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Van Graves was not impressed with his son.

Not because his son had somehow managed to find himself attacked and mauled by what could apparently only be wild animals, and not even because he'd been wandering around outside in the middle of the night with little more than his fists for protection. These two things lent themselves to him being unimpressed, but he was most seriously unimpressed by the fact that Grayson was the bitchiest, whiniest patient in the world.

He wasn't a doctor. He wasn't even a nurse. But he'd taken time off work so he could make certain Grayson wouldn't hurt himself further while attempting to doctor his own wounds, and his son was being decidedly ungrateful. For a boy who spent more time sleeping than waking if he could help it, he was remarkably uneasy with bed rest, ridiculously stubborn about the state of his own body.

Van could see that he was healing fast. Grayson had always been able to bounce back from wounds fairly quickly, so he wasn't too surprised. He also knew that Grayson was not the brightest crayon in the box, love him though he did, so he had to keep an eye on him.

At the moment, the current battle being waged was whether or not he would be allowed to take a walk after his shower. Van had no idea why he was so hell bent on getting out of the house when he looked like he'd been mauled by a pack of dogs, but Grayson was going head to head with him in the quiet, steady way he always did when something was really important to him.

This led to the two of them standing before one another, remarkably close in height, having a staring contest. The doorbell rang, and Van muttered under his breath, lifting a thin finger and pointing it at Grayson. "Stay here."

Grayson rolled his eyes, and he would have brought his arms up to cross them had he not been sure he would be smacked on the back of the head for "disrupting his ten thousand injuries." Really, he could take care of himself. Really.

Van opened the door, the dregs of temper still on his face, and blinked at the boy who had been in the same hospital room as Grayson. He'd been unconscious when Van had seen him before, but he was fairly sure this was one of his friends. Jude? He wanted to say his name was Jude.

"Oh, hello." His voice was clipped, but he wasn't being intentionally ungracious. "Are you here for Grayson? He just got home from the hospital yesterday, and I assume you aren't too far behind him. Is that really a good idea?"

From behind him, Grayson appeared, looking a little mutinous. His eyes were slightly narrowed, his mouth was definitely leaning toward a pout, when he gently nudged Van aside. He blinked at Jude, expression clearing, and said, "Oh, Jude."

Most of his bandages were hidden beneath his shirt but he did have a large, obnoxious band-aid over half of his face. It didn't do much for the "I'm fine, really" slant he was trying to put on the situation.

"I need to talk to Jude, Pop." After moment, he added, "Please."

"Ten minutes," Van decided, stepping back. "Honestly, Grayson, you are ridiculous sometimes."

Ignoring Van as he turned and swept into the kitchen, Grayson glanced at Jude's collar. It seemed the safest place; far safer than his face. "Do you want to come in, or..?"

So it was outside, then.

Grayson closed the door behind him, squinting a little as his eyes adjusted to the sunlight that suddenly washed over his face. Perhaps it was best to keep it as impersonal as possible, especially considering all that was wheeling around in his head as of late. He'd taken out his diary the night before, tried to sort through his own tangled thoughts, and had only ended up more confused.

Standing in front of Jude, something like welcome came into his face, even though he didn't particularly want it to. He liked Jude, cared about Jude. Repressing something and denying it were two entirely different things; though much could be said about Grayson, one thing that precious few people realized was that he was much more self aware than he appeared. He may not be able to read others particularly well on a regular basis, but he knew his own mind and heart for the most part, at least, once it made itself clear to him. He'd known for some time that he wanted Jude as a friend, hoped to gain his trust and respect.

Nearly losing him had shown Grayson that while that was still true, there was a small, long-buried part of his heart that yearned for even more than that. Things that he couldn't have, things he wouldn't ever dream of going after. There was an attraction that he could admit to and dismiss in its own time, as he had with many others, but there was more. There was affection, respect, admiration. There was a loyalty that went down to his bones, for Sagittarius the Zodiac and Jude the man, that was at now constant war with his loyalty to his own heart.

His traitorous heart that wanted things it had no business wanting. Logically, he knew this -- knew this, understood it -- but he couldn't stop the wanting.

Especially not when Jude leaned close, and he could smell him. Underneath the cigarette smoke he could recognize what was only Jude, the scent that wasn't shampoo or soap or even sweat and earth. Just Jude, and it made his stomach flip, his breath catch for just a moment. No matter what his mind said, his heart insisted on taking precedence.

And while his head took a vacation from his heart, Jude asked the most damning question of all: What all does the Captain know right now?

