Fic: RPS: An Extremely Circuitous Courtship
Title: An Extremely Circuitous Courtship
Rating: PG
Genre: RPS (Jensen/Jared)
Beta: samidha
Summary: Jensen has a mancrush, Jared is a Terminator robot, and neither of them have plans for New Year's Eve.
Notes: Written for uschickens for spn_j2_xmas with the prompt: A pretend-to-be-dating story, either Sam/Dean or Jared/Jensen. You said you liked happy endings and humor. I did my best with snappy dialogue. I might steal some of your prompts for future fics. I hope this is to your liking!
“It’ll be fun,” Jared wheedled.
“Being miserable and dateless on New Year’s Eve is not fun,” Jensen told him, crossing his arms over his chest.
Sadie barked her agreement and rubbed her head on Jensen’s knee, begging for attention. Jensen put down his beer and rubbed her behind the ears affectionately. A football game was on the television set and someone was losing, but he was just a little buzzed and a lot exhausted and couldn’t bring himself to care.
He was also pretty sure that Jared was even more buzzed than he was. They hadn’t been drinking much, not for them, but they’d been shooting ungodly hours and Jensen suspected that Jared secretly didn’t actually sleep. Whenever Jensen went to sleep, Jared was still awake, watching TV or playing with the Xbox or walking the dogs. And it was usually Jared who woke Jensen up, looking far too perky and alive to be newly awake himself. When he first moved in, Jensen thought that Jared might have been taking pills, but he changed theories; now he just thought that Jared wasn’t fully human. Those Terminator robots didn’t need to sleep, did they?
Jared shoved the paper, shiny silver lettering and all, under Jensen’s nose. “They say there’s food and dancing and free champagne and outdoor hot tubs! It’ll be awesome!”
“It’s a romantic getaway for two!” Jensen protested. “It’s for couples! Do we really want to be the two miserable losers who can’t get dates - and then go and spend time with the happy couples? Are you crazy?”
Jared pouted, looking a little ridiculous, a little drunk, and a little hurt. Jensen remembered the sting of the quiet in the house and on set and in his life when Jared first broke up with Sandy and regretted his words.
“Jare, come on. If you want to do something for New Year’s, we can throw a party or something. I’m sure people would be willing to come up here.” He yawned. “Or, hell, it’s not like we can’t fly down to LA for a couple days. It’s not like we’ll be working.”
“We could have fun together.” Jared took another long draught of his beer and flopped back on the couch, propping his feet up on Jensen’s lap. “Could just be us. Nobody trashing the house. No damn paparazzi taking incriminating photos of us drunk or asking personal questions. It could be a real holiday for once.”
Jensen toyed with the narrow neck of his beer bottle for a minute, looking at Jared’s hopeful face and knowing that he couldn’t actually say no. “Why don’t we think about it before deciding to send them the money and everything? Let’s make sure we’re not missing out on the New Year’s Party of a Lifetime, okay?”
“It’s not going to get better than outdoor hot tubs and free champagne!” Jared’s grin could have lit up all of Vancouver for a year.
*
Jensen had, honestly, pretty much forgotten about Jared’s beloved New Year’s Canadian Retreat by the end of November. It was finally getting cold and football was getting a little more serious and they were that much closer to finally being on hiatus. He could almost taste it. So, he really didn’t have any reason to be thinking about going on a couple’s vacation with his roommate/landlord/best friend.
So when Jensen got the sticky note (Sent in the money - boo-yah! Hot tubs!), he was reasonably confused. At first he thought that Jared was buying a hot tub for the house and then, as he was pulling some left over pizza out of the refrigerator, he realised what the sticky note actually meant.
“Fuck!”
“What? You out of beer?” Chris asked over the phone line from Los Angeles.
“Jared sent in the fucking money,” Jensen told him, putting the pizza in the microwave. “He didn’t even ask me and he sent in the money.”
“The money? He finally broke and bought you a hooker?” Chris was riding high on his new show and some mellow weed.
“Bite me,” Jensen told him, watching the pizza sizzle in the microwave. “He got some direct mail ad about a New Year’s Canadian Retreat. I don’t know; I don’t think I even read it. There might have been glitter on the paper. Jare’s really excited about the outdoor hot tubs, though.”
“Outdoor hot tubs, huh?” Jensen heard him take a long swallow of something, probably beer. “You and the giant are getting serious, moving in together, going on sexy getaways together…”
“That’s not even funny, man. You know Jared’s straight.”
“You’re not.”
“Come on, man. That’s not -”
“Shut up. Don’t even try to tell me you don’t have some kind of man crush on him. I mean, when was the last time you even talked to Danneel?”
“I’ve been working.” Jensen pulled the pizza from the microwave and wandered into the living room to sit on the couch. “She’s busy; I’m busy. That’s just how life works.”
“And somehow you’re living with him and spending New Year’s on some retreat,” Chris pointed out. “And you still find the time to call me, even though I’ve got a steady job, too.”
Jensen took a huge bite of pizza and thought for a moment while he chewed. “That’s not a real job, you loser.”
“Fuck you.” Chris paused for a beat. “When were you gonna tell me you weren’t gonna be around for January?”
“It’s only a couple of days. We can still make it down for your gig, don’t worry.”
“You damn well better. And you better watch yourself, going on this getaway with him,” Chris said, serious for a moment. “Don’t let your little crush fly out of control.”
“I don’t - he’s straight!” Jensen protested immediately, hearing the front door open.
“Who’s straight?” Jared asked from the front hall, over the barks of the dogs.
“Your mom!” Jensen yelled back.
“Jared home?” Chris asked dryly. “He gonna give you your hello kiss?”
“Bite me,” Jensen told him, taking another bite out of his rapidly cooling pizza.
“That Chris?” Jared asked, wandering into the living room, slowly peeling layers like snakeskin and leaving them in a trail behind him. “Tell him to fuck off. I need someone to make me dinner.”
Jensen flipped Jared off and laughed as Harley bowled into the room, his wet paws skidding on the wood floor, with Sadie close on his heels. Something felt indescribably right with the dogs making crazy fools of themselves and Jared promising to order take out from that great Indian place and Chris giving him the details about his January gig in Los Angeles. It felt warm and cozy and like home. Jensen told himself that he was really overworked and just needed some time off where he could relax and spend some real time with his friends.
