Chapter Text
The apartment was the same as they'd left it. Of course it was, they'd only been gone a few hours. Pearl kicked her shoes off by the door and moved to turn the light on. Gem followed her in and let the door fall shut behind them and stood there for a second, just taking the quiet in.
Pearl dropped her bag on the chair. "I'm going to make tea. You want some?"
"Sure."
Pearl filled the kettle. Gem moved to her bag and started unpacking it slowly. Books on the table, phone moved to the counter and plugged in.
"Did you want to shower tonight or in the morning?"
Gem glanced up. "Morning's fine."
Pearl nodded and said nothing else. Got two mugs out. The kettle started its low build toward boiling.
Tired.
Pearl filed it without much attention.
Long social evening. She'd come back to herself by tomorrow.
The kettle clicked off.
Gem was still crouched over her bag when Pearl came and picked up her lunch container, rinsed it without comment, set it in the rack. The water bottle after it, refilled, cap back on.
She glanced over. Gem was pulling the last things out, setting them on the desk in no particular order.
Once she finished, Pearl walked back over and picked up the bag.
Gem looked up.
Pearl was already standing, moving the bag to the hook by the door where it usually lived. She felt a small satisfaction of being useful. She lifted her own bag from the floor and hung it beside Gem's, then went and got her laptop and set it on the table next to where Gem's was already sitting.
There.
A few minutes passed. Pearl had her eyes on her screen when she heard Gem's chair shift.
"I'll get it," Pearl said, without looking up.
Gem stops and stares.
Pearl was already pushing back from the table. "Sit down, I'll bring it."
A pause. Then the sound of Gem sitting back down.
Pearl got the tea from the counter and crossed to her. "Here you go."
She set it beside Gem's laptop.
Gem didn't look at her.
Pearl stood there for a half second, waiting for something she couldn't name. Then went back to her seat.
She pulled her screen back toward herself, found her place in what she'd been reading and kept going.
A hour or so later, Pearl closed her laptop.
She glanced over at Gem still at her desk. Her shoulders showing she was deep in something or trying to be. Hard to tell which.
Pearl got up.
She tidied a few things on the counter without thinking about it, then noticed the pill bottle by Gem's keys where it had been sitting since this morning. She picked it up, checked it briefly, and crossed to the desk.
"Hey." She set it down beside Gem's laptop. "You didn't take these today."
Gem looked at the bottle.
Pearl leaned down and pressed her lips to the top of Gem's head.
Gem's chair scraped back hard.
Pearl flinched, stepping back.
Gem was on her feet, the bottle still sitting where Pearl had left it.
Her gaze was sharp enough to cut. "What are you doing?"
"I—" Pearl steadied herself. "I was just—"
"Why are you bringing me my medication?"
"Because you hadn't taken it today, I just thought—"
"You thought what?" Gem's voice was flat and tight. "That I forgot? That I can't manage that myself?"
"I wasn't saying that—"
"Then what were you saying Pearl, because it really seems like—"
"I was trying to help you." Pearl's voice came out sharper than she intended. "That's all. I noticed and I thought—"
"I know when to take my own medication." Each word landing separately. "I don't need you to track that for me."
"I wasn't tracking anything, it was just sitting there—"
Gem laughs once, short and humorless. "Right."
Pearl stared at her. "What does that mean..."
"Forget it."
"No, I want to—"
"Pearl."
"—understand what I did, just tell me—"
"I said forget it."
"—because I don't know what's happening right now—"
"Then maybe you don't need to know."
"Gem." Pearl's voice cracks slightly on it. "Please. Just tell me what I did wrong and I'll fix it, I can fix it, just—"
"You can't fix it."
Silence.
Pearl's expression shifts. "What?"
"You can't fix it." Gem's voice has gone flat again. "So just. Stop."
"There has to be something—"
Gem cuts her off. "There isn't."
"Why won't you just let me—"
"Not everything is yours to fix Pearl." The words come out harder than Gem intended.
"Then what is this even about because right now it feels like—"
"Like what Pearl, what does it feel like—"
"Like you can't even breathe around me—"
"I can't—" The words rip out of Gem before she's caught up to them. "I can't, Pearl. Okay? It's like there's a leash around my neck and I can't—I can't breathe, I can't—"
"A leash." Pearl repeats.
Silence.
Pearl's eyes go wet. She's not blinking. One tear streaks down her face and she doesn't move to stop it, she just stands there with an expression Gem has never seen on her before.
"Is that how you feel."
Gem doesn't answer.
One tear gets away from Pearl. She doesn't wipe it.
"Gem." Her voice has gone very still. "Is that actually how you feel." A breath. "With me."
Gem stays quiet.
Pearl already knows the answer. Gem isn't doing anything that would suggest the word "no" is anywhere close to the surface.
Another tear streaks down her face. She can't make a sound.
Then Gem moves.
Not the way Pearl might have hoped for. She looked pretty unhappy about it.
"Hey." Gem's voice comes out rough. "Look at me."
Pearl doesn't.
"Pearl." Gem's hand finds her arm. "Look at me."
Gem exhales through her nose.
"You didn't do anything wrong."
Pearl holds her gaze. Saying nothing.
"I mean it." The edge in Gem's voice hasn't fully gone. She isn't performing softness she doesn't have right now. "This isn't about you."
"Then—"
Gem's eyes cut her. Sharp and immediate, still fully pissed.
"Pearl, I don't want to talk about it right now."
Pearl closes her mouth.
Gem looks away. A long pause. A breath that takes a moment to finish.
"I'm sorry I said that."
A pause. Long enough that Pearl can hear her breathing.
"What I said." Gem doesn't name it. Another pause, longer. "I was wrong."
Pearl nods. Small. A tear gets away from her anyway.
Gem looks at the ceiling. Then back at Pearl.
She doesn't say anything else.