#theirs should be gayyy

[insertsickusername13]

What if- richjake with wings

warning: the wings are metaphorical. I'm so sorry.

word count: 1850

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In Freshman year, when Rich had been a background character even in his own mind, a conglomeration of flaws and insecurities so pitiful even he couldn't find any interest in himself, Jake Dillinger had been someone to idolize. He walked confidently, he spoke confidently. When he sauntered into a room with that idiotic politician smile on his face (the one that pleased everyone, that had even the strictest teacher bending the rules), it wasn't that the room lit up – it was that Jake glowed, and everyone else basked in his light. 

An angel. That was the only way to describe him. 

It was a common comparison. Rich heard it murmured in hallways and saw it when Jake put on tiny fake wings and wore a headband with a golden halo for Halloween. Jake Dillinger was an angel because he was confident, he was perfect, and he was everything Rich wasn't. 

During the SQUIP, when Rich got to know the real Jake and he became a human to be loved rather than a religion in and of himself, he discovered that Jake was an angel all over again. 

It was midnight, maybe a bit later, and the two of them were doing the stupidest shit they could think of. Rich was in Jake's driveway trying to figure out a new trick on his skateboard while Jake stood at the edge of his roof, shooting his basketball in the dark. On only his third try the ball made it into the basket and Rich let out a string of curses so vulgar they had Jake laughing so hard he had to grab his windowsill to stop himself from falling off the roof. 

"Only you, Jacob. Only you can shoot a fucking basketball from your roof, in the dark, and make it in. Fuck you. You're too perfect."

When he looked up at Jake's sillhouette, he was curled in on himself sheepishly. 

"Shut up," he said, his blush audible, "You're perfect too, y'know."

Rich scoffed at that. He was drunk, the SQUIP deactivated and useless. In this state, without it in his head to tell him how to talk and act, he was hardly perfect. Far from it.

Still, Jake somehow materialized beside Rich and poked at his cheeks lovingly.

"Especially that cute little lisp of yours," he teased, taking the basketball from the driveway and putting it back in the garage. Rich felt himself blush against both his own will and the lingering will of the SQUIP. Cute. His lisp. Something the SQUIP hated. Something that was really his. 

Jake Dillinger was an angel because he made Rich feel good about the real him. 

There were countless times Rich wished he could do the same for Jake. Compliments and affection burrowed themselves in his mind, forced into the dirt by the SQUIP. 

You can't say that, that's gay. 

Do you want him to hate you?

Shut up, Richard. 

Don't say that.

So Rich didn't say a word of praise unless it was hidden under six different layers of sarcasm. Jake seemed to understand most of the time. Still, there were times he didn't. 

Jake was missing from lunch. No one else seemed to mind much. Chloe seemed happy, in fact, choosing to sit next to Brooke and spend the entire time talking to her rather than Jake. The other boys — nameless blurs compared to Jake—carried on conversation as they usually would. The SQUIP spoke as Rich's mind wandered and worried, playing every worst case scenario until he couldn't stand to sit still anymore. Ignoring the protests from the SQUIP and the rapid succession of shocks at the base of his spine, Rich excused himself from the lunch room and searched half the school before finding Jake standing in front of his locker, forehead pressed against the cold metal, arms wrapped protectively around himself. 

His shoulders were shaking. Rich chose to describe it as merely that because if he didn't then he'd have to say the word crying and he never wanted that word to be associated with Jake.

"Hey, dickhead, where the fuck were you?"

Jake turned, still leaning against the locker, just enough so Rich could see his bloodshot, glassy eyes. After just a millisecond of eye contact, during which Jake appeared so exhausted he didn't seem to know what to do, Jake straightened himself out and quickly wiped his eyes. Within a moment, he was smiling. 

"Didn't want to deal with your annoying ass for a full half hour," he said, already messing with the combination to his locker. Trying to make it look like he was there for a reason other than crying, Rich thought. Fuck. 

Don't say that, don't say that, don't—

Jaw clenched with the effort it took to speak against the SQUIP's will, Rich managed, "Are you okay?"

Jake froze. Then, slowly, he nodded. 

"Yeah," he replied, tone too short and voice too deep, "Yeah, I've just got like—like AP tests are coming up and shit and I'm just stressed as fuck. I've got like four to take this year and it's driving me crazy."

The SQUIP scoffed and said, "Fucking try-hard."

