Chapter Text
Roy bit his tongue as he watched Jamie do push-up after push-up after push-up. The number he had told him to do was truly ridiculous, but Roy hadn’t expected Jamie to actually listen to him. Not really.
He’d only pulled such a high number out of his ass so that he could make sure that Jamie would be too busy trying not to collapse under his own weight to look at him by the time he found a way to bring up what he wanted to ask. Well, that and because he had wanted to see how far he could take tormenting Jamie for his own amusement before Jamie would stop listening to him.
Sure, he bitched and moaned a little here and there, but Jamie’s complaints weren’t particularly effective when they always came while he was already doing whatever Roy told him to.
Roy was well aware that he had been taking torturing Jamie a little bit further than usual since the season had ended. And the little shit had the nerve to act like he didn’t even notice. He was as annoyingly unfazed as ever.
While everyone else was enjoying taking a break for the off-season, Roy had expected Jamie to try to talk him into taking a break from training him or at least ease up until pre-season training would start up, but Jamie had been as committed as ever. Roy knew that from a coaching perspective, that was a good thing. But from a personal perspective, it was fucking irritating.
It really took all the joy out of making Jamie get up at four in the morning when he hadn’t even once questioned why the hell they were still getting up at that ungodly hour in the off-season when they could easily fit his training into far more reasonable hours. The fucker even had the nerve to be all cheery and chatty and shit every single day at four in the fucking morning.
So Roy was pushing him more than usual. Just to try to make that annoying chipper facade crack. Just to see how absurdly far Jamie would make him take it before it would.
And, okay, maybe the fact that Phoebe would not stop talking about Jamie and calling him Roy’s best friend didn’t help. And neither did the fact that his sister found it fucking hilarious and had started doing the same, both in front of and away from Phoebe. But none of that was more aggravating than the fact that Roy was rapidly running out of ways to try to convince them that he wasn’t.
And, okay, the whole stupid fucking fight over Keeley definitely was a part of it. Roy had been so damn sure that Jamie was over Keeley. Jamie was annoying in a lot of ways, but he had never said anything against Roy and Keeley’s relationship. The worst he’d ever said to Keeley about Roy was the same stupid old man jokes he made to Roy when she wasn’t here. And he’d long since apologized for telling Keeley he had still loved her and he had backed off after that.
That had been long enough ago that Roy had assumed that Jamie had been fully over Keeley. He had moronically believed that Jamie had completely forgotten any idea of getting back together with her, especially when he hadn’t tried to swoop in after Roy had been thick enough to end a good thing. And even when he’d learned firsthand just how hard Keeley Jones was to get over, he’d never considered that Jamie might still have feelings for her. And why wouldn’t he? She was fucking incredible. And way too good for either of them.
Roy had been stupid enough to assume that the moment that he was ready to pull his head out of his ass, Keeley would just take him back instantly. He had honestly thought that the biggest thing he needed to worry about was the chance that Jamie might try to get into his sister’s pants.
He hadn’t realized there was an option much worse than that. And then when out of nowhere Jamie had said that he wasn’t going to give up on the idea of getting back together with Keeley and just step aside unless Keeley officially got back together with Roy, Roy had acted like a complete and utter moron.
He’d spent the entire time since then mortified about what a complete ass he’d made of himself to Keeley. But that wasn’t even the worst of it. Oh no. He hadn’t just treated her like a fucking object or prize for them to compete over. He’d also been a total prick to Jamie while he was at it.
Roy was disgusted with himself for hitting Jamie and he was just as disgusted with himself for feeling guilty about hitting Jamie. Things had been so much easier back when Jamie had been a piece of shit and the only thing Roy had had to regret after hitting him was that he hadn’t done it harder.
Now, he wasn’t just worried about Keeley’s feelings on all of this. He was worried about Jamie’s feelings too and about fucking up their friendship. And the fact that he cared that much about Jamie made him so angry that he found himself taking it out on Jamie. And every time Jamie put up with his bullshit with that stupid smile on his face, Roy got a little more irritated and felt a little more shit over the whole situation and took it out on Jamie a little more.
