Over here at the side of your life (J2 AU, nc-17, 13700 words)
Over here at the side of your life
(J2 AU, nc-17, 13700 words)
Jared is a hooker, Jensen is his workaholic best friend.
For clex_monkie89 as part of spn_j2_xmas. Huge thanks to giandujakiss for the awesome beta; all remaining mistakes are my own. Title from Dido.
While Jared was with his two o'clock appointment, he furtively composed a text to Jensen to remind him that the charcoal gray suit Jensen needed for that meeting tomorrow was still at the dry-cleaners. It wasn't like his client minded: the guy was very busy with squealing into the pillow, and Jared really only needed one hand to work the vibrator in and out of the guy's asshole.
Jensen had the suit in the backseat of the car when they went to the store later. They made a pretty weird pair, what with Jensen smartly dressed from the office in a smooth navy-blue suit and tie, and Jared freshly showered but still wearing strategically ripped, butter-soft jeans and a t-shirt that just barely stretched over his broad chest. Still, as neither of them was willing to get the groceries alone, it had evolved into tradition that they went together, to the point that they'd do without even the essentials until they were both free to go.
"You're almost out of those disgusting muscle milkshakes," said Jensen, and took one of the tubs off the shelf and dropped it in the cart. Then he hesitated and looked back at the shelf. "Or you could have it in their new flavor, raspberry? Which I imagine is as stomach-churningly horrible as the current banana and chocolate flavors, but y'know, whatever."
Slouched over the cart handles as it he inched it down the aisle after Jensen, Jared raised an eyebrow. "You been drinking my shakes again? That why I'm almost out?"
"Ha! I tried it once, after you bullied me non-stop for a week and I've decided I would rather digest my own internal organs. And the fact you drink those things daily just confirms my belief that you're nothing but a fucking masochist."
"I got an organ you can digest," Jared told him distractedly, because he couldn't really leave a line like that hanging but couldn't give it the lecherous tone it required while he was preoccupied with admiring the store's holiday lights, which blinked on and off in red, yellow and green, like a string of miniature stoplights. Overhead, there was a big white snowflake that shimmered crystalline as it turned in slow half-circles. "We should decorate," he said. "Y'know, for the party. Some lights, a tree. It'd be pretty."
"Last time we decorated neither of us could be bothered to take 'em down until March. I'm not sure I could live with a giant inflatable Santa Claus for that long again," said Jensen, meticulously comparing two different detergents, both pretty much identical as far as Jared could tell. That was typical Jensen though; he had criteria for decisions that Jared made without even registering.
"Speaking of the party," Jensen went on, "we're hosting the big Christmas party for all our friends, huge social occasion and a lot of pressure, and our preparations so far consist of… buying lots of beer." He scrunched his nose up at Jared in a way that made Jared want to ruffle his hair. "Seriously? We don't have any other plans?"
"We could get nachos too," Jared said. At Jensen's mournful expression, Jared leaned over to pat him on the shoulder. "It'll be awesome. Anybody bitches about your hostessing skills, I'll kick their ass."
"Oh fuck off," Jensen muttered, shaking Jared's hand off his shoulder. "Don't come crying to me if everybody's saying how much better Lauren's and Katie's was last year."
The cart squeaked mid-turn into an aisle as Jared snapped to a halt. He stared at Jensen, wide-eyed and horrified. "We're not actually trying to compete with them, are we? Because, dude, seriously, I wanna slit my wrists now and spare myself the humiliation. They had a theme, and fancy little place settings and… and we don't have a theme, and we can't have place settings 'cause your work crap's all over the one table we own."
"At least when I bring my work home, it's not used condoms," Jensen said.
"Once!" Jared protested instantly. "It happened once! And it wasn't used either. I told you, I'd taken it outta the wrapper intending to use it but-"
"Please, spare me the details," Jensen said, holding up a hand. He heaved a massive sigh and scraped his fingers through his hair, leaving it standing up at a weird angle on one side. "I guess our plan's gonna have to be to buy enough beer that everyone gets so drunk they don't remember Lauren's and Katie's."
"Man, could you imagine getting Lauren or Katie for Secret Santa?" said Jared, while he smoothed Jensen's crazy hair down flat. "What the hell do you get them? I mean, what could you possibly get them that wouldn't get taken right back to the store the next day?"
Jensen tossed a couple bags of chips in the cart, then checked the back of envelope they'd written their list on and steered Jared to another aisle. "I got Katie some designer purse year before last. I saw her use it once a few months back, so I'm taking it as a win." He glanced back at Jared. "Who'd you get this year?"
"Mike," Jared said. "So I'm thinking sparkly ceramic unicorn, blow-up sheep, anything really, so long as a sane person wouldn't want it. How about you?"
"Sandy, so I'm thinking… I don't know what I'm thinking. Help?"
Jared snorted. "No fucking way. She uses last year's present from me as a doorstop. You're on your own."
Maybe Jared shouldn't have been able to lie to Jensen as easily as he did, but Jensen knew all the things that Jared had never really meant to tell anyone - like how the reason he didn't go to MIT wasn't because he lost interest in engineering, but because he'd still felt pathetically heartbroken about being dumped by Alexis - so it felt like this little lie was totally balanced out.
It had taken some trickery and underhanded maneuvering, but Jared had Jensen this year, not Mike. He didn't know what he was going to get Jensen yet, only that it had to be better than the one year subscription to several online gay porn sites that Chad had got him last year. Jared really thought Jensen deserved something he actually wanted this time around.
The only problem was knowing what exactly that might be.
:::
Something big was going on at Jensen's office. Jared knew because the files Jensen had brought home from work not only covered their one table, but had recently started to spread out over the floor around the table. Apparently, it was some very important contract, but Jared didn't care too much, because it was getting Jensen up early in the morning, keeping him after-hours at the office, and eating up way too much of his spare time for Jared to approve.
As usual for the few evenings they were both at home lately, Jensen was silent and lost in his ever-growing file-fort.
Jared carefully wound a length of lights around their beer can tower, which was impressively tall thanks to a group effort at Thanksgiving, and tried not to look in Jensen's direction too often.
"Have you even had dinner?" he said.
"Had something at the office," Jensen said distantly. He frowned at something on the page, then scribbled it out and wrote his own note by the side of it.
"Twenty-six cups of coffee doesn't count as dinner," said Jared, as he added a length of silver tinsel. "You want me to make you something?"
"No, m'fine. But there's lasagna in the fridge if you're hungry," he said.
Jared sighed and didn't answer.
He strung another garland of tinsel, red this time, around the tower, then sat back on his heels to admire his handiwork. The red and silver coordinated particularly nicely with the Coors beer cans. He'd also got an assortment of tiny Christmas balls, and he set about hooking them on unfolded paperclips to hang them from the rims of the cans. When he was done, he flicked on the lights, and looked the whole (sparkling, twinkling, multicolored) thing over critically.
"Too much?" he said.
Jensen looked up, and his frown smoothed out into a crooked smile. "Wow, that's... a fuckload of color. But it's nice," he added quickly, glancing at Jared's face. "I like it."
Jared beamed proudly and stuck the last ball on the only available rim-space. He sat down on the couch and spent a few moments in quiet appreciation of his makeshift tree. If Jensen had helped, there'd have been a color theme and significantly fewer balls, so Jared supposed he should be grateful he'd been left to it. He cast another quick look in Jensen's direction and suppressed a sigh.
He turned on the TV, started channel-surfing and then stopped abruptly to look over at Jensen with a grin.
"Hey, Jen, they're showing A Muppet's Christmas Carol! C'mon, I know you like muppets."
Jensen flipped him the bird and didn't look up from his work.
"Michael Caine's gonna try to sing," Jared coaxed. "You don't wanna miss that."
Jensen's pen stilled on the page. "How far in is it?" he said.
"Just starting?" said Jared, trying not to sound too hopeful.
As soon as Jensen was moving, Jared freed up his side of the couch, tucking his long legs up so Jensen had plenty of room to get comfortable. Jensen punched one of the cushions into shape and sat down next to him.
"You're a really bad influence," he said. "I'm just gonna watch 'til Michael Caine tries to sing and then I gotta go back to work."
He was half-asleep by the time the Ghost of Christmas Past showed up, and completely gone by the Ghost of Christmas Present. His head was propped up on Jared's breastbone, his hair tickling Jared's nose, and his shoulder was slowly cutting off circulation to Jared's arm, and Jared had absolutely no intention of moving him. If Jensen had fallen asleep that quickly, he obviously needed it. Jensen's breath was coffee-sour and hunger-sweet, and the product he'd had in his hair had been in there so long it was starting to flake.
A Muppet's Christmas Carol ended and Jensen didn't show any signs of waking up, so Jared resigned himself to watching the documentary that followed. It was about religion in ancient Egypt, and Jared found himself grudgingly getting interested in it. He was halfway through a section on the attempted wipeout of the Atenist cult, when his cellphone rang.
It was the cellphone he used solely for clients and it was sitting over the other side of the room.
