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J2 Fic + Birthday
Tomorrow is ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
baylorsr's birthday. Last year I recounted all the reasons why baylorsr is a horrible person so I don't think we need to rehash any of that, none of it's changed. I'd like to add to the list that this year baylorsr made a podfic of my SPN fic that made me alernately grin like an idiot and bawl like a baby, thereby adding a multimedia element to the many ways in which baylorsr continues to ruin my life.
In dubious honor of her awful birthday, I present J2 schmoop-fic.
Title: Hold
Genre: RPS
Pairings: Jensen/Jared
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Minor spoilers for early Season 4 episodes
Word Count: 4,500
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction for entertainment purposes only. No implication of reality or truthfulness is intended. They are not them.
Summary: There are things you just can't hold onto.
Notes: This story is a complement to, but not dependent upon, two other fics in my J2 UST series: Those Funny Stories and Three Dog Night. Your reading experience may also be enhanced by this picture:
And even if it's not enhanced, this is still a very pretty picture.
Jared was a big guy yet even so his hands always seemed bigger than the rest of him as if he'd never really grown into them. When he'd worked with Alexis he thought that every time he put his hands on her face her head looked the size of a softball compared to them and she even said once, "Jared, you could just squeeze my whole head like an orange between those mitts!" He'd been only eighteen then and still awkward about it but it wasn't something he'd thought about until nearly ten years later when they shot the last episode of that short season.
Jensen was lying there all bloody because Dean just gotten mauled to death and dragged off to hell and Jared had to kneel beside him and put his hand under Jensen's head and they tried the shot three times and something was wrong every time. When Kim called cut for that third time Jared didn't bother getting up he just sat back on his heels and sighed with his hand still under Jensen's head and then Jensen said, "You all right?"
Jared looked down at him. "I'm fine, you're the one who just died."
"Yeah, but you're the one who has to cry. I'm just hanging out on the floor here."
"Hey, do that thing where you make your eyes glaze over."
"What, this?" Jensen said and his eyes went blank and lifeless and for a few seconds he looked so dead that a chill crept up Jared's back in spite of the hot lights and muggy air.
"That's fucking amazing, man. How do you do that?"
Jensen's eyes snapped out the trance. "You just unfocus. See?" he said and did it again.
"That is unbelievably fucking creepy."
"That's why they pay me the big bucks. Although I have to say, not too shabby yourself on the waterworks."
"Yeah?"
"Yes. Very convincing."
"Thanks!" Jared said and just then the stills photographer came by and took a shot and neither of them looked at her and she went on her way.
"Don't mention it. I know how you dread doing the crying bit."
"No shit," Jared said and looked up and shook his head. "You have no idea how..."
"And you have lovely soft hands, too."
"What?"
"And big. It's like a feather pillow back there, dude. I could lie here all day. In your arms."
The crew was drifting back and getting ready to shoot again so Jared grinned and said, "And I could hold you all day. You are one goddamn pretty bastard, Jensen Ackles."
Todd said, "Oh Christ, who left them alone?"
"And you've got paws like a damn grizzly, Jared Padawhatsis."
"You know what they say about guys with big hands."
"Fellas..."
"Kiss me you circus freak!"
Jared went for it and at the last second Jensen rolled over laughing and Jared threw his hands up in triumph and hollered that he always won at gay chicken and Jensen whined that Jared had dropped his head on the floor and given him a concussion and then everyone was laughing and Todd said he was sorry they hadn't gotten that filmed so it could go on the gag reel and then everyone could see what a couple of jackasses they were.
* * *
He dreamt about it two weeks later. The season had ended and everyone had decamped for home or other projects and Jared dreamt that they were filming Dean's death only there were no cameras and no lights and no crew, just the two of them and Jensen on the floor and Jared cradling Jensen's head in his large hand and Jensen looking up at him.
Jensen said, "Very convincing."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah," Jensen said and he sat up and looked at Jared and Jared brought his hand around so that he was cupping Jensen's face and he stroked Jensen's cheek although no one was there to watch or to laugh.
"You know you're beautiful," Jared said and in the dream Jensen closed his eyes and pressed his cheek down into Jared's hand and Jared stared at him and he knew the way we know things in dreams that he had been waiting and wanting to see Jensen like this for such a long time. You're so beautiful, he thought, You are so, so beautiful, and he reached up with his other hand to caress Jensen's face and then he woke up.
"Whoa," he said. "Damn." He lay there in a daze for a minute and the next minute he thought it would be funny to text Jensen that he'd just had a dirty dream about him. But he didn't.
* * *
More than a month after the season ended Jared saw the picture that the stills photographer had taken during the shooting of Dean's death. Jensen emailed it to him with the caption Like a grizzly, because Jared's hand was so big that you could see his fingers curled around the back of Jensen's head. Jared laughed and then he sat and looked at the picture and couldn't even remember it being taken. Those photographers were good at blending into the background. They got more candid shots that way and what Jared noticed in this picture now was not the size of his hand but the way Jensen looked at him and the smile on his own face and the lock of their eyes.
After a while he wrote back, You loved it, prettyboy, and saved the picture.
* * *
Jensen's lease expired just after the fourth season began shooting and he moved into Jared's house with nothing but a suitcase of clothes and a box of books and another box of DVDs and CDs and his guitar.
"Everyone knows you're just a poser with that thing."
"You're just jealous of my future as a rock n' roll god." He threw the suitcase in the closet and said, "Well, that's that. We're roomies."
