As always Glee belongs to its rightful owners and I mean no harm to those characters. Onyx, belongs to me, and she can not be used without my permission. Mikki and Jeremy belong to KikiJuanita, and you need to go over to her page and ask permission to use either of them, if you do so wish.
I do want to warn everyone that there is talk about depression within this chapter and it will be in the next one as well. I personally know how it can affect you and how hard it is to say something, anything. As it is something that I have struggled with for years and I know how it can affect everyone differently.
So if it is something that you are going through, please ask for help, and don't let your pride stand in the way of seeking help.
With that said, enjoy!
"What are you two doing?" Onyx asked, walking into the apartment, holding the door for Clint. She was only stopping by to get things for a weekend away.
"Fighting over what we are going to be for this Halloween party that Mike and Tina are having next Saturday," Seb sighed.
"You should come, Onyx," Mikki invited. "Bring Clint with you," she said.
"I would like that," Onyx nodded, sitting on the edge of the closest chair, Clint sitting on the arm of the same chair. "But it won't work," she shook her head. "Blaine is having the party at the bar, and I have to ditch out of that early because Clint has a party at his club," she explained. It would be too much if she were to go to Mike and Tina's party as well. There were times that one Halloween party is pushing it, two is more than she wants to attend and she couldn't even try to make three Halloween parties on the same night.
"Don't worry about it," Mikki smiled. "You've got a bit on your plate there," she nodded. "What are you two going as?"
"Yeah man, what couple costume did she rope you into?" Seb asked, amusement written all over his face.
"Unless he wants to dress as a teacup or a white rabbit, it won't be much of a couples costume," she shrugged.
"Mad hatter, again?" Seb laughed, shaking his head. "He could always dress up as the Cheshire cat," he chuckled.
"How many times have you been the Mad Hatter, babe?" Clint asked, curiosity rolling through him.
"Two or three," she shrugged, letting the hundred or more times settle into the background. It was by far her favorite book growing up and she loved the Mad Hatter. "It's been years, like freshman year of college years ago," she told him.
"Why can't I dress as the Mad Hatter and you can be Alice?" Clint questioned. "That is if you wanted to be the whole couples costume thing," he shrugged, not so sure about it anymore.
"Or you ya know, you both could be the Mad Hatter," Mikki commented shrugging.
"We'll sort it out," Onyx said, pushing herself up. "Just don't let him be the Flash," she smirked looking at her friend. "It's his fall back costume, and it needs to be put to rest," she shared, walking to her room, Clint following behind to leave the couple alone while they worked out their costumes. "I could care less what we are for Halloween, you could be Frankenstein and I could be Cleopatra for all I care, as long as I am with you, I am happy," she told him, going to her closet to pull out her suitcase.
"We could be the Muppets for all I care," he laughed, falling backwards onto her bed.
"We're a little old for the Muppets, baby," she told him shaking her head. "We can be anything; I really don't care, we don't have to do the whole couples thing," she told him, giving him a look over her shoulder as she went to the closest to sort through her clothes to figure out what she wanted to take with on their little weekend getaway.
"We'll have to take a look before too much longer or the pickings are gonna be slim," he shrugged, watching as she tossed clothes from the closest to her bed. A mix of jeans, skirts and a few dresses. "You do know that we are going to be gone for a total of like two days, right?" He questioned.
"I do know this, but someone won't say where we are going so it's not like I can pack what I know I need so I need to over pack, just a bit," she replied, folding the clothes on her bed to place in the suitcase.
"Yeah, still not telling you," he smirked.
"Why do I put with you?" She asked, raising an eyebrow, walking to her dresser.
"You love me," he answered. In that moment the world around them stopped. Neither one of them sure what to say to that. "Onyx," he said, making a move to get up. She shook her head, spinning from the frozen state she had taken at his words to face him.
"Don't take it back," she snapped, turning around to look at him. "Don't try to justify saying it," she said, leaning backwards on her dresser.
"It is just a saying," he told her instead. She shook her head. It wasn't just a saying, not now, not here. There was a lot more to it than that.
"Do you?" She asked, waving her hands in front of her, willing for the words to be visible between them. She's never had this hard of a time in telling anyone how she felt, she didn't know why it is that way with the man before her, the very man who captured her heart when she wasn't quite ready for him to do so.
"Do I what? Love you?" He asked, swallowing thickly. She nodded her head, pulling the corner of her bottom lip into her mouth, her teeth sinking into the flesh of her lip. "I love you," he simply told her.
"Okay," she nodded giving him a smile.
