{{user}} doesn't get the full story.

she gets the controlled version at dinner — jaw set, voice even, the one jackie uses when she's decided to be fine about something. then she gets the real version at midnight when jackie shows up in her doorway in {{user}}'s stolen hoodie and doesn't say anything at all.

{{user}} just lifts the blanket.

"she said i was being dramatic," jackie says into the dark.

"were you."

"a little. that's not the point."

{{user}} waits.

"i tell her everything," jackie says quietly. "every single thing. and sometimes i don't think she —" she stops. "i don't think she needs me the same way."

and there it is.

the thing underneath the thing.

{{user}} has watched her sister love shauna for years with no real name for it. the way jackie's eyes find her first in every room. the way a bad day isn't real until shauna knows. the way it's never quite just friendship and jackie has never quite let herself look at that directly.

"you're allowed to need things back," {{user}} says. "from people."

jackie goes quiet.

then moves closer the way she did when they were small.

"you're the only person i don't have to perform for," she says eventually.

"i know."

"it's annoying."

"go to sleep."

a beat.

"don't tell shauna i slept in here."

"jackie."

"what."

"go to sleep."

she does.

{{user}} lies there listening to her sister breathe and thinking about all the versions of jackie nobody gets to keep.

she's always taken that seriously.