*
“I guess this isn’t so bad,” Jensen said, dropping his duffle bag on his bed, a queen with a simple dark blue duvet. The room they were sharing matched the bed: simple, blue, and fairly large for being one of the few bedrooms with two beds at the retreat. The carpet was a slightly worn grey-blue and the walls were painted to match. Their windows looked out over a snowy hill and a sliding glass door opened onto a deck with the promised outdoor hot tub.
“Not bad? This is going to be great!” Jared tossed his own bag to the floor and went to press his face against the window, staring outside. “We’ve got snow and a hot tub all our own and parties and booze and we know we’re not going to kill each other, living together for a week!”
“A week?! I booked us a flight to LA for Tuesday!”
“Almost a week, then,” Jared told the windowpane, oblivious to the slight panic with which Jensen was looking for his cell phone. “They’re kicking us out on Monday.”
Jensen breathed a silent sigh of relief that he wouldn’t have to explain that to Chris and started to pull his clothes from the bag. He’d just started putting them away in the set of drawers by the door - after looking at the snow for a minute and hoping that he’d brought enough sweaters - when Jared rocked back on his heels and turned to look at him.
“What are you doing?”
“Putting my stuff away like a normal person?” Jensen shoved his socks on top of jeans, figuring he’d probably need them both at the same time.
“We need to explore!” Jared told him. “You can put your stuff away later.”
“They’re going to smell like mildew, like my bag, if I leave anything in there any longer,” Jensen protested. “Besides, you haven’t even looked at the room.”
Jared rolled his eyes. “We’re not here for the room. We’re here because it looked like a fucking awesome vacation.”
Jensen dumped the rest of his clothes out on his bed and out of the musty bag and followed Jared out of their private room. “So what makes this vacation so awesome?”
“Did you even read any of the flyers I showed you?”
“Not really. You seemed to be reading them enough for both of us. I figure, I read the newspaper and our scripts and you can read our unwanted mail. Though, I might need to rethink that plan now, considering that we’re here.”
“Do you want to know about our vacation, then?” Jared asked, slinging an arm over Jensen’s shoulders companionably as they walked down the pastel carpeted hallway toward the main atrium.
“Somehow I don’t think I can avoid it.” Jared had a tendency to store up random facts and information about something he liked, something in which he was interested, and then he would corner someone, usually Jensen, though he used to to do it to Sandy and would do it to Chad when he was around, and fill them in on everything they never needed to know on - migratory patterns of Canadian coastal birds or something. Jensen had developed the defensive habit of checking to see if Jared had been looking up anything on Wikipedia so he could do his best to turn the information spiels into conversations, even though he didn’t really care about Arctic turns. He knew he had his own, far more annoying habits that were probably less useful, in the long run. He had a feeling that Jared had looked up everything about this place and their retreat and Jensen was going to learn more from him than he would have if he asked at the front desk.
Jared started in on it when they reached the atrium, a great circular room with a waterfall and fountain to one side and leafy green trees and poinsettias all around. It should have felt claustrophobic, but somehow Jensen felt like he was in some bizarrely warm holiday forest. It was strange and fascinating. Jared steered him toward one of the oversized plush green couches wedged between a lit fireplace and enormous Christmas tree, decorated with red velvet ribbon, white lights, and silver and gold reflective ornaments as he explained that they both had complimentary ski tickets and food and that tomorrow would be a formal New Year’s Party and they would both be expected to wear at least nice suits.
“Is this your first time here?”
Jensen looked up to see a gray haired woman, complete with a gray wool sweater and long plaid skirt, sitting at one of the couches by the fireplace.
“Yeah,” Jared told her, his grin splitting his face. “It looks amazing.”
The woman smiled, revealing two rows of straight white teeth. “My Henry and I have been coming here for years. I’m sure you two will love it.”
“You ski?” Jensen asked, slightly baffled.
The woman laughed lightly. “Oh no. I mean, we did when we started coming here, but we don’t buy the ski package anymore.”
“Package?” Jensen asked just as Jared elbowed him in the ribs.
“Oh, it’s fine,” she told them indulgently. “I’m an old lady and hard to offend. Helen Peterson, by the way.” She offered her hand to Jared.
“Jared Padalecki. And this is Jensen.”
“Pleased to meet you. You looked like you were coming to rest your feet by the fire.”
Jared sat on the couch opposite Helen and pulled Jensen next to him. “We drove up from Vancouver today. I was just trying to show Jensen around since he apparently didn’t read any of the brochures I gave him.”
“I heard. They should hire you here; you could make anyone believe this is the vacation of a lifetime.”
Jared grinned. “Hey, if my current job doesn’t work out, you never know.”
“You’ve almost sold me,” Jensen told him, stretching out his legs. “As long as I don’t kill you in your sleep, I think we’ll be fine.”
“Haven’t killed me yet.”
“That’s because you don’t actually sleep! If you don’t turn off the lights at a reasonable hour tonight, there will be bloodshed.” Jensen had been enjoying hiatus and his sleep too much to let something like sharing a room with Jared interrupt his preciously rare rest.
“I guess it’d be good to sleep,” Jared admitted.
“Have you two been together long?” Helen asked. “You seem so comfortable together.”
Jared laughed, the sound booming through the open glass-and-steel of the atrium. “Jen moved in with me over the summer. He secretly thinks I’m a robot because if he could, he’d sleep fifteen hours a day and thinks everyone should.”
“Yeah, but you take forever to get ready in the morning,” Jensen protested automatically, not even thinking of Helen and what she might assume.
“What is it they said, ‘Jared’s the girl?’”
“You love it.”
Helen smiled at them and told them they reminded her of her grandchildren. She was in the process of telling them about her youngest granddaughter, Melanie, and an incident involving a ballet school and a horse, when a an older man with thinning hair and glasses came to join her on the couch. “Henry! I was wondering when you’d get back here. I’d like you to meet Jensen and Jared; they’re one of the new couples this year.”
Henry smiled at them and continued Helen’s story where she had left off. Apparently their granddaughter and her best friend had been fighting over dancing and horseback riding and it ended both messily and hilariously. Jensen wasn’t entirely sure if they were lying or not, but he decided he didn't care, when he heard Jared’s belly laugh and saw the affectionate light in Helen’s eyes.
