Dirty can of worms
part 1 , part 2, part 3
Jade Leech x reader
warning: smoking, swearing, bullying, toxic relationship, violence.
summary: You’ve known Jade Leech since childhood, and your friendship has grown into a toxic co-dependency. Then you’re transported to another world, where another version of him forces you to confront everything you thought you knew.
“To cry is to fail.”
No- it was “to try is to fail,” but that one had a better ring to it.
Tears were like muck, like dirt. They clung like sludge and oozed like the mucus of an infected wound. For a thirteen-year-old boy, crying was the most humiliating ritual of all. And yet, for Jade, it used to be a daily occurrence.
Maybe he cried because it got him what he wanted. Maybe he was just a sensitive kid. If he couldn’t find you during lunch-he cried. If he fought Floyd over a toy-he cried and guilt-tripped his parents. If someone made fun of his hobbies-he cried.
Jade was your diaper buddy. His mother liked to reminisce about how he was more attached to you than to his own twin. How his first steps were toward you. How he’d pull his thumb from his mouth just to start chewing on yours, just because it made you laugh.
So having front-row seats to every tantrum and every tear he ever shed? That was no surprise.
They say children develop visual memory at age six, and for you, your very first memory was of his weeps.
It was first grade. You and Jade, as always, were in the same class. Jade had an obsession with seashells-tiny, chalk-white trophies he treated like treasure. He rambled endlessly about them: how they were made from the same stuff as chalk, how hermit crabs used them as armor, how each one had its own “story.” He’d bring his latest find to school just to show you.
“This one I found just below a surface of sand and mud,” he said, stumbling over his words as he placed the shell in your palm. It was brown with a tint of gold, depending on how the light caught it.
Before you could admire it, a ball slammed into your hand, jolting the shell out of your grip. Jade’s eyes widened in panic. Across the field, a classmate had accidentally kicked the ball off the pitch.
Jade scrambled to his feet, scanning the grass. The boy jogged over to retrieve his ball, brushing past Jade, who was on his hands and knees, desperately searching.
You rushed to help him, but just as you crouched, the boy let out a loud, fascinated noise.
“Woah, is this what you’re looking for?” he asked, holding something up.
Jade’s head snapped toward him. He shot up, reaching for the shell, but the boy effortlessly leaned back, keeping it out of reach. He smiled-wide and taunting.
“Is this what you do every lunch?” he asked.
Jade glared, silent.
He flicked his wrist and sent the shell sailing. It arced through the air and disappeared behind the school fence.
The boy’s grin sharpened.
“Lame.”
You looked back to see if Jade was alright, but what you saw instead were his eyes welling up. His tears slipped down like crystals-shiny, shifting in color the same way his shells did when the light touched them.
That memory sat so deeply in you it felt fossilized. Sometimes you wondered if it was just as carved into him.
You never forgot how red his face turned that day, or how loudly he cried. Everyone on the playground heard him.
And maybe that was the exact moment Jade started taking everything too far - the teasing, the pushing, the way he hovered around you like a shadow with teeth. An overcorrection. A shield. A way to pretend he was tougher than he felt.
And yet here it was again - replaying itself, except worse.
Jade was crying. Again.
His clothes were splattered with vomit - yellow and white, dotted with whatever you’d eaten. Your own face, hands, and knees were scraped raw. But none of that compared to the sound of him quietly breaking in front of you. Because you knew these tears were real. He wasn’t performing. He wasn’t pretending.
But you just stared at him - stunned, exhausted, strangely hollow. His face was blotchy, red, puffy, pathetic. And when he realized you weren’t going to say it, that you weren’t going to soothe him or lie to him or fix him-
And between choked breaths he kept muttering, “Take it back… take it back…” Take back that you hated him.
Take back the one thing he’d never imagined you’d say.
His shoes made a sharp, wet squeak against the pavement as he turned and bolted for home.
After that day, Jade started clinging to you even more. Maybe he finally realized-somewhere deep down in his demented little brain-that you were a person capable of having opinions, of feeling things about him.
Two years passed, marking the fifteenth anniversary of his bullshit and antics.
“You look like shit today,” he remarked as he fell into step beside you. “You can afford to smile.”
You hated the way he could be polite and condescending at the same time. How could someone swear so nicely?
“Okay, sorry,” you muttered, flatly.
“Just smile. I don’t get it-why are you always like this?”
“Like what?” you snapped, heat rising.
He rolled his eyes. Bastard.
“Jade, for the past month, you’ve dragged me to the beach every Saturday. Sure, you gaped about how nice it was going to be, but then you nearly drowned me, broke my fucking wrist trying to ‘save’ me, and oh yeah, let’s not forget you refused to take me back home when I begged for hours.”
You veered onto a longer route to school, your voice carrying down the street.
“So yeah, I don’t want to smile. Fuck smiling. And fuck you, Jade.”
His face disappeared into the distance, and you turned to run toward school, too afraid he might retaliate.
