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blowout sale.[break][break]

he sighed, staring out the window at a gray sky. the sun was hiding behind it. it would come out, eventually. for the time being, the warmth he felt was from inside those walls — when willow wasn’t understandably stressed about the business, and roman wasn’t being an asshole. that was to say, rarely.[break][break]

and it was supposed to be the good season.[break][break]

his hand ran down his face, fingers pinching into the scruff on his chin. her question echoed in his head, and it almost slipped by without an answer in the daze he found himself in too often lately.[break][break]

i should go back to work, he thought. but who would have him, except the rangers? all it would take was showing his face in a war zone, and rocket would know they’d have their opportunity to strike. his family would be unguarded.[break][break]

there were bags beneath his eyes. ”yeah,” he croaked, and cleared his throat. ”yeah.”[break][break]

blowout sale. ”that’s a good idea.” he smiled, but the stress was in his eyes too, a gray haze across the sun, as his thumb brushed against hers.[break][break]

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“oh... damn.”[break][break]

the disappointment was audible in his voice, enough to warrant the idea that he might have been thinking of returning to the rangers eventually. Laurence Anderson had offered him forgiveness and understanding when few others had.[break][break]

still, the stigma existed, as it always would. he was branded a villain, and honestly? it was fair. he deserved it, with more blood on his hands than he could ever admit to anyone around him. he did not belong in this world, but he would hold onto it until it was ripped away from him, gods forbid.[break][break]

what would greyson have said if he told him all of that blood had belonged to rocket’s own?[break][break]

“well, i’m sure ollie’s got it all under control. everybody seems to like him. i bet he’s a good leader.”[break][break]
though it could have been mistaken for jealousy, there was none. he liked ollie morales – enough to kiss him even, on one occasion. [break][break]

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his regret would never fade. every moment he remained breathing was bittersweet, but here, the scars he’d taken and the scars he’d left could be forgotten. the cruel passing of time did not exist in this world they shared, just the two of them.[break][break]

he obliged her pleading. soon, they were young in the grass again, all skin and joy and hearts that never forgot.[break][break]

”i love you,” he told her, warm and soft. he’d lied so much to survive, but this was truth he could not live in without, whether reciprocated or not. her touch told him it was. her lips told him it was.[break][break]

he knew she loved him back, and all was right in that little world, free from the wounds of the universe.[break][break]

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bo sighed, ”still?”[break][break]

shaking his head, he proceeded to haul things out of from the refrigerator and the far counter: ham, roast beef, mortadella, combusken, two kinds of cheese, pickles, lettuce, mustard, and mayonnaise.[break][break]

he winced as his brother sipped the poison he’d handed him. ”i figured. think they make the cans look cool to trick you. i do miss charjacola though…” but he’d been cutting back.[break][break]

he pulled out two plates, a knife, and a nice loaf bread off the top of the fridge lastly, before beginning to expertly craft two monstrously tall sandwiches.[break][break]

his hand slowed briefly at cian’s sweet sentiment. gold eyes looked over his shoulder with a smile that crept onto his face.[break][break]

”thanks, brother. got the life i always wanted, y’know? simple.”[break][break]

everything except for the battling circuit, but that was a small sacrifice for keeping an eye on the family that had welcomed him back with loving arms.[break][break]

once he was finished, he sighed again and cut off the crust of one of the sandwiches, and then sliced it diagonally across the middle, and handed it over with a napkin wordlessly.[break][break]

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he didn’t notice the flowers crushed beneath them. she was everything: the hopefulness of reaching trees and all the dreams in scattered stars that finally began to peek through the pollution of the city he’d known too long without her.[break][break]

clothes fell on scattered petals, their plight ignored. they were as bright and daring as they’d ever been before. his hands caressed and explored with curiosity, though he remembered the perfect way to bliss. he was hardly lost here.[break][break]

too much heat coursed through him at her words and that sparkle in her eye. his arm scooped her up and in a single movement, shifted her beneath him onto her back.[break][break]

”that’s the best thing i’ve ever heard.”[break][break]

his whisper faded from her ear to kisses trailing towards the heavens below. he would show her that he felt the same.[break][break]

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he was not always as sure of himself as he wanted to be and seem. things were not so simple, and after all he’d done, there were ever more reasons to be reminded of why the world might label him inadequate, if only they knew who he really was.
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damn ollie morales’s confusion, and willow’s hurt, and her thankfully dead father. damn all the mistakes and poor judgment and drama. simplicity was all he wanted. to bury it all for good that did not have to do with a perfect, quiet life in the country.[break][break]

but when would that ever be possible in a region like this anyways?[break][break]

tears welled in his eyes as he was struck by too much else boiling over far too early in the morning. he turned away sharply, sniffing and grabbing up the pancake mix to stir twice as aggressively as before, carrying on as though he’d forgotten what he was doing and was simply going through the motion.[break][break]

”you were with vollans,” he told willow over his shoulder, his tone willfully evening out again, though he could feel the man’s face on his knuckles and stirred harder still.[break][break]

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leaving for the kitchen couldn’t stop him from listening. his prep work was downright sluggish. he was certainly not paying attention to pancakes — which was strange for him.[break][break]

it was annoying to be woken up like this, but it was especially annoying that willow sat on the couch next to ollie, consoling him in his confusion while he’d only been lonely in dealing with his own.[break][break]

he hadn’t told her in high school. it had been silent and personal, a curiosity just barely explored and then all but abandoned — mostly because he’d pursued her instead, and then he’d never stopped loving her. it had been a nonissue. being bisexual had not felt like such a key part of his identity, anyways.[break][break]

so why now, in this moment, did he feel like he was hiding something?[break][break]

ollie’s words carved through his back to his heart. they’d shared one drunken night and it hadn’t even gotten that far, but he’d been emotional, feeling like the world was going to end that week, and willow would be in someone else’s arms, and his son would probably die mad at him for something. he would have failed both of his brothers and his mother, and never have mended things with his father.[break][break]

he had never felt quite so lonely as he had that week, and ollie had been smiling like an angel.[break][break]

it hurt more because it was so unexpected from someone who seemed so caring.[break][break]

”gee, thanks,” he muttered at him never finding a guy hot. must’ve been drunker than i thought. at least they’d only made out. if only he could take it back.[break][break]

then, through the power of the years he’d spent pining for her, he could hear that willow was prompting him to speak without having to look at her.[break][break]

he set down the pancake mix and turned, looking ollie dead in the eye again with a hurt look.[break][break]

”you really don’t remember? or are you just so ashamed for some reason that you won’t admit that it happened?”[break][break]