Breakeven

"What you do on your own time's just fine. My imagination's much worse- I just never want to know."

Reese woke up curled up in a Lay-Z-Boy, her neck stiff and her limbs sore. She squinted at the bright light cascading through the large windows of Jon's apartment and sat up slowly. Stretching her arms over her head hoping to rid her body of some of its aches, she glanced around the room, wondering how she never ended up making it to her bed the night before. When she glanced over to see Jonathan sprawled out across the couch, his eyes puffy and his face blotchy, all of the events from the night before suddenly flooded into Reese's mind.

She could still see the look on his face when he walked through the door, she remembered the sound of his voice when he asked her if she was going to say 'I told you so', she remembered the strain in his voice as he explained to her what had happened, and she remembered listening to the muffled whimpers as he finally drifted off to sleep. The night had been one big mess of emotions, one that Reese had so desperately tried to control. She realized soon into the night that just giving Jon the chance to let everything out was much better than her trying to coach him through his feelings. So she allowed him to voice his every emotion, not speaking once and only providing physical comfort in the form of a touch on the hand or arm every so often. And that was all he really needed.

Reese was both physically and emotionally exhausted as she pushed herself to her feet and then padded her way to her bedroom. She grabbed a change of clothes and quickly scurried into the bathroom, careful to not wake Jonathan. The warm water felt good on her skin, loosened her muscles, and eased her tension away. She hoped this would be a new beginning to a less drama free life, but deep down she knew this was only the beginning. She knew things wouldn't get worse, but she also knew they would stay the same for quite some time.

When the water ran cold on her back, Reese shut the shower off and stepped onto the cold tile. She was reaching for her towel when the door flew open, hitting the wall, and causing Reese to stare straight ahead, a deer in the headlights look adorning her face. Standing on the other side of the door was none other than Jonathan Toews, his mouth hung open. Reese stood in her place, shocked, for a few seconds before finally grabbing the towel and covering herself up. Jonathan's cheeks got red with embarrassment long before Reese's did and he began to stutter an awkward apology.

"I'm sorry, I just had to uhm, I had to uh- I really had to pee and I guess I just wasn't thinking about you being in here naked. Not that I was thinking about you naked! But you know, you have a nice body so I'm sure...other guys would love to look at you naked. Not that I was looking! But yeah, uhm...fuck," he let a long stream of air leave his lips before running his fingers through his hair and casting his glance to the ground. "I'm just uh, gonna go...away," he rambled, gutting his thumb over his shoulders and pointing towards the kitchen. He grabbed the doorknob and closed to door slowly, leaning against it when he heard the lock click shut on the other side.

Jonathan lied, he had been looking at Reese standing there in all her glory. It was hard not to really, after all he was a red blooded male and she did have an amazing body. But Jonathan had known her since he was a kid and he tried hard not to think about how droplets of water slowly cascaded down her flat stomach and how amazingly perfect her breasts were. He sat on the counter in the kitchen staring down at the floor, his eyes distant as he thought about Reese. When he finally heard her bare feet padding along the wood floor his head snapped up and he caught sight of her in a lavender v-neck and a pair of black sweat pants. He wouldn't have looked twice at her outfit of choice before this morning, but now he paid extra attention to how good the v-neck made her cleavage look.

"Mornin'," Reese smiled. "How'd you sleep?"

She had felt slightly awkward about her run in with Jonathan this morning, but she didn't let it bother her as much as most would have thought. Reese was comfortable in her skin, and was not at all ashamed of her body in the least bit. She found no problem with being naked and she had been known to strip down and change in front of people she barely knew on more than one occasion. Her body never hit that awkward stage when she was a teenager; it seemingly felt like she just woke up one day with a C-cup. This garnered a lot of attention from pubescent boys, but she never batted an eyelash. Along with a body women would kill for, Reese was also blessed with maturity beyond her years.

