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Flight Risk — 15.1K [!!]

Two years should have been enough for you to move on from a heartbreaking situationship. However, Jake’s return to North Island proves that time doesn’t necessarily heal all wounds.

Additional Cuts

My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys — 2K

Jake Seresin has pushed through the worst of war, but nothing can compare to the fear of you saying I love you. So he runs.

Grounded in the Afterburn — 1.8K

Jake Seresin buries himself in work—until a stitched red heart and a conversation with his father force him to confront the love he’s been too scared to claim.

Strangers Again — 1.8K

Returning to North Island is one thing. Seeing you at the Hard Deck is another. This may be the toughest thing Jake's had to do yet.

Here Comes the Sun — 2.6K

The morning after is never easy, especially not when Jake wakes up alone. Not when you can't even look at him.

More Than Time — 1.8K

Attending Javy's wedding has Jake thinking about his future with you — and how beautiful you would look in white.

Your call goes to voicemail for the fourth time. You send your twelfth text: I hope you’re ok. I landed an hour ago. Please call me. Nothing different than the eleven other messages that have gone unanswered. Forty-five more minutes pass of you sitting on a bench by the airport exit before you finally surrender your last shred of hope and call Bradley to come save you. 

Within the hour, you’re sighing in relief, the sight of a friendly face almost bringing you to tears. He approaches you with open arms and you fall right into the embrace, comforted by the hug that should be in your boyfriend’s arms, and the warmth that should be from your boyfriend’s body, and the forehead kiss that should be from your boyfriend’s lips. 

“Please tell me he’s ok,” you say against your friend’s chest. 

A heavy palm rubs up and down your back. “No one could get ahold of him.”

Your head jerks back so you can meet his eyes. “Oh my god!”

“I’m sure he’s fine, kid. Don’t worry.”

“How can you say that? He was supposed to be here and he’s not and–” You pause when Bradley looks away from you, and a hefty stone settles in your gut. You know your friend well. He’s a good man, honest but sensitive, and when that honestly meets that sensitivity, it results in his inability to look someone in the eye if he thinks the truth might hurt them. You’ve seen it a hundred times, but never with you. 

Your posture wavers with your lengthy exhale. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Another great thing about Bradley: he doesn’t make you play any games. You don’t have to jump through hoops. You don’t have to ask the right questions in the right way in order to get what you need out of him, unlike many men, your boyfriend included, who recently has found ways to skitter around telling the full truth. 

“Javy said he saw him a couple of hours ago,” Bradley says.

Your back teeth clench. Your mind shoots to one conclusion. “With her?” you ask. Bradley’s eyes drift from yours again and you nod, a tear at the ready to leak down your cheek. “He forgot about me because he’s with her.”

“We don’t know that for sure, and–”

Your hand scrubbing down your face cuts him off. Your fingers pinch the bridge of your nose before you suck in your whimper and say, “Rooster, why did he even ask me to come here?”

“Because he…I mean, we thought he–”

“You thought he gave a fuck about me.”

“He does,” Bradley says, stressing his words in an attempt to reassure you. “He never shuts up about you.”

“Sure,” you say. “He gives so much of a fuck that he forgot about me to be with his ex. How can you explain that?”

Rooster sighs. His hands slip into his jeans pockets just to have something to do with them. “I can’t.”

“Exactly.” 

No one can explain it. Not you, not Bradley, not Jake. Everyone you know back home would be telling you to run for the hills right now. They were already wary of this ‘Navy guy’ that they’d only met twice around the holidays, who lives a decent distance away from your entire life and who constantly requests that you be the one to hop on a plane rather than the other way around. 

For the duration of your time together, you’ve been understanding of that sacrifice. You know his schedule doesn’t allow impromptu trips out of state, but that hasn’t made it any less exhausting for you. And maybe that’s a sign. Another sign. A nail in the coffin. Maybe you and Jake aren’t meant to be. And why would you be? You met him on a brief vacation to visit a friend who doesn’t even live in the same town anymore, and somehow, during those few days, he convinced you to take a chance on him. So you took the leap. But being that bold doesn’t guarantee you won’t fall flat on your face, and you think that’s exactly what’s happening. You’ve tripped over a guy only to realize he doesn’t care about you to the same degree that you care about him. 

However, you’re not the type to avoid confrontation. If Jake Seresin is going to mistreat you because of his ex, then he is going to do it to your face. He’s going to look you in the eye when he shows himself to be the liar he is. It may hurt more to go to him rather than get on the next plane home without so much as taking in a breath of fresh Californian air, but you’re too upset to let that thought fully develop, and a moment later, Rooster is following your stomps out the door. 

