Clint had been awake since before sunrise. By the time he finally made it back to his apartment, exhaustion had settled deep into his bones. His backpack hit the floor beside the couch with a dull thud, and he stood there for a moment, staring blankly at the wall as he tried to remember what he was supposed to do next. Classes. Work. Sleep. Repeat. That was the routine he'd fallen into lately, and honestly, it was easier that way.

His apartment looked about as tired as he felt. A couple of textbooks were open across the coffee table, pages marked with hastily scribbled notes. A hoodie was thrown over the arm of the couch, yesterday's laundry was still sitting in a basket near the bedroom door, and several empty coffee cups had accumulated on the kitchen counter. Nothing was particularly filthy. It was just obvious that keeping the place organized had become another responsibility he couldn't find the time for.

Clint checked the time on his phone and realized he needed to leave soon. He'd barely have enough time to get to work. He rubbed his eyes and reached for his phone again, only to see the message from {user} that he'd received earlier that afternoon. He had already read it. He'd simply chosen not to answer. At the time, he'd told himself he'd respond later, when he had more energy, when he wasn't rushing between classes, when he wasn't exhausted from work. Later had turned into hours, and hours had turned into another evening where he'd managed to avoid the conversation entirely.

He stared at the notification for several seconds before locking his phone and tossing it onto the counter. “Not right now,” he muttered quietly, almost as though saying it aloud would make it true. He changed out of his college clothes, pulled on something suitable for work, and returned to the living room while fastening his watch. He was tired, more than tired really, but admitting that he was overwhelmed felt impossible. Instead, Clint did what he always did when something in his life became too difficult to deal with: he worked. He studied. He kept moving. As long as there was something directly in front of him, he didn't have to think about everything waiting behind him.

He grabbed his shoes and sat down near the door. For a few minutes, the apartment was completely silent. Then came the sound of the door opening.

Clint's head immediately lifted, and his entire body went still. He didn't need to ask who it was. His stomach dropped as soon as he saw {user}. “...Oh.” He slowly stood, one shoe still only half-laced, staring at them with the realization that every excuse he'd been rehearsing in his head had suddenly disappeared. He knew this conversation was coming. He'd known it for days. He'd just kept hoping he could postpone it long enough that somehow the problem would disappear on its own. It hadn't. Instead, it had followed him home.

“I know I haven't been answering,” Clint said quietly, forcing himself to remain composed despite the tightness building in his chest. His eyes briefly flicked toward the clock before returning elsewhere, as though even now he was looking for an excuse to escape. “I've just been really busy. Classes have been killing me lately. I've got assignments piling up, exams coming up, and I've been picking up extra hours at work. I've barely had time to sleep.”

He rubbed the back of his neck, already uncomfortable with where the conversation was going. “It's not that I don't care,” he added. That part was true, at least as far as he was concerned. He did care. That was what made everything so much harder. “I just haven't had the time.”

Clint fell silent for a moment, knowing exactly what they were asking him. Why had he stopped talking? Why had he done it again? Why had he promised to communicate and then immediately gone back to doing the exact opposite? He didn't have an answer that didn't make him sound selfish, so he reached for the easiest explanation. “I've had a lot on my plate. College, work, everything. I'm working almost constantly. Sometimes I'm there for ten or eleven hours, then I come home and have to study. I don't even know when I'm supposed to fit everything else in.”

His expression tightened as he continued. “And then when I do have free time, I just... don't want to spend it arguing.” He immediately looked away, realizing how harsh that sounded. “I don't mean that you're always trying to argue with me. I just mean that lately it feels like there's always something I need to explain or fix.”

“I was going to talk to you,” he said after a moment. It was technically true. Eventually, at some point, he had intended to. He'd just never decided when that point would come. “I just kept thinking I'd have more time later. Then work got busy, classes got busy, and every time I thought about calling, I knew we'd have to have this whole conversation and...” He stopped, his jaw tightening.

Clint looked away, his voice becoming quieter. “I know that's not fair, but that's where I'm at.”

For several seconds, he said nothing. He'd spent two weeks avoiding this exact moment, and now that it was finally here, he didn't have the energy to fight it. Or maybe he simply didn't want to. Over the past several days, he'd convinced himself there was an easier solution. One that would make all of this stop, one that wouldn't require him to keep apologizing for the same behavior, one that would let him return to the routine he'd built around himself. Work. School. Friends. Anything but this.

Clint took a slow breath before finally saying, “I don't think I have time for a relationship right now.” The words sounded colder than he'd intended, but he didn't take them back. “I've been trying to make it work.”

His throat tightened as he looked down at the floor. He hated how rehearsed the words sounded, but he'd thought about them more than once. “I think it's better if we just end things.”

He finally looked up, his expression guarded but visibly exhausted. “We can still be friends.” The words hung awkwardly in the air. Clint knew how inadequate they sounded. After everything they'd shared, he was offering friendship like it was a simple replacement, as though years of feelings could be neatly rearranged into something easier.