Work Text:
Carter is jealous of himself.
It sounds ridiculous even in his own head but the thought doesn't go away. He looks at Tree, sees the way she looks at him; memories of what he'd done in one of her alternate Mondays behind her eyes and lighting up her smile and he feels like a fake. Because it was him but it wasn't him. He doesn't have any memory of the time he tried to save her from Tombs. Doesn't remember coming up with plans or having any heart to hearts with her.
So he's jealous because it was not him but she looks at him like it was. Like he was. Is. Tree sees all of the Carters she's woken up to and considers them the same even though it sounds like in this one, in the Monday that eventually became Tuesday, he did almost nothing.
He doesn't know what he can do about it, either. This isn't anything like a normal situation. Who has ever heard of actual real-life Groundhog Day situations? Who has ever felt so jealous of themselves that they're nearly sick with it?
So he goes to class and he does his homework and he spends his free time with Tree and he tries desperately to feel good enough. To feel like he could possibly measure up to those other iterations of himself. He looks at Tree with her smile, a smile that lights him up from the inside to see directed at him, and he hopes that it is him. That even though he hasn't done any of the things those other Carters did, he has it in him to do them.
Tree believes he does.
Maybe someday he will, too.