When Hawk stepped into Sky's room, he realized Nicholas had been right on the phone. Sky was doing a lot better than the day before.
She was sitting in her bed, surrounded by stuffed animals - Hawk noticed the panda bear he had won for her at Valley Fest a million years ago, and the unicorn plushie he had given her when they had gotten back together last fall. Her clothes were clean - a loose black hoodie and leggings - she had showered, washed her hair, and there were pink spots of color on her cheeks. And even if it wasn't quite a smile that touched her lips when their eyes met, at least she was looking at him, acknowledging his presence.
A tight band that had been squeezing the air out of Hawk's lungs for days, snapped. He let out a breath he hadn't even realized he'd been holding.
"Hi," Sky said, her voice still dry and husky. "Come in, don't just stand there."
"You look good. Feeling any better?"
"Yeah," She ran a nervous hand through her hair, pushing the unruly curls behind her ear. "I even managed to eat something."
"I heard that your dad called a doctor last night. It helped?"
Hawk walked closer and took a seat on the bed. He wanted to sit as close to her as possible, to pull her into his arms, to hold her, but— something in her posture was stiff and tense, and he respected that, keeping a distance.
"She gave me something so I could sleep, so yeah, I guess it helped—-" She looked down and bit on her lower lip. "She said she could prescribe me something, to help me get over the worst part, but— I don't know."
"What, like opiates?" Hawk frowned.
"I guess. I mean— I slept last night. And I had— amazing dreams. So it can't be all bad, can it?" A short silence. "But on the other hand— I really don't want to start that stuff again. I fought so fucking hard to get clean, so…"
The end of that sentence drifted off, leaving Hawk uncertain of what he should say. Did he want Sky to do drugs again? Hell, no. But the stuff she had gotten last night had made her to sleep and eat and talk again, so as far as he was concerned, they had fucking saved her life.
He cleared his throat and turned his eyes to a small, leather-covered notebook she held in her lap. As soon as he had walked into the room, Sky had closed the book, and her fingers still lay on top of it, pressing it tight against her thighs.
"What are you writing?" he asked, changing the subject.
Sky shrugged and her fingers curled around the spine of the book.
"Nothing. Just… a diary kinda thing."
"Oh. I didn't know you kept a diary."
"I don't. It's just… something we used to do at rehab. Write it out, they would say. Or paint it out. And since I suck at painting— well, I gotta try something."
Right. Of course. The fact that she was up and about hardly meant she was over all the shit that had happened. Hawk swallowed and his eyes went back to the small notebook. A part of him wanted to ask if she would let him see, but the way she held the book with a white knuckle grip told him it was private. Besides, he knew she was writing about Cody. Would he really want to know the details?
Jealousy was a lot slower to die than people. It still lingered, no matter how much Hawk despised the feeling.
"I liked it at rehab, you know." Sky continued after a short and awkward silence. "The things we used to do there… they really helped. Dad asked if I'd like to go back. Not for drugs, obviously - but just to sort out my thoughts and feelings, you know. Just to get away from all this for a while. He called them. They said I could come."
"What— what did you tell him?"
Another strengthless shrug. Sky kept drawing invisible lines and circles on the back of the notebook with her index finger, and Hawk's glance followed. He was holding his breath waiting for her answer.
"I don't know. I mean— I liked the place, but…"
"But what?"
"Going back there without Luke or Cody— What's the point? It wouldn't be the same."
"Right—"
"They helped me get through it," Sky continued, keeping her eyes down, but Hawk heard the slight tremor in her voice. "They helped me get better. And now both of them are gone. They died and I'm still here. How is that fair?"
"I'm sorry," Hawk said, hoping he could think of something else to say, that he had better, finer words. But he had none. The truth was that he was still jealous, thinking about the fucking stunt Cody had pulled, faking his name into the documents to be able to sneak into the rehab facility, when it should have been him to help Sky, it should have been him to be there for her— but this was not the time or the place to say that. Sky had enough to deal with, without him being a jealous fucking asshole.
"So, if you're not going to rehab, are you going to come back to school?" He asked, stealing a glance at her profile, of the way the sunlight danced on her pale skin. "Maybe that would do you good. To get out of the house."
Sky looked down, her long eyelashes kissed her cheekbones. Her palm was flat against the notebook as if she was trying to feel its hidden heartbeat.
