Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Underneath the blue cover of a Santa Barbara bus stop, a man sits, huddled. Cold rain pours out of dark gray skies, deafening noise like bullets to his soul. The normally busy streets are abandoned, the absence of taxis and fruit stands and people he’s lied to amplifies the painful tightness in his chest.

He shakes, incapable of crying even now. 

His carefully manipulating charm and perfect mask of happiness mean nothing when he’s alone. No, the only thing left is himself, his own base code that’s raw and delicate and falling apart with every modification to the outside shell.

It’s not a part worth keeping.

He’s always been too good at lying to others, to himself, but now his truths are laid bare like spliced wires. He’s never good enough. He’ll never be good enough.

There’s nothing he can do to change that unwavering fact.

Pictures flash through his mind, the grainy quality he uses to detach himself from reality fading into disturbingly clear visions of death. Deep red blood stains, sightless rolling eyes, the slow leak of oil onto wood from broken lanterns. The dark cloud of hatred hanging over every body they find.

He wasn’t good enough. He’s never been good enough.

When will his lies finally drive everyone away? When will they learn that he can’t change? When will they leave him for dead, like he deserves?

His fingers dig deep inside his wrist, useless pressure never satisfying. He’s broken, always has been. What makes a human but for pain?

The rain grows louder, matching the dark paths he falls down within his own mind. It reverberates around the street, and it echoes in his head. There is no other noise.

He could leave them first, before they leave him. Travel the world again, seeking a place that doesn’t leave ashes in his throat, a place without his endless lies. Find a new life, new friends, new people to trap in his web of lies.

It won’t be enough. Nothing is ever good enough for him. 

Why can’t he just keep his head down? Why does he have to be so selfish? Why must these careful manipulations fall off his tongue with ease?

His chest aches with the hatred he holds for himself; dirty and ugly and completely deserving. Try as hard as he can, he can’t escape himself. The world would be better with him not in it.

He hopes it’s quiet when he’s dead.

Chapter Text

He’s called in for another case before he gets a chance to try. 

He hasn’t gotten far enough to figure out how he would die. All he knows is that he’s made his peace with dying, since the call when he was shot. It’s been a long couple of months since then. 

That night, Shawn’s not sure he would’ve minded dying if it weren’t for the case remaining open. He was fully aware of what he was walking into, alone without even Gus by his side. Of course he had to go and piss off the guy with a gun. It’s all he could do. But was his will to live already gone?

Gus is already at the police station, having gotten the call while still at his apartment. Shawn’s been staying at the Psych office, when he’s not at the bus stop that never seems to have anyone else there. It’s kind of eerie, actually, that he’s never seen anyone else there at the same time as him. No cars either.

Whatever. What does he care? He’s going to be gone soon anyway.

He pulls up to the department on his motorcycle, noticing as he dismounts that he forgot his helmet. That doesn’t matter either.

Forcefully adding a bounce into his step, he stretches a grin on his face. It’s so easy to pretend to be happy; why is it so hard to actually be?

The others are already waiting for him when he pushes open the door to the Chief’s office. Looks like it’s just the detectives and Psych again. All the seats are taken, so he hovers over Gus’s shoulder.

Shawn notices the picture in the file as soon as the Chief starts talking. It’s a body, generic white dude with no visible wounds—and the bus stop. The one he never sees anyone else at, much less any buses.

“There was a death last night, in downtown Santa Barbara. There are no visible wounds, no witnesses, and no identification.We’re assuming that this is a murder and not a natural death because of the nature of the surrounding area. Many shady businesses, gang shelters. We’re bringing in you two to find information regarding this man and his murder,” they direct at the Psych duo. 

Shawn’s a little too distracted by one key detail to answer—he was there last night. And he never saw the man. 

“We’ll assist as you need,” Gus answers, glancing up at Shawn in concern when he doesn’t reply first.

“Good. Detective Lassiter has the details of the scene; you’re dismissed.”

They file out slowly. Is it just his imagination or is everyone looking at him? 

A month ago, he would’ve made some stupid joke or reference about getting there faster or solving the crime before the detectives, leading to Gus rolling his eyes before Lassiter can respond or Shawn can annoy them further. But he’s just too tired to conjure up more bullshit to convince them he’s fine. 

They don’t need him. He won’t be around much longer to bother them.

And then, he can rest in peace.

