I Want To Save You - Chapter Three
Title: I Want To Save You
Author: Blink-sum-new-muse
Rating: R
Fandom: CW RP
Summary: Jensen's a street-hardened hooker who's sure he knows how things are meant to be. Jared's a bleeding heart with more money than sense. He wants to save Jensen, but will Jensen let him?
Disclaimer: I do not own Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Chris Kane, Tom Welling, Steve Carlson or any of their families. I also don't own the song I Want To Save You; it's by Something Corporate. I do, however, own Loretta and Max. Fiction is the word, and the words are mine.
Status: Ongoing.
Previous Chapters: One Two
Notes: This is part of the street 'verse.
Jensen wakes up the next morning to a soft knocking at the door. He's confused enough that he doesn't answer straight away; instead, he opens his eyes and blinks a few times as he stares up at the ceiling, trying to work out why he's in a huge double bed alone instead of sleeping next to everyone else on the floor, and someone's knocking quietly to wake him rather than accidentally waking him by crashing around the apartment.
"Come in," he eventually calls after a few seconds, during which the knocking pauses and then starts up again, but with his sleep-roughened voice it sounds more like "uh'min" and he clears his throat accordingly, sitting up as Jared enters the room with a soft smile on his face. Jensen thinks that 'smiling' is probably Jared's default expression. His own, he knows, is less friendly.
"Morning," Jared says, stepping a couple of feet into the room but keeping hold of the door, like if he stays close to it his own huge size won't be as evident. "Breakfast's ready downstairs when you want it. If there's anything not there that you want, just ask Loretta and she'll cook you anything you can think of. She's an amazing cook." Jared nods as he says this, grinning at the end of it like he's agreeing with himself, and the thought of food is a happy one. Judging by the amount the man had put away last night, Jensen thinks this is probably quite accurate.
"Okay," he replies sleepily. "Thanks." He can't get his brain to function much faster than this when he's just woken up, and at any time it'd probably never catch up with Jared's, but the host doesn't seem to mind as he simply grins again and leaves the room, closing the door behind him. Jensen listens to him walking down the hallway, then flops back onto the pillows with a sigh.
He hadn't thought he'd sleep easily here, last night. Due to his lifestyle he doesn't usually get to bed until the grey light of dawn is seeping through the curtains, at the earliest, and often past that, by the time the sun has well and truly risen. And the atmosphere was all wrong; he hasn't slept a night alone in fourteen years. He's almost always surrounded by his friends; Chris on one side, Tom on the other, and the rest of them scattered around in their usual places. Even on the nights he isn't, he'll be in bed with a trick, although he doesn't sleep much then, because it's hard to fall asleep with an unfamiliar arm around your body like a vice holding you in place, the scent of sex that isn't the mingled pervasive odour that defines the squat, only one person's breathing other than yours and probably the fact that you're sleeping on sweat-dampened sheets.
But he'd underestimated the quality of Jared's bedsheets, the comfort of his mattress and the peace that being entirely alone but also feeling safe brings, because he'd fallen asleep not long after he'd entered the room. Slept straight through till half ten this morning, which is another surprise. Broken sleep comes as standard with Jensen's lifestyle.
He doesn't want to think too hard on why he felt safe in this house; it feels like letting Chris down, somehow, after he'd been told to stay on his guard, even though Chris won't know and Jensen's always been the best judge of character of all of them. They think it's pretty cool how he can glance at a client and murmur, "Not worth it, man, he'll stiff you," but he just sees it as a survival mechanism. Knowing who can help him and who's going to kick him back into the gutter was what got him through the first ten years of his life, and they're not instincts he's aching to lose. But Jensen's instincts have long been warring with Chris's experience, so he manages to shrug the thought off without too much trouble.
Jensen stumbles into the en suite bathroom to take a piss and glance at himself in the mirror, make sure he doesn't look too horrific. Once he's satisfied that he's not going to send any small children running and screaming, he heads for downstairs and the kitchen. He's still wearing only his boxers and a T-shirt, but eating breakfast in anything more than this has always felt wrong and he has the brief, mulish thought that if anyone says anything to him about modesty, he'll point out the fact that he's a prostitute. But as it transpires, no one says a word or even looks at him askance, and when he realises this later, it both pleases and confuses him.
For now, he makes his way into the kitchen, still somewhat reserved if not shy because he's never met this woman before and he doesn't know that she's not going to turn her spatula on him and hiss at him to get out, stop corrupting her employer and her grandson. But when he meets her eyes, he knows immediately that that's not going to be the case, and he offers her a small smile without even thinking about it.
