"You look tired. Have you been sleeping at all?" Hawk asked, giving Sky a worried glance as they walked out of the classroom.

"Not much."

"Nightmares?"

"Yeah," Sky muttered, keeping her eyes down, hoping that Hawk wouldn't ask more.

She was going to the grief group for the first time, and it made her nervous as fuck. The last thing she wanted to do was to talk to Hawk about the nightmares but she could hardly blame him for asking. Her pale face and the shadows under her eyes revealed to everyone that she wasn't sleeping, so it was only natural for Hawk to worry.

"You know you can tell me anything," Hawk said silently, as they stopped in the lobby, in front of the doors of the auditorium. "I just— I wanna help you."

"I know."

That was all Sky wanted to say about that topic. Nothing good would come out of telling Hawk about the nightmares. They were too intimate, too awful. In her dreams she was kissing Cody, making love to him— and it carved her heart out to even think about it, to think about how sick and twisted it was to still want him, now that he was dead, now that she was in love with someone else. But that wasn't even the worst part. The thing that really killed her was the way those dreams always ended - with Cody's head exploding, his blood and his brain raining down on Sky's hands, on her face, in her mouth.

Every night she watched him die, over and over again. And she could never stop it.

"I think it's great you want to go to the grief group. Maybe it'll help with the nightmares too," Hawk said, glancing towards the doors of the auditorium.

Sky felt her stomach clenching into a tight knot of anxiety. She had promised herself she would come, that she would seek more help, but now that she stood in front of those doors, she only felt dread and fear and regret. The memory of the last time she'd walked into that room - the opening night of Dead Poets Society - was heavy on her chest, taking her breath away. She could barely believe it was only weeks ago. It felt like it had happened in another lifetime.

"Yeah, I guess." Sky shrugged, dragging her eyes off the doors back to Hawk.

"You want me to wait for you?" he asked with a worried frown. "You need a ride home?"

"No, I'm good. Dad's gonna pick me up."

"You sure? I was thinking— that maybe, if you want to, we could go for a coffee? Or a milkshake—"

"Eli, please—" her throat wanted to close up. "I don't think that's a good idea. Not today."

His face fell, a defeated sigh left his lips. "Right. I just— I really wanted to talk to you about something."

Sky's heart twisted painfully in her chest. She hated to be the one to always disappoint him, the one who made him sad, worried, nervous, but she had a pretty solid hunch about what Hawk wanted to talk to her about, and that thought was a cold stone in her stomach.

The prom.

She had been avoiding being alone with Hawk lately, just to escape the conversation she knew was coming. The prom was in two months, whether she wanted it to be or not, and everyone else seemed to be super excited about it. Sam was obviously going with Miguel, and even if Moon didn't have a date - she had broken up with Piper some weeks ago - she was still going, and had already everything planned out perfectly. She was going to go dress shopping with Sam next week, and they had asked Sky to go with them. It would do you good to go out, to do something fun. Moon had said, with her sweet, sympathetic smile. Some positive energy after everything that's happened. Please, think about it.

And Sky had thought about it - the same way someone thinks about their nearing execution. The thought of going dress shopping with the girls was beyond painful. Sam had said their mothers would join them too, that it would be this wonderful mother-daughter experience, shopping for beautiful dresses and shoes, having lunch together, and just doing fun girl stuff.

Sky knew Sam and Moon meant well, but a girls' day out— it just highlighted everything Sky had lost. She didn't even have a mom to bring with her.

The last time she'd gone dress shopping for a school dance had been for the homecoming in her freshman year. Kat's mom had been delighted to take them. Sky had chosen a dream-like pink princess gown, and Kat had caused a scene in the store by refusing every single dress and telling her mom she'd go in a tux or not go at all.

Sky's heart twisted painfully. At that homecoming, she had first met Matt. Two months later they had started dating. And a couple of months after that, Kat had been dead.

Sky hadn't attended a school dance since.

Thinking about the prom felt like she was watching an avalanche approaching, knowing it would suffocate her to death. It wasn't just about Cody, and the fact that Sky felt like the whole prom should be canceled because he was gone. It was all the weight of all of her previous mistakes combined, it was the absence of her Mom, it was Matt looking at her across the dancefloor, a wide, predatory smile playing on his lips, it was the gunshot and it was Kat dying, and it was all too much. She felt something inside of her chest breaking like glass every time Hawk as much as mentioned the prom.

"I—" she started and cleared her throat to make her voice not tremble quite that much. It wasn't Hawk's fault, none of it was. He loved her. He wanted to be with her. He just wanted them to go to the prom together, as a couple, and there was nothing wrong with that, except her own messed up mind. But for how long could she keep running away from that conversation? She knew they had to talk about it, sooner or later. "I know. Maybe— maybe we can talk when we go to the tattoo shop? Get our tattoos done, and then grab a coffee or something."

The smile that lit up Hawk's face was like the sun, and it made her feel awful. She had promised him nothing, but his eyes were shining, he looked so fucking hopeful, so fucking beautiful. It made her chest ache.

"That sounds great," he replied, the grin lingering on his lips. "I can't wait."

Sky forced a smile on her lips, hoping he wouldn't realize how utterly fake it was.

"Yeah, me too."

They were getting the tattoos done next week. Hawk was going to get the hawk on his back retouched so that it would match his hair, and Sky— well, she had a plan of her own. Hawk hadn't asked what she was going to get, and she hadn't told him. She knew he'd have questions when he saw it, but she would cross that bridge when they came to it, would come up with something to tell him. Hell, maybe she should tell him the truth, and while she was at it, she could also tell him about the nightmares, about the dreams where Cody pressed her down on the bed and kissed her, and she cried out his name, breathed I love you, I love you, I love you until the life went out in Cody's eyes and he died in her arms again and again and again.

That, at least, would make Hawk stop wanting to go to the prom with her.

She pressed a hand over her aching heart, trying to rub off the pain, hating the worried frown on Hawk's face as he noticed her gesture.

"Sky, is there something I can do?" He asked for a thousandth time, and just like every time, Sky shook her head, forced herself to breathe in, to breathe out, to breathe through the pain until it eased enough for her to speak.

"No, I'm fine. I should go," she sighed. "The group's probably starting already."

Hawk reached a hand, his fingers brushing hers gently. Oh, how warm his hand was, oh how kind his voice and oh, how Sky wished she were someone else, anyone else, someone who had no grief, someone who still had a heart, someone who could just smile and laugh and take that cute boy's hand and kiss him and go to the prom with him, and oh how her heart was breaking.

She wanted to give him everything. But she had nothing to give. Nothing.

"You sure you don't want me to wait for you?" He asked, letting his hand drop as Sky failed to take it.

"No, it's okay," she replied, already turning to leave. "I'll see you at the dojo later."