At least he wasn’t smiling anymore. Jamie’s arms were shaking, but he kept on pushing through and counting push-ups anyway.
Roy watched him for a moment longer as he considered how to try to bring the subject up casually before he finally just gave up and asked, “Have you talked to Keeley lately?”
Jamie froze at the peak of his push-up to look up at him curiously, then turned away again as he lowered himself back down again.
“Are you asking because you want to know if I’ve talked to her at all? Or because you’re worried that I’ve already worked my charm on her?” Jamie asked.
Roy couldn’t tell if the edge to his voice was because he was annoyed or just because he was focusing all of his energy on making it through the rest of the stupid push-ups. Roy was tempted to tell him to stop them to find out.
He didn’t.
Instead, he said, “I don’t know.”
“Have you?” Jamie asked instead of answering.
“Which one?” Roy asked. “Talked to her? Or worked my charm?”
“Talked to her,” Jamie answered. He paused for a moment as his arms shook, then added half under his breath, “I don’t think she’s overly likely to get back together with either of us anytime soon after the pricks we made of ourselves.”
Jamie tried to push himself up again but only made it halfway up before he collapsed, then lay sprawled out on his stomach in the grass, trying to catch his breath.
Roy was tempted to point out that he hadn’t finished yet. He was tempted to threaten to make Jamie start his whole count over. Instead, he just watched Jamie lie there as he said, “Yeah, I’d say we both totally fucking blew it.”
Jamie made some grunt that sounded like agreement, but he didn’t move from the ground.
“Honestly, I still don’t understand why she put up with either of us in the first place,” Roy added.
Jamie laughed at that but stayed with the side of his face pressed against the grass.
“Are you going to get up?” Roy asked.
“Depends,” Jamie said.
“On what?” Roy asked.
“Are you going to make me do more push-ups when I do?” Jamie asked.
Roy had already made him do more than enough and maybe a teeny tiny part of him felt bad about that, but there was no way he was going to admit that. So instead he said, “I haven’t decided yet.”
“Okay,” Jamie said. “Just give me a minute.”
Roy wasn’t sure if he had meant to give him a minute to pull himself together enough to get up or if he’d meant to give him a minute and then he’d get back to the push-ups.
Roy watched him for a few seconds, then gave in, “I’m not carrying you home when you can’t get up by yourself. You’re done.”
Jamie didn’t answer. He just rolled onto his back and laid there for a little longer, then finally sat up and looked up at Roy as he rested his forearms on his knees.
“I’ve been trying to figure out how to apologize to her,” Jamie said.
That surprised Roy. Jamie was a hell of a lot better at that kind of thing than he was. Roy was shit at talking about feelings and apologies. He hadn’t figured out how to apologize to either of them yet. He’d kind of assumed Jamie had already fixed things with Keeley, or at least tried to.
Jamie was infuriatingly good at apologies since he’d started actually making them. It pissed Roy off to no end how annoyingly sincere Jamie could be about it and how embarrassingly easily he had forgiven him.
He wouldn’t have been surprised if Jamie had already apologized and Keeley had already forgiven him. The worst part of this whole situation was that Roy couldn’t even just hate Jamie. All of the things about Jamie that had made Roy root for Keeley to dump Jamie long before he’d had feelings of his own for her had long since disappeared. Jamie had grown and shit and now Roy was disgusted that he could understand why Keeley might consider him.
That was part of what had made Roy threatened enough by Jamie to make a complete fool of himself. Hell, if Jamie’s success wouldn’t be directly correlated to his own downfall, Roy probably would have been rooting for him. If it had been any other woman, Roy would have been rooting for Jamie to succeed. Well, any other woman that wasn’t his sister.
“I thought you were the prince of apologies now,” Roy said, completely failing to keep the bitterness out of his tone.
Jamie went to get up and groaned as he used his arms to push himself up off the ground. Roy stuck out a hand to help him up without thinking.