They followed Helen and Henry to the welcoming buffet dinner and were introduced to other couples who had been coming to White Aspens’ New Year’s Canadian Retreat. Jensen blindly followed Jared back to their seats with Helen and Henry, practically drooling into the rib eye and brandied yams with almonds and walnuts. He was half tempted to ask Jared how much this retreat cost, but thought better of it when they reached their table and were greeted with a welcoming chorus of smiles and hellos.
*
“What the hell, man?” Jensen asked, pulling a pair of plaid flannel pants out of his drawer. “Really.”
“I think you had too much to drink because you’re not making any sense.” Jared yawned and stretched, unbuttoned his flowered over shirt.
“You let all of those poor people think that we’re - that we’re dating.” Jensen frowned, perching on the end of his large, blue bed and staring at Jared as he played out an innocuous and slightly tipsy striptease.
“Aw, come on, Jen. Everyone thinks we’re dating.” Jared pulled off his brown undershirt and treated Jensen to a show of muscle as he searched the dim room for his duffel. “Fuck, I’d bet most of the fans who come to our conventions figure that’s we’re sleeping together. Chad thinks tells me we’re just an old married couple.” He yawned and pulled off his jeans. “You don’t really mind, do you?”
Jensen thought about Chris and the little thoughts he sometimes had when he spent too much time with Jared. “I guess not…”
“Anyway, you said it yourself. They’re all couples. They expect us to be a couple. It’s easier. And hey, isn’t it nice, once in a while, not to have everyone trying to set you up with that nice girl they know?”
Jensen thought about that for a moment and pulled on his pants. “I guess.”
“It works.” Jared stretched out, his legs long and endless in their flannel cotton and his chest toned and bare above the blankets, as he reached to turn off the lamp between their beds. “Don’t bother. It’s easy.”
*
It was New Year’s Eve and Jensen thought he was going to jump out of his skin. He had no trouble admitting that he might have a bit of a crush on Jared, but they’d been living in each other’s pockets for almost four years now, it was to be expected. He was even used to Jared’s affectionate nature. He knew that when there were cameras rolling, he could expect to be humped, like Jared was a dog in heat. He knew that Jared would try to coordinate their clothes, just so that they’d look ‘better’ when they were photographed. He knew that Jared liked to touch him, liked to hug him. But this was beyond that pale. Jared was wrapping his arm around his shoulder at every opportunity and smiling in just that way and calling him honey and sweetie and all sorts of cute little nicknames.
As neither Jensen nor Jared knew how to ski beyond the level of a five year old who had never seen snow, they had spent the day inside the resort and away from the more-than-slightly intimidatingly steep slopes. For once, Jensen was awake before Jared and he had stood on their porch, just past the hot tub, and watched the slopes. He decided, upon seeing the mad skiers weaving around snow mounds, that he would not touch the mountain. He had taken the time to savour his coffee and enjoy the cold air, wrapped in his winter parka and wool cap, but that was the last time he had had time to relax. When Jared finally woke up, he’d dragged Jensen to breakfast in the atrium. Then they’d gone to a weight lifting and strength training class with a couple of Henry’s friends, whom they had met the previous night. After that they’d gone to a scheduled lunch in a private dining room and then they were off to some showings of some locally made movies and a documentary on the shrinking Canadian glaciers.
Jensen didn’t think that he’d been touched so often in his life. He felt like Jared hadn’t gone without touching him for more than five minutes. Maybe when they were exercising, because Jared was frighteningly serious about his exercise. But after that, surely, Jared had barely stopped touching him. He rested his hand on the small of Jensen’s back, guiding him from overly decorated room to overly decorated room. He carried Jensen’s punch for him at lunch. When Jensen bumped into a particularly low hanging evergreen wreath, Jared carefully brushed the pine needles and silver glitter from Jensen’s hair. Two women, one at lunch and one during the documentary, told him, with sighs, that they wished their husbands were as attentive as Jared. Jensen had initially tried to protest, but the women told him not to be modest. It felt kind of awkward that everyone thought Jared was his amazing boyfriend, but they weren’t acting much differently than they normally did. As long as no one said anything, Jensen could forget about the touching and the fake boyfriend bit and it just felt like they were on vacation.
Their room looked warm and inviting. It creeped Jensen out a bit to think of people coming into their room and messing with their stuff, but he had to admit that it was nice to come back and have the lights dimmed, a snack on the table by the sliding doors, and their suits laid out on their beds. Even if he was going to inspect his clothes before putting them on, it was still nice. It had started to snow sometime during the documentary and had started piling in little drifts on their deck, making their warm room seem that much cozier.
Jensen picked up his jacket and checked to see if anyone had done anything to it, like sewn miniature microphones into the seams or lined it with arsenic. You never knew. “You know we’re not actually dating, right?”
Jared shrugged and picked up an apple from the table. “And the people who iron your clothes aren’t going to kill you. I don’t think you can really absorb poison through your clothes like that anyway. ‘M pretty sure that’s just an urban legend.”
Jensen made a disgruntled noise.
“Wanna try out the hot tub? We’ve got time before dinner.”
“It’s snowing.”
“Exactly.”
When Jensen looked up from inspecting his pants, Jared looked far too pleased with the prospect of freezing to death so that he could hot tub in the snow. “I’m not going to freeze my balls off so that you can have your outdoor hot tub experience. Why don’t we just come back in the summer? Or, better yet, we can find you an outdoor hot tub in a place that doesn’t regularly have cold weather advisories about frostbite?”
Jared pawed through the bowl of food until he grinned triumphantly, a prized candy bar in one hand. “So, is there a reason you’re not ‘actually’ dating anyone?”
“Well, for one, they all think I’m dating you. And for another, middle aged married women aren’t really my style. I’m thinking more blonde, young, and single.”
“Fuck you,” Jared told him through a mouthful of melting chocolate and caramel. “You and Danneel haven’t actually been serious for, like, months now and you’ve barely looked at anyone.”
“You sound like my momma.” Jensen moved his suit to one of the chairs and flopped down backwards onto his bed. “I don’t know. With our shooting schedules, Danneel and I couldn’t make it work. We never saw each other. I wouldn’t put another girl through that and, seriously, there’s no real way around it. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, with all of the rampant dating you’ve been doing, but chicks, they like to actually spend time with the people they’re dating.”