"Man, those chicks on the internet are gonna go apeshit when they hear about this."
"Um, no, they go apeshit if we glance in each other's general direction. This? This may actually kill a few of them."
"It'd be kind of fun to yank their chains."
"Haven't we been doing that?"
"Yeah, but now that we're shacking up..."
"You're a sick, sick man, Jared."
Jared grinned. "But funny as hell," he said.
* * *
The funniest thing of all happened in the middle of shooting the black-and-white episode. Edlund's Arthouse Project, they called it. Jensen got beerfoam on his upper lip in the bar scene and Edlund thought it was so funny that he wanted to reshoot the scene with more foam.
"Is that like more cowbell?" Jensen asked while a PA plopped two Alka-Seltzers into his fake beer. He looked at Jared while it fizzed. "How do I get myself into these things?"
"It's your fault for being so damn cute. Which, by the way, I'm really looking forward to seeing you in lederhosen."
"Save it for the convention circuit, funny guy."
They did two takes of the beerfoam bit and by the third one Jensen was hamming it up so much and Jared was laughing so hard he thought his shoulders must have been shaking in the frame. On the fourth take Jensen foamed his lip all the way up to his nose and on impulse Jared shot up out of his chair and lunged over and grabbed Jensen's head in his hands and hoovered the foam off Jensen's lip with a huge wet slurp and broke up the whole set. Jensen was so startled he came up halfway out of his chair and reflexively put his hands over Jared's and in the last moment, in the last hairsbreadth of a moment of that joke while everyone was laughing and Jensen was leaning over the table and Jared had his big hands wrapped around Jensen's head they kissed.
No one saw it. Or Jared thought that no one saw it. Everyone was laughing too hard and afterward Jensen was laughing and Jared was laughing too. As if Jensen hadn't tipped his head under Jared's hands so that their lips met. So that the pressure and the angle of their mouths changed enough to turn a joke into a kiss, so that Jared's breath caught in his throat and when Jensen pulled away Jared wanted to follow him and take his face back between his hands and kiss him.
Someone shouted "Gag reel!" and that was the end of it. Jensen sat back down in his chair and grinning he wiped the back of his hand across his upper lip. "Was it good for you too?" he said and Jared rubbed his neck and looked at Jensen and they laughed.
* * *
He got the assistant editor to show him that take. For all that it had seemed long at the time it was maybe four seconds of film and Jared couldn't really see anything because his hands were up over Jensen's face. Then in that last sliver of a second Jared saw Jensen's posture shift and Jensen closed his eyes and two of his fingers just barely curled around Jared's hand, more of a twitch than anything else and something no one would have seen unless they were looking for it. When Jensen pulled away the camera was still on him and he sat there laughing with his mouth all shiny and wet and when he wiped his lip on the back of his hand his hand was shaking. That, anyone could see. In the end the take never made it onto the Season Four gag reel and although it was the funniest thing that happened on set all season no one ever brought it up again.
* * *
On a sleetsmacked winter morning not long after mid-season hiatus they had a godforsaken early call and Jared made coffee and brought it upstairs where Jensen was still sprawled out in bed. He put the coffee on the nightstand and laid a hand on Jensen's back and told him they only had half an hour and later in the car he joked that in his next interview he was going to say that he got Jensen up for early calls by kissing him awake.
"That would be funny," Jensen said and they were both smiling when they got out of the car. Sixteen hours later they were definitely not smiling and they got home exhausted and frozen and Jensen went straight to bed and Jared took a hot shower and then crashed himself.
He woke up in the middle of that pitch-dark winter night with an erection that demanded his immediate attention and he took care of it in three or four strokes and then he lay in a sweat with his ears ringing from the blood rush and his hand still around his dick. He'd dreamt that he was in bed with Jensen or maybe it was Dean. No, definitely Jensen but in Dean's wardrobe and the set was one of the many shitty simulated motel rooms and this one shitter than most, tangibly, vividly shitty. Jensen was on his back and the covers were pushed down to the bottom of the mattress and the sheet under Jensen was rumpled as if they'd already been in the bed but Jensen was still dressed and Jared was undressing him. They were undressing each other as they kissed and bit and touched and pushed off jackets and shirts and belts and when Jared sat up to unzip his jeans Jensen lay there beneath Jared's straddled knees and his hands were on Jared's hips and he was half naked and panting, his face and mouth flushed and he breathed, "We're out of character."
Jared paused and looked around and the set was no set, there was only this motel room with four real walls and a rusty curtain drawn over the window and one fluorescent halo in the ceiling instead of the big racks of stagelights. "It's all right," he said. "This isn't in the script."
Jensen nodded. "Okay," he said and Jared touched Jensen's face and put his hand beneath his head and pulled him up and bent down to him and they kissed until Jensen moaned into his mouth and then Jared woke up alone in bed with his urgent hard-on and the co-star of his wet dream sleeping two doors down and maybe by morning light this would be pretty hilarious but in the dark of night it was not funny at all.
* * *
Jared wondered if it was possible to have teased himself into believing something or if the collective will of thousands of starry-eyed and porn-scribbling fangirls had put some kind of hex on him or if maybe karma was just getting him back for letting the jokes go too far. He dialed it all back after that night and if Jensen or anyone else noticed they never said anything. By the end of the season he was seeing Genevieve and Jensen said that Danneel might be moving up to Vancouver for at least part of the next season and started looking for a place of his own. Jared helped him look.
