Step Into My Office

[Layla Harlow]

It happened. The world ended. Wasn't it supposed to end last year? For real? Nope, it just had to string her along and make her wait until she literally felt like her chest was caving in on itself. Who'd have thought the wedding would be what made them fall apart? Layla supposed she always sort of guessed it would happen, but she'd hoped that it wouldn't. She did love Riley, but some things just weren't meant to be and this was one of those things. The worst part of it all was that Sophie was no longer living nearby and she now had nowhere to live except home.

That had been one of the worst parts of the whole thing, telling her parents why she had to come live back at home. It was a wonder they even went for it. Legally, she was an adult and could be kicked out, but seeing as how their reputation couldn't be affected by one of their colleagues seeing their daughter on the road, homeless, it didn't really surprise her. It just meant she was stuck playing by their rules again. Being little miss perfect and making up for what she'd done in the past few months. They were going to make her dread ever disobeying them or being disrespectful. As if it wasn't bad enough that they hated her, add to that the fact that she had to be a good daughter, her life was now miserable. They had no pity for her, no sympathy that she was heartbroken. They didn't even understand what it was like to be in love, let alone get hurt because of it.

After the week she'd had, Layla just needed out. Of course, she cleared it with her darling mother before she took one step out the door. As soon as she was out of the house, she just drove. For a while, she drove around the town, looking for something, anything. She just didn't know what. Eventually she drove out to a place that she knew she'd find some comfort. The Lake, also known as Jack McCarthey's office. If there was anyone that would make her feel better or at least make her smile, it was him. It didn't take long for her to get there and park. Then just like that she was heading towards Jack's office, her body tensed up against the cold wind. She just hoped that he was there by now. She'd sent a message as soon as she knew where she was going.

[Jack McCarthy]

Ever since December things have been….well kind of weird for Jack Mccarthy. He always thought December would come and go like it did every year: With Bitterly cold, boring and for one day a year utterly miserably and alone.What he DIDN’T expect was, to save someone’s life, beat the crap out of a big scary Asian dude for assaulting his friend, seeing someone ACTALLY caring enough about him to throw him an elaborate Christmas party (The mere idea that someone cared about him enough to do something so nice, still bogged his mind) and of course there was the incident with Roger his roommate

Now normally Jack wouldn’t mind as much, in fact he would applause Roger’s creative approach to getting laid, and it was no skin off Jack. After all it may have been a man, but it was the body of a woman he screwing with. Why would Jack care about the circumstances? Jack would have been find with it…If he didn’t choose the body of Layla.

He could have picked any other girl that Jack new, Rya…George… Pen… but not Layla. In his mind, Layla was the one person he held dear to him more then anyone else and the fact that encounter messed up his head big time…let’s just say Roger wasn’t Jack’s favourite person.

But now for the moment Jack had a brief moment of normality, where he intended to spend in his fortress of solitude. Over time he had been collecting more and more goodies to keep in his friendly tree truck, he’s been cramming it full of candy chocolate and other sweets. He now had no reason whatsoever to ever leave his office.

He was approaching his office with a packet of store bought chocolate chip cookies in his hand. When he saw Layla, and if that wasn’t enough to startle him, she looked distress. No more then that. Positively miserable. She wasn’t crying but she was shuffling around like some kind of zombie, unsure where to go or what to do.

Like a dog being called to his owner by some kind of owner, the sight of the one thing jack adored more then anything else sad, was enough to send him rushing to her side. “Layla? Are you ok?”

[Layla Harlow]

She didn't have much time to dwell on things until she heard his voice saying her name. With it came a faint smile that slipped when he asked if she was okay. Was she okay? Would she ever be okay after this? Okay, that was being dramatic, but she was feeling like a damsel in distress. She needed a superhero because hers turned out to be a super villain instead. Of course she was going to make him out to be the bad guy. It had nothing to do with her at all. She was in denial about most things when it came to what happened. And she didn't quite feel like discussing it with anyone because she already got a good long lecture from her loving and adoring parents.

With a frown, she glanced down and wrapped her arms around her torso. "Glad to see you too, pal. You're looking quite snazzy today. Man how about this weather?" She was stalling as long as she was capable because she didn't want to be upset. She wanted to be happy and have fun with her best friend. She had missed him a lot the past few weeks. Leading up to the wedding where he was supposed to give her away. God, what had she been thinking? That was probably the bitchiest thing she could have done. Layla chewed on the inside of her cheek before glancing up at Jack.

