[A/N]: I tried something, what do you think?
The cool New York air stung Jay's face as he walked away from Ben and Alicia's apartment building, his footsteps loud on the empty sidewalk. He jammed his hands into his jacket pockets, but it didn't stop the shaking that had started when he slammed their door.
'What the hell is wrong with me?'
The question wouldn't leave him alone. Why had he yelled at her? Alicia was blind, for Christ's sake. She'd welcomed him into her home and he'd screamed at her like some kind of animal. And Ben... shit, Ben had been ready to give up his cure just to keep Jay safe.
He stopped walking and just breathed for a second. The memory of Alicia jerking back when he raised his voice made him want to punch something. She couldn't even see his face—just heard pure anger directed at her for no reason.
Friends. That's what Ben had called him. Said that's what friends do—stick up for each other, put each other first.
Jay had never had a friend like that. Hell, he wasn't even sure what that looked like—he was too busy staying ahead of everyone, figuring out what they wanted before they asked. People in his life always needed something from him: fix this, heal that, solve their problems. With the Morlocks, S.H.I.E.L.D., the X-Men—he was the guy who could handle things. That's how he'd set it up, because at least then he knew the score.
But Ben had looked him in the eye and said he'd rather stay a monster forever than risk losing Jay. And Jay had thrown that back in his face like the ungrateful bastard he was.
His phone buzzed, cutting through his self-recrimination.
"Bobby," he answered without checking the caller ID.
"Where are you?"
No hello, just straight to business. That was Bobby.
Jay stopped at a corner, watching people walk by like they had their shit together. "Dealing with something. Why?"
"We need to talk about Masque."
'Here we go.' Right. Because this shit wasn't complicated enough already. "I'll get to it." He sounded defensive and hated it.
"No, you won't." Bobby's voice got that edge that meant the conversation was over. "Where are you?"
Jay knew better than to argue when Bobby used that tone. "Washington Square Park."
"Good. Don't move."
"Bobby, I don't need—"
"Yeah, you do. Twenty minutes."
The line went dead. Jay stared at his phone for a moment, mind already racing through possibilities. Bobby never moved that fast unless something was seriously wrong.
Twenty minutes later Bobby showed up carrying a stack of pizza boxes like he was feeding an army.
"What's this?" Jay stared at him. After everything today—Masque getting grabbed, two people dead, him losing it on the only people who gave a damn—Bobby brings pizza?
"Fuel." Bobby set the boxes on a bench. "When's the last time you ate?"
Jay opened his mouth, then closed it. He honestly couldn't remember.
"Right." Bobby opened the top box. Perfect pizza, pepperoni and mushrooms. "Max made this one."
"Max?" Jay took a bite without thinking. 'Holy shit, this is good.'
"Kid's works nights encrypting and securing our communications, sends money home, still finds time to perfect his pizza recipe." Bobby sat down, watching Jay eat. "You know what the difference is between him and you?"
"He's not a screw-up?"
"He's busy as hell but he doesn't look like he's about to snap." Bobby leaned back. "When's the last time you did something because you wanted to? Not because someone needed it from you."
The question hit like a slap. 'What do I want?' When was the last time he'd even thought about that?
"I..." Jay set down the pizza. "I don't know."
"That's the problem." Bobby's voice got gentler. "Remember when we started the network? You said you were tired of being trapped at that hospital job."
"Yeah, I remember." The pizza suddenly tasted like nothing. "But I wasn't trapped by the job. I was trapped by needing to be needed. By knowing exactly what my value was."
"And now?"
Jay looked around the park—families playing, couples walking, people just existing without calculating their next move. "Now I'm in a bigger cage. Fancier bars, same prison."
'Metropolitan General Jay, Miracle Healer Jay, Strategic Asset Jay. Different titles, same trap.'
"Same cage," he said out loud. "Just convinced myself it was freedom."
Bobby nodded. "There it is."
"Everyone who tries to care about me..." Jay's voice cracked. "Ben, you, Alicia—you're all caring about a lie. Maria, Linda, Max, Tom—you're all caring about this person I pretend to be when I need something."
Bobby was quiet for a long moment, then leaned back against the bench. "You think that's what I'm doing right now? You think I brought pizza because I need something from you?"
The question stopped him cold. 'Am I calculating this too? Right now?'
"I..." Jay looked at Bobby—really looked at him. His friend had dropped everything, brought food, sat here listening to him fall apart. "No. You're just... here."
"Right. And you know what? Maria, Linda, Max, Tom—we're not idiots, Jay. We weren't born yesterday." Bobby's voice got more serious. "We knew you needed something from us when you showed up at that shelter. Hell, life taught us that everyone wants something. That's how we ended up homeless in the first place—trusting people who took everything and gave nothing back."
Jay felt his stomach drop. 'They knew. Of course they knew.'
