Bethkrichards​:

new kind of guy who just really likes the first 30 minutes to an hour of horror movies thats just people doing regular things and turns it off as soon as the horror part starts to kick in

chancecunningham​:

chance had undoubtedly come in hot with his questions, but he was at a loss. he’d been raised christian, which meant that to him, there had always been a clear line between good and evil. god and devil. it all used to be so black and white. but now…good people were doing terrible things. good people that he knew. people like adam. as his friend began to explain himself, chance clenched his jaw and did his best to listen.

“yo what do you mean?” chance asked as he rubbed the back of his neck and stared at adam, “like…you don’t remember anything? don’t remember yelling at cole to leave you alone and shit?” at the word ‘black out,’ he let out a scoff, “fucking christ, richards. you were drunk?” when adam shifted the focus to chance, he waved off his injury nonchalantly. “i’m fine,” the cut above his eyebrow had thankfully been the worst of it. 

chance wasn’t sure what he believed in anymore. he knew good and evil weren’t as black and white as he’d been raised to believe they, but he’d never considered that there was anything more powerful than god or the devil. but now…looking at adam…chance could see that he wasn’t lying. and this thing that had been possessing him…it felt more evil than the devil. “who put you guys up to this, adam? like…cause it wasn’t just you…i mean…heather halloway fucking lifted steve off the ground with her bare hands.” chance lifted both of his hands up like he was choking an invisible steve, “like…by the neck.” a beat. “it was like she wasn’t even human, man…like…” chance didn’t know what to think beyond that, so he just asked questions in circles. “you don’t know anything?”

Adam had distanced himself from the church a bit after he started dating Cole, but that didn’t mean that he’d stopped believing entirely. He had just worried about being part of a group that thought that what he felt for Cole was a sin. But Cole had known how much it mattered to Adam; he had shown him the research that he’d done on whether you could be both part of the church and gay. Not because Cole believed in any of it himself - he didn’t - but he knew that it mattered to Adam. And now, things were even more complicated than before. Because... how could someone who had strived their whole life to be good and do the right thing suddenly be capable of evil? What had Adam done to deserve this, or Jack for that matter? Was there even a Heaven or a Hell, and did Adam coming back mean that he didn’t deserve either? 

At the mention of what he’d done at the carnival, Adam flinched. Chance was upset, and he had a right to be. From the outside, Adam’s behavior made no sense and the things he had done were terrible. “No, I don’t,” He shook his head, distressed at the thought of yelling at Cole “I didn’t mean to.” Adam’s gaze snapped back up to Chance, eyes hardening at the implication that he’d been drunk that night. “I didn’t take or drink anything! I don’t know what happened, Chance! But I wasn’t drunk!” 

He wished he knew what had possessed them. Cole had called it the Mindflayer, but that meant nothing to Adam. He had never heard of anything like it, and he didn’t even know where to start looking into it. Research was more Cole’s area of expertise anyway. “I don’t know, Chance. Something... was controlling us, apparently.” Adam didn’t know how much it was okay to share with his best friend - did he tell him the whole truth or not? It wasn’t exactly something someone could just unknow once they’d heard it. Adam stared in shock at the image of Heather choking Steve and picking him up by the neck - he hadn’t heard that graphic detail yet. Jesus Christ. “I don’t know how we were suddenly super strong, or why she did that, man. I just know that I can’t remember it and apparently that’s how I was acting three years ago when... right before the forest commune thing happened.” Adam covered, not sure how Chance might take the news that he’d died. 

WHO: Adam Richards & @stevehharringtcns​

WHAT: Stadam After Dark ( in a platonic way ) Stadam Kiss While their Boyfs are Busy

WHERE: Cole and Steve’s Hospital Room

When Cole had finally fallen back asleep, Adam had taken the opportunity to get up and stretch. He’d been rotating between sitting in the uncomfortable chair next to Cole during visiting hours to laying beside him in the hospital bed once everyone had gone home. Cole was sharing the room with Steve Harrington, but considering he’d hooked up with Cole once himself, Adam doubted he’d say anything about Adam being gay. 

As he stretched, he glanced over to Steve’s side of the room to see him still up. “...Can’t sleep?” Adam asked quietly, careful not to cross over to Steve’s side without him being okay with it. “I could call a nurse or something. They might have sleeping pills or something you could take.” Frankly, after the shit Steve had lived through over the last few days, Adam didn’t blame him for not going to bed. Adam was sure he wouldn’t sleep well right now if it weren’t for being able to cuddle with his boyfriend. But even then, he was still so worried something would happen, like he’d wake up to find he’d hurt Cole again some how. Thankfully, that hadn’t happened yet. 