Conflicted, he watched it ring. A client was calling him, most likely so he would go and have sex with them and get paid a couple hundred dollars for it. But to answer it, he'd need to dislodge Jensen, who would wake up and immediately go back to work. Sex with a stranger for a couple hundred dollars, versus Jensen asleep on him and religion in ancient Egypt.
Jared watched the phone ring until it stopped, and then turned his attention back to the Atenist cult.
:::
It had stopped just being rain a while ago. Now it could be more accurately described as a torrential downpour. The rain was coming down so fast Jared's skin was stinging. His clothes were soaked through, sticking rough to his clammy body, and rainwater was dribbling down soaked tendrils of his hair into his eyes.
The street was bleak and empty, and all the windows were dark. Jared cowered in the first covered doorway he could find and watched the reflection of the streetlights in the puddles get beaten to jagged orange smears by the rain.
Jensen's phone had gone to voicemail, and Jared had tried not to sound too desperate in his message, just stuck to, "Hey, Jen, it's me. I'm on the corner of Seneca and Cleveland, and I can't find a damn cab. Could you come pick me up? Please?"
He pressed the heel of his hand to his aching jaw and hoped the bruise wasn't going to be as bad as it felt. Damaged goods really weren't great for business. Some guys in his trade really worked the twinky, fragile and delicate look, and the occasional bruise only emphasized it. Jared, though, was not fragile; Jared was built like the side of a really fucking big barn, and bruises made him look like trouble.
Right now, he wished he weren't built quite so big so he could get more of himself under the meager shelter of the doorway. He rubbed his hands together vigorously and then folded his arms tightly across his chest to conserve what body heat he could. His teeth were starting to chatter so he clenched them together.
A car rolled down the street and rainwater jumped up from its tires like seaspray.
He looked up and down the street hopefully and but there was nothing except the dull, dark shapes of buildings and the sticky shimmer of the wet street. Checking his watch, he saw it wasn't even eight o'clock yet, which meant Jensen could actually still be at the office and therefore ignoring his phone. Jared debated the wisdom of calling Sandy or Mike or one of the others. The prospect of having to recount just why he needed a ride wasn't an appealing one, but he was kind of getting desperate.
Still, it was only twenty minutes since he called Jensen, and home and Jensen's office were probably at least a half hour's drive away.
And even as he was thinking it, Jensen's car swept into sight. As it passed under a streetlight, Jared caught a glimpse of Jensen's face, an amber-hued stripe of him as he scanned the street for Jared. Jared stepped out of the doorway, the rain instantly painting his jacket and jeans to his skin, and waved Jensen down, grinning.
Jensen pulled in beside him and Jared scrambled into the car, wincing as he shook rainwater all over the upholstery.
"Shit, sorry about your car, man."
"I don't care about the car. What happened? Are you okay?" His tone was hard with urgency, and Jared registered that Jensen had one of his own hoodies thrown on over his scruffy jeans. Seeing Jared look, Jensen waved a hand irritably and said, "I was working from home when I got your message. Your hoodie was the closest thing. So, c'mon, talk to me. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," said Jared, scraping his hair out of his face where it was plastered to his skull. "I was s'posed to be getting a ride back towards home, but there was a little drama about whether I was gonna get paid or not and I got my money but… well, couldn't exactly hang around for the ride as well."
Jensen glanced at him sharply, his expression tight and blank, then did a double-take. "What the hell happened to your face? Did he hit you? Do I need to take you to the ER? Jesus, Jared!"
"I'm fine!" Jared insisted with a grin. "Like I said, a little drama is all." His grin faded and he frowned. "Think I might have broken his hand."
"Not like he's gonna go to the cops about it," Jensen said. He gazed fixedly out the windshield while he drove.
"No," Jared agreed, relaxing a little in his seat now that Jensen had said it. He laughed quietly but without much amusement. "Serves the asshole right for trying to get a freebie, right?"
Jensen didn't answer, and Jared sighed and sank lower.
For a while, the only noise in the car was from the hollow sweep of the wipers over the windshield.
"Sorry to drag you away from work," Jared said finally.
Jensen just shook his head and still didn't speak. He was silent right up until they were home, and then, as Jared was bent over the kitchen sink, wringing out his hair, he said, "Dump your wet stuff in your room and get in the shower." The tone of Jensen's voice didn't invite discussion.
Taking off his clothes was like peeling them off. Underneath, Jared's skin was chafed red and his body ached like the bruise on his jaw stretched down to his feet. With the water in the shower running hot enough for a light steam to have filled the air in the bathroom already, Jared stopped at the mirror to examine his bruise again. It wasn't as bad as he'd thought. Might even be able to cover it a little if he let his stubble grow out some.
He got into the shower, squeezed his eyes shut and tilted his face up into the water. The water drummed his skin and brought sensation back to his fingers and toes. Working his soapy fist along his upper back, Jared rolled out his knotted muscles. He heaved a shuddering breath and let go of the angry, used feeling as he soaped away the sweat and spunk. It went a long way to making him feel more human.
The door clicked shut and Jared peered around the curtain, but Jensen had already gone. Set on the lid of the toilet was a fluffy towel and a clean t-shirt, socks and sweats.
That made him feel better too, even if Jensen were quite obviously judging him heavily about this evening's events. He wondered if maybe he should have called one of the others after all; he didn't like Jensen thinking badly of him.
Jensen had taken his wet clothes from the bedroom as well and Jared could hear the burr of the tumble dryer downstairs. He paused again at the mirror, eyes drawn back to the bruise, and savagely hoped that he had broken the guy's hand, if only to teach him a lesson about not treating other people like shit.
"Are you okay?" Jensen said from the doorway. "Here," he said. "Drink this."
Jared took the mug of hot chocolate and grinned. "Aww, I get mini-marshmallows!"
Jensen shrugged awkwardly, half-smiling. "Don't get used to it." For a long, strange moment, he simply studied Jared's face, his eyes liquid-dark, and Jared let him, fixed there in front of him. Then Jensen turned away. "Gotta get back to work. There's pizza on its way for you."
Before Jensen could make it out of the door, Jared reached out to him, feeling the too tense line of Jensen's shoulders under his t-shirt. "Hey," he said. "I know you’re pissed about it, but I really am sorry about dragging you away from work."
Jensen's face was disconcertingly blank for a second, then he gave a razorblade smile. "Okay, Jared, I was pissed about my work. Whatever."
And it wasn't like he was actually ignoring Jared outright, but somehow Jensen didn't speak to him for the rest of the evening.
:::
"I just don’t know a nice way of saying 'your dick smells funny and I don't want it in my mouth or anywhere else for that matter'," said Sandy.
"Yeah, that wouldn't be it," Jared said, pausing mid-stroke in cutting a piece from his steak.
"Just as a general rule, 'funny' isn't a word a guy likes to hear applied to any aspect of his dick," Mike added.
Sandy forked discontentedly at her salad, turning it over and over on the plate. "He's a great guy otherwise. I really like him and I want this relationship to work. I just… can't. Not when it smells like that."
"So what exactly does it smell like?" said Mike, leaning forward over the restaurant table. "Is it a cheesy smell? Or something a little more unexpected? Floral maybe? Describe it like you were describing a fine vintage wine." Mike tapped the rim of his own wineglass with the tines of his fork to emphasize the point.
"Do we really have to discuss dick-smell while I'm trying to eat?" said Jared.
Rolling her eyes at him, Sandy said, "I don't think there's a topic gross enough to actually put you off your food, is there?"
"Okay, no," Jared said, "but it does makes me enjoy it less."
"But come on, Jared, you're the expert," said Sandy, clutching at his arm. "You can't tell me you've never been hired by someone gross. What do you do?"
Jared chewed slowly on his steak. He'd been hired by plenty of gross people in his time. There was a good chance that when people hired him it was because of some defect in their personality or appearance that made it impossible for them to get laid the usual way.
But Jared liked people and was good at making people like him. Generally, if he put a little effort in, he could find something fairly okay about whoever he was, and he just concentrated on that.
And in those rare cases that a person was completely devoid of all redeeming qualities, well, it wasn't that weird that he'd think about someone else. Someone else like Jensen, who may have been his best friend but was also just about the prettiest guy Jared had ever met. There really wasn't anything wrong with daydreaming about platonically fucking a really good-looking guy who had very green eyes and freckles and a sweet little mouth that'd probably give awesome blowjobs, while you were getting paid for sex with someone gross.
Not that he could trust Sandy and Mike to understand that though.
"It's different," said Jared. "This guy's your boyfriend. You're supposed to want to have sex with him. And if you don't, then why should you have to force yourself to want to?"
There was a pause as Sandy and Mike digested this.
"Or you could only have sex with him in the shower," Mike said. "Pretend it's a kink."
"Oooh, good one!" said Sandy. "Okay," she said, dabbing at her mouth with a napkin, "I gotta get back to the office. I'll see you guys later."
