Hello friends x
Terribly sorry for the delay with this chapter. I was struggling with motivation again, and then ended up coming up with OCs for Star Wars, Star Trek, and Teen Wolf which kind of overwhelmed my attention for a week or two, helpfully. I also can't stop reading Teen Wolf Stiles/Derek fanfics. I'm obsessed.
But anyway, here's the latest chapter, and I hope you all enjoy! I'll reply to reviews down the bottom x
Chapter Eleven - Overactive Paranoia
"I don't know what you want me to say," Jessica mutters, her phone wedged between her jaw and her shoulder. Her hands are busy pulling a fresh pair of jeans up over her legs.
"How about, 'Let's go for lunch'?" Trish's voice responds, and Jessica can just picture her hand gesturing irritably.
"That doesn't sound like something I'd say," Jessica grimaces. She buttons the jeans over her stomach and goes to her wardrobe to pick out a thick jumper - her apartment isn't very good at retaining heat, apparently, and the cold seems to be seeping into the building through her shitty windows.
"Jess," Trish says, the word drowning in frustration.
Jessica sighs sharply. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? I haven't had time lately to organise a damn tea party."
"I get that, Jess. But what's your excuse for avoiding me for the months before the attack?"
Jessica takes the phone away from her ear for a moment to pull her jumper over her head and thread her arms into the sleeves, and she briefly considers tossing the phone out the window. But she lifts it back to her ear as she trudges into the kitchen.
"WellI?" Trish persists.
Jessica grunts. "Sorry, I was hoping you'd have hung up." She moves to the sink, investigating the mug she hasn't washed and deciding a quick blast under the tap will do a good enough job. She needs coffee.
"You should know by now that you're not gonna get rid of me that easily."
"Lucky me," Jessica intones, fingers busy with the coffee machine.
"Damn right, lucky you," Trish retorts pointedly. "You got anyone else in your life looking out for you?"
"Nobody would notice if you disappeared, Jessica," the whispers recite.
Jessica's fingers stiffen and clench around the handle of her mug, and it snaps clean off. The body of the mug falls to her counter with a deafening clatter, the coffee inside sloshing out into a muddy puddle.
"Damnit!" she hisses, panic and rage swirling and swelling inside her chest. She turns abruptly and tosses the broken handle out through the kitchen door, watching it hit the wall outside and shatter into pieces.
"Jess? What's wrong?" Trish asks, a hint of panic in her cautious tone.
"Nothing," Jessica bites out, grimacing as the memory of his long fingers brushing her hair off her neck tickles her skin.
"Don't bullshit me," Trish snaps.
"It's my shit, Trish, back off!" Jessica snaps back. She storms from the mess of her kitchen into her living room, gaze zeroing in on the whiskey shelf. "I don't need you to hold my hand every second of every goddamn day."
"I know that, asshole - all I wanna do is have a normal conversation with you every once in a while!"
"Yeah, well, all you're gonna get is a shitload of disappointment," Jessica says, her face curled with anger.
"Yeah, I guess so," Trish retorts. "Call me when you're ready to stop pushing me away, Jess."
And when Trish hangs up, Jessica blinks with surprise and something that might be regret.
She throws her phone to her desk and reaches with shaking hands for a glass and a bottle, bringing them to her desk, too. The feet of her chair scrape against her floor when she slumps into it, rolling her shoulders and twitching her head back and forth to try and shake off the memories ghosting across her skin. Sometimes she has days like this, where the whispers grow stronger and turn into actual words that sound like him, rather than settling as just a bad feeling. In these days, she struggles to shove everything down where she can't think about it, and the memories resurface and replay to torture her.
Jessica bypasses the whiskey glass and brings the bottle to her lips instead, letting a mouthful of the alcohol burn over her tongue and down her throat.
"Nobody's looking for you, Jessica. You don't want to go back to that life. You want to stay with me."
She squeezes her eyes shut against the memory, against the phantom breath on her ear, against the sound of her own voice telling him she wanted to stay. Her fingers shake when she stretches them out, and her nails bite into her palm when she clenches them into a fist. She can feel her breath slipping falteringly between her lips, can feel the world tilting around her as her ribs tighten around her lungs-
"Come back here!"
