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It was hard, at the beginning. Or rather, the end– the end of the Crew, the end of the days full of excited squeals and barks and snide remarks that held no sting, the end of him. But then again, it had always been hard, what with them being perpetually broke and the lack of decent food.
It took a while for Jet to walk past Spike’s door without getting a lump in his throat. It wasn’t overnight that he started cooking for them again. And he let Faye be for a while. They were together by definition only; living in the same ship, but miles apart.
As the hole in his leg started to heal over and the Red Tail got patched up enough to be flown again, that’s when he realized she was still on board. It was like living with a ghost; he hadn’t heard Faye’s voice nor seen her since Spike went off to face Vicious. But the food he left out always got eaten, and regardless of what he believed she’d do, she stayed that day, then the next, and then the one after that.
After a while, he stopped expecting her to be gone every morning.
The first time they talked was three weeks later.
Faye had sauntered into the living room and stopped a few feet away from Jet, who was doing the laundry. “You always fold my stuff all wrong,” she snipped, snatching the top out of his hand. “I guess I’ll just have to do it myself.” She plopped down next to him and got to work sorting out the clothes.
Faye’s tone implied she wanted him to bicker right back, but her actions said otherwise. Did she want him to go? Stay? Talk? After a moment’s hesitation, he picked up one of his own t-shirts and began to fold it instead— the safest course of action.
“Heard there’s a bounty out for some guy in Alba City. 40,000 woolongs,” Faye said after a while.
Jet hadn’t thought about jumping back into the bounty hunting game. Well, he had, but if the four of them couldn’t muster up enough to get three square meals a day, how could the two of them? But Faye had a point in bringing it up– neither of them had picked up a job, and they were running low on the remainder of woolongs they had on their cards.
But Faye’s refusal to flat out ask him to take the Bebop over to Mars was telling, too. A hidden question that sat just below the surface of her confident voice, the same question he’d been wondering himself.
Can we actually make this work?
Jet didn’t know the answer. The two of them had never gotten along, and he didn’t think that losing the only crewmembers that eased the tension would help them form a bond. He still couldn’t move as fast as he used to because of his leg, and Faye didn’t exactly save her woolongs when she caught bounties by herself.
But if they didn’t make it work, what then? Would she leave? He saw no reason why she’d stay. He assumed the only reason she’d stuck around as long as she had was to come to terms with things. Grieve without worrying about food or money or a place to stay.
And this, this was her way of seeing if it was feasible. Worth her time.
Because she had to know it was worth his .
“We’re not too far out. If we leave now, we could dock in Alba in two hours.”
“60/40 since I was the one who found the details,” Faye said as she picked up the rest of her clothes and flounced off to her room.
It was a start. A shaky start, but a start nonetheless. If they were going to be a team, well. He wouldn’t complain any more than he did when the rest of them were on board. And if Faye wanted to keep him at a distance, that was fine with him. Beneficial to him, even– one less thing to devote energy towards.
It wasn’t until a few hours later that Jet realized that she had been folding her clothes the exact same way he always did.
They didn’t get that bounty, and they didn’t get the second, either. In Jet’s head, he imagined it going much easier. But between other bounty hunters getting the jump on them and the bounties themselves being a little too cunning, both attempts ended in failure. Low on food, woolongs, and patience, the two took out their frustrations on each other.
In the morning, they argued over which bounty to chase. In the afternoon, they squabbled over the chores. At dinnertime, they bickered about the food. Round and round and round, a biting comment from her and then a loaded insult from him, then a dramatic exit and muttered expletives.
Jet didn’t know how to go about bridging the rift between them. When the kid, the dog, and the liability were still on board, it was easier to ignore. He didn’t ever need to talk to Faye, nor would he go out of his way to. He was content with being civil toward her, if a little forced.
But now he wondered if they were too different to work– hell, live – together. They were opposites in almost every conceivable way, and with stubbornness being their only similarity, it made for few peaceful moments, and even fewer apologies.
As soon as the pair got home from their third botched bounty, insults were flying. It was the usual; the it’s-all-your-faults and the why-couldn’t-you-justs were being shot like bullets and the blame was being hurled with the force of one.
“It was your flirting that tipped him off!”
“Bullshit. It was you reaching for your gun and you know it.”
“What was I supposed to do, not threaten him?”
“You could’ve at least tried to be more subtle about it!”
“Oh, and you were the epitome of subtlety, Faye.”
“You’re just jealous.”
“Ha! Of you? Never.”
For a moment, Faye’s eyes flashed with something. Jet felt the atmosphere snap; it was almost audible the way the air shifted between them, like a crack of lightning had struck down in the middle of the living room.
Then, as if nothing had happened, she gave her retort back. “I’m getting the bounty next time. By myself. If you aren’t going to respect my methods, then you may as well not even work with me.” She turned away in a huff and stomped off to her room, slamming the door once she got there.
Faye didn’t come down for dinner. The next morning, she didn’t come down for breakfast, either. Jet was keenly aware that she was avoiding him, but what ate at him was that he didn’t even know why . He thought he knew how far to push, what topics to leave untouched– but he’d been wrong, apparently, and now they were worse off than when Spike had left.
Irritated by the situation and irritated that he was even bent out of shape about it, he reached into his pocket and fished out his pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He was about to pull one out of the pack when he remembered Faye saying something about having run out already.