After she'd gone, Mike looked at Jared and said, "I need help. Only you can save my friendship with Sandy. If you don't step in, she may never speak to me again. And the rest of you will no doubt side with her and I'll end up wretchedly alone, eating baked beans out of the can and watching Maury Povich."
"Okay. And the problem is?"
"Secret Santa," said Mike, staring closely at his wine as he swirled it around the bowl of his glass. "I'm starting to think the close similarity of Santa and Satan is not a coincidence. And y'know, I'd like to remind everyone that I'm Jewish and therefore should be exempt from this kind of shit."
Jared frowned. "Wait, you've got Sandy for Secret Santa?"
"Yep. And she used to be your girlfriend, so you should know what she likes. Unless that's why she dumped you."
Jared held up a hand to shut him up. "Hey, it was totally mutual. I was not dumped." He frowned again and started mindlessly cutting his steak into strips. "How long have you had Sandy? Did someone swap with you?"
"No, I pulled her name from the hat, as is in-keeping with the age-old tradition of Secret Santa. Do I need to go through an explanation of the entire ritual for you, with all its mysteries and curious customs?"
"No," said Jared thoughtfully. "I think I've got it."
:::
Before Jensen left for work in the morning, he chucked a thick brochure onto Jared's bed. Jared groaned and untucked his head from under the pillow, blinked at Jensen blearily.
"Wha'time is it?"
"Early. Very very early," said Jensen. "But I figure if I go in now, I can actually get everything finished in time for the party tonight."
Jared started upright. "Tonight? That's tonight?"
Jensen grinned. "Yes, Jared. Seven o'clock tonight. That's when the big hand is on the twelve and the little hand is on the seven."
"You want a big hand? I got a big hand for you," Jared muttered, stretching out languorously. He caught the brochure before it could slide off the bed onto the floor. "What's this?"
"I want you to read it through and let me know what you think," said Jensen. "It's the prospectus for a financial plan I think might be good for you. Might go some way towards compensating for the complete lack of benefits your current career has. Wanna make sure you can take care of yourself when you're old and not so pretty."
Jared smiled beatifically. "I don't need to take care of myself. I have you to do that for me."
"Remember, seven o'clock," Jensen sang, disappearing down the stairs.
:::
It was a quarter after eight by the time Jared made it home. Then it took another ten minutes or so to make it to where Jensen was out in the kitchen because he kept bumping into people who wanted to chat, like Chad, who approved of the beer can Christmas tree, and Lauren, who wanted to very sweetly mock the beer can Christmas tree, and Misha, who didn’t understand why Jared had decorated a pile of garbage and put it in the corner of the living room.
The thump of the music was much quieter in the kitchen and only Jensen was out there. He was searching through one of the cabinets for more glasses; apparently they were reduced to using the plastic Disney beakers that they'd bought for when various nephews and nieces visited. He glanced over at Jared and raised an eyebrow.
"Y'know, when I explained what time seven was to you, I didn't think I'd need to draw you a map to the house as well," he said. The green t-shirt he was wearing really brought out the color in his eyes, Jared noted absently. Jensen's eyes were really green.
He grinned and helped himself to a nacho from the bowl at his elbow. "Sorry for leaving you with the epic preparations for the party. Hope you didn't strain anything getting all of that beer out of the fridge. Or, y'know, filling bowls with nachos and peanuts."
Jensen smiled, more of a pursing of lips, and Jared realized he was decidedly pissed. He spread his hands helplessly and stopped trying to make it into a joke.
"What am I supposed to do, man? I'm in demand, which is a good thing. And it's not like I can say, 'can you hurry it up with your orgasm there 'cause I got someplace else to be?'"
"And how much do I have to pay you to make it worth your while to be here?" Jensen snapped.
There was a sudden, ugly silence. Jared blinked and tried to make sense of what had just happened. He stared at Jensen, waiting for him to laugh or something, anything. But Jensen had gone pale, appalled, as though somehow he was the one hurting most from what he'd just said.
"I'm sorry," he said. "Jared, that was unforgivable and-"
"It's fine," Jared cut in quickly.
"No, it's not. I don't have any right to say something like that to you, and I didn't mean it, I'm just a little stressed lately, must have been a bitch to live with me. But that's not an excuse and I'm really sorry." Jensen wouldn't look at him, was obviously uncomfortable around him, which Jared liked even less than what he'd said. "You go on in to the party. I'll finish up here."
Jared shook his head. "Let me help. Least I can do after turning up late."
As Jared reached for the glasses, Jensen spread a hand out over them. They held like that for a second. Finally, he looked Jared in the eye. "No, I got it. You go in. Enjoy yourself."
Offering a weak grin, Jared left the kitchen.
:::
In a frustratingly subtle way that made it impossible for Jared to call him on it, Jensen was avoiding him. The few times Jared had managed to get near him, Jensen had looked faintly pained and eventually escaped with some lame excuse. It annoyed Jared because he was the wronged party here; he was the one who'd had a sensitive part of his life thrown in his face by his best friend. And Jensen was the one who was apparently most upset about it.
After about two hours of this, Jensen settled on the couch, and Jared prepared to move in again.
"Keep away," said Mike, pressing a piss-yellow cocktail into Jared's hand. Jared grimaced at the cocktail and instantly looked around for the nearest place to dispose of it.
"What? Why?"
"Because," said Chad, moving in on the other side of him, "our friend Jensen is a fully-functioning homosexual. He needs the cock. He craves the cock. It's the holidays, we should let him have the cock."
"And by going over there, you would be blocking his acquisition of the cock," Mike finished.
Outraged and incredulous, Jared looked over at the couch again. There was only Jensen and that guy Jessica had brought, Michael someone. Jared looked back at Mike and Chad doubtfully.
"You guys are high, aren't you? Imma find weed stashed in weird places around the house after you've gone, aren't I? Jensen's so not interested in him."
At the sound of Jensen's laughter, Mike and Chad gazed back at Jared gravely. They clearly weren't getting it, so Jared tried again to explain just how ridiculous the idea of Jensen with Michael-someone was.
"Jensen doesn't date," he said, enunciating very precisely. "He's married to his job. And unlike you two, whose dicks apparently need constant exercise, he seems to cope okay without regular sex."
"Says the guy who fucks for a living," Mike said in an aside to Chad.
Jared threw his hands up. "Is everyone gonna be using that for ammo against me tonight?"
"We're just saying," said Katie, coming up from behind and laying a hand lightly on his back, "that Jensen is too young and too hot not be dating. He looks happy. And if you go over there, then-"
"He won't be happy?" Jared suggested irritably.
Katie pulled a face at him. "No. If you go over there, he will divert his attention from Michael, who seems like a nice guy, to you. It would be a douche-move, Jared."
When Jared looked back over at the couch, Michael-someone had Jensen's hand in his, palm up, and was pretending to tell his fortune. Whatever he was saying was making Jensen laugh.
Michael-someone probably didn't have sex for money. He was probably a doctor or an architect or something equally awesome and respectable, that Jared could have been too if he'd just put his mind to it. Jensen would be able to take Michael-someone to work events and not lie about what it was he did for a living.
Like he could feel Jared's eyes on him, Jensen looked over in his direction. His smile faded, then came back, something new and smaller but just for him. And Jared couldn't help it, he could hear Katie's hiss of disapproval and Chad calling him a jerk-off, but he was going over to the couch.
"Hey," he said, "great party, huh?" It was directed at Michael-someone, who was smiling in a manner that was friendly but bemused. Jared settled on Jensen's arm of the couch, his thigh pressed warm to Jensen's back and Jensen's head close to his chest. He felt Jensen still and go tense with Jared so close behind, and he laid an unobtrusive hand on his shoulder, smiled when Jensen relaxed.
"I think we underestimated the power of beer and nachos," Jensen said, peering up at him.
"Don't forget the peanuts. I think they add a certain something," said Jared. He looped his arm around Jensen's neck in order to wave the cocktail in front of him. "Look what Mike gave me. You dare me to drink it?"
"No," said Jensen, "because when you inevitably spew it back up all over the carpet, I'll either have to clean it up myself or let you try to do it and learn to live with the huge fucking stain you'll make out of it."
"You drink it then," said Jared, and he fitted the rim of the glass to Jensen's mouth and started tilting, laughing as he let Jensen squirm away. He caught sight of Michael-someone watching them and held the glass out to him. His grin grew teeth. "'Less you're man enough to try?"
Michael gave another smile, less friendly and more polite. "Not me. Think I'll find myself another beer."
Jared just about gave Michael-someone time to vacate his seat on the couch before Jared was in it, filling it up so there was no room for anyone but him and Jensen. He leaned in towards Jensen and looked out over the room.
"It is going well, isn't it?"
"We did good," Jensen agreed. After a moment's pause, he angled Jared a look from under his lashes, somehow almost shy, which Jared found absolutely fascinating. "I'm sorry about earlier."
"Dude, you seem to have taken it harder than I did. Let it go already." He nudged Jensen with his shoulder. "Guess what, I helped Mike with his Secret Santa gift."
