"I think that's why I like you, you know?" He says, a bit wistful, a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth as he leans back in his own chair, wrist cradled in his lap.
"You do what he did. Talk big for both of us so I can just listen like I'm used to doing. No body questions why I'm there or what I'm doing when you're soaking up the attention. I get to just hang back and be me while you chat it up."
"Buck was like that. Talking up the girls and dragging me along, having my back so I could get on in life when I was in over my head. When we were kids and he chased off the bigger ones that picked on me and I thought I was lucky to have a bigger stronger kid pity me, take me under his wing. But pity was about the last thing he felt for me, really. Took me time to realize it but I can tell you now I know it was true."
"Don't get me wrong, you've a whole different personality from Buck, but it just reminds me of him sometimes when I watch you keep everybody at a table hanging on your every word. He could do that, tell a story and make you really listen..."
The smile that's formed on his face crumbles abruptly.
"You remember when we were all bickering on the Helicarrier, and I said I knew men who had none of what you did and were worth ten of you? He was who I meant."
"And in retrospect that wasn't fair because expecting you to live up to a dead man that I loved like a brother is too tall an order for just about anybody. So... sorry, I guess. You made me eat my words about not laying down on the wire already, so there's the rest for you."
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"You do what he did. Talk big for both of us so I can just listen like I'm used to doing. No body questions why I'm there or what I'm doing when you're soaking up the attention. I get to just hang back and be me while you chat it up."
"Buck was like that. Talking up the girls and dragging me along, having my back so I could get on in life when I was in over my head. When we were kids and he chased off the bigger ones that picked on me and I thought I was lucky to have a bigger stronger kid pity me, take me under his wing. But pity was about the last thing he felt for me, really. Took me time to realize it but I can tell you now I know it was true."
"Don't get me wrong, you've a whole different personality from Buck, but it just reminds me of him sometimes when I watch you keep everybody at a table hanging on your every word. He could do that, tell a story and make you really listen..."
The smile that's formed on his face crumbles abruptly.
"You remember when we were all bickering on the Helicarrier, and I said I knew men who had none of what you did and were worth ten of you? He was who I meant."
"And in retrospect that wasn't fair because expecting you to live up to a dead man that I loved like a brother is too tall an order for just about anybody. So... sorry, I guess. You made me eat my words about not laying down on the wire already, so there's the rest for you."