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It should’ve been easier, right? To check his messages, his texts. To see if anything had been missed.

To see if he’d gotten a response to the brief message he’d sent out while flying down the street sidecar, knowing better, hopeful for tomorrow if not the rest of the evening.

Sent: — chickens, sunshine’s, eggs, a somber sort of smiley.

Sent out the night before and now again, tucked away in a walk-in, huddled in the recesses of someone else’s clothes—

Texting Out: misspellings and all, a slew of emojis more awake and excitable than the night before. Adding a t-Rex, this time, because it looked like it was waiving.

And now? Now he waited to hear something back…

Hoping Ren was up early, and more importantly? That he was doing the right thing this time—

“Holy s**t you’re up!” shocked rush of a little too loud for his own ears considering how early it actually was. He quickly fell into a half-whisper (as quiet as he could manage, considering?) and tried again, ignoring the way his heart skipped, the rush of joy that warred with trepidation, nerves over the way the night had gone creeping back in without his welcome.

“I mean—“ if wincing had a sound? If sheepishness could be gruff and grown man shaped? It was him. Trying to reset, to play it off — to — “Hey?” a squeak, a shuffle of rustling and shifting as Waru got himself comfortable in a dramatic way.

“Ehehm— Hi! Yeah, s’fine…just…” did Ren mean physically? Mentally? His ego? He wasn’t sure, wished he could teleport through the screen—

“Or—no, that’s not true.”

And ******** but he could! He could always just ask where Ren was and go to him couldn’t he?! That was an option right?!

“I mean—aughhh—this is so stupid…I’m being stupid…“ head leaned back on a rack of whatever, staring at the phone like he wanted to use it to bear sense into himself with. “******** sorry? I really, really, really—- I’m sorry how badly I ******** up last night for all of us.”

“For me n you, and—M’fine — I’m safe — I’m just being a dramatic-a** baby…”

“I’m mad at how I probably blew my chances at seeing you after so damn long…”

“N’less I didn’t?”

Hope like honey and he held his breath, but his tongue. Waited. For fire n brimstone, for Ren to hang up? He didn’t know which.

The sound of Rens amusement was like a drip feed of good feelings mainlined into his soul, a warm lick of baritone set over barest hisst of rustling background noise. He could almost hear the switch, the way Ren's voice became intimately clearer, closer, full of reassurance that he desperately wanted to believe!

The parts of himself that wanted everything to be easy as a warm summer day – the rest that rejected that entirely. For all of Ren’s promise? He was so sure he’d done – if not something wrong? Then something impolite – laid a brick in a wall that would slowly close in around him and leave Ren locked out on the other side of it forever…

“Y’werent—y’didn’t–” quick deflections as he swallowed and shifted to lay out in the space, wincing at the way the shift in motion pulled on more than just his feelings. But it was easier to be on his stomach, to stare into the screen with the speaker mode flicked on and wish that he could have Ren’s eyes for this. “Wh-you’re leaving again!?” a panicked little huff, and all the words he wanted to dump into reassuring Ren, the way they stalled out entirely.

He swallowed silence, held his breath, breathed out a muffled sigh; so he had blown it? Even if Ren wanted to eschew the blame, it didn’t remove the feeling. The way his heart sank as Ren pointed out in the same way Aelius had — ******** – the same way he’d done all on his own? Oh, all the ******** people he had to ‘look out for him’...

Save the ones he wanted – save the way he wondered fervently; ‘But who's looking out for you?’

And it should’ve been him, shouldn’t it? Whether or not Ren needed looking out for!! He wanted to be an option, someone who was there, someone who could provide ******** ‘that’ exactly!

“Sooo—-what you’re saying issss….” hesitant last straw grasp at turning things around, at manhandling what could’ve been back into his arms. “I can come see you off? How many hours is a few—-where are you flying off too? Is it for business…pleasure…” trying not to sound whiny as he tossed out the plea, aiming for all the charisma that’d been failing him of late. Even if he was holding onto it by the skin of his teeth. “Not that that matters, th-why you’re taking the trip? But you can’t just tell me I looked good and then leave without – ******** – double checking one more time, right? N’I give all my compliments better n’person!!”

‘And I want to see you—’

“Please, Ren? C’n prove it wasn’t you who blew n’ything if you let me. I can make it up t’you, in an hour's time. Heh, in thirty minutes or less even? If you tell me where you’re at…”

********–” softly crestfallen, and he tried to muffle the single curse into the meat of his forearm where he laid atop it. Squinting at the phone like he wanted to leap through it— He couldn’t simply call Ren to him anymore, wouldn’t disabuse that power if he could? But there was still a lingering want–to drag the man to him and refuse to let him go on one more trip somewhere else without him–to refuse to let him go ever again.

To offer to go with him—

To what ends? Where would he fit in Dubai, in Germany, in—

The puzzle pieces were jagged and fitting them together was a frightful challenge, he longed for superglue, sanding paper, more time. More of himself! To make a masterpiece with what he was given simply because he wanted it. He bit his lip instead of cursing more, scrubbed at his face with open palms, and heels at his eyes and tried his best to sound supportive.

There was a whole adult world out there! Ren did important work – or necessary work – or…

He adulted, and that was what mattered most.

