Regretting Decisions -- [[Jon]]

[Roxie McElroy]

Roxie had been so sure that she'd been making the right decision. That breaking up with Jon and sparing him from her weakness and seeing how pathetic she really was was the thing she should do. Hell, even when she was in the common room, saying to him what she'd practiced, it had felt so right! Running away had seemed so... so very perfect. Like there wasn't a better idea in the world.

The Fina had expected to feel a great sense of relief. She did, at first. When she left the common room. But as the days passed and nothing changed, she began to regret everything. She didn't feel any better without Jon there. On the contrary; she simply felt more pathetic for leaving him at all. Every day, she bitterly wished that she'd slowed down and thought about what she was doing.

Because, the truth? She wanted him back. Really bad.

The girl had decided, that morning, that she was going to find him. She was going to find him, and try her hardest to get him to stay still for just a couple of minutes, so that she could explain. Explain to him that she'd made the biggest mistake in her life for trying to leave him, and that her heart just wouldn't let her. And if he wouldn't listen, if he didn't care... her heart would shatter into a million pieces. Which was what she deserved, truly. But, oh, she hoped so much that he'd take her back.

That he'd forgive her and hold her and love her again. That was all Roxie wanted back again; what she'd had before.

So, she'd gone without breakfast, just pulling on some clothes and escaping her dorm. As she wandered through the school, looking, she thought about how things used to be. She'd wake with a smile every single morning, and immediately get up to find some of the people she loved. Jon, Christina or Belle, or even Emerald. But they'd all gone, too. She'd got rid of Jon, Tina had left for bigger and better things and she seemed to have driven Belle away somehow. And Emerald? Well. She'd never been particularly close with her anyway.

But she did miss them. She missed them all. Which is why, as she reached the courtyard, she was thinking that maybe if she couldn't find Jon, she'd meet one of her friends. So she could try and fix things with them, too.

[Jonathan Halliwell]

Standing on the edge,
battle in my head,
I'm dying to know
I'm dying to know

In life, you had good days and bad days. On a good day, you might find yourself in a great mood, among friends and loved ones, and just generally having an amazing time. It was always fun, and rarely could anyone ever shake you from that happy place you had found. Then there were the bad days... You know, those days where nothing is going right, you feel like a completely worthless piece of shit, and you pretty much hated your life. Some might contemplate suicide after many of them, years even, and some might just get angry and/or get drunk. We've all had them. And for Mr. Jonathan Halliwell, today was just one of those days...

If I take this leap,
to fail or succeed,
I'm dying to know
I'm dying to know

He had awoken from a nightmare, to put it in words. In truth, it had been much worse; a living, breathing reality he never ever wanted to step foot in, even in a dream world, would be a little closer. A little, but not much. The dream had started out okay, with him hanging out with his friends, and as he left them to go back, he came into the courtyard to find Faith lying on the ground, blood everywhere. Her blood. Needless to say, even in the dream, he had felt his entire world crash down around him. Then, of course, as things usually do, it all got worse. As they say, the shitteth hath hitteth the fan... eth.

This is it, I've shaken.
My body's aching,
I lose my hold,
I will let go.

He had looked around, holding her in his arms, and found Aimee dead not too far away. And then he had seen Matt, Cal, and Adam come in... only to fall at his feet in a flash of green light, their blank and empty eyes staring up at him. And as he stumbled back, unable to believe or face what he was seeing, his eyes had fallen on a beautiful face. Only now, it was not as beautiful as it had once been, for it was smeared in blood. It was Aly, his first... well, everything. Walking over to her, tears pouring from him, his finger had grazed over her cheek before his eyes fell on the last of the horrors, and this one knocked him off his feet. Literally.

This is it, I'm falling.
My wings need to grow.
I lose my hold,
I will let go.

It was the body of another student, another friend. Someone he cared deeply for, someone he never wanted to see hurt or scared. It was someone whose smile and laugh he had come to love, and it was someone who had put him back together when he had shattered into a million pieces. She had found each and every one of them and basically helped him find himself again... It was Belle. A strangled cry was ripped from his lungs as he fell to his knees beside her, a hand gently cupping her cheek. She was cold, so cold... And then, he had woke up to possibly something nearly as bad: a hangover. Yep, Jonathan Halliwell had gotten completely and utterly smashed the night before, courtesy of Cove Bentley.

There's so many roads,
pitfalls filled with doubt.
I'm dying to know,
I'm dying to know.

