Fair enough. Johnny sighs softly and smokes in silence for a while.

"Well," he says, "I can help you with keeping to yourself. Money's not a problem, like I said. I get it from someone who can basically make it out of thin air, and he doesn't really care what I do with it, so."

That feels a little like too much, but it's better than the alternative of just letting Tim wonder exactly why he's throwing money around, or if he will eventually ask for something in return. Gabe supplies him with more than he needs - he's never been in the habit of spending a lot of money, he still grocery shops like a poor person, so. If he can help someone with it, he might as well.

"You can't be invisible," he says, nodding around them. "But you can stay out of the way. I've been pretty good at lying low in my time, so. I'm happy to help."

He remembers the part of his book where he went off on a massive fictionalized tangent about his miraculous doctor friend who took him in and healed all his wounds and put him back on the right track. Pages of that, and then snapping at whatever readers who bought it for buying such a fucking stupid fairytale.

And here he is, offering some half-version of it.

Life is funny.