Chapter Text
At first, Jill hadn’t known whether or not it would be a good idea to return to the gym. The gym meant Carlos, and she had planned on avoiding Carlos for the foreseeable future. At least, that was before she took the much needed “mental health day” that Claire had suggested. When she returned home from the mountain trail, she’d felt impossibly lighter, as if the events of the day before hadn’t even happened, or maybe they had and the emotional weight of them simply felt easier to bear.
She had convinced herself to return by promising that she would sign up with Tyrell as her coach for her sessions (possibly session, depending on how awkward it could get with Carlos).
But when Jill pushes through the gym’s front door, and she completes a full sweep of the gigantic room, she doesn’t see Carlos.
Mikhail’s voice startles her. “Looking for Carlos, are we?” He asks, and Jill nearly jumps out of her shoes. She clutches her heart and squeezes her eyes shut for a moment, schooling her features. When she opens them, Mikhail is looking at her with a devilish Slavic grin, one that embarrasses her more than creeps her out.
Jill deflects. “Where’s Tyrell?” She asks, gripping at the hem of her tank top and pulling gently. Gently, because she doesn’t want to flash Mikhail. His grin smooths out slightly, and he points to the close corner to Jill’s right. Sure enough, there Tyrell is, jump-roping with a mix of finesse and pragmatism that Jill is mesmerized by, hands gripping the ends of the rope loosely and surely at the same time. Seconds later, she snaps out of her distraction and walks up to him.
Noticing her out of the corner of his eye, Tyrell immediately stops jump-roping and starts coiling the rope around his palm. She could probably watch that for days, too, if she’s being honest. “You really like that thing, huh?” She asks, shouldering her equipment bag.
“I’ve won a few competitions,” he says offhandedly, and Jill laughs. When he fixes her with a look, she immediately stops.
“Wait, seriously?”
“Boxing conventions,” he elaborates. “Some people like to make dumb contests out of the mundane things… like jump-rope. I always kill that shit.”
The smile returns to Jill’s face. “Well, do forgive me for interrupting you,” she says, dropping her equipment bag on the floor and reaching for the zipper. “But I was kind of excited about getting to punch somebody again.”
“Yeah, it’s been a while since your last session, huh?” She hears Tyrell ask from her crouched position, but something in his tone makes her almost look up and gauge his expression. She avoids the impulse and pulls her gloves out of the bag.
“Too long,” she simply replies.
“Every day you go without boxing is too long, Jill,” Tyrell responds, returning from the equipment rack with two mitts secured over his hands. “Let’s get started.”
Just like last time she had Tyrell for a coach, he works the hell out of her, reminding her of the importance of keeping her hands up as he pelts her with numerous slaps to the face. He doesn’t get too enthusiastic, but she takes enough hits to the point that she feels a slight sting start to develop on her cheek. At one point, she winces at another of his punishing strikes, and Tyrell immediately drops his hands. “You want me to quit that?” He asks, voice level, unlike hers when she finally speaks after taking a deep breath.
“No, it’s fine,” she dismisses, “It’s a good reminder.” Without realizing, she sweeps the gym again for Carlos, in every corner: near Mikhail’s desk, by the punching bags, the maize balls, the ring. She sees nobody aside from a few other trainers leaning against the far wall, shooting the shit. Disappointment rises within her, unbidden and tasting like bile.
“He took his break when your block came up on the schedule,” Tyrell suddenly says, forcing her to turn back to him.
Jill is somewhat disheartened, but also grateful. She had been pondering the possibility of talking it out with Carlos at the gym, but Jill realizes that she wouldn’t feel totally comfortable on his ‘home turf,’ so to speak. If and when they do talk it out, Jill wants it to be on her terms.
Still, Jill can’t keep herself from asking, “Why?” She’s curious what Tyrell will say, whether he will sell out his friend or play coy about it, the latter of which she expects.
“Ain’t it obvious?” He asks instead, making Jill’s eyes widen. “He’s ashamed.”
Ashamed. That single word confirms the thought that Jill had already been harboring: Carlos is not a bad man. The furthest from one, in fact.
“He told you about… what happened?” Jill asks.
