obsessivecomplex said: NDU: Jack has one of his lonely depressing walks when security guard Nightlight appears!!!
"He hates me," sobbed the boy in Nightlight's arms, and Nightlight rubbed his back before guiding him to a bench so they could sit and talk; Nightlight was used to students wandering at night with stricken faces, especially when holidays, exams, or results approached, and he'd come to realise his job as a security guard made him a temporary parent for many of those students.
He'd guided home drunks and found safe places to sleep for those afraid to go back to their dorms, and more than once he had offered his ears or his shoulders to those who needed them - a habit he was happy to share with Katherine, who he'd first met when she sat on the library steps with a girl who'd had a panic attack and needed the fresh air.
"Nobody worth crying over would make you cry," Nightlight said, knowing it was a platitude but that it was a platitude he generally agreed with, and glad he'd taken the boy's third solitary walk through the park in three days as a sign he needed someone to talk to.