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You carefully scrape the untouched food into separate tupperwares, hot with embarrassment, frustration, and disappointment. Even your own plate only has one or two bites taken, your stomach too twisted with ugly rejection to handle anything. You slide the rest off of the first plate into the tupperware and—
The sauce fucking splashes on your shirt.
Fuck.
It’s such a small thing, but it’s such a nice shirt that you never wear. Sure, he can’t see it, but it makes you feel good and you know it’s a fabric he likes to touch. So after hours of cooking, and then more of waiting, the small splash of sauce on your front is the last straw.
The disappointed heat in your body, your face, concentrates into your eyes with laser focus.
No, no, goddamnit, you think to yourself as the tears well up. I just want to clean and… fuck!
You dump the dishes in the sink, rinsing them off haphazardly before shoving them in the dishwasher and shoving the tupperware in the fridge, slamming doors as you go. Letting it out physically keeps the tears from spilling over, but you still sniffle the whole while as you leave the kitchen and collect your things to go home.
There’s a small part of you that hopes, wishes, that he’d come in through the roof access to find you leaving. Two parallel fantasies play in your head: in one, he grovels and apologizes, breathless and desperate and you tell him to can it. In the other, he arrives bloody and beaten, apologetic, tells you how hard he tried to make it and fought to get back to you…
You pause at the door, but he still doesn’t appear. You lock it behind you when you leave, and take the subway home and try not to cry the whole way.
The floodgates do finally open when you get into your building, like your body can sense shelter in reach and has had enough of holding back. Unlocking the door through blurred vision turns out to be somewhat of a small challenge, but you get in and finally cry openly, tossing your things on the small table all the way to your room. The tears just keep coming as you discard your clothes on the floor and change into your most comfortable pajamas.
You sit and cry on the edge of bed for a while, bent over and hugging yourself. You try not to beat yourself up, but you can’t help but feel like you’re overreacting— no, you argue with yourself. This sucked. Anybody else would be upset too. This week sucked. Of course I’m as upset as I am.
And then; Well, what did you expect? Of course he didn’t show. You were dumb to think it would be different just because he promised.
Your head is aching when the tears finally start to cease and you drag yourself to the bathroom to wash your face, bracing yourself in preparation for the mirror—which shows exactly what you expected when you turn the light on. Red, swollen eyes, puffy lips, and a demeanor sadder than a cat caught in the rain.
Still, you wash your face, only half-assing half the steps. And it helps. You feel somewhat better when you tuck yourself into bed.
There is no heartbeat in his apartment. He’s late, far, far too late, and you’re long gone by now.
Matt trudges down the stairs, the pit in his stomach growing heavier with each descending step. You cooked, just like you had said you would. The meal smells delicious—his stomach growls meekly, but the sensation is soured by guilt. Fuck.
He stops at the base of the stairs, head turning to follow the smells you’ve left. The apartment, though warmer than the night he’d just come in from, is still cold. You’d left the lights off, judging by the lack of extra electrical hum, and as he approaches the kitchen he puts together that you’d cleaned after yourself. There’s a bit of sauce in the sink—ah, the dishes are in the washer—and tupperware in the fridge. Two.
You never ate.
Damn it.
He stands on the sidewalk outside your building at midnight listening to your heartbeat and debating whether or not to come up. You’re asleep, but it doesn’t sound restful. It just sounds tired.
Would you be glad to see him? Would you be angry? He’s almost certain you’ll be very, very upset with him. But… he can’t pull himself away. Waiting until morning to apologize almost seems worse than what he’s already done—what he’s already failed to do.
His mind is both trapped still in quicksand and running a thousand miles a minute, formulating an apology as he clenches his cane’s handle in both hands, his bruised knuckles stretching pale and vivid purple.
Then, he hears you shift in your bed and your breath change—you’re waking up. Rising, walking to the kitchen to get water.
His tongue flicks across the split in his lip, and the decision is made for him. He enters the building, taking stairs two at a time to get to your third floor apartment before you settle back into bed. By the time he gets there, you’re back in your bedroom but you haven’t reached your bed. So, panting and breathless and stomach about to fall out of his ass, he knocks gently.
Your steps stop. He waits, knocks again.
His heart skips a beat when you come to the door. He hears the way your heart speeds up, nervous, and the way you suck in a sharp breath.
The smell of wet salt is heavy even through the door, and when he opens his mouth to speak he can taste it.
“Sweetheart,” he says quietly through the door, breathless. “I’m– I’m so, so sorry. Please. I’m so—” he clenches his jaw, hanging his head. “I’m so sorry.”
He hears you swallow on the other side of the door.
“Please,” he begs again, his throat tight with guilt.
“You don’t look very hurt,” you whisper. Anybody else wouldn’t have been able to hear you through the door, but he knows that you know he heard you perfectly fine.
His stomach lurches. Had you been worried about him?
“There was… Sweetheart, please let me in to explain.”
You don’t respond, but you don’t tell him to fuck off either.
Stalemate.
Matt rests his forehead on the door by your peephole. “I swear, I’m so sorry sweetheart. I didn’t… I made the wrong decision tonight.”
Your jaw clenches at that. Anger.
Surprising both of you, you open the door.
“Explain,” you say.
The taste of salt hits him hard, and he can hear the way you’re trying to keep your angry breaths in check as you stand in the doorway.
“There was a bait, a decoy, they set up a fake–”
You scoff. “And you fell for it?”
“The people who told me didn’t know it was a decoy.”
You take a deep, frustrated, steadying breath. Your heart steadies and Matt knows he has his foot in the door.
“They caught me out. I couldn’t go home, they were trying to track me, and I couldn’t—”
Oh, oh no. More salt.
You wipe at your face, voice trembling, as you turn away and walk into your apartment, letting him follow after you. “I’m tired, Matt.”
He quickly steps in after you before you change your mind, closing and locking the door behind him. He discards his folded cane by the door with your shoes and coats, following after you, hands outstretched with irrepressible desire to soothe. “I know, I’m so sorry–”
“You couldn’t call? Not once? Matt, I was worried!” You turn around to face him.
He approaches you like a skittish animal, and you push his hands away halfheartedly. “I would have called if I could,” he says earnestly. “Please believe me, this isn’t what I wanted for tonight.” His hands still hover in the air in supplication.
And then the tears spill over, and he can’t stop himself from reaching out to hold you and wipe them away. He thanks God when you lean into him this time, instead of pushing him away again.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, forehead to yours. “I’m sorry.”
“Something has to change, Matt,” you get out between tearful breaths. “I know this is who you are. But… but relationships—” you have to swallow, “you can’t neglect them. It’s been forever since we’ve had real time together. I don’t know if—”
“Don’t,” he whispers. “Please. I’m taking tomorrow off. Of everything. It’s just going to be about us. Okay?”
“I mean,” you hiccup. “Unless you hear something really fucked up. I don’t want you to not save people.”
He smiles, chuckles lightly. You’re joking, that’s good, but he can also tell you mean it. You want him to be who he is, just… he knows he’s been neglecting you. His priorities have been all wrong.
“Alright,” he says, thumbs smoothing across your cheeks as you look up at him. “I’m taking tomorrow off of everything, unless I hear a real, actual emergency.”
“Good,” you whisper, hands on his wrists as he cradles your face.
“I promise,” he says, face inching closer. “I’m going to make the last two months up to you.”
“You better,” you whisper, and he kisses you. His lips are soft, despite the healing split, and he kisses you so sweetly you feel as though you’ve floated off back into your dreams.
“Come on,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to your forehead after pulling back and wrapping his arms around you. “Let’s get you back to bed.”