When she told him, he gloated that he had been rationing his out to avoid that very issue and that she could learn a thing or two from him, which then resulted in her saying something about him needing to stop being a stingy old man, which of course he had to fire back at.
He looked down at the worn package. It wasn’t much, but he figured even a small olive branch was better than none at all. He made his way up the stairs and toward Faye’s room, then pushed the little box under her door. He didn’t hear a response from her, and wondered for a moment if she had even noticed, but as he walked away he heard her footfalls and the fwip of a lighter.
Faye came down for dinner that evening. They ate in silence until she spoke. “I’m serious about bounty hunting solo.”
Jet said nothing.
“There’s a local bounty– not a big one, but enough to get us by– and from the looks of him, he’d be an easy catch.”
She continued to talk, but Jet was still processing the word “us.” She’d said it so casually; like they were a real team.
“I’m going after him tomorrow. With any luck, we’ll finally have something decent to eat.” She glanced up at him then, as if waiting for admonishment. Or maybe praise. Jet wasn’t quite sure, but he knew she wanted some sort of response.
“I’ll cook up whatever you bring home,” he said back, and he kicked himself as soon as he said it, because this wasn’t home. Her home, her real home, was destroyed. This was simply a ship that fulfilled the requirements of a shelter. Place she could return to, yes. But never a home.
But if it bothered her she didn’t say anything. And when she came back with food the next day, she casually mentioned that she accidentally bought an extra package of cigarettes.
They fell into a rhythm of sorts. It wasn’t what Jet had expected; then again, it made sense. During the day, she’d go out and catch a few bounties. Normally small ones; the woolongs added up quickly once she stopped trying to chase after the big-name ones herself. And while she was gone, Jet would cook and do general maintenance of the ship. The Bebop was reliable, sure– but she needed quite a bit of care to keep in working condition.
Somewhere along the line, Faye had stopped giving Jet a portion of the earnings, instead opting to pool their funds for ease of access. Jet couldn’t argue with that; now that Faye wasn’t blowing all of her woolongs on horses, he felt more confident in giving her the freedom to use their resources.
It didn’t hurt that some of those expenses resulted in thinly made loungewear that bordered on being see-through.
And so she would leave in the mornings after having a bite to eat, and he’d clean the dishes and stick his nose in the wire-work of the Bebop, and then an hour before she’d return he’d start on the food and she’d recount all of her adventures over dinner.
On Faye’s days off she stuck close to the ship, occupying herself with various forms of amusement. Some days she’d watch the holo-screen, other days she’d busy herself by tanning on the landing deck. Jet saw her painting her nails once, but never saw her do it again after he griped at her not to get it on the couch.
One afternoon, Faye walked in on Jet while he was preparing lunch. She stood there for a moment, simply watching him with a cigarette hanging from her fingers.
“Since you’re here, could you peel that potato?” Jet asked as he adjusted the lower left-hand burner.
He was half-expecting Faye to stick her nose in the air and stalk off from such a request, but she stayed where she was. “I don’t know how.”
“You mean you’ve never–”
“They don’t exactly give you cooking lessons when you emerge from cryo-sleep,” Faye snapped, putting her cigarette out on the nearest ashtray and turning to leave.
“I could show you, if you want,” Jet offered before she walked away.
After a moment of consideration, Faye turned. “Well, if you’re so desperate for my help, I suppose I could try,” she said dryly, but approached the cutting board nonetheless.
“Okay. So you take it like this–” Jet said as he set the potato end-up on the cutting board and put the peeler up against the side of it– “And then you just pull it down. But you gotta be careful; it’s extremely sharp.” He handed both the potato and the peeler to her and she tried her hand at it.
“Good! Just like that.” He turned back toward the pan on the stovetop and stirred the chopped onions inside of it. In the other pan, he pushed around the chunks of chicken that had started to brown.
“What’s next?” Faye asked, pushing the potato peels off of the cutting board.
“Now you cut it. Start from the middle.” Jet watched as she followed his directions. “Then flip the halves over, and cut them in half, too.”
“And then like this?” Faye said as she set the quartered pieces flat on the cutting board.
“Yep, exactly. Cut ‘em into rows, then cut ‘em into cubes after stacking the rows together.” He left her to it and threw the chicken into the same pan as the onions. He started measuring out the water as he heard her slow chops of the knife.
After a little while, she asked him, “Do you like to cook?”
Jet paused in his movement to put the lid on the pan. He glanced over at her, but she was focused on the task in front of her. “Yeah, I guess. Beats traipsing around Venus just to come back empty-handed.”
“But you did it then, too. Back when we were all–” She cut herself off. “Back when you were still bounty hunting.”
Jet wondered where this line of questioning was going. “Well, ‘course. No one else was gonna do it, and I had to make sure you all got fed.”
“Why didn’t you ask me to help you?”
He figured she had meant to say “us” and proceeded as if she had. “Because you all had your own shit to sort out, and I already knew how to cook.”
“But wasn’t it hard? Didn’t you hate that you had to take care of me?” She was cutting faster, now, the knife clicking down hard on the board.
“Hate– well, I might’ve complained a little, but it wasn’t that big of a– careful, you’re going to cut yourself,” he said, grasping her hand that held the knife.
She wrenched her hand out of his grasp and set the knife down on the counter with a little more force than was necessary. “Why didn’t you ever kick me off the ship?” She asked suddenly, setting her hands down flat on either side of the cutting board, her hair falling like a curtain around her face.
