A/N thanks so much for all the beautiful reviews on the last chapter! :D

Carlos was home.

Carlos was home and he was miserable.

James knew because ever since his attack, he had spent a lot of time watching people. He had gotten to know his friends and boyfriend even better after he started observing their behaviour. Now James knew that when Kendall was embarrassed or feeling shy, he tugged on his left earlobe, and when Logan was stressed he nibbled the inside of his cheek, and that when Carlos was sad, he laughed more than he usually did.

Although he could move his legs, Carlos was struggling with doing, well, anything. He was ready to bite people's heads off – one minute he seemed fine, and the next, he was throwing something across the room. James hated it. He hated what the drunk driver had done to them.

He hated that Kendall paced at night when he thought James was sleeping. He hated that Logan was still hurting from his broken bones. He hated that Carlos couldn't walk.

He wouldn't tell any of them because they would yell at him – but James would trade places with any of them for an eternity if it meant one hour of their happiness.

But he wasn't sure they'd be any better off in his shoes. After all, they were all pretty miserable.

Kendall soaped James' back in the shower, laid kisses across the beautiful golden shoulders and stroked James' hair until it got wet. Then he lathered it with James' shampoo and reveled in being the one who was even allowed to do that.

But then it had happened.

James had reached for the razor, getting ready to shave his stubble, and had nicked his finger. He watched as the blood bubbled to the tip and blinked at it.

"James, oh my God, you're bleeding," Kendall's voice said beside him. The sight of the blood had made Kendall pale and his eyes were wide and, to James' alarm, shining with tears. He didn't understand why the tiny cut was making Kendall act like this but allowed Kendall to cover it with a bandaid.

"Kendall?"

Kendall sighed shakily.

"Sorry, James."

"You don't need to apologise." James pulled on his sweatpants, wincing a little. "But why did you…?"

"James, two weeks ago you almost bled to death in front of me. I just don't like seeing your blood, okay?"

"Okay," James said simply.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped." Kendall kissed his fingertip. "I always dream about it," he said. "I'll never… sometimes I wake up and I could swear that I still have your blood all over my hands and shirt. I swear that I can still smell it when you're sleeping and I'm by myself."

"Kendall," James said, stunned.

"I know. It's stupid."

"Only as stupid as making you come to the bathroom with me," James said heatedly. "And in your words, that's not stupid at all. It's not stupid to be scared for me, Kendall. I don't remember that night, I don't have anything to be scared of. You do."

Kendall wrapped his arms around James' waist and pulled him closer, kissing James' chin. "I know."

They stood like that for a long time, Kendall marveling at the sight of James' creamy, tan, clean skin.

Yeah, things had changed, James decided.

"Do you need anything?" he heard Logan ask Carlos.

"I'm fine, Logie. You should sit down. What about your leg?"

"It's fine, Carlos." Logan had been limping around stiffly on his injured leg, catering to all of Carlos' needs which, to be honest, were few and far between. He seemed fine so long as he had access to chocolate milk and cartoons.

James jumped when Kendall's hands slid around his waist, and he smiled. Kendall pressed a kiss to the back of his neck, then rested his forehead there. James felt the soft, silky strands of Kendall's blonde hair brush against it, and he turned, wanting to feel them under his hands as well.

Just as Kendall was leaning up to kiss him, there was a ground-breaking smash from the living room. James and Kendall hurried out to find a glass shattered on the floor and chocolate milk spreading rapidly across the floorboards.

Tensions in 2J had been rapidly rising since about a day ago, about three days after Carlos got home. Carlos wasn't a person who liked people to do things for him; he was someone who, no matter what, liked to do it himself. Logan was a person who liked to help… all the time. James was a non-confrontational person, so the bickering that had been going on between the two had been stressing him out as well, and Kendall was stressed because James was stressed.

Disability – Kendall loathed the word – didn't just affect the disabled person. It affected everyone in the household as well.

"I'll get it," James mumbled, hurrying for a cloth to avoid the mounting tension. Kendall stayed where he was, watching, waiting for everything to blow up in their faces, thinking every second oh God this is it they're going to fight, and the knot in his stomach never lessened, not once. He almost wished, for one stupid blind second, that he had been in the wreck with them and knew what they were feeling, all of them.

He didn't know what to do. And Kendall knight always knew what to do. He had known what to do when James had almost been raped, had known what to do to calm him in getting him out of the wreck, known what to say to stop Logan completely flying off the handle. And yet, when it came to a simple lover's tussle, he had no idea what to do. Because he didn't know everything there was to this, didn't know how long Logan and Carlos might have been arguing over the strain of all this crap that had happened to them lately, didn't know what either one of them was feeling because he was so intent on getting James (and, being honest) himself through the nightmares that plagued them almost every night.

He was focused on curling his body around James' and squeezing him tight, growing accustomed to rubbing James' thigh to sleep just to get him through those horrible black patches of memory that threatened to cause any sort of mental ailment.

Kendall was getting used to making sacrifices in the name of the one he loved. For a moment, he felt a surge of bitter rage swell up inside him, the urge to go to the hospital and smother the drunk driver almost overwhelming, but in the same instant, James had reappeared, holding a sponge and towel and heading to the spill of chocolate milk.

All Kendall's angsting came back to a glass of chocolate milk.

"I can do it, James," Carlos said.

"I uh…"

"I was the one who dropped the glass, so I can do it." He grabbed the cloth and leaned forward to try and mop up the milk. Kendall wanted to turn away. He wanted to shield himself from what was going to happen next, but some part of him, some masochistic part, told him to continue watching, like some kind of invisible voyeur in Carlos and Logan's private life.

