Fair Game | Foul Play : Chapter II, Part ii
Jared always thought his first kiss would be nothing short of spectacular. In truth, he couldn’t really remember it at all.
He’d always known what he’d wanted out of the experience, like he’d once confided in Charlie: the butterflies in his stomach, the sweaty palms, the tingles along his skin. For the longest time, he’d envisioned exactly how he’d loop his arms around the girl’s slender waist, how he’d have to stoop low to meet her tilted-up lips, how tightly she would’ve had her arms wrapped around his neck. He’d imagined the anticipation, the head rush, the swooping terror and excitement of it all. He’d planned and plotted but never put any of it into action, for, besides Mackenzie Ackles (and he was never acting on that impulse, under fear of death, dismemberment, and Merlin only knew what else, should Jensen have ever found him out), no one of his acquaintance had ever tempted him enough.
Reality, though, had been a bit…different.
He’d needed help getting to the basement that night, and since Jensen was the only other student his size, the responsibility had fallen upon his capable, and slightly less intoxicated, shoulders.
“You’d make a lousy lush,” Jensen grumbled, readjusting Jared’s slump across his body as he manoeuvred them both down the stairs. “Who gets pissed on Butterbeer?”
“Me?” Jared asked a little woozily.
Jensen rolled his eyes, panting a little when they reached the bottom step. He gasped when voices suddenly sounded on the steps above them and hastily dragged Jared into the alcove under the stairs, and when Jared opened his mouth to protest, Jensen whipped out his wand and cast a quick Silencing spell on him, pulling him deeper into the shadows in the nick of time since Professor Sprout picked just that moment to walk by on her rounds with Professor McGonagall. Figured that they would also choose that particular moment to stop for a little chat; girl talk, Jared mused with a giggle.
Jensen elbowed him in the ribs and shoved him right up under the stairs, Jared hunching so he wouldn’t hit his head; he startled when something brushed against his hair. Jensen shushed him in a ferocious whisper. “First, you try to out-Butterbeer me,” he huffed in the quietest of tones. “Then you think it’s a splendid idea to take a walk under the stars on the Astronomy Tower and we almost get caught by Sinistra, and now this? You are a blight on my life!”
Jared - still rendered quite mute by the spell - pointed above his head and shuddered, wiggling his fingers against Jensen’s shoulder in what he hoped was a good imitation of a spider.
“Spiders?”
Jared nodded frantically as Jensen shook his head in disgust, muttering something about Jared being the biggest baby he’d ever seen, but he did pull Jared a bit closer as he scanned the sloping overhang above them. Something brushed against Jared’s hair again, and he almost climbed Jensen like a tree before he saw the amused look on his tormentor’s face.
“Mistletoe.”
Jared looked up in surprise, blinking at the sprig of leaves and white berries tied together with a satiny ribbon that looked red even in the dark. Who’d put mistletoe in the alcove under the stairs, for Merlin’s sake?
Jensen snickered. “You badgers are a randy little bunch, aren’t you?”
Jared closed his eyes as he felt heat flood his face and, while immensely grateful that Jensen couldn’t quite see him well, even as their eyes adjusted to the dimness, he fervently wished he could go douse himself under a cold shower. When he finally opened his eyes a few seconds later, it was to find Jensen peering at him with a carefully blank expression. Jared raised his brows in question.
“You know what they say about mistletoe, right?”
Jared nodded, but failed to see the point just then: there were no girls in sight unless you counted Sprout and McGonagall and that was just…eww.
“It’s bad luck not to kiss,” Jensen whispered, his gaze flickering between Jared’s mouth and his eyes, “and, you don’t need any more bad luck if you can manage it. It’s for your own good, really.”
What is? Jared inanely wondered. And was it really bad luck? He was fairly certain that was just a silly little story that boys had come up with over the eons, just as an excuse to kiss girls, and…mmmph.
Jared blinked as his mouth was covered with Jensen’s, his eyelashes fluttering madly against Jensen’s, his nose smushed up against Jensen’s, his face, his body and his heart (stopped mid-beat, he was certain) all pressed up against Jensen’s.
Jensen was kissing him.
Jensen was kissing him…and Jared was being…kissed. Under the mistletoe. In the alcove, under the stairs. For the first time.
Eyes wide open, his ears registered a soft ‘plop’ as Jensen pulled away and stared at him, his eyes black in the dim light as Jared stared right back, speechless, and this time, not because of a spell. He’d just been kissed - not even a second ago - and apart from the phantom feel of plush lips pressed up against his, he couldn’t remember a thing.
Do it again, he said, but of course, Jensen didn’t hear him.
