A/N: Hey everyone!

First off I'd like to apologize profusely for my total lack of warning on the previous chapter. That was pretty weak... I really hated writing Vriska that way. It was rather painful.

Second note: we are approaching the end. I know. It's a scary thought. *shivers inwardly* But really. I'm thinking two chapters after this one and I'm seriously lacking motivation (seriously, I'm suffering from withdrawals) *cough* (insert selfishly needy request for reviews here)*cough*

Third: A bit of a trigger warning here. Gore. Not really. But I wanted to give you a heads up. (I am so sorry)

But who needs to listen to me spew senseless words at you? Here read these other senseless words instead!

-AJ3

Your name is John Egbert and you aren't certain that you are doing the right thing.

You lay along the side of the road for what feels like days but must have only been a few minutes. At least it was enough time for Vriska, her boyfriend, and their cronies to completely disappear down the road, hooting and hollering as they went as if they hadn't just physically, mentally, and psychologically abused someone who was beneath them. And, in reality, that's what you are, beneath them. If you were even close to their level, this wouldn't have happened.

After a few more shaky breaths and more than one attempt to accomplish the task, you get on your feet and saunter over to your bag, blood rushing to your head and making you dizzy. You reach up to your face and groan as a shot of pain flashes through your head; you realize that it would probably be a good idea not to touch your nose twice.

Slowly and almost ceremoniously, you place the razors back in the pouch and sling your bag over your shoulder, trying to avoid the bruises that are blossoming across your skin. You fail miserably and groan at the fresh and ancient pains that spring to your attention at the action.

You sigh once you are ready to get moving again and think for a moment.

You're going to have to do it.

You know there is no way he won't ask.

You can't avoid this forever.

You've made your decision.

You're going to tell your dad.

Fuck.

There is a multitude of reasons that you don't want to tell your dad. You have every single reason to believe that he will be thrown in a rage when you tell him. Somewhere, deep in your heart, however, you hope and pray that he will understand. That you'll still be his son no matter what you say, no matter what you are. You get a painful feeling that you are just kidding yourself.

You groan at your thoughts and pains and start walking down the road once again, dreading every step that will take you that much closer to potentially the most uncomfortable situation you've ever been in.

As you walk, your mind continues to race through every possible outcome of what will happen. None of them really make you feel any better because no matter what, things will never be able to go back to the way they were before you "came out".

Why can't you just ignore the problem at home. It's not like you need your dad to worry about you. He had to suffer through your mom's death too.

Before you realize what's happening, you are being thrown into the memory of the day you swore to forget.

You are now a twelve year old John. Although you don't quite know it yet, your surprisingly tall and gangly figure will barely change during your high school career. You are currently in eighth grade and everything is going well in your life.

You are in the same small town that you grew up in with the same mechanic's shop and the same school. You don't know it yet, but this whole place, full of blissful childhood memories is about to turn sou.

You are currently walking home. You had just stayed the night at your best friend, Karkat's house and you are completely worn out from the hardcore Nic Cage marathon that you had forced your friend to suffer through. Thee horrible t.v. headache you are suffering from now is totally worth it and you have no regrets. nope, none at all.

You are walking down an eerily silent Main Street when you just so happen to glance down the alley betwen the old supermakret and the even older antiques store. you see two figures standing the the shadows of the buildings and one of them is familar to you.

"Mom?" Your voice booms in the nearly vacant space like it would in an abandoned church. One of the figures whips their head around and the long, dark, familiar hair comes around with it.

"Johnathan?" she asks, her voice stressed and cracking from crying.

"What's going on, mom?" you say not as loud.

She moves as if to run to you, but the other figure speaks before she can take a step, "S-stop! Don't move, I'm warning you!"

Your mother stops instantly and looks at you, worry and fear clouding her kind features; it looks sickeningly unnatural on her. "Just stay back, John. I'll be alright. I need you to go home and-"

"Don't move, kid! I don't need you running off!" the stuttering voice of the other figure becomes even more distressed as you stand there, not sure what to do.

"Johnathan, I need you to run home and get your father."

"Don't move, kid, or I blow her brains out!" you hear a click and for the first time, you see that the stuttering figure is holding a pistol. The barrel is aimed at your mother and is wavering dangerously. You freeze up, you can't seem to feel you feet or vocal chords, all you can do is stand there gaping.