Chapter Text

“Alright, so the dead guy was found sitting on a bench when a resident called it in,” Lassiter tells the other three, navigating streets Shawn is used to walking. They’re piled in the detective’s car instead of taking two, for some reason that he can’t quite remember. “Chief seems to think it was murder, but personally, I think it could’ve been perfectly natural causes. Guy wanders down to get some air, leaves his wallet at home, has a heart attack and boom. Case solved.”

There’s a noticeable silence after he finishes speaking, one that he would normally break with his usual absurdity, but instead he keeps quiet. Gus and Juliet turn in their seats to frown at him in sync.

“Shawn, are you okay?” Jules asks. 

He forces a grin back on his face—when had he stopped? He couldn’t remember—and replies, “Just peachy!” Maybe the fake cheer will get them to stop looking at him like that . 

Like he was someone to be pitied.

“Oookay,” she acquiesces, sharing a worried glance with Gus. He ignores them.

“We’re here,” Lassiter announces.

They clamber out of the car, the noise of car doors slamming echoing in his ears. He stands limply outside of the car, forgetting what to do next, before Gus’ nudge to his shoulder gets him walking again, to the yellow crime scene covering the bus stop.

Every day there’s a tragedy, a new death, another gruesome crime to solve. It paints his dreams with blood.

The body is familiar, but in the way of a song playing on the radio. He can’t place the face, the clothes, the dead man sitting on the bus stop bench and leaning into the glass surrounding it. He’s on the opposite side of the one he always sits on.

He feels as though he should know him.

“—awn. Shawn!” 

He startles back into life, glancing at Jules in bewilderment. 

“I asked if the spirits are giving you anything,” she repeats, gently.

The spirits. There are no spirits. Another lie, the longest he’s ever kept, in a line of thousands, told to different people across the world before they find out the truth about him. When will they find out? When will he have to leave again, to seek out a new place to lie?

“Sorry,” he says instead of his thoughts. “I didn’t sleep last night.”

It’s true, technically. But not the reason for his spaciness.

“I uh… It’s true that there is no blood, but the spirits are telling me to look for something more internal. Poison.”

“Yeah, we need to get the body to the morgue and do an autopsy,” Lassiter says. “The spirits got anything else?”

Shawn doesn’t notice the surprising lack of sarcasm, too busy examining the man’s features.

“I know him.”

Chapter Text

“What do you mean you know him?” Jules asks. “Can you give us his name?”

White-painted wood, scratched familiarly in grooves he could trace. Smudged glass, carrying the prints of a hundred. Ridged green plastic, cracked in the corner and dripping water. He could almost taste the rain.

A glimpse of a man—grainy, unreal. The memory is just out of reach.

“No.”

“Great,” Lassiter bemoans quietly.

“Listen, maybe you guys should just do the autopsy, and we’ll come back when you have results. I need to reconvene with my partner,” Gus cuts in, shooting Shawn an intense look. 

“That’s a good idea,” Juliet agrees. “And—” she calls over Gus to whisper something in his ear. He doesn’t have the energy to try and overhear.

Walking back over, Gus gently grabs him by the arm and starts down the sidewalk. This bus stop is within walking distance of the Psych office, of course; it’s part of the reason Shawn chose it.

So maybe if he finally found the courage to do it, he wouldn’t be left long.

Gus stops walking, and Shawn stumbles over his own feet. He looks at his partner, stretching out a smile to ask what’s going on. 

“What’s going on with you,” he hisses, checking behind him to confirm their distance from the detectives. “You’ve been acting off for days now. Ever since that case—oh no. Are you having doubts about this job? I knew this would happen, I knew it, I knew it—”

“Gus, please,” Shawn cuts in. Still smiling. “This job is perfect for me. You know that. The risks, the detecting, the triumphs over a certain detective.” The lying, the manipulation, the danger he always ends up putting the people he loves in.

“Yeah, I know that. But do you?”

“What?”

Gus sighs. “Shawn. It’s obvious that something’s bothering you. Can you let me help? I want to help. So does Juliet, and although he won’t admit it, even Lassiter. So let us help. What are you going through?”

No one can know. No one would understand.

“Nothing!” he insists. It’s too loud, too defensive. “Nothing. I’m just a little shaken up, so what? It’s not everyday you get shot on the job.” 

Gus inhales sharply, and Shawn hates the look on his face. He’s said too much. 

“Look, I get that you’re trying to help me, I really do. I’ve just been feeling a little down. There’s nothing you can do. I just need to sort my shit out, and then I can rest in peace.”

“Rest in peace? Like dying?!” Gus whisper-yells.

