EPHEMERAL | JJ Maybank

2 • trusting jj

A/N : TRIGGER WARNING - some talk on abuse and sexual abuse.

A week passed and Melody is shocked to say that she hasn't seen another girl in JJ's bed since. Not that she's been watching because she most definitely hasn't been. Not at all, he's the farthest thing from her mind. Or at least she tries to make him the farthest thing from her mind but he always finds a way to keep coming crawling back to the top.

Today is the day that DCS was supposed to come check out John B's living situation so she had to stay out of there for the day. So she left JB's early in the morning and decided to go back to her house just to check on things. Hers was only a ten minute walk from his. The outside ran down a good bit since her mother died. Her stepfather just quit caring to keep things up. They were together for as long as she could remember. Her real dad left them when she was young and her mother remarried when she was five and moved them to the Outerbanks, where she reunited with her best friend. When her mother died from cancer, her stepfather didn't know how to handle it. He felt as though he was missing a piece of himself without her. He coped in the only way he knew how, drugs and alcohol. So when Melody walked into the house, she saw as she expected, her step father asleep on the couch with an almost empty beer bottle in one hand and pills spilled out onto the coffee table. Just the sight alone made her want to leave.

She sighed and tiptoed around him, afraid of waking him up. She found his wallet sitting down on the dinner table so she peaked it open to see a couple hundred in it. Like she said, she's not dirt poor but at the rate he's spending the life insurance money, they will be soon. They're definitely pogues. They just lucked out but it didn't change anything, they still live in a house that's falling apart and they still scrape for food. Most of the money is spent on her step dads addictions. She pulled two twenty's out to buy food for her and the group then went off in her room to grab some more clothes to take to JB's. When she finished, she grabbed the bag of clothes and snuck back into the living room to exit.

"Elena?"

Melody froze in her spot, scared at hearing her mother's name. Her head snapped to her step dad and noticed him still doped up but his eyes fluttered shut again. She realized that he thought she was her mom, they do look alike. Tears stung in her eyes and she ran out the house, the door slamming shut behind her. Dark clouds covered the sky as the storm rolled in. She ran the whole way back to John B's house, tears rolling down her cheeks. She made it there fast and barged in the empty house, looking for her best friend. She knew Kie was at her house and Pope was probably at his so she didn't worry about anyone else bearing her when she called for JB. "JB! JB where are you?" She called out, still crying. She knows that it wasn't that big of a deal but she was upset and it scared her, knowing the history of how her stepfather is now with the drugs, she is terrified to be around him or in her house. He was a good guy once upon a time, loved her like a daughter but now she just reminds him of his dead love and the burden she left him with that looks just like her.