Disclaimer: See inital chapters.
A/N: Nothing particularly disturbing. References events in season four. A little too touchy-feely, and, well, unrealistic. Hopefully not off-putting, though.
"Why'd you do it Juice?" Chibs asks. He hadn't really meant to hit the kid, but when he'd seen the chain wrapped around the broken tree limb it had struck a chord with him and he'd acted without thinking.
They're alone, back at the scene of the crime so to speak, the place where Juice tried to off himself. Chibs realizes how little time he has with the kid, he just hopes that he can get through to him, make him tell him whatever the hell is going on, what would cause him to want to off himself.
"Why'd you try to kill yourself?"
Juice is trembling, shaking his head, tears gathering in his eyes, and Chibs thinks, 'Shit, how the fuck am I going to handle this? The kid's gone over the edge.'
Juice just shakes his head and brushes at the few tears which have fallen down his cheeks.
"Can't tell you," he says, shaking his head and sniffing in an attempt to get his emotions under control.
"This about killing Miles?" Chibs knows that offing the other man is only part of what's going on, but he's not sure he wants to ask about the rest. He ain't a woman, all emotions and shit like that. All this touchy-feely crap is making him feel uncomfortable, and he shifts away from Juice who follows as though seeking the touch.
"Yeah," Juice says a little too eagerly, nodding to emphasize his agreement. It's an easy out and Chibs wondered why he offered it to the kid.
But fuck all if Chibs doesn't feel relieved, even if something else about the whole thing is still bothering him. He knows the kid isn't telling him everything, shit, the kid hasn't actually told him anything. He'd had to pry that little bit about Miles out of him.
'One confession at a time,' he thinks, grateful that Juice didn't manage to succeed in killing himself. That would've crushed the club, him. No good ever came from suicide. Not that he himself had never felt suicidal, he'd just never acted on those feelings.
Cliche though it is, Chibs can't help but think that suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. Whatever Juice's problems are, certainly they can't be as bad as all that, where the only viable solution is suicide.
"Tell me what else is going on," Chibs says, clasping Juice's neck so that the boy can't get away. He's got a feeling that Clay is behind some of it.
"Can't," Juice says, shaking his head. He attempts to duck out of Chibs' hold on him, but Chibs just tightens his grip and squeezes.
"Can't or won't?" Chibs asks.
Juice considers the question and then shrugs.
"Can't," he reiterates, his voice thick with tears.
Chibs applies more pressure to the back of the kid's neck, wanting , in a brief moment of irrationality , to wring the truth out of Juice. He hates that Juice looks to be on the verge of tears, again. How he , of late, always looks to be on the verge of tears. It isn't right, not for a member of the SONS, and as far as he knows, Juice ain't one of those emo type kids, no matter that he spends the bulk of his time hunched over a computer playing some sort of war game.
"Ouch," Juice mutters, but the boy no longer sounds like he's about to cry so Chibs counts that as a win. "You can let go you know," he says, "not like I'm gonna try to off myself right now." Juice chuckles, but there's no humor in it, and there's still a hint of desperation in his voice.
"That isn't funny," Chibs says, because it isn't. There's nothing about this situation that is even remotely funny.
There's a lingering sense that, given the chance to be alone, Juice will make another attempt at suicide. Chibs doesn't think the boy will take the failed attempt as an omen that he's supposed to live and face whatever horrors life has for him. Something that the boy apparently has no desire to do.
Chibs knows that things usually have a way of working themselves out. But Juice is still young and naive in the ways of this world. It irks Chibs to know that the boy almost fucked up, that he almost succeeded in killing himself before he could learn that life had a way of setting things to right. A lesson learned, unfortunately for some, too late in life.
Chibs vows not to take his eyes off of Juice for the foreseeable future, and as loath as he is to do this, he knows that Jax has to be told. If for no other reason than he needs another set of eyes on Juice.
"We gotta tell ..."
"No," Juice interrupts, his eyes pleading, "you can't tell Clay."
Chibs nods and frowns.
"I was gonna say that we've got to tell Jax."
"C'mon man," Juice says, plastering a smile on his face, "can't we just keep this between ourselves? I promise it was a one off, I won't try to ...you know," in lieu of the words, he gestures at the tree he'd tried to hang himself from, "again."
As much as Chibs would like to believe him and give into Juice's wish, he can't. It wouldn't be right. The look the boy is giving him now is filled with such trust and hope that it damn near breaks his heart. But, he doesn't really have a choice. This isn't about Juice. It's about the welfare of the club. Someone who's ready to off himself might just as easily turn homicidal, he'd read or heard that somewhere. A suicidal brother would take stupid risks that could endanger, not only themselves, but everyone around them.
