Chapter Text
Jimmy kept his eyes closed, because he was not awake.
Being awake meant facing the day, and the fact that it was his and Tango’s break-up-iversary. He would rather just stay in bed for a little longer, thank you very much, where he was warm and cozy and had no ex-boyfriends who wanted to see him.
I would rather just stay in bed forever, and never get up.
He scrunched his nose at the thought.
Or, well, not “forever”. Just like an hour. Or maybe twenty minutes. I’d get bored pretty quickly. And hungry.
Anyway, he didn’t have anywhere to be until lunch. He’d just gotten laid off again in the most recent downsizing attempt at his most recent job, and his resumeé was as finished as it was going to get, so he could start the job search whenever he wanted.
I’m sick of living as dead weight.
…Sure? That’s why I’m getting another job?
Jimmy agreed with his internal monologue, obviously, kind of, but it was being awfully aggressive. It didn’t feel great to not have a job, seeing as he sort of needed one to pay rent for his apartment, but he’d get one soon enough.
I meant: I’m such a burden on everyone. I should just stop.
Now Jimmy was getting a little confused. A burden on who? It’s not like Grian’s paying for his apartment or anything.
Of course he wouldn’t. I’m such a disappointment.
Ok, Grian has absolutely no legs to stand on. I’ve seen his life choices. If that’s all I was worried about–
Lots of people think you- I’m a disappointment!
Like who?
…lots of people!
So no one?
Ok, well people think I’m annoying!
That’s life. They can deal with it like I deal with them.
I’m just so tired.
Well yeah, I just woke up.
I just want it all to stop.
Want what to stop?
My life.
Hm. Weird. No, I can’t really think of a reason why I would.
Oh blummin’ hell! Just kill yourself already!
“Excuse me?”
The voice went silent. Nope, not getting away with playing innocent-slash-nonexistent after pulling that. Jimmy sat up in his bed, pushing his blankets off to confront this bully in his deeply intimidating stripey blue pajamas.
“I don’t appreciate that! Get out here right now!”
Just when Jimmy began to think he might be being ridiculous shouting at voices in his head, the voice was suddenly outside of his head and by his bedside.
“Alright, fine, I’m not actually you, but hear me out here!”
Jimmy’s not ashamed to admit he yelped.
There was a man standing by his nightstand, who also seemed to be dressed in his pajamas: he was wearing just a toga and sandals (and hopefully something under the toga). Because that wasn’t strange enough, he had a dyed green streak in his short, scruffy brown hair, and two little red horns poking out besides.
“Who– what are you?”
The man froze.
“Uh.” He relaxed into the easy confidence of what was probably going to be a poorly formed lie. “I’m an angel. That’s why I’m so gorgeous and handsome and strong.” The man flexed an arm, drawing attention to his vaguely ancient greek-looking arm straps that could not possibly serve any functional purpose except making his muscles look better. “I’ve got a divine message for you: you should kill yourself right now.”
Jimmy was unimpressed. By the lie, that is: the flex had definitely gotten him ‘impressed’. Unfortunately, even a minute conscious he knew he had to address the red flags first. Specifically, the red horns:
“Uh huh. What’s that in your hair then?”
In a blink, the points were gone.
“Don’t know what you mean.”
“Looked like horns.”
“Don’t think so.”
“I don’t think I remember horns being the angel head-thing.”
The ‘angel’ threw up his hands exasperatedly.
“Ok fine, I’m a demon, you got me. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t listen to me!”
“Doesn’t it?”
“No! You can follow the logic in my words pretty clearly regardless.”
“If you thought that you’d convince me with that angel act, your logic’s not very good!” Jimmy jeered.
“Oh look at me, I have a college degree! How’s your degree looking Jimmy? Useful? Paying off your student loans? Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
“I don’t have a college degree.”
“Wow. What a loser. Imagine.”
“Oi! Do you?”
“Nah, I’m immortal. It’s not like I need to convince an employer I’m educated or trained just to survive.”
“So you have no grasp on the human experience.”
“That’s classist! What about people who are rich enough they don’t need to ever be employed, huh Jimmy? Or what about nepo-babies? Are they not human to you?”
“If you think that comparison’s going to make me like you, I–”
“How’s this for a grasp on the human experience? Your life sucks. If you end it now, you can go chill out in Hell.”
“My life is not anywhere as bad as Hell! That’s kind of the point, isn’t it?”
“Yeah nice try buddy but I was just in your internal monologue. Your life’s pretty much worse than any part of Hell you’d get sent to.” the demon leaned over to be right in front of him, putting an arm on his headboard. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done? Lustful thoughts?”
Well. A half-shirtless man, with an undetermined state of pants, face-to-face with him, with previously mentioned ‘impressive’ muscles also right next to his face, in his bed… it certainly put him in the mind for it:
“...You’re not still in my internal monologue, are you?”
“Nah, I’m right next to you aren’t I? Are you like, blind, too?” The demon popped back up, alerting Jimmy that the heat in his face had actually been body heat and not (just) blushing. “Anyway, I’ve got some tips to make your death painless. Alternatively, I’ve got some ideas to make your death really funny.”
“Woah woah woah! Back up.” red flags first, hotness later, come on! “What part of my life makes you think I’d want to commit suicide ?”
The demon gave him a funny look.
“Are you being serious?”
“Yes!”
The demon jolted in surprise. “Oh! My goodness! Well, uh. I mean. Where to start?” He started counting points off on his fingers. “You can’t hold down a job. Your ex is blatantly still in love with you. Your other ex thinks dating you was an insult to his intelligence. Your old cult keeps finding you. Grian’s still in your old cult. Grian thinks you can’t tell he’s still in your old cult. Your stalker’s still in your friendgroup. Your sister's obnoxiously perfect. Everyone you know bullies you constantly. Grian again, but this time just because of his general personality. Uh. You ruin everything you’re involved with.”
“Excuse me?! ”
“You can’t be that surprised! Your friends tell you like, all the time.”
“My friends are idiots, and I generally don’t rely on anything they say. Especially regarding me. Isn’t there supposed to be an angel here telling me that my life is precious or something?”
“Angels are way too busy with all your messes to worry about ours. Humans are awful. They’d hold you an award ceremony and everything if you knocked one off. Meaning yourself. I’ve seen it happen.”
“That’s not what a funeral is.”