“No!” he immediately denies, lying right through his teeth. Like always. “Like resting. Relaxing. Y’know.”

Shawn needs to get Gus away from this subject, to distract him. He can’t be healed, he’s a waste of health.

“Let’s get back to the case,” he insists. 

The memories of yesterday night are cloudy, inconsistent. He can’t remember his eyes, his mannerisms, any details at all. He can barely tell it’s real. For all he knows, he could be the murderer. Wouldn’t that be fitting? He spends all his days lying to everyone in his life, manipulating them to trust him, and his perfect memory, of which he relies on so often, fails him while he’s the only person who witnessed the life leave this man’s eyes. Of course, they don’t know that he was there at all. Why would they? He’d have to tell the truth for them to know. 

Fuck. He doesn’t want to be this way.

“They have to do the autopsy first, Shawn,” Gus reminds him. “Unless you figured something out?”

He can tell that his partner is curious to know why he said he ‘knows’ the dead man. It’s in the careful phrasing of statements, the darting eye contact, the slight raise of his eyebrows and the fidgeting of his fingers. He knows these mannerisms like the sands inside his hand, the way he will never know pain. It requires no thought—just an immediate, cold analysis. 

Instead of answering, he turns and continues down the sidewalk. He’s walked this path many times, able to stare at the gray ground and avoid every obstacle. It’s unfamiliar by daylight, sun bouncing off metal and color flooding his vision. He can hear birds, people talking, a car passes them on the street. Fruit stands, conversations, green and orange and blues and browns everywhere he looks. Every living scene feels like an illusion, something he can see but not touch, not be a part of. 

Gus hurries along after him, clearly thinking up a new strategy to get him to talk. He doesn’t even feel annoyed, oppressive indifference taking up all of his emotional space. 

They reach the Psych office without talking. Shawn briefly remembers that his motorcycle is at the station, but doesn’t care to mention it. It doesn’t matter.

A heavy sigh behind him. Gus is still standing in the office foyer, Shawn having sat thoughtlessly in the chair facing away.

“Are you gonna tell me how you knew that man?” he asks finally. 

Months ago, he would’ve grinned, delighted in his partner’s predictability. Now, he silently stares at the trim on the wall. It’s weird how something can be so familiar yet become alien once it’s truly looked at. The paint is chipped, from when he crashed his rolling chair into the wall. The memory is vibrant, but it doesn’t feel like him.

“Guess I don’t,” is his answer. 

“Then why would you say you know him!” Gus yells more than asks, infuriated.

He’s so tired. He lets his head tilt, resting more on the cushions. “‘s familiar.”

“What? You’re mumbling.” Gus comes to stand directly in front of him. Shawn can’t move his eyes away from the trim. 

“He’s familiar. Swear I’ve seen ‘im.” 

He doesn’t say that he must have seen the man while at the bus stop. He can’t remember enough of the encounter to prove to himself that they did meet there, if they did at all. And Gus doesn’t need to know that his memory is failing him. 

“...Okay.” Gus looks at him a couple moments more, before sitting at his desk to call someone. Calling Juliet, probably. Shawn can’t even bother to listen in. 

Eventually, he leaves, going to his apartment. Shawn’s apartment hasn’t been visited in over a week. He’s probably late on rent.

He falls asleep in the chair, lights on, heart heavy, a strange wetness in his eyes.

Chapter Text

Shawn wakes before the sun, the day still dark and cold. The sky outside is beginning to lighten, slowly, but it won’t start to warm for hours. 

There’s salt on his fingers when he rubs at his eyes. He always remembers his dreams. But not even the feeling of sadness stays with him this time. He just feels empty.

Another day of pretending to be happy, for Gus’ sake. It’s getting harder to fake the bounce in his step, the lightness in his voice. He almost doesn’t care what will happen when his partner catches on. He just needs to get it over with.

The case though, this one he wants to solve. There’s gaps in his mind, ones that surely would be normal in the average person’s but not to him. Not with his memory. Why can’t he remember this man?

And yet he does, in the certain way you do when seeing a classmate you can’t name at the store. Recognizable, but not in a way that can be tangentially explained. He needs to solve this case, just to satisfy the mystery for himself. No case has been interesting for a while, going about the movements without a real thought towards them. They had been easy. 

Painless.

Shawn wonders sometimes, if not feeling pain will make his death easier. Would he still be able to feel his organs shutting down? His heart failing? The life leaving his body, finally, in entirety?