* * *
The day before Jared left for Texas he went to say goodbye to Eric at the studio and found him behind the desk in his dingy office.
"You still got beer in that fridge?"
"Help yourself," Eric said. "Might as well finish it off."
He tossed Eric a beer and sprawled out on the couch and took a long pull at the neck and looked around the office. "Man, why do you stay here? You can't ask for better digs?"
"I like it. Keeps me in that gritty Winchester mindset."
"Winchester? Looks more like Dickens to me."
"Winchester, Dickens, same shit. You leaving today?"
"Tomorrow. Driving down with the dogs."
"Jen's going with you?"
"Nah, he's staying up here to look at a few more places."
"You bummed about him moving out?"
Jared shrugged. "A little. I don't know. It was kinda fun. I guess it's probably healthier not to be around each other twenty-four-seven, nine months a year."
"Yeah, that's a little weird even for your epic bromance. Although, you know...if you two ever wanna hook up..."
"I know, I know..."
"Right through the roof, man. Ratings? Right through the roof."
"Sure, I'll switch teams to bring in those boffo overnights. But you know what that means."
"Don't say it."
"Sixth season, Krips. Sixth season. Maybe even seven."
"Oh Christ," Eric said. "Forget I mentioned it. You know what? You two stay as far away from each other as possible. And keep being seen with girls. Lots and lots of girls."
"What about lots and lots of girls?" Jensen asked. He was in the doorway with his shoulder against the jamb. "Damnit, Kripke are you gonna try putting lots of girls in the show again?"
"No, I was just saying how you two need to reaffirm your heterosexuality so that I don't have to keep driving this low-budget train wreck into my old age."
Jensen shook his head. "Um...okay...anything for you, dude. Anyway, I just wanted to stop by and say...you know, thanks for another great season and see you in July."
"Yeah," Eric said and he nodded and looked down at his beer bottle and Jared and Jensen gave each other a look and Eric said, "You know what this always reminds me of..."
"Here we go," Jared said.
Jensen said, "The shining thing?"
"Yes. Yes, the shining thing. It's just like that scene at the beginning of The Shining where everyone's leaving and they're shutting the hotel down and it's depressing and spooky and you know that all kinds of bad shit's gonna happen."
"Dude," Jensen said, "If you're like this at the end of a regular season what're you gonna be like next year?"
"I don't know. This was a weird season. Lots of highs and lows."
"Yeah, there were," Jensen said. After a minute he added, "Just don't go signing us all up for another five years because of the shining thing."
"Don't pay attention to me. I'm just moping."
"You know what your problem is?" Jensen said. He leaned over Eric's desk and turned the CD player up so that they could all hear it. "This old fart music you listen to."
"Old fart music? That old fart music is the cornerstone of this show you little punk"
"Oh man, what is that?"
"Speedwagon," Jared laughed. "REO Speedwagon. I believe this is...ah, yes, Keep on Lovin You."
"These power ballads are bringing you down, man."
"Oh, just for that, I'm so putting this in the show next year. I'm applying for the rights as soon as you leave."
"You know Eric, I can just see you. Cruising the backroads of Ohio in your t-roof Camaro...wind in your once luxurious head of hair...Speedwagon on the 8-track..."
"I did not have an 8-track! I got my license in 1985."
"Speedwagon on the tape deck..."
"Damn, I was still wearing diapers in 1985," Jared said.
"All right, both of you get the fuck outta here. Come in here and drink my beer, make fun of my music. Good riddance until July. And take care of those pretty mugs of yours, I don't want people to start paying attention to the writing."
"Oh, God no," Jared said.
"Exactly."
"All right, Gramps," Jensen said. "Have a good summer."
"Yeah, screw you," Eric said. He turned the music way up as they walked out and a few seconds after they left the office he yelled out, "And it was a Firebird, asshole!"
* * *
They drove back to the house together and halfway there Jared unconsciously started singing.
"And I'm gonna keep on lovin you, cause it's the only thing I wanna do..."
"Actually I like that song," Jensen said.
Jared glanced at him and then back at the road. "So do I."
* * *
That last night in Vancouver Jared lay awake with the dogs snoring around him and Eric's music running through his head like power-ballad tinnitus and keeping him from getting to sleep.
And I meant every word I said, when I said that I love you I meant that I'd love you forever...
After a while he finally dozed and after that he fell asleep. He dreamt that he woke up in this bed. When he turned over, Jensen was there, asleep. It was just past dawn and Jensen was sleeping next to him. He rolled onto his side and put a hand on Jensen's arm and whispered, "I don't want to sleep. I just want to keep on loving you."
He woke up with an ache in his chest and his gut that was worse than any erection and had no such easy relief. He sat up in bed and then he swung his legs down to the floor and stood up. He opened the door and closed it behind him so that the dogs wouldn't follow him and he went down the hall and paused in the doorway of Jensen's room. He stood there and watched Jensen sleep. After some time he turned and went back down the hall to his own room.
* * *
He left for Texas the next morning before Jensen was up. He saw him two weeks later in Los Angeles and then in London in May. Los Angeles was a blur and London was strange and in both places Jensen looked tired and in London he mostly looked exhausted and sick too and Jared ragged him about how all these women had plunked down hard-earned cash in the middle of a recession to see a good-looking guy and instead they were going to get someone who looked like he hadn't slept or showered in a week and had a gross bloody eyeball on top of it. Jensen told Jared that he'd just have to carry the load and be pretty for both of them.
