Give them no reason to stare, no slipping up if you slip away

Morgana was still eyeing Nick cautiously, like she wasn’t sure what to make of the things he was saying. He’d been very open and honest with her, showing her the real him. He just hoped that would help her open up to him in turn.

But he wasn’t holding his breath.

“Nick… what you just said… about maybe… being willing to do those things… if you get to know me better… you weren’t lying, were you?” Her red eyes glistened with tears. It must have been hard to see, crying through those contacts.

Nick swallowed and nodded his head rapidly. “Yes!” He declared. “Absolutely, I swear.”

“Even… even though I’m such a weirdo?” She was raising up her walls again, not willing to let him inside. “Even though I’m just a kid?”

“Well…” Morgana was young, there was no denying that. Young and immature. But he was sure he could help her come out of her shell and make friends with the others.

Nick swallowed, and wondered if he was going to go to hell for what he said next. “I don’t think it’s that big of a deal,” he finally replied. “Yes, you’re young, but you’re an adult. If you’re a bit more mature… then… maybe…”

He knew it was kind of a shitty thing to say. But he wasn’t going to lead Morgana on with false promises of some happy ever after that he wasn’t sure he could make good on when push came to shove. Nick’s issues with having sex with Morgana had started due to age, but the more that he thought about it the more he realized that wasn’t the case.

The issue wasn’t that Morgana was 18. It was that she acted like she was 15.

Sylvia had caused her body to go through some growth spurts. But her mind? That still had a lot of room to grow.

And he wondered, looking at her twisted and confused expression, if she knew that on some level.

Morgana looked into his eyes, and she could see how concerned he was about her. Everything he was saying, he was saying it for her sake.

But her brain wouldn’t let her believe it.

He doesn’t want you. Not really. He’s not your friend. You don’t have friends. Those other girls, you think they’re nice to you? They’re just humoring you because they know you’re going to be gone soon. Nobody would ever want to make friends with a weirdo like you. You think you’ve changed because your acne’s gone? Because you’ve got those huge melons stuffed into your shirt now? No, everyone knows that the real you is just some unlikable freak. Even if you did have a friend, they’d just abandon you in a second.

Morgana started trembling.

“H-hey, are you okay?” Nick led her over to the couch and sat her down on it. “Morgana, what’s wrong?”

She didn’t know what to say. She just started to cry.

“It’s… *hic* it’s nod real,” she sobbed. “None ob it ish real…”

Nick could see she was breaking down emotionally. He went and retrieved some tissues, and wiped away the tears and snot from her face.

“What isn’t real?” He asked.

“The other girls… you… you’re all pretending to be my friends…” Morgana looked completely deflated. “But I’m not going to fall for that… I don’t make friends… I…”

She started to shake, and then she shook her head even more vigorously than the rest of her. “No, this… this isn’t me!” She frantically protested. “It’s not, I just… I… I know I’m not right, but even so, I just can’t… I…”

Morgana couldn’t remember when the bullying started. It wasn’t her cousin who did it, but some girl at school. And when she told her… ugh… the woman who called herself Morgana’s “mother” that she’d gotten picked on, she’d received mountains of concern and worry.

And a statement that she’d never forget.

“Sweetheart, I’m so sorry! Your cousin never had any issues with bullies when she was your age. Why don’t you give her a call, and see what advice she has for you?”

Ah, yes. Morgana’s cousin.

Thanks, “mom”. Could we go with ONE conversation, please, that doesn’t involve you comparing me to Karen?

Every time talk of Morgana’s stupid perfect cousin came up, her family had nothing but great things to say about her. It was clear that her parents wished Karen had been their daughter, instead of an awkward girl like Morgana.

And that had just been the start of it.

“I-I’m sorry…” She sniffled, gazing up into Nick’s eyes. “I want to believe you… but I’m scared. I-I know… I know that you wouldn’t lie to me… that you’re being honest… and deep down inside, I also know that the other girls, they don’t hate me… Marley… she was really reaching out to me, wasn’t she?”

Morgana knew all that, but even so…

“That’s Marley,” Nick nodded. “She was really just trying to be friendly.”

Friendly.

That made Morgana feel even worse.

“I want to believe it… but it’s like… it’s like I can’t,” she confessed. “Every time I have hope that things could be better, that someone might like the real me… it’s like there’s this voice in the back of my head condemning me, telling me that I’m shit. That no one would like a creepy goth weirdo like me, who pretends to be a witch.”

She hated that voice so much. But she couldn’t help listen to it whenever her heart was wavering.

Nick grimaced. How could he fix this? How could he show her that her worries were just worries, and that the other girls didn’t have any problem with her?

Hell. I bet even if I had sex with her, she’d somehow twist it around into thinking that I didn’t really like her, I was just taking pity on her or something. This girl is too much, really, I swear.

Nick knew exactly how Morgana’s brain worked. Because once upon a time, he’d had a voice like that in his head, too. He’d had his own doubts and insecurities convincing him that nobody liked him and nobody wanted to be with him.