"I don't know. I mean— Everything in school is gonna remind me of Cody, and… I don't know if I'm ready. To see the cards and the flowers and stuff… And— how am I gonna face everyone? His friends? They fucking hate me."
"His friends?" Hawk frowned, sudden worry squeezing his chest. "Has someone said something to you?"
The day after Cody had died, a blood-red word Murderer! had appeared on Sky's locker, and its twin on the door of Blatt's office. The janitor had cleaned the doors and that had been that, but Hawk knew what people were saying on social media even if they had no guts to say it to his face.
He had hoped Sky knew nothing about that, but clearly that wasn't the case.
"Is someone giving you shit about what happened? Blaming you or stuff?"
Sky glanced up, her eyes dark with emotion.
"They have every right to do so."
"No, they fucking don't. And if someone's bothering you, you need to tell me."
"Right, because that fixes everything." Her tone was bitter. "Like when I told Cody about Kyler harassing me and he beat Kyler up. Look how well that ended."
"So you think it was Kyler who took the video to Blatt?"
It wasn't like Hawk hadn't thought about that too.
He had seen the video. It was short and of bad quality, but he had recognized Kyler's laughter in the background nevertheless. He knew it all too well - it had been the soundtrack of all his humiliations for years, and he always associated that sound with a fist in the gut, a backpack thrown to the trash, a carton of milk poured over his head. But the fact Kyler had shot the video, still wasn't 100% proof that he had been the one to take it to Blatt. Kyler was a bully and an asshole, but was he really smart enough to plan something like that, or evil enough to pull it through?
"Come on, I know it was Kyler," Sky replied, her words quick and sharp. "He was after Cody's blood. Had been ever since the fight."
It made sense, and Hawk knew it. He remembered Kyler lying on the floor, bloody and beaten, remembered the stench of blood and oranges and Christmas spices, remembered Cody standing over Kyler, gripping a gun in his trembling fingers, and Kyler begging Please don't do it, don't kill me, don't kill me, please—
Sky was right, Kyler had been after revenge - but Hawk hated the way Sky made all this sound like it was her fault.
"Okay, yeah, maybe. But Sky, you can't blame yourself for that—"
"I'll blame myself for that for the rest of my life. Had I not said anything—" She let out a tense breath, her lips were drawn back revealing teeth as if the words were painful to push out. "You don't understand. After Sam's Christmas party, when Cobra Kai attacked us— In the hospital, I told Cody what had happened. I told him I was scared of Kyler, that he made me feel like Matt. That's why Cody went after him. He— he couldn't kill Matt for me, but he wanted to kill Kyler, to make sure that what Matt did— that it would never happen again."
The Christmas fight. Hawk's chest clenched tight with shame, just like every time someone mentioned it. Yeah, he had switched sides at the end, but it had been too little too late. He had let Kyler and Tory into that house. He had let them attack Sky.
"I wanted to kill Kyler too," Hawk rasped, emotion making his voice raw. "When Miguel told me what Kyler did to you, I— I wanted to fucking end him."
Sky's eyes filled with tears. She drew in a long, trembling breath.
"You don't understand."
Hawk frowned. His eyes searched Sky's face but she avoided his glance, bringing her hands to wipe away the couple of tears that had fallen to her cheeks.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean— that there's something I haven't told you."
The way she still wouldn't look at him knitted Hawk's stomach into a tight knot. He felt like he had swallowed a stone, it was heavy and cold in his gut.
"Then tell me. What is it?"
Sky pulled her knees against her chest and placed the notebook into her nightstand, next to a half-full cup of coffee, a photo of Kat, and - Hawk noticed like an arrow through his heart - the pendant Cody had given Sky as a Christmas gift, the one that said Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful.
"It's a long story," Sky sighed, and Hawk forced his eyes off the damn pendant, suppressing the nagging jealousy, suppressing the need to throw that thing off the nightstand and replace it with the small gift box that was in his backpack. The phoenix pendant. The one he still wanted Sky to have, the symbol of their love.
"So? It's not like I need to be somewhere."
Sky let out another shaky breath, wrapped her arms tighter around her knees.
"You remember when we broke up— When you had told your asshole friends about… us and the janitor's closet?"
Hawk's cheeks heated. Sky's words stung like a slap in the face. "Yeah. Shit— I never should've done that. But what does it have to do with anything?"
