Ramone 'Nomad' Torres and Jesse 'Superstar' Costa

The frustration was hard to look at on Jesse’s face. Being a hero wasn’t easy especially when they all seemed to fall out of grace.
That old saying, “Never meet your heroes,” just seemed to apt for this time and place.

“I know it’s hard.” Ramone says and for the first time Jesse sees something other than confidence in him. There’s pain that has lingered for years in those amber eyes, the way his mouth twists into a frown, how his eyes narrow, there’s anger too and on him it seems more genuine and natural rather than amiss.

“People just keep showing you their worst sides. They keep failing you. They won’t protect you even when they know what’s going on is wrong.”

He slaps a hand on Jesse’s back.

“But that’s why we’re here. We’ve got to try.” His voice urges almost desperate. He wanted to it to be true, to be right, to be better than them, “We know it’s terrible out there so we have to try and be better for those that get left in the lurch like us. It’s why I decided to make this team. I want to change things. And I can’t do it alone.”

Ramone shakes his head looking so much more tired, so much more worn down, and unlike himself.

“I can’t do this without you.”

Jesse had come to enjoy the walks home he took with Ramone after a long day. They were back in their civvies, a bit sorer than how they started in the day, a lot more worn, and infinitely more tired than they started. But as the day wounds down he had come to look forward to these walks. He didn’t even care that they had started to take the long way home even though his body ached and protested.

“Alright then…What’s your favorite song?” Ramone asks. A smirk on his lips and this funny little look in his eye. It was almost the same spark he got while out in the field or in the middle of a fight. It was funny little look that Jesse had grown to enjoy.

“My favorite song?”

“Yeah.” Ramone said

“Ummmm.” Jesse waves his hand around having bet caught off guard as he thinks and as they walk down the street.

“It can be anything you like. I won’t make fun of you, promise.”

“Um, Dion. Only You Know? There’s this cover of it I like by Turner.”

“Perfect.”

“That’s…it? That’s all you want to know?” Jesse asked as he lingered at the doorway to his apartment. his hand on the doorway, one foot in and the rest of out and lingering so that he could keep on talking to Ramone

Ramone flashes a grin.
“Yeah.” He says as if it really was as simple as that.

—-

As Jesse walks into his apartment the lights are turned off, he had only been out for a second to grab Ramone’s scarf like he had asked, tonight Jesse hadn’t expected much, just a casual night with his friend, but as he walked further into his apartment he heard shuffling and hushed voices, and soon enough the familiar strumming of a guitar, and…was that singing?

The words melodically traveled through the air as he walked into his living room and there sitting on the couch illuminated by candles was Ramone with his old guitar, the one he said he rarely picked up anymore, singing:

I wanna see something
That used to be in your eyes again
I’m waitin’ to see it
You know it’s only a question of when

“Holy shit.” Jesse can’t help that the words tumble from his mouth, surprise and laughter and happiness mingling within him all at once as heh eld a hand up to cover his mouth, but his eyes said it all. No one had ever done something like this for him before.

Ramone’s eyes glance up to him, a smile on his lips as he sees him and his eyes brighten up seeing the look on his face.

‘Cause I know how much I’m missin’ heaven
You know that it’s missin’

And only you know where you have been to
Only you know what you have been through
But there’s better things you’re gonna get into
And I wanna be there too

And as the song ends the lights flip on and a chorus of “Happy Birthday” is yelled out as his friends and family pop out from their hiding places amongst the living room and the kitchen.

His father hugs him, his friends, and the cake it brought out with the candles lit and as “Happy birthday” sung to him he blows out the candles. Though there’s no wish in his mind he can’t help but keep his eyes on Ramone and think, ‘He remembered’.

  ————