Coda: Vol. II, Disc 2

[raeschae]

“How was lunch?”

“It was Gino's. How do you think it was?”

Mmm. Gino's deep dish pizza sounds so damn good right now, Jared's mouth almost starts to water. “How's Mac?”

There's a huff, almost a snort, on Jensen's end of the phone and Jared can just see his eyes rolling. “Pain in the ass as always.” Jared can hear papers shuffling and he wants to ask what Jensen is doing, but he doesn't. “Apparently, she's decided that I would be a fascinating case study for her thesis.”

“You?” He doesn't mean to laugh. It just kind of comes out.

“I know, right?”

Jared hears the snick of a lighter and then nothing. Jensen doesn't say anything and there are no papers rustling anymore. On the plus side, there's nothing to indicate that he lit the pile on fire or anything, so he probably shouldn't worry. On the other hand, he can see Jensen so clearly in his head that he knows exactly what the guy is doing.

“Stop burning a hole in your pants,” he scolds.

“Not,” Jensen denies, but then he follows up with, “Dude, it only burns the lighter fluid. Not the fabric.”




“Would you relax? He's not gonna set his leg on fire.”

Jared looked over at Brandon, the drummer from Rise Against, unconvinced. “He's drunk off his ass and playing with fucking fire, dumb ass. There was no way this could end well.” He didn't bother adding just how much he would not like to spend the night in the ER with Jensen and his flaming left leg.

“It's not even dangerous,” Joe, the bass player, assured him from behind, a heavy hand on his shoulder. Jared wasn't exactly sure if it was supposed to comfort him, or keep him in his place.

Carefully – as carefully as a dude who's so drunk he can't hold his own head up can manage – the group's lead singer, Tim, dribbled a line of the lighter fluid from a large bottle labeled 'Zippo,' onto Jensen's thigh. Jared risked a glance at his face to find Jensen grinning like an idiot with a bottle of beer in one hand and the other buried in his own hair. He didn't have to ask to know that Jensen was having the time of his life. Of course, the heavy lids of his eyes said that he wouldn't so much remember this in the morning, either.

Logically, Jared knew that only the fluid would burn, but everyone else seemed so goddamn entertained by the whole thing, so hungry to try it until they'd burned the whole bottle, that he couldn't help worrying it might get out of hand. It wouldn't be unheard of backstage at a rock show, after all.

It was weird, but that's when he kind of knew that his feelings for Jensen weren't just platonic. Because he didn't want to spend the whole night in the ER with Jensen's charred leg, but he would. If Jensen caught on fire and had to be rushed to the hospital, Jared would have to go with him. There was nowhere else that he could be, without freaking out and worrying and willing the phone to ring with constant updates. He would need to be there. He always felt like he needed to be where Jensen was.

“Jay, man, c'mon,” Jensen's voice interrupted his thoughts, and the smile on his lips when Jared looked up nearly sent him spiraling across the room to suck the stupid right off his face. “You gotta fuckin' try this shit. It's awesome!”

Jared didn't try, but he did force himself to stop worrying so damn much. Besides, it was pretty awesome just to sit back and watch Jensen act like a happy, drunken idiot.





“You're an idiot,” Jared rolls his eyes and lets himself out onto the balcony. One of his roommates, Aldis, is hosting a video game tournament in the living room and Jared doesn't really want his conversation with Jensen interrupted by five guys who barely fit in the living room constantly asking him to 'get next.' It's not his fault they can't figure out how to invite an even amount of competitors.

“You're an idiot,” is Jensen's response as Jared settles himself into the chair that has become his 'talk to Jensen' spot over the last three weeks. Every night, he tucks himself into this chair, props his feet up, and lets the hours fly by. And, yes, he's well aware that it probably looks like more than it is. But they're just friends. They used to do this shit all the time before they started sleeping together.

“That's a brilliant comeback there, genius. Take ya a long time to come up with it?”

“I hate you.”

“You love me.”

