Work Text:
Blood drips from his nose, an ache spreading across his face with the sticky warmth catching on his lip. There's an ache through his hips too, from falling backward to the dirt so hardly. Pebbles and burrs catching on his palms. The taste of iron on his tongue, as he stares up into eyes wide behind tinted glasses. Something like disbelief. He stares at a shaking hand, raised to rub at those wide, glassy eyes. Knuckles smeared with blood he knows is his own, smudging the bottom of the glass.
He hadn't expected a punch. Thinks maybe neither of them did, but it wasn't undeserved.
Jakob just exhales, shaky. Grins with blood coated teeth and tears born of pain. Axel stands above him; horrified. Glasses shoved askew. There's blood at on his cheek. Jakob's blood.
"Sorry," Jakob breathes, still smiling. Always smiling. "I wanted to know."
Axel's still shaking. Staring. Like he can't believe what either of them have done. Jakob can still feel his lips against his own, in the brief moment before.
"You– I-"
He can't find words. Jakob's never seen him rendered speechless; it's unnerving. Axel is always talking, always processing. Jakob ruined that. But all he's thinking about is the lingering taste of coffee on Axel's lips. He feels blood drip down his chin and onto his shirt. He can see how Axel's eyes zero in on the droplet, tracking it.
He doesn't move to help Jakob up.
"Nothing changes."
Something indescribable passes over Axel's face as Jakob says it. Maybe anger. Perhaps his indignation was just delayed. "Va? Then… why—?!"
"I told you," Jakob repeats, shoving himself up from the ground. Alone. Pressing his palm tenderly to his nose when he finally stands. It aches, but no more than his chest. "I wanted to know."
"Know what?! Stop being so… so..!"
"How it feels to kiss you."
That shuts up Axel's rambling. Blue eyes still wide in disbelief. Jakob just smiles, blood and all. It hurts. But it's fine.
Axel opens his mouth. Closes it again. Like a gaping fish.
"I broke your nose."
"I know."
Inhale.
"I… don't love you. Like that."
Pause. Exhale.
"…I know."
Axel's hand is still shaking, Jakob's blood across his knuckles a red blur. He doesn't think it's only anger, or just being startled, anymore.
The hand rakes through Axel's hair suddenly. Red catches there too, on the strands— and Jakob wonders if he forgot about it altogether. "That was… was unfair to do to me. Then."
"I know that too."
He sounds like a broken record.
Axel doesn't call him selfish, but his eyes do. At least, that's what Jakob can tell. So he puts his hands in his pockets, and nods. Once. "I know… what I needed to, now. Nothing else changes."
"…Right," Axel repeats. Incredulous. Shaken. "Nothing changes."
His sarcasm drips like the blood from Jakob's nose.
The air between them is tense.
Thick enough to slice, and Jakob is helpless to watch his friend go through the stages of grief in his expression after a moment. Like something shattered irrevocably. "Jakob, I—"
"Guys!" They're interrupted by Kevin, smacking the back door open looking vaguely frazzled, "You coming or what? Rehearsal was supposed to start, like, five minutes ago. We don't have all day with the space."
Kevin darts back in as Axel swears, pulling away from Jakob. He doesn't remember when they got so close again. But it feels like miles grow between them. "Axel—"
There's none of the grief now. Just the glare of a man Jakob's forced a wall between. But he sees the dampness in them.
"You got what you wanted," Axel cuts him off with a hiss. Nothing like himself. Nothing like twenty seconds prior. "I hope it was worth it."
It doesn't sound bitter, but it isn't kind. If Axel were anybody else, Jakob might think it sounded dejected. But he's moving to the door, following Kevin inside from a moment prior, before the thought truly coalesces.
"…No," Jakob answers, to just the grass under his feet, "But I got my answer."
The earth doesn't respond.
And everything changes, in the end, if only for him. Axel pretends it never happened, and that's fine. It's what Jakob wanted. Just to know, for a brief moment. So he could let go.
Except… it isn't what he wanted. Not really.
Because he still tastes the coffee on his lips.