He raised an eyebrow, not pushing or questioning her on the response she gave him. He's been around her as a friend and as her boyfriend to know that no good is going to come from him giving her any kind of push into her feelings. She would sort them out on her own, he found no reason to be worried. She isn't the type of person to be with someone if she didn't think things would work out.
"I like you a lot," she said, pushing her suitcase out of her way, to sit next to him on the bed. "I don't know if I am quite ready to say those specific words back to you, because they need to mean something and they're not words I like to toss around," she told him.
"You don't think I said them just to say them do you?" He asked looking a mix of panic and hurt clouded his eyes.
She quickly shook her head, grasping his hands in hers, pressing a soft and sweet kiss against his lips. "I know that you mean them," she whispered, moving away from his lips an inch. "You deserve my love, and I want to give it you when I am ready. I don't want to say it and not mean it," she assured him. "Trust me, you will be the first person I tell, even if it's the middle of the night and it won't be said over the phone, I'll show up at your door to say the words when they mean everything," she promised him.
He laughed, capturing her lips with his own, pulling her closer, his hand pulling her hair free from the pony she had in. "You're crazy," he chuckled, resting his forehead against hers. "But I happen to like crazy and all," he smirked.
She smiled, rolling her eyes at him as she got up to get what she needed from the bathroom. With it all packed and zipped shut; they were off. As everything else she needed is in her purse.
"I'll be back sometime Sunday afternoon," she is in the process of saying when she walks into the living room, seeing the standoff between Mikki and Seb. "Do I want to know?" She asked slowly, placing her suitcase by the door.
"Would you mind telling your best friend that there is nothing wrong with going as the tin man or say the cowardly lion," Mikki stated, eyes focused on her boyfriend.
"Yeah, I can't do that," Onyx sighed shaking her head. She wouldn't put Seb in a place like that. "I think you need to find another movie, or ya know a show to find inspiration from," she nodded.
"Look, I am not stupid, I know about his dislike of the Wizard of Oz, but what is so wrong with Dorothy, the cowardly lion, the tin man or the scarecrow?"
"Nothing, but no," Seb said firmly. "You know my feelings towards that whole movie. And I haven't been sitting here telling you that we need to dress as something from a movie or a show you don't like," he told her.
"Just tell her Seb," Onyx sighed. Seb shot her a look of hell no I am not saying a word. "Fine," she warned, glaring at her friend.
"Would you like to fill the rest of the class in?" Mikki asked half amused, half pissed that they weren't telling her the rest of the story.
"I hate you," he lobbed at Onyx. Who in return shook her head, knowing he held no ill feelings towards her. "When I was 13, I went to this party with Onyx and at this point she stayed at my home more than she was at her home. So it was natural for her to crash on my bedroom floor. We had to be home by midnight and at 2 in the morning Jeremy and his friends snuck into my room dressed as the flying monkeys. They opened the window and made the noises and everything," he explained, looking down.
"Jeremy's friend did have a nice black eye for a while after that," Onyx stated with a smirk.
"That's just horrible," Mikki sighed. She couldn't even imagine doing anything like that to her siblings or them doing such a thing to her or anyone. Pranks and jokes were made, but nothing quite like that.
"It was harmless then, I have realized that," Seb nodded. It freaked him out then, made him not talk to Jeremy for nearly a month, but he got over it and he now he can see it for what it is, harmless fun. "But we need to find something else to be," he stressed.
"Okay," Mikki nodded softly.
"Need me, call," she told her best friend, walking to the door, to get her things.
"I will, but I am sure I won't need anything," Seb chuckled. And he wouldn't be calling to ruin his friends weekend away, unless it happened to be an emergency of some sort.
On the drive to the surprise getaway, Onyx fell asleep, dozing most of the drive, leaving Clint to his own thoughts on the nearly two hour drive. He has known for the past week how much Onyx had came to mean to him and thinking back on how it came out, that wasn't his ideal way to tell her. He hadn't thought about how or the when, and he wasn't going to make it anything over the top and make it every walking cliché in the book, but it would have been when she was more willing to find that she loves him the same way.
But now that it's been said, he can't regret that she knows his feelings and how deep they run for her. If anything he is happy that his feelings towards her came out, gave her more insight in knowing that he wouldn't do anything to hurt her because he cared deeply for her.
"Have a nice nap?" He asked, amusement in his voice, seeing his girlfriend start to stir as they were closing in on what he has planned for the next few days.
"Why'd you let me sleep the whole way? Did I sleep the whole way?" She asked around a yawn, taking her surroundings in, seeing lush green fields on both sides of the road.
"For the most part," he chuckled, reaching over to give her knee a small squeeze, his thumb rubbing against the bare skin of her knee from the rips in her jeans.
