A/N: Thankyou to everyone who commented on the first chapter. I love reading replies. To Guest 1, thankyou for the criticism, I'm not good at dialogue and I have to struggle a lot to get it right mostly because my native language isn't English and that makes it rather hard. Anyway, I took your advice about the description thing so you can expect a lot of description in this chapter. I just mostly skip reading long descriptions lol so I never really thought about it, Thankyou so much for informing me about. To Guest 2, I may not be a professional writer but I can judge progress so yeah I have improved since I was 13, and if you don't think so you can just fuck off instead of dropping hateful comments. Onto the chapter then. I accidentally (debatable) made Jem relate to mirrorball. Oops?

I have this thing where I get older

but just never wiser

Midnights become my afternoons

When my depression works the graveyard shift all of the people I've ghosted

stand there in the room

I should not be left to my own devices

they come with prices and vices I end up in crisis. Tale as old as time.

– From Antihero by Taylor Swift

Jem surveyed the door with vary eyes. It was an ordinary door, made of coarse wood and polished to a degree. The handle had worn off due to age and just above it were several deep scratches where Jem and Walter had tried to engrave their initials about a decade ago. Besides that, it was thoroughly identical to every other door in this house. So why was Jem so scared to open it?

Just go in, he said to himself. What are you scared of?

If he'd bothered to evaluate himself, he'd find that the answer was either he'll push me away like he's been doing all year or he'll tell me exactly what has been going on with him all year. Jem wasn't sure which eventuality he was more anxious over. He didn't really want to think about either.

The door handle was worn beneath his fingertips. He took a deep breath, schooling his stressed expression and turned the handle.

Immediately, he was greeted with chaos. Several years ago, Nan, Walter, and Jem had argued over who the messiest person at Ingleside was. The argument had devolved into a full on competition and they had eventually had to drag Susan in to gasp over the state of their rooms. The emerging winner had been Di's attic which she had specifically made her own to do whatever she did in her free time. That unholy mess seemed like a cathedral in comparison to this. The paint on the walls was chipped and torn like someone or several someones had tried to pull it off bit by bit with their hands. The dresser and both closets were upended on the sides, clothes and notebooks spilling out of them. Empty dishes and mugs cluttered the only table which had been pushed to the side to give way for the huge world map opened on the bed. Newspapers and crumpled notes were scattered everywhere. The floor was a jumble of dishevelled clothes, torn papers and bundles of books. Aside from all the mess, Jem was concerned most about the books thrown carelessly everywhere. It wasn't like Walter to mistreat books. He had never even been known to fold pages.

Speaking of that individual, Walter was sitting almost out of sight, right next to the upended closet, back against the wall. He seemed to be writing something rather carefully, dipping a quill in ink and making artful flourishes on the paper. Jem surveyed his brother for a moment, his dark hair ruffled and eyes sporting deep shadows. Realising that Walter still hadn't noticed him, he coughed awkwardly, shifting on both feet.

Walter startled, immediately withdrawing his long scroll of paper. The inkpot, balancing gregariously on one knee was upended by his sudden movement and fell on top of the crumpled scroll, immediately soaking it with black. Jem made a startled noise, hurrying to the far corner to rescue the parchment but by the time his hands caught up, it was completely black. He grasped hold of the paper, trying to keep the ink from seeping in but the few words left were immediately covered by black.

"It's no use," said Walter morosely. He seemed even more dishevelled from up further, like a painting with the edges smudged.

"I'm sorry," said Jem miserably. He had come here to cheer Walt up and had managed to ruin his mood and his poem entirely.

"It wasn't your fault," murmured Walter, trying to smile but ending up with a wooden caricature of the real thing instead.

"What were you writing, anyway?" asked Jem nonchalantly. He grabbed hold of the nearest thing he could find, a well worn book which was edged open by several scraps of embellished paper.

"Don't-" warned Walter, a curious flush making way over his face. He darted a hand out to catch the book before Jem could read anything other than the title on the bunch of poems.

