If making himself scarce was the way to avoid anymore Echolls Sadsackery, it was a sacrifice Dick was willing to make. He'd smoke the Mars peace pipe, bury the hatchet yada yada...

Except, here he was... all alone with the one trigger that made him lose his hard fought for peace... the girl with sad silver eyes his brother had clapped and for at Graduation... Cindy Mackenzie who'd been the only person to show up to his brothers funeral. Brave move after the Mannings declared the younger Casablancas responsible for the death of his eldest daughter Meg, and the news broke about his part in the death of Mayor Woody Goodman.

His baby brother's tombstone was constantly being vandalized, as if even in death the cruelty of this place wouldn't leave him alone.

"Why did you stay?" he asked quietly, his face set in solemn lines. "I've been trying to figure it out all night. Last I checked no polar vortex marooned you from the penthouse."

"Maybe because in your best buds vodkabulary drinking responsibly translates as dont spill it?" Mac quipped, shifting her bag up her shoulder.

Veronica's request to keep Logan's roommate occupied while she soothed her brooding boyfriends anxious behaviour had led to this fragile alliance tonight but it seemed Dick was content to resume his Countdown to Nuclear, this conversation was about as welcome as dinner on a pirate ship with the Vice Principals son.

"Yeah, well I can deal with my Sexile without the clam jamming." he retorted cutting her a look that made her blood warm.

"A Clam jam! In that sausage fest?" she asked incredulously hinting at the direction the trio of Pi Sigs had went.

He was the one who'd dragged her into the Uber!

She bit her tongue and glowered back at him.

Dick tucked his hands into the back pockets of his trousers, he had the uneasy feeling that she'd stayed to keep a protective eye over him on Logan's behalf. He had no business talking to Cindy Mackenzie. She was sweet and good and kind.. the best thing his brother ever had, the goofy smiles he'd witnessed were the only evidence Dick had found in anything that made his brother feel happy to be alive. Cassidy had pined after the girl... Long sessions of listening-to-depressing-love-songs-type stuff.

His best friend had asked him to be his best man, and while he wasn't always down with who his buddy got down with... he was always down with Logan, and he wanted Veronica.

He'd told the therapist his mother forced him to that he was differently okay, and it was true. This okay wasn't the same as before, it was an okay on the precipice, a mid-step. Cindy Mackenzie could give him permission to leave that self-imposed cell but part of him hated her for it. She cleaved him in two, like she could see inside his head.

"Well Beaver Dam is a bit on the nose." he retorted pulling out the hipflask and taking a swig. He saw the quick glitter of angry tears before she tore her silver gaze away from him. "That's my dead weight, not yours."

It felt like she had been watching Dick Casablancas circling the drain for months. A man so lost in his cups there was never a need for pre-loading. There was a line when drinking stopped being about fun and began to start a dependence. She'd walk down town. The bus terminal was only half a block away. Anything to escape seeing the look in his eyes speaking a truth that he wouldn't.

Our pleasures are shallow, our sorrows are deep.

Not that she should be expecting anything so self-aware from the High School jock who tried to put his grades up for adoption because he couldn't raise them.

Did Logan even notice his best friends self-destruction? Dick had joined the Pi Sigs as soon as he'd enrolled at Hearst, after losing one brother, he'd found himself an entire house of honorary ones. She'd heard from Veronica that he'd become very protective of Chip Diller including the disgraced fraternity President his afternoons out with Logan, much to her disgust... but maybe it was an attempt to help an abuse victim since he couldn't be there for Cassidy?

"He was supposed to be in safe hands."

"Later Dick." she snapped and turned on her heel, walking away. He should be glad he'd finally run her off with his mouth, but whatever small surviving thread of conscience remained wouldn't allow him to leave their final interactions like this... again.

When a version of us ended, so did the connections attached to it.

Maybe, just like that familiar ache in his chest he woke up with every morning, that's why he couldn't let go of her either. She was a living breathing piece of the life he'd shared with his brother and a part of him still craved it... need it...

She was so damn beautiful his chest hurt.. the only piece of happiness his kid brother had ever found... and dammit he wanted it.

"Mackenzie, wait. I'm sorry that... I handle it the way that I do. This isn't coming out the way I-I its like I know we aren't done with each other yet, because if we are... either way I lose. No one else can spit out facts about him on the spot." Dick swallowed as she stilled. "No one but you could tell me the things I never knew about my brother."

Sometimes words cant measure up to the pain they carry or the damage they'd inflict.

Too much rum and a man's heart is laid open for all to see.

"You want forgiveness? A real apology isn't given with the intention of unburdening yourself. Its because you genuinely mean it." Mac told him quietly. Her eyes deadset on the blonde surfer she stood up taller.

Neptune was a warzone. High School was a breeding ground for losers; jealous, broken-hearted girls; and acne-covered fools with zero game. The disgustingly rich kids were cruel, vindictive, and popular - they'd be always be at the top. High school is simply survival of the fittest. And Dick was the fittest of them all.

Once.

Cassidy had thought he had nothing left, but I loved him with everything. He always had this dainty heart. Pain happens when you care.

If you cannot bite, never show your teeth. Dad had just wanted to toughen us up, prepare us for dealing with this fucked up world, but when Cassidy had really needed his father, he'd had no one. Only me.

And it wouldn't ever be enough...

"I... I thought I knew how to live, but I don't. I lost something, and I can't get it back. Its this... silence. He's gone, and I don't know how to not notice it. You know, when they first told me about Beaves.. I got this feeling like I was floating outside myself, and even after the funeral sometimes I feel like I'm still waiting to crash down from it. I can't imagine losing anyone else. So what I'm a jerk. Life isn't supposed to end after we crash and burn because of somebody's mistake. We are supposed to grow but because of Veronica's live action scooby doo... he'll never do that. He won't ever get the chance to become anything else." Dick told her with a devastated look on his face.