"In that case, it was a lovely little nap. I didn't even know I was quite that tired," she shared, resting her head on the headrest to look at her boyfriend.
"You have gone from being able to sleep the day away to getting up at the crack of dawn," he pointed out, slowing down to turn on a dirt road.
She nodded, agreeing with him to extant. Most days she hadn't been able to sleep the day away, not with her work at the community center. A handful of days she had been able to sleep while into the day. Dealing with three different classes of teenagers five days a week isn't exactly a walk in the park.
"Maybe," she shrugged. It really could have been from the lack of sleep since school started, but she really didn't know if there happened to be more to it or not. "Are we really spending the next few days in a cabin in the middle of nowhere?" She asked, raising her eyebrow at him seeing the log cabin, a small pond behind the house.
"Is there something wrong with that?" He asked, pulling the car to stop and turning it off once he had it in park.
"Well, you see I wasn't let in on the fact I needed a swimsuit of any kind, therefore I didn't bring one," she told him, opening the car door.
"Now who said anything about swimsuits?" He asked, wagging his eyebrows, holding a smug smirk on his face. Tempting enough for Onyx to lean over and get herself tangled up with her boyfriend the best one can across the middle of a car.
"You might end up being the death of me," she remarked, matching the smirk he wore mere moments ago.
"Now what happened to the title of best boyfriend, ever?" He gasped in a playfully shock.
"Hmm, can't say I ever said such a thing," she stated, climbing from the car, walking to the trunk to wait for him to join her.
"It's a good thing I love you," he remarked, pulling the trunk open, grabbing both bags before she had a chance to get her own bag.
"Is that so?" She questioned, shutting the trunk and following behind him to the front door of the cabin. He winked unlocking the door and placing the bags just inside the door to let her enter the place first.
Once the door shut, she pulled her boyfriend into her for a heated kiss, it had been far too long since she had been able to spend any real amount of alone time with her boyfriend and she wanted to cherish the time the best way she knew how when she craved the man before her.
The first night had been fun and amazing, so much so that they had went to bed curled up in the king sized bed, identical smiles on their faces, ready to enjoy the next few days fully without any interruptions by phones or people intruding on them.
The only thing that hadn't been factored into the whole equation had been when Onyx woke up hours before the sun was to rise. Laying next to Clint made her feel suffocated and she slowly trying not to disrupt his sleep, got out of bed. She dressed, grabbing a spare blanket as she went, making herself a cup of tea and headed outside to the back porch overlooking the pond. With the blanket wrapped around her, she sat down in the swinging chair, holding her steaming cup of tea in both her hands.
She let herself get lost in her thoughts as the world around her slowly started to come to life the longer she sat there. She enjoyed hearing the owls hooting in the distance, and the birds chirping around her as they started to wake the lighter it grew outside, her eyes adjusting to the early dawn light. Letting it all wash over her, wanting to be rid of the somber mood she found herself in. The last thing she wanted to happen on her weekend away was fall down the dark tunnel of depression.
She closed her eyes, taking deep even breathes, wanting to go back to the day before. The problem with being consumed by yourself, she didn't hear her boyfriend moving around the cabin, didn't smell the bitterness of the coffee he put on, nor did she hear the door creak open with her boyfriend taking a seat next to her.
"Baby?" He whispered, not wanting to scare her as he placed a hand on her shoulder. She gave him a tight smile, looking away quicker than normal. "What's wrong?" He questioned, worry etched into his caring tone, his thumb rubbing circles where it rested on her shoulder. He could see the dark circles under eyes, feel the way she tensed up under his touch, could see in her eyes that something wasn't quite right.
"Nothing," she replied, casting a glance down at her half empty cup of tea, that was cold by now, she was sure of. Clint remained quiet, knowing there was more and he wanted to give her the time she clearly needed. "Everything," she muttered, making a move to get up.
"Onyx, hey," he said, getting up with her, tugging her into a warm hug. "Talk to me," he whispered, pressing a kiss to her temple.
"I can't," she stated, shoving him away, trying to make her escape.
"Let me help," he pleaded. "Let me in, Onyx," he begged, wanting nothing more than to help her through whatever she is currently struggling with.
"It's not that easy, and I'll be fine," she hissed, storming into the cabin, going straight to the bedroom, relieved to see that it had a lock. With the door locked, she curled up in the middle of the bed and cried herself to sleep.
Clint followed her back into the cabin but instead of going to the bedroom, he retreated to the kitchen, making a start on breakfast. He is going to show and prove to Onyx that he isn't going anywhere. He wants to show her that she can trust him with whatever she is feeling. He doesn't want her to hide any part of her from him. He's not going to stop loving her because she has a few bad days.
