Dizgirl: So as a few of you know I put up a poll on deviantart and here asking you which of these that I had planned did you want me to write next. The resounding reply was this one (with "I'll Show You" as a close second), so that's what I wrote! I really liked this dream. It was unique…

Anyways, enjoy and love. Oh, and this takes place post-Phantom Planet.

Worth It

Warm sunlight streamed through the glass of my window and spilled across me as I lay in bed. I tilted my head towards the golden light and closed my eyes, exhaling softly. It was a day meant to be squandered on nothing but blue skies and bright sunshine, the kind I would waste with lazy flights over Amity Park and dream about when trapped at Casper High. A perfect early summer afternoon.

And yet I couldn't enjoy it.

I turned away, cool shadows falling over my face. Not even a day such as this could completely erase the feelings that hung in the corners of my room, drifting like cobwebs. The anxiety, the fear, the despair clung in wispy clumps at the edges of my vision. I could ignore them as much as I wanted but that didn't make them go away. Not even close.

Shaking my head, I shoved these thoughts into the background. No, I wouldn't do this today. I needed to be on my best behavior. Today, Sam and Tucker were coming to visit. I needed to be cheerful and optimistic. They'd see through it in a second but I knew they would be comforted by the fact that I was still trying. At least I was still trying.

Inhaling sharply, I pushed myself up into a sitting position and swung my legs out from under the covers. I paused, leaning heavily on my arms, and stared at my pale feet. They should be arriving any minute now which meant I needed to ditch my pajamas and find some real clothes….When was the last time I wore jeans?

I mused quietly on that thought as I heaved myself to my feet. Spots spattered across my vision and I swayed. After a few moments the dizziness passed and I walked to my dresser. The last time I wore jeans was probably the last time Sam was here. That was two months ago during spring break. She came down from college for the week. It had been wonderful to see her…until the last day when I ruined the whole trip.

Grimacing, I pulled open the drawers and shuffled clothing around to find a suitable outfit. I bet she was still mad at me. If there was one thing the Manson's were good at (aside from whipping up crowds of people into rioting mobs) it was holding a grudge. Today would probably be rough, but hopefully I could fix things so that the rest of the summer wasn't spent in a stony silence.

I changed my clothes and then turned to my mirror. My hair was messy, parts of it flattened and others sticking out at odd angles. Gotta love bed-head. I ran my fingers through it a few times and then gave up on the attempt when it only made it worse. Glancing over my image one more time, I shrugged and headed for the door.

Just as I turned the handle, the doorbell rang. A smile jumped on my face and I swung my door open. I heard the front door mimic the movement and my mother's muffled greeting. I started down the hallway toward the stairs, my feet padding softly across the carpet. Voices echoed upward and my stomach flip-flopped when Sam's joined the fray. I hope she wasn't too mad at me…

I stopped at the top of the stairs, the wall on the left side preventing me from seeing my family and friends gathering in the room below. It was at this point that my body seemed to have had enough. My legs grew shaky and I rested one hand on the wall. I was far too familiar with this sensation to be alarmed but I thought it best to sit down for a moment before continuing. I pressed my back to the wall, sunk to the ground, and stretched out my legs. Sighing, I closed my eyes and focused on the conversation drifting up from downstairs.

"How were finals?" Jazz asked. Why was it that she always went straight for the school stuff? I rolled my eyes and wondered if Sam was doing the same. I could just see her purple eyes sweeping upwards and the slight twist of her lips.

"Fine, they weren't that bad this year," Sam replied. "I'd ask the same but knowing you I bet they went very well."

"Well she did manage to graduate, so she probably passed them," Tucker joked.

"Yes, they went well and yes, I managed to graduate."

"So are you here for the whole summer, Sam?" my mom interjected, most likely cutting off another quip from Tucker.

"Yep, I'll start looking for a job later this week."

"You can always come work for me," Tucker said, his tone still teasing. "I could use a personal assistant."

"The day I become your personal assistant, 'Mayor' Tucker, is the day that the Box Ghost wins a fight," Sam countered. Now it was Tucker's turn to roll his eyes while the three women laughed and I chuckled quietly.

After a few moments of silence, Sam spoke up again, her voice dropping. "So…how's Danny?" I sighed. It was inevitable that she'd ask and I knew they had to talk about me when I wasn't around. Sometimes that annoyed me but for the most part I was grateful. I didn't want to hear them worrying about me.

"He was doing much better," my mom began. "Until yesterday." I could just picture in my head her exchanging a significant look with Jazz.

"What? What happened?" Sam's tone grew urgent. "Is he okay?"

