FIC: You Say I Talk So All the Time (Part 1/2)
Title: You Say I Talk So All the Time (Wherein Jensen Tells Jared to Shut Up) - Part 1/2
Author: Bow a.k.a. bowie28
Pairing: Jensen/Jared, Sandy, Chad
Word count: 8,075
Rating: R with some inexplicit sexing
Disclaimer: FICTION. ALL FICTION. READ MY LIPS: ALL FICTION.
Warning: het sex (inexplicit), humor, major angst toward the end, introspective
Spoilers: None
Beta: None, because I don’t really know anybody.
A/N: This was initially inspired by one line from the song “Stay (I Missed You)” by Lisa Loeb (see the title), so it bounds to be some angst. Write this in fifteen hours straight, and I’m pretty sure I got some of the real-life timelines wrong. So sorry for all the errors. Corrections and feedback are more than welcome.
Summary: Jared gets various forms of ‘shut up’ from people all the time, because it’s Jared we’re talking about, and none of them are really effective, because, hello, it’s Jared we’re talking about. Well, that lasts for a while, until Jensen tells him in his own way.
You Say I Talk So All the Time
(Wherein Jensen Tells Jared to Shut Up)
Part 1/2
Jared’s a talker, in case you haven’t noticed. He talks, it’s what he does. Like how he loves the feel of sands between his toes, the sugary taste lingering on his tongue, or dogs’ wet lapping on his face. You can say it’s the way he’s programmed. What he doesn’t do, or tends to forget to do, is thinking prior to talking. He realizes this, yes, he does, given the fact that this isn’t the first time he’s got a ‘shut up’ snapped at him. Though it’s never really bothered him because most of the times, those two words don’t hold anything more than a fleeting annoyance that a playful shove or a smug grin can’t fix. Now? That’s kind of changed, and it isn’t his fault, really. He just didn’t know any better.
* * *
Jared is superstitious, and he’s not ashamed to admit it. Actually he embraces it. When he lands the role of the younger Winchester, he totally believes it's fate and all the shit. Not because it is on the network he’s practically grown up on and for which responsible half his lifesaving already, or that he doesn’t even have to do the proper audition but instead gets hand-picked just because the show creator’s wife happens to be a Gilmore Girls’ fan. No, none of those. It’s simply because he believes that everything happens for a reason. Easier said than done, right? But with Jared, it’s really that simple. And that’s probably why most people look at him like he’s some freak of nature when he explains himself as much (a.k.a. yapping away in front of total strangers). His co-star is regrettably one of those people, but what prevents Jared from getting grossed out and turning down the role is the fact that the guy doesn’t look at him like he has a disease or something to have that kind of ability, an ability to believe in something as naïve as that. For a few seconds, the guy looks at him like Jared’s the world’s lost wonder, some kind of extinct species, and running into him is some sort of discovery. Jensen, this co-star of his, doesn’t exactly say those words, of course - the guy barely speaks during their first meeting - but the way the green eyes weighing Jared through those long eyelashes, and the corners of those lips (the most luscious lips on men he’s ever beheld, by the way) crook upward, Jared decides he’ll give the guy the benefit of the doubt. Some people just don’t know any better.
* * *
From then on, whenever he’s in the other guy’s presence, he finds himself talking. Always talking. Jensen listens, it’s what the guy does. This Jared realizes almost straight away. He knows Jensen type - the quiet, don’t-pay-attention-to-me, wait-for-the-opening-then-shoot type, and Jared’s okay with it. In fact he doesn’t really think about it at all, because, hell, Jared’s okay with almost anything.
Like with most of his co-stars, Jared effortlessly develops an attachment with Jensen, but unlike with most of his co-stars, Jared is kind of also ‘attached’ to Jensen, and not a let’s-hit-a-bar-and-get-shitfaced kind of attached, but a good-morning-assface, what-you’re-having-for-breakfast, coffee’s-not-breakfast, we’ll-get-you-an-extra-muffin-on-the-way-to-set kind of attached. Jared thinks it’s totally healthy as he’s babbling all the details into the phone with his other co-star at the other end of the line.
“You’ve gotta shut up sometimes, dude. The fact that he still hasn’t punched your face in actually have me develop a serious respect for the guy,” Chad’s voice is mixed with amusement.