Jamie took it and let Roy haul him up, then dropped Roy’s hand and said, “Yeah, well, I’m trying to figure out how to tell her I’m sorry without her thinking I’m just saying it to try to put myself back in the running or come out of things looking better than you.”
Roy made a non-committal grunting noise.
He had worried about the same thing. He didn’t want her to think his apology wasn’t genuine and was just an extension of some stupid pissing contest with Jamie. He hadn’t realized until then that he had kind of expected Jamie to intentionally or unintentionally use his own apology to his advantage without a second thought.
“Am I supposed to know what that grunt means?” Jamie asked.
Roy considered for a moment then said, “I’ve been trying to figure out the same thing.”
“You have?” Jamie asked skeptically.
“I’m shit at apologies on a good day,” Roy pointed out. “I’m lucky if I don’t come off looking even more of a prick during them on a good day. I don’t need her thinking I’m doing it just to fuck with you.”
“Yeah, I could see that,” Jamie said and Roy wasn’t sure whether to be offended or not. Before he had the chance to make up his mind on that, Jamie added, “You know, we could do it together… That way neither of us gets an advantage out of it and it doesn’t look like it’s some stupid strategic shit.”
Roy considered for a moment, then admitted, “That’s actually not a shit idea.”
Jamie laughed and said, “Of course, it’s not. I’m full of great ideas.”
Roy rolled his eyes at that, but let him have it. He was still busy trying to figure out how to get this next part out. Somehow, it felt like it would be easier with Keeley there. But he knew that would be shittier. That would make it look like it was for her benefit and not Jamie’s.
“Are you going to make me do something else first or can we break for lunch now?” Jamie asked.
Roy glanced at his watch. He was getting hungry and it was getting close to Keeley’s lunch break so he grunted out, “Lunch.”
“Great!” Jamie said. “I’m fucking starving, mate.”
He went to go walk past Roy, but Roy stuck his arm out to block him.
“Hold on a minute,” Roy said.
Jamie stopped and looked at him curiously and Roy tried to brace himself for the words he knew he needed to say.
Jamie’s brow furrowed further as he asked, “What are you glaring at me like that for?”
“Just give me a second,” Roy said.
Jamie’s judgy little confused face wasn’t helping anything. Roy sighed and decided to just rip the bandaid off.
“I’m-” he tried and then froze.
“You’re…?” Jamie repeated. When Roy didn’t elaborate right away, he asked, “Are you malfunctioning or something?”
“I need you to shut up or I am going to headbutt you,” Roy warned through gritted teeth. Then immediately after, he thought better of his word choice and added, “I’m not going to headbutt you.”
“Okay?” Jamie said. “Glad we got that sorted out. Can we go eat now?”
“Would you shut the fuck up and let me apologize to you?” Roy snapped at him.
“Apologize to me?” Jamie repeated. “What for?”
Roy glared at him. Jamie was staring at him confused as if he had no idea what Roy could possibly be apologizing for. Roy wanted to wring his neck for being so oblivious. And for making him have to spell it out.
“What do you mean what for?” Roy asked. “For punching you. I was being an idiot. I shouldn’t have hit you.”
“I hit you too,” Jamie pointed out.
“Yeah, but I hit you first,” Roy insisted. “You were just fighting back.”
“I mean, that wasn’t the only reason I was hitting you,” Jamie said. “And I kind of baited you into it. I was being a prick.”
Roy surprised himself as he said, “No, you weren’t. I was.”
“What?” Jamie asked, sounding stunned.
“I just assumed you were over her,” Roy said. Jamie had told him that he was still in love with Keeley and he had never told him anything after that to make him believe any differently. Roy had just chosen to assume that enough time had passed and Jamie had been supportive enough that he had been completely over Keeley and would be happy to see her and Roy get back together. “You shared how you felt with me and I punched you in the face for it… So I’m. Sorry.”
Roy could feel his jaw clenching as he waited for Jamie to respond.
“Trust me, you’re fine,” Jamie said. “And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry too. I mean, you told me your feelings and I turned it into a contest. That was pretty shitty too.”
