It was two months into her first semester at Hearst College when she completely and totally lost it. She'd thought she's been handling everything fairly well. At least as well as you could handle it when your you almost lose your virginity to your boyfriend before finding out that he's murdered ten of your classmates and jumped off the roof of the hotel.
She thought she was doing all right, but in this moment, sitting on the steps of her dorm, sobbing because some guy had tried to feel her up she realized she was just pretending. She'd been pretending since the moment Cassidy had taken her clothes and left her sobbing in a corner. Pretended to give a crap about her stupid classes, about socializing, pretended that she found Logan's constant over-protectiveness endearing instead of irritating, pretending that part of her wasn't so pissed off that he and Veronica, and hell, even Dick seemed to be able to move on while she was still stuck on the hotel room door trying to figure out what went wrong.
"Mac?" she heard a voice query, it sounded a million miles away. She looked up and saw of all people, "Weevil?"
"Yeah."
"What…what are you doing here?" she questioned, confused at seeing him and irritated that her voice was trembling.
"I work here, chica, what are you doing outside at the time of night?"
She took a deep breath, brushing away more tears, "I…uh…there was a party."
"And what, you got bored surrounded by the rich and privileged?" his voice is tinged with a heat she doesn't recognize. They haven't talked more than a handful of times in their lives, but she knows his voice never sounded like that, like a razor's edge.
"No, I…there was a guy, there" Why couldn't she seem to get a full sentence out?
She realized that Weevil had gotten closer and her face must be even worse than she thought because suddenly he's kneeling in front of her, concern on his face, "What guy? Did someone hurt you?" He looks so worried and angry at the possibility that she quickly shakes her head.
"No, he just…just got too close and I had to get out of there. I couldn't take it anymore. I can't take it. I can't," and just like that she is sobbing again and she hears him let out a deep breath. She can tell he is irritated, and waits for him to leave so she can continue her breakdown in private. So, she is very surprised when his arm wraps around her shoulder. It only makes her sob harder and she grabs his jacket in her hands, the jacket of this ex-felon that she's barely even knows and holds on likes it's a life preserver. She fears if she lets go she might drift away in her own pain.
Finally, she's cried all of the tears she had and jerked back, embarrassed and angry at herself for losing control. Weevil seemed to take it as a personal insult and he pulled quickly away and stood up. She watched him walk a few steps before she called out to him.
He turned back toward her and she tried to figure out what to say, "Thanks for…uh…for sitting with me. I really needed….to just…" she didn't want to say that she just really needed to be help, really needed to cry so she just shrugged.
He nodded and she felt that he understood. She didn't know how, from just a nod, but she did. He threw his arm up and gestured toward the building behind her. "Listen, you should go inside. Being out her like this, isn't safe. All kinds of nasty things out this time of night, even in Richey Rich land." The razor's edge is back again.
She nods and gets up to go in. She watches him walk away from inside the doors of the dorm. Watches until he's blended in with the night.
It's not until she gets to her room and goes to lay down that she realizes that there is a jacket around her shoulders. Sometime in her hysterical crying jag he slipped the jacket around her shoulders. She can feel a smile on her face, it's small, but it's real and as she drifts off the sleep she clutches the jacket tighter around her.