Not for the first time, Jared wishes that he could pull his foot out of his mouth. It’s an automatic response, honed over five years of Jensen claiming to hate him when the opposite is clearly true. Of course, now it’s painfully so and Jared doesn’t know how to fix the faux pas, or if it’s even going to matter. There are times when talking to Jensen is the best part of his day, and then there are parts that just suck ass.

“So Mac’s working on her Master’s, right? And this is what she lays on me today at lunch: Media and popular culture's effect on the pre-adolescent and adolescent subconscious as it relates to sexuality self-awareness and candidness within peer groups and family structure, including, but not limited to, communicating placement on the Kinsey scale.”

“You had to write that down, didn't you?”

“Shut up.”

When Jared laughs sharp and loud from his belly, Jensen joins him. “What the fuck does that even mean?” Jared asks.

“Shit. Fuck if I know.” He lights another cigarette and Jared hears the rush of his breath as he exhales before going on. “You know who Matthew Shepard is, Jay?”

Of course Jared knows who Matthew Shepard is. He’s a gay man who turned on a television in high school. “Yeah.”

“You remember where you were when you heard about him?”

“Not exactly.”

“I was in the living room, watchin’ the news with my parents. I was pretending to do homework and eating Pringles.” Another inhale. Another exhale. “My mom started crying and I remember Mac saying something about how we didn’t even know the kid and why was it such a big deal or whatever.”

“How old were you?”

“Seventeen. Just started my senior year, man. That was the summer I finally admitted to myself that I was gay. After I spent the entire three months sucking Danny Meyers off in the break room at Food 4 Less, he fucked me at his grandparents’ house while they were visiting his aunt for the weekend. Two months later, I’m in the living room watching my mom cry about this gay kid that got tied to a fence post and pistol-whipped to fuckin’ death.

“I had this whole speech planned. Before that, I was gonna tell them everything. But my mom,” Jensen stops and Jared can imagine him shaking his head, empty eyes fixed and unfocused on the wall just beyond that. “She kept saying it wasn’t right that people could kill someone’s child like that. Kept talkin’ about how scary it was to let your kids go in the world. About how she prayed that we never ran into people who would do something hateful for such a ridiculous reason.”

“And you couldn’t tell her.”

“And I… couldn’t tell her.”

Jared doesn’t know how all of that is going to become a thesis, but he’s more concerned about how he never knew it before now. Seems like something he should have known, something Jensen should have told him. Of course, maybe it means something that he’s telling it now. It feels like it means something.

“Mac’s theory is that I got scared or some shit, that I freaked out about hurting or worrying Mom. Maybe that I was a little scared of getting beat up myself, but that my brain didn’t wanna deal with fear. So I got it in my head that it was just nobody’s business, that I was gonna live a 'don’t ask/don’t tell' life forever. That’s why I was so determined not to come out before.”

“And what do you think?”

There's another long pause, one that means Jensen is thinking his answer out before giving it. “I don't know, man. I guess it's as good an answer as any. Not like I remember thinking all that through or whatever. Just kept kinda passing over tellin' anybody about it.” Another snick and Jensen sucks a drag of yet another cigarette. “Thing is, I'm startin' to realize that I didn't do such a good job of hidin' it, ya know? Like everybody I've told, the people that I actually know, are completely unfazed by it.”

Jared gets it. He ran into the same thing when he came out two years ago. Everyone already knew and they knew that he was with Jensen at the time. Didn't surprise even his parents with the revelation. “Yeah, well, apparently I suck at hiding it when I'm in love,” he says, hitching a breath and hoping that this doesn't kill the conversation immediately.




“Jensen and I broke up.”

Jeff's concern was immediate and genuine through the phone. “Dude, that blows. I'm so sorry, man.”

“Wait a minute,” Jared sat up on his bed and raked a hand through his thick hair. “I never even told you I was gay, did I?” He told his parents a week ago, and Megan the day after that. Misha was the first one he called, but he was pretty sure he hadn't mentioned it to his big brother.

