Jasper Lucas (sinsoftheson) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2021-04-03 15:21:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | #group scene, #june 2018, greer, jasper, logan |
Who: Jasper and Logan, cameo by Greer
When: Evening, Thursday, June 7
Where: The Lucas/Harris household, out and about
Status: complete
Though he had been working the last few nights, Logan was still sending quick texts to Jasper, as he usually did when they weren’t able to hang out. But weirdly enough… he wasn’t getting any response. Even when he called his friend, the call went to voicemail. It was a little disconcerting, especially since Tuesday had been Jules’s birthday. Maybe the shrooms he gave Jasper had been bad or something and Jasper was pissy about it. Logan wasn’t sure, but he was still worried. Which was why he had driven to Jasper’s dad’s house after his shift at The Boathouse tonight. This town was fucked up and if Jasper had been hurt again, or worse, disappeared, he needed to know.
Jasper’s car was out front and there were a couple of lights on inside, so Logan had no qualms about walking up to the front door. He still hesitated and pulled out his phone, sending a text to Jasper. on your front porch. Come let me in or I’ll sic your dad and sister on you.
Jasper had been home in his basement room for ... two days? He wasn’t keeping track of time, only emerging to use the bathroom or get something from the kitchen to eat when he was absolutely starving. Mostly he smoked and drank, having pilfered a couple of bottles of liquor from his dad’s cabinet in the kitchen, and slept. Being unconscious as often as possible was the way he was coping, and the more fucked up he was when he went to sleep, the more empty his dreams were, and that was what he wanted. Jasper vaguely remembered Amelia coming to check on him at some point and brushing her off with some mutterings about being sick, but he didn’t think he’d spoken to anyone else. He’d blearily looked at messages and missed calls every so often, but didn’t have the energy or the will to answer them.
He happened to be awake and rolling a blunt when his neglected phone lit up on the small coffee table he was using. The battery was almost dead, but Jasper read enough of it before the screen went black to see that Logan was at the house. Fuck. He definitely didn’t want Amelia or Gavin involved, hovering around and worrying about him, so Jasper hauled himself up and pulled on some basketball shorts and a hoodie to trudge upstairs. He was high and a little drunk already, but not enough, so he made it to the front door without stumbling. Jasper pulled it open and squinted at Logan a bit before he moved back so Logan could come in. “Downstairs,” he muttered, shuffling back toward the basement steps.
Logan was about to knock when the door was pulled open. His immediate thought was that Jasper looked like shit and maybe he had been MIA because he was sick. But he was pretty sure Jasper would have still texted, even if he wasn't feeling good. Without a word he stepped into the house, shut the door and followed Jasper to the basement. As soon as he stepped off the bottom stair, he slipped out of his jacket and tossed it on the nearest surface. The room smelled like weed and liquor, which wasn't all that unusual. "You all right?" Logan asked, moving to sit down in the chair, eager to be off of his feet after a long shift. "I was starting to think you ditched town without me or something."
Jasper plopped down a bit ungracefully onto the floor in front of the coffee table, pulling his supplies closer so he could finish rolling something to smoke. He tried to dredge up some emotion about Logan being there -- gratitude, wariness, lust, even some resentment would’ve been something -- but he couldn’t feel much of anything at all. He’d cried the first day, after he’d returned from dropping Jules off, endless hysterical sobs that he muffled into his pillows, but after that, Numb had been the goal. Numb was something he was actually good at. “Nah,” he said, staring at what his fingers were doing. No, he wasn’t all right, and no, he hadn’t ditched town. He would never get out of this place, it felt like. “Just didn’t feel like talkin’. Me and Jules broke up. Again.”
Well, that explained it. Logan watched Jasper roll the joint, quiet for a few minutes as he tried to think of the right thing to say. He just didn't know what that was. "I'm sorry," he said finally. "Do you wanna talk about it?" He would or he wouldn't. Logan wasn't going to push Jasper into giving him details but it certainly explained the smell in the basement. And why Jasper's eyes were all red-rimmed. As Jasper's best friend, he wasn't sure if he was supposed to badmouth Jules, or sympathize, or assure Jasper that things would work out, etc. etc. He just hoped it wasn't because of that Ethan guy, although Logan thought he might be up for kicking the guy's ass a bit. It had been a while since he got to punch someone.
Did he want to talk? What was there to say? ‘It’s all your fault, you sexy fucker’? That wouldn’t be fair. It wasn’t Logan’s fault that Jasper’s head was all messed up. Part of him wanted to say it was Jules’s fault -- she’d locked him up in that place, and then she hadn’t wanted to accept that maybe he was just bisexual and attracted to his best friend. If that was who he was, she should be okay with it, right? But he understood her too well. These were the ruts his brain had dug for itself, going round and round in circles. In the end, Jasper knew it was all on him, he couldn’t blame anyone else. He was a Fuckup and he’d fucked this up too. He gave the rolling paper a little lick on the edge and carefully pressed it down to seal it up. Jasper realized he was taking a long time to answer, and he tried to focus. “I dunno,” he muttered. “We were tripping and talking and I told her I want to sleep with you and she got upset. You wanna hit this?” He finally looked up to offer Logan the joint.