“What, because you suddenly know all about funerals? You’re Mr. Funeral now? Oh speaking of, did you know you can just do whatever with your funeral, and people just have to deal with it? Especially if it’s a suicide. I’m telling you, this is your chance to mess with these people harder than they’ve ever been messed with before”
“Oh my gosh, that’s true actually.” Grian could certainly use some messing with. Maybe if he said in his will that the Watchers were responsible for his death… he could start a whole murder mystery! “I mean I'll definitely just wait, but still.”
“This usually isn’t such a tough pitch. I don’t get why you’re being so difficult about it.”
“You don’t? ”
The demon sighed, then sat down on the bed next to Jimmy.
“Look Jim – can I call you Jim?”
“No.”
“Great. Look Jim, I'm gonna level with you here. Right now, you’re on track to go to Heaven when you die. That may sound nice now, but it’ll probably take, like, 70 years what with your lifestyle and progressing medical technology. That’s 70 more years of this.” he gestured around Jimmy’s studio apartment with an amount of disdain he frankly found unwarranted. “Or… you could pop yourself down to Hell right now and finally catch a break!”
“How could my life be worse than Hell? Isn’t the whole point of Hell that it’s worse than being alive?”
“Usually, yes. Not in your case. You have genuinely the most awful life I’ve ever seen.”
“My life is not that bad! What about like, human trafficking victims?”
“Ok, fine, that’s probably worse, but that’s not really my jurisdiction. I’m usually dealing more with the human traffick-ers.”
“Hold on, why are you dealing with me then?!”
“Convenience. Anyway, the point is: Hell is bad, but your life is terrible. If I pitched your life as a punishment, they’d tell me to chill out. Maybe put me on mental health leave. Especially if your only sin is suicide. Really, if you die now you’re saving yourself from quite possibly sinning a bunch in your life and ending up with an even worse spot than you’d get just for going down now.”
“Isn’t suicide like, a cardinal sin?”
“What do you know, when was the last time you even went to church?”
It didn’t take many required childhood visits to know the catholic church didn’t like suicide. Or was he protestant? Orthodox? He wouldn’t know, he never asked.
“Wait, hold on, what does this mean for non-christian religions? Are all their different afterlives around too? Or is Christianity just like, the only correct one? I don’t think I like that.”
“Ugh, I’ll tell you when we get there.”
“No thanks.”
“Come on. Please?”
“I’m not going to kill myself just because you said please.”
The demon clasped his hands together and gave Jimmy truly pathetic puppy dog eyes.
“Please? What if I begged?” And all of a sudden Jimmy was reminded that this was a very attractive, half-naked man, in his bed– “I mean I’m obviously not going to, but would it have helped?”
Aw. No wait, not ‘aw’, red flags first! It's for the best: begging would probably have been a very effective course of action towards making Jimmy do whatever he wanted (suicide not included). Even in lieu of that, however, Jimmy couldn’t think very clearly and just blurted the first thing that popped into his head.
“You’re shorter than me.”
The demon cut the pleading and scoffed.
“Fine then. We’ll see how you’re feeling after your break-up-iversary lunch with Tango.”
Jimmy dramatically groaned and slid back down into his bed.
His ‘break-up-iversaray’, as Tango insisted on calling it, would come with a lunch date (yes, a date date, with all the boyfriends) because Tango was Tango and saw nothing wrong with that. He meant well, but he just really didn’t seem to grasp that a little romantically-themed get-together with just his ex and his ex’s two boyfriends was absolutely not what he wanted to do today - or any day, for that matter! He would gladly spend time with Impulse and/or Zedaph, but when it was just them and Tango at a moderately nice italian restaurant, it felt a bit like… like a little romantically-themed get-together with his ex and his ex’s two boyfriends, which should probably speak for itself on being awkward and unpleasant.
Especially because, as the demon had pointed out, Tango was quite bad at hiding the fact that he still had feelings for Jimmy.
The demon smirked.
“Gosh, I can’t even imagine. That sounds like Hell. I literally can’t think of anything worse.”
“You are actually from Hell. How can you not think of anything worse? Isn’t that like, your job?”
“Uh, that’s racist. This is my job. I find poor souls in desperate need of a suicide and I give them the little push they need to go live their best life and die. Er. Metaphorically. I can’t actually push them, because then that’s just murder.”
“Sounds like a weird job. What are you allowed to do?”
“It’s not about what I'm allowed to do, it’s just what’s appropriate. If I need to go and mess with your life a bunch before you’ll kill yourself, that’s not really your life being bad, that’s just me being bad. Your life is already bad enough to warrant suicide, if you ask me: I’m doing jack-all to make it worse. All I’m here to do is try to show you the best way forward. I don’t know how I’m gonna convince someone as dense as you though.”
“If this is what you’re calling dense, I’ll take it.”
The demon blinked. “Hold on.”
“Yeah?”
“I just thought of something worse than Tango’s break-up-iversary lunch.”
“What?”
“You’ll see it later!”
In a blink, the demon was gone.
Well. Jimmy’s probably screwed.
Then again, the demon seemed pretty incompetent. So I’ll probably be fine.
Jimmy checked the time to see if he could go back to sleep, but It was already 9 and, as he’d just been so rudely reminded, he had lunch with Tango today.
Still rubbing sleep out of my eyes, and I’ve already made infernal contact.
“Time to seize the day, I guess.”
It’s one o’clock, and Jimmy is arriving perfectly on time, thank you very much.
This is stranger than you might think, seeing as he is not only a very punctual person, but he got up at 9 and left before eleven for goodness sakes.
Unfortunately, just like every time he has to be somewhere (so I guess it’s not that strange after all), everything went wrong: the bus was late, and he had to go back to his flat halfway through the journey anyway when he realized his umbrella was broken, because if it started raining while he was there Tango’s going to insist he borrows his, and then he’ll have to meet back up with him to give the umbrella back, and then Tango will inexplicably treat that occasion like a date and turn it into a romantic and extremely awkward walk in the park with Impulse and Zedaph loudly hiding in the bushes, and then knowing Jimmy's luck it’ll start raining again and he’ll have to borrow Tango’s umbrella again because if he doesn’t he’ll get a crazy cold from the rain and have to take sick days off from whatever brand-new job he has by that point, and then his boss won’t believe he’s actually sick because his voice will clear up just as soon as he goes to make the call, and that’ll just lead to more issues–
The point is, Jimmy doesn’t take chances, and he’s had a lifetime to learn how to balance ridiculous bad luck: that’s why a demonic intervention at nine didn’t stop him from getting to lunch at one.
