𝐑𝐎𝐎𝐅𝐓𝐎𝐏
[JJ Maybank x fem!oc]
"how badly is this gonna hurt?"
he looked up at her, his hair blowing in
the breeze, hesitating for only a second.
"how badly do you care?"
- or in which jj always won...
They stood there like that, gulping each other in as if for the last time for three minutes. Staring, looking, watching, waiting. JJ's three minutes felt like seconds. Athena's felt like years.
She couldn't shake the feeling that something was seriously wrong- that he was going to do something wrong any second. Athena was above all worried for JJ's well-being. Nobody else seemed to care. Not they didn't have bigger things going on, because they most certainly did. It was wrong to say out loud, Athena knew it, but she cared more about JJ being here than John B and Sarah being possibly dead. Kiara and Pope felt opposite, but they knew John B longer.
JJ didn't say anything, but he walked to Athena, their socked toes overlapping before he stopped right in front of her. He wrapped his arms around her for the first time in what felt like centuries. They melted into each other, huddling for warmth.
ATHENA & JJ: AT ATHENA'S GRANDMOTHER'S HOUSE
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They sat in Athena's bed now. Not her bed, but the guest room bed that she'd been using the entire summer so far.
The room was large and included a door to a balcony overlooking the bay. Not surfing water, but a pretty view nonetheless. Her bookshelf, a nightstand on each side of the bed, which sat in the middle of the room below a large window, which had its blinds shut loosely right now, a walk-in closest, a desk, a dresser, some childish artwork on the walls, and some greenery floating around here and there. Tons of trinkets belonging to Athena were placed strategically on flat surfaces as well. Tons of things were around to make the room feel more like hers. Posters and her own books, the TV always tuned into her favorite shows, her charger plugged into the wall at all times, her skateboard in the corner (used only once this summer), and other miscellaneous objects.
Athena's hoodie was thrown onto the floor now. Usually, she kept things neat and tidy, but in the effort of focusing on JJ and his mental health, she stopped caring. So, there it sat. In the middle of the room, along with JJ's backpack, hat, and socks- which he said were too sweaty to keep on.
They sat under the covers, his hands on her waist and hers in his hair again. She didn't even cringe as the dry sweat encased her fingertips.
They didn't speak of John B; Athena refusing to bring it up and JJ too sad to dwell on it too long himself. He already cried in front of Athena too much for him to comprehend. JJ was unwilling to force himself to do it again. Not today, anyway.
"So," he tried after about twenty minutes of no real conversation.
The television was blasting behind them. They were watching some feel-good movie JJ picked. He saw it was staring Adam Sandler and figured it could help flip his stomach the right way around, but neither of them had done much watching, of course. Though making out was proving to be a difficult feat with Athena's leg and the amount of bruising taking up space on JJ's body. Still, the movie played, illuminating the room with the help of the small portion of light creeping through the window through the curtains.
