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In hindsight, the note might have been a hint.
And Steve had known, of course, more or less, from the first time he'd met the guy - hell, from the first time his dad had told him about Bishop. Crazily prepared person ahead.
His mistake, maybe, clearly, had been in thinking that he was smarter, even more crazily prepared - which he wasn't, of course he wasn't; 'prepared' had never really been Steve's style, at least not beyond bringing a gun before leaving the house, and that was so completely basic, it didn't even deserve the word.
Plus (Steve could admit it, if only to himself) he'd kind of figured Bishop would understand. He'd walked away and he'd watched the gas drip-drip-drip-gushing into a pool and he'd pulled out his gun and pointed it and he'd thought: at least it will be quick, and the idea hadn't bothered him.
He'd wanted to kill Bishop, yes, but he hadn't particularly wanted to make him suffer.
(Given the note and what had followed after, he guessed maybe Bishop hadn't wanted him to suffer, either - and that was good, in a way. Good to know they'd parted as friends, still.)
(More or less.)
"Two things," Bishop says, and Steve thinks: hey, I'm not dead and then he thinks take that, you fucker and then he realizes that the fact that Bishop is talking to him means that he is, in fact, not the only one who isn't dead.
It's a little unreal and a bit embarrassing and a lot, well, relieving, might be the word.
Steve's done the vengeance thing, gotten the guy who killed his dad - good for him. Next item on the agenda: getting on with his life, and if he hadn't quite pictured still having Bishop around in it to talk down to him and treat him like he's some sort of cross between a friend, a student and family, so what?
With the way his life's been going so far, Steve figures he's owed a break or two.
Making it out of an exploding car alive probably counts as one. Regaining consciousness while staring at the shoes of the guy he thought he'd killed should possibly be considered another.
"You're not listening, are you?"
Observant, that's what Bishop is. Guy sees everything, up to including the fact that Steve was going to blow him to kingdom come - although hopefully, maybe, not the part where Steve was sort of bawling like a little kid who's smashed his favorite toy before, during and after he did it.
Steve doesn't assume Bishop'd think less of him, per se, for a few manly tears.
He just thinks it might be a bit detrimental to his ongoing campaign of getting Bishop to think more of him than he does, to look at him and not just see Harry's kid.
Of course, considering they've both tried to kill the other, and considering that Bishop survived by pure skill, while Steve managed it by sheer luck, the whole war may be a lost cause already.
"The car and the grammophone," he says.
"Yeah," Bishop says. One of his feet moves, and for a moment, Steve thinks Bishop's going to kick him in the face. He's not sure if he would kick Bishop in the face, if their situations were reversed.
(Fine, yes, he definitely would. But only because Bishop can be a condescending asshole.)
"I mean I told you, didn't I?" Bishop says. "Don't touch my grammophone. Don't drive my car. What, you've got a hearing problem? All those explosions left you a bit deaf?"
"Dude," Steve tells Bishop's shoes. "It was fucking reverse psychology."
Until the words are out there, Steve doesn't actually believe it himself. Because Bishop telling him the Rules of the House - that was forever ago. The first time they got to his home, before Dean, before the firing range, before (nearly) everything except the lucky carjacker who didn't actually kill his dad.
Before Steve even ever seriously thought about killing Bishop, Bishop was already making sure that Steve wouldn't be surviving the experience.
A bit of a flawed plan, actually, Steve decides not to point out this very moment. Steve knows himself; even if they'd have stayed nice and friendly, one day, he'd have taken that car out for a spin, because that's what cars are for, and he'd have played a record on that grammophone, just for the hell of it.
Would have been kind of awkward if it'd happened that way.
"It wasn't," Bishop says. "It really wasn't, Steve."
Steve isn't stupid; he doesn't argue the point out loud. When you're the guy lying there, kissing the ground and not being entirely sure you're going to be able to get up and stay up, you don't go pick a fight with the guy who's walked away from your attempt to blow up a car with him in it.
You might pray, but Steve isn't really the praying type - or the begging type, for that matter.
"So what happens now?" He can't quite see Bishop's socks. His trousers look clean, not a speck of ash or dirt on them. Shoes look fine; not new, but of good quality. "You going to kill me again?"
"I already told you," Bishop says - and there's a hand on Steve's back and then one in front of him, and because he figures he's got nothing better to do anyway, he takes it. "We're going to disappear."
Steve would guess you can't quite disappear more thoroughly than by dying.
"Together?" he asks. They've been here, done this. Tried to kill each other.
A new life sounds like a pretty good excuse to let bygones be bygones.
"If you want to," Bishop says. The expression on his face, Steve decides, comes very close to 'concerned'. Steve's legs do feel a bit wobbly, but they're holding. For the moment.
He's felt better, but then, for someone who's been in an exploding car, he feels pretty damn good.
"Yeah. All right."
Bishop's expression doesn't change, but Steve thinks he might be pleased. "Good. Can you walk?"
Bygones, Steve thinks; they might leave it at this, at the actions neither of them regret, leaving the words unspoken. "Look, Bishop. I - "
"Walk," Bishop says, and his hands are back, holding Steve steady and more or less vertical. "And if you must talk, call me 'Arthur'."
"You're not an 'Arthur'," Steve says. "Brad, maybe? I think you could be a Brad. But not Brad Bishop, that just sounds ridiculous."