Rosamund, thought Jem, feeling the word take root in his brain. I wonder if she's anyone we know.

"It's nothing- just some stuff I've been working on," Walter said in response to Jem's questioning look.

"You know you can show me stuff right? I would never make fun of you for anything,"

"I know," Walter murmured uncomfortably, not sounding at all like he believed it. A ray of light glistened over his face, elongating the shadows under his eyes.

"Do you want to go fishing?" Jem asked hesitantly, having nothing else to say.

"Maybe later," muttered Walter in a way Jem knew meant never. He stood up suddenly, and Jem was conscious of his thinness beside him own self. His brother looked fragile, like something that was too near to being broken.

Walter crossed the room, while Jem remained silent, guilt entering into his soul. Why had he not noticed the brittleness of Walter's bones, the lankiness of his structure? He was pale, too pale by a dozen degrees, and had a rather faded look about him.

"I've," Walter intoned tonelessly, "got to go."

He crossed a room in even strides, making for the door.

"Wait," said Jem a little desperately.

"Walter," he said. "Won't you tell me what's been bothering you?"

Walter paused for a second. He still looked tired beyond explanation, but his eyes flashed dangerously as he turned towards Jem.

"Why don't you trust me to protect myself?"

"What?" said Jem, confused at the sudden vehemence.

"You keep treating me like I'm Rilla or-or Faith," he said, flicking an accusing look at Jem, who flushed deeply.

"I can take care of myself just fine,"

"I know," entreated Jem. "I just don't want you to get hurt, is all,"

"I don't need you to run after me all the time like I'm a baby," His voice cracked in the middle. Jem took half a step forward, of a mind to wrap his arms around Walter and never let him go. But Walter was already composed, glaring at him with blazing eyes.

"Shirley doesn't warrant constant safeguarding does he?"

Jem had the feeling that Walter had misunderstood him completely.

"Walt, I don't- Just listen,"

Walter looked like he didn't hear or maybe he didn't want to hear. A thin layer of sweat had covered Jem's forehead. He swiped a hand over it. Somewhere, a bee was buzzing.

Walter was still speaking, voice hard and defensive.

"I've been a little under the weather lately but you don't have to pretend like I'm not able to do anything. I'm so tired of everyone fussing over me. It doesn't make me feel better. It just makes me feel like more of an inconvenience,"

He swept Jem a broken, agonised look, stepping over a broken mug and opening the door. Without as much as a by leave, Walter had gone, leaving Jem alone in this jungle.

What had he done? Jem felt wretched for startling this display out of his sensitive, feeling brother. His heart hammered loudly in his chest. Jem took a deep breath, then tried to make his legs cooperate. When that didn't work, he pressed a hand against the teteering closet, trying to regulate his breathing. Had Walter been feeling like this all the time? An inconvenience? He wasn't an inconvenience!

When his breaths were finally even, he gingerly stepped over the mess and exited the room. He ought to go comfort Walter. It was only right. But Walter was nowhere to be found. He had certainly disappeared off into Rainbow Valley. At the risk of disturbing his own private place and angering him further, Jem decided to let him cool down. He turned the other way and briskly walked towards his own room in the terrible silence.

The hallway outside his room was quiet. He pushed the door open and stood stiff at the sight of the room. Of course he had forgotten. This was not his room any longer. Shirley had claimed it as his own when he went off to Redmond. That was why he had been sleeping in the spare room. Jem didn't know why he had forgotten. It must have slipped his mind in his anxious state. He took a deep breath and walked into his brother's room.

Shirley's room was the polar opposite of Walter's havoc. It was neat and clean, the corners tucked into the bed, and everything set in its proper place. For some reason, this was as upsetting as the last room. Jem tried to look for the discrepancy and found nothing.

There's no personality, he discovered finally, eyes flitting from the perfectly untouched desk towards the plain walls. There was nothing that differentiated Shirley from a boarder in a house. Everything was neat and crisp, a little too perfect that bordered on unnerving.

Jem surveyed the bare room for a minute, thinking about whatever else he'd missed while he was in Redmond. He felt a queer sense of grief at this, like everything was changing without him knowing.

