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Cracked ribs, multiple stab wounds, dark ugly bruises, blood on his face, in his eyes, in his mouth. Muscle exhaustion, lack of sleep, a sore heart. It all weighs down on Jotaro. He barely breathes, barely walks, barely sees. Star Platinum is thrumming with energy, wired up and ready to demolish, destroy, protect. Unlike its user, who sits slouched in the back of the ambulance Joseph had previously laid dead within.
“We have located Mr. Polnareff,” a voice speaks up from the radio in the cabin of the ambulance, “We're on our way.”
Jotaro's exhausted mind flickers with recognition that Polnareff is okay. That soon he will see him.
He lets out a deep breath, broad shoulders falling. Beside him, Joseph glances at him from under the brim of his hat, his arms crossed. Jotaro ignores his concerned gaze and slowly closes his sore hands into fists, finding the shooting sparks of pain from his broken fingers a good distraction.
Jotaro tries not to think about much. He busies himself by opening his hands and looking at his palms. Counting the lines, examining the length of them, the width of them. What that would mean, to Abdul. If he could see Jotaro's life in his hands, in his skin. Jotaro wishes he had asked, before. If he could tell him the secrets of those lines.
He clenches them back into fists to stop the shaking.
His dull green eyes are heavy and stinging, from what he assumes exhaustion.
He remembers the time Kakyoin had taken him by the hand and commented on the dents in his fingernails, saying that it shows he has a deficiency in iron and needs to do better at feeding himself. Then he told him he should quit his habit of biting them. Jotaro had been irritated at the time (he can bite his goddamn nails as much as he fucking pleases), but now his face softens at the recollection. He knows now that Kakyoin had only been concerned, in his strange “you should listen to me” way.
But then again, maybe the heartache of death softens the memory.
Jotaro's thoughts fade when suddenly there's the loud shuffle of feet on the broken road outside the ambulance, joined by the shouting of voices and the rush of two paramedics. Looking over, he sees Polnareff stumbling up to the ambulance, followed by two men who keep their hands raised cautiously in case he takes a tumble. (No doubt, he had insisted he doesn't need help.)
Polnareff takes a heavy seat at the back of the ambulance, making the entire thing jostle. And then he's being taken care of by the two doctors on the scene; they touch delicately at parts of him to gauge the damage, cleaning off bloody gashes on his exposed skin, and checking his eyes with a small light.
Surprisingly, Polnareff lets them get away with it in total silence, save for the sharp inhalations from the pain. And then they drape a shock blanket around him once they're done cleaning his wounds, wrapping up his torso, and stitching him up. He's promised medication to relieve the pain of his broken ribs. With gentle hands, he's guided up into the back cabin of the ambulance.
When he sees his face, Jotaro stares. Polnareff's eyes are hollow, like he's seen a lifetime of war. Jotaro has seen those kind of articles in magazines. Before and after shots of soldiers' faces. Once cheerful and bright, now empty and heavy with exhaustion. It's a weird comparison to think of in this moment, but it comes to him without intention.
“Hey, Jojo,” Polnareff says, glancing up to meet his intense gaze. He smiles weakly. “Glad you made it.”
Jotaro feels Joseph pat him on the back, which he ignores. Jotaro looks into his heavy blue eyes and speaks, deep voice somehow more emotionless than usual, “Likewise.”
“Some of us had to survive,” Polnareff answers, looking down at his hands. He opens them and looks at his palms like Jotaro had done earlier.
Jotaro wonders if he is thinking of the same thing.
“We'll head out to a hospital, under the foundation's care, while they recover Dio's body,” Joseph speaks up, adjusting his hat and politely keeping his gaze away from Polnareff's sullen face. Jotaro says nothing. His hands rest in his lap, weakly curled. He closes his eyes and feels Star Platinum's frazzled desire to continue fighting weaken to flickering embers.
It's time to rest now, buddy. You did well.
“Jotaro... Fuck, it's been too long,” Polnareff says, voice threaded with a tender kind of pain as he draws his muscular arms tightly around Jotaro, who is somehow broader, more mature, more handsome. Polnareff holds him longer than Jotaro anticipated—despite this, he returns it with his arms around his torso, hands resting on Polnareff's shoulder blades, his eyes closed. A warmth fills his core, a feeling he's grown to associate with Polnareff.
“I missed you,” he hears himself say, like a foreign language on his tongue that he finds difficult to speak. Polnareff draws back and looks at him with tears in his blue eyes, which appear less haunted since the last time Jotaro looked into them. Polnareff grins and nods.
He pats Jotaro on the back and then draws away, saying amongst sniffles as he wiped at his eyes with broad fingers, “Okay, okay. I want to see your little girl. Let's go in.”