He’d managed to overcome that through a lot of hard work. And the affections of the people in his so-called harem didn’t hurt, either.

Could something like that work for Morgana?

Nick sighed, and took the girl by the hand. He was surprised that her skin was so smooth and tender. She seemed so small and delicate, like a porcelain doll…

He quickly shook his head, snapping out of the haze of his emotions. “Okay, um… Morgana… listen, I know you don’t believe me…”

“I do believe you!” Morgana exclaimed. Her voice cracked. “But… I also… I also don’t…”

What a twisted situation. It made Nick’s head hurt.

He sighed again.

“I’m sorry!” Morgana blubbered. She tried to draw back her hand, but Nick held onto it tight. “I’m so sorry… I know… I know this is dumb, but… I’ve had to live with it for so long…”

“Don’t worry, I get it,” Nick said, trying the best he could not to sound condescending or judgmental. “That’s why you always act like a witch, right? To drive people away. Because you know you can’t trust them to stick around anyway. So you’d rather reject them first, isn’t that right?”

Morgana sniffled, and then she nodded.

Nick swallowed. This next part might lead to a big blowup, but he needed to say it anyway. “But Morgana, I think… I think that’s not the truth.”

Morgana’s eyes widened. He was calling her a liar?! “What?!” She cried, her voice filling with both sorrow and rage in equal amounts of frustration. “I-I’m not lying, I-!”

“I know you’re not lying!” Nick quickly said. “Not intentionally, anyway, not to me! But I think… isn’t the real reason you pretend to be a witch… don’t you want someone to accept you, regardless of how you act?”

Morgana froze. Her eyes widened. “You… but… that’s…”

Now that the words were floating out there, Morgana could see the truth of them with her own eyes. Maybe… maybe Nick was right. Maybe that was what this whole thing was about after all.

“I understand that,” Nick said, his tone turning gentle. “It’s a little bit of both, right? Pretending to be some all-powerful mega-witch, that’s your way of screening people, I think. If they see you acting like that and push you away, then good riddance. You didn’t need them anyway, right?”

Morgana swallowed and nodded, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“But on the other hand… if they don’t care about how you’re acting, and they want to be your friend anyway… that’s good, right?” Nick pressed. “It means you’ve finally found someone who will accept you and be your friend, even when you’re acting like this.”

Frankly, it was a rather immature decision. The sort of thinking that came with the territory of an anime-obsessed social outcast.

Now, how did he make her see that?

“So you get it,” Morgana mumbled, pulling her feet up onto the couch and hugging her legs. “Nobody would want to be around someone like me…”

Nick sighed. He sat down next to her and patted her on the back. He was relieved that she didn’t push him away.

“Morgana… I think you’re holding the rest of us up to too high of a standard,” he confessed.

Morgana raised her head and stared at him incredulously.

“What?” A bit of anger started to leach into her voice, which Nick expected. But he didn’t let that stop him. He wanted to talk some sense into this girl, and this was the only way he could.

It would cause her to get mad at him at first, but it was the best option he had.

“Listen, I get it, I was there, I understand how that line of thinking works,” Nick assured her. The fact that he’d been able to recognize that trait in the young girl spoke to that more than enough. “But… that way of thinking… it’s a dead end.”

“What do you mean?” Morgana asked cautiously.

“I mean the whole ‘I’m going to behave in a way that pushes others away, so that only the right people who see the real me will accept me’ is really, really dumb,” Nick said bluntly, waiting for her to get upset. He didn’t like saying this stuff any more than Morgana liked hearing it, but the fact remained that it was the truth. “Listen, Morgana, other people aren’t necessarily bad just because they don’t want to be friends with someone who’s difficult to get along with. Some people can only put up with so much, alright? And they’ll gravitate towards the people in their lives who don’t require as much energy to spend time with.”

Morgana looked like she was about to cry. But Nick couldn’t stop here. She needed to hear this.

“I understand the compulsion to want to find only the ‘real’ friends, but honestly, I’m not surprised it hasn’t happened yet,” Nick said gently. “Putting on a façade like that, it makes a lot of people not WANT to get to know the real you, or ‘accept you for who you are’. And that doesn’t mean they’re bad people. It just means… I guess it just means they’ve got their own bullshit to deal with, you know? And people who make themselves the center of attention… they take a lot of getting used to.”

Nick stared at the goth girl as his words sunk in. He simultaneously hoped that he’d been harsh enough without being too harsh.

He didn’t want to cause the poor girl to have a mental break.

But it seemed like Morgana was really considering the stuff he was saying.

“Dawn…” She finally said, looking up into Nick’s eyes. “Dawn, she… she said something similar… and Gina, too.”

Nick smiled a little, relieved that she hadn’t completely snapped. “Well, they’re pretty smart women. …Okay, well, Dawn is. Gina…”

“I know,” Morgana giggled a little.

