Meadowlark (O Happy Bird!) - roxymissrose (2024)

Chapter 1 Chapter Text

O happy bird, of heart most gay
To sing when skies are gray!
The Meadowlark by paul lawrence dunbar

Coffee, black and hot, swirls in Jensen's cup. He's got one finger looped into the cup handle, idly moving it back and forth to the tune of an old song he's whisper-humming under his breath. A newspaper lays folded over next to him; he's finished the business section and is skimming the sports page. After a few seconds, he sighs and tilts his head to watch the sun trying to peek through the wet, gray skies. Drizzle skitters down the window panes, wetting the porch railings he can see through the kitchen door's window panes.

"Umf." He rubs a knuckle against his eyelid, trying to wake himself. Maybe more coffee....

He startles when sharp steps rap against the tile floors.

"You look like a toddler when you do that." She grabs a cup from the cup tree sitting near the coffee maker and pours. Adding a bit of cream and sugar, she stirs it savagely. She drinks and makes a face; clearly she hates the taste. She keeps gingerly sipping, though, nose wrinkled like she's sipping battery acid.

"Jeanette, why do you drink it when you know you won't like it?"

"Because it smells so good and I keep hoping one morning, it'll change."

She pours what's left of the coffee down the sink. She hesitates, then loads the cup into the dishwasher.

Thinking about her words regarding change and coffee, it occurs to Jensen that she sounded sadder than mere coffee disappointment called for. Jensen looks up to catch her eyes on him. He gives her an uncertain smile.

"Going in early?"

Jeanette sweeps past him, gathering her coat from the back of the couch. She flings it on, along with an oversized, sleek scarf, twisting and turning it around her neck. Of course it looks amazing when she's done. Crossing her arms, she tilts her head towards him, her full mouth pursed tight. Her eyes are a brilliant blue and when she's slightly annoyed, as she is at this moment, they practically drill into your soul.

"Yes. We talked about this already, remember?"

"Oh, yeah, of course. I was just…" He shrugged. "Making conversation?"

"Well, let's save it for this evening. I have to run before I'm late."

She really does look good, he thinks. That blue wool coat and the black and white scarf set off her flawless skin so well, a little pale under the winter sun. She's beautiful, though not as stunning as she is in summer. She always tans a healthy bronze and he just burns an ugly tomato red.

"Jensen. Did you hear me?"

"Oh. I'm sorry?"

"I'll be late tonight too."

He nods, murmurs, "Yes, of course," and feels a whisper of disappointment at having dinner alone again. A small part of him wonders if she's having an affair, but the thought fades before it's fully born. Does she wonder if he's having affairs when he's late for dinner?

"All right, then. I guess I should get myself together too—don't want to miss the train."

"Have a nice walk to the station. Don't forget your umbrella, they're calling for drizzly weather all day today," she reminds him.

Jeanette works for a local realtor's office that's relatively close to home, which means she takes the car while Jensen takes the train into the city. He usually enjoys the walk to the station, no matter the weather. It was a little bit of time all his own, breathing fresh air and letting his thoughts ramble. Lately though, he hasn't much liked the direction his thoughts have been heading.

He straightens up the kitchen in the silence that seems louder after Jeanette's departure. He meticulously wipes down the granite counter tops and thoroughly cleans the coffee pot, setting it on the stainless steel drainboard to dry.

He stands in the tiny foyer, staring into his reflection as he winds his favorite scarf around his neck—a cashmere Burberry she gave him for Christmas last year. He takes inventory of all the small changes in his face that seem to multiply every time he takes note—the thin lines around his eyes that persist even when he stops smiling, the way his hair has darkened with age, or maybe it was just from no longer living a life in the sun. And despite the lack of sun, he still has a face full of freckles, spreading down the bridge of his slightly co*cked nose and right up inside his ears to his great annoyance. It looks, well, it looks country. He smiles at himself: a wide, fake smile, full of costly, perfect teeth. Winces when the movement pulls at his lips. Where the hell is his lip balm….

Jensen digs around in his coat pocket as he licks at his painfully dry lips. They gleam in the watery, early morning light that creeps down the hallway. Like…fog, what the hell was that thing, that line; on little cat feet. Yay, high school English.

His lips soften and spread in a genuine smile, and Jensen quickly drops his eyes. He'd dodged so much crap about his mouth when he was young—too damn girly, fat lower lip, a cupid's bow upper lip and always so damn pink, like he wore lipstick. Ridiculous how something like full lips and long dark lashes could be a horror all through school until suddenly, they become a different kind of bad. Too much attention paid to his damn face all through college and it'd never sat right with him. If it hadn't been for Jeanette and her cool appraisal of his looks...he smiles ruefully, a tight, half curve of those too full lips…well. He'd mistaken that for level-headedness, when it seems that it was a chilly spirit instead.

Jensen grabs his briefcase and fishes his keys out of the bowl on the console, rolls his eyes at himself. Pretty narcissistic, right? Him standing in the hallway and mooning over himself. What a piece of work he is.

Horns beeping and brakes shrieking, the gasps and groans of the buses passing, spewing diesel fumes into the air—it's all the usual backdrop of his morning and evening walks, changed only by weather. Cold sharpens the diesel stink, but Jensen just flips the collar of his black wool coat high around his ears, tugs his scarf tighter, and shoves his hands deeper into his pockets. Even with gloves, it is cold this morning. Winter refuses to let her death-grip on the city go. It's a week past Valentine's Day, but it feels like the first days in December.

The day hadn't gone any better than he'd expected. Some days the shop was chaotic, full of bitch fights and blood feuds; today had been one of those days.

Just thinking about the day has Jensen making a fist and rubbing it between his eyebrows, trying to rub out all tension and irritation that's set up camp there. Bastards. Between Michael yelling bloody murder about the pointless changes Morgan wanted in the windows that even Glover hates and then having to deal with the rest of the crew's wounded feelings–Jensen was drained. And all because of Michael insisting, "Window displays are meant to make a statement, John—they're art!" and Glover screaming, "We just want to sell shoes, Michael!"

And where was Morgan during all this? No doubt holed up in his office, gloating about the tension he'd caused, f*cking control-freak.

God, what a sh*t-storm of a day. Not that Michael was wrong, not really. But instead of dealing with them head-on, Jensen had decided on cowardice. He'd hidden behind the piles of material and foam core stacked up on his drafting table, while everyone else found they suddenly had to help transport design pieces to other floors of the store. Days like this made Jensen wish he'd followed his original desire to teach art to kids. Though really, thinking about it, the Gyre Bros. Display Department was an excellent training ground in how to deal with overly-emotional, recalcitrant children.

At least the damn day's over. Hitching his briefcase strap higher on his shoulder, he walks briskly and purposefully to the station, no time to waste.

Usually at this point, he's powering down the streets like a demon is after him, but today for some reason, a spot of color catches his eye and he finds himself slowing past a stand selling flowers.

Flowers. He used to bring Jeanette flowers. It's been a long time since he's done that. Kind of doubts that she'd really be interested in them now, but…maybe?

Should he?

Jensen pulls off a glove, traces his thumb along the velvety edge of a daisy's damp petals, pulls his hand back and wipes it against his wool coat. Unh-unh. Nope, it's a waste of money, and he highly doubts that the sight of a two dollar bouquet of street flowers is going to make her smile.

He shakes his head as he sides the glove back on and continues walking. Maybe another day. Just the thought of choosing the right flowers, getting the right balance of shape and color just, god, it feels exhausting.

The sun's starting to set now, dipping behind the buildings and raising shadows in the valleys of the street. He crosses over towards a large open plaza linking a trio of skyscrapers, his habitual shortcut to his station.

He flinches just a bit at the sound of loud laughter and instinctively pulls his briefcase tight against his side. A gaggle of loud, hard-looking, garishly-dressed young people surge across the plaza like a tide. He vaguely remembers once being that young, that carefree.

What the hell! Jensen laughs at himself. College was only five years ago and he's acting like he's some ancient fart at twenty-six. Jensen huffs and turns away. Hell, most days he feels like it, right down to the bone; his creaky, achy, old man bones.

f*ck.

Jensen slows, gawping at the kids (kids!) before remembering the time. He steps it up again, speed-walking across the plaza like he's getting paid for it. He's almost to the far side when he stumbles, grunting in shock and pain, as something heavy lands against his back.

"f*ck!"

Jensen gets an impression of muscle and legs and arms flailing all over, and then a quick whiff of a really nice smell. Hair like silk slides across his face.

"Oh sh*t! Oh man, I'm so sorry! Are you okay?"

Big hands, long fingers, flap in his face and over his shoulders, working their way down until Jensen jerks backwards. He grabs at a thin pair of wrists, pushing them away.

"I'm okay, man, please, I'm fine."

"Oh, sure! Good, I am so sorry, dude, I'm like, not normally this much of a goober, but I was horsing around with my friends and being a goof and I almost flattened you and dude! I am so sorry!"

Jensen's jaw drops; he can't help it. The flailing whirlwind in front of him settles into some overgrown kid. Man? He's a tall boy—a bit thin, still growing maybe? Thick, gleaming hair stops short just above a pair of wide shoulders. He's wearing a beat up old leather coat, a bohemian-styled thing edged with embroidery and trimmed with hot pink fur, and Jensen's stunned; he can only think, "Oh."

Jensen lifts his eyes to the tall kid's face and gapes. Is he wearing lipstick? Yes, and eye shadow too, with glitter-dusted cheekbones that are too sharp for a kid his build. Jensen takes note again of how he smells really damn good.

The coat slides back from the kid's shoulders to show off a robin's-egg blue baby-doll shirt that stops well short of the waistband of his sinfully low-cut, skin-tight jeans tucked into scuffed cowboy boots. Jensen blushes. He has to stare at the guy's face to avoid looking at his body.

Even his damn eyes are pretty–comically wide, showing off green, blue, no—hazel irises. And perfect eyebrows. Jensen licks his lips, and wonders if he plucks them because no guy has eyebrows that nice. He plucks his own. Jensen just manages to stop himself from stroking an eyebrow, because he gets distracted by a beauty mark next to a slightly tilt-tipped nose that Jensen now has to fight to keep from reaching out and stroking. And dimples.

Oh god.

Jensen takes a huge breath, takes a huge step back, and shakes his head. "No." No, he can't go this way again. He can't step over the line.

Tall Boy's face falls. Dimples vanish. It bothers Jensen, the way the boy's mouth goes soft and he sucks his bottom lip in. Bothers Jensen a lot for some reason, along with the way the kid steps back so quickly, hands up like, 'look, I'm unarmed.'

"Sorry!" the kid says again, and that grin is back. He whirls and runs off to join the group of young people bunched up in the far end of the plaza. The way they arrange themselves near the doorways, but not blocking them, makes Jensen rethink his "students" tag for them. There's a look about them, the way they lean, obviously putting themselves on display.

Jensen shivers and walks on—but he risks a look back. The group had dispersed somewhat, and the tall boy was talking to a man who looks like Tall Boy's polar opposite. He throws his head back and laughs, and then curls their arms together before strolling off, a beautiful boy with a guy who might as well have been The Penguin.

Oh.

Jensen blinks, blinks again. Well, he was a bit of a fool today. A hooker. A streetwalker. Jensen has never seen a male streetwalker before. Watching the pink, fur trimmed jacket swing back and forth on Tall Boy's shoulders as he struts along, the way he twitches his hips, draws Jensen's eyes like a magnet. His heart stutters when he realizes where he's staring; squarely at the boy's ass, and now he wants to have that kid in front of him again. He wants to talk to him, see who he is.

No. No, he doesn't. Jensen shakes his head violently. He checks his watch and gasps. Now he's got no time to think of anything except catching the damn train.

Jensen turns into his driveway and sees that the lights are on. Walking up the drive, listening to ice crack beneath his heels, he slows while rubbing at his lips. He is not sure if the lights still being on means good or bad anymore.

Inside, he hangs up his coat, and sets his briefcase down on the bench in the foyer. With a lung-busting sigh, he plops down on the bench and yanks his shoes off. He's really tempted to fling them, but no. He tucks them beneath the bench, then reaches up to toss his scarf over the hooks lined up over the bench. That's the way Jeanette likes it. It's not like he doesn't like order and neatness himself, he likes knowing where things are. It's just sometimes Jeanette behaves as if neatness was a religion.

He leans back, eyes closed, and listens. He can hear the TV muttering in the living room, and every so often a soft laugh. Jean's awake. He's not sure if he wanted her to be.

Jensen hefts his briefcase and shuffles away from the living room towards the converted closet he calls his office. Ten minutes later finds him in the dining room, sitting down to burned fingers and a late dinner. He sets the dinner he pulled out of the oven onto a hot pad on the table and peels the foil back, then struggles to muffle a yowl, hissing like a pissed off cat. How the hell does he manage to forget, every damn time, how f*cking hot the foil gets?

He sits alone, feeling sorry for himself, sucking on his fingers and cursing silently. He could have had a TV dinner for less trouble than this. He fixes his plate with a skeptical eye. A TV dinner probably would have been as tasty as this dried-out plate of chops.

He was pouring himself a glass of water when he realizes he isn't hearing the babble of the TV anymore. The apartment is quiet, so quiet the sound of his cutlery hitting the china impacts like multiple gunshots. He opens eyes that had closed without him really being aware of it and Jeanette is there in the doorway.

"Oh, you're home. Hello."

She pulls at the shoulder of a filmy robe she's wearing over a matching gown. Slippers with little puffs of marabou leave flimsy bits on the carpet as she walks. Her hair's soft, natural, and piled up, held in place with a long barrette at the back of her neck. Her face is made up, subtle, except her eyes. Long lashes thick with mascara frame her eyes. Jensen can tell that it isn't fresh. She smells like soap and a wisp of Chanel #5. Almost reluctantly Jensen feels, along with some lingering suspicion, a touch of arousal.

It's never been hard with her, not in the beginning, not really even now, when they're more or less living two different lives, he thinks. It's the best way he can think of to describe them. Living their own private lives side-by-side.

"I am home, yes," he says with a smile.

After co*cktails, they make their way to the bedroom, trading kisses, hands sliding, holding, pressing all the points that each is well aware the other loves. He rides her pleasure home in their immaculate, just-like-a-showroom floor bedroom, carefully condomed and politely quiet.

"Damn it!"

His elbow hits something on top of the milk-crate side table that's not the phone. He instinctively snatches for, and grabs, the half-empty cup of takeout coffee. The cold, cloudy liquid inside sloshes back and forth, but thank goodness, is kind enough not to spill over the edge. He scoots back, as far as he can, and ends up jamming the other elbow into the wall.

"Ow! sh*t," he mumbles, rubbing at it. After a few minutes laying as spread out as possible for a six foot something guy on a twin bed mattress, he rolls over and kind of staggers upright. He skates forward a little, flailing at the air because he's stepped flat on a couple of sheets of the newspaper he'd thrown on the floor the night before.

Stumbling and cursing, he flails across the room until finally he manages to regain his balance. "Oh my f*cking god—" Wasn't he supposed to eventually grow out of that puberty-induced clumsiness? At least, that's what his momma used to say.

"Crap." Jared swallows down the little lump in his throat that thinking about his family always brings, just for a second. Then he shakes it off and grabs his bathroom kit from the stacked assortment of milk and fruit crates that serve as side table, bookcase, and utility cabinet.

"Let there be no showers with roaches or silverfish today. Amen." He inhales deeply, crosses himself, and heads for the communal bathroom, or as he likes to call it, Hell's Vestibule. In and out of it in less than ten minutes, longing for the day when he'd be able to take a shower that lasts longer than hair, face, pits, and ass. He's still wiping mouthwash off his chin as he bolts out of the door and back down the hall to their room—his room alone now, since his roomie took off.

Jared dances to Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy, shaking his ass in front of what he calls the closet, but is actually no more than a sort-of-dimple in the wall covered by a curtain. Jeans, of course. Though he does have these fabulous striped ones, and the ones with a flower covered panel up each side. Humm. No. It's a plain jeans day. Fishing around in a hatbox, he comes up with a belt that has an oversize leather buckle that's got BITCH burned into it. He smirks, running his finger over it, remembering blowj*bs in the park, late past midnight. It was supposed to have been an insult from a rejected suitor, but Jared kind of treasured it; a badge for refusing to hide who he was.

In the long run, being himself in his small, bigoted, Texas town got him a belt buckle and a bus ticket to parts as far away as he could get. And then landing here. But what the f*ck. Jared shrugs. "Say La Vee."

Speaking of treasure—Jared grabs a squat green bottle of cologne, a gift from a steady client who'd tossed it at him, wrapped in a fifty. He'd almost winged it back at the guy until he saw what it was. He taps a spritz at neck, chest and wrists, then a shot down the pants for good measure. Gives the bottle a little kiss before dropping it back on the box that serves as his vanity.

He shimmies into a pair of jeans, threads BITCH through the loops and pulls on a tiny striped polo shirt, waving his arms as he pushes them through the tiny armholes, in time to a last blast of trumpet and Bette's soaring voice calling out "Company B!"

f*ck, that bitch can sing.

Turning his ass to the mirror hanging over his 'vanity', he decides that it'll do. He flips a new record over onto the player before kneeling on the floor and looking through the pile of shoes on the closet floor, and singing his heart out. Who doesn't like The Dolls?

"Traayassh, go pick it up, take them lights awaaay—",

And speaking of The New York Dolls, he knows just what he's wearing today. Jared ends up fishing out a snappy pair of cowboy boots from the closet floor. Grinning, he shoots finger guns in the air, like a rough'em, tough 'em cowgirl. He's ready to ride, and all's right with the world.

Now that he's dressed, Jared rolls the window blind high so that some sunlight can creep in through the grimy windows. He pushes aside the screen that they'd used to separate the sleeping spaces before Jonas left. He'll shove it behind his bed later—it'll make a cute fake headboard.

Finally, after attaching a fresh ball of aluminum to the TV antenna (so he can pick up more than the local station), Jared slows down. Time for his morning cup of coffee.

The kettle whistles shrilly just as he thinks that, and he grins. "Thanks!" he tells the little battered pot because Jared thinks you should always thank the things that take care of you. He turns off the hotplate and slides the kettle off to a flat piece of slate he keeps on the Barbie doll-sized counter.

Humming to himself, he grabs a cup from the shelf over the sink and dumps a teaspoon full of coffee powder—freeze-dried, the best—and follows that with a spoon of dry creamer. "Damn it," He frowns when the spoon just scrapes across the top; the sh*t's dried out again. Jabbing his spoon into the jar a couple of times nets him a chunk of solidified creamer, and he dumps that in the hot water, followed that with one, two, ach, better make it three, spoons of sugar.

"Okay!" Jared snags one of the folding chairs that makes up almost all of the furniture and pulls it up to the counter, and finally, pokes through the plastic box that holds some of his food. Pop tarts this morning. "Apple? Or brown sugar? Brown sugar it is! You have such good taste," he praises himself.

He sips the coffee, crunches his tart, and balls up the empty bag to throw in the garbage can. "Yes! Score! Whatever," he yells as it arcs high through the air and down, where it hits the can's side and bounces out. Screw it. He turns back to his pile of boxes and turns on the TV. Thank you, Jonas, you cheap motherf*cker, at least you left this set behind with The List. Would have been nice if you'd paid your half of the rent before jetting.

Jared holds his hands up—"No, negativity," he mutters. "Good thoughts only." It was time for Sesame Street—god knows he needed his Big Bird fix before heading out for the day.

Checking his watch, he jumps up, snaps off the TV and grabs the coat hanging on the back of the door, a really cool yellow suede number trimmed with hot pink "fur" and heads out.

Five seconds later he's running back in the door, and grabbing the newspaper, crunchily folded to the "To Rent" section. He has got to get out of this closet. He'd sell his soul to be able to take a sh*t in peace.

So, thanks to f*cking Jonas, which, no, seriously, thanks, he's got an actual afternoon appointment with a guy who insists he wait for him in a diner a few blocks away. It kind of fits into his plans perfectly, since he had a couple of guys to meet, potential roommates, god willing. The diner was a nice, neutral place. Last thing he needed was some psycho following him back to his hovel.

Jared's on his second cup of coffee— f*cking 80 cents down—when the guy finally shows up. He's tall, thin, blonde and looks like he's been herding kittens all day.

Dropping down at the table, the guy groans. "Hey man, sorry 'bout this. Meeting ran long, and then some f*ck-up needed help and they're always f*cking sending me—anyway, I want my dick sucked. How's my car?"

"Your—car? I-uhm. Sure? Were you a regular of Jonas's? He said he gave a couple of guys my number?"

Jonas was his roommate, or he had been before he walked into their tiny-ass shoebox apartment one day and said "Yo, I quit. I'm going back to Jersey." At the time, Jared had wondered how that was better than where they were now, but he decided that maybe it didn't involve sucking dick for pay.

Now, here he was calling a closet home, and auditioning for some guy who wanted his dick sucked in his car. Jared does an internal shrug. Better than grinding his knees into the sludge in some dirty alley.

Man. He'd come to the city with nothing, no idea of how to support himself but he thought he'd find something, had even kind of thought maybe modeling. He had tall and skinny and not ugly going for him and he knew he'd have to work his way up. But without a portfolio and no recommendations, well, he might as well have scrawled "will suck dick for food" across his forehead.

But things are different now and Jared has something real to shoot for; he's going to community college. It's a lot of work and slow going at part time, plus still working at the sandwich shop which he'd viewed as a lucky break starting out but doesn't pay nearly enough. He'd been pretty desperate when he'd met Jonas, who always had a smile and some extra cash to spare. Jonas had been looking for a trustworthy roommate to get out of his current sleeping arrangement, and yeah. One damn thing led to another, and now here he is with Jonas' client list and maybe a way to get the f*ck out of the street.

And all this led to him sitting across from some guy named Chad in a diner whose clientele was mostly seniors or streetwalkers, depending on the time of day, and the menu was basic and cheap. Jared glances at the wrinkled piece of notepaper in his hand. Chad M. Murray. Kind of a dick. Grab the bread before. Count that sh*t. Jared looks up again. Chad was certainly a shifty looking motherf*cker.

"Jonas's regular? Yeah, pretty regular, I guess. Always had time for me when I called. Nice guy. Talented. Suck chrome off a bumper, y'know?" Chad looks everywhere but at Jared as he talks, scowling faintly.

"Um, yeah." Jared mumbles, and jerks back a bit when Chad finally looks at him—thrusts his hand out like it's after church or something.

"Chad, but you probably know that already. You're Jerret, right?"

"Jared, actually."

"Okay," Chad says, pumps his hand once and grins, and suddenly he's not quite so squirty-scowly, he's actually kind of not-bad looking. "So, what, you're brand new at this? Good you have a client list, means you don't have to deal with corner work. sh*t, I'm kinda hungry—Imma get a burger, you want one? Or do you not eat before, y' know—" And then this Chad guy makes a really straight-up gross hand movement and gagging sound. After a couple of shocked seconds Jared gets that he's acting out a really sh*tty blow j*b.

"Jezuz, can you be less subtle?" Jared asks and Chad laughs loud enough to stop traffic.

"Yep, I sure can. So, that's two burgers then?"

"If you're paying for it, hell yeah. Hope I can fit your no doubt massive dick in my throat after."

Chad ha-ha-s at the top of his lungs again, grinning fondly at Jared like he's just done the most adorable thing. It's really kind of disturbing.

"That's the spirit, Jerry. Hey," he yells at a passing waitress. "How 'bout two burgers? An' can I get a side order of rack with that?" He cups his hands at his chest and winks and Jared wonders if there's enough room to crawl under the table. If he folds himself in half, maybe. It was possible. Barely.

The waitress stops, still chewing emphatically on a wad of gum. She looks Chad up and down, throws a couple of wrinkled paper menus onto the table, inhales deeply.

"Y'know what you can, you can kiss my ass," she says, but it's said in a sort of good-natured way. Like Chad's a giant idiot puppy and she just can't take his sh*t seriously. Jared shakes his head.

The dude's a real charmer, for sure, and apparently open to some of everything.

A burger and co*ke later, Jared's in the back of Chad's car, lips wrapped around a pretty nice dick, swallowing spit and precome and groaning like it's the best thing he had in his mouth since—well, the burger earlier. Chad is groaning, hips twitching upwards.

"sh*t, I thought Jonas was good, but f*ck me, you're a f*ckin' master at this. Damn, boy."

