HEEYYY!

Kay so after that heavy chapter, there were some questions about the character Jamie and his intentions. I was trying to convey kind of a multiple personality disorder behavior in Jamie. I.e, he's good Jamie when he's around other people, but when he's with someone who's an image of his past (For example, Matt or their father) he turns into bad Jamie. So, brightnight003, he is kind of crazy, but when he snaps out of it, Jamie feels really bad. I hope that makes sense :S And to Glimfire- Yup pills are probably required. ;P

Oh, and to reviewer Awesomenessknowsnobounds- Mello didn't shoot him for a number of reasons. 1. He didn't want to disturb Matt. 2. He didn't want to break BB's heart. and 3. I still need Jamie for my story. XD Don't worry, karma may be a bitch, but she's also cruel justice. :)

So for all of you who are still confused, here's a chapter that will hopefully clear some things up! And it's kinda fluffy.

And just out of curiosity, who actually reads my author notes? Cause I'm giving you extra love. :P

Love you guys! :D

Matt paced around the room, limping and shaking and smoking. I leaned against the wall and went between watching his movements and looking at Jamie, who was sitting on the couch. He had his head down, and he was crying softly. BB looked confused and distraught and ready to stab someone. He was standing beside me, wringing his hands and grinding his teeth. Once Matt reached for his fourth cig, I broke the silence.

"Matt." He jumped, and dropped his unlit cigarette. I sighed. "That's enough for today, you're gonna get sick." He pouted, I made my no-nonsense face, and he placed his pack of cigarettes on the table along with the one that fell on the floor. He carefully walked past Jamie, who made no move to touch him and crossed the room to put his arms around me. I held him and stroked his hair, which made him tense a bit. "It's me." I whispered, and he relaxed a bit. I kissed his cheek, and then looked at Jamie. "So, want to explain what happened?" Jamie took a few shaky breaths and looked up, tears running down his face.

"I don't know." He croaked.

"That's not good enough!" I shouted, drawing my gun. Matt jumped out of my arms and BB looked terrified.

"Mel!" Matt exclaimed. He gently took the gun from me and left the room to hide it in the kitchen somewhere. "I think we need to solve this with words, not guns." He said quietly. I looked up at him.

My poor baby. He smiled at me softly, his bottom lip splitting a bit. He was starting to get a black eye, and I think his nose was broken. He had a burn on his collarbone that was in a circle, there had been a cut on his head that had made him bleed everywhere. I had fixed it as best as I could, and stopped the bleeding. There was still blood in his hair, clumping it together. He had a limp from his sore ankle, and also from being raped. I bit my lip and held back tears. Matt always called himself weak, but I knew better. To be able to stand there, smiling, after his worst nightmare came true and did horrible things to him. To be able to stand there, right beside the man who did it, with nothing more than a small limp and a smile on his face, made me know better. Matt was strong. He held himself together. But the look in his eyes let me know that he was dying inside. I could feel my heart breaking as I looked at him.

"Matt." I said quietly. He smiled at me, but his smile faded away after a while. I held out my arms, making a ghost smile cross his face. He hugged me, hiding his face, nuzzling into me. I slid down to the floor, taking him with me. I pulled him into my lap (I don't give a fucking shit if he's bigger than me. I can comfort him when he's hurting.) and held him, gently, letting him breathe in my scent and calm down. I gritted my teeth. "Okay, so now that I'm weaponless, explain to me, what happened?"

"It-it happened before, when I saw my dad again." Jamie stuttered, wiping tears from his face. Matt tensed so much he felt like a rock in my arms.

"Shh, shh. He won't find you, I promise. I'm not leaving you again." I soothed him, holding him closer. He took a few deep breaths and relaxed a bit.

"Seeing him just set something off in me, I don't know what happened, but this other me took over, the angry me. I kind of lost my mind for a while." Jamie looked at BB guiltily. "I did this to someone else that night too, but less… you know… harsh." He took a breath. "I didn't beat them as much." His eyes flicked over to Matt, looking remorseful. "Ever since I saw Matt, that other me started talking to me in my head, telling me to hurt him…" he broke off, holding his head in his hands. He started crying again. "I didn't want to!" he sobbed. "I tried so hard to fight it, but it won. I don't even remember what happened when…" he glanced over at Matt, who had started shaking. I tightened my arms around him, and he leaned into me gratefully. BB walked over to Jamie and stood over him, shuddering.

"Can you hear him now?" B asked, sounding hurt. Jamie tried to look at him, and went into a fresh round of sobbing.

