The Self-Importance of Being Jensen: Part Two
{ Masterpost }
Part Two
He’s totally drenched by the time he reaches the front door.
Jensen hates the rain. Even after living in Vancouver for going on five years now, he’s never gotten used to the way the clouds can overtake a perfectly sunny day in a matter of hours and unleash enough rain to make the idea of building an ark not a terribly bad one. He’s already got the two dogs, so that’s a decent start.
Speak of the devils, they don’t seem to mind when Jensen drips on them as he scrapes his sneakers on the mat, licking at his wet hands happily as he issues out quick pats and rubs.
“Shh,” he tries to calm them quickly as he shakes droplets of water from the spikes in his hair, knowing that Jared is quite possibly still napping in the living room.
But when he tiptoes down the hall, the TV screen is flickering in the grey-washed room and Jared’s eyes are open to half-mast where he lies on the sofa beneath the window, shadows of raindrops dancing across his face as they trail down the glass.
“Hey,” Jensen calls as he crosses to the hall bathroom for a towel. “If I’d have known there was going to be a monsoon, I would have left the car and fuckin’ swam downtown.” Vigorously he wipes at his hair and face, looking down at his drenched khakis in dismay. He hadn’t exactly dressed for tsunami season.
“How was the open house?” Jared’s voice floats to him with little enthusiasm.
Jensen grimaces at himself in the mirror before striding back to the living room. “Flashy. Lots of street noise. Not to mention only one bedroom for about double the price of what I’d been budgeting for.” he trails off and scratches at the back of his head awkwardly, because Jared is looking at him with dead eyes. “Do you really want to hear about this?”
A humourless twitch of lips. “No. I guess not.” Jared turns back to the television screen.
Jensen follows his gaze, and frowns. The TV is on mute. Before he walked in, the house had been absolutely silent save for the rain pinging down on the roof. Tranquility was impossible whenever Jared was in a room. He was either talking or filling it up with rock music or video games turned up so loud Jensen can’t think. If Jared is home and conscious, the house is never quiet.
Something was definitely wrong.
For the first time Jensen notices that Jared’s place on the couch now includes a heavy afghan that his grandmother made, tucked over socked feet and right up under his chin. There’s a half-empty glass of water resting on a coaster atop the coffee table, pulled just within reach. Jared himself is paler than even that morning, with bright spots of pink high on his cheekbones. His eyes are dim and glassy where they stare unseeingly at the screen.
“You feeling ok?” He sits on the edge of the couch and studies the younger man’s face. The raised temperature Jared had gone to bed with the night before had obviously returned.
Jared, never one to complain, just sort of shrugs one shoulder and makes a noise of indecisiveness.
“Your fever back?” He asks, and slips a gentle hand under the chestnut bangs. “Shit, you’re really hot, babe,” he states worriedly, his other hand moving to cup the slender neck and feel covertly for swollen lymph nodes.
Jared tries for a smirk, but it’s weak and forced. “And bothered. You think you can just walk in here with your wet t-shirt and not expect a reaction?”
Ignoring the flippant remark, Jensen tries to remember every bit of medical wisdom his mother has ever imparted on him, but right now his brain is failing. Jared’s temperature shouldn’t be getting higher, it should be going down. He’d thought that Jared had been on the mend this morning when he left, but this doesn’t seem like a very good sign. “Did you take some Tylenol?” He asks, noticing the pill bottle on the side table.
Jared grimaces and touches his throat. “I tried but I only managed one. It’s too hard to swallow,” he murmurs, and Jensen notices that his voice does sound kind of weird, not scratchy but thin and muted.
He makes an executive decision. “Okay. Let’s get you up.” He doesn’t wait for a reaction, just pulls back the blanket, places the sweatpant-clad legs down to the floor and Jared’s torso up into a sitting position. “We’re going to the clinic.”
His shoulders hunched, Jared seems to take a moment to get his bearings. “What? Jensen, no. It’s just the flu,” he complains and looks up at the older man with imploring red-rimmed eyes. “I’ll be fine in a few days.” It’s a promise, Jensen knows, one Jared would keep to cause less trouble if it were humanly possible.
“It’s been a few days. Several, actually. You aren’t getting better, and now you’re worse.” Jensen leaves him sitting on the couch while he walks quickly through the main floor, snatching up his keys, wallet, phone, and Jared’s health card before returning with a pair of shoes for Jared’s feet. Jensen doesn’t add that he knows it isn’t the flu, because Jared isn’t congested, hasn’t had a cough, and this high fever worries him more than he wants to admit.
When he looks up from tying Jared’s sneakers to find downcast Bambi eyes of doom, he begs, “Please? Just do this for me, Jay. Put my mind at ease.”