The drop was a vicious one, abrupt and dizzying as his breath came back all at once, his head filled with the logical voice that had been arguing tirelessly for days against any regard for Jude. It hurt, as he knew it would; hurt, as he'd tried to tell himself it would, time and again, but he couldn't help it.

Grayson led with his heart. He and Leo weren't so different after all, when push came to shove.

He didn't step back, but only because if he did, his back would be to the door. He didn't look pitiful, didn't let his mouth tremble around his words when he spoke, didn't let his eyes meet Jude's no matter how cowardly it felt.

"I didn't tell Elke anything. I went to sleep shortly after you passed out." It was easier to be precise, to simply state the facts and move on.

It would have been much easier if he hadn't finally given in and looked up, met Jude's eyes.

"How are you?"

If Jude wouldn't ask, he would.

But Grayson would have always asked, so that was nothing new. After all, he'd always cared; it was only just now he was beginning to realize how much.

Grayson was hyper aware of himself, aware enough to know that he ought to have brushed past Jude and leaned against the railing on the porch, but he didn't. There was a perverse part of him that didn't mind being this close, even when it caused as much pain as it did reluctant pleasure; they were like two dancers, hovering just close enough to initiate the beginning steps, but holding back because they weren't sure of exactly who was supposed to take the lead. Only, the only one uncertain was Grayson, the only one worrying obsessively over things that hadn't left his mind since they're arrived, was Grayson. He gave himself a headache as much as he did heartache, and even if he'd wanted someone to blame, there was no one but himself.

He couldn't blame Jude. How could he blame Jude? Jude had done nothing wrong, done absolutely nothing but be himself. It was Grayson who couldn't be satisfied with what he had, always seemed to want more, more, more. It was just lucky that he was able to keep his wants to himself, that he didn't reach out greedily for what he couldn't have. If he did, he was sure he would lose whatever he'd gained.

He wasn't sure his heart could take much more loss, not after Barren Pines. Not after Benny, not after taking his own life, not after seeing how his parents had changed while he was gone. Not after getting everyone back only to almost lose Jude, who had somehow become precious to him when he wasn't looking.

He just didn't think he would be able to rise up again if he took another blow straight to the core of him.

So that was why when Jude asked him what was wrong, he smiled. It didn't look fake; he was good at it, always had been, and he was honestly happy that Jude would ask. That he cared enough to even go through the motions, because sometimes, he even wondered about that.

"I'm fine, Jude." His voice was smooth and low, easily masking the troubled thoughts within. His eyes were another story.

Grayson had never been able to hide his emotions in his eyes. If you knew where to look, and what to look for, his heart was as open as the sky in his eyes.

And those eyes shuttered, cooled, at the apology. A defense mechanism, perhaps. "I know. Being in love..." He lifted a shoulder, left the statement hanging on the air for a moment.

Being in love. Had he ever been in love? He didn't think so. But Jude was, with Hero. And he'd had a fight with her, and then he'd gone out and nearly died, and --

And Grayson had never felt so afraid, not even when he'd held a gun to his own temple.

"It makes you do things you wouldn't otherwise do." He smiled again, this time showing teeth; fuller, brighter than before. A mask of a different variety. "I understand."

Grayson would have laughed if it wouldn't have sounded more than a little bit self-deprecating. Better off without love, sure. He could partially agree with that; he didn't have that soul-deep bond with anyone, the utterly inescapable need to see them happy, hold them close, never let harm come to them. He missed out on the bad parts, like when things went wrong and the person who knew you better than anyone else cut you straight down to the bone because they knew exactly how to. He missed the worry and the sacrifice, the constant putting someone else before you and taking all of their punches just because you loved them.

He missed all of that. But he also missed all the good parts. He missed the secret smiles, the casual touches, the not-so-casual ones. He missed always having a shoulder to lean on, having someone to turn to when nothing made sense and it seemed like it never would.

Yes, he was lucky.

Certainly very lucky.

He turned his face away slightly when Jude began to smoke, stared across his front lawn to where the bushes were carefully and rigidly maintained in a neat little row. Suburban paradise, complete with a manicured lawn and a cute little fence ringing the enclosure.

How out of place he felt, standing with Jude on his front porch, talking about the woman that he loved while Grayson struggled to understand just what he felt for him.

"What would you like to tell her?" He wasn't asking, What happened? Didn't think it was his business, wouldn't have before. He certainly didn't want to know now.

Or did he?

Wearily, he looked back over, scooped his hair away from his face in a motion oddly remniscent of Jude's. "It's up to you, Jude."

He was saying, I'll lie for you, Jude.

