A/N: I don't own Twilight. So here is chapter 61 of Static. We're still on the Kim thing as of the moment, and I know since I'm updating rather quickly, you may or may not have missed Jared's return in chapter 60. If this is news to you, go back and read the last chapter. If not, go right ahead to this one. Warning: this chapter features violence.

Enjoy.

LXI.

a smile, a guise
i'm trying to hide behind tired eyes, i sigh

"Kim, I think you're literally trying to kill me."

Kim didn't release her pull on the skin near Leah's eye. "Hold still, okay?"

"Oh my God, change the song," Leah said impatiently.

"Just hold s—"

"Change the song."

Kim picked up her phone from the counter and skipped to the next song on her playlist. The new song was blasted through her Bluetooth speaker which, despite its size, had a lot of power. "Look, Leah, I'm doing you a service. I should be able to choose the music. Hell, you should be paying me for all this."

"Okay, but I hate that song."

It was the following night, and Kim was helping Leah get ready for her date with Jacob. She put her phone and eyeliner down and picked up her tube of mascara.

"Keep your eyes open," she told Leah.

"Is this some new type of eyeliner?" Leah asked, sitting on the toilet seat cover.

"We already did that. Now we need to do mascara."

"Why do you know so much about makeup, Kim?" Leah asked. "You're gay."

"You're dumb. And these are literally basics, but I shouldn't have expected so much from someone who has a flip phone and isn't a drug dealer."

"Fuck outta here."

"Not yet. Almost done."

"I really don't get the point in this," Leah said. "Jacob already knows what I look like, and I don't think two lines on my eyes are gonna change that."

"Duh, he's gonna still recognize you," Kim replied. "This is just a boost. Think of it as an upgrade."

"Undamaged goods."

"Sure. Now look in the mirror and say you like it."

Leah stood up and bent forward in front of the mirror. "I look different."

"Nobody puts on makeup to look the same," Kim said bluntly as she sat down on the edge of the bathtub.

"Well, I will admit, Bambi, these two lines along my eyelids make me look good. They'll have Jacob swooning so hard tonight that he'll impregnate me and once we run off to Vegas to elope, you can be our witness along with Elvis."

"That's the sweetest thing I've ever heard," Kim said sarcastically.

Leah left the bathroom to slip on her dress, a plain black number that ended just above her knees, and then returned to the mirror. She ran a hand through her waist-length hair and smoothed out the dress.

"Do I look alright?" she asked.

"You look great," Kim replied, looking up at her. "You've always been a tall drink of water."

"I just hope he's thirsty tonight."

"It's Jacob—he doesn't have a choice."

"Are you sure you're gonna be okay?" Leah asked. "Because I can just reschedule with him. It's no big deal."

"No," Kim said curtly. "I did your makeup and you look great, so you have to go out. I'm just doing laundry, anyway."

Leah slipped on her strappy heels and laced them up. "Whatever you say."

Then the doorbell rang. "I think that's him," Kim said.

Leah checked her watch. "He's early," she realized.

"Maybe he's just excited. Do you need a condom?"

Leah rolled her eyes. "It's not fucking Prom," she said. "He should already have one." Then she winked.

"Good, because I don't have one, anyway," Kim said, making her way to the front door. "He's waiting."

Leah grabbed her purse and walked out to the entrance as gracefully as she could. "You're not my mom," she said. "I can greet him myself."

"Okay, okay," Kim said, retreating to the couch.

Leah opened the front door and greeted Jacob just as Kim whipped out her cell phone. She took a dozen pictures, leaning over the side of the couch. Leah quickly turned to Kim, rolling her eyes.

"Have fun, kids!" Kim called. She saw Jacob wave to her, but Leah firmly shut the door.

Kim unlocked her phone, went back to the song that Leah hated, and turned the volume even louder, blaring her music throughout the condo just from her speaker. She continued doing laundry—even Leah's, since she was a good person—and managed to clear her mind.

She went to the refrigerator at some point in search of leftover soup, but she paused with her hand on the door handle. Since Leah had moved in, which hadn't been a long time ago, she hadn't personalized the place that much. Taped to the refrigerator were printed images of Leah's favorite singers: Aaliyah, Amy Winehouse, and—of course—Selena. If this was Leah's idea of personalizing, then Kim wasn't surprised.

Laughing to herself, Kim retrieved the soup she was looking for and heated it up in the microwave. While she was waiting, the dryer finished, and Kim made her way over to it. The washer and dryer were in a closet near the front door, and with the music blaring so loud, Kim didn't even notice her front door being opened.

She was bent over in front of the dryer, taking clothes out of it and throwing them into a basket, when she was grabbed by one of her two braids and yanked back forcefully by the waist. She was thrown back and her head was smashed against the carpet when she finally saw her attacker. It was Jared, and he was lunging towards her.

"What the fuck did I tell you?" he asked her, his hands latching on her throat. She was a fraction of a second too late, and her hands were on top of his as she gasped for air.

"Why didn't you listen?" he demanded. His nails began to dig into her skin, and she cried out. That was when he removed one hand to cover her mouth, and she moved swiftly to kick him hard in balls.

He let go, and she began to crawl away in an effort to get to her feet, but he quickly had her by the hair again and began to drag her to her bedroom. She kicked away and yelled, but he was quick and had shut the door behind them.

He threw her onto her bed, and then all she felt was his body on top of hers. He was so heavy and she felt beyond helpless, but that didn't mean she was going to quit.