—

You find him at the Hard Deck, standing at a hightop with a beer glass in his hand that clinks against the one in his ex’s before he takes a sip. Bradley’s comforting hand lands on your back in solidarity. You only met him because of Jake, but the two of you bonded despite their differences, and having him by your side now makes him nothing short of a life-saver. 

He helps guide you through the crowd to the table, and when Jake spots you, he chokes around the liquid going down his throat. His blown-out emerald eyes rival saucers and his mouth gapes like a fish, but then his stare flicks to Bradley, and those eyes shrink into narrow slits. His face heats to a boiling red. 

“What the fuck!” Jake snaps, shocking the composure right out of his ex’s poised stance. Bar patrons close by turn their heads but quickly return to their own conversations. Jake steps away from the table, coming to a halt in front of you and his squadmate. “What the hell is this?”

You figured he’d be bothered if you showed up with Bradley in tow. And good, that’s what you feel he deserves. Jake’s been wary of the other Dagger’s closeness to you for a while, and even though you know—as does Bradley—that it’s an asinine concern, you have no problem using it against him now. But still, the intensity of his reaction manages to surprise you. You didn’t think he would be this angered by the sight of you with another man that it would have him overlooking his mistake of forgetting you.

Your arms cross. “This is your girlfriend and the guy who saved her when her damn boyfriend left her stranded at the airport.”

“Excuse me?”

Jake’s ex’s prying gaze tugs at your attention, but when you glance over his shoulder to catch her in the act, she quickly looks away—just more proof that whatever the fuck she’s doing with your boyfriend is something to be ashamed of. 

Bradley’s saying something. You can’t quite hear him over the anger-induced fuzzing in your ears, but you’re pretty sure it’s a scolding based on the twisting of Jake’s features as he shoots back his own words of aggression. And then your hand is in his and you’re being pulled through the bar, out the back door, and onto the deck where the only intrusive sound is the lapping of waves on the shore. 

“Why are you here?” he asks. 

You scoff to mask the heartbreak that comes with that question. “Because you asked me to be here.”

“Tomorrow.”

“What?”

“It’s Wednesday,” he says. 

“It’s Thursday, Jake.”

“No, it’s—” he freezes, and you don’t know if he’s tipsy or stupid, but it takes him a minute to come to the same conclusion: it is indeed Thursday. “Fuck,” he mutters.

Your lower back meets the edge of the railing, and you sigh, thankfully keeping in the tears. “What are you doing with her?”

“What the fuck are you doing with Rooster?” he returns much more forcefully. “Why didn’t you call me?”

“I called, I texted, I left voicemails,” you tell him, “But clearly, she was more important.”

Jake’s hands pat down his pockets, mouth setting in a frown when he can’t find his phone.

“Don’t bother. Phone or no phone, you forgot about me because of her. Last time I was here, you were late for one of our dates because of her. You spent fifty percent of our time together stepping away to take her phone calls,” you say, trying and failing to avoid the bitter taste on your tongue. “Just fuck her, Jake, if you haven’t already. I only came here to tell you that she can have you.”

You’ve never seen him fall apart the way he does. You’ve never seen the blood drain from his cocky face. You’ve never seen his features break and crack and contort into the vision of pure devastation as they do. His parted mouth must’ve gone dry because his next words come out slightly hoarse.

“You don’t mean that,” he says, but it’s more of a plea than anything. “Why…Why would you–” He swallows. A wrinkle forms between his brows and he shakes his head. “You love me. You didn’t mean to say that.”

You do love him—terribly so—but you’re willing to be one of those people who won’t view love as enough if it also means laying you out as a fool. “Jake–”

“Take it back,” he says. His steps are quick, and then you’re trapped where you stand, his hands on either side of your body, gripping the rail. Eyes drill into yours, and for a second, you feel a pang of guilt. “Please, baby, take it back. She doesn’t mean anything to me.”

“And I mean less.”

“No!” he says. “That’s not true. You’re everything, ok? You mean everything to me. She was just helping me, that’s all.”

“Helping you,” you mimic with a roll of your eyes. “Helping you what? Get off?”

With a little whine, Jake’s head drops between his shoulders, his blond hair brushing your collarbone. “Please. Please quit saying things like that.” His hands slide closer to your body and land on your hips. You don’t push him away—you can't—and his touch softens you ever so slightly.

“Then tell me the truth,” you say. “Right now. I’m giving you one shot.”

His head snaps up. His eyes flick back and forth between yours, ironically searching for your honesty, as if you’re the liar on trial here. 