Jensen frowned and raised an eyebrow, clearly unsure why Jared was telling him. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. It was for Sandy." Jared sprawled out against the back of the couch and then burst out laughing at Jensen's horrified and guilty expression. "Gotcha!" As he looked at Jensen, his gaze turned speculative. He licked his lips, bit the inside of his suddenly dry mouth. "You got me, didn't you?"
Jensen rubbed a hand over his cheeks, hiding his flush. "After bribing Lauren, yeah." One corner of his mouth quirked and he shrugged. "There was something in particular I wanted you to have."
Across the room, Katie was still watching them, and Jared was hit by a weird burst of heat and guilt. He looked back at Jensen, who was watching him, smiling slightly, and the guilt went away. He leaned in even closer, close enough that his mouth was just inches from Jensen's ear, and he could count every freckle over Jensen's nose, see the sheen of alcohol left on his lower lip.
"Mike's not my Secret Santa either," said Jared. "I might have rearranged things a little too, so I got you."
Jensen turned to look at him sharply in surprise, and his face was so close that Jared could study every detail of his feathery dark eyelashes and green eyes and shiny pink mouth that probably tasted as good as it looked. Jared should be pulling back but he wasn't.
"After everyone's gone home," Jensen said in little more than whisper. "We’ll exchange gifts then, okay?"
"Okay," said Jared, and then felt bad for wanting the party over already.
:::
"Is this piss or spillage from one of Mike's cocktails?" said Jensen. He frowned at the stain on the rug and sighed unhappily. "Your mom gave us this rug."
"I think it's gotta be cocktail," said Jared. "I think we might'a heard if someone was pissing themselves in the living room."
Jensen looked away from the rug to Jared. "Not necessarily. You might not have noticed but we're friends with some pretty weird people." There was a streak of gold glitter on his cheekbone, painted on earlier by Sandy and that he hadn't managed to get when he'd wiped his face over. His eyes were heavy-lidded, and Jared guessed he was about five minutes from falling asleep on his feet, much the same as Jared himself was.
Jared turned the music off and the sudden, blaring silence was like going deaf. The house was much smaller with just them in it - all those people and all that noise was gone, and now it was just Jared and Jensen.
"If I taste the stain," said Jared, "and prove that it's cocktail and not piss, can we stop worrying about it and get to the presents?"
After a second, Jensen's revolted expression gave way to amusement. He clutched his hands over his heart and fluttered his lashes. "You'd really do that for me?" He nodded at the rug, grinning. "Go on then."
Jared dropped to his knees, took a deep breath and firmed his jaw, then touched a fingertip to the patch of damp. Meeting Jensen's eyes, Jared put the finger in his mouth and sucked. Then his mouth tugged into a big smile. "I taste lemon vodka!"
"I can confirm there is an empty bottle of lemon vodka in the trash," said Jensen. "Win!" His nose wrinkled. "Wait, is vodka easier to get out rugs than urine?"
"Doesn't matter. We're doing Secret Santa now, as per the terms of our agreement."
"Okay, okay," said Jensen. "Just lemme fetch it."
They both went to their rooms, and as Jared retrieved his gift for Jensen from where he'd hidden it under his bed, he heard the click of Jensen's closet door opening and shutting. He couldn't stop grinning, and his heart was going fast, all the exhaustion of a few minutes ago wiped away.
They met again at the top of the stairs and, maybe they should have gone back to the couch, but instead they ended up sitting right there. There was barely enough room for both of them, so little in fact their knees were touching and banister was digging awkwardly into Jared's back, but it was somehow kind of comfortable.
Jared thrust his gift at Jensen. "This is for you," he said, inexplicably nervous that Jensen might hate it and second-guessing himself about the choice and wishing he'd wrapped it a little better.
He watched as Jensen diligently removed the paper without ripping it. His gaze flickered anxiously to Jensen's face as Jensen studied the black leather briefcase. He smoothed a hand over its surface, lingering over the gold monogrammed JRA in the corner, then he looked up at Jared, and his eyes were electric-green.
"You remembered," he said in a small voice.
"You've been using an elastic band on your old one for months," said Jared, relief and pleasure flooding him at Jensen's response. "Was kinda hard to forget, man."
Awestruck, Jensen smiled down at the briefcase again. "It's fucking spectacular, Jared. Seriously. Thank you." He took a shuddering breath and then passed his gift to Jared.
Jared was less considerate of the wrapping paper and had it shredded in seconds. He frowned at the small black box, then looked back up at Jensen, a question on his lips.
"Open it," said Jensen.
The box creaked just a little as Jared lifted the lid. Jared looked inside. Then he stopped breathing.
"Jensen," he said quietly. "You can't afford this."
Jensen gave him a shaky smile, briefly worrying his lower lip between his teeth. "Actually, I can. The project I've been working on? Comes with a bonus." He watched as Jared eased the watch from its case, its platinum shining like liquid, and closed it carefully around his wrist. "I wanted you to have it, Jared. And I knew you wouldn't buy it for yourself."
When he turned his wrist this way and that, light sparked off the watch, atomic-white. The metal was cold and smooth against his skin, and it had a pleasing, solid weight. He looked at it and he thought about the ridiculous hours Jensen had worked lately, and his heart clenched a little.
"You didn't have to," he said.
"I wanted to," Jensen told him firmly. He studied the briefcase again, smiling helplessly at it, then he looked up at Jared, and said, "You're awesome."
And Jared's heart did that clenching thing again. "It's kinda hard to take you seriously saying that when you're wearing gold glitter, y'know."
"Oh god, still?" Jensen said. He scrubbed at his face and spread the glitter over a larger area.
"Yeah, now it's everywhere. Here, let me." It felt like a line, especially when Jared rubbed the pad of his thumb over Jensen's cheekbone. He'd had too much to drink, that had to be why Jensen was letting him, why his eyes were fixed on Jared as Jared touched him, and why Jared was suddenly transfixed by Jensen's mouth. They'd both had too much to drink, that was what was happening.
Jared leaned in and kissed Jensen, soft and open, tongue delicately parting Jensen's lips so he could push deeper. The banister dug in even worse to his lower back as he moved in closer but it seemed like a faraway discomfort when he had Jensen's mouth. Jensen's hand settled tentatively at the back of Jared's neck, fingers combing through Jared's hair as he tugged Jared towards him. Jared gave a little groan at the back of his throat and he could feel Jensen smiling into the kiss, and it was all the encouragement he needed to turn the kiss dirty, to suck on Jensen's tongue until Jensen arched into him, his hand going tight on the back of Jared's neck. Jensen was all heat and hard lines against him, and Jared imagined the wreck he was making of Jensen's mouth, how pretty it'd look once he was done with it.
He wanted to see Jensen's mouth.
Jared broke the kiss. His fingers still splayed over Jensen's cheek, his thumb under Jensen's jaw, he kept Jensen close as he studied his face. He caught a quick glimpse of Jensen's red mouth, his flush and the high color in his eyes, before Jensen was laughing, amused and embarrassed, and tilting his face away.
Jesus, Jared had just kissed Jensen.
"Man, we must be drunker than we realized," Jared said, and Jensen nodded, still smiling but not meeting his eyes.
"Must be," said Jensen. He got to his feet clumsily swaying slightly, too much of him touching Jared as he rose. He curled his arms around the briefcase, holding it close to his chest. "Imma go to bed. I'll finish clean-up duty tomorrow."
Jared watched him go, and, after a few moments, headed to his own room. As he was shucking off his clothes, he caught sight of himself in the mirror. He raised a hand to touch the gold glitter that had made it onto his own face, and the silver watch glinted.
:::
In the morning, Jensen came downstairs after Jared had gotten back from jogging and was fixing himself breakfast. He grinned at Jensen and ignored the strange lurch in his belly when he took in Jensen's stupidly adorable sleep-ruffled hair.
"You want fruit loops?" he said, waving the box in Jensen's direction. "No coffee yet though, sorry."
"Fruit loops sound awesome," Jensen said.
He fetched a bowl and took the box from Jared. After Jared poured milk on his own, he put some on Jensen's, while Jensen got two spoons from the drawer. They perched on the kitchen stools and ate in comfortable silence. Acutely aware of Jensen's presence, Jared stoically resisted the urge to look over at him.
After he was done eating, Jensen set his bowl down on the counter. But he didn't move, didn't show any sign of being about to leave the kitchen. Jared stared at the puddle of milk in his bowl and thought that maybe they were actually going to have to talk about it. And he hadn't figured out yet how to say what he wanted, and what that even was.
"You think it might snow?" said Jensen.
For a second, Jared studied Jensen's profile, then he followed Jensen's gaze out the window. "Don't think it's cold enough."
"It's pretty cold," said Jensen. He turned a tight smile on Jared. "Are we really gonna talk about the weather?"
Jared's work phone rang, and both he and Jensen looked at it instantly. Jared glanced back at Jensen, but Jensen was standing, back turned to Jared while he dumped his bowl in the dishwasher.
