Well, guys... idek, okay? I've been gone for ages, I have a million notifications to go through... idek. Honestly, I've just been mentally... gone. Being a senior this year really sucked. I know how freakin lame that sounds but my school was literally my favorite place and yeah anyway all of this to say sorry and I know I always say this, but I really will try to do better.

 Adira followed Joel to his car with her entire mind screaming at her not to. Somehow, it didn't feel like she had a choice... not because Joel was forcing her to, but simply because his gentleness was something that it felt absolutely impossible to refuse.

They both buckled, Joel sent a text, probably to Moriah, and then he pulled out of the parking lot. The radio was on, playing a song she could quickly tell was Christian but didn't recognize in the slightest... unsurprising since she never listened to Christian radio.

Concern was radiating off of him. Somehow, judgement wasn't. And she just didn't understand.

After a few minutes, they pulled up to a red light, and he looked at her carefully. "What happened at your old church?"

The question came out of nowhere, and yet it was asked too gently to really surprise her. His tone made it clear that she didn't have to answer... and yet compelled her to against her better judgment at the same time.

She willed, We just got too busy to go, off of her tongue. It said something else entirely.

"People just... change."

"With your mom's sickness?"

She nodded, staring at the car floor. "You probably know what I'm talking about."

He confirmed it with a tilt of his head. "They're extremely concerned for a while. Send meals, pray, constantly check in. Then they get tired of caring. They'll ask you how the person is, and when you try to be honest that they're not good, they somehow turn the answer around because that's what they want to believe. Then, they just... stop asking, stop talking to you at all... look past you like you're not there."

"Yeah." It was crazy how spot-on his description was. "Exactly."

"We experienced that with Luke, too," he told her as the light turned green and he began driving again. "Even with some people at the church. But we were lucky to have the community we did, because most of them stood by us through it all. I can tell that wasn't what happened to you."

"Did someone ever lay hands on him and pray..." She had no idea why she was still talking. "ask God to heal him? But then He didn't, and the person praying looked at him and you like there was something wrong with you?"

The smile of a painful memory crossed Joel's lips. "Once, before he got really bad, we went to an interview at a radio station here in Nashville, since it was something he could do while he couldn't tour with me. In one of the segments, they asked us a bunch of questions about dealing with his sickness. That was fine... it wasn't anything we hadn't already publicly shared. But then on a break, they wanted to pray for his healing. Talked about how cool it would be to have him sick one minute, and then a few songs later be able to tell everyone he's healed. So they did, and God said no. The rest of the interview they were looking at us like they were doubting our salvation. It was horrible."

"Yeah. It is."

They fell back into silence for a minute before he asked, "What about your youth group? Same deal?"

She shrugged. "Just worse."

"Yeah?"

"They just..." She exhaled heavily. "They did all of that, and I put up with it, because I'd been in this youth group since the start of middle school. But then my Mom had Reagan. I asked my youth pastor if it was okay if I brought him, since that was the only way I'd be able to come. He said yes."

She'd never told anyone but Ray this story. She'd simply informed her parents youth group was distracting her from school and sports. She really didn't know why she was telling it now.

"When I first got there, things were fine. Some people ignored him, some people wanted to see and hold him, and it was awkward, but I expected that. But then, they just happened to be teaching about relationships and sex. We had two separate youth groups... one for middle school, one for high school, and they never mixed. My mom's health was too bad to go to regular church for most of the pregnancy, and I'd stopped too because people were being jerks. So none of the middle schoolers knew who I was. Then when we were about to go into our lesson, my youth pastor pulls me aside and tells me he wants me to go to the middle school group and help with their lesson. He's leading me that way as he explains."

Her leg started to bounce in a physical reaction to the memory.

"He told me he wanted me to pretend like Reagan was my son... said it would help middle schoolers understand the consequences of premarital sex if they saw them up close and personal. That the middle school leader was going to ask me questions about my 'experience as a teen mom' and I was just supposed to answer based on my experience as a sister and what I imagined it would be like. He promises he'll send an email to the parents explaining the truth, doesn't let me get a word in edgewise, and then just shoves me into the room where their lesson is going on."

She chanced a glance at Joel's face and saw that it was torn by troubled shock.

"The leader introduced me as, 'someone to talk to them about life as a teen mom', and I just... I didn't know what else to do."

She gnawed hard on the inside of her cheek, feeling her stomach turn over at the memory.

