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Jack has been doing better lately; he swears he is. So when he sees Joke staggering on the corner of the street leading up to his house, he shakes his head a little, trying to dispel the vision and the familiar ache that comes with it. But illusion-Joke doesn’t disappear. Instead, he hobbles closer, and Jack’s breath catches in his throat.
“Not real,” he whispers to himself, as if saying it will make the mirage scatter, stop it from torturing him.
Jack is rooted to the spot. If he moves, surely Joke will fade away. It’s been months since that awful day on the pier — since Carbon had taken everything from him — and only weeks since Jack had last seen Joke at the kitchen table, smiling from a desk at the learning center, hovering in their bedroom doorway. So, if the part of him he’s tried to lock away embraces the vision, he’ll let it, if only for a moment.
The ghost of his fiance moves closer, and Jack swears he hears the scuff of his worn-out shoes on the concrete.
“Jack…”
That voice is like honey to his ears.
Joke reaches for him. Solid fingers touch his cheek, softly, almost hesitant, but scarily real.
Jack closes his eyes and tries to keep his breathing steady until Joke disappears. But when he opens them again, Joke is still there. His tired eyes are sparkling with unshed tears.
Jack won’t believe it — he can’t — but this version of Joke is different. His hair is longer, his clothes are worn and dirty, and he looks weighed down by the world. The Joke in Jack’s mind was always perfect.
“Jack,” Joke says again, voice wavering, and Jack finally lets himself reach out.
He holds his breath as his hand comes up to rest over the smaller hand against his cheek. Jack nearly gasps when he feels it.
“Joke…” he breathes, disbelieving. “Are you… Am I… is this real?”
Joke nods, biting his lower lip as the first tears roll down his cheeks. “I’m so sorry.”
Suddenly, Jack’s legs stop working. He sinks to his knees, grabbing onto Joke’s legs like they’re his lifeline. He rests his forehead against Joke’s thighs, touching him, feeling him to make sure this isn’t a terrible sort of lucid dream. Jack doesn’t think he’ll be able to recover a second time if this isn’t real.
He doesn’t even realize he’s crying until Joke is sinking down next to him and embracing him on the sidewalk, the sobs wracking his body.
“I’m sorry, my love,” Joke, Joke, says again. “I’m sorry for everything. I’ve been trying to get back to you since I woke up.”
Jack shakes his head as best he can while buried in Joke’s shoulder. “It’s my fault. It’s my fault.”
Joke sighs a beautiful, shuddering sigh, “Baby, it was never your fault. We’re in this together, aren’t we? I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt you or our friends.”
When Jack’s sobs don’t relent, Joke shushes him gently, rocking him in his arms as Jack's mind tries to make sense of the man before him.
“Can… Can we go home now?” Jack finally asks, his voice trembling. Some part of him still doesn’t believe it, but he thinks he needs to lie down, and he wants whatever Joke this is to follow him. That, and he isn’t sure he can get up on his own.
“Yes, dear,” Joke says softly, and Jack hears the painful thickness of emotion in his tone.
Even though Joke is battered, bruised, and barely strong enough to support his own body weight, he helps Jack to his feet. Jack stumbles, legs weak from shock and disbelief, but this time his knees are spared from the concrete.
“Easy,” Joke says, wrapping an arm around Jack’s waist to support him. “There you go.”
Walking through the gate with Joke’s arm around his waist feels surreal. Everything is the same as he left it just a few hours ago when he went to take care of some paperwork at the center. The dirty dishes on the table and the jacket strewn over the back of the dining chair didn’t tell Jack that his life would be changing again. He wishes they had.
Joke shuffles them past the entryway and uses his foot to toe open their bedroom door — because it has never stopped being theirs. The room is still full of Joke the way it always has been. Their clothes are still mixed together on the clothing rack, and Joke’s duffel bag is still collecting dust in the corner. Even the suits they were supposed to wear for their wedding are still hanging above the door. Joke had been the one to put them there, saying he wanted to be reminded of their union every day. Now, his white suit is encased in plastic, hidden behind Jack’s own. He should have moved them — maybe it would have eased his grief — but the thought of putting them away hurts more than leaving them. Letting them sit in a dusty closet would feel like Jack wanted to forget him.
Jack doesn’t even realize he’s crying again until he feels Joke’s hands on his cheeks.
“It hurts me to see you in so much pain,” Joke says sadly, wiping the tears from under Jack’s eyes with his thumbs.
Jack desperately leans into the touch. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. Jack doesn’t like being vulnerable, but Joke in any form seems to break down his walls.
“Don’t be sorry. I’m the one who’s supposed to be sorry, aren’t I?”
Jack starts to protest, but Joke shushes him. “Come on, let’s get in bed.”
His hand drops from Jack’s face as he turns to face the mattress, and suddenly, panic floods Jack’s body. He grabs Joke’s wrist, heart beating in his ears.
Shock paints Joke’s face for a moment, but then it melts into something unbearably sad. “I’m not leaving you, my dear. Come lie down with me.” He twines their fingers together, his hand solid in Jack’s own.
Jack clutches Joke’s hand as he lets himself be led onto the bed, afraid that if he lets go, Joke will disappear again.
Joke lays them down on the tiny mattress, tucking the blanket around them both. Ever since that day, the bed has felt like an ocean, and Jack keeps sinking into it alone, but now he’s been pulled ashore, looking into the warm brown eyes of his lover like he was always meant to.
The warmth from Joke’s legs tangled in his is keeping Jack grounded. Jack must be staring because Joke smiles softly, letting out a little sigh that fans over Jack’s lips. What a beautiful, wonderful feeling.
But still, Jack has to ask — just to be sure. “This is real? Really real?”
Joke presses a gentle kiss to Jack’s lips, and it feels like heaven. “Yes, baby. Really real.”