#bergen_county

"Yeah, but you're missing the part where after that we come back again."

"That's what happens, too."

"It's not like it was, and I miss it...but what it is doesn't have to be awful if we keep it from being awful."

"It can't be what it was."

"No, it can't. Y'know why? Because that's not how life works. Shit changes. I'm not saying that change is good, but it doesn't have to be a bad thing. It's just the way it is. And if you make what-it-is something to be hated, then that's going to poison our memories of what-it-was. And I do NOT want that!"

"Well, if I'm awful and poison, then just... just..." She falters, not completing the ultimatum.

"You're NOT!" Sylvi's clearly frustrated. "When did I EVER say that? When did I ever ACT like I thought that? I don't like the way you're acting with us right now, but that doesn't mean I don't like you, you dope!"

She drags the back of her hand under her nose, backed into silence again.

Sylvi sighs. "Can we please just still be friends, even if that looks different now? I don't want to feel like I'm not welcome to come back home by one of the people who means a lot to me."

"...yeah..."

Sylvi is quiet. She's not quite sure what variety of answer that was...whether it was a genuine response, or a say-anything-to-make-her-go-away answer.

After a moment, she says, "You do mean a lot to me...even if I don't express that by staying in one place and keeping things the same forever."

"It..." She hesitates, frowning.

"It just..."

"Everybody leaves."

A ragged inhale. "Jaymes'll leave."

"He'll get undone, or he'll die..."

"It..." She clams up, eyes wet.

Sylvi steps closer. "He didn't, though. Not this time. And you helped protect him when others came. Yeah, it's going to happen sometime. And sometime you're going to be the one who does the leaving. Think about Connor...he's going to outlive all of us, everybody's going to leave him, eventually. And he knows it. But he doesn't dwell on it."

Another nose rub.

She shakes her head. "Look, I know I'm preaching, and I'm sorry, but...people aren't leaving because of you. You're not driving people away, and people aren't rejecting you. You're...you're one of the reasons it was really hard to leave." She glances at the door. "But when you shut down, or shut us out...." She leaves it unfinished.

She's not crying. She's not. She's not. But that seems to entirely be by dint of trollish stubborn.

"If all we're going to do is hurt you every time we show up....." she says quietly.

A helpless shrug. "I guess all I can say is that we're not trying to hurt you."

"Then you won't wanna show up at all." Her voice is thick.

A pause. "Is that what you want?" Genuine question.

"No." Miserable.

An exhale. "Okay. I wasn't sure."

Sniff.

"I'm fucked up. It... I..."

Sylvi's brow furrows as she listens.

"It's my fault. Not acting right."

"I just... it... I get so scared sometimes..."

"Yeah," she says quietly.

A frustrated noise. "I should be better already."

"Who says?"

"I should! I'm a knight and I... Chief asked me to swear and... and I have a family now, and... and I'm not like fucking Jordan...."

"Jordan? How'd he get in this? What's wrong with Jordan?"

"Sorry, just...confused."

"All he does is gripe about how much everything sucks, about this... and I just.. I get mad."

"And I was.. when I first came... and everybody was nice to me, but I'm not nice to him...."

"And I... I just... I thought I wasn't a fuck up anymore..."

Sylvi just listens.

"But I'm still... I'm still so scared and mad and I feel like I'm standing still when everybody else seems to know what they're doing... where they're going..."

Wide eyes at that. "Uh...no. Not a clue, here. I know where I am right now. No idea what it means or what happens next, not really."

"And I don't like being mean to Jordan, I don't like how I am when I do that... but..."

"And I upset Nadeen, and I didn't want to do that..."

"You know you can talk to her, apologize. You know she'll be okay with that. And...I bet you could do the same with Jordan, if you want to."

"I just... it... that phone was really expensive but I.. I really liked it, and I broke it, and Symon got me this phone and I was a dick about that too because it... it doesn't do pictures or tik tok or anything, and that's... that phone was a gift and I broke it, so I deserve... and it's stupid to be upset about it, like, Dad was shot and May was hurt, and everything.... and I'm upset about a phone and...."

"How'd it get broken?"