Someone you might have been (j2 au, 4/39)
Sorry, still writing the spy-fic!
Someone you might have been
Secret agent!Jared/handler!Jensen. Mildly more plot and porn this chapter.
part three
It's a dismal little hotel Jensen's set up in. There are huge, spidery cracks running through the plaster and the staircase is dark and ridiculously narrow. Outside, the wildlife rages with the sound of distant police sirens and shouting and the throb of music filtering out from the bars. Jared's nose wrinkles at the pretty pervasive smell of urine.
Never let it be said that the government spares any expense in putting up its operatives.
Jared finds Jensen's room and taps on the door, which is painted a really unappealing shade of green that probably hasn't improved with age. The door opens almost immediately, held on chain.
"Hey, baby. Wanna kiss it better for me?" Jared says.
The door closes, there's the rattle of the chain being taken off, and then Jared finds himself being hauled inside.
Without a word, Jensen pushes him up against the wall and pats him down expertly, hands moving lightly but thoroughly over Jared's body as he searches out the wound. Jensen's freckles and lashes stand out in stark contrast to the paleness of his skin. His face is set in taut lines. Then he looks up at Jared and tugs at the front of his long-sleeved t-shirt. The material is sticky with blood where the bullet went in.
"Take it off and come over here."
"Thought you'd never get around to stripping me," Jared says, while he follows him over to the table where Jensen already has a first-aid kit ready.
Jared winces as he starts working the t-shirt up, hisses out a sharp breath, and Jensen glances over at him.
"C'mon, you want me to cut it off?"
"Dude, have a little patience. You're getting me naked, aren't you?" says Jared. He peels the t-shirt off as gently as he can and throws it down. Then he grimaces down at the bloody hole in his shoulder. A large purpling bruise has already bloomed around it.
"Bleeding's stopped," Jensen says. "Good. Okay then, take these -" He presses some tablets into Jared's hand, "- and lemme get at it."
Jared sits down heavily on the couch, Jensen's hand on his other shoulder to steady him, and swallows the painkillers Jensen's given him. The medical disinfectant Jensen wipes over the forceps smells acrid and powerfully alcoholic, and even after the countless times he's been given first-aid, it still stings Jared's nose.
Jensen's fingers curl around the prominent curve of defined muscle in Jared's upper-arm. It's kind of weird how carefully Jensen's actually tending to him. This is so not even close to the first time Jared's been shot and he's had people fishing bullets out of his body in worse surroundings than this. It's not even like it's a serious wound.
But Jensen's touching him so delicately, shooting tightly concerned glances at Jared. And his eyes are huge and dark in his face. So all Jared can do is smile at him, and try to show Jensen that it's okay. Jared's okay.
"This your first time doing this?" Jared says. He frowns slightly, realising too late that Jensen might take offence at the obvious implication, but there's no hostility showing on Jensen's face.
"I can just dress it for now if you'd prefer to wait for proper medical treatment," Jensen says. "I only thought you'd want me to remove it because agents I've worked with before prefer to just get it done and not waste time with doctors."
So there's the reaction. Jared laughs at it, and shakes his head.
"No, no, it's on you, buddy. I leave my body in your tender care."
Jensen sighs and tightens his grip on Jared's arm. The flesh around the bullet gives a stinging pulse of pain as Jensen works the forceps in. Jared focuses his gaze on the scuffed fabric on the arm of the couch, details the way the threads have frayed while simultaneously reviewing his performance back at the communications tower.
"I'm guessing people shoot you pretty often," Jensen says abruptly. "I think I'd probably shoot you too, if it didn't mean a whole shitload of paperwork from my superiors."
Jared grins through gritted teeth.
"Sorry, man. Best thing you can do is wait until I screw up on foreign ground and then deny all knowledge of me."
"Well, then whichever foreign government has you will have to shoot you, 'cause I don't think they're gonna want you cluttering up their jails. There's a high standard set for residuals, buddy, and you fall a little short."
Jared's laughter cuts off into a sharp Fuck!, because Jensen's tugging on the bullet, and he trusts Jensen to be doing a good job of it, but having a bullet removed from your flesh hurts, no matter how skilled or careful the person is who's doing it.
To his credit, Jensen doesn't do anything stupid like ask Jared if he's okay or if he wants a breather. This is part of the job and Jared totally rocks at his job.
