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Pomni couldn’t sleep and so she ended up wandering to the common area. There was a dim, warm lighting encompassing it – almost like a blanket protecting the area.
Jax was apparently there, sprawled on the couch with his legs awkwardly folded like an origami figure, staring at the ceiling with that impossible, fake grin plastered across his face. He’d been that way for… well, long enough that Pomni immediately knew he wasn’t fine. Not really. Not even close. She leaned on a random column, arms crossed, frowning.
“Why are you still up?” she asked, voice sharp but low, like she was trying not to wake the dead. Or, in this case, him. Jax’s eyes flicked toward her, one brow quirked, and actually looked upset for once.
“I could ask you the same thing,” he said. He dragged his words like someone who wanted them to linger. “But I’m polite. I don’t interrogate my friends at two in the morning.”
Pomni narrowed her eyes. “Thought we weren’t friends,” she said, although the sharpness in her voice didn’t completely hide the tremor underneath. She stepped into the space anyway. He didn’t move. She came closer, each footstep deliberately slow.
He sighed, flopping one arm over his face. “We’re definitely not friends. Definitely nothing. Absolutely zero. You’re just an annoying maintenance liability and—”
“Cut the crap, Jax,” she interrupted, and this time there was a small shake in her voice she didn’t even try to hide. It made him blink. He pulled his arm down slowly, exposing just enough of his expression for her to see: the faint twitch of his jaw, the way his eyes refused to meet hers completely. His face wore a smirk now, the humor hiding everything underneath, but something about the edges of it cracked.
Pomni sat down in the couch opposite him. Her knees were pressed together, hands fidgeting with the sleeve of her motley. “I can’t… I can’t stop thinking about it,” she admitted quietly. The words sounded wrong coming out, too human, and Jax’s grin faltered for a fraction of a second.
“I can’t either,” he said, and he sounded like someone trying to convince himself more than her. He leaned back, pretending to stretch, fingers brushing against the sofa’s fabric like he was searching for comfort in something inanimate. “You’re… exhausting. You know that? You’re making me feel things again that I shouldn’t be.”
Pomni exhaled, letting a small laugh escape despite herself. “Isn't that fun for you?” Her voice cracked just a little at the end, but she kept it casual. As casual as one could be while sitting across from someone who could so easily dismantle you with a smirk.
“Fun.” Jax repeated it, like tasting it and finding it bitter. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, the smirk gone again, replaced by something that looked dangerously like honesty. “You have this… ridiculous ability to make everything feel real sometimes..— or whatever. It ruins my day.”
“Maybe that’s the point,” Pomni said softly. She wasn’t retreating, just sitting there, letting him unravel like threads from a sweater he didn’t want to let go of. “Maybe I like ruining your day.”
He snorted, almost bitter, but there was a laugh buried in it somewhere. “Yeah. Sure. You’d like that. You’d like to remind me that I’m still… here. Annoyingly here.” His hands moved, restless, scratching invisible patterns in the air. “Sometimes… you prove there’s still a part of me that matters. That… cares. And it’s… I don’t know. It’s stupid.”
Pomni leaned forward, elbows on her knees now too, trying not to let herself flinch when he said it. Trying not to let herself notice that even through the cracks, he was bleeding some part of himself into the room. “Not stupid,” she said. “Necessary. It’s necessary to have someone who actually notices.”
He looked at her then, really looked, and for a moment the world shrunk to just the two of them. “Necessary…” he repeated, voice quieter now, as if saying it out loud made it more fragile. “That’s a funny word. Like… maybe I don’t need it. Maybe I should… not need it. But here I am, needing it, staring at you like a moron in a common room at— what, three in the morning?”
Pomni let herself smile, a small, tight smile that didn’t reach her eyes fully but still carried weight. “Better three in the morning than never, right?” she said, and her hand brushed against the side of the couch accidentally or – maybe not accidentally. Jax’s head tilted, noticing, and for a second, the room felt warmer, softer, even with the warm cast light.
“Right,” he muttered. But then he grinned, the old mask slipping back on just enough to protect himself. “Don’t get all sentimental on me. I’ve got my funny-guy reputation to uphold. Can’t have people thinking I’m… soft.”
Pomni rolled her eyes, but she didn’t move away. “Soft or not, you’re a human whether you like it or not,” she said simply. And she didn’t add the part that maybe she liked it, maybe that was part of why she was still sitting there.
He laughed then, short and almost pained, shaking his head. “Yeah. Human. That’s me.” He leaned back again, staring at the ceiling, pretending to be indifferent. Pretending. But she could see it in his hands, in the twitch of his fingers, the way he didn’t quite straighten his posture all the way.
Pretending.
The room settled into a sort of silence then, a quiet that wasn’t really quiet. The ticking of some distant clock, the low hum of the lights, the sound of two people breathing in the same space without really touching. It was awkward, it was tense, it was… necessary.
Pomni finally spoke again, her voice measured. “You could talk to me, you know. Not just… whatever this is.” She gestured vaguely, like trying to encompass both the loud and the quiet, the humor and the pain. “Not just jokes…or— half-truths…?” She trailed off, her hands clenched in her lap.
Jax’s head snapped toward her. “Talk?” he said, incredulous. He laughed bitterly, leaning forward again, elbows on knees. “I’m the joker. I’m the funny one. I’m supposed to make people laugh and then leave them in a pile of whatever the hell is left after the joke dies. That’s my… function. I’m not… safe. I’m not…” He faltered, swallowed hard, and for a second, the room felt too big, too small, too everything. “I’m not supposed to be here.”
Pomni’s shoulders dropped slightly, the tension easing. She tilted her head, just enough for her hair to fall into her eyes. “Maybe that’s okay,” she said softly. “Maybe you are supposed to be here… everyone experiences life differently. Maybe it’s… necessary.”
He blinked. Just blinked, staring at her like she had said something impossible. Then he shook his head, a laugh escaping that sounded equal parts derision and wonder. “You’re… impossible,” he said. “Absolutely impossible. Why do you keep doing this?”
“Because,” she said, leaning back just slightly, “someone has to remind you you’re still here. You’re still… something that matters.” Her words lingered, soft and dangerous and necessary, and he hated them because they were true.
The moment stretched out, fragile, electric, until Jax finally leaned back fully on the couch, letting out a long, exaggerated sigh. “Fine,” he muttered.
Pomni let herself grin, small, triumphant. “Mmhm,” she hummed with a pep in her tone. And just like that, the room felt a little lighter. Not fixed, not perfect. But… necessary.