“Jill, Carlos would probably tell me the color of his underwear if I asked him. That man cannot keep any secrets.” Tyrell realizes the mistake of his statement nearly the second Jill does, characterized by a slight wince. “At least, he can’t keep any secrets with me.”
The correction sends a twinge of familiar sadness through Jill, the same she felt whenever she could tell that Carlos was lying to her, either by omission or simply a bald-faced one that he gritted out with squinting eyes as if he didn’t want to see her reaction.
“Whatever,” she deflects, putting her hands back up. “I’m gonna punch you in five seconds, you decide if you put your hands up.”
Quickly, Tyrell protects his face, chuckling. “I like your drive.”
The rest of the lesson is a quiet affair, and Jill doesn’t let herself slip once, diligently keeping her hands up and going just as hard as Tyrell does. When time is up, they’re both winded, and they take a moment to lean against the wall by the equipment rack, catching their breath.
“Thanks,” Jill says, gesticulating mildly, “for the lesson. And…” Tyrell turns to her. It’s like he knows what she’s going to say before she says it. The look in his eye almost makes her pause, but eventually she lets out, “for telling me about Carlos.”
“Call it a public service,” he says dismissively. Jill laughs one last time before popping off of the wall and returning to her equipment bag, stuffing her gloves in unceremoniously.
“See ya,” she calls over her shoulder as she walks to the door.
An hour later, when Jill is at home resting with a show on in the background while she lounges on the couch, she remembers what Tyrell said back at the gym.
Ain’t it obvious? He’s ashamed.
Does that make Carlos a coward, or does it make him respectful? Jill weighs the two possibilities. For the part of herself that is of the “coward” persuasion, she thinks, What, he can’t face me after what he did?
But, then again, didn’t Jill do the same thing? She ran. She got the hell out of Dodge before Carlos could have said anything to explain himself.
You are not a bitch for needing some space from a man who just showed how fucking terrifying he can be. Claire’s words, not hers, but they ring true, much like everything else that girl says. Jill can’t start down this avenue again, not after she only just turned off of it.
In terms of the hypothetical — no, obvious — respect that Carlos has for her, Jill has to admit that making sure you aren’t seen by the woman you just scared away is a pretty honorable thing to do. It just seems a bit overboard, much like a lot of other things about Carlos. For example, his enthusiastic flirtations. For another, those goddamn biceps…
Jill shakes away the thought. Focus. She can agree with both viewpoints, but indecision is not an option here. She’s always been a decisive person. Set on what she wanted to do when she grew up. Set on where she wanted to go for college. Set on how old she wanted to live to become. She isn’t quite set on Carlos yet, and that bothers her endlessly. Does she want to give Carlos another chance; that is the million-dollar question.
Jill pretends to forget what both Claire and Tyrell said, and focus on her own thoughts and convictions. Advice from other people can only get you so far, she supposes. When it boils down to it, she still likes him and definitely wants to hear him out. Even if he can’t redeem himself to her, Jill hates when things don’t end properly. She deserves closure — they both do —not the half-ending that they left each other with.
With a sigh, Jill pulls her phone out of the pocket of her sweatpants, and begins drafting a text to Carlos.
Jill:
We should talk.
No, Jill thinks. It’s too demanding. No matter how much she wants to be in control of this situation, she still has some semblance of manners. She deletes the text and tries again.
Jill:
I think we should meet up and talk some things over.
Something still feels ambiguous about the way she phrases it. Jill groans and gets rid of that one too.
Jill:
Hey, can we meet up and talk about what happened?
Jill likes that one; she presses send without a regret. Her eyes widen in surprise when the little bubble on Carlos’s side of the screen pops up instantly. She wants to feel flustered, but is more grateful that he didn’t leave her to stew in her pit of conflicting emotions.
Rocky:
Sure, where?
Jill makes a sad noise when she realizes she never changed his contact name. When she thinks about it, such things are petty, requiring too much energy and a bit too much caring to actually execute. Maybe she had never wanted to give up on Carlos in the first place.
Jill:
You know that park in Glendale?
Rocky:
O’Malley?
Jill:
That’s the one. Can you meet me there tomorrow at 5?
Rocky:
Yeah. I’ll be there, by the ball field
Jill:
See you then.
