Ianto had spent the day obsessively cleaning his flat between panic attacks. He'd called into work for the first time since he'd started, because he hadn't wanted to face Jack or Owen. The guilt over what he'd done, what he'd been doing, over the last five months was eating him alive. He knew Jack would be okay with him straying every once in a while, but not with the fact that he'd been carrying on an affair for almost half a year. Especially since he'd been doing it with Owen, and especially since he'd kept it a secret. Jack hated secrets to be kept from him, which was why Ianto had done it in the first place. It had seemed almost righteous at the time, a fitting revenge for being abandoned when Ianto had needed Jack the most. Now that it was over, however, he felt like he'd just woken up from a dream. What had seemed perfectly logical before, he could now see as the insanity that it was.

By the time he'd taken his third Valium, rewashed all the dishes in his cabinets, he realized that he couldn't go on like this. What he needed was Jack. Jack to hold him and kiss him, and tell him everything would be okay, even though he didn't know what was wrong. Then he could call Owen and apologize. He knew that they would probably never be on civil speaking terms again, but he didn't really need forgiveness. He just needed Owen to know that he was sorry. That would be enough. With time, perhaps these things would fade, and he could move on with his life. He thought about confessing to Jack, but pushed the thought aside. That was the one sure way to end what they had, and Ianto couldn't bear that. It was selfish, and it was wrong, but Ianto had lost enough people he loved to last him a lifetime. He looked at his watch and saw that it was already half past four. By the time he got to the Hub, everybody else would be long gone, and that suited him just fine. Ianto grabbed his keys and headed for the door.

When he opened it he was surprised to see Jack in the hallway, looking like he wasn't sure if he should be there. Ianto gasped, but pulled himself together before it could become a scream.

"I wasn't expecting you," he said, "I was just on my way to the Hub. Please, come in." He stepped out of the doorway, and made the universal 'welcome' gesture. Jack walked in silently, his face impassive, and Ianto could tell something was wrong. Something bad enough to bring Jack all the way over to his flat, without calling, or even speaking a word. Ianto forced himself to smile as he took his coat off, and when he asked Jack what the trouble was, his tone was cheerful. It was met with stony silence, as Jack perused a bookcase he'd seen a thousand times before. They stood in an awkward hush, until Jack said, without turning around, "You know when you do something stupid and you feel badly about it, and talking helps?" Ianto took a deep breath.

"Yes, I suppose so." He said.

"Especially when you tell the person you did it too."

Ianto cocked an eyebrow at him, and leaned against the corner of the couch.

"Yes?" he said.

"Well?"

"Well, what have you done?"

Jack finally turned, his face surprised.

"Me? I didn't do anything."

"Oh. Well, okay then. Would you like a drink?"

Jack narrowed his eyes, and Ianto could tell that there was something he was missing. Or, rather, trying very hard not to get.

"No." Jack said, "Don't you have anything to tell me?"

Ianto's heart sank, but he tried to ignore the implication. Admitting things out of paranoia was no the way to handle this. Besides, his thing with Owen was none of Jack's business. Jack never shared his life with him, why should he be held to a different standard? He decided to play dumb until Jack got to the point.

"No, I don't think so."

"I'm trying to give you a chance here." Jack said, "I mean that would have been the perfect opportunity to tell about fucking Owen, don't you think?"

"Oh. No, not really. I didn't do that to you, you see, I did it to him, and he was there so he knows."

Jack blanched, and for just one moment Ianto felt his heart break. Then he thought of all the things Jack had done, and he felt anger eating up the guilt.

"He knows?" Jack said, "Everybody knows! And you really don't think the fact you slept with him has anything to do with me?"

Ianto's jaw squared, and his hands tightened into fists. Jack, of all people, had no right to lecture him about his sex life. Especially not in his own flat. Any feelings of remorse he'd had earlier were gone, and it seemed absurd to him now that he'd had them in the first place.

"It doesn't," he said, " It was between him and me. You sleep with other people."

"No, I don't-"

"Yes, you do. I'm not stupid, and you don't hide it. You've never promised me anything, and you've never lied to me so please don't start."

"It's different." Jack said, flustered and almost yelling.

"Because it's you?"

"Because it's not him! You see him everyday. You work together, we all work together and now every time I look at the two of you, I'll know he knows you the way I do. It's complicated now." Jack ended in an almost despairing voice, as if he'd just lost his world.

Ianto felt himself give in slightly, but not enough. After everything they'd been thru and done to each other, he wasn't sure anything they did was enough.

"If you want it to be." He said, "You could just let it go. We could just forget about it and move on, like we do every time your eyes and hands wander."

Jack shook his head and sat down on the sofa. He looked lost, and hurt, and Ianto wanted to hold him, to apologize and ask for forgiveness. In the end he just stood at the corner of the couch, twisting a loose thread, and waiting for Jack to speak. After what seemed like eternity, Jack finally said, "He says he loves you."

"Yes, he says that."

" And does he?"

"He says so."

"Do you love him?"

Ianto shuddered at the question. It was the one he'd been dreading, because there was no right answer and there was no true one, either. He would have to choose the one that was the most true, and even he really didn't know what that was. The last five months had been so confusing he'd lost rack of what he really wanted. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and just began to speak.