Jensen left as Jared answered the phone.
part two
(J2 AU, nc-17, 13700 words)
Jared is a hooker, Jensen is his workaholic best friend.
For clex_monkie89 as part of spn_j2_xmas. Huge thanks to giandujakiss for the awesome beta; all remaining mistakes are my own. Title from Dido.
While Jared was with his two o'clock appointment, he furtively composed a text to Jensen to remind him that the charcoal gray suit Jensen needed for that meeting tomorrow was still at the dry-cleaners. It wasn't like his client minded: the guy was very busy with squealing into the pillow, and Jared really only needed one hand to work the vibrator in and out of the guy's asshole.
Jensen had the suit in the backseat of the car when they went to the store later. They made a pretty weird pair, what with Jensen smartly dressed from the office in a smooth navy-blue suit and tie, and Jared freshly showered but still wearing strategically ripped, butter-soft jeans and a t-shirt that just barely stretched over his broad chest. Still, as neither of them was willing to get the groceries alone, it had evolved into tradition that they went together, to the point that they'd do without even the essentials until they were both free to go.
"You're almost out of those disgusting muscle milkshakes," said Jensen, and took one of the tubs off the shelf and dropped it in the cart. Then he hesitated and looked back at the shelf. "Or you could have it in their new flavor, raspberry? Which I imagine is as stomach-churningly horrible as the current banana and chocolate flavors, but y'know, whatever."
Slouched over the cart handles as it he inched it down the aisle after Jensen, Jared raised an eyebrow. "You been drinking my shakes again? That why I'm almost out?"
"Ha! I tried it once, after you bullied me non-stop for a week and I've decided I would rather digest my own internal organs. And the fact you drink those things daily just confirms my belief that you're nothing but a fucking masochist."
"I got an organ you can digest," Jared told him distractedly, because he couldn't really leave a line like that hanging but couldn't give it the lecherous tone it required while he was preoccupied with admiring the store's holiday lights, which blinked on and off in red, yellow and green, like a string of miniature stoplights. Overhead, there was a big white snowflake that shimmered crystalline as it turned in slow half-circles. "We should decorate," he said. "Y'know, for the party. Some lights, a tree. It'd be pretty."
"Last time we decorated neither of us could be bothered to take 'em down until March. I'm not sure I could live with a giant inflatable Santa Claus for that long again," said Jensen, meticulously comparing two different detergents, both pretty much identical as far as Jared could tell. That was typical Jensen though; he had criteria for decisions that Jared made without even registering.
"Speaking of the party," Jensen went on, "we're hosting the big Christmas party for all our friends, huge social occasion and a lot of pressure, and our preparations so far consist of… buying lots of beer." He scrunched his nose up at Jared in a way that made Jared want to ruffle his hair. "Seriously? We don't have any other plans?"
"We could get nachos too," Jared said. At Jensen's mournful expression, Jared leaned over to pat him on the shoulder. "It'll be awesome. Anybody bitches about your hostessing skills, I'll kick their ass."
"Oh fuck off," Jensen muttered, shaking Jared's hand off his shoulder. "Don't come crying to me if everybody's saying how much better Lauren's and Katie's was last year."
The cart squeaked mid-turn into an aisle as Jared snapped to a halt. He stared at Jensen, wide-eyed and horrified. "We're not actually trying to compete with them, are we? Because, dude, seriously, I wanna slit my wrists now and spare myself the humiliation. They had a theme, and fancy little place settings and… and we don't have a theme, and we can't have place settings 'cause your work crap's all over the one table we own."
"At least when I bring my work home, it's not used condoms," Jensen said.
"Once!" Jared protested instantly. "It happened once! And it wasn't used either. I told you, I'd taken it outta the wrapper intending to use it but-"
"Please, spare me the details," Jensen said, holding up a hand. He heaved a massive sigh and scraped his fingers through his hair, leaving it standing up at a weird angle on one side. "I guess our plan's gonna have to be to buy enough beer that everyone gets so drunk they don't remember Lauren's and Katie's."
"Man, could you imagine getting Lauren or Katie for Secret Santa?" said Jared, while he smoothed Jensen's crazy hair down flat. "What the hell do you get them? I mean, what could you possibly get them that wouldn't get taken right back to the store the next day?"
Jensen tossed a couple bags of chips in the cart, then checked the back of envelope they'd written their list on and steered Jared to another aisle. "I got Katie some designer purse year before last. I saw her use it once a few months back, so I'm taking it as a win." He glanced back at Jared. "Who'd you get this year?"
"Mike," Jared said. "So I'm thinking sparkly ceramic unicorn, blow-up sheep, anything really, so long as a sane person wouldn't want it. How about you?"
"Sandy, so I'm thinking… I don't know what I'm thinking. Help?"
Jared snorted. "No fucking way. She uses last year's present from me as a doorstop. You're on your own."
Maybe Jared shouldn't have been able to lie to Jensen as easily as he did, but Jensen knew all the things that Jared had never really meant to tell anyone - like how the reason he didn't go to MIT wasn't because he lost interest in engineering, but because he'd still felt pathetically heartbroken about being dumped by Alexis - so it felt like this little lie was totally balanced out.
It had taken some trickery and underhanded maneuvering, but Jared had Jensen this year, not Mike. He didn't know what he was going to get Jensen yet, only that it had to be better than the one year subscription to several online gay porn sites that Chad had got him last year. Jared really thought Jensen deserved something he actually wanted this time around.
The only problem was knowing what exactly that might be.
:::
Something big was going on at Jensen's office. Jared knew because the files Jensen had brought home from work not only covered their one table, but had recently started to spread out over the floor around the table. Apparently, it was some very important contract, but Jared didn't care too much, because it was getting Jensen up early in the morning, keeping him after-hours at the office, and eating up way too much of his spare time for Jared to approve.
As usual for the few evenings they were both at home lately, Jensen was silent and lost in his ever-growing file-fort.
Jared carefully wound a length of lights around their beer can tower, which was impressively tall thanks to a group effort at Thanksgiving, and tried not to look in Jensen's direction too often.
"Have you even had dinner?" he said.
"Had something at the office," Jensen said distantly. He frowned at something on the page, then scribbled it out and wrote his own note by the side of it.
"Twenty-six cups of coffee doesn't count as dinner," said Jared, as he added a length of silver tinsel. "You want me to make you something?"
"No, m'fine. But there's lasagna in the fridge if you're hungry," he said.
Jared sighed and didn't answer.
He strung another garland of tinsel, red this time, around the tower, then sat back on his heels to admire his handiwork. The red and silver coordinated particularly nicely with the Coors beer cans. He'd also got an assortment of tiny Christmas balls, and he set about hooking them on unfolded paperclips to hang them from the rims of the cans. When he was done, he flicked on the lights, and looked the whole (sparkling, twinkling, multicolored) thing over critically.
"Too much?" he said.
Jensen looked up, and his frown smoothed out into a crooked smile. "Wow, that's... a fuckload of color. But it's nice," he added quickly, glancing at Jared's face. "I like it."
Jared beamed proudly and stuck the last ball on the only available rim-space. He sat down on the couch and spent a few moments in quiet appreciation of his makeshift tree. If Jensen had helped, there'd have been a color theme and significantly fewer balls, so Jared supposed he should be grateful he'd been left to it. He cast another quick look in Jensen's direction and suppressed a sigh.
He turned on the TV, started channel-surfing and then stopped abruptly to look over at Jensen with a grin.
"Hey, Jen, they're showing A Muppet's Christmas Carol! C'mon, I know you like muppets."
Jensen flipped him the bird and didn't look up from his work.
"Michael Caine's gonna try to sing," Jared coaxed. "You don't wanna miss that."
Jensen's pen stilled on the page. "How far in is it?" he said.
"Just starting?" said Jared, trying not to sound too hopeful.
As soon as Jensen was moving, Jared freed up his side of the couch, tucking his long legs up so Jensen had plenty of room to get comfortable. Jensen punched one of the cushions into shape and sat down next to him.
"You're a really bad influence," he said. "I'm just gonna watch 'til Michael Caine tries to sing and then I gotta go back to work."
He was half-asleep by the time the Ghost of Christmas Past showed up, and completely gone by the Ghost of Christmas Present. His head was propped up on Jared's breastbone, his hair tickling Jared's nose, and his shoulder was slowly cutting off circulation to Jared's arm, and Jared had absolutely no intention of moving him. If Jensen had fallen asleep that quickly, he obviously needed it. Jensen's breath was coffee-sour and hunger-sweet, and the product he'd had in his hair had been in there so long it was starting to flake.
A Muppet's Christmas Carol ended and Jensen didn't show any signs of waking up, so Jared resigned himself to watching the documentary that followed. It was about religion in ancient Egypt, and Jared found himself grudgingly getting interested in it. He was halfway through a section on the attempted wipeout of the Atenist cult, when his cellphone rang.
It was the cellphone he used solely for clients and it was sitting over the other side of the room.
