Re: Robert/Thomas
TJ shook his head. "Dad did a little hunting. It's what was done, you know. So, he dragged us along, put rifles in our hands. But, while I could fish, hunting was never my thing. Only thing I've ever pointed at a person was a paintball gun when Travis took us out for practice. I can hit him and Doug just fine with paint. I can shoot a paper target to his satisfaction. But, no, nothing alive with live ammo."
"I seem to have antagonized her well enough without even trying." TJ snorted softly. And then he'd been forced to help her deliver her baby, thereby creating the one eighty that had resulted in his even being there that afternoon. Sighing, he finished he beer. "There isn't a word for...this-" he waved his hand absently at the room in general. "Family...that's complicated. Friends? Most people here won't appreciate my definition of friends and the one who would is the one I'm learning to use a different definition with. There's been no team, no squadron, no...anything like this. Even our concepts of 'private party' aren't really the same." A private party for their family just meant one in which it was only family and colleagues. There was no such thing as someplace you could let yourself be seen without the masks.
Not even 'home'.
"It's not about trust." He winced slightly when Callen's hand fell on his bruised knee, then shook his head. "Not that much. The whole country knows almost everything I've done. People whose names and faces I'll never know possess intimate details of everything from my drug habits to the exact day I lost my virginity. Or some version of it. There really isn't any reason not to talk about it. I fucked up. A lot. Doug was the one who fixed the fuck ups with the spin." Not that TJ couldn't lie, cheat, or connive to get what he wanted. He had. Often. But, there was very little worth the effort of such tactics here. What he'd done with his life? The world knew that story. How he felt about it, what he thought of himself? That was his to dole out as it was earned.
Asking for help? That would require trust.
"I might need it," he admitted. "But, I might also need to do some things on my own. Someone wants to come pull me up the mountain, if I get stuck again? Feel free. That kind of help is more than welcome. Some of the rest? Help isn't always as helpful as one might think." And that was the problem in trying to communicate with Savannah. They disagreed on what kind of help he needed.