A/N: Hi guys! I apologize for the continuous wait, but here's the fourth installment!

Disclaimer: I own nothing of the PowerPuff Girls. Just the plot of the story ;-;

That's what he had been hiding from her. She couldn't believe it; it hurt too much to even remember the sight. She couldn't understand though… Hadn't she'd been a good girlfriend to him? She could have sworn he still loved her… Guess not.

The tears flooded her vision, making it so difficult for her to see as she maneuvered her way through the clear blue skies. Quietly she cursed the good weather; sure, she'd grown up, learned to face the sad truth that reality presented upon her as the days passed, but part of her psyche still childishly justified the scenes in storybooks and movies where the sky would darken to reflect a tragic or heart-wrenching scene. Or maybe those cliché scenes where the heroine runs away from her beloved who seemingly wronged her, but chases after her to explain that everything she had witnessed wasn't true.

But, this was reality. And the reality for Bubbles, in this moment as she soared quickly to who knows where, was that the sun was still shining despite her heart breaking inside her; that Boomer didn't love her the way she so hoped; that she was alone in this sky, running away― flying away she had to remind herself― from the problem, because she was too much of a coward to face the boy she'd been with for two years on exactly what was going on. She wanted to be an optimist, wanted to believe that what she'd seen had been a lie; that there was a crucial part in the story that she was missing that she hadn't figured out or noticed.

The scene she saw at the mall replayed in her mind again: that girl's hand in his, them laughing and smiling as they travelled the mall's corridor, the girl leaning up to peck the cheek that she always kissed before he would stare into her own baby blue eyes and gently kiss her lips…. The tears over-flooded her vision and she had to slow down just a bit because she just couldn't see where she was, where she was going.

Her arms swiped across her face in a pitiful attempt to clear her vision of the tears, but it did nothing as the tears continued to flow. Still he continued flying away, away, away. She didn't care where at this point, she just wanted the scene she witnessed to stop replaying in her mind. Mocking her with the cruelty of reality:

Boomer didn't love her anymore.

Her body felt weak suddenly and her throat locked up, preventing her from making a sound as the tears flowed freely and silently down her face. She didn't care at this point that her body suddenly felt too heavy to fly, or the fact that she was now flowing freely down towards the ground below her. She just continued to cry, knowing the fall would hurt―though it wouldn't kill her― but not knowing which would hurt more: the crash to the ground or the hurt that continued welling in her chest?

Heavy heaves from her crying racked through her body as her crying intensified, but she refused to cry aloud. She didn't bother to look at how much farther she had till her body touched the ground, she was already prepared for impact.

She never did crash though.

"Bubbles," the familiar voice screeched towards her, drawing the blonde's attention just slightly. Bubbles couldn't respond in her state as she saw her oldest sister race towards her. Blossom snatched Bubbles' arm, saving her youngest sister from a painful crash. "Are you crazy, Bubbles?! Why did you let yourself fall? You can fly," Blossom began to rant at the younger girl, but upon taking a closer look at her face, quieted down. "Let's go home, Bubbles," she murmured through the younger's crying and sped off in said direction.

The fly home was quiet, save for Bubbles' crying, but Blossom knew better than to pry just yet. She floated through the windows to keep the Professor from seeing her sister in such a state and allowed the girl to bury herself in her respective bed until the rest came.

Butch and Buttercup came in about an hour later, after calming down and gathering all their previously forgotten shopping bags. "We would have been here faster but, we had to fix a certain hole in the wall," was all Buttercup said on their arrival. Butch's eyes gleamed with bloodlust as he nodded towards Blossom before stalking off to a corner in the room near where Bubbles had situated herself earlier. The blue Puff had long-since quieted down, seemingly asleep, but they all knew better.

Buttercup trudged towards a chair in Bubbles' room and slumped down, anger still resting in her veins, but more concerned for her baby sister. Green eyes met with pink, as she noticed Blossom staring at her; she knew the look already, Blossom wanted an update, and that's exactly what she got.

Quiet settled in the room before Blossom spoke up. "Bubbles," she called out to the youngest sister. "We know you're awake. I think it's time to tell us what's going on."

Bubbles trembled, this wasn't something she wanted to deal with. This was exactly what she'd been trying to avoid since this all started. She thought over her words; what was she even going to say, when she didn't even know? Her trembling increased when her name was called a second time. 'Run' her body was screaming at her, and before she knew it her body was attempting just that.

Attempting being exactly it. It was as though Butch knew she was going to do that, before she even did as his arms circled firmly around her waist; her upper half was already out the window by then. It finally registered to her that escape was futile as he hoisted her back to her bed and sat her down, hovering close-by to prevent a second attempt.

"Talk."

His voice held no patience at this point and she could tell even without looking at him that she'd better start soon. So, she did.

"Funny enough, I don't even know myself― if you can even believe that. It just―he just―things just started changing all of a sudden you know? It was… just so sudden. At first, I thought he had something going on, stressing him out, but then it kept getting worse. He started getting more distant. Then I thought maybe it was me, maybe I was being a terrible girlfriend, maybe I did something wrong, that I'm just not good enough. Then that happened. I never thought―it never occurred to me―I just, I don't know!" She was rambling at this point, her breathing too heavy as her chest heaved for air. Her hands were gripping the sheets beneath her as she tried to collect her thoughts, but nothing seemed to connect.

Her older sisters looked between themselves in concern before making their way towards their little sister. Taking a spot on either side of her, Blossom pulled the girl into a hug as Buttercup awkwardly rubbed circles into her back. Blossom shushed her, preventing her from rambling.

"Why did you keep this from us, Bubbles?"

"I didn't want to burden everyone."

"You wouldn't burden anyone! What's a bother is keeping it all to yourself and not saying anything," Buttercup pinched the blue-eyed girl's arm, causing her to squeal.

