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[behavioural]

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[extent]

well good.
its been 5 yrs idk what youve been doing w ur life

[behavioural]

not gardening

you aren't telling me this bc you got aphro'd by vegetables are you?

[extent]

i dont garden like that

i just figured you wouldnt want to end up a horny fuck machine w/o ur consent thats all

[behavioural]

that's considerate of you

[extent]

yeah well
just be careful or whatever

[behavioural]

( he plans to leave it at read, but you know what? screw that. )

before you start worrying about me, why don't you start worrying about yourself first? bc it looks like you're doing a spectacularly crappy job at it

[extent]

dont you start too

[behavioural]

i wouldn't have to start if you weren't screwing yourself over like did you not only drink the fucking koolaid here but lose a chunk of your braincells along the way?

[extent]

its complicated okay?

[behavioural]

you keep saying it's complicated but it honestly isn't that complicated nick

all you had to do was stay the fuck away from him

[extent]

look
if youre going to hate me and stop talking to me too can you just tell me so we dont have to have the fight first

[behavioural]

don't be so fuckin overdramatic
just bc i'm pissed off at you rn doesn't mean i hate you
do you srsly think i would waste my fuckin time arguing with you if i hated you?

( it's like you don't know him at all nick )

[extent]

i dont want to fight

i did what i had to do, you dont agree
thats the whole argument and no matter how many times you call me stupid or i say i knew what i was doing it's just going to keep going round those two points

text → voice | cw for pierce being pierce tbqh

[behavioural]

( there is no way he can keep having this conversation over text because he's going to lose his fuckin' mind. )

I think you're kind of missing the point here. I don't want to fight with you, Nick.

But whether you believed your actions were right or justified or somehow not as insanely harmful as they were, what you did not only affected you but Oli as well. Actions fuckin' have consequences and, when you're handling a sensitive situation that involves more than one person, you don't go gallivanting off to do whatever you think is right at the time.

Or else I would have fuckin' kicked down the door of that fuckin' shitstain of an excuse and bashed his face into every single piece of furniture in his crappy ass apartment the moment I found out what he's been doing to you and Oli.

( he releases a frustrated breath. )

Do you really not know why I'm fuckin' mad at you? We've been friends since we were kids, mate. Like do I have to fuckin' spell it out for you?

[extent]

[ he seriously considers not answering. nick is so tired, and he's already played out exactly how he thinks this will go--so maybe it's just self-torment that sees him picking up anyway.

it would be better if pierce was yelling at him, he thinks. he knows how to respond to anger. this is just...messy, and he's already scraped so thin. ]

It was working until someone decided to tell him.

[ which is not the lesson that nick should have taken away from this whole situation, but--for better or worse, it's true, and it's kind of hard to ignore that. ]

Why are you mad? Is it...because I lied, or because you think I'm stupid, or because— just tell me.

[behavioural]

( he... really isn't getting the point, is he? )

I'm mad because I fuckin' care about you, moron. You're doing stupid shit that's putting you in harm's way. Do you think that I would just be okay with it? That Oli or Ken would be? Seriously, Nick. Use your fuckin' brain sometimes.

[extent]

You weren't supposed to find out.

[ which is also hugely missing the point, but some petulant part of nick desperately wants to make the point somewhere. if the information hadn't spread, if oli hadn't found out, if the only one still suffering was nick--

--well. maybe he understands why people aren't just okay with letting this happen, but that doesn't mean he feels any less right. ]

God, Pierce, what does it even matter? So I let him fuck me a few times so he wouldn't go sniffing after Oli as much, so what? It's hardly anything new. You know I've fucked like half the city, right?

[behavioural]

( is he doing this on purpose? he's doing this on purpose, isn't he? )

Let's put this into perspective. ( he can't believe that he has to be the rational adult here. ) Since you think what you did is okay, then does that mean you wouldn't get pissed if William abused Oli or Ken and they decided to continue sleeping with him "a few times" to get him off your back? That would be okay and it wouldn't matter as long as you didn't find out, right?

[extent]

But it didn't.

[ nick has blown right past wanting anyone to understand his thinking, he doesn't expect to convince anyone that he's in the right--but for some reason he still argues anyway, a little desperation straining his voice. ]

It's not them, that's the point. It's just me, and Oli was supposed to stay the fuck away once he got out and it would have been fine. It's not them.

[behavioural]

( he doesn't say anything for a long moment. when he speaks again, his voice has soften considerably. )

Yea. But that's the thing, Nick. You are part of the them for us.

You might think it's fine as long as you're the one getting hurt, but it isn't, mate. Just like how you wouldn't be fine if it was either Oli or Ken. That's the position you're putting us in right now. Is that the kind of precedence you want to set? Because if you insist that what you've done is acceptable and that none of us should get angry over it, then that means none of us should get angry if one of us end up in the same position as you are right now in the future. I'm not fine with that. Are you?

[extent]

It's different. You don't get it, it is. It's not the same at all.

[ but he can't explain how it's different, because he can't put it into words. nick doesn't know how to lay out all the reasons why nick makes for acceptable collateral damage in a way that none of the rest of them do. he just hasn't thought about it laid out so clearly as this, is the thing. that is was okay because it was nick.

it's not a nice realisation. it's not one he's willing to linger on, either. his breath catches in his throat, but nick clears his throat, moves on. ]

Pierce, it was working.

[behavioural]

( where the fuck has your self-worth gone, nicholas? )

At your expense, Nick. Do you want me to praise you for distracting that fuckin' dipshit with your ass? Do you want me to be happy about it? Like what kind of person do you fuckin' think I am, mate?

( don't get heated again. this is not the time, strickland. )

Explain to me how it isn't the same.

[extent]

I don't want you to be happy I just want you to--to realise I had a reason. I wasn't just...fucking around, getting myself into shit for nothing. I had a reason, a good one.

[ he almost hangs up. nick really, seriously considers just hanging up because it's preferable to trying to untangle his own chaotic thoughts on any of this. because the thought of trying to actually explain the logic behind that statement makes him feel a little like he's choking. but oli hasn't spoken to him in days, and nick isn't sure that he can lose anyone else. ]

I was here for a year before you guys showed up. A lot happened. So--no. It's not the same.

[behavioural]

There is a difference between having a good reason and having one that's actually worth it. Your reason was not worth it.

( he figured that it has something to do with this fuckin' city and its fuckin' people. )

Try again, Nick. Just because you were here longer doesn't make it more alright for you to treat yourself like crap compared to the rest of us.

[extent]

But I know how to handle this.

[ 'this' being a very loose, vague term on purpose. nick hates putting words to anything that has happened to him, almost as much as he hates talking about it in the first place. he just--doesn't, not even with the therapist he pays for the sole purpose of talking. ]

A year. I'm already...it doesn't hurt, I know how to deal. I figured it out, and they haven't had to, and I can't— I don't want them to learn how to figure it out.