Luke starred at his nephew as he closed his door and walked through the ally towards the street. His brown eyes looked wild, darting from side to side manically, his hair was wet and curly on his forehead. He looked miserable and scared out of his mind.

"Jess?" He asked questionably, getting out of his truck to meet him.

Jess nodded. "Yeah?"

"What's wrong?" Luke was getting sick of asking him that question.

Jess looked around, avoiding eye contact. "Uh, nothing."

Luke nodded absently, more trying to convince himself, then Jess. He couldn't help thinking, he looked no better than when he had went into the hospital.

They stood in an awkward silence for long moments.

"Let's get your stuff and we'll go."

"No!" Jess exclaimed with more emotion than Luke had heard in quite sometime, he was starring at Luke despairingly.

"No?"

"I'm-I'm ready now."

"You need your medication and stuff- your clothes, books, music."

Jess nodded, feeling his heart sinking, he didn't feel like telling Luke, he didn't feel like telling anybody because he secretly hoped in his heart that maybe somehow, it would just go away.

"Come on, we'll make it quick." Luke opened the door to find a war zone. A pill bottle was cracked on the floor, spilling blue pills across the floor, books were strewn around the room. Luke darted his eyes over and noticed his Father's pocket-knife was not where he had left it. Luke had left it there, as a test, he somehow hoped that it would be sitting there still.

"Jess! What in the hell happened."

Jess had been standing in the midst of his mess, his eyes on the floor, his hands deep in the pockets of his low rise jeans. He slowly looked up.

"Astoria came over."

"Astoria? You're telling me she made this mess?" Luke asked.

Jess nodded. "I think I may have helped." His voice was in a flat monotone, giving nothing away, or maybe he just didn't have anything, any emotion to give.

"How?"

"I was acting like my father."

Luke could not think of a literate response with the ideas floating around his head. Jess was scooping pills off the floor. Luke bent down and began picking up books, some of their covers creased and ripped, when he noticed two innocent blood spots in the floor. Blood that was still wet. Luke walked over to the bathroom and found exactly what he expected, his father's pocket-knife was sitting next to the soap.

"Damnit." Jess jumped dropping a handful of pills, and a pile of books with a thud.

"Huh?"

"Take off your jacket." It was an order, no ifs and or buts about it, Jess reasoned, but he didn't want to. He was sick of that look in Luke's eyes, the pity-confusion-anger look.

"No."

"You just got out, Ira told me you were on your way to getting better. He said you didn't make any cuts while you were in there. Are you asking for my help Jess? It wouldn't take much to put this knife back in the right place, I'm here Jess, I'm here to help you."

"I'm not asking for your help." He replied his voice cruel.

"But why then? What did you and Astoria argue about?"

Jess dumped the contents of his bedside table into his back with one swoop. He picked up the books and stuffed them in. He walked past Luke and without any abandon at all dropped the pocket-knife in his pocket.

"Let's go."

"No! We are not going! Tell me what the hell is going on?" Jess dropped his bags and walked up to Luke, starring him face to face. His brown eyes had ferocity, an unkind veracity to them.

"Astoria's pregnant. Her parents are religious fanatics and are making her give the kid up."

"Your kid?"

"Yes."

"Well, uh, you'll know its being, uh, taken care of." Luke's mouth was suddenly as dry as sandpaper as he tried to force those words out.

Jess chuckled bitterly. "She wants me to take.. Our kid."

Luke nearly choked on his own tongue. "Excuse me?"

"That's what I said, right around the time she started throwing things at me."
"You can't take care of a kid, you can't even take care of yourself."

"I am well aware of that Luke! But she doesn't buy it."

"What are you going to do?"

Jess shrugged his shoulders. "Find a job, take my medication, call my parole officer and hope that I wake up someone different by November 8th." His voice was desperate and breaking, he was at the end of his rope.

"November 8th?"

"Astoria's parents are taking her to court that day and if I can't prove I can take care of him, than that's it."

Luke paused, and took a deep breath. "No! No! You have got to be fucking kidding me?"

"What do you want me to do? He's my kid, mine! I can't just let him grow up thinking his parents didn't want him."

"Take a good solid look at yourself Jess, this is what happens when crazy people raise kids."

"I'm not crazy." He said defensively.

"Funny, I didn't get the memo, because last time I checked, you were on medication, cutting yourself for no reason at all, and spending sixty days in a mental hospital because you beat the crap out of somebody you thought was someone else! You are crazy Jess, and you can't raise a kid."

Jess sunk down on the floor, his head in his hands.

"Do you think I want to be like this? You think I cut myself because I want to? I would give anything, anything, to wake up and not feel like this." Luke could hear him sniffing, his voice muffled, in his hands, he was crying.

"Jess? I'm sorry." Jess was unresponsive.

"Come on, let's go home."

He stood up with a look of hatred in his eyes, that Luke could not understand. The ride was silent, oppressively silent. Just as they were entering Hartford Luke cleared his throat, and looked over at Jess, who was hugging his body and starring out the window.

"Why do you do it then?" He asked quietly.

Jess starred, as if he haden't heard him, and Luke continued driving.

"It makes me feel better." He replied quietly.

"Better?" Luke asked not bothering to cover up the pure surprise in his voice.

"Yeah, and after awhile it turns to an addiction." Jess didn't look at him, he just spoke to his own reflection in the mirror.

"So you're not trying to kill yourself?" Luke asked.

Jess laughed, cynical and bitter.

"No. How could I?"

"I don't know it seems like you're heading in that direction."

"I've got someone out there, who needs me."

"So is this how you're going to be? Is this how you're going be in front of your kid? A disaster, a guy taking anti-psychotics and starring catatonically through life, you barley exist Jess."

He was quiet for a moment, he rubbed his hands together.

"Fuck!" He straightened out his legs and balled up his fists.

"Fuck Luke! How about you don't fucking tell me what I already know, this is not who I want to be, but I can't change it, but if you think I'm going to fall over, wallow in my own mistakes, and let my kid take the fall for it. You are fucking out of your mind." Luke looked over at his nephew and he knew that Jess had the violence and the anger to get out of control. Before he did not want to believe Jess had beaten up that man, he wanted to forget about it, but looking at him he knew, he was fully capable.

Luke sized him up, his rigid stance, starring unblinkingly ahead.

"What did Derek do to you?"

Jess sucked in a deep rattling breath, and made a huffing noise as it caught in his chest, Jess looked over at him with fear in his eyes, sweat was glistening on his forehead, his hands were shaking.

"Let me out, I'll walk." Was all he said.

Luke stopped the truck, and Jess hopped out and began walking away from the truck as fast as he could.

As he watched Jess' hunched and thin frame disappear around a corner, the sun on his back, he knew just what Derek had done to him. It scared the shit out of him.