"You hurt me. I hurt you. That's how it always goes."

It's far from a satisfying answer. Even if it takes a long time to make him mad, they know they have. For saying the wrong things. For asking the wrong questions. Telling him the truth about how they don't think they want to be here anymore, and then he gets angry at them for saying it. How's he supposed to like them when he never likes what it is they say?

Does that mean he ever cared about them? Or did he just feel obligated too, picking up the slack of his own promise a thousand RESETs too late?

"...you're not the person I thought you were." It slips out suddenly, swiftly, and it grits their teeth so hard that they hurt. "I'm afraid that I'll tell you something about me and you'll get mad, because you have before. I thought, maybe, the promise - you'd be that person you promised you'd be."

Someone they could rely on to feel safe around. Someone whose jacket they could drape around thin shoulders. Someone they could curl up beside while he looked at the stars.

"But you weren't."

And you aren't.

"I was just tricking myself into thinking you could be."