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Tim came to the hospital every day to check on him. It was nice, Jay supposed, having someone care about him like that. Everything but the burning gunshot wound in his side felt numb, detached, like none of this was real. Sometimes when Tim smiled at him, when his wavering voice managed to speak over the beeping sound of Jay's pulse throughout the room, Jay would press against his wound, put pressure on his stitches and draw them tight. Not enough to injure himself further, but enough to make him feel real for a moment. Tim was real and he was smiling at him and Tim saved his life.
Despite Tim's reluctance, Jay forced him to show the last entries to the channel. Now that made Jay want to unravel himself, pull at his stitches and then hopefully, like a well worn sweater, he would pull apart into a stringy pile, organs spilling out of the ugly scar on his side. He had never felt so useless before. Despite his bone deep, apathetic exhaustion, Jay was furious. About what exactly he wasn't really sure anymore. Some days it would be at Tim, at how he tried to keep up an okay facade. Sometimes Tim lost his ability to act. Sometimes Jay could see the sleepless nights written in his eyebags and gruff beard. Sometimes Jay wanted to poke at that exhaustion, twist the knife so Tim would wake up, so that Tim would freak out and they could stop pretending that everything was suddenly going to be okay.
But today wasn't one of those days. Today Jay was discharged. Tim had shaved the beard that had been crawling higher up his cheeks for the past month, side burns once again sharp and clean. Like this was a special occasion. Like there was anything good about leaving–as if they had any home to go back to.
But Jay knew complaining was pointless, the complacency he felt in the hospital was driving him mad so he figured he should be thankful about getting a chance to leave. So he got into the car, cringing as the position tugged on his fresh scar tissue. He met Tim's concerned glance with a challenging glare and thankfully that's all it took to get him to back off. The man briefly coughed into his fist, then started his car, driving off to whatever shitty motel he'd had been staying in the past month.
The place wasn't half bad ignoring the very obvious 70's interior design. Their room had two beds, one a complete, unraveled mess, evidence of a restless sleep, whilst the other was a pristine, white, folded sheet tucked in tightly at the corners. The middle of the sheet bowed softly beneath the weight of Jay's backpack and duffle bag, oriented neatly on the bed, awaiting for his return.
Tim locked the door behind them, ushering past Jay to shut the blinds as if the light filtering in behind them would burn his partner. He didn't offer to help Jay into the room or ease him down to sit like he was some fine China. Jay could do all of those things himself, not without a wince of course.
"So..." Tim started, because it was always Tim that started.
Jay looked up at him with wide eyes. His cheeks were still sunken, his hair still a shaggy greasy mess, but the dark bags around his eyes had lighted some. There wasn't much to do in the hospital when Tim wasn't there other than to sleep. Jay was sick and tired of it–of forcing down the antsy feeling that had become an intrinsic part of him purely out of sheer boredom. But there he was, snoozing away like a baby while Tim worked his ass off at some sort of farm.
"You hungry?" Tim asked.
Jay let the thought slosh in his head for a moment. For some reason the idea of food made his injured stomach turn. Instead of providing all the graphic details about how he would violently puke if he ate anything right now, Jay just shrugged, eyes darting to find sudden interest in the room's warped wallpaper.
"Well I am. We have microwaveable meals if you change your mind." With that, Tim dug around in the shitty, manila colored minifridge, pulling out some cheap, frozen, meatloaf-gravy-bullshit, and throwing it into the microwave.
Tim placed himself on an uncomfortable looking chair in the opposite corner of the room, chewing quietly at the hockey puck of "meat" in his microwave meal.
Jay let out a stiff sigh, trying to shift himself further onto the bed without looking like it took the amount of effort it did. He tried to lug his brain out of its dissociated funk, pulling the restlessness of his mind into words. "So what now?"
