Title: Right kind of wrong – Chapter 18
Author: kreia03
Rating: M
Warnings: Some swear words.
Disclaimer: I don't own Skins. I just wish I do. I seriously need a genie.
Summary: A little Emily/JJ talk.
A/N: Not beta'd so mistakes are purely mine. Thanks for all the comments! They really do keep me going! AND PLEASE DON'T HATE ME FOR THIS CHAPTER! IT'S PART OF THE STORY! :(
Emily had no idea how long she had been mindlessly staring at the dark blue casket laid before her. She did not even have the faintest knowledge of how many days she had been staying up, wide awake, sitting on the exact same place she had occupied since the first day of the wake. She wasn't even sure if she was still able to blink or twitch. If breathing had not been a usual routine, she probably might have completely forgotten about it. Right now, she wasn't capable of thinking about anything, her thoughts empty, her mind wandering, her heart lost. She sat there, her head spinning in a huge daze, numbing all her senses, blocking everything out. She had grown tired of crying, or at least she thought, or maybe she had run out of tears from pouring her heart out the past days. Though she couldn't be bothered of the real reason why, like she couldn't be bothered about what's going on around her anymore.
"Ems, do you want to have some dinner?" She heard her twin spoke, yet ignored it like she did to almost anybody who approached her, asking how she was and offering condolences. The last thing she ever needed was a reminder that the core of her existence was dead, that Naomi was dead, forever gone. She cringed at the word "dead", wrapping her arms instantaneously around her shoulders as she felt a sudden shudder. Her eyes then fell to the dark blue casket. She wanted to topple it over, she had been wanting to since it came, but she couldn't bring herself to move, like her brain had been detached from her body. She kept thinking of doing things but couldn't find the strength or even the will to do it.
"Emily, you need to eat. You haven't eaten anything for the past three days."
"Leave me alone Katie." She replied, her voice grievous and cold, probably hoarser than it had ever been.
"Emily-"
"Just leave me alone." She barely whispered, breaking Katie off. "Please." She blew a deep breath as she felt her twin left her side begrudgingly, leaving her to live inside the little bubble she had conjured for herself. She knew that Katie was just trying to help. Her twin was just trying to make things easy for her and was just sincerely concerned. Honestly, she wanted thank her for being there, wanted to feel and embrace the concern and comfort. But that was the problem.
She couldn't feel anything, no emotion at all.
She closed her eyes, her stare falling back to the closed dark blue casket in front of her as they flew open.
"I really don't know why they chose a blue casket." It was JJ who broke Emily's stupor. She unwillingly tore her gaze from the casket and eyed the boy with a confused look on her face, wondering what the fuck was JJ babbling about now. "I mean, it's blue and Naomi's eyes are blue. Isn't that a sort of reminder? Kind of rubbing it in?" He continued, the look he saw on Emily's face encouraging him to go on.
Emily stared at him for a while, watching him fidget and play with his fingers as her stare took longer than expected. He actually had a point, of people rubbing it in with all the commiserations and stuff. Why can't they just fuck off and leave.
"Weird thing is people don't even know who exactly we are grieving for. They know her as Jade, not as Naomi. They see her as Jade, not Naomi. Fucking twats! They don't even have any picture of her! Just a closed fucking blue casket with burning candles and fucking yellow lights! Even the cards on those damn flowers say Jade Raymond! Shitification! Fuck!-"
"JJ. JJ!" She called out, holding the locked on boy by his shoulders. "Calm down, yeah?"
"Yeah, sorry." He whispered, getting back on playing with his fingers. "I just don't think it's fair."
For the first time ever, after the dreaded incident, Emily found herself offering a small, sad smile to JJ. She oddly felt comfortable with him, albeit having no idea why. Probably, because of the fact that JJ knew the real Naomi and he was the only one who could relate to her and to her emotions right now. Because they both lost somebody important to them, somebody they treasured in their lives.
"I actually envy you JJ." She managed to speak out.
JJ lifted his head, flustered. "Why?"
"Because you were able to spend more time with her. You got to know her better."
"I really think you shouldn't." JJ replied, the corner of his lips curling a tad bit.
"Why not?"
"I may have spent more time with her, but I never saw that side of her that shows every time she was with you. Not even a glimpse. And I don't think anybody had seen it at all, except you."
Emily's eyes grew wide with surprise. "You mean-"
JJ answered with a nod, finishing the sentence for the red head. "She had never been with somebody else. As far as I know and I can remember, she hated love. The mere word made her cringe. She even made faces when she saw couples passing by, especially those who were making out. She looked like she was going to throw up." He chuckled as he recalled, his smile turning into a lopsided frown as he felt his own tears stinging his eyes. "She never believed in anything, never trusted anybody, until she met you."
"She trusted you. She said you were the only person she ever trusted."
"Well I guess that makes us two then." He smiled, quickly wiping a tear that rolled down his cheek. Silence quickly followed, the kind of silence that was comfortable and calming enough as they both soothed their searing hearts with each other's presence.
"She loved you Emily, more than anything else." JJ spoke after a moment. "I could testify to that."
Emily tipped her head up, stopping the tears that were on the verge of falling. She had no idea how she could still even have tears when she knew she had cried her everything out. "She loved us both J. You were like a brother to her. The brother she never had." She watched as JJ's shoulders turn down into a slump, shaking as he broke down. She reached for him, enveloping him into a tight embrace as reality began to sink in on both of them.
Naomi was gone and they will never see her again.
O+O+O+O+O+O+O+O+O
"Katie, I'm going out."
"Do you want me to come with you?"
Emily shook her head. "Don't worry about me." She pressed her lips in a tight line. "I'll see you later." She turned and headed for the door.
It had been a week after the funeral, yet the thought of Naomi's death had never fully sunk in to Emily. She knew well that she was still in denial about things, but it was the only way she knew that would keep a hold of her saneness. She was hanging by a thread, struggling hard not to go over the brink of insanity and completely lose it. Everybody had told her to let go, even pushing her to it. Everybody but JJ and Freddie. She wasn't sure why Freddie had not said a word about acceptance and shit. Maybe he knew these things take time and should not be hastened, and JJ, they were almost at the same boat, almost.
She made her way down the path, turning into a corner. She spotted her purpose and headed towards it, her shoes sloshing at the slight damp grass as she walked. She was quite thankful that it had stopped raining, because she had not bothered to bring with her an umbrella. Well, she couldn't care less about herself anymore. Emily was pretty sure she looked like a total mess, looked like total shit but ignored it. Life wasn't that meaningful for her anyway. What's the use of dressing up and pretending to be okay? As she approached her destination, stopping by a few inches away from it, she crouched down, her fingertips touching the cold hard stone protruding from the ground, tracing the carved letters on it.
"Jade Raymond." She read out loud. She wanted to be angry, be mad at everybody pretending to know the girl she loved, when in fact they don't know anything about her. She caught her breath, her heart searing with pain as she tried to think of her name. Yet, she couldn't. The name itself brought a lot of memories, nightmares to be exact, that she had wanted to forget. Memories that she had locked into a vault and buried under the deepest, farthest corner at the back of her mind.
"You promised me you'll come back to me alive." She cried out, clutching the black leather jacket she had brought with her, the jacket that the blonde once owned. She buried her face in it, finally breaking down after days of holding it together as the scent filled her nose, bringing back images and scenes piercing through her heart. She was her life, her everything. And when your life has been taken away from you, you get to have this feeling of emptiness, like your heart had been ripped out, leaving a large, mangled hole in your chest. A hole that will never be filled by anyone else.
It was bad enough that she could see the memories, worse when she could hear Naomi's voice ringing in her ears.
