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raeschaeTitle: Falling in the Black
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
raeschae
Pairing:J2
Rating:PG-13
Word Count: 9800ish
Summary: There are only two people in the world who mean everything to Jared. Now he may lose one of them.
Part of the Disclaimer 'Verse.
A/N: I've been wanting to do this time stamp since I finished Sh*t Happens. A lot of other things took precedence, but now that it's done? I'm pretty fucking thrilled with it. I hope you guys like it.
FYI: This one falls, chronologically, some time after Like a Virgin. Also, the title comes from the Skillet song of the same name.
Graphics by:raeschae (Only dividers)
They say your entire life can change with one phone call. Jared usually thinks they are full of shit, but that's one truth that he's experienced enough to believe. Of course, he doesn't think about it all that often. Until he's heading back from LAX after a three-day trip to West Bumblefuck, Indiana. He's been tattooing every last member a rock super-tour, twenty-eight tats in forty-eight hours, and he's more than ready to sleep in his own bed, wrapped around his own Jensen.
He's almost to the Santa Monica Boulevard exit when his cell blares some ridiculous hip hop song that Brayden insists on setting as his ring tone every time Jared sets it back. “Dude, I'm almost home,” he answers in lieu of a 'hello.' What the fuck's Brayden calling him for anyway? He's supposed to be at school.
“Don't go home,” is Brayden's rushed response.
“What? Why?”
“It's Jensen. I don't know, man. Found him in his office this morning, on the floor. He's . . . it's bad, Jay. I don't know. Just . . . meet us at UCLA Med.” He disconnects the call and Jared doesn't notice that he's still holding the phone at his ear.
One call. One moment. Everything changes. The entire world shatters.
He doesn't freak out often, but by the time Jared gets to the UCLA Medical Center, he's pretty sure he's either going to pass out or throw up. Or punch something. Hard.
So it's probably a good thing that Tom's waiting for him at the ER entrance. Doesn't mean Jared's glad to see him or anything. Especially when Tom rests his hands against Jared's shoulders and hinders his forward progress.
“Settle down, Jay,” he says, blue eyes steeled for a fight.
“Fuck you,” Jared spits, pushing at Tom's chest with both hands.
“Man, I get it, okay? I do. But you can't go in there all Raging Bull. Calm the fuck down, or they're gonna kick your ass out.”
He wants to be bothered by the fact that his friends think he's a motherfucking powder keg. Like he's incapable of controlling his emotions or some shit. He would be, if it wasn't the truth most of the time. Which is why Jensen usually has to calm him down before he starts something.
But Jensen's not standing out here with him, and that's the problem. “Get. Out. Of. My. Way.”
Tom does as he's told and Jared rolls his shoulders before walking as calmly as he possibly can into the Emergency Room. For some reason, stepping through the door, taking in the sterile scent and the shining white floors, and the fucking people takes him right back to the last time he was here. Four years ago, with Jensen at his side and Brayden in a fucking hospital bed, unconscious. Now it's Jensen. He supposes maybe he should be glad that there's only two people that mean enough to turn his world inside out.
When he rounds the corner, Brayden is on his phone, cell pressed to his ear as he balances a clipboard on his knees and scribbles something on the paper there. “No, I got it,” he's saying when Jared approaches. “Allergies?”
“Shellfish,” Jared answers automatically. Jensen's allergic to shellfish. That place they go to with the really great lobster is the only place he doesn't steal food off of Jared's plate.
Brayden looks up, startled. “Jay's here,” he says into the phone and then blinks, turning his attention back to the paper. “No, I think he can get it from here. . . Yeah, thanks. . . I will. . . you, too.” He taps the screen on the phone and slides it into his pocket. When he looks up at Jared again, he looks wrecked. “Can you help me finish these? Donna was trying, but there's shit she doesn't know.”
Sitting in the chair beside his son, Jared takes the clipboard and starts looking over the questions Brayden and Jensen's mom couldn't answer together. “Talk,” he commands as he starts filling in blanks.
Brayden slumps back into his seat, his shoulders hunched as he runs a hand over his face and through his blond hair. “Okay, so ya know how he was kinda tired and shit the last couple days?” Jared nods because Jensen denied it vehemently after Brayden ratted him out on the phone the other night. “Well, he started pukin' yesterday, like a lot. Said his muscles hurt or some shit, but he wouldn't go to the doctor, and he made me promise not to tell you about it.”
Of course he did. Because God forbid Jensen Ackles admit to actually being sick. Jared remembers the time he botched a 540 on the pipe at Ollie and walked around with a broken wrist for three days because he didn't want to admit that Jared was right, he should see a doctor. Like an artist has any business trying to work with a broken wrist for three fucking days. Jensen's a stubborn fucker. Has been for all of the eight years Jared's known him.
“Told him the only way I was gonna keep my mouth shut was if he promised to stay home today and get some rest.” Brayden rolls his eyes and rests his head against the wall. “Said he'd lay low, but there's some new guy at Element that's makin' these bad ass boards for competition now, and he wanted to try to get a deal rolling, so he wasn't gonna pussy out for some virus or whatever.” Jared nods because it sounds exactly like Jensen. Idiot. “He was in his office when I got ready to leave for school.”
When Brayden stops, Jared looks up from the forms in his lap and quirks an eyebrow. It's not usual for Jensen to be up at the ass crack of dawn, but it's not exactly cause for a pregnant pause, either. Not when he's got a new project on his mind. “And?”
Brayden's eyes cloud and he licks his lips, shoulders shuddering like whatever's in his head is big, ugly, and scary. “He was passed out on the floor, man. Just crumpled in a heap like he stood up and fell right the fuck back down again.”
There are times when Brayden sounds less like the deep-voiced young man he's becoming, and so much more like the twelve-year-old kid he was when Jared first met him. Those times kind of freak Jared out a little, because they mean the kid's scared. Brayden doesn't get scared for no fucking reason.
“I called 911, and the store to tell 'em what was going on. Then I called you. Mike and Tom were here when I got here,” he finishes his tale with another sweep of his fingers through his hair.
“You talk to anybody yet?” Jared doesn't really recognize his own voice anymore, and he's not sure where the questions are even coming from. He's certainly not thinking very clearly. Doesn't really remember forming any kind of thought before things start popping out of his mouth. “Was he awake at all? When you found him? In the ambulance? Was he breathing?”
Brayden just nods and stares at the floor for a minute. “He opened his eyes a couple of times, but it wasn't like he was seeing anything, ya know? Like he wasn't even really in there or somethin'.”
As he finishes the papers and returns them to a less-than-pleasant-looking receptionist at the front desk, Jared tries like hell to convince himself that everything's going to be okay. That maybe it's just a strong case of the flu and Jensen's going to be better than ever in no time. That they're going to take him home in less than an hour.
Because Jensen has to be okay. There's no other option. Not for Jared anyway.
They've been hanging out in the waiting room for forty five minutes when Chad and Sophia walk through the door. Mike and Tom are still hanging out on the other side of the room, quietly talking between themselves.
Brayden and Jared are sitting side-by-side in hard plastic chairs that weren't exactly built for comfort. Brayden occasionally says whatever pops into his head, but Jared doesn't even open his mouth. If he does, he's pretty sure he'll start yelling.
“What are you doin' here?” Brayden asks, looking back and forth between them. It's not that he's not happy to see them or whatever, but he's pretty sure they're supposed to be working.
“Break in our schedule,” Chad explains, turning his eyes to his friend. “Welcome home, huh?”
When Jared doesn't respond, Brayden fills in for him. “He's not really in a jokey mood right now.”
“Have you heard anything?” It's not Sophia's fault that they haven't. But her question makes Jared's fists clench and Brayden stands with a shake of his head.
Chad looks back and forth from Jared to Brayden and back again. “Because they don't know anything yet? Or because you're gay and therefore aren't really considered a part of Jensen's family?”
Jared rolls his eyes. Four years ago, he and Jensen made it legal. Being as they're never going to get married, even if it's legal in California for more than three days in a row, they signed all of the necessary paper work to become Power of Attorney for each other. He thought it was stupid at the time, but Jensen insisted. Just in case. Fuckin' hell.
“You wanna go get some coffee, Kiddo?” Sophia asks, foot nudging Brayden's calf as she shoots a nervous glance in Jared's direction. They all know what Jared's 'calm before the storm' looks like by now.
Standing, Brayden runs his hands over his jeans. “You want anything, Jay?” Jared shakes his head, offers Brayden half of an almost-smile, and then goes back to staring at a non-existent spot on the floor. “He's not really saying much,” he says as he follows Sophia to the waiting room door.
She chuckles, more biting and sarcastic than her normal sweet voice. “Which is loads different from all those other times when we can't get him to shut up.”
It's true that Jared doesn't talk a lot, but they all know this is different. Normally, he doesn't have to say anything, because Jensen talks plenty for the pair of them. All Jared has to do is sit back and listen. Now he's not really hearing anything at all.
Chad sinks into the seat at Jared's side and lets out a long sigh. “You know it's not gonna be anything bad, right?”
Jared huffs. “Because people pass out in a good way all the time?”
“Maybe it's just exhaustion. Didn't Lindsay Lohan collapse from that one time?”
It might be funny, the comparison, if Jared's entire world wasn't hanging in the balance. “Can you just,” he runs his hands over his face and lets his eyes drift to the ceiling, “Stop talking?” There's a water stain in the center of the third tile from the center light fixture.
Chad does as he's asked and taps his foot against the floor, but Jared barely notices. An hour ago, he was thinking of falling into bed next to Jensen. Now he'd give anything for Jensen to get up out of bed.
Another thirty minutes pass with no word. Mike and Tom went to find a vending machine awhile ago, and Sophia returned with coffee for Chad and an explanation that Brayden was chatting up some nurse in the cafeteria and would probably wander back in soon. Unless he gets lucky, which he seems to do a lot since Demi broke up with him three months ago.
“Got here as soon as we could,” Danneel greets as she enters the room, Katie in tow. Jared would bitch about the fact that more than half of his staff is now in this room, and who the hell is running the store anyway? But Jensen's entire crew is here, too, and Jared knows that they're not going anywhere until they know something. They wouldn't get anything done at work anyway.
“What's the word?” Katie asks, sliding her jacket off of her shoulders as she makes her way to one of the chairs across from Jared.
Sophia shakes her head and moves her magazine from the chair at her side so Danneel can sit. Chad is on the floor, head thrown back against her thigh and she keeps running her fingers through his hair like she needs to be sure he's still there. “Nothing yet.” She just nods when Danneel hisses fuck under her breath.
Before she can say much more, they're interrupted once again. “What do we know?” Chris asks, eyes darting from one person in the room to the next, expression hopeful.
“Aren't you s'posed to be in the studio all day?” Danneel asks him, scooting over to make room for Steve in her chair. Chris won't sit. He'll pace and mumbled under his breath and silently freak the fuck out, but he won't sit down.
With a firm expression, he responds. “My best friend's in the fuckin' hospital.” Chris has known Jensen longer than any of them. Almost twenty years now. If anybody thinks he has anything better to do than hang around the hospital waiting for word on his boy, they clearly don't know him very well.
“Where's Brayden?” Steve looks around and then at the look shooting knowingly between Danneel and Sophia. “Really? In the hospital?” He can't help smiling as he sinks back in the chair and maneuvers Danneel until they both fit. “So much like his fucking dads, man.”
It's nearly an hour later, and about two seconds before Jared starts knocking some heads together for information, when Jensen's doctor steps into the waiting room. His eyes go wide at the number of people turning to look at him. “Wow. This is quite a crowd,” he smiles.