Logan cocked a brow, his lips parting in mild surprise. But he recovered quickly and leaned forward from the chair to take the joint with one hand. The other grabbed the lighter that was on the table. "Yeah, I guess that'll do it," he muttered before he got the joint lit. He would have asked Jasper why he would tell his girlfriend something like that, but he knew how the brain worked, or didn't when tripping on shrooms. After a moment, he handed the joint back to Jasper and settled back in the chair again. "Maybe give her a few days... just 'cause you want to, doesn't mean you would, right?" Logan was not someone who had many relationships or had even wanted any, but he sort of wished he had experienced at least one so he could better understand this whole thing. In his head, it didn't seem like that big a deal, but he wasn't a woman, and he had never been in love, so maybe it was.
Jasper watched him take a hit, his gaze dull and bleary, then accepted the joint when Logan offered it back. He shook his head a bit as he tucked it between his lips and sucked to make the tip of it glow brighter. “I told her that, that I wouldn’t do anything, but it wasn’t enough,” he said. Jasper drew in a deeper hit and held it for a moment, then exhaled upward. “There’s just too much going on right now, for me. I’m not like, a good boyfriend anymore. I need to ... not owe anybody anything for a while. No expectations, because I’m just like ... losing my shit, man.” Jasper took another drag off of the joint before he held it back out for Logan to take. “So we’re on a break or whatever, for however long.” His voice sounded flat and emotionless to his own ears, but Jasper knew that was just from the substance-induced haze. He wanted to be emotionless, emotions fucking sucked.
As much as it sucked for Jasper, Logan knew his friend was right. He was going through some shit and it was probably harder having a girlfriend on top of all of it. Especially one with the problems that Jules had. "I get it," Logan murmured, taking the joint from Jasper. "I'm still sorry though. It sucks. I'm here for you though. We can do whatever you want, or nothing at all." He had no idea what Jasper would want to do but he looked pretty terrible and sounded terrible and Logan was worried. But he took another drag from the weed and then offered it back to Jasper. "If you're losing your shit, we just... gotta find it again."
Just gotta find it again. It was so simple-sounding that it made Jasper laugh, the short sound rusty and smoke-hoarse. He took the joint back and finished it off before tapping it out into the ashtray. Logan knew that he was welcome to any of Jasper’s weed, so he could roll another if he wanted to. “My shit’s gone, gone, gone,” he muttered, folding his arms on the surface of the coffee table. Jasper laid his head down on them like he used to do in school when he wanted to nap, face tucked in, and he dimly realized that he smelled awful. He hadn’t showered since getting ready to pick Jules up for her birthday surprise. What a fucking waste. But everything tied to him was a fucking waste, wasn’t it? He infected everything around him, made everything worse. Jasper wanted to tell Logan to get out while he still could, but he didn’t have the energy to explain. “I should’a stayed gone too.”
"No." Logan shifted down off of the chair to move around the table to sit beside Jasper. He slipped an arm over his shoulder, squeezing. "You staying gone would've been the worst thing for Jules. And for your family and me. You're just going through a lot of shit right now. No one can blame you for how you're feeling." It was so easy to say the words but Logan knew it was a completely different thing to believe them and he could tell Jasper wasn't believing in anything right now. "Jules loves you. You said it was a break, right? She'll be there for you when you're ready." He didn't know that for sure either, but Logan was just searching for anything to give his friend a little bit of hope, something to pull him out of this funk.
Jasper knew that Logan was trying to make him feel better, and on some level he appreciated it, but it sucked at the same time. The more people who cared about him, the more people he would eventually disappoint. He knew that Jules loved him, that was part of why it hurt so bad. He just didn’t know if he agreed that everybody would have been worse off without him. Jasper leaned into Logan like he had his own gravity, pulling his arms off of the coffee table to loosely wrap them around Logan’s waist. He slouched enough to put his head on Logan’s shoulder and closed his eyes. “I feel different,” he murmured, his head spinning slightly. “Like ... like that place is still with me. Like a cancer. Like I’m ... tainted.” He felt only half aware of what he was saying as the THC started to really kick in and made everything slightly dreamy. It was better than painful. He was so tired of hurting.
"You're still adjusting to being back," Logan pointed out. "I don't think that's going to change anytime soon. I don't think you could go through what you went through without it changing you, Jasper." Of course, Logan didn't know if Jasper was changed physically or not. Maybe that place fucked him up mentally. Logan wished he had some way of finding the right answers, but he didn't. All he knew was that his friend was hurting and he wanted to be there for him. "Have you talked to Elodie? Maybe she's going through the same thing. Maybe it's not just you."
Oh right, he was supposed to talk to Elodie, wasn’t he? Jasper vaguely remembered having this conversation before with the same sort of conclusion -- talk to others. But who wanted to do that? Not him. He wasn’t sure if asking Elodie whether she felt like she had poison inside of her would be very effective ... he was pretty sure she’d always felt that way. He hadn’t even seen her lately, and he knew some aunt of hers was supposed to pick her up eventually. Whatever, Jasper didn’t know and it all felt like too much to think about at the moment. He just grunted some negative sound that he hadn’t talked to Elodie, and fell silent for a moment. Being high was starting to blunt his emotions, and he realized he was being a super downer. Jasper forced his head up, drawing in a deeper breath. “Hey let’s like ... go somewhere,” he said to Logan, sitting up straighter. “Drive around, grab a milkshake, I dunno.” He just really wanted fresh air and the feeling of motion all of the sudden. “You wanna?”
Logan was thinking Jasper ought to talk to someone who had been over there with him. Elodie seemed like the logical choice since she seemed to come and go from the Lucas household. But maybe Jasper just didn't want to deal with all of that right now, and that was okay with him. "Yeah, we can go anywhere you want," Logan said, giving Jasper a small smile. He was feeling the effects from the weed too but he'd driven high before so he wasn't too worried about it. "Let's get you out of here and into some fresh air. Change your clothes, man." He nudged his friend playfully before getting to his feet. "We'll get some food and find a place to chill for a while."