Standing up, he stumbles towards the small kitchen. The Psych office is bathed in deep blue light of dusk, the furnishings strange and unfamiliar compared to the sun of day. 

He stands there blankly for a moment, then gives up on the concept of eating and sits down. The last time he ate was yesterday morning, when Gus handed him a muffin. He doesn’t really get hungry anymore. It had tasted like ash.

The sun begins rising after some time of staring into space, not thinking particularly about anything at all. The orange and pink highlights change Santa Barbara from a lonely, dark town into a vibrant one, full of life. But Shawn is still, left behind with the darkness.

Daylight is streaming in, making yet another perfect day, when Gus walks by the window. He fumbles with keys for a second, before realizing it’s unlocked. He enters cautiously, and relaxes once he sees Shawn sitting at the table. 

“What did I tell you about locking the doors—wait, are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday?”

Shawn blinks, struggling to move into his typical persona. “...Maybe?”

“You totally are. Oh my God, Shawn did you sleep here? You know that’s terrible for your joints, this better have been a one-time thing!”

He, of course, does not tell him that he’s been doing it every night for weeks and this time he just forgot to change clothes before Gus arrived at the office. Wait… doesn’t he usually get here later?

“Why’re you here… So early?”

“Oh! Juliet called, told me the autopsy was finished. She wants us there pretty soon. They tried to get a hold of you, but the call didn’t go through…?”

Shawn glances at his phone, uncharged on the desk. He couldn’t be bothered to look for the charger, missing as it always was. Too much energy required. 

“Yeah, battery died. Dunno where the charger is.”

Gus sighs in exasperation. “It’s where I put it last time, Shawn. On the reception desk. C’mon, it’s in plain view!”

“My bad,” he replies half-heartedly. He plugs the phone in, then follows his partner out the door.

“Wait!” Gus stops him. “Grab your helmet—then you can grab your motorcycle.” He does so, then sits harshly in the car.

Throughout the drive, Gus tries to engage him in conversation. How was your night, what do you think the results are, do you need coffee, are you okay? Shawn answers with mumbles and shrugs. Not used to his best friend being quiet, Gus gives up and just glances at him periodically. 

Coming to a stop at the station, Shawn blinks himself awake and stumbles out of the car. This morning, he’s been so out of it that it feels the world itself is trying to drag him down. He’s so clumsy, so heavy. The unfamiliarity of the world has applied itself to his own body.

On the way in, he places the helmet on his bike’s handlebars.

Lassiter and Juliet meet them just inside the building, clearly waiting for them. The Junior Detective gives him a worried look, and Shawn tries to respond with a smile. It must look off, though, because she just looks sad.

Gus makes small talk, Shawn staying in the back. For some reason, today he just can’t fake the smile.

They file into the coroner’s office. The new coroner is there, Woody, and so far he’s seemed fun if morally gray. He greets them enthusiastically. The words flow right over Shawn’s head, like if he was underwater. 

The body is laid out under a sheet. Woody moves it off, and gestures at the dead man while talking. Lassiter responds, annoyed. None of the words register in his mind.

“—Shawn. Shawn!” 

“What?” he asks loosely, looking back at Gus. 

“You weren’t paying any attention. Woody said that the autopsy revealed excessive sertraline—a kind of antidepressant. Basically, he thinks he overdosed on Zoloft.”

“No idea why the chief would have us investigate this,” Lassiter cuts in. “He was on antidepressants, they didn’t work, he offed himself. Case closed.”

“Well, we don’t know any of that for sure,” Juliet points out. “They might not be his at all—this could still be a murder attempt.”

“I agree with Juliet. Shawn, what do you think?” Gus asks him.

Shawn stares down at the uncovered body. His face is so familiar, yet he can’t place a single moment they ever met. He’s pale in death. Undeniably a corpse. Shawn can’t picture him alive.

“It was suicide.”

All four turn to stare at him. It’s not the answer they expected, that’s for sure. He almost feels bad for ruining his image—always confident that something deeper was going on. Then again, he always said that because he was right.

He wouldn’t be, this time.

“Why do you say that?” Gus questions.

Shawn shrugs. “Just a feeling.” Gus gives him a narrow-eyed look, like he’s disappointed. He knows what his partner wants of him.

He doesn’t really want to do his usual song and dance. But he will, if only to keep up appearances.

First, he points at the marks on the man’s legs. “These scars here are from self-harm. They’re angled from the direction of where he would reach from his right hand, and way too thin and neat to occur naturally.”

