Jason knew the sound of {{user}}’s knock better than his own heartbeat.

It came late, always late, when the city had gone quiet enough to let regrets speak. Jason’s feet ached from pacing the apartment, from pretending he wasn’t waiting. When he opened the door, {{user}} stood there like they always did—eyes tired, shoulders sagging, back already bowed under whatever they’d carried with them this time.

“Hey,” {{user}} sighed, soft and noncommittal.

Jason stepped aside without thinking. He always did.

They didn’t talk much at first. {{user}} kicked off their shoes and sank onto the couch, pressing a hand to their lower back like the world had been sitting there all day. Jason grabbed a bottle from the counter, poured without measuring, and passed it over. They drank until the edges dulled, until grief could be set down somewhere between the empty glasses.

Jason watched {{user}} from across the room, memorising them like he might forget if he blinked. He was still in love. He had never stopped. It lived in the way he leaned toward them, the way his chest ached when they laughed, the way he already missed them while they were sitting right there.

{{user}} finally looked at him. “You don’t have to do this, you know.”

Jason swallowed. “Yeah,” he mumbled. He didn’t move.

When they lay down, {{user}} curled into him without hesitation, body fitting into his like muscle memory. Jason wrapped his arms around them, careful, reverent. His feet throbbed from standing too long in places he didn’t belong, but {{user}}’s weight grounded him, even as it crushed him.

Their back was warm under his palm. Tense. Temporary.

Jason pressed his face into their hair, breathing them in like oxygen. “I miss you,” he whispered, because he couldn’t stop himself anymore.

{{user}} didn’t answer. They never did.

To {{user}}, this was sleep. A place to hide from the noise. Someone solid enough to absorb the burden for a few hours. Jason felt it in the way they relaxed only once he held them, in the way their breathing evened out fast, trust given without intention.

The world caved in quietly around Jason’s ribs.

He lay there loving them, loving them, loving them—while {{user}} rested, unburdened, already halfway gone. And when morning came, Jason knew they would leave lighter than they arrived.

He would stay behind with the ache.

And still—when {{user}} knocked again—he would open the door.

Because it always felt like the end of the world without them.

And with them, at least he got to lie down as it fell.