She had walked away from him.
"Main Street. Birch Street-" she mutters stiffly.
"Jessica?"
She had ignored him.
"Higgins Drive-"
"Now, Jessica!" The words are almost too quiet and muffled to hear; but she has replayed them enough times to know them by heart, to know each and every tiny inflection and syllable by heart.
"Cobalt Lane," she says, and her voice sounds firmer to her ears.
She takes a steady breath and opens her eyes, the world once again sitting evenly around her. She unclenches her fist and stretches her fingers out, grimly satisfied when she sees they don't shake. The glass of her bottle presses coldly against her lips as she takes another long drink.
"Damnit," she breathes, and she sags forwards to lean her elbows on her desk, running a hand down her face.
It was horrific enough, not having control of her mind and body while he was alive - it's just fucking depressing that she continues to experience such a lack of control now that he's dead. She loathes that he still has this hold of her, this posthumous corruption of her entire being, no matter how many times she reminds herself that he can't get to her anymore because he's dead.
He died. That should have been the closure she needed to move on and put it behind her; but he plagues her every goddamn day as if he's still alive and well and stood right behind her.
She hates that she needs to throw a glance over her shoulder to make sure he isn't.
It's not an ideal time for her to be having one of these difficult days, because today marks a week since Thomas King first walked into her office with the job to dig up dirt on Stark, which means he's due to come back today and check in on her progress - if he was telling the truth when he said he'd come back. She's not sure what to expect, but she knows she'll need more alcohol if she's going to deal with him without exposing herself as the paranoid mess that she is.
Three-quarters of the bottle later, she's tipsy and her temperature is much more agreeable, but she can still feel the whispers ghosting across her skin, threatening to tear into her. She can count the number of times that alcohol has helped days like this on one hand, she really shouldn't be surprised - still, there's no harm in trying.
It's drawing closer to the time in the day that she found Thomas King waiting at her door and she'd really hoped that the alcohol would have dulled down her anticipation, but she can't stop glancing up at the window in her door, her tongue running over her teeth and lips distractedly. She has her texts with Stark open on her phone, glancing down at the screen and wondering whether she should say something or call him and have him on the phone while Thomas King is in with her. Would Stark find that weird? Would it clue him in to how paranoid and unstable she is?
It's not worth the risk. She locks the phone and slides it across the desk away from her.
She's taking another swig of her drink - smaller, this time - when someone knocks on the door. She nearly chokes on the alcohol but manages to swallow it down with a wince, hurrying to screw the lid back on the bottle and shove it in a drawer in her desk. She'd taken a piece of gum out to have ready for when King came so he wouldn't be able to smell the drink on her breath, and she snatches it up and tosses it into her mouth as she pushes to her feet.
Her steps are a little unsteady, but she gives herself a shake and rolls her shoulders back as she walks to the door. She plasters an attempt at a professional smile on her face when she opens the door and looks up at him.
"Welcome back, Mr-" Jessica cuts herself off, suddenly remembering that she only knows his name because she got JARVIS to identify him, not because he willingly gave her the information. "I'm coming up blank," she lies easily. "What d'you want me to call you?"
"Nothing," he answers stiffly.
Jessica bites her teeth together to stop herself from making a snarky comment. She pushes the door open further and turns to walk back to her desk, pouring her concentration into not looking like she's consumed as much alcohol as she has.
"Did you take the job I offered?" he asks, the click of the door sounding as he closes it behind him.
Jessica throws him a look as she skirts her desk and sits back down behind it. "I would've told you last week if I wasn't gonna take it," she says.
"So, you have been investigating Tony Stark?"
She stares up at him and works her jaw. "As much as a world-famous, billionaire, superhero can be investigated, yeah."
"What have you found?" he asks stiffly.
Jessica shrugs and tilts forward to lean her arms on her desk. "Whispers of embezzlement," she answers. "I need to look around a little more to find the evidence, but my gut tells me it's Stark."