Carlos’s typing bubble shows up for a few seconds, then disappears into the white nothingness of her phone screen. Jill misses it dearly, half-expecting him to come up with some last-second jab that would make her roll her eyes or scoff a laugh. Nothing of the sort arrives, and something within Jill feels empty.
She supposes she just has to wait until tomorrow.
O’Malley Park, reads the sign that Jill stands in front of, under a decal of a leaf, characteristic of the Raccoon City Parks Department. She looks beyond it into the park itself, lush with tall green trees and thriving shrubbery, asphalt paths cutting through the grass like dark grey snakes. The sun shines bright today, but its effect is weakened by the canopy of green that shields much of its light.
Jill walks through the gate and feels a sense of calm wash over her, not unlike the one she got on the mountain trail. That might have subconsciously been one of the reasons why she picked this spot for their… meeting. God, that sounds so formal, like they’re going to discuss some new piece of information that was just released on a corporate memo. Re: Much needed talk between two confused adults. All employees must attend.
She shakes the thought from her head, her eyes sweeping the park. Carlos said he’d be by the ball field, but not specifically where. She considers getting pissed at him when she does find him, but anger is exhausting, if she’s learned anything recently. Either way, she doesn’t mind a little detective work.
Around a few trees, Jill spots a tall wall of chain-link fence, on the inside of which is a blue tarp. The fence stretches around a large patch of grass, and in the distance she can see a baseball diamond. The ball field. She turns a corner around the fence, and thankfully from there it isn’t too hard to find him.
Jill spots Carlos sitting by one of the benches behind the dugout, hands clasped tightly between his legs, which are spread wide as he leans forward and looks at the ground in front of him. Dressed in a black t-shirt, blue jeans, and those stupid fucking boots, he’s significantly overdressed for the mid-June heat, usually-full hair drooping with what looks like the beginnings of sweat. He looks dormant, mind blank aside from what he came out to do. Jill’s stomach flutters at the sight of him, reminding her of the better times.
She makes her way over and announces her presence by plopping herself down onto the bench next to him. The gesture is a bit comfortable for the circumstances, surprising Carlos as he lifts his head out of his lap and looks at her with a shocked expression. It reminds Jill of a deer in headlights.
“Hi,” she says, her voice level and professional, like she’s in for a job interview.
“Hi,” Carlos replies, his voice gravelly and soft. A familiar rush travels through Jill and makes her leg want to start tapping skittishly on the ground. She keeps from submitting to the urge.
“I’m gonna have to go back a long way to really explain myself, if you have the patience to listen,” is how Carlos starts, without any preamble. Jill appreciates it; she wouldn’t have been able to make small talk.
“Go ahead,” she urges. She digs her butt deeper into the bench and considers crossing her legs over each other. They could be here for a while.
“Okay,” he says, with a heavy exhale. “Well, I was a pretty angry kid.” Kid? Jill thinks. What, is he going to give her his whole life story?
(Does she really have a problem with that, though? All the time they’d been involved with each other, and even before that, she’d felt the urge to learn anything and everything she could about him without prying. Now he’s handing that information up on a silver platter, no uncomfortably digging questions or “red-light-green-light” necessary.)
Jill decides to let him continue.
“When I still lived in Brazil, I was always getting into fights with the kids at school, when they crossed me, or maybe even looked at me wrong.” He pauses, as if wondering how to word something. “Kids used to call me Anderson Silva.”
Jill blanks. “Who?”
“The biggest Brazilian MMA star, probably ever…” he explains, a note of surprise worming its way into his voice, but he shakes his head and continues. “Anyway. My parents eventually made enough money to bring us to the States. But then, for some reason, my dad wanted to stay.” His voice hardens over his next words. “Something about not wanting to lose the spirit of the homeland . Total bullshit, but he wouldn’t budge. My mom was devastated, so she pretty much begged my grandma — her mom — to come with us. It took a lot of convincing, but eventually she agreed, so long as we would be there to help.”
“Do you ever miss your dad?” The question slips from Jill’s lips before she can stop it, and she realizes how dumb it is when he laughs, dry and full of hatred.
