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It wasn't healthy. He knew that. He shouldn't be torturing himself like this. He shouldn't be invading her privacy like this. But in his defense, he only watched when they were in public. They were the ones choosing to flaunt their new romance with those sweet smiles and lingering touches in full view of everyone. It wasn’t his fault that they snuggled and kissed in full view of the public. So, it wasn’t really privacy he was invading. It was publicity.
He wrinkled his nose at the thought. Even he realized that wasn’t right. Both the term and the justification. It was an extra twist of the knife imagining the way she would have wrinkled her nose at the word as she tried to figure out if it really was as wrong as it sounded or if it was yet another peculiarity of the English language. It was one of the ways he had loved to tease her, to see if she would catch it, to hear the exasperated huff and roll of her eyes when she did. She always caught it. He suspected it was because she could read him so well rather than her thorough understanding of the language.
And she could read him. Perhaps better than anyone else in his life. She seemed to know what he was thinking, what he meant by his actions and words, what he was planning. Even now, months after they broke up, he would think she knew he was watching and was playing up the sugary sweetness of her new relationship, except he would occasionally catch her smile fade slightly when he wasn’t looking or a far-off glance while she was waiting for him. She may be faking, but it wasn’t for Jason.
He knew her real smile enough to know when she was forcing hers. He didn’t. But Jason did. From across a crowded room or two streets away, Jason could see the strain that wasn’t there during his relationship with her. He could see the way she held herself back, the way she edited her reactions for him, the way she hid a part of herself.
Her smiles had always been easy and light for Jason… okay there was the occasional indulgent smile and roll of her eyes, but she never had to try to convince herself she felt something she didn’t. She had never needed to pretend to be someone else. He knew everything about her and he loved her for it. He loved all of her.
Or maybe he was just projecting. Because his relationship with Marinette had been the best time of his life, the happiest. For the first time he didn’t feel like he was an imposter, a stowaway who was moments away from being thrown out from the place he inhabited but most definitely didn't belong. He didn’t have to pretend. He didn’t have to hide. He was wholly himself; the good, the bad, the ugly, and she loved him anyway.
At least she did until he had to go and do the most selfless act of his entire life and break up with her. It was for her own good, really it was. She deserved better, a far better person than Jason. A person who didn’t bring the kind of violent baggage he brought. She was going to realize that at some point, but she would stay because she wouldn’t want to hurt him. She was supposed to be happier this way… eventually. She was supposed to be the person she was meant to be, with the person who was actually worthy of her, unlike him.
But he’d messed up. Because now, she’d moved on and it was like he couldn’t breathe and yet couldn’t look away. Every real smile, every time he brushed against her for no reason other than he wanted to, every time he let his hand linger on the small of her back were killing him. And no amount of reminding himself of the strained smiles, mitigated the pain. The ease of the touches were seared into his mind.
Touches like the ones they were sharing now. She looked gorgeous as always in a familiar green dress that fit in perfectly with the Gotham elite, which is perhaps why it looked so out of place on her that night when it had looked made for her in the past. Or, perhaps it was the glass of champagne she held in her hand, but had yet to take a drink of, if the lack of deep red lipstick along the rim was any indication. Whatever it was, it made him unreasonably angry.
He grabbed a drink from the bartender with a grateful nod and made his way over to them just in time to hear the man laugh a bit too hard at whatever story Tim had just told. “Sounds like I missed a good story,” he interjected with a forced lightness. “Which is a shame since I didn’t realize Tim had any.”
Tim rolled his eyes and started to back away until he saw Marinette’s pleading eyes and instead hung his head in defeat before plastering on a wide, amicable smile. “Just because they tend not to involve guns or Austen doesn’t mean they aren’t good,” he chided tightly. “Adam, this is my brother Jason. Jason, this is Adam, he works at Wayne Enterprises.”
Jason tore his eyes away from Marinette to nod at Adam. “Pleasure.”
Adam eyed him suspiciously, his eyes flickered between him and Marinette, but nodded back. “Same.”
“Marinette,” Jason greeted lightly, a stark contrast to his heavy stare that bored into her.
She gave him a short, awkward wave and moved incrementally closer to Adam. “Jason.”
He held out his drink to her. “I brought this for you. Sparkling water with pineapple juice.”
She looked between it and him a few times, eyes wide. “Uhhh…”
“She has a drink already,” Adam cut in for her. He put a protective arm around her waist and pulled her a bit closer.
Jason’s eyes narrowed at the move. He let out a scoff and held the drink out again. “Yeah, champagne. She hates champagne. Not to mention, I highly doubt she’s looking to get drunk tonight.”