"I'm getting there." Sky's shoulders rose and fell with sharp, nervous breaths. "Look— I'm not trying to blame you or anything. You've apologized. We're over that. But what you did— it hurt me so bad because— it made me feel the same as I felt when Matt— when he— he took pictures of me. Without my— my consent. And— and sent them to his friends."
"What?"
"They all laughed about it. Matt— and his friends. Like it was some kind of a joke." There was a tremor in Sky's voice, her words came out shaky, broken. "Like it was just a joke that— that he had— that he— after I passed out on the couch he— he raped me."
Hawk felt her words like a punch in the gut. The impact made him choke, it turned his stomach. He tasted bile at the back of his throat. Matt had—
That fucking asshole. What he had done to Sky—
Hawk stopped that thought before he could finish it. He could not make himself think about it, did not want to imagine how it had happened. A rage unlike anything he had ever felt, made his chest burn. Had Matt been in this room, Hawk would have ripped him apart limb by limb with nothing but his bare hands—
And yet, that raging anger mixed with shame and disgust as he remembered the way he had talked about Sky to his friends— Stupid. Just wanting to show off, not stopping to think how it had sounded, how it would make Sky feel. He hadn't understood then, but he understood now.
He had broken her trust in the worst way possible.
"I'm sorry— Fuck! I'm so sorry—" His voice broke on those words, but Sky kept talking as if she'd barely heard him.
"When Kyler— when he grabbed me— when he put his hand— under my skirt— it was all I could think about. That he was going to— to do that too," Sky's voice was shaking. "I know. Stupid. He wouldn't have done that in front of everyone… He just wanted to scare and humiliate me. It worked too. I really thought he was gonna— that it was happening all over again. I was so fucking scared— and I told Cody. And he beat Kyler up. And now Cody is dead. You see? Had I never said anything about Kyler to him, he would— he would still be here."
The weight of what Sky had told lay heavily on Hawk's chest, turning his breathing uneven, filling his veins with ice. He would think about it later— when he got home, he would think about what Matt had done, what Kyler had done, and more than anything, what he had done— all the stupid, stupid, stupid things he had told his so-called friends that day. He would go over them all one by one and feel all this disgusting and shame now that he knew— now that he understood why they had hurt Sky so badly. He would let himself think about all that when he got home, and he would let himself punch and kick the punching bag in his basement until his knuckles bled, until he was sweating through his clothes, until his muscles ached and burned and trembled, until he had killed Matt and Kyler and his former self a thousand times over.
But not yet. Not now. Not here. Because Sky needed him to be strong for her, and he couldn't let her see the way her words had ripped his soul apart.
He took her hand, gripped her fingers tight in his, and swallowed down the burning bile, the anger, the hate until he could trust his voice again.
"It's not your fault," he rasped, the emotion making his voice crack. "None of it is. Matt was an asshole and he deserves to fucking burn in Hell. And for Kyler— that piece of shit deserved the beating Cody and I gave him. But it's not your fault. Cody made his own decision, just like I did. He wanted to protect you, because— because he fucking loved you. And it's not your fault Kyler is a piece of shit who couldn't take a beating but went crying about it to Blatt instead and caused all this shit to go down."
"But—"
"No, just no, Sky— enough." He gripped her hand harder. "Enough already. You didn't cause this. It's not your fault. And I won't let anyone make you feel like it is."
She was blinking furiously to keep the tears away, but still a few escaped and rolled to her cheeks. Hawk released his hand from hers and brought it up, to gently wipe away those tears, hot and salty on his calloused fingers.
"Why didn't you tell me?" He asked silently.
It took a long while before she could answer and even then her voice was thick and raw with unshed tears.
"It's not something… I like talking about. I never even told Kat. And I— I only told Dad like a couple of months ago."
There was a bitter taste lingering on Hawk's tongue. To think that Sky had carried this secret all the time they had dated— All the times he had kissed her, made love to her— Gods, he felt awful. He would've been different had he known, gentler, kinder, more patient. He would have understood why she made him wait so long before having sex with him. He felt like an idiot now, an idiot for not asking more questions, for not listening, for making her feel like she couldn't tell him something this important, this fundamental.
The fact that she had kept this from him, felt like a betrayal, even if he knew she hadn't meant it that way.
"And Cody?" He rasped. "When did you tell him?"
This time her silence lasted even longer. Hawk let his hand fall from her face, but the movement was gentle, his fingers brushed her hair, her shoulder, trailed down her arm before finding her hand again.