In the living room of the Kujo household, Polnareff sits on the couch with Jotaro standing in front of him. He's holding a motionless bundle in his arms that is soon to be gingerly passed to Polnareff's. A soft, adoring look is on Polnareff's face as he gently adjusts Jotaro's daughter in his muscular arms, holding her against his chest with his enamored blue eyes searching her sleeping face.
Jotaro's wife stands at the doorway of the living room, arms crossed with a smile on her face. Jotaro takes a seat beside Polnareff.
Polnareff's lips curl into a smile, brow furrowed and eyes watering.
He cradles Jolyne in one broad arm as he brings his other hand up to wipe at his eyes.
“I think I'm the real baby in this room right now,” he says amongst wet laughter, shaking his head. Jotaro smiles while his wife laughs from the doorway and finally steps into the room to take a seat on Polnareff's other side. Jotaro sets a hand on Polnareff's back and gently rubs it up and down.
After Jolyne is gingerly put to bed in her crib by Jotaro (which is a fucking adorable sight that has Polnareff biting a knuckle with a broad smile on his face), Jotaro sets a hand on Polnareff's back and guides him out of the nursery, towards the liquor cabinet.
Polnareff spots Jotaro, waiting for him in the lobby of the grand hotel, wearing that ridiculous, blindingly white outfit with the obnoxious pins and seat belt across his chest. He goes running up, throws his suitcase aside, and leaps onto the other man. Stumbling back, Jotaro barely catches his footing against the brunt of Polnareff's weight.
“Jotaro!” Polnareff laughs, squeezing his legs tight around his midsection with his arms around his head. Jotaro says nothing, only holds him, and waits for Polnareff to cease this public embarrassment. Polnareff eventually unravels his legs from around him and Jotaro sets him down. He reaches up to fix his hat as Polnareff beams up at him.
“You're thirty-four, aren't you too old to be stressing your weak bones?” Jotaro says blankly, searching in Polnareff's delighted sapphire eyes. Polnareff doesn't even take offense, he just laughs aloud and then reaches out to pat Jotaro on the side of his neck.
“And you're too young for Silver Chariot to turn you into swiss cheese.”
“Nice one.”
“Thanks, I've been waiting to use that on you.”
Jotaro can't repress the smile that comes to his face. That has Polnareff grinning and cupping his hands around his mouth, turning around to yell at the annoyed occupants of the hotel lobby, “I made Jotaro smileeeeee!”
“Alright, alright, that's enough,” Jotaro mutters, pulling down on the bill of his hat as a heat blooms in his face.
Two weeks later, Polnareff sits on the floor of Jotaro's hotel room. An assembling group of empty beer bottles steadily grow around him on the carpet. He's playing some Nintendo game on the game system he bought while here in Morioh, just to pass the long days of boredom when there's nothing to do.
He moans in annoyance when he places last in another race, mumbling drunkenly about how bullshit the game is. Then he attempts to stand, but fails quite a few times with very attractive grunts coming from him. Once he manages to roll up onto his feet, he crawls over to the game system and switches it off. He switches the TV back onto the television channels and then tiredly gets up with the help of the TV cabinet.
Turning, he sees Jotaro sitting at the head of the bed with a book in his hands, eyes downcast. Polnareff splats face first on the half of the bed the other man isn't occupying and sighs heavily. Jotaro turns a page. Polnareff slowly curls around Jotaro's legs, slipping an arm under his calves to hug them snugly to his chest. He closes his eyes.
They sit in silence for a good long five minutes, save for the buzz of the channel Polnareff left on. With his eyes closed, the memories that usually cling to the back of his thoughts come to the forefront with a greater intensity. Visuals, words, sounds, scents, feelings. He can see it all so clearly again, especially now that he's drunk and not trying to force it away.
He remembers the smell of dust, of old stone and dry air. He hears the shout of a familiar deep voice and the jarring pain of being shoved with all the strength of a full-grown man. The feelings he experienced when he slowly sat up, disoriented, and squinted through the settling dust to see severed arms resting on the ground. Spurting blood from the exposed veins and muscle, with the dark fingers resting limply on the cold stone floor.
Flinching with his eyes clenched, Polnareff is brought back to the hotel bed in Morioh when he slowly opens them, back to the warmth of Jotaro and the alcohol. The other man must have noticed him squeeze at his legs because then he's glancing up towards Polnareff's curled up body and asking lowly, “Jean. Are you okay?”
Silent at first, Polnareff takes a few deep breaths and then rolls onto his back, sprawling his legs and arms out over the bed. He looks up at the ceiling with glassy eyes and clears his throat before speaking softly, “Not really. I'm just thinkin'. About uh... About how I saw...”
He swallows hard and lets out a slow breath.
“How I saw Abdul die... I dunno. It's still on my mind, after all this time. It's been ten years and it's still giving me nightmares.”
“Don't worry, I understand.”
