A/N: This goes with a picture which can be found here (without spaces)

polterrgeist. deviantart art /Contigo- 485883388

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Tucker had hundreds upon hundreds of photos of him and Danny and Sam on his PDA. It came naturally to take photos of all three of them, whether it be while they were out doing something or just chilling at someone's house goofing off. He loved having those photos. He loved the memories; he never wanted to forget all of the great things he did with his friends.

So why was he staring at the 'mass delete' button on his PDA, ready to wipe away years of photos? Years of memories when, at the touch of a button, would be gone forever?

See, Tucker always knew he was the third wheel in their group. It was plain to anybody (except Sam or Danny) that he was easily replaceable, and as a result, easily forgettable. It hurt knowing that he essentially meant nothing, but he pushed that thought away and always ignored it because Danny and Sam were his friends. They'd do anything for him and he'd do anything for them too; the three of them would die for each other. The thought that he was the least-liked always lingered in the dark corners of his mind though, some days it would occupy more of his thoughts than he cared for. But Danny and Sam always included him whenever they did things, how could they not like him? How could they not consider him their friend? He went everywhere with the two of them and most, if not all of the pictures on his PDA involved all three of them. They were inseparable.

But when Danny and Sam started dating… it was like Tucker didn't even exist. At first Tucker was ecstatic that the two lovebirds had finally become a couple, he'd spent so long trying to push them together that at times it was agonizing to watch them deny their feelings for each other. But as time went on, Tucker quickly found out that their group went from three to two. Tucker had given them space when it first happened to let them get used to dating and then he slowly reinserted himself into the group to get back to hanging out at the Nasty Burger or chill at the park and people watch with them. It just… wasn't the same though, and in all honesty it felt really awkward for Tucker to be around Sam and Danny.

The constant kissing and hugging and the doting on each other was of course what couples did, but Tucker had felt so left out. He'd figured things would be the same as before; after all, the two of them were practically dating anyways, the only difference was that it was now official. But how does someone interact with their friends when the two are constantly macking all over each other? How should Tucker try and talk to them now that they don't take their eyes off of each other? The answer is that he doesn't.

Tucker walked behind Danny and Sam on the sidewalk on the way to school. The sidewalk was of course not wide enough for three people, but they'd always taken turns on who would walk in the back. But now Tucker had taken permanent residence in that spot, so he continued to walk behind them as they held hands every single morning and every single afternoon. He ate lunch with them in silence as they laughed at yet another inside joke he wasn't part of. He never added to conversations anymore. They never offered to let him copy off their homework now. The two of them no longer passed notes to him in class. They never did much of anything with Tucker now, he was as invisible to them as a ghost. As days turned into weeks, the phone calls and the Skype video chats and the Doomed videogame sessions dwindled until they stopped completely, and Tucker let it happen.

He really didn't know why he let it happen. He just… did.

Sometimes Sam and Danny would remember that he was their friend and that he existed and would invite him to hang out with them. In the beginning he was happy to go; he missed them terribly. But now he would make up a dumb excuse as to why he couldn't go that Tucker knew Danny would be able to see through, but Danny never questioned him about it. He'd just say ok and would hang up. And Tucker would sit in his room alone. Again. Day after day, wasting away in his self-created prison. He just couldn't stand to be near them anymore.

The last time he hung out with them was nearly a week and a half ago; they'd been at Danny's for a Friday night sleepover. Danny and Sam were cuddling on the bed laughing about something Tucker didn't care enough about to listen to and he'd sat in Danny's computer chair scrolling through all the pictures he had of them on his PDA. The amount of times Tucker had contributed to the conversation could be counted on one hand. It was an hour before dinner when Tucker quietly slipped out the bedroom door and went home. Apparently Danny and Sam hadn't noticed his absence, as neither of them had called to ask where he'd run off to. It wasn't until next morning when he'd gotten a text asking where he was.

Tucker didn't know if he should reply.