Silence filled the room for a moment, each person stuck within their own thoughts.

"How long?"

"Huh?"

"How long? How long has this been going on, Bubbles?" It slightly surprised her that Butch was the first to speak up, after how quiet he'd been. She looked down at her lap, hands gripping the other in an excuse to stall. Truthfully, she was more afraid of telling him than she would have, if it was just Buttercup. Butch was and always had been unpredictable, to everyone besides Buttercup. She looked up when she heard him clear his throat, eyes trained on her, causing her to tremble.

"I―I'm not―I don't know how long that's been going on. Bu―but it wasn't until six months ago that he started changing," she whispered just barely, but knew their super-hearing would catch on to what she said regardless of how loud she said it.

"Excuse me?" It was Buttercup's turn to speak up this time, as she gripped Bubbles' arms and turned her towards herself. "How long," she seethed, hoping she'd heard the wrong number.

Her body started trembling harder than before as she stared at her green-eyed sister. She didn't want to repeat herself. She already heard what happened after she ran from the mall, between Butch, Boomer and Buttercup. There didn't need to be another repeat of that.

Blossom answered for her instead, much to her dismay. "Six months, she said Buttercup. We all heard her right."

Bubbles wasn't the only one trembling now, she noticed. Buttercup was quietly seething in her rage; and had she not checked, she would have missed the subtle twitches in Butch's hands. Blossom was the only one seeming to take this calmly―

She watched as her red-haired sister got up and walked towards the window. "I'm going to kill him," it was barely heard, but the blonde caught the words just in time to catch her sister from flying out of the window.

"Stop!"

"Let me go, Bubbles! He had this a long time coming!" She had only seen Blossom lose her cool a handful of times, but it was never something she could prepare herself for.

She resorted to begging, further bringing silence to the room as they listened to the youngest girl bring herself to that point.

"Bubbles… Why?"

"What do you mean 'why'? "

"Why are you defending him? After all that he's been doing to you, for so long? Why? He doesn't deserve it!"

Bubbles could only bark out a cruel laugh, causing her sisters to flinch at the foreign sound. It was just so wrong coming from the normally cheery girl. Butch remained where he was, unreadable as ever.

"Why," she laughed out the word, "why am I going so far?" The question was thrown out into the room, although it sounded as though she was questioning herself instead. Her hand traveled to her chest, right above her heart. "After everything, I just can't hate him enough to want him to experience any pain similar or worse than what either of us have already went through. If I can wish him bad, instead of wishing him to do better after all this, then I don't deserve any better than him. I ― I just don't want anymore pain to come out of this…" Bubbles bit her lip as she held her back straight. Her hand dropped to her side as she forced out a small smile to each individual in her room before trudging back to her bed. She could trust Blossom enough to stay in the room after her little speech, but it took all the energy out of her to spit the words out.

They heard the door slam shut the moment she sat herself on the bed; Buttercup had just stormed out of the room.

"Buttercup," Blossom rushed after their middle sister, pausing briefly to look at Bubbles, "I don't know when, but you've grown up so unbelievably fast, Bubbles. I'm so sorry we didn't do anything sooner, but I swear, I won't let you get hurt like this again. I'll come back later, after I check on Buttercup." She disappeared in a flash.

Bubbles threw out a small smile towards the door before letting her body fall across the bed. Her arm draped across her eyes as she forced herself to remember how to breath and just quiet the raging thoughts in her mind. "I never grew up. I just had to learn how to pretend to put on a brave face. I can't even be brave." The words were butchered through the heaving in her chest as she had to force herself not to cry. She bit her lip just a little too hard.

The hand that gently stroked her hair startled her into sitting up, causing her to choke. Her baby-blue eyes stared into Butch's emerald green ones. He rose an eyebrow at her as he retracted his hand calmly. She stuttered out, "I forgot you were still in my room. I'm sorry."

He nodded in her direction. "I noticed."

She wiped at the tears in her eyes as they stared each other down. The silence in the room was beginning to get heavy and made Bubbles feel awkward and nervous. She couldn't help but ramble aimlessly.

"I'm such a crybaby," she began, rubbing her eyes as more tears started leaking down, "Crying day after day over something I should have suspected a long time ago. Of course, he― he'd cheat on me, what good is crybaby who can't even keep her head up after seeing that. I ran away the moment I saw it, I couldn't take it. What is wrong with me? Why couldn't he just tell me normally? Am I that bad a girlfriend, a person? Maybe I deserved it after all… I don't know how I'm going to get over this, I'm lost. My heart hurts, my head hurts, it's like everything about me hurts and it just won't stop."

The tears were running down her face in streams at this point and her chest was heaving heavily again. He hands dug into her bedsheets as she continued badmouthing herself and questioning the situation. Her mouth was running on its own now and she knew she looked stupid in front of Butch, but at this point she couldn't even try to stop if she tried.

His hand covered her mouth though.

"You're making me mad." His voice was barely a whisper but she heard it all too clearly as she mumbled an apology behind his palm. He nodded to her and slowly took his hand back, quickly noting the tears that soaked the side of his hand. "You're saying things that aren't even true about yourself, you should give yourself a bit more credit. Boomer messed up. Big time." He patted her head, as he walked towards the window. "And Bubbles, it takes a strong person to cry and admit their feelings." With that he flew out the window, leaving the girl alone in her room

She fell back on her bed, her mind finally quiet for the first time today before the storm of tears slid from her eyes. Dry heaving racked her body as she could not voice her cries anymore.

She cried herself to sleep, and for the first time in awhile, she slept peacefully.

A/N: Annnnnd that's the end of the fourth chapter. I hope you enjoyed! How was it? Good? Bad? In between? R&R please! Thank you for reading and see you in the fifth chapter!