CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR S01E07 "THE HUB"
There are a number of things which Phil is expecting upon their return to the Bus. There are even a number of things that he isn't expecting but is none-the-less prepared for. Jasper Sitwell leaning with his hip against Lola's side isn't one of them.
"Don't touch Lola," Phil says automatically as they walk up the ramp.
"Nice to see you again, too," Jasper quips. He looks to Simmons with a smug smile. "And nice to see you, Agent Simmons."
Simmons fidgets anxiously, a nervous smile twitching at her lips as she laughs a little too loudly to be convincing. "Yes! Yes, um… pleasure to see you again as well, Agent Sitwell."
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I asked you to call me Jasper," he says smoothly, looking amused.
"Right. Well, I wasn't certain that still stood after I shot you and dragged your body to a corner of a restricted hallway," Simmons says in one breath.
"Most people are angry about that sort of thing," Fitz supplies.
"Well, usually when I get knocked out, it's by someone who isn't half as cute… so I figure I'll let it slide," Jasper hums with an easy smile.
Ward rolls his eyes when Simmons blushes a bright fire engine red and stammers, tugging on a few strands of her hair and looking anywhere but at Jasper. A slow, small smile works its way to Phil's face as he nods for the team to continue on in. Unsurprisingly, May hangs behind, lingering by the staircase.
"I know you didn't come here just to flirt with Simmons," Phil says.
"Well, not just," Jasper replies.
"Get to the point, Jasper," Phil says patiently.
Jasper looks over Phil's shoulder, his dark eyes unreadable, before returning his gaze to the other agent. "I figured we could have a little chat. There's this diner a few blocks from here; quiet, out of the way… and they make great pancakes there."
There was a time when Phil would have considered Jasper a friend. Watching him place his order with the waiter from the other side of the booth they're seated at, Phil has to wonder if that time has passed. They've known each other for years, have run missions of all kinds together, hell, Phil had been his S.O. when Jasper had first joined S.H.I.E.L.D. But things have changed; he's just not sure how much.
"So is this little chat on or off the record?" Phil asks.
"I didn't come here to interrogate you," Jasper answers, dumping the contents of a sugar packet into his coffee.
"Then what did you come here for?" Phil wants to know.
"I found it interesting," Jasper says, eyes locked on to his coffee as he slowly stirs the sugar in, "that I had to find out you were alive through a debrief a week before you and your team came to the Hub."
For the second time today, Phil is surprised. This isn't exactly on the list of discussion topics he'd had in mind. At his silence Jasper looks up from his mug.
"They didn't have any phones in Tahiti?" Jasper asks.
"It's a magical…"
Phil's fists clench against his thighs.
"…place," he finishes.
They sit in silence, watching each other carefully for some kind of tell, some sort of hint to tell them what the other is thinking. Phil has the sudden, insane thought that Jasper knows. Jasper knows something's wrong with him, something's different, something's not okay. It makes his skin itch. It makes him long for the solitude of his office, thousands of feet in the air.
The spell is broken when the waiter returns, placing a plate stacked with pancakes in front of each of them and offering to refill their coffee before departing once more.
"You've been back in the field," Jasper says slowly. "I'm Level 7. I'm authorized to know. And I guess I was kind of wondering why it didn't come from you. But I think I'm starting to understand why."
Phil tenses, waiting for the verdict.
"You're different."
Jasper doesn't even look at him when he says it, just focuses on pouring the optimal amount of syrup onto his pancakes. It shouldn't feel like a slap, but it does. It's not as though Jasper is the first person to point this out, but he's the first person to point it out in such a way that it feels like it's validating Phil's own feelings that something's wrong.
"You didn't know that they weren't planning on sending an extraction for your men," Jasper continues.
"And you did," Phil counters.
"At the time, I thought you knew," Jasper informs him. "It became pretty clear later that wasn't the case. I've had some time to think about it. I think they were testing you."
"Testing me?" Phil echoes.
"To see whether or not you would find out and plan an extraction yourself," Jasper clarifies, taking a bite of his pancakes. "It was the way Hand was talking about it after you'd left. I think she's testing you and I think it has something to do with you being different."
Phil's becoming less and less sure that he can trust the system, and now, as they sit together, he wonders if he can still trust Jasper. It's probably something he should have considered before coming to this diner with him, but it's too late for that now. The idea that Phil is being tested is truthful, that much he can tell. But Jasper's motives are harder to decipher. Has he told Phil this as a warning or is he gathering information? Phil has to make a decision and make it quick; does he talk to Jasper as a friend, or treat him as a potential threat?
Stalling, he takes a bite of his own pancakes.
"You know," Phil says, swallowing, "I've never understood your ability to find places like this."
"It's a talent that's wasted at the Hub," Jasper declares. "I told you they had good pancakes."
"I think you sold them short," Phil says.
It's another few minutes before he reaches a decision.
"I attempted to retrieve the files pertaining to my death and recovery," Phil says quietly. "I didn't have access."
"Decided you could trust me?"