" Shouldn't I?" He said, "Isn't that how this is supposed to go? I get myself into a loveless relationship with you, you break my heart daily, I have an affair with a man I can't stand and who has nothing for me, but we end up falling hopelessly in love, he saves me and we live happily ever after. Isn't that how it gets written and plays out on telly? Fuck it. I don't love him, I love you. He loves me, I love you and you love just about everybody else. See that's not complicated, everything's laid out in a neat little line."

"You think I don't love you?" Jack asked. Ianto sneered.

"Oh, I know you do, just not enough and not in the right way. Not the way he loves me. He would never do the things you do, he would never hurt me without even thinking, I would never be his second choice, he would never leave me, he would never be you, and you will never love me like he does. So I'm fucked. And you have the temerity to question me."

By the time he'd finished tears were rolling down his cheeks, and his words were almost sobs.

Jack took a step forward, and Ianto could see that he'd succeeded in pissing him off if nothing else.

"If you really thought it was okay," Jack said, "if you really thought this thing you're doing wouldn't have an effect on us, you wouldn't have hidden it."

"Maybe I was hoping you'd notice." Ianto said, "But you never did. In all this time, with all the signs you never noticed a thing was wrong, and you never would have if he hadn't told you."

Jack made a noise somewhere between a growl and a laugh, and threw his hands in the air.

"So now I'm supposed to apologize to you?" He said, "I'm supposed to say I'm sorry that I trusted you enough I didn't suspect anything? Well, you know there really wasn't anything to suspect. You're a gifted liar Ianto. I should have known that after you kept a cyber-woman in the basement. So what am I supposed to say?"

"Nothing." Ianto said, realizing it was true, "There's nothing to say. Owen and I, we're over. You and I don't have to be."

"The fact that you can use 'Owen and I' in a sentence, kind of negates that."

"Jack, I-"

"No." Jack said, moving towards the door. "There is nothing else. We're thru. When we're at work, that's just what we'll be: boss and employee. And whatever you and Owen are is none of my business."

Jack threw the door open and was gone before Ianto could reply. He thought of going after him, but he couldn't really see the point. Much like this morning, this felt final. Ianto started laughing as he realized the implications of that. His life had just come crashing down around him, for the second time in as many years, and he wasn't sure how much was his fault. A good bit, at least, but some of it belonged to Jack, some to Owen, some to the daleks and some to the Doctor that he wasn't worthy enough to know about. Ianto sat on his sofa and thought of the complete and utter fucking his life had taken since Canary Wharf, and he laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

xxXXxx

Owen stood outside Ianto's door, fidgeting, unsure if he should knock. After he'd cleaned and bandaged his wounds, he'd felt an insane urge to come over here, though he knew Jack would have already been. It was probably because he knew Jack would have been, and, as angry as he was with Ianto, he needed to make sure he was all right. This was his fault, after all.

He took a few deep breaths, steadied his nerves, and rang the bell. Ianto answered almost instantly, puffy eyed and bedraggled. His face flashed murderously when he saw it was Owen, and he looked about to scream, and then stopped. Owen watched him take in the bruises and the self-stitched cuts, and watched as Ianto's internal struggle between pity and anger played itself out on his face. Owen steeled himself for a verbal beating, but in the end Ianto simply said, "I should rip your head off."

Owen shrugged.

"You'd have a right to," he said, "I'm sorry. But, I was pissed off, Yan. Everything you feel for Jack, that's how I feel about you. I shouldn't have done what I did, but…"

Ianto nodded and cleared the way for him to come in.

"He ended it with me." Ianto said, and Owen shrugged again.

"Well, there's a lot of that going around these days. I brought beer, and I was going to bring pizza, but I decided on whisky instead."

He moved to put the bags on the table, and Ianto stopped him with a hand.

"Just because Jack and I are over, doesn't mean I'm starting with you again. I'm still so angry with you, I could kill. The only reason I let you in is because I think I need a friend, and I'm fresh out these days. Gwen would be angry with me, and Tosh… she'd be angry for different reasons. I want to be clear about that."

Owen frowned and pushed Ianto's hand off of his arm.

"I love you," he said, "and what I did today isn't the best proof of that, but it's true. I love you. I understand that we may never be together; I understand that Jack may come around and you two will live happily ever after, and I am not okay with that. Not in the least. But, I will be someday, and until then I need to be near you. Just to make sure that you're okay. So, what do you say? Can we be friends?"

Ianto bit his lip. "I don't know," he said "What you did was kind of unforgivable. But, it's not the first unforgivable thing either of us has done to the other, so I guess we can try."

Owen smiled, and opened a beer for each of them. "I was thinking we could watch a movie." He said, "Something with a lot of action, take our minds off things. You up for it?"

Ianto nodded and they settled down on the couch, not too close, but not too far away either. By the second half of the movie he'd had brought, Owen was feeling slightly better. He realized it didn't matter if Ianto reconciled with Jack, or if he found a place in his heart for him, or if he moved on completely. Anything would have to be better than the secret hell he'd been living in. And it would have to better for Ianto. Maybe, with enough distance, they could figure out where they belonged in each other's lives. By the time the credits were rolling, Owen was asleep against Ianto's armrest, snoring slightly, and dreaming peacefully for the first time in months.