Previously…
– While trying to evade capture, Zane crashed into the car that Landon was driving. Landon and Diane had relatively minor injuries, but the collision landed Samantha in a coma.
– At Prom, Christian became upset when Marcus asked Bree to dance. Caleb noticed his twin’s heartbreak and gave him a comforting pep talk.
– Diane allowed Jaq to visit Samantha in the hospital and then presented them with a surprising job offer — in Portland.

Students inside the gymnasium of King’s Bay Academy are outfitted in suits and dresses as the noisy, energetic sounds of Olivia Rodrigo’s “Good 4 U” fill the air. The teens jump up and down, pointing and shouting along with the music, with balloons and streamers all around decorating the gym for this year’s Prom. As he dances, Christian Taylor looks around himself in disbelief. He is currently dancing in a ring of his twin brother’s friends, mostly guys from the soccer team, and even more shockingly, he has had a pretty fun night. 

“This is kind of a jam!” Caleb‘s friend Arjun yells over the music. 

“I feel so basic,” Jasmine Knight replies with a laugh, hand nevertheless raised in the air, before she goes back to singing along. Right by Jasmine’s side, Caleb flashes a smile over at Christian. 

The song comes to an end, and excited cheers ring out through the gym. The loping beat of Mariah Carey’s “We Belong Together,” all finger snaps and piano chords, changes the energy in the space immediately.

“Old-school throwback!” Arjun hollers, as couples pair off for the slow dance. Christian watches as his brother and Jasmine begin to sway together and then decides to go to the refreshments table for some water. He grabs a paper cup and begins to fill it with cool water from one of the large jugs atop the table, and as the water pours from the spout, he reflects once again on how decent the night has been after Caleb forced him to come back inside and join his group.

Mariah’s voice has just kicked in — I didn’t mean it when I said I didn’t love ya so — when Christian feels someone standing beside him. He looks to find Bree Halston right there in her lavender dress.

“Oh. Hey,” he says awkwardly, unsure if she or Marcus saw him rush out of the gym once they began dancing together.

“Having fun?” Bree asks.

“Yeah. You?” Christian quickly takes a gulp of his water.

“Yeah. Totally.” She reaches for a paper cup, but her preoccupation is evident. They remain quiet, the song somehow not filling the space between them despite its loud volume, as Bree pours some water from the spigot.

“Would you want to dance?” Bree asks at last. “I think this might be the last song, or close to it.”

“Uhh… where’s Marcus?”

“He went to the bathroom. So, what do you say?”

Christian looks at her and then finds himself taking another swig of water.

“Christian?” Bree asks. “What’s going on? Is something wrong?”

—–

Jaq Pearson can hear the television as soon as they let themself into the house. Based on the voices, they are fairly certain it is Married at First Sight, and when they arrive in the family room, they see that is exactly what their roommate is watching.

“Hey!” Finn Campbell says, turning partway around on the sofa to look at Jaq. “Where’ve you been?”

“I actually went to the hospital,” they say. “To see Samantha.”

Finn reaches for the remote and pauses the TV. “And?”

“Her mom actually let me.”

“How was it? How’s she doing?”

“No change,” Jaq says solemnly. 

“That’s so sad. They stopped giving us updates at work, too. First it was every day, and then it kind of just… dribbled off into once a week, then nothing.”

“Yeah, I don’t think there’s much information. Everyone’s waiting.” Jaq steps into the room and takes a seat in the reclining armchair across from the sofa — one of the pieces of furniture left behind by the Brooks family from their time in the house that Finn and Jaq are now renting. 

“But you got to spend some time with her, right?” Finn says. “They say that people in comas can hear what’s going on around them.”

“I hope so. I really hope so.” Jaq pulls up their feet onto the chair. “And there was something else.”

Finn lifts one eyebrow. “Something good?”

“Something… I don’t know. Sam’s mom dropped kind of a bomb on me.”

“I don’t usually associate ‘bomb’ with ‘good.'” Finn pauses and taps a finger to his chin. “Unless you’re like, ‘This is the bomb!’ Which no one has said for twenty years.”

That gets a momentary laugh out of Jaq, but their serious demeanor swiftly returns. “She offered me a job.”

“She did what now?” Finn asks with surprise.

“She offered me a job,” Jaq repeats. “In Portland. While I was in visiting Sam, I guess Diane made some calls and found an AP — Associate Producer — job at our sister station down there.”