Jamie just looked at him like he was waiting for Roy to say something, but Roy was physically uncomfortable with the sincerity of the moment. He had to resist the urge to just take off and abandon Jamie in the park.
It probably wouldn’t work anyway. The fucker would just run after him.
“Besides,” Jamie said as he broke into his stupid smug grin. “Hitting you was way worse. You’re practically a senior citizen. You’re lucky I didn’t break your hip.”
Roy rolled his eyes as Jamie did that stupid thing where he stuck his tongue out before he laughed obnoxiously at his own joke, but he was glad that Jamie had broken the horrifying tension.
“You are such a prick,” Roy accused, but he was laughing too now.
Keeley was staring down at her laptop screen and debating texting Rebecca to see if she was available for a last-minute lunch date when she was drawn out of her thoughts by a quiet knock on her open office door.
She was expecting to see Barbara but was surprised when she looked up to see Roy and Jamie standing in the doorway together. She wasn’t totally sure what was going on, but she had a bad feeling. Spending time with them together wasn’t unusual. Either one of them showing up at her office on their own wasn’t totally out of the realm of normal either. But both of them showing up at her office together was strange, especially after the night they had gotten into a stupid fistfight over her and then shown up at her house to try to make her choose one of them.
Keeley’s eyes focused on the takeout bag in Jamie’s hand and she had a sinking feeling as she was reminded of the time that Roy had made her coffee and Jamie had brought her one and she’d had to combine them to try to spare both of their feelings. She thought that they’d come far beyond that and she had liked them being friends and caring about each other too instead of just her.
She hated that now they were right back to the way they had been before Jamie had rejoined Richmond. She didn’t want to be caught in the middle of their drama and she didn’t want them using her as a reason to hate each other. She had a bad feeling that now they were going to start showing up like this all the time to try to be the one to get there first or get chosen to spend time with her. She absolutely was not going to allow that.
“Shit, you’re busy,” Roy said and it took her a second to realize that he meant because she had been in the middle of reading an email when he had come in. “We can come back later.”
“No, it’s fine,” Keeley said.
The email could wait. And if this was going to turn into them fighting over whether she would let Roy take her out for lunch or stay with Jamie and eat the lunch he had brought, then she figured it would be better to get this over with and set some ground rules to keep them from dragging her into their stupid, petty, misogynistic fight over which one of them they thought deserved her.
“We brought you lunch,” Jamie said as he set the bag on the table.
Roy took a few steps into the office too and closed the door behind them.
Keeley smiled a little with relief at that we. At least they weren’t already trying to upstage each other. Maybe they weren’t going to be awful to be around together now after all.
“Both of you?” she asked anyway just to check. She opened the bag, wondering whether there would be enough food for two people or three. She found only enough food for her. “Neither of you is going to eat anything?”
“We already ate on the way here,” Roy said. “Jamie was starving.”
“Plus, that’s an apology lunch and we figured there was a chance you’d want to kick us out instead of eating with us,” Jamie added.
“An apology lunch. Really?” she asked as she looked between them.
“We were fucking idiots,” Roy said. “We fucked everything up and treated you like shit and you didn’t deserve that.”
He must have sensed that she wasn’t about to throw them out at that instant, since he took a seat.
“We know you’re not some trophy we can win,” Jamie added as he sat down next to Roy. “Fighting over you was moronic. And obviously, it’s your choice.”
They had been doing so well, but now there it was again. Them telling her to choose between them.
“Oh, so you still expect me to choose one of you?” she challenged. “Oh, I see. That part was fine. The only problem was that you shouldn’t have gotten into a fistfight to decide who I would go to before you thought to award me the honour of settling it for you?”
“No,” they both said in a rush.
“That’s not what I meant,” Jamie insisted.
“What he’s trying to say is that we’d understand if you don’t want to choose either of us, especially after we pulled that bullshit,” Roy said. “You get to decide if you want one of us or if you don’t want either of us. And whatever you choose, we’ll respect. Right?”