They both twisted around in fright when laughter rang out nearby - their professors again, further away this time - but Jensen still shielded him with his body, pushing Jared back until the mistletoe bumped across his forehead, its red ribbon trailing down his cheek. Jensen reached up and brushed it aside, fiddling with the sprig while Jared kept staring at him, spellbound, but not by any incantation he knew.
“Legend is,” Jensen murmured, so quietly that Jared leaned in even closer to hear him, “that when one claims a kiss by mistletoe, the kisser plucks one of the berries…” Jensen dutifully tugged at the bough, a tiny berry coming off between his fingers. “…and gives it to the one he’s kissed.” He pressed the berry into Jared’s palm, closing Jared’s fingers around it. “When the berries are all gone, no more kisses can be claimed beneath that bough.”
This time they both looked up at the mistletoe: four berries left. Jared gulped, Jensen took a deep breath, and in the time it took for Jared’s gaze to fall back downwards, Jensen reached up with both his hands and, cupping Jared’s face between them, like he was cradling something precious, kissed him.
Then he kissed him again, thrice more, soft and so endlessly sweet that it made Jared’s heart nearly burst with fondness. When Jensen pulled away, their lips parting on a sigh, he looked a bit spellbound himself. Then he blinked, his mouth rounding as he undoubtedly realized exactly what he’d just done.
“Oh!”
No! It’s okay…
“I’m sorry.”
Don’t be!
“I’m so sorry.”
No, Jensen, please…
“Forgive me.”
And before Jared could gather his wits together, Jensen ran off and up the stairs, an incantation whispered over his shoulder that spelled the last four berries into Jared’s hand and freed him from his silence, for all the good it did him.
And that was how his first five kisses had gone to Jensen, and despite the fact that they were nothing like Jared had ever imagined kisses to be, they were perfect - perfect - and he wouldn’t have traded them for all the Galleons in Gringotts. He also couldn’t wait to repeat the experience - over and over again if he could manage it - as early as New Year’s Eve, he’d hoped, but Jensen weirdly kept his distance, remaining confined to the Ravenclaw Tower, the one place he could go where Jared couldn’t follow.
The New Year came and went without Jensen. So did most of the rest of the term as he and the other Fifth Years studied for their OWLs, and Jensen and the Seventh Years prepared for their NEWTS. Jared barely saw him, hardly spoke to him, and only flew with him (against him) once, when Ravenclaw trounced Hufflepuff on the Quidditch pitch, well on their way to winning that year’s House Cup. Jared had finally resorted to sending him a note by owl, one that he knew Jensen wouldn’t be able to ignore.
“What the bloody hell is the meaning of this?” Jensen raged when he cornered him on the grounds after a particularly hectic Hufflepuff practice session. Jared was sticky and yearning for a shower, his hair plastered to his head with sweat, but Jensen didn’t seem to notice any of these things when he pulled him into the space under the stands. Jensen waved the note under his nose and Jared smirked, shrugging.
“You stole my first kiss, Ackles,” he said, affecting nonchalance. “I was saving that for someone special,” he teased, “and you stole it from her.”
“Her who?” Jensen asked in a whisper, his expression shocked.
“Er… I dunno who she is at the moment,” Jared confessed, “but I s’pose I’ll know her when I see her. And fall in love, obviously.” He’d thought about lying but he’d never been able to lie to Jensen before; he wasn’t about to start now. Those kisses they’d shared had confused him but he was completely willing to repeat the experience and see if kissing Jensen - minus the Butterbeer and mistletoe and Silencing spell - would still be as magical as it’d been on Christmas Eve.
The line of Jensen’s jaw tensed. “And that’s why you sent me this note? You want ‘kissing lessons’ so that you’ll know what to do when you do meet her?”
“Well, yeah.” Jared strove to keep his expression as innocent as possible; that’d been part of the plan anyway. A very tiny part. The big part was all about kissing Jensen again. Granted, Jared wasn’t all that great at planning things; kissing lessons was the best he’d come up with. “You’re the one who taught me how to fly, so I reckoned…”
“I should be the one to teach you how to kiss?” Jensen’s tone was flat, his mouth tight and his face humourless. It made Jared suddenly regret this whole thing. He opened his mouth to ‘fess up to it all but Jensen beat him to the punch. “Well. Pucker up, princess.”
That kiss under the stands (Jared’s sixth) was more of a punishment, really. It’d had none of the breathless magic of the others, and it made Jared suddenly afraid that he’d built up a memory in his head that couldn’t possibly compete with reality.