Jared hums, like 'I know' and Chad grabs the edge of the seat. He might act like a jerk, but he's not trying to shove his dick into Jared's ass through his throat which Jared appreciates. He inhales, exhales, loosens his jaw, and takes as much as Chad into his throat as he can. He kind of expects Chad to get loud and frantic and grab his hair, p*rno style, but he just whines, "Ah sh*t" and comes.

A lot.

Jared swallows like crazy, and Chad keeps cursing under his breath.

After, they're both leaning against Chad's car, Jared chewing on a couple of sticks of doublemint, Chad smoking. He hands Jared a folded bunch of bills, and Jared mentally slaps himself. God damn it, the guy buys him a f*cking burger and he forgets everything. Jared tries to look casual as he thumbs through the bills and nods at Chad.

Chad says, "Listen, whattaya say we make this a regular thing, y'know? Like more regular than Jonas. Good guy, but I didn't need to see him that often. He was kind of boring once I got past the BJ."

In Jared's experience, there wasn't supposed to be anything past that except 'give me bread' and 'ciao'. Giving Chad a good, long look, he can't deny that weird as the guy is, they've kind of clicked in some way. Like, the guy is horrendous, but he manages to make Jared laugh while he's also making him cringe with embarrassment. Plus, steady bread? A day or two less on the street? f*ck yeah. He nods, and as he does that, looks in the front seat. There's a pink sweater rolled up in the passenger side, one of those women's magazines under it.

"Do you, unh, have a girlfriend? Or do you like, enjoy Cosmo and a nice sweater set?"

"Hunh?" Chad follows Jared's eye line. He rolls his eyes and waves Jared off. "Oh, that's my wife's stuff."

"Dude, are you married?"

Chad looks at him like Jared's asked if he wants to run down the street buck naked. "Yeah? So? 'Course I am."

Jared stares at him, like…"Course I am?"

"Jeez, Jareth, is this like your very first time? Are you some kind of streetwalking virgin? Hell, most of your johns are closeted married guys."

"Jared."

Jared thinks about it, poking at the small-town morals lingering in his head. Is it his problem? Is it his fault? He decides that hey, he's not dragging anyone out of their nice, straight little bedrooms to f*ck him. He hasn't got that much power, and everyone else's morals are not his worry.

"Okay. Here's my number. But first promise me you won't call me late at night to gossip about the dreamy new boy in class."

"Ha-ha, f*ck you dude. By the way," Chad says, getting into the car. "I'm deducting the cost of the burger from the next time."

"f*ck you!" Jared yells, then laughs. Chad.

Shaking his head, Jared strolls back inside the diner to wait for potential roomies.

Later on that afternoon, when he's booking it to meet up with a couple of the girls and to coordinate their stroll—safer in packs at night—it gets interesting. Like, very.

He's sprinting across the plaza towards their spot when his beautiful boots fail him. He slips, then slides across a wet patch of brick like he's DorothyHamill on ice and almost knocks a super f*cking hot piece of ass to the ground.

Oh, but f*ck me, he's so pretty. Jared's trying to balance the both of them and the guy shoves him away. Jared's a little confused by that action because pretty guy sure seems interested, the way he's looking Jared up and down, and his bright green eyes are on fire. Jared preens a little because it's not every day the David practically drops in his lap. This dude? Definitely gets a discount.

But out of the blue, heat drains out of Pretty's face so fast Jared wonders if he imagined it. Well, of course he did; always hoping for too much. He can tell by the way Pretty's plush, yummy mouth goes all tight. Ugh, he's got it pursed up like people do when they put two and two together and come up with whor*.

Jared glares at Pretty. Not a whor*. Self-employed sex worker, thank you. And this, this, person. who has the nerve to scope him out like he's interested, gives him an absolute pickle-face. Jared can't even make a move before Mr. Formerly Pretty jumps back from him like he's contagious, shaking his head and giving him a freaked out, "No."

'No? Mary, no one asked you', Jared thinks, about to read him for filth—but then he remembers the manners he'd learned in his youth. Besides, Pretty is too f*cking hot, so Jared just holds his hands up like, 'look, I come in peace' and sings out, "Sorry!" before smirking at him and running off to catch up with his crew. f*ck him.

It's warmer than it needs to be in this place, but Jensen's used to it now. He's got his coat folded over next to him on the bench as a clear signal: leave me alone. This is his time, and he desperately needs it, in this place he's come to think of as his own. In an increasingly disorderly world, it's an island of peace.

Which, really, is horribly pathetic since it's only a tiny, narrow, old-fashioned diner with wooden floors that sound hollow when you walk across them, and worn leather benches patched with duct tape. Whose clientele he 's fairly certain are prostitutes in the morning and losers like himself at night. He smiles wryly, lifts the thick, crockery cup full of what was probably the best coffee in the city.

He thumbs a drip of coffee off his bottom lip and watches traffic pass by. Where he sits, the wall of big, old, air-leaky windows feel so close to the sidewalk outside it's like he's in the street.

Jensen's finishing up the remains of a slice of pie while eyeing the phone between the restrooms. He'd called earlier to let Jeanette know he'd be late, but he really hadn't planned on being this late. He kind of lied a little bit, told her it was a work thing, when really he just has a need to be here. Being not-Jensen for a bit. Just being that guy in booth four, the one who eats a burger with cheese, small fries and a small co*ke and endless coffee every time. He knows all the girls by name and tips like he's Rockefeller, or so he's overheard. He's smiling at the thought when a laugh rings out, so boisterous it makes him jump.

He recovers by gulping more coffee, snorts softly when he lowers his cup again. What a laugh that guy has, whoever he is. Hell, Jensen just has to smile; it's loud, free as hell, and makes his belly shiver pleasantly. He lifts his eyes. Curious, he wants to find the source of that laugh.

It's a young kid—man, he supposes. Judging by his build and the style of his clothes, maybe late teens, early 20s? Not really all that much younger than him. Long hair, just brushing his shoulders. Jensen grimaces—most long-haired men have greasy, unkempt-looking locks. But not this kid; his hair shimmers in smooth, bronze-and-chocolate waves to his shoulders. Jensen mentally pulls himself back.

There will be no stepping over that line he drew in college.

But he can't keep from looking over, glancing around in a way that's meant to appear casual. Not that anyone in the diner is looking; he could probably stand on the table buck-naked and this crowd would only roll its eyes. It's part of what he likes about the place. He'd describe it as…a benign indifference. Jensen lays an arm across the back of the bench, nods when the waitress catches his eye. One more cup and then he's hitting the road. In the meantime, he's pretending like he's not picking up scraps of conversation the kid's having with some blond in a suit.

"Oh my god, you are truly an asshole!"

Jensen snorts softly again, dropping his eyes to his refilled cup then " No, I'm not cheating" he thinks he hears. Oh man, is he inadvertently listening in on a soap? He doesn't catch the rest, but clearly hears "So, she's cool with you and prostitutes" and Jensen jumps.

Suddenly the kid shifts, turns so he's facing the aisle and waves down a waitress. Jensen almost chokes when he sees who it is. Oh my god, he knows this guy. Well, he doesn't know him, but this is the guy who almost wiped him out a few months back, nearly knocked him on his ass. The beautiful one, slips out before he can clamp that box in his mind shut.

"Jesus…" Jensen grabs his stuff and drops ten bucks on the table. it's more than he owes but he needs to leave, like, now. This instant.

Except, damn it, the kid sees him, and Jensen sees the moment the kid recognizes him. 'Oh wait, hold on, he recognizes me,' Jensen thinks, and swallows hard. God, his face must be so red. He can feel his cheeks burning like fire and it makes his gut twinge. But he can't stop himself, despite how horribly embarrassed he is–it's like a compulsion. He turns back and smiles. How can he help but smile at the kid? And the kid smiles back, kind of twiddles his fingers in, f*ck, the cutest wave, like,I see you.

Jensen gulps. I see you too. Kind of waves back, almost chokes himself as he twirls his scarf around his neck while also flinging his briefcase strap across his chest.

He escapes out the door.

Chapter 2 Chapter Text

"Oh my god, you are truly an asshole!" Jared crows. He knows Chad is just too-too, but he can't help it, the ass has somehow managed to crawl under his skin to become something like a friend, not just a job. Not that he'd give Chad a discount to save his life.

Chad, meanwhile, is wolfing down a pastrami sandwich, dripping Russian dressing on the files scattered across the tabletop, wiping it off with the heel of his hand. He mutters, "f*ck, think they'll notice that?" then louder, "No, I'm not cheating. We have an arrangement; she doesn't mind if I get dates once in a while. As long as I don't get, like, emotionally involved."

"So, you're telling me she's cool with you f*cking it you pay for it because feelings would mean you're cheating? Your wife actually said those words?"

Another plop of Russian accents Chad's answering snort; this time he gathers it up on his finger and sucks it off.

"Were you listening? What did I just say? Yeah."

Jared drops back against the bench seat, his boot heels knocking against the diner's wooden floor as he suddenly sits upright.

"Dude, I'm worried about you and your wife—no scratch that, I'm reeeeally worried about your wife. And a little bit about you."

"Chill, dude, it works. Though, okay, if she knew about you, she'd probably freak." Chad shrugged, staring pointedly out the window while sucking up the crushed ice left in his glass.

"Because you like me?" Jared asks, stretching his leg out to kick at Chad's shoe. He ignores Chad cursing "motherf*cker, these are brand new Florsheims" and hooks his foot, ankle to ankle, with Chad's. "Also, honey, since you like me so much, get me another coffee. We still on for Friday afternoon, right?"

Chad looks a little confused at this sudden shift towards business. "Unh yeah, me and my dick will be there. Your jerk-*ff roommate is gone for the whole weekend right? Damn, I need a serious-ass drillin'." he says and then snorts laughter, "Hey—ass, drilling, you get—"

"Yes, bitch, please. f*cking comedy gold." Jared shifts in the booth, looking over his shoulder to wave down a waitress and holy f*cking sh*t, it's the guy! 'Oh my god. It's my Mr. Pretty.'

Okay, so Jared has seen him once or twice since then, but always from a distance. Every once in a while, he just happens to catch sight of him so—okay, okay, he's almost stalking him, so sue him. Like, in a long-distance and peeking around the corner kind of way. Jared's initial pissed-offness at what he thought was the guy being a jerk has kind of worn away. Now, his picture of those co*ke-bottle green eyes is somewhat different. Like they're not full of repulsion. Now when he pictures the day he almost clocked him, he sees that Mr. Pretty's eyes are kind of sad.

In fact, Jared has constructed an entire life for Mr. Pretty. Married young, church-going, naive and closeted of course, too afraid to live his real life. Probably picks up guys, like, maybe not that often, just a little sin, enough to take the edge off before hopping the train back to his suburban split-level, picket fence, Valkyrie blonde of a wife and two kids, probably an AKC pup to beat.

Jared sighs. He's actually never seen any indication that the guy's hanging around the market, but a boy can dream. He watches Mister jump to his feet, drop money on his table and slither into his coat, pausing to let people go past in the miniscule aisle space.

Their eyes meet and Jared's got a second to decide if he's going to duck his head, pretend Mister's not there. Instead, Jared gives him the biggest smile he can, dimples and all, and Miss Thing, he knows how good he looks when he smiles.

Ah! Mister Pretty blushes the reddest red a human can blush! He jerks his head away, and then, slowly turns back, and Jared gets a smile that, holy f*ck, melts him right down to his socks. Jared gulps, and raises a hand to twiddle his fingers in some kind of f*cked-up wave 'thank you brain for flying out of town just when I need you'.

Mister wraps an, oh nice, Burberry scarf around his neck, gives Jared the tiniest incline of his head and is gone.

"Wow, sh*t, was that a john? Damn. You think you can talk him into a three-way?"

"No, slime ball, he's just a guy who thinks I'm cute. I think." Jared frowns faintly as he watches Mister hurry down the street. At least today his shoulders are back and he's watching the street instead of his shoes. Jared hopes he's having a good day.

Breakfast—actual breakfast, not just grabbing a coffee and a bagel—with Chad is rare. But here they are, in a slightly more upscale diner with tiled floors and plastic-coated menus; eating eggs, hash-browns, and yummy sausage. His cup's full of French roast coffee, and it's his birthday. In honor of that he's wearing a big straw hat, a rhinestone crown pin he'd found in one of the thrift stores on the street pinned to a tube top he'd also found there, and a pair of jeans with the legs cut off and the ass out—but tastefully so.

Jared is f*cking grateful for Chad taking him to breakfast; he'd woke up hungry as f*ck. The night before had been a supposed dinner date with the only other one of Jonas's regular clients that he'd hung on to because he was old and stinking rich. The better part of their arrangement was that they didn't always have sex sex and he still got paid. Sometimes he just had to—ew—rub his feet, sometimes just jerk off in front of him and call him Daddy. And sometimes it's this weird f*cking thing where Creepy Daddy, or more like Gramps, takes him to "dinner" and then watches Jared not eat the food. He's supposed to pick at it, push it around his plate and not want it—meanwhile the whole time his gut's screaming for something to fill it besides water and a slice of bread.

Creepy Gramps is one weird motherf*cker. He f*cking gets off on imagining Jared is starving himself. Jared shrugs. Money is money and getting paid not to eat was better than sucking ancient dick. Anyway, he's a world-class asshole, unlike Chaddy, who plays at being one. After all, look who's buying him the full breakfast. He even got a birthday card.

Jared lazily swirls a spoon through his coffee and wonders if Chad stole the card. He'd hardly be surprised if he had.

So, Creepy Gramps and Chad, and the corner. He'd had such high hopes in the beginning, but Jonas's clients drifted. Now, except for Chad and Creepy Gramps, Jared's back on the street. Still, he's got a reliable bunch of repeats there and none of them are really too, too awful. Could be worse. He's got an apartment–small, but not the roach motel he'd lived in with Jonas. Roommate's decent enough—they're not friends but they don't exactly hate each other either. Jared makes sure he's never late on the rent and keeps their joint spaces clean.

But time is marching on, honey, and when he looks in the mirror, it's plain he's not going to pass for underage much longer, not even in the dark—he's middle school skinny, but almost six two and judging by Padalecki genes, he might have a few more inches to go. His jaw's getting wider, his shoulders too. Thank goodness he still has a tiny waist. Sets off his basket just right. Jared laughs to himself before remembering he was bemoaning the loss of his pretty boy looks.

f*cking corner. f*cking chicken hawks. What kind of world is this when Chad's the only half-way normal guy he sees?

Jared sighs, rubs his tongue against the tines of his fork. Twenty-two now. Sitting in a diner with a f*cking trick on his birthday. No, no, that's not fair—Chad's more than a trick. He's almost, sort of, a friend. Ish.

Chad looks up from his side of the table, tucking a pen behind his ear and picking up the paperwork he uses to justify his two-hour long lunch breaks, shaking some crumbs away.

"Howdya you like those eggs? Nice place, right? Me looking out for my birthday boy."

"Oh yes, baby. You take care of me so good," Jared says in the breathy Monroe voice he reserves for when Creepy Gramps drops his pants. Chad rolls his eyes and flips him off. "Chad-ala, the birthday boy wants more toast. And jam. Oooo, and some more of the fresh-squeezed OJ."

"Damn bottomless pit. Next time we're doing your birthday at a hot dog stand, bitch."

Jared snorts. It's sweet Chad plans on being in the picture next year. Anyway, twenty-two years old and it's time to get real about the future, like, the fact he wants one. He's been lucky so far. He's had no real trouble, at least nothing he hasn't been able to handle. He's clean—absolutely never without rubbers and he's had to back that up once or twice with fists, f*cking perverts. Outside of the street work, he's been taking a few classes at the community college and thinking of the degree he'll have when he's done, maybe go on to a BA in graphic design. That would help with his dream of being this town's Candy Pratts Price, not that he's quite sure how yet. Jared wants things, and he needs money to get there, and he might just have an idea about how to go about getting it.

An escort service has made him an offer. He can be older as an escort—college age, his real age. He'd make more money. Hell, he's smart, he's entertaining, so why the f*ck not? It's time he did something real with his life. Like making his dream job come true. He wants so much to be a window dresser; a designer of hot, on trend, fabulous displays for Macy's or Gimbels or Gyre Bros.

There's just one tiny problem with being an escort. He wants to be his own boss, not hand over half his bread to someone else. He needs a partner, someone cool, who gets it, someone like....

"Chad, sweetie, nummy-chops, you know, I've kind of been thinking about the future. Like, college, getting a degree and all, and that means more—"

"Forget it," Chad says, waving Jared away. His squinty eyes went even squintier under his caterpillar eyebrows, the bitch. "I'm not coughing up more bread. Let the other johns take that up."

Jared tosses his fork back onto his plate, ignoring the clash of sound and Chad jumping back with a curse. Oops, looks like a bit of egg yolk splashed. Thank god that tie is the same ugly yellow….

"Okay, first of all, Miss Thing," he snaps his fingers in Chad's face. "You. Are. Cheap. As. f*ck. And second of all...sh*t. No second. Ain't no other johns right now." Jared drops his head and shrugs. "Well, there are," he says, and grimaces. "Just, you're my only regular. Well, and that other guy, the one I don't like."

Chad perks up. "So, you do like me? Hunh." Shooting Jared a sleazy grin, he says, "Flattered, dude, but I'm still not paying more."

"Oh my god—look, bear with me please, I'm thinking out loud here. I just—I want off the street altogether. I want a steady income, more control over how I make what I make. Escorts make more than hookers on the street. I look good—"

"Modest," Chad smirks, going after the easy joke, and then a second later, "Escort? You?"

"f*ck you. You know I'm hot and classy when I wanna be. You have friends. I'm sure some of them might want a different kind of dance once in a while. Right? So, let them know. We set up dates. You get a cut." Jared ends in a wheedling tone of voice.

"What the f*ck? You want me to be your pimp?"

Jared crosses himself—Lord, thank you for not letting this fool scream "Ima pimp" across this diner. at least not until he's finished breakfast.

"Drop a coupla decibels, will you please, Miss Beverly Sills? No, I don't want a pimp. I want to be in charge. You'll be...don't know? Manager? Handler? Something not too skeevy if you can manage that?"

"So, no full-length mink coat, then? Damn, I'd look good in one of those hats, too. If I help you, you gonna be nicer to me?"

"No."

"sh*t. Okay. Come up with some kind of plan. I'll look at it."

Chad sits back and tips a cigarette out of the pack in his shirt pocket, makes a production of lighting it before blowing a smoke ring into Jared's face. Jared bats it away, flicks him the finger. He's a bit annoyed, so it takes a second for what Chad said to percolate through his brain.

"What? For real? Just like that?"

"I like you, Jared. You keep treating me like sh*t, but I like you and I want to help you out, in a way that doesn't cost me a fortune. 'Cause you're a good guy. Does that make you like me any better?" he asked, a soft smile playing around his lips.

"No. You're still a penny-pinching size queen." Jared reaches across the table, snatches Chad's cigarette and puffs out his own smoke ring.

"You are such a bitch," Chad laughs so hard his eyes disappear. "Ah well, f*ck, you are offering to make me some money; that's almost a win/win situation. But you still suck, Jay-rad."

"Mmmm. If you have time and an extra fifty, yeah I do."

"Oh my god, I just bought you birthday brunch!"

"For eggs and hash browns, I give you a handy but stop halfway through."

"Oh, f*ck you!"

"I love you too, baby-doll."

"Humph."

When they meet at the plaza in a week, Jared has cobbled together something like a business plan, and Chad has a tentative list of friends—and some of their friends, who'd been interested.

Jared thanks Chad for helping him on the way to an actual future and walks off smiling. At the corner he catches sight of Mister Pretty, who's looking completely f*ckable this fine afternoon, decked out in a long, dark coat. It's a gorgeous, Jimmy Dean, classic kind of look, and Jared can't help staring. Oh but no, the poor thing is holding a slightly ragged looking bouquet, and his expression is too, too sad. Before Jared can look away, Mister Pretty meets his eyes.

It's a movie moment, a romance-novel chapter; Jared feels like he's suddenly become the princess in a Walt Disney movie, or maybe Marilyn Monroe stepping over a subway grate. No, like taking a sip of rum and getting a punch to the back of the head at the same time.

"Oh my stars."

Mister Pretty looks down at the bouquet, then up at Jared. He's smiling; such a sweet, gentle smile, and he makes a move, like he's going to take a step, but stops. That's okay, Jared doesn't mind taking the first step. He trots over to meet him.

"Hi there!"

"I...hello. I'm. I was going to…" Mister shakes the bouquet a little and multi-color petals rain onto the street.

Jared stares at the shower of petals and dried leaves. He covers his mouth, horror-struck and lets his eyes go wide. Okay, he's camping it up a little; it's too cute, the way it makes Mister blush and bite his lip trying not to smile. Jared fans himself in his mind. Lord.

He points at the sad little bouquet and tsks.

"Tell me those are not for your wife? Oh my god, these poor things have had a very hard life. You might want to pick something, I don't know, a bit peppier?"

"Yeah," Mister Pretty breathes out a soft laugh that sends a shiver right down Jared's spine. "Suppose so. Maybe I'll take her to dinner instead."

"Oh, that sounds good. I mean, who doesn't like eating? Not me! I mean, I do like to eat. I'll eat just about anything." Oh. My. God. Jared feels like an absolute, blithering fool, but refuses to shut up. He's shoved his foot in his mouth, at this point, he might as well swallow it. He just keeps smiling. "Okay, well, enough of my dietary habits. I'm just going to get out of your way now. Time to go to work."

"Oh," Mister says, "Oh, right, you, you, the, umm..." he kind of winds down and Jared's torn between laughing and feeling a bit insulted.

"Yeesss, the Umm. Well." Jared nods. "So. See you around?" He looks at Mister from under his fringe. Smiles slowly as Mister Pretty gulps and blushes even darker and then nods kind of reluctantly. It's like he doesn't want to see Jared, but kind of does too—and then he shoves the bouquet towards Jared.

"Take these?" Mister asks, and then says "Please?" Like Jared would be doing him a favor. "I've seen you around—well, you already know that." He laughs, and Jared feels like he's just ascended into the heavens and angels have sprinkled him with moon dust. Or like a hit of that f*cking wicked hash Chad shared with him a couple of nights ago.

"Ah, okay, sure, sure." Jared's head is bobbing up and down like one of those dashboard dogs as he takes the offering and babbles. "Jared. I mean, thank you, my name is Jared. Jared Padalecki."

Mister Pretty bites his lip and again, Jared gets that spine tingle, and also one right under his belt. Oh god, if he had his mouth on that lip, he'd suck the hell out of it. Before migrating lower to suck some more, lord.

"Jared...Padalecki?" Mister says, points on getting it right the first time. "Wow, what a mouthful."

Well, there's no way Jared can just leave that lying there. "Oh, you bet. And so's my name."

There's a few seconds of total silence, long enough for Jared to worry that maybe, he's stepped over some invisible line, and then Jensen is laughing—no, he's howling, bent over at the waist and everything. Poor boy, it must have been a long time since he's had a laugh, because it wasn't that funny. Jared's cheeks hurt from smiling, enjoying Jensen's enjoyment.

"Wooo," Jensen breathes out as he straightens again, rubbing his hand down his face. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry. I'm so embarrassing," he chuckles. "Jensen Ackles."

Mister—Jensen—holds his hand out, and Jared stares at it before wrapping his own hand around it. Jensen's so warm, he thinks, his hand's so soft. And nicely manicured, quelle surprise. Jared's a little shocked he got a name in return, which proves Jensen's a real human being and not a lost angel after all. Jared squeaks, "Jensen Ackles?"

"Hey, I know." Jensen shrugs as he gives Jared a half-smile. Now that he's closer, Jared can see the freckles under that rosy blush. "Jensen Ackles—weird, right? But yeah, that's me." He glances at his watch and double-takes. "Oh, darn! I've got to run, gotta get the train—s'long!" and he's gone.

Jared stands there, mushing his face into the flowers while his whole soul floats up into the clouds. Mister Pretty has a name! "Jensen, Jensen Ackles" he hisses quietly to himself. God, and it's so damn sexy too, just like him. Jared lowers the flowers and frowns. Everything about this was a positively amazingly perfect meet cute—except for a wife in the picture.

"Oh well, Say-La -Vee." he shrugs and walks off with his free flowers.

All My Children is muttering on the big TV in the background as Jared's knees slide a little against the bed sheets—nice sheets, smooth as glass, dotted with green and orange flowers and they smell like nothing but clean. Fabulous. He shuffles a little, trying to bunch the sheets under his knees to gain traction.

