Okay, big timeskip here guys. :) I hope you don't mind.

Ten Months Later

July 2001

If she had one more bad day at work Jeannie swore she would quit her job. She had been working at the same restaurant for over five years and her manager still had the gall to treat her like she was sixteen.

Muttering a string of curses under her breath, she climbed out of the car and shook her fist at the sky. She was sick of everything: sick of studying, sick of working ridiculous shifts, sick of living in poverty. Whatever dreams she'd had of happiness were now mere delusions.

Alas, the day wasn't over yet. Another three hours of consciousness was another three hours where an unlimited number of things could go wrong.

She opened the front door to inhale the tangy, pungent stench of smoke. Throwing her purse on the floor, she looked up and saw Jack with a smoking cigarette between his fingers. "Thought you'd never get home, Jean-nie," he said idly.

She couldn't believe her eyes. "Why would you take up smoking?"

"I'm not," he said, responding with his own disparaging look. Seeming oblivious to her irritation, he flicked the stub out the window and brushed the dirt off his hands. "But I have to admit it is a very…relaxing habit."

"Like hell it is," Jeannie snapped. "You are not smoking in here."

His eyes narrowed. "Whose apartment is it again?"

"Ours," she said furiously. "I've lived here for almost two years!"

"And yet," he replied languidly, "I don't recall you contributing anything towards the rent."

Jeannie's anger, which had been steadily building up since the start of the day, finally boiled over. "Why would I even want to pay a cent? You should have gotten this thing for free, because it's complete shit! Do you realize how many spiders I've killed and how many times I've had to listen to your neighbors scream bloody murder—not to mention the tiny rooms and the disgusting, polluted water! I can't—I can't live another day in this place!"

"Then go," he said dangerously. "Run away, Jeannie. It's not like I thought you'd stay here for long."

"So what am I, a plaything? Something to toy with when you get bored? If that's the case, then why did you marry me? Why not just fuck me whenever you feel like it and not bother with the formalities?"

He hadn't told her he loved her since he first proposed, and for a split second when he opened his mouth she thought he would. But this was no happily-ever-after, and Jack was no Prince Charming. "What am I?" he retorted. "All you've done is complain. You were only ever interested because you thought you looked really good, didn't you, making friends with the outcast."

"That's not true!" Jeannie cried. "I loved you, for God's sake. I still love you."

"Well, you sure don't act like it," he hissed.

"Look who's talking! You act like you don't give a shit about me half the time, and the other half you're laughing at my problems! Excuse me for thinking that I'm not worth much."

"Do I look like I would stay if I didn't want to?" he asked. "If I didn't want to be here I would have left months ago."

"Well, I—"

"Then why haven't you left?"

"I would leave," Jeannie whispered, injecting as much venom as she could into her voice, "but you wouldn't be able to function without me!"

That was definitely the wrong thing to say. Jack's eyes grew dark, and suddenly Jeannie found herself pinned against the wall, his hands tight on her shoulders. "Who. Told. You. That?" he growled.

There was no way Jeannie would sell her mother out, so she put on her best confident face and said as bravely as she could, "No one. It was obvious enough."

That was an even worse thing to say. His hand briefly disappeared and she thought he would release her, but just as she relaxed the cold edge of a knife dug into her throat.

All traces of bravado disappeared and Jeannie could do nothing but stare helplessly at him. He hadn't pulled a knife on her since they were in Los Angeles nearly a year ago, but that had only been to stop her from running away. This was a threat, and there was true rage in his eyes.

After a long, agonizing moment, he abruptly dropped the knife and it clattered to the ground. Jeannie couldn't read the look in his eyes. Taking advantage of his hesitation, Jeannie pushed herself off of the wall and scurried into the bedroom, where she climbed into bed, pulled the covers up over her head and didn't move for a long time.

Like she knew it would, her exhaustion ultimately got the better of her and she eventually fell asleep. When she next woke up, the room was still pitch black. Jack's side of the bed was cold and his pillow untouched.

But a sliver of light shone through the crack underneath the bathroom door and it was standing ajar. Hesitantly, Jeannie sat up and stared at it, thinking. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw what looked like a red stain on the door.

After several minutes of deliberation, her curiosity finally got the better of her and she crawled out of bed, tiptoeing toward the door. She reached her hand out and touched the red stain with her finger. It came back wet.

Blood.

When the door creaked open and light flooded the room she had to clap her hand over her mouth to keep from crying out loud.

The entire bathroom was splattered in blood, dripping off the counter and smeared on the walls. The harsh crimson color against the stark white of the walls gave it a horror-movie feel. It looked like someone had been pacing the room like a caged animal, and dragging themselves through every corner.

Jack was bent over the sink, head bowed and his hair clinging to his neck in damp ringlets. His shaking right hand clutched a bloody knife and he was spitting globs of blood into the basin.

What had he done to himself? As Jeannie watched in horror, he turned his head toward her and she would be forever haunted by the image of what he looked like in that moment for the rest of her life.

When he was hurt while they were in Chicago, his scars had reopened only partway—enough to draw plenty of blood; but this was far, far worse. He had slashed his face open even wider, so the scars nearly reached his cheekbones. If he had looked menacing before, he now looked like a clown from hell.

As Jeannie struggled not to scream, he leaned heavily onto the counter and his knuckles turned white as he tried to stay standing. The only sounds coming out of his throat were muffled gurgles.

Hands shaking, she reached out for him and pried his fingers loose from the knife. She wiped the blood on a towel and stuck it into her own pocket. Jack tried to open his mouth, but this only caused even more blood to gush out of his face. "Stop it," Jeannie ordered. "I'm going to take you to the hospital."

With surprising strength, he dug his fingers into her arm and made a shaking motion with his head. "I can't fix you, Jack," she said. "What do you want me to do?"

He shrugged, but it was obvious he was in severe pain. Jeannie propped him up on the counter and soaked all the towels they owned with water so she could wipe the blood off his face. He didn't resist and with his face turning increasingly paler she wondered if he was going into shock from loss of blood.

Why would he go so far to cut himself open? she wondered as she dragged the towel over his face. Was he taking his anger out of himself instead of her?

Jeannie was no nurse, but she had watched enough late-night television to know what she should do. She felt like she was taking care of an invalid as she washed every last drop of blood from his skin and dressed him in clean clothes. Jack didn't try to speak the entire time, even when she was putting rubbing alcohol on his cuts (something that would have elicited screaming from a normal person). After she had bandaged his injuries and he didn't look like he needed the emergency room anymore, she guided him to bed. His eyes, which had been flickering open and closed erratically the entire time, finally shut in defeat.

Some time later, he fell asleep with his head still on her lap. Jeannie watched the lines on his forehead smooth out and relax, his face peaceful for once. She felt her eyes beginning to tear as she gently pressed her lips to his scarred mouth.

She had said that he wouldn't be able to function without her; but deep down she knew it was her who couldn't live without him.