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Jemma slid her jeans down her legs, kicked them off, then picked them up off the floor. She folded them up and placed them in the dresser, and when she turned, she paused to glance at herself in the mirror.
Her shoulders fell as she looked at herself, really looked at herself, for the first time in weeks. She’d finally gotten a shower, but the water had only exposed her bruises. Her bones were pointier than normal, ribs showing under her bra. Ten days in the frameworks and time in space meant she was less than healthy.
Kasius had frequently mentioned her complexion. She had been complimented on her looks before, often when she was younger and often at the expense of her intelligence. When she’d told people she was interested in science, they often reacted in surprise, unable to picture someone like her in a lab. And Fitz called her beautiful, of course. It came with the territory of being a boyfriend.
Fiancé.
But Kasius’s interest in her looks was something different, something more sinister, and she had been surprised it was her complexion he was interested in. With her freckles, she had rarely heard that her complexion was flawless. And then there were the scars, of course, like the one above her right eyebrow, so faint it could hardly be seen. Still, she was amazed he missed it.
If he had seen the rest of her, he would have never called her flawless. That was a good thing, obviously, that she had always been fully clothed in his presence. To think of her being otherwise made her a little sick. But those clothes covered the myriad of scars she had sustained since she had started in the field.
The door to the bedroom opened and she turned to see Fitz slip inside.
“Everything all right?” he asked.
She gave him a small smile before turning back to the dresser. “Of course.”
“Jemma?”
She turned back to him. There was no use lying or trying to get around it. He always knew when something was off with her. “I was just thinking.”
“‘Bout what?”
She didn’t want to admit it. “What Kasius said.”
“Kasius?”
She shook her head, embarrassed she was letting this get to her. “He always compliment my complexion.” Jemma shuddered, remembering his hands on her face. “Good thing he didn’t see the rest of me.”
Fitz came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. The wool of his cardigan brushed against her bare stomach and back, making her shiver. “I’m glad for that too.”
She rolled her eyes. “I only mean that he wouldn’t have thought I was so flawless otherwise.”
Fitz stood up a little straighter, looking at her. “This is really bothering you, isn’t it?”
“I know it shouldn’t.”
He was quiet for a moment, then took her hand. “Come here.”
He pulled her over to the bed. “Lie down.”
“Fitz, I’m not really in the mood–”
“Not what I was implying,” he said.
Jemma hesitated a moment before lying down on her back, and Fitz came to lie down next to her on his side, propped up on his elbow.
“You’re beautiful, you know that, right, Jemma?”
“I know.” She also knew that he was obligated to say that.
“Do you know what I see when I look at your scars?”
She didn’t answer.
His fingers gently brushed the spot above her eyebrow, his touch so different than the cold grasp of Kasius.
“Courage.”
His hands moved softly down her body to her torso, where the majority of her scars were, scars from her time on Maveth, scars from her torture.
“Bravery.”
“That’s the same thing.”
He shook his head. “It’s not, though.”
Fitz kept going, letting his fingers linger over each bit of pink skin. “Resilience. Persistence. Perseverance.”
He made his way down to her leg, where the ugly gash ran up her calf. “And this one? It reminds me that you came back to me. That the cosmos can’t tear us apart.”
This time when she smiled, it was for real.
Fitz paused, looking up at her. “Jemma? What’s this one from?”
She glanced down to see him looking at the wound on her right thigh, the newest, freshest scar, still mending and still bright. She swallowed.
“The day the base blew up,” she said. “Daisy and I had to fight our way out.”
She was a terrible liar, even if it was technically the truth. Fitz could see right through. “Did I do that?”
“No. Not...not technically.”
“Tell me.”
She blinked away tears at the memory. “No.”
“Jemma–”
“Fitz, don’t do this to yourself.”
He swallowed. “I need to know. We haven’t even talked about it.”
She didn’t want to go into it. It still gave her nightmares, the way his face had flipped from wounded and teary to cold and violent. “We knew one of us was an LMD. You cut your arm to prove it wasn’t you, and when I came to help, you stabbed me.”
It was a weight off her shoulders to tell him, but she hated the look on his face, the way it fell, the pain.
“I did this.”
“It wasn’t you, Fitz.”
“But it was my design, my technology–”
She put a hand over his. “I don’t blame you, Fitz.”
He fell quiet. “I have scars, too.”
Jemma rolled over to face him, sliding her hand under his shirt and finding the still-healing bullet wound. “I know.”
“Not that kind,” he said. “Mine are...mine are inside.”
Jemma didn’t say anything. She had been there when Fitz had told Kasius about the scars his father had left.
“Those make you who you are, too,” she said.
Fitz rested his forehead against hers. “I know, even the new ones.”
She shook her head. “Those aren’t you. They’re who you could have been, but they’re not you.”
“The things I did…” he looked up at her with tears in his eyes. “Jemma, I shot you.”
“You were brainwashed, Fitz. Manipulated. I can’t blame you. I don’t.”
“I still do.”
Jemma reached up, stroking his face gently, feeling the stubble under her thumb. “I know. So let me help heal you.”
She leaned in, capturing his lips in a soft kiss.