Eight Years Ago

Everything was always better when Tess was home. The coming home wasn't always easy, sometimes it was, filled with nothing laughter and warm hugs, soft touches and lingering kisses but if she was injured… He always tried his best but that was more difficult and nothing he could do would ever stop those first few moments from being more fraught. Thankfully she wasn't this time, physically anyway but there was more than one kind of hurt. And even in the best of times catching each other up on what they'd missed still stung, the pain of their absences something that could only fade so much. And this time, knowing that they'd gone through something so similar while being so far apart…

Jay didn't have words for that.

But he was working on finding them. They always made Tess do her debrief first and thankfully watching a man choke to death had been the worst of this operation but neither he nor Mouse had been able to control their reactions when she said he'd killed himself. When she quietly told them how. First because from the little he knew cyanide was a fucking horrible way to go and second because of course it made them both think of Donnelley. Which of course she noted, more upset on their behalf than he thought either of them had been but maybe that was just because she was more comfortable with vulnerability than either of them could ever be. Everything was always better with Tess.

He didn't always love how insistent she was about talking about their feelings, it still wasn't his strong suit but she knew when to push and when not to, just like he did. Which was why he'd realized pretty quick that she was holding something back. He suspected at her first subtle glance and guilty look, the second confirmed it and the third made it obvious but since she tensed up whenever he started to prod he'd let it go. For now.

But that didn't mean he wasn't going to make her talk about what she was comfortable with, which this time was how much she'd missed home.

So he was going to send a bit of home back with her.

She always brought one of his shirts and hoodies when she went but since she also missed his voice in addition to his scent he'd decided to slip a couple notes into her backpack; it wasn't quite the same but under the circumstances it was the best he could do. The hardest part had been getting enough alone time to write the notes, and he'd had to store them in Greg's room so there was less chance she'd find them. Not none, but less. And because the two of them were currently relaxing on the couch after dinner he was using a bathroom break as his excuse to finally slip them in.

The hardest part was going to be making it look like he hadn't rifled through her bag but since they kept it in his closet, so as not to be reminded of her impending departures, he figured he could just say something fell on it if she got suspicious.

He could be sneaky too.

Jay was actually quite proud of himself as he started slipping the little pieces of paper into the different compartments, it had a lot of space for such a small bag, enough for him to sneak in some candies too. Enough to hide things. He didn't think about the fact that he was technically snooping when he felt something poky and pulled it out to see what it was, immediately smiling when he saw the little ring. His girl had fancy taste. It was rose gold with a big gem in the centre, sapphire like her eyes but as he turned it over he realized there was more to it than met the eye. There was a tiny clasp on the side which opened up to reveal a secret compartment, which was probably exactly why she'd gotten it, the little dork, with a little white pill already stored inside.

A little white pill.

Lots of operatives carry cyanide on them. Or something like it.

This… this was what she'd been holding back. And no fucking wonder. He didn't feel himself stand but he knew he was moving, knew from the second her eyes flicked from him with confusion to the ring with understanding that it was exactly what he thought it was. He knew it.

He just couldn't accept it.

"What is this?"

"Are you proposing?" Mouse asked and the genuine confusion in his voice might have made him laugh.

Might have, if the urge to shout hadn't been stronger.

"I honestly thought you would do better. You can-"

"What is it?"

He did shout then, hadn't meant to but he did, but only Mouse startled. "Dude, calm-"

"A cyanide pill." Tess finally answered, so damn calm that while most of him became even more enraged another part became very, very cold.

Because she was only this calm when her mind was made up about something.

"What?" Greg whispered, no anger but just as much horror. "Tess… I know what happened scared you-"

"I didn't get it because of what happened."

"Then why."

She stiffened before looking back at him and his normal instinct to soothe the hurt and fear in her eyes warred with what was raging inside him.

And the latter won.

"It was given to me."

"By who?" Greg asked incredulously but he already had a guess.

"Nysa?"

"No." Her confusion made him feel better, and then worse, much as she unnerved him he liked the Israeli woman but then she kept talking and the ice in his blood wrapped around his heart. "By the agency. They-… everyone gets one before their first mission."

Lots of operatives carry cyanide on them.

"You've always had this?"

Her nod was so small but so definitive it knocked the ground out from beneath him, everything he'd ever thought he'd known about her, about them crumbling around him. All the times he'd been worried about her in the field, all the times he'd comforted himself that at least a piece of him was out there protecting her, that she had promised she would always keep fighting… She'd lied.

This wasn't fighting at all. This…

This was cowardice.

"Why haven't we ever seen it?" Greg asked slowly, just as stunned as him but when she took a breath before answering that shook off his stupor.

"You take it off before you come home?"

"I've never put it on." Tess snapped, more hurt than he thought she had a right to be though it still made his heart ache to watch her fight to control her breathing; he could see now she was just pretending to be calm, or was losing it but neither meant much.

Not when she still wasn't backing down.

"I bought the ring a few years ago because it looked cool and I figured I could use it in other scenarios on the job and…"

"And?"

"And because I hated the ugly white box it used to be stored in. But I've never used it." The stubborn jut to her chin slid off when she lowered it but that didn't make him feel any better. How could it?

It was one thing to be terrified to lose her to the job, to an accident or illness but to herself?

How could he ever be okay with that?

"But you kept it."

"Yes." She said quietly but her chin lifted back up, her eyes glassy and wide but her mouth pinched as she looked between them, daring them to challenge her, a call they both answered.

"Why?"

"SEALS will kill one another if they're about to be taken and can't be saved-"

"It's not the same-"

"The hell it isn't!" She shouted and he didn't know if it was her jumping to her feet or him charging forward to meet her that had Greg scrambling to get between them.

"Alright, maybe we should take a beat-"

Too bad they never listened to him.

"I'm not saying I would make that choice." Tess said with a shake of her head and he didn't know what hurt more, the uncertainty in her voice or the nonchalance in her shrug. "I don't-… I don't know. But I do know that I get to have it. It is my choice."

"No."

"Yes." She insisted, her pleading as she took a step closer making him want to be sick. "You don't like it, I get that, it's not like I want this to be the way that it is but it is. And as the only one in this room who's actually been tortured, who knows that there are things that are so much worse than death I am the one who gets to decide what I will and will not subject myself to-"

No.

"Guys-"

No, no-

"Jay-"

"No!" He shouted, the hard lines of the ring cutting his palm as his fist curled around it but not as badly as her twisting features, or worse, the way they went slack when he flung a shaking finger at her. "You don't get to do that, you don't get to wear this and that!"