It wasn't, as one might think, because he was depressed. Far from that, it had been because Cove... was bored. That was it; no other reason, he was just bored. For chrissakes, the boy was absolutely mental, but Jonathan loved that about him. Cove's insanity was Jonathan's mental stability, and it had been just what the doctor ordered... Well, right up until the puking up of the stomach contents had begun, and all over his shoes, too. Cove, however, had taken care of him and made sure he got back safely, gave him a trash can, and left a note beside his bed giving him the best home-hangover-remedy he had. Which, by the way, was not so much fun as it sounded. Oh, wait, it didn't sound fun at all.

Grabbing what I need,
and rip it ‘til it bleeds.
I'm dying to know,
I'm dying to know.

So here he was, walking through the scene of the very dream that had destroyed him the night before, and well into the morning after. He was here, not by mere chance, but rather to face what had brought him to tears as consciousness had gripped him, what had caused him to breakdown at, what, four in the morning? Something like that. He had lost track, and he really couldn't care less anymore. He was teetering on the edge of a cliff right now, and he wasn't sure if he should make that leap or keep holding on. But it was one thought that entered his mind that seemed to answer that question: Roxie. His ex, the girl he had loved, the girl he had wanted to give the world to... The girl he would have died to please. But she had left him behind in the dust, ran away from everything, and left him to fall.

This is it, I've shaken.
My body's aching,
I lose my hold,
I will let go.

He loved her with all of his heart, and he still wanted to see her, to hold her again, to kiss her sweet lips and just to go back to everything that they had before... Before everything happened, before everything screwed it all up. Before the attacks, before the pain and the chaos, before the coma, and especially before the breakup. He just wanted his Roxie back, the girl he had cooked a special picnic for, and explained what the dishes were when she wasn't sure. The girl he had spent time with after she twisted her ankle... He wanted the Roxie McElroy he had fallen in love with back, the strong and fun-loving, amazing and beautiful girl who had stolen his heart and took his breath away...

This is it, I'm falling.
My wings need to grow.
I lose my hold,
I will let go.

But he couldn't have her back, now could he? She was gone. Oh, sure, Roxie was still alive, but she wasn't his Roxie. She was just Roxie now, just Roxie McElroy. She had her family and friends, but she didn't have him. He had his family and friends, but he didn't have her. They weren't 'Jon and Rox' anymore, they were just 'Jon' and 'Rox'. They weren't together, and there was a large part of him that wanted that back. It didn't want to feel the loneliness and the pain, the heartache and the torture it had to experience now, without her. For a time, he had been a mess, all over the place. Belle had been forced to take over all the Head duties, because he just couldn't do it. He didn't want to do it... Not anymore.

If I,
If I take this, this leap,
will I be broken?
I'm dying to...

But Faith had been there, to give him a talk that had probably been the very thing he needed to hear, although maybe his arms could have been spared the hits and punches she had given him when he had gone off beating himself up and everything. He had told her how he just wanted to give up, to give in and just crawl into himself to hide, to escape all the pain, and he had described how hurt he was, how he felt as though he would never be the same... And she had hit him, hard. He had nearly screamed he was so surprised; his sister wouldn't hit a fly, even if it was buzzing in her ear, and for her to actually hit him, it had nearly made him fall out of his chair. But he had needed it, badly.

This is it, I've shaken.
My body's aching,
I lose my hold,
I will let go.

And of course, there had been Belle there to help him, to pick him up when he had fallen pretty hard, slamming into the ground with no warning at all. It had hurt when Roxie had just ended it, not really giving him much of an explanation... But he knew. It was because he was weak, because he was hurt... It was because he had not fully healed yet, and it very nearly killed him. It was something he couldn't change. Waking up from a coma after a time... Yeah, that takes a toll on you, especially when your wounds aren't exactly fully healed, but hey, he was functioning rather well. That should be enough, right? But it wasn't, not for Roxie, and it had cut him pretty deep. It wasn't a cut that could just be kissed and made better; when it's pointed out that a guy was weak, well... It destroys them. It destroyed Jon, and he still wasn't quite over it yet.

I lose my hold,
this is it I'm falling.
I lose my hold,
my wings need to grow.