The news doesn't seem to please King, but it doesn't seem to displease him either. Jessica watches him carefully, her suspicion only building at his lack of reaction. "You'll need to continue investigating?" he checks.
"Yeah, if you want solid evidence for the whole blackmail thing," she retorts. She didn't mean to sound so snarky.
He blinks at her. "I don't want to blackmail him."
Jessica stares up at him, running her tongue over her lip before pulling it into her mouth with her teeth. It infuriates her that she can't figure out this guy's deal. None of this is sitting right with her at all.
"Do I need to be worried about what you plan to do with this information?" she asks, her eyebrows scrunching with irritated confusion. "If you do something shady and Stark figures out I'm the one who got you the evidence, I think he'd find it pretty damn easy to make me disappear - y'know, in a murdery sort of way."
Something flashes in his eyes, his face twitching, but it's too quick and small for her to figure out what it means - but she has to suppress an uneasy shiver that crawls down her spine.
"Stark isn't going to hurt you," he says, and he almost sounds careful about his words.
Jessica's toes curl in her boots. Maybe it's just because today is a bad day and her paranoia is simply being overactive, but she can't help but wonder if there is an emphasis on Stark - as in, he won't hurt her, but maybe someone else will.
"I'll come back in a week's time," King tells her. He reaches into his back pocket and Jessica's entire body tenses with anticipation, but when his hand comes back into view he reaches it over towards her desk with a brown packet in his grip. "You'll get the rest when the job is done," he says.
Jessica tries not to appear hesitant as she pushes to her feet and extends her own hand to take the packet from him. Her forehead scrunches downwards when she opens it up and finds about three-week's worth of pay in cash, neatly stacked. He had said she'd be paid generously, but she wasn't exactly expecting this.
She lifts her gaze back to him when he turns from her and starts to walk for the door. He doesn't even throw a glance back at her. He just opens the door, walks out, and shuts it behind him again.
Jessica drops the packet of cash on her desk with a scowl and presses her palms into the wood to lean on it. Her hair slips from behind her ear to fall into a black curtain around her face, but the obstruction in her vision only puts her more on edge.
Yes, Thomas King is laughably suspicious and vague and difficult to get a read of, but that doesn't mean she needs to be feeling this fucking uneasy about it. He's just a weird guy looking for dirt on another guy - she's had countless clients who've asked the exact same thing of her.
Except this weird guy wants dirt on Tony fucking Stark - Iron Man for shit's sake - and he's giving off vibes that make her think back to a certain time in her life that has successfully traumatised her.
She exhales sharply and shoves her hair back behind her ear. The force of her glare threatens to burn the brown packet on her desk, but she snatches it up and storms to her living room to find her satchel before the packet can spontaneously combust.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Tony is sat in filthy clothes on a plastic-wrapped sofa on one of the floors undergoing renovation, his eyes unfocused and tired as they stare blindly out the wall of windows before him. At a certain point, one has to give up the fruitless search for an activity with which to pass the time and instead come to terms with the fact that no activity will pass the time the way one wants it to. There isn't even anything he's waiting for to justify wanting to pass the time - he just wants it to pass.
Although, maybe he's waiting for the next villain to show up so that he can put everything he has into stopping them, so he can feel like he's making a difference, like he's redeeming himself, like he's useful. Or maybe he's waiting for the nightmares to stop, for a healthy sleeping pattern, for someone to look at him and see him, but in a way that doesn't make him feel like a liability.
Designing new suits is a good way to pass the time. He should know - he hasn't really stopped since the attack. No matter what he does, there's always some sort of prototype building itself in the back of his head, waiting to be made into something solid and real - more solid and real than he feels. But, after weeks of designing and theorising without really taking a break, he has finally listened to the disembodied voice of his only companion and taken a step back. Just for a couple of hours. Just because he thought he'd stumbled across an ingenious new range of designs, only to be informed that he'd already thought of and dismissed each one of them within the first week.
"Sir, it appears as though Miss Jones is on her way to the Tower."