"You should be a little nicer to me. I could'a died back there." Which is, okay, a bit of a lie but Jared is shameless.
"I'm not that lucky."
"Okay, maybe I couldn't have died, but I'm still in pain."
"Which is what I gave you painkillers for," Jensen tells him reasonably. "You need something a little stronger?"
"How much stronger have you got?"
The bullet glides free of Jared's flesh, silver beneath the blood, and Jensen says, "I got this," and he leans in, and he kisses him. And it's not some flirty little press of lips. This is a full-on proper Imma-tonguefuck-you-now-so-shut-up-and-sit-still kiss: open-mouthed and messy and kind of breathtakingly slutty from someone as tightly wound as Jensen.
It takes Jared a second to realise that this is actually happening in a real-world context as opposed to the thoroughly deviant confines of his imagination, and it's a second too long. Jensen starts to draw back and, stupidly, Jared tries to catch him. His shoulder throbs with pain and gives Jensen enough opportunity to put some space between them.
"I need to put some antiseptic on your shoulder," Jensen says, and it's only because Jared can see the slick, swollen plumpness of Jensen's lips that he believes that that did actually just happen. "Should hold off any possible infection until you can get a course of antibiotics."
Too stunned and bewildered to do anything else just yet, Jared holds still while Jensen sweeps a cotton ball, damp with antiseptic, over the bullet hole.
"Dude, you can't do that," Jared says finally. "You can’t ignore me flirting with you, then kiss me, and then try to act like nothing happened."
Jensen stubbornly ignores him. Jared catches hold of Jensen's wrist, squeezing just hard enough to make Jensen look up at him.
"Why did you stop? I wasn't exactly fighting you off."
"I told you," says Jensen. "I needed to put some antiseptic on your shoulder. If the wound had become infected-"
"I understand about the antiseptic, Jensen. I'm asking if it was totally necessary to do it then. And before you start talking about infection again, remember how easily I can kill you, 'kay?"
Jared's pushing. He knows that's not usually the best tactic with Jensen. Jensen's the kind of guy who requires careful and gradual manoeuvring into position. But Jensen can't do something like kiss Jared and then think he can avoid all discussion of it. It's not fair, and Jared doesn't care if that line of thinking makes him sound like a petulant thirteen-year old - he's sticking with it.
With as much dignity as possible, Jensen tries to extract his wrist from Jared's grip. Jared tightens his grip. Jensen shoots him a frustrated glare, which Jared meets with a pretty impressive one of his own.
"I remembered what a really bad idea it'd be," Jensen says. "We have to work together, and our line of work doesn't exactly reward personal connections. Now, can I please finish dressing your shoulder?"
Jared lets him. He considers Jensen speculatively, while Jensen pretends not to notice Jared's gaze on him and finishes up with the bandage. He even keeps quiet while Jensen goes about removing all obvious traces of their presence in the room.
"Who says it'd be a bad idea?" he says at last.
"I do," Jensen says without a moment's pause. "You have no idea what a fucking epically bad idea it would be."
"Dude, are you really that bad a lay?"
The satisfaction of actually flustering Jensen, of making him flush and frown and fidget, is immense. Jared likes the sensation very much indeed. It doesn't last long; Jensen regains his composure and turns his face away to the window, though the view is pretty shit, nothing but the gloomy sprawl of the inner-city at night. He looks pale and painfully pretty in the half-light. The pad of his thumb drags over his lips, which is a mindless, unintentional taunt as far as Jared's concerned.
"It's my job to ensure that you are functioning to the best of your abilities in the service of the agency. A relationship of any kind, beyond professional, would be counterproductive. I don't know if you've had this kind of relationship with your previous handlers-"
Jared has the fleeting mental image of trying anything like this with Lauren and has to fight the instinct to protectively cover his crotch.
"No," he breaks in. "Just you. Guess you inspired the idea in me. Why d'you suppose that is?"
"-But it's not going to happen with me," Jensen finishes, ignoring Jared's interruption aside from raising his voice enough to drown him out.
Seriously, Jared needs to stop pushing. The sum of his knowledge of Jensen is basically that the pretty bastard is fucking fantastic at his job, totally joyless at times, and stubborn as holy hell. He should really stop pushing, but it's so hard to stop when Jensen's right there, all big green eyes and kiss-swollen mouth and tightly controlled demeanour.