“Associate Producer? That’s, like, a step up from what you do now, isn’t it?”

“Big time. It’s a 25 percent raise, too.”

“Whoa.” Finn leans forward with interest. “Are you going to take it?”

“I don’t see how I can,” Jaq replies. “For one thing, I’d have to go pretty much right away.”

“So?”

“I wouldn’t want to leave you hanging without a roommate or enough time to find another one.”

Finn shrugs one shoulder in response.

“Besides,” Jaq continues, “it would mean leaving Samantha behind. And I don’t think I’m ready to do that.”

—–

The silver wrapping paper glitters beneath the harsh lighting in the elevator. Tori Gray looks down at the wrapped box in her hands, wondering once again if it was silly to wrap it up and place a bow on top of it. But she felt that she had to bring something.

When the elevator reaches the designated floor, she steps off and traverses the familiar path through the carpeted hallway. Her mind is transported back to the time when she lived here — sort of — and it strikes her how that might as well have been a different lifetime. 

What if I’d never gotten pregnant? What if I hadn’t gone back to Zane?

She knows that she has been doing this a lot over the past few weeks, thinking about “what if” scenarios, but no amount of daydreaming or wondering ever change the reality of what she went through with Zane. Soon she reaches the apartment and knocks on its door. Within seconds, the door is opened, revealing Landon Esco on the other side. 

“Tor,” he says, surprised.

“Lan,” she replies. “Sorry. Dumb joke.”

He snickers anyway. “When you texted asking if I was home, I didn’t realize that meant you were about to show up at my door.”

“Sorry. Is it a bad time?”

“No. No way. Come in.” 

He waves her into the apartment and closes the door. Once inside, Tori turns back to face him and is relieved to see that he looks like, well, Landon. His dark hair is a little rumpled, but there is no sign of the black eye or the limp that she noted when she saw him at the hospital in Mount Hood weeks ago.

“You’re doing okay?” she asks. “You look good– I mean–“

“I’ll take the compliment,” he says, grinning. “But I am good. It was probably a good thing that my parents made me stay with them while I recovered.”

“I bet.” She doesn’t know why she feels so nervous, but her stomach is in knots, even though she is happy to see him and to see that he is doing well. “I wanted to come see you sooner, but I didn’t know your parents’ address, and asking felt weird, and…”

“There are worse things to have when you’re injured than an Argentinian mom. She made sure I had all the empanadas I could ever need.”

“That sounds pretty good.”

“How about you? You’re feeling okay?” he asks.

“Yeah, I’m… I’m okay. Really.” She thrusts the box toward him. “This is for you.”

Landon regards the shiny silver paper as he takes the box. “Fancy.”

“It’s not too fancy, really. But I wanted to get you something — like a thank-you, which I know is dumb because you risked your life to help me, but I had to do something, and I don’t think guys love getting flowers…”

He looks up from unwrapping the box. “You were gonna get me flowers?”

“No, I mean… I thought about it… Just open the box!”

Within seconds, he is pulling away the last of the paper.

“Oh my god,” he says as he tosses away the wrapping paper to reveal several stacked boxes of PopTarts. “This is so much better than flowers.”

He flips through them. “It’s strawberry… it’s s’mores… it’s chocolate! You are the best.”

“I thought you might need a fresh supply since you’ve been out of your place for a while,” she says.

“I did. Thanks, Tori. This is really — it’s really sweet of you.”

“It’s literally the least I could do. You came all the way out there to save me, and you wound up hurt and with a wrecked car.”

“Insurance is working on the car thing,” he says, “and I’m okay otherwise. And I would do it all over again.”

A fresh wave of guilt sweeps over her. “I hope no one ever has to go through that again. All because I was so stupid–“

“You’re not stupid–“

“I am. I fell for Zane’s shit for so long. And you could’ve been hurt a lot worse, and so could Diane, and Samantha… she’s…”

“Travis said the doctors are optimistic,” Landon says.

“She’s still in a coma.” Tori exhales heavily. “I should go.”

“You came all this way — if you want to hang–“

“No, it’s better if I go,” she says, unable to suppress the jumpiness inside her. She pulls the door open. “Enjoy the PopTarts.”

“I will.” He places a hand on the door. “It’s good to see you, Tor.”

That gets her to crack a smile. “You, too, Lan.”

Her heart patters quickly in her chest as she hurries back toward the elevator.

