The room still smells like it—sweat and skin, tension and something that always feels like goodbye. The sheets are twisted, hanging off the edge of the bed like a white flag, surrendered. You hadn’t spoken much when he showed up at your door. You never really do.

But his hands had found your skin like muscle memory, like he was born knowing where to touch you. And you let him.

You always let him.

It was fast this time. Desperate. You didn’t take your clothes off so much as tear them away, fingers trembling, mouths bruising. He’d fucked you hard, face buried in the crook of your neck, gripping your hips like you were something he might lose again. And maybe that’s what it was always about—trying to remind himself you’re still here. Trying to forget everything else.

You’d clung to him, nails in his back, gasping his name when you came. He didn’t say much. He never really does. Just rough breaths, low groans, broken sighs. The kind of sex that leaves you sore and hollow at the same time. The kind that means nothing and everything.

Now, you’re both outside on the balcony, naked under thin sheets, half-covered, cigarettes in hand like you’re pretending it’s not complicated. The air’s warm. Sticky with night.

Jason’s leaning on the railing, bare back still streaked with the scratches you left, smoke curling from between his lips. There’s a bruise just under his jaw, another blooming down his ribs. You wonder how many of them are yours.

You light your own cigarette, watching the flame spark in the reflection of his eyes. He doesn’t look at you. He never does after.

“You’re quiet,” you murmur.

Jason shrugs. “Not much to say.”

You nod. You already knew that. Sex with Jason always starts the same way—violent in its hunger—and ends with this. Silence. Smoke. That aching space between bodies that know each other too well and hearts that never quite figured it out.

“You’re gonna end up dead one day,” you say, but it’s not cruel. Just quiet truth.

He exhales. “Been there. Done that.”

His eyes are on the city, but you can feel him thinking, like always. All the things he doesn’t say live in the way his jaw clenches, the way his fingers tap against the railing like he needs something to hold onto.

“You don’t have to keep doing this,” you tell him.

He glances at you, just once. “You mean the sex or the vigilante thing?”

“All of it.”

Jason huffs a dry laugh and flicks his ash off the edge. “You say that like I’ve got choices.”

You take another drag. “You do.”

“Yeah? Then why do I always end up here?”

You don’t answer him. Maybe because you don’t know. Maybe because you want to say because I let you, but it feels too real. Too sharp.

He shifts closer to you, the sheet slipping lower on his hips. You notice but don’t look. You’ve already seen all of him—inside and out. That’s the problem.

“You hate me sometimes,” he says. “And then you fuck me like you miss me.”

You swallow. “Maybe I do.”

Jason blinks, like he wasn’t expecting honesty.

You shrug. “But it’s not enough.”

He’s quiet a long time before he mutters, “I don’t know how to be enough. Not for you. Not for anyone.”

And still, you’re here.

Still, you let him crawl back into your bed and press his body to yours like a question he never wants the answer to.

Still, you light his cigarette.

Because for all the bruises and silence and sex that only ever scratches the surface, he’s Jason. And you’re you. And the only language you both understand is this: flesh and friction and too many words left unsaid.

So you finish your cigarette in the dark, the city humming beneath you, hearts beating quietly in the wreckage of what you’ll never admit.