A/N: Hello, lovely people! Just a quick thing I wrote because as much as I think Cat would totally be supportive of Jade and Tori, I can imagine that it would take her quite some time to adjust to this new situation. Also I was bored and I wanted to write something new. So enjoy!
The Way It's Supposed To Be
You are so happy for them.
They love each other, they do, and finally they are together. You smile and giggle and throw your arms around both of them. Tori laughs and Jade just mumbles something you can't understand but you only squeeze your arms tighter around them. Eventually, you pull back and that smile, that big, big smile is still firmly plastered on your face as you look at them with twinkling eyes. Tori grins and turns her head to the side to catch Jade's eyes, those really blue eyes you always envied. Sometimes they would change color and they would be green but they would still be beautiful, they would still be Jade's. You watch as those eyes look back at Tori, the softest smile you've ever seen from Jade on her lips, while Tori takes a hold of her hand.
They are perfect for each other and you smile, because you are so, so happy for them.
/
Later that day you sit on your bed, the smile on your face long replaced by a tight frown, the happiness you thought you felt earlier turning out to be completely fake. You think about Jade and Tori and how they're together now and how they love each other. You wonder what it took for Jade to fall in love with Tori, why she fell for her. Why her of all people? Didn't Jade hate Tori for a long time? You can't just skip from hating a person to loving that exact same person so fast, could you?
Besides, Jade is a girl. And Tori is a girl too. You just don't understand it. If Jade wants to date a girl, then why didn't she just ask you? You and her know each other for far longer than Jade and Tori do and Jade never ever hated you. You are her best friend. Why would she pick Tori over you? It just doesn't make any sense to you.
You play with the loose thread on your purple skirt as you feel yourself getting sad. You don't know why you feel like this all of sudden and why you just can't bring yourself to feel happy for Tori and Jade. You tightly knit your eyebrows together while you think about it and you think you almost got it figured out, but then, your brother bursts through the door, wearing a diver's suit and carrying a plushy duck.
"Mom!"
Oh well. You'd have to think about it some other time then.
/
She grins sweetly as she steals a strawberry from Tori's lunch, popping it into her mouth and winking at the brunette. You smile faintly as Tori raises her eyebrows and then lets out a laugh, shaking her head.
They've both changed, you realize, over the past few weeks. Tori is smiling even more now than before, mostly when Jade is around. Jade is generally happier which in return, makes you happier too. You like to hear Jade laugh and see her smile. You just really like the softer side, the happier side of Jade. And ever since she and Tori began dating, that side of her got more prominent, it came out more often.
You watch Jade shift closer to Tori, resting her chin on Tori's shoulder while she steals another strawberry. Tori slightly cranes her neck, her smile (her 'Jade-smile', you decided you'd call it that) firmly plastered on her face as she gives her a quick kiss, Jade smiling and shaking her head, murmuring what a sap Tori was.
They look so cute together. But there still is that nagging feeling you always have when you look at them. You couldn't be happy for them, you just couldn't. You desperately want to, but something's stopping you and you still didn't figure out what it is.
You love to see Jade so happy. But sometimes you wish she would smile because of you.
Not because of Tori.
/
You frown as Tori's hand finds Jade's and her head falls onto her shoulder, Jade taking a deep breath before placing her head on top of Tori's. They look so happy you think, and your eyes flick down to their joined hands, Jade's thumb rubbing slow circles on Tori's tan skin. Sikowitz babbles on and on about… about something, you can't really remember what it is.
You tear your eyes away and sigh quietly, your face relaxing as you look down at the stuffed animal in your lap. You smile slightly as you pat Mr. Purple's head, your thumb and forefinger gently stroking his little ear. You don't really know why you've brought him with you today, maybe so you'd have some company, or a distraction from Jade and Tori.
It clearly doesn't work though.
You look up again and your eyes focus on fluffy dark brown hair, perfectly styled (as always) lying on the top of the boy's head sitting in front of you. You wonder how Beck feels right now. How he feels about Jade and Tori, what he thinks of them. He acts all cool and nonchalant about it, but does he really mean that? He was dating Jade for over two years, you just can't believe that he just doesn't care about the fact that Jade found somebody else. This somebody else being Tori on top of that.
Sometimes you really don't understand people.
You don't understand Jade for falling in love with a girl she always claimed to hate. Why she would choose Tori over you. You and her don't spend nearly as much time together as you used to anymore. Just because Jade's always with Tori now. You don't understand Tori either. Why would she want to be with a person who endlessly teased her, who was always so mean to her in the past? This just didn't make any sense. Nothing made sense to you anymore.
Really now, sometimes you don't even understand yourself.
/
"Hey Jade?"
Her eyes flick from the book on your bed over to you and you take a deep breath. "How do you know you're in love?"
