cat!

Offering his sticky red credit over, you curl the corners of your lips in and feign an empathic smile. “Sorry, it declined again.”

The dazed man whips his head up at the sound of your voice over the bumping bass, eyes glazed and lips twisted in bewilderment. “Are you joking? Try one more time!”

Licking your lips, you shake your head, eyes flitting over to another customer at the end of the bar vying for your attention. The older man seemed impatient, looking to have been standing there and waiting for a while.

“I tried three times already. Sorry.”

When he starts denying it, continuing to leave your wrist tense while waiting for him to take his card, you place the piece of plastic down and stalk away before it could get worse. The dude was clearly already at his limit. It’s likely good his empty bank account had cut him off for the night.

Brushing hair away from your eyes, you cringe internally at the residue on your fingertips and then wipe them harshly on your jeans.

“Hi, what do you need?”

“Jesus fucking Christ, finally! 3 Snake Bites. Actually, make that four, an extra for the fucking wait I just had to endure!”

Biting your tongue, you bend to start his order, barely resisting the urge to roll your eyes. Pretending to not hear the burly customer over the chaos of the club doesn’t help because he leans closer across the bar to get in your face.

“You hear me right? 4 Snake Bites!”

“Yup, got it. Opening a tab?”

“Yeah, obviously!”

Now you turn, not willing to withhold the expression of annoyance anymore. This night already had you on your nerves and it was only past midnight.

Slapping four shot glasses in front of him, you pour and avoid looking in this dude’s eyes. He’s clearly still angry and more so by the next words he utters.

“Did you just roll your eyes at me?”

“Sir, I’m the only bartender working tonight, alright? It’s packed, I’m tired, and I’d rather not argue currently. Are you doing debit or credit?”

There’s a tick in his jaw and when his fist on the counter tightens, you hover your hand over the walkie-talkie on your waist.

“You have a big fucking attitude bitch, I should—”

Pressing the button, you walk away with the cocktail shaker towards the exit behind the counter, eyes scouring for the guard you’re paging.

“Johnny.”

“Yeah!”

“There’s a dumbass over here. You’ll see him, he’s stomping my way right now.”

There’s a crackle and then your coworker replies, “Coming babe, stay there.”

“Uh huh.”

You’re startled at the strength and speed with which the angry man reaches you, way faster than you had expected. Slipping slightly when backing up, his face screams furiosity for you to leave without hearing his derogatory comments.

Throwing the shaker in the sink, you slink quickly back over to the other end of the bar, hand on your walkie-talkie. Your finger lightens in color at the pressure you place on the button. Praying in your head doesn’t work fast enough because the customer clasps his meaty hand on your forearm, yanking you around.

His spit hits the side of your cheek but before he can let more than two words out, Johnny comes crashing in.

Dazily, you watch as the man screams and fights back from Johnny’s grip, trying his best to get back to you. Digging your nails into your thumbs, which usually helps to ground yourself, doesn’t, even as you attempt to suck in humid air that shakes with the music banging on your eardrums.

Too stimulated, you clench your eyes closed tight for only a second before a very loud yell interrupts you. It sounds so incredibly familiar and comforting that you can’t help but open your eyes to catch sight of him.

It’s been three weeks since that night.

“Y/N!”

Wiping your wet cheek, you face the call of your name, his warm caffeine-colored irises wide with concern.

“Jay.”

|—————|

“Are you alright?” Jay roams your face, seeking any type of shaken behavior.

Taking a deep breath, you nod, a small smile on your expression. It doesn’t reach your eyes. You take out a small and thin, rectangular tube of cardboard from your purse, one that Jay recognizes from Jake.

“You smoke now?”

Turning slightly to watch Jay’s expression, you’re a little surprised to see it blank at the lighter and the blunt you take out the box between your pointer and middle fingers.

“Yup.”

“Since when?”

Humming, you light it while pursing your lips. The end finally catches and you throw your head back to the moldy brick of the club, pulling from the small rolled joint.

“Maybe a week ago.”

Your peripheral sees Jay shift, hands deep in his pockets while he shuffles in the thin layer of brown April snow. The leaves on the ground scratch on the dirty cement from his movement and you blow out smoke to watch it fizzle and curl out in the cold 2 A.M. air.