"Are you trying to avoid the fact that I just saw your boobs?" Jonathan blurted out. His eyes closed tightly after the words left his lips, and he couldn't help but feel like a complete tool. But once he heard the sound of laughter, his eyes opened again slowly and he looked at Reese oddly. "Why're you...laughing?" He asked her uneasily. He knew the way women were, and this could have very well been a trick.

"Because it's funny!" Reese exclaimed, bending over and letting her cleavage become even more visible. "You walk in on me naked, and now you feel all awkward about it. It's like a movie or some shit! You can laugh Jonny, I know you're not made of stone," she giggled. Jonathan cracked a smile at her and hung his head low, shaking it back and forth.

"You're not normal," he said. Reese smiled up at him and began to bustle around the kitchen, grabbing things for breakfast.

"Do you have practice today?" She asked him, whipping together some eggs to make French toast.

"Yeah, at noon. We have a game at six tomorrow against the Wings," he told her.

"So that means morning skate tomorrow, right?" Reese inquired, glancing up at him shortly before dipping a piece of bread in the egg.

"Yeah," Jonathan nodded. They were quite for a few moments and Jon couldn't help but feel a little nostalgic as he watched Reese cook breakfast and they chatted about his upcoming schedule. "You know," he began. "I hope this doesn't make you feel weird or anything, but this is exactly what Alexis and I did almost every morning I was home."

Reese pursed her lips as she placed a piece of bread on the frying pan. "Well lucky for you I don't like middle aged men," she joked. But Jonathan's stoic expression returned and Reese felt bad for changing his rare good mood. "I'm sorry," she apologized. "I didn't mean to be a douche."

"You're not being a douche," Jonathan sighed. "It's just- you reminded me of yesterday."

"I didn't mean to," she said softly.

"It's fine, I mean- she can do whatever she wants now. And I'm sure she's happy living with Todd, and I'm sure that anything I can imagine them doing is much worse. My mind sort of goes into overdrive when I think about the fact they're already living together," he practically shuddered at the thought.

"Maybe you just have to accept she never felt the same way about you as you did about her," Reese shrugged. "And that's not to say she didn't love you. Because I really think she did," she said, making sure to make eye contact with Jonathan when she said those words. "But maybe she just never pictured spending the rest of her life with you like you pictured spending your's with her. And maybe she feels that way about Todd," she reasoned carefully. "You can't control your feelings Jon. Life would be way too easy that way."

"Why would she stay with me for so long then? Why would she stay with me if she didn't want to marry me?" Jon asked, growing frustrated again.

"You're both only 21," Reese explained. "Most 21 year olds don’t think of getting married. And she did love you Jon, so don't doubt that. But when she met Todd maybe something clicked. And you should be thankful she didn't cheat, and she at least cared enough not to put you through that as well."

"Are you doing that whole biased, unbiased thing again?" Jon asked, cracking a small crooked smile.

"A little, yeah," she admitted with a small giggle.

"Well what would you say if you were being biased?" He prodded.

"I would tell you that Alexis is a complete bitch who needs to be slapped," she smiled widely. "But I was being honest when I talked about how she loved you, and how you loved her. And that she at least has a little bit of a heart to not have cheated on you, although I guess moving in with someone right after you broke up sucks just as badly."

"No, I think you take the cake when it comes to shitty break-ups," Jonathan chuckled.

"Yeah," Reese nodded. "Sean was a dick, huh?" She laughed. "I mean, I can only imagine what he's doing with my slut of an ex-best friend right now. Or if they're even still "together", or fucking, whatever you wanna call it," she rolled her eyes, slicing up a strawberry as she waited for the French toast to fry.

"That's the worst part," Jonathan agreed. "We just need distractions."

"Maybe you should walk in on me naked more often then, how was that for a distraction?" Reese wiggled her eyebrows and Jonathan swallowed loudly. She laughed at his reaction to her words and tossed her rust colored curls into a bun at the nape of her neck. "Alright, settle down and go eat breakfast superstar," she winked, handing him his plate and motioning towards the chairs at the island in the middle of the kitchen.

Jonathan could certainly get used to Reese's French toast. And maybe her distractions as well...