It was funny how he could go from not wanting to move from his bed to itching to get out of the house, but that was how he felt. Jasper gave a soft huff at the reminder to change his clothes, and hauled himself up as well. “Hell yeah,” he murmured, moving toward the dresser next to the bed. “Hey, roll us another one to take with us,” Jasper added, glancing back. He just wanted to be somewhere private and fully relax with good company and something tasty. He pulled a drawer open and pulled out some fresh clothes, then started to strip and get changed. Jasper nabbed his deodorant off of the dresser for a quick refresh too, feeling a tiny bit more human as he plopped down on the edge of the bed to pull his sneakers on.
Logan did as Jasper suggested, finishing up the joint just as his friend was getting his shoes on. "You hungry?" he asked, standing from the couch and walking over to pick up his jacket from the chair where he'd discarded it earlier. "I mean, a milkshake from Moxie's always sounds good, but have you eaten anything? I mean, actual food and all that." Logan knew when he was feeling like shit he rarely had an appetite. But not eating tended to make him feel worse too and Jasper definitely looked like he needed quite a few pick-me-ups.
Was he hungry? It was kind of hard to tell when he was kind of achy all over ... though the weed was helping with that. Jasper tried to remember when he’d had his last bowl of cereal and couldn’t. Time was fuzzy and fucked up for him at the moment, with all the sleeping and being drunk and everything. “It’s been a while,” he said with a shrug, standing up and shuffling over to pick up his wallet and keys and smokes. “I could eat, I guess.” He really wanted something sweet and awful for him, but milkshakes always went well with burgers, so he supposed he could stomach some protein too. At least he hadn’t been drinking too heavily yet. Once they were ready, Jasper led the way to the stairs once more, ready to get out from under this roof.
Logan would do the good friend thing and make sure Jasper ate something. Getting him out of the house was a start. He didn't say anything else until they were in his car and Logan was driving away from the house. It sucked, because he felt at a loss for words. He ought to be coming up with something comforting, but it all sounded like bullshit in his head. Complacent stuff that Jasper would see right through. "You want to talk about... anything?" Logan grimaced a little as he glanced at Jasper. "I mean... you can vent, or... whatever might help. Or we could say fuck it all, get some food and, I don't know... go to Cherries. Or ditch out of town for a few days. Or... man, anything you want."
Jasper slouched in the passenger seat of Logan’s car, content with the silence as he watched the lights of the neighborhood roll by through the windows. His head rolled to look over at Logan when he spoke, and Jasper couldn’t help but smile a little. The thought of going to Cherries was almost physically repulsive at the moment -- he had no desire to go see neon-lit titties he couldn’t touch -- but it was a sweet offer anyway. Jasper knew he wasn’t currently easy to deal with, and he could see how hard Logan was trying to help him. The option of ditching town, on the other hand, sounded kinda good, actually. It sounded much more appealing than talking. “Could you even ditch town for a few days?” he asked. “Like with work and everything?” Jasper had no obligations, but Logan did, and Jasper didn’t want him to tank his employment just to make Jasper feel better.
"Yeah, of course I could," Logan said with a shrug. "I could get people to cover my shifts on days I have to work... we could drive to Portland, or fuck, wherever, you know? If that's what you want to do." Maybe Jasper would want to stay close, just in case Jules reached out to him. Logan didn't really know, as he'd never really done this whole break up thing. At least not with a long-term relationship. "You'd have to shower though, 'cause I don't need you stinking up my car," he added with a teasing grin while elbowing Jasper playfully.
He batted lazily at Logan’s elbow, giving a chuckle as he considered that. Sure, Jasper had hardly moved from his bed in the basement for a couple of days, but now that the option of going somewhere else was on the table, he was antsy to leave. He did think of Jules suddenly wanting to see him ... but Jasper didn’t think that was going to happen. Her reasons for doing this weren’t going to evaporate overnight. And besides, wasn’t this whole thing about him having time? Time away was going to be even better time. “Let’s do it,” he said, looking over at the side of Logan’s face. “Let’s spend the weekend in Portland.” Jasper’s heart gave a weird squeeze as he said it, like his body knew before his brain did what a weekend away with Logan might mean. It didn’t change his mind.
"Sweet." Logan grinned, happy that Jasper was on board with it. Maybe getting away from this place, even for a couple of days, would cheer him up. They could fuck around in the city and forget about Point Pleasant and everyone who lived here. "Let's leave tomorrow night, that way we've got two full nights there, yeah? I'm not supposed to work until Saturday night and then brunch shit on Sunday, but I can bribe someone into taking those shifts for me." And he had been pretty good with his money except for buying weed and shit like gas for his car, so they wouldn't have to stay in some flea infested motel or anything like that. "But you've got to promise to try and have a good time. We're not going to mope around the hotel room, okay? We're going to have fun."
Part of Jasper wanted to tell Logan to just start driving that way now, but they didn’t have anything to take with them, and disappearing on his family again would probably be a bad thing to do. So he could wait. And shower, and pack some stuff. “I promise,” Jasper said with a soft huff, his lips quirking up. If anything, he was going to have too much fun. He would try not to be a drunken burden on Logan, but something inside of Jasper was itching to get out, to stop caring about anything and really let loose and follow his instincts. “I need some fun. ... I’m broke as fuck though, so ... are you sure, dude?” he asked. Jasper felt vaguely guilty for everyone paying for him all the time now, but he really wasn’t sure how he was going to pull his shit together enough to work.
