Work Text:
Jeff is... Jeff is simple. But complex. See, he's easy: sweet, innocent, friendly, nervous, so nervous, and scared. He's clumsy with words. When talking to the wrong person. But he almost, sort of, has a way with them, when talking to the right person. His thoughts are complex paths carved through his mind, and you're awfully lucky if you don't get lost soon after stepping in. In fact you're lucky, Steve supposes, if you are shown the path at all. Again, you have to be the right person.
Luckily, Jeff knows his own mind well, and can help navigate you through the fog, around the thorns. So long as you give him the chance.
Steve wishes he'd given Jeff more chances in the past. Now that he's leaving, and Steve can't feel his lips, or his tongue. Patrick looks quite confused as well. Sad, even. Steve wants to grab hold of Patrick's knee and empathize, but - "You can't leave. What do you mean 'leave'?" His tongue's back at least.
"Well, I mean, 'go'. I'm going to go on a trip for a while," Jeff says, eyebrows raised. Isn't it just like him. To think they'd be happy for him to go...
"How long is a while?" Patrick asks, then draws a couple of fingers across his lips, his drink immobile beside his mouth. Steve silently thanks him because he feels as though he might've accidentally said something if no one else had spoken up first.
Jeff sighs, then puts his palms flat on his knees. "I was thinkin' maybe - about six months, or a year. You never really know with these kinds of things, do you?"
"Well of course you bloody do!" Steve shouts, arm whipping out in front of him, trying to push the bullshit back from him. "It's called a trip, a holiday! What you're doing is moving, Jeffrey!"
"Yeah!" Patrick says, eyebrows furrowed. His body still rigid. Steve really, really wants to comfort him, but at the moment, he isn't really capable.
"Oh," Jeff says, quiet, and his eyebrows furrow as well, as he looks to the side like he does when he's wandering about his pathways boldly. Like he so often does. Steve swallows harshly. "Well, you know, I'll be back. Isn't that - I mean, it's a bit different yeah? Moving constitutes planning a future somewhere... Doesn't it? And a year, isn't exactly, all the way, a future."
"It's future enough," Steve says, angry, as he breathes out through his nose, nostrils flaring.
Jeff frowns then. Looking up and into Steve's eyes. "Well," he starts. But doesn't finish.
"Well. Well. Well," Steve says, tone a mockery of Jeff's. "Bloody well. Alright then, well I suppose we'll see you in a year. If you remember to come back, that is!"
Steve stands up, breathe caught in his chest, filling it up. Patrick looks up at him with these hurt, puppy dog eyes, and so Steve grips his shoulder. And walks out of the bar into the cool, crisp air.
"Well," says Steve, as he turns onto his side for sleep, eyes wide open, and his heart pounding in his ears.
"Steve?" Jeff asks, voice low.
Steve remains quiet, though he lifts the phone away from his ear just for a moment as he considers hanging up.
"I don't know what I did wrong," Jeff says, plaintive in tone, asking. "But I didn't mean to. Honest." And Steve knows he's right, and he closes his eyes tight because he should be the one apologizing. And here's Jeff. Sweet, innocent, slightly maligned Jeff, asking for penance.
Another long moment of silence stretches passed them, and Jeff sighs into the phone. "Well, I'm off then..."
"Jeff?" Steve asks, timid, but knowing this is something he has to do.
"Yeah?" Jeff sounds excited, really, about Steve even just speaking to him. It tears something else inside of Steve. What an asshole he's been...
"I'm sorry Jeff. I'm the one that's sorry, not you."
"But what've you got to be sorry for? You've done nothing wrong? I'm the bloody arse who went and made ya mad."
The incredulity in his voice is so familiar it just winds up the ache in Steve even more. "No, Jeff, you're wrong. I'm afraid - you're very wrong. And I want you to be happy when you go, and where you go." He says it because he should, not because it's true. Because it isn't. Steve hopes that wherever Jeff goes, he's miserable. Absolutely, unmistakable, even for Jeff Murdock bloody miserable.
"Wow!" Jeff says in true astonishment, "Really?"
"Yes," Steve says, through his teeth, "Really." And then he sighs, hangs his head, and rubs at his creased forehead. "Miss you," he says quietly, and then hangs up before either of them can say anything else.