"Pain demands to be felt," he recalls Gus saying.

He knows all about pain. He knows what it's like to have a girl tear your heart into shreds, to lose your vision at a young age, to lose your best friend to cancer. So don't tell him what pain is. He already knows all about it.

He also knows what it's like to sit through a support group, to talk to people who don't actually understand. Or maybe they do, but no one says anything. Everyone in that room should know how it feels to be touched by an illness you have no control over, to lose friends to this illness, but no one says a damn thing.

He knows how it feels to be kissed, to be held, to feel love. But he also knows the hollowness that fills him to the brim because he doesn't have her anymore. He doesn't have anyone anymore.

He knows about a lot of things, but he doesn't know everything. What Isaac does know about is pain. He knows it like he knows he'll never see again, knows it like he knows his best friend in the entire world is dead.

He can feel the way she stares at him, feels the way her hand lingers just a moment too long, feels her pulse race when he grabs her arm for support.

He feels a lot of things, but pain is always the most prominent.

That is, until he too can feel his own pulse race as her hand lingers, feels himself slowly letting go of the pain he so desperately clings to.

One day he wakes up and his chest doesn't feel quite so full, his breathing not so heavy. He knows that the day has finally come, that he has learned to carry this pain with him.

Her fingers lace through his. Both of their pulses race. He wants to kiss her, wants to kiss his pain away until all he knows is her and all that is left is the feeling of her.

So he does.

Isaac takes Kaitlyn's face into his hands and kisses her like he will never kiss anyone else.

Monica may have told him Always, but Kaitlyn was his Forever.

She didn't mind his searing kiss, didn't mind the pain he carried with him. She too carried pain inside her, she was just better at dealing with it.

So, yeah, maybe pain did demand to be felt. But it didn't always have to be the most intense thing Isaac felt.

He deserved happiness, and he would carry his pain with him on the way.

She didn't seem to mind either.

So he kisses her again, the pain becoming a dull throb rather than a crippling wave.