His phone buzzed in his pocket.
Tango’s probably worried I’ll be late. Jimmy took his phone out automatically, but put it away as soon as he saw the time.
I will be late if I don’t get moving!
He pushed through the door of the kinda-but-not-really fancy restaurant and asked to be seated with the Tek reservation.
“Of course!” The host’s eyes flipped to their screen for the guest information. The wall behind them proudly displayed the name of the restaurant in an unreadable calligraphic font, long enough that Jimmy had to assume it wasn’t just the name of the restaurant. His pondering was interrupted by his actual purpose here as the host looked back up at them.
“Are you Mr. Solidarity or Mr. Pleighs?”
“I’m Solidarity.”
The host nodded, tapped their screen, and looked back up. “And then you would be Mr. Pleighs?”
Jimmy frowned.
“No, I don’t have him with–”
“Yep.”
Jimmy literally jumped. There was a demon – wearing decent clothes this time, thank goodness – right beside him. The host tapped his arrival into the system as if he’d been there the whole time ( had he?) and grabbed two menus.
“Great! Just follow me to the table.”
“Actually, can we have a moment?” Without waiting for an answer, Jimmy grabbed the demon and turned them both around for a sidebar that the host awkwardly pretended they couldn’t hear. “What are you doing here?!”
“I think I’ll be proving a point or two. Now come on, we’re gonna be late.”
The demon started to turn around but Jimmy grabbed him by the shoulder again and turned him back.
“I am going to be on time. You aren’t coming! The reservation’s only for four!”
“Yeah: you, me, Tango, and Tango’s guy. Learn to count.”
“You forgot Tango’s other guy! ”
“What?” Oh my goodness. Jimmy supposed he shouldn’t be that surprised that the demon hadn’t recognized Tango’s polyamorous relationship. At least it gave him some hope that Hell might be full of homophobes too. “Obviously I remembered him. That's why he isn’t here.”
Well there goes that dream. Wait, Zedaph–?!
“I thought you weren’t allowed to do things to people?!” Jimmy glanced back at the host and dropped to a proper whisper. “What did you–?”
“First of all, I do what I want, and second of all, he’s fine.”
“You didn't answer my question! What did you do?! ”
“I just set a little fire, come on Jim. Nothing important burned, but he has to stay back at the labs and double-check everything right now. He’ll get his lunch in an hour or so. Pretty sucky policy, really. Glad I don’t work there. Oh look at the time, we’re only getting later now, gosh Jim. Don't worry about it, I’ll cover for you.” The demon started walking, leaving the host to pick up from where they left off. Or try to anyway, as the demon blew past them and Jimmy scrambled after.
“Oh- sirs! I’ll show you where the table is!”
The demon brushed them off: “It’s ok, I can see them from here.”
The host glanced at their screen, which showed the Tek table as a table in the back, and then at the wall behind their desk that would have prevented any possible sight of that table.
“I– sir?”
The demon didn’t hear them: He was already weaving past tables as Jimmy followed, trying to figure out this situation before they got to the table. Unfortunately, Jimmy immediately got sidetracked.
“What are you wearing ?”
“It’s my human disguise.” It looked like a teenager from 2014 had gotten dressed in the dark, with clothes they also bought in the dark, to go to an emo rock concert. The demon got a giddy smile talking about it. “I haven’t worn this thing in ages.”
“Like ten years, you’d say?”
“Yeah actually. How’d you guess?”
“It’s a bit out of style.”
“And yet it’s always stylish when I’m wearing it.”
“It’s not stylish just because it’s sexy!”
“You think I look sexy?”
“I– uh– no! The outfit!”
“You don’t look so bad yourself.”
Jimmy’s comical weakness to flirting worked in his favour this one time, because in spluttering and looking away he saw they were almost to the table where Tango and Impulse were lost in conversation. Jimmy had a demon to stop.
Still blushing, he stepped in front of the demon and stopped them both.
“Leave.”
“Oh loosen up, Jimmy, it takes two to tango.”
“What does that even mean?”
“It’s a pun.” The demon placed a hand on Jimmy’s shoulder. “It means you’re not going through this alone.”
Jimmy pushed it off. “You are literally here to make things worse!”
The demon smirked. “And there’s nothing you can do about it.”
Jimmy considered the man in front of him. A demon. One that could read minds and go invisible and start probably magic fires. One that had read his thoughts and his memories, and yet somehow thought he was suicidal, that wanted him to be suicidal. One that thought of all things, and of all people, Tango was going to be Jimmy’s final straw.
One that was stupidly, embarrassingly, unbelievably dead wrong.
Jimmy grinned. “Alright then. It takes two to Tango? Let’s dance.”
He spun around and walked the final stretch to the table, raising his hand and his suddenly warm voice:
“Tango! Hey! I hope I’m not–”
Jimmy was interrupted by Tango’s excited shout of “Jimmy!” as he sprung up out of his seat. Tango approached with open arms, but snapped his arms down for an extremely obvious aborted hug the moment before actually reaching him.
“You’re fine, I’m just happy you’re here!” While he spoke, he continued beginning and aborting hugs. Impulse stood up and made encouraging gestures to Tango from behind him, as if Tango could see him and the others couldn’t. “I really appreciate us meeting up like this, I miss you! Not like– I mean– I miss you in a normal way. Not that I don’t– nevermind. Listen, I just texted you but Zed couldn’t make it, so it’s just gonna be us and Impulse, but we’re not cancelling or anything, it’ll just be like any other year."
At this point Tango gave up on the hug and just held a hand out, palm up, like he was a disney prince asking for a dance or a hand in marriage, before quickly deciding that wouldn’t work either and turning it over into a handshake.
Jimmy stepped to the side. “Not quite.”
Tango blinked. “What do you mean?”
The demon took Jimmy’s vacancy and grabbed Tango’s hand for an energetic handshake. “Hi there, nice to meet you, the pleasure’s all yours.”
Tango takes in the sight of the demon, eyes travelling up from the oversized jeans covering his shoes, past his exposed belly button to his spiked choker, before finally his gaze caught in his hair on–
Jimmy stifled a laugh.
Oh my gosh, did he forget to hide his horns again? No wait, are those fake devil horns?
The demon turned out towards Jimmy, dropping Tango’s hand.
“Oh Jim, he’s speechless. I’m flattered.”
