They said he wasn’t smart.

That he was rude, crude and violent.

They said he was a drunk and a womanizer.

A cold-blooded killer.

A man who valued nothing but money.

Oh they prettied it up, he was a friend, family, and you made excuses for them.

Overlooked things for that.

But what and how they said something did not matter so much as what they said.

And that’s what they said.

River teased her about her attraction to Jayne and in the same breath warned her away.

Which accomplished nothing.

Zoe told her stories, things that had been said and done.

And those things were repugnant to her. Sickening.

But that didn’t change what she felt.

Inara kept telling her how much better she could do.

And so she probably could.

Kaylee, dear sweet Kaylee who loved them both just said (doubt written clearly on her face and heavy in her voice) “If that’s what you want…”

It was.

Simon asked her why, he couldn’t understand.

And she couldn’t explain.

And Mal pretended not to see it, while warning her to be careful.

She was tired of being careful.

She couldn’t quite lay her finger on when she’d fallen in love with him, when he’d become so central to her life.

But he had.

She watched him for a long time, trying to determine whether what she had been told was true or not.

It wasn’t that he wasn’t smart; he was uneducated, and uninterested in acquiring that education.

He knew what he needed to know to survive and thrive in his chosen trade, and within his trade he was a master.

Granted she found the fact that he killed for money disgusting.

But then she’d done it too so who was she to judge?

He had often asked stupid questions, made inane and stupid comments, and of all of the people on board he had the worst grammar, spoke the most cant.

All of which lead people to underestimate him, assume he was stupid.

She suspected it was all a façade, a tool he used in the trade he worked, a harsh trade that greeted failure with death.

And more and more he was dropping that façade with the crew. Making intelligent observations, asking well considered questions. He still ignored proper English, still spoke in cant.

It grated on her nerves sometimes, because he was better than that.

He was rude.

He did it deliberately, he knew how he should act and he consciously chose not to behave that way.

He took a certain unholy glee in poking at people to see what was underneath. He rarely did it to crew though, Simon being the notable exception to the rule.

But then everyone poked at Simon, even she did, he just took himself entirely too seriously sometimes.

She wished he would be more careful when, where and who he picked at.

He had been crude, with his drinking and his whores and his innuendos.

But he wasn’t so much anymore. He drank only when everyone else was, and then in moderation.

He no longer went to whore-houses, and according to Zoe he’d thrown away all of the pin-up pictures he’d had in his bunk.

And he no longer made innuendos towards the women on the crew.

He’d even started a few fights when non-crew had made improper comments about or too any of the women on board.

He was violent, but that was the easiest thing for her to forgive.

She did not like violence, and she never would, but she had come to accept the necessity.

She ignored the stories they told her of him before she’d met him as immaterial.

It was patently obvious to her that the man he had been in those stories was not the man she knew and loved now.

People changed, and Jayne was changing.

Her parents had often argued about that, and in the end they’d agreed to disagree and leave the topic alone.

Her mother had always believed that people could change if they wanted to.

And her father had always said that they couldn’t.

When they’d called on her to vote she’d abstained, she hadn’t the experience to judge.

Now she sided with her mother…though sometimes after talking to Zoe or Mal she wondered if it was because she wanted it to be true.

He was a cold-blooded killer, she couldn’t deny that. But then so too was Zoe and Mal, Simon and Inara, so too was she.

She didn’t believe all he cared about was money. If it was he wouldn’t spend it on ammo for the crew, new security devices for the ship, shoes for two very much loved (and spoiled) little girls.

He wasn’t perfect; nothing like she’d imagined she would want.

He was just a man, human and flawed, and she couldn’t decide if she loved him because of that or in spite of it.

But love him she did.