"How are you? It's been a while since we hung out ya know," She said quietly, wrapping her arms around torso tighter.

How was she going to keep it from him? He'd see right through her, he always kind of did. How? She had no idea. He just kind of understood. Layla was kind of hoping he'd just wave through the bull shit, not ask her a thing and just hug her. It had been forever since someone hugged her. Someone that actually cared and wasn't doing it just to rub it in.

[Jack McCarthy]

Something was wrong. Don’t ask Jack what it was or how he even knew something was wrong, but Layla was acting a little off. He was reminded vaguely of how George was acting that day at the swimming pool after Kodi had beat her half to death. That day he was half ready to break every bone in that sick freak’s worthless body, and he almost did when he went to his room with a baseball bat in hand. If Jack ever found out that Riley touched a hair on Layla’s head Jack wouldn’t waste another moment talking to Layla. He would march right into Riley’s home and punch every inch of his body as hard as he could. True that Riley probably outweighed him by 400 pounds of pure muscle and he could most likely fold him up and break him in half over his knee Bane style, but he liked to think that he would get two or three lucky punches in there, For Layla he would go down swinging.

He may not consider himself a super hero in any way and he may be going up against Superman himself, but Riley may have his muscles but Jack had his bat.

For whatever reason Layla, looked…well..like she was in shock, Her smile didn’t contain the usual warmth that it usually did and she…was chit-chatting? About the weather?!

Jack seems taken aback by the downright odd topic of conversation. As he looked up for a moment “Ummm…Thanks, I guess, its not…raining…or whatever…Layla since when has the weather been interesting to anyone?” Still despite the weird topic of conversation, talking to Layla was always the undisputed highlight of his day. Even though it recently has turned into a rare treat, and he missed her when she was gone, not that Jack blamed her. Why the hell was she want to spend time with him, when she could hang out with her future husband fuck Jack had no clue how he was going to get through the whole giving away thing. He knew that Layla loved Riley, and Jack would do anything to make her happy, but…this wedding…it was…wrong, everything about it was wrong. The only thing that Jack could do is, try to numb that pain by getting rip-roaring drunk before giving her away.

“Well, I just assumed you were busy doing wedding stuff…picking out a dress… picking out music….Buying a cake. By the way I demand first dibs on slices of cake but…but; who cares about all that? You’re here now! Couldn’t live without by sweet angelic presents in your life, huh? Come here you little monkey you”

With laughter ripe on his voice and just the biggest pleased grin on his face he walked up to her and enveloped his arms around Layla in a warm hug. God he missed this. He missed HER. At the back of his head he couldn’t help but harbor the fear that she was going to be so busy with the wedding, that Jack wouldn’t’ see her until the wedding, Jack thought Layla looked like a goddess no matter the state she was. When he gets a first glimpse of her looking her best in her wedding dress….it’ll break him. It will totally break his heart if he doesn’t find any girl to take his mind off Layla and lords knows he’s been trying, but it wasn’t as fun as it was before. He rather cuddle Layla any day of the week then have sex with the hottest girl in Hammel. God damn it Layla. Why did you have to mess with his head? He was happy before she met her… now he was just confused.

But it was awesome hugging her. If he could he would cling on to her all day and night like a koala clinging to a tree just taking in her natural warmth. He was totally addicted to her but that was something that he would freak out about later. For now he was just going to enjoy being near to her. Riley had her for the rest of their natural born life, so Jack was determined to make every second count before they got hitched “It’s great to see you again Lay”

[Layla Harlow]

"Well, I mean, weather is important to everyone ya know? I mean all this snow and shit is crazy," She tried putting as much sass and attitude into her words as she could, but she was lacking it. There was no spark left in her, just a bunch of coals, dying down after an insane fire. She needed gasoline to be splashed at her, and she figured if anyone was the gasoline to her spark of flame, it was Jack. He always knew the right thing to say. Whether it was completely ridiculous or something that just got a snarky response from her, it didn't matter. She enjoyed talking to him and getting that sass back. And by chit-chatting, she knew that it would at least spark something in him that would get him going on a little tangent. He wasn't a small-talk kind of person anymore than she was. It was usually done out of sarcasm.