“ Hell , no,” Carlos replies, nearly sounding wounded. “He was too much of a pussy to come with us to America, he doesn’t deserve my sympathy. Either that,” he bristles suddenly, “or he was cheating on my mom.”
Jill doesn’t know how to respond to that, so she simply prompts, “Keep going.”
“Right. So, I was 10 when we came to the U.S. I knew a little English, but I had to make up for it with a lot of TV and a little bit of tutoring. My mom was working her ass off to pay for those classes, and I learned enough to get by.
“I never really considered college,” he continues. “The second I graduated high school, which I fought for tooth and nail, pretty much, I went into the workforce. I wanted to take some of the load off my mom’s back, you know?” His voice begins to pick up speed, sounding more and more animated. It gives him a sort of gravitational pull that Jill has to hold onto the side rail of the bench in order to avoid.
“She was all, It’s all right, Carlitos. You don’t need to do that. But I felt like I had to. I took on a bunch of jobs, just so I could see my mom smile when I got my paycheck. I felt amazing, like I was really doing something.
“Something I never told her about was that a lot of the reason I was getting good money was because I was boxing. I found Mick’s gym and fell in love with it. It was my favorite way to vent my anger. One day, Mick comes up to me and he says, ‘You are good fighter. I coach you, you kick ass. Good money.’” Carlos affects a poor imitation of the man’s accent on those words. “And I was hooked. I was damned good, too. And even if I wasn’t, you make money when you lose. Who woulda thought, right? I bought nicer things for my mom and grandma with that money and gave them some reassurance about paying the bills.
“I met a girl… Carmela,” he says the name with a little bit of trouble, like it pains him. A chill runs through Jill’s body at the mention of her, remembering the way the woman nearly spat in Carlos’s face on his and Jill’s first date. It makes sense now. “We were good together. She saw my softer side. I could have loved her, maybe.
“One Mother’s Day, I was driving me and my mom home after we went out for dinner. She was wearing this beautiful red dress that she’d saved up for, and she looked so happy. The restaurant was in a quieter part of town, so there weren’t too many cars on the street.”
From the way he loses some of his steam, looking down at the ground, Jill can tell that this is where it gets bad. She allows him to press on.
“We pulled up to this empty intersection, and when the light turned green, I didn't even bother looking both ways before gunning it. That was all it took.” When Carlos looks up at her, his deep gaze is marked by glassy eyes. He takes a shaky breath.
“Some drunk guy was speeding down the road and hit us full force from the side. My mom’s side. The car was totaled, and my mom was pretty much... dead on impact. And I was fucking peachy compared to her,” his voice cracks there. “Some bruises, a concussion, and a broken heart.”
Jill’s grip on the metal armrest of the bench tightens to the point of her hand sporting a ghostly whiteness. What the fuck, I’m so sorry, she wants to say, but Carlos isn’t done, it seems.
“I let everything go to shit after that. I wanted to fight, sure, but Mick didn’t let me. He saw how fucked up I was. Told me to take some time off. My grandma tried to keep me grounded, but that didn’t work for too long. I started drinking, heavily. I put on a lot of weight.” Jill must blanch at that, because a hint of a smile appears on his face as Carlos says, “Yeah, I know. I’m already huge. But it happened anyway.
“I tried to push Carmela away by acting like a complete asshole. I think you can tell it worked. I drank more and more every day, until one night, I almost got blackout drunk in some bar. They called the cops to escort me home, but when they came, I freaked out. I wouldn’t tell them where I lived, and when they tried to forcibly remove me, I punched one of them in the face. Knocked that fucker out, landed myself in jail. They sentenced me to two years for assault of an officer.”
Holy shit, Jill thinks. Those two words amplify themselves and repeat over and over in her head, flat but frantic, filling up every nook and cranny of her mind.
“My grandma visited every week, and I felt like such an asshole for leaving her. I don’t know how she survived without me… not to sound selfish or anything, it’s just the truth.
“I spent a lot of time feeling sorry for myself, and I would put more critical thought into sneaking a bottle of rum here and there, instead of self-reflection. But then I met Tyrell. He was in there for possession, and had been for a few years.”
Before the gym, Jill remembers.
