It didn't matter to Frank that his sides were aching from Jamia holding him tightly. He was really good at taking in pain. He was an expert at it, and holding her as she calmed down seemed much more important than to complain about some stupid pain that eventually would go away. Jamia's pain wouldn't. Not for a long time.


Though, it was strange to hold her there as she slept. It was nice, though. Cause she wasn't thinking about what happened. She felt really warm, too, Frank thought. He never actually held someone as they fell asleep and it was nice, he guessed. It was still weird. He could actually feel her chest go up and down from her soft breathing, and could feel her heartbeat against his chest. That was more than surreal to him. It just reassured him that people, besides his mom and dad, had hearts. It sounded stupid, and Frankie knew that, but sometimes, with everything he was and is constantly put through, he thinks people are just heartless. So, feeling her heartbeat, made him smile. She had one.


It wasn't long til Greg opened Frank's door slowly with bloodshot eyes from crying, most likely with Frank's parents, and spotted him and Jamia sitting on the floor not moving a muscle. Greg looked like the tension in his shoulders he had been dealing with ever since the tragedy Frank was so vague on details about happened, disappeared as he saw his daughter sleeping. He frowned tremendously because he had to wake her up and as much as he didn't want to, he couldn't just leave her there lying on Frankie, someone who she barely knew.


Greg slowly walked up to them both and kneeled down before them as he brushed back Jamia's short bangs. She furrowed her eyebrows but refused to open her eyes. Frank slowly unwrapped his arms around her and that made her eyes blink open. She looked around and saw her dad who she immediately hugged and clinged to. Greg slowly rubbed her back and mouthed a 'thank you' to Frank for distracting her from the conversation he and his parents had had.


"Angel, dinner is ready. I think you should eat something...even if it's a little bit...just eat, okay?" He told her as she nodded softly trying to rub the sleep from her eyes. "Frank, your parents would like you downstairs as well..." he continued as he took a pause to look at Frank's face. Frank looked down as he nodded slowly trying to avoid another lie he had to tell to keep everyone from worrying so much. Lord knew what Greg was thinking when he saw the marks on the boy's face. Frank decided it was best not to look him in the eye. Greg didn't push it.


"Okay." Frank said softly. Talking to Jamia was hard enough. Throw in an adult who just went through a hard time as well and Frank couldn't help but fidget all over. He most definitely wasn't a people person. He wanted to know what happened to them, though. Jamia's last message made him feel bad. Well, that's an understatement. He was devastated for her but he was going to do his best to not show it. Frank remembered that when Travis died, he wanted no type of sympathy, pity or people who just flat out told him how horrible he must've been feeling. That's something Frank didn't want to hear. Of course he was. But, again, Frank knew that people were very stupid. Not Jamia, though. She was something different. She was to him because she was just as lost as he was. And as she quietly made it downstairs with her dad, Frank followed right behind figuring what else to say or do to make her feel better. He knew nothing would for a long time, but something to at least make her smile once or twice.


Dinner was quiet since no one really knew what to talk about. It was more Linda asking how everyone was enjoying the meal she had made. Jamia ate here and there but she looked like she really wasn't in the mood to eat anything. She was more concentrated on what happened to her rather than paying attention to what anyone was saying. Not that anyone was saying much, but Frank worried about her.


"...and that's when I noticed Frank drenched in paint in the backyard!" Frank's dad exclaimed with a smile making Frank snap back into reality and blink a couple of times to try and understand what he was talking about. He had a smile on his face so it wasn't anything Frank had gotten in trouble for. Greg had a tiny grin on his face as Linda was laughing quietly. Frank's dad noticed how his son and Jamia were totally clueless as to what he was talking about since they were dazed in their own thoughts, that he smiled at them softly and told the small story again. "I was talking about the time Jamia and you were playing with some fingerpaints in the house and you both that it was funny to start a war, I guess and Jamia got you bad Frank. You ran to the backyard to hide from her and she decided to leave you be to continue to paint. I couldn't find you for about an hour.." His dad said giggling once again. It made Frank smile, surprisingly, and he turned to look at Jamia who was also grinning just a bit.


She raised her eyes a little to meet his and the grin she had on widened a little more. Frank giggled once as he looked down at his plate and faintly twirled his fork in his fingers. She had a really nice grin. Pretty girls like her shouldn't be sad, Frank thought to himself. He started to wonder that if her grin was that intriguing, then her smile had to be even better. He now set a goal for himself: get her to smile.


"I don't remember...but it sounds like we had fun.." Frank said quietly as he slowly tilted his head back up to see Jamia who was leaning in her seat trying to see if she could remember that day. It was highly unlikely that she would. But she grinned anyway.


The parents continued to talk about the two of them playing around together as kids. It seemed to be the only topic that they could talk about that didn't pick a nerve or anything. Frank didn't mind and neither did Jamia. They liked knowing what it was like back then between them. It seemed like during that time, while they were kids, everything was always okay.


Frank thought about this for a moment as his mother talked about a birthday party they had had one year. He missed being a kid and hated being a teenager. Because once a teen, responsibilities start taking place. But it wasn't even about that to Frank. He was as responsible as he could be. Always helped his mom around the house even when he pyhsically felt he was going to fall apart, hung out with his dad and grandpa playing his guitar every weekend, tried to do what he could with school and did his best to stay out of detention. Responsibilities was something Frank could handle. What he still couldn't grasp was how people, as they grew up, turned out to be such assholes. It was nice when he was a kid. Nothing mattered. Everyone was okay with everyone and absolutely no one used violence as an outlet to make someone else feel like they're in hell. Frank cringed a little as he faced his reality again. Tomorrow, he had to go back. It wasn't elementary school anymore. Getting the desk closest to the teacher wasn't his goal anymore...it was the desk closest to the door so he could run from class to class and avoid any type of contact from the guys that made his life miserable.

