The Glory of Them [Bastille Fanfiction]

Aftermath

Nicole POV

This evening seemed to be a nightmare that wasn't ending. I went to bed once Kyle left and in turn got a phone call from his high as a kite self. Little did I know the night would continue to get worse when his lips were pressed to mine. It felt like poison even though we had kissed and done plenty more together. It was the fact that you were mine Dan. That your best friend felt the need to kiss me and plague my thoughts with awful scenarios. Once back I had to try and calm the cat loving man down. His sentences were barely formed. It was always scary watching these drugs ripple through someone like waves of torture.

Kyle fell asleep talking, thank God because I felt sick to my stomach. Janna would consider this my fault. You would flip out knowing he kissed me and I couldn't bare your anger towards your best friend. I prayed he would forget considering his mental state. That this would be a secret forgotten quickly. At least for me. I wouldn't dare dwell on the kiss for a second. I carefully moved his head from my lap and looked to the shocked Will staring at me.

"Kyle kissed you?"

"Will..." The large man approached me. We've never talked really, however his hand wrapped around my neck as he pushed me to the wall.

"You're ruining my friends... Why?"

"I'm not." I chocked slightly though he didn't squeeze at all. He was keeping me in his sights like prey. "Kyle got high on ecstasy and he kissed me... It was an accident. He's mentally not there." His hand released my neck before he rolled his eyes and walked to the liquor cabinet. The way he drank from the bottle reminded me of myself. Chugging for numbness and not for taste.

" You think you know everything... It drives me crazy. Dan worships the ground you walk on. Kyle gloats you're his best friend. Janna loves you like a sister. Woody thinks you're a queen."

"What do you think of me?"

"You're like me." His confession. My newest secret.

"What do you mean?"

" You just wanna be in the group and think clearly, but you're plagued by expectations and well... A fogged reality."

"Ahh..." I cleared my throat while rubbing my neck. " Well Dan has certainly cleared my reality. I feel less.... Less need to be numb. Maybe that is what you seek? A mate. A person whose voice calms your soul and consumes you whole."

"I don't even know." He sunk into the chair beside the liquor cabinet and examined the bottle in his hands. "I'm good at hiding my... affliction like you."

"I suppose. Until people see through your bullshit. Then your world of escaping reality comes crashing around you. Painfully... If I may make a suggestion?" I sat down near Kyle as Will nodded. "Seek peace. Because seeking that numbness is not going to solve a thing. The doctor... who made me sick? I sought for his death. I wanted to be the person who ended his life, yet he ended it before the drugs I gave him did." I looked down for a moment. "I'm thankful for that because I was trying to feed that numb sensation. What would I have felt had I actually been the reason he died? Probably worse."

"How... how do you not feed it when it is the only thing you know?"

"You feed into something real... music... people... friends." I laughed weakly. "This probably sounds creepy considering you're his friend, but I focus on Dan. I'll lay beside him and memorize his features. I bring myself back to reality with that... I'll be thinking all this dark shit and the moment he nudges me or starts talking it goes away. " I stood and walked to him, taking the bottle. "Though I admit I indulge in my demons sometimes. Though I look to Dan and I see worry. This alcohol tastes like poison when he looks at me like that... enough serious talk for tonight yeah? Kyle is safe and we're all safe. Janna, Dan, and Woody will be back the day after tomorrow." He just nodded as I sat the bottle on the counter then began walking to my room.

"Nicole?"

"Mmm?"

"What if Kyle remember?"

"Then I pray Janna understands... and Dan." He just nodded before I opened the door to my room and closed myself in the dark. The silence was painful without you. When you weren't around I worried for multiple reasons. Your cuts on your wrists and the image of you in the closet haunted me almost every night. You however pulled me from those nightmares and would hold me till I'd fall back asleep. It was like we understood each others dark sides so well. Like a bonded pair before we even knew each other. I heard a knock at my door and lifted my head from the bed.

"Hello?"

"Sorry..." Will opened the door, peaking his head inside the dark room. "I just wanted to say sorry for... aggressively grabbing your neck."

"It's forgotten and forgiven William... good night."

"Night." He closed the door and I turned onto my side. I could tell by my thoughts that I wasn't going to sleep tonight. Nor tomorrow night till I would be reunited with you. Life seemed to be a torturous journey alone. What crossed my mind was a concept. The concept that everyone in this group had something wrong with them. Everyone had a secret and I had two left to figure out. Well three if I counted Chrissy. Kyle the paranoid man... nay child whose stuck in a adult's body. Will the angry alcoholic whose heart of gold is layered with pain. Dan the depressed poet whose wrists are scarred with his sins through time. Then there was me. The ragging alcoholic and drug addict hanging on for dear life through the bloody depressed poet. So with that what secrets were Woody and Janna hiding? After all we were a group of flawed people.