Phil should feel annoyed or embarrassed or angry at having been found out, but he doesn't. In a way, he feels relieved. This is familiar. This is something he knows. And for the first time in a long time, something feels the way it did before he died. He offers a mild smile in response to Jasper's shit-eating grin.
"Can you blame me for wondering?" he asks.
"Not really," Jasper admits with a shrug. "I'll do what I can, keep an eye open for anything that might be relevant to you. But I can't promise anything."
"I wouldn't ask you to," Phil says.
Making promises is bad business in their line of work. They both know that. With that, any hint of mirth or good humor is gone from the other agent's face, and all Phil can focus on is the pair of dark, inquisitive eyes boring into him.
"I never asked," Jasper says. "You okay?"
He isn't. He's very far from okay, he knows. Most of the time he can convince himself he is. He can convince other people, too, from what he's seen. He's different and he can feel it… but he can't see it. Outwardly, he seems unchanged. And deep down, that's part of why he hasn't reached out to anyone since his miraculous return from the dead. Sure, Fury had given him the whole spiel on why the Avengers couldn't know and why anyone below a Level 7 security clearance couldn't either and, on some level, he understood and respected that.
On a deeper level, he knows it's more than a simple adherence to the rules. It's because coming back to the people he'd surrounded himself with before meant running the risk of them seeing. He doesn't want people to know he's different any more than he wants to be different. May reminded him that something like this changes a person, but he hadn't counted on just how much it could change him or how terribly it could shake his foundations. The more he looks, the less he finds and that frightens him. He just wants to be the same old Phil Coulson he's always been and the more time passes, the less sure he is that it's possible to go back to being that man.
No, he's not okay.
But he smiles and dips his head and says, "I'm fine."
When he looks back up, Jasper's gaze is less intense, less scrutinizing, but he knows. And that's all Phil needs.
"So Simmons really tried flirting with you?" Phil asks, carving off another bite from his stack of pancakes.
"It was awful. Honestly, just about the worst I've ever encountered," Jasper replies. "Is she single?"
Phil narrows his eyes. "Don't."
"Come on, she's cute."
"Yes, and she's on my team."
"Okay, dad."
"What? Don't call me that. It makes me sound old."
"I hate to break it to you, Phil—"
"Finish that sentence and I'm bringing back the Night Night Pistol."
"…that is the most ridiculous name for a weapon I've ever heard."
"And that ridiculous weapon put you in the infirmary."
"Is that part of the package? Feelings of shame and humiliation upon waking to the knowledge that you were taken out with a weapon called the 'Night Night Pistol'?"
"Be glad she didn't use the Night Night Gun instead."
"You're kidding."
As they ramble on, talking like nothing had ever happened, Phil feels himself gradually relax. He'd jumped straight back into the field the second he was allowed and he doesn't regret that, but in doing so he'd failed to consider the things and the people he'd left behind. And maybe part of getting back to himself should include taking those things back.
"Well?" Skye demands as he walks up the ramp.
Phil raises his eyebrows at the sight of his team, standing together, waiting for him.
"'Well' what?" he asks.
"What was that whole meeting about?" Skye presses.
"It wasn't a meeting," Phil says, joining them. "I was having lunch with an old friend."
It could just be the light, but he thinks he sees May's expression smooth into something a fraction more relaxed. Minus Ward, the remainder of their team doesn't bother to hide their relief.
"We thought they were taking you in or something," Fitz says, exhaling loudly. "You know, for the whole… no extraction thing."
"If they'd wanted to take any of us in for that, they would have done it immediately," Ward informs them. "It's been two weeks, no one's going anywhere."
"Oh, like you weren't as worried as the rest of us," Skye scoffs.
"I wasn't worried," Ward says gruffly. "I just wasn't sure if Agent Sitwell should be trusted."
"Jasper can be trusted," Phil informs them, raising the loading ramp from the nearby control panel. "Let's get in the air."
He nods towards the stairs and everyone takes that as a dismissal. As they're filing up, Phil hands Simmons a piece of paper which she looks at curiously.
"What's this?" she asks.
"That's Agent Sitwell's number," Phil informs her. "He said to ask you to give him a call if you're still interested in men who are about your height but heavier than you."
That's all it takes to get the young scientist blushing and sputtering again, practically crawling over Skye in her effort to get up the stairs as quickly as possible.
"Wait, you're not actually going to call him are you?" Fitz demands, climbing up the stairs after her. "You can't do that!"
"I can call whomever I want, Fitz!" Simmons's angry voice drifts down from the next level.
Eventually it's just Phil and May left listening to the sounds of the FitzSimmons argument growing fainter and fainter the further they moved away. When it's quiet once again, May looks to him without expectation.
"Lunch with an old friend?" she echoes.
"I wasn't sure at first," Phil tells her, "but that's what it turned out to be."
"I'm going to keep an eye on him all the same," May says, making for the stairs.
Phil smiles. "I wouldn't expect anything less from you."
He catches the barest hint of a smirk before that expressionless mask is back in place. As he follows her up the stairs, he knows he's not okay, but today helped him to decide that, for now, he's alright.