“It was a surprise,” he tells you. “She’s a realtor now, and for the last few months she’s been helping me find a new place, one that’s bigger than what I’ve got because I was going to ask you to move in with me.” Your heartbeat stutters. A layer of goosebumps coats your arms. When you don’t respond, he continues, “I hate missing you. I hate how unfair it is that you’re always the one to come here because I can’t fly out at the drop of a hat. I know it’s a big step, but I figured if I had a place, I could show you how great things could be. That’s why she and I came here. We were celebrating because I’m signing on a house first thing tomorrow,” he says. “Well, that’s why I’m celebrating, anyway. She’s probably celebrating because she just made a decent commission.”

It’s almost unfair how that new information doesn’t make you feel any less of a fool. Had he told you that under any other circumstances, you’d be leaping into his arms, kissing him like you’ve been deprived of him for years, repeating ‘yes’ over and over between those kisses, but you can’t. You can’t because his explanation doesn’t fix everything. 

“That still doesn’t change that it’s Thursday, not Wednesday,” you say.

“I know, baby. That’s my fault. I was so excited, and I was thinking how perfect the timing was that I would be able to pick you up tomorrow and drive you by the house now that it’s officially mine, but I fucked it up.”

Jake’s thumbs press into your hips, and you’re instantly reminded of each moment in your relationship when you’ve felt that same light pressure on your skin. A gentle claiming. The same pressure you felt when you agreed to be his girlfriend. The same pressure you feel whenever you’re in bed together. 

You sense eyes on you other than your boyfriend’s, and when you turn your head, you find his ex staring right at you, an expression on her face that you wish you could say wasn’t one of distress, but it is. And worse, it’s obviously not distress for herself, but for Jake, as if she’s hoping she wasn’t just a contributor to a bomb dropping on his life. 

Jake’s busy staring at you despite your averted gaze, and in a monotone voice, you say, “She feels bad.”

He doesn’t follow your eyes. “Because she knows I’ve been doing this all for you.”

You blink. Your hand runs down your face before sifting through the strands of your hair. “You really want me to live with you?”

“Of course I do,” he tells you. He’s shaking his head, but you know it’s because he thinks any idea that he wouldn’t want you to be blasphemous. His hand cups your chin. “I love you.”

With a sigh, you push aside the rollercoaster of emotions, the misunderstandings that lead to frustration and hurt, and look him directly in the eye. And where moments ago you thought you saw lies, you see honestly. Where you thought you saw betrayal, you see love. 

“Can I see it?”

—

It’s small—a two-bedroom with a little driveway, the shingle siding painted a blue-gray shade that is more blue than gray; bundles of flowers bloom in the boxes under the windows; a bay window protrudes from the side of the structure facing the beach. And it’s perfect.

You can imagine building a life here. You can picture a dog that you’ll have to build a fence for and children years later that will have you reinforcing the fence because they’ll probably be like their father, and Jake didn’t choose to be a pilot because of his lack of adventurous nature. You look at this house and you can see the core of a family. A house that, no matter how far you go for Jake’s job, will always be home base.

Jake is leaning around you so you can both watch the house from the passenger seat window. “I’d offer to show you around, but I don’t get the keys until morning.”

“It’s ok,” you tell him. “I don’t need to see inside.”

When you say that, he falls back into his seat. The back of his head presses against the headrest. His fingers squeeze the steering wheel with his sigh of defeat. “You don’t like it.”

Shifting your body to face him, you say, “Jake, I love it.”

Just like that, his eyes brighten like a pouting child who was just offered a lollipop, and you can’t help but chuckle. You can’t help but forget everything that happened earlier in the night, all of it seeming so insignificant now, even though you know it’s not, and you both know that if he ever makes the same mistake again, he’ll have hell to pay. But something tells you that won’t be a problem. 

“Enough to live with me?” he asks.

You nod. “Enough to live with you.”

---

It went fine, for a while. His daddy set up two lines and dozed off in a lawn chair the way grown men did on hot afternoons, and Jake stood out on the flat rock at the edge of the deep pool, showing off, casting his line further than he had any real skill to justify, and you sat in the grass twenty feet off pretending you weren't watching.

You never did find out exactly how you ended up in the water. One second you were standing at the edge trying to see what he'd caught, and the next the bank gave way beneath your sneakers and the creek swallowed you whole, cold and fast and a great deal deeper than it had looked from dry land. You went under once, twice, water in your mouth and your ears roaring, and you would tell people for years afterward that you didn't remember being scared so much as you remembered being surprised, like your body hadn't caught up yet to how much trouble it was in.

