"But what if music is what escapes when a heart breaks?” Jandy Nelson, The Sky is Everywhere

Winter break was when it finally happened.

Nick came home during the first week of break to find Samantha sitting on his doorstep. He had come home in a hurry since his mom and Gwendolyn were both out and was looking forward to having some time alone. But instead he launched into best friend mode.

“Samantha? What happened? What’s wrong?” he asked, sitting down and putting his arm around her. She sunk into him and rested her head in the space between his arm and his shoulder.

“Luke,” she whispered in between sobs. Nick only responded with a nod and put his other arm around her, hoping it would help her.

Once her sobs settled down, Nick helped her up and led her inside and up to his room. By the time she collapsed on his bed she was crying again. He stood next to the bed for a few moments, running his hand through his hair a few times, and tried to decide what to do. He decided that boys were not equipped to handle this.

So he called Meredith.

The phone rang six times before it finally clicked to her voicemail. Nick left the room with Samantha still on the bed while he called again. This time the phone only rang three times.

He paced up and down the stairs a few times and almost called his mom or Talia before he realized someone else he could call that would know where Meredith was. He clicked to the person’s contact and listened to the phone ring.

Seven rings later, the person picked up.

“Hello?”

“Tobias?” Nick asked.

“Uh huh. Who’s this?”

“Who do you think this is? Don’t you have caller ID?”

“Well I’m sorry that I didn’t have time to check. But I know who it is now, because who other than Nick Kincaid would call me acting like the fate of humanity lies in the balance of me checking my caller ID?”

“Cut the crap. Is Meredith with you?” Nick said.

“Meredith who?”

“Tobias.”

“What, I really don’t know.”

“Just stop it.”

“Never,” Tobias said.

“Tobias, Samantha is here and she and Luke broke up. I don’t know what the story is but I do know that I can’t handle this.”

“How can Meredith help?”

“She’s a girl and Samantha’s best friend other than me. She’ll know what I should do to help her with this,” he said.

“Okay, here she is. Wait, Nick?”

“Yeah?”

“Is there anything I can do?”

“Letting me talk to Meredith will be enough. If anything changes I’ll let you know.”

“All right, here she is.”

“Nick?” Meredith said.

“Meredith? Hey, Samantha’s here and‒”

“I know, I heard when you were telling Tobias. Poor baby, how is she?”
“She’s, she’s pretty messed up,” Nick lowered his voice to a whisper. “She’s crying on my bed right now and I don’t know what to do.”

“Okay, here is my five step plan to making Samantha feel better: comfort food, music, PLL, hair, and fuzzy socks. Not necessarily in that order.”

“What kind of comfort food?”

“Pizza, chips, and ice cream. You order the pizza and Tobias and I will bring Doritos and Ben and Jerry’s by,” she said.

“Bring Cheetos instead.”

“What?”

“I like Cheetos more than Doritos and it’ll fulfill the cheese requirement of the comfort food section,” he said.

“Fine, I’ll bring both.”

“Thank you. Music I have covered and I guess I can watch some Pretty Little Liars if I have to.”

“Don’t act like it’s a punishment, she’s told me that you’ve watched it with her and that you secretly like it,” Meredith said.

“I am going to pretend I didn’t hear that. What do you mean by hair?”

“Play with her hair.”

“Um, what?”

“She’s laying on your bed right? After you order the pizza and turn on the Netflix, sit down next to her and smooth her hair. Maybe even lay down with her or have her put her head in your lap.”

“Got it,” he said.

“Do you have fuzzy socks you can have her wear?”

“No but my mom or Gwendolyn might. I could have her borrow a pair of theirs.”

“They won’t mind?” she asked.

“Nah. They love her. Maybe even more than they love me.”

“I can understand why.”

“Hey, you can insult me when you deliver the Cheetos, Doritos, and ice cream,” he said.

“Maybe I’ll just bring the Doritos and the ice cream.”

“Please don’t.”

“Then be nice.”

“As you wish.”

“Go order the pizza and turn on Pretty Little Liars. We’ll be there in twenty,” she said.

“Sounds good.”

“Wait, Nick?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t forget about the hair. It’s important, I promise.”

“I won’t.” Nick hung up and dialed the pizza place.

When he got back upstairs, Samantha was under the covers and flipping through the channels. Nick turned out the lights, gently took the remote from her, and turned on that stupid show. Before he could react, Samantha moved back against him and laid her head on the arm he had folded on the pillow.

Nick stiffened, Meredith hadn’t explained the protocol in these types of situations. She had only mentioned the hair. The hair, he had to smooth her hair.

So, slowly but surely, Nick raised his hand and put his hand on her head. Then he moved it down a little bit. Soon he got used to the motion, and didn’t pay much attention to it anymore. Samantha chuckled and whispered,

“I’m guessing you talked to Meredith.”