"He's fine," my mom reassured her. "He just…"

"He caught me when I fell down the stairs two days ago," Jazz explained. "Full contact." The memory was still fresh in my head and as Jazz began to relate what happened I let it sweep over me.

I was watching a movie in the family room, my eyes glued to the screen and my feet propped up on the coffee table. Jazz walked behind the television, completely absorbed in a book she was reading. She started up the stairs but with her nose in the book she didn't see the shirt my dad had tossed on the steps.

I looked up just as her foot slide off the edge of the stair. She started to fall backwards and my instincts kicked in. I moved faster than I had in months off the couch, across the room, and to the bottom of the stairs. I managed to catch her in time, but the consequences were serious.

As soon as her skin made contact with mine, my vision darkened and my limbs went numb. We landed hard on the carpet below and my arms fell uselessly to the side. My whole body felt like it had been sucked of energy and I closed my eyes wearily.

She rolled off of me and I could distantly hear her calling, "Danny! Danny? Can you hear me?!"

It took me several tries before I could open my eyes in answer. Her face was a blob of orange and peach and I shut my eyes again when things started to spin. She continued to repeat my name but when I didn't respond—I couldn't, my body was so heavy—she switched tactics and called for my parents. I could feel the thump of my father's footsteps. I looked up at him and my mom. More peach, more orange, and now blue. I could hear the alarm in their voices though the words were indistinct.

"S'okay," I mumbled, hoping to stop them from fully panicking. "Just…tired…"

That was the last thing I remembered before waking up last night. I was out for almost twenty-four hours and I would need a lot more rest before I would recover completely. The fact that I couldn't even make it downstairs without a rest in between was proof. I shook my head. That was my life now. All I did was sleep, eat, and avoid touching the people around me. It wasn't much but I had to if I wanted to survive. And I had to survive until my parents figured out how to stop this from happening.

How to stop my newest power from killing me.

It was about halfway through my first year of college that I discovered I had a new ability. When I touched someone who was sick or injured in some way, I healed them. It was automatic; I didn't even need to focus on it at all. One second a person was coughing and complaining of a sore throat, the next they were as good as new, ready to go to class instead of collapsing in their dorm room. I remember I even managed to heal a guy's broken leg. You should've seen the look on his face when the pain suddenly disappeared. I bet his doctor's expression was even better.

There was a downside to the new power of course. I would feel a little tired, and something as big as a fracture would leave me dizzy for a few moments. But I just expected that I would grow stronger as I used it. Like my ghostly wail, eventually it would become just another powerful tool in my arsenal that I could use at will with only minor consequences.

Unfortunately that didn't happen. The first sign that something was wrong was when I realized I couldn't control it. It didn't matter whether I wanted to heal the person or not, I would. I mean, I always wanted to help them but when I was dead tired after a day of classes and a shift of work I didn't have the energy to spare. But I couldn't stop it. One brush of a hand against me or a bump of our shoulders and they were feeling ten times better while I grew wearier.

And each time it got worse. At first I would just feel a bit tired like I didn't have enough sleep the night before, but then just the smallest of healings were making my head spin. I could see the look on Sam's face, the tightening around the corners of her eyes and the press of her lips. I was all too familiar with that look because she had worn it every time I came crawling back from a ghost fight in high school. Worry, concern…fear.

I told her it was okay. She said she'd believe me after my parents took a look when I came home for the summer. I didn't want to drag my parents into this—I still found it weird to talk to them about ghost stuff even though they had accepted my ghost half after the Disasteroid incident—but she insisted. Sam can be very persuasive when she wants to be…

My parents ran test after test, their foreheads scrunched in confusion. My mom and dad didn't know what was happening exactly. I kept trying to explain that my new powers always left me feeling out of it until I learned to control them. Their answer was the same as Sam's: but can you control it? It was insulting to say the least, but I was actually wondering the same thing. No matter what I did and how much I practiced, I still couldn't turn my healing power "off." The only thing my parents were certain of was this new ability was different from all of my other powers. Something about how it used my energy or something, I don't remember. I didn't care at the time.

Either way, I convinced them to let me go back for my sophomore year. It wasn't like I couldn't handle exhaustion I pointed out, thinking of the innumerable times I had had sleepless nights of chasing ghosts and scrambling to finish my homework just a few years before. If I could handle it then, I would now. For the most part I think my parents bought it, but Jazz and Sam were another story. I can still see the I-don't-buy-it-so-cut-the-crap looks they both sent me as I tried to convince them that I was fine.

They were right though, I wasn't fine.