Sophia explains everything with a simple, “It's Jensen.”
Pressing between Katie and Mike, Jared crosses his arms over his chest and steels himself for the news. Technically, Jensen's doctor is also Jared's, but he tries to stay away from the guy's office as much as possible. Aside from annual blood testing in order to get the shop re-certified, he doesn't see him all that much.
Fortunately, their limited history has taught the doctor that beating around the bush never works with Jared. “We did a lot of blood work, and then a spinal tap, in order to definitively diagnose Jensen with bacterial meningitis,” he explains.
Jared can't help the, “Fuck,” that slips out even as his eyes clench closed.
“He's not over the line,” the doctor goes on and Jared doesn't ask what line he's referring to. Doesn't have to. “He's pushing close, though. We had to put him in a chemically-induced coma to stabilize him. Let his body focus on fighting the infection for a little while.”
“How long's a little while?” Tom asks from somewhere behind Jared. This is why he loves his friends – they think to ask what he needs to know when he can't remember to ask it himself.
With a shrug and a contrite expression, the doctor throws a glance over Jared's shoulder and then meets his eye again. “Could be a couple of days. Could be a couple of weeks. We won't know until we see how he responds to the antibiotics.”
“When can we see him?” Chris demands.
“They're moving him to a room in the ICU right now. When they get him situated, I'll send a nurse. No more than two people in the room at a time, though.” Catching his bottom lip between his teeth, he looks over the dejected and worried faces assembled, like a professor addressing his students before finals or something. “He's not going to be responsive. It might be better for everyone to head home and wait for word.”
Jared knows the suggestion isn't for him. Because the doctor has to know that he's not going anywhere. Far as he's concerned, he has no reason to leave this building until Jensen's leaving with him. His friends start to dissipate, discussing a rough schedule for who will come to visit and when, and Jared blinks his eyes. He knows them, recognizes their faces and the sounds of their voices, but none of it feels real. Nothing in the last two hours has felt fucking real.
He reaches out and grabs the first arm that happens by. When his eyes settle on Katie's face, he says, “Find Brayden.” He doesn't care where the kid is or what he's doing. Jared's going to see Jensen as soon as the nurses come, and he wants both of his boys in one place. Where he can keep an eye on them himself.
He remembers stepping into Brayden's room for the first time after the accident. Remembers the way the monitors seemed to beep so loudly Jared couldn't think. Remembers the way he looked so tiny and pale against the white sheets, bruises ugly and dark like neon signs in contrast. And he remembers wanting to kill someone.
It's different this time. With Jensen, it's always different.
When he steps into the room, there's still the beeping, the smallness, and the pale Jensen. But he's not wearing eyeliner, and his fuchsia-dyed hair isn't shiny, and his black, chipped fingernail polish doesn't look remotely sexy or inviting. He's not wearing a wildly-designed tee shirt, or Dickies, or skater shoes. He looks like an imitation Jensen, and Jared doesn't so much want to kill anyone as crumble to the floor in a heap and cry like he hasn't since he was a kid.
That's his entire life. Right there, in that bed, barely breathing. In a coma, for fuck's sake. His vibrant, life-of-the-party, frenetic ball of constant energy and motion. His Jensen. Or, rather, the shell of him. He lets his eyes drift over the body in the bed and then settle back on his perfect face, and it hurts. It fucking hurts to see his world hanging in the balance like this.
“Dude, this is so fucked,” Brayden breathes at his side and Jared can't bring himself to tear his eyes away from Jensen, so he just nods in agreement.
He doesn't want to kill anyone this time. Not like he did with Brayden. Because he knows this is nobody's fault. Back in the waiting room, Sophia snagged a passing nurse and asked her a bunch of questions about meningitis. Jared barely heard her responses, but he knows that Jensen caught it from someone – either from kissing them, or sharing food with them, or being sneezed or coughed on in the last couple of days. Aside from the kissing thing, Jensen could have gotten it from anyone.
With Brayden, he couldn't stand being in the same room. Looking at the kid, so tiny and damaged, made him itch to get away. He couldn't stand there, knowing that Brayden was in pain, and not want to inflict some pain himself. Jensen's not in pain, though. And even if he was, Jared can't even fathom the thought of leaving him here. Alone? When have they done anything alone in the last eight years?
“Jay?”
“What?”
“Is he gonna,” Brayden stops and breathes through his nose, long fingers clutching the end of Jensen's bed. It reminds Jared of when he did the same thing four years ago, tapping his fingers against the end of Brayden's bed and clenching his jaw just like Bray is now. “You gotta promise me he's gonna wake up.”
Jared doesn't even hesitate. “'Course he's gonna wake up.” Why the fuck wouldn't . . . he's going to wake up.
“How do you know?”
“Doctor said.” He doesn't add the because he has to part of the answer.
It's quiet for a long time, and then Brayden whispers, “I shoulda stopped it.”
Jared snorts. “How?” The kid's all of about a hundred and sixty pounds at six foot three. How in the hell his toothpick ass thinks he could have stopped this from happening is beyond Jared. When Brayden just shrugs, Jared moves around the side of the bed and sinks to the chair at Jensen's side. “Nothin' you coulda done,” he assures Brayden.
The kid's a wreck. Considering the fact that he not only found one of his dads passed out on the floor this morning, and then spent the next three hours sitting next to the nearly-catatonic other one, Jared can't blame him. He knows what Jensen would do if he was awake right now.
“Go home,” Jared instructs, tossing the keys to his truck across the distance and Brayden's eyes widen like Jared has lost his motherfucking mind. “Sleep. Or have some people over. Just,” Jared shakes his head, “get your mind off it for awhile. Come back when you're ready.”
“You sure?” Brayden looks skeptical, but also a little bit relieved. He's just a kid, and the last time he was in a hospital, it wasn't so much a pleasant experience for him. Jared gets it. “Call me if anything changes?”
Jared just nods, eyes drifting to Jensen before snapping back to the door. “Be careful.” If either of them can be considered the mom here, it's always been Jensen. But Jared can't stop the words from popping out. For the briefest moment, he imagines something happening to Brayden on his way home, and it makes him want to vomit.
“Dude,” Brayden rolls his eyes and then stops himself from shooting off one of his usual, smart-ass remarks. “I will,” he promises when his gaze locks on Jared's. For a second, they just look at each other, comforting and consoling without words, and then he's gone.
When they're alone, Jared finally lets himself reach out and touch Jensen's smooth, unmoving hand. It's limp against his own palm, and his thumb ghosts over the black polish on Jensen's index finger. Into the stillness, just under the hum of the machines, he says, “Come back to me, Jen. Need you to come back to me.”
Jared couldn't tell you how long he's been sitting here, but he knows it's been awhile. Sitting by idly when a nurse stops by to dick around with Jensen's tubes and monitors, and then continuing to sit idly when they're gone. There's nothing he can do, and that's the worst part. He swore, when he left Texas a lifetime ago, that he would never again be at anyone's mercy. If something needs to be done, Jared does it.
Except, now that it's the most important thing in the entire fucking world that needs to be done? Jared is totally helpless to do a motherfucking thing. He's never felt so completely inept in his life.
A soft knock on the door interrupts his thoughts and Jared lifts his eyes from Jensen's collarbone to see Chris in the doorway. “You mind?” he asks and Jared shakes his head in invitation.
For a long time, Chris just looks at Jensen, and Jared wonders what he's thinking. Is he imagining that little, twelve-year-old pipsqueak who used to follow him around the skate park back in Dallas? Or the guy who showed up on his doorstep at twenty-eight, needing a place to crash and a new start? Or maybe the guy who got smashed at their New Year's Eve party last year and sliced his own finger open on one Chris's guitar strings?
Jared can't really tell what's going on in the guy's head – he's not exactly overtly-expressive on a normal day. “You know any more?” Chris asks, sitting in the chair on the opposite side of the bed.
Jared shakes his head. “Fever's down to 103. Which,” Jared shrugs, “is good. I guess?”
There's a forced sound of short, humorless laughter, and Chris returns the gesture. “Fuck if I know, man.”
They don't say anything for a long time, and Jared's glad to have Chris around. He loves Jensen, has for more than twenty years, and he's the only person Jared thinks comes anywhere close to feeling what he's feeling right now. Plus, Chris doesn't feel the need to fill silence with words, so . . . bonus.
He doesn't know how long they sit there, but when Chris stands, another nurse is coming in to change Jensen's IV. He turns blazing blue eyes to Jared and asks, “You need anything, man?”
He needs Jensen to wake up. Everything else seems pointless in comparison. “I'm cool.”
“Call me,” Chris instructs with a point of his finger and Jared nods as he leaves.
“Ya know,” the nurse's voice drags Jared's eyes from the door, “I watch your show all the time.” She's not the first to tell him so, and Jared wishes that he could let them all know that he doesn't give a fuck about his goddamn reality show right now. This reality? It's all that matters. “We're gonna take care of him, Jared. Gonna get him back to you.”
“Thanks,” he responds, voice polite, but thin. If being a fan of his show means that they'll take extra care of his boyfriend, then Jared will suck it up. He's not one to drop names, and he doesn't use his minimal celebrity to his advantage often, but this time? This time, he'll take any special treatment they're willing to give.
Jared is tired. He's been in this goddamn room for about twelve hours, and at the hospital for fifteen. He didn't really sleep last night, or the night before that, or the one before that. He never does when he's out of town on business. Without Jensen to wrap himself around, it's hard to find the deep peacefulness that breeds actual rest. He knows he's not sleeping again until they're both home again. Safe and healthy.
When Danneel peeks around the door, he doesn't bother to ask how she got in after visiting hours. He doesn't care. She's chewing on her bottom lip and staring nervously at Jared, like she's refusing to look at Jensen. When she does speak, it kind of surprises him. “Jay, I'm so sorry.”
He shrugs it off as one of those things that people just say in situations like this. “Not your fault.”
“It is,” Danneel insists, sitting in the chair across the bed from him. She looks at Jensen, and her eyes fill with fat, crocodile tears. “I was feeling pretty sick the other day, and he ate the cookies I baked. There's a pretty fucking good chance he got this from me,” she chokes on the word.
Sure, it's possible. It's also possible that one of those snot-nosed little tweeners at the park sneezed on Jensen while he was tryin' to teach them some move or another. Or that he helped someone at the store who hadn't washed their hands before handling the money they handed over. There are a million possibilities as to why Jensen's here. Only one of them points in Danneel's direction, and even then, blaming her is a stretch.
“Did you give him a cookie, Dani? Or did he steal yours out of your mouth?” He knows Jensen, and if Danneel had a half-eaten cookie in her hand when he walked by? He'd take it, eat it, and flash her a crumby grin without a second thought. He does it to Jared all the time.
“I could have told him not to,” she points out.
It's easier when there's someone to blame. When you can put a face behind the pain and focus your attention on something other than Jensen lying in a fucking coma. Jared gets that, and he wishes that he could blame her. Hating Danneel for doing this to Jensen would be so much easier than the pain that comes from not being able to help Jensen. But it's not true. And Jared's nothing if not completely honest, even when the truth blows.
“Woulda fuckin' done it anyway,” Jared shakes his head, eyes drifting back to Jensen's serene face. Even without the eyeliner and the perfectly-styled hair, he's too fucking pretty to be real. Jesus. “Bray said he started getting sick the day before yesterday,” he goes on. “Coulda maybe avoided this if he woulda called the doctor then. At least, the coma part.” He shakes his head and can't help quirking a little bit of a smile. “Kept fuckin' pushin' until he collapsed.”