It's silent for a moment as Jade blinks a couple of times, processing your question. Her eyebrows crease and she tilts her head, looking at you questioningly. "What do you mean?"
You sigh. You mean what you say. You want to know how someone knows if they are in love. With your bottom lip captured between your teeth, you shrug your shoulders and look down. "I just want to know… how you feel when you're in love." You look back up to see Jade stare at you with raised eyebrows. Your own eyebrows crease and you shake your head. "I mean, how am I supposed to know? How can I be sure that I'm not in love, like, right now? Right in this moment?"
Jade sighs deeply and lifts her shoulders in a shrug. "Cat, you'll know when you're in love. Trust me, would you be in love right now you would definitely know it. It's… you can't ignore that feeling. You just can't overlook it."
You nod slowly and Jade focuses back on her studies, turning a page in her book and then scribbling something down on her sheet of paper. It's silent again and you frown, something you do quite often lately. Your fingers fiddle in your lap and you look down at them, only looking back up when you hear Jade's voice again.
"Okay, what's wrong? You're not being your usual annoyingly hyper self."
Jade leans forward and despite her usual cold and mean tone, her face is full of worry and curiosity. You shake your head. "No, I'm fine Jade. But I have a question." Jade's face relaxes a little bit and you watch her nod at you, urging you on.
"Why do you love Tori?"
Jade's eyebrows shoot up and she sits up straight, her lips slightly parted. You almost regret asking the question as she looks at you full of confusion. She probably thinks now that you aren't happy for her and Tori… which you aren't but Jade doesn't need to know that. Especially since you yourself don't even know why you aren't happy for them. You look down and mumble that you "just wanted to know" when Jade suddenly sighs loudly.
"I love her because… because she's Tori. It's as simple as that." Jade shrugs and tilts her head as she continues. "I love her… generosity. Her drive. I love the fact that she never gave up on me. I just love absolutely everything about her. As for your previous question…"
She sighs and you watch her intently. Her eyes find a spot somewhere behind you and the faintest of smiles plays on her lips. "When Tori smiles at me, my heart beats just a little bit faster. Her touch makes my skin tingle and… I love it when she hugs or kisses me. She accepts me. My mean comments, my stupid jealousy… she accepts all of me and I accept all of her. I miss her so much when she's not with me and I… I need her." She blinks and her eyes find yours. "I guess that's how you know you're in love. If you can't picture losing that person and if you feel like your heart might burst by just looking at them… that's when you're in love."
You smile and Jade clears her throat awkwardly, shaking her head as she grabs her pen again. "At least that's how I feel," she mumbles, clearly embarrassed by her sudden outpour to you about her feelings. She doesn't acknowledge you anymore, instead she intently concentrates on her history book, continuing to write down notes. Your smile falters again and you finally grab your own book, flipping it open to a random page. You try to concentrate on the words you are reading but it doesn't work. You glance up to see Jade still engrossed in her studies and frown. Does your heart burst when you look at her? You don't think it does. Do you need Jade? Of course you do, she's your best friend and you can't picture losing her either. But does that really mean you love her?
But one thing is clear to you: you wish someone would talk about you the way Jade talks about Tori.
In that very moment, you realize that you're jealous.
/
"Just forget it, Tori!"
They fight and you sit there and watch, not knowing what to do. It's been like this for over an hour already and you don't really understand what they are fighting about, it just built up and up and up and now, Tori is almost on the verge of tears. Of course you witnessed them fighting before, in those seven months they are dating now they had plenty of fights about little, unimportant things but none of it comes close to this. They scream and Jade even threw a glass at the wall, the water droplets still slowly running down the white wallpaper. You really should leave now, that would be for the best but you know if you'd stand up, Jade would order you to sit down again. But this is making you dizzy, you can't handle this anymore. You never were good with fights and you feel like you might faint at any second.
"I don't know why you are so mad right now! What did I do?"
Tori is pleading, her brown eyes begging with Jade for an answer. You feel bad for her but on the other hand you almost feel… good. It feels so good to see that they aren't as perfect as they always seem to be, they yell at each other, they fight. They're really not the perfect couple you always envy. At least not in this moment. You look over to Jade, her hard eyes softening at the sight of an almost crying Tori and her shoulders slump, a shaky sigh escaping her lips.
"I'm not letting you control me, Tori."
Her voice is soft and quiet but you still hear the dangerous edge in her voice and you know she's still fuming. A humorless laugh from Tori's mouth makes you shift your attention back to the brunette, who's shaking her head, a tear finally making its way out of her eye. "What are you talking about? I'm not controlling you."
"You don't realize it, do you? You treat me the same way as Beck did! You started to become Beck!"