"Good morning to you," Loretta greets him, turned from the stove to smile at him even as she simultaneously flips the bacon in the pan. Jensen's impressed. "Now you just sit on down there at the table with Max and this food will be ready 'fore you know it. And get yourself a drink, honey, you look parched."
Jensen is momentarily confused as to how she knows he's thirsty when he hasn't even thought about it, but he forgets to wonder when he sits down at the table and sees the ridiculous array of choices in front of him. He selects grapefruit juice purely out of curiosity, pours himself a glass and downs half of it in one go, and that's when he finally notices the small boy staring at him with interest from across the table.
"Are you one of Jared's friends?" the boy asks when Jensen's eyes meet his. Jensen is not unused to children - in fact, he sees them more often that he would have liked given that the ones he sees are street kids - and he quite likes them, usually, but their unnerving frankness is something that can be quite uncomfortable at times. He glances across the kitchen at Loretta, but she's still busy at the stove, humming to herself as she turns the sausages now and Jensen gets the feeling that she heard the question perfectly and is just waiting to hear what he'll say.
"Uh, no," he replies, shaking his head minutely. "We only just met recently." Jensen's not ashamed of what he does, not by a long shot, but he still doesn't think it's fair to expose kids to that world before they have to be. Given the choice, he'd obliterate that world entirely and then everyone could be ignorant, but that would also mean abolishing unfairness and poverty and hunger and all, and Jensen hasn't got that sort of power. Instead, he does what he can, which in this moment is sparing one child his innocence for a while longer.
"Oh," Max replies, apparently thinking on this as his grandmother brings plates over to the table, loaded with all sorts of different, fattening, glorious things to eat, and Jensen momentarily forgets about it until Max adds, "So you might be later?"
"Uh...sure," Jensen guesses uneasily. He really hasn't a clue whether he's ever going to be counted as one of Jared's friends, and he'd like to say he doesn't care either, but if this is how Jared's friends eat...
"Dig in, honey," Loretta tells him as she sees him eyeing the food with enthusiasm. "Unless you need to say grace?" Jensen looks up at her with surprise, shakes his head and she smiles in return. "Then go ahead. We don't see the need for it in this house."
Jensen wonders whether he should wait for Jared or not, even though Loretta has said he can start and Max has already begun attacking his breakfast with gusto, but he doesn't have to wonder long because that's when Jared enters the kitchen, smiling at everybody and saying good morning. He's fresh from the shower if his clean smell and wet hair is anything to go by, and as he sits down next to Jensen, he's a momentary distraction before the smell of the food lures Jensen in again and he starts to dig in like everybody else.
Once they've eaten breakfast, with more conversation than Jensen thought possible given the amount of food they were inhaling between them, he goes back up to the guest room for his pants and shoes, tries to make the bed in a sort of thank-you to Loretta, even though he guesses she'll change the sheets after he's gone anyway, and then he calls an awkward thank you into the kitchen before he and Jared leave. He's surprised when Max comes running into the hallway, yelling, "Bye, Jensen!" and waving before running up the stairs.
Jared takes the Camaro this time as he intends to take it out for a bit of a spin once he's dropped Jensen off, get invigorated before the rest of his day as Loretta's weekend breakfasts always make him feel both sated and sluggish. Jensen slips into the passenger side seat, breathing in the scent of the leather and just enjoying it, because he can appreciate a fine car as much as any man and maybe more so because he is never going to be able to even get close to owning one.
Jared drops him off at the corner he'd picked him up at, because Jensen tells him the location of the squat is known only to gang members, which is the truth. In their business, especially when you added drug dealing to prostitution, it was stupid to risk the lives of your friends by not being careful. Jared would rather take him to his door, but he isn't stupid enough to push the issue and so he simply drops him where Jensen asks.
There are awkward thank-yous and goodbyes when they reach their destination. Jensen is very well used to being driven back at the end of a trick, even an overnight one, but much less so to a trick where there wasn't even power play involved, much less sex. Jared hadn't asked him to do anything but enjoy himself, and he isn't quite sure how to deal with that. Jared, meanwhile, is entirely out of his depth, but being out of his depth isn't really a new thing for him and he can think on his feet, so he mostly smiles and seems more relaxed than Jensen.
"Oh, hey," Jared says just as Jensen's hand starts creeping towards the door handle in an obvious effort to get the hell out of there. He reaches into his pocket and grabs a bundle of notes he'd placed in there before they left the house. "That should be an even thousand, but you might wanna check it."