The laugh against his ear was all-knowing, in that way that only a big brother could be. “Didn't you?” He could imagine Jeff's face twisting in confusion, like he was trying to remember the exact conversation. “Are you sure you didn't?”

“Uh, yeah, Jeff. I'm sure I didn't tell anyone until very, very recently,” Jared assured him. It wasn't the kind of thing he accidentally let slip.

“Huh,” was Jeff's response. “Well, it's not like it's not obvious, the way y'all eye-fuck all the goddamn time. Makes a big brother feel all protective and uncomfortable, Jare-Bear.”

Flopping back on the bed, Jared let out a sigh and rolled his eyes. “Man, fuck you.” And then he remembered that he wasn't going to be able to eye-fuck Jensen in front of anyone anymore. “Dude, I fucking miss the hell out of him. This blows.”

“Losin' your first big love always does, little bro.”





“Your brother only saw us together a couple times.”

It's true. Jeff was already in college when Jared's family relocated to Chicago, and he only hung out with Jared and his friends a handful of times when he made the trip up north to visit. “Guess it didn't take much time to figure us out,” he shrugs and takes a swig of the juice he's been playing with since Jensen called.

“Mac says the same thing about me. Like today, at lunch, she said that it wasn't so much anything I did or even said, but just the way I used to look at you.”

Sometimes, Jared wishes that he was back in Chicago, or that Jensen was here with him. Seems like it would make things better, if they could just look at each other and not have to say anything like they used to. But sometimes, like tonight, he's glad that there's so much space between them, that they can talk without the inhibitions or distractions that being together always used to bring.

Makes it easier to say, “I guess it's weird, but I kind of feel better knowing.”

“Knowing what?”

“That there's some decent reason for it all.”

“Why's that?”

“I don't know.” Jared stands from his chair and leans against the balcony rail, hands braced there as he looks over the city, still vibrant and alive, below. “I think it just makes more sense than your other bullshit excuses.”

“They weren't bullshit,” Jensen defends, and Jared doesn't doubt that he believes that. It's not true, but Jensen probably disagrees. “They just weren't maybe totally… accurate.”

He can't help smiling. The answer is so Jensen. “I didn't know that then,” he says, and he didn't mean to take it here. Didn't mean for the conversation to get heavy. They don't do this. He and Jensen are working on being friends, not dwelling on the demise of their former “relationship.” He needs to work this out alone. Jensen can't help. “Back then, I thought you just wanted out.”

“What?”

He sounds so affronted that Jared finds his defenses shooting up. “I didn't know,” he retorts, and then takes a breath to calm himself. “Jen. We were good. So fucking good. And then you. You were just done. What was I supposed to think? I just figured you wanted out.”

It hurts, thinking about that day, about the things they said to each other and remembering the way he wasn't sure he'd ever really breathe right again. It fucking hurts, but it also feels like maybe this is what they need. Maybe this is what Jared needs. Because maybe the only way to get around the pain is to go through it, to actually address it with the only person that can answer the questions that have been eating a hole in his gut for the last two years.

“Never wanted you to go,” Jensen finally says when the silence grows almost uncomfortable. “Damn-near killed me when you walked away, man. It was a shitty thing for me to do, asking you to choose between who you were and who I wanted you to be. I get that now. But don't you think for a fucking second that I wanted you to go. I stood there.” He stops and Jared hears another sharp inhale before Jensen goes on. “I stood there in the kitchen for I don't know how long, just waiting for you to come back. Hoping that you would.”

It's ironic. So much so that Jared has to chuckle and take another drink of his juice before he can make a confession of his own. “Well, I was standing in the hall, waiting for the same damn thing. Just praying that you would throw the door open and tell me that you were wrong and the whole thing was fucking ridiculous.”

He can still see that day so clearly in his mind.




His body shook so hard, he was sure he would fall over. Years. Fucking years of being with Jensen – knowing him, hanging out with him. Years just over. Like that.