"But then you gave us something we'd never seen before," Bobby continued. "A real miracle. Healing that actually worked. Treatment for people the system had thrown away. Powers that made us more than we ever thought we could be. And we figured, okay, we'll get used if it means our friends and families get the medical care they need and the abilities to protect ourselves and each other. Fair trade, right?"
"Bobby, I—"
"Let me finish." Bobby held up a hand. "But then we realized something. You were just a guy too scared to do good deeds and call them good. You had to package everything in transactions and mutual benefit because you couldn't handle people thinking you were actually decent."
'Scared. Shit, that's exactly what this is.'
"Of course, we know you're doing it for real reasons," Bobby said with a slight smile. "Nobody's purely selfless—well, maybe Captain America, but that guy's not human. But here's what you don't get; we follow you not just because of the miracles and the abilities you gave us, though that's part of it. We follow you because you've got a good heart and you keep trying to find ways for everyone to win."
Jay stared at him, feeling something crack open in his chest. "You... you knew? This whole time?"
"Kid, you think we're stupid? You think we didn't notice how you always made sure everyone got something out of every deal? How you'd exhausted yourself giving us powers that would make us targets alongside you? How you'd spend hours figuring out how to help someone without making them feel like charity cases?" Bobby shook his head. "You gave Maria tracking abilities and then worried for three hours about whether the physical changes would make her self-conscious. You gave Max encryption powers and immediately started planning how to keep him safe from government surveillance." "You're not half as good a manipulator as you think you are. You're just too scared to admit you're a decent person."
The words hit Jay like a physical blow. He sat there, pizza forgotten, staring at Bobby as everything he thought he knew about himself crumbled.
'They saw through it. All of it. And they stayed anyway.'
"You..." His voice came out rough, barely a whisper. "You all knew I was using you, and you stayed?"
"We stayed because you weren't really using us," Bobby said gently. "You were just too scared to believe anyone would stick around for Jay without all the calculations and careful benefits. So you built this whole elaborate system where everyone wins because you couldn't trust that people might just like you."
Jay felt tears sting his eyes. 'All this time, I thought I was so clever. So careful. And they saw right through me and chose to care anyway.'
"I don't understand," he said, his voice breaking. "If you knew, why didn't you say anything? Why let me keep pretending?"
"Because you needed the pretense," Bobby replied simply. "You needed to believe you were in control, that everything was transactional. But we were watching you, kid. We saw how you'd sit up all night after giving us those abilities and making sure we were all safe. How you'd check on Maria when she was working to keep track of every S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and teching medicine to Linda to make most of her diagnostic powers. How you'd find ways to get Tom's medications covered without him knowing it came from you?"
'They saw all of that?'
"Those weren't transactions, Jay. Those were just you caring about people and being too stubborn to admit it."
"You know what living looks like?" Bobby asked.
"What?"
"It's when you wake up excited about something. Doesn't matter what—Max gets excited about pizza dough and testing his encryption abilities. Maria gets excited about tracking down landlords who try to cheat our people. Some people get excited about stupid TV shows or arguing about sports." Bobby grinned. "It's about doing things because they make you feel alive, not because someone needs you to do them."
'When was the last time I felt excited about anything except for getting new powers or making my plans work? When was the last time I did something just for me?'
"I can't remember the last time I felt excited," Jay said quietly.
"Then that's where you start."
Jay took another bite of Max's pizza, really tasting it this time. 'The kid made this because he loves making it. Not to prove anything or get something back.'
"Thank you," Jay said suddenly. "For coming here. For the pizza. For... this."
Bobby started to respond, but Jay held up his hand.
"And I'm going to try not to figure out how to pay you back for it."
Bobby's grin was worth everything. "Now you're getting it."
"Don't go all therapist on me," Bobby added, standing and brushing crumbs off his jacket. "You still overthink everything. Maybe try talking to someone who isn't wrapped up in all this hero stuff. Go on a date. Meet someone normal."
Despite everything—Masque still missing, the guilt over screaming at Ben and Alicia, this whole identity crisis—Jay laughed. Actually laughed. 'When was the last time I did that?'
"There we go," Bobby said. "That's the sound I was looking for. Though knowing you, you'll probably turn dating into some kind of strategic operation."
"Probably," Jay admitted, and it felt honest instead of shameful.
"Bobby?" Jay called as his friend walked away.
"Yeah?"
"Next time Max makes pizza, save me a dozen of them. I want to eat it when I'm not having a breakdown."
Bobby's laughter carried across the square. Jay's thoughts were quieter now. 'I still have to deal with Masque. Still have to face Ben and Alicia after that disaster. Still have to figure out how to be a person instead of just a collection of useful abilities.'
But maybe that was what freedom actually looked like: not having all the answers, but being willing to figure them out as you go.
[A/N]: I write across multiple fandoms. Support my writing and get early access to 20+ chapters, exclusive content, and bonus material at my P@treon - Max-Striker.