"In the rehab. We told each other a lot of things," she finally replied, her voice silent, hesitant. "Cody had… a hard life. People— they'd done horrible things to him. Awful, awful things. He knew how it felt to be— abused."
Hawk's chest clenched. The lump in his throat was persistent, he couldn't swallow it down no matter how hard he tried and the silence grew long between them. Sky had once told him Cody was a foster kid, and now that memory resurfaced. A hard life. Awful, awful things, Sky had said. A part of him wanted to ask more, but the words wouldn't form on his tongue.
Cody.
Hawk's feelings about Cody were a sickening mess - one he hadn't even begun to navigate yet. Talking about him wasn't easy. Listening to Sky talk about him was even harder.
Hawk knew that it would always be so. Cody would always be a sore subject between them, an open wound, one they would learn to move around, careful not to touch where it hurt the most.
"I wish you would've told me," He said, still holding her hand in his. "About Matt. I— I would've been there for you."
"Yeah, well— we were both keeping secrets. I wish you would have told me about the stuff that was going on with your dad." Sky said, hitting a truth Hawk didn't want to think about.
"That's different."
She looked up from their joint hands to meet his eyes.
"Is it really? Cause I think it's exactly the same."
Hawk cleared his throat and looked away. Dad was the last thing he wanted to think about now. He added Dad's face to the list of faces he was going to beat into a pulp tonight, as soon as he got home, as soon as his fist started hammering the punching bag. Dad. Matt. Kyler. Himself - the asshole he had been in Cobra Kai.
He knew that no doubt there were healthier ways to deal with stuff than punching the bag until his hands bled, his body ached and his head was so empty it echoed. Ways like Sky's writing, or the therapy she went to, or meditation. Mr LaRusso was big on meditation, always talking about balance within and shit—
And Hawk felt the pull towards that, he really did. He wished Sensei Lawrence would let them do more Miyagi-Do stuff because it was helping him find new ways to deal with all the fucked up things he'd been through. But so far he had only scratched the surface of the meditation stuff and the only way he knew how to silence his demons was still the way of the fist.
At least he was punching just the bag nowadays, instead of people. That had to count for something.
"I wanna get another tattoo," Sky said out of the blue, pulling Hawk back into the moment.
He frowned. "A tattoo?"
"Yeah. The phoenix wasn't just to cover the scar, but to remember Kat. And now—" She hesitated, her cheeks turning pink. "I dunno. I just feel like it. You think Rico has time to do it?"
"Sure. You want me to call him and ask?"
"Well, not before I'm in the shape that I can actually think about leaving my room…" Sky muttered. "I don't know. Maybe next week."
"What are you gonna get?"
Hawk tried to sound cooler than he felt, considering he had an awful feeling Sky was going to get a tattoo about Cody. A painful jolt of jealousy twisted his heart. He had once tattooed Sky's name into his chest, and now Sky was getting a tattoo about her ex? Was he just going to walk around pretending he didn't care when the girl he loved had another dude's name tattooed on her skin?
I'm overreacting. She wouldn't do that to me. Maybe it's just another bird or stuff—
Her hand was still in his, her fingers entwined with his own as if she was oblivious to the torment her words had caused
"You'll see. What about you? Are you gonna keep the Grim Reaper forever?"
"I dunno. Haven't really thought about it. But— I might need to get the Hawk tattoo retouched, 'cause I think I'm gonna change my hair."
"Oh? You're not gonna cut it, right?"
"No way, just a new color. I guess it's just time for the red to go." He shrugged. "Feels too much like Cobra Kai."
Sky glanced at his mohawk, a ghost of a smile touching the corner of her lips. "It's a shame. I really like the red one."
Something thumped in Hawk's chest, so loud he was sure Sky must have heard it.
"You— you do?"
"You know I do," her cheeks turned a shade pinker. "It looks amazing on you."
"Well, I'm pretty sure you're gonna love the next one too." He smirked. "Just wait."
Damn, how good it felt to talk about something so normal, something fun, something that didn't involve jealousy or secrets, death and despair, and raping sicko ex-boyfriends. How fucking amazing it felt to just hold Sky's hand in his, to see the tiny little smile in her eyes, the flushing of her cheeks when their eyes met.
For the shortest moment, it made Hawk forget everything else. The world around this room ceased to exist when he fell into her eyes, and he knew - it didn't matter how long it took, or how hard the road was going to be.
They were going to be okay.