“Cole...told me. About what happened,” Adam admitted quietly, looking at the floor. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know why we did that.” He really didn’t - all he knew was that they’d thrown up black liquid than gone crazy. Apparently Adam had done that before. Apparently Jack had hit Steve, which Adam just couldn’t imagine. “Are you okay?” 

loverboymontgomery​:

who: Cole & @goldenboyrichards​​

where: Cole’s hospital room :’) 

Everything hurt: his head, his abdomen, his shoulder, his throat. He blinked, but his eyes were heavy and hard to open. What the fuck had happened? His head felt foggy, and his memories were short and senseless. He saw a flash of the Tunnel of Love ride, some unidentified black goo, an explosion, and… Adam looking angry. At him. Adam shoving him away, telling Cole to ‘leave him the fuck alone.’ 

Cole tried to turn onto his side, to hide his teary eyes from the door, in case anyone walked in. Only, moving was no longer simple– he must’ve broken a rib or two, because the pain that lit up Cole’s body was almost strong enough to knock him out. “Fuck,” he exclaimed, brows knit together and stars in his eyes. If he could keep his eyes open long enough to look around, he might have seen Steve in the bed across the room or the figure entering the room and nearing his bed.

Lifting his hands to his face, Cole shielded his eyes from the fluorescent lights. “Why are the lights so fucking bright,” he grumbled to no one in particular. He was about to complain about the bed being angled too high when he locked eyes with him. 

His stomach did a backflip and Cole’s mouth dropped open. He desperately searched Adam’s eyes, trying to decipher who he was right now– his Adam or… whatever he’d been at the carnival? 

“Hey,” he managed, after a beat of silence. Cole desperately wanted to be held, to have some confirmation that Adam was himself again, to push the memories of anyone else to the edge of his mind. 

After getting off of the Tunnel of Love, Adam couldn’t remember a single thing until he woke up surrounded by ash and smoke. Hours of his life were just missing, gone completely as if he’d fallen asleep and woken up. Adam had been popular in high school - he wasn’t unknown at parties. But even back then, he had never truly gotten so drunk that he blacked out. Whatever had happened to him at the carnival was something else entirely, something much more confusing. 

But when he’d come to? All Adam had seen was carnage. People injured, people dead, and Cole being loaded into a fucking ambulance. Adam had been too dazed to follow; he needed a minute to breath and figure out what had even happened. Because he just didn’t know - but there were several people glaring at him like he was responsible for this. Not solely, the others from the forest commune had helped, it seemed. But.... what had they done? And why?

Once he had fully come back into his own body, he remembered the nightmare he’d had. Or maybe it was a memory? But... but Adam would never hurt Cole. Even nightmare Adam hadn’t wanted to. But the thought of shoving him, pinning him against a wall and telling him to ‘fucking leave me alone already’ made Adam’s chest ache. 

As he caught a ride with someone to the hospital, he couldn’t help the tears that collected in his eyes. Just the thought that there was maybe a chance that he’d actually done that made Adam feel like he was going to throw up. 

Adam had waited while Cole lay on a bed, resting after breaking his rib. He couldn’t imagine that he was comfortable - that it didn’t hurt him. Adam would do anything in the world to take the pain from him, add it to his body instead of Cole’s. But there was nothing he could do but watch as his chest rose and fell, steady with the beeping of the heart monitor he was hooked up to. 

When Cole finally came to and asked about the lights, Adam leapt up immediately, reaching over to flick one set of fluorescents off. He thought about turning both off, but... well, what if Cole didn’t want to be in the dark? What if he was scared of Adam? His worst fear was seemingly confirmed when Cole stared at him, studying Adam’s eyes. 

Arms wrapping around him to hold himself together, Adam met his gaze sheepishly. Not because he wanted to, but because Cole deserved to see that it was him standing in front of him.  “Hey,” He replied, feeling far too casual given every fucking thing the two of them had been through. He kept his distance, standing by the light switch near the doorway. “Are you.... is it okay that I’m here?” Adam asked quietly, looking down at the floor. “I was worried about you. I don’t... I don’t know what happened. I don’t remember anything.” 

jackforeman​:

WHO: jack foreman & @goldenboyrichards​ WHERE: the foreman household

Jack hadn’t seen Adam since the night that everyone had decided to go to Lover’s Lake. The two had split up, mostly because Jo was on the side of going to the cabin, and Jack swore to himself that he would never leave her to deal with shit on her own, not as long as he could help it. It was the right decision, this much he knew, because they’d wound up in some weird ass portal, or something. He wasn’t entirely sure still. 