Sliding down the wall, Jared stared at the door like he wasn't entirely convinced that he wasn't having some surreal dream. Nightmare. Surely, Jensen was going to yank the door open any second, roll his eyes, and tell Jared to stop being such a girl. He would laugh at the way Jared pulled his knees to his chest and rested his forehead against them.

A part of him really wanted to barge back in there and punch Jensen square in the face. It wasn't some meaningless one-nighter. Jared wasn't some random drummer from some no-name band. They were in love. For real love. The kind that was supposed to trump every other fucking thing in the world. And Jensen was not supposed to throw that away because he was a motherfucking coward.

He wouldn't do that. Jensen wouldn't just break Jared's heart while he was standing there with his hands in his pockets. He wouldn't just end things like that. Not when they had plans and dreams and a life planned together. Jared had given up a job at Slide to stay at home in Chicago with Jensen – to live with Jensen and to be with Jensen. He had learned so much about who he was, what he loved, and what mattered from Jensen, just from being around him.

There was too much left in the tank. Things to do and words they hadn't said yet. Things Jared wanted to share, stories he still had to tell. Jensen didn't know about the final he aced yesterday yet. It felt like Jensen should know that since he helped Jared study for it.

Everything was wrong. Jensen on the other side of the door was wrong. Jared, crying against his knees like some junior high girl, was wrong. The future that he refused to admit he planned to the very last detail didn't play out like this. It wasn't possible. It couldn't be fucking real.





“It wasn't ridiculous,” Jensen almost whispers in his ear. “We did the right thing, Jay. Even now, I know that we did. I loved you, so fucking much, but it just wasn't. Wasn't our time, man.”

He snorts a little at that. There was a time when they were undeniably indestructible. When they both thought they could take over the world, nothing would ever bring them down or drag them apart. “Who woulda thought that it would be bad fucking timing that finally tore us apart, huh? We were always so,” Jared lets the sentence trail off because he honestly doesn't know how to finish it.

How in the hell do you define what he and Jensen were to each other? What they were together?

“Epic,” Jensen supplies. “We were fucking epic, man. Dark Side of the Moon epic.”

And there it is. In vintage Jensen fashion. “Appetite for Destruction epic,” he counters.

Jensen snorts, and when he says, “You and Guns N’ Roses, man. Fuckin' hell,” Jared knows that they're done moping over what could have been.

“Dude,” he starts, turning his back to lean against the railing, eyes falling on Aldis' friends, all drinking and high-fiving and laughing in the living room together. Fuck, he misses this guy on the other end of the phone. “Don't get me started on the genius that is Guns,” he warns.

Jensen's response is lazy, and for the first time, it occurs to Jared that he might not be smoking tobacco. “You're fuckin' lucky I'm not in the mood to prove you wrong.” Shit, what he wouldn't give to be lighting up with Jensen in the living room right now, listening to Beck and waxing philosophical about the textured ceiling of Jensen's apartment.

“Dude, you couldn't. Even if the mood hit you. You don't have the vocabulary to convince me.”

“I'm a writer, too, ya know.”

“Yeah. You're just not as good as me.”

“You're an asshole.”

Jared laughs. “Your comebacks suck ass.”

“You suck ass.”

“Been known to.”

Again, the answer is so automatic that he doesn't even think about it until he hears Jensen grunt, soft and low and dirty, on his side of the phone. Fuckin' hell, that grunt. “Pretty fuckin' well if I remember,” comes the voice, all weed and sex against Jared's ear.

“Like you could forget,” he aims for light, maybe hoping to make a joke of Jensen's words. Stop this thing before it goes too far. “Your ass has clocked more time in my mouth than anybody on the planet.” Jensen wasn't wrong in his blog a few months ago. Jared always did love rimming him. So much that he hasn't done it to anyone since. Just didn't feel right. Like that was something that was only Jensen's. Like it's not fair to the memory of what they were to give it to anyone else.

“Jay?” Jensen's voice is shaky, like he's fighting to control it and might be losing the battle.

“Yeah?”

“Unless you wanna take this conversation in a decidedly not-friendly direction, I suggest you move it along quick.”

