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Jim’s eyes snap open, blinking blearily, and he scrubs at the grittiness with the heel of one hand as his brain tries to sort out what it was that woke him. The house is quiet, and the green light of the numbers on the clock at bedside greet him as he squints at them. 4:23.He rolls over, intent on just curling back up to go back to sleep. Corey’s absent on the other side of the bed he’d occupied when they’d both fallen asleep, but Corey’s always kept crazy hours anyway. No big deal.But there’s this nagging feeling clawing at the pit of his stomach.Something. Something. He pushes back at the thought, at the gnawing, squirmy feeling settling there more fully, at the dull beat of his own heart hammering away at his eardrums as he holds his breath, listening. Nothing. Still nothing.
Something.
Another few minutes pass, Jim’s eyes squinting closed, before he tosses back the blanket with a low growl of frustration, long legs swinging over the side of the bed. The sound of his bare feet slapping the hardwood is so loud in the silence as he rises from the bed and makes his way to the bathroom. He can see the rim of light around the edges of the door, and he knows Corey’s in there. He pauses, holding his breath again, straining his ears to see if he hears anything untoward. Nothing. The silence suddenly feels suffocating. Jim’s heartbeat picks up pace, grows louder in his ears, sounding like the pounding of a bass drum as he raises his hand, hesitating only a moment before rapping softly on the door.“Corey?”He waits, but only silence greets him yet again, and he feels a hit of adrenaline race through his veins as fear wraps dark thorns around his heart. He knocks again, louder this time, and when Corey doesn’t answer, his hand finds the smooth brushed nickel of the doorknob, relieved when it turns easily in his grasp. Corey’s curled up on the floor, his body made as small as possible to try to fit on the small bath mat in front of the tub. Jim rushes over, panic making his stomach churn at how still Corey is, ignoring the feel of the unforgiving tile as his knees hit next to Corey’s body. Relief follows pretty quickly, though, drowning out the adrenaline so completely that Jim feels himself nearly melt. He’s breathing, Corey’s breathing. He can clearly see the rise and fall of his rib cage as it expands and contracts with each even breath. So he’s hasn’t done anything stupid, and Jim isn’t gonna have to make a mad dash to find his phone to call 911. Jim’s heart breaks as the relief starts to chill a bit, and he looks Corey over, really looks him over, not just checking to make sure he’s not dead. Tear stains are plainly visible on Corey’s cheeks, and even closed, Jim can tell how swollen they are from crying.He knows it’s not because of him. At the least, he’s pretty damned certain of it. Jim sighs, his legs unfolding from beneath him as he leans his back against the vanity cabinet, contemplating what he should do. Corey can get kinda violent sometimes when he’s awakened, or he can get grouchy, or, rarely, emotional from too many negative thoughts and not enough sleep. He knows exactly those kinds of thoughts. Because he has them himself. This is far from the first time he’s awakened to find Corey passed out on the bathroom floor, of course. He surveys the surroundings. Nothing is amiss that he can see, except for Corey, curled up, his top half bare, his body rolled into the tiniest ball he could manage. Which, Jim marvels, is pretty damned small. He himself could never almost-fit on a bathmat, after all. Not with his too-long legs and arms, his long torso. Too many limbs and sharp angles. Absent, he realizes, are any bottles: beer bottles, whiskey bottles, vodka bottles, pill bottles with the labels torn off. Maybe this won’t be too bad of a night once he wakes Corey up. At the least, it’s a lot better than the scenes of years past. Or even of recent past. Lord knows Corey’s no stranger to substances. And Corey plus substances can almost guarantee that they’ll have a bad night.Or, Jim thinks, he’d have a bad night. Corey, on the other hand... well, Jim’s pretty sure that Corey enjoys the fight. Because it keeps them from getting too close, from having to deal with too many emotions and baggage and... whatever the fuck. Corey’s never been too great past a certain level of depth. Jim learned to live with that years ago. Jim’s hand reaches out, petting Corey, feeling just how muscular he’s become recently, yet still, somehow feeling delicate beneath his large hands. And again, Jim has to marvel to himself at the stark contrast. Corey is a walking contradiction, because of course he is. He’s brash and tough and loud-mouthed, he’s all piss and spit and hurled insults. He’s rough-and-tumble and never backs away from a fight, even if he knows he won’t win. But underneath all of that, hidden except to a very select few, is the real Corey, the actual man-child who is broken, fundamentally, as a human being. The