"Oh, oh, fuu-uck…'

Chapter 3 Chapter Text

Jared's in the kitchen, rummaging around in the box marked with a J. It's his little stash of terribly unhealthy, but delicious-and-good-for-the-soul food, muttering to himself, "Cupahnoodles…Pop Tarts...hmm, puddin' cups. Combos? Maybe Bugles?"

He frowns at the box of Bugles and thinks he really should stop being lazy and cook a healthy meal. An omelet maybe, veggies and cheese. He's got a pack of ham somewhere in the fridge and he can cut the slushy bits off the green peppers. He picks one up and peers at it, weighing whether it has any nutritional value left. It's wrinkled and blotchy and dimpled in an ugly way, and reminds him too much of his high school disciplinarian, the bitch. He wings it into the trash. Enh. Today's not an omelet day.

His roommate, Zack, wanders in, yawning and scratching his little belly, furry treasure trail revealed by the sad, baggy, boxer shorts he was wearing. Oh my god, whose grandpa did he steal those boxer shorts from? But Jared has a kind heart, and keeps that thought to himself. No, he'll tease the sh*t out of Zack later, when he's fully awake.

Zack gives Jared a bleary look—late nights shifts blending into early morning rising to study is beating his roomie's ass. Jared tsks over the purplish circles under the boy's Bambi eyes, dark copper skin doing nothing to hide them. Jared pencils in a mental note to get Zack to chill a bit with him and Chad.

"Yo. You're not working tonight, JP?"

"Actually, I just got in from work, so, good morning, Stickybuns."

Zack giggle-snorts in response. He really is a total sweetheart. He yawns wide and heads for the teapot and his godawful instant coffee.

"Don't know about tonight yet, waiting for a call," Jared says, jerking his chin at the green phone hanging near the fridge.

He really does like Zack; he's a non-judgmental dude with a sweet personality, and despite dressing like his parents were hippies, actually has pretty good taste, which he shows by letting Jared do whatever he wants to their space, decor-wise. Such an improvement over the last roomie—the one whose spine was a broom stick shoved up his ass. God, what a mistake that had been. Creep had acted as if Jared had hid his whorish ways just to get a room. Which is word for word what the asshole had said when Jared tossed him the last month of rent.

Jared scoffs a bit. Yeah, Zack is a f*cking dream baby compared to that toad; this place is nicer, he's got an en suite, so Jared doesn't even have to share a bath. For seventy-five a month, he's got peace and privacy and a locking door on his bedroom. Heaven.

Ugh. Screw cooking, he's just gonna go with Frosted Flakes. And skim milk, so he doesn't feel completely guilty. He'd juggling the cereal and a bowl just as the phone rings—twice, then silence. Chad's goofy "secret signal".

Zack snorts again as he grabs the bowl and cereal from Jared's hands, rolls his eyes when the phone rings again. "Why does he do that?" Zack asks, and Jared shrugs and laughs.

"Have you met the boy? Don't you know his life is a movie, starring the famous Chad Skywalker?" Jared asks, eyes wide and hand spread on his chest. Zack shakes his head, snickering as he walks out, and Jared swings around to grab the phone. "Hola," he sings out. "Date night?"

"Yeah. Clark Kent, seven pm at the Overlook. He'll have the room."

"Chad! Stop calling the hotel the Overlook! And stop acting like the phone is bugged." Jared feels a little guilty when Chad mutters a definitely put-out 'sorry', so his tone's a bit sweeter when he says, "Thanks. How's the rest of my week looking?"

"Not bad. Let's meet up at the diner and we'll talk. And by talk, I mean a blowj*b."

"What a surprise. Hounddog." It really was, though. Since working together, they hook up less and less. Jared really doesn't mind; with sex out of the equation, Chad's more like a friend now, and Jared needs that more than he needs the cash. Not that he's gonna blow him for free later. A girl has her standards.

Evening rolls around, and Jared gets ready; shower, hot as he can take it, a thorough shave from chin to toes, with a little light trimming in between, a compromise between baldy and fluffy pubes. A little light plucking of the brows—thank the lord he was blessed with good ones—then moisturizer, tinted face cream, the barest dusting of glittery blush, just a whisper, and a tinted gloss, again just a whisper.

He stares at himself in the mirror, looking himself over critically: slightly tilted hazel eyes, greenish, blueish, depending on the light and his mood. He's been told they look fox-like. It wasn't a compliment, but now he likes that they do. He rubs a hand down his nose. He used to hate how it tilted up, 'ski-slope nose', his mom used to call it, 'too pointy.' Just another aspect of his face he's grown to like, like his dimples and his cupid's bow lips. People used to point out all those little parts of his face to make him feel bad about himself, but now, he loves them, moles and all. It all makes him him.

Jared shakes his head, flinging his hair around his face, then pulls fingers through it until it settles the way he wants. He looks, judging, before smiling.

"Bitch, you look good."

Today, he tones down his look slightly, going with jeans, wide-collared shirt, a chest-hugging vest. He tends to do this on a new date; the client will let him know what he wants after.

He's ready for the night now—and kind of upbeat about it. He likes sex, likes having it, and the guys he has it with these days aren't bad. He mostly has control over what happens, when and how, unlike the streets. And now, the difference is he's finally able to work whole-heartedly towards an end goal. Life could be worse.

Tom
Jared's leaning against the room's door, knocking softly. "Come on, angel cakes, it's JJ; let me in," he whispers, and seconds later, the door creaks open and like always only opens enough to show a sliver of eye, cheek, chin, as Tom peeks out the door like the entire vice squad is going to leap out, gasoline and matches in their hands, champing at the bit to roast the queers. Jared has no idea why dear Mr. Welling insists on doing this to himself. It's annoying and Jared gets kind of impatient with the same damn dance week after week. But dough is dough, and Thomas Welling is f*cking loaded, so Jared parks his annoyance at the door.

Tom looks him up and down as he struts in the door. It's a look that in a tiger would mean mealtime, but Tom is generally careful not to step over the line; he toes it hard, but never scoots over. If he toes it too much, he makes up for it by being extra nice—the "Clark Kent" Chad describes him as.

"You look really good tonight, JJ," Tom says, and Jared grins, does a campy little turn, ending with a hand on his hip and his package nicely on display in his skin-tight, super low-cut jeans. He does a little shimmy–it's kind of like his signature move–then leans back on his heels. His platform boots he chose this evening makes him ten feet tall. Or at least three inches taller than Thomas. That little shimmy also made sure his meticulously trimmed treasure trail is visible, running like a guideline from under the knotted hem of his T-shirt to point down at the goods.

Tom grits his teeth and, holy sh*t, Jared thinks, did he just growl? Then Tom balls his hands and breathes deep.

"Yeah, like really f*cking good, damn. For me, right?"

"Thank you, Baby, I'm glad you like. And of course this is just for you tonight." Jared grins, sweeping the newsboy cap he's wearing off and across the room. He likes the way he looks too, and the BITCH buckle sits proud right over his dick, of course. Despite what Tom wants to think, Jared's got no problem dressing semi-butch for him, just like he has no problem imitating Bowie, or Johnnie Cash, or who the f*ck ever the client wants. If it freaks out the straights, that's just a perk.

Tom circles him like a hungry hyena, trailing his fingers around Jared's waist, just barely skimming the waistband. It tickles, in an irritating way.

"So, I know we usually do dinner and sh*t, but I'm really kinda horny, JJ, How 'bout you?"

Tom has got the most beautiful blue-green eyes, full lips and a wide jaw that sets them off perfectly. With black hair and those eyes, he's really hot looking, not to mention built like a brick sh*thouse. It's just his personality got arrested somewhere around grade ten. Whatever he does for a living, it can't possibly involve sparkling conversation. Jared flicks those thoughts away. He's not getting paid to f*ck Tom's personality. All in all, he's an easy hundred bucks: a decent f*ck, and sometimes they watch TV after, or talk sports or music over pizza. And on those rare occasions that iron control slips, holy sh*t, he's a monster in the sack, and sometimes, even creative. Jared makes sure he gets a good tip after, because he's usually too sore for the next few days. No biggy.

Before Jared answers him, Tom stalks up and grabs his BITCH belt buckle, shakes it.

"You know what—don't care. Get on the bed."

Oh, you f*cker! So it's gonna be one of those nights. Jared pulls his T-shirt over his head, throws it to the floor, then unbuckles BITCH. He plops his ass on the floor, legs spread wide and Tom's eyes zero in on his crotch. Jared smirks, and yanks his platforms off one by one, then flops flat on his back, bucks his hips up and starts to peel off his jeans.

Tom's watching this little bit of theater like a parched man about to dive in a lake. damn, I shoulda been an actor,' Jared thinks as he makes a big production of squirming out of his jeans. He crawls upright, showing off the tiny silk panties he's half-hard in, head of his dick peeking out over the lacy top.

Tom, on the other hand, is iron-rod hard and practically ripping his own clothes off.

"Oh, f*ck," he groans. "Red lace? You're f*ckin' killing me, JJ."

Jared leers at him.

"Oh, you like, baby?" he asks, running his thumbs under the lacy waistband. It was hard as hell to find a pair of panties in his size. His balls barely had room, but luckily his tiny hips fit in a big girl's pair.

Naked, Tom drops to his knees and licks and sucks the front of them, soaking the red silk and bringing Jared to full hardness.

"f*ck, work that dick," he hisses, because Tom likes some chit-chat while he works. Tom grunts, and his hips punch the air before he dives back in, all sloppy and wet like the greedy little bitch he is.

Tom works the panties down with his mouth and fingers, stopping every few seconds to suck the tip of Jared's dick. It turns Jared on to no end, the way Tom starts out all pinch-faced and reluctant, and ends up absolutely f*cking desperate to get in his ass. Tom pulls off with a heartfelt groan, eyes closed, tears leaking at the corners, his mouth soft and open. Looks like a martyred saint—except for the drool dripping off his chin. Jared's hips twitch. One day, he's gonna get this trick to let him come on his face.

Tom leaps up, yanks Jared to the bed and tosses him on it. "Take 'em off, hands and knees."

"Okay, Angel Cakes. But rubber first." As if he'd let this closet queen f*ck him raw.

"Yeah, okay," and Tom digs a rubber out of the bedside table drawer, along with a slim tube of lube. Chad's buddy is on his business—it's him that stocks the drawers. Jared knows there's a couple of sets of towels in the bathroom, and sheets to change the bed, a laundry bag to stuff them in. It's Jared's job to f*ck 'em and clean up after. And for that, he makes a cool two hundred. One hundred of that gets split with Chad and his buddy, but the rest is his. Some weeks he's taking five hundred clear, what with the occasional extra that he pockets.

Not bad at all. Chad is underpaying himself, but his bud is making more than enough to keep his mouth shut.

"Yew-ouch!" Great, thanks, dude; that felt like getting a tank shaft shoved up my ass. f*cking Tom, so impatient. He does stop for a second to let Jared adjust, then pounds on when Jared gives him the high sign. Just like he thought, it's gonna be one of those nights.

Tom's pretty big, and Jared feels the heat and width of him as he shoves every f*cking inch up inside. Tom pulls back until just the crown is hooked inside him, and Jared can't help but groan; his asshole does love that stretch. He's concentrating on nothing but the feeling of big, fat dick punching back inside him, blocking out everything but that, when suddenly his lovely, blank, f*ck-me-f*ck-me space is invaded by images of Jensen. It's Jensen who's holding him, Jensen's dick spreading him wide. He sees Jensen bending over him, dripping sweat on his shoulders, gasping, digging in deeper and grinding.

Jared yells and curses, gets his hand on his own dick. Tom grunts, digs his nails deep into Jared's hips and twists—

Jared barely squeezes his dick before come floods his hand, shoots up his wrist, drips all over the sheets. He's got a mouthful of pillowcase he nearly bites a hole in. He kind of hates how hot that piercing twist of nails in his skin was.

Tom drops back on his heels, still straddling Jared, his finger and thumb locked around the base of his dick and the rubber. His face is bright red and he's breathing like a bull. Jared groans and Tom's dick jerks. "Ah, f*ck, seriously JJ, you're gonna kill me one day."

"Sure, Sugar, so long's you're not in the saddle when it does," Jared laughs. "C'mon baby, let me up now. Gotta shower."

"Okay. Money's in the drawer." Tom rolls off, and lays there, staring at Jared, looking f*cked out and slightly confused or something, but hello, not Jared's problem. He has no idea what's going on in that closet of Tom's and doesn't really want to know. He punches Tom's arm softly, and rolls out of bed.

It had been a decent day, truly. But thank the lord, it's finally over, and not only over but the day had ended more or less on time. Any time a Monday ran that smoothly was a miracle. That they were way ahead on the newest promotion was a double miracle, meaning Wednesday would be a breeze and he'd be able to catch up on paperwork. Jensen's step picks up as he counts out the other pluses to a good day—Morgan was happy, Michael was happy, Glover's some emotion that for him passes for happy….

Jensen himself is, well, not unhappy. Even with today's pluses he feels just slightly...blah? Gray? And the thought of going home makes him feel the kind of gray that not even the sun streaking through the buildings can break up. Just the thought of spending another nearly silent, so-very-civil night with Jeanette, sipping Tom Collins and watching PBS, fills him head to toe with a cloudy kind of blankness that's almost like dread. Another night where his only other choice besides PBS and silence is to close himself up in his closet-dash-office.

Or maybe, he thinks, tonight they'll pull out TV trays, and watch Mash during dinner instead. Not really a hardship, he thinks. Mash features his favorite TV character: BJ Hunnicut, who's kind of, well, hot actually. Tall, a nice build, with big hands and a great smile. And he's funny, and he's kind—Jensen thinks he might possibly be his type. And yes, Jensen's brave enough these days to quietly admit, to himself, in the privacy of his mind, that he might not be as ruler-straight as he wants to be.

Jensen walks on a few more steps before letting out a startled laugh.

"Oh my god," he moans out loud. BJ reminds me of Jared, or vice versa. Just a little. Maybe BJ's the hint of an older Jared to come.

"Oh, wow, you do know how to laugh!" he hears from behind. Jensen whirls around and there he is, the architect of Jensen's sexual crisis. Thinking that surprises another laugh out of him and that makes Jared giggle. How the hell can a grown man giggle like that and still be so damn sexy?

"I love it when you laugh," Jared says, his eyes sparkling, his face lit up so sweetly. Jensen's struck by a desire to kiss that grin.

Jared goes on brightly. "So, I'm here and not busy. I'm guessing from your joy your workday's done, and I'll bet you're as hungry as I am. You wanna get dinner? Oh! Or do you have to hurry home?"

It's bright outside, the breeze drifting past them is warm and full of the smell of growing things from the park. He's already gone through his options for the evening and really, this one is preferable to the others by far. "You know what, no, I don't have to rush. I'll call home when we pass a phone."

"Oh good!" Jared tilts his head. The sun gleams off a glitter-dusted cheekbone and Jensen is lost. He'll go anywhere Jared drags him and he'll love it. "I know a place in the park, has the best dogs ever."

Oh my god, anywhere except for a hot dog stand—salmonella on a bun. Jensen rubs the back of his neck. Smiling hopefully, he says, "Uhm, How about we take a walk through the park and then find a place where we can sit down, and order from a menu instead of a chalkboard? My treat."

Jared throws his arms up in the air and does a hilariously awkward shimmy, but looks so damn pleased Jensen can't help smiling too.

"Yes!" he crows, "and I know just the place; a real restaurant that you will love, I promise."

Jensen sneaks looks at Jared as they walk. Jared always dresses so, so boldly, he's unique. Today he's wearing a pair of high-waist pants and leather suspenders—surprisingly sexy as heck. He's also sporting a blue and white oxford shirt, open almost to his waist, with the sleeves rolled up over some impressive forearms. Jensen swallows, and imagines what it would feel like to have one pressed against his throat. Blinking, he drags himself out of his little smutty, weirdly kinky, fantasy, just to end up fixated on the red bandanna tied around Jared's beautiful swan neck. Jensen's dick also takes notice. He's beginning to suspect he might have a yen for tight, constrict-y things and necks.

"Wow," he mutters, meant to be a comment to himself but Jared hears him, and breaks out in a dimple-bracketed smile. God, f*ck, this man is going it kill Jensen with sheer sex appeal.

"You like today's look?" Jared asks, swirling around in a tight circle. "I call this my 'Dirk Bogarde At The Beach' look."

Jensen is so distracted by a flash of pretty, pink, nipple he has to rerun what Jared said in his head. Still didn't get it, so, "Your what?" Jensen asks, guessing that it's maybe some kind of gay code-talk for drop-dead sexy.

"An actor who—you know what? Never mind," Jared pouts, and kicks out gently with Converse-clad feet. "Just count yourself dead lucky to be strolling out with a fox like me."

"I do," Jensen says. He's a little embarrassed at how serious he sounds. He wants to make a joke of it, but Jared falters, kind of stumbles to a stop and blushes. He smiles shyly at Jensen, so unlike the sex kitten he was a second ago. In this moment, he's not Jared, the street-wise working boy; he's just a sweet, gorgeous, lovely boy, who actually wants to spend time with Jensen. Jensen smiles back, hiding a sigh. He wishes it could be like this all the time.

They walk down a gravel path that takes them into the park, Jared tugging him cheerfully along the wide pathways lined with benches and strips of frantically blooming spring flowers. Jared stops occasionally to show Jensen things that interest him, which makes them interesting to Jensen as well. Like a small cat sculpture sitting neatly under a tree—a sketch of granite that says cat without being a cat—something he'd never noticed before but Jared happily points out to him.

"I always like to walk here in the daytime," Jared says. "It's like, full of people, but minus the horrible, desperate feeling. I only do night walks during holidays or evening concerts, or an outdoor play. I do like plays but can't afford them much." They walk along quietly. "I saw David Bowie last year," Jared blurts. "A client, I mean my friend, Chad, gave me tickets. Said he didn't want to go, can you imagine?"

Jensen expresses surprise—not really that someone didn't want to go, but because he's seen pictures and read an article or two about Bowie, and can't imagine what it's like, going to a concert like that. Every once in a while, there's a lawn concert in their area and they'll go, but...Jensen frowns, deepening the little vee between his eyebrows. It's actually been a long time since Jeanette and he have attended one. Maybe he should suggest...something, anything, for Jeanette and him to do together.

Jared's enthusiastically recounting what seems like every single second of the concert; how they'd dressed like Bowie, had spent what felt like hours making up his face like Bowie's. How he'd walked blocks in platform boots that made him almost seven feet tall—he was laughing and smiling and f*cking beautiful. Jensen desperately orders himself not to notice, without much success.

Their round-about stroll finally takes them to a little Greek restaurant in a neighborhood that is obviously gay-friendly. From behind a big paper menu, Jensen steals glances at the people lingering on the sidewalk outside, flitting and flapping about like half-stoned peaco*cks. It makes him uneasy, makes him wonder if he could ever fit into that life. Not that he needs to, it's not like he's gay. He's just…curious.

Jensen turns away and settles his entire attention on Jared, who preens under his gaze, and flits and flaps a tiny bit himself. Jensen decides that on Jared, it's kind of cute. He slowly relaxes, a few glasses of wine and Jared's joyful personality working magic. They order with Jared's help, and Jared offers tastes of everything he's ordered, and filches bits of whatever Jensen has ordered. There's a cucumber-yogurt-sauce thing that's actually good, eaten with pita bread.

Jared notices he's a little slow to choose this unfamiliar food, so of course he helps. "Here, try this, it's called dolmades," Jared says, and forks over a few bundles of leaves wrapped around rice, Jensen thinks, and it's not bad, but Jared loves them.

"You can eat the rest of mine," Jensen says, and Jared pretends to pout before scarfing them down. The souvlaki is quite good, though, and he fends off Jared's poaching attempts. Grilled meat on a stick? Hell no, he's not sharing.

Dinner's winding down to an end. Between them, they enjoy a piece of sticky-sweet baklava, and their coffee's nearly gone when Jared yelps," Your wife!"

Jensen quells the impulse to leap to his feet and run, before he gets what Jared means.

"Oh hell, I have to call her," he breathes. Jared points towards the phone on the back wall, and he hurries to make the call. He's damn lucky: he gets the answering machine, and though he briefly wonders where she is, his overriding feeling is relief.

After dinner, Jared walks him back to the train station. When he says goodbye, he kisses Jensen on both cheeks, like Michael's air kisses, but unlike Michael, Jared actually makes contact. His lips are so soft and warm, Jensen can't help but lean into them, just a bit.

"Thanks so much, Jen. I can't remember the last time I had so much fun."

"Jen. Ah, you called me Jen…" It felt weird, no one called him Jen. But hearing it from Jared, it felt different.

"Oh, I did! I'm sorry, do you not like that? I'll stop--"

"No, please don't. It sounds…friendly. Yes. I like it And I had a terrific time too," Jensen replied, and meant it with all his heart. "I'd like to do this again. I…" he shrugs and laughs. "I could use a friend. I mean, I have coworkers I talk to but...not too many friends."

"Oh, Jensen!" Jared practically hugs him off his feet. "Of course, we're friends, the best of!"

Jensen makes his way down the stairs to the platform, watching Jared wave good-bye so enthusiastically he imagines he can feel the breeze. His sweet, adorable, goofy friend keeps waving like that until Jensen can't see him anymore.

Jeffery Dean Morgan
Oh my god, 'm f*ckin' fried… Jared rolls over onto his face, absolutely exhausted. He's had his two least favorite dates in a row this week—closeted, self-hating Tom, and now Jeff. He usually likes to space those two apart, give himself time to recover, but Jeff had been adamant, and Jeff pays really well, so Jeff gets what he wants.

Jeff. The man's been kind of a mystery since the day they met. He's bi, older than Jared by ten or so years. He gives off strong daddy vibes—he liked it a hell of a lot when Jared had tentatively used "Daddy" on Jeff that first date. Too bad, because Jared f*cking hates Daddys.

"On your back" Jeff says, his voice a deep rumble that vibrates in his chest. Like always, it makes Jared's toes want to curl, the faithless bitches. Jared doesn't think he's got one ounce of strength left to give. They've been at it forever. How the f*ck is this guy still going? He's old, damn it. Shouldn't he have a sh*t refractory period?

Jared flops to his back and Jeff grabs his legs, throws them over his shoulders.

"You're a wreck," he growls, thumbing at the tender, swollen hole. Jared's torn between wanting to kick him in the face and wanting to come. Again.

"Jeff…"

Jeff doesn't reply, of course. He's too busy between Jared's legs. The only time he pays attention to something that's not Jared's asshole is when he's making sure Jared's got his knees up over his shoulders. Jared crosses his ankles, holds on for dear life, and sends up a prayer to…whoever listens to whor*s.

Jeff is not like most of the tricks Jared's had in the game—most of them were sloppy, desperate, and acted like they were playing some secret, dirty game, like what they do is disgusting and shameful. Jeff, though, he leaps into it like he's about to drag Jared to heaven, or maybe drag him to hell. A hell run by a sexy, f*cking devil. He hates how Jeff can f*cking play him like a fiddle. It's like being tortured, the way Jeff brings him to the edge time and again, without letting him drop over.

It wouldn't even be so bad if Jared could believe even the littlest bit that Jeff sees him as more than a walking, talking, sex doll who's maybe slightly smarter than a golden retriever. He learned early on that Jeff basically didn't give a sh*t about what Jared had to say unless it was 'f*ck me, Daddy, harder, faster', or 'Can I get you a drink?'

Jeff slides two fingers inside him and pulls him wide. The ache and the sting makes Jared moan, not necessarily in a bad way. God, he can't really complain too much about any of the stuff Jeff does, not when he pays double what his other clients do.

Jared jerks when Jeff's tongue slides inside, hot, wet—kind of rough against the overworked, sensitive skin of Jared's hole.

"Oh, please, Daddy, please, swear, killin' me," Jared moans out through gritted teeth. Before Jeff, no one had ever touched his asshole with anything other than fingers or their dicks. First time Jeff had gone down on him, he'd almost flown off the bed—like "ew, what the f*ck are you doing down there?"

Now though, Jezuzf*ck, it's the hottest thing ever. His dick struggles to stand, but no dice. Jeff, though, he doesn't have a problem. He's rolling a rubber down his shaft and slicking up and punching right inside. Jared feels like he's coming, even if his dick is like, 'no thank you'.

