High School AU! Eliza knows senior year is supposed to be the best year of her life. Come April, she's convinced it's horrible. Alex's acting odd and she's paired up in an impossible Literature work with the mysterious Maria Lewis. Senior year can't get any worse, Eliza thinks. It turns out, it can—but not in the way anyone expects. Rated T, for language and mentions of abuse.

/ Maybe it's because when Jack turns sometimes he has to stop himself from screaming, his hands clawing at his closed up throat. He thinks of the thump-thump, the steady beat of heart. His boy's voice counting on french, une, deux, trois, quatre…/ Jack's problems consist of: his father's shifty behavior, his mother's death and the wisp of a boy who won't just leave him alone.