Tim looked up, eyebrows bouncing upwards as if not expecting Jay to even talk to him. "Well," he set the plastic dish down onto his leg. "I've been paying for this place by the week. Been doing farm work for a business a couple miles away and that's been pretty steady. I was thinking of at least working through the season and then..." Tim's eyes finally met Jay's. "I'm getting out of here."
That weighty gaze seemed to hold the key to Jay's everything. It felt like in that instant, the waxen wall he saw the world behind cracked. The fog in his brain was replaced by panic and realization, and his yearning for something to make him feel real desperately replaced by a desire for dreamy security. The truth rammed into Jay at a thousand miles an hour, his breath was lost in his body, not seeming to make it through his throat and into his lungs like it should, getting caught in a hiss in the back of his throat as the pain in his side bloomed to life. Tim's words replayed over and over again and based on his tone and language and everything about this situation, Jay could only come to one conclusion.
Tim was leaving him.
In witnessing Jay's blotchy red face suddenly struggling for breath, Tim raced to Jay's side, kneeling in front of him and reaching up to grab Jay's forearms. "Hey, hey just breathe, come on, Jay what the fuck is wrong?"
Jay tried to listen to Tim, tried to suck in a breath, but as soon as he was able to regain control of his brain and look into Tim's eyes, panic consumed him once again, his breaths becoming hiccuping sobs as he stared wide eyed past Tim's face.
He was such an idiot. A stupid fucking idiot. He didn't think this far, he didn't even want to get this far, living and fighting and breathing on the certainty that Alex or that thing would kill him. He didn't have a life before this, so why the hell would he want one after? At least he had a purpose, at least he had someone. He's never had someone in his life like Tim. When Tim was with him things were okay. Jay didn't care about people like a normal person, he knew that, but he also new he couldn't go back to being alone again, for being aimless and drifting and all by his fucking self.
Tim helped him survive. He would not survive without him.
And suddenly he felt something icy cold run down his back, biting into his skin. He let out a holler, stumbling off of the bed and failing to skitter away from the ice trapped between the back of his shirt and his shoulder blades. He gasped in a breath, suddenly aware of his surroundings as he tried to rid the sudden intrusion. He whipped around to face Tim who had an empty ice bucket in hand.
“What the fuck?!”
“Sorry, you were freaking out!” He replied in defensive panic.
“So you threw a bucket of ice on me??” Jay had never wished bodily harm against Tim as deeply as this moment.
“Well you're not freaking out now, are you?”
Jay paused, assessing his freak-out-o-meter and found himself a little less panicked than before. Instead of giving Tim the satisfaction of a response, he turned his back, yanking his duffle bag toward him and fishing through it for a clean, non soaked, T shirt.
He muttered something about Tim being an asshole, then stripped out of his shirt right then and there, not failing to notice how Tim quickly turned around to give him privacy. Jay's gunshot wound tinged in pain as he shimmied into his new shirt, causing his nausea to crawl back up his throat. He stood there, wavering a little, praying for Tim to turn back around, to do anything but walk straight out the door right now and leave him stranded.
When Tim finally turned, bashful gaze meeting Jay's hollow one, Jay snapped. “You're leaving me aren't you?” It was more of an accusation than a question. Tim was just being silly, they just needed to fight this out like they always did and things would be okay, right?
The man before him looked a little taken aback, any form of care on his face suddenly stamped out into the furrow of his brows. “Well I didn't particularly get the impression that you liked me,” he scoffed.
Jay's eyes shot wide, that familiar anger building up in him. It was satisfying, having it sizzle hot through his veins, replacing the apathetic cold.
“Liked you?” He practically laughed. “Like you??” Jay took a step towards Tim, the panic and rage pulling his breath tight in his chest. He wound himself up, forcing out the pressure with his biting words. “I love you. I love you, Tim, is that what you want me to fucking say right now? Is that what will make you stay? Because I love you as much as I can love anyone!” Jay marched forward with each declaration of twisted affection, now glaring into Tim's pale face.
“No you don't,” the man before him whispered gravely.
