Chapter 6
Johnny, Four A.M

Kate

Two or three nights after I sent that last email, I was startled awake by someone calling my name.

"Kate? Pst."

I thought that I was probably still asleep, and that if I just stayed quiet and still whoever this was would leave me alone.

No such luck. "Kate, get your lazy ass out of bed," said whoever. It was a guy.

"Adrien?" I asked, confused and groggy. I rolled over and opened one eye, then the other. My room was dark and I could only vaguely make out the man standing beside my bed. I didn't recognize him yet.

"Oh, so Adrien's in the habit of waking you up at four in the morning now? I'm not going to even ask what for, because I really don't want to know all the sordid details of your early morning trysts."

Not Adrien. Now that my eyes had adjusted, I could clearly see that this guy was blonder, a little taller, and a lot scruffier than Adrien was. "Johnny," I said.

"In the flesh," Johnny returned with a grin. He raised both arms at his sides, as if he were presenting himself. "And literally like a thief in the night, as promised. I lost my key so I had to climb in the bathroom window. You really need a better security system around here. Adrien should get on that."

I struggled into a sitting position and squinted at my clock. I groaned. "It's not really 4:13, is it?"

"Absolutely," Johnny answer cheerfully. One wondered how he was so awake at such an ungodly hour. "Get up. I want to talk to you before the rest of the demon squad arises."

The demon squad. Johnny always made his family sound like a comic book.

"Four o'clock still seams a little unnecessary to me. It's not likely that anyone else is going to be up before eight, at the very earliest," I grumbled.

Johnny frowned at me and crossed his arms over his chest. "Hey, I'm here. Try to hold back the excitement."

Whether or not he had a right to be insulted by my lack of early-morning enthusiasm, I apologized. "Sorry." I pulled myself out of bed and offered him a quick hug. "I really am glad you're here," I added.

"You'd better be. Because I'm not. Come on."

I rolled my eyes, grabbed my glasses, and stumbled down the stairs after him. I was slightly scandalous in my boxer shorts and tank top, but I figured I'd have plenty of time to dress myself before anyone else what up, and like Johnny cared. We entered the kitchen.

"I already made coffee," Johnny said. "Stopped here before your room."

I sat down on the floor as he grabbed two mugs from the cabinet. I was suddenly very glad Johnny had woken me up so early. I hadn't talked to anyone in a long time. I found I had a lot to say.

"How long are you staying?" I asked, watching him pour the coffee.

Johnny shrugged. "Can't say," he said. Naming even an approximate date would've been too close to commitment for him. He sat down on the floor next to me, handed me my coffee, and changed the subject. "Now, Kate, tell me the story."

So I told him about Scott and Manda and Jessica and Jessica's fiancé, the twisted foursome. That was easy to talk about, with how little it affected me. And Johnny, I knew, would see the humor in all of it. I wasn't planning to talk about Rachel and Adrien. As far as I was concerned, Johnny was going to have to stick around long enough to observe that one for himself. But Johnny kept asking me questions, and I guess I just wanted to tell someone something.

"And what about Saint Adrien?" Johnny asked. We were still talking about Jessica and Scott. "He's not doing anything to impede the shocking infidelity?"

It was difficult to say exactly what Johnny thought of his family. When he talked about them like this, his conversation was always loaded with irony. But I never was sure what was behind the sarcasm—whether it was a sort of reluctant affection, or whether it really was just distain.

I set my coffee on the floor and picked at the skin around my thumb nail. "He's not exactly noticing," I said carefully, studying the nail.

"Oh isn't he? Now why wouldn't he be noticing?" Johnny asked, pushing a little too hard. I broke. I looked up and him and rushed into something this:

"Adrien's a little distracted. Scott has this sister." There wasn't a point in pretending not to care about it. This was Johnny I was talking to. He knew what he knew.

"There always is a sister," Johnny sighed. I thought he was definitely laughing at me a little, but I decided not to mind it.

Yet.

"You know what I think?" Johnny continued.

"No," I said dully. "And I'm not sure I want to."

"I like that sense of humor," Johnny said, which meant he was going to say whatever he wanted to say. "I think you should marry Scott," he began.

My look must have asked him why, in God's name, he thought that because he continued to explain. "It's seriously the best ending I can think of for this saga. Mainly because it would seriously piss off my entire family, which is," he paused and leaned back into the counter, stretching his arms out behind his head, "my primary goal in life."

"But not mine," I interjected.

Johnny was on a roll, and continued as if I hadn't interrupted. "Or you could marry me, which would have basically the same effect. It would probably be worse on Adrien, though, because eventually he'd realize you were the love of his life, and your marrying me would be sort of like you'd joined the dark side. So if you want to exact your revenge on him for all the years of unrequited passion, I'd go with option two."

"Thanks, but no thanks," I smiled.

Johnny shrugged. "Don't say I didn't offer."

I laughed, shook my head, and added for good measure, "And I'm not admitting anything about passion, unrequited or otherwise. Let's talk about something else."