"So I tried to play along. But I mean... they were young, not stupid. Things went fine until the leader let them ask questions. They wanted to know what pregnancy was like. One girl asked how I'd stayed so skinny. A group of thirteen-year-old idiots wouldn't stop asking why my chest hadn't gotten bigger. Around the time they asked what sex was really like, I just kind of... lost it. I started crying, told them he was my brother and I was a virgin, and yelled at the leader that I couldn't believe she'd ask me to do this. Then I ran out."

Her hands were shaking, so she desperately clenched and unclenched them a few times until they stopped, taking a deep, shaky breath.

"Reagan was crying at that point, and when I walked back into the high school room cuz it was my only way out, they were in the middle of their own purity speech. They all looked at me and my crying baby and some girl was like, 'Listen to the pastor, or that's what you get.' A guy said something about how I'd gotten all the consequences with none of the pleasure, but at least the pressure was off since now I had a kid anyway, and that was the last thing I heard before I made it outside. My youth pastor tried calling once, left a half-rate apology in my voicemails, and that was it. I just told my parents it was getting in the way of school, and I never had to go back."

"Darling, that's horrible." Joel's voice came out a whisper. "I'm so sorry. You never should have had to deal with that from anyone, but especially not from Christians... from your own church."

Adira just shrugged a little. "People suck. It's the way it goes. I really didn't have time for youth group anyway."

"I'm sure it wasn't easy walking back into any church after they did that to you," He observed gently. "I'm so sorry so many have been so judgmental all over again."

"Like I said, people suck," she said simply. "At least your church has people like you and your family... people who don't."

He managed a small smile. "Glad I could make that shortlist."

He'd somehow made a shorter list than just people who didn't suck.

She felt a fresh wave of self-hatred wash over her at the reminder. What had she been thinking?

That if she hadn't called him, she'd probably be checking into a psych ward right about now.

As nightmarish as this was, it had still been the better option.

She directed her attention out the window and saw that they were in a neighborhood now, a nice one in a better part of town than she'd ever set foot in. Another mile or so, and they were pulling into a driveway beside what she was assuming was Moriah's car.

Joel parked and turned off the car before unbuckling and hopping out. She willed herself to follow, but that reality of her situation hit her all over again the moment she released her own seatbelt, and she felt frozen in place.

Her head jerked up as her door opened anyway. Joel was standing there, his expression a gentle request for her to just give him a chance. He took her backpack from its place at her feet and slung it over one of his own shoulders, then softly inclined his head in the direction of the house.

Somehow, she stepped out of the car, he closed her door behind her, and then before she knew it, she was trailing him up the walk, and then they were stepping inside as he called to his wife.

"We're home, Doll!"

"In the living room!" Moriah returned from somewhere up a flight of stairs.

Joel motioned Adira after him as he mounted it. She had no choice but to follow.

The stairs let out into a comfortable family room, with creamy furniture surrounding a television cabinet and a bay window that overlooked the neighborhood. A cat was sleeping in the window, while a great dane napped on the rug in the middle of the room. Moriah was leaning over the back of the coach, watching something on her phone, which was set face up on the cushion.

Joel crossed the room, and she looked up to accept the quick kiss he offered her, though he was chuckling as he was.

"You know, Darling, that coach is usually sat on. Most people find that more comfortable than leaning over the back of it. And if you're enjoying YouTube on your phone, you'll love it on the tv. Our tv does that, remember? It's really phenomenal."

"Oh shut up," Moriah sighed, but she was smiling. "I live life how I live life."

"You most certainly do."

They were such couple goals. The way they looked at each other. She'd kill to have someone love her half that much.

Moriah directed her attention away from Joel's jawline and to Adira, greeting her with a winning smile. "And Adira! Welcome! Make yourself at home, please. The bathroom's down the hall, and there's a bedroom there as well if you feel like lying down. Otherwise, the tv's here, as Joel pointed out, or we have a breakfast bar if you wanna do your homework, and we have food in the kitchen. You hungry?"

Adira forced a smile. "No, I'm good. Thank you though."

"Let us know if you change your mind," the woman returned simply.

"Thanks," she repeated. "I'll probably just try to knock out some homework."

"Right this way."

She followed Moriah into the next room, where an open kitchen was bordered on one side by a high bar and its line of stools. Adira slid up onto one while Joel set her backpack on the next as Moriah quickly wrote on a sticky note before sliding the pad of them across the bar to her.

"There's everything you need to know to get on the wifi."

"Thank you." It seemed she'd been saying that a lot lately.

"Do you usually put on music while you work?" Joel asked.

"Yeah." Her mind was only half on the question, the other half already on the math assignment she was about to work on. "It kinda fills up the empty house, I guess."

"Favorite artist?"

