note1: this chapter is unedited, because i figured you guys have been waiting long enough for an update. i'll come back to it soon.
note2: this one is a whopper! all the povs this time [evil laughter] and i think it covers enough of homecoming to satisfy you.

listen ma i'll give you all i got

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claire;

There was a sharp intake of air.

"Wow."

Feeling almost relieved at the awed look on Derrick's face, Claire finally stopped tugging on the yellow tulle of her skirt and let it flutter around her thighs. She couldn't stop her smile from tugging up the corner of her mouth at the sight of Derrick leaning against his car on her driveway. In his hands was a clear glass container, holding her Homecoming corsage.

Derrick stilled seemed speechless, so she peeked up at him from the bottom of her lashes.

"Is… this going to be a problem?" she asked.

"For me it is," he replied, taking her hand. "You look beautiful."

Claire couldn't stop smile from breaking out on her face when he slid her corsage on her wrist. It contained three yellow hydrangea flowers, accentuated with white pearl sprays and decorated with long trailing blue ribbons that matched Derrick's own suit.

"Thank you," she told him, admiring the complimentary colors.

Derrick's thumb ran across her wrist as he looked at her. She watched him for a moment before the silence became too heavy for her. She had to speak up. "Is everything alright?"

Finally, he nodded, and then seemed to try for a smile to placate her. "Yeah, everything's fine. Let's go."

Claire didn't like his silence and was already looking for a way to break it. Derrick was only just pulling out of her driveway when his phone pinged. She watched with apprehension as he fished it out of his inner tux jacket and read who it was from. She was uncomfortable with him looking at phone and driving, despite still being in her neighborhood, so she reached over to tug it out of his hands.

Derrick was surprised, but he didn't let go of his phone, and Claire's curiosity got the better of her.

"You shouldn't text and drive," she teased, still holding on.

Derrick seemed to meet her eyes for a long time, and Claire felt the pressure of his gaze this time, as if he was considering her. For a moment, Claire almost thought he wouldn't let go, but then he released his phone into her hands. He returned his own hands to the wheel and his attention on the road.

Claire clicked on his phone so that it lit up again and saw that it was a text message.

"It's from your dad," she told him. Derrick had never mentioned his parents to her before, so she suddenly felt like she was invading his privacy. She realized now why he had been so reluctant to hand her his phone. She bit her lip and turned to look at him. "Do you want me to read it to you?"

Derrick grunted, which wasn't really an answer.

She watched as he signaled to make a traffic-heavy turn out of her neighborhood.

Claire tapped on the message, but his phone was locked. Not wanting to outright ask for his password, Claire placed the phone down on her lap. She only glanced at it again when it vibrated a few more times in rapid succession.

"I think he's trying to get a hold of you," she told him.

Derrick stayed focused on the road, and for a moment, Claire thought he hadn't heard her over the light music on the radio, until he finally scoffed. "If he wanted to get a hold of me, he would do more than send a few texts." At her look of confusion, Derrick explained, "I haven't talked to him since the beginning of summer."

Claire's brow furrowed. She couldn't imagine not keeping in contact with her parents. Her parents might have been having problems, but they still kept in constant contact with her. Feeling discomfited from his response, she finally asked, "You don't get along with your dad?"

Derrick was silent for another long moment, before he finally said, "Got along without him."

Sympathy welled up inside her chest and threatened to overflow.

"What do you mean?" she asked for clarification.

"I mean, that if they gave awards out for absentee parent of the year, my dad would win every time, and he would be too busy to show up to collect," Derrick joked with a hollow laugh.

Claire didn't know what she hated more. His words or the fact that he tried to play off that it didn't bother him in the least.

"Don't," she snapped, before he could crack another joke. She couldn't even imagine a world without her father in it. Jay Lyons was everything to her, and her parent's recent divorce had altered everything about her world. She didn't like to think about the fact that their problems might be unsolvable. Hearing Derrick talk about his own parents like that made her both mad and sad. Both for him and for herself.

"Don't what?" Derrick asked her, interrupting her turbulent thoughts.

