A/N thanks for all the brilliant reviews guys! It honestly means so much to me! I really hope everyone is enjoying changes so far! I don't own WOWP, just in case you thought i did. ;p
Alex woke up too early the next morning. In fact, it was so early, it was barely morning. Her room was nearly pitch black with just a touch of grey to say that morning was not too far away. She sat up in her bed and tried to figure out what woke her. It took a second, but then she heard that pitiful whimpering from downstairs. She knew instantly, that that was what had woken her, even though it was very quiet. She pulled a sweater she had stolen from Justin over her head and a pair of thick socks to protect her feet from the cool wooden floors. She tip-toed down the stairs and into the window room. There was Emma, sitting cross legged on the floor with a dripping candle to her left and a half empty bottle of vodka to her right. In front of her were half a dozen photo albums and about a hundred discarded pictures. She was sobbing, but was covering her mouth with one of the cushions from the couch in the other room as to not wake Justin and Alex up.
Alex was afraid. She had never been in this situation before. Emma looked half mad as she rocked back and forth in the moonlight and the glow of the candle, her hair dark and falling in her face. Her eyes were wide and wild and her sobs sounded like a dying animal. Alex took a step towards her, thinking she should do something to comfort her, wishing Justin was with her. And then he was. It was as if he had read her mind or heard her thoughts, because he was suddenly hurrying past Alex to his birth mother. He pulled her towards him and wrapped his arms around her thin frame. He stroked her hair and made low, soothing noises that seemed to calm Emma a little. Alex stood at the foot of the stairs for a second, then slowly walked over to the mother and son and sat across from them. She sat there in front of a broken and sobbing Emma and watched as Justin cradled her as if he was the parent, not the other way around. She must've fallen asleep, because when she next opened her eyes, the sun was fully risen and Emma was dozing against Justin's shoulder.
"Justin..." She whispered, trying not to wake Emma.
"Hmmm?" He murmured sleepily.
"What happened?" Alex asked quietly.
"From what I can understand, this was about Jake." He said. "My – my father."
"What do you mean?" Alex asked, her brow furrowing in confusion.
"I think she had a flashback or something from the day he died. She must still be very upset by it. She pulled out some photos of him and that made her even more upset. She started to drink and that's when we found her." Justin said softly.
Alex looked at the woman sleeping against her adoptive brother's shoulder. She seemed so innocent and young during sleep. Her dark auburn curls fell across her face and pale purple eyelids covered her grey-green eyes. She stirred then woke up.
"Oh!" She blurted out in surprise when she saw the two young adults staring at her. "Oh." She then said more darkly when she noticed the vodka bottle and messed up photo albums.
"Emma..." Justin said slowly. "What happened?"
"I-I dreamt of him again. Jake." She muttered. "The day he died. I had to see him again, so I found our photo albums and pictures. It made me feel worse so I had something to drink. I don't remember much after that."
Justin and Alex sat quietly in front of her. She started to cry again.
"I loved him!" She cried. "I still love him! I miss him every single second of my life! I never go without thinking of him! My – my heart literally hurts! It's like an ache that just won't go away!"
Alex felt tears rising in her own eyes. She could never imagine loving someone so much, it actually hurt. She thought of Mason and bit her lip.
"How did you and Jake meet?" Justin asked, leaning forward slightly.
Emma took a breath, "We met in high school. It was... March, I think. March of eleventh grade. He had just moved to New York from Los Angeles and he was so different from every other boy I had ever met. He was confident and charming. He was very intelligent and played in a band. We were in English class together. He sat next to me and tried to flirt with me through every class. I tried to ignore him and focus on my studies. But the more I ignored him, the more he pursued me. Finally he just leaned over and whispered, 'I think you're beautiful and amazing and perfect. Please give me a chance, just one. If you don't like me after that one chance, I'll leave you alone. I promise.' I gave him a chance. And we were inseparable ever since."
Emma dug through the mess of pictures around her and pulled out one of her and Jake. He was wearing a suit and tie and she was wearing a fancy turquoise dress. They were standing in a garden by a church. In the back ground you could faintly see a woman in a white dress and a man beside her.
"This was taken at your parents wedding." Emma said about the picture. "It was the summer before our senior year. Everyone thought we were just friends, because it was illegal for a wizard and a mortal to be together. But when I found out I was pregnant that November, our families knew the truth. You were born in June, Justin. Which you know. The whole time I was pregnant, I was worrying about what I should do. My friends said I should get an abortion, which I refused point blank. Jake even said he would marry me, but I didn't want that because I knew if we got married, the authorities would find out and he would lose his powers. And he loved magic more than anything. So when Theresa and Jerry offered to adopt you, I accepted. I knew they could give you a better home then I ever could."
She then handed them a picture of herself at around age eighteen laying in a hospital bed holding a baby wrapped in a blue blanket. She looked young and scared and tired. Jake was sitting beside her but he was looking right at Justin. He was smiling at the tiny baby boy, and Justin was looking back.
Alex could hear Justin's sharp intake of breath and winced.
"After I had you, Justin, and your parents took you away, I went to college. It was the University of Florida and your father came with me. He took some classes at the community college but he was more focused on his band. He played lead guitar and wrote songs. He was amazing. We kept our relationship a secret because we were still afraid of the wizard police. No one knew we were a couple except a select few who could keep a secret. I graduated to become a teacher. He was still with his band, but Jake was always interested in Physics. He was thinking about going back to school, when... when he had the accident." Emma stifled a sob.
She pushed pictures towards them. Jake playing guitar and smirking at the camera, Emma caught by surprise in a classroom, the both of them laughing on a beach.
