Dean was also noticing a pattern, but he didn't quite know what to do with it. They always seemed to start a more meaningful conversation and then things got tense for a moment and then they were sliding into something else, something easier, and it still felt unresolved. They were always dancing around the important things and maybe that was why they never seemed to stick. The problem was, he didn't know what to do about it. Every time things got too difficult or leaned toward something more permanent, either he balked at something or Don Juan just dropped and ran. This felt like one of those times where they were on the edge again.

He hadn't learned how to say no to Dempsey though, so Dean nodded. He was rarely not in the mood, especially with Don Juan, but it felt like a cheap shift. Maybe he just needed a minute to grapple with his own demons. "Go ahead, I need to wash up first." Having to sweat out his consequences both figuratively and literally, and now dealing with this aftermath left him feeling off, somehow.

Sliding away and off his side of the bed, Dean padded toward the washroom without waiting for an answer. He left the door open, but did little more than lean both hands on the counter and take a deep breath.

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   Don Juan Dempsey

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Hudson hadn't said he was angry, or done anything to indicate it, but as he retreated down the hall Don Juan was left with a firm impression that he'd mismanaged that conversation. This was probably unsurprising, in the scheme of things; he habitually mismanaged anything important. He sat on the bed for a moment leaning on the palms of his hands and considered his options. It was an option to just leave, he supposed. Not sneaking out like a thief in the night but letting Hudson know he was going to give him some space: a gracious, dignified retreat. A glance around the bedroom dissuaded him if that, though. It was so thoroughly lived in from the past days, and he had half a chapter laying in disparate scraps of parchment. The idea of fumbling around and collecting them all on his way out was mortifying, but so was leaving Hudson with his messes. Another option: Hudson had technically given him permission to carry on with his plan of distraction through seduction, but given the lackluster response it seemed regrettably shallow now. They hadn't slept together in years; Don Juan had thought the idea would be enticing. Evidently not enticing enough.

The last option was to actually talk about it. Unfortunately this seemed to be the one he was left with. Don Juan took a breath and steeled himself to look and sound like fool. He didn't bother trying to think what to say, knowing that none of it would come out the way he'd planned even if he did. Then he pulled himself up out of bed and padded to the washroom where he lingered in the doorway, hands on either side of the frame.

"Listen," he said, looking at the muscles in Dean's back rather than his face in the mirror. "You don't have to. I appreciate that you want to be there. But you don't have to drop everything to come save me," he protested — rather weakly, because this was exactly what he'd asked of Dean before and they both knew it. "Not anymore," he added. A clarification? A promise? It was difficult to say.

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Dean hadn't even managed to get a good look at himself in the mirror, too busy trying to sort through his thoughts, let alone actually wash up, when Don Juan appeared in the doorway. He stilled, listening, trying to find the weakness in whatever wall kept cropping up between them, but he never could quite find the cracks until it was too late and everything was simply demolished and it was a pile of insurmountable rubble.

"I don't think I know how not to." Dean knew it was more than that. He wanted to be there. As foolish and unrealistic as it was, he had never managed to fall out of love with Don Juan, even if it brought more heartbreak than anything else. He could try and fill the gaps, make some progress, occupy his time with different people or goals, but it always circled back. Maybe it was worse because he kept holding out hope that things would be different. He was doing it to himself and he knew that, but he just kept wondering if maybe he could figure it out better, make different choices, be something stronger.

His voice had already been low, but this was nearly mumbled, almost more to himself. "I don't think I could live with myself if I didn't show up and something went wrong." That was always a concern too. Dean's grip on the sides of the sink tightened a little and he still hadn't been able to look up. Don Juan had managed to get himself in and out of plenty of trouble in their time apart, but that didn't mean it sat well with him.

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There it was again. This was what had snagged inside his chest and put the edge into his voice. It was nothing new, really: Dean had always been trying to take care of him, from the very first, and Don Juan was often happy to be cared for. Except when it hurt Hudson, and it seemed like he never knew where the line was except in hindsight.

His instinct was to push it away again, to find any way at all not to talk about it directly, but the way Hudson gripped the sink and how severely he'd dropped his voice affected him too deeply to brush it off. So he wrestled with it, trying to find a way to force the thing that snagged inside him into words.

"I don't want to be the kind of person who can't be trusted to be alone," he finally said, in the quiet tone of an admission. But he was, obviously — Hudson didn't trust him, and it was killing him.

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Knowing what they both didn't want wasn't going to be them anywhere. Of course that didn't get him any closer to knowing what he did want out of this. Dean liked to think he'd always been good at keeping his expectations low, of not trying to get Dempsey to be something he wasn't, but maybe that was a poor foundation to begin with. He was always too afraid to upset the balance, to ask too much. He'd tried once, to ask for a little more from Don Juan and that's when everything shattered.