By the time you arrived, Jade was already at his desk, casually smiling while chatting with everyone. His eyes flicked to you, and the smile lingered like a warning.
When you sat down, he leaned slightly toward you and whispered, “Your wrist seems fine, unfortunately. Maybe you’ll break your neck next time we go.”
“Fuck you, Jade,” you muttered, leaning back in your seat with a heavy sigh.
Of course, he didn’t let it go. His fingers pinched your arm, and you jerked, biting your lips to keep from crying in the middle of class.
Lunch didn’t offer any relief. He kicked the back of your knees as you passed the cafeteria line. By now, you were pretty sure your whole body was covered in bruises, and his shoe had left a perfect imprint on one leg.
Standing back up, you reached for your bag-and it was open. Your lunch was gone.
You turned to see Jade still behind you, smiling.
“Floyd took it, not me,” he said, his eyebrows knitting together in exaggerated concern. “I can share my lunch if you want.”
He always did this. Take something of yours, make it vanish, and then offer his as if he were some kind of saint. Your lunch would end up with Floyd, or thrown in the trash. Your pens, your rubber, your umbrella-gone. Stolen. But oh, Jade couldn’t help feeling bad, and just had to share his instead.
It was maddening.
“Oh, yeah-never mind,” he said, a smirk tugging at his lips. “You’ve been muttering ‘fuck you, Jade’ and ‘I hate you, Jade’ all day… so I guess you wouldn’t want Jade’s lunch anyway.”
He mimicked your voice, dragging out the words in a cruel, teasing tone.
Then, without waiting for a response, he grabbed your arm and pulled you to the table. He set his lunch down in front of you and started eating, eyes locked on yours.
Your pride flared hotter than your hunger. You bit your tongue, refusing to ask, refusing to let him see how much it stung.
So you stayed hungry for the rest of the day.
While walking home with him, Jade suddenly veered off your usual route. Confused, you hesitated, but his hand clamped around your wrist.
“What are you doing?” you murmured.
“Just follow me,” he said, his tone flat, almost too casual.
You didn’t agree-but honestly, you didn’t have a choice.
He led you into a narrow alleyway, shadows stretching along the walls. There, Floyd was leaning against the brick, waving at you with that sheepish grin.
“Hey, shrimp! How was lunch?” he said, chuckling, holding a cigarette lazily between his fingers.
Well, of course. You remembered dinner at the twins’ house not long ago-Floyd had been caught high and had received a two-hour lecture about the dangers of smoking and pot. Somehow, you’d been dragged into it too, nodding along awkwardly while Jade sat silently beside you, smirking.
Now, here he was, holding the little stick of rebellion between his fingers, the tip resting against his lips. And for some reason… Jade’s eyes flicked to you.
You hadn’t expected him to be smoking, either. Not that he didn’t seem the type-he had this uncanny way of getting lost in whatever little thing fascinated him. You remembered the one time he got high off that weird fish he caught at the tide pools, of all things. He’d eaten it raw, claiming it was “special,” and then staggered around the beach for hours, muttering facts about crabs and the other kids at school like he was some kind of oracle. By the end, he’d passed out in the sand, barefoot and pale, leaving you and Floyd panicking and trying to drag him home. You’d never forget the sound of him mumbling secrets no one had told him out loud, the way his eyes flickered with some strange, unearthly focus.
Now he pressed a lighter into your hand and nudged it toward his cigarette. The tip was right on his lips. You froze for a second, then pressed your thumb down on the switch. A tiny flame flickered, catching the cigarette. Jade’s lips brushed it lightly as you held it there, and you flinched, the heat stinging your skin. Bruising it.
He didn’t apologize. He just seized your hand, moving away from his brother and deeper into the alley.
Almost instinctively, he brought your hand forward, inspecting your thumb. Then, like he had done countless times since you were children, he tucked it under his shirt, against his chest.
That's how he took the pain away when you were kids.
Only now, it felt… weird. You were older, and what had once been familiar and comforting didn’t feel that way anymore.
You pulled your hand back, heart hammering. He glanced at you, eyes narrowing.
“I took your pain away. Are you satisfied?” His voice had gone whiny, desperate for an answer.
“Yes… now can I go home?”
“No.”
“Please… I’m begging you, Jade.” Fuck your pride-you just wanted to leave.
He blew smoke into your face, leaning closer until your back hit the wall. You coughed violently.
“Take a drag,” he insisted.
“I don't want to.”
“I’ll let you go home-the beach, or Narnia-if you take a drag,” he said, smirking like it was a stupid game.
Your lips parted reluctantly, touching the cigarette clinging to his fingers. You inhaled bits of smoke, gagging as ashes scraped your throat. Tears pricked at your eyes, and he reached out, brushing them away like it was nothing.
Finally, he stepped back, letting the cigarette fall to the ground, and took your hand. You tried to pull away, panic flaring.
“Calm down. I’m taking you home. You should thank me,” he said, rolling his eyes slightly.
“Thank you,” you whispered, voice trembling.
He gave a small, impatient sigh. “So dramatic.”
