fic: Blame (AP Forensics)
Title: Blame
Show: AP Forensics
Characters: Noah
Word Count: 214
Sometimes Noah blames himself.
It happens when he's grading papers or once the police have left again after roping off a hall with yellow CAUTION tape and questioned students once again, or when he's at home with the TV on and his mother calls again, asking him if he intends on staying at "that horrible school", as if Pinegrove itself is the one taking the life out of all those kids and not some lurking menace wandering its halls. He feels terrible about all of it-who wouldn't, really?-but his mind always goes back to seeing Austin coughing up blood, his eyes fluttering and breath shaky as he's wheeled into the ambulance.
"I shouldn't have let him go alone," he says into the phone, light from the flickering television casting shadows over his living room. "Maybe he would've been able to get away. Maybe nothing would have happened and they would've gotten caught..."
"Or, if you had sent someone else along with him, they would've been hurt too," Brooke says. "It's not your fault, Noah."
Hearing her say that does reassure him a little. But sometimes during his free period, when the room is still, he half expects to hear a knock on the door and then, "Hey, Mr. C, need any help?"
Show: AP Forensics
Characters: Noah
Word Count: 214
Sometimes Noah blames himself.
It happens when he's grading papers or once the police have left again after roping off a hall with yellow CAUTION tape and questioned students once again, or when he's at home with the TV on and his mother calls again, asking him if he intends on staying at "that horrible school", as if Pinegrove itself is the one taking the life out of all those kids and not some lurking menace wandering its halls. He feels terrible about all of it-who wouldn't, really?-but his mind always goes back to seeing Austin coughing up blood, his eyes fluttering and breath shaky as he's wheeled into the ambulance.
"I shouldn't have let him go alone," he says into the phone, light from the flickering television casting shadows over his living room. "Maybe he would've been able to get away. Maybe nothing would have happened and they would've gotten caught..."
"Or, if you had sent someone else along with him, they would've been hurt too," Brooke says. "It's not your fault, Noah."
Hearing her say that does reassure him a little. But sometimes during his free period, when the room is still, he half expects to hear a knock on the door and then, "Hey, Mr. C, need any help?"