"Yeah, I'm sure. I'm not broke as fuck, so I got you." He flashed Jasper another grin. "Don't worry about that stuff. I mean, we're not going to be going out for steak and shit each night, but we'll be fine." It was his job as Jasper's best friend to make him feel better about a break up. Logan knew one weekend away wouldn't fix everything, but it had to be a start. Given everything Jasper had been through, Logan had a feeling it would be really easy for him to spiral if he was left alone in that basement for however long. "You ever been to Portland before?" He turned the car down the street toward Moxie's.
He knew that Logan wasn’t loaded, but Jasper was fine with doing things as cheaply as they could. He just wanted to get away, get a break from everything. The constant looming presence of Point Pleasant, Jules and her hands and Ethan, being stuck in the overcrowded house of his former teacher, trying to seem fine for everyone. It was just a lot. Going out of town with Logan would be perfect, they could get fucked up when they wanted to, and do anything they wanted to, and nobody would be watching them. “Not like, overnight,” he answered Logan’s question. “Definitely never partied there, but we’ve been there like ... shopping, or whatever. Day trips. So this’ll be fun.” He’d really never partied anywhere but home, so it would definitely be interesting.
"It'll be fun," Logan agreed. He pulled into Moxie's parking lot. "Do you want to go in and eat, or I can run in and get us some stuff and we can go park somewhere else." He had a feeling Jasper would want to just get something to go so he didn't have to be around other people, especially since Moxie's looked kind of busy. Thankfully he didn't see Jules's car anywhere and he wondered if that was going to be a normal thing for them from now on... always looking for Jules's car. It was a small town, after all. Was it weird for him to be thinking that? Logan had kind of figured he and Jules had become friends over the last few months, but if Jasper told her he wanted to have sex with him, Logan was pretty sure that friendship thing was on hold.
Jasper felt something strange as they pulled up and parked at Moxie’s. He wasn’t looking for Jules’s car, the breakup far from his mind for a moment -- probably for the first moment since it had happened. Something else had grabbed his attention and he felt a strange pull toward the restaurant he’d been in a million times. Like somebody was in there he needed to see. It wasn’t Jules ... it was one of the others from Over There. Jasper had no idea how he knew that, just that he did. He blinked a couple of times before he glanced over at Logan, already reaching for the car door. “No, uh ... I’ll come in with you to order, but we can get it to go,” he said with an air of distraction. Jasper climbed out without waiting for an answer and barely pushed the car door shut before he was walking toward the entrance.
Logan cocked a brow at Jasper's willingness to go inside, but he wasn't going to argue with it. He followed Jasper, mildly curious at his friend's eagerness to get inside. Was Jules there? Shit, was she there with Ethan? Logan could just imagine the two of them getting into a physical altercation with the other guy but he was really hoping it wouldn't come to that. Logan was trying to be good and stay off the PPPD's radar. Inside Moxie's, there was a woman at the counter, paying for food so Logan waited, slipping his hands into his pockets as he tried to decide what he wanted to order. He barely noticed when the woman turned around to look at the both of them. Well, not the both of them, just Jasper.
Greer had felt the same thing that Jasper had, only she hadn't really known what to do with it but glance around the diner as she dug through her bag for the crumpled bills she'd tossed in there earlier. She had dinner ordered to take home to her boys but had become increasingly distracted in the past few minutes. It was like fog had cluttered her mind and all she could focus on was someone nearby. When she turned and saw him, Greer felt an odd sense of relief. "It's you," she said, a smile forming on her lips. "I was wondering who it was I was feeling. Do you remember me?"
Jasper’s eyes widened a bit as the woman turned around and looked directly at him. He’d been so focused on what he was feeling, he hadn’t even thought to wonder if it was mutual. The open way she smiled and spoke to him felt good somehow. Like they were old friends, even though he wasn’t even sure of what her name was. G-something ... Gail? Grace? “Yeah, of course,” he answered, feeling himself smile back at her a bit without thinking. Jasper felt rusty at it, like he hadn’t made that expression in days. “But I don’t ... I forgot your name. Sorry.” He had tried to spend as little time as he could at the Over There Juniper, and details like names had seemed not to matter much on that side. He remembered her face though, and all that long hair. His brow furrowed a bit. “You felt me too?”
"I felt you too," Greer said with a nod, absently reaching back to take the receipt that was being handed to her. "Before you walked in. It was a very strange feeling. But it wasn't just you that I felt. I feel the others too. Does that make sense? You're just the first one I saw. Like I knew you were near me." She shoved the receipt into her bag, her smile widening a little. "I'm Greer. I know you were off with the other girl your age a lot at the time. But you're... Jasper?" The instinct was there to hug him and before she could even stop herself, she stepped forward to do just that. They had been through a lot of trauma together, even if they weren't physically together the entire time. Pulling back, Greer kept her hands on his shoulders, her bracelets clinking together as they slid down her wrists. "You look really tired. Are you sleeping all right?"