In the elevator on the way back upstairs they stood there flanked by bodyguards like a couple of Mob stoolies and Jensen looked at him and said, "This has gotten weird, hasn't it?"
"What?"
"This whole thing."
Jared glanced over his shoulder at the bodyguards and said, "I think it's been getting that way for a long time."
* * *
Jared got back to Vancouver in the middle of a blazing heat wave two weeks before shooting was scheduled to begin. The city seemed shuttered, empty, stunned into silence by the impossible heat. Jensen flew in from Los Angeles the next day and took Jared to see the condo he would be moving into.
"There's no furniture."
"They're delivering some stuff tomorrow."
"Amazing view."
"Waterfront. Can't beat it."
"You're gonna love it here."
"Yeah."
Jensen spent one last night at Jared's house. The dogs paced and whined and wouldn't settle down all night and Jared thought it must have been the heat.
* * *
In the morning he found Jensen sitting in the kitchen and reading the first episode script, without his glasses now since the laser surgery and looking tired and puffy-eyed.
"You sleep okay?"
"It was a fucking hotbox up there. I'm looking forward to that central air."
"Yeah, if I'd known it was gonna be a hundred frigging degrees here I'd've picked up an air conditioner."
"I think the whole province is sold out." He put the script down and rubbed his eyes and looked at Jared. "You should come and stay in the condo until this heat breaks."
Jared shook his head. "I've barely looked at that script. And the dogs need to get settled in so..."
"All right well, I offered. Enjoy your hotbox."
Jensen had made coffee but it was too hot for that. Jared got a Coke out of the fridge and opened it and leaned against the sink and drank and glanced at Jensen who was back to reading the script.
"You need help moving?"
Jensen shrugged. "I'm pretty much moving out with what I had moving in."
"Oh yeah that's right, you've got the whole hobo thing down."
"No phone no pool no pets."
"Ain't got no cigarettes."
"I'm king of the road. Only, you know...now I've got a pet. Or I will in a couple days."
"I'm gonna let Sadie and Harley terrorize that little shit, just so you know."
"Hey, don't underestimate the inbred fierceness of a cockapoo, pal. He'll have those two sissies hiding under the couch."
Jared laughed. He took another drink and said, "They're gonna miss you."
"Yeah, I'll miss them too. Big dumb mooks."
"I'll miss you. Too. You know. It was kinda fun."
"I feel sorriest for the fans, you know, what are they gonna have to talk about now?"
"Yeah, I think they'll find something. They usually do."
"They are...passionate."
"No shit," Jared said and he smiled and looked down at the bottle in his hand and he stood there and traced the white letters with his thumb. The dogs were chasing each other in the backyard, barking. The sun fell through the kitchen window onto the back of his neck, hot as midday although it was only morning. Another scorcher.
Jared said, "Jen."
He raised his head and saw Jensen looking at him.
"I love you," he said and Jensen didn't say anything.
"I love you and I think you love me too. I mean...we kissed, okay? Even though it was just supposed to be a joke, we kissed and everyone knows it and that's why no one ever talks about it and why they're not gonna put it on the gag reel. Anyone could see it. And all that shit, all that joking around that we do...we stopped kidding about that stuff a long time ago. We just pretend it's a joke now but it's not. I love you and I want to be with you and I'm sorry, I am so fucking sorry I didn't say anything until now but I'm saying it now...please don't go. I don't think you even want to go, I know you don't want to go. It's probably our last season here and I don't want you in some...some fucking condo on the other side of town, I want you here, I want...I want to go to bed with you and I want to wake up with you and I don't want to act like this is a game or a joke. I'm in love with you, Jensen. I love you. I love you."
Jensen looked at him. He said, "Yeah?"
He wondered what Jensen would be saying if Jared had actually spoken any of those things. He hadn't. And wouldn't. He asked Jensen what time he would be heading over to the condo.
"They're coming to set up the plasma around twelve so I guess I oughta be there for that."
"Okay," Jared said. "I think I'm gonna go out for a run."
Jensen squinted at the blazing sun, the heatstruck morning. "You're out of your fucking mind, Padawhatsis."
"Yeah," Jared said. "Yeah, I am."
* * *
When he got back to the house the dogs were passed out under the tree in the backyard and Jensen was gone. He'd left a note on the kitchen table saying to come over if he couldn't take the heat. Jared picked it up and looked at it and folded it and put it back on the table.
He went upstairs and into Jensen's room and sat down on the bed. The closet door stood open and Jensen's things, such as they had been, were gone. Jared had left the backdoor open and he heard the dogs come up the stairs and they trotted in one behind the other and jumped up on the bed behind Jared and sprawled out there. Jared still had a picture on his phone of Jensen last winter sleeping in this bed with these two dogs and in the hot emptiness of the house it already felt as if that had happened years ago or maybe never happened at all. Harley whined and Jared turned around and smiled and rubbed him between the ears.
"I know, boy."
His hand nearly covered the big dog's head. He saw his hands under Jensen's neck. Caressing Jensen's face. Laid on Jensen's arm while he slept. He was a big man, with big hands, yet for all that there were things too big, too perilous, too fragile to hold.
He stayed up there until it was very hot and then he went downstairs and grabbed a beer and the script and went out into the backyard and the dogs followed him and they lay down in the shade of the tree and went to sleep.