Jeff's a f*cking bastard, he's a dick in more ways than one. Jared just lays there, sobbing, while Jeff wrecks the f*ck out of him. Doesn't take long before Jeff grunts, "Bitch," and unloads into the rubber.

"Next time, we do this raw," he growls and Jared screams 'Oh yes, yes, Daddy!" Hah. f*ckin' dream on.

Jeff pulls out, strips off the rubber and tosses it somewhere in the room. Great. He'll have to make sure to get that when he cleans up—

Jeff strokes his lip with a huge, calloused thumb, then tilts Jared's jaw down and holds his dick out to let Jared clean the spunk off him. He smiles down at Jared with that, 'you're such a clever golden retriever' look on his face. Jared flutters his lashes, laves his tongue around Jeff's dick and reminds himself of the balance in his savings account.

There's not much chit-chat with Jeff afterward and that suits Jared just fine. He says his lines. "Thank you, Daddy, that was amazing." Not much of a lie, Jeff's an asshole but he knows what to do with his dick—"Thank you for giving me a treat." Jared smiles slow and seductive, licks his lips like he's just had a triple brownie sundae, and almost groans in frustration when Jeff's eyes heat up again and he takes a step closer. Jared just manages to quell a sigh of relief when Jeff shakes his head instead.

"Sorry, Baby-Boy, gotta get back home before the old ball and chain sends bloodhounds after me. You be a good boy til I see you again, y'hear?"

"Yes, Daddy," he says, watching Jeff stroll off to the bathroom, muscle shifting under that furry hide like a panther.

"f*ck you, Daddy," he mutters. "You f*ckin' hot-ass creep."

Jeff whisks through a shower; he's dressed and gone in minutes, leaving behind a stack of bills placed neatly on the nightstand. Jared crawls across the bed, grabs the stack to count it. "f*cking sweet," he whispers. Instead of his usual four hundred, Jeff's left six, and damn right he did. sh*t, should have left more considering; Jared's chest is still heaving, still working for air, his hole's still clamping and opening around nothing and sore as hell. God, he oughta quit the motherf*cker. It's not like he doesn't know Jeff's an asshole, sometimes almost scary, especially when he comes in rolling that f*cking wedding ring around his finger, a hard, blank stare in his eyes….

Someday, soon, Jared swears to himself, someday soon, Jeff is going to get the old heave-ho despite the bucks. Jared blows hair out of his face and snarls. It's Chad's fault. f*cking Chad with the god damn Jeff-hate. Like, he's starting to get a little under Jared's skin with his whacked-out paranoia about the guy.

"Oh well." Jared snorts softly as he counts the pile of hundreds again, peels one-fifty off the stack. Today is not that day. He'll give Chad a bill, and fifty as usual to his buddy because somehow it's never quite come up in casual conversation that Jeff always pays more than Jared's price—and yeah, he's so not telling either of them that tonight earned him a cool six bills. After all, it's not like they're the ones going to have to plop their aching asses into an oatmeal bath for the next night or two.

He slaps his feet on the floor, ready to lever himself up and "Holy sh*t!" It feels like he's got an arrow shoved up his ass. "Oh, f*ck me…."

Grabbing an extra twenty-five bills off the stack, Jared tosses it aside and fumbles for the bedside phone. "Chad, man, can--"

"Jared, what? Are you okay?"

Jared rolls his eyes at Chad's barely concealed panic. What the f*ck does he think the guy's going to do? He's a raging asshole, yeah, but he's not crazy.

"Chad, I'm fine!! I keep telling you, he's enthusiastic, not dangerous. He's not gonna hurt me, but sweet-cheeks, I'm soooo tii-ired. Can you please call the concierge guy an' tell him we're keeping the room overnight?"

"Winton, and he's gonna want more cash…okay, yeah, take it out of my cut,"he says, and Jared feels a pinprick of guilt.

"No, no, I, I got a tip. I'll take care of it."

"Wow, you sure? Okay. I've got you, girl, go sleep. Rest that asshole up for the rest of the week, we need that money maker in tip-top shape, y'hear?"

"Oh, f*ck you, Miss Thing!" Jared goes on to describe just how short and stumpy Chad's family tree is, and he can still hear Chad laughing as he hangs up on him. Jared's giggling too. Sure, Chad's a jerk, but he's Jared's jerk.

He rolls himself in the blankets and heaves the biggest sigh. He's been kind of lonely lately—meaning he hasn't spent any real time with Chad. Or Jensen. God, but he misses Jensen. Sadly, he's stepped back somewhat, calling off on lunches, rarely coming into the city for breakfast anymore. He's been on some kind of kick to "save his marriage". Not that Jared begrudges Jensen his desire to be normal. It's just, what Jensen should be doing is fighting his way out of the closet, not diving deeper into it. But Jared can't tell him that. Jensen has to find that out on his own. People need to find their own truth at their own time.

Jared stretches out on the huge bed, and watches TV for a bit, hoping the mindlessness of infomercials will eventually lull him to sleep. He's halfway through a fish being whirled into soup by a magically proficient blender before he's up again, cursing and punching his pillow.

Okay, alright damn it, the truth is he hates Jensen's wife. Jared has the feeling that she married Jensen with ‘fixing' him in mind. Not because of anything Jensen said, exactly; it's just, Jared's run into those "love of a good woman" bitches before. He knows they're capable of taking everyone down around them in their quest to love the gay out of a good man, and that includes themselves.

Jared mutters, "God help you, Jen, get the f*ck out before she eats you alive." He flicks the cable box to another show, the late night movie this time. Hopefully it'll be boring enough to send him to dreamland.

It's the third time Jensen's checked his watch–he smiles when he catches himself doing it. He switches the tiny bouquet he'd grabbed on a whim to his other hand, petals drifting to the ground. His forte is not picking flowers, it seems. With luck, Jared'll be here before the darn thing wilts away entirely.

Jensen breathes out a little sigh; a little exasperated, a little amused, but definitely fond. Jared's always a little late, but he's always so very apologetic. It's kind of sweet really. The man is six foot four, maybe more, and he's a glitter-splashed hurricane. Every time Jensen sees him, it feels like the first time. That spark of excitement, followed by a little wave of warmth, or heat sometimes, depending on how Jared looks back at him. It's been a while since they've had the chance to meet up—Jensen frowns briefly—but finally, he's ready.

Ready. Jensen shakes his head. Will he ever be? He's attracted to Jared, he's...but it's a sexual thing, that's all, nothing more than that. He wants to sleep with Jared because he's...he wants to know what it's like, being with a man. He's kissed a boy, but not more than that. Kissing had made him hard, but that experience is also twisted up in fear and a feeling of desperation. Sleeping with Jared might just chase all that away–his life would be a clean slate again and he could go forward.

But chasing the fear away with Jared will definitely throw a twist into Jensen's carefully arranged life. And that's not even counting the infidelity. Jensen's pretty sure Jared has no problem with that—it's his bread and butter, isn't it? Repressed, closeted old men getting their rocks off. But Jeanette, and the life they've made...does she really deserve something like that? Jensen finds it hard to imagine she does. And ignores the small, dry voice in the back of his head that wonders why a realtor has so many late nights at the office. And why he never checks up about it.

"Jensen!"

Thank god! Those thoughts are blown away when he hears his name being shrieked out, sounding like a four-year-old meeting Elmo for the first time. Jared is running towards him, decked out in pale blue, skin-tight jeans and a pink baby-doll top. He's wearing pink lipstick and a smile a mile wide. He's outrageous and silly, and so f*cking adorable at the same time. Jensen wonders if Jared knows how incredible, how amazing he is?

"Oh my god, Jen, I've missed you so much! Oh my stars, are these for me? So sweet! And oh, I am so sorry! I know, I know, I'm always late! But this time I've got a very good reason, I swear, it was absolutely not a hair crisis. Or an eyebrow crisis. So, I have this new client—"

Jensen pretends he wants to hear about some guy who's sleeping with Jared, who's paying to sleep with Jared. What would Jared do if he offered to pay him? Jensen doesn't even finish that line of thought, because Jared would say yes since it's his job, and that would tank their friendship. It would confuse who they are to each other. Jensen doesn't want that. He might be sexually attracted to his friend, but he needs Jared. As a friend. And of course, his marriage…it's got to come first. Ought to come first. He ignores that damn voice that is getting louder lately, the one that's asking, 'but do you want it? Does she want it?'

He glances over at Jared. Jared's chatting away, dragging his fingers through his unruly hair, flipping the ends as he pulls his hands away. He notices Jensen staring and smiles shyly. How? How does he do that, turn into a sweet kid who doesn't make his living sleeping with men? Jensen bites his lip,hard, before smiling back at Jared.

"— forward to getting to know him better, Timothy is really a lovely person, I almost feel bad getting paid for it. Almost. Jensen?" Jared's looking at him like Jensen hasn't heard a word he's said, which to be fair, Jensen actually hasn't heard a word he's said.

"Jenn-sseen," Jared mock-whines, tosses his head and fakes a pout. God, Jensen wishes he didn't find Jared pretending to be prissy as adorable as he does. "Where are you, 'cause you're not here with me. You have to pay attention to me on our date—I mean, oh wow, not date. I didn't mean date. You know what I mean."

Jared's bright pink and mortified now, and Jensen laughs a little before giving him a side-hug. This kid is going to kill him.

"I know, it's okay. Hey, where are we going to lunch today?"

"Well," Jared bites his lip, and his pink cheeks flush even darker. "I was thinking I'd love to make lunch for you, maybe just hang out. If you have time, I mean. I know you and your wife have had some," Jared shrugs and buries his nose in the little bouquet, effectively hiding his face. It bothers Jensen that he does that, makes him feel oddly guilty, but he just nods.

"Jeanette and I have been trying to, to reconnect. I. . . I need to try, Jared, y'know? I need to try before I throw three years away, just like that." Jensen stops and sucks in a shocked breath. He hadn't meant it like that—sh*t, he hadn't let himself even think of it like that. Leaving her.

Jared takes Jensen's hand in such a gentle hold, and smiles softly, and god, those eyes of his, so full of sadness, of knowing.

"Then come to my place. I'll put these cuties in some water before they finish dying in my hands—"

Jensen laughs. "It was the only small arrangement they had!"

"Oh, I'm so sure. We'll have lunch, and we can talk about you and Jeanette if you want, okay?" And then his attitude shifts; he looks like a giant, mischievous elf. His eyes glitter like he's about to share the best joke. "If you're worried about your virtue, my roommate's going to be there, so you'll be safe. He's not into threesomes."

A woman passing by does an enormous double-take, sneaking looks behind her as she hurries away, and Jensen barks a loud laugh.

"Ah, man, you're crazy, Jared. But I'd love to have lunch at your place, roommate or not."

Chapter 4 Chapter Text

Jensen's not sure what he expected, probably some dreary little box smelling of Pine-sol and gym socks, with grey, unfinished wood floors and milk crate furniture, something like a cross between a dorm room and a hovel. With maybe a sketchy, nose-rubbing, sniffling roommate. Instead, it's nice; an average two-bedroom apartment, just like his and Jeanette's first place. Jared's front door opens into the living room, and tilting his head, Jensen can see an open doorway into the kitchen, the corner of a 1950s style, enamel-top table visible.

"Come in, come in," Jared crows. As soon as Jensen steps inside he smells sandalwood incense, and he smiles. Memories of college days..

Jared points at a hall tree. "Coats," he says, then points at a shelf on the floor next to it. "Shoes." He swirls around and points at two directors' chairs facing an afghan-covered futon holding down an orange shag rug. There's also an oversized leopard print bean bag, big enough for two people to sit snugly, next to a wide bookcase holding a decent size TV and stereo setup, and tons of books. Jared waits while Jensen hangs his coat and slides off his moccasins.

"Come sit here with me." Jared's patting the backs of the director's chairs. He sounds…proud. Happy.

Jensen grins at him. Everything about the apartment appeals to his designer's eye. The vibrant colors—apple green, royal blue, a touch of orange here and there, the arrangement of furniture and art. It's obviously low budget, but beautifully put together, with a great eye for style, color, and balance. Jensen's impressed. Over the futon are framed movie posters: Willie Wonka, A Clockwork Orange. Jared notices Jensen noticing, and says, "Zack's got a friend who works at the Midtown, they usually let him take the posters."

It really hasn't been that long since college. Jensen feels a little stab of jealousy at the coolness of the posters. They would have looked great on his dorm wall. Snickering at CollegeJensen's envy, he follows Jared through the living room and into a short hallway.

"Bath and bedrooms—mine is the one with the Warhol print on the door."

Jensen looks and is surprised that it's not soup cans or Marilyn. Instead, it's a pen and ink print of a single, sexy high heel.

"And that door leads to the bathroom if you need it," Jared says, and points to the door at the end of the short hallway. He smiles at Jensen, radiating the pride he has in his comfortable space. Leading Jensen back into the kitchen, Jared takes a few items out of the fridge and from the cabinets next to it. He gestures for Jensen to take a seat at the kitchen table while he spreads a few radishes, some carrots and chunks of pepperoni and cheese on a cutting board.

"Hey, JP." There's a cute kid, brown-skinned, a little chubby, standing in the doorway behind Jensen. peering out from under a mop of black, thick curls. He looks like a student, wearing worn bell bottoms and a wash-worn R. Crumb T-shirt. He's even got a backpack made of old blue jeans, like some hippy throwback, hanging from his shoulder. His grin is friendly, but his doe eyes are laser-focused on Jensen.

"Zack," Jared says, beaming at the kid, "This is my friend, Jensen." There's no mistaking the emphasis Jared puts on his name, it makes Jensen feel ridiculous…and also pleased.

Zack nods, still faintly smiling but now looking even harder at Jensen. Jared catches his expression and laughs, hands up in the 'stand down' position. "No! Really a friend, my very best friend. I've talked to you about him."

"Oh! Jensen! Yeah, hi!" Zack's face completely changes, his smile goes wide, rounding out his cheeks which flush faintly red. He bobs his head and his thick curly hair bobs with the motion. He looks really pleased to see Jensen now. Jensen, though, is still lost in 'best friend'. He's Jared's best friend? Well, good...because he guesses that Jared is his best friend too.

Zack leaves shortly after—he's got a date, or as Jared says, "Yeah, it's less a date and more like an extended hookup." He also tells Jensen that Zack's cold reception was because he was probably worried that Jared had broken the most important house rule—no business in the apartment.

Jensen nods, even though he feels a sharp stab at being reminded again about Jared's job. Still, they're friends, best friends even, right? Jared is fine, apparently doing well, and it's none of Jensen's business.

"Zack knows? He's okay with it?"

Jared stops chopping veggies and says, "Yes, and yes. Believe it or not, the world is different outside the suburbs, darling. Hangups about sex and sh*t, that's for old people in their little tract houses and their narrow little minds to worry about. Me and mine, we're different;" He stops, points the knife at Jensen. "We are the future, baby."

"Right." Jensen swallows. "Okay, I'm sorry. You know it doesn't matter to me how you pay the bills."

Jared snorts. Grabs a head of lettuce and rips it apart in a way that makes Jensen cringe away from the table.

Jared notices and rolls his eyes. He drops the sadly shredded head into a salad spinner and gives Jensen a sideways smile. He holds his hand up with pointer and thumb almost touching. "Maybe a little bit, though?" But that sideways smirk blooms into a full, dimpled smile as he says it, and Jensen laughs softly.

"Okay. Maybe a tiny, tiny bit. Part of it is worry for you, you know. I get that you can take care of yourself—I just can't help but worry. There are some real nut-jobs out there."

"I'm as safe as I can possibly be. Chad makes sure to weed the nutjobs out, and I make sure I never have to show up at a clinic to drop my drawers and lean over an exam table."

Jensen blinks, blinks again and says, "Oh. Okay, then. G-Good."

Jared winks at him and then swirls around the kitchen, setting out their plates and glasses. He plops the big wooden bowl he's filled with salad on the table, along with a bright orange plate covered with cut veggies and chunks of cheese and pepperoni. He pours them both iced tea and gives a graceful curtsey. Lunch is served.

After lunch is cleared away, Jensen helps Jared wash and put the dishes away.

"It's just polite not to stick your roommate with them," he says, and earns a huge smile from Jared for it.

Zack comes back as they finish with the dishes, and he wants to watch TV, so Jared grabs Jensen's sleeve and pulls him into his bedroom. This is Jared's personal, private place, and Jensen stops to take it all in. His first impression is how this is just so . . . Jared.

In one corner, there's an old wooden dresser painted a bright yellow, topped with a really big mirror. It's something someone's granny would have owned, nothing at all like the sleek, Danish modern furniture Jeanette picked out for their little home. Jared has turned it into a showstopper—the bright yellow paint and black trim gives it a hint of chinoiserie. The stylized poppy material hanging on the wall behind it makes it pop.

Jensen takes mental notes, like how that dresser would be an amazing piece to showcase a new line of jewelry and scents the store is pushing. He loves how the mirror's draped with bright scarves and boas that nicely complement it. There's nothing that looks messy or out of place anywhere, except for the massive makeup case sitting on top of the dresser. The thing is the size of a deep-sea fisherman's tackle box and covered with stickers and pictures Jared must have glued to it.

Everywhere there are bits of Jared that he's managed to tuck in any available space: boots stacked in painted fruit crates in the corner, an extra clothes rod near the bed hidden behind a rattan screen, dripping with clothes. It smells good in the room, too, a mix of floral and earthy scents. It's chaotic, but also not. There's a rhyme and reason to all the colors, shapes. Jensen sighs; Jared's cobbled together bedroom feels homier than his own.

Jared puts a few of his things away, then they sit on Jared's bed, a surprisingly big thing covered by a thin, Indian print spread. They're talking about books, specifically the one Jared's taken from the bookshelf that takes up one wall, something about dragons and world-building that Jared wants to lend him.

Jared tells him with that hint of pride he'd shown earlier that the bookshelf was the first thing he'd bought when he'd started making real money, enough that he can sock most of it away because damn it, he's got plans. But he's not stingy with himself either, he tells Jensen.
.
Jensen likes that and tells Jared, "It's good to treat yourself well, look out after yourself—no one else will. People only want one thing from you and that's everything, they don't want to give anything in return. Except for the rare person who has a really good heart. A person like you."

Instead of being flattered, which frankly, he'd hoped Jared would feel, Jared swipes at the air and huffs in irritation. "Oh please, Miss Thing! What a dark and fatalistic view of the world! I mean, lord, I'm a gay man in this world, and I swear I have a more positive outlook on life than you!"

Jensen shakes his head, smiling wryly. "Well, that's because you're not really looking at the world, Jared. It's 'bounce around like Tigger' all the time for you, like you're too busy vibrating to see it," Jensen says. It's meant as a joke, a tease, but as he hears himself, it sounds like an attack, which god, he doesn't mean it that way at all. Jared takes it wrong though, and Jensen can't really blame him.

"I'm not seeing the world? Are you crazy? Not seeing the world where you can say or do what you want, kiss your Jeanette anywhere, walk hand in hand down the street with her, say out loud and have it be legally recognized,' this is my precious wife, I love her so much '—but me? Me? I run the real risk of dying just for hugging a man on the street. You have no idea what it's like, with your simple life and your boring little problems with your wife. God," Jared snaps and flings the book away. "You have no f*cking idea."

Jared's outburst shocks the hell out of Jensen. This is not the bubbly, happy-go-lucky kid he thought he knew. The story he'd built up in his head about the hooker with a heart of gold and a bouncy, can-do attitude, doesn't jibe with this different, bitter, angry man. All of a sudden, Jensen sees Jared truly as a real person, not a cardboard cut-out. On the heels of being shocked by reality, he's horrified at himself. He was basically denying Jared's truth; he'd painted a one-dimensional picture of a Jared who lived to make Jensen happy. On top of that, Jensen had the nerve to be disappointed in Jared for not being that sham. f*ck, he's so disgusted with himself.

"Jared, jezus, I'm so sorry. You probably think I have no idea, but I do know how you feel—"

"No! No speaking," Jared breaks in, hands out to silence Jensen, and Jensen clamps his jaws together. "I wasn't born on a street corner, Jensen. I had a happy, picture-perfect, f*cking June and Ward Cleaver suburban family life. Until they found out their little boy was a pervert."

"They threw you out?" Of course they did, the bastards. How many damn awful stories started just that way in this city?

Chapter 5 Chapter Text

Justin
"Okay, I have got to ask again, Baby. Why do you paaaay, when you could be knee-deep in free dick, you gorgeous idiot?"

"Because like I've told you a million times, I'm not looking for relationships," Justin drops his pants, pulls off his tie and slides his shirt off, letting that hit the floor. "And I don't have time to look for someone and hope they feel the same." he slides his thumbs into the waistband of his leopard-print briefs and pushes them down. "And I'm not into cruising the scene and picking through the trash for gems."

Justin steps out of the puddle of his clothes.

"I mean, here you are, f*cking hot as hell, built, healthy, an' not looking for anything but the two bills I leave on the table. Smart enough to be good with what we've got here, which is." He leans over Jared on the bed, and kisses him, sliding his lips gently from mouth to ear, sucking softly on Jared's earlobe in a way that sends him before continuing, "a great financial agreement."

"A girl could get a complex," Jared snickers, and Justin just snorts, continues dropping tiny kisses around the shell of Jared's ear, stopping to flick his tongue inside, then skipping down to his neck, latching on and teasing a light bruise into his skin. He's not out to make Jared work to turn pain into sex; Justin is careful, respectful, always asks Jared if he likes what he's doing. God, Jared loves that about him.

Justin climbs onto the bed and bends over Jared to run his open mouth over Jared's dick. "f*ck, this thing is pretty as hell, and big, love that."

He licks, flicks his tongue over Jared's balls, sucks lightly again, works his tongue against the seam and rubs his thumb against Jared's taint as he does it. Jared jerks, levers his hips up and shimmies. Justin laughs, the punk. He sucks wetly on his own thumb and slides it into Jared's asshole.

"Fuu-uck." Did he say Justin was a punk? Justin is a genius, oh, and a sweetheart, and "Oh! Oh!" He's just f*cking nailing that spot, over and over, and practically swallowing Jared's dick as he does it. Seriously, genius.

Jared tosses his head back and gives into the feeling completely. Damn, there's nothing like a client who spends all day wearing the suit society insists on, faking their real self until they can finally let it go. And unlike Tom, who blames Jared for pulling his uptight, puckered ass out of the closet, and Jeff too, the asshole, Justin knows the closet is all his own issue, and Jared, he's just there because Justin pays him to be there.

He opens his eyes so he can watch Justin wrap a hand around Jared's dick and lick him like a lollipop, the f*cking tease, and reach the other hand behind himself and work like, all those fingers at once into his ass. Elbow pumping, drooling and groaning over Jared's dick until the vibrations almost make him cry it feels that f*cking good, and Justin looks that f*cking hot.

"Killing me, Justin!"

"Yeah, yeah, ready now," he says and backs away so Jared can pull himself up against the headboard. He reaches for the rubber he tucked under the pillow earlier, and rolls it down, making a big production of it and ends with a wink. "All for you."

"Grrrwwr," Justin purrs or growls, and does this slinky, cat-like move over his body, like a panther…actually, Jared decides, more like cartoon panther.Oh God. He bites his lip, struggling to hold in a laugh. Justin looks up at the little choked noise Jared's making—"Oh, shut the f*ck up," he says, "you know it looks drop dead sexy."

Jared finally bursts out laughing, "You look like the Pink Panther," he hoots.

"Oh my god, bitch, don't f*cking make me lose my hard on," Justin laughs back.

Jared narrows his eyes and licks his lips. "Not on my watch, baby."

Justin snorts again—he's grinning as he scoots his way upwards, stopping when his knees are on either side of Jared's chest, He paints precome on Jared's lips, rubbing lightly back and forth until Jared opens and swallows him. Justin curses low and hoarse and lunges forward. His dick rides over Jared's tongue almost into his throat; Jared gags trying to breathe around it and he tears immediately, nostrils desperately flaring to fill his lungs. Justin grunts out something of an apology. He pulls back before Jared can stop him—Justin knows he's kind of into it. But Justin just shakes his head, scoots backwards and drops the hell down on Jared's dick.

"f*ck!" The both of them bark out in tandem, and Justin struggles to pull a few brain cells together, enough to squeak, "Jinx!"

"Oh my god, you dumb f*ck," Jared laughs and then groans long and loud as Justin sets up a pretty quick pace, practically forcing Jared to come, the bastard. And then unloads all over Jared's chest and abs, a bit even hits his chin. He's gonna pay for that. Like, literally. There's a tip in Jared's future.