“I don’t say anything I don’t say to you, so what’s the big deal?”
“You’d known me for how long before starting harassing me at the crack of dawn with phone calls and that sunshine attitude of yours?”
Uhh…
“I don’t know. A few months?”
“Exactly my point.”
“Which is…”
“Dude, you’re dumber than you look, and that says a lot.” Chad’s laugh is seriously cramping his style, because it’s Chad, and you just don’t get laughed at by Chad fucking-Michael Murray.
“Fuck you.”
“I don’t think that’s what you need,” his friend replies calmly, and then adds, “Not from me anyway.”
Hold the fucking phone.
“Watch your fucking mouth.”
But that’s not what Chad does. He just doesn’t, and Jared fucking knows it.
“You’ve been calling me for what, two weeks now, about how you’re obsessing over this, and I paraphrase, totally intelligent, talented, gorgeous, perfect of a creature who happens to be your male co-star on this new show you said you were so excited about, but still haven’t said a single word about it to me.”
“I’m not obsessing, I’m just…”
“Talking about how totally intelligent, talented, gorgeous, perfect of a creature he is. Yeah, I think the whole North America’s got the picture.”
Jared’s speechless for two seconds. Two whole seconds, speechless, and that doesn’t happen every day.
“I don’t have a crush on Jensen Ackles.” Those two seconds must have been the longest two seconds in the history of time, and Jared sure is glad he’s survived them.
Chad’s chuckle is clear as bells. “Excuse me, Mr. Padalecki, what are your holding in your hand again?”
Jared bites his tongue, hard. Fuck you, he mutters silently. “A PSP.”
“A brand-new PSP that you’ve just bought for the one co-star you totally don’t have a crush on because…” Chad pauses, which is killing Jared and the fucker knows it, “because what again? Oh, right, just because.”
“Fuck you.” This time his muttering isn’t so silent.
“I stand corrected,” Chad says, and fucking giggles.
“I don’t… It’s not…” Jared tries to find the right retort, the affective one, but all he can come up with is, “You’re just jealous you’ve never worked with someone who actually appreciates your friendship and not what’s in your pants.”
“Oh, I’m sure he appreciates whatever you have to offer. After all, he hasn’t told you to shut up yet. But I assure you the day will come, Jarebear, and when it does, you’re gonna come crawling back here, crying over this fucking phone with me on the other end.”
Another ‘fuck you’ and Jared clicks off the phone. This is one of those times he wishes they still use those old phones where you can actually slam the receiver back in its cradle so the person on the other end could fully relish the experience of being hung up on.
* * *
The first time Jensen tells him to shut up Jared doesn’t come crawling back to Chad, and Jared has an urge to pick up the phone and call the fucker just to show him how wrong he has been about the whole thing. Jared doesn’t have a crush on Jensen fucking Ackles. He just really, really likes the guy, especially when the said guy gets completely wasted and ends up crashing on his couch.
It’s Jared’s first birthday celebration together - together as in him and Jensen, and Jared’s been so fucking over the moon the entire night, from the on-set party, the off-set party, to the post off-set party where he swears he has drank some bootleg he’s sure wouldn’t be illegal anywhere in the world any time soon, something that’s probably destroying his brain cells as we speak, because that’s the only logical explanation for what he’s doing right now - flopping on the cold granite floor against his couch, watching his co-star’s socked feet hanging weightlessly at its end with an amazement of unknown origin. And then, God, those slender fingers brush his arm as the sleeping man shifts to get the more comfortable position. Jared’s sure it’s because of the booze, because he’s fully clothed, in layers, and yet his skin there, where those fucking fingers have touched, burns like the entire room’s on fire, and that can’t be happening because his ass is numb from this fucking freezing floor. In fact every part of his body except for those few square inches on his arm is numb. This can’t be normal, or healthy for that matter.
“I’m numb,” Jared blurts out, doesn’t even direct it to anyone in particular.
The other man, of course, doesn’t know that, because this is Jared we’re talking about, and Jared’s always talking to get someone to respond. Jensen grunts some inaudible syllables.
Jared turns around to look at the other man as he’s so far seen only his limps. “Jen?” Jesus, are those lashes for real? Jared blinks away the thought and presses on his curiosity about… uh, right, about the numbness. “Are you numb?”