“...Jimmy, who’s this?”
“Yeah, go ahead and introduce me, Jim.” said the currently unnamed demon, his voice laced with a grin that made it clear he thought he had a checkmate.
Jimmy smiled angelically. “Of course!” No names, no problem! “Tango, Impulse, this is Smallishbeans. It’s a nickname, because he’s so short.”
Jimmy ruffled the demon’s hair, pushing his horns headband off centre. ‘Smallishbeans’ quickly pushed his hand away and righted it with a scowl.
Tango appraised the other man. “He’s basically my height.”
Jimmy shook his head. “Sure, but Smallishbeans just feels short. He’s got short king energy. Look at him. He’s just… pint-sized.”
Smallishbeans – who was a perfectly respectable 5’7” (170 cm), thank you – was suddenly scrabbling for that checkmate he had a moment ago. “That’s ok Jimmy, you can just give them my real name.”
Impulse cocked his head. “Where does the beans part come from?”
“Oh, it’s actually a really funny story. Once I tell it to you you’re not going to be able to think about anything else every time you say his name all lunch.” Still smiling, Jimmy slowly made eye contact with the demon, thinking of how defensive he’d gotten whenever Jimmy had poked at his pride that morning. “You’ll not be able to take him seriously at all. He’ll be a joke to you.” He turned back to Tango and Impulse. “Do you want to hear it?”
Tango was perfectly oblivious to Smallishbeans’s widening eyes. “Sure!”
The demon jumped in. “Actually, Jim–”
“Yes, Smallishbeans ?”
Last chance, demon.
“Why don’t you just give them my real name?”
Jimmy’s grin sharpened ever so slightly. (As much as it could, at least: his face just wasn’t very good for being threatening.)
That’s not the right answer.
“I think they should hear the story first. So basically, you know how beans make you fart? Well–”
“I’m Joel!”
There it is! Jimmy couldn’t help but do a little victorious arm pump, even if Impulse and Tango had no idea why and looked at him in a way that immediately made him embarrassed.
He tried to pass his sheepishness off as realizing a mistake. “You know, now that I think about it, you really had to be there for that story to be funny.”
“I’m Jimmy’s life coach.” Joel continued.
“Oh?” Tango glanced over at Jimmy like he was about to ask a bunch of clumsy questions about why exactly Jimmy had a life coach, and Jimmy redirected because he didn’t really want Mr. Joel Killyourselfnow to be allowed to enter a conversation about his mental health, actually:
“He just calls himself that. We’re…” Uh. What’s his cover? “friends.”
Joel shrug-nodded vague assent. “Yeah, but it’s also sort of a role I've taken on myself. I’ve been telling him he needs a change in his life. He’s gotta… take a leap, you know?”
Tango nodded sagely. “Absolutely. Take the leap, Jimmy!” he agreed, seemingly oblivious to his own inability to accept change and Joel’s stifled giggles.
Impulse was not quite so blind to Joel’s teasing Tango (as it appeared to an outside observer), and let it show in his tone:
“Why is he here?”
Joel clapped a hand on Tango’s shoulder. “Well, I had to meet the man himself! The Tango!”
Tango’s voice filled with so much hope that Jimmy winced. “Jimmy talks about me?”
Jimmy shut him down. “He’s inferred.”
Impulse was still stumped on the whole ‘surprise guest to a very intimate meet-up’ thing. “Why did you bring him, Jimmy?”
“He insisted.”
“Not to mention,” Joel-oh-so-helpfully added, “the reservation’s for four. Seems a waste to only have three people just because Zed had to cancel.”
“It’s Zedaph.” Impulse corrected, not ready to bestow nickname privileges.
Tango had a slightly distant look: “Wait… sorry, I’m just mathificating… I only just texted you?”
Jimmy checked his phone. There was a text.
“Hey jim just found out zed can’t make it. We’re still on tho”
The text was from two minutes ago. The most recent text before it was confirming the restaurant an hour ago. He looked up at Joel, who answered far too confidently:
“Yeah. You texted him, and then he texted me, and then I got here really fast.”
“He was nearby.” Jimmy added, for the benefit of people with basic reasoning skills and/or engineering degrees (ie; Tango and Impulse).
“I mean,” Joel started, “when I heard about Jim’s situation, I just had to swoop in and help out. Of course, he had to wait for me then to make sure I found the place and everything. Kind of my fault he’s so late, really.”
“It’s your fault he’s…” Impulse checked his watch, “a minute late?”
“Yeah.”
“Huh.”
Joel sat down at the table and scooted to the end of the booth. The others followed, Jimmy sitting on the edge of Joel’s bench and the others taking the other side.
Joel took the initiative on the conversation:
“So. Tango. How’s the wife?”
Impulse and Tango exchanged a look.
“...Is Impulse the wife?”
“You tell me.”
Impulse leaned over to Tango to try and help.
“I think Zed might be the wife? I mean, I'm sitting right here, so he could have just asked me about me.”
Tango shook his head. “But I don’t want it to sound like I'm more committed to one of you than the other. None of us are ‘the wife’, we’re all just ‘the girl’. Or, y’know, boy, but he’s doing like a hetero bit so girl.”
“I won’t be bothered, I’ll know what you mean."
“But he won’t.”
“He will now, we’ve just said it out loud.”
“Should I just talk about both of you?”
Jimmy tried to simplify. “How are you ?”
It only made Tango more confused. “Wait, am I the wife?”
“Sure.” Jimmy and Joel answered at the same time.
“That wouldn’t make any sense.” Impulse shook his head, because apparently this making sense was more important than this being over. Tango clearly agreed:
“Was he talking to you maybe?”
“No he said ‘so, Tango’, so he was definitely talking to you.”
“No I meant when he said ‘how are you’ just now.”
Even Joel had his limits: “The wife is whoever you want it to be.” Tango went to speak, but Joel interrupted him because no he actually doesn’t, I guess. “Not Jimmy though, that’s sort of the whole point of this lunch.”
“Oh. Right.” Tango got that forlorn husband at war look he sometimes did when his relationship with Jimmy was brought up, but snapped out of it given his present context. “Not that I was going to say Jimmy!”
“It’s ok if you were.” Jimmy very much disagreed with that sentiment, Joel, and tried to make that known but unfortunately the demon was focused on Tango (and also doing this on purpose) and so didn’t react. “We’re all friends here, friends can flirt with each other without it being weird.” Joel looked over at Jimmy, his voice and smug expression cracking under the glare he found levelled at him. “Right babe?”