At home I was only in contact with my family and two best friends, but when I went back to school I was surrounded by hundreds of other students with various illnesses, injuries, and health problems. Walking through a crowded hallway left me breathless and no matter how much I slept I wasn't feeling better. Sam started avoiding me when she wasn't feeling well or when she had small injuries, like paper cuts and kinks in her neck. Jazz's calls came like rain, pestering me with questions and advice despite the fact that she was miles away finishing her own college degree.

And then it got worse. It wasn't just hurt people anymore, I was feeling tired whenever I was touched by someone else. It didn't matter if they were sick or injured or perfectly healthy. A second's contact with their skin and my vision was blurring. I'm sure I looked like the living dead (well more so at least) as I stumbled from class to work to my dorm room. Everything was a haze and I was falling asleep all the time.

It all cumulated about mid-semester. I was running late for my geology class when I cut through a large courtyard in the middle of campus. There was some event going on or something, I don't really remember, and I decided it was quicker to plow my way through the crowd than to go around it. Call me an idiot, but in my defense I wasn't thinking clearly at the time.

I remember twisting my way through the throng of students, trying to avoid touching them as much as possible. I spotted a pocket of open space to my right and riveted my attention on that, so I didn't see the guy with the skateboard coming. We crashed into each other and the contact was too much for me. My body collapsed and I was swept into oblivion faster than I could process what happened.

I woke up in a hospital bed. I had never felt so tired before in my life. I couldn't move, I couldn't speak, I could barely think. Everything felt so heavy and blurry and thick. I was only conscious for brief periods of time before the exhaustion pulled me back into blackness. My mom said I almost died several times before they found a way to care for me without touching my skin. From there I came home and my parents set up a new rule. No contact, not until they found a way to stop my power from sucking me dry.

"Is he sleeping?" Sam's voice pulled me from my thoughts and I blinked slowly, disoriented. My head had sunk to my chest and my body felt heavy. I...dozed off, I realized with faint surprise. I shook my head to clear away the drowsy fogginess and sat up straighter.

"He was when I checked earlier," my mom responded. "You can go check on him if you want."

"Yeah, maybe I will," she said. It took me a moment to process those words but when they did, my heart gave a jolt and I pulled away from the wall. I didn't want them to know I had been listening! That'd only make them worry more. I struggled to my feet, my body feeling stiff and lethargic from almost falling asleep. I just managed to stand up when Sam appeared at the bottom of the stairs. She stopped when she saw me.

"Hey," I mumbled as casually as I could. I rubbed the grit out of my eyes and tried to comb a hand through my hair again. She slowly started up the stairs, her purple eyes watching me intently. I could see the little crease between her brows and when she smiled it was strained.

"Hey, sleepyhead."

I tried to ignore the hints of worry playing on her face and smiled back. At least she didn't seem angry. "I wasn't sleeping," I retorted. In my bed, I added silently.

"Well then maybe you should go back to bed 'cause you look like you could use some more." Her tone was teasing but full of underlying concern. I guess I looked worse than I thought. I sighed, both annoyed and appreciative of the sentiment. I debated on whether I should argue against her suggestion but I had just almost passed out a second ago...

"Okay I'll go but only if you come join me," I smiled suggestively. She rolled her eyes and waved a hand in front of her. A year ago she would've slugged me playfully on the arm…

"You wish," she scoffed. "I'll go in your room but the bed is yours." I sighed dramatically and turned back down the hallway.

"Some girlfriend you are."

"Hey, you know why," Sam protested seriously. Then her tone lightened, "Besides, I have standards."

"Yeah yeah," I pushed open my bedroom door and automatically walked to my bed. She followed after me, her eyes scanning the familiar room. It hadn't changed much over the years, still covered in glow-in-the-dark stars and NASA posters. My dreams of becoming an astronaut were shot but that didn't mean I stopped loving space.

"So…how are you feeling?" Sam's eyes were staring at me again, daring me to lie.

"I'm fine," I shrugged. "Just a little tired, but when am I not?" I lounged back on my mattress. She frowned softly but it disappeared and she began to circle the room.

"Your mom says they have a new theory about what's happening."

"Yeah, something to do with core energies and the way my body uses energy to heal others. Sounds a lot like what they thought last summer."

"Well they never said they were wrong," Sam pointed out. I could hear it in her voice, a desperate hope that my parents were right this time. Everyone had it: mom, dad, Jazz, and Tucker. Sometimes I could feel it too, but the cobwebs kept coming back.