Justin opens his eyes, exhales long and loud. He drags his fingers through his come, smearing it into Jared's skin, making Xs and Os. He meets Jared's eyes and snickers.

Jared groans, and shoves him back. "Gross. Giant goofball." He grabs the sheet, uses it to scrub Justin's come off himself, then throws it in Justin's face.

"Ahh-ah,"Justin grins. "You know you like it when I get a little freaky."

"I like the tip afterwards," Jared huffs. "Now you have to feed me."

Justin peels off Jared, and sways to the bathroom. At the door, he stops, shimmies and winks. "I love Friday night," he says, and Jared just laughs.

After his shower, Justin asks Jared to order something from room service. They smoke a joint while they wait, then eat steak and baked potatoes in bed, and Jared listens to Justin describe the latest engineering project his group's working on, a way to fill pill bottles faster and more accurately. It's actually kind of interesting, Jared thinks, especially given that Justin's still naked and when he's enthusiastic about something his whole body moves in a way that's nice.

Over dessert, a slice of chocolate cream pie that they share, Jared tells him he's finally going to graduate soon, but he's still not certain where his commercial arts degree is going to take him. Maybe ad work? Or teaching, he likes kids. Teaching little minds the joy of creating and all. Justin tells him he'll ask around, that he's sure there are people he knows who'd be willing to help. “People tend to want to do what I ask them to—except for you,” he growls at Jared, who snickers and dabs a bit of creamy chocolate on the pointy tip of Justin's cute nose.

They pass bites of pie between them, Justin assaulting Jared with ridiculous jokes, and then Justin goes quiet and asks, "So, ah, what about…?" He makes a 'me and you' gesture between them.

"Ah. Well, babe, leaving the game was always my goal."

Justin sighs and nods. "Of course," he says, and licks the fork tines and gives Jared a big, theatrically lascivious wink. "But damn, I'll miss you when you're gone."

He drops the fork into the plate; he almost looks shy. Jared raises his eyebrows; shy is something Justin has never been. Before he can ask what's wrong, Justin stutters out, "S-say, uhm…we can get together without f*cking, right? I mean, I'd dig just hanging out with you. Is that possible? Like, can we…sh*t, Jare, you're more like, ah, you're kind of my friend," Justin laughs, blushing pink in embarrassment. "You and Chad."

"Oh my gaaawd, you poor f*cker," Jared crows." Your best friends are a pimp and a hustler! No, wait," he jumps to his knees and ruffles his hair, strikes a sexy pose and whispers huskily, "Le escort."

"You asshole!" Justin wacks him in the chest and Jared falls back laughing, grabs Justin and pulls him down with him.

"Seriously, I'm happy you think of us as friends. Me and Chadawocky, the Littlest Pimp."

"Shut up!" Justin laughs along with Jared, "God, I'm pathetic." But he looks pleased as hell and his eyes are sparkling, and he's got such a bright grin that Jared pulls him in for another hug. He's thinking about Jensen though, and wonders if Jen thinks he's a friend too. Or if Jensen can understand that a guy like Justin, a client, can be just a friend.

After Justin leaves, Jared strips the bed, his brain full of Jensen. He wonders if sex with Jensen would be anything like this. He knows it wouldn't be like Jeff, or Tom, god. He tries to picture Jensen, how huge and astonished those green eyes of his can look whenever he gets him comfortable enough to drop some of those guards of his.

Jared crams the used pillow cases into the laundry bag with an extra punch. All this thinking of Jensen is a pretty pointless exercise; Jensen's not the kind of guy to f*ck anyone as long as his wife is in the picture. Poor boy, he's such an idiot. His wife moved on a while ago, and Jared has a feeling she knows Jensen isn't as straight as he wants to be. Jensen, though, keeps wanting to hang on to his life as it is. Not out of love, Jared doesn't get that feeling from him at all. Maybe he's fond of her, but it's not love keeping him there, nope.

He tucks the pillows into fresh cases, then pulls clean sheets on, straightens them, tosses the covers back on and straightens them too. What's keeping Jensen with his wife? Could be habit, maybe. Fear of the unknown. He fluffs a pillow and drops it onto the bed. No, no, it's a shield, that's what's keeping Jensen with her. He pounds the other pillow and drops that in place. The marriage is a shield against Jensen's fear of being queer, being outed. Or, it's a shield against his folks who, he's willing to bet, are just as bad as his own folks are. They just haven't had a reason to show Jensen how bad yet.

He shoves the used linens in the bag, grabs a fresh towel and shoves Justin's used ones in the bag as well, and drops down on the bed. "sh*t," Jared mutters. Jensen's life is knotted up with fear. Of himself, fear of his losing parents; Jensen's so afraid, he'll stay living with that, that, woman until his parents die or he's old and gray and knocking on heaven's door himself. It's a miracle the guy will step out of his box long enough to take lunch with him, Jared thinks. Wild. Jared snorts softly and heads towards the bathroom. Hell, maybe the only reason they do lunch is because Jensen doesn't know how to say no to Jared either.

Jared takes a hot shower, smiling a little as he thinks about someone who knows what they want Jared to be to them. Justin was cute, with his plea to be friends. That thought leads back to Jensen, and how much he doesn't want Jensen as just a friend, and how he's pretty sure it's a mutual thing, but life being what it was, he's stuck in idle until Jen breaks through that flimsy closet door.

After the world's fastest shower, Jared throws fresh clothes on. He picks up his beautiful BITCH belt and rubs his thumbs over the buckle, lifts it to his lips. Eyes closed, he decides. he's going to confront Jensen. Will it be too much? Will Jensen bolt? He fishes through his travel makeup bag, tosses the condoms and lube in. Gives the room a critical eye and nods.

He calls Chad. "All done. Come get me, honey-buns."

Dinner had been nice, but the sf movie they'd seen this evening had been awesome. The special effects were amazing. He's definitely going to catch Star Wars again. Maybe with...Jensen mentally shakes his head, redirecting his thoughts.

He wished Jeanette had liked it more, but appreciated that she'd let him choose and hadn't argued it, had sat through the showing smiling vaguely at him whenever excitement made him squeeze her hand. They'd even gone to a play earlier in the month—a local production—and enjoyed it. These were the types of things they'd used to do before increased workloads and…other things made them drift apart. Jeanette's doing her best, since they'd both decided to examine this, this thing they called their relationship. Clarity, that's what they needed. Even if deep down it feels like a last-ditch effort. There's nothing about who they are together that's comfortable.

They're home, hanging up their coats, putting away their shoes. Jensen makes them drinks, Jeanette's favorite Tom Collins, Jensen a co*ke and rum, and they settle on the couch. Jensen pretends to ignore that there's a distance between them that he and Jared don't have. He subtly shoves a pillow between his back and the unyielding armrest.

Thanking Jensen quietly, Jeanette picks up her drink and sips. "It's good, as always. Jensen," she says, and a few minutes later, startles him by asking, "Do you remember college?"

Jensen looks at her in surprise, the cubes in his glass clink together as he sits straighter. "What? Well, yes. Sure." He laughs weakly. "It wasn't that long ago, y'know." She continues, barely acknowledging Jensen's remark. "I remember the first time I saw you. We were outside, at Gary's place, the last, big party of the season before we all headed back to university. I was sitting poolside, me and a couple of

girlfriends. We were a little—heck, maybe a lot—tipsy, draped over the beach chairs and rating all the guys there, laughing…" she shook her head.

"We were so young. I was laughing, only half-paying attention to them when I looked up and saw you. You looked like a Greek god, like Apollo. Like Ganymede. The sun was shining on you, and you still had all that blonde in your hair, and you were smiling at a friend of yours, a beautiful guy, too, and I fell, oh my god, I fell so hard. I never thought I had a chance at all, though. I never thought I was your type," she laughed ruefully. "I should have paid attention to my instincts."

Jensen blushes, embarrassed, unsettled. What Jeanette said didn't feel like a compliment. It felt more like, like, an accusation. Jensen rubs his face, swallows hard. He remembers that day, remembers everything about it.

He replies, "I remember meeting you. I remember thinking that with a girl like you, everything in my life would just fall into place, that all I needed was to convince you of the same."

"Really? Did you?" She sounds unconvinced, but after a moment, she smiles—it looks a little sour to him. "After you wandered away from the pool, I went inside to see if I could find you. I wandered around and around that horrible, ostentatious pile of a house, hoping I'd see you." She shook her head. "I was so foolish."

Jensen bites his lip, unsettled by her tone of voice, hell, the whole tone of this conversation. "Well, like you said, we were all really young, weren't we? And doing a lot of foolish things comes with the territory," Jensen says and shrugs.

Jeanette makes a soft sound, not agreeing, not disagreeing, takes their empty glasses and walks away from him. He can hear the clink of ice cubes hitting glass, the faint glug of liquid. She walks around towards him and hands him another glass, scotch.

"You know that's not what I mean. When I saw you the first time that evening, you didn't see me at all. Me, the girls–we were invisible. When I saw you the second time you were coming out of a bathroom with that friend of yours, the Zeus to your Ganymede. You looked...terrified. You were paper white and almost in tears."

Jensen felt violently ill. He remembered, despite years of pushing any recollection of that day away, ignoring any of the bits and pieces that flashed into his mind at inopportune moments of the day. That day, the incident. What happened hadn't exactly been unwanted, but it hadn't really been wanted either.

"I should have walked away then," she said, "but I thought that maybe I could save you. Maybe it was a mistake, maybe you just needed a steady companion, a good woman to look after you."

"I—I—I love you. I married you."

"You love me? Maybe. It seems we don't love each other enough, though. When I realized that you would always only be halfway here, I thought, why bother? Why tie each other down? Why have children, why make it impossible to leave?"

"Do you. What the f*ck—have you deliberately held back all these years? I kept looking for more, thinking there should be more, but you'd already decided that you weren't going to give it?"

"Oh, looking, Jensen? How long has it been since you've looked, really looked for it? Hasn't there always been a little piece of you that was glad of that? Are you really unhappy that we can walk away from each other so easily? You're—" She stopped and peered at Jensen. "You're guilty. God. What have you done, Jensen? You've given in to that twisted, dirty part of yourself, haven't you? Your father was right to doubt you, you…". She slammed her glass down on the coffee table and glared at him. "Can't you be a man about anything?"

Jensen sat frozen in his seat. Be a man….

Jensen hears it: the door slamming, his father's emphatic footsteps on the wooden stairs leading down to the laundry room, the stairs he'd been under when he'd caught the two of them.

Jensen's been crouched there in the gloom curled over himself and terrified. His dad's face when he saw Boyd, how he'd grabbed him by the arm and marched him up the stairs and Jensen had been too terrified to move….

His dad rounds the last stair and yanks Jensen out into the light by his collar, which twists and chokes him and cuts off his air, but he's too afraid to do anything but stumble after his dad.

Dad yanks him over to the tool bench facing the washing machine and dryer. He stares around, his head darting to and fro like a bird of prey searching from one corner to the other, until his eyes land on a bit of plastic hose tossed to one side of the bench. Jensen sees it at the same time his father does and yelps no—he doesn't have to be psychic to know what's going to happen next.

His dad snatches the hose off the bench, raises it over his head. "Be a man," he roars, and brings his hand down, fast, hard. The noise it makes when it hits makes Jensen rear back; his shirt collar cuts his air off again and the splat as the hose hits registers before the needling shock of pain does. And then his dad does it again, over and over and over again.

Chad drives him back to the apartment. He's uncharacteristically quiet, darting little looks at Jared, and guppying like he wants to talk, but he's afraid to. Jared sighs, slumps down in the seat, and decides to let Chad stew on whatever is bothering him.

Zack's lounging in the living room when they come in, music thumping while he sits busily rolling joints on one of their cookie trays. "Hey, boys. JP, in for the night?"

Chad crawls over the back of the futon to drop down next to Zack. "Yeah. Dude, Zack, talk to your damn roommate. Tell him to hang up his heels before he ends up giving five dollar sucks at truck stops."

"Whaat! f*ck you very much, Chadick!" Jared screams, and Zack shakes his head, lights a joint, sucks hard before passing on to Chad.

"Dude," he starts, whooshes out smoke, "I've been trying to tell him. He's like, so f*cking dumb about how f*cking lucky he is, and how he needs to get the f*ck out before things finally do go wrong an' he gets hurt or worse."

Jared scoffs. "Oh my god, nothing's going to go wrong. My clients are sweethearts; well, most of them, and my one-offs are tolerable. I mean, look at me." Jared smirks, flexes his arms. "Laced and made up or not, who's going to f*ck with me? And I'm not dumb. I haven't been to a clinic since I was a baby in the streets. I know what I'm doing." He leans over the coffee table and snatches the joint from Chad's lips, tokes and squeaks out, "Besides, started telling 'em I'm about to retire. Talked to Tim, to Justin, and all the one-offs know not to bother calling no more."

"Thank f*ck," Chad says over Jared's whoosh of breath. "What did that jerkoff Morgan say?"

"Well, um. I haven't actually told him yet," Jared mumbles, and suddenly finds the posters over the futon completely fascinating.

"Jared! Now tell me again you're not afraid of him!" Chad shouts, startling Zack so much he fumbles the jay and sparks fly up all over.

Jared smacks frantically at his legs, frowning, kinda pissed at Zack that his best pair of tights now have pinholes burnt into them. "I'm waiting for the right time, Chad." he snaps, then mutters, "Sheesh, don't bite my head off."

But that's not good enough for Chad. He jumps up and stomps around the living room. Jared and Zack both have to twist back and forth to watch him.

"No, you know what, I don't want you talking to him alone anyway. When you tell that bastard, I'm gonna go with you. What?" he snaps at an eye-rolling Jared.

"Chad. Chadbacca. I have no idea what issue you have with Jeff, but as God is my witness, he has never laid a hand on me that I haven't agreed to. He's never hurt me." Jared pauses, with the joint half-way to his mouth, his eyebrows quirked. Okay, Jeff hadn't ever hurt him, not really. He could maybe get a little over-enthusiastic from time to time, but never meant to really hurt him. It was never anything that lasted long.

Chad reaches over the back of the futon and snatches the joint from Jared's lips, breaking up his fragile train-of-thought.He squints at Jared, ferociously scowling all the while he inhales. "I just don't get a good vibe from that motherf*cker." He snarls, and pinches the roach.

"Seems like you need some push to get out of the game, JP. Maybe you should talk about this to that hot Jensen guy," Zack says. "He seems smart. Plus, he likes you." He heaves to his feet and wanders off to the kitchen. "I'm hungry. You guys want some grilled cheese?"

"Talk to Jensen about what," Jared calls out to him. Looks at Chad and repeats at a lower level, "Why should I talk to Jensen?"

"Man, just shut up an' let me put my feet up." Chad shoves and pokes Jared until he reaches some ultimate comfort level for Chad, who then plants his stocking feet in Jared's lap. He thinks about shoving him off, then decides it's too much trouble, and they're kinda warm and the way his toes curl over Jared's thighs are actually kind of nice. His head is rolling against the futon's back, there's something weird on the TV that he can't quite put together. He feels so soft and warm that maybe he's gonna fall asleep, when Chad's voice knocks him out of his comfy place.

"Wish you two'd stop f*ckin' dancing 'round each other. Dude's great, a great guy. Know how I know? 'Cause he doesn't care how you make your money—rare as f*ck—an' he gets life ain't about Cinderella's glass pumpkin coach—oh, shut up," he snaps at Jared, who's snickering, "Glass pumpkin coach" under his breath.

Jared gives him the ' look', the round-eyed, innocent one, murmuring "Gosh, what'd I do now?"

"Spare me the face. You're about as innocent as Damien." Chad rolls his eyes, smacks him in the chest before Jared can dodge the hit. "You know what I mean," Chad nags on. "Take steps, grow up. Seize your man."

Seize my man. Okay, that's a dramatic note, Jared thinks, and as if the universe wants to underscore it, there comes a hammering at the door, loud enough to piss off other tenants on the floor; a breath later he hears, softly, tentatively, "Jared?"

It takes a minute before it registers just who it is whispering at his door. Oh my f*cking stars, what in the world is Jensen doing here?

It's so unexpected that Jared freezes. He's swept with the strangest feeling; he just knows that whatever is about to happen now is bigger than anything that's happened to him the last five years. This is going to change everything.

Sweeping Chad's feet off him, fumbling past the futon, Jared stumbles to his feet, shakes his head to try and order his jumbled thoughts.

He walks like a dancer to the door, in precisely placed steps. He stops, inhales deeply, and lets it out in a whisper under his breath, "OhgodOhgodOhgod." He clasps the doorknob, turns it slowly, then swings the door wide.

"Rats!" Jensen stumbles over the threshold like some sit-com character. He grabs Jared's arm to steady himself and then looks up at him. Jared actually gasps out loud. This is a Jensen he doesn't know. This Jensen is a mess; wild and un-put together, and Jared has no idea what the hell's going on, but it's obvious Jensen is not in a good place.

He's in faded blue sweatpants, beat-up sneakers, and Jared's first thought is "Wow, this boy is cowboy bow-legged." Which, okay, dumb—it's not like Jared didn't know he was bowlegged, but in the pricey dress pants Jensen always wears, it's not as obvious, not like it is in these sweatpants. They're so worn, they'd probably feel like velvet under his hands. There's a little hole right above Jensen's knee that keeps drawing Jared's eye.

"sh*t," he mutters. Get hold of yourself, bitch, this man is in distress and you're drooling over a tiny square of exposed skin. He can make out a college logo on the chest of Jensen's ragged, paint-spattered hooded sweatshirt. Jared would bet anything that he's wearing comfort clothes; the sort that are old and familiar and the first thing you reach for when you feel like sh*t. Jared used to have stuff like that, when, before. Now, all his stuff is rotting in a landfill somewhere.

Jensen's hood is pulled up like it's winter, and the hair peeking out from under is limp, greasy, and messily parted to either side of his forehead. Honestly, the poor man looks like he hasn't bathed in a couple of days–in fact, he looks like he's been sleeping in his car. Jared ignores the uncomfortable sense of deja-vu and reaches out to pull Jensen into the living room.

Meanwhile, Chad's watching all this with an expression Jared can't quite figure out. Zack comes out of the kitchen with a plate piled high with grilled cheese sandwiches. He pauses, eyes Jared's fingers twisted in Jensen's sleeve, Jensen apparently finding his sneakers fascinating, and Chad, frozen in place.

"Oh! Oh, unh. Chad, whyncho come on in my room," he says, because Zack's smart and concerned and not an asshole like Chad, who's still on the futon, gawping at Jensen like he has no plans to move from the show. "We can scarf these down, check the boob tube, and y'know," he hisses at Chad, "stop being f*cking nosy parkers."

Jared shoots his wonderful roommate Zack a grateful look. "Jen, let me go rake a quick pathway through the stuff in my bedroom, and then we can sit and talk. If you want to." Jared softly strokes Jensen's rough cheek. He hasn't even shaved, poor sh*t. Jared frowns, certain that Jen falling apart like this has to do with the bitch. Jared crosses mental fingers—hopefully, god willing, Jensen has finally figured out oil and water don't mix.

When Jared comes back to the living room, Jensen is still statue-still by the futon, head down, until Jared comes to stand beside him.

"Jensen, do you want to talk? About whatever's wrong?"

Jensen rocks back on his heels, and draws a hand down the back of his neck. "I...what makes you think that?"

"Oh, sweetbuns, you never just show up—I practically need to send you an engraved invitation. Come on over here, and you can tell your fairy godmother everything." Jared swings around the futon, sits and pats the space next to him with a smile, trying to appear as supportive and non-threatening as possible. He exhales softly as Jensen gingerly sits and, after a few seconds, slides the hoodie off. Goodness, Jared thinks, this poor boy hasn't seen a shower in a few days.

"Jeanette and I…talked. Seems she's been much less lonely than I've been—" Jared jerks at that, but Jensen doesn't notice. "She's been having an affair," he says. His voice, his expression is flat and toneless, like he's totally unaffected. Jared bites his lip. He knows how much that isn't true.

"I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry too, that we wasted so much time trying to hold something together that should never have been. I'm sorry I was so weak that it screwed up her life and mine, for too long a time. She moved out." Jensen shrugged. "So, that's that."

Jared can't help but stare at Jensen in sympathy. He knows what it's like to have the bottom drop out of the world.

"I feel like an asshole even telling you about my problems."

"Anh-unh. Nope. You are not an asshole. Tell you what, let's go to my room. Did you eat? We'll order in some Chinese and, and just, I don't know, watch TV, listen to music, just kinda chill out."

"That sounds good. It's not like I have anywhere else I have to be," Jensen's smile is twisted, definitely not amused. "But what about you? No clients?"

Jared can tell that Jensen wants to say it light and unconcerned, but there's a note to his voice, a slight, bitter tinge. He tilts his head and peers at him like that'll help him see into Jensen's head—is he jealous? Jared kind of thinks so.

"No, baby. Free and clear."

"Well alright then," Jensen taps his hand, then curls their fingers together and tugs on Jared's hand until he follows. He thinks about it and decides he kind of likes Jensen taking the lead. In the kitchen, Jared hunts through the menus Zack's piled on top of the fridge. "Sweet and sour ribs, fried rice, and soup for two?"

"Yeah, okay. And almond cookies."

Food ordered, holding hands again, they head back to Jared's room, passing Zack in the hallway on his way out.

"Don't wait up, JP. Not that I think you're worried about me," he grins and looks at Jensen. He totally thinks that Jen doesn't see the huge, lascivious wink he gives Jared, and Jared just pushes him down the hall.

"Go, get laid. Don't tell me about it."

Chad passes too. "Ugh, don't tempt him. No one wants to know about college boy boring sex. Talk to you later, Jared. Remember what I said."

Once they're in Jared's room, he nudges Jensen towards a director's chair. "Sit! We'll be ready in a minute!"

So Jensen sits and pulls his fingers up into the sleeves of his sweatshirt and watches Jared cover his bed with a buffalo-check blanket. "It'll be like a picnic," he says with a wink, and plops a tray in the middle of it, and a bottle of wine. Jensen raises an eyebrow at Jared's tiny bar, and Jared just laughs harder when Jensen mutters, "Boy scout."

Jared grabs a couple more pillows to toss on his bed, and by the time the food arrives, he's built a nice little nest and makes Jen spread out in the middle, shoes off and hoodie tossed in the corner. He's got a really nice t-shirt on, but what Jared notices most is that it's tight across the shoulders, and curves around Jen's biceps like it's in love with him. It's loose around the waist, riding up to expose a silky-smooth expanse of skin. Mmm, definitely not rock-hard abs, but on Jensen, it just seems perfect.

Jensen sighs, sounding so content, and Jared watches as his eyes drift closed. Oh, my dear. Jared can't stop looking down on Jensen, smiling at him because he looks so damn sweet, the way his lashes sweep his cheeks, and his mouth looks sweeter and fuller as he relaxes. If not for the purple smudges under Jen's eyes, poor thing, he'd look like a little teen baby on his bed. Jared tosses his head, and a wicked grin narrows his eyes. "Umm, teen baby twink." He mutters, then slaps himself softly on the hand. "Ah-ah-ah, he didn't come here for that, y'hear?"

Jensen meanwhile is curled around a pillow, eyes closed, breathing soft and gentle so that Jared's pretty sure he's halfway to sleep. Taking advantage of it, Jared strips down in his room to change, and since he has the time, adds a touch or two just to make himself feel pretty. He squints and twirls, and fluffs his hair just right, and only when it's perfect does he nudge Jensen out of his drowsy state.

"Oh!" Jensen giggles—giggles!—when his eyes ease open, then widen. Jared's wearing his favorite at home lounging outfit, a beautiful, silky kaftan covered with a glorious peaco*ck feather pattern: green and teal and a deep royal blue. He even has a flower tucked behind his ear, a sunflower, silk of course. For some reason Jensen does a little double take at seeing it. Jared swirls, knows how the kaftan material flows around him and clings like a lover to some parts of him, slides over others. Judging by the way Jensen flushes, he's seeing Jared just how he'd hoped to be seen.

"Cat got your tongue? Or are you just not used to a man in a dress, Baby?"

"That's not it at all. Hell, seems like half the models out there are really boys. Who cares?" Jensen shakes his head. "No, I'm not used to seeing someone so beautiful; you with your gorgeous sunflower eyes."