"John! Get out of here!" she moves toward you, legs shaking and tears streaming down her normally cheerful face.

"I SAID DON'T MOVE!" the figure shouts, barrel still trained right on her.

"Johnathan! Please, baby, RUN!" she's waving at you, signaling you to move. You can't, you want to so badly. You don't want to be here anymore, to see your mother like this, to see her scared and crying. But you can't just leave her. You're so scared, you're frozen and there's nothing you can do but stand there shaking. Your mother continues to yell at you. Get out, she says. The figure is telling you to stay. You don't know what to do, what to think, how to feel. Everything is chaos and all you can do is stand there. The loud boom that follows shakes you to your very core and the sight of your mother falling to the gravel crusted pavement releases you from your spell and you race toward her, one word on your lips.

No.

That was years ago.

The pain should have dulled somewhat by now, right? Settled into more of an ache instead of this searing iron pressed into your heart that was just as hot as the day it happened? Right? And now it is worse than ever. They know the story of your mother's death, they know what you've been through. Who are you trying to fool? You stood by like a moron and let that person kill your mother. You couldn't even help the police find her killer. You were and always will be a helpless, useless piece of trash who can't even keep one good thing going in your life. You scared Karkat away for the last few days he was in town. You know it wasn't your fault that he left, but he doesn't even talk to you at all anymore. That was completely your fault. The last message you've received from Jade was an angry one telling you that you were going to get your ass handed to you for not talking to her. The funny thing was, you did.

You didn't even want to think about Dave. His whole situation could be summed up in four words: you are avoiding him. As far as you can tell, he seems to have gotten over his frustration at you ignoring him and is now moving on with his life. A life without you as his friend. You pull out your phone and open the pesterchum app on your homescreen. You open up ancient logs filled to the brim with similarly ancient red textr. You read over the lines you always seem to be going back to.

TG: come on john

TG: youre being kind of a kick right now

TG: what kind of bro leaves his best bro hangin

TG: youre breaking my heart here man

And lastly

TG: you know what john fuck you

That last one was the final time you heard from Dave. It probably hurt worse than the blows you received from your classmates. You take a deep, stuttering breath to calm yourself and clear your head.

Then there's your dad.

When your mom died, you seemed to be in a constant state of numbness. You only spoke when you were spoken to directly, you didn't sleep, barely ate. You know your dad worried for you and it makes you feel even worse now for not being there for him.

A while after your mother's funeral, your dad couldn't seem to take your seclusion and his wife's death on his own any longer. He could have turned to anything; drugs, alcohol, women. But he decided on the coping mechanism that he, you think upon reflection, assumed at the time wasn't going to hurt you. Your father turned to religion.

Once you were finally able to snap out of your shocked, grieving state, you quickly realized how different your father had become. You could tell that he had been trying to hide any changes that had occurred from you. He tried his best to act normally around you, but you noticed the constant presence of Betty Crocker products in the kitchen, your dad's tell for when he's under pressure or stressed. You noticed him humming your mother's old lullaby when working around the house or in his office. You noticed the cross he hung above the stove in the kitchen. you noticed, when you got out of bed for a late night snack, him on his knees, praying.

You hated that time, that lull in your relationship with your dad. Neither of you wanted to admit what was happening to the two of you. You couldn't even hold a decent conversation without it getting awkward. One night, you couldn't take the silence at the dinnertable and exploded, saying something along the lines of, "What the hell is wrong with us," and then going into a lengthy rant about how the two of you weren't even acting like father and son. Heck, you weren't even acting like you cared for one another! Once you had finished your tirade, breath slightly heavy from the frustration, he agreed with you and promised that he would try to be more open with you.

And open up he did.

The few weeks after your dad started actually speaking with you could definitely be classified as degrading. He seemed to over analyze everything you told him about your day or about something you had heard from a friend. no matter what you said, no matter how you tried to avoid it, the conversation always seemed to weasel it's way into something related to God. it really irritated you, trying to ask if Karkat could come over after school and your dad turning it into an invitation to go to church on Sunday.

That was another thing that got you riled up. Despite your many attempts to convince the man that you weren't into the whole church/religion thing, he made you go to Sunday School every week, no matter what.

Eventually, you just couldn't take it anymore.

One Sunday, when you were about fourteen, your dad came into your room to wake you up for church. You had already been awake, thinking hard about what you were about to do, so you rolled over, looking him straight in the eye and said, "I'm not feeling well."

