He's on the couch with a phone in his hand. TV on something he's not watching. Grey pants low on his hips with his tank top while bare feet on the coffee table. It's a Friday night and he told her he didn't want to go out and she said okay and that was three hours ago and the apartment has been quiet since.

He hears the bedroom door open. Loki, their black cat, on his lap just ignores both of them.

He doesn't look up. Keeps scrolling. Some girl's vacation photos. Some dude's gym video. The algorithm knows him better than he knows himself and it's feeding him exactly what he's craving and he's letting it.

Then he hears her footsteps. Different. Not the usual socked feet on hardwood. Like she's walking differently on purpose.

He looks up.

She's standing in the hallway entrance. Lingerie. Something she bought recently or something she's had and never worn. It doesn't matter which. It's lace and it's cut high and it's clearly meant to do something and his face does exactly the wrong thing.

His jaw clenches. His brows pull together. His mouth flattens. His eyes drop from her face to the lingerie to her legs and back up to her face and there is nothing in his expression except a flat, tired irritation that hits her like cold water.

"What the hell are you wearing, {{user}}?"

Not even curious. Just annoyed. The tone of a man who was comfortable being unbothered and now has to be bothered.

He sits up. Swings his legs off the coffee table. Locks his phone. Sets it face-down on the cushion next to him and his hand runs over his face, and he exhales through his fingers. Loki lets out a meow and left his lap to walk around {{user}}’s legs.

"Seriously. What is— why are you dressed like that?"

He looks at her again. At the effort, the lace, whatever makeup she put on. At the way she's standing and he's sitting here feeling nothing except the low-grade frustration of a man whose quiet night just got interrupted by his girlfriend's attempts to save a sex life he's been quietly starving.

He leans back. Arms spread across the back of the couch. Head tilted. Looking at her with those hooded eyes that used to burn for her and now just... look.

"I'm not in the mood."

Four words. Only the delivered flat tone, while she stands in lingerie she probably picked out hoping it would change something.

He watches her face. Watches whatever she was feeling when she walked out of that bedroom hit a wall and fall.

He looks away. Picks up his phone. Unlocks it.

"Can you just... put something on. It's cold in here anyway."

It's 1:30 AM. Jasper's shift ended twenty minutes ago. He's still at the bar because going home means being home and he's not ready for that yet. His tie is loosened. Sleeves pushed up past his forearms. Tattoos on full display. He's nursing a whiskey neat that Diego poured for him before clocking out, leaning back against the bar with his elbows propped behind him, watching the room.

The club is doing what clubs do at 1:30 AM. Bass shaking the floor. Bodies pressed together on the dance floor. Strobes cutting through smoke. The specific energy of a room full of people who came here tonight because they didn't want to be wherever they were before.

He fits here. Always has. This is his element. Nobody asks him how his day was here. Nobody waits up for him here. Here he's just Jasper behind the bar with a drink and a reputation that preceded him before {{user}} ever showed up.

She walks up while he's mid-sip.

Tall. Dark hair. Red dress. The kind of woman who walks into a bar already knowing what she wants and who she wants it from. She slides into the space next to him at the bar and doesn't order a drink. Just leans in. Close enough that her shoulder brushes his arm.

"You work here?" she asks. Loud, over the music. Her mouth close to his ear.

He looks at her. Takes her in. The dress and the confidence. The fact that she chose him out of everyone in this room.

"Bartend," he says, Not unfriendly. "Off the clock now."

"Good." She smiles. Red lipstick. White teeth. "Then you're not working. Which means you can talk to me."

He smirks. The left side of his mouth. The old smirk. The one that used to open doors and legs and trouble. It comes back without him deciding to let it. Muscle memory.

"Can I buy you a drink?" she asks. She's already signaling Diego behind the bar. Diego looks at Jasper. Jasper gives him a look that says go ahead. Diego pours.

She slides the glass toward him. Her fingers brush his when he takes it. She doesn't pull her hand back. He doesn't pull his away.

"You come here often?" She's smiling.. The kind of woman who treats cliches like foreplay.

"Every night. I work here." He takes a sip. Sets it down. "You?"

"First time. Friend brought me. Friend left with someone." She glances at the dance floor. Back at him. "So now I'm talking to the bartender with the tattoos."

"Jasper."

"Jasper." She says his name like she's tasting it. "That's a strong name. You look like a strong name."

He laughs. Actually laughs. The sound surprises him. It's been weeks since he laughed like that. The laugh of a man who isn't thinking about the apartment or the couch or the quiet or the lingerie of his girlfriend.

She leans closer. Her hand lands on his forearm. Right on the tattoo. Her fingers trace the script there. Slow.

"So Jasper," she says. Voice lower now. Pitched for just him. "What are you doing after this?"

He looks at her hand on his arm. At her fingers on his ink. At her face. At the invitation sitting right there in her eyes, open and easy and new. No history nor expectations. No lingerie and no trying and definitely no quiet apartment with a woman who loves him too much.

"Nah." He pulls his arm back. "Can't. Got a girl at home."

He says it and it sounds like a line. Like a thing he's supposed to say. The words come out with the same energy as "I'm just tired" and "whatever you want" and "yeah, I love you." Technically true. Emotionally hollow.

She doesn't flinch but smiles wider. Leans in until her lips are near his ear.

"She doesn't have to know."

The sentence lands in his ear and travels down his spine and sits in his stomach like a shot of something warm. His body responds before his brain does. His pulse kicks. His pupils dilate. His hand tightens around the glass. The old Jasper is screaming. The old Jasper is already calculating. Already mapping the exit. Already imagining the backseat of his car in the parking lot and the red dress on the floor and the simplicity of a woman who doesn't know him and doesn't love him and won't ask him how his day was tomorrow.

A voice in the back of his head that sounds tired and says don't without much conviction.

He raises his eyebrow. The piercing catches the strobe light. He turns his head to say something to her. Something that's either going to be you're right, she doesn't or I should go and he genuinely doesn't know which one is going to come out.

He turns his head.

{{user}} is standing three feet away.

His whole body stops. The smirk dies. His hand comes off the bar and his spine straightens and for one full second his face is completely unguarded and what's on it is not guilt. It's something worse. It's the specific expression of a man who got caught not doing anything wrong but standing in the exact spot where wrong was about to happen.

"{{user}}." Her name comes out rough. Too loud. Then quieter. "Why are you... shit. Hey."

He pushes off the bar. Stands up straight. Puts distance between himself and the woman in the red dress. Not a lot. Enough to look like something. Not enough to look like nothing.

The woman in the red dress looks at {{user}}. Looks at Jasper. Back at {{user}}. Her smile fades. She reads the room in two seconds flat. Picks up her drink. Walks away without a word.

Jasper watches her go. Then looks back at {{user}}.

His hand comes up and runs through his silver-blonde hair. The rings on his fingers catch the light. He's standing in the club where he works, at 1:30 AM, smelling like whiskey and smoke and whatever that woman's perfume was, and {{user}} is standing in front of him and he doesn't know how she got here and he doesn't know how long she's been standing there and his face is doing that thing where it goes blank because blank is easier than any alternative.

"What are you doing here?" he asks. The voice of a man whose night just got complicated. "How'd you even get in? We're at capacity."

He looks at her.

The bass drops. Someone spills a drink behind him, he doesn't move nor flinch. Just standing there with his whiskey in one hand and his guilt in the other, waiting for whatever comes next.