Jared laughs nervously as his fingers skate quickly across the fake sunflower before dropping to curl in the silk of the kaftan. He's startled and a little shook at how honestly Jensen had said that, so for both their sakes, he plays it off as a small joke.

"Don't you dare flatter me like that, you rake, you'" For some reason, that makes Jensen burst into belly laughs, and if the sight of him giggling was adorable, him full on laughing was, well, kind of hot and fun.

They watch a few comedies on Jared's tiny TV, then a cheesy cop show. They absolutely kill the Chinese, wolfing it down like famished stevedores, Jensen practically licking the cardboard. Jared wonders just what Jensen's been doing the last few days since it's obvious Jen hasn't been eating.

Along with the fried rice and ribs, they share a bottle of cheap wine that Jensen swears is delicious and just perfect with the sweet and sour ribs.

"Vintage? What vintage, we don't need no stinkin' vintage!" Jared crows, and they kill the bottle. Maybe two bottles. Definitely the wine got better as they went along. They finish off dinner with a few almond cookies, a favorite of Jared's, then smoke some pretty decent hash.

As the evening wears on, Jen loosens up. He relaxes more, the troubled little furrow between his eyes smoothing out. At some point, Jared finds himself in Jensen's lap, just snuggling, nothing more. Passing the pipe to Jensen, Jared tsks when Jensen tries to inhale. He's managed it a couple of times, but this time, he gags a bit and hacks the smoke right out.

"Wait a minute." Jared tips Jensen's chin down, runs a finger gently over his lips and says, "Open, Baby."

Jensen jerks. If Jared hadn't practically been plastered to him, he'd never have known. Okay, he thinks, and stashes that bit of reaction away to examine later. Right now, he's watching Jensen's lashes flutter as his eyes close, and the way he flushes but opens his mouth right away. Sucking in smoke, Jared cups Jensen's cheek and huffs a thick stream of it, like a dragon, into Jensen's mouth. Doesn't work, the poor baby just can't get the smoke down. Jensen tries, he really does, but as much smoke wreaths round his face as goes inside.

"Stop?" Jared asks but Jensen shakes his head no. Jared sighs. He pulls on the little pipe, sucks a little more smoke in. "Gonna touch your lips, 'sat okay?"

Jen nods, looking a little scared but also, kind of anticipating, like a puppy being offered a treat. Jared presses their mouths together. It almost instantly goes to more, deeper. Jared's a little embarrassed that his caftan is starting to tent like it is, just from touching the boy's lips. The smoke trails out between the two of them, Jared totally forgetting the point of what they were doing, instead falling into kissing those warm, plush, lips.

Jen, the wicked bitch, runs his palm over Jared's steadily thickening dick, rubbing the smooth, soft material over the crown. "Silky," he mutters and somehow seems to concentrate on swirling his thumb right over the head of Jared's dick, fascinated, it seems, with how quickly it starts to get wet. "Wow," Jensen whispers softly, running his fingers around the crown, the silk not stopping his fingers and thumb from gripping lightly. Jared bites his lips to keep from groaning, but his dick practically lurches at the touch, and Jensen breathes an awestruck, "Wow" again.

"God." Jared rolls his eyes at himself because he doesn't want to do what he's about to do next, but he has to. He sets aside the pipe, and curves his fingers around Jensen's warm, firm chin. It's for the best, it's for Jensen. For Jen. Jared started this, with the lamest bit in the books, and he really should put the brakes on it, for now.

He leans close, meaning to tell Jensen that, and Jensen meets him immediately in a kiss. Jared hmms in pleasure, kisses him, sucks the taste from his tongue and Jensen bucks up, pulling Jared closer—oh sh*t, okay, right, he's supposed to be keeping the lid on.

"Jen, baby, let's maybe slow this down a bit, it's probably too soon, we ca—shouldn't. You just split with your wife, you haven't even had a chance to think about what's next."

"All I've been doing is thinking. It's been days, longer, and what I think is she's probably f*cking her boss right now and that's really okay. Right now, this here, god, this is all about me and, and you. f*ck anyone else."

There's a part of Jared that feels horribly guilty. He can't help feeling that he maybe was the catalyst for all this, and what if he's about to ruin Jensen's life? But then Jensen looks up at him with those beautiful, green eyes of his and the sweetest smile full of promises. Jared fights the battle—for a few seconds anyway—before shrugging and looping his arms around Jen's neck.

"You tell me when to stop, okay? I'll stop the very second you feel unsure, promise."

Jensen drops his eyes, he bites the curve of his lower lip, and then says soft and serious like he's in confession, "I kissed a boy before…and, and, there was this one time, that I did more."

"More, hunh? Well, how 'bout we just stick with kissing, okay? And if you feel you're ready, I mean really ready, Jensen, you'll tell me you're okay with it. Out loud, Jen, whole words, baby," Jared whispers against his cheek, when all Jensen does is gulp and swallow.

Jensen's answer, when it comes, is breathy, a little shaky with nerves, but, "Yeah, okay. Yes," he says. They kiss, a neat press of lip to lip at first, quickly morphing into lazy, sloppy, open-mouthed kisses, licking at each other until they're wet, and shiny. Jared moans, sucking Jensen's lower lip into his mouth, pulling until Jensen squirms and pushes at him. Jared lets it slide from his grip, taking in every second of sensation like how smooth, and soft, how it gives under the pressure of his teeth. He's so careful not to break skin but makes sure Jensen feels it. f*ck it's like a ripe peach.

It's not long after that Jensen is throbbing under him, twisting, trying to yank the caftan out of the way, muttering "this is okay, right, it's good, right?" Jared shows him that it is by sliding the caftan up and over his shoulders. Jensen freezes. Jared, naked to the world and all, is sitting on Jensen's extremely hard dick.

Jensen stares for so long that Jared starts to mini-panic inside. Should he stop? Oh no, it was too much, he broke Jensen, oh f*ck—but before he can get off his lap, Jensen begins to wiggle and shimmy at which point Jared nearly levitates off the bed before he realizes that Jen's just trying to get his his sweat pants down, which he does, shoving them down his hips, pulling them under his ass. And then, he touches Jared.

"Jared, Jare…so big. Pretty," Jensen says, and his fingers tremble as they touch Jared's bare skin, rubbing precome around the crown. His face is a picture of concentration as he presses gently against the slit until it pouts open, and a spill of precome coats Jensen's fingers. He makes this tiny, surprised noise before lifting them to his mouth and pushing them in, sucking.

Jared's not sure, but he thinks he might have died momentarily. "Oh f*ck, f*ck, Jen, oh sh*t."

Jensen looks lost, reaches out with his other hand and draws it down Jared's bare belly. "I want to-to—I don't know what to do."

"Let's do this, just this tonight. "Jared wraps his hand around the both of them, and as soon as they touch, Jensen yelps like he's electrocuted. Jared understands. The heat, the weight of Jensen against him is mind-blowing. It felt like he'd been waiting a thousand years for this.

Jen's hands shoot out, and Jared prepares to let go thinking Jen's changed his mind, but Jensen grabs his wrists, slides his hands up Jared's arms and holds on tight as Jared resumes—feeling the shift of muscle Jared guesses, and sure enough, Jensen moans, "Your arms, I love the…so, so strong…"

His hands wander higher, touching, squeezing, and then down again, lingering on Jared's chest, his pecs. Just feeling, touching, warm and intimate. Fingers slip over his nipples, too quick to really register, and then settle on his waist. All through Jensen's tentative inspection Jared is jerking them off, slowly, watching Jensen's red, sweating face, his open mouth, gasping, gasping.

Jensen's hips rise and fall, and Jared imagines that Jensen's rising and falling on his dick, holding on tight and begging Jared to f*ck him harder, deeper. Jared's getting to that point of no return, his balls drawing tight. Jensen must be too, his dick grows harder against Jared's palm and then come sluices over Jared's grip. Jensen's climax in turn triggers Jared's org*sm. It's almost too much with how good it is. The slide is quicker, faster, it feels so damn good all he can do is shake and moan and pray he's not scaring the sh*t out of Jen.

It's so wild, kind of messy, and hot as f*ck, especially when Jen leans forward and bites into his shoulder to muffle the scream that pours out of him. If anyone had told Jared there would come a point in his life that a guy gnawing on him would actually be a tremendous turn on, he would have laughed his ass off. But this? With Jensen? Jared can hardly believe that this is happening. Or how the feeling makes him fly right out of his body. All he can do is hang on for the ride and the incredible feeling of his skin against Jensen's until Jensen grips his wrist, and stops him with a whispered, "Jared."

Jared gives them one final, gentle, squeeze, and begs for a kiss.

It's perfect. And he knows it is because Jensen tells him so, muttering "perfect" into his shoulder, licking the throbbing bite there; he mutters perfect one last time before pressing a kiss right in the middle of Jared's forehead then drawing back. Jensen's eyes are shining, he's smiling wide and bright, and Jared feels like he's swallowed a nova, he's done, he's overcome. He's not going to say it out loud, god, he may never get a f*cking chance to, he's no fool—but he knows, with all his heart, that he loves Jensen. Loves him so much.

Jensen worries him a little though. He's gone from sparkling to sitting still with his hands gripping Jared's hips. His head slowly drops forward to stop on Jared's chest. He's shaking a little but it's not until Jared feels the wet trails on his skin that he gets it: Jensen's crying. Oh sh*t, he's crying!

Jared pulls back, already apologizing, ready to take the fault of anything, all of it, but Jen shakes his head.

"No, no—it's not you, it's me."

Worse, Jared thinks. "I made you cry?"

"I just…I mean, my whole, almost my whole life I've tried to think of myself one way…I'm kind of scared, Jare. And also thinking how much time I wasted just trying not to be me. I don't want to be that way but this…this is a lot. You know?"

'Of course I know!' Jared wants to shout, but he just holds Jensen in as soft a hug as he can. "I want to tell you it'll be alright, but it's up to you. I think you're perfect and wonderful and special. I hope you can see yourself that way too. I hope, hell, I hope you'll let me help you to get there."

"f*ck, Jare." Jensen laughs, his voice shaky and weak. "You're just…wow. You're the perfect one. Brave, gorgeous. Thank you." Tears are still running down his cheeks and Jared wipes them off.

"Don't thank me, honey. You're the brave one here."

Chapter 6 Chapter Text

When Jared wakes up, Jensen's gone, has been for a while from the feel of the bed. He's so pissed off that he snatches the pillow off the side Jensen had slept on and throws it across the room.

"No, he f*cking didn't!" he yells and jumps out of bed, stalking out of the room buck naked. No, this f*cker did not run off after giving Jared one of the most intense nights of his life. How f*cking dare Jensen leave him without a damn word?

No one is home, but there's a sheet of paper stuck to the fridge with a magnet. Jared reads "I'll be back. Give me a couple of days to get everything together but promise, I'll be back because I need you and I can't live without you. This is a sh*tty way to tell you, but I swear to god I'll make it up to you.♡ Jen"

Jared stares at it for a long time, committing every loop and swirl of Jensen's handwriting to memory. He takes the sheet down, folds it in half and takes it back to his room. Just wait until he sees Jensen Ackles again. See if he doesn't push that f*cker to make good on his words.

"Thank you again for having given me the opportunity to grow and learn. I appreciate everything about the time I've spent here at Gyre Bros."

Jensen gives them his very best smile, and shakes hands across the desk. He politely fends off attempts to 'work something out', a change of position—possibly a change of some other employee's position, at which Jensen does his very best to swallow a smile. He'd have been happier if they'd have decided to change that particular employee's position years ago, instead of relying on Jensen to keep Jeff in line. That's what happened when one was too good at certain aspects of one's job, Jensen thought ruefully. But now, it fell on upper management to corral the guy. Neither Michael nor Glover were good at handling Jeff, at least not in any way that didn't involve cement blocks, an ocean drive, and Jeff tied up in the trunk. The guy was, and would always be, an enormous anus; he's the perfect example of a person failing upwards. Instead of responding to the thinly veiled offer of landing in Jeff's job, Jensen solemnly, gently, refuses, and heaves a sigh of relief when he's finally able to leave. No two weeks given, separation effective immediately, and he'll worry about employment when his bank account gets tight.

CCR's Lodi keeps running through Jensen's head as walks down the hall leading to the studio, Oh, Lord. stuck in Lodi again, and he hopes it not a damn sign or something. He turns a hundred watt smile on everyone he passes, fueled by a sense of freedom from a job that felt like it was sucking the life out of him, and the lie of his life outside of it. Of course, threaded through it was some trepidation—his life was taking more than a turn, it was a leap of the cliff edge and him hoping that he lands on something soft. Or someone…he snorts, seeing Jared's pretty face, him rolling his eyes and laughing. At Jensen, but that's okay. Jared loves him.

He's still got a goofy grin plastered on his face when he walks into the studio, and it makes Michael go ballistic.

"What are you smiling at, you bastard?" Michael shrieks as Jensen pushes through the doors."How dare you leave me? Glover, make him stay."

"Don't be ridiculous, Michael. It's past time the boy spread his wings. Come along, Ackles, let's collect your things." Glover waits until Jensen catches up and stage-whispers, "I have dibs on your desk chair. Beautiful leather, and unlike some I could name, I'm totally indifferent to the fact that your ass once filled it."

"Hey, hello, my hearing is excellent," Michael yells, but of course Glover ignores him. Between Glover and Jensen and a smidge of help from Michael, they quickly sort out everything Jensen wants to keep. It occurs to Jensen as they're packing his things, there are surprisingly few items he wants to keep, considering the years he's spent there: some sketchbooks, a few tools, markers, pencils, the camera he'd bought to take photos of his work for a portfolio that now was probably going to end up in the attic.

Standing there with Jensen and looking over his small stack of banker's boxes, Glover squeezes his shoulder, shocking Jensen with the contact. "Ackles, darling, you deserve to be happy. You need to walk out of these doors and grab life by the lapels and live it with a vengeance."

This advice surprises Jensen, because he'd always thought that Glover regarded him as sort of an ambulatory house plant—a ficus that got in the way of a position he'd originally wanted. Jensen''s strangely moved, even when Glover takes the actual ficus that's sitting on Jensen's file cabinet and walks off with it.

Before Jensen can take a breath, Michael is on him: arms wrapped tight around him, one leg wrapped around Jensen's hip in an uncomfortably close embrace. Michael moans directly into his ear, "Oh, I am so f*cking mad at you right now. How dare you leave me! And not only that, we're short staff now!"

"Come on, Michael, you're head of the crew now, the Queen Bee! You can do what you want. As long as Jeff approves, but whatever, he doesn't really care about the day to day, right?" Jensen manages to peel off Michael's octopus-like grasp, and scrubs discreetly at his ear. The man has disturbingly hot breath…."Think of it as a good thing, what with you taking my place, and Glover taking your place. You're all falling upwards, like dominos." Jensen wheedles, reaching out to chuck Michael under the chin until finally he smiles, face brightening like the sun's coming out.

Michael gasps dramatically and swirls around to face the floor. "Oh sh*t, that's right, I'm second to Jeff now—oh f*ck I'm second to Jeff now. I hate you again, Jenny. No, I'm making Glover assistant to that asshole…and that definitely leaves me short a menial, and none of these bitches are capable of unscrewing a light bulb on their own. Damn it. Hate, Jen, hate." he yells, pointing a finger at Jensen's forehead.

Jensen ducks and whisks Michael's finger out of his face, blinks at a sudden explosion of thought in his head. Ah, now this will work—"Hey, I think I know someone. I mean, I do know someone. He's really talented, has a great eye for color and design, a free-wheeling imagination, plus he knows what teens and young people like so that's an asset. This boy is smart, and sassy, and I think he'll fit in great. He's got an AA and he's working towards his BA, and I can tell you, he's a hell of a hard worker. You'll love him, I promise, just…keep an open mind, Rosey, please."

"What, did you pick him off the street—" Michael's eyes go wide when Jensen turns a hot red. "Oh. My. f*cking. God. Okay, first of all, bitch, don't call me Rosey, and…and!" Michael crowed. "Are you sleeping with him? You are! You finally found your way out of Narnia! Wait, am I going to recognize him?" Michael shrieks, brushes off Jensen's protests, but finally does settle a bit when Jensen begs him to keep it to himself.

"At least at least until after the divorce, Rosey. I'm…Jeanette and I want to keep this as low key as we can. We don't want to involve anyone, you get it?"

Michael's eyebrows climb impossibly high, but only a moment or two passes before he's hugging Jensen again.

"Aaah, so it's like that. Not just trade but a whole new life. Not to worry, darling, I'm an absolute tomb. No one is hearing a damn thing from me. I wish you every f*cking happiness and all the f*cking luck." He grabs Jensen's hand, and squeezes lightly. "You tell that boy to come in. I'm sure we'll love him." Before Michael pushes him away, he whisper-hisses, "I think he's got a job here."

Finally ready to leave, Jensen heaves up a box, and Michael tuts and insists Jensen let him help. "You, you, and you, get your lazy slack asses over here and grab one of these," he shouts. An explosion of cursing young people rush through the studio. Michael sets another box on top of the one Jensen is already carrying—beams like he's done something wonderful.

Behind them, at the studio doors, they can hear some sort of commotion going on, but Jensen doesn't care; nothing here is any of his concern anymore. Until he hears shouting, and things being tossed about and rolls his eyes. Of course Jeff would be an utter asshole here on his last day. With a heavy sigh, Jensen divides the boxes he's carrying between the crew who'd been corralled into helping and sends them to the security desk downstairs—he'll pick them up later. Right now, he can hear Jeff revving up to being a world-class jerkoff, and feels obligated on this, his last day, to help Michael and Glover out. And of course, revel in the fact that he'll never have to do this again.

They walk out just in time to catch Morgan flinging boards and pens and rolls of tape around the room, growling at whoever's unfortunate enough to get in his way. The man looks a mess, nothing like the cool, sardonic jerk that usually swaggered through the place, he's certainly not acting like it. He's snapped, completely flipped his wig, and Jensen's kind of glad he's here to see it.

Michael is the first one to remark on Jeff's state, of course. "Holy sh*t, were you in an accident? What the hell!" Michael stares at Morgan, "Did you fall down the stairs? Get pushed?" he asks sweetly, fluttering his eyelashes.

Michael's definitely not wrong, Jensen thinks, looking Morgan over. The man's a f*cking mess. Maybe not at a fall-down-the-stairs level, but he sure got a working over from someone. His lip's busted, ballooning, and wet with blood. He's got a purpling lump on his forehead that's crusted with dried blood and a rip in his shirt, which is also spattered with dots of blood. He's got scratches down both hands and Jensen bets that his jacket is covering more of those scratches on his arms. He can't help it—he laughs. Morgan got the sh*t kicked out of him.

Jensen takes a deep breath, trying to calm down enough to speak, and notices Jeff's got blood on his shoes too…just the tips Some stippling his pants leg. Morgan raises his arms and yeah, the scratches go all the way up—or all the way down, like someone tried to grab his arms and he yanked them free. Jensen shudders, a metallic taste floods his mouth; he knows what that looks like, gets a flash memory of his father, face twisted in rage.

What the hell happened? What did this f*cker do? he wonders, frowning now. Maybe he got beat up, maybe he didn't….

Morgan storms past them, shoving Michael so hard he staggers back into one of the benches, knocking sketches and mockups to the floor. "f*ck off, fa*ggot," Moran snaps at him and keeps going, ignoring Michael's offended screech, and Glover shouting, "How dare you!"

That's it—that's enough. "f*cking bastard," Jensen growls, and he follows Morgan right into his office, a small space Morgan had cut out of their work area. He's at his desk, flipping through a rolodex in a fury. "I'm gonna kill that bitch, gonna find that f*cker Murray and wring that whor* bitch's address out of his neck—"

Jensen raps on the cubicle wall and Morgan jerks his head up. "What the f*ck do you want?"

"I want you to apologize to Michael and Glover, hell, the whole crew. This is our workplace, and you acted inappropriately. Whatever happened to you is no excuse," he snaps. Morgan is scrubbing at the scratches, his busted lip, still dripping. "Picked a fight with someone who didn't give a f*ck? Or no, let me guess, the side piece left a memo on your face—"

"Shut the f*ck up. Get out of my office—no, get out the damn building, you're fired!"

Jensen grins at Morgan. "You dumb f*ck, you can't fire me—I quit." Jensen's still laughing as he walks out the door. He can hear Morgan shouting but that's something he doesn't need to care about anymore.

Jared's still waiting to hear from Jensen when he begins what he thinks of as his goodbye tour. Tom takes it well, better than Jared expected at any rate.

"But I thought we had some kind of…thing between us…" Tom had already been naked when he finally opened the door to Jared. Jared explaining that this situation they shared was about to end had come as a surprise to him, and Jared's still trying to get him to understand. He's quite put out, but boys and their toys, as the saying goes. Jared sweeps his hair back, tilts his head and smiles at Tom.

"Sweetheart. Darling. We did! It's called a business arrangement. And now I'm not in the business anymore. But don't worry, I have this for you," Jared pulls a card out of his makeup bag; it's from the agency that had sent feelers out to him an underage time ago. He presses it to Tom's bare chest. "Call here, they're very discreet. Perfect for a guy like you."

Tom turns the card in his hand, frowning at it.

"Well, okay, I guess. Does that mean this time's gonna be free, you know, for old times sake and all?" He's grinning and f*ck, he looks so good, so bright, so corn-fed and gorgeous. He'll almost, kind of, miss Tom.

"No." Jared starts pulling off his clothes, because why not—one last go, he might even tack on a bit of a discount, maybe. "But I am going to do you a huge favor. Your ass technique needs some work. So, I'm here to help you. Roll over."

"Hunh? Oh, no, I don't do that." But he's hard, and creeps into position like an obedient puppy. Jumps and moans breathily when Jared slaps an incredibly yummy ass cheek.

Jared straddles his legs, and grabs double-handfuls of a peach of an ass and squeezes. He smooths over his grip, smiling down at the fading pink flush. "Oh honey," he purrs, "You are in for a ride and a half! All you have to do is let go, and let me take the reins."

Jared and Tim meet for lunch; Jared's surprised that they're meeting outside of the hotel since their dates always take advantage of room service. This is very different, and a bit unsettling, a feeling Tim's brother seems to share. He looks rather confused as he drops them off at the door of a lovely, old-fashioned cafe, all wood and glass. Inside it's bright, with sunlight pouring in through giant windows. There's a dessert case a mile long, stuffed with cakes and pies, cookies and cupcakes, and Jared wants to spend a month there and try everything!

They head towards the back, led by one of the waiters, who're all togged out in white and black like penguins. Every one of them look like they have stories to tell, but there is no one there worth telling them to. Jared giggles softly, which earns him a sour look from their penguin. Tsk. Tough crowd.

They are released at a booth in the far rear of the cafe, darker without windows but quieter than the front of the cafe. Jared notices that high up on the walls are signed black and white photos—of actors, Jared guesses, but none that he knows. Tim waits while their waiter pulls a chair back for him and Jared seats himself. They sit quietly, smiling at one another as water glasses are filled, and little menu cards are passed out, and all the while Jared's getting a thorough and disdainful eye crawl from the waiter, with a bonus curled lip. Guesses that his outfit, a denim jumpsuit belted with a gold lame scarf, was not exactly dress code for a crowd that skewed oldish. Except of course for Tim, who was eternally young at heart.

So, it's while sipping on their water that Jared leans forward a little, ready to break the news to Tim that this was a last date—but Tim reaches out for Jared's hand and squeezes. "I already know, that's why we're here. Someplace different, no memories attached. Lots of sweets to ease the blow."

Jared tells Tim about his hopes for the future, admits he has no solid idea what that's going to be as yet, but graduation is coming and he's not walking across the stage as a hooker.

"Well, yes, that's a goal to meet, a worthy one, but don't be ashamed of what you do—did. As in, you're not defined by the things that happen to you, you're defined by how you react to them. As for you, love..." Tim shakes his head."You're a miracle, you know. You made this work for you. Maybe blessed, if you think about it; the way you took the coals life handed you and made diamonds."

"Oh, Timmy,"Jared croons. "You're so full of sh*t. But I'll have what you said embroidered on a pillow and treasure it always." But he's holding Tim's hand as he says it, curls his fingers around Tim's slightly smaller hand and squeezes gently. Tim smiles and shakes his head.

"Well my beautiful boy, the world has no idea what is about to hit the stage. As for me, I'll be the first to say 'I knew him when'. And then make everyone die of curiosity when I refuse to explain what "when" was," Timothy smirked.

