"... He has no right to ignore me," Bianca said loftily. "What, does he think he's better than me?"

The idea made Jane laugh. "No," she said sweetly. "He doesn't think he's better than you. He knows it."

He had recognised the symptoms. He'd had it before. The last time, they had gone away after a few weeks and, not knowing any better, he had hoped that meant it had gone away.

He knew now that that was common with syphilis. He also knew that the way so-called medical professionals looked at you when telling you that you had the disease in its tertiary stage was almost as humiliating as learning you had the disease in the first place.

And now he had it again, and he felt just as dirty and ashamed as he had the first time around. Funny that he should; you were talking about the difference between being sexually abused for two years and a night's unprotected indiscretion – but the dirtiness was the same. His blood felt tainted, his entire being felt tainted.

He made his way home, feel numb. He couldn't believe this was happening again. Maybe he was being punished.

How many times did he have to be punished?

He settled himself on the couch with his vodka, trying to blur the pain that had worked to some degree every night for the past few weeks. Except, this time, it didn't work. This time, all it seemed to do was make him feel sicker and sicker – and all-pervading sickness that had nothing to do with the alcohol he was using to poison himself with. He remembered, like it had been yesterday and he was thirteen again, being raped and being told that he had aged for it – begged for it. He remembered his step-mother not believing him, and telling him that he was a useless slut, just like his mother...

Jack took a deep, shuddering breath and felt the tears start to flow. He didn't care; he didn't care about anything anymore. Everything had got to shit, everything that had mattered he had lost – or perhaps he had never had it.

When the alcohol failed to work, he retrieved his diazepam prescription from his bedroom. An hour later, his stomach revolted from the combination of the two drugs on an empty stomach, and he threw it all up.

It reminded him of all the other times he had spent on his knees, throwing up.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he spotted his razor on the edge of the sink and suddenly, it all seemed clear, the solution crystal in his mind and bringing him the first bit of peace he could remember having. He reached for the razor...

"Jack?" Jane had had her doubts about going to see him, but she had heard that he had been particularly upset over something this afternoon and had figured she should at least make the effort. She had been thinking a lot these last few days about Jack and Gabrielle, and Bianca, and that maybe if she had said something to Jack weeks ago about how determined Bianca was to break them up, maybe he could have done something about it and maybe no he wouldn't be so miserable. Miserable? she asked herself ruefully. She had been miserable when her first boyfriend had broken up with her in year eight; Jack was practically suicidal.

That, and she couldn't ignore the nagging feeling in her gut that something was very, very wrong.

"Jack?" she asked again when there was no answer. Not that she had expected there to be; Jack had made it clear the last time she had gone over that she wasn't welcome. Like that was any deterrent; the lock on her parent's liquor cabinet had been a more advanced one than the ones AUMEL supplied for their student accommodation, and she had worked out how to steal her parent's booze – actually about the same time her first boyfriend had broken her heart in year eight. She unlocked the door with no effort and let herself in, hoping that he wouldn't be so pissed at her (not to mention pretty pissed himself) as to commit violence on her. God knew, he had a good case for self-defence after she had broken into his house.

The house was quiet, and Jane's first thought was that Jack had drunk himself to sleep. Well, she was here now, she may as well make sure. To get to his room, she had to pass the bathroom, and it was then that her heart stopped. Jack had slit his wrists, and by the look of it, done a pretty good job.