Jensen had almost forgotten about the money, a fact which shocks him a little bit now. "Nah, it's okay," he shakes his head. Normally, Jensen would always count, because aside from the fact that you couldn't always trust people to be honest, it helped him to reiterate the fact that this was nothing more than a business relationship. That simple act stopped people from getting too close and attached, which some of the stupider clients could tend to do. The ones who were looking for love in all the wrong places. But this situation kind of hasn't been strictly business, has been some weird hybrid of business and burgeoning friendship, and Jensen can't define it like he's used to and really, he just wants to get out of it now so he exits the car with an awkward smile.
Jared smiles at him again when he shuts the door and half-turns, unsure whether he's supposed to look back and smile again or simply start walking, but luckily before things go any further Jared simply holds a hand up in goodbye and drives away. Jensen takes a deep breath, lets it out again and heads for the squat, pocketing the money.
Back home he finds Chris waiting up for him, a still-sleeping Steve's head in his lap. Chris runs his gaze up and down Jensen before he smiles in greeting, making sure first that his boy is okay, and Jensen smiles back weakly.
"That was fuckin' weird," is the first thing Jensen says, after he's picked his way across the few bodies and more piles of accumulated crap and dropped onto the floor next to his friend, back against the couch. "He didn't even try to do anything. Didn't even look like he wanted to. He gave me a guest room, for Christ's sake."
Chris laughs as loudly as he can without waking the others. "A guest room?" he repeats, mirth spilling from his words. "That's awesome. Did you get room service, too?"
"No," Jensen replies, "But the housekeeper cooked breakfast for me, and we all ate together at the kitchen table. With her six year old grandson." He rolls his eyes.
He and Chris continue to dissect the events until they've no more jokes left to make about the ridiculous situation, and the fact that Jared is a total loser, but when it's over and Chris is settling down to sleep, Jensen can't help but think that even though Jared is a stupid nice guy, it was kind of nice being with a stupid nice guy anyway. He can't deny the fact that he had an enjoyable time, for the most part. When this thought becomes too weird to contemplate any longer, he gets up to go and find one of the kids to play with, take his mind off of things.
Continue to the next chapter or continue to the insert
Pic//Blink-sum-new-muse
Author: Blink-sum-new-muse
Rating: R
Fandom: CW RP
Summary: Jensen's a street-hardened hooker who's sure he knows how things are meant to be. Jared's a bleeding heart with more money than sense. He wants to save Jensen, but will Jensen let him?
Disclaimer: I do not own Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Chris Kane, Tom Welling, Steve Carlson or any of their families. I also don't own the song I Want To Save You; it's by Something Corporate. I do, however, own Loretta and Max. Fiction is the word, and the words are mine.
Status: Ongoing.
Previous Chapters: One Two
Notes: This is part of the street 'verse.
Jensen wakes up the next morning to a soft knocking at the door. He's confused enough that he doesn't answer straight away; instead, he opens his eyes and blinks a few times as he stares up at the ceiling, trying to work out why he's in a huge double bed alone instead of sleeping next to everyone else on the floor, and someone's knocking quietly to wake him rather than accidentally waking him by crashing around the apartment.
"Come in," he eventually calls after a few seconds, during which the knocking pauses and then starts up again, but with his sleep-roughened voice it sounds more like "uh'min" and he clears his throat accordingly, sitting up as Jared enters the room with a soft smile on his face. Jensen thinks that 'smiling' is probably Jared's default expression. His own, he knows, is less friendly.
"Morning," Jared says, stepping a couple of feet into the room but keeping hold of the door, like if he stays close to it his own huge size won't be as evident. "Breakfast's ready downstairs when you want it. If there's anything not there that you want, just ask Loretta and she'll cook you anything you can think of. She's an amazing cook." Jared nods as he says this, grinning at the end of it like he's agreeing with himself, and the thought of food is a happy one. Judging by the amount the man had put away last night, Jensen thinks this is probably quite accurate.
"Okay," he replies sleepily. "Thanks." He can't get his brain to function much faster than this when he's just woken up, and at any time it'd probably never catch up with Jared's, but the host doesn't seem to mind as he simply grins again and leaves the room, closing the door behind him. Jensen listens to him walking down the hallway, then flops back onto the pillows with a sigh.