Jimmy’s brain froze slightly, and he had a little buffering moment: “What? Babe?”
“See? Flirt friends. So I guess really you could say Jimmy, if you wanted to.”
The demon’s blasé attitude towards death makes a lot more sense all of a sudden, considering how he clearly doesn’t value his own life.
“This doesn’t feel like doing ‘jack all’, Joel.”
Tango perked up at Jimmy’s voice. “What was that?”
“Nothing.”
“So. Tango.” Joel leaned forward, placing his elbows on the table. “How’s the wife?”
Jimmy looked at Tango and tried to psychically communicate with him:
Don’t. Don’t do it. DO NOT. Stop thinking about it, you’re thinking about it!
Tango had thought about it. “...Jimmy’s amazing, like always.” The Jimmy in question screamed, groaned, and cried internally for a quick moment. “But you probably know that. I’m actually curious about you, Joel. I’ve known Jimmy for years but I’ve never seen you before!”
“Oh yeah, I’m new. We met each other completely randomly.”
Tango and Impulse looked at Jimmy expectantly.
“Uh.” Why me? “He complimented my leather jacket.” Ok, maybe I could’ve done better with that lie.
Joel went with it anyway. “I was wearing one too.”
“Joel asked me where I got it, he said it was very ‘bad boy’– ”
“Very bad boy.” Joel nodded, “And bad boys stick together. Right babe?”
“That’s right babe.”
“So we exchanged numbers right there on the sidewalk.”
“Outside the grocery store, because I was getting groceries, that’s why I was out. Right babe?”
“That’s right babe.”
Jimmy tried to wrap up their scenario before it got suspicious:
“And so I was like: ‘Let’s hang out sometime, babe!’ And he was like–”
“I was absolutely down. I thought he was flirting with me–”
“But I wasn’t.”
“Not yet, right babe?”
“That’s right babe!”
Wait, what? Nevermind, just go with it.
Joel shot him finger guns. “Bad boys call each other babe, that’s why we keep saying that. Right babe?”
“That’s right babe.”
Tango is silent for a second. When he speaks, his voice is fragile.
“...You still have my leather jacket?”
Shoot, right, that’s where he got it from.
“...And when I found out a spot opened at lunch, I just had to meet you!” Joel was more awkward than Jimmy had thought him capable. ”And now here we are. Love the jacket. Looks great on Jimmy.”
“You think so?”
Tango started to get a mushy look in his eyes which Jimmy knew meant it was time to change the conversation:
“Anyway! How’s Zedaph been doing? I feel like I never see him.”
Impulse fielded this one, bless his heart.
“Oh he’s been great, work is work. Another day, another advancement.”
“That’s good.” There was never much they could say about Zedaph’s job that Jimmy would understand.
“He also got a new conditioner and now his hair is fluffier.”
“Oh, that’s nice!” Now that’s more his language!
Tango nodded vehemently.
“It’s amazing. Did you change your hair routine?”
“Uh, nope, same old, same old.”
It looks super soft.” Tango was enraptured, and Jimmy was starting to feel a bit like those people in cartoons who get kidnapped and treated like gods before being sacrificed.
Luckily(?), Joel came to his rescue.
“Must be the lighting, huh babe? Then again, Jimmy’s always adorable.”
Jimmy gasped in mock affront. “Don’t patronize me! I am in turns adorable, pretty, and handsome!”
“Of course babe.” Joel nodded.
“Of course babe.” Tango nodded.
Oh wow, Jimmy thought that maybe he was going to snap. Instead, he forcefully changed the subject for the second (third?) time in as many minutes.
“What’s everyone ordering? I’m starving!”
Tango matched his manic energy, albeit with a different spirit:
“Let’s get pizza!”
Impulse remained calm, flipping through the menu.
“Oh Jimmy, I think you’ll like the carbonara here. That’s what I usually get.”
Jimmy nodded, eager to keep forward and away from the babe incident.
“Yeah, that sounds good.”
Joel put his hand up and quickly got a waiter’s attention. “Don’t worry, I’ll split a pizza with you Tango.”
“Thanks Joel.”
Joel grinned. “No problem.”
Their waiter arrived with a notepad out.
“Hi there! Are we ready to order?”
Joel nodded, straightening his expression. “Yeah, could we have two penne carbonaras and a pizza with anchovy, jalapeño, and pineapple?”
“What size?”
“Extra large, please.”
Tango tried to butt in, “Uh–”
“Don’t worry about it Tango, I’ll pay.”
The waiter was clearly accustomed to this sort of nonsense and nodded along. “Anything to drink?”
Joel looked back to the table. “Guys?”
“I– uh–” Tango was too polite not to answer quickly. “Just water.”
“Ditto, but Joel maybe we should–?”
Jimmy cut Impulse off, because he knew Joel wouldn’t compromise. (And because maybe, possibly, the whole thing was just a little bit funny.)
“I don’t know Joel, what sort of drink do you think I’ll want for this lunch?”
Joel shot him a finger gun of understanding, then turned to the waiter: “We’ll have bourbon.”
“Not what I meant, that’s my bad.” Jimmy was not drinking at 1:00 pm, and composed a polite smile for the waiter. “Vanilla milkshake, please.”
The waiter cheerily m-hm -ed and looked down at their notes. “Ok, that’s two penne carbonaras, an extra large anchovy/jalapeño/pineapple pizza, two waters, and a vanilla milkshake. Is that everything?”
“I–”
Joel cut off whoever was trying to fix it and just grinned at the waiter.
“Sounds right to me.”
Jimmy nodded. “That’s good, thank you.”
“Alright then, we’ll be back with your order soon. Have a great lunch!” the waiter strode away to the kitchen.
After a few seconds, Impulse was the first person to recover.
“...So, Joel, do you day drink a lot or…?”
“Not really, just figured Jimmy could use a stiff drink.”
Tango jumped in with his Jimmy fact of the hour: “Oh, Jimmy doesn’t drink before six o’clock, and not unless everyone else is.”
“Wow!” Joel scooted over and nudged Jimmy with his elbow. “He knows you so well.”
Tango waved away the compliment, blushing. “Well, we were together for well over a year.”
Joel stopped nudging Jimmy, but didn’t bother scooting back to his original distance.
“And you, Jimmy, dumped him ? That’s not the way I would have seen that going. I suppose by the time you’re already dating you’ve gotten past his general patheticness.”