Jared just rolled his eyes and continued to eat his candy bar, smudging some of the chocolate on his bottom lip. He sagged a bit in the chair and toyed with the foil wrapper with his left hand.
Jensen propped himself up on his elbows. “What’s up, man? I mean, why’re you bringing this up now? Did you meet someone or something?”
“You’re really oblivious, you know that?” Jared said, dropping the candy wrapper into the trash bin as he got up and made his way over to his duffle bag. He rummaged through it for a moment until he retrieved his swim trunks. “I’m going to use the hot tub in the snow. Join me if you like.”
Jensen dropped his head back down onto his bed and wondered for a moment what the hell just happened. Jared fairly stomped out onto the deck and Jensen could hear him as he splashed down into the water. He knew the if he bothered to look, he would probably be able to see the water steaming into the cold air and Jared looking torn between scowling about whatever was the matter and being excited about finally using his outdoor hot tub.
Running a hand through his short hair, Jensen wondered what had Jared so upset. He had figured that coming up to the retreat would make Jared happy and it had, right up until they’d returned to their room. Of course, they’d been pretending to be dating all day, so it could have been an act, but Jensen thought that he was a decent judge of when Jared was upset. Maybe Jared was having some kind of delayed post-relationship existential crisis about love and life and how it had kicked his ass to the curb. Jensen winced slightly; his cynical discussion of his fairly amicable break up with Danneel probably hadn’t helped that. It was true, though: Acting on location wasn’t usually conducive to starting new, long term, stable relationship.
Jensen sat up and looked at Jared through the sliding door. He was sitting half naked in a hot tub and trying to catch snowflakes on his tongue. He did not look like he was have a particularly distressing existential crisis. He looked like he was having a good time, but was probably still fairly disgusted with his best friend/roommate/tenent/coworker. Jensen thought back over things: Jared in general, but also Jared telling Helen about Jensen moving in, Jared giving him the extra bacon at breakfast, Jared brushing the pine needles and glitter out of his hair, Jared asking about why he didn’t date.
The cold was a little biting through his shirt, but Jensen ignored it as he moved to crouch by the hot tub. The steam felt good on his cold face. “If you weren’t straight, I would think you had a really shitty way of asking me out.”
“I’m not straight,” Jared pointed out. “And you’re an idiot.”
Jensen rocked back onto his heels. “You’re not?”
“I dated a guy before I met Sandy. He was kind of an asshole, but he was definitely a guy.”
“Well, I’m not an idiot. You could have just said, ‘Hey, Jensen, wanna go on a date?’ I’m pretty sure that would have been easier.”
“You think it would have been.”
Jensen rolled his eyes. “I would have figured out what was going on a hell of a lot quicker. And I could have said yes and we could have saved our money and probably had sex by now.”
“I like the hot tub,” Jared said defensively. “You would have said yes?”
“Are you deaf?”
“Then get in the hot tub with me already!”
*
“Champagne?” Jensen asked, handing Jared the flute without waiting for a reply.
Jared wrapped his free arm around Jensen’s waist and Jensen found himself relaxing into it and leaning slightly on Jared. The atrium was decorated beautifully for New Year’s Eve, with the small Christmas trees lining the walls to make room for dancing and brightly coloured balloons hanging in nets, waiting to be dropped at midnight. It was beautiful and even if Jensen planned to harass Jared for the next year about taking him to White Aspens’ New Year’s Canadian Retreat as an elaborate and sneaky first date, he thought that it just might have been worth it.
“You know, Chad always told me that we’re just an old married couple and the sooner we admitted it, the happier we’d be,” Jared told him, taking a sip of champagne.
“You talk to Chad about your gay feelings about me before you talk to me about them?”
“I try to talk to you, but then you think that me stealing your clothes is as manly and heterosexual as drinking beer and watching football, so you’re not very useful, are you? Besides, Chad understands my inner gay feelings more than you do and will drink cosmos with me.”
“I seriously hope you’re lying about that or I’m going to have to stop dating you.”
“Of course, I’m lying. I think Chad would puke if he tried to talk about inner feelings.”
“Are you two having a good time?” Helen asked, skirting the edge of the dance floor to stand beside Jared. “Enjoying the White Aspens?”
“It’s great,” Jensen told her honestly. “I don’t think I realised how much I needed this vacation.”
“Sometimes it’s getting away that makes you realise what you’ve got at home.” Helen smiled at them. “You two should get out on the dance floor. Enjoy your young legs!”
Jared just grinned at Helen and then tugged Jensen out onto the floor, saying, "Come on, it's mean to disappoint old people. You don't want to be that guy who's mean to old ladies."
"I'm going to tell her that you think she's an old lady," Jensen told him, wrapping one arm around Jared's shoulder as a slow waltz began to play over the speakers.
"When? It's almost midnight and I'm pretty sure they're not going to be out here until two."
Jensen smiled as Jared leaned into him, swaying a little with the music. "So, are you going to kiss me at midnight?"
Jared laughed and leaned down to press his lips to Jensen's. Jensen wanted to just enjoy it, but he suddenly remembered all of the times they'd been recognised on the street, all of the times that Kim and Eric had posted some of that god awful fanfiction on set, all of the time the fans asked if they were dating and wanted photos of them. Wasn't it suspicious that no one at the whole retreat had recognised them? They were mostly little athletic Canadians who tried to talk to them about doing yoga to center themselves and take up cross country skiing so that they could learn to enjoy the great outdoors, but surely even crazy Canadians would watch Gilmore Girls and recognise Jared. That had happened often enough before. What if they'd all been waiting for this moment, when they'd actually do something in public and were going to take their picture and put it in their centered yogic scrapbooks or green living blogs? What if they ended up as the gay celebrities on the front cover of Canadian's premiere cross-country skiing magazine?
"They don't care," Jared told him, smiling. "We're not going to end up in their meditation magazines or whatever it is you're thinking. They've thought we've been dating since we got here. This is as much privacy as we're ever going to get in public."
"Some day I'm going to find out that you're actually psychic, aren't I?" Jensen asked, holding him close.
"I just know you really well."
Jensen pressed his lips to Jared's and closed his eyes. Jared was right; no one cared here and they could deal with the other people as it came up. This was now and there were no cameras, no crazy fans, no paparazzi. It was New Year's Eve and they could kiss.