He believed it right up until Jensen grabbed him in the library the next evening, pushing him up against the book stacks, kissing him insensate to everything but the touch, scent and taste of Jensen. It wasn’t as brutal as the kiss that preceded it, but it was possessive, and Jared was beginning to find that he didn’t mind that one bit; it was more exciting and heady than anything his meagre imagination could’ve ever come up with.
He got his eighth kiss mid-air, when Jensen playfully rammed into him and entangled their brooms (supposedly to teach him a Beater move that was all sorts of illegal unless you were playing the Weasley version of Quidditch). Jared laughed and Jensen just leaned over and claimed his mouth, kissing him breathless, and it was only Jensen’s quick reflexes that saved Jared from taking another tumble off his broom.
His ninth kiss was up against a boulder on the shores of the Black Lake, and while this kissing business was fantastic and all, it lacked somewhat in the enchantment of the first few; perhaps the mistletoe had played a bigger role that he’d initially thought. It was obviously time for Jared to take matters in his own hands, which, when it came to Jensen, meant making Jensen think that it'd all been his idea in the first place.
Their tenth kiss came when Jensen cornered him in one of the Herbology greenhouses one bright and sunny day, no one else around, Jensen’s face so serious (although Jared was fairly certain he was aiming for sexy) that Jared laughed right into his mouth, causing him to pull back in a huff.
“What?” he snapped, whacking away a Honking Daffodil that was trying to cop a feel; it…well…honked at him.
“You’d make a lousy professor.”
Jensen blinked at him. “What?”
“Shouldn’t you be giving me pointers on the proper way to kiss?”
“You learn by doing,” Jensen insisted, kissing him again; Jared didn’t respond and Jensen sighed and pulled away in annoyance. “Oh, right. Hufflepuff. Would you prefer your instruction in point form? Perhaps I should bring some parchment next time so you can take notes?”
Jared worked hard to suppress a smile at Jensen’s acerbic tone, especially in light of the fact that a sunny yellow flower was so lovingly caressing Jensen’s cheek. “I don’t think the Headmaster would approve the inclusion of kissing lessons in the syllabus.”
“Pity that. Lucky for you, you have me.”
“Yes. Lucky, lucky me.”
“Sarcasm does not become you.” Jensen huffed again and pressed in close, pinning Jared to the workbench with his hands, and already he was much more like the cranky Jensen of old, the one Jared adored. Secretly, of course. “So. To begin your formal instruction: When one kisses…someone…”
“The one they’re in love with.”
“I don’t believe in love. It’s a fool’s errand.”
“I believe in love.” Jared chuckled when the daffodil’s leaf tickled Jensen’s ear. “That daffodil believes in love.”
Jensen glared at the plant but it just tooted softly and kept up with its ministrations. “Figures. You’re both quite foolish.”
“How do you kiss someone you love? Or like?”
“I don’t love or like anyone. Unless you intend me to kiss you like I kiss my mother. Her, I love. Also? That’s just sick.”
Jared laughed and punched him in the shoulder. “Shut up, you idiot!”
“Fine. All right. I might not know love, but I sure as hell know how to fake it. C’mere.” Jensen’s hands framed Jared’s face. “Generally,” he started in a bit of a husky whisper as his thumbs dug into Jared’s cheeks where his dimples usually were, “you start by gently grasping her face. Then,” he murmured softly, his gaze moving between Jared’s eyes and his lips, spit-slick where Jared licked them, “you very tenderly kiss her lips. Giving her every opportunity to pull away if she wishes. Girls like to do that; they like to tease. If she doesn’t do you any bodily harm, you should play into that and repeat the soft kisses until she stays. Like this.” He dutifully demonstrated, pressing his plump lips against Jared’s, the kisses light and airy with just the tiniest hint of moist heat. “You can suck at her lips a bit, if you like. If she allows it,” he said, parting his lips and sucking on the bow of Jared’s upper lip, delicate, elusive little nips that had Jared practically melting into a puddle, they were so sweet. “You can lick,” Jensen whispered, sound a bit wrecked as he inched closer, until not even a sliver of space existed between their bodies as his tongue poked out to lick across Jared’s top lip, tracing a tentative path into his mouth until Jared’s lips parted on a sigh and he took Jensen’s bottom lip between them, sucking softly, revelling in the breathy little moan Jensen let out. “You can use your tongue…” Jensen gasped as he came up for air, just for a second before he plundered Jared’s mouth again, his tongue delving inside to tease and tangle with Jared’s until they both groaned and opened their mouths wider and kissed deeper as Jared got hard in his trousers.
Then Jensen wrenched his mouth away, the look in his eyes shattered as he stepped back, turned on his heels and stalked away.