She must have thought aloud, because Carlos nods and says, “‘Before the gym,’ yeah. Code for ‘prison.’ He basically helped me set myself straight. Put me on a workout regimen, if you can believe that. I started working on myself. I read a few books. T got out a few months before me, and I told him before he left to go check out Mick’s gym. By the time it was my turn to leave, I kind of missed the structure that prison life had.
“But I made it out, and Mick welcomed me with open arms. I couldn’t bring myself to box again, but he offered me a job as a coach. My grandma tore me a new one and then made sure that I basically never left her sight again. I resented it for a little while, but I knew it was good for me. I’ve been working at the gym ever since. I met you five months after I was let out of prison.
“And that’s what I should have told you before we could have gotten any further, Jill. I’m sorry. You deserve better. I just… when I heard what that guy was saying, I couldn’t just stand by, you know? I wasn’t even the target and I was feeling every single word.”
With that, he takes a deep breath, and Jill waits for him to continue, but he doesn’t. He’s simply allowing her to sit in the wake of what could be called a doozy of a confessional. All of the puzzle pieces that had been floating around her head for the past few weeks have now finally fit themselves snugly together, creating an ugly, yet honest picture. Jill tries to remember that she is scared of Carlos, that he is still the one who brutalized the man who catcalled her without so much as a second thought. When the image does come to her mind, though, she can’t see it through the blue and cold filter, brought upon her by fear and emptiness of the heart, but with startling clarity, because now she understands. And that is enough to make Jill forget her fear.
“That wasn’t your call to make,” she finally says, because she doesn’t know how else to accept his apology.
Carlos sighs. “Yeah, I know.”
Jill shrugs, as Carlos turns his gaze to the side. “I mean,” she says, “if I cared a little bit less about keeping myself in check, I can’t say I wouldn’t have done the same.”
His attention snaps back to her just as quickly as it had shifted. “Really?” He asks, surprised.
Jill grins sadly. “Hell, yeah. It’s the worst feeling in the world to be talked to and looked at like that.”
“I can’t imagine, Jill,” Carlos says, his eyes falling to his lap. “I’m sorry.”
Her grin settles into a smile. Why is he apologizing for her grief when it’s clear he suffers under a mountain of his own?
“I know,” she says because she can tell that he isn’t lying, that he’s trying to understand the pain that is actually at the back of the back of her mind in this moment.
Carlos blows air out of the side of his mouth, leaning back against the park bench. “So, I guess you have to go find a new boxing coach, huh?” He asks.
Jill frowns. “What?”
Carlos’s gaze hardens in his own confusion, as if what he just said is a given that she had already accepted. “A new boxing coach,” he repeats, his tone flat, “Since you don’t want to do… this anymore.” He gestures between himself and her.
Jill bites back a laugh. “You make a lot of assumptions, Carlos,” she says, shaking her head.
“What?” He asks dumbly.
Jill takes the opportunity to toy with him. “You think you know things, so you form opinions on those things that aren’t yours to form opinions on—”
Carlos holds up an interrupting hand. “I know what it means, Jill,” he says, sounding tired. “Just… what do you mean? Beyond the literal definition.”
“Tyrell is one hell of a boxing coach, but I never said I didn’t want to do ‘this’ anymore,” Jill explains, gesturing between herself and Carlos in a mockery of his previous gesticulation. He watches, slightly dumbfounded. She takes this as an invitation to continue speaking. “To be honest, watching you beat up that guy was both the scariest…” Carlos winces, “and the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.” Jill surprises herself with her own boldness.
His eyes widen in surprise for an instant, then settle back to normal. “I… don’t know how to take that,” he admits, looking like he wants to laugh but not knowing if it’s appropriate. “Is that supposed to be a backhanded compliment?”
Jill shrugs. “It’s just a statement.”
“So what are you trying to state?”
All or nothing, right? Jill takes a deep breath. “I still like you, Carlos. My mind was clouded for a while because I didn’t know what to think about what happened that day, but now my head is clear. And I still like you…” she notices that familiar glint appearing in his eyes that warns of an imminent joke, and tacks on, “for some reason.”
Carlos huffs a laugh. “‘For some reason.’ I can’t help but agree.”
Jill sighs in slight exasperation. “You’re a good guy, okay?” She implores. “I know you only did what you did because you… care. And that’s enough for me. Just don’t go beating up random people.”