“What makes you think that?” he whispered back.

“You’re playing with my hair. It’s one part of her five part plan to make me feel better.”

“You make it seem like she has to make you feel better a lot.”

“More than usual lately,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry about that.”

“It’s all right. I at least get comfort food each time. And now you’re watching Pretty Little Liars with me almost voluntarily.”

“Yeah, about that, were you going to tell me that you told Meredith I watched that with you?” he asked.

“Eh, I knew it would come up eventually. So when are they coming over?”

“When is who coming over?”

“Tobias and Meredith, of course,” she said.

“How do you know that they’re coming over?”

“Because you ordered pizza but didn’t bring up any ice cream or Doritos. That means you don’t have any. But since Meredith can’t not fulfill her five part plan, that means she’s dropping them off. And since she and Tobias are a thing, he has to be coming too.”

“You got all that from me ordering pizza?” he asked, chuckling.

“Of course. What kind of best friend would I be if I didn’t?”

“Very true. They should be here soon.”

“Well when they do, you’ll have to get up.”

“I’ll have to get up? Why?”

“Because you love me,” she said. He froze once again at her flippant use of the l-word but calmed down when Samantha started talking about how she didn’t understand why Aria and Ezra kept going back to each other.

Twenty minutes later they were sitting cross legged eating pizza and Ben and Jerry’s “Half Baked” with the empty bags of Doritos and Cheetos crumpled on the floor.

Tobias and Meredith had wanted to stay but Nick told them, out of Samantha’s earshot of course, that this was something he had to handle and it would be better if she could be sad without an audience. So they left and Nick went back upstairs to find only half a pizza.

“You were gone a while,” Samantha had said sheepishly.

“I was gone like five minutes.”

“You were gone ten at least. And hey, I saved you your half.”

By the time Nick has finished his half of the pizza, he was pretty invested in Pretty Little Liars and was forgetting why he hid his like for it in the first place.

“But why do they not just turn off their phones? Change their numbers? Move?” he asked.

“Because they’re stupid stupid people,” Samantha responded as she swallowed the last bit of ice cream.

“You’d think that after all the things she’s gone through with Toby, she’d trust him more,” Nick said after a moment.

“And you’d think he wouldn’t want to become a cop in the first place. When your girlfriend has been a prime suspect of a murder case several times, you’d find another profession.”

“Or you’d go somewhere else and become a cop.”

“Exactly.”

“So, you read to talk?” he asked.

“About what?”

“You know what.”

“If you want me to talk you have to ask,” she said.

“What happened with you and Luke? Last I checked you guys were nauseating.”

“We were, nauseating, weren’t we.”

“You were,” he replied.

“You know how you’re really happy at one point and then suddenly you’re imagining how the happiness is going to end? Because you know it can’t stay that way forever, and that you imagine it ending so you won’t be at sad when it ends?”

“Yes.”

“Well, the thing is,” she stopped, a sob catching in her throat. She wasn’t looking at him anymore. “Sometimes, when you’re unlucky, as much as you prepare for something to end, it hurts even more than you thought. And it’s completely different than you imagined it. And it hurts like a bitch.”

“Samantha,” he whispered, putting his hand over her hand. “What happened? What did he do?”

“He just,” she stopped to catch her breath, “He just didn’t want to be my boyfriend anymore.”

“That can’t be all. There has to be something else.” She shook her head, the tears falling freely now.

“No, there’s nothing else. He said, he said‒” Her whole body shook as she tried and failed to get the words out. Nick pulled her to him and sat her down in his lap. She wrapped her arms around his torso and sobbed into his shirt.

“He said I just wasn’t worth it,” she wailed.

“Shh, shh,” Nick said into her hair. “It’ll be okay.”

“No it won’t! I’m not worth it. He’s right.”

“He’s an asshole,” Nick said, resting his chin on her head. “And a wrong asshole at that. You’re worth it, you’re worth everything.”

“You have to say that,” she said through the tears, her hair sticking to her face. “You know it’s not true.”

“It’s true,” he whispered, knowing she probably couldn’t hear him. “You have no idea how true it is.”

He held her until the tears subsided and her breathing slowed and he saw she was fast asleep. He laid her down next to him with her head on his arm like they were before and was soon asleep himself.

He woke up when he heard someone basically ransacking his room. He rubbed his eyes until he could clearly see what was going on: Samantha had gone completely insane and was rushing around his room.

“What are you doing?” he asked sleepily as he checked the clock. It was 2:56 in the morning.

“I need to break something,” Samantha said, more to herself than to him, which scared him a little, if he was being honest.