He jumps a little at the implication, at the tone that he recognizes instantly in Jensen's voice. A part of him wants to let it go, to see where they can take this thing, if it will feel half as good as it used to. But the rational part of him knows that it will only fuck things up. And they've come way too far in the last few months to slide back now.

“Yeah,” he nods and licks his lips, fingers raking through his hair as he breathes the cool air through his nose and searches for a topic that doesn't center around licking, sucking, or anything else that might bring Jensen's perfect mouth to mind. “Say, does your grandma still make those awesome butter cookies?”





“Jay, you got that interview with The Script ready?”

Casting a quick glance up from his screen, Jared nods at Sophia. “Give me three minutes. Spell checking,” he promises with the most sincere smile he can muster.

She nods and turns as Chad calls out, “Lookin' good, Soph.” She huffs and heads back to her own office in response.

“Bitch,” Chad mumbles under his breath.

Jared doesn't have time for Chad's bullshit about how unfair life is and how Sophia should be willing to give him a second chance. “Dude, she's got a right to be upset.”

“Whatever happened to forgiveness? That's all I'm sayin,” Chad spits, turning back to his computer and whatever he's pretending to be working on this week. Sometimes Jared wonders how he keeps his fucking job.

When he finishes, just under three minutes as promised, he e-mails it off and then swivels toward his friend. “Man, you can't blame her for being pissed, Chad. She really liked you, and you fucked around on her.”

“We weren't dating,” Chad replies. “I mean, we were, but we weren't exclusive or anything. It was casual.”

“Maybe she wanted more.”

“She never said that.” Chad leans back against the wall and crosses his ankles atop a pile of what Jared thinks are important papers. Who can be sure on Chad's desk, though? “I mean, not until after she found out about it. Then she was all sorts of interested, but before that? She never so much as alluded to the idea of monogamy.”

Jared tries to consider things from Chad's perspective. He's always identified with Sophia when the subject of her relationship with Chad comes up. He knows what it's like to be so into someone and have your heart broken so thoroughly you wonder if it will ever be put back together again. Something tells him to hear Chad out this time, though.

“Woulda freaked you out if she said anything, wouldn't it? You can't honestly tell me you were ready for it back then.” Jared knows Chad. There's no way he would have settled for monogamy with Sophia a year ago when everything fell apart.

“What if I am now?”

“Dude, you hurt her. Why would she give you another chance?”

Chad taps a pen on the desk and shrugs his shoulders, expression more thoughtful than Jared has come to know him to be. “Ya know what? You might be right.” He nods and then casts a longing look toward the door. “She might not be the right girl for me. Not if she wants someone who never fucks up.”

“Dude, there's flawed, and then there's unforgivable.” For the record, he realizes that he's not solely talking about Chad anymore.

With a nod, Chad lets his feet fall heavily to the floor. “True,” he nods, dusting one of the papers on the top of his pile with his pen. “But then there's fucking up and being a fuck up. Also two completely different things.”

He's not wrong. Jared knows he's not wrong. And that doesn't help the way he's been thinking about Jensen lately. At all.





“Jesus, you,” Tim laughs, rolling onto his back and staring at the ceiling, his breathing shallow and fast, “are so damn good at that.”

Jared nods and opens his mouth to answer, but his cell phone vibrates on the side table. Is it bad form to answer it after sex? At least he didn't pick it up the four times that it buzzed during.

The text is simple. It says, “Forty-three apple crates and one fucking box of tissue.” Jared has no idea what the hell Jensen is talking about, so he simply texts back, “I know, right?” He's still chuckling, his foot running distractedly up and down Tim's thigh, when the reply comes. “You have no idea what I'm talking about, do you?” Jared types back a simple, “Nope,” and then tosses his phone on the table and flops down next to his boyfriend.





The first day of his freshman creative writing seminar, Jared was talking to a cute little brunette named Genevieve. She was telling him a fascinating story about, uh, something fascinating, when his cell vibrated against his hip.

“Hold on just a second,” he held up a finger and checked the screen.