He’d been so numbed out and intoxicated and trying to hide from himself, Jasper hadn’t been feeling anything until they’d pulled up at the diner. But now that Greer said something about it, he realized he could feel the others too. They were like distant lights in his consciousness, flashing in the dark. Some deep instinct he didn’t understand told him that he could find any one of them if he wanted to ... just follow the light until he tracked them down. His lashes fluttered as he tried to focus on Greer’s words instead of that odd feeling -- the unexpected hug really brought him back out of his head. Jasper’s body stiffened slightly, but he accepted it, his hands coming up to rest very lightly on her arms until she pulled away and he let them drop again. Greer’s question put a sudden lump in Jasper’s throat and he swallowed hard as he shook his head. He wasn’t not sleeping all right, amongst a long list of other things. “Nothing’s all right,” he mumbled thickly. Jasper finally glanced over at Logan, who just looked baffled by all of this. “Sorry, this’s ... this is my friend Logan,” he added, glancing between them. “Greer was Over There too.” Logan had probably already figured that out, but Jasper just didn’t know what to say.
Logan was confused at first but when they started talking he got the jist of how Jasper knew this woman. Greer, which was a super strange name, but she was kind of dressed like some weird gypsy hippie lady, so he supposed it fit. Her real name was probably Mary or Kimmy or something boring like that. He quickly offered a small smile and brought his hand up in a 'hello' gesture when Jasper introduced them. Greer turned her attention on him and reached out to take his hand, clasping it both of hers before bringing it up to her chest.
"Hi, Logan. You have really kind eyes. And lovely eyebrows," she told him, squeezing his hand before she lowered it and released him. Logan wasn’t really sure what to say or do so he thanked her and glanced curiously at Jasper. Greer had turned her attention back to Jasper by then.
"Can we sit down and talk for a minute?" Greer asked him. "I've been wanting to talk to someone else who went through what we went through, but I wasn't sure where to start. There are some... things to talk about, I think."
Jasper eyed the oddly familiar way Greer took Logan’s hand, and had a strange sense of his worlds colliding. He hadn’t really spent time with this woman on the other side of the portal, but his connection to her was from over there, and Logan was ... well, he was Logan. Besides Elodie, Jasper hadn’t really seen any of the others he’d been locked away with, and everything felt weird and surreal for a few heartbeats. Then Greer was looking at and talking to him again, and Jasper’s mouth fell wordlessly open for a moment. This was exactly what everyone kept saying he should do -- talk to one or more of the others, see how they were feeling, what they thought, how they were coping -- but he suddenly didn’t want to. He was high and so tired of having to think, and he’d just wanted to go park somewhere with his best friend and drink a milkshake and maybe kiss a little to make himself feel better. Or just get more and more stoned until he fell asleep in Logan’s car and had to be taken home. Greer looked so earnest though, and there were so many things to talk about, and would he really seek out this opportunity on his own, or keep avoiding it? Jasper looked over at Logan for help, but didn’t see any immediately. “Yeah, uh ... just for a few minutes though,” he murmured sheepishly to Greer. Jasper glanced at his friend again. “Grab me a chocolate shake and some chili cheese fries?”
Logan nodded. "Yeah, you got it." He would give Jasper and Greer some privacy since he figured Jasper would tell him all about the conversation later. Maybe. Even so, he figured he could order their food and then try to keep an eye on the two of them. Greer didn't look dangerous, but Logan didn't know her so he just wanted to make sure Jasper didn't get hurt or upset or anything like that.
Greer picked up the brown bag holding her, Rost and Dev's dinner, and then headed for the door, thinking it was probably easier to talk outside where there wasn't music playing and people talking. "I won't keep you long," she promised, turning to look at Jasper once they were both outside. "I just wanted to ask... you said you weren't sleeping well. I'm not either. Not all the time, anyway. I have a lot of nightmares and sometimes I feel like... I wonder if I'm still there and this is all in my head." She glanced around before offering Jasper a faint smile. "I know it's just trauma. But, something else happened. Something feels like it's changed inside of me. That I'm not fully human anymore. I realize it's a very strange thing to admit to someone who I barely know and who barely knows me, but I can't help but wonder if the others, like you, are feeling the same way."
He had thought they would just sit down at a table, but as he followed Greer outside, Jasper realized it was a better idea to talk where there were fewer ears to listen in. He stopped when she did, shoving his hands into his front hoodie pocket, his fingers fidgeting with the lighter that was in there. His brow furrowed gradually as she spoke, and he had mixed feelings about someone more or less describing the fucked up way he’d been feeling lately back to him. There was a sense of relief and camaraderie that someone else was feeling the same stuff, but that clashed with the dread of being seen and admitting to a near-stranger that something was wrong with him. That was hard enough to do with his friends and family. He didn’t answer for a few heartbeats, his gaze drifting up over Greer’s head as he thought about what to say, how much to reveal. “I do feel the same way,” he murmured finally, meeting her eyes again. “Like ... I’m an alien trying to slip back into my old life. I don’t ... I don’t like crowds anymore, my, uh ... I went to a party and had like, a panic attack. Just felt different from everybody there, and it was too much noise and people. I only sleep real well when I’m shitfaced, or super stoned. But I wonder the same shit, if I’m just dreaming all this. Or if I’m dead already. And now there was this feeling that one of us was in there.” He nodded toward Moxie’s. “Never felt that before.”
Greer nodded as Jasper spoke, recognizing a lot of what he was describing. She didn't mind crowds so much as long as she didn't touch many of them. It was hard for her, because Greer was a physically affectionate person, as she had shown inside with Logan. But considering what she saw sometimes, it was just easier to avoid a lot of situations where she might end up bumping into someone and seeing more about them than she wanted to. "I've felt different too," Greer said, shifting her bag of food into her other arm. "But I've never felt anyone else's presence, like yours, until tonight. I think being over there for so long, breathing in that air? It changed us." She studied Jasper closely. "Have you experienced anything else? I mean, beyond the restlessness and anxiety... anything... unusual? Like maybe you came back changed in a physical way?"
