I hold her hand as I drive us to my house, hating how she’s trembling.  Her sniffles are quiet and becoming less and less frequent, which makes me feel better because I want to kill him every time I hear it.

All thought and reason left me the moment I saw his hand pull back.  I’d been watching from the patio as they’d spoken angrily to each other, and before he’d even struck her I was halfway down the stairs.

I have never hated anyone or anything more than I hated Dawson the moment I saw him backhand Joey, slapping her so hard she fell against the car.  She didn’t even cry out.

“Are you hungry?” I ask her as I pull in the drive.  I don’t suppose she is but I want to draw her out of her thoughts and “are you okay” is out of the question.

“No,” she replies slowly as I park the car.  “I’m so tired.”

“We’ll go to bed now, if you want,” I say, getting out and hurrying around to her side.

“That sounds great,” she says, threading her fingers with mine again as we walk into the house.

As I shut the door behind me I say, “Let me go find a nightgown of Gretchen’s or something for you to sleep in.”

“Actually,” she says, kicking off her shoes, “I think I want to take a bath.”

“I think a hot bubble bath is exactly what’s needed here,” I agree.  “Why don’t you go take some aspirin and I’ll go run a bath for you.”

She nods and I head to the bathroom.  Digging around underneath the sink, I come up with a bottle of Gretchen’s strawberry scented bubble bath.  Turning on the faucet, I wait until the temperature is hot but not scalding to put the stopper in, pouring liberally from the bottle as the tub begins to fill.

I have to keep myself from thinking about it.  If I do, I’ll jump in my car and go back there to finish him off.  I don’t want these thoughts or these feelings and I concentrate on making the bath enjoyable for her, soothing. 

Gretchen has candles set on each corner of the tub and I get the matches from medicine cabinet and light them.  The florescent lighting of the bathroom is a bit too bright for someone who’s been crying for the past half hour.

The door creaks open further and she comes in with one of my old hockey jerseys in her hand.  “I didn’t want to go through her things,” she says, setting the shirt on the edge of the sink. 

She slides the dress from her shoulders and lets it slip to the floor, stepping from the pooled material.  She’s left in only her stockings and kneeling down in front of her, I slip the elastic lace garters off her thighs and carefully slide the silk from her legs.  Earlier at her house, I’d watched her put them on and she’d complained about how she hates “runners” and how she’d specifically paid a little more for these hoping that being silk and all, they wouldn’t tear.  They’re riddled with runs now, probably caused by the asphalt of the parking lot.  Damn him.

“They’re just hose, Pacey.”

She’s trying to tease me and I love her for it, smiling for her benefit as I stand up.  Reaching for the tap, I turn off the water and she steps into the tub, closing her eyes and hissing at the temperature difference as she sinks down into the bubbles.

“Do you want anything?  A soda or something?”

“Just sit with me, please?”

Closing the lid of the toilet, I sit down and watch her as she relaxes, inch by inch.  I think maybe I went a little overboard because there seem to be mountain ranges of bubbles threatening to swamp her.

“So what happened, Jo?”

Her eyes open and the flickering candlelight is reflected in the tears beginning to gather again.  She takes a breath before beginning, and says, “He came up behind me in the parking lot, I don’t know where he came from.”

“From what Jen said, he’d gone out onto the patio not long before we did.  He was probably sitting in the shadows or something,” I tell her.

She absorbs this before continuing.  “He was trying to get me to understand that being with you is wrong and leaving Capeside with you after graduation is the worst mistake I could ever make.  He asked me if I honestly thought it would last.”

As calmly as possible I ask, “How in the world could he . . . what provoked him to . . .”

“Hit me?”

“Yeah.”

Her eyes meet mine and she looks increasingly uncomfortable.  “He left his coat here last night and he came back and he . . . saw us.”

I nod, telling her that that’s why Jen wanted to talk to me alone. “Apparently he didn’t take it very well and sat in his truck outside his house for about an hour last night.  Jen tried to talk to him and reason with him but she said that his reaction worried her and that’s why she told me.  To warn me that he was angrier and more hurt than she’d ever seen him before.”

She’s silent for a few moments, reaching up to gingerly touch her cheekbone.  It’s swelling and even in the candlelight I can see it beginning to purple.  My stomach churns at the sight.

“How did you get there so fast?” she asks softly.  “It happened and I barely had time to react before you were there.”

“I was dancing with Jen when I saw him cross in front of the doors.  I went out to the patio because it looked like he was heading for the parking lot after you.”

She shifts inside the tub, bringing her knees to her chest.  “I never thought he’d be capable of hitting a woman.  Let alone me.”

Having had my nose broken by Dawson slamming a basketball into my face, I’m not inclined to think him incapable of hurting someone out of pain and anger.  But Joey?  His precious soul mate Joey?  Never in a million years would I have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.

“He was sorry the moment he touched me.  I could see it on his face, he was just as surprised as I was,” she says, her tone thoughtful.

“Fuck that.”

The harshness of my tone focuses her attention wholly on me, her eyes widening slightly.

“You listen to me,” I continue.  “I don’t give a god damn if he’s sorry or not.  I hope he rots in hell.”

“I deliberately provoked him, though.  He was upset because he’d seen me having sex with you, something I’m sure he never let himself believe would happen, and he lashed out.  I taunted him, Pacey,” she says, and I have to close my eyes and swallow hard to keep from screaming at her and her apologetic tone.

“I don’t care what you said or did to anger him.  I don’t care if you pissed him off on purpose, either,” I tell her, trying hard to keep myself as calm as possible.  “There’s nothing on earth you could have done to deserve being slapped.”

She shrugs one delicate shoulder and reaches for the washcloth and the bar of soap lying on the sill.  “I know that, I do.  I just think that maybe snapping back at him wasn’t the brightest thing to do.  I knew he was upset, I knew he was hurt.  I was trying to listen to what he was saying and talk to him, but he attacked our relationship.  He insinuated that I’m nothing to you but your . . . whore or something.”

My fists clench and unclench and the heat from the water is suddenly cloying.  “Joey, I know this is going to sound completely chauvinistic of me but I don’t give a damn.”

“What is it, Pacey?” she asks quietly.

I struggle to phrase it correctly as I say, “The two you, you’ve been best friends for most of your lives.  And I know that even now, even after what he’s done, you still care about him.  And I’m sure he cares about you, if he was, as you say, shocked by his own actions.  But I don’t want you to be alone with him, ever again.”

“Pacey -”

“He’s going to try and work this out with you, apologize to you.  He’s going to try and regain your friendship at the very least, claiming that he was beside himself with jealousy,” I continue.  As gently as I can manage I tell her, “Whatever his reasons were for hitting you, I don’t care.  He doesn’t belong in your life.”

She nods slowly, saying, “I don’t want to be alone with him, either.  But it‘s inevitable that I‘m going to have to talk to him, deal with him.  This is Capeside, and we share the same group of friends.”

“I don’t think Dawson has many friends right now, Jo,” I inform her.  There’s a sadness in her eyes as she agrees with me.