Five Years Ago

It didn't work with just one.

That was the whole point of a triangle- you had to have three sides so they could always hold each other up. Support each other when one or even two fell down. It had been fine to have one of them leaving when they were always coming back but it had been two years now since Tess had gone and he didn't know anymore if she was coming back. He couldn't lose Greg too. But he was going to.

I've been thinking about going back in.

In where?

The Rangers.

Even knowing that he left tomorrow, today, Jay still couldn't believe he was serious. He couldn't say the thought was a foreign one, there were still times he wondered if he'd made the right choice leaving the military, especially the last two years but as much as he regretted everything he'd lost… He had done his duty. And as much as he respected the men still fighting that war, every war, as bad as he still felt about walking away from that fight he'd known that his time in it was done. He had done his duty and if he had stayed he honestly didn't know who he would be right now, what those losses, and even the wins would have turned him into. It had been time for him to come home, to find new pillars to hold him up and even after the devastating losses of Tess and Lydia, he hadn't ever imagined would lose Greg too. That he would want to go back in.

You want a war, you're right here.

There's just too much noise here.

He could understand that, to his shame he'd thrown his friends' struggle in his face, but he didn't feel it himself. If anything sometimes it was too quiet in his head, like with every person that left his life he was losing everything they'd given to him. And he wasn't replacing them. He wasn't trying to, because he knew he couldn't and because he couldn't bear to lose anyone else. And because no one else was really trying. No one but Erin.

What you two went through and what you carry is real and you know if you ever need my help carrying it you just have to ask me.

But he didn't.

He wasn't.

Even being given the perfect opportunity he still wasn't talking about any of it. Not the fights he'd had with his dad about enlisting, not anything about his training or his time in the Rangers, not his men, not his rank, not the events that led to him leaving. It didn't matter how long it had been, those wounds were still too fresh and talking about them with people who didn't understand, who hadn't been there, seeing the pitying faces they all made, no matter how well intended was just salt in the wound. His wounds. But he wasn't the only one who'd suffered.

Why are you not listening to him?

Because going back isn't the right move for him.

For you. Him going back is not the right move for you.

It wasn't. Even if they weren't living together anymore it gave Jay a very real peace to know Mouse was still in the city, that he could get to him if he needed to. Of course Lydia had proved that proximity didn't equate to safety but that was part of why he'd pushed so hard for his friend to join Intelligence. He'd been adamant about not joining the academy, about keeping his stripes instead of being a thirty-year-old rookie.

Do you have any idea what it's like? To sit behind that desk and watch you go out every single day?

Do you have any idea how that makes me feel?

He did now.

Maybe if he'd looked closer, asked more questions sooner it wouldn't have been such a surprise. Maybe if he'd tried harder, been stronger he wouldn't feel the need to leave. Because Greg may not have said it but they both knew the job was only part of his reason for going. Much as his friend might dislike it he needed routine and stability to thrive but he also needed a team. A family. And Intelligence wasn't that for him. He hadn't bonded with them the way Jay had, and shit, even he had barely bonded with them. He liked all of them but bar Erin who was his partner, in both senses of the word, he didn't let any of the others in.

And that was the other reason he was leaving. Because they'd had a family. And Tess might have been the one to walk away but they were used to that. The truth was…

He was the one who'd let go.

It's not your call.

No, it wasn't.

He'd already made his, had chosen the same thing three times now. So he had no one but himself to blame now that he had to deal with the consequences.

Someone honking pulled him out of his head and he realized the light was green so he quickly hit the gas but he only drove another block towards work before he found himself pulling a U-turn and heading to the other side of the city. His stomach was a jumble of knots just thinking about his destination and it got tighter the closer he got, so much he spent ten minutes sitting in his truck once he arrived, telling himself he could handle being here. That he owed it to Greg to come. To her.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am not there.

I do not sleep.

There was only one other person in the world who so accurately fit Lydia Ryan's epitaph, No One Loved More, but if he thought of her right now he was going to break and Jay honestly didn't know if he'd be able to put himself back together. At least he had a few minutes to gather himself, he'd beat his friend here but it didn't take long until he heard him walking up, the surprise in his somber gaze shoving the knife that was already in his heart in deeper.

"Is this the first time you've come back here?"

"It literally says not to come." He rasped with a wave to the little iron plaque; his throat was too thick to speak but he forced the words out because he knew he only had so much longer to say them.

Because he'd held them inside long enough.

Greg was silent for a second and then let out a stunned laugh, too short but Jay drank it in, reaching up to clasp his hand after he grabbed his shoulder. "Thanks for coming."

"I'm sorry. For not listening to you. For not talking to you-"

"It's okay." He said quietly and he followed suit when he let go of him to kneel down in front of that plaque. "We all did what we had to. It… It may take some time but we'll find our way back. I believe that."

He wasn't so sure anymore.

People got hurt every day in war, and they were fighting three of them.

I was born to be a soldier.

And if it comes down to it I will die one.

"I'm still looking out for you. You know that right?"

"Of course I do." Greg said solemnly, his own voice hoarse, the tears in his eyes matching what he felt in his.

They both took a moment to gather themselves, and he gave his friend one alone with her until they stepped back to say their own goodbye, staring at each other for another moment before they came together in a tight hug. From the moment they'd chosen the bunks across from each other he'd decided he would look out for the other man, and a minute later had considered him a friend, a bond that had grown… exponentially since. He'd been twenty when they'd met and honestly hadn't ever expected to live any part of his life without him. One of six people he could say that about. And now he was going to have to figure it out. Again. He knew Ortiz would look out for him, he was a great Sergeant, had turned down multiple promotions because he'd found his calling and had stuck with it. Greg would be safe with him. But only as safe as a soldier could be. And the very real thought that this might be the last time he ever saw him…

It made Jay want to go with him. And for a minute he could see it so clearly; how easy it would be to slip back into that uniform, and how quickly it would pull Tess back into their lives. He even had the strongest sense of surety that he would be able to handle the weight of leadership, of loss. But he didn't want it.

Do whatever it is you need to do.

I'm behind you.

He was, and he always would be.

Jay just hated that meant he had to be left behind.