—–

Bree stares at Christian as she awaits some kind of response from him.

“Have you been avoiding us?” she finally prompts.

“What? No!” Christian feels his cheeks growing warm and is grateful for the dim lighting in the gymnasium.

“You’ve been with Caleb’s group, like, all night,” Bree says. “You never hang out with them. Or him.”

“I ran into him outside and just kind of…” Christian forces a shrug, since he can’t find any more words. 

“As long as you’re not upset.”

He feels his heart pounding in his chest. “I’m not. I swear.” 

“Okay. Well… do you want to dance?”

Christian isn’t sure what the right answer is. He is leaning toward saying yes when he looks past Bree and sees Marcus in the distance, returning from the bathroom in the far corner of the gym. Marcus raises his arm in an enthusiastic wave, and Christian manages to return the gesture.

“I don’t want to interfere. You guys seem like you’re having fun,” he tells Bree as genially as he can. “I can tell you’re, like, vibing.”

“Vibing?”

“Bree, come on. I don’t wanna be in the way.” He pulls his phone from his pocket. “I was actually gonna call an Uber. I’m so tired.” 

“Really?” 

“Yeah.” Quickly he tosses his paper cup into the nearby trashcan. “Have fun for me, okay?”

“Okay,” she answers, but he is already headed for the exit.

Seconds later, Marcus sidles up beside Bree.

“Where’d Christian go?” he asks.

“He said he was heading home because he’s tired.”

“You think that’s all?”

“I don’t know,” she says, before downing the rest of her water. Her gaze lingers on the exit that Christian just passed through.

—–

“Samantha has great doctors and a lot of family around her,” Finn tells Jaq. “You aren’t personally responsible for holding a vigil until she wakes up.”

Jaq sighs. “I know. But it still feels wrong to abandon her right now.”

“I get that.” Finn runs a hand through his brown hair. “But this sounds like a pretty awesome opportunity.”

“It is,” Jaq admits. “But that’s the other thing.”

“What is?”

“Samantha deserves to know that her mom is pulling strings again. I know how much it bothers her. If she found out Diane tried to buy me off with a job to leave town–“

“Jaq,” he says, interrupting them. “I know you still really care about Samantha.”

“I do. I love her.”

“I know… I’m just not sure that causing more problems between Samantha and her mom is going to be the key to winning her back.”

“She deserves to know–“

“And for all you know, Diane’s going to tell her the minute she wakes up,” he says. “I hate to say this, but isn’t it possible Samantha might actually be grateful that her mom got you out of the picture?”

“How can you say that?” Jaq asks, springing to their feet.

“All I mean is, Samantha has been pretty consistently upset with you since you got arrested. There’s no guarantee that when she wakes up, she’ll even be in a place to consider getting back together with you, let alone want to.”

Frustrated, Jaq furrows their brow.

“I don’t think you should turn down an amazing job on the chance that Samantha might change her mind when she wakes up,” Finn says. “Between your legal bills and the chance to start over in a cool city — why not take it?”

Jaq slumps back into the recliner. “I’d be leaving you in a bad place, too. It’s such short notice to find a roommate for next month.”

“I’ll talk to Trevor. I’m sure it won’t be a big deal.” Finn smiles encouragingly. “I might not like my next roommate as much, but if it means you get to go off and be happy, so be it.”

A lengthy moment of silence stretches out between them. Jaq stares at the frozen face of the women, mid-confessional interview, on the TV.

“You really think I should take the job?” they ask at last.

“I think you should,” Finn says. “My whole life was kind of falling apart before I moved here. I’ve been through a bad breakup, I had no idea what I was doing career-wise… and then I took a leap of faith and moved here, and I’m working in fashion, I’m meeting people — the future looks brighter than it ever did. But that would’ve had happened if I’d let all that stuff from the past keep a hold on me.”

Jaq scratches their head as they contemplate this.

“I’d definitely miss you,” Finn adds, “but you deserve to be happy. And maybe a fresh start is the key to that.”

“Wow,” Jaq says as they take out their phone.

“Wow what?”

Again Jaq stands from the recliner. “I’m really doing this. I’m going to call Diane and tell her I’m accepting the job.”

END OF EPISODE 1134

Is Jaq making the right decision in taking this job?
Should Christian open up to Bree and Marcus?
Why was Tori so jumpy when visiting Landon?
Talk about it all in the comments below!

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