“So it's his fault?” Danneel asks, eyes narrowing angrily.
Jared can't help looking at Jensen with affection. He works too damn hard, and he runs all the fucking time. Parties when he can, and stays up until long after midnight most nights just to prove that he's not too old to handle it yet. The fact that his immune system hasn't completely shut down in protest before now is a testament to how truly awesome he really is in Jared's book.
He doesn't even think about the fact that he's running the backs of his knuckles down Jensen's arm when he nods in affirmation of Danneel's question, and he doesn't stop when she snorts at his side and mutters, “Dumbass,” under her breath. “Fucking stupid workaholic dumbass.”
Jared can't disagree. Jensen is a dumbass. Sometimes he's downright idiotic. Occasionally, he's even a giant douche. But he's Jared's dumbass idiotic douche. “He really fucking is,” he responds and doesn't bother to look up when Danneel rounds the bed, presses a kiss to the side of his head, and then slips out of the room, absolved.
Night fades into morning and Jared watches nurses string in and out of the room. The doctor stops by once on his rounds and offers Jared little more than a smile and a 'that's encouraging' when Jared mentions Jensen's fever going down. One of the candy stripers brings him a stack of tattoo magazines and then proceeds to tell him all about her back piece and what she wants to have added once she's saved the money from her other job (she's a sales associate at Macy's and loves Jensen's line, of course). He nods and smiles half-heartedly, but she and her art are the last things he gives a damn about at the moment.
The head nurse for this shift chases the girl out and apologizes profusely to Jared, but he just shakes his head and settles back in his chair. He's flipping through one of the magazines, eyes never really focusing on any one page, when the door bangs open and the waft of grease and french fries fills the room.
“I brought food,” Genevieve announces.
She wasn't here yesterday. It's been almost a week since Jared saw his perky receptionist, and he doesn't want to admit that he kind of missed her. Genevieve's alright, no matter what Chad says. “Congratulations?” he answers when she looks like she's waiting for a response.
Shoving the bag toward Jared, she rolls her eyes and sets the over-sized cardboard cup onto the table next to Jensen's bed. “For you, boss.”
“Not hungry.”
“Bull shit,” Genevieve fires back, hand on her hip as she looks down on him. “You're always hungry.”
It's the go-to joke for all of their friends. Jared and his enormous appetite. Except it's not all that funny now. Nothing is. “Can you just,” he shakes his head, “not?”
With another roll of her eyes, Genevieve shrugs out of her jacket. “For the record, Jen's gonna pissed as hell when he wakes up and finds you completely lost your sense of humor.” In lieu of saying anything else, she steps between Jared and the bed and situates herself on his thigh, arms tight around his neck.
“The fuck you think you're doin'?” he asks sharply as Genevieve settles back against his chest.
“Workin' on a theory,” she states simply, like maybe Jared should already know this. “Figure nothin' gets y'all worked up and ready to fight like somebody touchin' what's yours. So, if I get all up on you, maybe Jenny'll decide to wake his ass up and do somethin' about it.”
“You're outta your goddamn mind,” Jared says, but he tightens his hand around her hip because it feels good to have something warm and solid pressed against him. Not as good as Jensen, but comfortable. Safe.
“It's true! You guys are, like, crazy fuckin' cavemen about each other.” Jared 'pffts', chin resting on her shoulder. “Dude, remember that night up at 4100?” Jared does, but he's not going to admit it and further prove her theory. “You fired me for grabbin' his ass!”
It's true, and he can't fight the smile in the wake of the memory. He was drunk off his ass, hanging out at a gay bar with his boy and his friends, and Genevieve somehow thought that jumping up on Jensen was a good idea. “You didn't grab his ass,” Jared corrects her. “You full-on wrapped your legs around him and tried to ride his cock on the dance floor.”
It's not like Jared felt threatened. Not by a mouthy lesbian who didn't want to grind on Jensen any more than Jensen wanted her grinding on him. But he was drunk enough to be bothered by the sight of anyone touching his Jensen. So he fired her. She showed up for work the next day anyway.
“Please,” Genevieve sighs dramatically. “He didn't even get hard.” As though that means anything at all.
“What can I say?” Jared offers as his only defense for the incident, and maybe for everything else ever. “He makes me do crazy shit sometimes.”
She falls silent for awhile, head resting on his shoulder, arms loose around his neck as her fingers tease the hair curling at his neck. “He's gonna be okay, Jay,” she whispers finally. Jared just nods, because it's the only thing that he has to believe. “You guys are indestructible.”
“Yeah.” Even as he says the word, he can't help wondering: If Genevieve's right, then why does he feel so goddamn fragile?
By the next day, Jared's pretty sure he hasn't felt this strung out since he smoked shit with that band at The Roxxy and waxed philosophical about his own toes. His eyes are burning, his legs won't stop twitching, and every once in awhile he catches a whiff of something he hopes isn't his own body odor. The nurses are starting to look at him with more concern than they look at Jensen, and he knows they all think he's kind of pathetic. Maybe sweet, but pathetic nonetheless.
The thing is, Jared can't bring himself to care. Because going home to sleep and shower means leaving Jensen's side, and that's just not an option. He can't. And fuck anyone who doesn't get it.
So when Sandy pops in around ten in the morning, waving her Blackberry like it's candy Jared just has to try, he rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. When she says, “I need signatures,” he huffs. “Jared, I'm not asking you to leave. I'm just asking you to keep your business from collapsing.”
It's been two days. Well, if you count the three that he was out of town, it's been a week since he was in the shop. It's not like Slinging Ink is going to go under because he hasn't been in for a few days. He and Jensen take two week vacations every year and the place is always there when he gets back. Chad and Sophia don't actually need him to keep the place up and running.
But he didn't make Sandy his business manager for her ability to back down when he's being a pouty child. “Where do I sign?” he asks reluctantly, straightening his posture and running his fingers through his hair. It feels gross and greasy, but he ignores the fact that the pen kind of slips in his hand when he starts to sign the first paper.
When he's done, Sandy considers him with a critical glare. He loves her, but sometimes she looks at him like he's about to break and Jared really wants to tell her to shut the fuck up before she says anything. Mostly because whatever she says will probably be right. She's annoying like that.
“Jensen would kick your ass, ya know?”
“What?”
“Sitting here, canceling appointments. He knows you have a business to run, Jared. He'd be pissed that you're not even bothering to call and check in.”
He almost agrees with her, because Jensen probably would be pissed, but then he shakes his head. “He'd do the same fuckin' thing if it was me,” he says, and he knows that it's true. There's no way in hell Jensen would leave him alone in this room if the situation was reversed.
And she can't argue, because they all, every last one of their friends, their family, fucking know that there is nothing in the world more important to either Jared or Jensen than the other. Nothing. “Remember how twinky he used to be?” is what she says when she finally pushes the last of the papers into her messenger bag and turns her attention back to the bed.
“He's never been twinky,” Jared corrects. Jensen wears eyeliner and skinny jeans and studded belts, but he's never been fucking twinky.
With a roll of her eyes, Sandy huffs. “Please! He was a skinny little twink the day he walked into our lives. Pretty as hell, don't get me wrong. He was fucking gorgeous. But he was also damn twinky.”
“Can you stop saying twinky, please?”
She does. Stops saying anything for a minute. “He would want you to eat.” Jared can't argue with that. Jensen would want him to eat. “And sleep.”
“I'm sleepin',” Jared argues, but it's lame because anyone with eyes knows that he's just protesting for the sake of saving face. He hasn't slept more than twenty minutes at a time in the last two days.
“In a chair.” She tilts her head and takes a step forward, nose crinkling. “When's the last time you showered?” Jared just shrugs. “Uh huh. I'll be right back.”
She's gone for less than five minutes.
“Alright, here's how this is gonna go.” She's cute, and tiny, and sweet, and fun most of the time. But when Sandy's in 'manager' mode? She's kind of intimidating. “There's an empty room next door. You're going to lay down and try to sleep. Brayden's on his way with clothes and food. You are going to shower and eat when he gets here,” she holds a finger up when Jared starts to protest. “I'm going to sit right here and I am not going to take my eyes off this pretty, pretty boy of yours.”
It's tempting, and he wants all of those things; nap, shower, food. But he can't leave this room. He just . . . he can't. He's spent his entire life clinging to the few things that he has, terrified that someone was going to snatch them away when he wasn't looking. If he takes his eyes off of Jensen, if he steps out and something happens? Something takes him away? Jared can't leave.
“You can,” Sandy assures him, voice soft as her hand slides up and down the curve of his spine. “You have to.”
It takes him another full minute to pull himself together and actually stand to his feet. He's pretty sure he won't be able to sleep, but if it'll shut Sandy up, he can try. Brayden drives like a maniac, so he'll be here pretty soon anyway, and then Jared will have an excuse to get back inside the room. Back to Jensen's side.
Just a few minutes . . .
Four fucking hours. He sleeps for four fucking hours and nobody bothers to wake him up. Fucking Sandy and her bull shit ideas. Of course, he can't be angry when he walks back into Jensen's room to find Sandy at his bedside, just like she promised, and Brayden scribbling in his sketchbook. She leaves, and returns fifteen minutes later with hot food, before taking off again.
After he takes a quick shower, they sit in relative silence for a long time, Brayden doodling and Jared flipping through a magazine. He doesn't want to admit that he feels better after his nap and shower, but he really does. Brayden tells him about plans to trick his bike out, and Jared can see the passion behind his kid's eyes when he talks about painting the gas tank and changing out the rims. The same passion he used to have for tatting, and then skating.
Jared offers to hook him up with a guy he knows who customizes bikes, and Brayden just lights the fuck up. Kid's interests change every other fucking week, but they always come back to art and extreme sports. Jensen always says that Brayden could become a fucking accountant for all he cares, but Jared knows that he won't. Regardless of what career Brayden settles on, he's an artist. Just like his dads. Has been since the day he walked into their lives, and Jared can't help but wonder if that's why he's always felt like theirs.
When Brayden leaves again, claiming he has a date with some chick he met at the Pier, he hands Jared his sketchpad and pats him on the shoulder. He'll be back later tonight, or in the morning, and it doesn't really bother Jared that he's not hanging around. Not a chance in hell he woulda stuck around at seventeen, either. Not when fucking his worry away with some random piece of ass was easier. Jared gets it.
He doesn't really realize that he's drawing Jensen until he's pulled out of his concentration by the door creaking open. He smiles when Steve shuts the door behind him and offers a small wave. “Your shift, huh?” Jared asks.
With a shrug, Steve sits and props his flip-flop clad feet on the side of Jensen's bed. “How you holdin' up?”
There's a serenity about Steve that has always appealed to Jared. In his fast-paced world, where Chad is a complete spazz at all times, and Sophia is a drama queen, and Genevieve is perpetual motion, having Steve around to balance the madness is kind of essential. Times like this, Jared's glad he's not out on the road, though he's pretty sure Chris would have dragged the band back to LA for this anyway.
With a shrug, he sets the sketch pad on the edge of Jensen's bed and licks his lips. “I'm cool,” he answers. It's the closest thing to a lie he's told, and Steve sees through it with a raise of his eyebrow. “Doctor says he's responding to the antibiotics, so I guess that's something.”
There's pure affection in Steve's eyes when he looks at Jensen. “Yeah, well, he's a scrappy fucker.”
It's true. Jensen will look a bull dog in the face and insult it's mother. He's not scared of anything. He teases Jared about being his enforcer, but they both know that Jensen doesn't need a fuckin' helping hand in a fight. He can hold his own just fine.
