He eyed Jason carefully, watched him light up. It was always the first thing he did in a tough situation. Hadn’t it always been? Damian couldn’t remember a time when Jason didn’t smell like cigarette smoke. Part of him wondered if he’d been born addicted to that shit.“You really should step outside to smoke,” Damian commented offhandedly, “You’re going to make your couch smell more terrible than it already does.” He shifted uncomfortably, closing his eyes, and then opening them to look away. “What do you want to say? Even better, Jason, what do you want to hear?” He couldn’t help but swallow hard. Everything…ached. And something inside of him was screaming.
The taller man raised his brows again. Damian was surprising him a lot today. And for some reason that sort of…..hurt. He swallowed air down, shook his head. Damian’s voice sounded muted. As if he were really fading, Jason placed a hand on Damian’s shoulder, as if to hold onto him. As if he’d disappear. He squeezed lightly, but his fingers were numb to the feel of the younger.
Stupid, this was so goddamn stupid.
“I don’t know, I…” Every time he forced a smile back onto his face, it dropped right back off again. He felt as though he should stamp out that cigarette; realizing deftly that Damian was right. He just sucked in nicotine at twice the speed he normally did, tongue running along his teeth whenever the cigarette was removed, an old habit that that he hadn’t fed since he was fourteen.
“Damian.” Why did his voice sound small? He was the one that wanted to do this…
A breath hitched in his throat as Jason touched his shoulder, and he wasn’t sure why. He felt a sick sense of trepidation, and a voice inside said that he should end it before Jason could. Maybe that was the key here…he needed to get a leg up on the other. If it was going to end, it was going to be on Damian’s terms.
…the only problem being that Damian wasn’t sure what ‘IT’ even was.
“You what? You want to stop doing…whatever it is we’re doing? You feel like it’s wrong somehow, and now you’re going to step off? Or is it something else?” His gaze fell squarely on Jason, but it wasn’t as intense as he’d been hoping for. “Because if you’re planning on pushing me out of your life, hurry up with it. I hate being strung along more than I hate being aban—” he shook his head.
“What I mean to say is, if this is ending, whatever this is, just end it now. We can easily go back to fighting one another whenever we accidentally cross paths in Gotham. I can leave your apartment, and you can get a new one, and I won’t even know where to find you. I can easily throw away all the clothes I’ve ruined with the smell of nicotine by hanging around you, and wash the smell of gun oil off of my skin. I can even forget the way…” he trailed off, realizing that if he didn’t blink, or swallow, or something, his voice would never level out.