A small sigh, but Jared lets him pull him up to his feet. There he wavers worryingly for a moment, leaning against the hands Jensen has placed on his shoulders. “Okay,” he croaks, and closes his eyes with a painfully visible wince when he tries to swallow. “But don’t say I never did nothin’ for you,” he says pointedly, but he’s trembling lightly under the thickness of his fleece sweatshirt.
Rolling his eyes, Jensen propels him towards the door. “You’re far too generous.” He finds a windbreaker from the closet and guides it onto Jared’s arms until he’s batted feebly away. “Okay, stay here. I’m going to pull the car closer.”
By the time they get to the drop-in clinic ten minutes away, Jensen is wet again and Jared is shaking like a leaf, despite his layers and the fact that even though it’s raining the July air is muggy and warm, making Jensen sweat and itch.
There aren’t a lot of people there for a weekday afternoon, so after only a short wait they call Jared into one of the exam rooms. Jensen sits outside in a hard plastic chair, wiping at his dripping skin with handfuls of Kleenex that the pitying receptionist offers to him. It’s a ridiculously short amount of time later when Jared is weaving an unsteady line back towards him. Jensen jumps to his feet to meet him halfway, removing a crinkled piece of paper from the hot, tight grasp.
“That was fast,” Jensen comments and wraps a steadying arm around the younger man’s shoulders as a doctor appears in front of them.
“Yep. Most obvious case of strep throat I’ve seen this year. Didn’t even need to do a culture,” he states like it’s something to be proud of, and points the end of his pen at the paper Jensen has taken ownership of. “Get that prescription filled right away. He’s not going to get any better until he’s a couple dosages into the antibiotics.”
“Okay,” Jensen agrees like a dutiful parent.
“His throat is very swollen. Advil for pain and the fever is best. Drinking will be painful at first, but if he doesn’t get enough fluids he’ll have to go to the hospital for an IV.”
It’s an alternative that Jensen wilfully refuses to acknowledge.
After a quick trip to the pharmacy they’re back home. Jensen deposits his charge back on the sofa and creates a nest of pillows and blankets. Soon the coffee table becomes a smorgasbord of juices, sports drinks, and vitamin waters. Medication in many varying forms litter the surface like a junkie’s wet dream. There are popsicles in the freezer, and if soup were to become currency, well, Jensen is going to be a wealthy motherfucker.
“Okay. You’ve got lots to drink, your phone is within reach, and there’s a stack of trashy magazines on the end table,” Jensen summarizes from his perch on the edge of the sofa. “And here is the remote control. You want to watch something?”
Jared gives a small shake of his head.
Jensen frowns, feeling useless and frustrated. He hates that Jared has gotten this sick. “Okay. Just sleep, then, babe. I’ll wake you in a little while for dinner.” His hand travels up to stroke at Jared’s hair, tucking the long strands back and tracing the curve of his ear.
A quiet sigh, and Jared closes his eyes. “Thanks, Jen.”
He smiles at the polite response. “You’re welcome,” he answers.
Slowly, eyes still shut, Jared’s hand moves up and catches his, stilling the motion and bringing it down to his cheek where he holds it, tucking it close to his face like a teddy bear. After a moment or two he’s asleep, lips slightly parted and breathing deeply.
Jensen has to get up. He has to move. He’s got scripts to read, an e-mail to write to his realtor, and a long-overdue flight to book. But for now he sits and just watches Jared sleep, feeling so lost and so at home that it’s dizzying.
There’s a bowl of chicken noodle soup congealing on a coaster.
Jensen is bilingual. He can speak a little bit of French, and if he were to get dropped randomly in the streets of Mexico, he’s pretty sure he’d be able to ask for directions to the nearest cantina. But one of Jensen’s best talents has to be his ability to speak the language of Jared.
Jensen is just about fluent.
He picks up the dishes on the coffee table with a sigh. “You sure you’re done?” he asks, and looks pointedly at the man on the couch.
Jared nods, rubbing at his cheeks with the back of his hand.
“Okay,” Jensen submits, carrying the bowl to the kitchen and dumping the nearly full contents down the drain. When he walks back to the living room, Jared has his eyes closed, dark lashes fanning across pale cheeks. “You take your third pill yet?” he asks, because he knows Jared isn’t asleep.
Lips forming a line of hesitation, Jared says nothing but opens his eyes and looks at Jensen hopefully.
Jensen shakes his head. “I’m sorry, babe, but you know you’ve gotta do it.” He finds the correct bottle out of the assortment on the table and pops the lid, shaking one out onto his palm. Picking up a condensation-laden glass of water, he holds out both and waits for Jared to untangle his hands from beneath his pile of blankets. “Just do it quick, get it over with.”