Tony blinks. The world slowly comes back into focus around him and he takes a deep breath, puckering his lips thoughtfully. He can sense the change in himself - the adoption of false joviality - even though the only person who can see him is JARVIS, and he's seen Tony in much worse states than this anyway.
A tiny part of him sometimes entertains the hypothetical notion of opening up to Jessica, because he can see the tension in her shoulders and the twitch in her movements and he recognises that state of being in himself; but he appreciates the lack of heart-to-hearts in their friendship - are they even friends? - and knows for definite that Jessica isn't someone to talk freely about her emotions anyway. His other friends, Potts and Rhodey and Banner and, hell, even Rogers, all give him that look and ask how he is and inevitably become irritated by his unwillingness to cooperate and end up just making him feel even less inclined to talk to them; but Jessica has as much of an aversion as he does, and yet he thinks there's been a couple of instances where she's tried to help in her own way, and that has meant something to him.
"Miss Jones is entering the lobby, sir. If I remember correctly, Thomas King was to have visited her today."
Tony's mouth twitches at the mention of her strange client, still unsure of what to think of him. "Who?" he chirps. He pushes off the covered sofa and slips his phone out of his pocket. "Bring up the feed, would you, J?"
"Certainly."
Tony's phone lights up with a live feed from the camera in the lobby, and he smirks at how easy-to-spot Jessica is amongst all the suited businessmen and women in her leather jacket and ripped jeans. There's something almost reassuring about it.
"I think the elevator she's picked is a little sticky, don't you?" he comments innocently, pushing through a door into the stairwell.
"As you say, sir," comes JARVIS' measured reply.
Tony rolls his eyes, descending the concrete steps quietly. He's just having some fun.
After a moment of watching Jessica wait for the elevator, Tony realises she isn't even paying attention to the display of which floor it's on. She's just standing there, glaring at the doors, her head tilted slightly towards her right shoulder.
"What's goin' on?" he mutters, pouting.
"There appears to be a man making a scene at the front desk," JARVIS answers.
The feed switches to a view of the desk, showing Tony a man dressed in a casual shirt and trousers, a suit jacket and glasses, with an expensive camera dangling by a strap over his shoulder.
Tony huffs out an irritated sigh. "Let's hear what he's bitching about."
"-weeks! I came for an interview, you told me to make an appointment, so I made a goddamn appointment, and now you're telling me he's busy?"
Tony swipes the screen and the feed switches back to Jessica. She's running her tongue over her lip, her jaw jutted out at an angle that implies nothing but pure irritation. Tony quirks an eyebrow at that - either she's annoyed on Tony's behalf by this guy, or she's just feeling particularly short-fused today. He figures it's most likely the latter.
"I don't give a shit! I've made an appointment - multiple appointments actually, and he's never once respected them! I don't care if he thinks he's some bigshot hero, he obviously lacks any semblance of common courtesy!"
Jessica closes her mouth again and her eyes fall shut, her full lips pressing into a tight, flat line. Tony pauses on the stairs, eyes twitching into a narrow.
"I'm sorry I don't worship the ground the prick walks on like everyone else - I can actually see him for the arrogant, selfish, self-absorbed fucker-"
"Jesus christ, would you give it a goddamn rest?" Jessica finally snaps, turning a face of uninhibited annoyance and judgement on the man.
Tony starts moving again, his steps a little quicker than before. He has a certain floor in mind and it's another few down.
"No, I won't give it a goddamn rest!" the man shouts back indignantly. "And who the hell are you, anyway?"
"Hey, man, maybe you should calm down and think about where you are," a bystander says warily.
"No, I wanna know who this bitch is that she thinks she can talk to me like that!"
"I'm the bitch whose foot'll be up your ass if you don't calm the hell down," Jessica retorts, but she doesn't look at him. She's still just glaring at the elevator doors.
"She fought with the Avengers, dude," someone else warns.
"You're that Jessica Jones woman?" the man realises. "Wait, so you're on your way to see the prick right now, aren't you?"
Jessica ignores him.
Tony pushes through a door leading out of the stairwell and onto the floor he needs.