Eyes closed, Jensen still gives him meaningless syllables, but Jared finds himself okay with that, with seeing his co-star/friend like this, even though he’s sure his balls are turning to icepacks right about now.
“I think it’s the booze the guys sneaked in,” Jared tries. “Jen, this feels weird. I feel weird.” He starts to get desperate, and, honestly, concerned as he sees no response from the older guy, and Jared’s left with no other option.
“Jen.” Jared shakes the other guy’s arm gently, hoping to see some signs of life, any sign. “Jen!”
And thank the Lord, Jensen grunts out two words, firmly and clearly, “Shut up,” and then turns away from Jared, settling back into Jared’s couch.
Over the next five minutes Jared sits there, considering calling Chad, telling him how HE is NOT crying on the day Jensen says those two words to him. In fact hearing them kind of makes him smile, a lot, and that’s when Jared decides against the idea because, really, Chad’s a sneaky bastard, and the fucker’s sure gonna twist everything Jared has to say into something Jared doesn’t understand, or want to hear, or isn’t ready to hear, or what-the-fuck-ever, and that’s not something Jared can handle while totally shitfaced.
* * *
Jensen says them to Jared a lot. Those two words, you know. It’s kind of become their routine - Jared will mouth off some nonsense and Jensen will tell him to shut the hell up, and like most people, Jensen doesn’t really mean it, as in expect Jared to really shut up. But there are times when Jensen means it, and unlike with most people, Jared doesn’t know what the hell to do, except the obvious, you know, to actually shut up. Sure, he’s been put in his place before, by his friends, his family, but with Jensen, it’s different. Like when he's ranting on the most random things, when Jared doesn’t expect to get such a life-and-death serious reaction, Jensen will get in his face, all defensive, and tell Jared to shut his pie hole and storm off. It’s ridiculous, really. It’s not like he’s even lying. All he says is how Jensen’s eyelashes make about 70% of world’s female population go insanely jealous, and teases him just a little how that’s considered some kind of a sin if your really think about it, because, hello, they’re on a show where people literally believe in the Deadly Seven Sins. Okay, maybe he shouldn’t have teased him a little in front of fifty-plus people during lunch after one of the hardest Dean angst scenes, but come on, it’s essentially a compliment. Jared’s sure he’s not the first one to bring it up.
Ten seconds afterward, Jared still freezes where Jensen has shoved pass him to go anywhere but there, to get away from him, and that’s left Jared a black void in the pitch of his stomach. It’s not that he can’t breathe, because that would be ridiculous. He’s more convinced that it’s because he doesn’t know how to deal with the fact that his eyes might have played tricks on him, and makes him see things like those freckled cheeks flushing and those ears reddening a few seconds right before they are gone, right before Jensen’s gone. Jared knows Jensen’s shy, but he can’t be that shy. He’s a goddamned actor, for Christ’s sake, and an excellent one at that. So there’s only one explanation left, and that’s Jensen hates his eyelashes. Only that’s even more ridiculous, because… well, just because.
Jared finally realizes how dumb he is when one of the makeup girls walks up to him and smacks him in the arm, hard, (he’s sure she would have smacked him on the back of his head if he isn’t so abnormally tall), and says, “You’re really are a dumbass. Don’t talk about the lashes in front of the Ackles! Ever! It’s like… blasphemy.”
“Ow!” Jared jumps, turns around, and rubs the sore skin. “Sorry, I didn’t get the memo.” He turns to look at the trailer where Jensen’s slammed its door less than a minute ago, frowning. “What’s his fucking problem anyway? I was just fooling around.”
The girl gives him a desperate glare. “Just not the lashes, okay? The guy’s self-conscious enough as it is, and having you of all people call him a woman isn’t exactly helping.”
“A wo…? What? I wasn’t… That’s not what I meant!”
“Who the hell knows what you mean around here anymore, you freak?” The girl twists the sore skin again before Jared can get away. “Now, go in there and fix it, or Eric’ll have your ass for ruining half a day of shooting.”
Jared wants to ask how the hell he could do that, ‘fix it’ as she’s suggesting, but she’s already gone and he’s left alone in the sea of curious eyes, and that’s when he’s starting to realize how Jensen must have felt just now, only multiply that with at least a hundred.