Part of him said not to as a test to see if they still cared, to see if they would send more texts asking where he was and why he left.

But the other part of him, the dark part that lurked in the recesses of his mind said not to bother because they didn't care anyways so there was no reason to reply. They wouldn't send more texts if he delivered no reply.

He wanted to reply, he really did.

He wanted to believe that he hadn't been so unceremoniously ousted from their tight-knit group, if only for a few minutes. Tucker was tempted to reply only with "Home." No other response, just that one message. No matter what Sam and Danny sent him, that would be all he would give to them. Would the curt message get through to them? Would they see that the both of them had completely erased him from their lives? Would they beg for him to come back? Would they understand that he'd left because they had forgotten about him? Would they apologize? Would they even care?

The message was there on the screen, all Tucker had to do was press send.

Tucker knew though. He knew they wouldn't beg for him to come back over. He knew Danny and Sam wouldn't send more texts if he didn't respond.

So he erased the message, and waited to see if they would send him more texts. Maybe, just maybe, he was wrong. Maybe they really would send him more messages.

Tucker had hope. It was a pathetic, barely indistinguishable speck, but it was there.

He was silently begging for another message to pop up on his screen.

Please send another text.

Please.

But they never did.

And that's when something burst inside Tucker. A seed of hate had been sown in him, and over the course of the next few weeks it grew into a monster.

Tucker actively avoided Danny and Sam after that day. He took the bus to and from school to avoid walking with them and he sat as far away from them in class as he could. He didn't eat lunch with them either. He did his best to stay away from them to the largest extent of his ability.

He should be happy for them, he really should be and he knew that. But every time he saw them together, laughing and smiling like the world was made of sunshine and rainbows it made bile rise in his throat and a feeling he couldn't quite place would wind its way around his heart and clamp down. Seeing them so happy made him anxious beyond belief. Tucker couldn't find one reason to be so… scared of their relationship. But the second he'd see them walk into class his stomach would do flips and his gut would clench and he was sure he'd soon loose whatever it was that he'd recently eaten. He'd steel himself against the feeling, hoping that if he ignored it it would go away. Sometimes it did. Sometimes it lingered for hours.

Why did he feel this way?

Why?

Danny and Sam had gotten what they'd both wanted for so long; they were finally happy. But then why was he so angry at them all the time? Why did all of this bitter resentment settle at the bottom of his stomach like a rock and burn at his heart like acid? Why did he ache for them so much? Why did the mere mention of the names Danny and Sam gear his emotions into overdrive and fog up his brain with indignation? Why was it so easy for him to boil over in rage at the thought of his best friends?

Why was he so hurt by their happiness?

He couldn't sleep at night because the ire he held in his heart for them would never die down, everything in his life still revolved around Danny and Sam and they weren't even there anymore. The flurry of happy memories of their friendship that slammed into him in the dead of night was sometimes too much for him. He couldn't take knowing that he could no longer add any new happy memories; all he had were the old ones and his newfound animosity. Sometimes he cried at night when he was sure nobody would be awake to hear him.

Tucker missed them so much that he physically hurt for them. He would wake up sore and sad and tired like he'd just run a marathon and he wasn't sure he could make it through the day. What little energy he had would be sapped just from getting ready for school, on the weekends he sometimes wouldn't get out of bed at all.

He tried to not think about them. There were so many emotions flying around in his head whenever he thought of them that he thought it best to just not think about them at all. He was so sore over having lost his friends that it made him want to constantly punch holes into his bedroom wall until his fists were bloody and bruised, so he tried to shove all thoughts involving them into the back of his mind. Keep them away to numb the pain. Go on living like they didn't even exist so Tucker didn't have to agonize over them day in and day out. He was tired of his very soul longing for the return of two people that he was sure he would never get back.