She forced herself to take a deep breath.

"Don't act like you don't care," she finally said, "when you do."

Maybe it was the way she said it gently, instead of snapping at him again. Or maybe it was the way her own pain revealed itself in her tone, but Derrick didn't lash out at her. Even though Claire thought he would have every right to after she had basically called him out.

At Derrick's dark silence, Claire swallowed and forced her feelings out into words. "They're your parents," she told him gently. "It's okay to feel hurt. You don't have to always hide how you're feeling behind that mask."

It was advice to herself, as much as it was also for Derrick.

Maybe she was heading too much into uncomfortable territory. Maybe she was being too honest too soon. But after all the time they spent together, inside and outside of school, in public and in private, Claire thought that she had a pretty clear idea of who Derrick was and what he had to represent.

There were sides of him. Different ones that he showed the world and the ones he revealed when he was with her. And the way he joked around about his father just felt off to her. It was obvious that it affected him, and she hated that he was forced to play it off in front of her. If he couldn't be honest with her, how could he be honest with himself?

She hoped that he could, because that meant maybe she could be with her own parents as well.

Derrick took a deep breath and Claire glanced up at him.

"You're right," Derrick finally admitted, surprising her. She almost did a double take. She hadn't expected him to admit it.

"They're my parents," he told her simply when he saw her looking. "Of course I care."

Feeling heartfelt warmth blossom in her chest at his acceptance, Claire reached over and laid her hand over his. He stiffened for a moment before he consciously relaxed.

"Is there anyone in your family that's there for you?" she asked, thinking of her younger brother. Todd was back in Orlando, yet he still remained her lifeline as the only other person to understand what she was going through, if only because he was also going through the same thing.

Derrick seemed to be fighting down a scoff, but he didn't say anything. Probably out of respect for her feelings again. She found that she liked that he didn't want to upset her.

"Not even Massie?" she asked tentatively, trying to fight down her bubbling curiosity.

It wasn't working.

Derrick Harrington. Massie Block. Two names; constantly spoken of, almost always together too—and Claire could even understand why. The student body president and the captain of their championship winning soccer team were bound to be talked about and heard of at their small private school. But the thing was… whenever Claire heard one name from a gossiper's lips, the other would inevitably follow. It was like people couldn't even talk about them without relating them to the other. On top of that, everything she had ever heard about them was conflicting too.

She had heard they hated each other, but also that they were actually close friends. She had heard that they were barely able to coexist together in one household, but also that they had dated in the past.

Which she thought had to be wrong, because they lived together now.

But she hadn't noticed anything untoward between the two of them. They interacted like a cross between maybe friends and actual stepsiblings when they were together in front of her.

But whenever she brought Massie up in front of Derrick, he always seemed to be closed off.

She didn't know why. And in turn, it made her almost obsessed. She was constantly fishing, but nothing she heard or saw made sense. She wanted to know more. About Derrick. About Massie. About the both of them.

This was her chance.

"…unless your parents are there for Massie?" she asked, hoping that it'd spur him into opening up again.

Derrick shook his head and Claire was disappointed he didn't say more. However, when they stopped at a red light, he turned to her again and continued their conversation, "Let's just say growing up Massie's mom held a certain view on physical affection."

Claire raised her eyebrows in question.

"It'd wrinkle her perfectly pressed pantsuits."

Her jaw dropped.

"That's awful," she muttered. It was Derrick's way of brushing things off again. He always presented this act, always saying things lightheartedly, joking around, and acting like nothing could bother him. When it was obvious it did. She hated it.

But she didn't focus on that; instead she focused back on Massie's behavior. It seemed she and Derrick were both the same way. Only instead of goofing off, Massie acted impervious. But unlike Derrick, maybe she really was that way.

"Is that why Massie's the way she is?" she finally asked, tapping her finger against her chin.

Derrick laughed. It was his turn to raise his brows. "What? Uppity? Uptight?"

No, that wasn't it, but Claire struggled to put it into words.

"Self assured," she finally decided to say.

