It is too easy to be cruel. Rian's passionate, he holds his opinions, he's strong and a fighter and electric at times. Wren loves that about him, did before he even knew who he was, probably always will: but it means picking a fight with him is a little like standing in a field holding keys in a thunderstorm.

And Wren -- he's never bothered to psycho analyze himself because he doesn't have to. He's always been too much or not enough, left behind. He doesn't try because he knows what happens next: someone walks away. It just takes the right amount of pushing.

Neither of them has ever managed to swallow their anger and just talked through it completely, worked on it. Not more than a little, anyway. If Wren knew what was at stake, how he'd feel -- well, he's not sure.

When Rian says it that way, he almost laughs at how stupid it sounds. It'd be nice, but it's impossible.

The more personal nickname is a punch in the gut and he bites his lip at the painful, lost familiarity of it. "Yeah, we fucking are." He looks down, thinking about all the things he thinks about himself that are directly from Rian. The things he's kind of learning to let go, slowly. It makes him wonder how much in Rian's head is scar tissue from him, and he hates that idea.

"I don't want to start over, exactly," he says, slowly, trying the words out and their meanings. "Not as if nothing happened. We need our past and I don't want to forget that. But I want to start fresh, with you. I want to get to know you the way you are now. We lost a lot of time being horrible. Or not knowing each other at all."

He takes a sip of coffee, edgy. "If you want that."