She kept screaming, and he covered her mouth.

"Keep it down, bitch," he said. "Before I really—"

Then she bit down hard on his hand, tasting blood.

He pulled his hand away yelling, "What the fuck!" and Kim promptly punched him in the nose. He continued to yell, and she kicked him over and over again in the stomach.

Jared reached his hand up, covered in his own blood, and quickly brought it down to slap her across the face. She heard his knuckles crack as he hit her, but she tried not to become too shocked by it. She was ruled by rage. She kicked him in the balls again, this time taking advantage of the fact that he was halfway off the bed. He fell, and the broken lamp came down with him. Unfortunately, it smashed on the floor right next to his head, the broken pieces just missing him.

Kim quickly got off the bed and put her bare foot up against his throat. He was about to take her down again when they were interrupted by the sounds of someone frantically pounding on the front door, as well as the doorbell ringing over and over. Under the loud music still playing, there was just a lot of noise happening at once.

"Kim!" a voice called. "Kim, are you alright?" It was Tanya.

Jared took advantage of the distraction and brought Kim down with him, her body hitting the ground with a hard thud. He had his hands wrapped around her throat again. "Say anything," he whispered, "and I'll fucking kill you."

Tanya remained at the front door, knocking and ringing the doorbell, but nobody answered. It seemed to have gone on forever before it finally ended. The music was the only noise Kim recognized besides her own heartbeat.

Jared finally released his grip on Kim's throat, and he got up, wiping the blood from his mouth. Kim lay motionless on the ground. The shock caught up with her.

"I mean it," he said. Then he left her bedroom and walked right out the front door. Kim couldn't even hear the front door close underneath the music still playing.

She paused the music and went after him at some point, but by the time she got down all the flights of stairs to the first floor, he was gone. She heard the siren of a police car approach the condo complex, but it just passed, dashing away in a flash of blue and red.

Kim went up to the fourth floor, and when she got there, Tanya was waiting for her, leaning against her own door frame.

"Sorry about the music," Kim told her, hoping Tanya couldn't see her markings in the dim light. "I had it up really loud."

"Did you fall?" Tanya asked her. "It sounded like a lot of things were hitting the floor, too."

"Oh, yeah, I was just doing laundry," Kim replied casually. "I dropped the basket. And then I accidentally knocked over some stuff. I'm kind of a klutz." Tanya didn't know that she was actually fairly graceful.

Tanya gave her a wary look. "Okay," she said. "I was just worried."

"I'm fine," Kim said, lying through her teeth. "Have a good night, okay?"

"You, too."

Kim went back into her condo, put on a hoodie, grabbed her keys, and went out to her car. She started it up, but she decided she should talk to Quil before she barged in on his basement in La Push.

She messaged him on the only number she had now, and it turned out to be a real one, probably the phone he had used to upload that Vine of her.

You still the plug?

He replied in a matter of moments, a first for him. Come thru, Bambi.

Within half an hour, she was still angry but she decided that demanding where Jared went would get her nowhere right now. She could hardly think and she knew damn well that Quil wouldn't know. Quil didn't know anything but drugs, and that was all she needed now.

Within half an hour, Kim was on her way back to her condo in Forks, her little happy pills in the pocket of her hoodie. She hadn't done this in a while, but she was angry and excited and all over the place. She needed to feel something else besides the imprints of Jared's hands in her throat and the throbbing in her head.

Kim was home in minutes, and she flew up those flights of stairs, the pills in her hands and her head three years backwards in time, sometime in high school when she had been this impulsive and this dumb. She didn't care.

She didn't care, but she did care. She cared enough to the point that when she sat down on her living room couch with the pills in her hand, consideration plagued her mind. She cared enough to think about what she was going to do.

And then she cared enough to flush those pills down the toilet. She didn't care about the effort or the money. She didn't care, but she did care. She just wasn't going to get high alone tonight—not again.

So she finished the laundry that night. She didn't put her music back on, but she finished her and Leah's laundry and folded their clothes nicely because she was a good person.

I'm still a good person, she told herself.

She got her soup out of the microwave and ate it cold. Then she cleaned up the broken lamp and got rid of all the glass, all the evidence. There was still a speck of Jared's blood on her sheet, though, so she flipped the sheet inside out and put it back on her mattress. And somehow, she willed herself to go to bed. When she laid down, though, it was like Jared had never disintegrated. She still felt heavy.

Kim was awake when Leah came home that night from her date. She faced the wall against her bed, her eyes open and wet. She heard Leah undo her heels and take off her clothes and climb into bed, wordless.

"Don't go to sleep without taking off your makeup," Kim murmured, her voice hoarse. "That's bad."

Leah shifted in her bed. "Why are you still awake, girl?"

"I don't know." Kim paused. "How was the date?"

"He didn't have a condom."

That was the least Kim had ever heard Leah speak in her entire life.

"You fucking didn't," Kim whispered.

"I didn't," Leah assured. "We didn't. I just..." She trailed off, and even though everything on Kim hurt now, it made her hurt even more.

"I gotta sort out some real problems," Leah concluded.

"I believe you," Kim replied.

"I just wish I knew where to start."

"Go to the bathroom and take off your makeup," Kim told her. "That's a start."

Leah sighed and eventually got up. "That's a start," she repeated.

A/N: Up next: the (sub)plot thickens.

Thanks as always,

HS