"Carlos, you can't-"

"Stop it, Logan."

"Stop what?"

"Stop being my nursemaid. I can do it myself."

The chair tilted and James managed to catch Carlos before he toppled out and onto the spill and the floor, stopped him from tumbling into a sea of humiliation and rage and regret and fear.

"I've got him, James."

James watched worriedly as Logan helped Carlos back into the chair. Carlos turned away from all of them, away from his failed attempt at cleaning the milk.

It was just milk, Kendall thought. When had it become so freaking significant? What did it matter who mopped up the milk?

"Carlos, listen, you're not ready to-"

"Not ready to what, Logan? Not ready to walk again? Not ready to look after myself again? Not ready to what? In your eyes I'll probably never be ready! All of you will always want to shelter me, even after I'm better, because I'm the baby of the group, right?"

"What?" Kendall demanded. "You're not a baby!"

"Or maybe you'll treat me like glass, Logan, like Kendall does to James! Treats him like he needs to be wrapped in bubble wrap and cotton wool and hidden away from the world because he's not tough enough to defend himself! You can't defend him forever, Kendall!"

"I never thought of James that way," Kendall snapped. "I love him and I would die for him, any time, anywhere. I treat him carefully because in case you haven't noticed, nobody else does! I want him to know that I love him."

James offered him a shy smile.

"If you hadn't been so insensitive on the night he-"

"Don't go there," James warned. "It wasn't Kendall's fault. It was mine. I went out there and I got myself into trouble, like always, and Kendall…" James faded out, and Kendall could tell he was sinking into memories.

"It wasn't his fault," James finalized.

"It was all our faults," Carlos snapped. "None of us stopped you going."

James shook his head and walked out then, with Kendall following. Evidently, they thought the argument, such as it was, was over, thinking that Carlos had blown off enough steam to last him quite a while.

Logan appeared to wake up at that moment; he limped forward, kneeling in front of Carlos' wheelchair. He knew he was going to be yelled at, knew it was going to hurt.

Didn't care.

"Why are you being so angry?" Logan demanded of Carlos, feeling like he was on the verge of tears – and embarrassed. Kendall and James were in the kitchen, clattering around and trying to pretend they couldn't hear. It was mortifying to know that he was about to be yelled at in front of his best friends like a child who'd done something wrong.

Carlos threw down the remote; the back exploded and the batteries came rolling out. James, in the kitchen, jumped about a foot in the air; Kendall rushed out to see what was going on.

"I'm angry because I've got this thing!" Carlos yelled. "I've got this thing and it's called a disability, and no matter what there's nothing I can do RIGHT NOW to rip it out or scrub it clean! I've got this thing and it's called a disability and because of it I can't even hug my boyfriend properly! I've got this thing and every time I look at James and Kendall I see what I should be able to do with you!"

"Carlos, it doesn't matter-"

"It does to me! Maybe you'd be happy like this with all your books! Maybe James would be happy so long as he had Pop Tiger! Maybe Kendall would be happy if he could watch hockey all day! But there's nothing I can do to be happy about this!"

"I'd never be happy like that," James said quietly, just to break the silence that had descended upon them like a dark cloud and to take the attention off Logan, who looked like he was going to cry.

"This isn't about you, James," Carlos said.

"Hey," Kendall snapped. "He was just trying to help, Carlos. He was just pointing out that none of us would be happy in your position."

"In my position, Kendall?"

Kendall opened his mouth to retort, hot-headed and ready to argue, but James grabbed his arm. "Don't," he said softly. "Let's just… leave them to it."

"Logan?" Kendall asked. "Will you be okay here?"

Logan nodded and sank onto the couch. "You guys go."

It wasn't a request. It was an order.

James and Kendall surfaced on the rooftop, feeling the wind blow across their faces and through their hair. James shivered and Kendall wrapped his arms around him.

They stared out at the sunset for a long time, watching, waiting, for a sign that it would soon be better, that everything was going to come back together and they would be Big Time Rush, four hockey players from Minnesota, four best friends, and be okay.

"I almost wish I had been there," Kendall mumbled.

James jerked like someone had stabbed him and turned to face Kendall, eyes wide. "What?" he stammered.

"If I'd been in the wreck," Kendall mumbled, "I might actually know what all of you are going through, not just be floating around waiting for any of you to break down and begin to cry. If I'd been there… maybe…"

"If you'd been there," James said, "in the wreck, I wouldn't have gotten out of the van, and I wouldn't have made it to the hospital. You saved my life, Kendall. If you'd been there I'd probably be dead right now."

"Don't say that," Kendall snapped.

"Sorry," James said. "Just putting it in perspective, that's all."

Kendall looked at James and leaned over, kissing him deeply. James' fingers knotted into his hair, and Kendall leaned their foreheads together.

"I love you," he said. "I am so in love with you. And I would… I would do anything, I would be anything, if it meant making you smile for just a second longer."

James smiled a watery smile at him. "Same here."

The sun was setting.

A/N okay, guys… I really struggled with this chapter. I mean, I really, really struggled. I think it's crap because I wanted Carlos to be all ponies-and-sunshine but in his position not many people would be like that. So I'm keepin' it real. Also, there's been a lot going on lately, so it's been hard to update. School, friends, job, family, etc.

Sorry for the late update and sorry for the super short chapter. I'm working on another chapter story as we speak and I'm putting a lot into that.

My soundtrack was "Closing In" by Imogen Heap, "Worlds Apart" by Jars of Clay, "Gabriel" by Lamb, and "Till the Clouds Clear" also by Lamb. I don't know if any of you guys even look this up, but even if there's one person who does, it's worth it.

Review? :)