"That's just a persona." Derrick's words were bitter, but then, he always seemed bitter whenever she brought Massie up. He wasn't looking at her again. His attention was back on the road. "Don't tell me you bought into it too."

He almost sounded disappointed, and it rubbed Claire the wrong way. She bristled, but Derrick continued before she could say anything.

"Look, you don't know the real Massie. No one really does. She might seem really self possessed, but that's the thing. She overestimates herself. Her ability to control."

Claire had a hard time listening to his clear-cut analysis. This was his own stepsister, and also the girl that had done so much for Claire since she had arrived in Westchester, but she also didn't stop him. She couldn't seem to want to stop him. It seemed that she was more curious than she thought.

"Block's... like a driver, but one who enjoys driving recklessly between boulders and around cliffs. But only for the purpose of saying that she did it, did it effortlessly, and that she came out if it perfectly fine. And then she uses that reason as justification to keep going, to keep doing—"

Derrick cut himself off abruptly, but Claire didn't even notice. She was still stuck on that analogy. She couldn't figure out what to say in response. It was almost too deep for her.

"Some people would even praise her for something like that," Derrick murmured, tightening his hands on the wheel. He said it softly, but Claire could tell he was upset. "Or commend her, whatever, but you shouldn't follow her blindly for that."

Claire stopped herself from protesting, if only because Derrick was sort of right. She had admired certain things about Massie, and about Derrick, and about Westchester. Probably blindly. How much did she really know about the real Massie or the real Derrick?

Did she even want to find out?

Still, she… shouldn't have pried into things that Derrick didn't want to talk about, but she was also surprised at how well he seemed to know Massie, and how well he seemed to put her personality into words. She stared at him for a moment, but he seemed to be lost in thought now too.

"She actually agrees with your views, and she hates herself for it."

Claire blinked, but Derrick must have thought he had said too much, because he was quiet after that.

She couldn't help herself, she had to say something. "I knew—I mean, I could figure. That what I see probably isn't what's real." Derrick didn't seem to believe her and it pissed her off. So she elaborated, "Because everyone in Westchester seems to have a persona. Including you, Derrick. You even admitted to it yourself, and I just can't understand it. Why can't people just be true to themselves?"

"Not everyone has that luxury," Derrick stated. Like it was fact. Like that was it. End of story.

He shifted his car into park and made to exit. They had arrived at the event hall. Claire felt her lower lip tremble, a sign that the entire conversation and its abrupt end was getting to her. They were finally here, finally parked, finally out of the car, but it meant that this was probably the end of this topic forever.

And she couldn't let that happen. She couldn't let that be it.

Claire allowed Derrick to open the passenger door for her. She stepped out and looked around. There were plenty of people milling around outside, elegantly dressed and lining up to head into the ballroom—that could probably see them—but Claire didn't care. She didn't care at all about anyone else or what they might say.

She reached over and grasped at Derrick's hand again. He looked down at her in surprise.

"You can have that luxury," she whispered, "with me. You can be yourself with me."

Derrick seemed to struggle for a moment. He must have never received an offer like that before. He stared at her for a moment, with something like incredulity, before he lifted his hand and interlocked their fingers.

"You don't have a disingenuous done in your body, do you?" he asked, seemingly in disbelief.

Claire tilted her head in confusion. Why would she be insincere about this? At her look, Derrick let out a chuckle that slowly turned into a laugh. The same one she liked so much, the one that made his caramel eyes crinkle and her belly warm.

Before she could ask if he was laughing at her, he leaned down and kissed her.

She was surprised again, but the smell of the fresh grass on the lawn, the glow of the old-fashioned Paris street lights above them, and the chattering of the crowd of students in front of them all faded away. Until all that was left was the feeling of Derrick's lips on hers.

She wanted to commit this to memory. The way that he had looked at her in awe at her words, the way he tasted on her own lips, and the way he made her feel, kissing her in front of a giant crowd of people from their private school.

She fought down the sudden balloon of happiness rising in her chest.

Because now, everybody would know that Derrick Harrington didn't have to hide when he was with Claire Lyons.