They were worst in my room. In here the doubts and anxieties crowded in on my mind, threatening to overwhelm me. What if they were wrong? What if they could never figure it out? What if I could never touch someone ever again? And then fear would turn to anger. Why was this happening to me?! Why couldn't I stop this power from taking my life away? This was so unfair!

And the hardest part was fighting against the part of me that wanted to lash out at my family and friends. It wasn't their fault, it wasn't mine. It just was. I knew that, but I needed something—someone—to blame for why I was this way and for why my parents had to make that stupid rule.

No contact. I wasn't sure which would kill me first, my new power or that rule.

Being in my room for hours and days at a time was slowly driving me crazy. I couldn't escape this cycle of uncertainty and frustration. It was especially vicious when I was alone but even now with Sam in the room it was starting to attack me again. I could taste the sour edge of bitterness rise in my mouth and I swallowed hard.

"Danny," Sam's voice was low and questioning. I looked down at my hands in my lap, trying to get a grip on myself. Quietly she crossed the room and I felt her sink down on the edge of my bed. "Danny, what's wrong?" I squeezed my eyes shut as my emotions bubbled over.

"I hate it," I said. "I hate how you all look at me, how you won't come near me."

"You know why," she repeated. "Besides, I'm near you now, aren't I?"

I shook my head. "You know what I mean! You all keep your distance."

"Because we're afraid we'll touch you! If we do…you know what happens."

"I don't care! I don't care about that!" I looked up and our eyes locked. "Please, Sam, just do it for me." It was a revisit of our argument from two months prior, an argument spawned from that vicious cycle of emotion and desperation. I asked for a favor, she refused to do it and left mad. I knew why of course, but I couldn't let the subject drop.

The rule had to go. The urge for physical touch was clawing me raw from the insides out.

"I am doing this for you! Why do you think I'm stopping myself from holding you right now? You're not the only one who hates this!"

"Okay, so don't stop yourself!"

She stared at me furiously, "It will kill you!"

"I've been saving up," I replied stubbornly.

"What about the thing with Jazz?"

"I feel better."

At this she jumped to her feet. "You can barely stand! You were out all day yesterday! You are not feeling better!" I glared back at her, unable to argue but unwilling to give in. The fire in her eyes was replaced with worry and pain.

"Please, Danny, don't ask me to hurt you," she continued in a softer tone. I looked away, my hands curling into fists. Just as quickly as it had risen my anger vanished, and in its wake came a deep longing despair.

"I can't stand it," I whispered. "Not being able to touch anyone. I know all of you love me but how can I feel it? How can I show it when I can't even hug you?" It was all gone, every loving gesture I had come to know.

My mother's kisses on my forehead, my father's bone-crushing hugs, my sister's gentle pats on my shoulder, Tucker's high fives, holding Sam's hand…gone.

"We know you love us, and we love you," Sam said.

"That's not enough," I replied. "Not anymore." Silence fell between us and I thought about these past two years. I was falling apart. My parents might figure it out in time but maybe they wouldn't. My body had to give out at some point. I could keep deteriorating until I died.

It was a distinct possibility despite what everyone said. They clung to theory after theory, hope after hope, but it was getting harder and harder for me to do the same. What if I never recovered? What if my life just slowly wasted away until it ended? What if this was it? Was there anything in this life that I could hold to, that would make it all worthwhile?

My gaze fell on Sam sitting on the corner of my mattress, her eyes downcast. I loved her. I loved my family and Tucker too, but Sam was special. She made my life worthwhile. That was the conclusion I had come to and I had tried to explain that to her. She had refused, but this time I wouldn't take no for an answer.

"Sam," I called. She looked up, her brow furrowing as I leaned closer. Surprise flashed across her face as I closed the distance between us.

"Danny…" she tried to move away but before she could stop me, I slipped my hand behind her neck and pulled her closer. Our lips met and I kissed her. I could feel my energy draining into her, my fingertips grew numb and bright spots fizzled across my closed eyes, but I held on with the dregs of my strength. I would not get this chance again and I wanted it to last as long as it could.

I began to feel lightheaded and my ears were ringing when Sam pushed me away. She was gentle but it was enough to send me onto my back. I half-opened my eyes and smiled lazily. Exhaustion held me down and it was sure to knock me out in a moment, but I was happy. It didn't matter how long I had to stay in bed because of this, I wouldn't trade that kiss for anything.

"Danny!" Sam had stumbled to her feet and was now watching me fretfully. "That could've killed you. Why? Why would you do that?"

Because, I thought silently as darkness crept around me, it was the only way I could keep trying, to keep those cobwebs at bay. And because…

"It was worth it," I mumbled before sinking into unconsciousness.