It's Tori's mom who answers the door, words of welcome poised on her lips. They die in her throat as she takes me in, dripping and shivering on her doorstep, make up smeared over my cheeks. "Jade? Honey?" She says my name like it's a mystery, like she's not sure it's really me, but her voice still rings with the same warmth that Tori's does. It's not fear, but concern in her voice.

She turns, calling out for Tori before ushering me inside. "You're soaked! You poor thing." She sounds like a mother, something I haven't heard for a long time. She yells for Tori again, torn between me and the stairs. Even she knows I need Tori. "Wait right here. I'll get you a towel, okay?"

I nod, water dancing and dripping off the ends of my hair, my top cold and heavy, clinging to my clammy skin. I don't remember the drive here, apart from white-knuckled hands on the wheel, breath bleeding out through my cold lips. The shaking didn't even start until I got to Tori's driveway, starting in my shoulders and working its way down. The rain felt almost warm on the walk to her front door, a million fingers prodding over me, tugging at my hair, my clothes, ushering me closer to her.

I have some stupid notion in my head that she'll be happy to see me, that she'll come dancing down those stairs like she always does, a smile never far from her lips. When she finally appears, her steps are heavy, shoulders bowed, eyes fixed on the next step ahead. "Mom, what is it?" She whines, annoyance in her voice, and I wonder how she'll react when she sees me. Did she smile before because I was there, or am I the reason she's not smiling now?

She's in her pyjamas, blue and cloud-spattered, black framed glasses perched on her nose. She was probably doing homework, sprawled out on her bed where we once tangled together. Tori notices me as she reaches the bottom of the stairs, foot freezing as it touches the ground. She grabs the towel off her mother as she comes back, dismissing her mom in stilted words. It's like a before and after picture; seeing them side-by-side. Mrs. Vega, just like Tori was, warm, concerned. Happy. And this Tori now, hard and cold, holding herself like it's an effort just to stand, just to keep herself together. She's become just like me, and my dream to see her that way is now a nightmare. It doesn't make me happy like I thought it would. It only makes me aware of how empty I really am, how it wasn't Tori that needed to be broken, it was me that needed to be fixed.

"What are you doing here?" Tori's voice is low, towel bunched in front of her like a shield, fingers pinching the edges.

"I... I didn't know where else to go." My voice comes out hoarse, shaken and rattled about in my bruised chest. It comes out broken, shattered, and the only other time Tori's heard me like this was in the park, for that one brief instant when all the possibilities became too much, when they crowded me with their plaintive voices of what could've been.

"Are you okay?" Even with what I've made her into, her goodness still shines through. Even when caring hurt her so much, she still does it. She can't stop caring, and I'm starting to wish that I could start.

I try to say yes, to straighten my spine and take the shake from my shoulders, but all that comes out is a noise like a cough, a rattle in my throat like I just can't unstick the lie and force it out.

Tori reaches out in an instinctive gesture before recoiling. If I wasn't who I am and she wasn't who she was, her arm would be around me, she'd be pulling me into a tight hug and keeping me from sliding apart. But the problem's always been who we are, and it keeps us separate now. "Come on, you're freezing. You can change in my room." Her voice is soft, almost guarded, like she wants to be the wall that I am towards her, not letting anything in. The problem with Tori is she never closes the gate, though. She can never shut you out completely.

She leads me up the stairs while I wrap the towel around myself, trying to calm my shivering. It's a familiar path to her room, but every time I take it it's a different journey. I never feel the same way about her twice. She opens the door to her room, her name emblazoned on the white-painted wood, a few cheery photographs and magazine cutouts floating around it, motioning me inside as she stands back.

The carpet sinks under my heavy shoes, droplets of water painting the light-coloured carpet dark. Tori's bedcovers are messy, a textbook open near her pillow, Pearpod playing a soft song on a portable speaker. The scent of her is rich in here, a mild, floral scent that settles in the bottom of your lungs, that sinks into your clothes until you carry her with you. She's never even been in my house, yet I can still smell her there. In my room. In my car.

Tori crosses to her bed, flicking a glance at me before she bends to rifle underneath her pillow, tossing a bundled up shirt to me. "This should fit."

I examine the black shirt, material soft and warm under my cold, pruny fingers. The name of a familiar band is plastered across the front, faded and worn. "Isn't this mine?"

Tori's mouth twists, her shoulders shrugging. "Yeah. You left it here... before."

My fingers tighten in the shirt. She kept it under her pillow. "Oh."

I shrug the towel off me, resting it across Tori's desk along with the shirt; the piece of me I'd forgotten I'd left behind. There's no such thing as a clean break. I pluck at the wet hem of my top, material sticking to my skin, Tori's gaze fixed on me.

She tears herself away, fingers fumbling with a drawer handle. "I'll find you some pants to wear."

I wince as my arms raise over my head, ribs throbbing. Tori turns at the noise, eyes widening.

I let the slippery top drop to the ground, a finger tracing the angry red stripe that crosses my chest, skin raised and swollen. "Think it's gonna bruise?"

"Jade..." Tori approaches me, a hand outreached, the other hovering about her mouth. "What happened?"