"Yes." His voice broke. He looked over at Matt desperately. "Matt, I would never want to do something like that to anyone, much less you. I'm so, so sorry! You have no idea how sorry I am!" he started crying again, and Matt had done his stone-tensing thing. I ran my fingers down his spine gently.

"You don't have to talk to him." I whispered to Matt. I looked over at BB and Jamie. BB was standing there, looking torn, his right hand reached out, about to touch Jamie, and the other clenched into a fist by his side.

"I don't know…" BB whispered. "Whether to hug you or kill you." He tilted his head to the side.

"Jamie." Matt murmured. Everyone in the room except for Matt jumped. We weren't expecting him to speak. "What did you do with that other person?" Jamie looked baffled.

"W-well when I snapped out of it, I was standing in an alleyway, and there was this girl lying on the ground beside me. So I crouched down and asked her what happened. She had some of her clothes off and she was bleeding. It was obvious that she had been raped. She screamed when she saw me and stood up. She pushed me into a wall and shouted 'You did this to me!' and ran away." He let out a breath. "It was really dark, so I doubt she saw my face, and no one came looking for me. But the thing that let me know that I really had done it was that the voice in my head was gone, like it was satisfied." He swallowed, tapping his fingers against his knee.

"Is it still there?" Matt asked.

"W-what?"

"The voice! Is it still there?"

"No, it's gone." Matt sighed against my shoulder. I petted his hair. I leaned back, letting Matt lie against me. "What are you going to do with me?" Jamie asked, sitting up and looking at me. I touched Matt's back, pleased that he hadn't flinched away from me.

"Do you want to press charges?" I asked Matt.

"No." We were all flabbergasted by that.

"You don't?" Matt looked up at me. His goggles had been discarded at one point, probably during the rape, and I could see his green eyes clearly. They were calm and clear.

"He punishes himself enough. I don't need the government to do that for me." He brought his hands up to his face and rubbed his eyes, hissing when he pressed against his darkening eye. "I'm tired, Mello. Can we go to bed?" I look at him for a moment, my mouth open. He stopped rubbing his eyes and looked straight into mine. "Please?" he asked. I wasn't used to seeing his eyes so much, and they were so expressive. They were begging me. I swallowed the lump in my throat.

"Let's have a shower first. Get you all cleaned up, okay?" he considered this, and then nodded slightly. I carefully pulled him up with me and let him walk into the bathroom. I stepped into the living room for a moment. "Are you two staying here tonight?" BB was sitting beside Jamie, holding his hand. A wave of sudden respect flowed through me. Beyond Birthday was a tough man.

"I'll watch him." BB promised, nodding to me. I half grinned and nodded then went back into the bathroom. When I walked through the door, I found Matt standing in front of the mirror with a razor on his arm and blood running down his hand.

"Matt!" I gasped. He looked up at me, his expression hurt.

"I didn't mean to…" he whispered. I grabbed a towel and pressed it to his wrist, holding it down tightly to stop the bleeding.

"Matt, what made you do that?" I wrapped the towel around his arm and held his face. His bottom lip was quivering adorably and he looked down at me with tearful eyes.

"It hurts." He whimpered. I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him, petting his hair and letting him cry against my shoulder. He didn't need to act tough with me, and he knew it.

"I know," I whispered. "I know you're hurting. But it's no good to do that to yourself. You need to stick around. I need you here. And I know that sounds selfish, but Mail, I don't know what I'd do if you weren't here with me."

"I'm sorry." He sounded like he was a child again, and it broke my heart.

"It's okay. Just don't do it again, love." I held his face and wiped his tears away. He laughed softly, leaning down to kiss me. A shock went through my body at the unexpected contact. "What was that for?" I asked, smiling against his lips. He brought his uninjured arm to his face and wiped his eyes.

"I hate being scared, Mel. I've spent a lot of my life being scared. But the best years of my life, the ones I've spent with you, were the only times I ever felt safe. I associate fear with times I'm not with you. I don't know how I'm going to get used to this, being scared when I'm around you…" he took my hand and put it on his chest, over his M.K scars. "When I was young, my father used to molest and rape me and make Jamie watch." My breath caught in my throat. "I was always scared of him, of Jamie, of both of them. When I got out of there, out of that life, and met you, you showed me what love was, and that there was a way to be with someone without being scared." I let out a shaky breath, feeling hot tears leave my eyes. He looked at me sadly. "What am I supposed to do with two opposite parts of my life in one house?" he sighed and leaned his head against my shoulder, moving my hand down his waist and to his hip, "When you touch me… I think about what they did. My body is tainted now, after you cleaned it. I don't know if I'll ever be clean again…" I took a few deep breaths. All these years…