Jasper tried to think around the huge black cloud in the middle of his mind, the emotional mess that had come from breaking up with Jules. It seemed like everything had felt bad since he’d come back, even if he knew that wasn’t completely true. But something unusual besides the anxiety and anger and mental toll it had all taken? Something physical? He shook his head slowly. “Not that I’ve noticed yet,” he murmured, staring right back at Greer. Jasper wasn’t going to rule out that there was something different about him he didn’t know about yet, especially not since Greer brought it up. “Why ... have you?”
There was some reluctance to tell him about what changes she had gone through. He was young and it was clear he was having trouble readjusting to being home. Greer didn't want to add to his burden, or scare him, but it felt important that he know something could happen to him, if it hadn't already. He could have changed and it just hadn't surfaced yet. It had taken a couple of weeks before Greer's visions had started. Sighing, Greer gave him a mildly apologetic look as she nodded. "It's not entirely physical. But when I touch someone... sometimes... I get this vision of... their future." That sounded a little too simple for what it really was. "I can see how they'll die. It's not anything I was able to do before."
His brows knotted together even further as Jasper listened to her. She was a psychic now, but not before? Months ago he might have scoffed that off and told her she was crazy, but after what they’d been through together, Jasper was on board with believing pretty much anything was possible. “You can see how they’ll die? Like, everyone?” he asked, then his eyes widened and he shot a glance toward Moxie’s door. “Did you see it just now, with Logan?” Jasper’s heart was suddenly beating fast -- he both did and didn’t want to know the answer to that question, and the natural one that would follow if Greer said yes. When and how?
Greer scrunched her nose up thoughtfully for only a moment. "No, not everyone. I mean, not all the time. I can't really control it and I don't know if I'll ever be able to." She glanced toward the windows of Moxie's to see Jasper's friend watching them from the counter. "I didn't see anything from Logan, or even from you. But the girl at the register? She'll be killed by a drunk driver on the highway outside of town in four years." Greer exhaled slowly and forced herself to relax her hold on the bag of food in her arms. She had been lucky enough not to see anything when touching Rost and Dev but she had a feeling it was coming and it was making her reluctant to go near them. It was torture in every way possible but Greer did her best to keep those terrors hidden. "I could touch him again and it might happen, but... maybe not. I just thought if I had changed over there, maybe you and the others did too." Greer studied him closely. "So you haven't felt anything odd about yourself?"
In his sudden rush of worry about Logan, Jasper had forgotten that Greer had hugged him and therefore could’ve seen his death too. He was glad that she hadn’t, because he didn’t think he could’ve resisted asking questions about it, even though he didn’t truly want to know. He looked through the glass as well, but his eyes were on the cashier girl instead of Logan. Four years and she would be dead. If Greer’s visions were correct, anyway. Maybe she was just seeing shit that wouldn’t actually happen. He forced himself to look at her again and try to think about her question instead of whether Fate was a real thing or not. “Nothing like that,” he murmured, shaking his head a little. “I just feel fucked up in general and crowds make me nervous and I have lots of bad dreams and like the next time I wake up I might be back there ... If I’ve got some fucked up superpower now, I haven’t found out yet. I definitely don’t get visions when I touch people.” Jasper paused, then winced a little. “Sorry though, that sounds like it fucking sucks.”
Greer had no idea if her visions would remain accurate, or if they could be changed. Perhaps by a decision or knowledge of what was coming. She knew she needed to learn more, she just didn't know how to go about it. Some days she believed in fate and destiny and others... it seemed like a lovely idea, but not at all realistic. Lately though, she liked to think fate could be manipulated. Greer smiled softly at Jasper. "It sucks, but... I don't know, maybe eventually I'll come to see it as helpful. Maybe I can change the inevitable somehow. But it does sound like you're suffering from PTSD and that makes sense given what we all went through. Do you have anyone you can talk to? Anyone who can help?"
PTSD sounded like a thing that happened to Other People, like soldiers who had seen people get blown up or violent rape survivors or something. Jasper didn’t feel like one of those people, but he was gradually realizing that he was. He’d been traumatized, just in a really weird, long, drawn-out way. Greer’s questions made him frown a bit and shift from one foot to the other. It was uncomfortable in a way he couldn’t quite place. “I talk to some people,” he murmured, which wasn’t exactly a lie, even though he’d just started being really honest with like two people. One of whom had dumped him for it. “But ... who can help?” Jasper shrugged a shoulder, more of a helpless gesture than a dismissive one. “Nobody knows what to do with me. Me and my girlfriend broke up. My family just wants me to be fine, and they were plenty fucked up before I even left, so.” He didn’t have any answers and didn’t know anyone else who did.
Greer frowned and yes, it was instinctive to try and drag this boy home so she could help him heal somehow. But she knew that happening was very unlikely. Men could be difficult, especially when it came to emotional trauma and Jasper was still so young. It saddened her that it didn't sound as though he had anyone he could really lean on. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "You have me. And the others. I know we don't know each other but... can I give you my number? In case you want to talk, or you have questions. Not that I have a lot of answers, but I think it's important that we keep in touch." Especially if something happened or changed inside of him or to him. Greer didn't think her death visions were random. They had to be the cause of that place and she was sure that the others would eventually realize something had changed in them too.
