Fic - For What It's Worth (15/25)
Title: For What It's Worth
Chapter: 15/25
Rating: M
Ship: James/Kendall, Logan/Camille, side Carlos/Dak, Carlos/Lucy, Jett/Mercedes, and Guitar Dude/Jennifers
Summary: AU. Kendall was a dancer when he was a kid, but when his dad unexpectedly passed away, he had to give it up. He becomes a bit of a stoner, and ends up in a little trouble, and his mother decides that she doesn't want her son living that life. So the Knights pick up and move all the way across the country, to L.A. That's where Kendall meets his cousin, Camille, her boyfriend, Logan, the wacky dresser and actor, Carlos, and, among them all, James. James is a ballet dancer with more ambition than Kendall's ever known. Though the two of them do not get along at first, James finally convinces Kendall to use his natural talent, rather than waste it, and they find each other as kindred spirits, and eventually, lovers. This doesn't come without difficulties. With James' ex-partner, Mercedes; the pompous actor-extraordinaire, Jett, and even Kendall's best friend, Joseph (Guitar Dude) getting in the way. But in may not be a person that come between them. It may be the actual thing that brings them together that splits them apart.
Artwork By:thilia
Beta: jblostfan16
Author's Note: This is my bigtimebang. Woo! I had been playing with this idea for awhile when this finally came around and then Cassie convinced me to do it. And it kinda got away from me. Lol! But anyway, I won't ramble. Strap in. It's a long ride.
Chapter Fifteen
“So very nice to meet you Mr. Diamond.” Mercedes was all snob, reaching out and languidly shaking the man’s hand. “James has told me all about you.”
“Oh has he?” The man looked overjoyed, but not to see his son. To see his son’s girlfriend.
Kendall wavered a little on his spot.
“Kendall?” Carlos whipped his head to look at him. “Kendall? You okay? You look like you’re going to be sick.”
James kept his head down. To most eyes, he would have appeared humble. To Kendall, all he could see was shame.
“So how did you two get together?”
“We’re dance partners.”
“Ah, yes. Well, James, you’ve got the perfect woman. Strong, powerful, smart, beautiful.” Kendall kept expecting the man to turn into some foul beast and eat her. He wasn’t sure whether or not he was okay with that. “I’m glad you finally came around, son.”
“Yeah, heh. Me too.”
Kendall felt dizzy. He turned away, unable to look, stumbling into the door.
It wasn’t anything serious, he kept reminding himself. They only made out for a few days. That was all it was. That was all it was.
It didn’t help.
“Kendall, woah, hey. You don’t look good. Should we go to the nurse?”
Kendall’s eyes felt like they were being pushed out of his skull. He fought back the tears with all his might. But fucking… Mercedes? Of all people James could have chosen, he picked Mercedes. It felt like a personal blow.
“When did James start dating Mercedes?” Kendall asked softly, not looking up from his trembling hands.
Carlos blinked. “James is bi?” He looked out at the scene that had been playing before Kendall’s eyes. “Woah. When did that happen? I didn’t think he even liked her very much. She’s been trying to get in his pants for years.”
“Why?”
“Because his parents are rich. His mother owns one of the biggest cosmetics franchises in the country. If they got together, the business merger would bring Griffin tons of cash.”
Kendall wanted to rip the door off its hinges and throw it at the three people at the bottom of the steps. But he wasn’t The Hulk and it wasn’t going to help anything.
“I gotta go.” Kendall pushed through the door and took off down the hall, away from Carlos.
He pulled out his cell phone and dialed Joseph.
“Bro, what’s up?”
Kendall felt the tears coming. “Hey...”
“Woah, you okay?”
“I miss New York. I miss you. I miss things not being fucking complicated. I miss my fuckups not actually being that bad…”
“Kendall?”
“I’m sorry. I can’t talk… I’m sorry.” Kendall hung up.
He wanted to throw his phone across the room and cut off all contact to the outside world. Let it fucking explode while he toiled away in his solitude. Didn’t seem like a bad idea.
