~~~~~~

"a father's tears and fears are unseen, his love is unexpressed, but his care and protection remain as a pillar of strength throughout our lives"
-ama h. vanniarachchy

song to listen to: to build a home by the cinematic orchestra

warnings: descriptions of violence, self harm, suicidal thoughts, suicidal actions, mentions of suicide, blood, mentions of blood, car crash, swearing, the trauma of cameron peters

~~~~~~

cameron peters's point of view

"Hey, Peters! A little late to the game, big guy!" Nick called out to me with a half-smile on his face as I walked over to him.

"Yeah, I know, I uh-I didn't want Jen to go, but once Mia started to blackmail me, well, I had to...I had to cave in." I shrugged, letting out some careless laughter.

"Mia knows almost everything, doesn't she?" His words were weird when he said 'almost,' but I just brushed that off as nothing more than me overthinking shit again.

"Yeah, yeah she does..." I allowed my sentence to trail off.

"When's your shift end, Cam? Mine should be ending in, uh, about an hour or so, if you wanna go and grab a beer."

"I'm on all night, sorry, man," I wasn't on all night. I just didn't want to hang out with anybody.

"No, you're not." Nick's voice seemed unfathomably angry, and I turned my guard all the way up.

"Yeah, I am."

"No, you're not."

"Alright, no I'm not. I just don't feel like drinking tonight, man," I straight-out refuse to say 'sorry' though.

"Why not?"

"Why do you need a reason for everything I do?"

"I don't, but-"

"But nothing then." My tone was as harsh as I intended it to be.

"You aren't always this rude, Peters, what's going on?" 

He didn't care. He was faking sympathy. I can't tell him what was going on in my head. He wouldn't understand. How could he? He's put me in charge of finding some logical reason that Ryan Torres snapped and killed his coworkers. Because Sunnyvalers don't believe in Sarah Fier's curse, and there's a good chance that they never will.

"Nothing's wrong, I just...I'm gonna go, alright?" I didn't give him time to answer. "Yeah, yeah I'm gonna get going now."

And I walked back to my car, hearing Nick calling out to me but not bothering to find out what he was trying to say to me. Getting into the cruiser, I punched my arm and didn't bother to put on my seat-belt before driving away. The police radio was silent, no criminal activity or accidents I needed to respond to. It was too silent here. It was too silent. It felt unlawfully silent. The silence was stunning. The silence was uncomfortable. The silence was too loud. I need to make the silence stop. I started to drive faster, and when that didn't cut it, I drove a faster than before.

The tires were squealing against the pavement now. Not silent anymore. It's not silent anymore. That's good. It's good. It's okay. As long as I don't let it get back to that silence that it was before. Then I'll be okay. I'll be just fine. I sped up a bit more, and truly let my mind go. No thoughts. No thoughts. No thoughts. No thoughts. I looked at the speedometer. 90 miles an hour. I could go faster than that. If I wanted to achieve what I had in mind, I needed to go faster than ninety.

An abrupt turn of a corner, I stopped the cruiser inches away from the guardrail. Not because I didn't want to complete what I tried, but because I was pretty sure I heard my radio going off. It was just static, though. No voices.

"Shit!" I swore as loudly as I wished-nobody could hear me. "SHIT!"

I punched my arm three times, one time for every-

"This is Sheriff Nick Goode to Officer Peters, Officer Peters do you copy? Over." The static sounds of the radio finally turned into words, and I froze, unable to find words to speak. "Officer Peters, do you copy? Over." It sounded like two voices, that's when I grabbed the radio.

"Yes, this is Officer Peters, I copy...I copy. Is everything alright?" Silence. "Over."

"There's been a car crash, your daughter and her friends are at the scene. Jen's unconscious, friends say she fainted after a nosebleed. Doesn't make any sense to me, but get over here, the ambulance won't leave without you. Over and out."

"Over and out..." I mumbled angrily, not pressing the buttons so nobody heard me. "Over and out!? Yeah, yeah just over and out after giving some shitty news like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, just over-and-fucking-out."

I put the walkie talkie back in its usual spot; looked out of the windshield for a couple of seconds, and then let my head down, pinching the bridge of my nose. Get it together, Cameron. Get it together. You've got to get it together. Get it together for Jen. Jen needs you right now. Get it the fuck together, Cameron. And so, I started to drive the cruiser to the location that'd already been put in.

"Save her..."

"What the shit?" I swore under my breath, entirely sure that nobody else was in the car.

Where the fuck did that voice come from? Who fucking talks with an accent like that?

~~~~~~

jennifer peters' point of view

My head was throbbing as I came to, and just as I realized I was semi-lying down in a gurney, I saw Sheriff Nick Goode walking my way. Simon, Kate, and Deena were all standing off to the side, probably waiting to be asked about what happened-or perhaps they had already been asked, and I just missed all of it. Fucking fantastic.

"Hey, Jen, it's good to see you awake again. Your Dad's on the way right now, but if it's okay with you, I'd like to ask you a couple of questions regarding the accident that occurred about forty-five minutes ago."

"Go on." I shrugged, crossing my arms.

"Can you tell me how that car crashed, and if your friends had anything to do with it?"

"The car spun out of control, and you can suck my dick." I smiled a fake-sympathetic smile at the king of Sunnyvale, tilting my head back a bit.

"Jennifer, please, I'm just-"

"Trying to get another Shadysider in jail for a crime they didn't commit? Yeah, no, not gonna happen." I shook my head, causing Sheriff Dick to roll his eyes practically into the back of his head.

"Jennifer-"

"Nick."

A long sigh came from the Sheriff, a sigh that I could tell was translating to 'don't-kill-her' and, in a more general scenario, was an exhale of all the homicidal thoughts.

"Jen!" Another voice-my Dad's, to be specific-saved me from Nick Goode's grasp as it came closer. "Jen, oh my God-" He was standing on the side opposite of Nick, taking one of my hands and giving it a gentle squeeze. "Are you alright? What in the shit happened here?"

"It's a long story that Goodester here won't believe."

The Goodester walked away, his hands on his hips like the over-dramatic-yet-'proactive' type of person he labels himself to be. Dad brushed some hair out of my face, held me close, and kissed my forehead. It was a sweet and relatively silent moment-a moment that was only ended when he talked, and I was endlessly thankful that that moment hadn't been ruined.

"D'you wanna go home? I talked to your mother on the talkies on my way over here, she said you should be fine to go-"

"Yes," my voice was borderline too eager, I felt as though it was now obvious that at some point tonight, I would sneak out.

"Don't do that, Jennifer." An accented feminine voice echoed seemingly everywhere, and my head spun to look up at Dad.

"What'd you say?" I asked, praying that he was just being the weird father that he is.

"I didn't say anything, doll...are you sure you're alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine, just-just tired."

What the actual shit?

~~~~~~

like father like daughter yaaayyy

anyways this was totally a nice chapter

how do we like how cameron copes with his trauma y'all don't fully know about yet?

also, this will not be the last chapter from cam's point of view, so i really hope you guys like him cuz i'm proud of him :)

don't forget to vote and comment please!!