There was obviously nothing wrong with you and you could tell your dad was baffled by the statement. He opened his mouth to reply, but you beat him to it and said, "I think it would be best if I stayed home today." Your dad had shut his mouth with a little snap and nodded, exiting the room as calmly as when he had entered.

He never got you up to go to church again.

You have often contemplated whether or not this decision was the right one based on what happened afterward: nothing. You honestly have no idea which is worse, the constant exposure to your dad's new-found enlightenment or the way the two of you seem to be doing nothing but avoiding each other. He never makes you come down to the table for dinner anymore. Meal time, if either of you make it, consists of the evenings chef yelling, "Dinner!" out into the silent house and then retreating to their dwelling with plate in hand. All contact is kept the bare minimum. And you are the only one who can take the blame for the tension between the two of you. Every single thing that is wrong with your relationship with your dad can be traced back to you in a neat little line. There is no avoiding it, there is no covering it up. Hell, you might as well carve it onto your chest for the world to see.

You eventually get home, bleeding and ready to bolt at any moment. You open the front door and pause for a moment to emotionally and mentally collect yourself. Convincing yourself you're sane enough, you grunt and force yourself to walk through the entrance way and into the kitchen where you know your dad is. Once you're in, you see the five foot ten man standing by the oven in his apron covered business suit and fedora. He glances over at you, surprise clearly written on his face before he actually takes in your appearance.

His mood instantly changes to the father you need him to be right now. Worry and slight panic take over his face as he rushes over to you and examines your face, "What happened to you, John?"

You manage to stutter out a light sigh. You don't know whether it's from the relief of your dad actually caring about you or from what you know you're going to have to admit, "Some kids from school jumped me after school..."

"Oh my," he glances around and motions toward one of the bar stools located around the granite island in the center of the kitchen, "Go on, sit down. I'll go get a first aid kit," you go to sit down hurriedly, thankful that you can do something other than talk. After a few moments of you sitting there, wondering how you are going to broach the subject, your dad walks in with a small white box. You cringe inwardly at the thought of what is in your bag and exactly how it had come into your possession. Your dad tilts your chin up and examines your face. You wince at the contact. He starts dabbing at the blood on your face and you hiss as the hydrogen peroxide comes into contact with cuts on your face. For the most part, he tries to avoid your nose, but you can feel the blood still dripping down your face slowly.

After a few more minutes of you hissing and wincing and your dad cleaning you up, he finally breaks the ice, "So, are you going to tell me why this happened?"

You wince at what you are about to say, hoping he won't notice the change in tone, "Uh..." you look him in the eye and he stops what he's doing. He looks back at you and you can feel the shameful tears forming in your eyes, blurring your vision even more and shooting pain through your veins once again. You see his head tilt down as if he is looking at your shirt. You can feel every letter burn your skin, scalding your flesh like white iron.

He looks back up at you, "Is it true?" he asks, tone level and unfeeling. You shiver and lower your head. You don't say anything, but both of you know what the answer is at this point. You can see his hand shake as he says, "Go to your room."

Tears still heavy, you grab your backpack and race up to your room, trying not to trip on anything on your way up the stairs. You make it into your room where you collapse onto the floor. You don't even care about the pain in your nose. It's welcome. It can come in anytime it likes so long as it washes away the pain you are feeling right now.

You kick your door shut from the floor before curling in on yourself and letting the sobs wrack you. How in the hell had you expected anything different from your father? How in the hell could he have ever- have ever accepted you? You don't understand why you put yourself through this torture. You drew yourself into believing that people could be good to you. That people could understand you. Who were you kidding? No one would ever understand you. No way in hell anyone would ever accept you. It was a desperate form of self mutilation that you were putting yourself through, you bring yourself up, only to have the world tear you down farther than when you started. There was absolutely no hope for a piece of shit like you.

This time, without hesitation, you reach into your bag and pull out the razors. You try, almost desperately, to get the package open, but when you do, you break out a blade and press it gently to the skin of your forearm and lightly caress the skin with it. You hiss as the pain slips into your blood and reciprocates with a few dots of the red liquid as compensation for the blessed act. You run the blade over your skin three more times before you are satisfied with your own new-found enlightenment. Just like you had driven your father to desperation, he has driven you to it as well.

And you can't say you don't regret or deserve a second of it.