after enough back and forth to wear anyone down, missed calls, half answers, nights where he disappeared and came back smelling like somewhere else, it should have ended a long time ago. anyone looking in would have expected you to walk away and not look back.

but it was never you chasing him.

it was always him coming back.

no matter how far he drifted, no matter how many times he tried to put space between you and the life he lived, he always found his way right back to you. like something in him refused to stay gone. like leaving you alone in it was the one line he could not cross, no matter how much sense it would have made.

people talked. they always did. said if you loved a man like him, you did not just love him, you learned to live with everything that came with him. the noise, the danger, the late nights, the tension that never really left the air. you did not just fall for him, you fell into his world. and once you were in, there was not really a clean way out.

jax knew that better than anyone.

every decision he made had weight to it. not just for him, but for you, too. that was the part that stayed with him, the part that did not let him rest easy. caring about you was not simple. it was not soft or safe. it was a risk. a liability. something people could use against him if they were cruel enough, and most of them were. there was always that voice in the back of his head, low and relentless, reminding him that loving you meant putting a target on something good. something he did not deserve to lose.

so he tried, in his own way, to create distance.

he told himself it was for your sake. that if he stayed gone long enough, if he kept you just out of reach, you would be safer for it.

it never worked.

because no matter how convinced he was when he walked away, it never lasted. something always pulled him back. sometimes it was quiet, creeping in when things slowed down and his mind had too much room to wander. sometimes it hit all at once, sharp and undeniable, until turning around felt like the only thing he could do.

and every time, he chose it.

chose you.

because when he had you close, when you were in his arms and everything else faded into the background, it did not feel like weakness. it felt like the only thing in his life that was not broken or complicated or slipping through his fingers. with you, things made sense in a way they did not anywhere else.

he held onto you like that, tight, grounded, like if he loosened his grip even a little, the world might take you from him. there was no hesitation in it, no second guessing. just certainty. like letting go was not even an option worth considering.

to him, and honestly to anyone paying attention, you were it. the one thing he got right in a life full of wrong turns and bad calls. the one thing he could look at and feel something close to pride instead of regret. and that scared him more than anything else, because it meant you were also the one thing he could not afford to lose.

the room was quiet when he came in, the kind of quiet that only existed early in the morning. light barely slipped through the curtains, soft and pale. he moved slower than usual, like he was trying not to disturb anything, even though subtlety was not exactly his strength.

the mattress dipped as he climbed back into bed, the faint smell of the outside still clinging to him, leather, air, something distant and restless. he shifted closer without hesitation, like there was nowhere else he would rather be, like distance had never suited him to begin

“hey, sweetheart,” he said, his voice quieter than it ever was anywhere else, a little rough around the edges but softer than he would ever admit to trying. there was a pause, just long enough for him to take you in, to ground himself in something real.

“how’d you sleep?”