Craning his head back, Polnareff looks up at Jotaro's hard face. Jotaro glances down to his open book and purses his lips.
“I think of them, every day,” he says quietly, running his thumb up and down on the pages of the book, “It's not as bad as it used to be, though. And I do dream of them. But... not always a nightmare. Sometimes it's just us, together. Conversing.”
“Ha, wanna switch? Take my goddamn nightmares from me, Jojo?” Polnareff mutters in a slur, a wry smile on his face. Jotaro says nothing. He fixes his gaze on Polnareff's flushed, freckled face. Polnareff lets out a deep breath and rolls his stare back up to the ceiling. He slides the back of his hand up over the covers, stretching it high above his head to rest by Jotaro's hip.
“I think I loved him,” Polnareff says softly, closing his hazy eyes, “It's weird. We argued all the time and he, uh... Had different values. Different ways to do things. I always got impatient with him but then... He would be so fucking charming. I wanted to dance with him, I wanted to take his hand and spin him into my arms. God, that's fuckin'... gay. But he made me feel so warm and... conflicted. Even now.”
Speechless, Jotaro doesn't know what to say. Polnareff had just confessed a love for a dead man to him. Jotaro is not very good at meaningful conversations like this, to begin with. He stares at Polnareff's flushed, relaxed face, eager to say something that would comfort the Frenchman, but nothing emerges. Polnareff sighs and continues, tone softer.
“But, I know I... I...”
He trails off, then opens his glassy blue eyes. He looks up to meet Jotaro's gaze. He knocks his hand against Jotaro's hip and blinks heavily as he speaks thoughtfully.
“I know I love you, too. Is that possible? To love two men at once? And I... I dunno if I'm even gay, y'know? Like, I've always been into girls since I was like, eight. Anyways, it's like... It's like... it runs deeper than just 'sexuality'. Like... it doesn't matter, Jojo. You're you, Jotaro. You're my favorite person and I love you. Like, my heart sings when I'm with you. That kinda love.”
Jotaro looks at him silently, his heart oddly beginning to race. His face heats up and Polnareff notices with a broad grin. But he doesn't tease him about it. Jotaro brings a hand up to run it through his curly locks, letting out a deep breath.
“Ah... well. I think I know what you mean. I know I have... feelings for you as well. But I'm not sure if it's quite as intense. It's complex. Sorry.”
“No, no, it really makes me happy knowing you feel anything for me at all,” Polnareff says with a laugh, rolling over to rest on his belly, scooting closer across the bed towards the other man. Jotaro looks at him with a gentler look in his eyes and smiles weakly. Polnareff sighs like a weight is lifted from his shoulders, a loving smile growing on his lips as well. He rests his head down on Jotaro's chest, haphazard silver locks splayed across his sleep shirt. Setting aside the book on the nightstand, Jotaro sets one hand on the top of Polnareff's head and begins to stroke his hair.
“I've wanted to kiss you so bad for years,” Polnareff admits quietly, nuzzling into Jotaro's chest. Jotaro thinks he sure is loose-tongued when drunk—but he's used to it. He imagines that's an invitation.
“You're welcome to do it.”
Polnareff looks up at him, startled at first, before a grin spreads over his face. It's cute. Jotaro stifles his own smile. Sluggishly raising up onto a hand, Polnareff searches in Jotaro's sea green eyes, looking for any hesitation. When he finds none, he shifts closer and raises his other broad hand to cup Jotaro's jaw, fingers sliding into black locks. Eyes becoming lidded, Polnareff leans in with his head angled. When he presses his lips firmly to Jotaro's, he lets out a deep breath through his nose and furrows his brow.
Jotaro keeps his hands to himself as he returns it, eyes closed and lips pursing gently against Polnareff's.
Kissing him felt unusually comforting. It felt right.
Their lips moved together slowly and tenderly at first, the soft sounds of their kiss mixing with the background noise of the TV. And then Polnareff is pulling back, looking at him with a pleased smile growing on his flushed face. He leans in and presses a long, loving kiss to Jotaro's forehead, eyes closing again with his nose among curls of black. Jotaro smiles at that, gaze lowered.
“I'm gonna sleep with you tonight, okay? We can get super comfy and cuddle,” Polnareff murmurs as he draws back, searching in Jotaro's gaze momentarily. After Jotaro cocked a brow and nodded, Polnareff plops his head down on his chest again. He exhales deeply, sleepy and happy. He curls his muscular arm around Jotaro's midsection and wiggles closer.
Jotaro begins to pet his hair again. He sets his other hand on the arm that is now around him.
Normally, he likes to wash his face and brush his teeth before bed, but he supposes tonight he'll make an exception.
He reaches out to turn off the lamp. Then he grabs the remote from the nightstand to turn off the TV with a click, bathing them in darkness.