"This is why I love you and I'm never giving you up. Brunch dates for eternity."

"As long as there are mimosas, love," he says, and waggles his eyebrows.

Justin
Jared sucks in a startled breath when Justin drops a file folder in his lap. "What's this, babe?" he scoops the folder up and opens it. "Oh, oh sh*t, thank you! Oh. My. God. Did you have to blackmail people into this? These are like, great schools, even I know that. I don't even have anything to show them, my portfolio is underwhelming, no experience—no degree. Well, not yet." Jared threw the folder on the little table and threw himself on the bed. "I haven't even started and I've failed."

"See, you're looking at this the wrong way. You get your foot in the door and then you charm the f*cking hell out of them. Show your portfolio like it's your baby, and make them see it's the most beautiful f*cking baby ever. Show them that the f*cking little rich kids you're gonna teach are going to learn something because that's how good you are."

Jared rolled over onto his belly and stared at Justin. "You're putting a lot of faith in someone whose only real skill, for all you know, lies in sucking dick. But bless you for helping set up those interviews for me. You're a prince."

"Ah-ah, I promised when you were ready I'd help, and I keep my promises."

Justin comes over and sits next to Jared on the bed, And Jared scoots a little closer, running a finger down Justin's ski-slope nose, and gives in to his sudden urge to tweak it. "Yeah, you do, and thanks cutie, seriously."

"You're welcome" is slightly muffled by Justin's hand rubbing his nose, "you asshole" as well. And then out of nowhere he asks, "Hey, you play basketball?"

"No!" Jared laughed, "Do I look like the athletic type?" Jared crows, and rolls to his knees, showing off a pair of lace trimmed panties and a silk kimono—it’s the last time they’re going to f*ck, and Jared kinda wanted it to be a little bit spicy. When Justin had absolutely not fallen down laughing, he'd considered it a win.

"Hah! Look at those legs, look at those mitts, there's no way you can't play. You're coming shopping with me. We're gonna get you proper sneakers and shorts that cover your whole ass, and then we play this weekend." Justin stops and stares Jared up and down like he's just seeing him for the first time. A slight expression of doubt blooms on his face . "You do have some basic idea of the game, right? Like, you played in school, right?"

"Oh, bitch, please! Ah, I mean. Kind of? There's like, a lot of running and yelling and slapping asses, and then you light a ball on fire and fling it into a basket on a big ole pole or something? Oh my god, I'm kidding, you asshole!"

Jared claps his hands together and collapses into helpless laughter as Justin's expression writhes through disbelief to horror to a slightly pissed-off but reluctant grin. Jared goes on,"So let me see if I've got this right: we're not having sex anymore, but you still want to "hang out" if I recall correctly, but if we do I have to be some kind of straight guy cliche?"

"Yes." Justin says emphatically, then coughs and laughs when Jared slaps him in the belly, hard enough to make him bend over.

"Such an asshole," Jared murmurs. Definitely out of all the clients he's ever had, Justin is one of his favorites. He amends his mental list with, 'out of all the people he's ever known, Justin is one of his favorites.

Jeff
The conversation with Jeff about Jared's leaving the game lands like a lead balloon. Jeff's whole face radiates indifference; he looks to be about five seconds from falling asleep, only perking up when Jared takes his clothes off. This is their last scheduled date, so biz as usual. He'd kind of wanted to leave after explaining why this was their last one, but the extra four hundred dollars won out. With this pay, he'll have his last semester paid off, thank the lord, mentally crossing himself. Mary, what he's gone through for this.

"What, are you in la-la land? Snap it up—bed," Jeff barks, shucking his clothes. "I don't have all day."

What follow's is a short, aggressive bout of f*cking, in which Jared pretty much lets Jeff toss him around like a puppet; all he can do is squeeze his eyes shut and pray for the end to come quickly. When it does come, Jeff doesn't even bother to look his way, just rolls off Jared's aching ass and walks straight to the bathroom, starts the shower and tosses the rubber. 'Prince f*cking Charming.'

Jared rolls to his back. His dick's rock-hard and struggling to stand. He cups himself and huffs out an annoyed sigh. It's one of those dates, where Jeff doesn't give a sh*t if Jared comes or not. Right now, sore and border-line pissed off as he is, it's more than okay. All he wants is what's due him, and the sight of that man's backside going out the door. Jeff trying to punish him by not getting him off is hardly surprising. He'd expected Jeff not to take being dropped well, control-freak asshole that he is.

Jared sits up, sucking his lower lip in to stifle the yelp that wants to break free--but frankly, some mild bruising and a sore asshole is a small price to pay to rid himself of Jeff and guys like him forever.

A few minutes later Jeff strolls out of the bathroom, wet from his shower and finger-combing his hair. Jeff''s still not acknowledging Jared in any way as he dries off and dresses. He walks around the bed, tossing his jacket on the end before stalking over to the oversized mirror on the wall opposite the bed. He finishes buttoning his shirt, then fidgets with his hair, flicking errant strands back in place. Jared watches him from the bed, pretty sure that Jeff's eyes are only on Jeff and not Jared's reflection in the mirror.

Jeff's pulling his wide shirt collar from under his vest when he tosses over his shoulder, like the thing they'd—Jared—had talked about earlier meant nothing, "I'll see you again Thursday. I'll pick the place we'll meet. Don't worry about where, I'll call you with the info you'll need." He grins at Jared in the mirror as he button his cuffs. It's like getting a smile from some mustached reptile. "I just need your personal number."

"But Jeff," Jared whines, drawing out his name in that gross, breathy, daddy's-little-boy voice that chicken hawks, like this f*cker pretends he isn't, tend to like. "We talked about it, right? It's over, like, completely over. Besides even if it wasn't, you know I don't, I mean I can't, do exclusives like that. I'm sorry, but not for anyone, Daddy. As per Chad's policies." Tries giving Jeff a 'what can you do?' look as he eases his way to the edge of the bed. Jared's starting to feel like he's in one of those Disney nature shows, how the predator tracks the prey that's desperately trying to avoid being eaten…he looks at Jeff's flat, dark eyes and swallows. Or maybe worse. Maybe f*cking Chad was right all along.

Jeff strokes his mustache, god, like a f*cking silent picture villain, his grin grows wider and more reptilian, like he knows what Jared is thinking. Jared feels pinned to the bed with the weight of his gaze.

"We don't need him anymore; you said you were dropping him—" Jeff cuts Jared off when he tries to explain that wasn't exactly what he'd meant. Jeff keeps smiling at him. Smiling and smiling, like a shark on speed. Jared blinks; he kind of wants to cry, and he can see by the light in Jeff's eyes he knows it too, and likes it.

"You don't need any of those others now, Baby Boy, never again. They don't know what you are, but I do, I could see it the first time I touched you. I know: what you need, how you want it. You just need someone to show you how much you can take. And trust me, you can take a lot—more than you have been. I'm going to teach you that."

Jared can feel a moan trying to crawl up his throat. He hasn't felt this scared since he was seventeen and just getting off the bus, dead broke and stupid. He blinks again and sh*t, his eyelashes are wet, feels a warm trail on his cheek as a tear breaks loose. Apparently, that delights the hell out of Jeff. He chuckles and makes a big show out of stepping back so Jared can slide off the bed. Of course, the minute his feet touch the floor, Jared drops, trying to grab his clothes, get dressed—run. Jeff's eyes are on him, super-cold marbles pinning him in place.

"I have a place I keep for…special boys," he says. "You'll move in there. You'll be safe there. It's clean, and nice, the kind of place a pretty boy like you should be. I can take care of you the way you need there; you'll never have to worry about a thing but keeping Daddy happy. Sounds good, right?"

Jared's proud his voice isn't shaking much as he snaps,"Hell f*cking no, you whacked-out sh*thead," because he's pissed off and terrified, and the mix makes him stupid for f*ck's sake. He glares at Jeff, trying to throw all the lessons he's learned on the street into his voice, his stance. He snatches up his pants, just about jumping into them, then quickly shoves bare feet into his shoes--socks are cheap, he'll buy more. Jared's just reaching for his T-shirt t when Jeff grabs him by the hair and yanks him upright. Slaps him, once, twice across the mouth and then, swings a balled fist backhand across his face

Jared falls like Jeff's hit him with a cattle prod. Crashes to his knees, and even over the thump when he lands, he hears a faint crack. sh*t, sh*t, sh*t! Jared tries to scuttle back out of reach, but Jeff's too damn fast. He aims a kick at Jared, connects, does it again, and then again, and again. Jared's fading out, slipping in blood. It's all over the place, from his mouth, his chin, there's a thudding crashing pain in his eyes—for a moment he even thinks he's blind, but his brain flicks back on and makes him open his eyes. Bleary but working. Jared can't even scream, it hurts so much.

"Bitch." Jeff reaches down for him. He grabs Jeff's hands, his nails digging in as he tries to hold Jeff off. Jeff curses the bleeding furrows Jared's nails dig into his hand--it sends a vicious shock of pleasure through him, right up until Jeff bashes him again. Through bleary eyes, he sees the cord for the bedside clock. Yanks it down and forces himself upright. Jared's panting, his eyes running with tears, but of rage. Jeff, the f*cker, is just standing there panting, laughing softly under his breath. He's excited, geared up, of course he thinks Jared's crying with fear. Because he's a dick. Because he has no idea who Jared is and he's so certain that he's won.

Jeff slinks closer, Jared grimaces—Jeff’s hard, his eyes gone from snake-gaze to blazing, pupils blown. "Now come on, Baby Boy, don't carry on like this. Don't make me hit you again, I don't like it."

"Liar, sh*t-eating liar," Jared hisses. Jeff comes at him, and Jared takes the cord he's been wrapping around his wrist and swings the clock with all his might, aiming to hit Jeff in the face.

He does, dead center—the crunch when it hits his face is loud, so is the shriek of pain.

"You scream like a girl," Jared pants and while Jeff is curled up on the floor, howling, Jared drops everything and runs. And f*ck it, he's gotta split without grabbing his money. He sure could use it too—he might head over to the clinic after this. His ribs are either cracked or bruised and one eye is closed and screaming at him with every breath. "You're the bitch," he spits and staggers to the door.

Jeff's on his ass where he fell, legs splayed. Blood's pouring between his fingers, and even with his hands covering his face the shock he's feeling is visible; in his world bitches don't fight back. Jeff finds his voice. Spraying blood everywhere, he's practically screaming, "You whor*, you trash bitch, I'm gonna f*cking beat the sh*t out of you!"

"God, I feel sorry for your poor, stupid wife," Jared shouts, "f*ck you forever!" because he is who he is, and he's got to get the last word in, luckily he's halfway out the door already, and once out all he's thinking is get to the elevator.

Once inside the sanctuary of the elevator, he leans back against a wall, takes a deep breath, then yowls like a crazed cat into his hands. When he drops them, he jumps, they're covered with blood. It looks like he's dipped them inside the carcass of something. He gingerly touches his bleary eye and cries out. Feels like a cut there and it hurts. His ribs, his face, his ass, his goddamn knees, and thinking that makes him laugh before the pain shuts him up again and he drops his throbbing head. Blinks tears from the eye he can see out of.

Jeff, f*cking bastard, he should get gang raped by baboons—no, too ambitious, he hopes the f*cker gets hit by a car and dragged for blocks until not even his mother would know him; he hopes he eats something bad and dies screaming and choking on vomit and sh*tting himself.

He hates Jeff so much, for hurting him, for taking away the feeling that he's—Jared laughs again, wet and choked—kinda invincible. He carefully drops his head back against the wall, not at all pleased at what he sees in the strips of polished metal set in the walls. God. His face is already swollen, he's half-naked, got no money, and he's obviously f*cked up. He just hopes he can get out of the building before cops find him or that mother-f*cking crazy, bitch pervert chicken hawk does.

Jared's getting ready to walk out into the lobby when Chad's dude, Winton, spots him. "Holy sh*t, Padalecki, you can't be in the lobby, 'specially not looking like that, goddamn! Jezuz, come with me." He herds Jared to a door that opens out to the hotel's parking garage, grabbing a shirt off what looks like a pile of rags as he goes and tossing it to Jared. "sh*t. Chad's gonna flip when he sees you. I—I can't call the cops on that guy, you know that."

"f*ck no, don't call the damn cops, I'll be the bitch in lockup while that f*cker dances free and clear. Just..thanks, y'know, for the shirt. Thanks for, I guess, everything."

Winton's gaze is darting nervously around the alley, and he's making unconscious little moves away from Jared, without wanting to seem like he's trying to put space between them.

"Un hunh, no problem, I'll see ya next week." He hesitates, looking Jared up and down, his forehead pleated in a frown. "Oh, wait, Chad says you guys are done. Guess you can't trick with that mug, anyway. How bad is the room? Bad, I'll bet. Gonna to have to get off-site cleaners in and all. Blood's a bitch," he mutters to himself. Then, "You're gonna need to slide me extra for that, dude. Plus, seeing as it's our last call and all."

"Well, aren't you the sentimental one? Thanks for your concern, but—" Jared sneers at him, "—screw that and screw you. And FYI, I've been f*cking short-changin' you from the beginning." He grins and lumbers off, ignoring Winton's cursing at him. He gets himself out of the alley and wanders his way across the plaza; by the time he limps his way to the concrete benches, he's really hurting, a lot, like, terribly a lot and it's so f*cking unfair. He's a decent guy, more or less. Why the hell did the universe think he deserved this? Jared rubs his hands under his nose, smearing wet and dried blood around his face. God, what a way to look in public. Jared's about to drag himself upright and hoof it to the subway when he hears a familiar voice.

"Jared, hi—f*cking what in the world! Jared, what happened?"

Looks up and there's Jensen, holding a banker's box and looking horrified.

Oh, look. It's my guardian angel "Hi," Jared says, getting ready to give Jen a big smile; instead, he bursts into tears.

Getting home took a rather costly taxi ride. They took a taxi because Jensen just couldn't subject Jared to the scrutiny of strangers on a train. The thought of them gawking at Jared's poor, swollen face and his heavily bruised bare chest makes him queasy. He steals a look at Jared, trying to judge how he is. Jared's curled against the window, plucking at the hem of the ragged, grease-stained shirt he's wearing—where the hell had that thing come from? His eyes go to Jared's face, tracking the traces of blood smeared across his pale cheeks. There's still some rimming his nostrils where Jensen's handkerchief hadn't been up to wiping it away. Jensen swears under his breath; if he finds whoever did this to Jared, they'll get some of the same.

Chapter 7 Chapter Text

Home bound traffic's not too bad, so they're back at Jensen's house almost before Jensen's ready for it. Stopping on the front steps, he gazes around at his little house, soon to be his alone. He heaves a sigh, and unlocks the door.

"Come on in, Jared. We'll get you sorted out, okay?" Standing aside, smiling slightly, he ushers Jared in. Inside, it's so quiet—so quiet that he can hear Jared's shaky intake of breath. Nerves, probably. They step in further inside, into the foyer, and Jensen notes the covert little glances Jared takes of the house. Before Jensen can lead him into the living room, Jared stops, wincing in pain.

"Do you, would you like to…sit?" Jensen points out the hall tree bench, and Jared does sit, with a grateful sigh.

"Oh, thanks, Jen. My feet are killing me." He slides his shoes off, gingerly, and grimaces. "Ugh. These babies were not made to go barefoot in," he says, trying to affect a light tone. Jensen has to bite back a growl when he sees what running around barefoot in the platform shoes had done to Jared's feet. The skin is red, raw, and blistered at the heels. Is that blood? Jensen wonders and this time, growls out loud before slapping his palm against the wall.

"Sonofaf*ckingbitch," he yells, alarming Jared, who leaps to his feet, then stands there jittering and wringing his hands in distress, obviously unsure what to do next. Oh for f*cks sake, Jensen thinks. Scare the sh*t out of the guy who's already had a f*cked up day.

"I--" Jared starts, and nervously looks about. "What about your wife?" he whispers, eyes wide as he haltingly backs closer to the front door.

"Relax, Jare." Jensen reaches out and grips Jared's shoulder, trying to calm him. "It's just you and me here now. Jeanette, ah, she moved out pretty quickly once we…talked." He knows the smile he's giving Jared is a little twisted. Even if their separation's more or less mutual, he's not yet at the point where he doesn't feel a bit like he failed. "After some, some, well, it can wait until you feel better. But it's okay, really. She was…you know, it was like she was waiting for a sign. The both of us."

Jensen's rubbing up and down Jared's shoulder, the whole time he speaks, like he can send the truth of his words through touch. "Don't worry, okay?"

Jared nods slowly, maybe not wholly convinced, but he is looking slightly more at ease. Jensen coaxes him out of the foyer into the living room, where Jared turns circles, eyeing everything. He misses Jensen's wince—Jensen's pretty sure he knows what Jared is seeing. Jared turns back to him, clearly struggling to find something complimentary to say about the place. After a beat, he settles on a nice, neutral, "Well! This is very clean. Very…nice?" His voice rises a bit at the end, as if he's not entirely sure that's true, but it is Jensen's house, so maybe it is.

"Oh god, no it's not," Jensen laughs. It's sterile and utilitarian because that's how Jeanette wanted it. Restful, she called it.Neat and orderly. Jensen had been fine with it. It had been comfortable enough as far as he was concerned, a place to leave work behind. Now, looking at the nearly colorless, spartan space through Jared's eyes, it's… wow. It really is bad: boxy furniture in rigid lines, everything cream on beige on palest green. A single bookcase holds a few books and a glass vase. On the far wall, too high and too small to see very well, hangs a single, lonely painting. It was a piece of art she'd actually been drawn to, which made it unique.

"It's not nice now, but it will be." Jensen smiles at Jared, who blushes, which reminds Jensen about the blood, oh my god! The poor kid is standing there, looking like a bloody Jackson Pollack, and here Jensen is worrying about his damn beige decor. "C'mon, Jare. Let's get you into a shower."

"Okay, but no funny business," Jared mutters, trying to lighten the mood, but it comes out rather flat.

"Noted," Jensen replies, "no red, rubber noses or seltzer bottles in the shower." He's a little surprised, and very pleased, when he gets a tentative smile in return.

Jensen invites himself into the bathroom with Jared; Jared needs the help. He's in too much pain to easily raise his arms, plus he's favoring one knee, groaning when he tries to lift it. Jensen closes the toilet lid and makes Jared sit while he bustles around like a mother hen, turning on the water, finding a fresh toothbrush, unwrapping a fresh bar of soap and laying it out for Jared. He takes Jared's elbow—carefully—to help him into the shower, he even adjusts the shower head for him. Afterwards, Jensen helps to dry him off, brushing off Jared's thanks with, "No, no, you'd do the same for me."

"I would," he replies, so solemnly it makes Jensen feel like something much deeper has been said. Swallowing hard, he holds out a folded, clean set of PJs to Jared, who bites his lip to keep—unsuccessfully—from laughing.

"Oh my goodness, Sugar-nips, I haven't worn anything like those in years! In fact, I haven't worn anything at all come bedtime in years. This is too funny—are those cows? Why cows? Can't I have the cowboy ones?" he asks as he slips the pants on. "Lord, it's like wearing a bag knit from barb-wire. Who hated you enough to give you these?"

"Shut up, you dork! These dumb pajamas are the only set I own," Jensen laughs. Jared teasing him makes his heart soar, makes him feel like things might be improving but he loses even a trace of a smile after seeing again what's been done to Jared, how stiffly the kid lifts his arms to put the top on. Jensen takes Jared's hands, kisses them lightly and moves them out of the way so that he can take over buttoning. "Jared, god—you should let me call my doctor to check you out."

"No, no, Jen it looks worse than it is. Listen, if it was really bad, I'd be begging you to take me to him, believe me. f*cking Jeff," Jared hisses as Jensen tries to gently smooth the shirt down. "What a f*cking asshole. I mean, I knew he was a jerk, and he had a temper—I guess that's obvious—but he didn't seem like a, a murderous jerk until today. I swear, Jen, he just suddenly turned into a nightmare. You think you know people." Jared starts to shake his head but gasps, his hand going up to gingerly cup his eye.

"Yeah—careful, sweetheart," Jensen murmurs, using a tissue to pat the skin around Jared's swollen eye dry, while promising himself that he was going to find this Jeff bastard and kick the f*cking sh*t out of him. "I'm familiar with dealing with Asshole Jeffs. My ex-boss is one."

"Ex-boss is a—wait, you quit your job? But you loved that job."

Jared looks so distressed that Jensen quickly explains, "I quit the job, yes, and yes, it was a good job, but not what I loved. Teaching kids, that's what I've always wanted to do. But for right now, I'm just going to revel in the fact I never have to deal with that asshole Morgan again. No more whining 'Mr. Morgan, please calm down' ever again. Oh, sure Jeff, batwing collars are hip to the max. Ha! Mr. Jeff Morgan can kiss my ass. I'd like to grab that f*cker by his stupid mustache and sweep the floor with his face. If I never hear him call me Baby Boy again, it'll be too soon."

"H-he...he does what?" Jared suddenly goes limp like a puppet with its strings cut, and only Jensen's grip keeps him from hitting the floor. "Is he—is he tall and," Jared waves his hand around his head, "dark haired with a lame Mark Spitz mustache—Jeff Morgan's your boss?"

A weird sort of dull roar crashes through Jensen's head, muffling his hearing and fogging his sight. "Jeff…did this to you…he hurt you like this?" Jeff…so it was Jared who'd made Jeff look like he'd had an encounter with a sledgehammer. "That f*cker was your client?"

Good. He's glad Jared got his shot in. But it's not enough, not for Jensen. He stalks out to the foyer and grabs his shoes from under the bench.

"He was a client!"Jared calls after him. "Past! And trust me, I left my mark on him. Jensen! Where are you going?"

"To kill Jeff."

"No, Jen! Please don't! I don't have anything else but you—Jen, I can't risk losing you!" Jared voice rises until he's almost screaming; he sounds so desperate that Jensen staggers to a stop. Turning back to Jared, all he can do is stare at him, open-mouthed and a little shocked that Jared seems to have taken him literally. For god's sake, did Jare really think he had it in him to murder someone? For some reason, the thought brings laughter bubbling out of him; he gasps out an apology for laughing when Jared is so visibly upset, but apologizing for something so out of the world just starts him off again, until finally even Jared laughs.

"Jare! Tell me you didn't seriously think I was off to murder Jeff in cold blood!"

"No! Stop laughing at me! God, why do I love you so much?" Jared slaps a hand over his mouth. "Oh, dear. I meant—"

Finally, Jensen thinks, finally. "Can you possibly think I don't love you too? Baby, of course I do, so much." Jensen takes Jared by the hand—carefully. If Jared was in any better shape, he'd swing him around the room, smother him with kisses until Jared called him a bozo and pushed him away. Taking a step back, he knocks into the banker's box he'd brought home. There's a heavy thump as something inside the box shifts. Hearing it triggers a reminder of what's inside, which triggers a light bulb moment, possibly the germ of a plan.

It's obvious that Jared's puzzled at Jensen's excitement when he opens the box and all he takes from it is a camera. Jensen's fond of it—a nice little Yashica he'd bought to take pictures of really top-notch displays for his portfolio. Dangling it from his hand, he hesitantly approaches Jared with the idea he'd been struck with. It's not a great idea. In fact, it's kind of slimy and underhanded, but then so is Jeff. The only one Jensen's worried about possibly hurting is Jared.

"So. Two things, Jared. First? No matter how much I might want to, I'm not about to kill Jeff or, or anybody, for crying out loud. Second I wanted to tell you earlier but with the whirlwind life has been lately, it just…how do I say this…?"

"Ungh, Jen, just—out with it!"

"Well, good news, baby," Jensen laughs. "You have a job! You are employed! I got a spot for you in Gyre Bros. In fact," Jensen says, in as dramatic a tone as he can muster. "You are now, as Michael calls them behind my back, almost officially the newest gofer-dogsbody-schlepper-menial on the Gyre Bros Display Department team."

"What the f*ck are you talking about, Jensen? Are you f*cking with me?" Jared's staring at Jensen, really searching his face, whatever he sees makes his lip tremble and his eyes go shiny. "Really? Oh my god…I dreamed, I mean I hoped that someday I'd have something like this—oh sh*t. f*ck, f*ck, f*ck! Jeff, Jensen! I'm done before I even start—even if he agrees to Michael hiring me, that bastard will make my life a living hell."