End
baylorsr's birthday. Last year I recounted all the reasons why baylorsr is a horrible person so I don't think we need to rehash any of that, none of it's changed. I'd like to add to the list that this year baylorsr made a podfic of my SPN fic that made me alernately grin like an idiot and bawl like a baby, thereby adding a multimedia element to the many ways in which baylorsr continues to ruin my life.In dubious honor of her awful birthday, I present J2 schmoop-fic.
Title: Hold
Genre: RPS
Pairings: Jensen/Jared
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Minor spoilers for early Season 4 episodes
Word Count: 4,500
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction for entertainment purposes only. No implication of reality or truthfulness is intended. They are not them.
Summary: There are things you just can't hold onto.
Notes: This story is a complement to, but not dependent upon, two other fics in my J2 UST series: Those Funny Stories and Three Dog Night. Your reading experience may also be enhanced by this picture:
And even if it's not enhanced, this is still a very pretty picture.
Jared was a big guy yet even so his hands always seemed bigger than the rest of him as if he'd never really grown into them. When he'd worked with Alexis he thought that every time he put his hands on her face her head looked the size of a softball compared to them and she even said once, "Jared, you could just squeeze my whole head like an orange between those mitts!" He'd been only eighteen then and still awkward about it but it wasn't something he'd thought about until nearly ten years later when they shot the last episode of that short season.
Jensen was lying there all bloody because Dean just gotten mauled to death and dragged off to hell and Jared had to kneel beside him and put his hand under Jensen's head and they tried the shot three times and something was wrong every time. When Kim called cut for that third time Jared didn't bother getting up he just sat back on his heels and sighed with his hand still under Jensen's head and then Jensen said, "You all right?"
Jared looked down at him. "I'm fine, you're the one who just died."
"Yeah, but you're the one who has to cry. I'm just hanging out on the floor here."
"Hey, do that thing where you make your eyes glaze over."
"What, this?" Jensen said and his eyes went blank and lifeless and for a few seconds he looked so dead that a chill crept up Jared's back in spite of the hot lights and muggy air.
"That's fucking amazing, man. How do you do that?"
Jensen's eyes snapped out the trance. "You just unfocus. See?" he said and did it again.
"That is unbelievably fucking creepy."
"That's why they pay me the big bucks. Although I have to say, not too shabby yourself on the waterworks."
"Yeah?"
"Yes. Very convincing."
"Thanks!" Jared said and just then the stills photographer came by and took a shot and neither of them looked at her and she went on her way.
"Don't mention it. I know how you dread doing the crying bit."
"No shit," Jared said and looked up and shook his head. "You have no idea how..."
"And you have lovely soft hands, too."
"What?"
"And big. It's like a feather pillow back there, dude. I could lie here all day. In your arms."
The crew was drifting back and getting ready to shoot again so Jared grinned and said, "And I could hold you all day. You are one goddamn pretty bastard, Jensen Ackles."
Todd said, "Oh Christ, who left them alone?"
"And you've got paws like a damn grizzly, Jared Padawhatsis."
"You know what they say about guys with big hands."
"Fellas..."
"Kiss me you circus freak!"
Jared went for it and at the last second Jensen rolled over laughing and Jared threw his hands up in triumph and hollered that he always won at gay chicken and Jensen whined that Jared had dropped his head on the floor and given him a concussion and then everyone was laughing and Todd said he was sorry they hadn't gotten that filmed so it could go on the gag reel and then everyone could see what a couple of jackasses they were.
* * *
He dreamt about it two weeks later. The season had ended and everyone had decamped for home or other projects and Jared dreamt that they were filming Dean's death only there were no cameras and no lights and no crew, just the two of them and Jensen on the floor and Jared cradling Jensen's head in his large hand and Jensen looking up at him.
Jensen said, "Very convincing."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah," Jensen said and he sat up and looked at Jared and Jared brought his hand around so that he was cupping Jensen's face and he stroked Jensen's cheek although no one was there to watch or to laugh.
"You know you're beautiful," Jared said and in the dream Jensen closed his eyes and pressed his cheek down into Jared's hand and Jared stared at him and he knew the way we know things in dreams that he had been waiting and wanting to see Jensen like this for such a long time. You're so beautiful, he thought, You are so, so beautiful, and he reached up with his other hand to caress Jensen's face and then he woke up.
"Whoa," he said. "Damn." He lay there in a daze for a minute and the next minute he thought it would be funny to text Jensen that he'd just had a dirty dream about him. But he didn't.
* * *
More than a month after the season ended Jared saw the picture that the stills photographer had taken during the shooting of Dean's death. Jensen emailed it to him with the caption Like a grizzly, because Jared's hand was so big that you could see his fingers curled around the back of Jensen's head. Jared laughed and then he sat and looked at the picture and couldn't even remember it being taken. Those photographers were good at blending into the background. They got more candid shots that way and what Jared noticed in this picture now was not the size of his hand but the way Jensen looked at him and the smile on his own face and the lock of their eyes.
After a while he wrote back, You loved it, prettyboy, and saved the picture.
* * *
Jensen's lease expired just after the fourth season began shooting and he moved into Jared's house with nothing but a suitcase of clothes and a box of books and another box of DVDs and CDs and his guitar.
"Everyone knows you're just a poser with that thing."
"You're just jealous of my future as a rock n' roll god." He threw the suitcase in the closet and said, "Well, that's that. We're roomies."