“I hardly think one drink is going to get her drunk,” Adam growled through his plastered on smile.
“Adam,” Marinette said quietly, her reassuring hand on his chest to calm him. She smiled weakly at him in an attempt to defuse the situation that might have worked if Jason hadn’t spoken up at the same time.
Jason barked out a loud laugh that garnered the attention of the people around them. He leaned in closer to her but didn’t lower his voice, letting it carry to everyone not so subtly listening in. “Doesn’t know you very well, does he, Pixie?”
“Oh, shit,” Tim mumbled under his breath. “Guess we’re doing this here.” He looked around quickly to case the damage about to be done.
“Jason!” Marinette exclaimed, mortified. She followed Tim’s movements, eyeing the people around them to see who was going to know their business firsthand.
“I know my girlfriend plenty well,” Adam snapped, all semblance of cordiality gone.
“Not well enough to know she doesn’t like people speaking for her,” Jason challenged. He stepped up to Adam until he was towering over him. His body was tensed, prepared for whatever move Adam made next. It hadn’t been his plan to start a fight, but then again, he really hadn’t had a plan, so it wasn’t against his plan either.
“I’m not speaking for her, I’m defending our relationship,” Adam argued, refusing to back down from Jason.
“Awfully sensitive,” Jason teased. “It’s almost like you already know you don’t deserve her or that your relationship is teetering on the edge of finished.”
“Jason,” Marinette hissed. She moved between the two men, both of whom refused to move, which left her squeezed between the two, with barely any space to breathe, craning her neck to attempt to glare at Jason.
“Alright boys,” Tim spoke up. He settled a heavy hand on Jason’s shoulder and pulled back hard, forcing him to separate and give Marinette room. “This is not the place. And for the record, you both look like assholes.”
“Excuse me?” Adam growled. He moved in front of Marinette and into Jason’s face again. “I was just defending myself.”
“Not helping your case,” Tim snapped, leveling him with a warning glare. “Jason, take a walk.” Jason glared at him, then at Adam, but his eyes softened before he looked at Marinette. Seeing her mortified face made him agree to leave without a fight.
“This is ridiculous,” Adam fumed. “I’m getting a drink. Marinette?” Marinette shook her head. Her eyes never left the floor despite feeling his intent stare. He continued to stare at her for a few more moments. His eyes moved to Tim appraisingly and back to Marinette before giving an annoyed grunt and stalking away.
“Thank you, Tim,” Marinette whispered.
“Anytime, Mars,” Tim whispered back. He pulled her into a soft hug. “Need anything?”
“A break,” she responded. She looked around them again, noting the few people who were still listening. “Or maybe I just need to go home. Do you think you can have someone call a car for me?”
“Yeah, of course. Want me to wait with you?” he offered. He pulled back to look her over, concern clear in his gaze. She shook her head and handed him her glass of champagne with a wry, grateful smile. “I’ll check on you tomorrow, okay?” His voice made it clear he was not asking, despite the question format.
She nodded at the offer anyway, knowing full well she’d need one of her best friends to talk with after she’d had the chance to breathe. She patted him on the shoulder as she quickly made her way through the gala to the exit, too embarrassed to make eye contact with anyone on her way. She’d been outside alone, finally having a moment without judgmental eyes on her, for less a minute when she heard the door behind her. She quickly straightened before whoever it was could see her in her weak state.
“Hey, Pixie…” Jason’s familiar voice started quietly. His voice just for the two of them, soft but strong, like her.
She whirled on him, her eyes blazing and an accusatory finger poked in his face. “You're a bastard!” she hissed, attempting to keep her voice low so they wouldn’t draw any more attention of anyone from the gala.
He searched her eyes for just a moment before giving a resigned nod. He hadn’t meant to upset her, but it was inevitable. There was no way forward but through. “I know.”
She shook her head incredulously, her eyes moving away from him to the door, confirming it was fully closed. “I hate you so much,” she growled as she shook her head again as if to dispel a thought that would not leave, her eyes lowered but never left the door.
“I know,” he nodded again.
Her eyes snapped back to him, anger and frustration radiating from her as she stared. “You can't just do this to me,” she continued after a few seconds. “You can’t swoop in like a jealous ex and berate my… Adam’s…” She trailed off as she tried to come up with a word to describe what their relationship was. Despite Adam’s words earlier, they weren’t dating. Well, they were but they’d never decided it was serious. They’d never had the talk about what they were. He'd never asked her to be his girlfriend and she’d certainly never been ready to ask him. “You broke up with me!” she roared.