"Imagine Dragons, probably."

Before Joel could respond to that, his wife did. "In that case, I have another band I think you might like."

"Darling..." Joel started, but his wife quickly shushed him, turning back to her phone to key up the music.

She liked the sound of the song immediately. It did remind her of Imagine Dragons, just a little tamer and with a twist she couldn't quite place. Whatever it was, she liked it.

All of the dreams that haven't come true,

And all of the hurt that happened to you...

It matters. I hope you know it matters.

She started plugging numbers into her calculator, most of her brain on the math, but a small part of it lingering on the music.

You felt the pain of a bitter defeat,

Where the weight of the grief is more bitter than sweet...

It matters. I'm tellin you it matters.

A lump formed in her throat for some reason, while she wrestled with a feeling of vague familiarity when it came to the voice. Had she heard the voice before?

To the One who spoke and set the sun ablaze.

To the One who stopped the storm and waked the waves.

That was a different voice, but it was even more familiar. Where would she have heard it?

To the One who took the tree so He could say...

You matter. I hope you know you matter.

That lump was growing bigger. She swallowed it with an effort and focused on the problem in front of her.

She'd have to disagree with whoever was singing, but she had more pressing matters to attend to.

The song was almost over when it hit her.

She looked up sharply, her mind jumping from calculus to the blinding realization in a millisecond.

"Oh my God, it's you."

Joel stood, having knelt to pet the great dane, a rueful smile on his face. "I'm afraid it is. I hate to be that person, but my wife gives me no choice, so I apologize now."

"Don't," she said as she looked back down at her work. "You're really good."

"You hear that, Joel?" Moriah asked. She'd disappeared momentarily and now re emerged from the hall with a laptop and textbook of her own in her arms. "You're really good. Stop being bashful."

"Are you in school?" Adira asked as she plugged in another line of numbers.

"Online," Moriah replied. "Just working on my degree on the side."

"Nice."

Joel hummed agreement as he brought his own computer over, sliding into the spot between Adira and the place where Moriah had set her things. "It's certainly much higher education than I will ever achieve. i don't even know if mum ever ordered my diploma."

They fell into relative silence other than the music for the next forty-five minutes, giving Adira time to finish the math, as well as read the next two chapters of The Last of the Mohicans.

She'd managed to tune the music out for the most part, definitely a good thing seeing as everytime she caught a line or two, it made her feel like crying.

But as she turned to her computer to work on research for her history term paper, the emotion she'd shut off for the past span of time threatened to invade again.

Rolys, her favorite teacher she'd ever had, had discovered that she burnt herself to cope.

The Salem witch trials. That was what she needed to think about.

How could today be happening?

The Salem witch trials.

She was sitting in the home of a near-stranger who was now burdened with her psychological problems.

Salem. Burning innocent girls at the stake.

They wouldn't have had to bother with her. She did a fantastic job of burning herself.

Without meaning to, she jerked upright, just slightly, a physical reaction to the darkness of her own mind that she was desperately trying to stay out of.

But just slightly was more than enough for the man two stools over to notice. He looked up, and she could immediately feel his eyes carefully searching her face.

She willed herself to disappear.

"I don't mean to be the bad influence here," Joel said at length. "but I think you're working too hard. Both of you. You both need a break. You need to rest."

Moriah looked up from her notes, first at Joel, then Adira, then back again, before smiling a little. "What did you have in mind?"

"Well..." He leaned back, thinking. "What time do we need to pick up Reagan, Love?"

Adira gnawed on the inside of her lip, realizing a moment before she said she could take care of it that her car was still at school, so no... she really couldn't.

"Um... on Wednesdays I usually get off practice at six, and then have a game at seven... so I get him around six forty-five."

Joel glanced at the clock on the wall at the same time she did, and they were met by a reading of close to three.

"Then I say we relax here until then," he concluded. "Moriah, you're always good at finding movies and shows to watch. I'll make dinner. I just want the two of you to stop and breathe for a while."

"I think you're a wise man, Joely," his wife said with a little smile. "Adira, are you up for some sitcom binging?"

She opened her mouth, but it didn't really seem like Joel was going to take no for an answer, so she shut it again and forced a smile, nodding. "Sure."

"You ever watched Boy Meets World?" Moriah asked.

Adira shook her head, and Joel chuckled lightly. "Oh, here we go."

"Well, we cannot let that go on!" his wife exclaimed. "You have no idea what you're missing, girl. It's only probably the best tv show ever."

The couple headed back into the living room, and there was nothing for Adira to do but follow them. Why did something she knew was so much better than she deserved feel so right?