Shooting him a look that says easy for you to say, asshat, Jared takes both with a grimace. Then, after a moment of mental preparation, he pops the small orange pill onto his tongue and takes the smallest sip of water possible for the task, swallowing it down.
Jensen watches his eyes squeeze closed and places a sympathetic hand on the younger man’s knee, waiting for the white-knuckled grip on the blankets to loosen when the moment is over. “Drink some more of that, Jay,” he says, hating to be the bad guy, especially when Jared looks like that over that over one little pill.
Jared glares at him beseechingly.
“Come on, you need more,” he says, reaching out to swipe a thumb under one of Jared’s shadowed eyes. “You’ve hardly had anything today. You’re going to get dehydrated.”
This look says don’t exaggerate, Florence, but Jared tips the glass to his lips anyway, slowly draining the contents. When he’s done and Jensen takes it away, he sags back against the cushions, looking pale and wrung out.
Jensen nods his approval, hovering and fixing blankets. “You want some ice cream?” he asks hopefully, trying to think of the easiest thing on the severely swollen throat.
Jared shakes his head.
Gnawing at his lower lip, Jensen tries not to let his concern register on his face. Jared turning down food of any kind is strange, but ice cream? That’s got to be a warning sign for the impending apocalypse. “Okay,” he relents, and sits down on the end of the sofa when Jared lifts his feet to make room for him. He tries to focus on whatever reality show Jared currently has settled on, Jon and Kate Plus Way Too Fucking Many Kids or some shit, but honestly, who the fuck cares?
It’s been two days since the doctor visit, and Jared is still refusing anything more solid than oatmeal. Jared is one of those freaks of nature that require a massive and frightening intake of calories daily in order to maintain a normal amount of meat on his bones, so as far as Jensen knows, Gatorade and chicken broth aren’t going to cut it. If Jared doesn’t turn a corner in the next twenty-four hours, Jensen is going to take him back to the doctor.
Its dark outside by the time Jensen realizes they’ve just watched four episodes of that bullcrap in a row, and he rubs at his eyes with the heels of his hands. He glances at Jared, expecting to find him asleep, but the dark, murky eyes are watching him from beneath heavy lids.
Jensen smiles warmly. “Ready to turn in?” he asks, rubbing the sock-covered feet resting on his lap.
Jared blinks at him.
“No, not here. Come on babe, you’ll be way more comfortable in a real bed,” he yawns, stretches, and slides out from beneath the legs and blankets to stand beside the couch. He leans down to help Jared unearth himself from his nest, leaving one blanket wrapped around his shoulders as they make the slow, weaving trek to the bedroom.
Jensen gets the basics done fast. He makes sure Jared brushes his teeth, gets through his own night-time routine, and does a final check of the house for locks and lights. When he gets back to the room he once again expects Jared to be out like a light. Instead he finds him still sitting at the edge of the turned-down bed, just where Jensen left him.
Approaching slowly, Jensen flicks on the bedside lamp and Jared blinks owlishly, watching him intently. “Come on, babe. Lay down.” Jensen holds him gently by the shoulders and gradually lowers his head to the pillow.
Jared is staring at him so attentively it makes him uncomfortable. “Are you real?” he asks quietly, and it takes Jensen by surprise because it’s probably the first time he’s really heard him all day.
Jensen winces, because Jared’s voice is so wrecked his throat has to hurt worse than he’d thought. It’s the words that concern him, spoken so naturally that Jensen wonders if he’s missed something. But when two hands lift from the mattress to attach themselves to the sides of his face, Jensen feels the heat radiating off the younger man’s skin and knows Jared’s fever has returned, as it does every night. “Yes, I am,” he responds calmly, keeping his tone light and lilting.
Jared acts as if he’d said nothing. “Doesn’t matter,” he says, studying every inch of Jensen’s face. “If you weren’t, I’d make you up.”
When Jensen swallows, the pain he feels is for a completely different reason. “We’ll still be together, Jay.” He covers the hands on his face with his own and carefully removes them, bringing them down to rest on Jared’s chest and holding them there gently. “I’m not going to go away that easily.”
Jared’s eyes close and he draws in a slow, deep breath. “Who said anything about easy?” he asks, suddenly sounding sad, and it’s so coherent that Jensen squints at him, waiting for more. But in the next moment, Jared’s breathing has evened out.
Jensen closes his eyes with a sigh. With a heavy heart, he turns out the light and shuffles to his side of the bed. With Jared’s body a solid furnace beside him, Jensen falls asleep and dreams about cold, industrial apartment buildings on a gloomy city skyline.