What you did remember, clear as anything, was Jake.

He didn't hesitate. Didn't call for his daddy, didn't stop to think about it — just went in after you, fully clothed, fishing rod abandoned on the rock, and got a fistful of your shirt and hauled you both toward the bank with more strength than his skinny nine-year-old arms had any business having. His daddy was already up out of the lawn chair and running by the time they broke the surface, wading in the last few feet to help haul you both up onto the grass, and you would swear afterward that you heard him mutter something under his breath the whole way in, quick and low and half a prayer — don't take her, don't you dare take her, not this one, not today — like the thought of losing the girl next door was one his own heart couldn't survive either.

"I told you," Jake said, when it was just the two of you again, sitting soaked and shivering in the shade while his daddy went to fetch dry towels, "it's a boys' thing. You could've drowned."

"You went in after me."

"'Course I did." He said it like it was the most obvious fact in the world, like there had never been another option on the table. "Wasn't gonna just let you drown, was I. Wasn't gonna be the one who let 'em take you."

You didn't know, at nine years old, what it meant that he'd said it that plainly, that certainly, like the idea of a world without you in it wasn't one he was willing to entertain even for a second. You just knew you stopped being scared of him teasing you after that, and he stopped telling you that fishing was a boys' thing, and by the end of that summer he was hauling you down to the creek right alongside him, tackle box and all, without a single complaint.

II. The Night of the Homecoming Dance

You were sixteen the year Jake Seresin got his driver's license and his ego at roughly the same time, and the two of you had spent the years between the creek and that fall doing what small-town kids did — growing up alongside each other so gradually you barely noticed it happening, right up until the night of the homecoming dance, when you noticed it all at once.

He picked you up in his daddy's truck, hair combed for once in his life, wearing a button-down that still had the fold creases in it from the store, and stood on your porch looking so nervous you almost laughed.

"You look nice," he said, too fast, like he'd rehearsed it.

"You look like you ironed that shirt with your hands."

"I did iron it with my hands. Didn't know we had an actual iron."

You laughed properly then, and something in his shoulders eased, and the two of you drove to the dance with the windows down and the radio too loud, and it was, for a while, exactly like every other night the two of you had spent together — easy, familiar, comfortable as an old pair of boots.

It stopped being comfortable somewhere around the third song, when he pulled you out onto the floor and put his hands, careful and a little stiff, at your waist, and you realized you'd never actually been held by Jake Seresin before. Pulled out of creeks, teased mercilessly, driven around back roads at speeds his daddy would've killed him for — but never just held, quiet, close, his chin nearly resting against your hair.

"You're awful quiet," he said.

"So are you."

"I'm concentrating. Don't want to step on your feet in front of the whole school."

"Since when do you care what the whole school thinks?"

"Since it's you I'd be stepping on." He said it lightly, but his hands had tightened just slightly at your waist, and when you tipped your head back to look at him he wasn't wearing the easy, cocky grin he wore for everyone else — he was looking at you like he was working up to something and hadn't quite found the nerve.

"Jake."

"Yeah?"

"You're doing the thing where you almost say something and then don't."

"Been doing that all night, have I."

"Every year, actually. I've just started noticing."

That got a real laugh out of him, startled and a little embarrassed, and he ducked his head, and when he looked back up some of the nerves had settled into something steadier. "Fine," he said. "Since you noticed. I like you. Have for a while, if I'm honest, longer than I've had the guts to say so. Figured I'd tell you before some other fool at this dance beat me to it."

"That's the least smooth I've ever heard you sound."

"I'm aware. Give me a break, I've never done this before."

You didn't make him wait long for an answer. You'd known, somewhere under the teasing and the creek water and a decade of growing up two houses apart, that this particular night was always going to arrive eventually — and when it did, standing on a school gymnasium floor under sagging paper streamers, you kissed Jake Seresin for the first time and felt him go still with surprise before he properly, thoroughly kissed you back.

"Well," he said, a little dazed, when you finally broke apart. "Wish I'd said something years ago."

"You had years. You spent them telling me fishing was a boys' thing."

"I was nine. Cut me some slack."

You were still riding the high of it an hour later, windows down again, radio low this time instead of loud, taking the long way home because neither of you wanted the night to end yet — until Jake pulled into the gas station off Route 9 for coffee neither of you needed, just an excuse to keep the night going a little longer.