Jet blinked, trying to catch up to wherever her train of thought was going. He felt thrown off balance, like the Bebop had lurched but it hadn’t, like he had tripped and was caught in the limbo between upright and hitting the ground. She couldn’t just ask that, because she was Faye and Faye was never direct and why of all times would she pick now to start making a change?
He evaded the question with one of his own. “Did you want me to?”
Faye didn’t say anything, and he didn’t say anything, and the silence stretched before them like the space highway they always passed when they came into Mars– cold, empty, and endless.
But then she shook her head, let out a sharp little laugh. “I don’t know what I want anymore.”
Cryptic in some ways to Jet, but so hollow and pained he almost felt he understood. The words he may not have comprehended, but what the tone of her voice implied he knew all too well.
Faye straightened, pushed her hair out of her face. Swallowed. “Is that it?” She asked, and he worried briefly that she meant his lack of response, but her hand gestured toward the diced potato.
Whatever had just happened, it was over now; the same Faye he had gotten used to over the last few weeks was back in the kitchen with him, awaiting his instruction. “Yeah. Now it just has to cook.” He took the lid off, grabbed the cutting board and scraped the little cubes into the pan. “It’ll be ready in about a half an hour.”
“Alright,” she said simply, then turned and left. For a fleeting moment, Jet considered asking her to stay.
But he didn’t, and he was so lost in thought over what he could’ve said differently that it took the chicken starting to smoke for him to snap out of it.
The days started bleeding into one another, like watercolor paints spreading out across a canvas. For Jet, it was cook, eat, clean, sleep, repeat. It didn’t help that Faye had stopped eating with him. He was seeing less and less of her, and though she had valid reasons– fatigue, boredom, wanting to get off of the Bebop and live a little– he had a sinking suspicion it had to do with him.
He felt her absence like it was tangible, but he ignored how it made him hurt, the same kind of hurt he felt when Alisa left. It didn’t hurt because it was Faye; he would’ve felt the same way if it was anyone else avoiding his presence.
At least, that’s what he told himself.
On a particularly blustery day as Jet was making breakfast, he heard Faye’s hurried footsteps and the sound of her getting sick. He ran up the stairs and into the bathroom to see her on her knees throwing up whatever she’d consumed the night before.
He knew she’d gone out drinking last night, but she’d always sleep it off and be fine in the morning. He’d never seen her get so sick afterwards, counting the time he watched her down three shots in a row on top of the largest margarita he’d ever seen. He wondered how much she’d drunk to get so sick, and why on Mars she decided to do so in the first place.
Her hair was short, but it was still in her face. Jet figured helping her superseded any sort of wariness she may have about him touching her– or frankly being in her presence– so he grabbed as much of her hair as he could and held it back behind her head.
Faye held the sides of the toilet with shaky hands and she gasped for air after she finished. Tears streaked down her face from the exertion, and Jet noticed how pale she was. She lifted a hand to hold her hair back herself, and Jet got up. “Stay right there, okay? I’m gonna get you a cold rag.”
He made his way down the hall to the Bebop’s supply cabinet and grabbed the first washcloth he saw. He returned and rinsed it under the tap, then gently wiped Faye’s mouth. She looked up at him with bleary eyes as he did so. “Did you mean to overdo it?” he prodded gently, taking the clean side of the rag and pressing it against her forehead.
“Yeah,” she mumbled, leaning into the cloth.
“Why?”
Faye sighed. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Jet couldn’t see her face from the way the washcloth obscured it, but he could hear the sadness in her voice. “Try me.”
“It’s just a stupid crush. It’s nothing.”
“Doesn’t seem like nothing to me.” Jet moved the washcloth to her cheek. “Does he know?”
Faye’s face hardened at that. “No. And he never will.”
Spike, Jet realized as soon as she said it. She was talking about Spike. And here he was asking her to explain herself to him like he could fix things.
But he couldn’t. Spike made sure of that when he jumped into the jaws of the Syndicate with little more than a past frozen in glass and a half-baked idea of fate. Spike should’ve known better than to sacrifice himself without thinking of what it would cost those around him.
And Jet should’ve known better, too, than to pry into Faye’s life.
He set the washcloth on the counter and stood, then helped Faye to her feet.
“Shit,” Faye muttered, looking at her ruined top. She had made it to the bathroom quickly, but not quick enough. “I’m all out of clean shirts, too.”
“You can wear one of mine,” Jet said reflexively. He couldn’t bring Spike back from the dead, but he could at least get Faye a change of clothes.
Faye looked at him with an expression he couldn’t place. Interpreting it as disgust, he said, “I’ll be sure to get a clean one.” He retreated to his room and pulled one of his red undershirts from his closet, then returned and handed it to her.
She took it and stared down at it, rubbed her thumb over the fabric absentmindedly. She looked up at him. “Thank you.”
Jet would’ve been less surprised if she had reeled her arm back and slapped him across the face. He didn’t think he’d ever heard her say the phrase, and if she had, it most definitely wouldn’t have been directed at him. He nodded once, haltingly, and gestured vaguely with his hand, saying, “I’ll get some water and crackers set out for you downstairs.”