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massie;

"Everything looks sooo amazing, Massie," Alex Higgins and her junior posse gushed.

Massie barely spared the girls a smile before breezing past them towards her table. After being forced to make one last review of the entire ballroom with Dean Wiseman and the hired event coordinator to fix all the mistakes her incompetent classmates made, Massie was in no mood for empty babble.

She had missed making a big entrance with her girlfriends, and even the sight of students entering the decorated ballroom, freezing in their tracks, and gasping in delight at her theme and decorations, didn't cheer her up.

Massie swatted away one of the string fairy lights in her line of sight. Visually appealing, but annoying. She almost regretted them as she headed towards the nominee's table. Finally reaching them, she slid down into one of the padded dining chairs of the head table, draped elegantly in white silk, with an inaudible sigh of relief. Her cocaine high was the literally the only reason she wasn't itching to kick off her strappy heels and lay down for a nap.

But no, there was business to take care of.

"Well?" she asked, turning to Kristen. As one of her running mates, the blonde was seated on her immediate left and flipping through the Homecoming ballots. "What's the verdict?"

It wasn't exactly protocol, but nobody was around to care.

Kristen was murmuring under her breath, counting it all in her head. Finally, after only a beat, she tossed the ballots into the middle of the table, scattering them everywhere. "Claire Lyons," she reported.

Dylan, seated next to Kristen, hissed when a stack almost knocked over her drink.

"Impossible," the redhead snapped, tossing back her drink. She placed her glass down and lifted up a few of the ballots to take a closer look. "It's me, you, and Massie all on one ballot."

"Ex-cuse me," Alicia, seated next to her, fired back. "It's all Sadie Meltzer's fault I have so little votes. Like I would ever voluntarily chose to run with Wire Hair. It's PC tradition to put the girl who presents me with the juiciest piece of gossip on my ballot."

Kemp Hurley, seated across from them, laugh loudly at that revelation. He brazenly tipped his flask into their drink cups laid out on their table and asked, "Who was the gossip on?"

"Claire Lyons," Alicia bit out. The irony was almost funny.

Massie clenched her hands into her fists, feeling the bite of her manicured nails against the inside of her palms. It helped her focus.

Kemp leered and lifted a shoulder. "Come on, you gotta admit she's an acquired taste."

"Yes, and apparently, everyone in our entire school needs to acquire some," Massie seethed. She lifted one of the ballots on the table and stared at Claire Lyon's name and then the ones next to hers. She had chosen Layne Abeley and Becca Wilder, of all people, as her Court running mates.

Massie couldn't believe her eyes. What was wrong with the world? Was she suddenly in the twilight zone?

Massie quickly did the calculations in her own head. Analyzing people and understanding their motives was what she excelled at, so why wasn't it adding up? Had she underestimated everybody? She could understand the masses' vote for Claire. She was the new It Girl, a pretense crafted deliberately by the Pretty Committee themselves. Layne, she could probably reason out as well. Everybody loved a good underdog story. Layne was the definition, if there ever was one.

But Becca Wilder? She couldn't fathom it.

Just last week, she had been utterly destroyed. She hadn't even been back at school since the photo leak.

Who did Claire Lyons think she was?

"You aren't seriously going to let her win, right, Mass?" Kristen asked her in a low whisper. Anxiety was heavy in her tone.

Alicia, on the other hand, honestly couldn't believe that Massie Block wouldn't be holding the title for Homecoming queen for the first time in years, and worse yet, that nobody in the Pretty Committee would be either. "No way am I losing that prize money just because some people have terrible taste," the dark haired girl stated bluntly.

Without even meaning to, Massie felt her lips quirk up. It was funny because Alicia was richer than all of them put together. Ten thousand dollars was nothing to any of them, with the exception of Kristen, who Massie had been planning on donating the money to her scholarship fund after being crowned anyway.

To Massie though, it was less about the prize money and more about the principle of it. The loss was a blow to all the girls at this table. It was a blow to her.