“Oi! First off, I resent that! And second off:” Jimmy made a bit of a face. “You’d think so, but that’s pretty much why Scott broke up with me.”
Tango was not going to stand for this blatant Jimmy slander:
“Jimmy’s not pathetic! He’s just clumsy, and dorky, and not too smart! But he feels like home, like a doormat, and he’s always willing to let people walk all over him. He’s strong for always trying his best, even though he knows it isn’t good enough! And yeah, maybe he doesn’t have a lot of skills, or a clear future, or anything like that, but he’s just so lovable!”
Jimmy, who doesn’t ‘know his best isn’t good enough’, thank you, stared back flatly. “Wow. Thanks. I could say a lot of the same about you.”
“Oh! You’re welcome!”
Impulse sent a glare at Jimmy like ‘don’t be mean to Tango!’, which like if it was so mean then where was the glare when it was about him?!
“Wow.” Joel was beginning to realize that he would have to be pretty sarcastic before Tango would notice. “I can’t believe you let this one get away, Jimmy.”
“Yeah, well.” Jimmy shrugged. “People change, or else you learn more about each other, and sometimes you just have to break up.”
“And why did you two break up?”
“Oh I don’t think we need to–”
Impulse answered. “Jimmy didn’t like that Tango was poly.” This was clearly not appreciated.
“It wasn’t–” Jimmy spluttered, “He can be poly! I don’t mind! I just couldn’t be in an open relationship!”
Tango tried to mediate Impulse’s righteous anger: “If it makes him uncomfortable, we don’t need to talk about it.”
Impulse softened towards Tango, “I think we should, firework, so he can understand what he did wrong.” He turned his glare back to Jimmy. “Tango doesn’t need your permission to be himself.”
“Yeah Jimmy.” Joel chimed.
Jimmy threw up his hands. “I’m just trying to defend myself!”
Impulse scoffed. “Why should you defend yourself? You left Tango because he was poly and you didn’t like it.”
“I’m just not comfortable having a partner who has other partners! It’s just a personal thing! I don’t think this is that weird?!”
Joel gasped. “Now poly people are ‘weird’ ? Jimmy!”
“No! That’s not what I said!”
Tango, hopeless sweetheart that he was, was bothered seeing Jimmy so distressed. “Guys can we just drop it?”
Impulse turned in his seat and gave his full attention to his boyfriend. “Tango, I think it’s important that he recognizes his views and actions for what they are. If you want to stop, we can, I just think that this could really be a teaching moment for him.”
“Thank you.” Tango held out a hand to Impulse. “Can we stop?”
Impulse took it.
“Of course.”
Allowing them their gentle moment, Joel quietly interrogated Jimmy. “He has so much love to give, and you think you should be allowed to keep it all for yourself?”
“I literally broke up with him! How is that keeping him to myself?!”
“Jimmy!” Impulse snapped, moment ruined. “You’re making Tango uncomfortable!”
“Joel started it!”
The demon rolled his eyes. “If your friends jumped off of a bridge, would you?” He blinked. “Wait actually, would you?”
Impulse ignored him. “I don’t want excuses Jimmy.”
Jimmy only mouthed why me?? instead of saying it, having learnt his lesson for now.
“Thank you honey.” Tango squeezed Impulse’s hand
Impulse squeezed back. “Of course honey.”
There was an awkward silence that got significantly more awkward when Impulse and Tango stopped staring into each other's eyes and faced back to the others.
After a minute, Jimmy tried to start speaking, but Impulse glared at him.
Jimmy shrugged sharply and waved his hands like “I literally wasn’t going to bring it back up!”
Tango gave Impulse a look for cutting Jimmy off unfairly.
Impulse glanced between Tango and Jimmy like ‘What? I didn’t do anything.’ and ‘You snitch.’ respectively.
Jimmy gesticulated back something to the effect of “How is this my fault? You started it, and Tango’s sitting right next to you! There was no way he would’ve missed it no matter what I did!”
Joel shook his head like ‘tsk tsk tsk, it’s always Jimmy.’
Jimmy shot a ‘don’t you start, hellspawn ’ glare at Joel, which was met with a ‘aw, you don’t mean it’ expression that somehow caused Jimmy to melt into a ‘yeah, I guess I don’t’ face.
Tango and Impulse each raised an eyebrow and exchanged ‘did you see that?’ looks.
Jimmy raised his own eyebrow to send over a ‘Did you see what?’ when he was suddenly cut off by an enormous pizza gliding onto the table.
“Alright, here’s your food!”
“Whew. That was fast.”
“I always forget how great the service is here.” Impulse had forgotten his anger in favour of trying to maneuver his little bread plate so that the pizza would fit on the table. He ended up putting it in the corner of the table before the waiter took it and replaced it with a much larger bowl of spaghetti carbonara that required a slight amount of negotiation across the table to figure out the placement of. Then came the not-tiny-enough plates for sharing the pizza, which Impulse tried and failed to deny the entire time it was being carefully placed on the rim of his spaghetti bowl.
His glass of water managed to fit, but Jimmy had to hold his tall vanilla milkshake with two straws in his hands. Joel’s drink, however…
Jimmy raised his free hand to try (and fail) to get the departing waiter’s attention:
“Oh, I think we also ordered a bourbon?”
“No we didn’t.” Joel corrected him, “You cancelled it, remember?”
“No?”
“I said ‘we’ll have bourbon’ and then you said ‘no: milkshake’. Singular. This is our milkshake.”
“Oh no!” Tango was truly concerned, bless his heart: “We have to get your drink, Joel!”
“It’s ok, I’ll just share with Jimmy.”
The Jimmy in question brought his milkshake arm across his body and held it away from Joel. “You will not.”
“Fine, then Tango can share with you and I’ll take his water.”
“Oh, ok!” Tango chirped.
“No! We’re across the table from each other, we can’t share the milkshake!”
“Just pass it around!”
“No!”
Tango perked down, an action Jimmy only knew was possible because he’d seen it from Tango before. “Do you not want to share your milkshake with me?”
Impulse gave a look to Jimmy like ‘stop being mean to my boyfriend just because he’s your ex’.
Jimmy gave a counter glare regarding exactly who he thought was making the ex-boyfriend-ness an issue, and snapped to the table at large “I don’t want to share my milkshake with anyone! It’s my milkshake!”