He nods at the second part, but then he scoffs, clearly unable to not put a joking twist on every little thing she says. “Hell,” he begins, and Jill already has an idea of what’s about to come out of his mouth next. “If I’d known you were so easy to please I would have asked you out first.”
That surprises her, because there’s some truth to it. Maybe she really had been “easy to please” this whole time, but didn’t open herself up to the opportunity to find someone who could understand her because she was so focused on matters she considered more pressing. But she can’t tell him that he basically has her figured out. That’s why she smiles faintly when she says, “Shut up.”
“Okay, okay,” Carlos says, putting his hands up in surrender but still smiling, “shutting up.”
Jill looks at him long and hard, which he matches for a second before losing his nerve and looking down at his hands, clasped tightly together in his lap.
“Come here,” she says quietly.
Jill grabs the sides of Carlos’s face, pulls him toward her, and kisses him gently on the lips, a sweet and short thing. She pulls away just as quickly as she swooped in, watching Carlos process.
“Oh,” is the extent of his reaction, but Jill can see the gears turning in his head. His hesitance still amuses her. For such an outwardly bold man, he sure lacks initiative. It’s something Jill finds cute. After all, she’s always liked taking control.
She giggles. “Yeah, oh.”
Carlos seems to regain some semblance of his familiar confidence after a moment. “By the way, I still like you too,” he replies, sounding serious despite how obvious the statement seems to her.
Jill sighs. “I know, dumbass,” she says, the name slipping from her tongue affectionately. “Get back here.”
The second time she kisses him, he’s expecting it.
Epilogue
Something Jill discovers as her relationship with Carlos progresses is that they balance each other out, near-perfectly. When it comes to the more intimate aspects of their relationship, Jill is usually in control. A couple of times, though, she’s egged Carlos on, making digs at his lack of initiative (which piss him off to no end, she’s elated to find out) and as a result been swept off her feet — sometimes literally — by the way he loses his trademark docility for an intense look in his eye and a searing kiss that he plants on her lips to show Jill that, as a matter of fact, she hasn’t seen the half of it.
In turn, Carlos is always the one to remind her to “fucking take it easy for one afternoon, you’re working yourself into the ground and digging you out is never fun.” Indeed, many late nights that Jill spends poring over her work from the precinct are interrupted by Carlos coming out of the bedroom to drag her in with him.
She likes the game that they play on nights like this, which always starts with a shirtless Carlos leaning against the doorframe of her office, arms balancing on the outer edges of said doorframe, and maybe subtly flexing his biceps to put on a show, but Jill is often too flustered at this point to say anything about it. “Come to bed,” he’ll say, in a voice deepened to a seductive baritone by sleep. That’s another thing; Carlos seems to have a sense for these nights, knowing intrinsically that Jill is going to get far fewer than her work-recommended six hours of sleep.
“Okay,” she’ll relent, after raking her eyes hungrily over Carlos’s body. She’ll never get sick of the sight. “Just let me finish reading over this one thing…”
And Carlos will take a step into the office, one huge stride that covers the distance between the door and the edge of Jill’s desk. “Nope, not an option, super-cop.” Then he’ll pause, and amend, “ Or is it super- detective now?”
“Doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it?” She’ll say coyly, batting her eyelashes at him. He’ll smile at that, knowing exactly what she’s doing, and then lean over the desk so that he hovers above, casting a hulking shadow over her paperwork.
“What, you want me to carry you? Because I will carry you. I will drag you,” he says, leaning slightly closer with each word, “kicking,” closer, ”and screaming,” he’s so impossibly close now that Jill can feel the ghost of his lips over hers, “to bed with me.”
And then Jill will pull away, grinning devilishly at the irritation in Carlos’s eyes. He’s learned to temper the extent of his emotions slightly. She’s convinced it’s a latent effect of her proximity to him, the thought of which always makes her heart race.
“I like the thought of you making me scream,” she might say. Or maybe she’ll make a show of putting the paperwork away, bending over her work bag as she stuffs the files back into the pocket. Invariably, Carlos will groan with agitation.