When he mentioned the wedding stuff, her stomach clenched and she got that sickening feeling again. She had been busy doing those things. She had picked out the dress, hired a DJ and designed the cake. Everything had been so close to being ready...and then it all just crumbled. Now she was left with this dress hanging in her closet, mocking her for being so stupid thinking she could get married right out of high school. The DJ was cool about things at least and the bakery, too. But she still had all of the designs, all of the playlists tucked away in a binder filled with things she'd always wanted from her wedding. And she could feel the ring on her finger as though it was still there. She'd taken it off though and given it back to him, reluctantly, but just the same, it didn't feel right to keep it. She was also very careful to hide her left hand from Jack. As long as he didn't catch a glimpse of her ringless finger, she'd make it through this without crying.

"Well, of course. I mean you are my guardian angel after all, always keeping me from doing stupid shit, or at least keeping me from doing it alone," She offered him a half smile. And before she knew it, he swept her up in a hug. A real hug, one that she'd been missing for weeks now. And as he hugged her, tighter than she had been expecting at first, she could just feel her eyes brimming with tears. She didn't want to cry. She didn't want to be upset. Layla hugged him back just as tight, burying her face in his shoulder to keep from it showing that she was crying. It wouldn't be fair to put Jack through this, making him see how much pain she felt because she wasn't getting married. And she didn't want to make him a rebound because that's what she had always done before when she got too attached and things fell through the cracks. She jumped to another guy because she wanted to forget everything. Jack didn't deserve that. He deserved to have his best friend be happy and smiling around him. But she wasn't. She couldn't.

Her arms tightened at his words and she squeezed her eyes shut, "I missed you, Joker." She forced out a laugh and pulled back just slightly, hoping that she could play off the tears as something else. Tears of happiness maybe? At seeing her best friend? That wasn't exactly a lie...

[Jack McCarthy]

“You should come to Ireland some time” Jack mused “We have both kinds of weather. Rain and slightly less rain.” Jack smiled getting used to the climate, it was never truly mild here, it was either VERY warm or VERY cold. Never in between

…and what was with Layla’s voice? Her voice didn’t seem to carry around the same spunk that she usually did, it was like she was trying way too hard to convince Jack that everything was fine when clearly she wasn’t. Take a tip from someone who a pro at putting on a false mask, if you usually was fairly energetic then you needed to maintain that level of energy at all times otherwise they’ll start to suspect someone, but of course if you became too animated, then they’ll most certainly suspect something. It was a fine line to walk.

Jack didn’t really have a plan per-say for the wedding after his duty of giving Layla away. How do you plan for one of the worse days of your life? There was no way Layla would let him leave. So his working idea was to just sink into the shadows, she doubt she would pay must attention to him now that she hinched rather to dance the night away with Riley showering him with love and attention to worry about where Jack was. So he would just sit at the corner of the room eating some cake and drinking himself numb watching from the outside in, trying to avoid looking at Layla throughout the night.

Jack had been called a number of things throughout his life not a lot of them very nice. In fact 99% of the things he was called was insulting, but Jack over the year had developed a shield to it, but Guardian Angel? Jack was visually taken aback by this. Since when did he have a positive impact on anyone’s life? It was a when known fact that Jack could only be a irritation to someone, One of the main traits of Jack is that he would do anything for the people he cares about, and for Layla? That goes double. If anything or anyone dared to hurt Layla…well, maybe it wasn’t exactly the truth to say that Jack wasn’t a super hero…it only when he had something to fight for with a fierce passion,did he show quite a different side of himself side of himself, and for Layla? He would fight for her, if it made her smile he would fight the world

“Me, your guardian angel? Holy shit. Someone really doesn’t like you up there? In what sick universe would that be a good idea? Do you know how many problems I’ve tried to solve by pooping in someone’s bed?..Like an uncomfortable amount…For a short time back home called myself the brown avenger….I tell you want if Tony Stark left Loki a little present for Loki in his bead. It would have saved the avengers a LOT of trouble…but yeah Jiminy Cricket I’m not.”

I wasn’t able to stop you getting saying “Yes” though was I?

Jack was a little surprised when Layla hugged her back with such enthusiasm but Jack certainly wasn’t going to complain, this was honestly the best feeling of the world. There was no feeling in the world that could compare to Layla’s warmth, her smell, her soft weight the feeling of her silky hair. Who else could possibly make him feel this way?

You’re going to have to let go of her you know

You again?
She loves another Jack, someone better. You’ve going to have to let her go eventually.

I know, I know…

So let go…

Yeah, sure I'll let go…in a secord.

Jackkkk


As reluctantly as a person can be Jack let go somewhat alarmed to see her beginning to cry, and just like that the protective streak of Jack kicked into gear “hey, I know my masculinity is quite intimidating but there’s no need to cry…what’s wrong”