They sat in the Foreman family’s basement, where Jack had seen Jo for the first time since coming back, and the image of the shock on her face still replayed in his head on loop. “Alright, dude, be real with me. Did I miss anything crazy at the lake while Jo insisted on going into the cabin?” he asked, turning to his friend. “I wanted to stay with you guys, I really did, but Jo wanted to go, and I couldn’t really tell her I wouldn’t go with her after, you know … going missing for a few years. I feel like I shouldn’t really leave her when I have the chance to stay with her.” Jack was sure he didn’t have to explain, not to Adam, but felt the need to after doing a lot of explaining in the past week. “Sorry, I’m so used to having to defend every single choice I’ve been making to everyone I know since we’ve been back.”

Adam still had zero clue what had actually happened at Lovers’ Lake, especially with the other group. He’d heard bits and pieces of their adventure in the cabin that night from people as they’d partied afterwards, but nothing concrete really. All Adam knew was that this town was seriously weird, weirder than it had been a few years ago, apparently. He was just glad he’d been with Cole and had been able to make sure he was okay after whatever had happened to them in the water. 

It was good to catch up with Jack, though. They’d been teammates and friends for years, and Adam wanted to make sure he was handling everything okay now that they were back here in Hawkins. “Yeah, man,” He nodded, setting his can of Coke down on the coffee table. “Okay, so it was pretty normal at first. We were drinking a bit, we decided to go for a swim, and then the waves picked up. Cole and I were having trouble making it back, and then something grabbed out legs...” Adam said, biting his lip at the memory. It had been a terrifying few minutes - part of him had been worried he wasn’t going to make it back to shore. “Whatever it was didn’t leave any mark on me or anything, though. Cole’s ankle looked kind of fucked for a minute, but then it was gone? I have no clue what that means.” He admitted with a shrug. “Something weird happened to one of the kids too, but I wasn’t really paying attention during that part. What about the cabin?” 

As Jack explained his decision, Adam nodded. If his own sisters had been there, he probably would have followed them too. It was hard to come back and face people who you’d left behind, especially family. “I get it, dude,” Adam told Jack, giving him a small smile. “You don’t owe me anything.” Adam understood that feeling all too well, too. Everyone wanted to know why he’d left three years ago, now that he was back. It was a question that he kept doing his best to avoid, when he could. “Are you doing okay? With everything?” Adam asked cautiously, dipping into feelings territory. They weren’t known for being vulnerable around each other, but they’d had one hell of a shared traumatic experience. Talking about everything with the forest commune probably wouldn’t hurt. 

thequeenofhawkins​:

There were only a handful of people that made Chrissy feel truly safe or like herself. At the top of that list rested Adam Richards. Childhood best friend. Ex-boyfriend. Closest friend. She felt like there was no one she knew better. Cut from the same cloth, some would say. They both ticked off that boy-next-door/girl-next-door behavior and both deserved more than what they were dealt from life. Namely? Death. 

Chrissy shut the door behind her, given Adam’s permission. She let out a soft laugh. If anything, Adam’s mom would probably leap with joy knowing they were in his bedroom with the door shut. She knew their parents hoped that it would be Chrissy and Adam that ended up together in the end, which would never happen in a million years. “Tell me about it. My mom wanted to get me drug tested when I came back home,” and Laura Cunningham had drug tested her daughter, only for the test to come back negative. 

“The same,” she answered, vaguely. Whenever Chrissy thought back to her time on the commune, she couldn’t remember anything. If she tried hard enough she could remember being in Eddie’s trailer, then in the forest, and then back home, but any memory of the forest just felt like a memory that wasn’t hers. Like, they belonged to someone else or… they weren’t entirely real at all. “What do you mean?” She asked, turning her head towards him. The more she thought about it, Chrissy was able to convince herself that she had willingly gone, even through all the fallacies. “Like, that we were never there?”

Chrissy was probably his closest friend besides Cole. She knew so much about him; so many small personal details she’d accumulated over the years of them being family friends, then awkward boyfriend/girlfriend, and finally actual friends. Being around her had become so much easier once he had come out - he felt like she really understood him. She had seen the bad with the good, and accepted him because of who he was. In Adam’s eyes, there was no one in the world with a better heart that Chrissy Cunningham.

