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[weaponwithoutpurpose]

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[handleyourshit]

"I'm not that person," she says again, firmly, looking up at him.

"I mean yes, we shared some characteristics, but she's not - she never -"

She shakes her head. "She got to be happy. And she was, with you."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

"Yeah. I know. But he was happy, too. And he, goddamn...I - feel the same way with you."

He leans his head back. "Even here in the middle of this fucking place with some killer out there putting people on hooks. Maybe especially here."

[handleyourshit]

She's quiet for a moment, studying him, watching him watch the ceiling.

Feeling... all kinds of things, lodged right at the base of her throat.

"...you know that's not fair, right?" she finally asks, swallowing.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He looks down to her.

"What's not fair?" There's a lot of things that aren't fair.

[handleyourshit]

"You can't just - say that. When you're still looking for a ring on your finger." Yes, she saw.

Yes, she's done it herself.

"When you're still looking at me and seeing someone who can't fucking sleep without you breathing beside her. Who still jumps up onto countertops when a mouse runs by, who still believes people are basically good if they can just get out of their own way. Who asks for a pool party birthday specifically so the two of you can beat everyone else at chicken fighting, or whatever that's even called."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He shakes his head, finding his words, finding the breath in his chest. "No, Rosita, don't- it ain't like that. This breach didn't- put shit on me that wasn't there before. It just confirmed what was already there. For me. It's fine if it's not for you. But what isn't fair is - sitting around here, knowing something like that and not saying it."

[handleyourshit]

"Oh, so now I'm not being fair because I've never said anything?"

She's not quite in control of saying it; anger is better than fear, and especially this fear.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He's quiet for a moment, then sighs. "Not you, Ro. Me. What's not fair about me is that I've been sitting here feeling it and not telling you. I don't - know what you're feeling," he admits.

[handleyourshit]

She could keep the fight going - or rather, fan it into existence, since Jacob refuses to bite. Every version of her prefers anger to fear, prefers to be on the offense than cornered on defense.

But she remembers the conversation they had on the beach - the conversation they had in Astarion's cabin, all three of them. She knows exactly where the problem is.

"You said you were building a place for me into your future. You never leave your people behind, wouldn't let me break up with you. You've said how you feel. I'm the one who can't figure out how to trust what you're saying."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He doesn't dispute that. He just plucks a bit of fabric from her shoulder, toying with the shirt as he does. He's not taking the bait, he's not turning this into a fight, because he's tired. And there's more important things to do than fight. For him.

Anger is better than fear, but he feels both so much all the time that he can't help but simply - allow it to happen.

"Nothing I can do to fix that," he tells her softly. "But - it's fine. I'll figure it out one day."

[handleyourshit]

"It's not yours to fix."

She pulls away enough so that she can turn more to face him, so she can see him more clearly - and hopefully he can see her.

"I care about you, Jacob. You're important to me. You haven't done anything wrong by me, and that's... terrifying to me."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

Jacob crosses his ankles and leans back, feeling his chest tighten a little. He doesn't know why.

"I know. And I'm not giving up on you or anything. So get that out of your head."

[handleyourshit]

She doesn't want to lose him - lose this. Lose whatever could be ahead of them because of what's behind her.

But what's behind her is so staggering in its entirety. What's behind her almost killed her, still might, she doesn't know. Some days she feels like herself again. Some days she can't remember why she's getting up and moving at all.

She watches him lean away and her instinct is to reach out again, to pull him close again, to follow. She swallows and holds steady.

"So what, then?"

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He isn't deliberately leaning away as much as he is settling in, so it takes only her hesitation before he pulls her close again. "Dunno. You wanna tell me about the shit out there? What's inside your brilliantly nervous mind?"

[handleyourshit]

She is, at least, soothed by that; she doesn't resist at all, tucking her feet up under her, leaning into his side. This, she neither takes for granted nor is willing to pass up.

Especially when he asks that, and normally she'd deflect, but she has to try.

"I just... wasn't ready for it, you know? That's the kind of shit you see out on the road, and if I were on the road, nothing would surprise me." But people keep telling her she's safe here, that this is different than home, except it's not.

It's really not, down at the core of it. "We're not safe, here. Nothing can make us safe here, if only because the Admiral himself isn't interested in that at best, and is actively making sure we're not at worst."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

"No, we aren't safe here. And I don't give a fuck about the Admiral. It's the people. It's the system. The Admiral just enables it."

He sighs, reaching down for the blanket to put over her feet. Even with socks on, he's not willing to risk cold toes.

[handleyourshit]

It makes her smile, and makes her feel tired all at once; it's exhausting, being on alert all the time. It's exhausting, not knowing who or what to trust, vacillating back and forth.

"I think, too - the things I was afraid of in the breach, and the things I'm afraid of as myself. They're two different threats. She's not used to... bodies hanging on the side of the road. It was more of a shock because of that, too. More like early days, when that was still new." Still half in her breach mindset, half in the real world.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

"Hard to imagine people doing that to each other," he mutters. "Until it happens. And then it keeps happening and keeps happening and shit gets worse and worse until you can't remember what it was like to think of bodies on hooks as horrifying." He knows that he's not talking just about her.

[handleyourshit]

"Civilized people don't do that."

She's clearly quoting someone, the way she pitches her voice, the expression she pulls after.

But she shakes her head, and tries her best to listen at least as much as she talks.

"I saw things like that a few times, out on the road. You don't sound surprised either."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

"No," he sighs. "We'd string up heretics like that sometimes. John, especially. People tied to stakes and used for target practice. People hanging from trees. Didn't just pass it, I lived in it."

Like most times he has to talk about home, he wars between shame and pride.

[handleyourshit]

And like most times he talks about home, she is reminded again that she's seen men like that before.

She's been threatened, terrorized, and tortured by men like that. So she has to sit with it a moment before she can ask, "Heretics? How does one qualify as a heretic?"

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He knows. He knows so he doesn't say anything for a moment, letting his arm dangle over her shoulder. "Fancy word for people who piss off Joseph," he answers and it's more of an honest response than he thought himself capable of before. Maybe it's still the breach. Maybe it's just - time.

[handleyourshit]

It's not lost on her that this is the first time she's heard him talk about Eden's Gate and not mention something from the cult there - some title, some scripture, some teaching. Some role.

She reaches up to hold onto his arm around her, breathing out. This is the difference between Jacob Seed and Negan Smith.

"That's what happens when one person has too much power. Has too many people around them willing to kiss ass, and not enough willing to call them out."

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

He simultaneously relaxes under her touch and breathes into his tense chest. "Yeah, maybe," he mutters, but he's not up for defending Joseph today. Not after everything that's happening outside.

"Just - shit that shouldn't remind me of home, you know?"

[handleyourshit]

"I wish it were the same for me."

That she could think of home and not think of everything it is now. All the horrible things it is now.

She's not great at being an optimist. She's not great at looking past what is, at whatever's in front of her. But she tries.

She smiles, small and brittle but she tries.

"D'you know she had a wedding scrapbook? She'd been building it since she was fifteen."