Tucker would never admit it to anybody but for the first few weeks Danny and Sam were all he thought about. They were his best friends and had been for as long as he could remember, his greatest and happiest memories involved Danny and Sam. The three of them planned on going to college together and living together and they had planned the rest of their lives revolving around each other; they were supposed to be together forever, the bestest of friends the world had ever seen. None of them could see a life not involving the other two of the group. But that dream had come crashing around Tucker's feet and how he was left alone, angry, and sad.

How could they do that to him? How could they just… forget about him like that? Act like he was never a part of their life? Act like he was last week's trash? Use him only to dump him when he was no longer needed?

How could they betray him like that? Leave him like that?

They were all tucker had and now they were gone. For weeks the raw ache in his heart never subsided. Eventually though the all-consuming anger gave way to cold hard sadness and regret.

Tucker knew this would happen when they started dating. Danny and Sam had reassured him that their friendship would be fine and that nothing would change, they'd talk and hang out every day just like they always do. Why would anything change? Things would stay the same. They promised him.

And things did stay the same for a while. But then it all headed south and now Tucker was left to pick up the pieces alone.

He was so sad without Danny and Sam. He wished that he'd never met them so that he wouldn't be here right now having to deal with this mess. No Danny and Sam equals no sadness and anger and regret and loathing. Tucker could never seriously wish for that though. After all, it was his fault the friendship failed.

He'd made little to no effort to keep it afloat. He could have tried harder, done better. Texted more, called more, set more hangout times. He should have been a better friend to them. Why didn't he try harder? He'd let everything slip through his fingers like sand; he'd sat by and watched the friendship fall apart. Maybe it was because deep down he knew it was inevitable.

Danny and Sam fit together perfectly, and unfortunately Tucker wasn't part of the formula. He knew that he shouldn't waste his energy trying to fix something that was probably meant to be broken. It didn't mean that Tucker didn't wish he'd still tried to fix it though.

He tried a little. Not enough apparently, but he did make the smallest of efforts at first. He'd text them and try to engage in a conversation or set hangout dates, but the texts either always ended up unreplied to or Tucker was sent some lame excuse. So he stopped trying. What was the point?

They didn't care about him anymore. They had each other now, they had the person of their dreams. They no longer needed him as a distraction for their feelings. He was their rebound and now that they no longer had to deny their feelings he was of no use. So they left him. Fury coarsed through Tucker's veins at the thought. If he had known that they were using him like that he would have never stuck around; he would have gotten out of there as soon as possible to prevent all of this heartbreak from happening.

Tucker felt so awful for thinking it, but he wishes they hadn't gotten together. He wanted things to go back to how they used to be; the three of them goofing off and laughing and smiling and having a good time. Back then they were all happy. Back then there was no suffering and no crippling loneliness and no ruined friendships. Tucker would be fine putting off the feeling that he was the least-wanted because his friends were there to make it go away. They were good at that and he was fine with it.

He just wanted his friends back. He was so tired of lying in bed all day thinking of them. He was so selfish, but he didn't care. He wanted Danny and Sam back and he wanted them back now. He would trade anything to have them back and he hated himself a little more every time he thought of ruining their happiness for his selfish wants. Who was he to ruin their happiness? Since when was he the center of the universe? Tucker knew that he wasn't and that Danny and Sam had their own lives to live and they can't spend every waking moment catering to his needs, he wasn't that dull. But that didn't stop the hurt and it didn't stop him from wishing that they could have somehow worked something out so everybody would be happy.

But that didn't happen.

Sam and Danny were practically different people now. They acted different and their lives were now consumed with each other and Tucker stuck out like a sore thumb. Being around them only made him feel worse because nothing was the same anymore and he didn't have it in him to try and make things better. So he didn't.

His friends were gone and that was something he would have to get used to. He didn't want to get used to it; the thought of living without Danny and Sam twisted something in him and made him feel like it was the end of the world.

Danny and Sam were gone.

They were actually gone.

He still lied awake at night thinking about them, even though it had been weeks since he last talked to them. He didn't know why he couldn't get over them and he wasn't really sure he was ready to.