Rebecca Richards had always wanted them to end up together - she had taken their breakup worse than anyone else. Adam had had to assure her multiple times that they weren’t getting back together, no matter how perfect they seemed for one another. They were better off as friends. And though he couldn’t tell her this - Adam was gay. If he could fall in love with a girl, it would be someone like Chrissy, but he just wasn’t interested. He hadn’t been since the moment he met Cole Montgomery and he realized that he could only ever love him. “Thank god mine didn’t. Although, maybe we should have,” He said, brow furrowing in thought. After all, Adam thought there was a good chance that maybe they had been drugged with something unless Cole was right about everything.

Adam was terrified about what not remembering meant. If there was nothing to remember, and he had died, did that mean he hadn’t gone to Heaven or Hell? It had been years since Adam had really felt like he belonged in church, and he really didn’t know if he could believe in a God that hated him for being in love with Cole, but..... he just couldn’t believe that he’d gone no where. Adam really didn’t like thinking about that. “No, I mean...well, maybe?” Adam shrugged. “Maybe we were drugged and taken there or something.” He proposed, preferring to believe that rather than the possibility that he had died. 

chancecunningham​:

when adam snapped, chance held up his hands like a white flag. “don’t come at me, man,” he urged him, shaking his head, “i’m just trying to understand what the fuck is going on.” chance knew he wasn’t wrong to be questioning everyone around him, particularly the people who had been part of this forest commune thing who seemed to be involved. but at the same time…this was adam. chance knew him. he knew he wasn’t capable of being bad or evil. “okay,” chance finally said after a pause, exasperated, “i believe you. you weren’t drunk or on anything or whatever. okay.” 

up until this point, chance had been trying to come up with a logical explanation for everything that had happened. maybe these people were being blackmailed. maybe they were on drugs. maybe that was why they were acting out so violently. but the more adam explained what he knew, the more chance was convinced that this defied logic. “something was controlling you?” he asked as he furrowed his brows in frustration, “what like…something…not human?” now his tone was hushed. he expected this type of talk from someone like jo, but for adam to be suggesting it? someone who grew up with all the same values and ideas as him? well…it was a trip. 

everything adam was saying corroborated chrissy’s story too—about blacking out, about not remembering anything. his heart sank. what had happened to them? what was happening now? chance tuned adam back in just as he was reaching the end of his explanation. apparently that’s how I was acting three years ago when…”right before you died,” chance stated, overlapping with whatever adam was about to say. “i know,” he explained, figuring that warranted an explanation, “i mean…i remember. no one else seems to remember it but i do and i know cole does and it wasn’t just you…” this part chance was telling him in confidence, “i remember chrissy too. dying, i mean. she died, man. she…” his voice trailed off as a lump formed in his throat. he swallowed it down and took a second to regroup. “what do you think this is, adam? like…for real…level with me…what the fuck is this?” adam had always been the one chance went to for advice, for answers. surely he wouldn’t fail him now. 

“I’m not coming at you!” Adam snapped back, not used to being angry with Chance. They’d been best friends since they were little, inseparable until they’d reached high school and suddenly most of Adam’s time had gone to Cole. Adam usually was able to keep a level-head around Chance, but being accused of doing all of that just because he’d been drunk rubbed Adam the wrong way. There was no way Adam was capable of that, even intoxicated.  “I don’t know what the fuck is going on either, Chance,” He said more evenly, running a hand through his hair as he leaned back against the wall. 

He was worried Chance wasn’t going to believe him. After all, they’d both gone to mass growing up. They’d both been raised by parents with specific values and morals. The idea of something controlling him like that? It didn’t make sense, unless they were talking about a demon. Adam was positive if he’d told either of his parents about anything like that, they’d be calling their priest immediately to get him to come see Adam. So for Chance to be somewhat hearing Adam out meant a lot. “Something not human.” Adam confirmed, biting his lip. “I don’t know anything else, really. Just something possessed me, or us, I guess. And it happened to me three years ago too.” 