“Black balloons, a bottle of lube, and a stripper pole.” Jared couldn't stifle his laugh as he texted back, “What the hell? Are you drunk?” He tried to turn his attention back to Genevieve, but the response was quick. “It's 2 in the afternoon.” With a shake of his head, Jared responded with, “Kinda busy.” Genevieve smiled ruefully when the phone sounded again. “Never 2 busy 4 me. Bitch.” Jared snorted at that one. “Nice attempt at text-speak, loser.”

“Girlfriend?” Genevieve asked, and when Jared shook his head, she nodded like she understood. “Boyfriend, huh? Figures.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“All the good ones, man.” She sighed and started pulling a laptop out of her bag.

Jared just laughed at the inference. “Jensen's not my boyfr-,” he stopped to laugh again. “He's just a friend. My best friend.”

To that, Genevieve patted his arm and rolled her eyes. “Keep tellin' yourself that, Pollyanna.”




“Jensen, right?” Tim's voice invades his thoughts and Jared shrugs in response.

The truth is that he's been waiting for this conversation for awhile now. He trades e-mails and texts with Jensen all day. Sometimes they call each other in the afternoon, if something happens that just can't wait until later. Jared has skipped out of spending time with Tim in the evening on more than one occasion, and though he doesn't admit he's doing it to talk to Jensen, Tim's not stupid. He has to have figured it out by now.

With a nod, Jared rolls over and buries his face in Tim's neck. He's a good guy. He's hot, in that geek chic, New York kind of way that drives Jared a little more wild than he likes to admit, and he's hella smart. Fascinating and cultured and interested in so many of the same things Jared is. He does have some questionable hip hop on his iPod, but nobody's perfect and it's never bothered Jared the way he knows it would bother Jensen.

“We gonna talk about it?”

“Talk about what?”

Tim pulls away and looks at Jared, dark eyebrow raised. “You know what.” When Jared doesn't say anything, he clarifies, “The fact that you're still in love with your ex?” Jared huffs and Tim rolls his eyes. “Look, man, I get it, okay? Everybody has that person they just can't let go. One person that they'll probably never be rid of, no matter how far and how long they run. I get that.” He 'oomph's as he sits, arms draped over his bony knees. “I just need to know if you're even going to start running at some point.”

Raising an eyebrow, Jared stretches back on the bed and thinks this is maybe a conversation they should be wearing pants to have. “What are you talking about?” Is he playing dumb? Yeah. Is he aware of it? Maybe a little. “Jensen's my friend, Tim. That's all.”

He's never bothered to mention the indiscretion back in Chicago four months ago. It would only upset his boyfriend, and there was no fucking so Jared has convinced himself that it wasn't exactly cheating. Also, it was Jensen and that's always going to fit into a different category in his head. Maybe he's an asshole for not saying anything, but Jared tells himself he can live with that, as long as he doesn't think about it much.

By the time he realizes what's going on, Tim already has his pants on and is pulling his shirt over his shoulders. “We're not on the same page here, man. And if you were just friends with an old ex, I wouldn't say a damn thing. But this is more, and I'm not gonna be the one laying next to you when you wake up and figure out you're in love with somebody else.”

Jared thinks maybe he should go after Tim, tell him that he's wrong and put a little more effort into making things work with a guy who's been nothing but great since the day they met. Instead, he waits until his bedroom door closes and then stands up to find a pair of sweats. Tim's right – they've been together for eleven months and it's never going to be more than this. He's never going to be in love with him and he's not even really trying to be.

His default impulse is to grab the phone and call Jensen – confess that he doesn't feel more guilty about this whole thing than maybe he should. But there's still some things he can't really talk to Jensen about, and the fact that his boyfriend broke up with him because he's convinced Jared's still in love with Jensen is definitely one of those things.

Making his way into the kitchen, he grabs a beer and listens to the sounds of the television in the next room. Aldis is playing some game and Steve is plucking his guitar on the couch next to him. Jared drops into the armchair beside them and keeps his eyes fixed on the TV.