There’s a little park a few blocks down that Jensen had never noticed before.
Jensen needs direction. So when he first started taking the dogs for their walks while Jared was sick, he’d asked Jared about his usual route. It’s not like he was afraid of getting lost, he’s driven the roads of Jared’s neighbourhood enough times to know his way around. He just likes to know the best jogging trails beforehand, and spots that are okay to let the dogs off their leashes without getting a finger-wagging from the old crone down the street.
It’s a small park, mostly obscured from view on the street by a row of planted maple trees, but inside there was a large, lush green lawn with no signs barring dogs, so Jensen tosses a Frisbee for Harley and Sadie for the better part of twenty minutes. While they barked and chased one another happily, Jensen’s eyes wandered and found a small playground in a wide sandbox off to one side, complete with swing sets and a teeter-totter. Further back was an old but still functional tennis court, and a winding footpath that disappeared into dense foliage.
He imagines him and Jared going there in the future, playing in the court or taking a walk through the trail when the leaves have turned orange and red in the fall. He thinks about it all the way home.
When he comes in, he must be quieter than he realizes, because Jared is standing in the open fridge chugging back a carton of orange juice.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to see you getting your vitamins,” Jensen says, purposely surprising him and taking great pride in the caught-red-handed look Jared sports in the aftermath.
“Sorry,” he says sheepishly, voice stronger than it’s been in days. Then, purely for Jensen’s benefit, he goes to the cupboard and pours the remainder of the juice into a glass, even though barely two sips remain.
Jensen smirks and gets himself a bottle of water while Jared pours some into the dog bowls. “It’s going to be hot today,” he says, wiping at his brow with the back of his wrist.
Jared clears his throat tentatively, knuckling blearily at one eye. “Fantastic. Maybe I can actually enjoy what’s left of the summer.” He’s better now, or well on his way, and Jensen hopes that maybe they’ll be able to get out into the sun today, replace some of the colour Jared’s bout of illness has sapped away from his features.
Stepping closer, Jensen studies the face in front of him with acute disapproval. “Hmm, yeah,” he murmurs critically. “Gotta work on your tan, Jay. No one wants to fuck a corpse.”
Incensed, Jared shoves him playfully. “Just you, perv,” he retorts, snorting.
“What can I say? Sunken cheek bones and sallow skin really gets me going,” he chuckles and slinks forward again until his body is flush against Jared’s, nosing along his jaw and pressing a kiss to the corner of the younger man’s mouth.
“Sick,” Jared tells him, fighting a grin as he pushes him away.
Amused, Jensen goes to peel off his shirt on his way upstairs for a shower. “Oh, hey, can I borrow your cell phone charger? I can’t find mine.”
“Junk drawer.”
Rolling his eyes skyward, he retraces his steps back to the counter farthest from the kitchen while Jared laughs at him and proceeds to lapse into his favourite impression of Jensen lecturing about tidiness in a voice that sounds alarmingly like Jensen’s own father. But Jared is right, in what he has to be the least practical drawer in the history of civilization is Jensen’s cell phone charger.
And it’s resting on top of the formal write-up of the preliminary offer he had placed on a condo in Yaletown. He was planning on bringing the documents with him to LA to show Danneel. Jensen must have left it out somewhere and Jared had found it, putting it away in a place that he considered to be safe.
“You get it?” Jared asks, appearing around the corner. When he sees Jensen staring into the open drawer, his expression falters for a moment but recovers quickly, back into that classic carefree failsafe he probably thinks Jensen requires from him.
Jensen lets him get away with it. “Yeah,” he smiles, and holds up the charger triumphantly.
“Good. Now go shower, you stink.” He wanders off to living room. Seconds later the Playstation starts up.
Jensen snorts. “This from the walking pandemic.” He pushes the door closed silently and retreats to the privacy of the bathroom.
Jensen is not totally lost. Going to LA and seeing Danneel is inevitable. Bringing her back here soon enough and creating a home seems like the next step in the road. But somewhere deep in the recesses of his mind, Jensen knows that if Jared simply told him to stay, forget Los Angeles and his ten-year-plan, Jensen would do it in a heartbeat.
Maybe that’s what scares him the most, and makes all of this heartache almost worth it. Almost.
The sheets are tangled and half on the floor.
Jensen doesn’t believe in fate. God’s will, a master plan, everything happens for a reason, Jensen just doesn’t buy it. Bad things happening to good people is something he’s never been able to get on board with. He’s a realist, and being down-to-earth has never let him down before.
But there are moments with Jared, sometimes tiny fragments in time, when Jensen wonders if maybe he’s been wrong all along.