He hadn't thought he'd sleep easily here, last night. Due to his lifestyle he doesn't usually get to bed until the grey light of dawn is seeping through the curtains, at the earliest, and often past that, by the time the sun has well and truly risen. And the atmosphere was all wrong; he hasn't slept a night alone in fourteen years. He's almost always surrounded by his friends; Chris on one side, Tom on the other, and the rest of them scattered around in their usual places. Even on the nights he isn't, he'll be in bed with a trick, although he doesn't sleep much then, because it's hard to fall asleep with an unfamiliar arm around your body like a vice holding you in place, the scent of sex that isn't the mingled pervasive odour that defines the squat, only one person's breathing other than yours and probably the fact that you're sleeping on sweat-dampened sheets.
But he'd underestimated the quality of Jared's bedsheets, the comfort of his mattress and the peace that being entirely alone but also feeling safe brings, because he'd fallen asleep not long after he'd entered the room. Slept straight through till half ten this morning, which is another surprise. Broken sleep comes as standard with Jensen's lifestyle.
He doesn't want to think too hard on why he felt safe in this house; it feels like letting Chris down, somehow, after he'd been told to stay on his guard, even though Chris won't know and Jensen's always been the best judge of character of all of them. They think it's pretty cool how he can glance at a client and murmur, "Not worth it, man, he'll stiff you," but he just sees it as a survival mechanism. Knowing who can help him and who's going to kick him back into the gutter was what got him through the first ten years of his life, and they're not instincts he's aching to lose. But Jensen's instincts have long been warring with Chris's experience, so he manages to shrug the thought off without too much trouble.
Jensen stumbles into the en suite bathroom to take a piss and glance at himself in the mirror, make sure he doesn't look too horrific. Once he's satisfied that he's not going to send any small children running and screaming, he heads for downstairs and the kitchen. He's still wearing only his boxers and a T-shirt, but eating breakfast in anything more than this has always felt wrong and he has the brief, mulish thought that if anyone says anything to him about modesty, he'll point out the fact that he's a prostitute. But as it transpires, no one says a word or even looks at him askance, and when he realises this later, it both pleases and confuses him.
For now, he makes his way into the kitchen, still somewhat reserved if not shy because he's never met this woman before and he doesn't know that she's not going to turn her spatula on him and hiss at him to get out, stop corrupting her employer and her grandson. But when he meets her eyes, he knows immediately that that's not going to be the case, and he offers her a small smile without even thinking about it.
"Good morning to you," Loretta greets him, turned from the stove to smile at him even as she simultaneously flips the bacon in the pan. Jensen's impressed. "Now you just sit on down there at the table with Max and this food will be ready 'fore you know it. And get yourself a drink, honey, you look parched."
Jensen is momentarily confused as to how she knows he's thirsty when he hasn't even thought about it, but he forgets to wonder when he sits down at the table and sees the ridiculous array of choices in front of him. He selects grapefruit juice purely out of curiosity, pours himself a glass and downs half of it in one go, and that's when he finally notices the small boy staring at him with interest from across the table.
"Are you one of Jared's friends?" the boy asks when Jensen's eyes meet his. Jensen is not unused to children - in fact, he sees them more often that he would have liked given that the ones he sees are street kids - and he quite likes them, usually, but their unnerving frankness is something that can be quite uncomfortable at times. He glances across the kitchen at Loretta, but she's still busy at the stove, humming to herself as she turns the sausages now and Jensen gets the feeling that she heard the question perfectly and is just waiting to hear what he'll say.
"Uh, no," he replies, shaking his head minutely. "We only just met recently." Jensen's not ashamed of what he does, not by a long shot, but he still doesn't think it's fair to expose kids to that world before they have to be. Given the choice, he'd obliterate that world entirely and then everyone could be ignorant, but that would also mean abolishing unfairness and poverty and hunger and all, and Jensen hasn't got that sort of power. Instead, he does what he can, which in this moment is sparing one child his innocence for a while longer.
"Oh," Max replies, apparently thinking on this as his grandmother brings plates over to the table, loaded with all sorts of different, fattening, glorious things to eat, and Jensen momentarily forgets about it until Max adds, "So you might be later?"
"Uh...sure," Jensen guesses uneasily. He really hasn't a clue whether he's ever going to be counted as one of Jared's friends, and he'd like to say he doesn't care either, but if this is how Jared's friends eat...
"Dig in, honey," Loretta tells him as she sees him eyeing the food with enthusiasm. "Unless you need to say grace?" Jensen looks up at her with surprise, shakes his head and she smiles in return. "Then go ahead. We don't see the need for it in this house."