Corey he never got close enough to know until he’d already been his band mate and friend for several years. The Corey that Jim had fallen so in love with. Happiness, be damned. Jim sighs to himself, contemplating what he should do, his hand running softly over Corey’s arm and back. He definitely doesn’t want to wake him up and have them start to argue. Which is, Jim realizes, about a 50% chance here. Before Jim can make a final decision, Corey’s body shudders and a soft noise escapes.Jim’s hand freezes. Waiting. Watching Corey. He doesn’t remove his hand as Corey’s body stretches slowly, his head turning back and forth as he gets his bearings. He doesn’t speak. Waits for Corey to speak first, so he can judge just what kind of night this will end up being. The minutes tick by in silence, the only noise in the room being Corey’s shuffling around as he unfurls. For a minute, just a minute, Jim wonders if Corey is gonna speak at all, and he’s about to break the silence himself when Corey finally does. “Why?”The soft, hoarse word is almost unintelligible, but Jim manages to make it out anyway, because it immediately tells him which scene is about to play out for them tonight. One word, three letters, and they’re off to the races. Jim has to suppress the urge to sigh heavily, because he’s just not in the mood. “Why, what?” Jim asks, after a minute, his tone even and gentle. He’s careful not to put too much weight behind the words. Too much, or perhaps even too little, and Corey might snap. You never know. It’s happened before. And all Jim really wants to do is go back to bed. He doesn’t want to go through all of this tonight. He just wants to help Corey up from the floor, and go back to bed with him. “Why do you love me?” Corey’s head turns, the blue of his eyes startling in contrast to the bloodshot whites. Jim watches him swallow - gulp, really - as their eyes meet. Jim gives Corey a small smile with no real happiness behind it. Their script is always the same for any given scene; two star-crossed lovers bound by fate to act out the same tragic tale ad infinitum. Neither knowing, exactly, how to move forward to their resolution, whatever that may be. “Because... I just do. Because I always have.” The lines are well-rehearsed. He holds his breath for Corey’s rejection. Knowing what comes next. “You shouldn’t.”Corey doesn’t disappoint. At least, not in this way. Never straying from their demolition derby-style romance. Never sparing a moment of melodrama.Jim does sigh this time, his head bowing for a moment, hands coming up to scrub at his face before dropping into his lap with an audible slap against his bare thighs. “Can we just... for once... skip this scene and just go back to bed?” He’s tired of the battle. He’s tired of the fight. Just plain tired. He doesn’t want to do this anymore. He wants to just be happy, for once. Corey’s eyes blink as he stares up at him. Jim can see the resignation there. He can see the weariness as well. Corey’s tired, too. He can feel it, can sense it in the heavy energy in the air between them. And he thinks for a minute that Corey will protest. They have to finish the scene, after all. They have to argue over why Jim loves him, has always loved him, will always love him. Why Jim lets Corey destroy him again and again and again. Why he lets Corey have his pound of flesh to rebuild himself before running away to chase his own happiness, or what he thinks will be his own happiness, anyway. Why, without fail, Jim has always been there no matter what. But Jim knows that Corey won’t stray the course. He never strays the course. Corey nods, after a minute. Falling silent, pulling himself from the floor and shuffling to the door. Jim blinks in surprise, in complete shock, really, before following after him, watching as Corey slides between the mattress and the blanket. On his side of the bed once more. And this is... this is different. Not unprecedented, but certainly not how things normally go.Jim hesitates for another moment, waiting to see if Corey is luring him into a false sense of security. But Corey just looks at him from his side of the bed, and pulls the covers back on Jim’s side in a silent invitation for Jim to climb in next to him. And so he does. He climbs in next to Corey, his heart feeling heavy as Corey’s arms circle him, as Corey’s head settles against his chest. They’re silent now, with so much left unspoken, the entire scene left in suspended animation. Which seems about right. Their whole relationship, Jim thinks, it seems they’ve been in suspended animation. One step forward, two steps back. Jim’s hands resume petting Corey’s back, and he has to close his eyes, clench his jaw, try with all his might to push away the tears that suddenly want to come. Because he knows what happens next. He knows what’s coming now. Knows that it’s likely that the next time he wakes up, Corey will be gone again. Just like always. It doesn’t matter if their scene had been cut short. No matter what, the show must go on.