"Man, those chicks on the internet are gonna go apeshit when they hear about this."
"Um, no, they go apeshit if we glance in each other's general direction. This? This may actually kill a few of them."
"It'd be kind of fun to yank their chains."
"Haven't we been doing that?"
"Yeah, but now that we're shacking up..."
"You're a sick, sick man, Jared."
Jared grinned. "But funny as hell," he said.
* * *
The funniest thing of all happened in the middle of shooting the black-and-white episode. Edlund's Arthouse Project, they called it. Jensen got beerfoam on his upper lip in the bar scene and Edlund thought it was so funny that he wanted to reshoot the scene with more foam.
"Is that like more cowbell?" Jensen asked while a PA plopped two Alka-Seltzers into his fake beer. He looked at Jared while it fizzed. "How do I get myself into these things?"
"It's your fault for being so damn cute. Which, by the way, I'm really looking forward to seeing you in lederhosen."
"Save it for the convention circuit, funny guy."
They did two takes of the beerfoam bit and by the third one Jensen was hamming it up so much and Jared was laughing so hard he thought his shoulders must have been shaking in the frame. On the fourth take Jensen foamed his lip all the way up to his nose and on impulse Jared shot up out of his chair and lunged over and grabbed Jensen's head in his hands and hoovered the foam off Jensen's lip with a huge wet slurp and broke up the whole set. Jensen was so startled he came up halfway out of his chair and reflexively put his hands over Jared's and in the last moment, in the last hairsbreadth of a moment of that joke while everyone was laughing and Jensen was leaning over the table and Jared had his big hands wrapped around Jensen's head they kissed.
No one saw it. Or Jared thought that no one saw it. Everyone was laughing too hard and afterward Jensen was laughing and Jared was laughing too. As if Jensen hadn't tipped his head under Jared's hands so that their lips met. So that the pressure and the angle of their mouths changed enough to turn a joke into a kiss, so that Jared's breath caught in his throat and when Jensen pulled away Jared wanted to follow him and take his face back between his hands and kiss him.
Someone shouted "Gag reel!" and that was the end of it. Jensen sat back down in his chair and grinning he wiped the back of his hand across his upper lip. "Was it good for you too?" he said and Jared rubbed his neck and looked at Jensen and they laughed.
* * *
He got the assistant editor to show him that take. For all that it had seemed long at the time it was maybe four seconds of film and Jared couldn't really see anything because his hands were up over Jensen's face. Then in that last sliver of a second Jared saw Jensen's posture shift and Jensen closed his eyes and two of his fingers just barely curled around Jared's hand, more of a twitch than anything else and something no one would have seen unless they were looking for it. When Jensen pulled away the camera was still on him and he sat there laughing with his mouth all shiny and wet and when he wiped his lip on the back of his hand his hand was shaking. That, anyone could see. In the end the take never made it onto the Season Four gag reel and although it was the funniest thing that happened on set all season no one ever brought it up again.
* * *
On a sleetsmacked winter morning not long after mid-season hiatus they had a godforsaken early call and Jared made coffee and brought it upstairs where Jensen was still sprawled out in bed. He put the coffee on the nightstand and laid a hand on Jensen's back and told him they only had half an hour and later in the car he joked that in his next interview he was going to say that he got Jensen up for early calls by kissing him awake.
"That would be funny," Jensen said and they were both smiling when they got out of the car. Sixteen hours later they were definitely not smiling and they got home exhausted and frozen and Jensen went straight to bed and Jared took a hot shower and then crashed himself.
He woke up in the middle of that pitch-dark winter night with an erection that demanded his immediate attention and he took care of it in three or four strokes and then he lay in a sweat with his ears ringing from the blood rush and his hand still around his dick. He'd dreamt that he was in bed with Jensen or maybe it was Dean. No, definitely Jensen but in Dean's wardrobe and the set was one of the many shitty simulated motel rooms and this one shitter than most, tangibly, vividly shitty. Jensen was on his back and the covers were pushed down to the bottom of the mattress and the sheet under Jensen was rumpled as if they'd already been in the bed but Jensen was still dressed and Jared was undressing him. They were undressing each other as they kissed and bit and touched and pushed off jackets and shirts and belts and when Jared sat up to unzip his jeans Jensen lay there beneath Jared's straddled knees and his hands were on Jared's hips and he was half naked and panting, his face and mouth flushed and he breathed, "We're out of character."
Jared paused and looked around and the set was no set, there was only this motel room with four real walls and a rusty curtain drawn over the window and one fluorescent halo in the ceiling instead of the big racks of stagelights. "It's all right," he said. "This isn't in the script."
Jensen nodded. "Okay," he said and Jared touched Jensen's face and put his hand beneath his head and pulled him up and bent down to him and they kissed until Jensen moaned into his mouth and then Jared woke up alone in bed with his urgent hard-on and the co-star of his wet dream sleeping two doors down and maybe by morning light this would be pretty hilarious but in the dark of night it was not funny at all.
* * *
Jared wondered if it was possible to have teased himself into believing something or if the collective will of thousands of starry-eyed and porn-scribbling fangirls had put some kind of hex on him or if maybe karma was just getting him back for letting the jokes go too far. He dialed it all back after that night and if Jensen or anyone else noticed they never said anything. By the end of the season he was seeing Genevieve and Jensen said that Danneel might be moving up to Vancouver for at least part of the next season and started looking for a place of his own. Jared helped him look.