He glanced over at Jamie and Jamie quickly agreed, “Yeah. What he said.”
Keeley glanced between them. She wasn’t sure what to say. Things had been a lot more awful when they’d been fighting over her, but at least then she had decided that she wasn’t going to get back together with either of them if that was how they were going to behave.
But now, they were being the emotionally mature versions of themselves again and that was better, but it made things so much more difficult. She liked the emotionally mature versions of them. She liked that they were friends. She liked that they brought out the best in each other. She just hated that it made knowing what to say so much more difficult.
She didn’t want to hurt either of them. Picking one would inevitably hurt the other, even if they all managed to stay friends. And she was fairly sure that admitting that she didn’t know how to choose right now would hurt both of them.
She hadn’t intended to have feelings for both of them, but things were complicated.
Roy was Roy. She’d never stopped having feelings for him. Obviously, she wanted to get back together with him. Obviously, it meant something that he wasn’t running from his feelings anymore. Sure, the obvious choice would be to pick Roy.
But things with Jamie were more complicated now. He had done a lot of growing up since their break up. He wasn’t the kind of man she’d have to put endless emotional labour into anymore. When she had broken up with him, she’d accepted that he would never be the kind of man that she had spent their whole relationship trying to convince herself she might be able to turn him into. But now, he’d grown into that person on his own. And since they’d started spending more time together, a part of her had feelings for him again too.
Keeley couldn’t just pick Roy and get back with him without telling him about her feelings for Jamie. But she was pretty sure that when he found out about those feelings, he wasn’t just going to be fine with getting back together and the three of them all being friends and spending time together as if nothing had changed.
And obviously, Keeley couldn’t just throw things away with Roy and pretend she didn’t have feelings for him to be with Jamie either.
She didn’t want to lose either of them from her life. She didn’t want to choose neither of them. But she didn’t see how she could possibly choose without making a decision that would be unfair to all three of them.
Roy must have noticed the look on her face because he added, “You don’t have to choose right now. We didn’t come here to ambush you and get an answer. That’s not what this is this time.”
That should have been comforting, but Keeley didn’t know that she was ever going to be able to just make a simple choice. She couldn’t decide to have feelings for only one of them. She’d tried that already and it hadn’t worked. She didn’t see that changing and she didn’t want them to just wait around thinking that eventually she’d know what to do.
Keeley’s voice was quiet as she asked, “What if I don’t know how to choose?”
She wasn’t sure exactly what reaction she was expecting. Maybe, she’d thought that they’d look hurt or angry, but she didn’t know what she had expected them to say. She didn’t even realize that she had expected them to say anything until she was caught in the horrible silence that followed her words.
Roy’s face was completely unreadable. Keeley thought he might be angry, but there was a chance that his face was just like that. He had a naturally angry processing face. He had a naturally angry face most of the time. His body language was stiff, but that wasn’t really surprising after what she had just said.
Jamie was staring at her with his jaw slightly dropped and surprise in his eyes. After a moment, he turned to look at Roy like he was trying to judge how he should react based off of Roy’s non-reaction. Roy made eye contact with him for a moment, then looked back at Keeley. Jamie turned to look back at her and Keeley very abruptly realized she had absolutely no idea what to say now.
She couldn’t just kick them out of her office. She couldn’t just change the subject and pretend that she hadn’t said it. She couldn’t undo what she had revealed. And neither of them looked like they were planning on saying anything any time soon.
“What if I don’t want to choose?” she asked, even though she knew that was impossible. She would have to make a choice, even if it was to value her friendship with both over choosing either of them.
“What? Like date both of us at once until you figure it out?” Jamie asked.
Roy was staring at Jamie now. Or maybe glaring. It was hard to tell.
Keeley let out a humourless laugh at that. She wasn’t sure why she was surprised that Jamie’s solution sounded like another reality dating show. That wouldn’t be anything new for him. He’d already competed for a woman on national TV and lost. She shouldn’t be surprised that he would be willing to try the same when the stakes were a lot less public.