“Fuck,” Jared mutters and starts walking.
Of course he fixes it, but it isn’t the kind of experience he wishes to undergo ever again. He starts with clever statements like,
“I’m a freak, you can’t blame me. It’s like blaming Mother Nature, and that’s just stupid.”
And the word ‘stupid’ sounds so stupid Jared wishes someone, preferably Jensen, would just shoot him then and there, in Jensen’s trailer.
Jensen’s a lot crueler than that though. He just shoots Jared a death glare only rapists and racists and scum of the earth deserve from the couch where Jared swears Jensen hasn’t moved a muscle since Jared gingerly stepped inside. Everybody says he’s a giant freak of nature, and he wholeheartedly agrees, but in that trailer, during those stretched minutes, in the eyes of Jensen Ackles, Jared feels he’s the world’s smallest midget.
“I wasn’t implying you were a woman, Jen.” God, and the fucking nickname. But he loves calling Jensen ‘Jen.’ It fits just right in his mouth. “I mean, Jensen. I wasn’t implying you’re not manly just because you have these incredibly long and most luscious eyelashes I have ever seen…” Wait, what the hell…
“I mean, you’re perfect, Jen. I mean, Jensen, and there’s no reason to be ashamed…” Jared feels his cheeks burning as he meets those green eyes, which are now a bit softened, but not without a hint of doubt. Jared just wants to turn around and run off, and never comes back until next year.
“I… I didn’t know that you… I just thought it was…” He’s babbling now, and it’s bad, even for him, so he settles with, “I’m just sorry, Jen.”
Fuck. Jared squeezes his eyelids together.
“Fuck, I mean, Jensen.”
“Will you just shut the fuck up?”
Jared opens his eyes, and Jensen’s staring at him like he is some kind of a babbling freak that he is. And then the sigh comes, and Jared knows this is working. Something he’s said is actually working, and for the better.
Jensen pushes himself up and off the couch, and starts taking steps toward the door, toward him. Jared suddenly feels the need for air, and he inhales a little too sharply, and when Jensen is close enough for Jared to smell his cologne, Jared takes in another deep breath, completely out of necessity, he convinces himself. And then he realizes he doesn’t have words in his head. None. Nada. Zip. Not even his favorite curses. Jared’s head has never been this blank since, well, since ever.
“I’m gonna go back out there and finish my lunch, and when you’re ready to shut up, you can follow and finish it with me.”
And then Jensen brushes pass him to get the door. The fucker doesn’t step aside and walks around Jared, no. He fucking brushes pass Jared, and damn it if the sensation doesn’t linger and leave goosebumps all over his skin.
Jared’s not sure how long he stands there, replaying the words ‘finish it with me’ in his fucked-up head. This has never happened to him before - he’s lost his fucking appetite.
* * *
Sex with the girlfriend always helps. At least that’s what he’s been telling himself, praying and chanting that it would, that it does, before, during and after the sex. Not that there’s something psychologically wrong with seeing his co-star’s face behind his eyelids while jerking off or fucking Sandy into the mattress. It happens. Things happen. He tries not to think about his life philosophy - about how everything happens for a reason. He’s sure there’s a good reason for it, he’s just not sure he wants to know, or that it’s even necessary for him to know at all. At any rate, he’s sure he’ll move on after the first few weeks. He’s had man crushes before. This is totally normal. And to think about it, he’s not the one to blame, not really. It’s totally Jensen’s fault for not locking the fucking door to his trailer when the fucker decides to dance around half-naked like a lunatic, well, a professional dancer with a glorious body of a lunatic, to Eric Huchinton’s “Rock & Roll.” The song will always be the death of him, Jared curses, for he loves the song, and Jensen’s just completely ruined it for him.
“Fucking knock, would you?” Jensen jumps, turning around as the cold air slips in and licks the creamy skin. Jared hears his own breaths catching.
“You dance.” Jared blurts out like it’s the truth of all truths.
“And you fucking barge in people’s private properties.” Jensen’s hands suddenly glue to his own bare chest as he turns to the stereo and switches it off. Those cheeks are reddening, and they never fail to make Jared grin. They kind of have that effect on him, Jared has come to realize after months and months of working with the guy.