So instead, Jared finds himself crowding Jensen up against the wall, and the only reason Jensen gives ground when Jared moves in on him is because Jared's not stopping, and it's backing up or ending up pressed chest to chest into Jared.
Jensen's back hits the wall and his jaw clenches furiously. His lips part to protest, but Jared tilts his face down to his, mouths so close they're sharing breath, and Jensen goes mute. Jared leans in closer, changing his angle as if to better catch Jensen's mouth, and - dazed, instinctively - Jensen sways a little towards him before he can help himself.
Jared doesn't kiss him, doesn't move back. Jared isn't even touching him but Jensen is as good as pinned there.
"You're seriously saying you don't want me to kiss you?" he says. "You don't think you'd like it if I kissed you? I'm talking about me kissing you, not you laying one on me while I'm not even paying attention. You don't wanna see what that's like?"
Jensen's lashes flutter as he blinks, coming back to himself. The pink tip of his tongue flickers over his lips, and Jared thinks he should have kissed him when he had the chance. Determinedly, Jensen turns his face away. His eyes fix blankly on the bandage on Jared's shoulder.
"What I want and what I will allow to happen aren't the same thing," he says, and his voice is so quiet Jared can barely hear him. He takes a small breath and then looks Jared straight in the eye. "You need to put a shirt on and leave."
If Jared were to push, right now, he could make Jensen give in to him. It wouldn't take much at all. Jensen wants Jared to kiss him, it's in the way he's looking at Jared, so fucking hot and desperate.
But Jensen's saying no, and Jared's not that kind of guy. He gives Jensen some space, turns away to find a shirt. There's one crumpled at the bottom of his bag and he pulls it on gingerly. Last thing he needs is to set the bullet wound bleeding again. If Jensen touches him again right now, then Jared will not be held accountable for his actions.
"See you next time," he says, as he heads for the door.
"Jared."
Jared stops, seriously debates not looking back, gives in and turns around. Jensen gives an awkward little smile and tosses the misshapen bullet at him. Jared catches it one-handed, examines it in his palm. It's skin-warm from how tightly Jensen must have been holding it.
"If you gotta bring me back a souvenir," says Jensen, "I liked the cocktail umbrella better than the bullet."
part five
Someone you might have been
Secret agent!Jared/handler!Jensen. Mildly more plot and porn this chapter.
part three
It's a dismal little hotel Jensen's set up in. There are huge, spidery cracks running through the plaster and the staircase is dark and ridiculously narrow. Outside, the wildlife rages with the sound of distant police sirens and shouting and the throb of music filtering out from the bars. Jared's nose wrinkles at the pretty pervasive smell of urine.
Never let it be said that the government spares any expense in putting up its operatives.
Jared finds Jensen's room and taps on the door, which is painted a really unappealing shade of green that probably hasn't improved with age. The door opens almost immediately, held on chain.
"Hey, baby. Wanna kiss it better for me?" Jared says.
The door closes, there's the rattle of the chain being taken off, and then Jared finds himself being hauled inside.
Without a word, Jensen pushes him up against the wall and pats him down expertly, hands moving lightly but thoroughly over Jared's body as he searches out the wound. Jensen's freckles and lashes stand out in stark contrast to the paleness of his skin. His face is set in taut lines. Then he looks up at Jared and tugs at the front of his long-sleeved t-shirt. The material is sticky with blood where the bullet went in.
"Take it off and come over here."
"Thought you'd never get around to stripping me," Jared says, while he follows him over to the table where Jensen already has a first-aid kit ready.
Jared winces as he starts working the t-shirt up, hisses out a sharp breath, and Jensen glances over at him.
"C'mon, you want me to cut it off?"
"Dude, have a little patience. You're getting me naked, aren't you?" says Jared. He peels the t-shirt off as gently as he can and throws it down. Then he grimaces down at the bloody hole in his shoulder. A large purpling bruise has already bloomed around it.
"Bleeding's stopped," Jensen says. "Good. Okay then, take these -" He presses some tablets into Jared's hand, "- and lemme get at it."
Jared sits down heavily on the couch, Jensen's hand on his other shoulder to steady him, and swallows the painkillers Jensen's given him. The medical disinfectant Jensen wipes over the forceps smells acrid and powerfully alcoholic, and even after the countless times he's been given first-aid, it still stings Jared's nose.