"I didn't know what to do with myself after that. I wasn't in any contact with my family or yours, not since your birth. I didn't do any grief counselling because no one was supposed to know we were together, though I guess it didn't matter since he had died. I took out my rage and anguish on a canvas. I painted, I did pottery, I took yoga, I surfed, I wrote poetry, I ran, I gardened I did anything to distract me from Jake. Nothing really helped. It's been fourteen years and I still long for him, his smile, his laugh." She sobbed and smiled sadly.
Alex picked up a couple more pictures. These people had a life. They were real people, he was a real person. Justin's father.
Justin sat still and silent this whole time. He hadn't moved since he had run to Emma in the night.
"He named you, you know." Emma said. "It was Jake who had picked out the name Justin. It means fair or just. It was also his middle name. Jacob Justin Thomas. He said he wanted you to have something of him, even though you would never know him."
They were all silent for a long time. Alex was breathing slowly and trying to stop herself from outright sobbing like Emma. She was so touched by that story. She could never imagine how Emma must feel, to keep her love for someone a secret for such a long time and then to have that person die.
After a while, she seemed to calm down. She smiled awkwardly and stood up.
"Thank you." She said to Justin and Alex. "For being there for me. You're so much like Jake." She said fondly to Justin. He blinked as she walked into the kitchen. Alex could hear the coffee machine click on and Emma turn the radio on.
Justin stood up and walked out the back door. Alex followed. Justin did seem to be like his birth-father. Jake had black hair and a strong Roman nose, like Justin. He was tall with broad shoulders and full lips. Emma told them that he was charming and confident. Justin could be both. Jake played guitar like Justin and was interested in science. Emma said he was intelligent and loved magic. But Justin was also like Emma. He was organized and emotional. He had her eyes. He wrote poetry and essays (remember the cruise?). Looking back, Alex realized that she should've known Justin was different a long time ago. Neither she nor Max was goal driven or ambitious like Justin. Their parents weren't either. She looked at the man she had known to be her brother and couldn't recognize him anymore. It was like he was a different person. It made her sad.
As usual, her thoughts drifted back to Mason. He said he was lonely on his Facebook status. What did that mean? Did he miss her? Did he regret what happened? Did he want to see her again? She sighed and Justin looked over at her.
"Alex," he said. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing." She muttered.
He frowned at her. They were sitting side by side on the steps leading down to the beach. She squirmed uncomfortably in his gaze. Finally, she broke.
"I just miss Mason." She said. "That's all."
"Oh, Alex." Justin said sympathetically. "He had to visit his family in England for the summer. He'll be back soon."
Alex scowled at the sand because he wasn't coming home soon. She would probably never see him again. And it was all. Her. Fault. Justin seemed to read her mind again. He knew she wasn't telling him the whole story.
"Alex." He said firmly in his 'grown-up voice'. "Tell me."
Her lower lip trembled. She gasped for breath and whispered, "Okay. It was my fault he moved away. He's not visiting family. He's never coming back."
Justin frowned, "What do you mean?"
"Two weeks before we graduated, we got into a fight. He – he had been acting distant lately. He was hanging out with Gigi more often. I... accused him of cheating on me." She whispered shamefully.
"Was he?" Justin asked.
"No!" Alex cried. "Of course he wasn't! He would never do that to me!"
"I still don't understand." Justin said slowly.
"When I accused him of cheating on me, he lost his temper. He – he couldn't control his temper." She said so softly, he could barely hear.
She saw his eyes widen with shock and his jaw clench in anger when he finally understood.
"That day you came home and told us you fell down the stairs at the subway station, that was Mason?" He hissed angrily.
She lowered her eyes in shame. Mason had lost it when she said he was cheating on her with Gigi. He beat her up pretty badly. He was half in his wolf form and couldn't stop himself. She was too embarrassed to tell anyone the truth, so she just said she slipped on the stairs at the subway station and fell down the stairs. Right after that, he moved back to London. He said he was horrified at what he had done, and had moved away to protect her. That was a month ago.
"That bastard!" Justin shouted. "I'm going to freaking kill him!"
Except he said a word a lot stronger than just 'freaking'. Alex was a little frightened. She had never seen Justin so angry.
"Justin, it was my fault!" She cried. "I should never have accused him of cheating on me!"
He grabbed hold of her shoulders and stared directly into her eyes. She saw pain and horror and rage in his misty green eyes. "Alex, listen to me." He said fiercely. "It wasn't your fault! Never think that! It was his fault, not yours!"
He suddenly pulled her close to him. Her face was pressed against his shoulder and she wrapped her arms around him tight. He was holding her just as strongly. She could feel his sobs vibrate though his whole body. She could feel his tears on her scalp. She was shaking as well. For the longest time, she had blamed herself entirely for the accident, but maybe Justin was right. Maybe she wasn't the only one to blame.
Nobody spoke for the rest of the day. She didn't eat and avoided everyone. She wasn't mad; she just didn't have the energy to say anything. That night she was lying in her own bed alone and wishing someone would lie beside her and stroke her hair the way her mother would when she was young and sick. She slipped out of her room and down the hall to Justin's room. She opened the door quietly and stood beside his bed. He didn't say anything and neither did she, he just moved over and held open the blanket for her. She climbed in beside him and closed her eyes. She could feel the warmth from his body on her back. He started stroking her dark hair and humming under his breath. He kept it up until she was fast asleep. She was wrong, he wasn't a different person. He was the same as always and she was glad. She would never want him to be anyone other than just himself.
A/N okay i know this is kind of dark (for me at least) but i have been in kind of a mood, so whatever. Please please please review! :)