The end result is Jill and Carlos curled up together in bed, her head resting on his broad chest. It’s the soft moments like these, Jill thinks, that make her glad she put herself out there for this particular guy.
Sometimes Carlos has a bad day, where he barely holds back from going apeshit on someone. Sometimes it’s Tyrell, sometimes it’s Mikhail. Jill doesn’t show up as often to the gym for lessons anymore, so the extent of her experience with Carlos in a rage is when he directs his anger at her. Even if he’s so pissed he could fight King Kong, Carlos will try to limit his aggression when she’s around. But eventually, something will set him off, and he’ll either swear loudly or throw something across the room, and she will tell him in a calm, yet forceful voice to Take a walk and come back when you feel better.
He likes his solitude, which is something she learned early on. It’s what helped him think his way through the process of deciding to come clean to Jill; sure, he’d told Tyrell what happened, but apparently never asked him for advice on how to handle the situation.
He’s a smart guy, smarter than most would give him credit for. He can tell when she’s feeling burnout from work and is always prepared with a mug of hot cocoa (or a cold bottle of beer, depending on the season) to hand to her without a word, just a knowing look. He can tell when something really pisses her off and won’t hesitate to reach for her hand, which she grabs greedily and squeezes her frustrations into. Sometimes, she tries to make him wince with her grip on purpose, feeling a twisted sense of satisfaction at the way his face warps with pain that he is quick to hide.
On one memorable occasion, Jill and Carlos are walking down the street together when a man makes a pass at her, the moment fleeting but the effect lasting. They both wince at the same time, and Jill can see Carlos ball his fists up out of the corner of her eye. Jill herself clamps her mouth shut with an iron jaw and reaches for his hand, slowly coaxing Carlos’s fingers away from his palms and snaking her hand into his. She squeezes it gently.
Carlos squeezes back.
She squeezes again, tighter this time, and he does it again, also tighter. They continue to squeeze each other’s hand with increasing intensity until both of them start making quiet grunts of pain or even halting in their step for an instant to temper the sensation. Jill wins their little competition, but she has a sneaking suspicion that Carlos let her. She likes to lord it over him, even for weeks after the incident, at which he smiles sneakily, both of them knowing what had really happened.
Of all the times and places to propose, Carlos does it when they’re watching a nature documentary on Jill’s couch. When he pulls out the box, Jill nearly smacks it out of his hand, thinking it’s some gag. With his ring box-holding hand shaking, Carlos reaches for the remote that rests on the table and presses the pause button. Carlos looks at Jill, who’s starting to tear up.
“I don’t know if you’re the kind of woman who likes speeches,” he begins, smiling widely in a nervous, uncertain kind of way. “So I’m going to keep this short.”
Jill simply stares back at him, sniffling loudly.
“Jill,” Carlos says. He takes a deep breath before continuing, and holy fuck she wants to slap him for dragging it out like this but she also understands that he needs his time. “Will you marry me?”
Even though she was expecting it, the question leaves her utterly floored. Carlos wants to marry her. Her. Jill has no idea how he’s put up with her for these past few years, but she does know that she loves him for it. And isn’t it as simple as that?
“Yes,” Jill says softly, and she laughs breathlessly when Carlos’s smile widens and he pulls her into his lap with little effort.
“Thank God,” he says, and she laughs even harder. “What?”
Jill finishes laughing, and she places a hand on his chest, right over his heart. It’s beating wildly, which makes all of the blood rush to her head. She feels a lump in her throat forming. “I just…” she begins. “I just love you so fucking much. Don’t need to worry about me turning you down.”
In Carlos’s face, she sees a familiar look: hesitance. She knows from that look that he’s hearing what she’s saying, but it’s not completely registering. So she sighs, and leans in to kiss him long, hard, and bruising. His mouth molds comfortably against hers.
When she pulls away, Carlos is grinning proudly, eyes shining, lips heavily swollen. “You,” he says, “have just made me the happiest man alive.”
The funniest part of the whole thing is, after that, they finish the fucking documentary. Jill had been planning on watching it for weeks, thank you very much. Only when the credits roll does she drape herself over Carlos, kissing his neck lazily and forcing him to carry her, koala-style, into the bedroom, where they get into some very wholesome business.
The End