He left quickly, suddenly feeling flustered about the whole ordeal. He’d touched her face— which was strange enough on his own, he made a point not to ever get into her personal space— and she just… let him. Didn’t protest, didn’t flinch away; she simply sat there and let him take care of her.
What had changed between them to allow that, and when?
Faye came downstairs in his shirt, the fabric dwarfing her and hanging down past her waist, and he felt a peculiar warmth in his belly that he pushed away immediately.
If Spike had been there, it wouldn’t be Jet’s shirt that she’d have chosen to wear.
Months passed, and Faye started warming up to him again. Jet knew they’d reached a milestone when they started saving five percent of their woolongs in the safe. He wasn’t sure what it signified, exactly, but he felt it held meaning.
As soon as Faye had scraped together a couple thousand woolongs that hadn’t been spent on food or ship repair or bars or put in the safe, she took off to the nearest casino. Jet tagged along just to play a few rounds of poker and take in the surroundings; he’d never gotten the same kick out of gambling that Faye seemed to.
When they arrived, she went straight to the slot machines while Jet found himself a seat at the poker table. He talked up the other guys there on local bounties and asked where they were all from. With him being mainly on the ship for the past few weeks, the small talk and pleasantries were a welcome change.
After winning 2,500 woolongs in the fourth round, he decided to head to the bar.
Out of habit, he glanced over at Faye from time to time to make sure she wasn’t in trouble. Then he’d check to see if she was causing trouble, which was far more likely. But this time, she didn’t seem intent on cheating and getting chased out of the establishment; instead, she seemed to have taken a liking to one of the men playing eight-ball. She was laughing and smacking the man’s arm playfully as if he was one of her bounty targets.
Jet was dumbfounded as to why Faye had picked the tallest, broadest man of the group as the receptor of her charms; she had always gone for the guys who looked like… well, who looked like Spike. Skinny, bedhead, and a cocky grin– that was Faye’s type.
He huffed a laugh and turned back toward the bar. Since when did he take any interest in who Faye liked? She probably just picked him because he looked the richest.
After chatting with the bartender and polishing off some drinks, he took to walking around the rest of the casino.
It was loud and bright and excessive, just like many of the other casinos he’d been to before. It wasn’t his scene, but it was a nice difference from the dim, undecorated interior of the Bebop. After taking a look around and counting his woolongs, he decided to call it a night. He’d had some drinks, played some games, and now he was ready to sleep it all off.
As he made his way past the slot machines to the exit, his eyes met Faye’s. She had been laughing, presumably at something the guy from before had said, but as she looked at him her smile faded. She looked almost sad with the way her lips were slightly parted and her eyebrows furrowed up. The man nudged her shoulder and she snapped out of her trance, smiling back up at him and putting her hand on his arm, watching as his split hit bounced around the table.
He walked on, not bothering to wait around any longer. She knew where the Bebop was docked, and from the looks of it, she wouldn’t be returning tonight anyway. If she was disappointed he didn’t stick around longer, that was her problem. And the way his heart twisted painfully from watching her flirt? That was only because he’d had too much to drink.
As soon as he returned to the ship, he locked his door and shucked his flight suit. If Faye was going to be gone tonight, he may as well take advantage of the opportunity. It had been a while, and with the mixture of the whiskey and knowing they weren’t in the red, he was finally able to dedicate some time to taking care of other matters.
After removing his arm and taping the socket, he turned on the shower and stood under the spray. He sighed in relief as he started, the pressure finally receding some. He pushed his usual thoughts to the surface, the ones of Alisa. The feel of her as he held her in bed. The way she laughed. Her touch.
But the closer and closer he got, the less and less he thought about her. Instead, the memories that flooded his thoughts were those of Faye. Her laugh when she beat him at chess for the first time. The hint of surprise in her voice when she pointed out that he made her favorite dish. The way she had started lounging in the living room with her hair in a messy ponytail and no makeup, as if she trusted him to see a part of herself no one else ever did.
He closed his eyes and let his high wash over him like the too-hot water that stung his skin. Gradually, he came back down and finished showering. He toweled off, got changed, and sank into the bed, and as he waited for sleep to come he considered the implications.
He wasn’t in love with her. That much was certain. Otherwise, it would complicate things– and after finally getting some savings and food on the regular, the last thing they needed was another hurdle in their path. He was simply attracted to her, is all. Nothing more.
It took a while for him to fall asleep that night. And the next morning, it took everything in him not to ask Faye if she had left with the man from the casino.
As the money started becoming easier to come by, Faye started looking for other means of entertainment around the ship. This led to her asking Jet if she could borrow one of his books.
It took him off-guard the first time, mainly because she used the word “borrow” and secondly because she asked him for permission. “Books?”
Faye rolled her eyes. “Yeah, books. I thought you might have some. Y’know, since you’re so old fashioned.”
Jet blinked. “I’ve got a couple. Don’t know if there’ll be any you’d be interested in, though.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“All the books I’ve got are from Earth, back before we started living in space.” He stood and led the way to his room, talking over his shoulder as she followed him. “Ages before the tech we’ve got today. If you think I’m old fashioned, you should hear how they talk in some of these books.” He walked into his room and opened up one of his desk drawers, then backed up so she could take a look at the selection.
Faye mumbled to herself as her fingers brushed over the spines, and as she tucked her hair behind her ear with her other hand, Jet realized that she’d never actually been in his room before. It was intimate in a way he couldn’t explain; she had walked into his personal space without questioning it, like she belonged there.
