Title: Give me one reason
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,198 words
Content notes: Post-CoE AU
Author notes: Written for Challenge 503 - Second chances
Summary: Jack has to hope that Ianto will give him a second chance to make things right.


Jack could tell that Ianto wasn't completely thrilled to have him here, but he hadn't shut the door on him either. In fact, he'd asked Jack to stay for coffee and that was something.

It still hurt that Ianto had walked out on him – on them – and moved away to London, taking up a job with the one organisation Jack really didn't like dealing with. It felt like a betrayal in so many ways, but then again, hadn't Jack been the one to betray Ianto first? It was all his secrets and his past lives that he'd never shared with Ianto, for what had felt like a very good reason, that had driven him away.

That his past had caught up with him in the most terrible way imaginable stung even more. It was bad enough when John had unearthed his long lost brother Gray, who had wreaked his vengeance on Jack and the city and people he loved. Somehow it was worse revealing the fact that Jack had a secret family – a daughter and a grandson – and that they'd become casualties of Jack's war against keeping the world safe.

If he was cold enough to sacrifice his own grandson, what else was he capable of? Small wonder Ianto couldn't stand to be in the same room with him anymore. Jack was a stranger to him; one with whole other lives that he'd been living in parallel to the one they'd shared. Instead of fighting it, Jack had let him go, convinced that Ianto would come around once he'd had a chance to process it all. He just needed time.

But days became weeks, and weeks became months, and Jack got the very strong sense that Ianto had moved on with his life and that there was no place left for the shadow of the man Jack had become. There was no place for Jack left here on Earth. He'd be better off leaving and never looking back. It might hurt less for a while to be some place else until Ianto Jones was nothing more than a speck in Jack's lengthy black book of broken hearts.

Jack had come by only to say a final goodbye before he did, and now he was trapped between going and that ever so slightly hopeful request to stay for just a little while. Ianto had said that if Jack left it would kill him, but Jack didn't know how much truth there was in those words, having simply repeated them after Jack had said them himself. As much as Jack could have chosen to see him anytime in the past six months, so too could Ianto have come to see him. His actions spoke louder than words.

The coffee Ianto made them was exceptional, or perhaps it just seemed that way after months of nothing. It gave Jack's hands something to do, and his gaze somewhere to avert itself, so that he didn't have to meet Ianto’s gaze the entire time they were awkwardly sat on the plush white leather sofa, a careful two feet of distance between them as they held their mugs in their laps and skirted around tentative conversations about what they'd been doing with themselves without going into much detail. Gone was that easy way they’d always shared space together without running out of things to say. It was easier to talk about Gwen and the baby than it was themselves.

Their stilted conversation stumbled around for a while longer and then fell into an uncomfortable silence. They'd run out of things to say that wouldn't be controversial or inflammatory, neither of them wanting to circle back to the reasons why they'd split in the first place. It felt like dangerously unstable ground to tread. Maybe there really was no way of pulling things back from the brink.

Jack checked his watch and sighed. ‘Ship's gone,’ he finally said. The one he'd planned hitching a ride on to the furthest part of the galaxy he could find at short notice. From there he could hitch a ride elsewhere, even further away, perhaps somewhere where his pain could no longer find him. He had no fixed plans other than running as far away as he could. It was what he’d always done, and he’d been running his whole life.

Ianto nodded at his comment. ‘That's good,’ he said quietly. It wasn't enthusiastic relief but it was something. It said that he wasn’t entirely disappointed that Jack had missed his opportunity to leave for good.

Before Jack could change his mind he leaned across and kissed Ianto. He pulled back only for a moment before kissing again, this time reaching up to cup his cheek as he did so.

The return kiss was there, natural but not needy, still tentatively sounding out its own reasons to reciprocate before Ianto pulled away. ‘I'm not…’ He didn't finish the thought aloud. He stood up from the sofa and began pacing across the deep grey carpet, a bright silhouette against the wide panoramic windows displaying the London nightscape. ‘I should be dead,’ he finally said. ‘I died eight months ago. Hundreds of people died that day. I was one of them. And yet, for some reason, I'm not dead.’ He turned and looked at Jack. ‘Something to do with you. Maybe. I don’t know.’ He started pacing again. ‘I got given a second chance at life.’

Jack squirmed uncomfortably despite the buttery smooth leather. ‘A second chance that doesn't include a second chance for us?’

Ianto shook his head, staring out at the twinkling city lights. ‘I don't know.’ There was a long pause as he reached up to rub his face, looking out into the darkness for answers. ‘Maybe I should have stayed dead. Maybe that would have been easier.’

Jack stood, moving towards him until he was right in front of him, blocking his motions. ‘Not for me. I died that day too, remember? I died because you were gone forever. I didn't want to come back to a world without you in it.’

‘You seem to have managed okay until now.’

The barb hurt more than Jack wanted to admit. He could have come here at any time, whether Ianto was done being repulsed by his actions or not. Instead he’d slunk away like a dog with its tail between its legs, always afraid to show Ianto just how much it had broken him. Perhaps Ianto was right and Jack was just a death sentence for him but he had to believe that wasn't true. He had a second chance to do things differently as well.

Jack rested a hand on Ianto's hip and Ianto's eyes raised to meet his. They looked sad and lonely, like he’d been carrying a weight there that hadn’t lessened with the passage of time. Jack leaned forward and kissed him once more. This time Ianto's lips reciprocated with more force, arms wrapping around him and pulling him in. Jack snaked his own around familiar curves, tightening his grip and deepening the kiss. All he needed was one chance to prove to Ianto that this was where they were both meant to be.