Joel placed a hand over his probably-not-actually-a-heart in fake hurt. “But I don’t have a drink!”
“Do you even need to drink?”
“Of course I do, it’s a basic human need.”
Tango raised a hand. “I’ll just flag down a waiter.”
Jimmy looked at Joel and got the sinking feeling that if he got the chance to order a drink he’d use it to start a fire. (Joel’s puppy dog eyes did not enter the equation at all. Or maybe they did. Look, just because they couldn’t make him kill himself didn’t mean they were terrible.)
“No, it’s fine.” Jimmy brought his milkshake back to the space between them. “I’ll share my milkshake with Joel.”
Before he’d even finished speaking, Joel was taking a sip from the glass in Jimmy’s hands.
“Ah, that’s the good stuff. Thanks Jim, you’re a life saver.”
“Can I have a sip?” Impulse asked. “I’ve never had the milkshakes here.”
“No!” Joel pulled Jimmy’s hand over so he could comfortably wrap his arms protectively around the glass. “It’s my milkshake now, and I’ve already got one parasite on it!”
Tango meekly brought up a hand. “...Could I have a sip?”
Jimmy spoke before Joel could get started.
“A small one.”
Joel released his arms from their protective stance. “What?!”
“Well– I can’t tell him no on his break-up-iversary, can I?”
“Uh, literally the whole point of this lunch is you telling Tango no.”
“Oi! Don’t remind him!”
“He’s reminded now.” Impulse’s stern “dad tone” cut through their bickering. “I hope you’re happy.”
“No no it’s,” Tango sniffled, “It’s ok.”
“Oh, Tango…”
“That was ridiculously fast.” Joel whispered. “Is he actually crying?”
Jimmy and Impulse fired caustic looks at Joel before quickly moving back to the yes, Joel, actually crying man, who tried to take Joel’s side.
“I’m sorry guys. I’m making this weird. It’s just a milkshake.”
Jimmy gently shook his head. “No, no, you don’t need to apologize.”
Impulse nodded, scooting closer to Tango and leaning in for a hug. “Yeah, buddy, it’s perfectly natural to get nostalgic on days like this.”
“Yeah.” Joel had had a quick emotional turn around that Jimmy was beginning to associate with poorly devised schemes. “Let’s take a moment to think about the good old days. What was your guys’ relationship like?” And there it was. Wow, so subtle. If Jimmy wasn’t trying to be a good friend to Tango right then, he would’ve rolled his eyes.
Tango, as usual, didn’t notice anything off. “It was beautiful. I treasured every day. I could have spent forever in his arms.”
Everyone looked at Jimmy.
“Uh.” What do you want me to say?? “Yeah. It was good.”
Impulse smiled wistfully, his mind full of memories sparked by Jimmy’s ‘heartfelt’ comment.
“I was only dating Tango at the tail end of it, but he always lit up like an adorable little firecracker after a date with Jimmy.”
Tango's voice cracked. “I miss it every day. I wish we could go back.”
Everyone looked at Jimmy again.
“Um. It was nice.”
A single, tiny sob came out of Tango. “He was my little golden ray of sunshine.”
“Hold on, where did little come from?” Jimmy did a little mental checkup to make sure that yes, he was still the tallest–
“Not the time, Jim, honestly.”
Tango continued as if uninterrupted, “You know, we used to say we were going to move to a ranch together.”
“I remember.” The ranch thing was pretty cute and romantic, even if a bit impractical.
“Come on Tango, what do you really want to say?” Joel was really very bad at sounding empathetic, still coming across more bro-y in the moment than compassionate.
“Jimmy…”
Tango was sobbing like he was remembering his dead wife, except the wife in question was his ex sitting across from him and they were never married. He looked at Joel like he was waiting for a queue. Joel was happy to provide:
“Just let it all out.”
Tango nodded and moved into action, pulling out his phone and sending a message. After a few long moments of waiting, Be My Baby by the Ronettes started playing on the restaurant speakers. The host peeked out from behind their wall and sent a cheery thumbs up to Tango.
Oh. This is what we’re doing.
Tango took a breath and straightened his posture, despite his tears, as if he was about to sing, despite his tears, when Impulse put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head. They leaned in together and quickly whispered about ‘something something Zed’s harmony, something something crying, something something static electricity something something kangaroo ’ and yep, that was definitely a karaoke version of the song, but the plan had changed: Tango only nodded, slid out of the booth, and took a knee.
“Jimmy!” and oh gosh he was loud when he cried, loud enough that people turned to look at them, saw a man on one knee, started whispering and gasping. “I need to ask you something.” Already, some people were filming. One of them was Impulse. One of them was Joel, and Jimmy didn’t even know he had a phone. “Will you–” Tango’s voice cracked, and he had to stop. For once in Jimmy’s life, he wished the room was more homophobic, because as it was not a single person thought this was anything less than adorable. Tango took one final breath in to control his shaking voice:
“Will you be my boyfriend again?”
“So what happened to not saying no to him on his break-up-iversary, Jimmy?”
“So what happened to doing jack-all, Joel ?”
Jimmy and Joel were standing under the front awning of the restaurant to avoid the drizzle. It had started up lightly just when they stepped outside.
Joel shrugged obnoxiously. “I only brought out what was already there. It’s just potential energy babe, no wonder you never got a degree.”
“Everything just ‘brings out what’s already there’! You don’t make a bomb and say it was just the ‘potential energy’ in the… in the whatever stuff you made the bomb from!”
“Gunpowder and sand, although really Jim, you shouldn’t be shouting about bombs in public.”
Jimmy huffed.
“I’m just saying, you were quite mean in there. I shouldn't've expected a demon to have manners, but I’d hoped.”
“C’mon, I thought Tango was meaner: ‘He tries his best, even though it’s never good enough’? Priceless. I’m definitely using that one on the job.”
“What?” Jimmy shook his head. “No, not to mean me, mean to Tango! You kept making fun of him!”
“I’d be more worried about yourself. If that’s how Tango feels now, he’s going to be miserable later. Awkward… I’d probably just hop off now. There’s still time to plan your epic prank funeral.”
“Oh get off your high horse, you act like he doesn't do it every time.”
“WHAT?”
“Didn’t you know that? You rooted through my memories and stuff.”
“I only got vague impressions! I didn’t look through your whole life, the bits I got were enough to give you a go! This happens every year? ”
“More like every month.”
“Oh my gosh, kill yourself right now!”