“Ya know what the weirdest part of this shit is, man?” Jared doesn't know why he's saying it. Sure as fuck wouldn't say it to anyone else. But a part of him trusts Steve's ability to be a mature adult more than anyone else he knows. “Eight fuckin' years I been hearin' that voice every goddamn day. Even when we're on the road or whatever, we talk. Sound of Jen's voice, it's . . . it's in my head, ya know? Like it's a part of me or some shit.” He sighs and drops his head, raking his fingers through his hair. “Sucks.”
He blesses the fact that Steve doesn't say anything in response. Words are vain and empty and shallow. Words mean nothing if they're not coming from Jensen.
“Longer he's out, the better the chances of brain damage and shit,” he says later. “Doctor told me this morning.” He shakes his head. Didn't bother telling Sandy that. Or Brayden. Didn't want to worry anyone. Make them freak out like he is. Doesn't wanna think about it himself, really.
It scares him, though. He's been sitting here for days now, wishing to hell that Jensen will just wake the fuck up and be his Jensen again. To find out that, even when he does wake up, he might not be Jared's Jensen anymore? There might be something wrong with his brain? That he might never be the same guy Jared left at the airport a week ago? Fuckin' hell, man. What's he supposed to do with that?
“His parents wanna come.” Hell, it's not like Steve's his priest or anything, but talking to him has always just been easy. He knows he's not gonna catch hell for having actual fears and emotions. Not that he believes any of his other friends are tactless enough to mock him for this, but they just . . . they wanna help, and they offer all of this fucking advice, like they've actually done this before. Steve won't.
“They're his parents,” is all he says, like that explains everything.
And Jared knows they're his parents. His family. And if Jensen wakes up wrong, if his brain is broken, Jared's afraid they're going to want to take him away. That they're going to think he needs more care than Jared could give him. They're not going to understand that Jared doesn't care how Jensen wakes up. He just wants his boy home. They can deal with the rest of it. He can deal with it. As long as he still has Jensen.
“I got him, Steve,” he says, voice breaking for the first time. He hasn't let himself cry. Forced himself not to. Once he starts, he's pretty sure he won't be able to stop. “I got him, and I got Bray, and that's it. That's fuckin' it, man.”
With a nod, Steve leans forward and rests his elbows on the side of Jensen's bed. “I know,” is all he says.
The clock beside Jensen's bed says it's 6:45 when Jared opens his eyes and realizes he's not alone in the room. The doctor is holding a chart, eyes darting back and forth between it and one of the monitors. One of the nurses tried to tell him once what they all did, but he wasn't really paying attention.
“Morning, Jared,” the doctor smiles warmly. Jared just offers him a half-smile and an almost-wave. “I think I have some good news for you, son.” Jared shifts in his chair, sits up a little bit straighter, and forces himself not to hope. “Jensen's fever is down. His vitals are strong. Infection is all but gone. I would like to bring him out of the coma this afternoon.”
He doesn't want to hope for something that's going to disappoint him, but what the fuck else can he be but elated. “Really?” He knows he sounds like a little kid, but who the fuck cares?
With a nod, the doctor drops the chart back into its place on the end of the bed. “Now, that doesn't mean that he's going to wake up right away. We're not going to be sending him home tonight or anything, okay? And we still won't know about brain damage or anything until he's back with us. But as far as the meningitis is concerned, I'm confident that he's out of the woods.”
Jared doesn't care about brain damage. He doesn't care about anything except the words Jensen's waking up. Nothing else matters. “Thank you,” he rounds the end of the bed and shakes the doctor's hand. “Thanks.” The doctor offers him another smile and Jared considers having Sandy order the man flowers, or one of those sausage and cheese platters. Possibly a stripper. Whatever. Jensen's waking up.
Digging his phone out of his pocket, he presses a button and waits for the groggy 'the fuck' on the other end. “Get your ass outta bed and down here, asshat. They're wakin' Jensen up.”
Three hours after they take Jensen off of the medication keeping him sedated, Brayden is sitting next to Jared at the side of the bed. Waiting. Neither of them are so good at it.
“What if he doesn't remember us?” Brayden asks suddenly. Jared smacks the back of his head. “I'm serious! The doctor said he might not know what's goin' on when he wakes up. What if he doesn't know who we are?”
He quells the urge to tell Brayden he watches too many fucking movies, but instead shrugs his shoulders. “Then we'll hang around until he does remember us.”
Quietly considering for a moment, Brayden shakes his head. “Gonna suck if he recognizes, like, Chad before you.” Jared raises an eyebrow. “Could totally happen, dude.”
“I'll kill him,” Jared teases, and it's the first time he's really felt like joking in days. It's weird, but he's pretty sure nothing could fucking ruin his mood right now.
“Ya know what would be hilarious?”
“If you shut your mouth before I kick your ass?”
“If he wakes up fuckin' straight!” Brayden guffaws and Jared rolls his eyes. “I'm serious! He could, like, totally leave your ass for Danneel or some shit.” When he stops to consider what he's actually saying, his lips curve into a devilish smirk. “If he does, I'm so goin' to live with him.”
“You can't,” Jared intones. “You're mine.”
“Fuckin' hell,” Brayden cringes. “What kinda fucked up shit is that? I gotta miss Danneel walkin' around in her underwear because you signed some fuckin' papers? Bull shit,” he shakes his head and then stops, eyes lighting up. “Can we hire Soph to come walk around in her underwear at our house when Jensen wakes up straight?”
With a nod, Jared purses his lips. “Sure. You handle the negotiations.” He almost laughs at the way Brayden's eyes go wide. The thought of him asking Sophia to come walk around the house in her underwear for money is kind of hilarious, actually.
He doesn't actually laugh, though, because the paper-thin sheets of the bed rustle and Jared looks over to find Jensen's eyes fluttering open. Hazy green , drifting and groggy, like maybe he doesn't know what's going on. But there they are, for the first time in a fucking week, those green eyes that bring him to his knees every fucking time.
It's pretty fucking clear, as those eyes drift around and never really focus on anything, that Jensen's still out of it. The doctor said that patients coming out of a coma can wake up several times and go right back to sleep before they're actually capable of forming words or maintaining consciousness. If they can even form words, if their brains remember how.
Brayden starts to say something when Jensen's eyes roll lazily in their direction. He doesn't speak, and the smile could be in Jared's imagination, but his gaze settles and there's a spark there. Something that Jared knows, because he knows Jensen better than anyone else on the motherfucking planet, is recognition.
Before anyone actually get a word out, he's asleep again, but Jared slumps back into his chair and feels like the entire weight of the world just went flying off of his chest. His Jensen is in there, and no matter what incarnation they get when he wakes up fully? It's all Jared needs to know.
He's so stuck in his own head, staring and willing Jensen to just open those eyes one more time, that he doesn't really feel Brayden's hand on his arm. But he sure as hell hears him when he says, “He's gonna be okay, Dad.”
He doesn't know what it feels like when you're heart explodes, but Jared thinks maybe just like this. With a nod, he smiles. “Yeah, he is.”
“You gonna get off my ass and let me walk up the fuckin' stairs?”
Jared follows closely behind as Jensen makes his way slowly toward the stairs. After he woke up, the doctor ended up keeping him in the hospital for another week. He kicked Jared out and made him go back to work after two days. Now that he's home, he's delusional if he thinks Jared's letting him do anything that remotely resembles work. Not until he's sure that he's not going to break again.
“Can you?” Jared challenges, hands on Jensen's hips as they start up the stairs.
“Not if you don't get outta my ass,” Jensen fires back over his shoulder and then raises an eyebrow when Jared doesn't respond. “Oh, come on, man!” He stops and turns. “I can walk up the motherfuckin' stairs by myself!”
“Sorry,” Jared mumbles and releases his hold, letting Jensen take a couple more steps on his own. The doctor said that he's probably going to be a little weak and tired, but other than that, everything seems fine. His brain isn't cracked or anything.
“Stop bein' such a pussy,” Jensen snarks as he reaches the top of the stairs and heads for the bedroom.
Jared follows and watches as his boyfriend moves slowly around the room, like he's trying to familiarize himself with it again. Like he does every time he comes back from vacation or a business trip. “You almost died,” Jared points out. If he's being a little over-protective, he thinks he has a right.
“But I didn't,” Jensen points, hands loose against his hips, expression narrowed.
“Jensen, lay off,” Jared snaps. He doesn't want to fight with Jensen on his first day home. Doesn't want to fight with him at all. Not now. When he knows what it's like . . .
Jensen rolls his eyes and grabs a bottle of black polish from the dresser. “Don't yell at me,” he uses it to point at Jared before lowering himself to the edge of the bed. “I almost died.”
He grins, all smart ass and white teeth, and it breaks something inside Jared's chest. Something that's been building for two weeks. Something that worry and concern and fear kept down until Jensen was out of the woods. Until he knew that everything was okay. Something that he thought he'd pushed far enough away not to deal with. “Fuck off,” Jared snarls, turning to escape the room.
Jensen moves pretty fast for a fucker who just came out of a coma a week ago. Grabbing Jared's wrist, he says, “Hey, stop.” Jared does, immediately. “Look at me,” he instructs, and Jared turns. “I'm right here, okay? I fucked up, and I didn't take care of myself, and I ended up in a coma for four days. You're pissed at me, and I get it, okay?” With a softer smile, he runs his fingers up over Jared's arm and settles his hand heavy against his shoulder. “Lesson learned.”
Shaking him off, Jared creates space between them and balls his hands into fists. “You don't fucking get anything!” he roars. “You didn't sit there for four fucking days, Jen. Four days, praying to a god I don't even fucking believe in to just let you wake the fuck up! You don't know what it was like to sit there knowing we weren't done, that there was shit I should have told you, places I wanted to take you. Didn't fucking know if I would ever hear your goddamn voice again. So don't you dare stand there and crack jokes when I almost fucking lost you. You almost fucking died!”
When he stumbles, Jensen is there to catch him, and they both stammer back against the bed. Jared's draped across him, tears flowing over his cheeks as his chest heaves and he releases every emotion he couldn't let himself feel until Jensen was safe and here and home. And Jensen just lays under him, one hand in his hair, the other on his back, telling him that he's sorry, and he's going to take better care of himself, and it's going to be okay.
By the time he manages to collect himself, Jensen is subtly trying to roll out from under the weight of him, and Jared slides over so that Jensen can breathe. Suffocating him on his first day home is probably not the best idea.
Jensen smiles, and suddenly, everything feels like it clicks back into place again. Jensen's here, in their bed. So is Jared. Together. Brayden's tromping up the stairs like his shoes are made of concrete. Life is normal again.
“Y'all gonna stand around cryin' about the value of life, or can we fuckin' eat now?” comes the voice from the doorway.
Jensen grunts as he stands from the bed, hand finding the back of Brayden's head as they start into the hall. “Your compassion overwhelms me, Bray,” he teases.
“Oh, shut up, you're fine,” Brayden throws back and Jared follows, giving Jensen just enough space not to bitch anymore. When they get to the kitchen, Brayden hands Jensen a Styrofoam take out container and his brow furrows. “You are fine, right?”
Jared hops onto the counter and Jensen leans against his thigh, nodding as he grabs his noodles with his chopsticks. “I'm fine,” he assures the kid and then nods toward him. “Now eat your fuckin' dinner.”
Free Counters
Author:
raeschaePairing:J2
Rating:PG-13
Word Count: 9800ish
Summary: There are only two people in the world who mean everything to Jared. Now he may lose one of them.
Part of the Disclaimer 'Verse.