“You don't know what I feel-”
“Yes I do!” Tim snapped in return, shock abandoning his system. “And this is not love. That fucking panic attack you just had was not love and I know that from experience. I know that from holding your lifeless body in my fucking hands, Jay. I know that that type of panic so deeply it's all I remember for the past six months of my life: being constantly fucking worried about you.” he punctuated the last bit of his statement by jamming his pointer into Jay's sternum.
Jay savored the sting. He gathered his words again, now added with the ammo Tim so graciously supplied him. “Then why save me,” Jay challenged. “Then why fucking save me, huh?” Jay could smell Tim's breath from how close they were now, coffee and cigarettes. Bitter, familiar. “I didn't ask you to hold me, I didn't ask you to save my life,” Jay finished ungratefully. He knew what he was saying was messed up, he'd be an idiot not to know that. He knew this wasn't going to make Tim stay but he just couldn't stop himself. The thought of Tim keeping him in this world just to abandon him made Jay feel a new type of awful, like his lifeline was slipping away.
But the longer Tim’s silence stretched, the quicker Jay became remorseful.
Tim always talked so much, a lot of the time it was about nothing–just ambient observations, fond recounts of their college days, or just useless matter to fill the often silent air Jay liked to keep around them. Jay never listened and Tim didn't expect him to, that's just how they worked. But now Jay craved to go back to that complacency. He wished he could slap himself across the face and force himself to listen and talk and empathize like a normal human. He would do anything if it meant that Tim would find some worth in keeping Jay around despite how deeply the both of them knew they were bad for each other. But Jay couldn't go back in time, the hand he currently pressed tight against his wound wouldn't punish the unworthiness out of him. The world hung on Tim's reply
“Because you dragged me into it.” Tim started with a low bite, fits clenched tightly at his side. “Because despite however many people try to tell me otherwise, I'm a good fucking person and despite EVERYTHING you've done to me, I can't let you die.” Tim took a moment to breathe, both of their heaving breaths accompanied by the shutter of the too old heater. “I’m done playing as your lacky, I'm done playing stupid, I'm done being angry, I'm done hurting you and I'm done trying to kill myself. I'm moving on, with or without you.” Tim punctuated his sentence by taking a step back.
Jay's heart felt heavy, this couldn't be it. It couldn't be over that fast. “What do I have to do to come with you?” he offered weakly, his sluggish eyes following Tim as the man brushed past him on the way back to his chair
Tim gave a frustrated shrug, his string of composure still drawn tight. “Not ruin my life again?” he collapsed back into his chair. “Act like you actually give two shits about me as a person? Be stable enough to actually earn your keep, go see a therapist for Christs sake, AND actually take care of yourself like a fuckin’ adult?”
The last comment bit at Jay. Why did Tim take the effort to get him food, to force him to shower, force him to sleep, all of that–which Jay didn't ask for, mind you–just for it to be held over his head now? Oh that's right, because Tim was a good person. But even good people have their limits, and Jay Merrick, Star Detective, had found Tim’s.
And Jay Merrick–star detective-code cracker extraordinaire-reckless without abandon-undoubtedly clumsy-and equally as lucky- Merrick, for the first time in his life, gave up. His fingers released the throbbing pain at his side, releasing the anger pulled tight in his tendons, hand falling limp towards his side as he stared his savior in the eyes. “Okay,” he breathed. “Okay I’ll do it. I’ll fix this.”
He wasn’t sure exactly what “this” was. Himself? Their relationship? Their anger? He didn’t know where to begin, nausea suddenly overtaking him as he lurched forward in alarm, suddenly set on skittering to the bathroom as fast as his clumsy limbs could take him. Finally all of the squirming bile in his stomach released itself into porcelain in one pathetic sob. Jay Merrick, Star Detective…Who was he kidding? Another wave of nausea hit and suddenly Tim was at his back, rubbing soothing motions into his skin.