You would’ve thought the silence would be suffocating. So suffocating that you’d do anything to avoid staying in it with Jay for so long but the preemptive haze you know will slide over your mind eases the anxiety.

You don’t even mind looking at Jay so directly. You can tell he’s a little worn down and not just because he went seeking out you tonight.

No, you can tell because he’s wearing an expensive black dress shirt that looks like his wrists are being choked. You think this is the first time you’ve seen Jay wear pants that aren’t ripped jeans or anything else that is wrinkled like it was left at the bottom of a basket for too long.

Jay hates doing laundry. He probably got some fancy dry cleaner place to do this suit for him. Or maybe his family’s maid to pick it up.

An unnecessary thought crosses you. “Where’s the suit jacket?”

Jay looks up for a split second before checking himself. “Oh,” he pats his sides, “It was stuffy. It’s in my car.”

A silent scoff leaves a trail of icy smoke from your nostrils. Tapping the end of the blunt, the ash withers to the ground, red to black.

He’s bothered by the uncaring smile on your lips. There’s a tilt to it that shows you’ve lost— something. Jay isn’t sure what and whether he should hope it’s because of him.

It does feel like sometimes punches his chest when you utter your next words though.

“Did you come to fuck?”

You pull from your joint again, making dead eye contact. Jay swallows harshly, dumbfounded by how lowly you think of him. Or maybe how lowly you think of yourself.

After all, Jay was beating himself up, driving all around the city and going to every bar he knew you worked shifts at. He had finally been driven to the wall in madness of how much he hated how things were left with you. Hated how he let you walk out of his place that night, especially how he didn’t fight hard enough for you.

And here you were. Somehow willing to accept Jay’s savior-complex-self back into your life. But… all for a fuck?

He’s somewhat angry at how you’re so ready to fall back into him. Jay has no right to feel that way. But if you were going to put up such a harrowing, hard, and unbeatable wall around yourself, you shouldn’t crumble so easily.

All for, in your kind words, “a fuck”.

“You really think I came to you for…” He can’t help but scoff in disbelief, “Sex?”

Saying it leaves a sour taste on his tongue.

“I don’t know, I kind of missed you.” You loll your head, cheek hitting the wall and eyes narrowed on the end of your blunt, “This guy I’ve been filming with recently isn’t really all that. I didn’t have to pretend to come with you.”

Jay’s jaw shifts, unbelieving of the words leaving your mouth. The long lashes you love on him so much blink hard and fast.

“Are you even hearing yourself right now? I—”

“Hm?” Finally kicking off the wall, you walk a step closer to Jay, “What?”

His hands stay locked in his pockets, red from the dropping temperature tonight, though they itch to shake some sense into you.

“Did you expect me to turn you away? After what?” You gesture towards his clothes, “After, clearly having the worst time at some stifling dinner party you went to. Isn’t that usually why you came to me all the time in the past? That’s why I came to you—”

“Don’t say this type of shit to me.”

He’s so calm with his words, looking down all high and mighty at you, you lose your cool for a moment. Fury flashes in your eyes.

“Say what!?” You humorlessly laugh, stepping forward to make Jay step back, “Why are you denying what our relationship was really like?”

Pressing him further and further with an invisible force, Jay’s back hit the opposing wall of the alley.

“It was all just sex, so I’m not sure why you were starting to get all attached—”

Jay lands a tight grip on your wrist’s next anticipated move, holding it rough enough to yank the lit blunt from your hold and dropping it. He doesn’t look down to stomp and dig the small flame out on the ground… but you do.

“You owe me money for that.”

He flares up at your comeback. “Stop it.”

Breathing unevenly out your nose, you can barely meet Jay’s hardened expression. Shame floods your insides. You want to get sick from the amount of overwhelming reality he snaps into your head but you didn’t eat too much today.

“You get enough of that out?” He leaves space for rhetoric, “Got it all out of your system, hm?”

Your chin tilts your face down but Jay doesn’t allow it, following by moving his to meet your embarrassed self.

“Don’t shy away now. Keep talking shit and trying to undermine what the fuck we had. Because now I know for a fact, you’re trying to push me away.”

You step back far enough to get Jay let loose on your wrist.

“You keep trying to hurt me and clearly do not see for yourself how much you’re hurting either.”

Lungs caving at his words, you curl in on yourself. Going back to leaning heavily on the club’s brick wall, you slide down and sit heavily on your ankles.

