Jude
The anger flares right back into life, sour behind his teeth. There’s no target he can fight - no proper one, that being the Family which he can’t possibly stand against - so that only leaves Koa. And maybe that’s all either of them wants is someone to dump all that onto. It’s certainly not healthy, but Jude seems pretty damn good at burning bridges just to keep himself warm and the match is already in his trembling fingers.
“Because you weren’t the only one gone! Me and her - off gallivanting with them, because I live there but I’m not always at her side!” Which is true for a variety of reasons. Jude’s inherent ability to fade into the background like a chameleon, ghosting through the house to the bed they’d given him between the schedules of the inhabitants within. It’s not like he has specific hours to keep as a singer scraping coins at odd hours in clubs. Trying to be unobtrusive out of respect for the Carpenters opening their door to him. Before he’d found out about her infection, he’d last hung out with Noe in more than passing to find out she had a new companion. Yet it burns to think he has to explain himself to Koa.
“It doesn’t take long to write a letter, Koa! Gods!” Jude shoves his hands in his hair, gripping tightly at the roots as his teeth grit so hard they shoot pains up into his cheeks and sinuses. “I could have been an extra pair of eyes this entire time! You came back, found out, and were gone so fast I didn’t even know you were back. I wouldn’t expect you to wait around before starting on a solution but I thought you’d fucking include me!” Koa’s looming makes his stomach churn for a variety of reasons (fear, despair, loss) but Jude doesn’t back away. If he’s going to swing so be it. Jude was a fool to think he mattered to the Dragoon. Not more than Noe, never, but enough to be remembered.
“They got to her because she was lonely. Because I wasn’t enough for her after you left.” His lashes are wet now as he juts his chin up at the taller man who curves over him like a threatening, taut bow. “So yeah, I’m owning that I’m more to blame. I fucking failed her. But you’re not the only one who jumped straight to trying to help her - I just also came to you.” And Koa hadn’t. So Jude is all the more the fool for the way the man lives eternally in the back of his head when it’s not reciprocated. “So here’s the message: go see your sister, because she clearly needs you more than me and I clearly can’t fucking do anything helpful as you so helpfully pointed out.” And, like a coward, Jude spins on his heel and stomps away with a snarl to hide the wetness that slides into what might have been inherited smile lines if he’d ended up a different person. If Koa wants to hit him he doesn’t want to see it coming. Even the scraps of seconds it might buy him are seconds more he can live in his pale delusions.
“Because you weren’t the only one gone! Me and her - off gallivanting with them, because I live there but I’m not always at her side!” Which is true for a variety of reasons. Jude’s inherent ability to fade into the background like a chameleon, ghosting through the house to the bed they’d given him between the schedules of the inhabitants within. It’s not like he has specific hours to keep as a singer scraping coins at odd hours in clubs. Trying to be unobtrusive out of respect for the Carpenters opening their door to him. Before he’d found out about her infection, he’d last hung out with Noe in more than passing to find out she had a new companion. Yet it burns to think he has to explain himself to Koa.
“It doesn’t take long to write a letter, Koa! Gods!” Jude shoves his hands in his hair, gripping tightly at the roots as his teeth grit so hard they shoot pains up into his cheeks and sinuses. “I could have been an extra pair of eyes this entire time! You came back, found out, and were gone so fast I didn’t even know you were back. I wouldn’t expect you to wait around before starting on a solution but I thought you’d fucking include me!” Koa’s looming makes his stomach churn for a variety of reasons (fear, despair, loss) but Jude doesn’t back away. If he’s going to swing so be it. Jude was a fool to think he mattered to the Dragoon. Not more than Noe, never, but enough to be remembered.
“They got to her because she was lonely. Because I wasn’t enough for her after you left.” His lashes are wet now as he juts his chin up at the taller man who curves over him like a threatening, taut bow. “So yeah, I’m owning that I’m more to blame. I fucking failed her. But you’re not the only one who jumped straight to trying to help her - I just also came to you.” And Koa hadn’t. So Jude is all the more the fool for the way the man lives eternally in the back of his head when it’s not reciprocated. “So here’s the message: go see your sister, because she clearly needs you more than me and I clearly can’t fucking do anything helpful as you so helpfully pointed out.” And, like a coward, Jude spins on his heel and stomps away with a snarl to hide the wetness that slides into what might have been inherited smile lines if he’d ended up a different person. If Koa wants to hit him he doesn’t want to see it coming. Even the scraps of seconds it might buy him are seconds more he can live in his pale delusions.
My tongue will tell the anger of my heart
Or else my heart, concealing it, will break