"Well, I'll just go with you, then. You can take me up to see him, and I'll give him a piece of my mind."
"I'm not doing shit for you, asshole," she throws over her shoulder.
Tony slips his phone into his pocket and steps into his suit, JARVIS fitting it all around his body automatically. When his helmet slips into place and his display flickers to life, JARVIS continues the feed in the corner.
"You're gonna take me up to him right now, Jones!"
The man is marching towards her.
Jessica's shoulders stiffen.
"No."
"I wanna see him right now! Now, Jessica!"
Tony is already out in the open air and flying down to the lobby when he sees the terror flash across Jessica's face, and he puts more energy into the thrusters. Jessica turns and lunges for the man, grabbing a hold of his clothing with white-knuckled hands before she tosses him away from her. He hits a structural pole with a loud thud and falls to the ground, and Jessica surges towards him with pure fury in her eyes, her fists clenching at her sides.
Tony bursts through a window and throws up a palm before his feet touch the ground. "Lightly, J - we don't know her tolerance," he commands tensely, and his thruster fires at Jessica, blasting her away from the man. She hurtles through the air, hitting the wall next to the elevator with a grunt.
"Bring it down," Tony says.
"At once, sir," JARVIS responds.
He hears the ping of the elevator as he turns his head to the man Jessica attacked, making sure to keep her in his peripherals as she crawls onto her hands and knees, glaring at him.
"I think it'd be a good idea for you to get the hell outta my building," he tells the man, his voice low and clipped. He'd meant to sound more falsely-upbeat than angry, but he's running on two hours of sleep and four coffees - and the terror on Jessica's face is burned into his memory.
The man's face is contorted with fear, pain, and anger. "But you- But she-"
Tony lifts a palm in the man's face, thruster humming as it charges. "Now!" he barks.
The man glares between them and finally scrambles out of the lobby. Tony stalks towards Jessica, ignoring the stares of the crowd in the reception. She is on her feet now, a hand braced against the wall, her chest heaving. He can't help the frown pulling on his mouth when he sees the shake in her limp hand, the sudden panic in her gaze as it flicks around the room, searching. He stops in front of her as JARVIS brings up an estimated heart rate on the woman, noticing her ragged, insubstantial breaths, and takes a moment to pick his words.
"You wanna come upstairs?" he asks, his voice steady despite the sudden churning of his stomach as he waits for her reaction.
Jessica is stubbornly avoiding his gaze, until he speaks, and then her eyes flick to him and stare. He thinks she must have noticed the wording, known that he could have barked out an instruction at her, too, for attacking a visitor in his lobby. Her jaw clenches, eyes suddenly unreadable, and she pushes off the wall to walk into the elevator.
Tony doesn't realise how tense his body had become until it deflates with relief. While his gaze is still pinned to Jessica's face, he waves a dismissive hand at the audience gathered in the lobby. "Sorry you had to see that, folks. Have a fantastic day."
He steps into the elevator beside Jessica and tries not to take it personally when she moves closer to the wall, away from him. The doors slide shut and the small box shoogles ever so slightly as it begins the ascent. Jessica's fingers shake when she reaches for the flap of her satchel, digging around until she finds her flask.
"Uh, JARVIS, tell Potts to give that receptionist a raise," he says, trying to pretend to ignore the two large gulps Jessica downs of whatever alcohol's in the flask. "And thank the two knights in shining armour for trying to reason with that doofus."
"Of course, sir."
"Thanks, bud."
The elevator pings when they reach one of the recreational floors, and Tony tries to gauge whether he should leave first or if Jessica would rather escape the small space immediately. But she is glaring into nothing, her forehead crumpled with distress.
"Jones?" he asks quietly, moving to place a hand on her shoulder before thinking better of it. He's seen the way she reacts to touch once before, the first day they met, and it was enough to put him off touching her ever again - something about seeing that kind of panicked, enraged fear in her eyes really hadn't sat well with him.
Jessica blinks, her eyes becoming more focused, and she gives him a stiff nod. He takes it as an indication that he should leave the elevator first, so he does, listening to her steps as she follows behind him. He moves off to the side and has his suit open up again, stepping out in his sweatpants and Henley shirt.