Rating: PG
Genre: RPS (Jensen/Jared)
Beta: samidha
Summary: Jensen has a mancrush, Jared is a Terminator robot, and neither of them have plans for New Year's Eve.
Notes: Written for uschickens for spn_j2_xmas with the prompt: A pretend-to-be-dating story, either Sam/Dean or Jared/Jensen. You said you liked happy endings and humor. I did my best with snappy dialogue. I might steal some of your prompts for future fics. I hope this is to your liking!
“It’ll be fun,” Jared wheedled.
“Being miserable and dateless on New Year’s Eve is not fun,” Jensen told him, crossing his arms over his chest.
Sadie barked her agreement and rubbed her head on Jensen’s knee, begging for attention. Jensen put down his beer and rubbed her behind the ears affectionately. A football game was on the television set and someone was losing, but he was just a little buzzed and a lot exhausted and couldn’t bring himself to care.
He was also pretty sure that Jared was even more buzzed than he was. They hadn’t been drinking much, not for them, but they’d been shooting ungodly hours and Jensen suspected that Jared secretly didn’t actually sleep. Whenever Jensen went to sleep, Jared was still awake, watching TV or playing with the Xbox or walking the dogs. And it was usually Jared who woke Jensen up, looking far too perky and alive to be newly awake himself. When he first moved in, Jensen thought that Jared might have been taking pills, but he changed theories; now he just thought that Jared wasn’t fully human. Those Terminator robots didn’t need to sleep, did they?
Jared shoved the paper, shiny silver lettering and all, under Jensen’s nose. “They say there’s food and dancing and free champagne and outdoor hot tubs! It’ll be awesome!”
“It’s a romantic getaway for two!” Jensen protested. “It’s for couples! Do we really want to be the two miserable losers who can’t get dates - and then go and spend time with the happy couples? Are you crazy?”
Jared pouted, looking a little ridiculous, a little drunk, and a little hurt. Jensen remembered the sting of the quiet in the house and on set and in his life when Jared first broke up with Sandy and regretted his words.
“Jare, come on. If you want to do something for New Year’s, we can throw a party or something. I’m sure people would be willing to come up here.” He yawned. “Or, hell, it’s not like we can’t fly down to LA for a couple days. It’s not like we’ll be working.”
“We could have fun together.” Jared took another long draught of his beer and flopped back on the couch, propping his feet up on Jensen’s lap. “Could just be us. Nobody trashing the house. No damn paparazzi taking incriminating photos of us drunk or asking personal questions. It could be a real holiday for once.”
Jensen toyed with the narrow neck of his beer bottle for a minute, looking at Jared’s hopeful face and knowing that he couldn’t actually say no. “Why don’t we think about it before deciding to send them the money and everything? Let’s make sure we’re not missing out on the New Year’s Party of a Lifetime, okay?”
“It’s not going to get better than outdoor hot tubs and free champagne!” Jared’s grin could have lit up all of Vancouver for a year.
*
Jensen had, honestly, pretty much forgotten about Jared’s beloved New Year’s Canadian Retreat by the end of November. It was finally getting cold and football was getting a little more serious and they were that much closer to finally being on hiatus. He could almost taste it. So, he really didn’t have any reason to be thinking about going on a couple’s vacation with his roommate/landlord/best friend.
So when Jensen got the sticky note (Sent in the money - boo-yah! Hot tubs!), he was reasonably confused. At first he thought that Jared was buying a hot tub for the house and then, as he was pulling some left over pizza out of the refrigerator, he realised what the sticky note actually meant.
“Fuck!”
“What? You out of beer?” Chris asked over the phone line from Los Angeles.
“Jared sent in the fucking money,” Jensen told him, putting the pizza in the microwave. “He didn’t even ask me and he sent in the money.”
“The money? He finally broke and bought you a hooker?” Chris was riding high on his new show and some mellow weed.
“Bite me,” Jensen told him, watching the pizza sizzle in the microwave. “He got some direct mail ad about a New Year’s Canadian Retreat. I don’t know; I don’t think I even read it. There might have been glitter on the paper. Jare’s really excited about the outdoor hot tubs, though.”
“Outdoor hot tubs, huh?” Jensen heard him take a long swallow of something, probably beer. “You and the giant are getting serious, moving in together, going on sexy getaways together…”
“That’s not even funny, man. You know Jared’s straight.”
“You’re not.”
“Come on, man. That’s not -”
“Shut up. Don’t even try to tell me you don’t have some kind of man crush on him. I mean, when was the last time you even talked to Danneel?”
“I’ve been working.” Jensen pulled the pizza from the microwave and wandered into the living room to sit on the couch. “She’s busy; I’m busy. That’s just how life works.”
“And somehow you’re living with him and spending New Year’s on some retreat,” Chris pointed out. “And you still find the time to call me, even though I’ve got a steady job, too.”
Jensen took a huge bite of pizza and thought for a moment while he chewed. “That’s not a real job, you loser.”
“Fuck you.” Chris paused for a beat. “When were you gonna tell me you weren’t gonna be around for January?”
“It’s only a couple of days. We can still make it down for your gig, don’t worry.”
“You damn well better. And you better watch yourself, going on this getaway with him,” Chris said, serious for a moment. “Don’t let your little crush fly out of control.”
“I don’t - he’s straight!” Jensen protested immediately, hearing the front door open.
“Who’s straight?” Jared asked from the front hall, over the barks of the dogs.
“Your mom!” Jensen yelled back.
“Jared home?” Chris asked dryly. “He gonna give you your hello kiss?”
“Bite me,” Jensen told him, taking another bite out of his rapidly cooling pizza.
“That Chris?” Jared asked, wandering into the living room, slowly peeling layers like snakeskin and leaving them in a trail behind him. “Tell him to fuck off. I need someone to make me dinner.”
Jensen flipped Jared off and laughed as Harley bowled into the room, his wet paws skidding on the wood floor, with Sadie close on his heels. Something felt indescribably right with the dogs making crazy fools of themselves and Jared promising to order take out from that great Indian place and Chris giving him the details about his January gig in Los Angeles. It felt warm and cozy and like home. Jensen told himself that he was really overworked and just needed some time off where he could relax and spend some real time with his friends.
