Laughter…happy, light, make you warm all over laughter…but he wasn’t payin’ any attention…not to Mal’s hairbrained story about how Zoe and him barely escaped getting their asses in a bind with their one of their former Platoon Commanders (how many damn stories could they possibly have left to tell?) or even Kaylee’s sob story about her folks and how she missed them.

All Jayne could watch was Sonja…how she was sitting there, her eyes trying desperately to avoid meeting his, the rest of the crew in the dark about what had transpired on the couch between them some few feet away.

Don’t think bout’ it…jus’ makin’ things worse is all…jus makin’ things worse. Jayne told himself.

Twiddling his protein grindage in front of him with his fork, Jayne sat silently while the others continued their warm and cozy conversation, hardly noticing his apparent lack of feedback to add.

“Kaylee…do you ever…wish you were doing something else? Closer to your family?” Book asked her then.

“What? And not be able to be with Serenity?” Kaylee exclaimed, hurt filling her voice. “Of course not!”

“That’s cuz she’s got the Doc here…why would she wanna go cryin’ home to Mommy and Daddy when she can be with Mr-I-Haven’t-Got-A-Clue-That-Kaylee’s-Tits-Are-Always-Near-My-Face? Sounds like a damn fair trade to me.” Jayne shot up then, giving his usual nasty scowl at Simon.

The laughter that was flying so gallantly overhead was put to a fiery death immediately as everyone fixed their shocked glazes in Jayne’s direction. Forks dropped onto plates and eyes were wide at the sheer nastiness of Jayne’s remark towards one of the few people he actually treated with some amount of normal human feeling.

Throwing his fork down in front of him, it hit the plate with a loud angry clink! as Jayne grabbed the napkin he had tucked into his shirt as a makeshift bib and threw that down next to it. Standing up and without another word, Jayne headed to the doorway and walked out.

“Tyen shiao duh!” Wash exclaimed then, shaking his head, alarmed. “What the hell