This floor, nearer the top and therefore smaller than the lower ones, is one big, open space. There are sections divided by partition walls and artificial plants, but it's otherwise completely open-plan, full of tables and sofas and armchairs. There's a bar - of course - along one wall, and a kitchen area on the opposite end. Since the refurbishment is still ongoing, the room is still a bit messy and nowhere near done being decorated, but some of the sofas and chairs are no longer wrapped in plastic sheeting. Tony doesn't really know if this is the right place to take Jessica, but he can imagine where it would be wrong to take her, and this isn't it, so it'll have to do.
He clicks his fingers uncomfortably when he turns round to find the woman again, and blinks when she appears in front of him, her eyes distracted, her expression rigid with tension, and accepts the brown packet she's thrust towards his chest.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"What's this?" Stark asks, taking the brown packet from her hands. When he opens it and realises the contents, his eyebrows shoot towards his hairline. "You trying to solicit my services, Jones?"
Jessica's facial muscles breathe a sigh of relief when she loosens them to give him a flat glare. "I'm sure you'd be worth more than that, Stark," she retorts, her words slightly stilted with her lingering panic.
She doesn't feel like bantering with him, but she's thinking of the way he just asked if she wanted to go upstairs, instead of dragging her with him after attacking a civilian in his building, and she's pretty sure it was a conscious decision on his part. He adapted to the situation and avoided triggering her - the least she can do is adapt to his fallback on humour to cope with the tension in the air. And if anyone was to say that responding in kind actually eased the tension she felt, she'd deny it violently.
Stark gives her a look. "Thank you?"
Jessica lifts her flask to her mouth again. Her fingers are still shaking and she still feels like there's a presence looming over her shoulder, whispering insults and commands, but she can't say her mantra without cluing Stark in to just how fucked she is. She doesn't want him to know, and he doesn't need to have it hanging over him. She's a big girl who can deal with her own issues, and he certainly doesn't need any more on his plate.
"King came by earlier," she explains after swallowing the mouthful of whiskey. "I fed him the bullshit you suggested, he said he'd be back next week, and he gave me that."
"I didn't realise your rates were so high for a week's worth of work without any solid evidence," he quips, handing the packet back to her.
"This is what I'd charge for three weeks and a solved case," she retorts, lifting the flask again.
She sees Stark glance at the flask, sees the twitch under his eye, and wonders if he's going to pull a Trish and scold her for relying on alcohol to calm her nerves.
Instead, he says, "Have I told you that I think there's something fishy about this guy?"
Jessica gives him a flat smile. "I remember you acting like I was an idiot for thinking anything of it."
"Well, that was back when you thought I was the intended victim, here," he counters, turning to walk to the kitchen area.
"I still think that, dumbass." She should really find a bathroom to recite her mantra in.
"Oh, yeah? Did he give you a reason to justify this suspicion?" he challenges.
Jessica's face scrunches. "Other than the fact that he's paid me a lot of money to dig up dirt on you, without giving me any personal information or indication of what he intends to do with the information?"
"You want a sandwich? PB and J? J? PB?" he rattles off, disinterested, as he looks inside the cupboards.
"No," she grunts, rolling her eyes. "Don't change the subject."
He pulls out a loaf of bread, eyeing it like it's some piece of alien technology that he's both disturbed and intrigued by. "I still think he's after you," he says.
Jessica's boots scuff the floor when she walks to a nearby table, putting her flask down on the surface so that she can look again at the money King gave her. "Maybe I should try tracing these," she mutters. She pulls a couple notes out, gritting her teeth at their pathetic wavering in the air from the shake in her fingers.
"He's probably been saving them up in a little box at the center of the shrine he's built you."
His utter deniance of this being a threat to him and his reputation - which is what it is - infuriates Jessica. She can't figure out why he's only interested in discussing it when he's imagining her as the victim, rather than himself.
"I thought you were supposed to have crippling narcissism," she says, brows furrowed and eyes narrowed, her mouth twisting with confusion.