Jensen's fingers curl around the prominent curve of defined muscle in Jared's upper-arm. It's kind of weird how carefully Jensen's actually tending to him. This is so not even close to the first time Jared's been shot and he's had people fishing bullets out of his body in worse surroundings than this. It's not even like it's a serious wound.
But Jensen's touching him so delicately, shooting tightly concerned glances at Jared. And his eyes are huge and dark in his face. So all Jared can do is smile at him, and try to show Jensen that it's okay. Jared's okay.
"This your first time doing this?" Jared says. He frowns slightly, realising too late that Jensen might take offence at the obvious implication, but there's no hostility showing on Jensen's face.
"I can just dress it for now if you'd prefer to wait for proper medical treatment," Jensen says. "I only thought you'd want me to remove it because agents I've worked with before prefer to just get it done and not waste time with doctors."
So there's the reaction. Jared laughs at it, and shakes his head.
"No, no, it's on you, buddy. I leave my body in your tender care."
Jensen sighs and tightens his grip on Jared's arm. The flesh around the bullet gives a stinging pulse of pain as Jensen works the forceps in. Jared focuses his gaze on the scuffed fabric on the arm of the couch, details the way the threads have frayed while simultaneously reviewing his performance back at the communications tower.
"I'm guessing people shoot you pretty often," Jensen says abruptly. "I think I'd probably shoot you too, if it didn't mean a whole shitload of paperwork from my superiors."
Jared grins through gritted teeth.
"Sorry, man. Best thing you can do is wait until I screw up on foreign ground and then deny all knowledge of me."
"Well, then whichever foreign government has you will have to shoot you, 'cause I don't think they're gonna want you cluttering up their jails. There's a high standard set for residuals, buddy, and you fall a little short."
Jared's laughter cuts off into a sharp Fuck!, because Jensen's tugging on the bullet, and he trusts Jensen to be doing a good job of it, but having a bullet removed from your flesh hurts, no matter how skilled or careful the person is who's doing it.
To his credit, Jensen doesn't do anything stupid like ask Jared if he's okay or if he wants a breather. This is part of the job and Jared totally rocks at his job.
"You should be a little nicer to me. I could'a died back there." Which is, okay, a bit of a lie but Jared is shameless.
"I'm not that lucky."
"Okay, maybe I couldn't have died, but I'm still in pain."
"Which is what I gave you painkillers for," Jensen tells him reasonably. "You need something a little stronger?"
"How much stronger have you got?"
The bullet glides free of Jared's flesh, silver beneath the blood, and Jensen says, "I got this," and he leans in, and he kisses him. And it's not some flirty little press of lips. This is a full-on proper Imma-tonguefuck-you-now-so-shut-up-and-sit-still kiss: open-mouthed and messy and kind of breathtakingly slutty from someone as tightly wound as Jensen.
It takes Jared a second to realise that this is actually happening in a real-world context as opposed to the thoroughly deviant confines of his imagination, and it's a second too long. Jensen starts to draw back and, stupidly, Jared tries to catch him. His shoulder throbs with pain and gives Jensen enough opportunity to put some space between them.
"I need to put some antiseptic on your shoulder," Jensen says, and it's only because Jared can see the slick, swollen plumpness of Jensen's lips that he believes that that did actually just happen. "Should hold off any possible infection until you can get a course of antibiotics."
Too stunned and bewildered to do anything else just yet, Jared holds still while Jensen sweeps a cotton ball, damp with antiseptic, over the bullet hole.
"Dude, you can't do that," Jared says finally. "You can’t ignore me flirting with you, then kiss me, and then try to act like nothing happened."
Jensen stubbornly ignores him. Jared catches hold of Jensen's wrist, squeezing just hard enough to make Jensen look up at him.
"Why did you stop? I wasn't exactly fighting you off."
"I told you," says Jensen. "I needed to put some antiseptic on your shoulder. If the wound had become infected-"
"I understand about the antiseptic, Jensen. I'm asking if it was totally necessary to do it then. And before you start talking about infection again, remember how easily I can kill you, 'kay?"
Jared's pushing. He knows that's not usually the best tactic with Jensen. Jensen's the kind of guy who requires careful and gradual manoeuvring into position. But Jensen can't do something like kiss Jared and then think he can avoid all discussion of it. It's not fair, and Jared doesn't care if that line of thinking makes him sound like a petulant thirteen-year old - he's sticking with it.