“Oi! Stop that, we’re in public. You’ll trigger someone.”
“How has Impulse not dropped him yet?”
“Tango’s very loving and attentive towards his boyfriends, it’s just… harder to notice when I’m involved. He’s really sweet actually. I love the guy - platonically - but he just sort of boils over in a bad way whenever we’re alone enough. His boyfriends don’t count, because they’re actively supporting him: they want him to be happy, and that happiness unfortunately includes me.”
“Wouldn’t they be better off helping him move on, seeing as you’re so obviously not interested?”
“Despite the degrees between them, none of them are really very smart. At least not with stuff like this. It’d probably make more sense to you if Zedaph was there and you could see the looney-toons schemes they get up to over this. I think it’s a sort of date activity for them, planning ways for Tango to get me back. Good for them, honestly.”
“No! Not good for them! Tell them to stop!”
“I don’t want to mess up their fun. It doesn’t bother me all that much.”
“Were you even at that lunch? Did you see yourself? Are you stupid?”
“No!” Joel gave him a skeptical look. “Ok, it bothers me when they go all out, in public, but when they’re just messing around or doing a quick bit it can be fun. Up until I have to reject Tango, that is. Although now that I think of it, this was probably the best Tango-break-up-iversary I’ve ever been to.”
“WHAT?!”
“Your trying to wingman was really only about on par with what I usually get at these things with Zedaph there, not to mention without him they couldn’t do their musical number or whatever they had planned. Your pushing got him to the point faster. They had you there as a nice convenient distraction. And, even if you were a bit mean about it at times,” Jimmy gave a short glare at Joel, then dropped it for a shy smile. “it was nice having someone there who could recognize how absurd the whole thing is. So I guess you can consider this mission failed. You lost.”
“Ha ha nice try, but I’m actually immune to losing. Like, I can’t really lose because as long as you’re alive you can still kill yourself. So take that.”
“You’ll be sticking around then?” Jimmy was not excited about that, no siree. (Or maybe he was. Look, it’s not every day he meets someone who he doesn’t need to worry about being overly sharp with or not understanding. Joel is just evil: there’s no “he means well” to get him out of it, no “he’s having a rough time of it”, and no “he doesn’t know any better” that he cares about, there’s just Joel being evil. And fun. And attractive. And talking right now, pay attention– )
“Goodness no, I’m not going to just follow you around all day every day, that’d be so boring. I think I will come back though.”
“What, are you going to come for all my breakups?”
“Well, I mean, we’ll see how long it takes. I still don’t think you’ll last that long. I usually try to come at people’s darkest moments, but like. How am I supposed to bloody know when you’re going to be sad. So yeah, anniversaries are pretty handy.”
“I’ll be seeing you on Scott-iversarry then?”
“When is that?”
“Two weeks.”
“That close? That’s rough.”
“Not really. Scott doesn’t really care about the day, so it’ll just be like any other work day. If I have a job by then. Where do you want to meet?”
The demon just stared at him silently. Feeling judged, Jimmy addressed it after a few seconds:
“What?”
“You’ve got no problem with the suicide demon sticking around? Maybe I can work with your self-preservation skills.”
Jimmy scoffed. “I’m not ordering an exorcism, I can barely survive as it is. And on that note, you got me out of paying for lunch today. So. Where do you want to meet?”
“I’ll find you with my amazing demonic omniscience.”
“Ok.” Jimmy was getting a grasp on what superlatives meant coming from this man. “And assuming I’m not at my address, which you already know, that ‘demonic omniscience’ will still find me?”
While he waited for a response, Jimmy got out his umbrella. It was one of those tiny ones with the contractable handle, so he could just keep it on him in case he was ambushed by bad luck/English rain without having to lug around a full-sized one and look crazy.
When he looked back over, Joel had not gotten any better at being caught in a lie since that morning:
“...Yes. Totally. I would never forget that mortals have lives outside of my existence. That’s ridiculous. Why would you even think that? I’m not stupid.”
(Really, it was strange that Joel was so obvious a liar because he’d been pretty smooth lying to Tango at lunch. Maybe Jimmy was just hard to lie to? Or maybe Joel didn’t try as hard when it was just them seeing as Jimmy already knew he was a demon. It would explain why he went so red sometimes: maybe he was slightly reverting to a more demonic form?)
“Uh huh. Well, if that doesn’t work out you can just look me up.” Jimmy tried to pull open his umbrella, but it got stuck. He kept wrestling with it as he spoke. “The first social media account that shows up should be the one where I put my work address.”
“You publicly share your workplace’s address?”
“Yeah? Isn’t that normal?”
Joel has no idea if it’s normal, but either way the respect he had for the skills of Jimmy’s various stalkers just went up like a poof of smoke.
“...nothing. Thanks. Even though I could totally find you with magic.”
Jimmy rolled his eyes and smiled. “Right.”
He got back to his feeble umbrella fiddling, and Joel grumbled.
“Oh just give it to me–” Joel snatched the umbrella and yanked at it. Something definitely broke, but at least the umbrella opened.
That was probably the end of that umbrella’s life anyway.
“Oh! Thanks.”
Joel handed the umbrella back to Jimmy.
“I, uh. See you in two weeks.”
There’s that red in his face again. Maybe he had to use some demonic strength just now?
Jimmy beamed. “Bye babe!”
Joel went even redder, presumably in preparation for his dimensional journey. “See ya babe.”
Just then, Impulse rushed out of the restaurant, and after a moment of looking around made eye contact with Jimmy. Uh oh, he can’t be happy after that.
“Thank goodness you’re still here! I have some words for you… two…” He trailed off.
“What is it?”
“Where’s Joel?”
Jimmy looked around him. Yup, still a magic demon from actual hell. He shrugged back at Impulse.
“He left.”
Impulse blinked, surprised. “Well, when you see him, could you tell him not to be so antagonistic? I know Tango’s your ex and he was probably feeling threatened, but that doesn’t mean he can act like that.”
“I already told him off. His behavior was absolutely unacceptable in there.”
“Great.”
Impulse returned to the restaurant to comfort Tango and presumably to deal with any wooing props and materials that they didn’t get the chance to use today.
Jimmy stepped out from the awning, holding his tiny umbrella above his head.
Well. It’s only lunch, but it already feels safe to say that that right there was a weird day.
Jimmy only got a few steps away from the restaurant before he processed Impulse’s words.
“...Why would Joel feel threatened?”