"I thought you were supposed to not give a damn," he retorts swiftly, and when he turns his gaze on her, she spots the tension around his eyes.
She stares back at him for a moment, her face relaxing until only her eyebrows remain pinched, and tries to steady her breathing. She probably shouldn't have bit out at him like that, calling out the fact that he isn't as self-absorbed as he's led the world to believe. She should reign in her instinct to snap back at him when he called her out in kind.
He presses his lips together, lifting his eyebrows briefly as he gives her a weak shrug and a shake of his head. His eyes slowly soften again, the warm brown trapping her in a silent stare. All she can do is breathe. He's got that stubble spreading across his cheeks, lining his jaw, and his hair still hasn't been trimmed. Some of it slips when he shakes his head, and her eyes manage to break away from his to follow the curled lines of his hair as it falls over his ear. She can see the long-sleeved Henley shirt curving around his arms and torso, his sweatpants loose on his legs until they slim down at the ankle, and he isn't wearing any shoes.
She moves her gaze back to his, glancing briefly at the mouth that slowly relaxes into a deflated line, and sees the dark bags under his eyes, the unhealthy pallor of his skin. His eyes flick around her face, too, and she knows that he's investigating her appearance as much as she is his. They bite at each other, make offhand jabs that cut too close to the truth, and avoid putting it all aside to actually talk about their issues. But she thinks they might not need to.
There's a lot that goes unsaid between them, a lot that's hinted at but not elaborated on, a lot that's read between the lines. They have, she realises, a certain understanding of each other - one that makes heart-to-hearts redundant. Because she can see the signs of PTSD, she can see the insomnia, the sleep deprivation, the unhealthy diet, the tension, the fear, the guilt, and because she sees it she doesn't need to ask him how he is, or what's wrong. She knows he's not okay, just as well as he probably knows the same about her. She doesn't know the extent of his understanding of her issues, but she at least knows that he realised inviting her up instead of telling her to go was the better idea, and she knows that he had went to touch her, but stopped himself, probably because the last time he'd done so she had been unable to stop the flash of panic that surged through her.
Jessica drops her gaze to the table at her side, running her tongue over her lip absent-mindedly as her brow furrows again. The knowledge that Stark is able to read her - even if she's not completely transparent - sits uneasily in her chest. She doesn't want anyone to see how deeply rooted her trauma is in her mind, her soul. She doesn't want anyone to look at her like she's a victim, like she's to be pitied, like she's weak. If people know you, they can manipulate you, and she'd sooner walk into the jaws of one of those goddamn space crocodiles than let someone manipulate her ever again.
Stark brings her back to the moment when he slides a plate onto the table in front of her, presenting a sandwich cut into triangles. She blinks down at it, suddenly completely opposed to ever making eye contact with him again. She doesn't want to see him seeing her. Not when her fingers are still shaking and she desperately needs to say her mantra.
"Can I tempt you with a glass for that drink and an afternoon in a room without windows watching Return of the Jedi?" he offers, his voice quiet and nonchalant, his body close at her shoulder, but far enough away to let her breathe.
Jessica purses her lips, torn between accepting and relaxing for the afternoon, and telling him to fuck off.
"I should go," she mutters.
The air between them seems to deflate, and she hears him sigh out his nose. "What'd you come here for?" he asks quietly. "Just to show me that King gave you more money than you expected?"
Jessica clenches her teeth. She doesn't really have an answer for him. Not an honest one, anyway. Not one that is the whole truth. "I thought you might've been interested in an update," she says.
She waits for him to point out the obvious fact that she could have simply called - or, better yet, texted. She waits for him to voice his suspicion that there's more to it than that, because she knows he can see it.
"You got me there," he says.
It takes a moment for the words to sink in, for Jessica to realise that he isn't going to push her to admit anything she doesn't fully understand herself.
"Listen, Jones, all I'm saying is I'm gonna go stick a movie on and sit down to forget about the real world and the fact that Potts is gonna wanna kill me for dropping some employee's salary change on her, and you're more than welcome to partake. We can talk about King after."