A/N: I've been wanting to do this time stamp since I finished Sh*t Happens. A lot of other things took precedence, but now that it's done? I'm pretty fucking thrilled with it. I hope you guys like it.
FYI: This one falls, chronologically, some time after Like a Virgin. Also, the title comes from the Skillet song of the same name.
Graphics by:
raeschae (Only dividers)They say your entire life can change with one phone call. Jared usually thinks they are full of shit, but that's one truth that he's experienced enough to believe. Of course, he doesn't think about it all that often. Until he's heading back from LAX after a three-day trip to West Bumblefuck, Indiana. He's been tattooing every last member a rock super-tour, twenty-eight tats in forty-eight hours, and he's more than ready to sleep in his own bed, wrapped around his own Jensen.
He's almost to the Santa Monica Boulevard exit when his cell blares some ridiculous hip hop song that Brayden insists on setting as his ring tone every time Jared sets it back. “Dude, I'm almost home,” he answers in lieu of a 'hello.' What the fuck's Brayden calling him for anyway? He's supposed to be at school.
“Don't go home,” is Brayden's rushed response.
“What? Why?”
“It's Jensen. I don't know, man. Found him in his office this morning, on the floor. He's . . . it's bad, Jay. I don't know. Just . . . meet us at UCLA Med.” He disconnects the call and Jared doesn't notice that he's still holding the phone at his ear.
One call. One moment. Everything changes. The entire world shatters.
He doesn't freak out often, but by the time Jared gets to the UCLA Medical Center, he's pretty sure he's either going to pass out or throw up. Or punch something. Hard.
So it's probably a good thing that Tom's waiting for him at the ER entrance. Doesn't mean Jared's glad to see him or anything. Especially when Tom rests his hands against Jared's shoulders and hinders his forward progress.
“Settle down, Jay,” he says, blue eyes steeled for a fight.
“Fuck you,” Jared spits, pushing at Tom's chest with both hands.
“Man, I get it, okay? I do. But you can't go in there all Raging Bull. Calm the fuck down, or they're gonna kick your ass out.”
He wants to be bothered by the fact that his friends think he's a motherfucking powder keg. Like he's incapable of controlling his emotions or some shit. He would be, if it wasn't the truth most of the time. Which is why Jensen usually has to calm him down before he starts something.
But Jensen's not standing out here with him, and that's the problem. “Get. Out. Of. My. Way.”
Tom does as he's told and Jared rolls his shoulders before walking as calmly as he possibly can into the Emergency Room. For some reason, stepping through the door, taking in the sterile scent and the shining white floors, and the fucking people takes him right back to the last time he was here. Four years ago, with Jensen at his side and Brayden in a fucking hospital bed, unconscious. Now it's Jensen. He supposes maybe he should be glad that there's only two people that mean enough to turn his world inside out.
When he rounds the corner, Brayden is on his phone, cell pressed to his ear as he balances a clipboard on his knees and scribbles something on the paper there. “No, I got it,” he's saying when Jared approaches. “Allergies?”
“Shellfish,” Jared answers automatically. Jensen's allergic to shellfish. That place they go to with the really great lobster is the only place he doesn't steal food off of Jared's plate.
Brayden looks up, startled. “Jay's here,” he says into the phone and then blinks, turning his attention back to the paper. “No, I think he can get it from here. . . Yeah, thanks. . . I will. . . you, too.” He taps the screen on the phone and slides it into his pocket. When he looks up at Jared again, he looks wrecked. “Can you help me finish these? Donna was trying, but there's shit she doesn't know.”
Sitting in the chair beside his son, Jared takes the clipboard and starts looking over the questions Brayden and Jensen's mom couldn't answer together. “Talk,” he commands as he starts filling in blanks.
Brayden slumps back into his seat, his shoulders hunched as he runs a hand over his face and through his blond hair. “Okay, so ya know how he was kinda tired and shit the last couple days?” Jared nods because Jensen denied it vehemently after Brayden ratted him out on the phone the other night. “Well, he started pukin' yesterday, like a lot. Said his muscles hurt or some shit, but he wouldn't go to the doctor, and he made me promise not to tell you about it.”
Of course he did. Because God forbid Jensen Ackles admit to actually being sick. Jared remembers the time he botched a 540 on the pipe at Ollie and walked around with a broken wrist for three days because he didn't want to admit that Jared was right, he should see a doctor. Like an artist has any business trying to work with a broken wrist for three fucking days. Jensen's a stubborn fucker. Has been for all of the eight years Jared's known him.
“Told him the only way I was gonna keep my mouth shut was if he promised to stay home today and get some rest.” Brayden rolls his eyes and rests his head against the wall. “Said he'd lay low, but there's some new guy at Element that's makin' these bad ass boards for competition now, and he wanted to try to get a deal rolling, so he wasn't gonna pussy out for some virus or whatever.” Jared nods because it sounds exactly like Jensen. Idiot. “He was in his office when I got ready to leave for school.”
When Brayden stops, Jared looks up from the forms in his lap and quirks an eyebrow. It's not usual for Jensen to be up at the ass crack of dawn, but it's not exactly cause for a pregnant pause, either. Not when he's got a new project on his mind. “And?”
Brayden's eyes cloud and he licks his lips, shoulders shuddering like whatever's in his head is big, ugly, and scary. “He was passed out on the floor, man. Just crumpled in a heap like he stood up and fell right the fuck back down again.”
There are times when Brayden sounds less like the deep-voiced young man he's becoming, and so much more like the twelve-year-old kid he was when Jared first met him. Those times kind of freak Jared out a little, because they mean the kid's scared. Brayden doesn't get scared for no fucking reason.
“I called 911, and the store to tell 'em what was going on. Then I called you. Mike and Tom were here when I got here,” he finishes his tale with another sweep of his fingers through his hair.
“You talk to anybody yet?” Jared doesn't really recognize his own voice anymore, and he's not sure where the questions are even coming from. He's certainly not thinking very clearly. Doesn't really remember forming any kind of thought before things start popping out of his mouth. “Was he awake at all? When you found him? In the ambulance? Was he breathing?”
Brayden just nods and stares at the floor for a minute. “He opened his eyes a couple of times, but it wasn't like he was seeing anything, ya know? Like he wasn't even really in there or somethin'.”
As he finishes the papers and returns them to a less-than-pleasant-looking receptionist at the front desk, Jared tries like hell to convince himself that everything's going to be okay. That maybe it's just a strong case of the flu and Jensen's going to be better than ever in no time. That they're going to take him home in less than an hour.
Because Jensen has to be okay. There's no other option. Not for Jared anyway.
They've been hanging out in the waiting room for forty five minutes when Chad and Sophia walk through the door. Mike and Tom are still hanging out on the other side of the room, quietly talking between themselves.
Brayden and Jared are sitting side-by-side in hard plastic chairs that weren't exactly built for comfort. Brayden occasionally says whatever pops into his head, but Jared doesn't even open his mouth. If he does, he's pretty sure he'll start yelling.
“What are you doin' here?” Brayden asks, looking back and forth between them. It's not that he's not happy to see them or whatever, but he's pretty sure they're supposed to be working.
“Break in our schedule,” Chad explains, turning his eyes to his friend. “Welcome home, huh?”
When Jared doesn't respond, Brayden fills in for him. “He's not really in a jokey mood right now.”
“Have you heard anything?” It's not Sophia's fault that they haven't. But her question makes Jared's fists clench and Brayden stands with a shake of his head.
Chad looks back and forth from Jared to Brayden and back again. “Because they don't know anything yet? Or because you're gay and therefore aren't really considered a part of Jensen's family?”
Jared rolls his eyes. Four years ago, he and Jensen made it legal. Being as they're never going to get married, even if it's legal in California for more than three days in a row, they signed all of the necessary paper work to become Power of Attorney for each other. He thought it was stupid at the time, but Jensen insisted. Just in case. Fuckin' hell.
“You wanna go get some coffee, Kiddo?” Sophia asks, foot nudging Brayden's calf as she shoots a nervous glance in Jared's direction. They all know what Jared's 'calm before the storm' looks like by now.
Standing, Brayden runs his hands over his jeans. “You want anything, Jay?” Jared shakes his head, offers Brayden half of an almost-smile, and then goes back to staring at a non-existent spot on the floor. “He's not really saying much,” he says as he follows Sophia to the waiting room door.
She chuckles, more biting and sarcastic than her normal sweet voice. “Which is loads different from all those other times when we can't get him to shut up.”
It's true that Jared doesn't talk a lot, but they all know this is different. Normally, he doesn't have to say anything, because Jensen talks plenty for the pair of them. All Jared has to do is sit back and listen. Now he's not really hearing anything at all.
Chad sinks into the seat at Jared's side and lets out a long sigh. “You know it's not gonna be anything bad, right?”
Jared huffs. “Because people pass out in a good way all the time?”
“Maybe it's just exhaustion. Didn't Lindsay Lohan collapse from that one time?”
It might be funny, the comparison, if Jared's entire world wasn't hanging in the balance. “Can you just,” he runs his hands over his face and lets his eyes drift to the ceiling, “Stop talking?” There's a water stain in the center of the third tile from the center light fixture.
Chad does as he's asked and taps his foot against the floor, but Jared barely notices. An hour ago, he was thinking of falling into bed next to Jensen. Now he'd give anything for Jensen to get up out of bed.
Another thirty minutes pass with no word. Mike and Tom went to find a vending machine awhile ago, and Sophia returned with coffee for Chad and an explanation that Brayden was chatting up some nurse in the cafeteria and would probably wander back in soon. Unless he gets lucky, which he seems to do a lot since Demi broke up with him three months ago.
“Got here as soon as we could,” Danneel greets as she enters the room, Katie in tow. Jared would bitch about the fact that more than half of his staff is now in this room, and who the hell is running the store anyway? But Jensen's entire crew is here, too, and Jared knows that they're not going anywhere until they know something. They wouldn't get anything done at work anyway.
“What's the word?” Katie asks, sliding her jacket off of her shoulders as she makes her way to one of the chairs across from Jared.
Sophia shakes her head and moves her magazine from the chair at her side so Danneel can sit. Chad is on the floor, head thrown back against her thigh and she keeps running her fingers through his hair like she needs to be sure he's still there. “Nothing yet.” She just nods when Danneel hisses fuck under her breath.
Before she can say much more, they're interrupted once again. “What do we know?” Chris asks, eyes darting from one person in the room to the next, expression hopeful.
“Aren't you s'posed to be in the studio all day?” Danneel asks him, scooting over to make room for Steve in her chair. Chris won't sit. He'll pace and mumbled under his breath and silently freak the fuck out, but he won't sit down.
With a firm expression, he responds. “My best friend's in the fuckin' hospital.” Chris has known Jensen longer than any of them. Almost twenty years now. If anybody thinks he has anything better to do than hang around the hospital waiting for word on his boy, they clearly don't know him very well.
“Where's Brayden?” Steve looks around and then at the look shooting knowingly between Danneel and Sophia. “Really? In the hospital?” He can't help smiling as he sinks back in the chair and maneuvers Danneel until they both fit. “So much like his fucking dads, man.”
It's nearly an hour later, and about two seconds before Jared starts knocking some heads together for information, when Jensen's doctor steps into the waiting room. His eyes go wide at the number of people turning to look at him. “Wow. This is quite a crowd,” he smiles.
Sophia explains everything with a simple, “It's Jensen.”
Pressing between Katie and Mike, Jared crosses his arms over his chest and steels himself for the news. Technically, Jensen's doctor is also Jared's, but he tries to stay away from the guy's office as much as possible. Aside from annual blood testing in order to get the shop re-certified, he doesn't see him all that much.