“I thought those were stretch marks,” Woody said, looking more carefully at the body. 

“I guess they could be, but they’re not in the right area.” He points to the man’s messy brown hair. “His hair hasn’t been thoroughly washed in a long time. It’s sort of greasy but dry at the same time. Depression makes it hard to do simple tasks—like washing your hair. Also, his shirt is clearly dirty, there’s pit and dirt stains here and here.” 

He points at the spots with his words, then moves to gesture at the man’s arms. “All down his arms, there’s little scars and marks.”

“Sunspots?” Juliet guesses.

“No. Combined with his fingernails—” he lifts up a hand to show the red under the nails “—He’s been picking at his skin. Why? Well, it’s a pretty subtle way to hurt yourself by scratching an itch.” He drops the hand.

“That’s all. Oh—and the eyebags.”

Juliet and Woody just stare at him. Gus is still frowning for some reason. Lassiter looks at him like he’s become a completely different person. 

“How did you know all that?” Lassiter asks. He sounds suspicious.

All of a sudden, Shawn realizes that he explained everything to them the way it makes sense in his own brain. As in, without any spirits or magic or interpretive dancing.

Shit. No wonder Gus is worried. He’s going to blow their cover.

“Ah, I just realized I have an appointment soon. I’ll catch up with you later, feel free to do all the paperwork without me,” he says lamely. 

Then he bolts. 

He puts his helmet on in the parking lot and starts his motorcycle from muscle memory, speeding all the way to the Psych office.

Chapter Text

Shawn falls into the armchair with a loud exhale, door unlocked and motorcycle parked haphazardly outside. 

His head has cleared. The world outside is a little sharper, a little less painful. As much as he hadn’t wanted to explain all the clues the dead man’s body had given him, it had been the first real emotion he had felt in weeks. 

He loves talking to people. He knows this, really, but somehow in his isolation he had forgotten. Being confident, finding clues, these are things he’s comfortable in. Solving cases was his livelihood—how had he forgotten?

But he knows the real reason he’s been avoiding the station and his partner. 

It’s the reason why right now, he should be panicking. Shawn’s continued work on cases despite not being police hinged entirely on his ability to fake being psychic. It’s the hole he dug himself into, impulsively lying when questioned for knowing inside information four years ago. If he confessed his lack of spiritual insight, all the cases he had helped to solve would be called into question—and he could be arrested for lying to the police.

Juliet and Lassiter can’t know about his manipulation. That doesn’t stop him from wanting to tell them, to come clean. Every time he thinks their relationship is good, that they’re truly close, his supposed psychic-ness is brought up and he’s reminded that he can never let his guard down.

Neither of them are at fault, either—it’s entirely his own. He brought this onto himself, because it’s in his nature to lie and manipulate and use people for his own selfish gains. 

No wonder he always runs. It’s impossible for him to just tell the truth.

Shawn curls up into a ball on the chair, facing the windows. The light is starting to hurt his eyes. 

Would he be able to salvage the situation? It’s not like he ever said that spirits weren’t real, or that he wasn’t a psychic. He just showed a previously-unseen amount of knowledge and deductive reasoning, with no explanation for it. Perfectly fine.

He’d have to hope they wouldn’t confide in the Chief. And he had left Gus there, to get them out of the situation by himself, probably freaking out about his slip-ups.

God, he’s a terrible person. Gus deserves so much better than him as a best friend.

Shawn inhales, and exhales deeply. It’ll be fine. Things generally seem to work out for him. He can fix this.

How could he explain how he knew all that information about depression symptoms? Well, lies are always better created with a grain of truth. How does he know?

He tries to think back to where he could have learned these things. Maybe Henry? Or a person he met on the road? 

No startlingly-accurate pictures come up in his mind, overlain with grainy film. No scenes of his dad teaching him symptoms at the dinner table, no marked-up photos of customers at assorted jobs. There’s nothing.

Shawn’s breath comes labored, muscles tightening where he’s hugging his legs. How couldn’t he remember? He always did. Every minor moment or conversation was recorded forever. 

He starts to go back through his recent memories. Details were fuzzy, words were missed. He can’t zoom in on every picture to see it clearer. The sequences are indistinct.

He’s losing his memory. The only thing that makes him valuable.

The breath he takes next is choked. The hairs on his arms stand up.

I need to calm down. Just calm down.

Inhale. Hold. Exhale. Hold. Inhale. Hold. Exhale. Hold.

Just as Shawn’s mind starts to clear, a fact rings its way out of subconscious into his active thoughts; memory loss can be a severe symptom of depression.

