I'm so sorry, Kurt. I'm so sorry.
She thinks these words over and over, whenever she looks at him, whenever she doesn't know if she should touch him.
She would say the words if he would let her talk about it, if he would even acknowledge the problem. But Weller swears that everything is okay, that she doesn't need to apologize. Yet he doesn't touch her the way he used to, doesn't reach out to her anymore. So she's nervous to initiate anything herself, push past this new awkward boundary.
Jane tells herself that it'll take time, that he'll eventually get over it. But she's sick of waiting, misses him so much. Especially when she's sitting on the couch right next to him, eyeing his hand cautiously, wondering if she should take it in hers.
She's pretending to read her book, but really just thinking about Kurt. Someone has to make the first move, she thinks. If only she could tell if he's ready yet, would welcome her approach.
Jane sighs to herself, wonders how they got there. She used to be able to read him so easily. But since he found her in Nepal everything had been tainted by the secrets between them. And now it's as if he's hiding behind a wall, something he'd never done with her before.
It breaks her heart knowing how much of it is her fault, everything she hasn't quite apologized for. It had all been a mistake. Feeling so lost that she looked for comfort in someone else's arms. Then reaching out again in her desperation, throwing it all right in Kurt's face.
I just want to be with you again, she thinks, watching him read. He has his hand out between them when he's not using it to flip a page and suddenly on impulse she reaches for it, forgets to question herself.
Just as she's about to touch him though, Kurt flinches, pulls his fingers back.
Jane tries not to react, feels her hand retreat and curl into a fist as she fights the wave of sadness crashing through her. She's so focused on containing her own emotions, not falling to pieces around him that she doesn't notice him scoot closer, put his hand on top of her tightly wound fist.
She looks up, startled at his touch. Finds Weller looking at her with intense blue eyes, a furrow in his brow.
"Sorry," he says, watching her closely while she tries to shift her gaze aside.
"Are you okay?"
It seems ridiculous to tell him no, that she's not okay. Because everything is seemingly fine and yet completely messed up at the same time.
So Jane prepares herself to nod, convince herself for another night that things are alright the way they are. But then she finds that she's teary and bites down hard on her lip, trying not to cry.
"Hey, hey," Kurt says. "What's wrong?"
He brings his hand up to her face, in a gesture that is too familiar. But the comfort of his touch only makes the tears spill out in earnest, leaving her sobbing pathetically into his hand.
"I'm sorry I pulled away, okay," Weller explains, a little frantically. "I was just startled."
Jane grinds her teeth, tries to gain control of her breathing and her tears before she says anything to him.
"Goddamn it, stop apologizing, Kurt," she finally blurts out, cringing to herself at how harsh she sounds.
He looks a little taken aback, a lot confused. But he doesn't let go of her, just questions her silently with concerned eyes.
"You don't get to apologize anymore," Jane says, trying to pull back some of the emotion that's flaring in her chest.
"I'm the one who messed this all up."
Kurt still has his hand on her jaw, is stroking her cheekbone as he gives her a quizzical look.
"I told you," he says. "None of that matters. It's over. Everything's forgiven."
"No, Kurt," she argues, struggling against the invitation of his touch. "You always do this. Look past all my mistakes. It's not right. I need to face the things I've done, all the ways I hurt you."
Kurt is still furrowing his brow at her, gives her cheek one more gentle swipe with his thumb before he drops his hand back down to the couch.
"Okay," he says. "Tell me."
Now that he's willing to hear her out, Jane finds all her regrets jammed tight in her throat. She means to be more loquacious but all that comes out is a stammered apology which says nothing of substance.
"I'm so sorry," she says, shaking her head and exhaling loudly. "I missed you so much, I just... wasn't thinking straight. So really, it's my fault. All of it."
He's still giving her a little frown and she can tell that he's mostly just humouring her, yet is listening to her words seriously, trying to understand her need. It's so Kurt, thoughtful and patient with her even though he clearly doesn't think she should be apologizing for anything.
"Okay, so what can I do to let you know you're forgiven?" he asks, his voice steeped in sympathy.
Ugh, count on Weller to come up with an unexpected question that cuts right to the heart of the matter. How does she explain what she wants? The lack of hesitation, the full capacity of his touch.
"I just want to feel you," she says. "All of you."
The look that Kurt gives her is totally unexpected, full of confused delight.
"Whatever you want," he replies with a suggestive eyebrow raise. "Anytime."
She wants to jump him, touch him everywhere until he forgets all her sins. But she also wants an answer, wants to know what he's been thinking. Why he looks so open to her affection right now when he's been so shy with her of late.
Jane decides to start by taking him up on his offer, turns over on the couch so that she's straddling him, taking his shirt off slowly.
Kurt is all attention but he lets her make the moves at first; lies back as Jane revels in the feel of running her hands all over his chest, the way his body reacts to her touch. Then, after she's done appreciatively rubbing her palms down his abs, she starts her hands back up his spine.
When she reaches the back of his neck, Kurt finally snakes his own hands under her shirt, starts to run his fingers in a familiar pattern. It feels so good both sensually and emotionally that Jane shudders for a moment and he stops immediately, pulls back as if wounded.
There it is, she thinks. She hadn't been imagining it.
"Sorry," Weller apologizes softly. "Was that too much?"
It takes a moment for his words to register, another for her to really realize what he was saying.
"No," she says, a bit stunned. "It wasn't enough."
Weller gives her a surprised look and a sly smile as he reaches his hands back under her shirt, resumes where he left off. It takes her no time at all to relax again under his touch, especially as he puts all of himself into it, everything she'd been missing.
When she's melted into his hands, he takes her shirt and bra off, starts to map her skin out with kisses. Makes his way down her back and up again, ending with his mouth by her ear, his lips sending tingles down her spine.
"I didn't think that you wanted this yet," he murmurs. "I guess I was wrong."
It should be some sort of lesson in epic miscommunication, crossed signals. But there is so much weight off her chest at the moment that Jane doesn't care how she screwed it all up; just wants to revel in how close he is, how good it feels.
"All I wanted to do was touch you," she confesses. "But I thought…"
Weller raises his eyebrows at her unfinished sentence, runs his hands along her scars one more time before laying back, hands laced behind his head.
"I'm all yours," he says, with another suggestive raise of his eyebrow.
Jane grins, immediately reaches for the button of his jeans. Then when she's pulled off his pants and boxers, she moves up to his collarbone, starts kissing him all the way down his ribcage, then past his navel, and teasingly along his groin until she reaches the long strip of scar tissue on his right thigh.
She flashes back to that moment suddenly, remembering how it had all felt. Saving the world with him, hearing him confess his love as he passed out from pain and blood loss.
They both carried some lasting marks from their past but she wouldn't exchange the lives they've had together for anything.
Jane grazes her lips along the length of his scar, adores how his body responds.