She had designed this entire Homecoming dance after Paris as reclamation of the worst summer of her life. Being crowned for something she worked hard to earn set against the backdrop of the Eiffel Tower she worked hard to build was supposed to be her comeback. It was supposed to be her moment of triumph.

It was supposed to be a fuck you to everyone who looked ever down on her after being dumped.

It was supposed to be a prize for correctly conforming to society's ideal standards. She might not be Claire Lyons, but she wasn't Becca Wilder either.

And now, it was all gone. It wouldn't mean anything anymore if Claire and Becca won. It meant that the statement, the message she had been trying to send, was all wrong. It meant a repeat of exactly everything Massie Block was trying to change about her life.

Alicia leaned over towards them, interrupting Massie's increasingly frantic train of thoughts. "We should rig it," she conspired quietly enough that none of the boys across from them would hear.

"Why?" Kristen asked bitterly, fighting the urge to smash her champagne glass against the wall. She considered herself the real loser here. She was the only one of them that really needed that money. "Were you planning to use that money for the breast reduction surgery you need?"

"No," Alicia hissed, baring her teeth. She quickly crossed her arms over her chest. She had always been self-conscious of her breasts. "I wasn't talking about me, but maybe it should be. I can donate the money to you for the bitch reduction surgery you need."

"I vote we pull a Carrie," Dylan voiced loudly over their argument. She was a bit too drunk to grasp the concept of discretion.

"That doesn't mean what you think it means," Kristen snapped.

"Enough." Massie's voice was barely audible to herself over the rising tide of nausea rushing through her, but the girls all snapped their mouths close at once at her tone. "Enough."

Massie sucked in a deep breath and gripped her chest. Her heart was suddenly going a mile a minute, and not in the good way. She realized she must be hitting the comedown stage. There was just no way she was having a panic attack in the middle of a ballroom in front of the entire school.

Fighting past the roaring of noise in her ears and the sudden eruption of a blinding headache, Massie brushed her curls over her shoulder. The room was suddenly too hot and she was getting the sweats. She stopped when she realized her hands were shaking. Everything was entirely out of her control, and now her own body wasn't even cooperating with her.

Coke.

She needed more cocaine.

Her high was the only way she could escape this horrible feeling.

Suddenly, Kemp was around their table and right there behind her. He smirked down again at all of them and placed his hands down on Massie's shoulders. Against her flushed skin, his touch felt invasive. It was familiar, but it felt all wrong. She could barely fight down a twitch at his intimacy.

"Come on, baby," Kemp told her, guiding her up and out of her chair. Massie didn't even fight him as he led her away. He knew what she wanted and she knew what he wanted.

This was easy. This was familiar, but it felt awful.

Why did it feel awful?

Kemp pressed another flask into her hands, and Massie couldn't help herself. She barely remembered what happened last time, but she knew it had been bad. It had been really bad. Still, she drank. The burn of bourbon sliding down her throat distracted her from that train of thought. The sound of the crowd and the fairy lights in front of her slowly blurred away as they headed down a deserted hallway.

Her lungs were on fire, but it took her away from the burning in her heart, the empty ache in her stomach, and the stinging sight of Claire Lyons walking into the ballroom arm and arm with Derrick Harrington.

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derrick;

Derrick knew exactly what it meant walking into Homecoming with Claire Lyons on his arm.

And still, he did it. He wanted to say that it was the next step in his grand master plan, but the truth was that it hadn't been. Talking about his family did that to him sometimes. To be honest, just thinking about his home life situation could probably drive him to binge drinking, but this that was no still no excuse.

No. He had to be honest about this. It was more than that.

Shit, his first mistake was taking Claire words to heart. She was getting to his head.

As he led Claire across the elegantly decorated ballroom, following the path laid out by stupid fairy lights, he could acknowledge that he could probably still spin this into his favor. Massie words about dating Claire flashed through his mind. Monogamy wasn't his thing, but it didn't sound too bad if it was the next step into getting Claire Lyons into his bed. It was too late to back out now. The sweet smile on Claire's face after their public kiss cemented that too.