“I'm sorry, do I know you?” Steve asks.

Jared rolls his eyes and hands two more beer bottles to Steve. They're not the best of friends or anything, he and his roommates. Aldis is probably home the most and that's because he allegedly works from his room. Jared's still not sure what he does, but it has something to do with computers and he always pays his rent on time, so who really fucking cares? Steve's a struggling musician who plays for change in the subway and does a few local club gigs. He's also a trust fund baby whose father still pays his rent and all of their utilities even though Steve's over thirty.

Of the three, Jared probably has the most “normal” schedule, but even he spends more time out of town and at gigs than he does in the loft. It's not that they don't get along – they do, pretty fucking well for three guys who met through an ad on the internet – but they just don't see each other enough to be good friends. Still, Jared needs to talk, and these are the only two sets of ears he has available at the moment.

“Tim ran outta here in a hurry,” Steve observes, leading into the conversation for Jared.

He nods and tilts his bottle to his lips. “Took the time to break up with me first.”

“Ouch,” Aldis interjects, but the head of his game character just got ripped off, so it's possible he's not even really listening to his roommates at all.

“Because of Jensen?” Steve asks.

Jared would pretend to be shocked, like he doesn't know what Steve's talking about, but who would believe him? He nods. “Thinks I'm in love with him still.”

“Because you are,” Aldis says.

“I was. A long time ago.”

“So, two hours is a long time ago now?” Jared raises an eyebrow at Aldis' question. “Cause you were readin' me that blog he wrote before Tim came over and you were clearly lovestruck then. I'm just sayin'.”

“So just because I read a blog, it's true love? I read Daniel Kreps's blog over at Rolling Stone all the time, man. Ya think I'm in love with him, too?”

“It's a possibility,” Aldis shrugs and returns his attention to the game he's playing, pretty much signaling the end of his involvement in this conversation.

They don't say much more, Jared stuck more in his own thoughts while Steve picks at his guitar strings and Aldis trash talks his video game. Sometimes he doesn't need to talk shit out. Sometimes it helps just having someone in the room.




“You're going out?”

Jensen shoved his wallet into his back pocket and nodded. “I told you. Gotta do a write-up on Battle of the Bands over at the school. Your school, by the way. You should totally be handling this one.”

“Those bands all suck. Stay here.” He was well-aware of just how desperate he sounded, but Jared really didn't care at the moment.

Without responding, Jensen crossed the room and leaned on the back of Jared's chair, his chin resting on the top of Jared's head. “What're ya workin' on?”

“Paper. For my Social Change in the United States class.” Jensen huffed and stood, his hand ghosting over the back of Jared's neck. “It's that sociology credit I told you I had to pick up.” The paper itself wasn't the problem. “I can't concentrate.”

“And you want me to stick around and what? Be your cheerleader?”

Jared shrugged. That was, in fact, exactly what he wanted Jensen to do. He never really admitted it, but he'd grown accustomed to having Jensen around when he was trying to write. It just made things easier. He couldn't explain it, and he didn't even want to think about the reasons, he just knew that it had been a fact since high school.

Jensen pressed a kiss to the top of his head and pulled away from the chair. “I'll be back before you realize I'm gone,” he promised, and he was out the door before Jared could even think of a retort.

Of course, he was back five minutes later. “You're sure they all suck? We're not missin' out on a scoop?” he asked.

Shaking his head, Jared stood and stretched his arms over his head. “Terrible. All of 'em. Tom could play better and you know how awesome he's not,” he promised, grabbing Jensen's wrist as he strode by on his way to the kitchen. After a brief kiss that turned out to be not-so-brief, Jared patted Jensen's ass and sat back down. “Now go watch television or somethin'. I got work to do.”





Of course, Jared isn't stupid, so the fact that his thoughts just keep coming around to Jensen doesn't pass him by or anything. Nor does the fact that he should probably be thinking more about the year-long relationship that just fell apart around him than the one he's been building with Jensen for the last four months.