“What’s this one about?” Faye asked as she pulled a thin paperback out from the rest of the books.
“Oh,” Jet said, reading the cover. “Maybe you should wait a bit to read that one–”
“But it looks interesting.” Faye straightened up and looked at the cover. “ The Great Gatsby. ” She looked back up at Jet. “So? What’s it about?”
Jet’s jaw clenched for a moment as he pushed Spike’s memory from his mind. “Obsession,” he began, suddenly finding the air in the room too thick. “Betrayal. Greed. Heartbreak.”
“What about love?” Faye asked.
“Well– in a way, I suppose it’s about that, too,” Jet answered, rubbing his forehead. “But you’d really slog through all of that sad stuff just to read about it?”
For a moment, it looked like Faye was going to say something in response. Jet figured he misread her expression, because she held up the book with a look of determination and said, “This is the one I wanna read.”
A few hours later, dinner was on the table, but Faye was absent. Jet walked up the flight of stairs and knocked on her door. “Food’s ready.”
No response.
“Faye? You alright?” His hand hesitated over the doorknob. Just as she’d never been in his room, he’d never been in hers. Was he allowed to be? If that unspoken rule had been broken, then were the rest null and void, too?
After debating with himself, he settled on opening it. After all, Faye had been mad at him before– he could handle that. But if she was hurt or needed help, he wouldn’t know unless he checked.
The door swung open, revealing Faye sitting on the side of her bed, book in hand. She looked over at him, her eyes red-rimmed with tears. “Just like Spike,” she said, and her voice broke on his name.
Jet pushed the sting of jealousy down right along with the pangs of sadness at Spike’s absence. He swallowed thickly and nodded. “Yeah.”
Faye’s lower lip trembled as she looked at him. She looked so small; so un-Faye-like. Jet had never seen her look like this; not even when she shot holes into the ceiling did she look like this, tiny and helpless and hurting. She’d done all her mourning away from him, and he didn’t intrude on that just how she didn’t for him, but seeing her like this made him want to bring Spike back just so he could slug him.
Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks. “Do you miss him, too?”
He looked up, willed the tears forming in his own eyes to recede, looked down and nodded. Huffed a laugh. “Of course. Of course I miss him. He gave us nothing but trouble and yet I wish he was still here.”
“He really did, didn’t he?” Faye laughed before her face crumpled under the weight of her grief. She sobbed into the balled-up tissues she held in her hand, her cries growing louder by the second.
If only Spike was here. Spike would know what to do; he always knew what to do. He’d dance with death and smirk while doing it, come back from being injured within a matter of days, ready for the next bounty. He always had a smile, one final quip that could pull a laugh out of the crew.
And he’d hold Faye if she cried.
But he wasn’t here. Jet was.
Jet couldn’t be Spike— he’d never be Spike— but if Faye let him see her like this, it wouldn’t be that much of a stretch to assume she wanted to be comforted.
And if that’s what she wanted, who was he to deny her that?
He strode into her room, past the dresser and the clothes littering the floor, sat down next to her, and wrapped her up in his arms.
He let her cry like that for who knows how long, until her sobs turned into hiccups and she pulled away. She slipped under the covers of the bed and clutched her pillow, which Jet took as his cue to leave.
Only after he had turned off her lights, closed her bedroom door, and put her share of the food in the fridge did he let himself cry. For Spike, yes; but mostly for the fact that Faye wanted him back even more than he himself did.
The days marched on, and without Jet even realizing it, a year and a half had passed since they started working together. The conversations he had with Faye started getting longer, and her presence on the ship became less of a variable and more of a constant, a purple-and-yellow fixture that made him wonder if it was going to be like this for a long time– him and Faye, traveling the solar system together.
It was odd that they’d been able to keep going as long as they had; he almost felt like one of these days the rug would be pulled out from under him and she’d be gone, just like that, and he’d be alone again. He wanted to prepare himself for that possibility, because she didn’t have anything tying her down to this ship, or their partnership, or him. But he also couldn’t help getting caught up in the thought of it all, having someone to cook for and someone to comfort and someone to talk to for more than just a few months, instead of a make-shift team that would end with him waking up to find the Red Tail missing.
He was tending to his bonsai in the gardening room, contemplating this, when he heard the click of Faye’s heels.
She stopped just outside the open doorway and leaned against it, arms crossed.
“Hey,” he said, slightly taken aback that she had gone out of her way to come talk to him. Mostly, Faye stuck to conversing with him in the more neutral spaces of the ship: the living room, the hangar, and the kitchen. This was different; this was one of the spaces that was his and his alone.
“Hey,” she said back, meeting his gaze.
She didn’t elaborate on why she was there, and the silence began to get a little too long for Jet’s comfort, so he said, “Do you wanna come in?”
Faye shrugged and pushed herself off the doorframe. She didn’t say anything, but instead walked past him and sat down on the little half-bench to his left.
There was still a silence between them, but Jet figured he would let Faye start the conversation. He didn’t have to wait long.
“I met someone. Another bounty hunter,” she said, fiddling with the sleeve of her jacket.
Jet’s hands stilled on the little plant as he processed what she said. Even though he’d assumed it would happen sooner or later, it didn’t make the gut-punch of reality any less painful. He could at least take solace in her telling him beforehand; he supposed that was a better alternative than her walking out without letting him know why. “Oh?”
