Work Text:
“You shouldn't be in here.”
Kevin startles at the new voice, his head shooting up to find none other than Jean Moreau hovering at the doors to the otherwise empty exy court.
Jean toys with a loose thread on his sleeve, which had gone threadbare long ago. Kevin understand why he hasn't let go of it though, knows its the same reason every single pair of socks he had ever owned is crammed into an overflowing drawer in his own shared dorm room.
He tries to focus on that, rather than the thrum of pain still exuding from his freshly bandaged hand. It's all Kevin has done lately, if he's being honest with himself—as if ignoring it and continuing his drills as he always does at this late hour, even if a bit clumsy now, will turn the past few days into nothing but a horrible dream. Because broken hand or not, what is Kevin Day without exy?
“What are you doing here?” Kevin asks, letting his racquet fall to the floor and carefully composing his expression into something neutral.
He could've sworn everyone else had gone to sleep, that the court had finally cleared of any other Ravens slipping in a midnight practice so he could slowly begin piecing himself back together, one drill at a time.
He's pretty sure Jean, if he'd even realized what was going on, won't tell Riko what he saw, but Kevin immediately turns defensive regardless.
“You shouldn't be here right now,” he adds, when Jean's eyes drift from Kevin to the abandoned racquet.
“Surely you know,” Jean says, ignoring the question, “using your hand while it's mending will only make it worse. Aggravating the injury is practically a guarantee that you will never play again.”
Kevin is relieved when he realizes Jean doesn't know, hadn't stood here long enough to see him clumsily grip the racquet in his right hand and perform drills he could do in his sleep no better than a clumsy toddler. Still, he laughs bitterly. “We both know that's probably going to happen anyway,” he whispers, mostly to himself.
Jean doesn't react. They both know that platitudes and sympathies are useless.
By now, Kevin is sick of crying over it. Now, he's just desperate to gouge a place for himself in exy again, even if it's bad right now and even if it means venturing out beyond the safety of the Ravens and all he's ever known.
Jean doesn't know it yet, but this will be the last time he ever sees Kevin in the Nest. Because now that he knows he can still play, even if it’s crude and sloppy right now, unworthy of a Division I team, Kevin isn’t going to lay down and walk away. It's like the ever present loose thread on Jean's sleeve, persistent and inevitable.
By this time tomorrow, he'll be in South Carolina, swallowing his pride and groveling at the feet of David Wymack for a sliver of a chance. For survival, yes, but also to one day feel alive again and running across an exy court.
And though it means leaving Jean to his own devices here, at the mercy of Riko and all of his inevitable rage, it's a sacrifice that Kevin is willing to make.
Still, the small, hidden, soft part of him that's nestled into a Jean-shaped ball feels a pang of guilt, knowing what he's about to do in mere hours. So he sits down on the bench, beckoning for Jean to join him, and pulls a lone packet of dried seaweed from his bag. It's organic and unsalted, of course, an extra ration given to him as the King's right hand.
Kevin slides it over to Jean without a word. It isn'tmuch, but he knows that when Riko lashes out and inevitably limits Jean's own resources and rations, it'll be everything.
Jean stares at him, confused. Why? his eyes seem to ask, but Kevin only reaches over and squeezes his hand once, briefly, right over the plastic packet.
When he stands up again to pack away his equipment for the last time, Kevin hopes Jean soon understands what it is—his own version of goodbye.