It was kind of true, you think, as you hear Tori scoff on the other end of the room. She started to use the same methods Beck did, giving Jade time outs, scolding her to be nicer to people she didn't like… maybe she really didn't realize it but that doesn't make it any less true. "That's not true, Jade." Tori's voice is weak and you take a deep breath, causing Jade to flick her eyes over to you for a short moment before she quickly focuses back on Tori.
"This was one of the reasons Beck and me broke up, aside from you of course. Because he was controlling me. Always. He acted like my father and I hated that. You were different. You accepted me, Tori." She tiredly shakes her head, tilting her head as she looks at Tori and now you see that she has tears in her eyes too. "What changed?"
"Nothing has changed. I don't know why I did that." She shrugs and sighs. "Or… I kinda… do. You and Beck… you get on really well with each other again and… I'm just scared that you miss him and I thought if I do some of the same things Beck did, you wouldn't miss him anymore. I was simply being stupid. I'm sorry."
"This is just plain stupid, Tori!" Jade grows louder again and you bite down on your lip because you really don't like it when Jade is like that. So angry. "I love you! I don't miss Beck at all! Youwere the main reason Beck and me broke up, you know that! And you always told me that it would be good for Beck and me to treat each other normally again, that I should give him a chance so that we could become friends. And now you're pissed because I try to do just that?"
"I'm not pissed I'm just… I'm just jealous!"
"Well, you don't have a reason to be!"
"Oh yeah, sure! When you're jealous because of some random person then you expect me to be cool with it, which by the way, I always am. But when I get jealous because of your ex-boyfriend then you think it's stupid!"
"So what do you want me to do now? Beck won't just disappear and I don't want him to either!"
They're both silent and you are too, too scared to say anything. You clasp your hands together and look down. You shut your eyes and try to imagine yourself being somewhere else, somewhere with unicorns, with flowers and rainbows and no yelling friends.
"I can't do this with you. I don't want to." You snap your eyes open and quickly lift your head up at hearing the drastic change in Jade's voice, your eyes looking back and forth between Jade and Tori. Tori's eyes widen and her mouth falls open and you have to stop yourself from doing the same. Jade looks down and bites her lip and your heart breaks by looking at her. "W-What are you saying, Jade?"
"You know what I'm saying."
Her voice is quiet and you've never seen Jade like that. Not when her parents divorced, not when she broke up with Beck. Tori frantically shakes her head and quickly strides over to her, grabbing her hands. "No, no, no, Jade. Don't do that, don't! We're not breaking up, Jade! Please tell me you're not breaking up with me!" You swallow harshly and you feel your own tears gather in your eyes. Jade lets out a sob (you've never heard such a sad sound come out of Jade's mouth) and Tori calls her name, over and over again, telling her that she loves her. "I'm sorry, don't do that. God Jade, I love you. I'm sorry, everything will get back to normal, I promise. I promise."
They're both crying and you swallow back your own tears because you realize that this isn't what you want. You know they love each other, they need each other and you almost hate yourself for thinking that you would be happier if they would break up. You slowly get up and wordlessly walk past them, leaving them alone and giving them the time they need.
/
They're back to normal just a week later.
You giggle as Jade throws Rex across Tori's living room, Robbie gasping and loudly calling Rex's name. He runs after him and a light smirk starts to form itself on Jade's face as she watches Robbie. And Tori, instead of scolding her girlfriend, just chuckles and shakes her head.
"I'm glad you're not fighting anymore," you say and watch as Jade takes out her phone, pretending she didn't hear you. But Tori smiles at you. "We are too," she says as she turns her head to Jade, taking a hold of her hand which causes a faint smile to appear on Jade's lips.
You smile and this time you really mean it. This is the way it is supposed to be. Jade and Tori, together. Seeing them fight so bad, seeing them almost break up made you realize that Tori and Jade are like the people out of fairytales. Their love is special and you really, really believe that they need to be with each other so that both can be whole, so that both can be happy. You don't ever want them to be apart and if you think about it now, you can't even remember anymore why you weren't happy for them in the first place. You know now that you aren't in love with Jade. Sure, you love her but not in the same way as Jade loves Tori and Tori loves Jade. You don't have these exploding feelings inside of you when you look at her, you don't feel your heart bursting like Jade described. She's your best friend and nothing more.
"Girl, I nearly broke my ribs!"
"Oh yeah. You don't even have bones, puppet."
"Jade, stop calling him that!"
You giggle at Robbie's whining and he looks over to you, a pout on his lips. You smile at him and he hesitantly smiles back, which kind of causes your heart to flutter. It's a weird feeling, your heart doing this quite often when Robbie's around, mostly when Rex isn't with him and you wonder what it means. You look back to Tori and Jade who sit close together on the couch, both of them laughing at something on Jade's phone. You smile and hope that someday you'll look at someone, maybe even at Robbie, and you'll feel your heart burst.
And you will love them the same way as Jade loves Tori.