He couldn't remember a time when he would have ever lied to Aries for anyone, not even Elke. He hoped Jude didn't notice.

Grayson's eyes could be depthless. They could be absolutely blank. They could be a lot of things, each meaning a different thing from the last. As Jude spoke, they gradually blurred; not with tears, nothing close, just blurred. Vision was less important than listening, the way he looked while he spoke didn't say nearly as much as the nuances of his voice, the way it stressed over a certain word or rushed past another. If you could tell a million things about Grayson from his eyes, he thought you could tell more about Jude from his voice. His accent, that he had viciously subdued to hide away parts of himself that he didn't want others to see. His laugh, abrupt and surprising, or dark and cold. The way he said Hero, even when he didn't know it, with a sort of reverence that made Grayson a little embarrassed.

Jude was a man of his voice.

Grayson just listened, let him ramble until he ran out of words, doing nothing but standing there on his porch while the wind whispered by. He was certain it had been more than ten minutes -- it felt like hours -- but they remained undisturbed. Dimly, he thought that Pop must realize they were talking about something important, though he doubted he would eavesdrop.

And it was important. It was important to Jude, and that made it important to Grayson. Near the end, his eyes sharpened, focus came back to them as they traced the strong line of Jude's jaw, worked their way back up to his eyes. So much turmoil, so much sacrifice, so much pain; all for the one he loved. Grayson was a hopeless romantic, and he always had been. Always would be. His heart ached for Jude and not himself, or not wholly himself, and for Hero. For what they had, the struggles they'd already faced, all the ones they would have to conquer in the future.

It was too much for anyone to be expected to take in.

He tried, though.

He licked his lips, curled his hands at his sides. Breathed in, and out.

What could he say to Jude? He always found himself asking this question in his mind, in a voice that was smaller than his own, weaker.

What could he do?

"I'll... be discreet," he decided, and it meant more than just in reference to the fight. About everything. What he knew of Jude, what he knew between Jude and Hero. The jungle, the drowning. Of love, and how impossible Jude's was for their Captain. He would be... discreet.

He cleared his throat, because somewhere along the line, it had gone a little dry.

Still, he smiled again. "I'll do my best, Jude. About -- everything."

He wiped his palms on his pants, hesitated a moment. "But... are you all right?"

It wasn't in reference to physical wounds.

Not when Grayson was looking at him like that.

Grayson's head was spinning, his balance was thrown, and though his feet hadn't moved since he'd stepped outside of the house, he felt like he was slowly leaning toward a fall that he wouldn't be able to brace himself for. Jude was not all right; Jude was willing to tell him that he was not all right. Like the night that he had found him stumbling around the streets, drunk and frustrated, Grayson felt he was seeing a part of Jude that not many others were privy to, only this time, there was no alcohol involved. This information was intended for him, and it hurt. God, it hurt.

All he could think was, Jude. Poor Jude.

Because here he was, tearing his own heart out for Hero, hurting himself more than even she had the power to do, and there was nothing Grayson could do to stop it. He could try to be a safety net after the inevitable crash, but he didn't even know if he would be good at that. He could ask the questions, but he couldn't provide any words of comfort, not really.

Before he could even try, Jude had changed the subject. It was so abrupt that he actually looked confused, for a moment, mouth falling open slightly as he tried to process the shift. Someone... else? Someone aside from Grayson?

His first instinct was to say no, but that was a lie. He'd had... dreams, before. Fragments of a life that he was sure wasn't his, but seemed real to him somehow. Memories of an impossibly black sky, faces swirling by that seemed familiar even though he was sure he'd never seen them before. Sometimes, he woke from them as though they were nightmares, only able to grasp the barest memory of the dream, understanding little of it.

He'd always thought they were just vivid dreams, but they were too vivid. Each one was different, but there was a consistency to them that made him wonder, made him close his mouth before he spoke. Someone else?

Hadn't he always been Grayson? Longer than he'd been Leo?

Inside of him, there was a little shift, something pressing against the back of his mind. It was a feeling that he was wrong, that he'd misspoken, but he didn't have anything to justify it.

So, he shrugged, brow creased into a frown. "I don't think so, Jude? I have dreams sometimes, strange ones... But I don't know."

He finally moved his feet, shuffling them a little, looking down at them. Back up at Jude. "Do you? Feel like you're someone aside from Jude?"

That wasn't the best way to phrase it, but he decided not to make the matter worse by trying to correct his wording. He figured Jude would get the idea.