“She wants to team up with me. Said we’d work well together and have a shot at making it big.”
Jet thought of himself as a tough person, but damn did that hurt more than he thought it would. His hand clenched around the pruning shears and he tried to focus on the task in front of him. It was over. There was nothing more he could do or say. She had made her choice, and he had to live with that.
He wished he was the type of person who could put their sorrows in a box in their mind, put the lid on it, then stuff it away to never be seen again, but he just wasn’t. He knew this would happen; it always happened like this. He’d get in too deep, get hurt, then carry around the pain everywhere he went, unable to work through it alone.
“She’s exactly what I want in a partner: she’s fun, laid-back, and pulls her own weight.” She set her hands in her lap. “She said she’s leaving Jupiter tomorrow; asked if I wanted to come along.”
Jet could feel the tension in his jaw tighten at every word she said. It was too hard to sit there and take; he’d been strong enough to handle her yelling at him, avoiding him, hell, even stealing from him– but the way she was praising this person that was taking his place was beyond his ability to bear.
Taking his place? He wanted to laugh at himself for that. What place? He’d never had a place with Faye; if anything he was a place holder. A hotel before she made it to her final destination. A stop-and-gas-up roadside attraction that offered little more than a roof and half-decent food. A sugar-free substitute for whatever she was truly looking for.
“Well,” Jet said, forcing the word past the lump in his throat, “I’m sure you both will make a great team.”
Faye didn’t say anything for a moment, which confused him. He looked over at her for the first time since she entered and was surprised to see that her eyebrows were drawn.
“You want me to go.”
“I never said that.”
“But you thought it.”
“Oh, so you’re a mind reader now? Go on, tell me what I’m gonna say next, Faye.”
“You’re avoiding the question.”
“You haven’t asked me one!”
Jet wanted to stop this from escalating, stop from getting angry, but the emotion was so much more familiar to him than the sadness he felt knowing she wanted to leave. It was almost comforting the way they had fallen into an argument again, like this was about him overcooking the beef and not about her leaving for good.
“You want me to team up with her, don’t you?” Faye accused, standing suddenly and watching as he did the same. “You’ve been wanting me gone ever since I first stepped foot on this pathetic excuse for a ship!”
“If you hate Bebop that much, then why’d you even stick around?” Jet fired back, picking the easier half of her claim to argue, the half that didn’t require him to fold his hand. His fists balled at his sides. “I never made you stay; I never expected that of you. You could’ve left anytime you wanted to!”
“See? That right there!” Faye said, pointing a finger at him. “ I want you to leave. That’s what you’re saying right now!”
“Stop putting words in my mouth!” Jet shouted, his voice rattling the shelving units the bonsai sat on.
“Then tell me I’m wrong!” Faye yelled back.
He had never conceded in an argument with Faye. Given a peace offering in the aftermath, yes, but never surrendered mid-battle. And he could wiggle his way out of this direct confrontation if he tried another route, changed the subject with an accusation of his own, but this was the first time one of their arguments actually meant something.
This was the first argument he actually had something to lose.
“You’re wrong,” he said, his voice lowered to its normal volume. Then, softer: “You’re wrong, Faye.”
Faye’s eyes widened briefly, shining with an emotion he couldn’t comprehend, and she lowered her hand. “Okay,” she said simply, her eyes still looking into his. “Okay.”
Tomorrow came and went, and the next morning Jet walked in on Faye sitting splayed out on the couch. “Ugh, finally. I was beginning to think you’d died up there or something.” She stood up and stretched. “I’m feeling scrambled eggs for breakfast.”
Jet couldn’t deny the feeling of relief that washed over him. “Only if you help with the dishes afterward.”
Three months later, the Red Tail got taken out of commission. Faye had been flying back to the Bebop when she got caught in the crossfire of a dogfight.
When her ship screeched onto the landing deck full of bullet holes, Jet felt a sense of terror shoot through him. Faye was all he could think about. Was she alright? Was she hurt? How close was the nearest hospital? Could they make it in time with the Hammerhead alone?
Then she hopped out of the cockpit with a string of swears, no blood in sight, and he barely mustered up the restraint to keep from running over and crushing her in an embrace.
He tried not to think about his initial reaction and his almost-response as he worked underneath the left twin machine gun. But that, just like most things involving Faye, was easier said than done.
As he worked on a stubborn bolt, he wondered when he started worrying about her well-being. It could’ve been when she told him about a fist-fight she’d gotten into with one of her targets. But no, that wasn’t it, because he started telling her “be safe out there” a couple weeks after she started bounty hunting without him. Perhaps it was that day, the one where it all went to hell and he realized just how dangerous it really was for bounty hunters like them. The day he realized he didn’t want to lose any more crew members than he already had.
He sighed and wiped the sweat off his face, still trying to get the damn bolt moving. Looking closely at it, it looked like some sort of glue was caked on around the base. “You gotta be kidding me…” Jet muttered.
“It’s seen better days,” Faye called out from the entryway to the hangar. He heard her approach, then saw the metal casing above him sway as she leaned against the side of the ship. He lifted his head up a little to see that she was standing close to him; her boots were only a couple inches away from his legs.
“Better days,” he huffed. “It’s about a woolong away from being totaled.”
“Is that an offer to buy me a new ship I hear?” Faye teased, crossing her legs at the ankle.