That never worked out in reality shows though. Some girl always dated a bunch of guys at once and fell madly in love with at least two of them and wasn’t able to untangle her feelings. She didn’t need to date them both, only to have her feelings for both of them grow even stronger and to become even more uncertain. That wouldn’t solve anything. That would only make things so much worse.
“What if I just want two boyfriends?” she asked.
She had meant it as a joke to try to lighten the mood and change the subject from why Jamie’s suggestion would only end more disastrously for them all. But as soon as the words left her mouth, she wanted to take them back.
They weren’t laughing. They didn’t look like they thought she was joking. She had definitely done nothing to help the situation.
Roy sat straight-backed and stiff in his chair as he studied her face. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know what he saw there or what he was thinking. Jamie leaned back in his chair at that and suddenly looked deep in thought as if he was actually considering the idea.
She looked back at Roy and his eyes moved from her to Jamie and back again. He opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again and furrowed his brow.
Keeley waited to see if he would say anything, but after a moment, he stood up and headed over to the door. He paused in the doorway and turned back around to look at her.
She expected him to say something angry and storm out, but instead after a moment’s pause he said, “I have to go.”
And then he left before she could even think of anything to say.
That exit was maybe a little better than if he had just stormed off without a word, but not by much. Keeley was absolutely certain she had irreversibly fucked things up. Roy probably hated her now. She hoped that if he did that he at least wouldn’t hate Jamie too.
Jamie stood up then too and sounded half-apologetic as he said, “I should probably go too.” He pointed over his shoulder as he added, “He’s my ride and there’s like a ninety percent chance he’s going to leave without me and make me run home if I don’t beat him to the car.”
Keeley gave him a nod. At least he didn’t seem completely furious at her.
“I can give you a ride if he leaves you here,” she offered.
Jamie waved the offer off with a smile as he said, “Ah, he moves slow. I’m just giving him a headstart to make him feel better about how quickly I can catch up to him. Enjoy your lunch.”
She had made the offer in case Roy decided to leave Jamie behind intentionally because he was upset about what she had said, but she didn’t say that. Instead, she just watched him leave with a soft, “Bye, Jamie.”
“Are we going to talk about what she said in there?” Jamie asked after Roy had spent the last ten long minutes driving in complete silence. Jamie had tried to blather on about other topics to ease the tension, but Roy hadn’t said a single word, even to snap at him to shut up.
Roy grunted at that question and Jamie wasn’t sure if that was an improvement or not.
Jamie was mildly concerned that Roy was broken. He had a death grip on the steering wheel and he seemed ready to explode. Part of Jamie wished that he would just start yelling at him or swearing or something to get out whatever was going on inside that had him completely nonverbal.
Jamie felt a little guilty that behind his concern for Roy, he was kind of thrilled that he was apparently still in the running. He had thought that he needed to at least give telling Keeley how he felt a try before she got back together with Roy so at least he would know that it wouldn’t have made a difference. He hadn’t really expected that she might choose him. He felt bad that Keeley and Roy both seemed miserable, but he couldn’t stop himself from feeling a little happy that he hadn’t been completely ruled out.
“Okay, I’m just going to assume that means no talking,” Jamie said. “Does this mean afternoon training is cancelled?”
Roy grunted again, sounding more annoyed this time. There was almost a growly quality to it.
“Is that a no?” Jamie asked. “Or are we still training and you’re just pissed that I asked?”
Roy took his eyes off of the road for a moment to glare at him, then stared straight ahead again.
“How about one grunt for yes and two grunts for no,” Jamie suggested eagerly. “Where are we going?”
Roy glared at him, but didn’t break his silence to call him stupid for suggesting a yes or no system and then immediately asking a question that couldn’t be answered with it. Jamie had thought that playing dumb to annoy him might work, but clearly, it hadn’t.
“Are we doing more training?” Jamie asked.
Roy didn’t answer. He didn’t even grunt.
“Okay, I guess I’ll figure it out when we get wherever you’re taking me,” Jamie said, then leaned back in his seat with a blatantly exaggerated sigh.