With as much dignity as possible, Jensen tries to extract his wrist from Jared's grip. Jared tightens his grip. Jensen shoots him a frustrated glare, which Jared meets with a pretty impressive one of his own.
"I remembered what a really bad idea it'd be," Jensen says. "We have to work together, and our line of work doesn't exactly reward personal connections. Now, can I please finish dressing your shoulder?"
Jared lets him. He considers Jensen speculatively, while Jensen pretends not to notice Jared's gaze on him and finishes up with the bandage. He even keeps quiet while Jensen goes about removing all obvious traces of their presence in the room.
"Who says it'd be a bad idea?" he says at last.
"I do," Jensen says without a moment's pause. "You have no idea what a fucking epically bad idea it would be."
"Dude, are you really that bad a lay?"
The satisfaction of actually flustering Jensen, of making him flush and frown and fidget, is immense. Jared likes the sensation very much indeed. It doesn't last long; Jensen regains his composure and turns his face away to the window, though the view is pretty shit, nothing but the gloomy sprawl of the inner-city at night. He looks pale and painfully pretty in the half-light. The pad of his thumb drags over his lips, which is a mindless, unintentional taunt as far as Jared's concerned.
"It's my job to ensure that you are functioning to the best of your abilities in the service of the agency. A relationship of any kind, beyond professional, would be counterproductive. I don't know if you've had this kind of relationship with your previous handlers-"
Jared has the fleeting mental image of trying anything like this with Lauren and has to fight the instinct to protectively cover his crotch.
"No," he breaks in. "Just you. Guess you inspired the idea in me. Why d'you suppose that is?"
"-But it's not going to happen with me," Jensen finishes, ignoring Jared's interruption aside from raising his voice enough to drown him out.
Seriously, Jared needs to stop pushing. The sum of his knowledge of Jensen is basically that the pretty bastard is fucking fantastic at his job, totally joyless at times, and stubborn as holy hell. He should really stop pushing, but it's so hard to stop when Jensen's right there, all big green eyes and kiss-swollen mouth and tightly controlled demeanour.
So instead, Jared finds himself crowding Jensen up against the wall, and the only reason Jensen gives ground when Jared moves in on him is because Jared's not stopping, and it's backing up or ending up pressed chest to chest into Jared.
Jensen's back hits the wall and his jaw clenches furiously. His lips part to protest, but Jared tilts his face down to his, mouths so close they're sharing breath, and Jensen goes mute. Jared leans in closer, changing his angle as if to better catch Jensen's mouth, and - dazed, instinctively - Jensen sways a little towards him before he can help himself.
Jared doesn't kiss him, doesn't move back. Jared isn't even touching him but Jensen is as good as pinned there.
"You're seriously saying you don't want me to kiss you?" he says. "You don't think you'd like it if I kissed you? I'm talking about me kissing you, not you laying one on me while I'm not even paying attention. You don't wanna see what that's like?"
Jensen's lashes flutter as he blinks, coming back to himself. The pink tip of his tongue flickers over his lips, and Jared thinks he should have kissed him when he had the chance. Determinedly, Jensen turns his face away. His eyes fix blankly on the bandage on Jared's shoulder.
"What I want and what I will allow to happen aren't the same thing," he says, and his voice is so quiet Jared can barely hear him. He takes a small breath and then looks Jared straight in the eye. "You need to put a shirt on and leave."
If Jared were to push, right now, he could make Jensen give in to him. It wouldn't take much at all. Jensen wants Jared to kiss him, it's in the way he's looking at Jared, so fucking hot and desperate.
But Jensen's saying no, and Jared's not that kind of guy. He gives Jensen some space, turns away to find a shirt. There's one crumpled at the bottom of his bag and he pulls it on gingerly. Last thing he needs is to set the bullet wound bleeding again. If Jensen touches him again right now, then Jared will not be held accountable for his actions.
"See you next time," he says, as he heads for the door.
"Jared."
Jared stops, seriously debates not looking back, gives in and turns around. Jensen gives an awkward little smile and tosses the misshapen bullet at him. Jared catches it one-handed, examines it in his palm. It's skin-warm from how tightly Jensen must have been holding it.
"If you gotta bring me back a souvenir," says Jensen, "I liked the cocktail umbrella better than the bullet."
part five