"I don't know." He sighs, and he doesn't even try to cover it up, noting dryly to himself that he's one big roller coaster ride lately. Up and down and looping. Over and over and over...

"Story of my life, I guess. No one knows, and as far as I know, no one really wants to."

He looks up, smiling (and he can feel how fake it is, so fake it's cracking like a slab of mud on a hot summer's day). "It is what it is, right?"