The summer air is warm and muggy as it flutters through the curtains above the bed. Jensen watches a bead of sweat roll down Jared’s neck to pool in the hollow above the younger man’s collarbone. When he leans down lick it, Jared breaths his name on the end of a sigh.
Jensen goes still above him, elbows planted in the pillows on either side of Jared’s head. As the room is filled with only the sounds of their heavy breathing, Jensen loses himself in Jared’s wanton appearance. He studies the dishevelled hair, the flush staining his cheeks, the way his swollen lips part as he draws in breath after shaky breath.
It’s hard not to believe in destiny when sometimes looking at Jared makes Jensen feel as if his entire life has been leading up to this moment.
A shudder runs through the body beneath him. “Jen...”Jared whispers, eyes opening to fix on his, pupils blown wide with desire.
Jensen resumes his thrusts, picking up speed until the headboard starts up a sharp rhythm as it bangs against the wall. Jared’s head thrashes on the pillow, legs tightening around Jensen’s waist, but he still manages to reach a hand down between their bodies, feeling where they’re joined. It makes his head spin, and he’s coming before he’s even aware, Jared painting their stomachs with his release.
As they both come down, Jensen stays bowed above him, head resting on the younger man’s shoulder. It’s hard to catch his breath when it feels like his heart has lodged itself in his throat. If Jared feels his tears mingling with the sweat on their skin, he says nothing.
His flight is boarding in a half hour.
Jensen is always ridiculously early. He hates to feel rushed, whether that means setting all the clocks in the house ahead by five minutes (which drives Jared berserk), or arriving first at every party, Jensen doesn’t care. The art of being casually late has always been lost on him.
Jared had griped about it under his breath all the way to the airport. He claimed he didn’t mind driving him, but didn’t understand the absurdity of leaving at the asscrack of dawn for a flight that didn’t take off until just after noon.
Jensen hadn’t told him that he’d just wanted a little bit more time together.
But then, when they’re standing at the blissfully empty entrance to the security gate, Jensen stands in front of the man he’s with nearly twenty-four hours a day and realizes he has no idea what to say.
The car ride over had been surreal, like a drive into work on any regular day. Jensen had made sure they stopped for coffee at least twice and Jared filled the lapses in silence with erratic rambling. Any moment of tension was broken with inappropriate jokes no doubt picked up from Chad, one involving a priest and the name for a reproductive organ Jensen had never even fucking heard before.
If it had been distraction that Jared wanted, it had worked, because in all the time it had taken them to get to where they now stood, Jensen hadn’t thought at all about what he was going to say.
Jared has his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “When is your flight back?”
Jensen pretends to think about it, even though he’s got it committed to memory. “A week Friday,” he says, and knows that Jared is adding the days up in his head. It will be the longest they’ve been apart in over six months. He pastes on a smile. “So don’t get into any trouble while I’m gone.”
Jared nods and smiles thinly instead of replying.
Clearing his throat, Jensen shuffles his feet. He hates a quiet Jared. “Go to San Antonia, Jay,” he tells him instead of asking, because the thought of Jared alone in their - his - house makes Jensen a little sick to his stomach. “And when you get home, take Harley and Sadie for a walk. There’s this park I found on the corner of Burley and...”
Jared interrupts by laughing. “No one is dying, you tool.” He reaches out with a big hand and yanks on one corner of Jensen’s jacket. “I’m going to see you in, like, ten days,” he says, but his top lip is starting to twitch.
Jensen smiles. So he had counted. “I know.”
Clearing his throat, Jared looks around the terminal. “So, then, is she coming back with you?” he asks, finally settling his eyes on Jensen’s apprehensively.
“I don’t know,” Jensen answers, honest.
Jared gives a sharp nod. His brows are starting to pull together, blinking quickly as he tries to hold back everything that’s coming to the surface. “Okay. Okay, well...” he says, voice a little strangled.
Jensen steps closer, any stray bystanders be damned. “I’ll see you soon,” he finishes, making it sound like a promise. He grabs hold of Jared’s sleeves until his hands come free from his pockets, closing the distance between them. When they kiss it’s chaste and over way too soon. Easy, like a habit. Like the possibility of this being their last moment together is fucking absurd.
Jared rests his forehead against Jensen’s, eyes closed. He doesn’t say anything, just breathes.
Jensen’s eyes close, too. “Soon,” he whispers, and feels Jared nod.
When they pull apart it’s a fluid motion, both of them turning away from one another before they even open their eyes. Jensen starts walking towards his gate and doesn’t look back, knowing Jared is doing the exact same thing in the opposite direction, away from him.
Part Three