He offered her a weak, wry smile. “I know.”
“It isn't fair,” she declared bitterly, some of the heat was starting to bleed from her tone, and she hated it. She needed to stay strong. She needed to stay angry. The alternative was too dangerous.
“I know,” he agreed.
“I moved on,” she insisted though she wasn’t sure if it was more for her or him.
“I know.”
“I could love him.”
He moved a step closer to her, his smile sympathetic. “I know.”
She stared hard at him for a few seconds, looking for something. Not even she was sure what. Whether she found it or not, she took a few steps away from him before she continued. “I can't hurt him,” she stated, her voice weaker as she shook her head.
“I know.”
“I was happy.” She was almost pleading for him to understand and leave her alone so she could go back to her life as it was. Her perfectly acceptable life with a perfectly acceptable partner.
“I know,” he agreed, his voice quieting as hers became more fractured.
“This isn't fair.”
“I know.”
“This hurts so much.” Her voice came out as a broken whisper and when she looked back up to meet his gaze, the shine in her eyes from barely contained tears almost broke him too.
“I know,” he agreed. He reached to cup her face, longing to comfort her, before he realized his hand had moved. The act was so ingrained in who he was, it was automatic.
“No!” she yelled and slapped his hand away. Her eyes immediately flew to the door to see if she had garnered any attention. When the door remained closed for a full minute, she returned her glare to him. “You don't get to do that anymore! You don’t get to touch me anymore. You left!”
He slowly dropped his hand but the weighted gaze never did. “I know.”
Her chest was heaving from the outburst, her glare seemed to intensify the longer she stared until suddenly her eyes dropped. “I still love you,” she admitted quietly, like it was a dangerous secret. Dangerous to him. Even more dangerous to her.
He moved closer until he was a breath away from her, but not touching. Not yet. “I know.”
She shook her head. “I hate it,” she whispered to his chest, still not breaching the treacherous waters of eye or physical contact.
“I know,” he whispered back.
She screamed and shoved him with her full strength, which wasn’t enough to move him much, but he still backed away as though it was. “Stop saying ‘I know’, you absolute asshole,” she yelled, no longer concerned with anyone else hearing them. When she looked back, the tears she had just barely restrained before had started streaming down her cheeks.
He advanced on her in an instant, his hands caressing her face, this time undeterred. He wiped away the tear tracks with a gentle touch he only reserved for her. “I know I don't have the right. I know it's unfair. I know I don't deserve you. You deserve someone better, someone who can love you better, be better for you. I know you finally moved on and found happiness again I just... I had to let you know. I couldn't let you think I didn't, that I didn't know what I had with you, that I didn't realize how good it was, how rare that was. I did. You deserved…”
“I deserved someone who would stay,” she cut in, attempting to make her voice show the defiance and strength she wished she felt. “Someone I can trust.”
“I know.” His mirthless smile became more authentic at her reaction to the two words, but faded back to mirthless after a moment. He brushed his fingers gently against her cheek. “I convinced myself it was better for you, so you could find someone who actually deserves you…” He sighed and clenched his eyes closed for a moment to focus his racing mind. “I know he's a good man, a better man than me, better for you and I don't deserve you. But I'm a villain and villains are selfish. We take what we don't deserve.”
She snorted inelegantly. “You're not a villain. Not anymore.”
He huffed a small laugh and let himself gaze into her eyes a while longer. “But I am selfish. I realized you feel like home and without you I feel like I’ve been exiled. And I just want to come home. I know I don't have any right to ask, I know you'd be better off without me, but I want you and I'm selfish enough to ask anyway.”
She started to lean into him but caught herself and backed away with a deep breath to steady her heart. “I can’t do this to Adam.” They may not have been official, but that didn’t mean jumping into someone else’s arms was okay. She couldn’t do that to someone, especially someone as nice as Adam.
“Judging by his reaction tonight, he knows you two aren’t meant to last. He’s known this was coming,” he assured her.
“You don’t know that,” she exclaimed. “We were happy. We… we could have been happy,” she insisted.
Jason’s gaze softened. “You were going to tell him who you are?” he asked gently. “What you are?”
“I… I…” she stuttered, finding anything but his eyes of interest. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. It was something she had determinedly not thought about. “I may have.”
He scoffed. “You weren’t going to tell him,” he retorted like he knew her well enough to be certain, and really… he did. “And you can’t keep something like that from someone you share your life with. You two were made to fall apart. You weren’t ever going to be able to be yourself around him.”
“That’s not me!” she yelled at nothing. “This is me. This!” she motioned violently toward herself dolled up in her elegant design.