Jessica takes a breath before she finally meets his gaze again. She doesn't want to see his understanding in his eyes, his awareness of her weakness, his sympathy; but she doesn't see it. Stark is looking back at her, his gaze borderline vulnerable, hints of guilt in the slight scrunch in his forehead, and Jessica realises he's not offering her company out of pity. He's asking her to stay for his own benefit.
She supposes this is where the two of them differ. While she wants to put up a front of independent stability, even if it materialises in brash, blunt, hurtful words, and avoid anyone seeing too much to instigate sympathy and care and questions, Stark wants to put up a front with his nonchalant, self-absorbed attitude, and avoid anyone seeing how much he actually cares and how much sits upon his shoulders; but Stark also seems to need someone to see it all under his facade, despite his attempts to cover it up. It's not that he wants sympathy or pity, she thinks, but more just because then someone can see the effort he puts in. She's not sure why he thinks it matters - maybe it's because then someone can make an opinion of who he really is, and he can take meaning from that.
But the fact is that Jessica Jones is recognising that Tony Stark needs someone to see him like this, to understand what it is he's feeling, and why. She would hate for someone to know her like that - the proof is in the way she treats Trish, who is the person closest to understanding Jessica's trauma in the whole world.
And this is where Jessica finds herself infuriatingly conflicted. She knows that the more time she spends with Stark, especially in situations like this where he's seen her toeing a breakdown and has offered her something that would probably be an effective distraction, the more Stark will learn about her and what she's been through and why she is the way that she is. She doesn't want anyone to get to know her like that. Once they know where her trauma lies, where her fear lies, they'd be able to use it against her, and she just can't risk that happening.
But.
She is watching Stark and he is waiting for an answer, his body slowly sagging at her side, his eyes so gentle and warm and asking and needing, and she can't find it in herself to be disgusted by him. Because she knows what he's going through and understands that it could easily be her hoping that some person she barely knows will spend just a little bit longer with her so that she can fool them and herself into thinking she's more stable than she really is. She could have spent her life searching for approval and validation in other people to make up for the fact that she-
She grits her teeth and glances away again, scowling when she hears Stark sigh quietly and lower his chin to his chest. There's a small intake of breath, and she is anticipating the hidden disappointment in the coming reassurance that she doesn't need to stay.
"Alright, one film and then we'll talk about King."
She blinks.
Stark lifts his head to stare at the side of her face, his mouth still hanging open around the beginning of his sentence. As fleeting a glance as it was, it was still a mistake to look up at him and witness the sudden weight to his gaze.
She clears her throat and reaches for her flask again. "You're buying the pizza," she mutters.
And Stark grins at her, though the edges of his mouth are curled downwards as if in an attempt to dull the effect. "After that fat packet?" he quips, lifting an eyebrow as he schools his features into something less exposed. "Rude, but alright."
She tosses the packet onto the table and removes her satchel and jacket. He moves to walk behind her as she leans down to pick up the plate and her flask again, and then turns to follow him out of the room.
And when they find themselves seated in his movie theatre, Jessica forgets that she had been so desperate to take a moment alone to repeat her mantra, and she lifts her whiskey glass to her lips with fingers that no longer shake.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Replies to reviews!
bgoodman: thank you so much for your kind words! I'm relieved that you enjoyed the bit with Natasha!
Hearteyesmf: as always, your reviews humble and move me xxx thank you so, so much for being such a supportive reader of this story! I'm so happy you're enjoying the way things are going, and I also can't wait to bring in more characters over the chapters to interact with Jessica! This is all mostly completely unplanned for me so I'm as excited as you are to see where it goes!
tamedbanshee: I feel the same! It's daunting trying to think of how everyone's going to fit in together, and who I should bring in - but I'm gonna try my damndest to make it work! Thank you!
Lived100Lives: thank you so much, I'm so glad you're enjoying it!
TinnedBeeny221: dude I love you, thank you!
Lucky Strike's alter ego: welcome to the story and thank you so much for your kind words! You're onto something there.. ;)