The man came in about two minutes after you did. You noticed him before Jake did — the way he stood too long by the door, the way his hand stayed jammed in his jacket pocket like it was holding something he didn't want seen — and you'd barely opened your mouth to say something when he crossed to the counter, pulled a gun on the kid working the register, and told everyone in the store to get down, right now, hands where he could see them.

Jake put himself between you and the man before you'd even finished processing what was happening. Didn't think about it, the same way he hadn't thought twice at the edge of that creek years earlier — just moved, quiet and immediate, angling his body so that whatever came next would have to go through him first.

"Easy," Jake said, low, hands raised, voice steadier than you had any right to expect from a boy still wearing his homecoming button-down. "Nobody's gotta get hurt here. Take whatever you want out of the register. Take my wallet, take the truck keys, they're right here—" He was already working his keys out of his pocket, sliding them slowly across the linoleum. "Whatever you need. Just — that's it. That's all there is to take."

The man's eyes flicked to you, crouched behind Jake's shoulder, and something in his expression shifted, calculating, and Jake's whole body went rigid in a way you'd never seen from him before, not even the day he'd hauled you dripping out of that creek.

"Hey." Jake's voice dropped even lower, every ounce of his usual cockiness stripped clean out of it, replaced by something plain and urgent and entirely sincere. "Whatever you're here for, it's not her. You can have everything else in this store twice over. Take the money, take the truck, take anything you want — just don't take the girl. Please. Don't take her."

Whether it was the money, or the keys, or something in the flat, unflinching way Jake said it like he meant to make good on every word behind it — the man grabbed the cash from the drawer, snatched the keys off the floor, and was gone into the dark before the door had even finished swinging shut behind him.

For a long moment afterward, nobody in the store moved. Then Jake turned, dropped to his knees in front of you right there on the gas station floor, and pulled you into him so hard you felt the shake in his hands through your whole body.

"You're alright," he said, again and again, like he was convincing himself as much as you. "You're alright, you're alright."

"Jake, I'm fine—"

"I know. I know you are." He pulled back just far enough to look at you, and his eyes were wet in a way he'd have been embarrassed by on any other night. "Just needed to hear myself say it a few times."

You reached up and steadied his jaw with both hands, the way you had a hundred times since you were kids, and felt him lean into it, breathing like he'd just come up for air.

"You offered him the truck," you said, half a laugh, half something closer to tears. "Your daddy's truck. Same night you finally told me how you felt. Some homecoming."

"Would've handed over anything in the world," he said, quiet, rough. "Long as it wasn't you. Told myself that at a creek when we were kids. Wasn't lying then. Sure as hell wasn't lying tonight. Don't take the girl — that's the only rule I've got, and I'll say it to anybody who asks."

III. The Waiting Room

The years after that went the way years tend to go — fast, in the way you only notice looking backward. Jake left for the Navy the way you'd always half known he would, chasing something in the sky he'd been chasing since he was a boy standing at the edge of a creek daring the world to keep up with him, and you built a life that bent itself, without much resentment, around deployments and distance and the particular ache of loving someone whose job occasionally required him to be unreachable at thirty thousand feet. You married him in a small church outside the town you'd both grown up in, and Bradley stood up as his best man and made a toast that was somehow both filthy and moving, and life, for a long while, was as good as either of you had any right to expect.

It was supposed to be a normal delivery. That was the thing you kept turning over, afterward — every appointment had gone fine, every scan, every checkup, right up until the moment it very suddenly wasn't fine at all, and the calm hospital room turned into a blur of raised voices and moving bodies and someone telling Jake, very firmly, that he needed to step outside now, sir, right now.

He did not, by his own later admission, handle the waiting room well.

He didn't sit. Couldn't. He paced the length of it in his flight suit — he'd come straight from the base, hadn't even had time to change — boots scuffing the same stretch of tile over and over, jaw locked, hands shoved deep in his pockets like it was the only way to keep them from shaking. Every time the door opened he was halfway across the room before he registered it wasn't for him.

He wasn't a praying man, as a rule. Hadn't been to church regular since he was a boy, hadn't found much use for it out on the flight line where the only thing that saved you was your own hands and your training and a healthy dose of luck. But standing in that hallway, staring at a closed door he had no clearance to walk through, he found himself doing it anyway, low and rough under his breath, over and over, the same handful of words.

Take me instead, if somebody's got to go. Take whatever this costs out of me. Just don't take the girl. Please. Don't take her.

He didn't know how long he stood there. Time did something strange in hospital hallways, stretched and compressed in ways that made no sense afterward. He thought about the creek. He thought about a gas station off Route 9 and a night he'd once thought was the scariest of his life, back before he knew what real fear cost. He thought that if the universe was going to keep asking him to make the same choice over and over, it could at least have the decency to let the answer stay the same every time.