He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised. He got attached to things easily. After losing his dad, his mom had to work all the time. He was a lonely kid. When Joseph was busy, he’d wander the streets after school, befriending stray dogs and begging his mom to let them keep the poor things. They never got to. They couldn’t afford to feed them. He always felt like he was trying to fill a huge hole in his heart that was always hungry for something that wouldn’t satiate it. He tried to fill it with different hobbies and different people, but nothing ever quite fit the mold. It persisted for years. He fell in and out of beds with girls that Joseph picked from the ripe age of fourteen. He felt like he was part of The Three Bears. This bed was too big. This bed was too small. But nothing was just right. Nothing was ever just right. And he knew too much and too little at the same time.
He felt stupid. Plain and simple.
What he didn’t get was that he’d been the one to say that things were casual. And God - they’d only been at it for a week at most.
Maybe it was just the fact that’d he’d found such a kindred spirit in James. James was so much like him and so much like the man he wanted to be, and yet everything Kendall was afraid of becoming too. He was this massive windstorm of confusion and emotion that brought Kendall to his knees and made him feel like laughing, crying, and screaming all at the same time.
He should have never kissed him. He should have never been so stupid.
…
Kendall was fairly certain he was going to choke to death. And he didn’t give a fuck. Because he was higher than Everest and he felt great. He blasted his music through his headphones, sprawled flat on his bed, smoke swirling over his head. The crinkle of empty chip bags and Little Debbie cake wrappers kept a steady rhythm with the ceiling fan and his steadily beating heart. The world slowed to a halt, and he closed his eyes, feeling like his bed was floating, dipping and bobbing like his own little raft in the middle of the ocean. His own private island in the sea.
He wiggled his toes and took in the sounds of Bob Dylan. He figured he’d dance if he felt like getting up, but, eh, fuck that. He didn’t want to get up. He wanted to lie there forever until he dissolved into the bed. The only thing that sucked was he had definitely smoked up the rest of his stash in one foul swoop.
“Kendall?” Camille knocked at the door for like, the fifteenth fucking time. “Kendall, get out of there. What’s wrong with you?”
Kendall didn’t feel like talking. He rolled his head over to look at the door, knowing she’d finally give up and come in. When he was right, he broke into a fit of chuckles.
Camille closed the door, looking irritated. “You’re high.”
“No, no, no. No. No. No.” Kendall paused. “No.”
“Kendall-“
“No. I’m fucking stoned. I’m so fucking wasted. Oh my God.”
“You ate all the snacks in the house.”
“I-I know. It’s weird, right? I’m not even hungry.” Kendall poured the crumbs of Lays potato chips down his throat. “I’ve got plants growing inside me. They’re hungry.”
“That’s it. I’m telling your mom.”
“No no no no no. No.” Kendall rolled off the bed and onto the floor, crawling over to Camille’s feet. “No don’t tell her.” He coughed. “I smoked cause… cause… I’m sad.” And then Kendall started giggling, which didn’t really help his case. “But I’m not anymore. Fuck everything. Fuck it all. Woo!” He toppled over, lazily looking up at his cousin.
She furrowed her brows. “What on earth happened?”
Kendall felt like dozing off on the floor. “Fuck everything,” he murmured. “Fuck all of them.”
“Kendall, honey…” Camille sat down on the floor and pulled his head into her lap. “What’s gotten into you? Don’t act like I didn’t see you getting Carlos to cover your bruises with makeup the other day. And now you’re getting ridiculously stoned?”
Kendall snuggled his head against her belly, warm and comfortable. “It’s nothing. It’s nothing.”
“It’s something. You’re usually a pretty chill guy. Something’s gotten way under your skin.”
“Doesn’t matter anymoreeeee.”
Kendall fell asleep.
When he woke up, he was tucked in to bed and his room had been cleaned up. Getting up did not feel like an option. He had never felt more tired in his life. It hurt to open his eyes all the way.
“Kendall? We’ve got class. Get up. Let’s go.” Camille’s voice was irritated.
He lifted his head off the pillow, and it felt like it was filled with concrete.
“Your eyes are freaking blood red. I hope you’re proud of yourself.”
Kendall rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyes. “I smoked all of it. Fuck, I should’ve saved some to get over this part.”
“Yeah, well, you weren’t really thinking very much, were you?”
“Shut up, Camille. It’s not like you’ve never gotten wasted before.”