Which is why, when his eyes fell on a girl with blonde hair, a small smile nearly touched his lips. Belle. He needed her right now, needed her kind and loving spirit, and her ways of making him feel... okay again. She always had the right thing to say, and he tended to look for her when he needed them. But then he realized it wasn't Belle, and a moment of confusion passed before his eyes widened as he stopped in his tracks, staring into the face of a person he really didn't want to have to face yet: Roxie McElroy. Finding it suddenly hard to breath, he swallowed hard and struggled for words, finding none, and instead looking away from her and standing, rooted to his spot. Maybe she would have something to say; maybe she would explain... His eyes slowly looked up to meet hers, waiting for a moment. If she didn't speak, he would simply turn and walk away. It was best.

I lose my hold,
I will let go
I will let go.
I will let go!


((Okay, so I wrote a small novel. Oh well. I got bored. xD))

[Roxie McElroy]

Yeah, bad days. Everybody really did have them. Some worse than others, however. In the past, Roxie’s bad days had been nothing. Her bad days had consisted of continued quietness, sometimes snappish answers to questions people asked her. But that was way back then, when barely anything put her in a bad mood because she had nothing to obsess over. She’d never done anything particularly bad, or greatly hurt someone; with the exception of her slightly mental twin sister, of course, but that had been mostly accidental.

My, things really changed.

But even now, though, the Fina didn’t get very depressed on a bad day. It was similar to back then, except that she’d get waves of huge, highly painful guilt every now and again, that often made her cry. After all, everything she had was wrecked. She would have been able to get over that, but the fact that she’d brought it all on herself - while hurting people that she cared for - made it all the more difficult. She couldn’t look in the mirror without seeing herself as the girl who ruined her life.

Imagine feeling that way about yourself. Imagine obsessing over disliking yourself for causing that much pain, and at the same time pushing away the remaining friends you’d already got. Even Mirabelle had become distant, and Roxie couldn’t understand why. That added to the pain on her bad days as well, of course. It was a never-ending cycle of crap, which was why she’d finally decided to try and fix some things. Fix some things that would make everybody’s life just a little bit better- hopefully. That was the plan, anyway. Although it wasn’t like her plans tended to go smoothly these days anyway.

If the girl had known right from the get go that Jonathan had both thought about them being together, how he wanted them to be like that again, but dismissed it as impossible because she’d gone, she’d have gone right back to her bed in her dorm and curled up in her bed. And she never would have seen the light of day again, because the hope that the people she loved MIGHT want to let her fix things had urged her to try and do it in the first place. To be shot down so soon would be awful…

But maybe she’d have been able to take that truth and deal with it, if she’d bothered to go and find Jon and find out way in the beginning. If they’d talked things through instead of avoiding it and falling to pieces in their own way, maybe things would be so much easier. But Roxie didn’t know how he felt. She hadn’t found him. She hadn’t even asked Mirabelle about him, and she knew the other girl had been visiting him. Seeing him, because they were friends. She could of simply asked her, and dealt with it quietly. But, of course, things weren’t that simple, and she’d been too embarrassed to do such a thing.

And when the Fina (who was standing somewhere near the middle of the courtyard, slowly turning her feet in circles and looking about for people she knew and needed to speak to) saw Jon, who she’d really been hoping to see all along, she was so pleased that his facial expression didn’t look revolted. In fact, it looked perfectly calm and content. But then it sort of… disappeared. He froze, and that happy look in his eyes changed to something worse. The kind of guarded eyes, that read that, God, he really wished he hadn’t come down to the Courtyard at all. Roxie’s heart dropped to somewhere around her stomach just realizing that he didn’t want to see her at all.

But still, she had to try and do what she’d promised herself that she would, or else she simply wouldn’t be able to rest. At least she’d be able to sleep with the knowledge that she’d tried her absolute hardest to fix things. Heck, maybe a miracle would suddenly drop on her life and everything would go the way she hoped. Maybe not. But she still had to try.

As Jon’s head turned away, and darted forwards, thinking that he was going to make a run for it. She’d just die if he did. She Needed to do this. Needed the chance to put things right. “No!” The anguished little cry left her lips just as his eyes met hers, and she was reassured for a moment that he wasn’t going to leave right away. Not yet. “Don’t go! Wait a minute.” She blinked, and paused, struggling for the right words that might make him stay and listen to her. “Please, just… wait a minute.” She sighed. “I know I don’t deserve a second of your time, but I’m dying without you. I need you to listen to me. Listen to the reasons I have to justify what I did before we throw this all away. Please.”

And now she was lost for words.