( it's less an accidental trap than an unknowing one; his baseline expectations of people are far from flattering, whatever a wide smile suggests, and so such callousness is almost anticipated.

instead, she startles a laugh from him.

he doubts it's meant to be a kindness so much as a reflection on her own misery — from you to no one, it's probably interchangeable — but it's still a foreign sentiment. not that it should be, really, but even a year of kindnesses he never would've dreamed possible can't paper over fifteen cold ones prior.

or rather, it could, but only if he'd let it. )

You shouldn't worry about something like "deserving." ( because feelings like that, friendship, aren't about 'worth' is what someone else would think while saying that, and it's the image he wants to portray anyway ) Looking at it another way, if I've given you a burden, and you've given me one, doesn't that make us even?