He eyed her analytically. “But that’s not just you.”
“No, it isn’t just…” she started indignantly.
“You’re both,” he interrupted before she could get too fired up. “This is you and that is you. You’re both. It’s both part of who you are. And so, so much more. And you were never going to be happy hiding an entire part of your life. It doesn’t matter who you’re with. If you’re hiding a part of you, it is going to implode eventually.”
“You don’t know that,” she said tentatively, but the shake in her voice betrayed that even she didn’t believe her own words.
“I do,” he promised. “Because that’s how I felt with everyone before you, even with people who knew who I was. It didn’t matter, I still always hid something. And that feeling; like a piece of me was missing, like I was a refugee in my own life, waiting until I could go home again. All those things that being with you made go away.”
She stared into his eyes searching for the deception she desperately hoped to find there but there was only sympathy and affection. It was too much. She couldn’t stop the tears from cascading down her face unabated as the emotions rolled over and through her, crushing her in their wake, pulling her in every direction. For the last few months, as soon as she felt like thins were settling, something would happen to pull her under again. And she was done. She couldn’t handle another major emotional upset.
Jason pulled her into his chest, wrapping his arms around her, a comfort and a shield, letting her soak his shirt as he whispered words of comfort, regret, and support. After a few minutes, she was able to get enough of a grasp on her emotions to stop her tears at least until she could get home. She took a deep breath and pulled out of his embrace, putting necessary space between them.
It was another few beats before she could meet his eyes again. “I’ve missed you,” she admitted, her voice breathless like she had nothing left to put into it. “I’ve missed feeling right. But I don’t know how to trust you again.”
Jason moved to close the distance but faltered when Alfred pulled up with a car. “Miss Dupain-Cheng,” he greeted as he moved around the car to open the passenger door for her. “I believe you requested a ride?”
Marinette blinked a few times and looked between him and Jason to remind herself where she was. She moved to the car quickly without meeting Jason’s eyes. “Right. Right. Yeah, thank you,” she answered with a small smile for Alfred.
Jason fought every fiber of his being to stop himself from glaring at Alfred for the interruption. The effort took so much focus, he almost missed Alfred starting to close the door. He moved instantly, inserting himself in the doorway before it narrowed too much. He opened his mouth a few times but had to close it as he tried to figure out what he wanted to say. “I’d like to continue this conversation, if that’s okay.”
She reacted instantly, her eyes widening and breath shortening. “Later!” he blurt out quickly. “In a few days.” He took a deep breath to calm down and reset. “I’d like to stop by or call in a few days, if that would be okay. We can talk and see what happens. Yeah?”
She let out a longer, lighter breath. “Yeah,” she nodded gently, a soft smile curling her lips. “Yeah, okay.”
He grinned brilliantly. Hope edging into his eyes for the first time in months. He had to stop himself from lurching forward to hug her, reminding himself it was too early for that. “Great! Yeah. Right. Okay.”
He almost lost his hold and fell into the car at the sound of a throat clearing. He looked up with a grimace, expecting a judgmental glare from Alfred but instead was met with proud, twinkling eyes. “Sorry, Alfred.”
“Quite alright, Master Jason.” He closed the door but paused before moving around the car to the driver’s seat. “Please do not repeat your past mistakes with her, Master Jason. She doesn’t deserve it.” Jason dropped his gaze to the ground and nodded in agreement. He startled when Alfred rested a hand on his shoulder. “And neither do you. You’re a good man. I’ve had the sincere pleasure of watching you grow up, mistakes and all, and I can honestly say, you have become someone I am profoundly proud of.” His eyes darted to the car quickly. “And I am not the only one.”
Jason stared at him wordlessly, which was a first for him. He couldn’t even come up with a snappy retort to combat the heavy emotions. “Don’t run away from the happy ending you’ve earned, that both of you have, because you’re still seeing yourself through old eyes.”
Jason nodded rapidly to fight the tears pricking his eyes. “Yes, sir.”
Alfred patted his shoulder and moved to the driver’s side door but paused to look back at Jason. “It will be a lot of work. Earning back trust is always harder than earning it in the first place. It will be difficult.” He cocked his head to the side and fixed Jason with a knowing stare. “But you’ve never been afraid to put in the work for the things you really wanted. And Miss Marinette is something you want, correct?” He disappeared into the car before observing Jason’s dazed nod.
The taillights had already disappeared before Jason shook himself out of his stupor, a wide smile grew on his lips. “Yes. Yes she is.” He started walking to his motorcycle, his mind already whirling with plans. He had someone’s trust to earn back.