“I'll be on the balcony,” he announces to no one in particular as he stands from the chair and heads outside. Does his best thinking here anyway, it seems.

The thing is, Jensen broke his heart. And for a long time, Jared's been using that as an excuse to be angry, to hold Jensen at arm's length. He's been telling himself that he doesn't need a guy like Jensen in his life, someone who can't even come to terms with who he is, let alone be what Jared needs. And when he thought that Jensen was still some dumb ass, closet-case blogger who considered himself in a league with the musicians he writes about, that wasn't so difficult.

Parts of that guy are still in there. The one who doesn't really feel comfortable talking about his sexuality or who he's fucking around with. The one who hangs out backstage at shows, rubbing elbows with rock stars, and then heads home to write about it instead of actually being able to make the music he loves so much. The one who acts like nothing in the world matters as much as the perfect song, synced up to the perfect moment in time.

But there's another side to Jensen now. One that Jared's been getting to know recently. A side that is trying to be okay with who he is, opening up on what he thinks and feels about things. The one who still gets excited about a new band, but who sits and listens to Jared talk about the ones he's feeling at the moment, as well. This guy has learned that the perfect song won't make everything better, but he still looks for the perfect song anyway.

And Jared realizes, as midnight rolls in over the Atlantic, that Chad was right. Jensen fucked up, but he's not a fuck up. He may have stumbled into change accidentally, but he's trying to hide from it anymore. He finally figured out how to stop being an idiot.

Jared's not still in love with Jensen. He's fallen in love with him all over again.

Of course, knowing it and doing something about it are two totally different things. When he finally heads to bed around three, his phone is ringing on his desk.

“Shouldn't you be in bed?” he asks Jensen.

With a snort, Jensen responds with a dry, “What? And let you miss out on the pleasure of telling me good night? Come on, Jay. You know I wouldn't do that to you.”

He could tell Jensen about Tim, or he could talk about his three-hour think session on the balcony. There are a thousand things he probably needs to say, and about a thousand more he wants to. What he actually settles on is, “Don't know how I'd survive without ya, man.”

“Damn right you don't. Now shut up and listen to this. Are you listening?” Jared grumbles to the affirmative and lays back on his bed. “Alright, then. You remember a couple months ago I sent you that download for that band, Alaska and Me?”

“Yeah. I added 'em in my up-and-comers column right after that.”

“Right. Well, tag team, back again,” Jensen chuckles and Jared narrows his eyes, focusing his gaze on the ceiling. “They signed with Virgin about a week after our write-ups came out. The web traffic and the online sales that our articles generated caught the ear of the A&R guy there. They're headed for the big time, man.”

“Fuckin' A, man,” Jared smiles brightly. It used to happen all the time. When he and Jensen champion a cause together? People listen. Maybe he thinks it's a little prophetic to find out they still have it. Professionally, of course. “That's awesome, Jen. They must be psyched.”

“They are.” Jensen's voice drops out, and when he speaks again, it's without any of the signature bravado that Jared's grown re-accustomed to hearing over the last few months. “And I'm sure you'll hear from 'em or whatever, but thanks, Jay. For throwing their name out there. For trusting my instincts.”

With a sigh, he runs his hand over his face and says, “Nobody's instincts I trust more than yours, Ackles.”

It's the truth.

He loves the guy. And he's going to tell Jensen. Just as soon as he can be sure that it's not going to bite him in the ass.

Comments

[keerawa.livejournal.com]

“Epic,” Jensen supplies. “We were fucking epic, man. Dark Side of the Moon epic.”
And there it is. In vintage Jensen fashion. “Appetite for Destruction epic,” he counters.
I love these guys. And apparently everyone from Jared's big brother he hadn't come out to, to the cute girl he met in Creative Writing, to the roommates he barely talks to, to his boyfriend Tim, all know that Jared loves Jensen.

[raeschae.livejournal.com]

While Jared was never trying to hide it as much as Jensen was, I don't think either of them were really very good at not looking like they were ass-over-feet in love with each other. ;)