“Lock the goddamned door, then, you freaking prude.” Jared says, but the words hold no real meaning because, really, he doesn’t even know what’s coming out of his mouth, for all he’s focusing on right the fuck now are the muscles on those arms, that stomach, and wait a fucking second, are those fucking freckles on the fucker’s chest?
Jared doesn’t have time to find out since Jensen decides to put a t-shirt on right that second, and this is not exactly the kind of question he can just out and ask his co-star who’s always encouraged Jared to be open and honest with him. Jared would love to know the answer, sure, because he’s a curious son of a bitch, but he’d love more to not sport black eye(s) on the next day. He’s not in the mood for another lecture from Eric, and especially not from those makeup girls whom Jared seriously believes possess psychic abilities when it comes to Jared and his fucked-up mind which has recently been more and more revolving around Jensen who usually sits all innocent at the opposite end of their makeup trailer.
“Stop ogling me, your perv.”
Jared blinks, and sees that Jensen is now fully dressed, with a jacket (the jacket Jared’s lent him, by the way, because Jensen’s said it’s warmer than his own), gloves and a beanie pulled over his ears, and has already grabbed his bag and car keys.
“What?” Jared’s response is genuine, but that almost always equals lame as he stutters, “I’m not… I… I wasn’t even…”
“Shut the hell up already, and get moving.” Jensen’s gloved hand is shoving him toward the door. “We have fifteen pages of dialogue to learn in eight hours.”
‘We’ is starting to have some disturbing effect on Jared too, and the way the word rolls off Jensen’s tongue so naturally isn’t really helping. Not to mention the mere thought of Jensen’s tongue doing anything, anything at all, is more than enough to put a healthy young man in his twenties in a temporary but oh-so-blissful coma.
“Fuck!” Jared hears himself groan, and then he feels the hands, the small hands, soft and comforting, rubbing his arms and back as he lands his last thrusts, and when it’s all over, he forces his eyes open and looks into those brown eyes, wide with sensations, and then questions, but they’ve never lasted long enough for Jared to feel the need to answer them. He leans in and whispers terms of endearment in Sandy’s ear, ignoring the nagging pain in the pitch of his stomach that is now hollow, and pulls her into his arms, and again, after four months since Jensen’s Dance of Doom, Jared stays awake for the rest of the night.
* * *
Jared’s a talker, sure, but that doesn’t mean he’s a mean liar. No, he’s the worst liar there is, though he doesn’t always admit it. So when Sandy says, not asks, but says, that Jared’s seeing someone else, he finds himself in the most ridiculous situation he doesn’t know whether he wants to laugh or cry, because he is NOT seeing anyone else, and that’s the truth, but that’s not the whole truth, and omitting the truth constitutes a lie, and Jared is not good with this shit, never was, with this gray-area shit where things can go both ways, or more precisely, can screw you both ways.
She says she won’t ask him who it is, and thank God she uses the neutral pronoun, because Jared knows all too well he will never pass the pronoun test if his life depends on it, and that will be the end of him, because it will be the beginning of a whole lot of things he doesn’t plan on going into with his ex fiancée. Ever.
* * *
He doesn’t cry. Not that night. Not the whole week after that. And it kind of surprises him because, come on, he’s a fucking Cancer, he’s a total drama queen. He remembers he used to tell Jensen that tidbit a while back while they were reading this horoscope section in one of those trashy magazines they love to buy just for kicks. Jared remembers laughing about it, and not because it was kind of embarrassing to read that with Jensen, but because he knew it was completely true, and Jensen said he’d already known it, like months before that magazine was even in print, and Jensen laughed, and Jared felt his face burning in the middle of winter afternoon, and laughing seemed the most logical explanation for that at the time.
He sleeps a little better, but still startles in the middle of the night, finds himself staring at the digital clock on the nightstand, develop a slight jealousy over his dogs who sound asleep in the corner of his room, and then back to staring at the clock and then his cell phone nearby, and imagining conversations that he would have with Jensen if he’d ever have the courage to make the call, but in the end, he always beats himself up for having such a monumentally stupid idea, and even though sometimes, mostly when he’s close to sleep, and it doesn’t seem so stupid to him, Jared knows it’s still a monumentally stupid idea to have that kind of conversation over the phone, and anyway, it can wait until they are back on the set for the new season.