Don't take the girl. Take me, if somebody's got to go. Just not her.

The door opened.

He was across the hallway before it had swung halfway, already searching the nurse's face for whatever verdict she was carrying, braced for the worst the way you brace for turbulence you can see coming — and then she smiled, tired and warm, and said the words he would replay for the rest of his life like a mission debrief he never wanted to forget a single detail of.

"She's asking for you. Both of them are just fine."

He didn't remember crossing the room. He remembered the door, and then he remembered you — exhausted, pale, smiling at him like he'd hung the moon, a small, furious, red-faced bundle held against your chest — and he remembered crossing to you in three strides and dropping to his knees at the side of the bed like his legs simply couldn't hold him up any longer, one hand finding yours, the other coming to rest, feather-light, like he was afraid he'd break something, against the baby's tiny fist.

"Hey, flyboy," you said, voice cracked and hoarse and utterly delighted. "You look terrible."

"Feel terrible. Best terrible of my whole life." His voice wasn't steady, and he didn't try to make it be. He pressed his forehead to your hand, to the baby's fist, breathing like a man who'd just pulled out of a dive he genuinely hadn't been sure he'd survive. "I thought — for a minute there, I thought—"

"I know." You freed your hand just enough to card your fingers through his hair, the same gesture you'd been doing since you were kids and he'd come up from that creek soaked through and shaking, and it steadied him now the same way it had then. "I'm here. We're both here."

"Yeah." He let out a breath that seemed to come from somewhere very deep, pressing one more kiss to your knuckles, then to your temple, then finally — carefully, like he still couldn't quite believe he was allowed — to the crown of the baby's head. "You're here."

He stayed on his knees at that bedside a long while, not saying much else, just holding on — to your hand, to a story that had started at the edge of a creek and very nearly ended in a hospital hallway, and to the two people in the room he had, in the end, never once considered a world without.

"Guess this makes three times now," you murmured eventually, half-asleep, teasing even through the exhaustion. "The creek. The gas station. Now this. You've spent our whole life telling somebody or something not to take me."

"And I'd say it a fourth time, a hundredth time, if it came to that." He pressed his lips once more to your hand, quiet, certain, the same nine-year-old conviction still sitting under every word. "Don't take the girl. Simplest thing I've ever known to be true. Just glad I get to keep saying it instead of meaning it."

★・・・・・・★

“Stop driving like a lunatic.” The range between the glare Steve pins Eddie with and the soft look he gives you is impressive. “Hey, try to look out the front window if you can, okay? Do you wanna switch seats?” 

“That’s okay.” You breathe in, focussing on the fresh air hitting your face. “I’m good.” 

“Is it the heat? Are you hot?” 

“She’s always hot,” says Eddie, earning him a shove. “Hey! No attacking the driver.” 

Steve frowns at you. “Do you want to stop? We can pull over for a while.” 

You shake your head, stopping when your nausea worsens. “It’ll pass.” 

“Okay. Look out the front window, honey.” 

You do. Eddie’s eyes continually dart to you in the rear view mirror. You meet them once, and he pouts. 

“You want some of my coke?” he offers. “It’s, uh, kind of warm, but…” 

“I’m okay.” You offer a wan smile. “Thanks.” 

Steve turns around again. “Are you sure you don’t want to pull over? We could use a stop anyway.” 

You lean into the wind blasting through your window, breathing deeply. “I’m fine.” 

Five minutes later finds you sitting on the curb of a gas station with your head to your knees. 

Eddie lifts your hair. The sun beating down on your neck is worth it for the cooling power of the breeze. He’s asked how you’re feeling about every ten seconds since you exited the highway. You’ve stopped answering in anything but hums and grunts. 

The crisp sound of a soda can opening is about the best thing you’ve heard all day. 

“Here.” Steve sits on your other side. “See if this helps.” 

Beads of condensation roll off the can of ginger ale, wetting both Steve’s palm and yours when you take it. You tilt your chin up to take a sharp, fizzy sip. 

Eddie grins when you exhale. 

“Good stuff, huh?” he asks hopefully. 

“It helps,” you agree. 

“I think we should wait a while before getting back on the road,” says Steve. “But when we do, I’m driving.” 

“Uh.” Eddie’s eyebrows raise. “No, you are not.” 

Steve gives him an unamused look. He mimics Eddie’s intonation. “Yeah, I am.” 

“No! It’s Eddie’s Van Halen. Eddie drives.” 

“Oh, grow up. We were going to have to switch out at some point between here and California.” 

