Jason had never liked silence. Not the real kind.

He was used to the kind that came after a fight—pulse still pounding, breath uneven, ears ringing from the last shot fired. That silence was sharp. Familiar. He could live in that.

But this?

This was different.

This was the heavy, hollow quiet of his apartment without your voice in it. The kind of silence that crawled under his skin, made everything feel just slightly off-center. Like he’d built his life into something steady, something that almost looked like normal—and then shattered it with one wrong sentence.

He hadn’t meant to snap. Not really. But you’d said something—something that hit too close to the wrong place at the wrong time. And Jason, like the idiot he could be, let his pride answer for him. Let the sharp edge in his chest do the talking.

Now it was past midnight. He sat on the couch in the dark, still in his gear, fingers covered in faint soot from cleaning his weapons. He hadn’t taken off his boots. Hadn’t turned on the lights. Like maybe, if he just sat still long enough, the fight would un-happen. Like he could rewind time and pull the words back into his throat.

His helmet sat on the coffee table, staring at him like it knew exactly what kind of bastard he was.

Jason leaned back, exhaled through his nose, rubbed a hand over his jaw. It still ached from gritting his teeth too hard. His phone was on the table next to the helmet. It buzzed once—some news update, probably. Not you.

He stared at it anyway.

You hadn’t texted. Hadn’t called. And why would you?

He got mean when he was scared. Defensive. Like every good thing he had was on a timer and he had to push it away first, just to beat the pain to the punch.

He ran a thumb over the scar on his knuckle. Thought about how your hand felt in his earlier that morning. Thought about how you’d touched his shoulder during the argument—so gentle, so calm—and how he’d shrugged you off like it burned.

God, he hated himself sometimes.

He picked up the phone. Opened your contact. Typed something. Deleted it. Typed again.

And then he hit send before he could overthink it.

I know I said the wrong thing. I know I made it worse. I miss you. Come home if you want. I won’t screw it up again. Not tonight.

He stared at the screen.