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Dean remembers never wanting anything from Seth.
At least not at first.
It was simpler that way. No obligations. Fight, bleed, win. Night after night. Glances could be ignored, embraces in the ring written off.
Roman was different. He always had been. That was simple too. Something sturdy to prop him up. Always holding him while he was on the verge of collapse.
Then sometime between building The Shield and it falling apart, it got messy.
Dean can hear Seth’s stupid fucking laugh in his head, the one that almost feels like nails on a chalkboard if he thinks about it too much. Smug, lined with ambition, and dipped in something that works on him like a slow acting poison after it enters his system. He’s wished he could shake it for years now. Get it gone. It doesn’t work that way though and no amount of whisky or lukewarm PBR can change that. Dean will always feel the cut of Seth’s words and teeth against skin.
“You just want it too much, Ambrose. Don’t you have any self preservation skills left?”
Frankly no. And at the time, he’d been running on a short supply of patience as well. After Seth had shattered everything they were together, he’d lost himself in the wash of numbness anger gave him. It felt good to focus on one thing and one thing only. Beating the hell out of Seth Rollins. Attempting to drown in so much blood that you’d both never come back from it.
Seth though—Seth figured him out again faster than he’d ever give him credit for.
Dean can remember waiting for Seth in the parking lot, hunting him. Knuckles still aching from a fight earlier that night and the static of anger bubbling in the back of his brain. He also remembers Seth meeting him there, plan already in place. A carefully constructed trap. Spitting blood. Long fingers pulling his hair and that laugh .
“Is this where you ask me to hit you as hard as I can?”
Dean’s always hated Seth’s jokes too.
“Fucking fight me you son of a bitch.”
Voices always sound muddier through a broken nose. His included.
“If you can’t stay away from me like a good boy then let’s get one thing straight. I. still. own. you.”
He’d begged that night. Not for mercy, but for more.
Shameful? Maybe...but feeling Seth again after all that time...it was the best shot of adrenaline that Dean could have ever asked for.
He’d pick himself up, grit his teeth and then they would do it all again the next night. A familiar pattern of violence laced with lust. Dean’s never hated or loved anyone as much as Seth. He couldn’t trust him, but that didn’t matter. They were back on the same page—equal terms. Dean realizes that he was addicted to it. It’s why looking at Seth now. Earnest, seeking forgiveness or something that at least looks like it pisses him off so much.
“You? I don’t know you. I mean...I knew a guy that looked like you once...
He was a liar,
Dean’s hands shake as his own words echo in his head.
a cheater.
The look on Seth’s face. Trying so desperately to push down every last ounce of darkness inside himself. He hates that he likes how hard it seemed to be for him.
The kind of guy that would stab his brothers in the back.”
He was running on pure emotion after that. He still is. The concrete floor is cold and Dean. is. tired .
“I’m such a dumbass.” He mumbles.
It’s a lost cause.
Dean’s always been uncontrollable and Seth was just fooling himself if he thought that time might dull the ache of everything they’ve been through.
Truth is...
Angry and high off of adrenaline...
Dean doesn’t tell him anything he doesn’t already know.
He’s a liar, a bastard, a traitor. Ambition always been his worst enemy. Toxic and acrid eating him from the inside out.
The kind of poison that you don’t realize is rotting away your insides until you’re already hollow. Seth never remembers apologizing for anything, but he’d done it with Dean tonight and it had only made him angerier. Like spitting in his face.
Considering he’d done just that months ago, to a much different reaction--it’s left him a bit off balance.
Seth’s trying to be better. But maybe he just doesn’t remember how. Dean certainly doesn’t think he does.
He rubs at his temples and takes a deep breath. It’s unusually cold outside and the only thing that illuminates the parking lot of the arena are the street lights off in the distance. Seth shouldn’t be out here, but inside feels suffocating in a way he can’t really describe. He avoids introspection for a reason, he’s not really sure why he’s letting guilt haunt him like a ghost now.
“I should kick your fucking head in.”
Dean. Inches behind him.
Seth’s shoulders tense. If Dean wants to fight, and by the sounds of it he knows he does, at least that would be familiar.
No more scrounging for empathy then.
“I already gave you an open invitation to fuck me up.” A beat of silence and then he turns around. Dean’s wearing the same expression he was earlier. Blue eyes intense as always. Focused. Ginger hair wild and his beard only makes his face more handsome. Scowl firmly in place. It’s frustrating. It always is. Seth knows he’s not looking at the same man from three years ago. Someone he can manipulate with words or secret touches in the dark. “You turned it down.”
Hating each other is so familiar, it’s like putting on an old coat. Seth can feel it around the edges whenever they talk.
“Don’t mean I can’t reconsider.” Dean’s leather jacket smells like beer and blood. “I’m supposed to believe that you somehow found a conscience inside that little black heart of yours? That you’d take back everything you did if someone gave you a do over?”
“What the hell do you want me to say?” His own voice is raspy from screaming at Dean for forgiveness earlier.
“I’m not askin’ you to say anything. Show me.” Dean levels a look at him. “Show me. No chair, no ring--you and me. No fake bullshit.”
Seth freezes, looking at Dean for anything he can find. Any path forward. All he gets is cold fury before Dean grabs his arm and jerks him forward. Chest to chest.
“Show. Me.”
He’s wrapping his arms around Dean’s waist before he can think about anything else. Seth feels stubble against his cheek before their lips meet and even then the sensation is dizzying. It’s been too long since they’ve done this. A year—maybe more. He realizes that maybe that’s part of this; maybe Dean’s just as pent up and frustrated about that as he is anything else. Everything else.
The warmth vanishes as quickly as it came and then Seth feels the crack of knuckles against his jaw.
A kiss and a fight. The Dean Ambrose 2 for 1.
Seth knows his lip is bleeding immediately and when he looks up, clutching his face, Dean’s smile is knife sharp and dangerous.
“I’d tell you what that was for, but we ain’t got time for me to go through a list that long.” He’s snarling and surly—-confidence back in his voice that was missing the last time they talked. “But now you know. You trusted me at my word and I put my fist in your face.”
“You’re a son of a bitch, you know that?” The words are muffled through his hand. Dean had something to prove and it finally clicks in Seth’s brain.
Trust.
Dean never wanted to hit him with a chair to get absolution. He wanted him to prove that he was willing to put his trust in him, blindly.
“And you’re still here.” Dean has his hand suddenly. The gentleness startles him and even though Seth can feel the embarrassment pooling in his chest, he shuts his eyes when Dean wipes the blood off his bottom lip.
Seth melts when Dean kisses him again, properly this time, the ache of his jaw clinging to it. It’s good. Better than it should be. Dean’s always possessed him like a ghost and if it feels this damn good, he’s happy to be haunted.