Depression, like the dead man on the morgue table. 

These past few months, he’s been struggling to do basic things in his life. Unable to sleep, to eat, to return to his apartment after he was shot. Unable to dredge up the energy that came to him so easily before. Unable to be himself.

If he continues to go down this path… Shawn’s going to end up the same way as that man. Dead on a table, his symptoms clinically listed out. 

Isn’t that what he wants? To finally rest in peace?

After today? Not anymore. 

It’s hard to act carefree now because he’s not. Before, he was truly happy and could live his days one at a time. He didn’t have to act, nevermind the psychic problem. But recently he hasn’t been able to be his cheerful self, because he’s stuck in the past.

Fuck, he really could’ve died.

That bullet, if the men who took him had been worse shots, could’ve killed him.

Alone and dying, could he have texted Gus? Could they find him, if he wasn’t alive to leave them trails?

Could he have ended up as another dead body to haunt the detectives?

Just because he went alone?

Something warm slips down his cheek, leaving him cold. He swipes a hand at it, and stares past the teardrop on his finger. He already knew what it was.

The door is shoved open, and Shawn flinches with his whole body. Despite facing the windows, Gus had still gotten past without him noticing.

Another way his… feelings are messing up his brain.

He scrambles to wipe away the tears in his eyes, and sit in a normal, happy way instead of his panic scrunch.

Gus immediately catches him in the act.

“Shawn! —Shawn? Were you… crying?”

Shawn coughs slightly, to clear his throat. “No.”

“Uh-huh. Sure.” Gus drops a paper onto his desk, then comes to stand in front of him. “You okay?”

He hates how his partner can just—do that. Change his emotions on a whim. Gus was definitely planning on yelling when he came in. Now he’s concerned?

Shawn wishes he could fix his emotions half as fast.

“Yep.”

“I don’t believe that at all.” Gus pulls a rolling chair over and sits. “What’s been going on with you lately?”

“Nothing. Just under the weather.”

“Uh-huh,” Gus says again, dubiously. Shawn sighs loudly, and it sounds wet. They sit in expecting silence. 

“Just not been. Feeling well. It’s fine. Won’t forget to be a psychic again,” he says eventually. His voice cracks on half the words. 

“Hm.” Gus looks disappointed. “Have you been taking your ADHD meds?”

“Yes.”

“Right.” Back to silence. Shawn pulls his legs back up into his seat, considers hiding his face. No, that would make him look guilty. Which he is. Maybe he should.

Gus breaks the quiet this time. “Shawn, let me help you, you’re my best friend. I just want you to be okay!”

“What if I’m not okay?” Shawn asks before he can think about it. He grinds his teeth together to keep himself from saying more.

Gus leans forward. “Then you’re not okay. But I still want to help you.”

He doesn’t want to tell Gus everything he’s been thinking. His partner would cry, probably, and it’d end in an emotional hug, and then Shawn would feel guiltier than ever. Gus doesn’t need to know about his… thoughts. 

But he can use a half-truth instead.

“I think I’m losing my memory.”

Gus’s eyes widen right away, and Shawn thinks maybe he made a mistake. He’s gonna start panicking about his brain, and the business, then he’s gonna have to go to a doctor or quit Psych and honestly he doesn’t think he can handle that. Instead:

“Isn’t that a symptom of depression?” 

What? Shawn is so confused he doesn’t deny it. “How do you know that???”

“I work in pharmaceuticals, Shawn, I know a lot of medications and the symptoms they treat. Oh my God, this makes so much sense. How didn’t I see it? It’s been staring me in the face this whole time…” Gus stands up and starts pacing, mumbling feverishly to himself. 

Shawn watches him go back and forth, around their two desks. 

Maybe instead of a half-truth he should’ve lied instead. He’d be much better at controlling the conversation rather than dealing with whatever this is.

“Are you okay?” he asks. It shocks Gus out of his trance, and he stops pacing. 

“Shawn, come here,” and he holds out his arms. Shawn stands to indulge him. 

Gus crushes him in a hug. “I’m here for you. I’m so sorry I didn’t see it sooner. You’re my best friend, I love you,” he whispers. 

Despite the shattered pieces in his chest, something about his partner’s words feels like a breath of fresh air when he’s been trapped in his grave. He was right about Gus’s reaction—but not about his own.

Shawn wraps his arms tightly around his partner in return.

Maybe it’s okay to tell the truth, once in a while.