With breakfast done and on a tray, he walked to the bedroom, finding the door to be locked. He sighed, using one hand to hold the tray as he lightly knocked on the door. "Onyx, baby," he softly called out, not wanting to wake her if she happened to have fallen asleep. "I've got food," he said, not knowing if she was awake and just plain out ignoring him. It'll be out here if you get hungry," he informed her, placing the tray on the floor in front of the door. "Please eat something."
He racked his brain for hours trying to figure out if he had done something wrong the night before, but every time he came up empty handed. He thought about calling Sebastian or Jeff to get their inputs on the whole matter, but he didn't know what's wrong with Onyx to even ask them for help.
He found things to do to keep his mind from over worrying about his girlfriend, but she was there in the forefront of his mind, all day. Because as darkness started to set upon him, he realized that she had spent the day in bed locked away from the world and mostly him. And that hurt deeply.
He was in the middle of contemplating about picking the lock on the bedroom door, when his girlfriend stepped out of the room, her suitcase behind her. He dreaded to know the words about to come from her mouth, as he had an inkling he already knew what she wanted. And he would give it to her, if it meant she wasn't in pain any longer.
"Can we please go?" She asked him, her focus on the wooden floor. There isn't a way for their getaway to go back to being the amazing weekend they had planned.
"Give me a few minutes to pack," he told her, surprising even himself, with keeping his emotions in check. "You know you can talk to me about anything, right?" He asked, pleading with his eyes, for her to open up to him. The only response he got happened to be a small shrug. He sighed, heading to the bedroom, to pack everything he unpacked yesterday.
To say the car ride home was anything but silent would be understatement as a heavy awkwardness settled in the car, one that had never been there before. She kept far away from him as she physically could, her eyes focused on the vast blackness of the night, the stars and the moon covered up by the clouds that moved in. The radio nothing more than to provide background noise.
"I need Jeff," she told him in a broken voice, once they got within city limits.
"Okay," he told her, licking his lips. Wondering just what his girlfriend is going through to break her to the point that she needs to see her brother over her best friend. "Onyx," he started to say.
"Don't," she warned him, shaking her head, something he could barely make out with the street lamps shining in for the brief second he drove past them.
They rode the elevator together, standing on opposite sides of the small box that took them up to their separate destinations. When the doors opened on the floor she needed, the best she gave him was nothing more than a small broken smile. And he hated that look on her face.
Once he got to his place, he put his luggage on his bed and found some shorts and an old shirt, grabbing a pair of running shoes, to go out for a late night run.
"Onyx?" Jeff questioned, pulling his apartment door open, confused on why his sister stood before him at such a late hour in the night, when should had been off for the weekend with her boyfriend. "Is everything okay?" He asked, stepping aside to let her in.
"No," she whispered, shaking her head. "It's been years," she tacked on softly, sitting in the middle of the couch, leaving her suitcase by the door.
"How long?" He asked with a sigh, sitting down next to her and wrapping an arm around her. She easily fell into him, her eyes closing, feeling safe in her brother's warmth.
"4 this morning," she replied, feeling her brother tense up for a moment before he relaxed, a hand rubbing gentle circles on her back.
"You should really tell Clint. Because I can't imagine him being anything other than worried and concerned over how broken you seem to be," he prompted.
"You know I can't," she harshly told him. It had taken her years to explain the depression to anyone, placing a happy domineer on her face that was anything but real, to fool those closest to her.
It had been Jeff to figure out that she had been faking her happiness. And he had been there, helping her out of her funk, the only way he knew how. He had always been thankfully that her depression never resulted in self-harm or thoughts about suicide.
"But you can't push him away, he's going to take it wrong if he hasn't already. You can't shrug your way out of explaining things to him," Jeff told her. "You'd be surprised how strong others can be, once you let your pride move out of the way," he said, resting his head against hers.
"He told me that he loves me yesterday, before we left," she told her brother. "And being the broken person that I truly am, I can't say it back and I go right ahead and fall into a bout of depression, something that hasn't reared its ugly head since Sophomore year of college," she bitterly spit out. "So you can see why I think it might be best to cut my losses now and let him go find someone that isn't me to deal with," she said on the verge of tears.
"That is for him to decide, and he can't decide that if he doesn't have all of the facts," Jeff stated. "And don't give me any bullshit about protecting him or any other sort of crap, Onyx," he warned.
"Leave it be Jeff," she stated, moving away from him. "Can I crash here or not?" She asked, pushing herself from the couch.
Jeff nodded getting her blankets and a pillow, knowing that she wouldn't take his bed, as she hasn't done so any other times. He could only hope that by morning she felt more like herself and not fall deeper than she already has.