Johnny, who naturally didn't believe me, continued with the subject at hand. "So then as far as Adrien goes—"

"I'm losing, alright?" I interrupted, a little crossly. Adrien had made sure things would be okay with me, had made sure Aunt Lucy wouldn't be giving me any more days of torture. But I'd still barely seen him lately. Rachel was still the top of his list. "I can't even compete," I finished.

"Well, I'm here," Johnny said. "That ought to turn the tide. I'm like the ultimate trump card."

I didn't completely follow that. "How so?" I asked.

"The effects of jealously can be really be rather surprising."

He meant it seriously, but I had to laugh in spite of that. The idea of Adrien ever being jealous over me seemed beyond ridiculous. I was about to tell Johnny that, but I didn't get the opportunity. Because just as I opened my mouth to say it, Adrien himself walked into the kitchen.

- - - - - - - - - - -

Adrien

I thought I could hear voices coming from the kitchen, which didn't make sense. It was only ten past five, and no one else was ever up this early but me. But there was definitely someone in there. Two someones—a guy saying something about jealousy and surprises, and then a girl laughing. I rounded the corner into the kitchen. Kate was the girl. She was sitting on the floor next to a guy who for a second I didn't recognize. Then I realized that it was, of course, my brother.

The first minute was awkward. To be honest, the whole quarter hour until I left for the shower was awkward. But that first moment was the worst.

Kate stiffened when she saw me, and folded her arms across her chest in an embarrassed sort of way. She'd stopped laughing. Johnny, on the other hand, looked plenty amused.

I'd talked to Johnny two days ago, and he hadn't mentioned anything about coming home. But when I thought about it, that wasn't really the surprising part. The surprising part was that he was here at all.

"What are you doing here?" I asked him, struggling to find the right tone. The question came out a little harsher than I meant it to. I didn't know what it was exactly about my brother that rattled me like this. There were too many things, I guess. We were too different.

"Come on, little brother. You know as well as I do I only come to see Kate, her being the only person I like around here."

"Indeed," I muttered. That was one thing—he hated me, and went out of his way to make that very apparent.

All three of us were silent then. Tension escalated. Kate had pulled her knees up to her chest and was staring intently at her toes. Johnny was smirking at me. I looked from him to Kate, then turned abruptly to the cabinet and pulled out a coffee cup. I helped myself to rest of whatever Kate and Johnny were drinking.

Clearly, somebody needed to say something. I racked my brain for something smart. But in the end I asked, "How long are you here for?" A stupid question, but a question none the less.

Kate answered. "He won't say," she said, and I turned when she spoke to face them again.

"We'll just see how it goes," Johnny added. He let his left arm fall to Kate's shoulder, using her as an armrest. Kate allowed it. I felt, all at once, all lot of different things. Mostly I felt self-conscious towering above them like I was. But it suddenly came to me that I wasn't on the kind of terms with either of them that would allow me to join them on the floor. More particularly, it came to me that I wasn't on these kinds of terms with Kate. That I hadn't actually really talked to her for over a week.

I didn't know what to do with myself. I struggled onto the counter and sat, so at least I wasn't standing anymore. I sipped my coffee. On the floor, Johnny leaned towards Kate and said something quietly to her, something that I wasn't supposed to and didn't hear. She smiled and hit him good-humoredly. They seemed happy enough to ignore me.

I didn't have a right to feel jealous. Or hurt. Betrayed by Kate's obvious alliance with Johnny. What had I done lately to earn her loyalty?

I slid back off the counter and turned to let them be. "Adrien," Kate said after my back was to them.

When I turned back around, her perplexed expression seemed to say that she wasn't sure why she'd called after me. She opened her mouth, tried to articulate something, but nothing came. I gave her a reassuring, no-harm-done sort of smile. That smile was kind of a lie, but I figured it was the good kind of lie, the kind you're allowed to tell. After all, I didn't have a right to feel wronged.

And then I did leave them. And went to the shower. And I told myself that things were going to change.

Of course, I knew with Johnny back, they already had. Life was spiraling in all sorts of new directions.

A/N: Sorry, no reader responses this time. I barely have time to think, breathe, let alone write now that I'm back at school. But please keep reviewing and hopefully I'll be able to respond next time. I love you all.

Jill: Hmm. I write for your reviews, and you review for my reviews of your reviews. I think we're getting a bit co-dependent here. Actually, I've never seen Dawson's Creek myself (not because I'm a TV snob or anything, I mean, I am marginally devoted to the OC and how much more vapid than that can you get? Somehow I just missed the Dawson Creek years. I must have been out playing football and other tomboyish stuff while that was going on) so I was missing those parallels. Although I have always thought that Mansfield Park was the most soap-opera-esque of Jane Austen offerings. Interesting that Scott and Johnny are your favorites. They're secretly mine too, although Adrien is slowly growing on me. You just can't help but love Scott though, the bastard. The next chapter shall be once again his perspective. And speaking of Scott, that is the beautiful tragedy of Mansfield Park: Kate doesn't change his life. She only almost does.