Later that night, in the solitude of his four poster bed, as his dorm-mates slept and snored around him, Jared relived the heat of that kiss, closing his eyes and fisting his hand around his cock, tugging with fierce desperation as he came in his pyjamas, panting and wishing more than anything that Jensen was there with him.
After that day in the greenhouse, and the exchange of an abundance of truly magical kisses, in and around every nook and cranny of Hogwarts (and not counting those the Honking Daffodil had bestowed upon Jensen’s person), Jared’d stopped keeping track. There’d been too many to count after that anyway, even with the distraction of Jensen’s NEWTs and Jared’s OWLs, and by the end of term, Jared was pretty sure that he never wanted to kiss anyone else. Ever.
He couldn’t wait for them to find a way to spend the summer in each other’s company, as much as possible, so Jensen could teach him all sorts of…umm…other, sexier new things besides kissing.
It was really too bad Jensen hadn’t felt the same way.
Months later, Jared’d turned up at The Burrow and Jensen hadn’t, but by then, it’d hardly mattered, because Jared hadn’t been able to forget what he’d seen when he’d found Jensen on the train en route to London, in that empty compartment. Well, empty except for Jensen and that arsehole Brock Kelly, who’d been down on his knees at the time, sucking on Jensen’s cock like it was a particularly sweet Sugar Quill, Jensen’s fingers splayed over Kelly’s head as he’d held him close and pumped into his mouth.
Their gazes had collided then, Jared’s completely gobsmacked, more than a little horrified and a hell of a lot betrayed, and Jensen’s a bit sad, but glazed over with arousal and maybe a little self-loathing as he’d grunted and spent himself, his eyes still focused on Jared, Kelly moaning wantonly as he’d licked and sucked Jensen clean of every bit of his come.
It was the last Jared saw of Jensen for another two years, and like Jensen had once said, Jared had long since forgiven, if not forgotten, by then.
The only thing he really remembered of his sixth year at Hogwarts was anxiously trying to better his OWL grade for Defence Against the Dark Arts; ‘Acceptable’ was unacceptable to him, especially seeing as how he’d lost his father. Every spare moment he’d had had been dedicated to diligently preparing for his NEWTs the next year, and trying not to miss Jensen too much. He succeeded with his studies and failed miserably when it came to Jensen.
He still spent most of the summer with the Weasleys; Mrs. Weasley had practically adopted him the year prior, when she’d finally learned that it’d been his dad who’d died trying to save her brothers, the Prewetts, the same men Fred and George had been named for, at least in their initials. It had made Jared exceedingly happy to be a part of such a big, boisterous and very loving family, but his high spirits dimmed as the days went by and Jensen didn’t join them.
Bill mentioned in passing that Jensen was excelling at Connemara, one of the most elite Wizarding universities in the world, and he was spending his summers in school to fast track his way out with a Masters in Charms. He also captained the university’s Quidditch team, the Connemara Conjurors, and had even taken them to victory in the European Varsity Games. There was talk of a Ministry job waiting for him as soon as he graduated and Jared couldn’t have been more proud or happier for him; he just hoped Jensen was happy, too.
Jared’s last year at Hogwarts, the one he’d wanted to make the most memorable, was anything but. It dragged on in an endless daze of homework and fretting feverishly over his NEWTs. To be fair, though, he’d brought it upon himself; many of his classmates had left after sixth year, some even immediately after taking their OWLs, but he felt as if he owed it to himself to try harder, to have a back-up plan in case his career of choice didn’t pan out. It was the smart thing to do; it was what Jensen would’ve wanted him to do.
Quidditch was his only salvation. From everything, really: the never-ending toil and tension of school, to planning for a future after school that never seemed too clear no matter how hard he tried to picture it in his head. Besides which, Quidditch was in his blood; it was his legacy. He knew from Great Aunt Callie that his father had played in the World Cup once, long ago, and maybe someday, Jared would follow in his footsteps and do the same. It was a good aspiration to have, he thought. It was the only anchor in the sea of uncertainty he’d found himself adrift in, so he clung on for dear life as he worked and studied and played harder than he’d ever done before.
It was well worth the effort when he graduated with better marks than he could’ve ever hoped for and, a couple of months later, when he tried out and made it into the Goonpiper Ghouls, the Reserve team for the Falmouth Falcons, his hometown team, as one of their Beaters. It wasn’t exactly what he’d hoped for career-wise, but beggars couldn’t be choosers, and he was happy to be playing Quidditch in any sort of professional capacity; plus, being in Goonpiper meant moving back home to Cornwall and that was a very comforting thought.