Jasper hesitated. Did he really want to get on those sorts of terms with these people? He could feel the instinct inside of him to reject the offer, pull back, keep everyone at arm’s length, especially the people he couldn’t hide the truth from. But Greer sounded so sincere and concerned, and everybody kept saying how he should talk to the others, and if something weird did start happening to him ... “Yeah, uh, sure,” he mumbled after a beat, slipping his fingers into his jeans to pull out his phone. He created a contact called Greer and prompted her to recite her number to him so he could put it in. Jasper normally would have sent a text so she could have his too, but he didn’t this time, just tucked his phone away again. Jasper glanced into Moxie’s again -- it looked like Logan was getting their food. His gaze ticked back to Greer. “We’re gonna get outta here, so ... guess I’ll talk to you later.”
Greer nodded and offered Jasper another small smile. She had no idea if he would actually reach out to her or not, but at least now he knew he had the option if he wanted to. "Of course. Take care of yourself." With a small wave with her free hand, she turned to head for Rost's truck, eager to get home to her men and tell them about Jasper.
Logan walked out of Moxie's with a bag of food and a drink container, watching Greer walk off before he turned to Jasper. "You okay? What was that about?"
Jasper watched Greer as well until she was climbing into her truck, then focused on Logan again. He felt a little bad, because she seemed really nice, but Jasper just couldn’t handle that kind of shit right now. Niceness from strangers was always weird to him, even if they weren’t technically strangers. She wouldn’t have been that nice to him if she knew what he really was, he felt sure. “Yeah,” he murmured to answer Logan, trying to push the others out of his mind. He reached to take the drinks from Logan to help out with his load. “She just wanted to ask me some stuff, how I’m coping, and give me her number.” It was an impulsive decision to leave out the part about her seeing people’s deaths, but Jasper didn’t want Logan to worry about him even more. “C’mon,” he muttered, turning to head back toward the car.
Logan's brows rose. "Already collecting numbers. Damn." He was teasing, of course, and his voice was light enough to project that, at least. He followed Jasper to his car, pulling out the keys to get it unlocked. He waited until they were both inside and settled before he had handed Jasper the bag of food to hold so he could drive. They could go somewhere quiet and stuff their faces for a bit. "It wouldn't be a bad thing if you talked to her," Logan added, once they were on the road again. "I mean, about what happened over there and stuff. You know I'm here for you for anything, but I wasn't there. It might be good if you could talk to someone who experienced that too. Find some kind of... relatability or whatever you'd call it."
Any numbers Jasper was going to get in the near future would be related to the worst time in his life, he was pretty sure. He definitely wasn’t in the state of mind to flirt around and try to hook up with anyone. Logan was just giving him shit like a good friend was supposed to do, he knew that, so he didn’t say anything, just held onto the food and watched while Logan drove. When his friend spoke again, Jasper glanced over, but not for long. “Yeah,” he murmured vaguely at first, letting it linger in the air for a moment. “I just ... dunno what to say. ‘Hey remember when we couldn’t bathe or even drink water for months? That sucked, huh?’ I didn’t like, make friends over there, dude. I tried to avoid those people most of the time. All hiding out at Juniper like little mice in holes.” He opened the hot bag on his lap to fish out a fry to munch on, needing the distraction.
"Maybe that's all they could do," Logan pointed out. Reaching over, he snagged a fry to pop into his mouth. It was hot and salty, but delicious. "I know you didn't make friends over there. But I don't know... shared trauma and all that. You don't have to, obviously. I'm just really shit at advice." He chuckled softly, though it didn't harbor much humor. He drove them away from Main Street, towards the beach parking lot. He didn't think it would be terribly busy at this time of night and they could chill in peace. "I just want to make sure you're okay, dude. I know you're not, but... maybe you can be."
Maybe that was all they could do, and something dark in Jasper hated them for it. He’d adapted as much as he could, learned to navigate in the fog and to keep moving. Maybe he’d gone a little crazy with isolation, sure, maybe he’d sort of had a deathwish, but he’d survived it, and they could have too. Jasper didn’t want to be weak and scared like them, even though he’d learned that his capacity for terror was endless. Maybe especially because of that. He hated it, so he hated them. “I know,” he muttered. He knew Logan had good intentions and was worried about him, Jasper just wished he knew how to reassure everyone so they would leave him alone and stop asking questions and making helpful suggestions. “I don’t need advice from you,” he added after a moment. Jasper started to fish around in the console for the joint Logan had rolled before they left. “I just ... need your help to feel like myself.”
Selfishly, it was something of a relief that Jasper didn't need, or want, advice. Logan was shit at that stuff anyway. But he also worried it might feel like he didn't care or understand what Jasper was dealing with if he ignored it. Or pretended things were okay. Maybe that was what Jasper wanted, though. Logan didn't really know. He just worried he didn't have the emotional capacity to help Jasper deal. "I'll do my best," he promised. "Just tell me if I fuck it up." Pulling into a parking spot that faced the beach, Logan put his car into park and rolled down the windows a bit before turning off the engine. "This is going to sound... I don't know... but do you think you can feel like yourself again? I mean, before all of this happened."