“I don’t know what you were thinking, but I have a twelve-pack of Jolts in the back. I can go all night.” 

“Perfect, that sounds super safe. It was your driving that got her carsick in the first place.” 

Something dangerously close to contrition flashes across Eddie’s expression as he looks to you. 

You give him a sorry smile. “I’m feeling a lot better now.” 

His mouth tilts. “Yeah? Glad to hear it, beautiful. Hey, maybe when we hit the road again we can try something new. Obviously you’re a better candidate for the passenger seat than Stevie here, so you can play DJ.” He waggles his eyebrows. “We have an array of music in Eddie’s Van Halen, with vocal accompaniment by yours truly.” 

Steve huffs, an eye roll in audible form. 

Before they can start bickering again, you say, “Yeah, sure. A distraction might help.”  

He asked you to wait so that he could see you home himself. Mean, but not without cause. Intent counts for something, right?

You've figured him out now, anyway. Your brow scrunches into a frown. "I thought you were gonna come get me."

"I am getting you."

"I mean earlier. I could've worn a mask or something."

Carmy scoffs before he can stop it. You both know a mask isn't enough to keep food safe from germs even in a pinch, but beyond the fact that Carmy wasn't going to let you contaminate his kitchen he also wasn't going to let you run yourself into the ground trying to work while you're sick.

"We don't have to talk about this right now," he says.

"I could've helped," you insist.

"Not really." He doesn't sugarcoat it. He sees that you know it, too, in the awful way guilt twinges in your brow. "And you didn't have to. Ebra was fine taking over your station."

"You didn't need to stretch Ebra when I was just sitting around in here."

"You shouldn't have fucking been here in the first place—" Carmy's voice rises, and he catches himself, biting his cheek hard. "Sorry. I'm sorry, but you know you shouldn't have."

If anything, you look guiltier. "I tried to—"

"I know, I know." Jess was supposed to cover for you tonight. You texted Carmy yesterday, let him know that you weren't feeling well and wouldn't be in tonight. He was going to stop by tomorrow morning to bring you groceries and sudafed and shit. But when Jess pulled out at the last minute, you didn't tell Carmy about that. You just showed up, and he was as surprised to see you as you were to be benched upon arrival.

He hates that he's created this environment where people are so reckless with themselves. He tries hard to correct it. Maybe Carmy can admit privately that he tries his hardest with you.

"Look," he breathes out, slotting his hand along your face to hold your cheek. You're as warm as he thought. "You can't see yourself right now, but you look fucking miserable."

Some of the guilt in you fizzles. "You're not very good at flirting," you say without bite.

"I know. But it's true. Just come home with me, okay?"

"I take it back." You blink slowly. "That was really good flirting."

As you consider the offer, you really begin to look like you might fall asleep. Carmy thinks he might get his way if he just has to carry you home. "I have sudafed," he adds to sweeten the deal.

You sniff as though reminded of how sorely you need it. "I don't want to get you sick."

"I'll be fine."

"You're not reassuring me, Carmen."

"What can I do to reassure you?"

You think about it. "If I get you sick, you can't work, either."

Carmy sucks his teeth. "Okay."

"Really?" You look surprised for a second, but then your eyes narrow. "Are you lying?"

"You'll come with me if I agree?" he asks, exasperated, like he doesn't love you so much it makes him want to tear his hair out.

"…Yeah. If you really mean it."

Carlos has never considered himself a ‘soft’ man. Umbrella saw to that. They weren’t looking for soft men—a soft man wouldn’t have survived the childhood he did, and wouldn't have been able to complete the work he’d done for Umbrella.

Still, he tries for you. He swallows back the fear and pain and rage that grows in the pit of his stomach like a cancer, forces himself to stop and think before he does anything because he knows while he may not be soft, that doesn’t mean you aren’t.

It’s been harder lately with the news of more Umbrella shenanigans. The first time he’d seen it on the news, his fist had curled around the remote, fingers working quickly to switch the channel back to something he could actually stomach.

It didn’t work. 

He feels it bubbling under his skin long before it comes to the surface. He tries his best to fight it, to breathe through it the way he taught himself a long time ago. He goes to the gym more, throws himself into his work, distances himself from you.

He’s a ghost in his own home, fleeing rooms as fast as you can enter them, squirming away whenever you cuddle up to him. He misses you, yearns for your warmth and yet, he can’t bring himself to taint you with his touch.

Not like this, not when he feels like he can burst at any moment.

It all comes to a head when you manage to catch him off guard in the kitchen.