“No, hey–I get it, yeah? It was all kinda spur of the moment…I should’ve known when I didn’t see you at the little—at the meeting our board members threw? Wasn’t expecting the announcement either…s’ah real surprise…” he swallowed as he pulled himself together, dragged himself up and looked at the situation he was in. The one he’d left Ren to. The ring around his finger was a quiet little vice that squeezed no matter how he fiddled with it – and how he wished it had more teeth instead of smooth Taenite and warmth. Something with enough bite to be a more salient reminder…

“You’re sure you don’t want me t’just—t’see you off?” pulling his flopped phone up off the floor as he finally stood, started pacing. “I can be at your place, Ren.” determination and promise as he completed a circuit, pulled items off hangers like an errant shopper having a quiet and personal tantrum all his own. It wasn’t his, he didn’t care for it, it all looked better on the floor than on the rack, or the man who owned them.

“I can be there *now* – won’t even get in the way, not once, promise with my whole heart!” An uptick of urgency, his attempt at being persuasive one more time. The way Ren said he was going to have told him, if only there’d been the time? If only they’d gone home together? Waru wondered if he’d get a call – if he’d have ever gotten one – if he would’ve been woken or dutifully slept through as he so often did. Cocooned in opulence, searching for silver strands, left surrounded by everything he could’ve ever dreamed of wanting! Save the man it felt like he missed – who it felt like he’d let slip through his fingers like sand – who he’d pushed out like a careless wave. Whose doing was it but his own? Who was there to blame, save himself?

“If I don’t say goodbye…” the way that worry flared, noose-like and startling, the fear that Ren would go and wouldn’t come back, that a few weeks would be too many – when was that even? Sometime around Halloween?! N’he was looking for his own things even as he slowly finished talking, not caring if they were from the night before – or how scattered - or –

The desperation prickled like staticy claws and built a nest of worries in his mind. The way nameless fear spurred him into action, made his words ache with deliberation punched behind each one.

“Properly? Th’right way. Right now.”

“But I will,” quick on the heels of Ren's words, the way that quality of sigh sounded like the hiss of doors closing with locks clicking behind them. He told himself he wasn’t panicking. That he wasn’t grasping desperately at straws.

He didn’t need to, did he? The man would go and come back and he could try again! Right?! Could maybe even do better this time….

Telling himself that did nothing to stem the flow as he pulled his hair into something messily out of his face and paced his self-made cage like a tiger.

“That whole ‘out of sight out of mind’ s**t only works for — like — little babies and maybe some chores I don’t wanna do?” Stifling the urge to huff petulantly, he knew Ren didn’t believe he lacked object permanence! Unless he did? And ********, the rising tide of ‘do something now!’ that raced through him with the brewing knowledge that Ren truly believed he’d not spend the entire time thinking about the fact that Ren was gone until the man returned!

“M’not an infant, n’you’re not a chore.” He had blown it then, he knew it. Believed he cild feel what Ren wasn’t saying, his lack of mind reading aside. And he wished the man would. That the forgiveness wouldn’t come and the sound of busy yet smiling he was receiving over the phone would fade so he could pick the reality of it all apart.

“You’re a person. *My person*. My husband. And I’ve missed you. Hell, I’m still missing you!” Not that he knew what to do with it, how to address that fact other than throwing it at Ren's feet and demanding it be fixed in the moment when there was clearly no time to do so. “If you’re mad at me? You can say so — if I — and it’s the communication lacking on my end, yeah? It’s a whole bunch of things m’sure…“

He was anything but sure and more than capable of lying to himself well enough to believe he knew what he was saying. Even when all of it felt rushed.

“If so then I wish you’d tell me — cause I won’t know what I need to do better if you don’t, Ren. I won’t even know where to start…” paused in his pacing, picking through his thoughts at speed. “I’ll just keep doing this — and throwing darts in the dark — so I need you to let me know.” Sincere as he was demanding, reeling himself back only once he realized how much pressure that put on the man. To demand things in an instant and want all the answers in the universe now. It couldn’t happen in an instant, he shouldn’t’ve pushed for it so firmly. “If saying goodbye is too much? If—“ hesitance upon hesitance, the words crowded at the gates and jostled for positions alongside his feelings. He guessed at worst case scenarios, hoped for better than his fears. “If you need something else?”

The ‘please’ that sat in his tone, a constant undercurrent, a word that remained unspoken.

Cause knowing he’d ******** up but not knowing how? What point was there in saying sorry, or begging for forgiveness, in hurting thr other man further!! Waru winced at himaelf for the way he always did this, a terrible pattern of only reaching out after the offense was made, of wheedling selfishly with apologies for one more chance to prove that — even if he couldn’t change completely — then at least he could try to not repeat the same tired mistakes he’d made again and again.

‘Not that m’making it better now by holding up his trip, am I?’

The splash of cold water reminder that Ren had places to go and things to do, and the idea that the last thing the man probably wanted was to have a difficult phone call when he should’ve been packing to leave.

He almost wished he hadn’t made the call —

No.

Coward.

He wished instead to take all his words back, to apologize and let Ren go like an adult would instead of bartering desperately for more moments of time that he could’ve had if he’d only done better before. He’d made a waste of it, was making a mess of it now. Thus cal that should’ve been a simple apology and him wishing Ren well on his travels and asking for metrics when he returned and—-

‘Why am I always like this!?’

“When — when you come back maybe — I’m asking for a lot right now, I know. Too much? And it’s not fair of me t’do this in the middle of you leaving. But maybe when you come back!” Like hope springing eternal, he swallowed all the pleading whines that wanted to leach out of his soul and anchor the man here, to him, forever. To make up for what he knew in his heart he must’ve done wrong. “Cause I won’t ******** it up a second time. I promise. It’ll be just you n me, alright? We can talk. I can welcome you back home.”

Properly, the right way.