Before he knew it, his mother and father were clearing the table telling Greg and Jamia that they should just lie down for the rest of night. They told Frank to do the same since he took quite the beating. Frank offered to help anyways, despite the cruel and twisting pain that was stirring around in his ribcage but his mother insisted he go back to his room and go to sleep for school the next day. If only she knew what it meant to Frank to go back. If only she knew what it was like to go to sleep and have the next day come sooner rather than later. She had no idea that for Frank, waking up was worse than sleeping for the rest of his life. But since she didn't know, he nodded slowly and thanked her for the wonderful dinner.

Greg and Jamia wished Frankie a goodnight, well...Greg did on behalf of both of them, Jamia waved at him a bit, and headed towards the guest bedroom down the hall on the first floor. After a tiny nod and wave back, Frank booked it upstairs to his room. He stripped down to his tshirt and boxers thinking it was going to be the most comfortable thing he would be able to wear. His bruise, or injury he should say, just felt so bad. It was really hard for him to breathe but at least he was breathing. He had to keep reminding himself of that. He was breathing. He groaned as he slid into his bed, the cold sheets rubbing his shirt up. It felt so nice. He decided that once his parents were asleep, he would go downstairs and get himself a bag of ice. He usually did that when he was beaten up and he knew his body would kill him at first but then later on would love him. Frank also wanted to go downstairs, like every night, to get to his one true objective: the sleeping pills in the top drawer of the kitchen. It was the only way he could get some sleep at night. Usually he wanted to stay up, but tonight (or nights where his body just couldn't take the pain it was in and sleeping was the only way to live with it) it was needed.

Frank knew it didn't take long for his parents to fall asleep. They were the type to just lay down, get comfortable, give each other a kiss and fell right asleep. Frank was always jealous of them when it came to that. He wished for years to be able to curl up under his sheets and let his dreams take over. He couldn't remember the last time he actually dreamed something and that made him frown tremendously. Normal people dreamed. Another thing that made Frank hate himself even more than he already did. He let out yet another sigh, possible breaking his own personal record in sighs in one day, and hissed as his side bitched at him for doing so. It was time to get this sleeping pill in his system so this pain would go away.

He was so thankful that the stairs to his house hardly creaked to make it easier to get down them without worrying he'd wake his parents. He quietly made his way to the kitchen, not turning any lights on since he knew the layout like the back of his hand, and went directly to the drawer he wanted. He pulled out the bottle that contained them, popped two in his hands and placed it back in the drawer all in the darkness of the night that invaded the kitchen. He then headed to the fridge to get that ice pack his side was just begging for. As he closed the door with his foot, back facing it, his whole body froze when he saw Jamia sitting at the kitchen table next to the window where the moonlight was shining through. She seemed heavily concentrated on something in order to not hear or see Frank. Well, maybe she did but she just didn't care. Frank looked both ways unsure if to go up to her or to go back to his room and continue his ritual. He chose the first leaving the pills he initially went to go get on the kitchen counter.

Jamia looked at him as he slowly sat down in the wooden chair across the table from her. She blinked once before focusing again at the chess board in front of her. Yes, an actual chess board. She was playing herself and she seemed to be very into it. Frank didn't say anything at all. He placed the ice pack in the place it hurt the most biting back a whimper to not disturb Jamia's concentration and continued to look at her. She slowly lifted her hand and placed her fingers on a bishop and slowly moved it one square in front of it. Frank had no idea what any of this stuff meant. He didn't have the slightest idea on how to play chess but Jamia was playing herself. She must've been an expert. She let out a huff because it seemed to Frank that she stumped herself. He didn't think that was possible, to be quite honest, but then again, he didn't even know the first thing about chess.

She leaned back in her seat letting it creak slightly and looked up at Frank. She pulled out from her hoodie pocket a post it pad and a small pencil. She wrote on it slowly and then slid it over to Frank turning it around so he could read it under the moonlight. He looked at her for a moment before looking down at the yellow square and read, 'Can't sleep. You?'

Frank looked back up at her and shook his head, still scared he'd disturb the silence around them. She wrote again under her previous comment.

'You know how to play?'. Frank then blushed and didn't look at her as he shook his head. He didn't know why it was so embarrassing that he didn't know how to play chess. He guessed he didn't want her to know that he wasn't good at anything at all. Jamia took the written little pice of paper off the stack, stuck it next to her and continued to write on a new sheet. This time, she bit her bottom lip a little before sliding the pack back to Frank. She looked so shy and Frank found it endearing. It just made her more innocent than she already was. He carefully pulled the post it notes closer to him and read her comment.

'I can teach you if you want. It's not as hard as people say it is.'

Frank pondered over this for a moment without looking at her. She was actually willing to teach him. No one has ever wanted to sit with him to teach him something because they wanted to. It was always because they were forced to. It's something that was so new to him. He couldn't help but stay speechless and Jamia took the post its before he replied. She noticed his look and understood it completely. She wrote something quickly and slid it back to him with a tiny grin. Frank blinked back down to Earth and almost instantly looked down at her writing when the second the post it was in front of him.

'I wanna teach you. It can really help you sleep. I honestly wanna teach you. I could use a friend and so could you.'

With that said, or written, Frank couldn't help but bite his lip to try and hold back some tears. He was succesful in not letting them fall but not to make them disappear before Jamia had a chance to miss them. She saw the tears building up in his eyes before he wiped them away. She pretended she didn't notice and he bought it.

"Let's play some chess.." Frank whispered softly with a smile on his face. Jamia smiled back and Frank couldn't believe he actually accomplished a goal. He got her to smile. He gazed at her as she slowly started to put the chess pieces back in their positions. Tonight was going to be okay.