It was bizarre to think about past lives. He understood the concept but didn't really buy into it for the most part. Despite being a senshi, Grayson had a fairly limited imagination, and less tolerance for the supernatural. One would think that ridiculous given he was Sailor Leo, at least in this life, and rightfully so, but he couldn't change who he was or how he felt. The idea that his consciousness had existed before, possibly more than one time, and would exist again, was a little too much for him to be able to grasp without skepticism.

Jude seemed to believe it, though. That he and Hero had both existed in a past life, not as themselves but as the same souls that had found each other. And that Hero had been... a man?

Had Jude been a man, too? He supposed the implication here was that they had been together in their past lives, and so...

Eyebrows raising slowly, Grayson stared. Three Second Rule be damned, he stared. He could recall suddenly Jude asking him a similar question in the past -- How do you know, Graves? When you're one of you? I mean, how do you know? -- and his own vague answer to it. Had he known even then?

Had he been trying to accept loving Hero, in any of her forms, even then?

This time, though, he didn't back out of the question. He brought his hand up, cradled it against the bandaged side of his face. And he thought, he really thought.

"I don't really consider myself -- gay." He held up his free hand, insisted, "No, listen. I don't."

How to explain this? It was much more personal than Grayson usually got, certainly with the other Zodiacs. In this respect, he and Jude were startlingly similar; it was so much easier to share with those who weren't also senshi, who didn't report to the same Captain, who didn't know them as Leo and Sagittarius first. This was difficult for him.

For Jude, he would try.

"I am attracted to men. Physically, I am attracted to men." His cheeks began to burn, but he ignored it. "But physical attraction... it doesn't matter as much as what pulls me toward a person. What makes me really care."

He dropped his hand, wiped his palms on his pants. "So I look at men, yes, but I don't consider myself homosexual because I don't fall for the man, I fall for... who the person is. So, if you love someone, really love someone, it brings something else into the equation."

God, this was more awkward than anything else. He was counseling someone he was attracted to -- cared for -- trying to help him with... someone else.

"I'm more attracted to men than women. But if I ever fell in love with a woman, I think I would be able to look past that. Because I would love the person she was, not the shape she took."

All that rambling, and his cheeks were still bright red. His voice was a little deeper than usual, gaining feeling from the topic at hand as well as the incredible trust he was giving Jude in sharing part of himself. And he was talking in circles, wasn't he?

"So, yes -- I think -- you can. But not really." Where were his words when he needed them? "I mean, do I think you would ever look at a man and say, He's attractive. first? No. But I think that if Hero was a man, took the form of a man somehow, you would still love her. Because you love Hero."

Twist, dagger.

"Did that make any sense?"

God, he hoped it did.

If the ground had fallen out from underneath Grayson's feet suddenly, he wouldn't have been any more surprised or horrified.

Jude thought he was --

He thought he was kind of --

Grayson didn't even try to help himself; he brought his hand up, shielded his eyes, tucked his thumb tight against his temple. The motion was one Jude might remember, if he recalled a cold winter night when Grayson had been freezing against the side of a building and trying desperately to stop crying. He wasn't quite so emotionally distraught just then, but he knew better than anyone that his eyes were his weak point, and there was too much swirling inside of him to allow that kind of window.

Jude thought he was kind of gay. But Hero was a woman. But he thought?

But he loved Hero. And he was teasing Grayson, because Grayson was like some kind of childish little brother to him, someone to heckle when the situation got otherwise awkward, someone it was funny to make blush when he was trying his best to help, and --

He took a slow, steadying breath. Really, Jude, this was just too much.

Sounding aggrieved, weary, aged beyond his years, frustrated -- any number of things -- he said, so slowly, "Sometimes, I just don't know what to do with you, Jude."

It was the truth. Had he believed in God, he would have said it was the God's honest truth, sworn on a Bible, bet his eternal soul on it. Jude confused him like no one else, sent him running in circles chasing after every question and answer he'd ever had, and yet... and yet, he still cared for him dearly.

It didn't mean he understood him.

Not even for a moment.

"There is such a thing-" And there he was again, sounding more and more like his father. His father? No. Someone older, someone different; someone pompous and a little bit condescending, someone who knew better, Jude. "As bisexuality. Attraction to both sexes. Not regardless of sex, but attraction to both."

Perhaps Jude was just bisexual.

Wonderful.

"And Barnaby Price --" Barnaby, really. "He..."

Grayson finally dropped his hand, and the look on his face would have been comical if he hadn't been bleeding freely from wounds only Jude could inflict. "I don't know, Jude. Maybe he can help better than me."

And there went the ego. There went the tone, the rigid posture. "Maybe."