Conflicted, he watched it ring. A client was calling him, most likely so he would go and have sex with them and get paid a couple hundred dollars for it. But to answer it, he'd need to dislodge Jensen, who would wake up and immediately go back to work. Sex with a stranger for a couple hundred dollars, versus Jensen asleep on him and religion in ancient Egypt.
Jared watched the phone ring until it stopped, and then turned his attention back to the Atenist cult.
:::
It had stopped just being rain a while ago. Now it could be more accurately described as a torrential downpour. The rain was coming down so fast Jared's skin was stinging. His clothes were soaked through, sticking rough to his clammy body, and rainwater was dribbling down soaked tendrils of his hair into his eyes.
The street was bleak and empty, and all the windows were dark. Jared cowered in the first covered doorway he could find and watched the reflection of the streetlights in the puddles get beaten to jagged orange smears by the rain.
Jensen's phone had gone to voicemail, and Jared had tried not to sound too desperate in his message, just stuck to, "Hey, Jen, it's me. I'm on the corner of Seneca and Cleveland, and I can't find a damn cab. Could you come pick me up? Please?"
He pressed the heel of his hand to his aching jaw and hoped the bruise wasn't going to be as bad as it felt. Damaged goods really weren't great for business. Some guys in his trade really worked the twinky, fragile and delicate look, and the occasional bruise only emphasized it. Jared, though, was not fragile; Jared was built like the side of a really fucking big barn, and bruises made him look like trouble.
Right now, he wished he weren't built quite so big so he could get more of himself under the meager shelter of the doorway. He rubbed his hands together vigorously and then folded his arms tightly across his chest to conserve what body heat he could. His teeth were starting to chatter so he clenched them together.
A car rolled down the street and rainwater jumped up from its tires like seaspray.
He looked up and down the street hopefully and but there was nothing except the dull, dark shapes of buildings and the sticky shimmer of the wet street. Checking his watch, he saw it wasn't even eight o'clock yet, which meant Jensen could actually still be at the office and therefore ignoring his phone. Jared debated the wisdom of calling Sandy or Mike or one of the others. The prospect of having to recount just why he needed a ride wasn't an appealing one, but he was kind of getting desperate.
Still, it was only twenty minutes since he called Jensen, and home and Jensen's office were probably at least a half hour's drive away.
And even as he was thinking it, Jensen's car swept into sight. As it passed under a streetlight, Jared caught a glimpse of Jensen's face, an amber-hued stripe of him as he scanned the street for Jared. Jared stepped out of the doorway, the rain instantly painting his jacket and jeans to his skin, and waved Jensen down, grinning.
Jensen pulled in beside him and Jared scrambled into the car, wincing as he shook rainwater all over the upholstery.
"Shit, sorry about your car, man."
"I don't care about the car. What happened? Are you okay?" His tone was hard with urgency, and Jared registered that Jensen had one of his own hoodies thrown on over his scruffy jeans. Seeing Jared look, Jensen waved a hand irritably and said, "I was working from home when I got your message. Your hoodie was the closest thing. So, c'mon, talk to me. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," said Jared, scraping his hair out of his face where it was plastered to his skull. "I was s'posed to be getting a ride back towards home, but there was a little drama about whether I was gonna get paid or not and I got my money but… well, couldn't exactly hang around for the ride as well."
Jensen glanced at him sharply, his expression tight and blank, then did a double-take. "What the hell happened to your face? Did he hit you? Do I need to take you to the ER? Jesus, Jared!"
"I'm fine!" Jared insisted with a grin. "Like I said, a little drama is all." His grin faded and he frowned. "Think I might have broken his hand."
"Not like he's gonna go to the cops about it," Jensen said. He gazed fixedly out the windshield while he drove.
"No," Jared agreed, relaxing a little in his seat now that Jensen had said it. He laughed quietly but without much amusement. "Serves the asshole right for trying to get a freebie, right?"
Jensen didn't answer, and Jared sighed and sank lower.
For a while, the only noise in the car was from the hollow sweep of the wipers over the windshield.
"Sorry to drag you away from work," Jared said finally.
Jensen just shook his head and still didn't speak. He was silent right up until they were home, and then, as Jared was bent over the kitchen sink, wringing out his hair, he said, "Dump your wet stuff in your room and get in the shower." The tone of Jensen's voice didn't invite discussion.
Taking off his clothes was like peeling them off. Underneath, Jared's skin was chafed red and his body ached like the bruise on his jaw stretched down to his feet. With the water in the shower running hot enough for a light steam to have filled the air in the bathroom already, Jared stopped at the mirror to examine his bruise again. It wasn't as bad as he'd thought. Might even be able to cover it a little if he let his stubble grow out some.
He got into the shower, squeezed his eyes shut and tilted his face up into the water. The water drummed his skin and brought sensation back to his fingers and toes. Working his soapy fist along his upper back, Jared rolled out his knotted muscles. He heaved a shuddering breath and let go of the angry, used feeling as he soaped away the sweat and spunk. It went a long way to making him feel more human.
The door clicked shut and Jared peered around the curtain, but Jensen had already gone. Set on the lid of the toilet was a fluffy towel and a clean t-shirt, socks and sweats.
That made him feel better too, even if Jensen were quite obviously judging him heavily about this evening's events. He wondered if maybe he should have called one of the others after all; he didn't like Jensen thinking badly of him.
Jensen had taken his wet clothes from the bedroom as well and Jared could hear the burr of the tumble dryer downstairs. He paused again at the mirror, eyes drawn back to the bruise, and savagely hoped that he had broken the guy's hand, if only to teach him a lesson about not treating other people like shit.
"Are you okay?" Jensen said from the doorway. "Here," he said. "Drink this."
Jared took the mug of hot chocolate and grinned. "Aww, I get mini-marshmallows!"
Jensen shrugged awkwardly, half-smiling. "Don't get used to it." For a long, strange moment, he simply studied Jared's face, his eyes liquid-dark, and Jared let him, fixed there in front of him. Then Jensen turned away. "Gotta get back to work. There's pizza on its way for you."
Before Jensen could make it out of the door, Jared reached out to him, feeling the too tense line of Jensen's shoulders under his t-shirt. "Hey," he said. "I know you’re pissed about it, but I really am sorry about dragging you away from work."
Jensen's face was disconcertingly blank for a second, then he gave a razorblade smile. "Okay, Jared, I was pissed about my work. Whatever."
And it wasn't like he was actually ignoring Jared outright, but somehow Jensen didn't speak to him for the rest of the evening.
:::
"I just don’t know a nice way of saying 'your dick smells funny and I don't want it in my mouth or anywhere else for that matter'," said Sandy.
"Yeah, that wouldn't be it," Jared said, pausing mid-stroke in cutting a piece from his steak.
"Just as a general rule, 'funny' isn't a word a guy likes to hear applied to any aspect of his dick," Mike added.
Sandy forked discontentedly at her salad, turning it over and over on the plate. "He's a great guy otherwise. I really like him and I want this relationship to work. I just… can't. Not when it smells like that."
"So what exactly does it smell like?" said Mike, leaning forward over the restaurant table. "Is it a cheesy smell? Or something a little more unexpected? Floral maybe? Describe it like you were describing a fine vintage wine." Mike tapped the rim of his own wineglass with the tines of his fork to emphasize the point.
"Do we really have to discuss dick-smell while I'm trying to eat?" said Jared.
Rolling her eyes at him, Sandy said, "I don't think there's a topic gross enough to actually put you off your food, is there?"
"Okay, no," Jared said, "but it does makes me enjoy it less."
"But come on, Jared, you're the expert," said Sandy, clutching at his arm. "You can't tell me you've never been hired by someone gross. What do you do?"
Jared chewed slowly on his steak. He'd been hired by plenty of gross people in his time. There was a good chance that when people hired him it was because of some defect in their personality or appearance that made it impossible for them to get laid the usual way.
But Jared liked people and was good at making people like him. Generally, if he put a little effort in, he could find something fairly okay about whoever he was, and he just concentrated on that.
And in those rare cases that a person was completely devoid of all redeeming qualities, well, it wasn't that weird that he'd think about someone else. Someone else like Jensen, who may have been his best friend but was also just about the prettiest guy Jared had ever met. There really wasn't anything wrong with daydreaming about platonically fucking a really good-looking guy who had very green eyes and freckles and a sweet little mouth that'd probably give awesome blowjobs, while you were getting paid for sex with someone gross.
Not that he could trust Sandy and Mike to understand that though.
"It's different," said Jared. "This guy's your boyfriend. You're supposed to want to have sex with him. And if you don't, then why should you have to force yourself to want to?"
There was a pause as Sandy and Mike digested this.
"Or you could only have sex with him in the shower," Mike said. "Pretend it's a kink."
"Oooh, good one!" said Sandy. "Okay," she said, dabbing at her mouth with a napkin, "I gotta get back to the office. I'll see you guys later."