Nick sighed in relief. “Morgana, like I said before, deep down you’re a good girl. And it seems like you’ve realized that just pretending to be someone you’re not isn’t going to help you make any friends, isn’t that right?”

Morgana nodded glumly. “Yeah… I… I know. But sometimes… like I said, my head…”

“Just ignore all that stuff,” Nick urged her. He took her hands and held them tightly. “No, better yet, what’s your voice telling you about me?”

Morgana stared into his eyes and squinted. “Right now… I’m… I’m trying to figure out if I can trust you or not.”

“And what do you think?” Nick pressed.

“I-I want to,” Morgana admitted. “Because of course I do. But in the back of my mind, I keep hearing that voice telling me that you’re lying, that you’re just pretending to care about me… because you want to humiliate me, or something. Compare me to the other girls and make me feel awful?”

Nick was scandalized. “I would never do something like that!” He exclaimed, ignoring all the times he’d done just that to Holly.

She liked it anyway. Didn’t count.

“I-I know you wouldn’t!” Morgana tried to tear her hands away and return to her ball, but Nick held onto her tightly. “But I just… I don’t know…”

She felt like she was going to cry. Again. It had been one of those mornings.

“You know it’s true, you’re just having trouble believing it, huh?” Nick said quietly. “Trust me, I know a little bit about that, too.”

He remembered how many times Carly had thrown herself at him. Not just on the island, but way back in the old days. All the advances she made, the innuendo… she’d practically been wafting her pheromones in his direction with a giant fan, but he was too gun-shy from the drama with Dawn and Dani (not to mention all his other issues) that he hadn’t been able to take that leap.

Nick rubbed his fingers against the palms of Morgana’s hands. It really did feel nice to touch her… even though he shouldn’t…

“I… where was I?” Nick shook himself out of his daze. “…Sorry. But like I was saying, Morgana… I know what it’s like to have doubts, even about something you know is true. But I promise, I’m not using you, I’m not trying to humiliate you, and as far as caring about you goes? I’m not pretending. I swear. I really do care about you, Morgana.”

Morgana gazed up into his eyes and nodded shyly. “I… I know,” she admitted, her pale cheeks turning red.

“But you just have a hard time believing it, right?” Nick sighed and nodded. “I wish I could help with that… really, I do. But I’m not a therapist. I wouldn’t even know where to start, when it comes to fixing an insecurity like that. I can do my best, but…”

“You’ve done enough,” Morgana urged him. “Really, it’s okay. I feel a lot better, I honestly do!”

Nick wished he could believe her. But part of him still thought that she was putting on a tough exterior for his sake.

“…How about this?” He said after a moment’s contemplation, getting up off the couch and looking down at Morgana. She stared up at him anxiously, wondering what he was going to say.

“What if we attack this problem at the source?” He suggested. “You said that you were scared that the other girls didn’t really like you, right? That they were just pretending to like you, for… what reason, again?”

Morgana just shrugged. She didn’t have any sensical reason for feeling the way she did. Even she was aware it was mostly her insecurity sabotaging her relationships with the others.

“Well, then the best thing I can think of to fix this problem is if we go attack it at the source,” Nick repeated himself. “And by that, I mean we go see what all the other girls are doing today, and spend some time having fun with them. What do you think?”

Morgana looked at him the way a deer might look at an incoming truck.

“Wh-wh-wh-whaaaaat!?” She stammered, shaking like a leaf in a tornado. “You… you want me to… what?!”

Part of the reason Morgana had run into the Master’s Suite had been to run out the clock. She knew she needed to come here anyway tonight, so she might as well save some time and just camp out for the rest of the day.

The thought of leaving had never crossed her mind.

“Morgana, I think we need to do this,” Nick urged. He really didn’t want to see her get eliminated. Frankly, he didn’t want anyone to get eliminated; but Morgana really needed some personal growth to go along with her physical growth.

And from the many therapy sessions he’d had with Sylvia, he wasn’t sure if she’d be all that interested in an exit transformation that would actually help the poor goth’s self-esteem issues.

“I-I…” Morgana was busy trying to come up with excuses about why she couldn’t leave, which meant Nick had plenty of time to try convincing her.

“You’re a great girl, Morgana, I’m sure you are,” Nick coaxed. “And that’s why we have to do this. Not just so you can accept that people want to be your friend, but also because you need to work on fostering your relationships, so that you have people who will want you to be their buddy.”

That’s what the Auditionee needed. And Nick guessed that’s why Marley had reached out to her this morning.

Mimi had made friends with a lot of the girls, and everyone cared about her. But when push came to shove, everyone who won picked someone else, instead, even though they liked Mimi.

The result of that had been tragic. And while it may have gone okay for Mimi/Marley in the long run, it didn’t change how painful that moment had been.

He didn’t want Morgana to go through something similar if she could help it.

“What do you say?” Nick coaxed her, flexing the fingers of his extended hand to urge Morgana to come over to his side.

With a sigh, she looked up into his eyes, accepted his outstretched hand, and got off the couch.

“…Okay,” she mutely agreed.