When Chance mentioned Adam’s death, he was floored. He had known Cole remembered it, and Beth too, but Chance? Fucking hell. Adam had died and it seemed like only three people remembered it happening. That was so difficult to wrap his mind around. “...you remember me dying?” Adam asked, studying Chance’s face as he explained that Chrissy had died too. Oh fuck. Adam hadn’t known that - he hadn’t realized. “Oh my god...” He blinked, trying to understand what all of this meant. “I don’t remember dying. Cole, Beth and you do, I guess. Does Chrissy? She said...she didn’t seem like it. Does she know?” He asked, rambling through the question as he tried to process it all and think back to his conversations with Chrissy since he’d gotten back. “We’re in way over our heads.” Adam admitted to Chance when the other asked him what this all was. “I really don’t know much. I just know whatever possessed me three years ago is dead, according to Max Mayfield. But this new thing seems to be able to control us too.” 

adam jacob richards & walden cole montgomery

“he was my north, my south, my east and west, my working week and my sunday rest, my noon, my midnight, my talk, my song; i thought that love would last for ever: i was wrong.”

― w.h. auden, stop all the clocks

“come then, put away your sword in its sheath, and let us two go up into my bed so that, lying together in the bed of love, we may then have faith and trust in each other.”

― homer, the odyssey

“so excuse me forgetting, but these things i do. you see, i've forgotten if they're green or they're blue. anyway, the thing is, what i really mean, yours are the sweetest eyes i've ever seen.”

― elton john, your song

“whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” 

― emily bronte, wurthing heights

“he said, "let's get out of this town, drive out of the city, away from the crowds." i thought, heaven can't help me now. nothing lasts forever, but this is gonna take me down. he's so tall and handsome as hell. he's so bad, but he does it so well. i can see the end as it begins, my one condition is: say you'll remember me standing in a nice dress staring at the sunset, babe. red lips and rosy cheeks, say you'll see me again. even if it's just in your wildest dreams.”

― taylor swift, wildest dreams

"he smiled understandingly — much more than understandingly. it was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you might come across four or five times in your life. it faced — or seemed to face — the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. it understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey."

― f. scott fitzgerald, the great gatsby

“you do not have to be good. you do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. you only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. tell me about despair, yours, and i will tell you mine. meanwhile the world goes on.”

― mary oliver, wild geese

zccming​:

adam richards. it was a name she’d been hearing for years from cole. max was no therapist, but when it came to grief, her and cole had gotten pretty good at sitting down, dumping all of their feelings together, then doing absolutely nothing about them. cole, adam, robin, all of them were older than her, but with adam specifically, max hadn’t known of him while he was in school and other than a few pictures and glances from a distance this past summer, didn’t really even know what adam looked like. that was until she clocked him curled up in cole’s hospital bed. this was adam, without a doubt in her mind. 

she had been weaving in and out of rooms for so long she felt like her legs might collapse from underneath her and she just needed to sit. not wanting to overstay her welcome in any of the other rooms, she chose cole’s to rest for a minute. she hadn’t been expecting him – or adam to wake up. she jumped a bit when adam did, watching him like a frightened animal. it wasn’t his fault, more the impact of all the unexpected events that had transpired in the past twelve hours. for a while, she said nothing, and neither did he. when adam finally spoke, max noted how kind his voice sounded. in a way, that quality reminded her of lucas. she shrugged off the question, “it’s cool.” don’t apologize. when adam grasped at answers, max sighed. there was no hiding the truth from him, he already knew at least to some extent. “i’ve only seen something like this once before.” she admitted, rubbing her tired eyes. so much for rest. “but the thing that did it is gone.” with surprising conviction, max assured him, “but from what i can gather, that wasn’t you acting at the carnival. we just…need to find the weakspot of this new guy and take him down.” 

she made it sound so easy, even though she knew well how difficult the journey ahead could get.

Adam hadn’t known Max before. She’d been a kid then, someone he had maybe seen at the pool a few times or heard about from Billy. Coming back and finding out she’d became Cole’s best friend had been unexpected, but he knew from how often Cole spoke about her that she meant a lot to him. Adam was grateful for her supporting him during his grief these last few years. 

He moved closer to Cole’s bed, unwilling to be far from him after everything that he’d been through since the carnival. He kept space between him and Max, not wanting to freak Max out, in case she had seen what he’d done while he was blacked out. Sitting down in the chair closest to Cole, Adam reached subconsciously for his hand, lacing their fingers together while Cole continued to sleep. “If it’s gone... how are we still doing this?” Adam asked her, frowning at the information. There was just so much he didn’t know, so much he couldn’t even begin to process. And it fucking sucked. “Have you done that before?” Adam asked curiously, worried that they wouldn’t figure this all out. He knew he certainly didn’t know enough to solve shit. 