"Come on." I whispered. "Let's clean you up." He looked at me. I brought my hands to the hem of his striped shirt and started pulling it off. He just started at me, and then smiled. He raised his arms so I could pull it over his head. I dropped his shirt beside us, looking over his torso. There were bruises and scrapes forming on his skin, under his scars, scattered all over his body. They were marks of violence, of pain and fear. I looked into his eyes and placed my hands on his chest. "You're beautiful to me." I whispered. "No matter how dirty you feel, Mail, you will always be beautiful to me." I ran my hands slowly over his chest, and he closed his eyes, a tear escaping from his right eye. I kissed his cheek, capturing his tear. "I will never hurt you. I will never leave you again. I owe you that." I told him.

"Mihael…" My hands had reached his jeans and I was undoing his button.

"Shh." I unzipped his jeans and slipped them over his thighs. His breathing was getting faster, but not out of lust. Out of fear. He hadn't had the time or state of mind to put on underwear when he was scrambling to get dressed before, so he stood there, naked before me. And he had never looked more beautiful. There were bruises in the shapes of fingerprints on his hips and thighs, marks that Jamie- his own blood and DNA- had left behind. He was covered in marks, scratches and bruises and whatnot all over him, but he stood tall, and he stood steady. I didn't touch him. He opened his eyes.

"I won't hurt you." I whispered. He stared at me, waiting. I kept my hands to myself. Finally, he smiled again, life returning to his eyes.

"Promise you won't touch me until I say so? Touch me in that way, I mean." I nodded.

"Whatever you need." He moved closer, his hands in my hair and on my face, tracing my scar with his thumb.

"Then it's your turn." He breathed, leaning down to kiss my scar.

His fingers made their way down my body to the bottom of my t-shirt, where he pulled it off and placed it with his own. He struggled a bit with the laces of my leather pants, making me laugh.

"Need help?" I asked. He chuckled a bit.

"Probably." I pulled off my pants and stepped out of them, looking up at Matt.

And then it was just us, Matt and me, standing together. I had never felt so in love. We stared at each other like we had never seen the other before. Matt smiled softly, his eyes full of love. He took my hand, lacing his fingers through mine, and brought me to the shower. He turned on the water, letting go of my hand so he could fix the temperature. He stepped in and motioned with his hand for me to follow. I stood behind him, the spray of water wetting my skin. I watched as he stood under the warm water, washing the blood out of his hair and off of his skin. He turned to face me, his hair wet and clinging to his face, his eyelashes holding water. He held my hands and brought me under the spray of water with him. Our chests touched. He pulled me closer so we were pressed together, water flowing over us. He leaned down and caught my mouth with his, pulling me in for a deep kiss that tasted of clean water, soap and smoke. I lived for that taste. He held my hands the whole time he was kissing me. When he pulled away, he was short of breath. It hitched in his throat and came out in short pants, blowing across my chest and my neck.

"I'm still confused. My brain feels dizzy. I want to touch you, but I'm scared..." he whispered, his breath hot on my lips. I got on my toes and stole another soft kiss from his lips.

"You should sleep. You need to rest." Matt nodded and let go of me to turn off the water. I felt empty and clingy when he wasn't near me. I stepped out first, offering him his favourite giant fuzzy towel. He smiled and let me wrap it around his shoulders, leaving a kiss on the tip of his nose. He shivered, teeth clicking together while he stood and waited for me to find another towel big enough. We walked to our bedroom, being quiet so we wouldn't disturb BB and Jamie. They were on the couch, talking in hushed tones. We crept into the room and I closed the door. I handed Matt a light, baggy t-shirt and some loose sweat pants. I dug around our pile of clean clothes while he dressed, and pulled on a pair of Matt's soft, faded Tetris boxers. He laughed softly from across the room, causing me to look up. He was drying his hair, smiling innocently at me. I rolled my eyes and grabbed a black tank top, pulling it over my head. I pulled my hair into a loose ponytail and got in bed, watching Matt limp clumsily around the room in search for his beloved DS. "Babe." I interrupted his search.

"Mm?" I could imagine dog ears poking out of his hair when he popped up beside the bed after digging under it. I held up his beaten black DS.

"It's right here, silly." Matt facepalmed.

"I swear to god, Mels. Fuck my brain sometimes!" I shoved that weird mental-image out of my brain very quickly.