“Not on that stuff.”
“You should try it some time.” Kendall sat up and considered falling back over into his bed. He felt like his brain was sending signals to his limbs, but they weren’t quite getting them.
“You’re not making it look very glamorous.”
Kendall flipped her off and wriggled into a pair of jeans from the floor. He sniffed his shirt. It smelled like weed. So much so that Kendall fathomed he could smoke the damn fabric and get over his little weed hangover. “Hand me a shirt.”
Camille rolled her eyes and grabbed a shirt from his dresser. “Hurry up. We’re gonna be late.”
Kendall didn’t see any kind of hurrying in his future, but he tried his best. He donned a pair of sunglasses before heading down the stairs, but he did see the bloodshot in his eyes in the reflection of them before he put them on.
They were late. Camille went rushing into the school. Kendall took his time. Five minutes or ten minutes didn’t really matter. He was already late. Mr. X wasn’t all that forgiving for tardiness. He probably wouldn’t make it to class anyway. He didn’t want to see James and Mercedes.
He wandered around campus for a while. No one asked him about class, because the schedules around the place were always all over the place. He waited for Carlos to get out of class and insisted they go get smoothies alone.
“What about James?”
“I don’t want to talk to James right now.”
“Oh… why-“
“I don’t want to talk about him either.”
“Oh… so it’s that kind of fight.”
Kendall glanced at Carlos, too tired to look at him fully as they made their way down the sidewalk. “What?”
“Kendall, first you come to me covered in bruises, and now you’re not talking to James. Are you guys not friends anymore or…”
“It’s… he doesn’t want to see me.”
Carlos blinked. “You did something wrong? I thought he was the one that pissed you off.”
“He did.”
“Then…?”
Kendall huffed. “It’s complicated. I can explain if I can get my brain working again.”
They scooted into their usual booth and Kendall hovered over his smoothie, not really drinking it.
“He’s been acting funny too. I thought it was just because his dad was visiting. He always turns into a total asshole when his dad is around. It’s been awhile.”
“I’m not acting funny.”
Carlos gave Kendall a dubious look. “Why haven’t you taken off your sunglasses?”
Kendall glared through the lenses, sucking his smoothie down until he felt like his head was exploding from brain freeze. That didn’t really help anything at all. He clutched his skull and groaned.
There was something a bit cleansing about a brain freeze though. It shocked his system enough to where he could push some clear thoughts through the haze of disappointment. Yeah, it sucked that James was playing straight and would probably end up cringing his way through sex with Mercedes, but Kendall knew that he wasn’t serious. He had to get over it. He’d smoked up all his dope, so it wasn’t like he could run from it anymore.
But first:
“Carlos, do you really think James is straight?”
Carlos almost choked on his sandwich. “What?”
“Honest opinion.”
Carlos took a long time to chew his food. “Um…” Then, he shrugged.
“Oh, come on. You know. You’ve known James for a long time.”
“I know when I tried to kiss him a few years back that he shoved me away.”
Kendall’s stomach clenched. “Huh?”
Carlos fiddled with his straw. “I have kind of a bad habit for falling for people. James was really nice to me…”
Kendall furrowed his brows. “You fell for James just because he was nice to you?”
Carlos looked down at his food. “Well, uh… you can probably imagine the shit I got dealt growing up. My family’s awesome. Other kids? Not quite so supportive.”
“I’m sorry, Carlos.”
“It’s not your fault.” He looked up at Kendall with a huge smile, and there was a tiny bit of heartbreak in his eyes. “You’re really nice to me too.”
After a few minutes, Carlos started talking about Dak. Conversation worked backed to him quite a bit since Malibu.
Kendall was starting to think Malibu was magical, with its hot white sand and twinkling ocean. He supposed all dreams had to come to an end sometime.
He decided then and there that he wasn’t about to get hung up on James. There was no point. If James was so fucking afraid of being who he was, Kendall wasn’t about to fight that fight. He needed to focus on other things.
James and Mercedes passed by the window, almost as if on cue, Mercedes in her little white mini skirt, and James looking like the most uncomfortable person on the planet. James’ dad trailed along behind them, listening to the supposed tour of the city. Kendall glared at them through his lenses. Fine. He’d be fine.