“Don’t break my stuff,” Nick groaned as he collapsed back on the pillows.

“Well I have to break something!” she said, turning towards him with a book in one hand and a picture frame in the other.

“Break something of yours!”

“Augustus Waters let Isaac break all his basketball trophies when he got dumped!”

“Yet another thing that separates me from Augustus Waters. Sorry to disappoint you. If I develop cancer, buy some cigarettes, and lose a leg will you forgive me?” he said, still laying down.

“I’d rather just break something. Besides, if you die who will watch Pretty Little Liars with me? None of my other friends watch it.”

“Your other friends are teenaged girls, I’m sure one of them watches it.”

“Nope, they’re all more manly than you,” she said, jumping onto the bed next to him and dropping the book and picture frame on the mattress. The way she said it was so happy you would have thought her life was perfect if you couldn’t see the tear stains.

Nick slowly sat up and grabbed both the book and the frame. The book was Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, which seemed thoroughly unbreakable, and the picture was of the two of them at their middle school promotion. This was one thing Nick was actually okay with her breaking this, they’re awkwardness was horrifying.

“Are you trying to kill me? Other than by breaking all my stuff, I mean,” he said.

“I just need to break something okay!” Her sudden outburst scared him even more than the talking to herself.

“But let’s think through this clearly…” He reached for her and she pulled away and began pacing the room again.

“I’m done crying, I’m done wallowing, and I need to break something! Now I’m just pissed and I need to get it all out. God, can’t you just help me?” She was walking in circles and throwing her arms around.

Nick threw off the covers and grabbed her, picking her up and sitting her down on the bed. She squirmed and tried to get away, prompting him to kneel in front of her and hold her arms to her sides until she stopped, her hair all over the place and her glare scarier than ever before.

“Now,” he said. “What can I do to help you?”

“You can give me something to break. One of your arms will do.”

“Hey there, let’s not get hostile. If I find you something you can break, will you go back to sleep. More importantly, will you let me sleep?” She took a deep breath and did her best to move her hair out of her eyes without her arms, which he still held to her sides.

“Yes, I will go back to sleep and let you sleep if you find me something to break.”

“All righty then. Stay right here,” he cautiously let go of her sides, “And I will find you something.” She nodded and he got up and inspected her room.

After a few minutes of searching, he pulled a record from her collection and handed it to her. She didn’t take it.

“I can’t break that,” she said.

“Why not?”

“It’s part of your collection. You love your collection, you can’t give me part of it to break just because I got dumped! Luke is not worth that! And I’m definitely not worth that.” Nick chuckled and kneeled down in front of her again, handing out the record.

“I told you, you’re worth everything. Including sacrificing one of my albums to make you, my best friend in the whole world, feel better. He’s not worth it but you are.”

“I can’t.”

“You can. It’s Lil Wayne’s rock album ‘Rebirth.’ He should never had made it. I don’t even know why I have it. Save me from having to take it to Goodwill and force it on some poor person?” he said.

She sighed and hesitated, but eventually took the record from him.

“Where should I break it?”

“Hmm… Let’s go outside.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her outside and to the backyard where it was pitch black except for the sad little porch light.

He led her to the proper spot, had her take the record out of the cover, and then remembered something.

“Wait right here.” He ran back into the house and back upstairs. He reached his room and grabbed the Polaroid camera his mom had given him last Christmas and ran back downstairs and to where Samantha was waiting.

“What’s that for?” she asked.

“To document the moment.” He gestured for her to break the record and she complied.

The picture Nick ended up getting was probably one of the favorites he had ever seen of her. She had the two halves of the record in her hands and was looking up at him, laughing. Somehow the bad lighting worked for her and hid the tear stains and her hair was all loose in a way that almost seemed magical.

After showing her the picture and after she fell asleep, Nick placed the picture on his nightstand by where he had left the picture of them at promotion. He smiled looking at it and fell asleep glad that Luke was finally out of their lives.

Of course, he should’ve known that that wasn’t true.

A/N: Let me start with a huge huge apology. I meant to update yesterday, I really meant to, but I kinda only started the chapter yesterday... Well not quite yesterday, I had the first couple paragraphs written, but not enough.

But, on the bright side, this is a good length chapter! What was your favorite part? You guys should know by now that I love it when you comment on. Every. Little. Thing.

This chapter is dedicated to inanimatezebra for being such a wonderful reader :)

And if you guys haven't noticed, I've added photos of everyone I've cast in this story on the right of every part! This week's photo is who I have cast as Jessica, Samantha Boscarino. The video on the right is "Thinking Out Loud" by Ed Sheeran, basically the best song ever.

One last thing: thank you so much for the 1.2k reads! And more than 200 comments?! I love you guys so so much. I don't deserve readers as great as you.