Misfits.

Author's Note: I do not own.

…

…

He can hear her footsteps on the floor of the flat, or maybe he just thinks he can. Still, there isn't any way to explain away the sudden all-encompassing chill that runs up his spine. Like the water turned to liquid nitrogen.

Only it hadn't because distant parts of his body registered that it was near scalding.

He blinks, trying to clear the hazy spots in his vision. The steam that is coming off of the tile and his skin is thicker than it should be. Mixed in with the pounding of water into his face and forehead are scraps of a future that hasn't happened yet, he leans further into the spray and exhales hard out of his nose.

He shuts off the water quickly. The slight squeaking of the handle and then the very pronounced silence afterward give way gradually.

There is the sharp inhale of breath as he turns to step out of the shower, a moment of complete panic as he remembers that the sound doesn't belong to him.

She is awake.

It takes a second of careful thought before he decides that toweling dry and putting on pants are the most acceptable things for him to do. She doesn't know him yet, not the way she will eventually. He has to treat her differently, like glass or a spirit bound in spider-silk and lace.

She has her back turned to him when he comes around the elevator shaft, resolutely giving him as much privacy as she can in this open air and soul-lacking space. He wants to thank her and stare at her and throw open his memories and just tell her that they will be close someday.

He takes a few careful barefoot steps to her, stopping more than an arm's length away. He inhales and feels his body tune into hers, an awareness that goes down to his bone marrow.

She turns around slowly, a complete thirty seconds passes before he spots her nostrils flare just the slightest bit. It registers to him that she had only just began breathing and he cannot help but quip a smile broadly across his face. His heartbeat shutters into being again and he waits, because these first words belong to her.

"It was you."

He cannot tell if she is on the edge of mental breakdown or wrapped up in figuring out the mechanisms responsible for making this moment possible. Grateful awestruck confusion have her breathing shallow pulls of air. It is all he can do not to touch her.

As with everything else he must get the timing exactly perfect, and while he hadn't calculated the specifics of this interaction he knew he must wait a moment more. It would be easier said than done.

He has always been able to read her best. It takes no effort to focus in oh her face and watch the emotions play across it, confusion, joy, fear… everything namable he has ever known… until it settles into something he could never classify.

His expression changes, the smile falling out of his eyes as it is replaced by something battered and loyal. He is grateful, so impossibly grateful at what he finds in her. Because she wouldn't be herself without this quality. It is sparking at him, singing into his nerves as he holds himself in place. Waiting, as he had to, for the right moment.

She has impressively assembled herself, shoulders back and jaw slanted just slightly upward, one foot planted a fraction further back than the other. The look in her eye screamed a soft bravery and an open minded willingness to face whatever was coming head-on.

She was still as beautiful as he remembered, even with these touches of an almost-warrior grace.

He is quiet, stare fixed on her eyes as he waits. There are a hundred million questions in the color of her eyes and he can see them fight each other. He understands that he cannot tell her everything. He does his best to tell himself that one day she will know for herself.

He sees her mouth form his name and though she puts no volume behind it he grasps that she is already trying to connect everything together. Trying to become used to the sight of him. His mind fights the fact that she has just called his name. In another set of moments, a past she has not yet had, he would have closed the space between them and pulled her close.

"Why?"

There is confusion for a bright-hot second, written all over her body, before she settles into a calm. He gives her another smile. It is time to explain.

He steps forward, catching the way she leans backward a fraction, to her it is reflexive. He swallows back the thought that she has rejected him. She exhales hard, watching him with a gaze that switches between molten and icy. His hand rises slowly.

The instant his palm meets skin his eyes flutter closed, he swallows hard against the need to press his other hand to the small of her back. He is still attuned to her body, can still feel her frozen in shock and confusion and blank expansive unknown fear.

She steps forward, a half step. It shakes him, unsettles the repeated mantra that he has been whispering to himself in this lifeless flat for the past few months. He has told himself over and over that she cannot be allowed to see him, he cannot interfere with what they will eventually become.

His unoccupied arm presses into her back, hand sliding almost completely around her to rest over her ribs. She is stretching and curling up into his embrace. His hand moves from her cheek and neck to a spot on the back of her head.

He has never felt so empty. He has never been so out of place and at home as in this moment.

Her head is angled down and he can feel a bit of her spine press into his forearm. She shudders and he feels her breathing against his skin. For a moment they are the simplest versions of themselves. Two people who need contact after going so long without.

Then the moment passes and all is quiet. He is blinking the terrified anxiousness out of his eyes as she learns -instantly and slowly- what it is that makes this him so different. When she hits on it, running her mind over the concept again and again, she flinches.

He knows that she understands. He knows with absolute certainty, and he is aware that she cannot ask him if he loves her. Neither of them have the words to frame those sort of questions, he isn't yet sure he can tell her anything without changing the way things will be. It is complicated.

The lights flicker overhead as she steps out of his arms.

His hands fall to his sides and he lets his eyes rest on the floor. He swallows again and fixes his eyes on the last clock set into the far wall.

When he looks back at her she is all but on fire, unsure and ready, anxious, terrified, scared, battle-ready and willful. He is reminded again, why he did this.

In the corner of his vision a clock counts down rare seconds.