Jem felt like he must collapse with the emotions rising to life inside him.

To distract his thoughts from their eventual rampage, he paced around the room in steady intervals. The bare walls which had seemed to be closing around him at first now seemed to be grounding him. He took several breaths in succession, willing himself not to burst into tears.

Stop snivelling like a little girl, he said to himself. Man up.

On his fifth round around the small room, he spotted a bright flash of colour poking out from behind the desk. Without thinking, Jem bent forward to wedge it out. It was hard from the upside but soft paper lined inside. He withdrew his hand to stare at the uncovered book. The brightly painted cover regarded itself as The Picture Of Dorian Gray. Jem didn't consider himself to be a purveyor of books but this was clearly well read. The pages were creased and annotated by a Shirley's scrupulous handwriting. The top parts were folded on half the pages, announcing the well loved parts in the book.

Jem was not an avid reader like Walter or Nan or apparently Shirley himself. But he had never heard of this book, which ought to have been mentioned at least once. Maybe Shirley wanted to keep it hidden. His thoughts even more muddled than before, Jem slipped the book back into place and stepped out of the room with a strange feeling of displaced time.

Nan, coming out from her own room gave him a wary look when he appeared. He gave her a wide berth, making his way towards the parlour. In a few minutes, he felt the cool back beneath his back. A telephone was pressed hard against his ear, and he realised almost distantly that there was someone saying something on the other side.

"Hello?" the murmurs distinguished into an easily recognizable voice.

"Faith," breathed Jem into the telephone. He clutched it with both hands, uncaring of his stiff muscles.

"Are you okay?" Faith asked concernedly, reading something in his tone.

"Can you just talk?" He murmured soft. He chose his words carefully, conscious of a dozen other receivers lifted into people's ears, probably a whole of those meddling women the glen had in extreme quantity.

Faith understood him. She had always understood him.

She started talking. She told him about things at the manse, Bruce's trials in talking, Norman Douglas' scandals, Carl's new pets, Una's quiet declamations. Her voice grounded him, and with each word he came fully back into himself. When the clock struck 6, he was disconcerted to know that he had spent two hours talking to Faith. The door opened in the background. Susan exclaimed a revered "Mrs. Doctor Dear,". He could hear Di and Rilla trooping up the stairs.

"Well I suppose I ought to go help Rosemary set the plates," said Faith finally, ending her long rant about Mr Trellis of Queen's,"

"Thankyou," said Jem quietly. A queer flush was crawling up his spine. He didn't dare tell her how much she had helped him on the phone but she read it in his words nonetheless.

Her tone softened. "Anytime," she promised.

"Although not when I'm supposed to be fishing with Jerry. You owe me, Jem Blythe,"

Jem laughed. Mother, entering through the kitchen door, waved and flicked and inquiring glance at the phone. He mouthed 'Faith,' smiling.

Jem's back was stiff against the wall. His hand was half numb from clutching the phone. Still he felt like he hadn't for a long time, like he was right on top of the world.

"Anything," Jem promised, a bit rashly and was reminded of his mistake when Faith laughed brightly on the other side.

"Alright then, what do you say to a little boating competition? Wednesday, bring your whole troop,"

Jem groaned fitfully.

"You said it," Faith told him cheerfully. "Have fun being annihilated,"

The phone disconnected. Jem grinned to himself in the afternoon light.

twirling my moustache like a storybook villain. dorian gray?? whatever can this mean?

a little bit of walter's rant is taken from a quote from will byers in season 2 of stranger things. "it doesn't help. it just makes me feel like more of a freak," WALTER AND WILL KINNIES??? we'll just have to wait and see. I giggled so much about making jem a 'the archer' girlie but it had to be done guys. also i had shirley in a previous draft of this chapter but i had no idea how to characterize him so I had to take him out. pls give me suggestions on how to write this character i either make him too dry or too jokey how do i write a sensible 15 year old when i have never come across such a person like have you ever met a 15 year old who isn't completely insane like?