Room 417, Tuesday night

[fates_jaye]

The babbling from the animals has kind of turned into a white noise that Jaye can almost ignore. Almost. She gets three words into an E-mail before she realizes she's spending more time shushing them than she is typing anything, so she closed the computer and decides it can wait until she's like, living in a cabin in the woods or something.

Ooh. That's an idea.

[For Alec.]

Comments

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Alec walks very slowly up the fourth floor hallway. Not that he's afraid - he just isn't really looking forward to this.

After a few minutes of loitering, he finally knocks, at the least because loitering? Is actually pretty boring.

[fates_jaye]

It takes her a second to realize she is hearing someone. "Shhhhh," she tells the animals, and louder, says, "Enter!"

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Letting himself in, he wonders if she's talking to someone, right up to where he's pretty sure the room is empty except for them. He bites at his lip until he figures he should say something. "Hi."

[fates_jaye]

And it's quiet.

"Here for awkward conversation number one?" she asks, and is actually pretty casual about it. "Usually it happens in a common room so it's really really impersonal, so hey, points."

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Part of him is kicking himself for not going that route, but he'll take the points right now instead, because that might actually get him somewhere. "I was really kind of hoping for no more than one, maybe two? I'm not a big fan of the awkward thing."

[fates_jaye]

"That seems to be the standard. Two awkward conversations followed by one where everything seems cool and then I never see you in public again so the whole awkward thing doesn't really matter anyway." She shrugs. "I don't make the rules."

She might have spent a good part of a year getting burned. Just possibly.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Alec frowns. "I don't want that either."

[fates_jaye]

She's heard that before. Not that specific answer, because she's just recently figured out the trend to call anyone on it, but still. It counts. "So... what then?" she asks, and bets she knows the answer.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"I want to apologize," he says, still frowning. "Because I did something shitty, even if I didn't mean it."

[fates_jaye]

Jaye opens her mouth, ready for some snarky comment that passes it all off as nothing, but that's a lot harder to do with him. "Yeah," she says. "I know you didn't."

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Alec looks down, trying not to mumble or sound like he doesn't want to do this. "I'm sorry, Jaye. I never wanted to hurt you."

[fates_jaye]

She's actually heard a lot of apologizing from him. Probably more than she's ever heard of anyone. Sure, this packed more of a punch, but still, she's not used to it. "Okay, stop apologizing, please 'kay thanks."

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

He looks up, jaw set slightly. "Fine. Then what should I do, Jaye? I want to fix this."

[fates_jaye]

"Well, first off, fix it how? I mean... what do you actually want out of this?"

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"I want you around, I'd like you to be there, like you were before," he says, making a face because he's sure it's not coming out right. "I want to be able to hide in the basement over Parents' Weekend together, or go bowling. I don't want to lose one of the only people that I've ever cared about."

[fates_jaye]

Okay, that makes it hard to be all cynical.

"I'm going to really need to hide out Parents' Weekend," she says after a moment.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Alec nods, kind of earnestly. "And it'd be really boring on your own."

[fates_jaye]

"Hey, I can make my own fun," she says. Which would probably mean hanging at the Sin because parents hopefully wouldn't go there. "It would just be a choice not to."

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"I know." He shrugs a little. "I guess I should say whatever choice you want to make is okay, but I really don't want you to say no."

[fates_jaye]

Jaye debates her answer for about two seconds before she could swear she hears something behind her clearing its throat. "I might have kind of missed you. A little," she says.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"Really?" He grins, but still hopefully.

[fates_jaye]

She makes a little "Mrrrgh" noise because she's kind of embarrassed at having said it. "Don't let it go to your head," she says.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"Me?" He looks innocent a moment, but can't help the grin that breaks through. "Nah."

[fates_jaye]

"Shut up," she says, failing at not smiling back.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"Only since you ask so nice," he says sweetly.

[fates_jaye]

"I'm always nice," she says, and the smile fades a little. "So we're... what are we?" She has to ask.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"We're..." He trails off, then sighs, holding out a hand to her. "I can't be your boyfriend. But I'm not anyone else's either."

[fates_jaye]

She considers his hand, but can't take it yet. "I can't do the open thing anymore. I suck at it," she says, wincing a little even as she says it.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

He nods, biting at his lip, but doesn't drop his hand because he's stubborn like that. "It was really good sex. But I value your friendship more."

[fates_jaye]

So first on the agenda, stop liking the ex. Kind of slowly, she takes his hand. "Okay. Friends, then," she says. "And if you stop talking to me, I swear to god I'm sending people after you."

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

He squeezes her hand slightly, smiling. "Fair enough. But I don't plan on disappearing."

[fates_jaye]

"Can I ask something?" she says, knowing she might not like the answer.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

Alec nods, swinging their hands slightly. "Sure."

[fates_jaye]

"Was it the Dean thing, or was what we had all I was ever going to get?" she asks. And she still kind of hates Dean for saying that to her.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"Dean had nothing to do with it," Alec says honestly, and he's now looking over her shoulder like he's not happy saying this out loud. "I can't give any more than what we had, in the way you wanted."

[fates_jaye]

"Could have fooled me," she says quietly, and shakes it off, and even manages a little smile. "Okay. So... okay."

And she doesn't say that Alec deserves better than Dean because she thinks that might ruin things. She's thinking it, though. Really really hard.

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

"Okay?" He grins softly. "Yay."

[fates_jaye]

She smiles back a little. "Definitely yay."