Fortunately, their limited history has taught the doctor that beating around the bush never works with Jared. “We did a lot of blood work, and then a spinal tap, in order to definitively diagnose Jensen with bacterial meningitis,” he explains.
Jared can't help the, “Fuck,” that slips out even as his eyes clench closed.
“He's not over the line,” the doctor goes on and Jared doesn't ask what line he's referring to. Doesn't have to. “He's pushing close, though. We had to put him in a chemically-induced coma to stabilize him. Let his body focus on fighting the infection for a little while.”
“How long's a little while?” Tom asks from somewhere behind Jared. This is why he loves his friends – they think to ask what he needs to know when he can't remember to ask it himself.
With a shrug and a contrite expression, the doctor throws a glance over Jared's shoulder and then meets his eye again. “Could be a couple of days. Could be a couple of weeks. We won't know until we see how he responds to the antibiotics.”
“When can we see him?” Chris demands.
“They're moving him to a room in the ICU right now. When they get him situated, I'll send a nurse. No more than two people in the room at a time, though.” Catching his bottom lip between his teeth, he looks over the dejected and worried faces assembled, like a professor addressing his students before finals or something. “He's not going to be responsive. It might be better for everyone to head home and wait for word.”
Jared knows the suggestion isn't for him. Because the doctor has to know that he's not going anywhere. Far as he's concerned, he has no reason to leave this building until Jensen's leaving with him. His friends start to dissipate, discussing a rough schedule for who will come to visit and when, and Jared blinks his eyes. He knows them, recognizes their faces and the sounds of their voices, but none of it feels real. Nothing in the last two hours has felt fucking real.
He reaches out and grabs the first arm that happens by. When his eyes settle on Katie's face, he says, “Find Brayden.” He doesn't care where the kid is or what he's doing. Jared's going to see Jensen as soon as the nurses come, and he wants both of his boys in one place. Where he can keep an eye on them himself.
He remembers stepping into Brayden's room for the first time after the accident. Remembers the way the monitors seemed to beep so loudly Jared couldn't think. Remembers the way he looked so tiny and pale against the white sheets, bruises ugly and dark like neon signs in contrast. And he remembers wanting to kill someone.
It's different this time. With Jensen, it's always different.
When he steps into the room, there's still the beeping, the smallness, and the pale Jensen. But he's not wearing eyeliner, and his fuchsia-dyed hair isn't shiny, and his black, chipped fingernail polish doesn't look remotely sexy or inviting. He's not wearing a wildly-designed tee shirt, or Dickies, or skater shoes. He looks like an imitation Jensen, and Jared doesn't so much want to kill anyone as crumble to the floor in a heap and cry like he hasn't since he was a kid.
That's his entire life. Right there, in that bed, barely breathing. In a coma, for fuck's sake. His vibrant, life-of-the-party, frenetic ball of constant energy and motion. His Jensen. Or, rather, the shell of him. He lets his eyes drift over the body in the bed and then settle back on his perfect face, and it hurts. It fucking hurts to see his world hanging in the balance like this.
“Dude, this is so fucked,” Brayden breathes at his side and Jared can't bring himself to tear his eyes away from Jensen, so he just nods in agreement.
He doesn't want to kill anyone this time. Not like he did with Brayden. Because he knows this is nobody's fault. Back in the waiting room, Sophia snagged a passing nurse and asked her a bunch of questions about meningitis. Jared barely heard her responses, but he knows that Jensen caught it from someone – either from kissing them, or sharing food with them, or being sneezed or coughed on in the last couple of days. Aside from the kissing thing, Jensen could have gotten it from anyone.
With Brayden, he couldn't stand being in the same room. Looking at the kid, so tiny and damaged, made him itch to get away. He couldn't stand there, knowing that Brayden was in pain, and not want to inflict some pain himself. Jensen's not in pain, though. And even if he was, Jared can't even fathom the thought of leaving him here. Alone? When have they done anything alone in the last eight years?
“Jay?”
“What?”
“Is he gonna,” Brayden stops and breathes through his nose, long fingers clutching the end of Jensen's bed. It reminds Jared of when he did the same thing four years ago, tapping his fingers against the end of Brayden's bed and clenching his jaw just like Bray is now. “You gotta promise me he's gonna wake up.”
Jared doesn't even hesitate. “'Course he's gonna wake up.” Why the fuck wouldn't . . . he's going to wake up.
“How do you know?”
“Doctor said.” He doesn't add the because he has to part of the answer.
It's quiet for a long time, and then Brayden whispers, “I shoulda stopped it.”
Jared snorts. “How?” The kid's all of about a hundred and sixty pounds at six foot three. How in the hell his toothpick ass thinks he could have stopped this from happening is beyond Jared. When Brayden just shrugs, Jared moves around the side of the bed and sinks to the chair at Jensen's side. “Nothin' you coulda done,” he assures Brayden.
The kid's a wreck. Considering the fact that he not only found one of his dads passed out on the floor this morning, and then spent the next three hours sitting next to the nearly-catatonic other one, Jared can't blame him. He knows what Jensen would do if he was awake right now.
“Go home,” Jared instructs, tossing the keys to his truck across the distance and Brayden's eyes widen like Jared has lost his motherfucking mind. “Sleep. Or have some people over. Just,” Jared shakes his head, “get your mind off it for awhile. Come back when you're ready.”
“You sure?” Brayden looks skeptical, but also a little bit relieved. He's just a kid, and the last time he was in a hospital, it wasn't so much a pleasant experience for him. Jared gets it. “Call me if anything changes?”
Jared just nods, eyes drifting to Jensen before snapping back to the door. “Be careful.” If either of them can be considered the mom here, it's always been Jensen. But Jared can't stop the words from popping out. For the briefest moment, he imagines something happening to Brayden on his way home, and it makes him want to vomit.
“Dude,” Brayden rolls his eyes and then stops himself from shooting off one of his usual, smart-ass remarks. “I will,” he promises when his gaze locks on Jared's. For a second, they just look at each other, comforting and consoling without words, and then he's gone.
When they're alone, Jared finally lets himself reach out and touch Jensen's smooth, unmoving hand. It's limp against his own palm, and his thumb ghosts over the black polish on Jensen's index finger. Into the stillness, just under the hum of the machines, he says, “Come back to me, Jen. Need you to come back to me.”
Jared couldn't tell you how long he's been sitting here, but he knows it's been awhile. Sitting by idly when a nurse stops by to dick around with Jensen's tubes and monitors, and then continuing to sit idly when they're gone. There's nothing he can do, and that's the worst part. He swore, when he left Texas a lifetime ago, that he would never again be at anyone's mercy. If something needs to be done, Jared does it.
Except, now that it's the most important thing in the entire fucking world that needs to be done? Jared is totally helpless to do a motherfucking thing. He's never felt so completely inept in his life.
A soft knock on the door interrupts his thoughts and Jared lifts his eyes from Jensen's collarbone to see Chris in the doorway. “You mind?” he asks and Jared shakes his head in invitation.
For a long time, Chris just looks at Jensen, and Jared wonders what he's thinking. Is he imagining that little, twelve-year-old pipsqueak who used to follow him around the skate park back in Dallas? Or the guy who showed up on his doorstep at twenty-eight, needing a place to crash and a new start? Or maybe the guy who got smashed at their New Year's Eve party last year and sliced his own finger open on one Chris's guitar strings?
Jared can't really tell what's going on in the guy's head – he's not exactly overtly-expressive on a normal day. “You know any more?” Chris asks, sitting in the chair on the opposite side of the bed.
Jared shakes his head. “Fever's down to 103. Which,” Jared shrugs, “is good. I guess?”
There's a forced sound of short, humorless laughter, and Chris returns the gesture. “Fuck if I know, man.”
They don't say anything for a long time, and Jared's glad to have Chris around. He loves Jensen, has for more than twenty years, and he's the only person Jared thinks comes anywhere close to feeling what he's feeling right now. Plus, Chris doesn't feel the need to fill silence with words, so . . . bonus.
He doesn't know how long they sit there, but when Chris stands, another nurse is coming in to change Jensen's IV. He turns blazing blue eyes to Jared and asks, “You need anything, man?”
He needs Jensen to wake up. Everything else seems pointless in comparison. “I'm cool.”
“Call me,” Chris instructs with a point of his finger and Jared nods as he leaves.
“Ya know,” the nurse's voice drags Jared's eyes from the door, “I watch your show all the time.” She's not the first to tell him so, and Jared wishes that he could let them all know that he doesn't give a fuck about his goddamn reality show right now. This reality? It's all that matters. “We're gonna take care of him, Jared. Gonna get him back to you.”
“Thanks,” he responds, voice polite, but thin. If being a fan of his show means that they'll take extra care of his boyfriend, then Jared will suck it up. He's not one to drop names, and he doesn't use his minimal celebrity to his advantage often, but this time? This time, he'll take any special treatment they're willing to give.
Jared is tired. He's been in this goddamn room for about twelve hours, and at the hospital for fifteen. He didn't really sleep last night, or the night before that, or the one before that. He never does when he's out of town on business. Without Jensen to wrap himself around, it's hard to find the deep peacefulness that breeds actual rest. He knows he's not sleeping again until they're both home again. Safe and healthy.
When Danneel peeks around the door, he doesn't bother to ask how she got in after visiting hours. He doesn't care. She's chewing on her bottom lip and staring nervously at Jared, like she's refusing to look at Jensen. When she does speak, it kind of surprises him. “Jay, I'm so sorry.”
He shrugs it off as one of those things that people just say in situations like this. “Not your fault.”
“It is,” Danneel insists, sitting in the chair across the bed from him. She looks at Jensen, and her eyes fill with fat, crocodile tears. “I was feeling pretty sick the other day, and he ate the cookies I baked. There's a pretty fucking good chance he got this from me,” she chokes on the word.
Sure, it's possible. It's also possible that one of those snot-nosed little tweeners at the park sneezed on Jensen while he was tryin' to teach them some move or another. Or that he helped someone at the store who hadn't washed their hands before handling the money they handed over. There are a million possibilities as to why Jensen's here. Only one of them points in Danneel's direction, and even then, blaming her is a stretch.
“Did you give him a cookie, Dani? Or did he steal yours out of your mouth?” He knows Jensen, and if Danneel had a half-eaten cookie in her hand when he walked by? He'd take it, eat it, and flash her a crumby grin without a second thought. He does it to Jared all the time.
“I could have told him not to,” she points out.
It's easier when there's someone to blame. When you can put a face behind the pain and focus your attention on something other than Jensen lying in a fucking coma. Jared gets that, and he wishes that he could blame her. Hating Danneel for doing this to Jensen would be so much easier than the pain that comes from not being able to help Jensen. But it's not true. And Jared's nothing if not completely honest, even when the truth blows.
“Woulda fuckin' done it anyway,” Jared shakes his head, eyes drifting back to Jensen's serene face. Even without the eyeliner and the perfectly-styled hair, he's too fucking pretty to be real. Jesus. “Bray said he started getting sick the day before yesterday,” he goes on. “Coulda maybe avoided this if he woulda called the doctor then. At least, the coma part.” He shakes his head and can't help quirking a little bit of a smile. “Kept fuckin' pushin' until he collapsed.”
“So it's his fault?” Danneel asks, eyes narrowing angrily.
Jared can't help looking at Jensen with affection. He works too damn hard, and he runs all the fucking time. Parties when he can, and stays up until long after midnight most nights just to prove that he's not too old to handle it yet. The fact that his immune system hasn't completely shut down in protest before now is a testament to how truly awesome he really is in Jared's book.