*
“I guess this isn’t so bad,” Jensen said, dropping his duffle bag on his bed, a queen with a simple dark blue duvet. The room they were sharing matched the bed: simple, blue, and fairly large for being one of the few bedrooms with two beds at the retreat. The carpet was a slightly worn grey-blue and the walls were painted to match. Their windows looked out over a snowy hill and a sliding glass door opened onto a deck with the promised outdoor hot tub.
“Not bad? This is going to be great!” Jared tossed his own bag to the floor and went to press his face against the window, staring outside. “We’ve got snow and a hot tub all our own and parties and booze and we know we’re not going to kill each other, living together for a week!”
“A week?! I booked us a flight to LA for Tuesday!”
“Almost a week, then,” Jared told the windowpane, oblivious to the slight panic with which Jensen was looking for his cell phone. “They’re kicking us out on Monday.”
Jensen breathed a silent sigh of relief that he wouldn’t have to explain that to Chris and started to pull his clothes from the bag. He’d just started putting them away in the set of drawers by the door - after looking at the snow for a minute and hoping that he’d brought enough sweaters - when Jared rocked back on his heels and turned to look at him.
“What are you doing?”
“Putting my stuff away like a normal person?” Jensen shoved his socks on top of jeans, figuring he’d probably need them both at the same time.
“We need to explore!” Jared told him. “You can put your stuff away later.”
“They’re going to smell like mildew, like my bag, if I leave anything in there any longer,” Jensen protested. “Besides, you haven’t even looked at the room.”
Jared rolled his eyes. “We’re not here for the room. We’re here because it looked like a fucking awesome vacation.”
Jensen dumped the rest of his clothes out on his bed and out of the musty bag and followed Jared out of their private room. “So what makes this vacation so awesome?”
“Did you even read any of the flyers I showed you?”
“Not really. You seemed to be reading them enough for both of us. I figure, I read the newspaper and our scripts and you can read our unwanted mail. Though, I might need to rethink that plan now, considering that we’re here.”
“Do you want to know about our vacation, then?” Jared asked, slinging an arm over Jensen’s shoulders companionably as they walked down the pastel carpeted hallway toward the main atrium.
“Somehow I don’t think I can avoid it.” Jared had a tendency to store up random facts and information about something he liked, something in which he was interested, and then he would corner someone, usually Jensen, though he used to to do it to Sandy and would do it to Chad when he was around, and fill them in on everything they never needed to know on - migratory patterns of Canadian coastal birds or something. Jensen had developed the defensive habit of checking to see if Jared had been looking up anything on Wikipedia so he could do his best to turn the information spiels into conversations, even though he didn’t really care about Arctic turns. He knew he had his own, far more annoying habits that were probably less useful, in the long run. He had a feeling that Jared had looked up everything about this place and their retreat and Jensen was going to learn more from him than he would have if he asked at the front desk.
Jared started in on it when they reached the atrium, a great circular room with a waterfall and fountain to one side and leafy green trees and poinsettias all around. It should have felt claustrophobic, but somehow Jensen felt like he was in some bizarrely warm holiday forest. It was strange and fascinating. Jared steered him toward one of the oversized plush green couches wedged between a lit fireplace and enormous Christmas tree, decorated with red velvet ribbon, white lights, and silver and gold reflective ornaments as he explained that they both had complimentary ski tickets and food and that tomorrow would be a formal New Year’s Party and they would both be expected to wear at least nice suits.
“Is this your first time here?”
Jensen looked up to see a gray haired woman, complete with a gray wool sweater and long plaid skirt, sitting at one of the couches by the fireplace.
“Yeah,” Jared told her, his grin splitting his face. “It looks amazing.”
The woman smiled, revealing two rows of straight white teeth. “My Henry and I have been coming here for years. I’m sure you two will love it.”
“You ski?” Jensen asked, slightly baffled.
The woman laughed lightly. “Oh no. I mean, we did when we started coming here, but we don’t buy the ski package anymore.”
“Package?” Jensen asked just as Jared elbowed him in the ribs.
“Oh, it’s fine,” she told them indulgently. “I’m an old lady and hard to offend. Helen Peterson, by the way.” She offered her hand to Jared.
“Jared Padalecki. And this is Jensen.”
“Pleased to meet you. You looked like you were coming to rest your feet by the fire.”
Jared sat on the couch opposite Helen and pulled Jensen next to him. “We drove up from Vancouver today. I was just trying to show Jensen around since he apparently didn’t read any of the brochures I gave him.”
“I heard. They should hire you here; you could make anyone believe this is the vacation of a lifetime.”
Jared grinned. “Hey, if my current job doesn’t work out, you never know.”
“You’ve almost sold me,” Jensen told him, stretching out his legs. “As long as I don’t kill you in your sleep, I think we’ll be fine.”
“Haven’t killed me yet.”
“That’s because you don’t actually sleep! If you don’t turn off the lights at a reasonable hour tonight, there will be bloodshed.” Jensen had been enjoying hiatus and his sleep too much to let something like sharing a room with Jared interrupt his preciously rare rest.
“I guess it’d be good to sleep,” Jared admitted.
“Have you two been together long?” Helen asked. “You seem so comfortable together.”
Jared laughed, the sound booming through the open glass-and-steel of the atrium. “Jen moved in with me over the summer. He secretly thinks I’m a robot because if he could, he’d sleep fifteen hours a day and thinks everyone should.”
“Yeah, but you take forever to get ready in the morning,” Jensen protested automatically, not even thinking of Helen and what she might assume.
“What is it they said, ‘Jared’s the girl?’”
“You love it.”
Helen smiled at them and told them they reminded her of her grandchildren. She was in the process of telling them about her youngest granddaughter, Melanie, and an incident involving a ballet school and a horse, when a an older man with thinning hair and glasses came to join her on the couch. “Henry! I was wondering when you’d get back here. I’d like you to meet Jensen and Jared; they’re one of the new couples this year.”
Henry smiled at them and continued Helen’s story where she had left off. Apparently their granddaughter and her best friend had been fighting over dancing and horseback riding and it ended both messily and hilariously. Jensen wasn’t entirely sure if they were lying or not, but he decided he didn't care, when he heard Jared’s belly laugh and saw the affectionate light in Helen’s eyes.