After she'd gone, Mike looked at Jared and said, "I need help. Only you can save my friendship with Sandy. If you don't step in, she may never speak to me again. And the rest of you will no doubt side with her and I'll end up wretchedly alone, eating baked beans out of the can and watching Maury Povich."
"Okay. And the problem is?"
"Secret Santa," said Mike, staring closely at his wine as he swirled it around the bowl of his glass. "I'm starting to think the close similarity of Santa and Satan is not a coincidence. And y'know, I'd like to remind everyone that I'm Jewish and therefore should be exempt from this kind of shit."
Jared frowned. "Wait, you've got Sandy for Secret Santa?"
"Yep. And she used to be your girlfriend, so you should know what she likes. Unless that's why she dumped you."
Jared held up a hand to shut him up. "Hey, it was totally mutual. I was not dumped." He frowned again and started mindlessly cutting his steak into strips. "How long have you had Sandy? Did someone swap with you?"
"No, I pulled her name from the hat, as is in-keeping with the age-old tradition of Secret Santa. Do I need to go through an explanation of the entire ritual for you, with all its mysteries and curious customs?"
"No," said Jared thoughtfully. "I think I've got it."
:::
Before Jensen left for work in the morning, he chucked a thick brochure onto Jared's bed. Jared groaned and untucked his head from under the pillow, blinked at Jensen blearily.
"Wha'time is it?"
"Early. Very very early," said Jensen. "But I figure if I go in now, I can actually get everything finished in time for the party tonight."
Jared started upright. "Tonight? That's tonight?"
Jensen grinned. "Yes, Jared. Seven o'clock tonight. That's when the big hand is on the twelve and the little hand is on the seven."
"You want a big hand? I got a big hand for you," Jared muttered, stretching out languorously. He caught the brochure before it could slide off the bed onto the floor. "What's this?"
"I want you to read it through and let me know what you think," said Jensen. "It's the prospectus for a financial plan I think might be good for you. Might go some way towards compensating for the complete lack of benefits your current career has. Wanna make sure you can take care of yourself when you're old and not so pretty."
Jared smiled beatifically. "I don't need to take care of myself. I have you to do that for me."
"Remember, seven o'clock," Jensen sang, disappearing down the stairs.
:::
It was a quarter after eight by the time Jared made it home. Then it took another ten minutes or so to make it to where Jensen was out in the kitchen because he kept bumping into people who wanted to chat, like Chad, who approved of the beer can Christmas tree, and Lauren, who wanted to very sweetly mock the beer can Christmas tree, and Misha, who didn’t understand why Jared had decorated a pile of garbage and put it in the corner of the living room.
The thump of the music was much quieter in the kitchen and only Jensen was out there. He was searching through one of the cabinets for more glasses; apparently they were reduced to using the plastic Disney beakers that they'd bought for when various nephews and nieces visited. He glanced over at Jared and raised an eyebrow.
"Y'know, when I explained what time seven was to you, I didn't think I'd need to draw you a map to the house as well," he said. The green t-shirt he was wearing really brought out the color in his eyes, Jared noted absently. Jensen's eyes were really green.
He grinned and helped himself to a nacho from the bowl at his elbow. "Sorry for leaving you with the epic preparations for the party. Hope you didn't strain anything getting all of that beer out of the fridge. Or, y'know, filling bowls with nachos and peanuts."
Jensen smiled, more of a pursing of lips, and Jared realized he was decidedly pissed. He spread his hands helplessly and stopped trying to make it into a joke.
"What am I supposed to do, man? I'm in demand, which is a good thing. And it's not like I can say, 'can you hurry it up with your orgasm there 'cause I got someplace else to be?'"
"And how much do I have to pay you to make it worth your while to be here?" Jensen snapped.
There was a sudden, ugly silence. Jared blinked and tried to make sense of what had just happened. He stared at Jensen, waiting for him to laugh or something, anything. But Jensen had gone pale, appalled, as though somehow he was the one hurting most from what he'd just said.
"I'm sorry," he said. "Jared, that was unforgivable and-"
"It's fine," Jared cut in quickly.
"No, it's not. I don't have any right to say something like that to you, and I didn't mean it, I'm just a little stressed lately, must have been a bitch to live with me. But that's not an excuse and I'm really sorry." Jensen wouldn't look at him, was obviously uncomfortable around him, which Jared liked even less than what he'd said. "You go on in to the party. I'll finish up here."
Jared shook his head. "Let me help. Least I can do after turning up late."
As Jared reached for the glasses, Jensen spread a hand out over them. They held like that for a second. Finally, he looked Jared in the eye. "No, I got it. You go in. Enjoy yourself."
Offering a weak grin, Jared left the kitchen.
:::
In a frustratingly subtle way that made it impossible for Jared to call him on it, Jensen was avoiding him. The few times Jared had managed to get near him, Jensen had looked faintly pained and eventually escaped with some lame excuse. It annoyed Jared because he was the wronged party here; he was the one who'd had a sensitive part of his life thrown in his face by his best friend. And Jensen was the one who was apparently most upset about it.
After about two hours of this, Jensen settled on the couch, and Jared prepared to move in again.
"Keep away," said Mike, pressing a piss-yellow cocktail into Jared's hand. Jared grimaced at the cocktail and instantly looked around for the nearest place to dispose of it.
"What? Why?"
"Because," said Chad, moving in on the other side of him, "our friend Jensen is a fully-functioning homosexual. He needs the cock. He craves the cock. It's the holidays, we should let him have the cock."
"And by going over there, you would be blocking his acquisition of the cock," Mike finished.
Outraged and incredulous, Jared looked over at the couch again. There was only Jensen and that guy Jessica had brought, Michael someone. Jared looked back at Mike and Chad doubtfully.
"You guys are high, aren't you? Imma find weed stashed in weird places around the house after you've gone, aren't I? Jensen's so not interested in him."
At the sound of Jensen's laughter, Mike and Chad gazed back at Jared gravely. They clearly weren't getting it, so Jared tried again to explain just how ridiculous the idea of Jensen with Michael-someone was.
"Jensen doesn't date," he said, enunciating very precisely. "He's married to his job. And unlike you two, whose dicks apparently need constant exercise, he seems to cope okay without regular sex."
"Says the guy who fucks for a living," Mike said in an aside to Chad.
Jared threw his hands up. "Is everyone gonna be using that for ammo against me tonight?"
"We're just saying," said Katie, coming up from behind and laying a hand lightly on his back, "that Jensen is too young and too hot not be dating. He looks happy. And if you go over there, then-"
"He won't be happy?" Jared suggested irritably.
Katie pulled a face at him. "No. If you go over there, he will divert his attention from Michael, who seems like a nice guy, to you. It would be a douche-move, Jared."
When Jared looked back over at the couch, Michael-someone had Jensen's hand in his, palm up, and was pretending to tell his fortune. Whatever he was saying was making Jensen laugh.
Michael-someone probably didn't have sex for money. He was probably a doctor or an architect or something equally awesome and respectable, that Jared could have been too if he'd just put his mind to it. Jensen would be able to take Michael-someone to work events and not lie about what it was he did for a living.
Like he could feel Jared's eyes on him, Jensen looked over in his direction. His smile faded, then came back, something new and smaller but just for him. And Jared couldn't help it, he could hear Katie's hiss of disapproval and Chad calling him a jerk-off, but he was going over to the couch.
"Hey," he said, "great party, huh?" It was directed at Michael-someone, who was smiling in a manner that was friendly but bemused. Jared settled on Jensen's arm of the couch, his thigh pressed warm to Jensen's back and Jensen's head close to his chest. He felt Jensen still and go tense with Jared so close behind, and he laid an unobtrusive hand on his shoulder, smiled when Jensen relaxed.
"I think we underestimated the power of beer and nachos," Jensen said, peering up at him.
"Don't forget the peanuts. I think they add a certain something," said Jared. He looped his arm around Jensen's neck in order to wave the cocktail in front of him. "Look what Mike gave me. You dare me to drink it?"
"No," said Jensen, "because when you inevitably spew it back up all over the carpet, I'll either have to clean it up myself or let you try to do it and learn to live with the huge fucking stain you'll make out of it."
"You drink it then," said Jared, and he fitted the rim of the glass to Jensen's mouth and started tilting, laughing as he let Jensen squirm away. He caught sight of Michael-someone watching them and held the glass out to him. His grin grew teeth. "'Less you're man enough to try?"
Michael gave another smile, less friendly and more polite. "Not me. Think I'll find myself another beer."
Jared just about gave Michael-someone time to vacate his seat on the couch before Jared was in it, filling it up so there was no room for anyone but him and Jensen. He leaned in towards Jensen and looked out over the room.
"It is going well, isn't it?"
"We did good," Jensen agreed. After a moment's pause, he angled Jared a look from under his lashes, somehow almost shy, which Jared found absolutely fascinating. "I'm sorry about earlier."
"Dude, you seem to have taken it harder than I did. Let it go already." He nudged Jensen with his shoulder. "Guess what, I helped Mike with his Secret Santa gift."
