Summary: David is a mess in the otherwise completely organized and productive Griffin's life.

Warnings: Language.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Jumper, characters or anything else associated.

A/N: Response to the 100 Fic Ultimate Challenge at jumperslash. The prompts I used - #81 admiration and #96 which was a writer's choice which in this case is - 'getting used to pain'. For those who didn't take notice previously - all challenge fics (Interlude) are sequent unless said otherwise.

Griffin's Day.

Griffin sat still for a moment staring at the wall opposite to him. No profound thoughts circled in his head for those few minutes. If he were asked he wouldn't say that he hadn't known that David would leave. After all, he had done everything in his power to make him leave to the point of telling it straight out. He wasn't sorry for driving off David, not really. He was still annoyed at being left in Chechnya for dead and he still wanted to deck the kid and after last night he wasn't sure of anything anymore and he needed some time and space. David's presence just served to irritate him and make him feel caged.

He glanced around the lair and was mildly surprised to find that it was tidy. He knew for sure that when he had left the place had been a mess. He supposed he should have noticed it earlier - the discs that were so conveniently by his armchair were scattered on the floor before. Griffin found himself getting angry. Who the hell David thought he was? Messing in his life, in his bed and, finally, in his lair! Griffin sure as hell hadn't asked for the kid to come to him for advice, team up, hook up and general mess up. Not for once a thought that it was his own fault crossed Griffin's mind.

He rose from the armchair and raged for a couple of minutes making the place a complete mess once more. Finally he punched a wall and slid down to the floor nursing his hand which was probably broken now. His anger slowly abated and was substituted by pain.

He tried to never let people get close. They only messed with him and his stuff and when they left or where forced to leave, at which point it didn't really matter anymore because no matter how you look at it they still were gone, he stayed. Griffin stayed and memories of them stayed and as beautiful everlasting remembrance can be in poetry as screwed up, painfully numbing and hard it is in life. Every misplaced thing stood out like a beacon in a dark night to a sailor swimming through a thunderstorm away from the shipwreck in hope of finding a land only to never reach it. Every waking minute was cruel because one can never know when he shall be assaulted with a sudden flush of memories renewing the pain of separation until finally the anguish diminished and he felt less like a human because of it.

He had lost people enough times to never want to feel like that again. And as much as he wanted to believe what he had said to David - that he was used to losing people, he wasn't. It was one of those things a person just can't get used to no matter how good they are at self deluding. This is exactly why Griffin hated people and why he pushed them away. Up until now instead of leaving like everyone else David had pushed back but apparently even he had his limit which was just fine by Griffin. He wasn't going to go after David.

Griffin wasn't lonely. Being alone had become a habit for him a long time ago and breaking one's habits is a hard thing to do, especially, if said person does not want for things to change. Griffin rose from the floor wincing at the pain in his arm from the indirect movement. Sometimes he wondered where the whole thing about 'getting used to pain' came from because he could tell that it was a load of bullshit. Sure, he had learned to keep his mouth closed more tightly as the time went by but that didn't mean that it hurt any less. Of course, frying a few brain cells could go a long way to help with that but Griffin felt that the Paladins did good enough of a job on him in that specific area of expertise without his additional help. He jumped to some nondescript hospital to get his arm checked.

He walked out of the hospital admiring his arm. His arm was in a cast from elbow till mid palm like a really thick and rather weird fingerless glove. While Griffin would never really admit it, he was a rather artistic person and felt somewhat giddy at the prospect the cast offered for his creative urges. He had never broken anything in his body before. To tell the truth it wasn't a break this time either – few hairline fractures, but the doctor had felt the necessity for a cast.

He swung his arm a few times while walking down the street and relished in the whooshing sound that the movement made. He couldn't help but think that this could give a whole new meaning to the term 'concealed weapon'. Grinning like a kid on the Christmas Eve he turned into a seemingly abandoned alleyway and jumped.

The middle-aged homeless guy that had been sleeping in a carton box behind the garbage cans vowed to quit drinking before taking a mouthful from a dirty, dark green glass bottle and snuggling back into the rags, the he event witnessed a couple of seconds ago already half forgotten.

Griffin blinked letting his eyes adjust to the light of Egypt. It took him a couple of seconds to realize that there was nothing but him on the top of this particular pyramid. He frowned. He looked around and jumped to the next closest one supposing that he could have made a mistake and ended up on top of the wrong tomb however half-hour later he had to admit it. The safe just wasn't there and there was only one somebody who could have gotten it before him.

"David," he growled under his breath. "You son of a bitch!" Griffin yelled to clear, blue skies of the valley of the tombs of ancient emperors.

And come to think about it, with the cast he couldn't pull on his favorite leather jacket. "Damn."