Jasper didn’t really know what he wanted or what would be best for him either. That was part of the problem. But it wasn’t like he’d been prepared for what had happened to him, or even raised with good tools for handling his emotions, much less a major complicated trauma. He didn’t even know how to say that, he just knew he was stunted and fucked up and he wasn’t sure how to help himself. It seemed like most everybody else didn’t know how to help either though, and he was getting so tired of hearing their well-intentioned advice. It was all the same and none of it felt like enough. Glad they were parked now, Jasper tucked the joint between his lips and lit it before he answered. “I have noooo idea,” he said with a humorless laugh, smoke sliding out from his along with the words. Jasper slouched further and took another small sip from the joint before he offered it to Logan. “What even is yourself, dude, you know? It’s changing all the time, right? And maybe I needed to change. Who knows?”
"I don't have any fucking idea." Logan took the joint to take a pull, silent as he watched the water. What he could see of it anyway. "I don't know if I'm changing anymore. I kind of like where I am now. Like, the thought of changing makes me cringe." He grinned a little and then reached over to grab the bag of food. "But I get what you're saying. You'll figure it out." After handing Jasper the joint again, Logan pulled out some of the food to start eating. "You just tell me what you need, though, okay? I don't want to be a shitty friend but I don't want to keep pushing shitty advice and stuff on you either. I know it doesn't really work."
Jasper tended to think that everybody changed whether they wanted to or not -- his dad was a great example, especially lately -- but what the fuck did his know. He couldn’t keep his own shit straight, much less advise anybody else. Jasper rested the joint in the car’s ashtray and pulled out his chili cheese fries to start on. Food would improve his mood, it always did. Jasper hoped so, anyway. “You’re never a shitty friend,” he murmured, pulling a couple of gooey fries away from the bunch. The refill of THC was already starting to make him feel a little floaty again. Talking to Greer had brought him down some, and Jasper just wanted to escape from all of it. “The fact that you care about tryin’ to help me makes you not shitty. I just need you to stick with me.” A wave of sadness tried to wash over him as he thought of Jules, and Jasper shoved the fries into his mouth to try and swallow it down.
"Dude, that's not gonna be a problem," Logan said. He unwrapped his burger and took a bite. "I'm not going anywhere." It didn't seem like Jasper was depending on him to fix everything and make it better, which was probably a good thing because Logan sucked at making things better. But he could definitely just be there as a friend and do whatever Jasper needed him to do. Logan looked at Jasper, his brow raised. "You need to promise me something, though. If shit starts to go down like it did before... you'll tell me, okay? Like, if you start to feel not like yourself again."
Part of Jasper was tempted to remind Logan that he had gone somewhere, and for quite a while, but he pushed that away. Any abandonment he’d felt over his best friend getting the fuck out of Point Pleasant -- the only sane thing to do -- had faded a long time ago. He understood it. Logan probably should have stayed gone, but Jasper was glad that he’d come back. He wasn’t sure how he would be getting through this without him. Chewing, he looked over when Logan’s tone turned more serious, then nodded slowly. “I will,” he said quietly. “I mean ... I don’t feel like myself now, but not like that. Not in that like, psycho way, like before I disappeared.” He definitely had feelings and empathy now, whether he wanted them or not. “I promise,” Jasper added in a murmur.
"Was that psycho?" Logan asked, cocking a brow as he chewed his food. "I mean, I know you weren't yourself then, but it seemed like you were more paranoid than psycho. But I know what you're saying." Smiling, Logan reached over to brush his hand over Jasper's head, still enjoying the buzzed feeling beneath his fingers. "We'll get you better somehow. Or at least closer to better. You'll be amazed at how much better it feels to be away from this place, even if it's for a weekend." He meant that too. Logan hadn't missed anything about Point Pleasant when he had been gone beyond his mom and Jasper. It just felt impossible to go and stay gone.
Murdering his grandfather was pretty psycho, in Jasper’s opinion. If he thought about it too much, he could still feel the jolts in his arms as he broke through facial bones, could still hear the crunch. Maybe Logan had momentarily forgotten about that part, and Jasper was in no rush to remind him. He didn’t want to think about it ever again, but it still lived vividly in his brain, dancing through his thoughts at the worst times. Jasper closed his eyes and tried to focus on how Logan’s hand felt against his hair. He wanted to get better, he really did. “Yeah, hope so,” he mumbled, the words barely audible. Jasper ate another couple of loaded fries, then shifted his position enough to lean over and put his head on Logan’s shoulder. He didn’t know what was in his future, even through the weekend, but he was grateful not to feel completely alone at one of the lowest points he could recall in his life.
Logan liked Jasper's proximity and he was careful not to move too much as he ate his burger. He knew things sucked for Jasper right now, but hopefully they could start taking baby steps to things getting better by ditching out of town for the weekend. "You want to crash at my place tonight?" Logan asked after a minute. "We can smoke some more and watch stupid ass movies or something." He would be okay if Jasper wanted to go back home and be alone but he knew that wasn't always the kind of thing people wanted after a shitty couple of days. And Jasper was going through a break up too, so maybe he'd want the company.
For a second, Jasper had the knee-jerk thought that spending the night with Logan was a Bad Idea because of Jules ... but they weren’t together anymore. She still factored into the equation in his heart, but maybe he should stop letting that influence his decisions. He was single now, for a reason. Even if this breakup had happened because of things other than his feelings for Logan, he would opt to spend the night with his best friend afterward. Jasper wanted his company and comfort, and he honestly felt too miserable to be horny, so he didn’t think anything would happen but exactly what Logan suggested. And after that it would be nice to fall asleep next to someone. “Hell yeah,” Jasper murmured. “That sounds perfect.” He lifted his head to press a kiss against Logan’s cheek, then sat up straight to finish off his fries so they could get going.