Jensen frowned and raised an eyebrow, clearly unsure why Jared was telling him. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. It was for Sandy." Jared sprawled out against the back of the couch and then burst out laughing at Jensen's horrified and guilty expression. "Gotcha!" As he looked at Jensen, his gaze turned speculative. He licked his lips, bit the inside of his suddenly dry mouth. "You got me, didn't you?"
Jensen rubbed a hand over his cheeks, hiding his flush. "After bribing Lauren, yeah." One corner of his mouth quirked and he shrugged. "There was something in particular I wanted you to have."
Across the room, Katie was still watching them, and Jared was hit by a weird burst of heat and guilt. He looked back at Jensen, who was watching him, smiling slightly, and the guilt went away. He leaned in even closer, close enough that his mouth was just inches from Jensen's ear, and he could count every freckle over Jensen's nose, see the sheen of alcohol left on his lower lip.
"Mike's not my Secret Santa either," said Jared. "I might have rearranged things a little too, so I got you."
Jensen turned to look at him sharply in surprise, and his face was so close that Jared could study every detail of his feathery dark eyelashes and green eyes and shiny pink mouth that probably tasted as good as it looked. Jared should be pulling back but he wasn't.
"After everyone's gone home," Jensen said in little more than whisper. "We’ll exchange gifts then, okay?"
"Okay," said Jared, and then felt bad for wanting the party over already.
:::
"Is this piss or spillage from one of Mike's cocktails?" said Jensen. He frowned at the stain on the rug and sighed unhappily. "Your mom gave us this rug."
"I think it's gotta be cocktail," said Jared. "I think we might'a heard if someone was pissing themselves in the living room."
Jensen looked away from the rug to Jared. "Not necessarily. You might not have noticed but we're friends with some pretty weird people." There was a streak of gold glitter on his cheekbone, painted on earlier by Sandy and that he hadn't managed to get when he'd wiped his face over. His eyes were heavy-lidded, and Jared guessed he was about five minutes from falling asleep on his feet, much the same as Jared himself was.
Jared turned the music off and the sudden, blaring silence was like going deaf. The house was much smaller with just them in it - all those people and all that noise was gone, and now it was just Jared and Jensen.
"If I taste the stain," said Jared, "and prove that it's cocktail and not piss, can we stop worrying about it and get to the presents?"
After a second, Jensen's revolted expression gave way to amusement. He clutched his hands over his heart and fluttered his lashes. "You'd really do that for me?" He nodded at the rug, grinning. "Go on then."
Jared dropped to his knees, took a deep breath and firmed his jaw, then touched a fingertip to the patch of damp. Meeting Jensen's eyes, Jared put the finger in his mouth and sucked. Then his mouth tugged into a big smile. "I taste lemon vodka!"
"I can confirm there is an empty bottle of lemon vodka in the trash," said Jensen. "Win!" His nose wrinkled. "Wait, is vodka easier to get out rugs than urine?"
"Doesn't matter. We're doing Secret Santa now, as per the terms of our agreement."
"Okay, okay," said Jensen. "Just lemme fetch it."
They both went to their rooms, and as Jared retrieved his gift for Jensen from where he'd hidden it under his bed, he heard the click of Jensen's closet door opening and shutting. He couldn't stop grinning, and his heart was going fast, all the exhaustion of a few minutes ago wiped away.
They met again at the top of the stairs and, maybe they should have gone back to the couch, but instead they ended up sitting right there. There was barely enough room for both of them, so little in fact their knees were touching and banister was digging awkwardly into Jared's back, but it was somehow kind of comfortable.
Jared thrust his gift at Jensen. "This is for you," he said, inexplicably nervous that Jensen might hate it and second-guessing himself about the choice and wishing he'd wrapped it a little better.
He watched as Jensen diligently removed the paper without ripping it. His gaze flickered anxiously to Jensen's face as Jensen studied the black leather briefcase. He smoothed a hand over its surface, lingering over the gold monogrammed JRA in the corner, then he looked up at Jared, and his eyes were electric-green.
"You remembered," he said in a small voice.
"You've been using an elastic band on your old one for months," said Jared, relief and pleasure flooding him at Jensen's response. "Was kinda hard to forget, man."
Awestruck, Jensen smiled down at the briefcase again. "It's fucking spectacular, Jared. Seriously. Thank you." He took a shuddering breath and then passed his gift to Jared.
Jared was less considerate of the wrapping paper and had it shredded in seconds. He frowned at the small black box, then looked back up at Jensen, a question on his lips.
"Open it," said Jensen.
The box creaked just a little as Jared lifted the lid. Jared looked inside. Then he stopped breathing.
"Jensen," he said quietly. "You can't afford this."
Jensen gave him a shaky smile, briefly worrying his lower lip between his teeth. "Actually, I can. The project I've been working on? Comes with a bonus." He watched as Jared eased the watch from its case, its platinum shining like liquid, and closed it carefully around his wrist. "I wanted you to have it, Jared. And I knew you wouldn't buy it for yourself."
When he turned his wrist this way and that, light sparked off the watch, atomic-white. The metal was cold and smooth against his skin, and it had a pleasing, solid weight. He looked at it and he thought about the ridiculous hours Jensen had worked lately, and his heart clenched a little.
"You didn't have to," he said.
"I wanted to," Jensen told him firmly. He studied the briefcase again, smiling helplessly at it, then he looked up at Jared, and said, "You're awesome."
And Jared's heart did that clenching thing again. "It's kinda hard to take you seriously saying that when you're wearing gold glitter, y'know."
"Oh god, still?" Jensen said. He scrubbed at his face and spread the glitter over a larger area.
"Yeah, now it's everywhere. Here, let me." It felt like a line, especially when Jared rubbed the pad of his thumb over Jensen's cheekbone. He'd had too much to drink, that had to be why Jensen was letting him, why his eyes were fixed on Jared as Jared touched him, and why Jared was suddenly transfixed by Jensen's mouth. They'd both had too much to drink, that was what was happening.
Jared leaned in and kissed Jensen, soft and open, tongue delicately parting Jensen's lips so he could push deeper. The banister dug in even worse to his lower back as he moved in closer but it seemed like a faraway discomfort when he had Jensen's mouth. Jensen's hand settled tentatively at the back of Jared's neck, fingers combing through Jared's hair as he tugged Jared towards him. Jared gave a little groan at the back of his throat and he could feel Jensen smiling into the kiss, and it was all the encouragement he needed to turn the kiss dirty, to suck on Jensen's tongue until Jensen arched into him, his hand going tight on the back of Jared's neck. Jensen was all heat and hard lines against him, and Jared imagined the wreck he was making of Jensen's mouth, how pretty it'd look once he was done with it.
He wanted to see Jensen's mouth.
Jared broke the kiss. His fingers still splayed over Jensen's cheek, his thumb under Jensen's jaw, he kept Jensen close as he studied his face. He caught a quick glimpse of Jensen's red mouth, his flush and the high color in his eyes, before Jensen was laughing, amused and embarrassed, and tilting his face away.
Jesus, Jared had just kissed Jensen.
"Man, we must be drunker than we realized," Jared said, and Jensen nodded, still smiling but not meeting his eyes.
"Must be," said Jensen. He got to his feet clumsily swaying slightly, too much of him touching Jared as he rose. He curled his arms around the briefcase, holding it close to his chest. "Imma go to bed. I'll finish clean-up duty tomorrow."
Jared watched him go, and, after a few moments, headed to his own room. As he was shucking off his clothes, he caught sight of himself in the mirror. He raised a hand to touch the gold glitter that had made it onto his own face, and the silver watch glinted.
:::
In the morning, Jensen came downstairs after Jared had gotten back from jogging and was fixing himself breakfast. He grinned at Jensen and ignored the strange lurch in his belly when he took in Jensen's stupidly adorable sleep-ruffled hair.
"You want fruit loops?" he said, waving the box in Jensen's direction. "No coffee yet though, sorry."
"Fruit loops sound awesome," Jensen said.
He fetched a bowl and took the box from Jared. After Jared poured milk on his own, he put some on Jensen's, while Jensen got two spoons from the drawer. They perched on the kitchen stools and ate in comfortable silence. Acutely aware of Jensen's presence, Jared stoically resisted the urge to look over at him.
After he was done eating, Jensen set his bowl down on the counter. But he didn't move, didn't show any sign of being about to leave the kitchen. Jared stared at the puddle of milk in his bowl and thought that maybe they were actually going to have to talk about it. And he hadn't figured out yet how to say what he wanted, and what that even was.
"You think it might snow?" said Jensen.
For a second, Jared studied Jensen's profile, then he followed Jensen's gaze out the window. "Don't think it's cold enough."
"It's pretty cold," said Jensen. He turned a tight smile on Jared. "Are we really gonna talk about the weather?"
Jared's work phone rang, and both he and Jensen looked at it instantly. Jared glanced back at Jensen, but Jensen was standing, back turned to Jared while he dumped his bowl in the dishwasher.
Jensen left as Jared answered the phone.
part two