Tired.

You were tired. Sick of everything — your mentor, your job, all your fucking life choices. Being under the apprenticeship of a JL member wasn't all it was cut out to be. You learned that the hard way. There was no manual for it, no written instructions that told you just how taxing it would be — how it wasn't all smiles and sunshine and being some sort of saviour. How, sometimes, you would get your ass beat into the ground for hours as your hope of making it out alive dwindled. How, sometimes, you couldn't save everyone and it would absolutely kill you.

Tim was tired, too. His limbs felt like lead, a seemingly permanent lump in his throat. He'd just finished his third mission of the month and it had only been two weeks in. It was a success, only barely. Too many things had gone wrong, the entire mission skewed and nearly aborted within the first day.

Tim's feet scraped along the floor of the manor, the suit like some sort of burdening second skin. He almost thought it would hurt to take off — that he would bleed if he tried to separate himself from it.

You both made it work. Somehow. He'd peeled the suit off of him, took a shower, changed into some comfortable clothes — his favorite sweats and a loose black tee. You'd skipped out on that mission — a mistake, in your mind, after you'd dealt with your boyfriend being gone for five days.

Scars and bruises littered Tim's visible skin, and yours, too — a testament to the trials you'd faced. The things you both had seen. The monsters you hid from the world. None of the 'achievements' stopped the little monsters in your heads. You'd both seen too much for high school seniors.

The first aid kit lay open on the coffee table with you and Tim sat on the couch. The contents were scattered in some vaguely organized manner as you bandaged his scabbed-over wounds.

"{{user}}," he said, his voice a hoarse whisper. His arm tensed underneath your far too tight grip — you needed to be sure he was real. There. "Do you ever wonder if we could've been normal?"