Jensen wonders whether he should wait for Jared or not, even though Loretta has said he can start and Max has already begun attacking his breakfast with gusto, but he doesn't have to wonder long because that's when Jared enters the kitchen, smiling at everybody and saying good morning. He's fresh from the shower if his clean smell and wet hair is anything to go by, and as he sits down next to Jensen, he's a momentary distraction before the smell of the food lures Jensen in again and he starts to dig in like everybody else.
Once they've eaten breakfast, with more conversation than Jensen thought possible given the amount of food they were inhaling between them, he goes back up to the guest room for his pants and shoes, tries to make the bed in a sort of thank-you to Loretta, even though he guesses she'll change the sheets after he's gone anyway, and then he calls an awkward thank you into the kitchen before he and Jared leave. He's surprised when Max comes running into the hallway, yelling, "Bye, Jensen!" and waving before running up the stairs.
Jared takes the Camaro this time as he intends to take it out for a bit of a spin once he's dropped Jensen off, get invigorated before the rest of his day as Loretta's weekend breakfasts always make him feel both sated and sluggish. Jensen slips into the passenger side seat, breathing in the scent of the leather and just enjoying it, because he can appreciate a fine car as much as any man and maybe more so because he is never going to be able to even get close to owning one.
Jared drops him off at the corner he'd picked him up at, because Jensen tells him the location of the squat is known only to gang members, which is the truth. In their business, especially when you added drug dealing to prostitution, it was stupid to risk the lives of your friends by not being careful. Jared would rather take him to his door, but he isn't stupid enough to push the issue and so he simply drops him where Jensen asks.
There are awkward thank-yous and goodbyes when they reach their destination. Jensen is very well used to being driven back at the end of a trick, even an overnight one, but much less so to a trick where there wasn't even power play involved, much less sex. Jared hadn't asked him to do anything but enjoy himself, and he isn't quite sure how to deal with that. Jared, meanwhile, is entirely out of his depth, but being out of his depth isn't really a new thing for him and he can think on his feet, so he mostly smiles and seems more relaxed than Jensen.
"Oh, hey," Jared says just as Jensen's hand starts creeping towards the door handle in an obvious effort to get the hell out of there. He reaches into his pocket and grabs a bundle of notes he'd placed in there before they left the house. "That should be an even thousand, but you might wanna check it."
Jensen had almost forgotten about the money, a fact which shocks him a little bit now. "Nah, it's okay," he shakes his head. Normally, Jensen would always count, because aside from the fact that you couldn't always trust people to be honest, it helped him to reiterate the fact that this was nothing more than a business relationship. That simple act stopped people from getting too close and attached, which some of the stupider clients could tend to do. The ones who were looking for love in all the wrong places. But this situation kind of hasn't been strictly business, has been some weird hybrid of business and burgeoning friendship, and Jensen can't define it like he's used to and really, he just wants to get out of it now so he exits the car with an awkward smile.
Jared smiles at him again when he shuts the door and half-turns, unsure whether he's supposed to look back and smile again or simply start walking, but luckily before things go any further Jared simply holds a hand up in goodbye and drives away. Jensen takes a deep breath, lets it out again and heads for the squat, pocketing the money.
Back home he finds Chris waiting up for him, a still-sleeping Steve's head in his lap. Chris runs his gaze up and down Jensen before he smiles in greeting, making sure first that his boy is okay, and Jensen smiles back weakly.
"That was fuckin' weird," is the first thing Jensen says, after he's picked his way across the few bodies and more piles of accumulated crap and dropped onto the floor next to his friend, back against the couch. "He didn't even try to do anything. Didn't even look like he wanted to. He gave me a guest room, for Christ's sake."
Chris laughs as loudly as he can without waking the others. "A guest room?" he repeats, mirth spilling from his words. "That's awesome. Did you get room service, too?"
"No," Jensen replies, "But the housekeeper cooked breakfast for me, and we all ate together at the kitchen table. With her six year old grandson." He rolls his eyes.
He and Chris continue to dissect the events until they've no more jokes left to make about the ridiculous situation, and the fact that Jared is a total loser, but when it's over and Chris is settling down to sleep, Jensen can't help but think that even though Jared is a stupid nice guy, it was kind of nice being with a stupid nice guy anyway. He can't deny the fact that he had an enjoyable time, for the most part. When this thought becomes too weird to contemplate any longer, he gets up to go and find one of the kids to play with, take his mind off of things.
Continue to the next chapter or continue to the insert
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