There was nothing different between how they had to be. It was just the fact of everybody knowing it now.

His mind flashed back to Massie, wondering about her reaction after what went on back at the house, and Derrick felt more conflicted than ever. Luckily, he didn't have enough time to think about it anymore. They had arrived at the center of the ballroom, right next to a massively constructed Eiffel Tower, where all the other Homecoming Court nominees were standing.

"Just on time," Kristen greeted, checking them off on her clipboard. Claire greeted Kristen with her usual charm, but Kristen didn't seem to have time, already moving onto the people behind them. Derrick rolled his eyes.

"Is everybody accounted for?" Dean Wiseman asked off to the side.

Kristen looked ready to ignore him too, but her ingrained respect for authority seemed to stop her. "Almost," she reported evenly, scanning the group and counting heads. "We're missing Massie."

Hearing his stepsister's name out loud again was just as jarring as hearing it in the car. It sent a jolt straight through his stomach. Derrick swallowed and forced himself not to think about what had happened between them.

He still felt conflicted.

He cast his eyes around the ballroom, but the dim lighting and the fucking fairy lights weren't helping. There was nothing to really focus on.

"Last we saw, she was with Kemp," Dylan reported dutifully, despite looking drunk already. How Dean Wiseman wasn't wising up was a joke. Claire was narrowing her eyes in suspicion, but at those words, Derrick's head snapped back towards their group.

"When did you last see her?" he couldn't help but ask.

He shot for casual, but probably missed by about two miles. Derrick distinctly remember straight up telling Massie he was done with her issues, but it seemed like it was a harder habit to actually break. Easier said than done.

He should have stayed away. He shouldn't have gone into her room, he shouldn't have thought with his dick instead of his brain, and he shouldn't have given into her. He should have let her walk out the door and let that be it. But he hadn't, and now he cleaning up after her again.

"Down the hall, to the right," Dylan slurred.

Claire was just opening her mouth—probably to out her to Dean Wiseman standing right there, but Derrick spoke up before she could, "I'll get her," he volunteered, before Alicia could as well. She might not have been too bad of a choice, but Massie would have probably murdered them all if anyone discovered this side to her. He turned and walked away without another word.

He was starting to think he was fucked in the head.

Derrick slammed the ballroom door shut behind him, drowning out the sounds of bass from the DJ and the laughter of inebriated high school students. The hallway was padded with thick carpet and completely empty.

Derrick was having a distinct flashback to the country club this summer.

Massie never knew when to fucking quit.

Red was turning his vision black. His hands involuntarily clenched. He could have drawn blood and not felt it at all through the sudden adrenaline rushing through him. His footsteps quickened down the hallway.

He found them in one of the event hall's unused conference rooms. Bourbon was seeping into his dress shoes from the floor and white powder was littered all over the mahogany conference table. The only thing different from last summer was that instead of instead of passed out and gushing blood, Massie was clearly still in the middle of a high.

And Kemp, instead of freaking the fuck out, was on top of her, kissing her neck.

Derrick gripped the back of his dress shirt and tugged him back so hard he almost slammed into the opposite wall. Kemp cursed loudly, but when he realized it was Derrick and saw the look on his face, he seemed to realize too.

"She's fucked up," Derrick gritted out through the swell of rage charging and churning inside him. It was telling him to fuck the consequences and beat the shit out of Kemp Hurley. He couldn't even imagine what would have happened if anybody but him came to find them.

Derrick grabbed him and stared him hard in the eyes. Kemp looked out of it too, and it was the probably the only thing that saved his life. If Kemp had been sober…

He didn't finish the thought. He pushed Kemp away from him in disgust.

"Shit," Kemp whispered, falling back into one of the office chairs and rubbing his face.

Massie chose that moment to lean over the table and vomit all over the floor.

"Shit," Kemp repeated, shooting out of his chair and out of range. He looked wracked with guilt, but Derrick knew it wouldn't last. Apparently, he hadn't learned his lesson from last time. "Shit, Derrick, I—"

"Dean Wiseman's looking for you," Derrick dismissed him, secretly vowing to deal with him later—when he wasn't needed for damage control. "Sober the fuck up."