They followed Helen and Henry to the welcoming buffet dinner and were introduced to other couples who had been coming to White Aspens’ New Year’s Canadian Retreat. Jensen blindly followed Jared back to their seats with Helen and Henry, practically drooling into the rib eye and brandied yams with almonds and walnuts. He was half tempted to ask Jared how much this retreat cost, but thought better of it when they reached their table and were greeted with a welcoming chorus of smiles and hellos.
*
“What the hell, man?” Jensen asked, pulling a pair of plaid flannel pants out of his drawer. “Really.”
“I think you had too much to drink because you’re not making any sense.” Jared yawned and stretched, unbuttoned his flowered over shirt.
“You let all of those poor people think that we’re - that we’re dating.” Jensen frowned, perching on the end of his large, blue bed and staring at Jared as he played out an innocuous and slightly tipsy striptease.
“Aw, come on, Jen. Everyone thinks we’re dating.” Jared pulled off his brown undershirt and treated Jensen to a show of muscle as he searched the dim room for his duffel. “Fuck, I’d bet most of the fans who come to our conventions figure that’s we’re sleeping together. Chad thinks tells me we’re just an old married couple.” He yawned and pulled off his jeans. “You don’t really mind, do you?”
Jensen thought about Chris and the little thoughts he sometimes had when he spent too much time with Jared. “I guess not…”
“Anyway, you said it yourself. They’re all couples. They expect us to be a couple. It’s easier. And hey, isn’t it nice, once in a while, not to have everyone trying to set you up with that nice girl they know?”
Jensen thought about that for a moment and pulled on his pants. “I guess.”
“It works.” Jared stretched out, his legs long and endless in their flannel cotton and his chest toned and bare above the blankets, as he reached to turn off the lamp between their beds. “Don’t bother. It’s easy.”
*
It was New Year’s Eve and Jensen thought he was going to jump out of his skin. He had no trouble admitting that he might have a bit of a crush on Jared, but they’d been living in each other’s pockets for almost four years now, it was to be expected. He was even used to Jared’s affectionate nature. He knew that when there were cameras rolling, he could expect to be humped, like Jared was a dog in heat. He knew that Jared would try to coordinate their clothes, just so that they’d look ‘better’ when they were photographed. He knew that Jared liked to touch him, liked to hug him. But this was beyond that pale. Jared was wrapping his arm around his shoulder at every opportunity and smiling in just that way and calling him honey and sweetie and all sorts of cute little nicknames.
As neither Jensen nor Jared knew how to ski beyond the level of a five year old who had never seen snow, they had spent the day inside the resort and away from the more-than-slightly intimidatingly steep slopes. For once, Jensen was awake before Jared and he had stood on their porch, just past the hot tub, and watched the slopes. He decided, upon seeing the mad skiers weaving around snow mounds, that he would not touch the mountain. He had taken the time to savour his coffee and enjoy the cold air, wrapped in his winter parka and wool cap, but that was the last time he had had time to relax. When Jared finally woke up, he’d dragged Jensen to breakfast in the atrium. Then they’d gone to a weight lifting and strength training class with a couple of Henry’s friends, whom they had met the previous night. After that they’d gone to a scheduled lunch in a private dining room and then they were off to some showings of some locally made movies and a documentary on the shrinking Canadian glaciers.
Jensen didn’t think that he’d been touched so often in his life. He felt like Jared hadn’t gone without touching him for more than five minutes. Maybe when they were exercising, because Jared was frighteningly serious about his exercise. But after that, surely, Jared had barely stopped touching him. He rested his hand on the small of Jensen’s back, guiding him from overly decorated room to overly decorated room. He carried Jensen’s punch for him at lunch. When Jensen bumped into a particularly low hanging evergreen wreath, Jared carefully brushed the pine needles and silver glitter from Jensen’s hair. Two women, one at lunch and one during the documentary, told him, with sighs, that they wished their husbands were as attentive as Jared. Jensen had initially tried to protest, but the women told him not to be modest. It felt kind of awkward that everyone thought Jared was his amazing boyfriend, but they weren’t acting much differently than they normally did. As long as no one said anything, Jensen could forget about the touching and the fake boyfriend bit and it just felt like they were on vacation.
Their room looked warm and inviting. It creeped Jensen out a bit to think of people coming into their room and messing with their stuff, but he had to admit that it was nice to come back and have the lights dimmed, a snack on the table by the sliding doors, and their suits laid out on their beds. Even if he was going to inspect his clothes before putting them on, it was still nice. It had started to snow sometime during the documentary and had started piling in little drifts on their deck, making their warm room seem that much cozier.
Jensen picked up his jacket and checked to see if anyone had done anything to it, like sewn miniature microphones into the seams or lined it with arsenic. You never knew. “You know we’re not actually dating, right?”
Jared shrugged and picked up an apple from the table. “And the people who iron your clothes aren’t going to kill you. I don’t think you can really absorb poison through your clothes like that anyway. ‘M pretty sure that’s just an urban legend.”
Jensen made a disgruntled noise.
“Wanna try out the hot tub? We’ve got time before dinner.”
“It’s snowing.”
“Exactly.”
When Jensen looked up from inspecting his pants, Jared looked far too pleased with the prospect of freezing to death so that he could hot tub in the snow. “I’m not going to freeze my balls off so that you can have your outdoor hot tub experience. Why don’t we just come back in the summer? Or, better yet, we can find you an outdoor hot tub in a place that doesn’t regularly have cold weather advisories about frostbite?”
Jared pawed through the bowl of food until he grinned triumphantly, a prized candy bar in one hand. “So, is there a reason you’re not ‘actually’ dating anyone?”
“Well, for one, they all think I’m dating you. And for another, middle aged married women aren’t really my style. I’m thinking more blonde, young, and single.”
“Fuck you,” Jared told him through a mouthful of melting chocolate and caramel. “You and Danneel haven’t actually been serious for, like, months now and you’ve barely looked at anyone.”
“You sound like my momma.” Jensen moved his suit to one of the chairs and flopped down backwards onto his bed. “I don’t know. With our shooting schedules, Danneel and I couldn’t make it work. We never saw each other. I wouldn’t put another girl through that and, seriously, there’s no real way around it. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, with all of the rampant dating you’ve been doing, but chicks, they like to actually spend time with the people they’re dating.”