Also, Sons didn't try to off themselves, they were made of stronger mettle than that. If Jax didn't think that Juice could hack the life any longer, he'd have to go. Chibs doesn't want that to happen, and he's prepared to stick up for Juice, but it could go either way. He knows that Jax has a lot riding on his shoulders. The kid's the future of the club; every decision that he makes needs to take every possible future repercussion into consideration. A suicidal brother might be desperate to do just about anything, including turn on the club which would be detrimental to every one of his brothers.
"Sorry, but we really don't have a choice," Chibs says, squeezing the back of Juice's neck in an attempt to bolster the boy's spirits. Juice's flinch isn't lost on him, but he ignores it. "This is serious business, Juicy Boy."
"I know," he says, smiling sadly, "I know, but I was kinda hoping I could avoid all of this." He gestures behind them with one arm, and that's when Chibs knows with certainty that this isn't over and he really is doing the right thing for everyone involved, including Juice, though the boy ,like as not,won't see it that way.
"Avoid all of what?" Chibs asks, sensing that he's on very iffy ground and that if he presses too hard, too fast, he'll lose Juice and never get the truth out of the boy.
"I don't want to be kicked out of the club," he says in a whisper, and Chibs thinks he understands the boy's actions a little more now.
"Why'd you be kicked outta the club?" he asks.
Juice looks at him like he's lost his mind and shakes his head. He gives a bitter sort of half laugh that sounds like a snort.
"I ain't stupid Chibs, I know what this means. I tried to off myself. Jax is going to kick me out of the club," he says, and his voice is rising a little hysterically.
Tig's waiting for them by the tow truck, and if he hears their conversation, Juice won't have a chance in hell of staying in the club. Tig will bring the matter straight to Clay. Jax might be coaxed into giving Juice a second chance, but Clay will be immovable on the matter.
"Sh," Chibs hisses, "keep your voice down Juicy, we're not alone."
"What's it matter who hears?" Juice asks, his voice bleeding despair. "I'm as good as gone already, I was just hoping to do the club a favor. Jax isn't going to understand. Hell, you don't even understand."
"Then help me understand," Chibs pleads, "tell me what's going on so that I can help you."
He knows that Juice is feeling vulnerable right now, that he has to tread carefully or the boy's going to clam up on him and he'll be no closer to getting the answers that he needs from him. If he's going to help Juice and stick up for the kid, what he needs right now is the truth about what's going on and what made Juice choose death over facing the situation like a man.
Up until he saw what Juice had been trying to cover up, the real reason behind the dark bruising around his neck, he'd never thought of the kid as a coward, but right now, though he doesn't like it, that's all he can think of him.
"I," Juice says, looking down at his feet, "I just couldn't take it anymore."
"What? The shit going on with the club? That's going to pass, you and I both know that. Tell me what's really going on," Chibs, unable to keep the anger out of his voice, presses.
"I know, I know that," Juice says, meeting his gaze, "it's, I, ever since we left Stockton..."
"What the hell's taking you two so long?" Tig stumbles over a root as he makes his way into the clearing and he gives the both of them a calculating look.
Chibs closes his eyes and clenches his hand into a fist. He silently curses Tig when he opens his eyes. Juice's jaw is locked and it's clear to Chibs that Juice is clamping down on his emotions, getting them back under control. The window of opportunity, slim though it was, has closed. He'd almost finally gotten to the bottom of what has been bothering Juice and Tig had to walk into the thick of it and ruin it.
"What, you two having a lover's spat?" he asks, grinning like a madman. "Did I interrupt a make out session?"
Chibs flips him the bird and shakes his head.
"C'mon Juicy," Chibs says sighing, "it's time we got back to the club."
The conversation with Jax goes just as Chibs had thought it would, and he can tell that Juice is relieved and surprised.
"See, what did I tell you?" Chibs asks, playfully punching Juice in the arm.
Juice flinches and shimmies away. Chibs doesn't like it. Doesn't like the possible reasons for such an action on Juice's part. The kid had been that way back at the woods when he was confronting him, and he'd also noticed that Juice had been reacting that way toward everyone else in the club lately.
It could mean so many different things, and yet Chibs is afraid of only one possible interpretation for Juice's avoidance of physical contact with him and the others.
They've, all the Sons really, always had a close relationship. Touch has never been an issue. Before now, that is. Now it's like something has wedged itself between him and the kid and Chibs is willing to bet that it has something to do with Clay. He just wishes that he could prove it.
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