Exhaustion tightens your lower leg muscles and now the register of your throbbing temples further the dizziness. It doesn’t help either that your throat is now so taut you can’t let a coherent word out from emotion.

You can’t even let Jay know how exhausted you are now that you want to.

“Do you even know how much I adore you?”

Leaning your cheek on your crossed arms laid on your knees, you close your eyes. Pray for the rocking world at your feet to pass.

You strangle out, “We’re not good for each other.”

“Can I not decide that for myself?” He laughs without the humor and there’s a pause in Jay’s words.

They come out choked, “Because I think I’m okay with not being good for each other.”

“You deserve better.” You warble out, unable to continue looking at the pain you’re creasing into Jay.

You should push away the only person who’s gone out to look for you, sought and fought to love you for the first time in a long time. Right?

You had nipped that blooming bud of something good in your eternal winter of life. You had shut out one of the only people in your life to truly care for your broken self. But to only have one last time to redeem yourself, ending up completely hurting him again.

It’s an eternity where you sit there, trying to even out your breathing. The sound of the mushy snow in receding footsteps makes your heartbeat climb to your ears.

You choke out a cry soon after. The faucet is loosened to let the tears fall finally. The pressure of everything on your shoulders should crush you. And it’s so close to doing so.

At least until the weight of a jacket is draped over you. Jay plants himself beside you before wrapping a warm arm over your back, gently rubbing before curling the other to cradle your head into his chest.

You’ve never held onto someone so tightly before, knuckles going white and digging so hard into his solid body that you’re sure Jay is hurting. But he withstands it all, quiet and there for you as you crack and fall apart in his arms.

His own heart crumbles from the quiet pain that seeps from the sounds you make. Hearing the anguish that’s been built up for so long makes Jay want to forever hold you like this; regardless of how his fancy dress shirt is soaked now or the creases his shoes are bound to get. Regardless of how much hurt you’ve caused him because he knows you have a good heart. A heart that’s been dragged in the dirt for too long.

You make him want to keep the smile you get on your face when he buys you the right Gatorade from the convenience store down his street.

Or the specific rare laugh you let out when he’s so ridiculously knowledgeable on the most random thing while drunk, spewing facts.

Or the tired, mumbling voice you have when you just woke up, eyes bleary while you rub and walk like a grandma around his place.

The way you clutch to his shirt when walking through the people on the dance floor, afraid to get lost with sloshing tequila down your sticky fingers. Your smell after a shower, his shampoo, and his band tee on but also your natural scent sneaking in to land on his pillowcase for a week.

The way you were embarrassed to start wearing your glasses around him because you were afraid they were too big for your face, but also too afraid to replace them. Sneaking his take-out food from his container even though you had your own box, claiming stealing made it taste better.

The way you lean on anyone around you when cackling in laughter, willing to lose sight while your eyes scrunch. Silently tying your friend group’s shoes, no matter the time or weather, sober or blackout wasted.

The way you scratch at the nape of his neck in bed, slow but with purpose. Curling your knee around his leg and splaying a wide palm to his tummy, falling asleep to the feel of it rising and falling. Your unfiltered noises and sounds, all for him.

You make him want to show you the little good parts in life.

“Do you know how much I love you?”

You can only sniffle and sob louder into Jay, clutching to his sides with a death grip. He laughs, chest shaking you on him as he looks up to the night air, stars never in sight in this city.

“You should… You should know.” He sighs out to the moon, hoping the world was listening so maybe have it go easier on you, just for tonight.

“Why do you, hm? Why?” You painfully yell past wet cries, weakly punching him with no real intent.

Jay thinks of all the specifics but settles for curling the wet hair behind your ears. “I just do. Should there only be a few reasons to love someone?”

Managing to gather yourself after a few moments, you nod. “I love you for a lot.”

“Yeah?” Jay grins so big, his cheeks hurt from doing so.

“Yeah. So I’m sorry,” You twist and curl your arms back around Jay’s neck, hiding your messy face in the crook of his neck. “I’m really, really sorry. I’m scared but I want you now. Nothing else.”

Jay’s hand hooks at your shoulders, “Is that what you really want?”

Your small and muffled voice makes it to his ears. And he wishes he could turn back time already to be able to hear your next words over and over again, whenever he wanted.