“You tell me. You’re the one who bounty hunts for a living.”
“On second thought…”
Jet chuckled at that. There was something comforting about the easy way they had been talking to each other lately. It felt natural, joking with her over a shared inconvenience. Almost two years ago, they would’ve been at each other’s throats over such a thing; now, it was like catching up with an old friend.
And there was another change he couldn’t tie down to one instance. How exactly did they come to a point where they could tease and smile and laugh together without a cruel taunt or a hidden agenda?
It was strange, Jet thought, but not unwelcome. Far from unwelcome, even. It felt… right, somehow. Right in a way that introduced more questions than he had answers to, but since Faye was giving him her full attention, he decided he should do the same. He tabled the mental conversation he was having with himself for the time being.
“You know, it was actually pretty scary,” Faye said. “It’s funny, because I’ve been in plenty of fights myself— remember that one where a hundred missiles fired at me at once?” She laughed lightly. “But this one… I don’t know. In that moment, when I heard them spray and I lost control of my ship I…”
“Hmm?”
“I guess I just worried. Worried I wouldn’t make it back.”
“Hm.”
Faye huffed. “You jackass, you’re not even listening to me!” She poked his thigh with the toe of her boot and he reflexively went to sit up. The dull ring of his head hitting the metal above him echoed in the hangar.
“Fuck,” he swore, rubbing at his head. “I was listening. I was just thinking.”
“Thinking about what?”
“Thinking about how I was worried, too.” He wouldn’t normally be so open about such a thing, but it helped that she couldn’t see his face and vice-versa.
“Wh— oh.” He heard her boots shuffle on the floor.
“Yeah.” His face felt hot all of a sudden, and not because a fuse had blown in the wiring. “Damn, this bolt just won’t budge,” he said as the wrench slipped again. He tucked a knee up and rolled out from under the ship.
As he stood up Faye looked at him, then laughed. “You’ve got shit all over your face.”
“What? Oh.” He wiped his cheek on his shoulder in an attempt to get the grease off.
“No, no, stop. That’s just making it worse. Here.” She grabbed a rag from off of the rolling cart that held his tools. Then, with one hand on the top of his head to hold him still and the other holding the cloth, she got to work scrubbing the grease from his skin.
If his face had been hot before, now it was burning. When he had cleaned Faye’s face, did it make her feel this flustered? No, it couldn’t have, because she didn’t like him like that. Him helping her when she was sick was just as platonic as her helping him now, and he needed to treat it as such, because it would be foolish to think otherwise.
She backed away from him then, and sure enough the white rag had black stains on it.
“Thanks,” he said, the wheels in his head still trying to catch up to the present instead of reminding him how attractive she had looked with her expression all focused and how close her face had been and how easy it would’ve been to bend down and kiss her.
“Well, that’s what partners are for.”
Was it? Was this something partners did for each other? The lines had been blurred before, he supposed, and that was all this was, he could handle being touched by her. It’s not like she meant anything by it; she was just being helpful, which Faye never was but apparently she changed her tune today because it couldn’t possibly mean anything else.
And just partners? It suddenly didn’t feel like it was enough, which was strange because hadn’t it always been enough before?
He wouldn’t fall for her; wouldn’t allow himself to. Where there used to be a multitude of reasons, they’d dwindled down to one; regardless, he recalled it again— he’d been doing that a lot lately, reminding himself of the fact that she was in love with someone else.
Besides, it was better this way, wasn’t it? Being alone had suited him just fine for decades; he’d grin and bear it as long as he needed to, wouldn’t he? Partners was good enough… right?
As Faye left him in the hangar, he found he no longer had it in him to agree.
Jet woke up to the sound of something clattering on the lower deck. He forced his eyes open and pushed himself out of bed to go investigate. He knew it had to be Faye; they were out in hyperspace, so he wasn’t worried about bandits or petty thieves.
He grabbed his arm and put it back in its socket, then left his room. He rubbed his face as he made his way down the stairs, his eyes adjusting to the light coming from the kitchen. “Did you need me to make somethin’?”
Faye whirled around, a hand over her chest. “Shit, Jet, you scared me… what?”
Jet rubbed the back of his head. “Did you need me to make you something?” He asked again, walking into the kitchen.
“No, I– well, maybe… I just wanted some hot chocolate, but I couldn’t figure out how to get the burner going, and then the kettle fell…” she trailed off and ran a hand through her hair.
“Here, let me,” he said as he took the kettle from her and filled it up with water. “This thing’s tricky; you have to push it in until it starts clicking, and only then do you turn it,” he instructed as the flames flickered up from the stovetop. “Now we wait for it to boil.”
Faye leaned back against the countertop; Jet did the same. A comfortable quiet fell on the two as they watched the fire lick the bottom of the kettle.
“I used to make hot chocolate like this all the time,” Faye spoke, her words breaking the silence. “We had a different type of stove, though.”
Jet wasn’t used to her talking about her past– it was one of those things he never tried to poke at when they had argued in the past. He stayed quiet to let her continue.
“Whenever I’d had a rough day, I’d just heat up some water and stir in the mix. It was like magic— as I’d watch the powder dissolve, I’d picture my problems doing the same thing. I haven’t needed to do it for a while, though.” Something about the way Faye crossed her arms made Jet feel like she wanted him to say something.
“Why?”