"A cat." I try to form a smile, lips trembling. "Don't worry, the cat's fine."

"Are you hurt?"

I press my hand over my sternum, a pulse of pain knocking my breath out. "N-no." Tori's hand covers mine, drawing it away gently. "Yes." The word's almost gasped, torn out by Tori's closeness, her concern, her everything. "I'm scared, Tori. I'm so scared." Tears prick my eyes again, Tori's fingers brushing away one as it spills over, carving down my cheek.

"It's okay, you're gonna be fin-"

"I'm scared of you." I burst out, knocking her hand away. "Why are you still being so nice to me?" I ignore the wrench of pain as I turn and tug on the shirt that smells of both me and her, scents mingled together.

"Because you need it." Tori draws her hand back to her side, fingers slightly curled.

"But I don't deserve it. Why can't you treat me like the person I am, instead of this saint you want me to be?" I'm fucking things up again. I came here to apologise, to finally accept what I've been fighting ever since we fucked in that filthy bathroom; that I love her. That I can't hate her, not even a little bit. The things I want to say, the things I feel... they're not me, they're her, and for once, just once, I want to be like her. To open up my locked gate, and let someone in. To have my walls come crumbling down.

Tori stays silent, shoulders slumped. She fought against me, for me, as long as she could. She kept fighting because I wouldn't accept her surrender, because I kept attacking again and again. I still am, but now she's silent, taking my blows with little more than a hurt expression.

I swipe my cheeks roughly, fingers coming away coated black from my smeared makeup. "Tell me, Tori."

"Tell you what?" She says the words dully, like she's expecting me to insult her, to yell her into nothing, to cut until she's nothing but mincemeat on the ground.

"Tell me what it would've been like. If things were different. If I wasn't... if I wasn't me. Tell me we could've been happy." I can't keep the desperation out of my voice, the faint and disgusting hope that refuses to die in me.

Tori's lips tighten. "I can't."

"Tell me. Please, Tori. Tell me we could've been something." I take a step towards her, Tori wincing like it's a blow. I raise a hand to her cheek, fingers shaking. "Tell me we could've been happy."

"Why are you doing this?" It's the question she asked every time. The question I never gave a truthful answer to, always finding the words that'd hurt her the most, that'd poison her a little more each time.

This time, it's the antidote on my lips. "Because I love you."

Tori's hands curl into fists. "Every time-" She spits it out between clenched teeth, returning the venom I gave to her so often. "Every time I think it's over- every time I think I'm over you- every time I think it doesn't hurt anymore, you show up. You show up, and you just hurt me more. You've hurt me more than anyone else ever has Jade, and I want to tell you to leave. I want to tell you to get out, to get the fuck out of here because I know all you'll do is hurt me again. I want to hate you so bad, Jade. I really do." She takes a ragged breath, tears shimmering in her eyes. "I want to, but I can't. I can't hate you. Why?" She looks at me helplessly, completely torn down. "Why can't I hate you?"

She's asked the one thing I could never answer. Not for her, not for myself. All that's left to say can't be spoken, because there aren't words for it. Words are so good at wounding, and so helpless at healing. There aren't enough to suture up a heart, to seal closed the wounds they cause. Words are the alternative to feeling, and we've both run out of ones to hide our hearts. There's nothing I can say, but there's something I can do, and it's the only thing I can think of. It's the only thing I need right now. Maybe I can use my lips for something other than lies.

Tori's lips are soft, wet with tears, the salty liquid dampening my fingers where they tilt her chin up. Her shoulders shake like they're coming apart, and instead of shoving me away, telling me to get out, she leans closer, fingers trembling on my waist. It's not what any normal person would do. It's what I'd do, and this whole time, Tori's every action has mirrored my own. She's pushed me, challenged me, squashed down her feelings... but most of all, she's tried to hate me. But that's something both of us couldn't do. We might be two sides of a coin, but it's still just one coin, made from exactly the same stuff, just with a different stamp.

For the first time in a long time, I'm not scared. I'm not angry. It feels right to kiss her, it always has, but for the first time I'm not telling myself it's wrong. I'm not telling myself her lips taste too much like mint, that her hands are too dry, her hips too bony. She's perfect, and she always has been. I've been trying to make her mirror image match the crack running through mine.

For the first time, I don't feel that crack splitting me in half.

Our lips part with a soft sound, Tori's breath feathering my neck. Her forehead is pressed against mine, eyes still shut tight. Her hands are just a little too tight on my hips, like she's trying to stop me getting away, to keep me firmly in place. "Is this real?" She murmurs, a hint of fear in her voice, muffled beneath the hope, the longing.

I answer her with another kiss, a soft, slow caress. A kiss that confesses what I could never say - that she's been right all along, about everything, about me. Our history is a blemish; the lies, the games, the pain. They're a mark on us both, an ugly growth that has to be lopped off, seared away and scoured from existence.

I part from her with a soft sigh. "It's real."

I'm done with the game I was playing with her. The game over screen is flashing, and my score is set at zero. I'm ready to start a new game, a different kind, and this one is co-op.

/