But it seems Jensen has other ideas, because the first day of the second week after the Breakup, while Jared’s watching The Rock for the sixty-seventh time (yes, he counts) in his favorite couch, the fucking ‘Rock & Roll’ ringtone he once thought he was so clever setting it for Jensen, and Jensen alone, blares on the coffee table where his bare feet laid mindlessly, and he almost knocks off a half-full bag of chips and a dozen of empty beer cans onto the already littered floor. Once composed, he sits up in the couch and stares at the phone like it’s some kind of a deadly flesh-eating bug. It vibrates and keeps screaming,
If he wants to stay he stays
If he wants to go he goes
He doesn’t care how he gets there
Long as he gets somewhere he knows
and suddenly the image of the man who has once wiggled his ass like there was no tomorrow is now calling him, because he has waited for Jared to call him for the whole goddamned week, and Jared’s been too much of a coward to do it, and now his friend is breaking all the rules he believes in - giving people privacy and space, giving Jared time and whatever the fuck that Jared needs, and says ‘fuck this’ and picks up the phone and makes this call just to make sure this chicken shit of a man is still breathing living air, and hell, that just makes this whole thing ten times worse, because it makes Jared realize he’s that much worse of a person.
“Shut the fuck up!” Jared finds it’s weird to hear himself say those words out loud, but that’s not the weirdest thing. The weirdest thing is that the phone keeps on screeching, and Jared finds it a miracle that he hasn’t already been brutally murdered for not learning how to shut up when he was told.
* * *
He never likes being drunk. Not really. It’s pointless to him because when he’s boozed up, he doesn’t feel much of anything, and that’s not really what he constitutes fun. Being drunk is more of Jensen’s forte. The guy actually has a system worked to perfection for over a decade, and Jared laughs to himself when he thinks about how proud Jensen sounded explaining said system to him, like it was a goddamned dogma or something.
Some girl ask him something, maybe the way to the toilet or just as typical as his phone number, but whichever it is, he’s completely useless. A) he’s so trashed he’d go here if nature actually calls, and B) he has no intention of getting anywhere near that fucking phone in the next few days, or weeks, or maybe he should just go all phone-free like those hippies he once saw the documentary about on some boring channel Jensen always watches.
Fuck.
More girls bump into Jared as he leans in the bar to order more beer. They look at him, amused, like he’s a freak. Well, he is. So fuck him! And fuck them! He downs another glass, and then hears some sheering and whooping, ahh, more girls, and Jared starts wondering if this is some kind of bachelorette party he’s got lost into. And then from somewhere at the other end of the room the music starts, and it’s like something inside Jared’s switched on, like he’s programmed to physically and emotionally respond to this particular tune.
It’s an angry girl’s song, and though the words don’t really make much sense to Jared, they start poring out of his mouth, and when it reaches ‘now I know that I did something wrong, ’cause I missed you,’ he starts screaming the rest of the song like it’s a manifestation of his soul or something. And when it gets to ‘I think that I'm throwing, but I'm thrown. And I thought I'd live forever, but now I'm not so sure,’ he feels the sharp sting behind his eyelids, before ignoring it and blinking away whatever that isn’t there, and then he sees it, a scene from one of his lucid dreams he’s had too many times to count - Jensen standing there, in the midst of swaying crowd beneath the dim light in a smoky room, and those wide eyes are on Jared, and Jared only.
He blinks and waits for it to go away, like it always does, but instead, Jensen’s treading toward him like he’s a man on a holy mission, and the next thing Jared knows Jensen claps on his left shoulder and leans in, dangerously close.
“You’re a pathetic son of a bitch.”
Jared blinks again, and when the feel of the other man’s hand isn’t going away, he squints and slurs, “Jen?”
“I’m taking you home.” And then the other hand comes up and grabs Jared’s right arm, pulling him up.
But Jared’s not having it. He squirms out of Jensen’s demanding hands, and reaches out for the weary stubbled face, and pulls it in to taste those lips, and that’s because it’s what he always does in his dreams.
And when he does, he smiles against the slightly-parted lips and mumbles, “I’m home.”
But unlike those dreams, he doesn’t wake up right afterward.
For the first time in over half a year, Jared falls right to sleep and doesn’t wake up until eighteen hours later.