“Well, I’ve had an obstinate crewmate who doesn’t leave me alone until I’m feeling better.” She raised an eyebrow at him.
“Oh.” Jet glanced over at her. “Then I take it this is something… I can’t help with?”
“No.” Faye looked away. “It’s about a guy.”
“Oh,” Jet said again, feeling stupid and small. He should’ve known better than to ask; now it felt like he was intruding on a personal moment. “Well, if it helps, I’m sure Spike felt the same way.”
Faye’s head snapped toward him, her face scrunched up in confusion. “Wh– Spike? What does he have to do with any of this?”
Jet blinked, his eyes flitting around her face looking for some sort of help deciphering her words. “Didn’t you– I mean, weren’t you just– didn’t you mean him?” Jet gestured helplessly with his hand.
“I meant you,” Faye said in exasperation. As soon as the words left her mouth, her eyes went wide and she simply stood there, frozen.
“What problem could you possibly have with me that I couldn’t help fix?” Jet asked, completely lost and growing impatient. He looked at her then, really looked, at the way her face was flushed red and the way she looked like she was ready to bolt and the way her hands were grabbing the hem the shirt she wore, his shirt, the one that he’d lent her last year that he assumed had ended up back in the laundry, why did she still have his shirt and all at once all of the little mysteries he could never figure out clicked into place.
The kettle whistled and they both jumped.
Jet tore his eyes away from Faye and grabbed a washcloth to take the damn thing off the stove, and as soon as he did he could hear her quick steps receding back down the hall. “Faye, wait– damn it–” Jet swore under his breath as he spilled some of the water onto the stovetop. He flipped the burner off and ran up the stairs after her, hating that it still took him longer with his scarred leg. “Faye!”
He approached her closed door and knocked hard on it, enough to leave a dent.
Faye flung the door open, a deadly scowl pointed at him and tears streaming down her cheeks. “What, Jet? What?” She demanded, taking up the whole doorway with her wide stance.
He cursed himself as he looked at her face, knowing he was the cause of those tears and that hurt. He should’ve known, from the moment she stayed past that first day he should’ve known, and every time after that he should’ve known, but he hadn’t; now there was only his series of misjudgments and insecurities that had prevented him from seeing clearly for two years straight, carved into the permanence that was the past. But if she was still here, standing here waiting for him, then it wasn’t too late.
And he’d be damned if he didn’t finally do something about it while he still had the chance.
When he kissed her, taking her face in his hands and bending down to her level, he tried to tell her everything with it that he knew he wasn’t eloquent enough to say. It was horrible timing, he knew, but Faye didn’t seem to mind– she kissed him back with just as much intensity, gripping the front of his flight suit with enough strength that he thought it might tear.
She tasted like cigarette smoke and whiskey, bitter and warm and perfect and her, and he wondered how he managed to breathe for so long without the oxygen that was her soft lips pressed against his own.
Faye pulled him backward into her room, angling Jet so that he was the one moving backwards, until the backs of his knees hit the bed. He sat and watched as Faye pulled her shirt off– well, his shirt, he still couldn’t get past that– and she didn’t have anything on underneath, and he didn’t have time to process this before her sleeping shorts were gone too, and she was back on him, her fingers laced through his beard and her thighs straddling him, and– and–
And he’d been missing out on this for two years?
He moaned into her mouth as she ground her hips into him, wanting– needing more, needing her, needing this, whatever they were, whatever this was, whatever it signified, he’d take all of it, no questions asked.
Because she meant everything to him; she had for a long time. The realization had come so gradually that it was less of a surprise and more of a certainty, like a warm summer following a chilly spring– comforting and beautiful and right.
She helped him peel off his own clothes, and that look in her eyes alone– the one he’d seen but never understood until now– was enough to make all of the pain and confusion and heartache worth the while. All of what he’d imagined paled in comparison to the way she bit her lip and how her eyes fluttered shut as she took him in all at once, sinking down onto him slowly but assuredly as he helped guide her with his hands on her hips.
And then she moved, and he helped her, shifting so that his hands were under her as she rode him. Her own hands had migrated back to his face, resting there, pulling him close to her for what he thought was another kiss, but instead she rested her forehead against his and he forgot how to breathe.
They stayed like that for a while as she moved, the sound of her gasps and his groans seemingly filling the silence of the entire ship. And when she did kiss him again, all he could think about was how she had wanted this, too– wanted him. To what extent he wasn’t sure, but the way she was riding him with reckless abandon gave him hope that maybe– just maybe– this wouldn’t be a one-time thing.
It didn’t take long before he was close, his breaths coming faster and his grip on her thighs tightening. From her little moans and the way her nails were digging into his right bicep, he knew she was close, too. He watched her face, wanting to see her when she hit her peak.
And when she did, the sight of her, the feel of her, everything that had been building up to them in this shared moment together sent him tumbling over the edge with her.
After, she slowed her pace and rested for a moment, panting. When her eyes opened again, she looked up at him. In her gaze was that same look he had seen years ago, when they first started working together. All the things she didn’t speak aloud, all mixed up together in that one expression. Worry. Fear. Hesitance. And under it all…
A question.
Can we actually make this work?
But this time, after the years they’ve spent together, after their fights and their resolutions, after their triumphs and their failures, after everything they’d said and done and thought and mourned and dreamed and lived, after this…
He finally knew the answer.