"What do you want? He asked, almost uncertainly, afraid he wouldn't like the answer. He wasn't even sure he would have an answer of his own, if the question was turned back on him, but he might have a better idea if he had something to work off of.

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Don Juan leaned his forehead against one of his arms. It was far too pedestrian to say a happy ending. Hudson would think he was being glib, slipping back into humor to avoid a real answer. But for someone who had given their heart away wholesale at eighteen only to pull pieces of it out of the grinder a few months later, who had been abandoned once in the very room he'd begun to think of as more a home than his own, who had ruined a woman he cared for so badly she would never been welcomed in polite society again, the idea didn't feel trite, any more than it felt even remotely possible.

"I want to feel like I deserve you," he confessed miserably. "I want to believe this doesn't end with me hurting you. I don't know. I don't know how."

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   Dean Hudson

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In the heartbeats between question and answer, Dean worried this was about to crumble again. He ran a hand through his hair and turned around to face Don Juan, leaning back against the sink. He frowned, mostly at the fact that Dempsey didn't think he deserved what was between them, but he could also understand where it was coming from.

Where did that leave them then? There wasn't much Dean could do for Don Juan on that front. He'd tried to ask for an attempt at some level of sobriety in the past and it hadn't lasted. It had only seemed to make things worse. All he could do was be patient, which he didn't mind doing, and as long as he was close it was better, but Dempsey was right; Dean didn't trust him to be alone and he couldn't always be physically present.

"I'll always be here," he echoed the thought from earlier. "And I can be patient, but I can't do the leg work for you." Whatever that looked like for Don Juan, whatever he decided needed to be done to get where he wanted to be, was something only he could do.

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Dean didn't have to tell Don Juan that he could be patient. He was here. Five years and some months after things had ended between them the last time. Seven years and some months since things had ended between them the first time, and Don Juan couldn't have credibly argued he'd made any significant improvements to himself in the time between the two. Anyone with a limited supply of patience would have already been long gone. Hudson had dropped an important work thing to come find him by a lake in Ireland. He was unreasonably devoted. Don Juan thought then he'll take me back next time, already presuming this time would eventually fall apart. But he hadn't changed in seven years, so what was going to be different in another year, or two, or ten? He didn't know how to change, as a person. When he felt fitful he changed his surroundings; he put himself in a different context and hoped it would do what he couldn't. Spain had been the most dramatic example, because he had felt entirely miserable with himself after ruining Elfie — but what could have been his fresh start in a new place with a new person had just ended with him ruining her life, too. He was the same person no matter where he went.

Don Juan thought I do love you, but he didn't want to say it. He didn't know whether it was worth anything. It hadn't been worth anything the last time. He hadn't said it often enough and had never been able to prove it with action.

"Alright," he said, because there was nothing else to say, even if he didn't think he could hold up his end of the deal. He shifted his head against his arm to peer back at Hudson with one eye, as though he could hide behind himself. "But you will tell me if I'm being an idiot?"

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Exhaling slowly, Dean knew in the back of his mind he was already asking too much. He knew Don Juan realized it too, but they just kept making new promises to break later. It always became a later problem, but at least for the moment, he was ready to let it go and see what happened. There was nothing wrong with optimism when it was only him left dealing with the fallout. It wasn't like it affected anyone else and learned to deal with it in a better way.

"My favorite idiot." Dean tried for a break in the tension. He could feel it sitting on his shoulders and he wanted it to go away. The last few days of just pretending the outside world didn't exist had been a nice reprieve by the real world always came back around (for him anyway) and this was a stark reminder. It was always there, even if he tried to shove it all down and he was just going to have to learn to manage it better.

He held his arms out as Don Juan finally looked at him. It was what he'd been trying to avoid a few minutes ago, settling into the easy, physical side of things, but it had been a long time and it would be a lie to say he was disinterested in the offer.

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   Don Juan Dempsey

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He hadn't realized how much his question sounded like a deflection until Dean reacted to it. He hadn't meant it as one. He'd meant: I don't know how to do this. Even if I want it I don't know where to start. He'd meant: will you tell me when I get it wrong? Will you help me figure it out? Hudson couldn't do the legwork for him, fine, but Don Juan wasn't unwilling. Just — lost. He didn't know if this was something he was allowed to ask for help with, or if this was part of what Dean had said he couldn't do. Once upon a time he'd told Dean I don't know how to fix things when they break and Dean had said we'll figure it out, but god, they'd been young then. And neither of them had been thinking that the broken thing in need of fixing would have been Don Juan himself.

But the words he'd picked didn't convey all that; they sounded like a deflection, and this time Dean seemed ready to accept it. He held his arms open and it was as though the gravity in the room shifted. Hanging back would have been impossible.

"At least I've got that going for me," he returned. He crossed the room and tangled himself around Dean and set about kissing every spot on his face that had furrowed with tension today.

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   Dean Hudson

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