He doesn't even think about the fact that he's running the backs of his knuckles down Jensen's arm when he nods in affirmation of Danneel's question, and he doesn't stop when she snorts at his side and mutters, “Dumbass,” under her breath. “Fucking stupid workaholic dumbass.”
Jared can't disagree. Jensen is a dumbass. Sometimes he's downright idiotic. Occasionally, he's even a giant douche. But he's Jared's dumbass idiotic douche. “He really fucking is,” he responds and doesn't bother to look up when Danneel rounds the bed, presses a kiss to the side of his head, and then slips out of the room, absolved.
Night fades into morning and Jared watches nurses string in and out of the room. The doctor stops by once on his rounds and offers Jared little more than a smile and a 'that's encouraging' when Jared mentions Jensen's fever going down. One of the candy stripers brings him a stack of tattoo magazines and then proceeds to tell him all about her back piece and what she wants to have added once she's saved the money from her other job (she's a sales associate at Macy's and loves Jensen's line, of course). He nods and smiles half-heartedly, but she and her art are the last things he gives a damn about at the moment.
The head nurse for this shift chases the girl out and apologizes profusely to Jared, but he just shakes his head and settles back in his chair. He's flipping through one of the magazines, eyes never really focusing on any one page, when the door bangs open and the waft of grease and french fries fills the room.
“I brought food,” Genevieve announces.
She wasn't here yesterday. It's been almost a week since Jared saw his perky receptionist, and he doesn't want to admit that he kind of missed her. Genevieve's alright, no matter what Chad says. “Congratulations?” he answers when she looks like she's waiting for a response.
Shoving the bag toward Jared, she rolls her eyes and sets the over-sized cardboard cup onto the table next to Jensen's bed. “For you, boss.”
“Not hungry.”
“Bull shit,” Genevieve fires back, hand on her hip as she looks down on him. “You're always hungry.”
It's the go-to joke for all of their friends. Jared and his enormous appetite. Except it's not all that funny now. Nothing is. “Can you just,” he shakes his head, “not?”
With another roll of her eyes, Genevieve shrugs out of her jacket. “For the record, Jen's gonna pissed as hell when he wakes up and finds you completely lost your sense of humor.” In lieu of saying anything else, she steps between Jared and the bed and situates herself on his thigh, arms tight around his neck.
“The fuck you think you're doin'?” he asks sharply as Genevieve settles back against his chest.
“Workin' on a theory,” she states simply, like maybe Jared should already know this. “Figure nothin' gets y'all worked up and ready to fight like somebody touchin' what's yours. So, if I get all up on you, maybe Jenny'll decide to wake his ass up and do somethin' about it.”
“You're outta your goddamn mind,” Jared says, but he tightens his hand around her hip because it feels good to have something warm and solid pressed against him. Not as good as Jensen, but comfortable. Safe.
“It's true! You guys are, like, crazy fuckin' cavemen about each other.” Jared 'pffts', chin resting on her shoulder. “Dude, remember that night up at 4100?” Jared does, but he's not going to admit it and further prove her theory. “You fired me for grabbin' his ass!”
It's true, and he can't fight the smile in the wake of the memory. He was drunk off his ass, hanging out at a gay bar with his boy and his friends, and Genevieve somehow thought that jumping up on Jensen was a good idea. “You didn't grab his ass,” Jared corrects her. “You full-on wrapped your legs around him and tried to ride his cock on the dance floor.”
It's not like Jared felt threatened. Not by a mouthy lesbian who didn't want to grind on Jensen any more than Jensen wanted her grinding on him. But he was drunk enough to be bothered by the sight of anyone touching his Jensen. So he fired her. She showed up for work the next day anyway.
“Please,” Genevieve sighs dramatically. “He didn't even get hard.” As though that means anything at all.
“What can I say?” Jared offers as his only defense for the incident, and maybe for everything else ever. “He makes me do crazy shit sometimes.”
She falls silent for awhile, head resting on his shoulder, arms loose around his neck as her fingers tease the hair curling at his neck. “He's gonna be okay, Jay,” she whispers finally. Jared just nods, because it's the only thing that he has to believe. “You guys are indestructible.”
“Yeah.” Even as he says the word, he can't help wondering: If Genevieve's right, then why does he feel so goddamn fragile?
By the next day, Jared's pretty sure he hasn't felt this strung out since he smoked shit with that band at The Roxxy and waxed philosophical about his own toes. His eyes are burning, his legs won't stop twitching, and every once in awhile he catches a whiff of something he hopes isn't his own body odor. The nurses are starting to look at him with more concern than they look at Jensen, and he knows they all think he's kind of pathetic. Maybe sweet, but pathetic nonetheless.
The thing is, Jared can't bring himself to care. Because going home to sleep and shower means leaving Jensen's side, and that's just not an option. He can't. And fuck anyone who doesn't get it.
So when Sandy pops in around ten in the morning, waving her Blackberry like it's candy Jared just has to try, he rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. When she says, “I need signatures,” he huffs. “Jared, I'm not asking you to leave. I'm just asking you to keep your business from collapsing.”
It's been two days. Well, if you count the three that he was out of town, it's been a week since he was in the shop. It's not like Slinging Ink is going to go under because he hasn't been in for a few days. He and Jensen take two week vacations every year and the place is always there when he gets back. Chad and Sophia don't actually need him to keep the place up and running.
But he didn't make Sandy his business manager for her ability to back down when he's being a pouty child. “Where do I sign?” he asks reluctantly, straightening his posture and running his fingers through his hair. It feels gross and greasy, but he ignores the fact that the pen kind of slips in his hand when he starts to sign the first paper.
When he's done, Sandy considers him with a critical glare. He loves her, but sometimes she looks at him like he's about to break and Jared really wants to tell her to shut the fuck up before she says anything. Mostly because whatever she says will probably be right. She's annoying like that.
“Jensen would kick your ass, ya know?”
“What?”
“Sitting here, canceling appointments. He knows you have a business to run, Jared. He'd be pissed that you're not even bothering to call and check in.”
He almost agrees with her, because Jensen probably would be pissed, but then he shakes his head. “He'd do the same fuckin' thing if it was me,” he says, and he knows that it's true. There's no way in hell Jensen would leave him alone in this room if the situation was reversed.
And she can't argue, because they all, every last one of their friends, their family, fucking know that there is nothing in the world more important to either Jared or Jensen than the other. Nothing. “Remember how twinky he used to be?” is what she says when she finally pushes the last of the papers into her messenger bag and turns her attention back to the bed.
“He's never been twinky,” Jared corrects. Jensen wears eyeliner and skinny jeans and studded belts, but he's never been fucking twinky.
With a roll of her eyes, Sandy huffs. “Please! He was a skinny little twink the day he walked into our lives. Pretty as hell, don't get me wrong. He was fucking gorgeous. But he was also damn twinky.”
“Can you stop saying twinky, please?”
She does. Stops saying anything for a minute. “He would want you to eat.” Jared can't argue with that. Jensen would want him to eat. “And sleep.”
“I'm sleepin',” Jared argues, but it's lame because anyone with eyes knows that he's just protesting for the sake of saving face. He hasn't slept more than twenty minutes at a time in the last two days.
“In a chair.” She tilts her head and takes a step forward, nose crinkling. “When's the last time you showered?” Jared just shrugs. “Uh huh. I'll be right back.”
She's gone for less than five minutes.
“Alright, here's how this is gonna go.” She's cute, and tiny, and sweet, and fun most of the time. But when Sandy's in 'manager' mode? She's kind of intimidating. “There's an empty room next door. You're going to lay down and try to sleep. Brayden's on his way with clothes and food. You are going to shower and eat when he gets here,” she holds a finger up when Jared starts to protest. “I'm going to sit right here and I am not going to take my eyes off this pretty, pretty boy of yours.”
It's tempting, and he wants all of those things; nap, shower, food. But he can't leave this room. He just . . . he can't. He's spent his entire life clinging to the few things that he has, terrified that someone was going to snatch them away when he wasn't looking. If he takes his eyes off of Jensen, if he steps out and something happens? Something takes him away? Jared can't leave.
“You can,” Sandy assures him, voice soft as her hand slides up and down the curve of his spine. “You have to.”
It takes him another full minute to pull himself together and actually stand to his feet. He's pretty sure he won't be able to sleep, but if it'll shut Sandy up, he can try. Brayden drives like a maniac, so he'll be here pretty soon anyway, and then Jared will have an excuse to get back inside the room. Back to Jensen's side.
Just a few minutes . . .
Four fucking hours. He sleeps for four fucking hours and nobody bothers to wake him up. Fucking Sandy and her bull shit ideas. Of course, he can't be angry when he walks back into Jensen's room to find Sandy at his bedside, just like she promised, and Brayden scribbling in his sketchbook. She leaves, and returns fifteen minutes later with hot food, before taking off again.
After he takes a quick shower, they sit in relative silence for a long time, Brayden doodling and Jared flipping through a magazine. He doesn't want to admit that he feels better after his nap and shower, but he really does. Brayden tells him about plans to trick his bike out, and Jared can see the passion behind his kid's eyes when he talks about painting the gas tank and changing out the rims. The same passion he used to have for tatting, and then skating.
Jared offers to hook him up with a guy he knows who customizes bikes, and Brayden just lights the fuck up. Kid's interests change every other fucking week, but they always come back to art and extreme sports. Jensen always says that Brayden could become a fucking accountant for all he cares, but Jared knows that he won't. Regardless of what career Brayden settles on, he's an artist. Just like his dads. Has been since the day he walked into their lives, and Jared can't help but wonder if that's why he's always felt like theirs.
When Brayden leaves again, claiming he has a date with some chick he met at the Pier, he hands Jared his sketchpad and pats him on the shoulder. He'll be back later tonight, or in the morning, and it doesn't really bother Jared that he's not hanging around. Not a chance in hell he woulda stuck around at seventeen, either. Not when fucking his worry away with some random piece of ass was easier. Jared gets it.
He doesn't really realize that he's drawing Jensen until he's pulled out of his concentration by the door creaking open. He smiles when Steve shuts the door behind him and offers a small wave. “Your shift, huh?” Jared asks.
With a shrug, Steve sits and props his flip-flop clad feet on the side of Jensen's bed. “How you holdin' up?”
There's a serenity about Steve that has always appealed to Jared. In his fast-paced world, where Chad is a complete spazz at all times, and Sophia is a drama queen, and Genevieve is perpetual motion, having Steve around to balance the madness is kind of essential. Times like this, Jared's glad he's not out on the road, though he's pretty sure Chris would have dragged the band back to LA for this anyway.
With a shrug, he sets the sketch pad on the edge of Jensen's bed and licks his lips. “I'm cool,” he answers. It's the closest thing to a lie he's told, and Steve sees through it with a raise of his eyebrow. “Doctor says he's responding to the antibiotics, so I guess that's something.”
There's pure affection in Steve's eyes when he looks at Jensen. “Yeah, well, he's a scrappy fucker.”
It's true. Jensen will look a bull dog in the face and insult it's mother. He's not scared of anything. He teases Jared about being his enforcer, but they both know that Jensen doesn't need a fuckin' helping hand in a fight. He can hold his own just fine.
