Closure
---
Charlie is fingering chords on his guitar, but he doesn't strum out any sounds. Jack would have thought he'd have already been asleep. Charlie's eyes are moist and dull. From time to time, he sniffs back the watery mucous draining from his sinuses.Jack wonders why it took him until today to notice Charlie's addiction.
Jack gets to his feet, spending a moment contemplating the fire pit, wondering if he needs to add more fuel, before he wanders real nonchalantly to where Charlie is sitting.
"You need anything?"
Charlie looks up, seems startled. Jack doubts he noticed he was watching him.
"No, man. I'm good. Thanks."
The corner of Charlie's mouth tugs up in a half-hearted grin. Jack thinks about ordering bed rest, but he knows Charlie must be turning something over in his mind. Maybe even everything in his life that led up to this night.
"Mind if I sit?" Jack asks.
Charlie shrugs, another twitch-like grin. Jack takes a seat beside him.
Jack looks out into the trees, into the dark places between the fire-lit trunks. Charlie fingers chords on his guitar, the familiar patterns lending him comfort. Sometimes, he mimes a strum.
Charlie's fingers pause.
"Y' don't have to," he murmurs, after taking a long moment to turn it over in his mind.
Charlie looks up at Jack. He's hoping that Jack'll tell him he doesn't mind, and pretending he's hoping anything but.
Jack smiles: that practiced, smile designed to comfort that he used to use on patients.
(Charlie feels his heart leap into his throat. He feels warm-fuzzies like he hasn't felt since Liam became a bastard.)
"Don't worry about it," Jack says.
Jack pretends he didn't see the way Charlie's eyes lit up at the attention. He doesn't want to embarrass him.
Jack feels like a bastard.
Charlie ducks his head, manages to put up a real grin for a minute and gives a few energetic mock-strums.
"You planning to get some sleep soon?" Jack asks. Jack knows he should have gotten to sleep already, himself, but the aches in his body and pain in his arm and the tension that's stayed with him since the day's near-catastrophe has kept him awake.
How could he have let this go on for so long? he asks himself. What was he doing wrong -- so wrong that Charlie started feeling worthless?
"Yeah. Yeah, I am," Charlie assures him, glancing up a shyly to catch his eyes.
Jack wonders if it was just the withdrawl. If he's blaming himself for something that was out of anybody's control.
Looking at Charlie's craving-worn face, lit up so bright from just a little concern and a few kind words, he doubts that's true.
"You'll have to sing for us sometime," Jack says, punching Charlie's shoulder playfully. He doesn't let it look like he's being as careful as he is.
Charlie feels a relief like he wants to cry. But he doesn't. He's a man.
Instead, Charlie's grin spreads ear to ear despite the sick, weary feeling in his limbs and the puffiness about his face, his heavy eyes that feel fat and are moist enough to hide the emotion welling up.
"Be glad to, mate," Charlie says.
Charlie plays a few chords aloud on his guitar, affection-starved but smiling.
Jack feels like a real bastard, and promises himself he'll make up all the time he's overlooked him.