For two years afterwards, he dutifully tried out for the Falcons but he never made the cut. He was happy with his life, however, or content, at the very least, and just as he reckoned he was ready to turn over a shiny new leaf in his personal life and embark on a hopefully more exciting phase of his Jensen-free existence, Jensen decided to Apparate back into his arms and into his life, as if he’d never really left in the first place.
The most momentous things, Great Aunt Callie had once told him, happened when you least expected, and it was really up to you to decide whether to run away or rise to the occasion.
“Hello, Hufflepuff,” Jensen blithely greeted as he stood his ground upon Apparation, when Jared barrelled into him, their arms wrapping around each other just to keep their balance. Or at least that’s what Jared told himself.
“Jensen!”
“Brat.” Jensen nodded as if they’d bumped into each other in the hallways at Hogwarts only yesterday. “Merlin’s Bones, you’ve shot up like a reed! Did Sprout secretly feed you fertilizer? You’ve grown taller than me!”
“Told you I would.” Jared laughed, and he couldn’t help himself, he hugged Jensen close. “I sent you letters.”
“Did you?”
“Plural. And you didn’t reply. Not even once!”
“I must not have gotten them.”
“Owl Post can find anybody.”
“Perhaps I made myself Unplottable.”
Jared rolled his eyes. “That would work only if everyone didn’t already know you were at Connemara.”
“Obviously I didn’t think it through well enough.” Jensen smirked.
“As if.” Jared laughed. “It’s so good to see you!” Jensen looked like he’d swallowed a particularly bitter pill, so Jared gave him another big squeeze, hoping he’d get the message and understand that there were no hard feelings, and trying not to be too obvious about burying his nose in the hair at Jensen’s neck. “Merlin, I’ve missed the way you smell! How’ve you been?”
Jensen cleared his throat, his gaze locked with Jared’s. “You’ve missed the way I…smell?”
Jared snorted. “Well, I missed you, too. But then you already knew that from my letters…”
“Which I never received.”
“Which you claim to have never received.”
“How do I smell?”
Jared hid behind his messy fringe, a bit embarrassed; he hadn’t meant for that bit to slip out. “Like leather-bound books. Parchment and ink. Melted chocolate. And a hint of salt. Like the air smells when you’re near the sea on a frosty day.” Jensen blinked at him and Jared felt his face heat. “Or not. Mostly you smell like you. Buy you an ice cream?”
Jensen’s gaze dropped to Jared’s mouth for a fraction of a second. “Always with the food. Although I suppose there’s a lot more of you to feed now, isn’t there?”
“Still a growing boy.” A shout from the main street behind them had Jensen pushing him further into the shadows until Jared’s back was up against a brick wall, and suddenly, Jared couldn’t help but stare at Jensen’s mouth, especially when Jensen absently licked his lips. He held his breath as Jensen pressed in close, nuzzling his face into the side of Jared’s neck and breathing in deep, as if he, too, was chasing Jared’s particular scent, re-familiarizing himself with it; Jared wondered what he smelled like to Jensen, but he wasn’t brave enough to ask. Knowing Jensen, he’d probably get wet toad, Bubotuber pus, rancid onions and rotten eggs.
“How do you do this to me every single time?” Jensen muttered against Jared’s skin. “Every time I think I get you out, you creep back in again, right under my skin, like an itch I can’t quite scratch and just as irksome.” Jared was more than a little confused. And distracted. Because Jensen was licking him. “Have you found her yet?”
“Her who?”
“The love of your bloody life.”
“Oh.” Jared paused, blinking down into Jensen’s stoic face. “Was I meant to be looking?”
Jensen huffed in frustration. “Wasn’t that what you wanted?”
“Used to be,” Jared told him nervously, more than a little cautious because the last thing he wanted was for Jensen to run from him again. “Not anymore, though. Not since…”
“I kept every one of your damn letters,” Jensen interrupted suddenly, his green eyes dark with what looked a lot like desire. Jared would know; he felt it, too.
“You did?” he asked softly, quite unable to look away from this boy who’d made his miserable life worth living. This boy who was now a bit more of a man. A man who excited him in a way that no one else ever had.
“You know I did. You knew I needed them; that’s why you kept sending them.”
“Did they cheer you up?”
“Yes. Just as much as they made me wretchedly homesick.”
“You should’ve come back then. We missed you at the Weasleys’.”
“Only at the Weasleys’?” he asked in a hushed, expectant whisper, right up against Jared’s mouth, and it looked like a lot was hinging on Jared’s answer; now was not the time to tease.
“I missed you from the second you left,” Jared said. “Always. There wasn’t a moment I didn’t miss you…mmmph!”
And just like that Jensen was kissing him again and all was right in Jared’s world.
All was bloody brilliant actually.