“Ya know what the weirdest part of this shit is, man?” Jared doesn't know why he's saying it. Sure as fuck wouldn't say it to anyone else. But a part of him trusts Steve's ability to be a mature adult more than anyone else he knows. “Eight fuckin' years I been hearin' that voice every goddamn day. Even when we're on the road or whatever, we talk. Sound of Jen's voice, it's . . . it's in my head, ya know? Like it's a part of me or some shit.” He sighs and drops his head, raking his fingers through his hair. “Sucks.”
He blesses the fact that Steve doesn't say anything in response. Words are vain and empty and shallow. Words mean nothing if they're not coming from Jensen.
“Longer he's out, the better the chances of brain damage and shit,” he says later. “Doctor told me this morning.” He shakes his head. Didn't bother telling Sandy that. Or Brayden. Didn't want to worry anyone. Make them freak out like he is. Doesn't wanna think about it himself, really.
It scares him, though. He's been sitting here for days now, wishing to hell that Jensen will just wake the fuck up and be his Jensen again. To find out that, even when he does wake up, he might not be Jared's Jensen anymore? There might be something wrong with his brain? That he might never be the same guy Jared left at the airport a week ago? Fuckin' hell, man. What's he supposed to do with that?
“His parents wanna come.” Hell, it's not like Steve's his priest or anything, but talking to him has always just been easy. He knows he's not gonna catch hell for having actual fears and emotions. Not that he believes any of his other friends are tactless enough to mock him for this, but they just . . . they wanna help, and they offer all of this fucking advice, like they've actually done this before. Steve won't.
“They're his parents,” is all he says, like that explains everything.
And Jared knows they're his parents. His family. And if Jensen wakes up wrong, if his brain is broken, Jared's afraid they're going to want to take him away. That they're going to think he needs more care than Jared could give him. They're not going to understand that Jared doesn't care how Jensen wakes up. He just wants his boy home. They can deal with the rest of it. He can deal with it. As long as he still has Jensen.
“I got him, Steve,” he says, voice breaking for the first time. He hasn't let himself cry. Forced himself not to. Once he starts, he's pretty sure he won't be able to stop. “I got him, and I got Bray, and that's it. That's fuckin' it, man.”
With a nod, Steve leans forward and rests his elbows on the side of Jensen's bed. “I know,” is all he says.
The clock beside Jensen's bed says it's 6:45 when Jared opens his eyes and realizes he's not alone in the room. The doctor is holding a chart, eyes darting back and forth between it and one of the monitors. One of the nurses tried to tell him once what they all did, but he wasn't really paying attention.
“Morning, Jared,” the doctor smiles warmly. Jared just offers him a half-smile and an almost-wave. “I think I have some good news for you, son.” Jared shifts in his chair, sits up a little bit straighter, and forces himself not to hope. “Jensen's fever is down. His vitals are strong. Infection is all but gone. I would like to bring him out of the coma this afternoon.”
He doesn't want to hope for something that's going to disappoint him, but what the fuck else can he be but elated. “Really?” He knows he sounds like a little kid, but who the fuck cares?
With a nod, the doctor drops the chart back into its place on the end of the bed. “Now, that doesn't mean that he's going to wake up right away. We're not going to be sending him home tonight or anything, okay? And we still won't know about brain damage or anything until he's back with us. But as far as the meningitis is concerned, I'm confident that he's out of the woods.”
Jared doesn't care about brain damage. He doesn't care about anything except the words Jensen's waking up. Nothing else matters. “Thank you,” he rounds the end of the bed and shakes the doctor's hand. “Thanks.” The doctor offers him another smile and Jared considers having Sandy order the man flowers, or one of those sausage and cheese platters. Possibly a stripper. Whatever. Jensen's waking up.
Digging his phone out of his pocket, he presses a button and waits for the groggy 'the fuck' on the other end. “Get your ass outta bed and down here, asshat. They're wakin' Jensen up.”
Three hours after they take Jensen off of the medication keeping him sedated, Brayden is sitting next to Jared at the side of the bed. Waiting. Neither of them are so good at it.
“What if he doesn't remember us?” Brayden asks suddenly. Jared smacks the back of his head. “I'm serious! The doctor said he might not know what's goin' on when he wakes up. What if he doesn't know who we are?”
He quells the urge to tell Brayden he watches too many fucking movies, but instead shrugs his shoulders. “Then we'll hang around until he does remember us.”
Quietly considering for a moment, Brayden shakes his head. “Gonna suck if he recognizes, like, Chad before you.” Jared raises an eyebrow. “Could totally happen, dude.”
“I'll kill him,” Jared teases, and it's the first time he's really felt like joking in days. It's weird, but he's pretty sure nothing could fucking ruin his mood right now.
“Ya know what would be hilarious?”
“If you shut your mouth before I kick your ass?”
“If he wakes up fuckin' straight!” Brayden guffaws and Jared rolls his eyes. “I'm serious! He could, like, totally leave your ass for Danneel or some shit.” When he stops to consider what he's actually saying, his lips curve into a devilish smirk. “If he does, I'm so goin' to live with him.”
“You can't,” Jared intones. “You're mine.”
“Fuckin' hell,” Brayden cringes. “What kinda fucked up shit is that? I gotta miss Danneel walkin' around in her underwear because you signed some fuckin' papers? Bull shit,” he shakes his head and then stops, eyes lighting up. “Can we hire Soph to come walk around in her underwear at our house when Jensen wakes up straight?”
With a nod, Jared purses his lips. “Sure. You handle the negotiations.” He almost laughs at the way Brayden's eyes go wide. The thought of him asking Sophia to come walk around the house in her underwear for money is kind of hilarious, actually.
He doesn't actually laugh, though, because the paper-thin sheets of the bed rustle and Jared looks over to find Jensen's eyes fluttering open. Hazy green , drifting and groggy, like maybe he doesn't know what's going on. But there they are, for the first time in a fucking week, those green eyes that bring him to his knees every fucking time.
It's pretty fucking clear, as those eyes drift around and never really focus on anything, that Jensen's still out of it. The doctor said that patients coming out of a coma can wake up several times and go right back to sleep before they're actually capable of forming words or maintaining consciousness. If they can even form words, if their brains remember how.
Brayden starts to say something when Jensen's eyes roll lazily in their direction. He doesn't speak, and the smile could be in Jared's imagination, but his gaze settles and there's a spark there. Something that Jared knows, because he knows Jensen better than anyone else on the motherfucking planet, is recognition.
Before anyone actually get a word out, he's asleep again, but Jared slumps back into his chair and feels like the entire weight of the world just went flying off of his chest. His Jensen is in there, and no matter what incarnation they get when he wakes up fully? It's all Jared needs to know.
He's so stuck in his own head, staring and willing Jensen to just open those eyes one more time, that he doesn't really feel Brayden's hand on his arm. But he sure as hell hears him when he says, “He's gonna be okay, Dad.”
He doesn't know what it feels like when you're heart explodes, but Jared thinks maybe just like this. With a nod, he smiles. “Yeah, he is.”
“You gonna get off my ass and let me walk up the fuckin' stairs?”
Jared follows closely behind as Jensen makes his way slowly toward the stairs. After he woke up, the doctor ended up keeping him in the hospital for another week. He kicked Jared out and made him go back to work after two days. Now that he's home, he's delusional if he thinks Jared's letting him do anything that remotely resembles work. Not until he's sure that he's not going to break again.
“Can you?” Jared challenges, hands on Jensen's hips as they start up the stairs.
“Not if you don't get outta my ass,” Jensen fires back over his shoulder and then raises an eyebrow when Jared doesn't respond. “Oh, come on, man!” He stops and turns. “I can walk up the motherfuckin' stairs by myself!”
“Sorry,” Jared mumbles and releases his hold, letting Jensen take a couple more steps on his own. The doctor said that he's probably going to be a little weak and tired, but other than that, everything seems fine. His brain isn't cracked or anything.
“Stop bein' such a pussy,” Jensen snarks as he reaches the top of the stairs and heads for the bedroom.
Jared follows and watches as his boyfriend moves slowly around the room, like he's trying to familiarize himself with it again. Like he does every time he comes back from vacation or a business trip. “You almost died,” Jared points out. If he's being a little over-protective, he thinks he has a right.
“But I didn't,” Jensen points, hands loose against his hips, expression narrowed.
“Jensen, lay off,” Jared snaps. He doesn't want to fight with Jensen on his first day home. Doesn't want to fight with him at all. Not now. When he knows what it's like . . .
Jensen rolls his eyes and grabs a bottle of black polish from the dresser. “Don't yell at me,” he uses it to point at Jared before lowering himself to the edge of the bed. “I almost died.”
He grins, all smart ass and white teeth, and it breaks something inside Jared's chest. Something that's been building for two weeks. Something that worry and concern and fear kept down until Jensen was out of the woods. Until he knew that everything was okay. Something that he thought he'd pushed far enough away not to deal with. “Fuck off,” Jared snarls, turning to escape the room.
Jensen moves pretty fast for a fucker who just came out of a coma a week ago. Grabbing Jared's wrist, he says, “Hey, stop.” Jared does, immediately. “Look at me,” he instructs, and Jared turns. “I'm right here, okay? I fucked up, and I didn't take care of myself, and I ended up in a coma for four days. You're pissed at me, and I get it, okay?” With a softer smile, he runs his fingers up over Jared's arm and settles his hand heavy against his shoulder. “Lesson learned.”
Shaking him off, Jared creates space between them and balls his hands into fists. “You don't fucking get anything!” he roars. “You didn't sit there for four fucking days, Jen. Four days, praying to a god I don't even fucking believe in to just let you wake the fuck up! You don't know what it was like to sit there knowing we weren't done, that there was shit I should have told you, places I wanted to take you. Didn't fucking know if I would ever hear your goddamn voice again. So don't you dare stand there and crack jokes when I almost fucking lost you. You almost fucking died!”
When he stumbles, Jensen is there to catch him, and they both stammer back against the bed. Jared's draped across him, tears flowing over his cheeks as his chest heaves and he releases every emotion he couldn't let himself feel until Jensen was safe and here and home. And Jensen just lays under him, one hand in his hair, the other on his back, telling him that he's sorry, and he's going to take better care of himself, and it's going to be okay.
By the time he manages to collect himself, Jensen is subtly trying to roll out from under the weight of him, and Jared slides over so that Jensen can breathe. Suffocating him on his first day home is probably not the best idea.
Jensen smiles, and suddenly, everything feels like it clicks back into place again. Jensen's here, in their bed. So is Jared. Together. Brayden's tromping up the stairs like his shoes are made of concrete. Life is normal again.
“Y'all gonna stand around cryin' about the value of life, or can we fuckin' eat now?” comes the voice from the doorway.
Jensen grunts as he stands from the bed, hand finding the back of Brayden's head as they start into the hall. “Your compassion overwhelms me, Bray,” he teases.
“Oh, shut up, you're fine,” Brayden throws back and Jared follows, giving Jensen just enough space not to bitch anymore. When they get to the kitchen, Brayden hands Jensen a Styrofoam take out container and his brow furrows. “You are fine, right?”
Jared hops onto the counter and Jensen leans against his thigh, nodding as he grabs his noodles with his chopsticks. “I'm fine,” he assures the kid and then nods toward him. “Now eat your fuckin' dinner.”
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Date: 2010-01-13 10:54 pm (UTC)There will never be, ever, a death!fic in this 'verse. Never ever ever. I can't kill these guys. The one time I had a passing thought of it, I wanted to kick my own ass. So no worries - they're safe. This story is as much angst as you will ever see in this 'verse. You have my word.
And thank you - I'm really glad you liked the story. Jensen is EVERYTHING to Jared, the kid who had NOTHING of his own growing up. I'm glad it translates in this one for you. :)