“Apparently, I did stuff like that before,” He admitted, despite not knowing Max at all. He trusted her with this, though, considering how much she already knew. “And...well, if it happens again,” Adam felt guilty asking this. She could say no - he wouldn’t blame her. She didn’t owe him anything. “If it happens again, can you just... make sure Cole isn’t near me? I can’t hurt him.” Not again. Adam wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if he did. 

jackforeman​:

Though Adam was right, that he hadn’t killed anyone, either, that didn’t absolve him of the guilt from hurting Steve. In truth, he probably could have killed him, if what he’d heard was true and that he’d kicked the living daylights out of someone who was supposed to be one of his best friends. For what, though? Jack had no idea. Maybe to set off explosive fireworks, but those hadn’t even been his, and he and Adam would never intentionally do something to hurt people like that. They just wouldn’t.

Jack watched Adam’s face grow colorless, as though he’d seen the ghost of himself in Jack’s own eyes as he recounted what had happened. Adam had died, too? His mind raced like the red string on Jo’s board. Adam had known for weeks that he’d been dead, even from the first day that they’d come back from the commune. The forest community that they’d apparently been sent to, but in reality, they’d both come out of the forest rising from the dead. It made absolutely no sense. 

“Hold on,” he said slowly, pulling away from Adam to place his hands on his friend’s shoulders. “You’re telling me that we came out of the commune,” he lifted a hand, flexing his fingers in air quotes, “right, but we’d both been actually dead the entire time. So, the commune … it couldn’t have existed, did it?” It sounded insane, but it was the only thing that made sense, at least right now. “Because … you were there, and I was there, but we actually weren’t. Did it not actually exist at all, or were there just some people there, and they grouped us in with them?” The questions he had were all rhetorical, all ones that neither Jack nor Adam could answer right now, but he at least knew someone who could attempt to tackle the unanswerable. “Jo has this board, this … it’s a murder board, but she doesn’t call it that. But, whatever. Not the point. There has to be something on there that would help us figure this shit out.”

Jack pulled his hands from Adam’s shoulders, taking a seat on the edge of his bed. “I know. I’m sorry, too. I had no idea … I didn’t know that you, you know, died, too. I’m just glad that we have each other.” He paused, turning toward him. “Do you remember anything, at all? Like, about the afterlife? Because I can’t remember shit. It’s like it never happened.”

Neither of them had chosen to commit the actions that they had, Adam understood that. But he was struggling with forgiving himself, even now. He might not have made the decisions, but it had been him doing it regardless. While he could understand logically that he wasn’t responsible, it would take him some time to process the fact that he wasn’t guilty. That he hadn’t killed anyone - the Mindflayer had. The...Doppelganger had, if Max was right. But it was hard to believe that when those things sounded so insane. He had never heard of anything like that before, and Adam tried to be a pretty level-headed guy. Believing in outlandish stuff just wasn’t something that worked for him, usually. But he knew now that he needed to try to believe in it if he wanted a shot at forgiving himself for the things his body had done. 

As Jack put his hands on Adam’s shoulders, Adam looked at him in confusion. He could tell Jack was putting something together, realizing some truth about their situation. “...I don’t know,” He admitted, shaking his head. “I think it had to, right? Why else would Peter be around? Why would they want us to be going to therapy?” How could all of that just... be a coverup? And what were they covering up, if that was what it was? It made Adam’s head hurt to think about, and he just wasn’t sure he could believe all of that. “Not everyone could have died! How would...how could that many people just... come back?” None of this made any sense. Why them? What had Adam ever done to deserve being resurrected? “We just... maybe we came back, and it was around the time they found everyone else, and so they lumped us together?” He shook his head again, not being able to rationalize all of this. “We should talk to Peter. He would know. Right?” 

At the mention of Jo’s murder board, Adam bit his lip. He wasn’t exactly excited by the idea of going over to Jack’s house and seeing his sisters, if he was being honest. Jo hadn’t kicked his ass last time, but what if she’d changed her mind since? Or what if Julie did? 

Jack sat down, and Adam hesitantly followed. Perching on the bed beside him, he kept some distance between the two even now. “Jack, you have nothing to be sorry about.” Adam told him seriously. He was glad to have Jack too, in a way, but that seemed horrifying to admit considering Adam had been the one to kill him. He let out a shaky breath at the mention of an afterlife, hand subconsciously coming up to touch the crucifix that still hung around his neck even after all this time. “...no.” Adam admitted quietly. “There wasn’t anything. Just nothing, and then us waking up in the woods.”