* * *
The day before Jared left for Texas he went to say goodbye to Eric at the studio and found him behind the desk in his dingy office.
"You still got beer in that fridge?"
"Help yourself," Eric said. "Might as well finish it off."
He tossed Eric a beer and sprawled out on the couch and took a long pull at the neck and looked around the office. "Man, why do you stay here? You can't ask for better digs?"
"I like it. Keeps me in that gritty Winchester mindset."
"Winchester? Looks more like Dickens to me."
"Winchester, Dickens, same shit. You leaving today?"
"Tomorrow. Driving down with the dogs."
"Jen's going with you?"
"Nah, he's staying up here to look at a few more places."
"You bummed about him moving out?"
Jared shrugged. "A little. I don't know. It was kinda fun. I guess it's probably healthier not to be around each other twenty-four-seven, nine months a year."
"Yeah, that's a little weird even for your epic bromance. Although, you know...if you two ever wanna hook up..."
"I know, I know..."
"Right through the roof, man. Ratings? Right through the roof."
"Sure, I'll switch teams to bring in those boffo overnights. But you know what that means."
"Don't say it."
"Sixth season, Krips. Sixth season. Maybe even seven."
"Oh Christ," Eric said. "Forget I mentioned it. You know what? You two stay as far away from each other as possible. And keep being seen with girls. Lots and lots of girls."
"What about lots and lots of girls?" Jensen asked. He was in the doorway with his shoulder against the jamb. "Damnit, Kripke are you gonna try putting lots of girls in the show again?"
"No, I was just saying how you two need to reaffirm your heterosexuality so that I don't have to keep driving this low-budget train wreck into my old age."
Jensen shook his head. "Um...okay...anything for you, dude. Anyway, I just wanted to stop by and say...you know, thanks for another great season and see you in July."
"Yeah," Eric said and he nodded and looked down at his beer bottle and Jared and Jensen gave each other a look and Eric said, "You know what this always reminds me of..."
"Here we go," Jared said.
Jensen said, "The shining thing?"
"Yes. Yes, the shining thing. It's just like that scene at the beginning of The Shining where everyone's leaving and they're shutting the hotel down and it's depressing and spooky and you know that all kinds of bad shit's gonna happen."
"Dude," Jensen said, "If you're like this at the end of a regular season what're you gonna be like next year?"
"I don't know. This was a weird season. Lots of highs and lows."
"Yeah, there were," Jensen said. After a minute he added, "Just don't go signing us all up for another five years because of the shining thing."
"Don't pay attention to me. I'm just moping."
"You know what your problem is?" Jensen said. He leaned over Eric's desk and turned the CD player up so that they could all hear it. "This old fart music you listen to."
"Old fart music? That old fart music is the cornerstone of this show you little punk"
"Oh man, what is that?"
"Speedwagon," Jared laughed. "REO Speedwagon. I believe this is...ah, yes, Keep on Lovin You."
"These power ballads are bringing you down, man."
"Oh, just for that, I'm so putting this in the show next year. I'm applying for the rights as soon as you leave."
"You know Eric, I can just see you. Cruising the backroads of Ohio in your t-roof Camaro...wind in your once luxurious head of hair...Speedwagon on the 8-track..."
"I did not have an 8-track! I got my license in 1985."
"Speedwagon on the tape deck..."
"Damn, I was still wearing diapers in 1985," Jared said.
"All right, both of you get the fuck outta here. Come in here and drink my beer, make fun of my music. Good riddance until July. And take care of those pretty mugs of yours, I don't want people to start paying attention to the writing."
"Oh, God no," Jared said.
"Exactly."
"All right, Gramps," Jensen said. "Have a good summer."
"Yeah, screw you," Eric said. He turned the music way up as they walked out and a few seconds after they left the office he yelled out, "And it was a Firebird, asshole!"
* * *
They drove back to the house together and halfway there Jared unconsciously started singing.
"And I'm gonna keep on lovin you, cause it's the only thing I wanna do..."
"Actually I like that song," Jensen said.
Jared glanced at him and then back at the road. "So do I."
* * *
That last night in Vancouver Jared lay awake with the dogs snoring around him and Eric's music running through his head like power-ballad tinnitus and keeping him from getting to sleep.
And I meant every word I said, when I said that I love you I meant that I'd love you forever...
After a while he finally dozed and after that he fell asleep. He dreamt that he woke up in this bed. When he turned over, Jensen was there, asleep. It was just past dawn and Jensen was sleeping next to him. He rolled onto his side and put a hand on Jensen's arm and whispered, "I don't want to sleep. I just want to keep on loving you."
He woke up with an ache in his chest and his gut that was worse than any erection and had no such easy relief. He sat up in bed and then he swung his legs down to the floor and stood up. He opened the door and closed it behind him so that the dogs wouldn't follow him and he went down the hall and paused in the doorway of Jensen's room. He stood there and watched Jensen sleep. After some time he turned and went back down the hall to his own room.
* * *
He left for Texas the next morning before Jensen was up. He saw him two weeks later in Los Angeles and then in London in May. Los Angeles was a blur and London was strange and in both places Jensen looked tired and in London he mostly looked exhausted and sick too and Jared ragged him about how all these women had plunked down hard-earned cash in the middle of a recession to see a good-looking guy and instead they were going to get someone who looked like he hadn't slept or showered in a week and had a gross bloody eyeball on top of it. Jensen told Jared that he'd just have to carry the load and be pretty for both of them.
