S nods, that much easy to understand, something he would have assumed even without J saying it outright. Of course talking about before is hard. There's a reason why they don't do so very often, after all, and probably, too, that it only tends to come up like this, with emotions running high and when there's no way to hold it back anymore. They should have brought this up sooner, but of course they didn't. He can't be upset with J for not doing so, and he tries to offer that same understanding to himself, even if he does still feel incredibly stupid. The assumption he made may be better than the one J thought he made, but the truth is better still than both of them, and he could have known so long ago instead of spending all these months trying to convince himself that he couldn't have this, that he didn't want to. There's still so much that's uncertain and no way to predict what it will be for either of them, but that doesn't mean it can't be anything. That alone is huge.
"I know," he murmurs, lifting one hand to brush the backs of his fingers along J's cheek again, the touch gentle, light. "It's hard for me, too. Of course it is." He has, inasmuch as is possible, made his peace with the mess of what happened. He had more time to do so, all those months on his own before he showed up here and found J again. Everything that's happened since, this past year, has only affirmed what he feels, but that doesn't mean he likes revisiting the time when they were falling apart. Nothing good lies back there except for knowing what not to do this time, and he still isn't always even sure of that. He should have known before, but he didn't. He might not know now.
But every time here that something has gone wrong, they've talked it through. They haven't always gotten things right, but they haven't gotten them horrifically, irrevocably wrong, either. That has to mean something. Even now, with both of them believing something wrong about each other, they've found the other side of it, and they can make their way forward from here. He meant what he said a few minutes ago, that they do learn. They've gotten so much better at talking these things through. They just still have further to go. "I should have asked," he agrees, swallowing hard. "It was just... easier, I think. Or less complicated. To tell myself that this should be just yours, and leave it at that. But I missed it."
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"I know," he murmurs, lifting one hand to brush the backs of his fingers along J's cheek again, the touch gentle, light. "It's hard for me, too. Of course it is." He has, inasmuch as is possible, made his peace with the mess of what happened. He had more time to do so, all those months on his own before he showed up here and found J again. Everything that's happened since, this past year, has only affirmed what he feels, but that doesn't mean he likes revisiting the time when they were falling apart. Nothing good lies back there except for knowing what not to do this time, and he still isn't always even sure of that. He should have known before, but he didn't. He might not know now.
But every time here that something has gone wrong, they've talked it through. They haven't always gotten things right, but they haven't gotten them horrifically, irrevocably wrong, either. That has to mean something. Even now, with both of them believing something wrong about each other, they've found the other side of it, and they can make their way forward from here. He meant what he said a few minutes ago, that they do learn. They've gotten so much better at talking these things through. They just still have further to go. "I should have asked," he agrees, swallowing hard. "It was just... easier, I think. Or less complicated. To tell myself that this should be just yours, and leave it at that. But I missed it."