"Shit, shit—" Kemp kept repeating, looking completely lost.

"Go," Derrick snapped. It was the same exact shit. Derrick hated people who started shit and couldn't back it up. He almost didn't get the word out through the overwhelming desire to force Kemp to deal with the consequences of his actions, but Massie heaved again, and he gripped her by the arm before she could topple off the table. She groaned in protest. Kemp left and Derrick kicked the door shut after him. He turned back to his stepsister.

"My knight in shining armor," she slurred, sliding down to the ground. Her world was blurring and it seemed to be the most stable thing for her right now.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?"

Infuriating was too inaccurate of a description for her right now. Fucking impossible was more fitting. Her dress was still off her shoulder, revealing that her lingerie matched her dress. Derrick kept his eyes on her face. Massie blinked up at him with red, lidded eyes and gave him a wicked smirk. "You know how I get when things don't go my way. It makes me so horny," she simpered.

"Jesus Christ, Massie!" He couldn't stop from shouting. Derrick barely restrained himself from physically shaking her. He hated her like this. Her smile more brittle than mischievous, more dejected than calculating. This wasn't the Massie Block he knew. Block didn't do this.

This wasn't one of their games. Derrick refused to play.

Was everything a game to her? Were people just pieces for her to tease? Were the people around her just players on a chess board in her mind? Was life just a series of events she fought to control and ruin?

"You never call me Massie."

"What?" Derrick asked, missing what she said. He cast his eyes back over to her. His stepsister's pupils were dilated and her face was flushed. She looked sick and clammy, probably because she was breathing heavily to fight down her nausea. She didn't look at all ready to head back to the ballroom.

There was probably a perfect word for a situation like this.

Fucked.

Yeah, that was it.

"My head hurts," Massie whispered softly. She glanced up at him again, and looked ready to lie down. She was probably crashing now, because he didn't think he had ever seen her look so vulnerable, but Derrick couldn't bring himself to muster up sympathy for her anymore.

Push and pull. Push and pull.

Massie had it down to an art form.

"Yeah, well, you make my head hurt all the time," Derrick snapped. It was all heat and no fire though. For some impossibly stupid reason, he couldn't bring himself to hurt her while she was down. He grabbed her by the arms and tugged her to her feet.

At the sudden motion, Massie turned to the side and vomited all over the floor again. She'd probably feel better in a second when it was closer to being out of her system. This time though, he held her, brushing her hair away from her face and over her shoulder. He didn't think he'd ever seen Block like this before. She must have been high for a while for a down to be this bad. The whiskey probably hadn't helped.

"You're okay," he inexplicably said to her.

Massie stiffened. "I'm not her, Derrick," she rasped, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand and tugging her dress back up over her shoulder. "I'm not Claire. I don't need to be babied."

Derrick stiffened too, but then he sighed. "You also don't need to be a bitch," he told her, but he didn't release her. Deep down, he knew this was just her inexplicable way of trying to save face. Instead, he brushed more strands of her dark brown hair from her face.

For a moment, Derrick almost thought Massie would push him away, but after a moment's hesitation, she leaned into his touch for balance.

Being around Massie Block was like walking through an emotional minefield. A real life game board where he discovered that whichever way he stepped next was a new risk, a new gamble. It was as exhilarating as it was exhausting. An unending game that he couldn't seem to escape, filled with frustration, second guessing, and the possible destruction of everything he loved.

With anybody else—with Claire—it was simple. With Claire, it was easy.

Derrick still didn't know why he hadn't let her walk out the front door. He still didn't know why he had agreed, and he still didn't know why he had volunteered to get her, when deep down, he probably knew exactly what he'd be walking into.

And maybe he was starting to realize why he continued to play her games.

Maybe Derrick really was fucked in the head.

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note3: thank you thank you thank you to all my wonderful reviewers. you are the reason this story is still alive.
note4: pls review if you like. more coming soon! xx