In the elevator on the way back upstairs they stood there flanked by bodyguards like a couple of Mob stoolies and Jensen looked at him and said, "This has gotten weird, hasn't it?"
"What?"
"This whole thing."
Jared glanced over his shoulder at the bodyguards and said, "I think it's been getting that way for a long time."
* * *
Jared got back to Vancouver in the middle of a blazing heat wave two weeks before shooting was scheduled to begin. The city seemed shuttered, empty, stunned into silence by the impossible heat. Jensen flew in from Los Angeles the next day and took Jared to see the condo he would be moving into.
"There's no furniture."
"They're delivering some stuff tomorrow."
"Amazing view."
"Waterfront. Can't beat it."
"You're gonna love it here."
"Yeah."
Jensen spent one last night at Jared's house. The dogs paced and whined and wouldn't settle down all night and Jared thought it must have been the heat.
* * *
In the morning he found Jensen sitting in the kitchen and reading the first episode script, without his glasses now since the laser surgery and looking tired and puffy-eyed.
"You sleep okay?"
"It was a fucking hotbox up there. I'm looking forward to that central air."
"Yeah, if I'd known it was gonna be a hundred frigging degrees here I'd've picked up an air conditioner."
"I think the whole province is sold out." He put the script down and rubbed his eyes and looked at Jared. "You should come and stay in the condo until this heat breaks."
Jared shook his head. "I've barely looked at that script. And the dogs need to get settled in so..."
"All right well, I offered. Enjoy your hotbox."
Jensen had made coffee but it was too hot for that. Jared got a Coke out of the fridge and opened it and leaned against the sink and drank and glanced at Jensen who was back to reading the script.
"You need help moving?"
Jensen shrugged. "I'm pretty much moving out with what I had moving in."
"Oh yeah that's right, you've got the whole hobo thing down."
"No phone no pool no pets."
"Ain't got no cigarettes."
"I'm king of the road. Only, you know...now I've got a pet. Or I will in a couple days."
"I'm gonna let Sadie and Harley terrorize that little shit, just so you know."
"Hey, don't underestimate the inbred fierceness of a cockapoo, pal. He'll have those two sissies hiding under the couch."
Jared laughed. He took another drink and said, "They're gonna miss you."
"Yeah, I'll miss them too. Big dumb mooks."
"I'll miss you. Too. You know. It was kinda fun."
"I feel sorriest for the fans, you know, what are they gonna have to talk about now?"
"Yeah, I think they'll find something. They usually do."
"They are...passionate."
"No shit," Jared said and he smiled and looked down at the bottle in his hand and he stood there and traced the white letters with his thumb. The dogs were chasing each other in the backyard, barking. The sun fell through the kitchen window onto the back of his neck, hot as midday although it was only morning. Another scorcher.
Jared said, "Jen."
He raised his head and saw Jensen looking at him.
"I love you," he said and Jensen didn't say anything.
"I love you and I think you love me too. I mean...we kissed, okay? Even though it was just supposed to be a joke, we kissed and everyone knows it and that's why no one ever talks about it and why they're not gonna put it on the gag reel. Anyone could see it. And all that shit, all that joking around that we do...we stopped kidding about that stuff a long time ago. We just pretend it's a joke now but it's not. I love you and I want to be with you and I'm sorry, I am so fucking sorry I didn't say anything until now but I'm saying it now...please don't go. I don't think you even want to go, I know you don't want to go. It's probably our last season here and I don't want you in some...some fucking condo on the other side of town, I want you here, I want...I want to go to bed with you and I want to wake up with you and I don't want to act like this is a game or a joke. I'm in love with you, Jensen. I love you. I love you."
Jensen looked at him. He said, "Yeah?"
He wondered what Jensen would be saying if Jared had actually spoken any of those things. He hadn't. And wouldn't. He asked Jensen what time he would be heading over to the condo.
"They're coming to set up the plasma around twelve so I guess I oughta be there for that."
"Okay," Jared said. "I think I'm gonna go out for a run."
Jensen squinted at the blazing sun, the heatstruck morning. "You're out of your fucking mind, Padawhatsis."
"Yeah," Jared said. "Yeah, I am."
* * *
When he got back to the house the dogs were passed out under the tree in the backyard and Jensen was gone. He'd left a note on the kitchen table saying to come over if he couldn't take the heat. Jared picked it up and looked at it and folded it and put it back on the table.
He went upstairs and into Jensen's room and sat down on the bed. The closet door stood open and Jensen's things, such as they had been, were gone. Jared had left the backdoor open and he heard the dogs come up the stairs and they trotted in one behind the other and jumped up on the bed behind Jared and sprawled out there. Jared still had a picture on his phone of Jensen last winter sleeping in this bed with these two dogs and in the hot emptiness of the house it already felt as if that had happened years ago or maybe never happened at all. Harley whined and Jared turned around and smiled and rubbed him between the ears.
"I know, boy."
His hand nearly covered the big dog's head. He saw his hands under Jensen's neck. Caressing Jensen's face. Laid on Jensen's arm while he slept. He was a big man, with big hands, yet for all that there were things too big, too perilous, too fragile to hold.
He stayed up there until it was very hot and then he went downstairs and grabbed a beer and the script and went out into the backyard and the dogs followed him and they lay down in the shade of the tree and went to sleep.
End
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*sprays Febreeze*
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