Tucker could never forget about them, how could he? How could he forget about the two people who had made him so happy, yet at the same time filled him to the brim with so much hate and sadness that it made him want to wrap his hands around their necks and choke them? Everything reminded Tucker of Danny and Sam. The way people talked or the jokes people made would leave Tucker writhing on the inside, wanting to get as far away as possible because they sounded like his friends. He couldn't look at astronauts or spooky things or anything else that was a facet of his friends' personalities without a little bit of sadness rising from the depths of his stomach and washing over him. His friends were everywhere but nowhere at the same time. Even Doomed had remained untouched.

He could never forget about his best friends. Ever.

But unfortunately, it seems they'd already forgotten about him.

Tucker was slowly getting used to it though, as much as it pained him. Life moved on without him and Tucker had decided that maybe he should try and move on too. He had accepted what had happened.

So he sat there, scrolling endlessly through his vast collection of pictures of the three of them. It hurt so much to look. He pined for the return of the two most important people in his life and he hated that they weren't in any pictures anymore; now all Tucker took pictures of were his parents or things he was working on. Those old pictures were constant reminders that things would never be the same; just a bunch of remnants of a time when the three of them operated as a single unit. Now it was just him. He was all alone.

He brought up the mass deletion option on his photo gallery, finger poised to remove the physical reminders of the memories that continued to haunt him day in and day out. He could push that button and be done with it. They could be out of his life and he could finally make peace with himself and get rid of the grief.

He wasn't sure he could do it. His hand trembled a few scant millimeters from the button while he weighed the options to see if it was better to have these memories or not. Was it better to be able to look back on the past or to move on? He wanted to do both, but the past now only held painful memories that sometimes made tears fall down his cheeks. He couldn't move onto the next chapter of his life if he kept dwelling on the chapter he was on, but at what cost was it to move forward? The prospect of starting off fresh scared him.

He wanted Danny and Sam there to help him figure this out.

He wanted…

An odd feeling he couldn't quite name welled up inside of him. He'd felt this strange feeling every time he thought of his friends and he couldn't quite figure out what it meant. It was a strange combination of everything he'd been feeling for weeks on end; sadness and guilt and loathing and anger all rolled into one package.

He couldn't keep living like this.

Tucker scrolled through the gallery of photos before landing on the one he was searching for and unchecked it. He then proceeded to press the mass delete button, every single picture except the unchecked one being wiped from existence.

Tucker stared at the one picture, oddly numb.

It was a picture of all three of them, laughing with tears in their eyes. It was Tucker's favorite picture and held his favorite memory. It was the night that they had all agreed to be friends forever, they were at a sleepover and it was the best sleepover they'd ever had, it had been the perfect weekend.

Tucker flipped his PDA off and went to sleep.

It was a few weeks later when Tucker learned that he had to move. He'd had half a mind to tell Sam and Danny but had quickly decided against it. He was done investing all of his happiness into people who wouldn't be there; he had learned to never let his well-being depend on other people because nobody ever stays and at the end of the day, the only person he has is himself. Danny and Sam would no longer be his source of happiness.

Two weeks after Tucker had moved he'd had a sudden realization as to why he had been feeling so awful all the time, and he'd finally recognized that weird sensation that would crawl up his spine sometimes. It was an odd kind of homesickness, except it wasn't his house that he was missing. He missed the memories that had been formed there and the two friends he used to have. He missed who they used to be and he missed what he used to have with them. He would give anything to get that back and banish that odd homesick feeling. But unfortunately that wasn't the life he had now and time travel isn't possible for him. Tucker had moved to an entirely different state and hadn't heard from Danny and Sam in many, many weeks.

He wondered if they ever thought about him; he sure did his fair share of thinking about them.

He also wondered if he should try contacting Danny and Sam every now and then.

He wondered if he would ever hear from his two best friends again.

But he never did.