"No thanks." Matt sat down gingerly, hissing a bit in pain. He got somewhat comfy, then held out a hand for his gaming thing. I shook my head and showed him bandage and gauze that I had taken from the bathroom. He sighed and held out his arm. The cut was pretty deep, and it actually scared me more than they usually do. This one looked like it had a purpose. I didn't bother cleaning it, seeing as we just had a shower. I covered it up and wrapped it in gauze, keeping it tight. I gave him his DS when I was satisfied with his bandage and rested my head on his lap, watching him. He made his usual gaming faces, a mixture of furrowed eyebrows and expressions of joy. Eventually, his battery died and the screen sopped flashing that blue light on his face. I was secretly relieved. I liked the way the warm light from our lamp looked on his face. It made him look softer than he already did. I think I found Matt the most attractive at times like these, times when he was completely relaxed and unguarded. It brought me great pride and joy to know that I could make him feel so safe. I remember once, a few months ago (When we first got back together) I came home from shopping, walked into the living room area and found Matt sprawled out on the couch, playing his game.

"Hey gorgeous." I whispered, leaning down to run a hand through his hair and kiss his forehead.

"Stop talking to yourself, Mels. Someone's gonna think you're crazy." he called to me while I brought the groceries I had just bought into the kitchen. I smiled and blushed a bit. Matt was the king of compliments.

"I was talking to you, you silly redhead!" Matt came into the kitchen, feigning shock. He put one hand over his chest and the other lifted weakly to his forehead. He leaned back like he was going to faint.

"Who? Little old me?" I smacked his arm and he wrapped them around me, pulling me close for a long, lazy kiss. It was one of those kisses that made my knees weak. He braced his hands on the counter, leaning forward. I was effectively trapped. "You know, I really love you." he said that so casually, but with so much meaning. I snaked my arms around his neck and kissed him quickly.

"I love you too. Now go play your game while I put this bullshit away." Matt stood up straight and saluted me.

"Yes sir!" I slapped his ass while he walked away, laughing. After I put the bullshit away, I stood at the doorway of the kitchen, looking at Matt. His game was on the table, and he was holding a picture we kept in a frame on top of the TV. I knew that because it was the only framed photo in the apartment at the time. The picture was of us kissing, with Matt's hands on my face while I held the camera away from us with one hand. It was kind of blurry, mixing us together. I loved it. Matt looked at me, and for a moment, he didn't smile. He didn't frown. But he spoke to me with his eyes.

It was one of those moments. He had his goggles in his hair, so I could see his eyes. He looked peaceful and loving and so heartbreakingly true. I smiled at him from where I stood. God, I loved him so much. He grinned halfway, making this little lopsided smile he still does sometimes.

I was pulled into the present by Matt stroking my hair.

"What's wrong?" he whispered.

"Nothing. I was thinking about you." Matt smiled at me with his eyes.

"Good thoughts?"

"The best." He sunk down beside me, our bodies brushing and starting pleasure shivers down my spine.

"You know," Matt sighed. "I always feel the most like me when I'm with you." I smiled at him and he kissed me again.

"We should sleep." I mumbled when he pulled away.

"You're right." he continued to kiss along my jawline. He kissed along me until he could rest his head on my chest. He pressed his ear to my chest, making a face of concentration.

"What are you doing?"

"Listening for your heart." his expression turned to relief. "There we go." I laughed softly, tangling my hands in his hair affectionately.

"I feel like I'm falling in love with you all over again." I told him. He peeked up at me.

"Yeah?" I nodded. He smiled one of the biggest, cutest smiles I've ever seen on him. "You really meant it when you said you wouldn't leave me again?" I nodded again. Matt cuddled up to me, intertwining his legs with mine. We lay there quietly, when Matt started laughing suddenly.

"What?" I was confused. He giggled adorably.

"I just realised how fucked up I am." he whispered. I clicked my tongue in disapproval.

"We'll fix this." I insisted.

"We'll fix me." I stroked his hair and kissed him gently.

"Baby," I said gently. "You dont need to be fixed. You're perfect the way you are." he smiled happily at me and pulled his ams around me, holding me close.

We fell asleep together, with the warm light of our bedside lamp lighting up my angel's face in the most beautiful way possible. As I drifted off, I remember thinking...

What comes next?

I hope you liked this chapter! ^.^ I enjoyed writing it. I hope it clears up issues with Jamie for you guys, and don't worry, Matt's on a steady road to recovery! Also, this isn't the end of the story. I have more ideas for this one that need to be published! :O

Love ya! XOXOXOXO

P.S, LONGEST CHAPTER EVAR! OVER 4,100 WORDS! Z-O-M-G! *insert tearful happy-face here* -^O^- (This guy is dancing)

K THNX BAI!