Jared just rolled his eyes and continued to eat his candy bar, smudging some of the chocolate on his bottom lip. He sagged a bit in the chair and toyed with the foil wrapper with his left hand.
Jensen propped himself up on his elbows. “What’s up, man? I mean, why’re you bringing this up now? Did you meet someone or something?”
“You’re really oblivious, you know that?” Jared said, dropping the candy wrapper into the trash bin as he got up and made his way over to his duffle bag. He rummaged through it for a moment until he retrieved his swim trunks. “I’m going to use the hot tub in the snow. Join me if you like.”
Jensen dropped his head back down onto his bed and wondered for a moment what the hell just happened. Jared fairly stomped out onto the deck and Jensen could hear him as he splashed down into the water. He knew the if he bothered to look, he would probably be able to see the water steaming into the cold air and Jared looking torn between scowling about whatever was the matter and being excited about finally using his outdoor hot tub.
Running a hand through his short hair, Jensen wondered what had Jared so upset. He had figured that coming up to the retreat would make Jared happy and it had, right up until they’d returned to their room. Of course, they’d been pretending to be dating all day, so it could have been an act, but Jensen thought that he was a decent judge of when Jared was upset. Maybe Jared was having some kind of delayed post-relationship existential crisis about love and life and how it had kicked his ass to the curb. Jensen winced slightly; his cynical discussion of his fairly amicable break up with Danneel probably hadn’t helped that. It was true, though: Acting on location wasn’t usually conducive to starting new, long term, stable relationship.
Jensen sat up and looked at Jared through the sliding door. He was sitting half naked in a hot tub and trying to catch snowflakes on his tongue. He did not look like he was have a particularly distressing existential crisis. He looked like he was having a good time, but was probably still fairly disgusted with his best friend/roommate/tenent/coworker. Jensen thought back over things: Jared in general, but also Jared telling Helen about Jensen moving in, Jared giving him the extra bacon at breakfast, Jared brushing the pine needles and glitter out of his hair, Jared asking about why he didn’t date.
The cold was a little biting through his shirt, but Jensen ignored it as he moved to crouch by the hot tub. The steam felt good on his cold face. “If you weren’t straight, I would think you had a really shitty way of asking me out.”
“I’m not straight,” Jared pointed out. “And you’re an idiot.”
Jensen rocked back onto his heels. “You’re not?”
“I dated a guy before I met Sandy. He was kind of an asshole, but he was definitely a guy.”
“Well, I’m not an idiot. You could have just said, ‘Hey, Jensen, wanna go on a date?’ I’m pretty sure that would have been easier.”
“You think it would have been.”
Jensen rolled his eyes. “I would have figured out what was going on a hell of a lot quicker. And I could have said yes and we could have saved our money and probably had sex by now.”
“I like the hot tub,” Jared said defensively. “You would have said yes?”
“Are you deaf?”
“Then get in the hot tub with me already!”
*
“Champagne?” Jensen asked, handing Jared the flute without waiting for a reply.
Jared wrapped his free arm around Jensen’s waist and Jensen found himself relaxing into it and leaning slightly on Jared. The atrium was decorated beautifully for New Year’s Eve, with the small Christmas trees lining the walls to make room for dancing and brightly coloured balloons hanging in nets, waiting to be dropped at midnight. It was beautiful and even if Jensen planned to harass Jared for the next year about taking him to White Aspens’ New Year’s Canadian Retreat as an elaborate and sneaky first date, he thought that it just might have been worth it.
“You know, Chad always told me that we’re just an old married couple and the sooner we admitted it, the happier we’d be,” Jared told him, taking a sip of champagne.
“You talk to Chad about your gay feelings about me before you talk to me about them?”
“I try to talk to you, but then you think that me stealing your clothes is as manly and heterosexual as drinking beer and watching football, so you’re not very useful, are you? Besides, Chad understands my inner gay feelings more than you do and will drink cosmos with me.”
“I seriously hope you’re lying about that or I’m going to have to stop dating you.”
“Of course, I’m lying. I think Chad would puke if he tried to talk about inner feelings.”
“Are you two having a good time?” Helen asked, skirting the edge of the dance floor to stand beside Jared. “Enjoying the White Aspens?”
“It’s great,” Jensen told her honestly. “I don’t think I realised how much I needed this vacation.”
“Sometimes it’s getting away that makes you realise what you’ve got at home.” Helen smiled at them. “You two should get out on the dance floor. Enjoy your young legs!”
Jared just grinned at Helen and then tugged Jensen out onto the floor, saying, "Come on, it's mean to disappoint old people. You don't want to be that guy who's mean to old ladies."
"I'm going to tell her that you think she's an old lady," Jensen told him, wrapping one arm around Jared's shoulder as a slow waltz began to play over the speakers.
"When? It's almost midnight and I'm pretty sure they're not going to be out here until two."
Jensen smiled as Jared leaned into him, swaying a little with the music. "So, are you going to kiss me at midnight?"
Jared laughed and leaned down to press his lips to Jensen's. Jensen wanted to just enjoy it, but he suddenly remembered all of the times they'd been recognised on the street, all of the times that Kim and Eric had posted some of that god awful fanfiction on set, all of the time the fans asked if they were dating and wanted photos of them. Wasn't it suspicious that no one at the whole retreat had recognised them? They were mostly little athletic Canadians who tried to talk to them about doing yoga to center themselves and take up cross country skiing so that they could learn to enjoy the great outdoors, but surely even crazy Canadians would watch Gilmore Girls and recognise Jared. That had happened often enough before. What if they'd all been waiting for this moment, when they'd actually do something in public and were going to take their picture and put it in their centered yogic scrapbooks or green living blogs? What if they ended up as the gay celebrities on the front cover of Canadian's premiere cross-country skiing magazine?
"They don't care," Jared told him, smiling. "We're not going to end up in their meditation magazines or whatever it is you're thinking. They've thought we've been dating since we got here. This is as much privacy as we're ever going to get in public."
"Some day I'm going to find out that you're actually psychic, aren't I?" Jensen asked, holding him close.
"I just know you really well."
Jensen pressed his lips to Jared's and closed his eyes. Jared was right; no one cared here and they could deal with the other people as it came up. This was now and there were no cameras, no crazy fans, no paparazzi. It was New Year's Eve and they could kiss.