He hasn’t been sleeping well lately, plagued by nightmares of horrors he’ll never let you know about. He’s off his game, too tired to sweep the corners of the house for any signs of your presence like he usually does.

“Carlos?” The usual sweetness in your tone has been drained away. “Why are you avoiding me?” He blinks, swallowing hard. He didn’t think, didn’t consider for a moment that you might catch on to what he’s been doing. His stomach twists in knots.

“I’m not—” He sighs, tugging at the loose strands of hair that hang in his face. “I’ve been busy.”

You shake your head, lips forming in a hard line the way they do whenever you’re upset with him. “No you’re not.”

He goes quiet, casting his gaze downwards. He’s speechless, at a loss for words for once in his life. Usually, he’d be able to talk you down, say just the right things to calm your nerves, be the perfect partner that he needs to be. 

You take a step towards him, unaware that you’ve boxed yourself in between his body and the kitchen counters. “Talk to me. Why are you avoiding me?”

He clenches and unclenches his fist, breathing through the moment. “I just need space.”

“And you couldn’t have told me that?”

It’s the way your voice catches on the words that really twists the knife in his stomach. The way your eyes are shining, your lips trembling in frustration. Carlos knows what this is, sees through it in a way no one else can. You’re not sad, you’re angry. 

He knows he should back off. He knows he should grumble out an apology and go hit the gym, burn off the adrenaline spiking in his veins. But Carlos Oliveira has never been one to back down from a fight.

“Do I have to tell you everything?”

“Excuse me?”

He squeezes the bridge of his nose. “Do I have to tell you everything?” He repeats himself, taking a step towards you.

You shuffle backwards in response, trying to add distance between the two of you when all you’ve wanted for days is to close it.

“You don’t get to do this,” he says, coming another step closer. “You don’t get to corner me and—and force me into some touchy-feely conversation.”

“I-I wasn’t—”

“Yes, you were.”

You back up even more, your palms brushing the corner of the counter. Trapped. You find yourself feeling akin to a cornered animal, with all of the fear and none of the ferality. 

Your heart pounds in your chest, breath leaving your body. Carlos has never—would never—hurt you, but you’ve also never seen him lose his composure quite like this. 

“I know you’re upset, but this—” He brings his hand up to gesture for emphasis and you flinch.

Carlos freezes, the words dying on his tongue. The world stops spinning, time stops ticking, he swears his heart stops beating. The anger dies, red hot rage going cold as winter.

Your eyes are glassy, hands clenched on the counter behind you so tightly that your fingertips burn. Carlos lets his eyes flutter closed, as if between one blink and the next, this will all go away. It doesn’t.

“Sweetheart, I—”

I what? He’s not sure what to even say anymore, what could possibly make this better. He would never hurt you, he knows that, but clearly you don’t. He suddenly finds himself wishing that the ground will open up and swallow him whole.

“It’s fine.”

Carlos falls to his knees in front of you and even the hard linoleum floors don’t hurt as much as the sight of you flinching at him.

He’s slow to reach out to you, to press a gentle hand on either side of your thighs. You don’t flinch this time, don’t even react to his movements, but the damage is done.

“It’s not fine.” He shakes his head, resting his forehead against the plush of your thighs. “Sweetheart, I would never hurt you. Ever.”

“I know, I just—” A stray tear slips from the corner of your eye. Your lip trembles. “I’ve never seen you like this before.”

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, pressing a soft kiss to the side of your knee. “I’m so sorry.”

You rest a hand on the top of his head, cautious and slow, like you’re petting a wild animal. Carlos pulls away ever so slightly, looking up at you from where he’s claimed his place on the floor.

“I’m sorry, I love you so much, sweetheart.” He shakes his head, “I never should have—fuck, I’m so sorry.”

You brush a stray strand away from his face, “it’s—” “It’s not okay. Don’t let me feel okay about this.”

“Carlos…”

“No, baby.” 

“Get up off the floor.”

He obliges, rising to his feet in front of you. Despite your height difference, despite the width of his shoulders and the flex of his biceps, he’s never seemed smaller than he does right now.

“I know you would never hurt me,” you say quietly, snaking your hands over his shoulders. He tenses beneath your touch.

“But you—”

“Had a normal human reaction to someone standing very close to me and raising their hand. That’s all.”

He relaxes ever so slightly. “I love you.”

You draw him in, pulling his head to yours until he’s close enough to brush your lips over his. It’s soft and full of the warmth you’ve lacked these days, Carlos’s hands finding your hips and tugging you tighter against him.

You rest your head against his chest, “I love you too.” 

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