Jared limps over to the couch and drops down, hissing a little as he does. He looks devastated, and Jensen can't stand how lost he looks. He sits next to Jared, camera still in his hand. "Jared…listen. I have an idea. It's…frankly kind of awful, but it might work."

"Does it involve cutting Jeff into tiny pieces and burying them secretly in various obscure locales?"

Jensen stares at him again. "Wow. Have you always been this scarily bloodthirsty and I'm just noticing it now?" When Jared giggles, it feels like a wonderful reward. "No cutting. Actually, it may be worse. I..I want to take pictures of you." Jensen talks over Jared's yelp of protest, desperate to explain. "No, wait, Jared. This might work, considering the kind of guy Morgan is, and the kind of face he stands to lose. You'll have something to hold over him, so he'll have to be nice."

Jared hates the idea, but gets it. "I'm used to being practical. Hell, I'm no saint. Not at this point, right?"

Jensen is going to take pictures of everything Jeff's inflicted on Jared, every bruise and scrape and cut. Jensen promises Jared, cross his heart and hope to die, that no other person besides the two of them and Jeff will ever see the photos—he's going to develop them himself, using a friend's darkroom. Once they're ready, he'll confront Jeff.

"Do you really think that'll ensure he doesn't f*ck up the job for me?"

Jared looks uncertain, but Jensen can tell he's already agreeing to the plan. Jensen's absolutely not going to tell Jared that what he wants to do is make sure of more than that. He just kisses Jare on the cheek and says, "Something like that, sweetheart. Just…leave it to me, okay? I'm going to make sure you get this job, and that you'll keep it."

"I don't know, Jen. It just seems. Not right, y'know? Like I'm cheating. Like I'm using you instead of making it on my own. Everyone else has to interview and I just walk in off the street like, Oh hey, it's me, thanks for the job? I mean, you've worked for what you have, you came from an arts, a graphic arts background. You came with proof of what you were capable of. All I've ever done was f*ck people and sling sandwiches."

"Sling…what? " Jensen asks, then waves it off. "And work towards your associates with everything stacked against you, and have a great understanding of design, and you're an idiot if you don't take an advantage thrown in your lap! How do you think people get ahead? Through connections, dude, and luck, and talent—take this chance, for god's sake!" Jensen's working himself up. He's going to convince Jare to do this, take this leap by god, or—

"Okay."

"Jared, I'm telling you, you—oh. Okay?" Jensen deflates a little, and laughs at himself for being disappointed he doesn't get to argue his point longer.

Jared scoots back on the couch and pulls his feet up, grabs one of the boxy little pillows lined up against its back and tucks it under his knees, He's got the cream throw Jeanette always placed, folded just so, along one arm of the couch, wrapped around him and he looks like he's settling in for a while. Jensen feels like floating, he's so damn happy. Look at his boy, making himself at home.

"Yeah, okay," Jared says, his eyes are gleaming, his big, dimpled smile is just visible over the edge of the throw. "Yes, alright, my very own personal avenging angel. I'd be a fool not to take the chance you're giving me. Screw Jeff."

"With a vengeance," Jensen promises. "God, Mike is going to love you."

Jared giggles. "What about Glover?"

"Don't wish for the moon, love."

It's early morning when Jensen comes back home with a folder full of photos and a splitting headache. Hanging out in a darkroom working the night through was tougher than he remembered it being in college, Still, seeing Jared in those goofy PJs and one of Jensen's robes wrapped around him, looking like he belonged curled up in the breakfast nook, went a long way towards easing the thumping behind Jensen's eyes. "Good morning love, what are you doing up so early? Are you feeling okay?"

Jared shoves the coffee cup in front of him away and looks up at Jensen. He pokes at the single slice of toast on his plate. Turns a look on Jensen that would put a sad puppy to shame and moans, drawing out Jensen's name. "Everything I do hurts. I can't even lift a slice of toast!"

"Aww, I know, baby. But see this?" He waves the folder full of pictures at Jared. "This is our ticket to our future. After I slap these on Jeff, everything changes." He tries to hand the folder to Jared, but Jared holds his hands up, frowning.

"No, Jen. I don't want to see them. You…you do what you have to, just don't let that bastard get hold of them."

"Never. Not in a million years. These pictures here go into the fire as soon as I'm done with Jeff. Promise. And the negatives are going into a fire safe in the bedroom."

Chad calls just as Jensen is leaving. Jared blows him a kiss, crosses his fingers and crosses himself as Jensen walks out, then turns his attention to Chad.

"What's Wonder Boy doing?" Chad asks and when Jared hesitates says, "Probably something I shouldn't know about. Okay. Good for him. So, listen, Justin called, wanted to know if you're following up on the interviews he set up for you. Teaching? Also, good for him. You have some f*ckin' amazing friends, Jay-rad."

He laughs before going on, "Dude, no idea why, but he also wanted to know when you were going shopping for...basketball shorts? And sneakers? Are you really giving up the biz or is this some kinda weird fetish, like, no judgment and all but Wonder Boy might not like you side-fuc—"

"Chad! No! Like you said, he's just an amazing friend—apparently the only one I have, you pervert. But hark, I have a job, an amazing one! Jensen arranged a job for me at Gyre Bros, I mean, if Jensen's plan works out."

"What plan? No, you know what, don't tell me. All your friends' plans are illegal."

"Not all of them, just you and me," Jared says. "I guess I don't need Justin's addresses—oh my god, I'm a f*cking idiot! Chad—can you bring those papers to me? No, you know what? Meet me at the diner, puh-leeeze?"

"What the hell, I got nothing else to do, why not?"

Jensen strides into Gyre Bros like he owns the place; head up, shoulders back, his lips curved in a smile verging on a smirk. He hopes that no one notices that he's a little pale with nerves, that the hand clutching the large envelope is shaking. He stops at security and asks them if they could please call up to Michael and have him come down. The man appears in what feels like seconds, smiling from ear to ear, his arms out for a hug.

"Hello, darling!" He talks over Jensen's grunt of pain—the man has the muscular grip of a Russian shot-putter, despite acting like he's made of a single strand of straw. "Where's your boy? I thought you were bringing him?" he asks, peering behind Jensen like he might be hiding all six foot something of Jared behind his back.

Jensen closes his eyes for a second, before taking Michael to the side. He asks quietly, "Michael…what would you do if Jeff was gone? I mean like, gone gone?"

Michael takes a big step back, plants his hands on his hips and looks Jensen up and down. His expression shifts from amused to the most serious Jensen's ever seen on the man's face.

"If he was gone…would that mean you were coming back? Not that I wouldn't love to have you back, darling one..." Jensen shakes his head no, and Michael goes on, "Then I would run the whole shebang. I can do it, you know I can, and do a better job than Jeff's ever done. Hell, between the two of us, we did his damn job."

"Take me up—I've got something to talk to Jeff about."

Michael's still staring at Jensen, then his gaze moves to the envelope Jensen's gripping. He doesn't say a word, just lifts an eyebrow and purses his lips, giving Jensen the faintest nod. They go up with the elevator practically vibrating with the depth of silence in it. Michael walks Jensen through the studio, hands up at anyone who wants to speak.

They walk past Glover, who's leaning against a table, both eyebrows lifted high. Jensen knows that Glover knows something is about to happen—he winks at Jensen before turning back to work. It makes Jensen smile, even wider when he sees his ficus in a brand-new pot.

Michael leaves him at Jeff's door with a whispered, "Don't get yourself in trouble, Jensen. But screw him dry and hard."

Jensen straightens, his hold on the envelope tightening, tells himself, 'Okay, Jensen, don't flake, don't fold; Jared needs this.' He taps on the edge of the open door and steps inside.

Jeff looks up with a smirk on his face that drops off when he sees it's Jensen in the doorway. "What the hell are you doing here? This is for employees only," he says, sneering at Jensen like he'd been fired instead of quitting. "You better haul ass before I call security," Jeff snaps. "No, f*ck that. I'm calling 'em right now."

He grabs his phone, finger on the button for security. His sneer's back, wider now, verging on unhinged. A crocodile smile, Jensen thinks. Shaking his head, Jensen steps forward, opens the envelope. He shakes a few photos out of the envelope, they skitter across Jeff's desk, and he makes an instinctive move to catch them. Jensen watches him, arms crossed over his chest. He feels like...like he's showering in slime. But it's for Jared, he tells himself. And honestly, it doesn't feel horrible at all watching Jeff pale to a fish-belly white and his expression flip from "supercilious bastard" to "desperate drowning man".

"So—so what. No one's going to care about a—a whor*," Jeff gasps.

Ignoring the instant wave of rage that hearing Jared disrespected by an asshole brings, Jensen shakes his head. "Oh, Jeff. Such an asshole. What do you think would happen if, say, your bosses got these? Your wife …imagine her getting these." Jensen grimaces and nudges a photo across the desk: a curve of hip, the camera angle pointing downwards to show a bruised hip with just a hint of Jared's ass—skin marred with purple, finger-shaped bruises and scratches. He pulls it back before Jeff can touch it, then fans out a handful featuring Jared's face and chest—bruised and swollen and beaten. Jeff looks like he's going down for the third time. Jensen gathers the photos back, sits across from him and waits.

Jeff's jaw works for a few seconds before he can spit something out, "What do you want?" he shouts. "Your whor* want money? Or you want your position back? No, a higher one, right? Is that what you're angling for—I can work something out."

Jensen taps the envelope on the edge of the desk, rubs his chin like he's thinking hard about Jeff's offer. Across from him, Jeff's starting to smile. He leans his elbows on the desk; it's obvious he thinks he's going to win something here.

Jensen gives the asshole a crocodile smile of his own and says, "Let's talk about how you want a transfer to a South Atlantic store—I hear that's a growing region now—and how you recommend Michael to head the department. Let's talk about you leaving—now."

Jensen comes back from the city about a few hours later, smiling from ear to ear. He's still jazzed at how well the plan went, and even happier when he opens the door to see his lover waiting for him, smiling like a naughty Donna Reed, wrists wrapped in multiple pearl bracelets and dressed only in a pair of tiny orange track shorts. Only that, along with some lipstick and rouge and a long, flowing scarf complete his ensemble. As far as Jensen's concerned, Jared's dressed to the impeccable nines. He's also holding some sort of drink, an electric blue thing, so Jensen grabs it with a murmured thanks and gulps half of it, ignoring Jared's gasped, I meant have a taste, not the whole thing!

"God, I needed that—that was in the bar?" He flaps his free hand, dismissing his own question, and hands Jared his drink back. Wrapping the silk scarf floating around Jared's gorgeous neck in his fingers, Jensen pulls him close and whispers in his ear, "Guess who's now officially Gyre Bros new assistant to the head of design?"

Jared tosses down what's left of his drink, before pressing a hand to his chest, like he's trying to hold his heart in place. "Assistant to the head of design? Oh my god, are you insane? No, that's totally crazy—I can't do that, Jensen!" Jared protests but Jensen hushes him, covering Jared's mouth with a gentle hand.

"Yes you can. Remember we talked about this. The minute you can see out of both eyes, Michael wants you in the studio. You. Can. Do. This," Jensen punctuates each word with a kiss. "Remember, it's who you know—and what you can do with that, that makes amazing breaks. Just think of it as your ship finally coming in."

Jared pulls his scarf from Jen's grip, nibbles on the end of it. "I think I can talk to Michael,” he mutters. Then, a bit louder, says, “Yes, I will go talk to him, and he’s going to see how fabulous I am, and, and—oh Jen, I can't believe it! I'm finally going places—it's too exciting," Jared crows. Wraps his scarf around Jensen’s neck and yanks him in, planting a big, deep, wet kiss on him. Before Jensen can react, Jared is sweeping away, headed for the kitchen.

"Now I’m definitely doing this, but you have something to do for me. Mr. Michael Murray called. Said he heard from Justin—an ex-client, sorry, you're probably going to see a lot of him. Oh, and Timothy too, you'll adore him—anyway, it reminded me that Justin had set up some interviews for me, teaching positions; I swear, that Justin boy could sell sand sundaes in a desert! What we'll do is work it so you'll take these interviews instead, okay?"

Jensen’s baffled. In what world did Jared think this could work? He looks into his lover’s smiling face, not wanting to squash the excitement he sees in Jared's sunflower eyes but..."Jared, they're expecting you—I can't just walk in in your place, like, yo what’s crackin’ dudes?"

“No!” Jared laughs long and loud. “Puh-leeeze! Promise me never say that again!"Jared throws himself into one of the kitchen chairs and wraps his long, naked limbs around the legs, making Jensen take a second to wonder what it would feel like to have those legs wrapped around him. He blinks when Jared calls his name, and grins shamefaced before sitting as well.

"Of course, you can take my place, and you will! Jensen, seriously, you have a much better chance at getting those jobs than I do, with your knowledge and experience. Just, smile a lot and be all charming as well and you'll get it." Jared's face lights up, and leaning across the table, he reaches out and takes Jensen's hand. "Oh my stars...Jensen. I've got a job, a real job. I'm never going to have to smell like pathetic sex or salad dressing ever again! Now you go get yours."

Jensen leaves Jared at home, resting. He's doing great, healing really well, but Jensen's managed to talk him into taking the rest that a kid that young never thinks they need—and there he goes again acting like he's some grandpa years older than Jared. He shakes his head and flags down the waitress. She smiles, because though it's been a while, the waitresses still remember Jensen, the Mr. Rockafeller of generous tipping. He orders a breakfast sandwich, pork roll, egg, and cheese on a bagel, with black coffee, and asks for an extra cup to come in ten minutes.

Jensen wolfs down the sandwich—appears blackmail makes for a hearty appetite. Wiping his mouth, he glances around the time-worn place, the place where, not to be corny, his real life began. For the better, god, so much for the better.

He's staring at the tabletop, thinking, smiling, and halfway through his cup. He looks up, and there's Chad suddenly appearing out of nowhere like a f*cking Jedi.

He's frowning, but in a thoughtful way. He's got an oversized white envelope in his hand, and an extremely skeptical look on his face. He doesn't say a word, just sits there, glaring at Jensen, and after a few seconds Jensen realizes Chad's glaring at his coffee too; looks like Chad's just about to open his mouth when the waitress drops a coffee on the table.

"Well, hell, If I'd known it was for you, I'd have waited until it got cold," she drawls, leaning a hip against the table and looking Chad up and down like he's an upright slug.

"Yeah, sure, you know you love me," Chad grins. "Heck, what's not to love?"

She snorts and whirls off, but Jensen catches the way the corner of her mouth turns up in a smile. Turns to Chad. "So, thanks for bringing that for Jare. And I guess I have to thank that Justin guy for taking the extra step for him."

"Yeah…where's Jay—Jared? It was me and him supposed to be meeting? Why's he not here?" He glares impossibly harder. If Chad had possessed heat ray vision, Jensen's pretty sure he'd be a pile of ash right now.

"Jared's good, better than good. Healing great. I had to beg him to stay home and get some sleep."

"Hmmm. " Chad takes a slug of coffee then leans over the table towards Jensen, squinting slightly with the intensity of his emotions and says, "Swear to god, if you screw Jared in any way, I'll kill you. He's a great kid, he deserves something great. Yeah, he might need a bit of a push sometimes, 'cause okay, he's a little too prone to slide the easy way, but...I know he can be anything if he has someone who believes in him."

Jensen tries to sit back away from Chad's looming presence and his cologne, says "Of course, agreed—wait. Are you, you are—you're jealous." Didn't this guy have a wife? Jare said he had a wife….

"f*ck yes", Chad says, "and if I thought I had a whiff of a chance, I'd cram you in a cement overcoat and toss you in the river, but I'm invisible to him that way. That's why I paid, to remind myself that what we had was business. Well, now he's my best friend. No matter what my loopy ex thinks." He stops, takes a breath and another slug of coffee. "Ah well. Say La Vee."

"La Vee," Jensen mutters and Chad finally cracks a smile.

"You know, that's the original reason I sent Justin his way. Jay-rad deserves something nice, and that dude's a catch, even if he's dumb enough to think he doesn't want a serious thing. Too bad he ended up in the same boat as me—he didn't figure out what he needed until it was too late."

Jensen stares at Chad, feeling the emotional place Chad's in, the knowing the one you want will never want you back."I want him with me, only me, forever." After choking feelings like this into silence all his life, it's terrifying to say it out loud. But...feels good too.

"Yeah, yeah. I know. The both of ya. Sickening." Chad rolls his eyes, but behind the smirk, there's a little pain. But, when he says, "I knew this is the way it would end the moment I saw the boy eyeing your hot-ass, you bastard." There's also a bit of real affection there too.

"Anyhoo, catch you later, Jenny. Good luck," Chad says and drops a couple of bills on the table before walking out. "Take care of our boy," he shouts over his shoulder, and then he's gone, leaving Jensen to sip lukewarm coffee and try to avoid the eyes that are all pinned on him. He picks up the money and sees it's more than enough for breakfast and a tip, and snorts, has to smile. He thinks maybe he gets why Jared loves the guy so much.

In the year that he and Jen have lived together, Jared's life has changed in ways he'd always been afraid to imagine. He gets to sleep with, and wake up to, the most amazing man in the world. He has an incredible job, and as time goes on, he adores his coworkers more and more. His boss Michael is a high decibel queen and he loves her for it. As for Glover...well. John is the smart, elegant, sarcastic Queen Mother he hopes one day to be, and Jared adores him as well. Friday lunches with John is the icing on his weekly cake. The fact that it kind of pisses Jen off that they get along so well is just a wee bit of an extra bonus.

The job itself? He loves the brainstorming, he loves putting their ideas into workable plans, he loves the work of dressing the windows, even on days when he feels like putting a chair through every single f*cking one of them. It’s okay though, on those days he takes a deep breath, exhales slowly, and remembers what the woman who raised him used to say, ‘How can you know what’s good if you never have some bad?’

Jensen is doing wonderfully well himself, thanks to dearest Justin’s helping hand. He'd had his pick of positions—something Jared knows he wouldn't have had. Jensen loves teaching, and he's wonderful with the kids, just like Jared knew he'd be. He's patient, and kind, and truly cares about his students. It's something that Jared got to know after they moved in together, just how deeply, genuinely, unselfishly caring he is. Everyday with Jensen feels like a discovery of how good life with the right person can be.

There's a fairy tale quality about all this—minus the rough divorce, and the streetwalking, and the forbidden love—but Jared does kind of feel like he's been woken by the handsome prince with a kiss—but the handsome prince got his own awakening. They are their own family, and all’s right in the Queendom.

It's a beautiful Sunday, the lawn is a brilliant blue-green under a watercolor sketch of a sky. Jared's wildly running around in circles, exhorting a little brindle dog that looks like a slightly wonky, pocket-size German Shepard to go for some kind of stick thing that cost a million dollars but that Jared insists was safe for her and that was all that mattered. Jensen shakes his head. Hell, when he was a kid, dog toys were grody old sticks and dog treats were leftover chicken bones to chew on. But not for Heidi, oh no. Heidi slept inside on her very own fluffy pillow. She had a wardrobe almost as big as Jared's. It's just f*cking ridiculous the way that man dotes on a dog he “rescued” from a shelter. One minute its just Jared and Jensen, and the next, there's a little four-legged girl whose puppy eyes give her dad's a run for his money. Apparently, those were the kind of things happened when you were with someone with a heart as big as Jare's.

Jensen, on the other hand, led with his head, not his heart. He was immune to puppy dog eyes of any tripe. And he would let bamboo slivers be shoved under his nails before he'd confess that when Jared worked a rare evening, Heidi slept next to Jensen in the bed.

This morning, Heidi slept in her kitchen bed—Jared had woken them both early, sent Heidi to the kitchen, and shut the bedroom door before advancing on Jensen with a leer.

"Are you planning on having your way with me, you wicked, wicked man?"

"Aren't I supposed to be asking you that," Jensen laughs, and spreads out wide like a starfish in the bed.

Jared gasps. "I do believe you are!" he says and leaps onto the bed. He splays out on top of Jensen. "I challenge you, sir. Hand jobs at dawn," he whispers and Jensen chuckles.

“I accept your challenge...it sounds perfect.”

They begin with kisses; long, slow kisses, that heat up the longer the kisses go on. They rub against each other, slow, undulating waves. Jared reaches between them to roll Jensen's balls in his fingers, soft but firm movement as his tongue slides against Jensen's. Jensen groans, tries to spread his legs wider when Jared's fingers walk back, over his perineum, thumb rubbing there just long enough to make Jensen jerk his hips up. A long, slim finger slides into his asshole. "f*ck Jare, that feels good."

"I know, right?" Jared mumbles, his finger moving in and out, tugging a bit at the rim as he pulls out, the way Jensen likes it. Kissing away Jensen's automatic protest as Jared pulls back, he moves just enough for him to gather their dicks together in his hand the way only Jared can because his mitts are huge. Jensen cups his own hand over Jared's because he's helpful like that. Okay, mainly it's to feel the way tendons and muscles move in Jared's hand as he works them together—so f*cking hot.

Jensen fumbles around in the bed, looking for—ah. The little bottle of lube that ended up under his pillow last night. Jensen pours a little lube over them to slick the way.

"Ooo, thanks," Jared says, and begins a slow, thorough glide up, down, making sure his clever fingers catch against their crowns as he goes, that the heads of their dicks rub together. Jared's beginning to get noisy, leaking slick steadily—something Jensen loves. Precome mixes with the lube and makes it wetter, hotter, inspires Jared to move faster.

Jensen wraps his arms around Jared, twists their legs together, just does what he can to get as close as possible. Jared's opens to him, smeary wet kisses punctuated with groans and soft grunts. Jensen sucks on Jared's tongue like he'd suck his dick, because for some reason that's a thing that totally sends Jared.

"Gonna come all over you, gonna mark you up," Jared growls, like a p*rn star top. Jensen giggles, groans; when his princess suddenly turns into a savage beast it's just so f*cking hot, especially when he tosses Jensen around like he's made of fluff and feathers...but this morning it's just hand jobs and sweet kisses and then Sunday breakfast at their favorite place.

Suddenly all thoughts of breakfast go flying out of his head, anything that’s not "Jared!" Jensen gasps, belly hitching and his toes curling, dick swelling and jerking against Jared's as he comes. It pulls the trigger on Jared's own org*sm and they hit together like synchronized swimmers in a Busby Berkeley flick. And damn it, Jared, he shouldn't be thinking about Busby Berkeley after sex this freakin' good.

Jensen's knees are still a little shaky when they leash Heidi and head to the park, even after buckets of coffee and a ton of bagels—Jared's still a growing boy and his raging metabolism requires tons of fuel, at least that's his claim. Their neighborhood just put in something they call a dog park, and Jensen guesses that means your dog can sh*t guilt free there. Fine, he's got a huge coffee and a bagel left from breakfast, and there's an empty bench right outside the little park's gate. Comfortably content, he chews on his bagel and watches his little family and smiles. They are cute together, no doubt.

Jensen closes his eyes and lifts his face to the sun, letting it warm him, soothing his spirit the way it always does. He opens them with a contented sigh, searching out the grass for his lover, and sees her.

Jeanette. She looks good, relaxed, right up until they make eye contact and she stiffens. Jensen lifts his coffee and smiles into his cup. There's no need for her to panic, after all, they both got what they wanted, finally. Jensen turns his head and sees that Jared is totally engrossed in making Heidi fetch the stick thing, an act she doesn’t seem to understand. He's so involved that he misses the interaction between Jensen and his ex wife, and anyway, Jared wouldn't know Jeanette from Adam even if he had caught it.

Jensen tips his cup to her, a spare movement. Jeanette glances over in Jared's direction and sees him dashing across the grass, Heidi’s toy held high and Heidi running after him. Jensen can tell when some instinct leads her to put two and two together. She startles, and then, gives him a slow head nod before walking away. The whole encounter takes less than five minutes; there'd been no mystery about the reason their marriage ended, yet it still feels somehow like the world has changed.

Jensen turns his head away, inhales the scent of crushed grass and freshly turned soil, warmed by the sun. In a few more minutes, he’s going to go collect his little family. Later this evening, they’re meeting Tim for dinner, and then...who knows? Maybe a movie, maybe dessert, definitely sex. Sex and dessert.

It's going to be a good day.
fin

Meadowlark (O Happy Bird!) - roxymissrose (2024)

Chapter 1

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Chapter 2

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Chapter 3

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Chapter 4

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Chapter 5

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Chapter 6

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Chapter 7

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References