Jake's fake smile faltered. It was the SQUIP rather than Rich who noted that Jake was shaking out his hands at his sides and shifting from foot to foot. His lips were trembling and fuck, no, Jake, I didn't say that, it wasn't me, I'm—

"I'm trying so fucking hard, Rich. Social services won't leave me alone and I just—” he took a shaky breath and stared blankly at the empty space behind Rich, his expression the embodiment of crumbling ruins; ashes; the gray snow that came at the end of the year while spring melted it away. “–I really need to pass these stupid tests to show them I'm fine on my own. I can do this by myself. I can, okay? I–I really can."

Was he asking Rich for confirmation? Of course Jake could do whatever he wanted to. He was perfect.

Don't say that, don't say that, leave this alone, Richard. Leave it alone. 

Taking Jake's hand in his own and running his thumb over the joints of Jake's fingers (a useless form of comfort, what did that do to fix anything? Still, Jake fell, practically plummeted, into the touch), Rich said, "Why are social services on your back?"

Jake shrugged helplessly and, though he sounded like he was on the verge of crying again, laughed. It was short; scared.

"My parents got in some legal trouble. It was between freedom and their son, so. Easy decision, I guess. Up and left last month. Haven't heard from them since."

What?

What the fuck?

No.

At first, the words were easy to hear. Rich had grown accustomed to the SQUIP in his mind. He didn't need to understand and register every word his friends said because the SQUIP would pick it up no matter what and respond correctly. So Rich heard Jake talking, but it wasn't until a moment later, when the SQUIP was trying to say fuck yeah, you have the house to yourself all the time? Bro, imagine the fucking ragers we can throw! that Rich actually understood the words.

"What?" he said, not because it was the right thing to say (as the SQUIP constantly reminded him, Rich never knew the right thing to say), but because he knew it had to be better than talk of parties and shit. No matter what everyone said or what the SQUIP claimed, Jake was more than the 'ragers' he threw and his self-destructive tendency to try and meet every expectation put upon him.

"Yeah. I don't even fucking - fuck-" one hand still holding Rich's, he pressed the heel of his free hand against his temple, both to hide the tears threatening to fall at merely a blink and to assuage his growing headache (he's reacting negatively to light, the SQUIP noted, and the bags under his eyes suggest he hasn't been sleeping well). “–I don't even know, I don't miss them, but now I've got all these people watching me constantly, and I just can't–I can't–"

He didn't even hug Rich, just collapsed forward onto him. There was nothing left in him—no fight, no vigor or joy. The SQUIP scoffed, and for the first time since letting it into his mind, Rich felt genuine anger toward it. How could he? Jake was crying, a morbid sight Rich had never seen and prayed he would never see again, and somehow the SQUIP was amused?

Without considering the consequences (which would surely be painful—electric shocks, leaving him to deal with his dad alone, an itemized list of all the things wrong with him), Rich shoved the SQUIP into some useless sector of his brain where it could no longer take control of his speech or actions. Almost a year of having it in his head had taught him a few tricks.

"Hey," Rich whispered, letting go of Jake's hand only so he could wrap his arms over his shoulders and around his neck. Though Jake felt metaphorically small, with his desperate, childish hold on Rich's shirt and the tiny sobs he was trying to suppress, he was still over half a foot taller than Rich and despite the fact Jake was already leaning down, Rich had to get on his tippy toes just to pull Jake down further into the hug. 

"I'm sorry," Rich said, "Jakey, I'm really, really sorry."

Jake shook his head and nuzzled further into Rich's neck. It hurt just to see him like this and hurt even more to feel it in the shaking of his hands and knees, in the tears wetting Rich's shirt. 

"It's okay," Jake whispered, "It's fine, I'm fine, I just–I gotta–” He never finished, too much of him dedicated to not breaking down to be able to summon words.

Rich didn't need him to speak. He'd been friends with Jake long enough to know exactly what he wanted to say.

Jake Dillinger was an angel because, despite fate twisting and breaking to hurt him, he was still fucking trying. 

How fate could look at a boy like Jake and decide he deserved this, why it hadn't bent the rules just to make the path Jake walked safe, Rich didn't know. 

Until, of course, he was drunk and the SQUIP was still screaming and clawing at the tissue in his brain. Until it was dark and hazy, with music and pounding beats echoing in his bones and the match in his hand. Until there were flames and Rich thought there was no chance of survival. That he was going to die and fall straight to hell because he wasn't Jake Dillinger; he wasn't holy. 

He didn't remember Halloween. Whether it was his own survival instincts or the SQUIP that erased every moment from his mind, he had no way of knowing. He only saw the aftermath—the ashes of Jake's trust, the blisters on Rich's skin, the casts and the crutches that Jake cursed and scorned. 

Jake Dillinger was not an angel. If he were, he wouldn't have fallen. 

Because angels have wings.