* * *
Part 2/2
Author: Bow a.k.a. bowie28
Pairing: Jensen/Jared, Sandy, Chad
Word count: 8,075
Rating: R with some inexplicit sexing
Disclaimer: FICTION. ALL FICTION. READ MY LIPS: ALL FICTION.
Warning: het sex (inexplicit), humor, major angst toward the end, introspective
Spoilers: None
Beta: None, because I don’t really know anybody.
A/N: This was initially inspired by one line from the song “Stay (I Missed You)” by Lisa Loeb (see the title), so it bounds to be some angst. Write this in fifteen hours straight, and I’m pretty sure I got some of the real-life timelines wrong. So sorry for all the errors. Corrections and feedback are more than welcome.
Summary: Jared gets various forms of ‘shut up’ from people all the time, because it’s Jared we’re talking about, and none of them are really effective, because, hello, it’s Jared we’re talking about. Well, that lasts for a while, until Jensen tells him in his own way.
You Say I Talk So All the Time
(Wherein Jensen Tells Jared to Shut Up)
Part 1/2
Jared’s a talker, in case you haven’t noticed. He talks, it’s what he does. Like how he loves the feel of sands between his toes, the sugary taste lingering on his tongue, or dogs’ wet lapping on his face. You can say it’s the way he’s programmed. What he doesn’t do, or tends to forget to do, is thinking prior to talking. He realizes this, yes, he does, given the fact that this isn’t the first time he’s got a ‘shut up’ snapped at him. Though it’s never really bothered him because most of the times, those two words don’t hold anything more than a fleeting annoyance that a playful shove or a smug grin can’t fix. Now? That’s kind of changed, and it isn’t his fault, really. He just didn’t know any better.
* * *
Jared is superstitious, and he’s not ashamed to admit it. Actually he embraces it. When he lands the role of the younger Winchester, he totally believes it's fate and all the shit. Not because it is on the network he’s practically grown up on and for which responsible half his lifesaving already, or that he doesn’t even have to do the proper audition but instead gets hand-picked just because the show creator’s wife happens to be a Gilmore Girls’ fan. No, none of those. It’s simply because he believes that everything happens for a reason. Easier said than done, right? But with Jared, it’s really that simple. And that’s probably why most people look at him like he’s some freak of nature when he explains himself as much (a.k.a. yapping away in front of total strangers). His co-star is regrettably one of those people, but what prevents Jared from getting grossed out and turning down the role is the fact that the guy doesn’t look at him like he has a disease or something to have that kind of ability, an ability to believe in something as naïve as that. For a few seconds, the guy looks at him like Jared’s the world’s lost wonder, some kind of extinct species, and running into him is some sort of discovery. Jensen, this co-star of his, doesn’t exactly say those words, of course - the guy barely speaks during their first meeting - but the way the green eyes weighing Jared through those long eyelashes, and the corners of those lips (the most luscious lips on men he’s ever beheld, by the way) crook upward, Jared decides he’ll give the guy the benefit of the doubt. Some people just don’t know any better.
* * *
From then on, whenever he’s in the other guy’s presence, he finds himself talking. Always talking. Jensen listens, it’s what the guy does. This Jared realizes almost straight away. He knows Jensen type - the quiet, don’t-pay-attention-to-me, wait-for-the-opening-then-shoot type, and Jared’s okay with it. In fact he doesn’t really think about it at all, because, hell, Jared’s okay with almost anything.
Like with most of his co-stars, Jared effortlessly develops an attachment with Jensen, but unlike with most of his co-stars, Jared is kind of also ‘attached’ to Jensen, and not a let’s-hit-a-bar-and-get-shitfaced kind of attached, but a good-morning-assface, what-you’re-having-for-breakfast, coffee’s-not-breakfast, we’ll-get-you-an-extra-muffin-on-the-way-to-set kind of attached. Jared thinks it’s totally healthy as he’s babbling all the details into the phone with his other co-star at the other end of the line.
“You’ve gotta shut up sometimes, dude. The fact that he still hasn’t punched your face in actually have me develop a serious respect for the guy,” Chad’s voice is mixed with amusement.
“I don’t say anything I don’t say to you, so what’s the big deal?”
“You’d known me for how long before starting harassing me at the crack of dawn with phone calls and that sunshine attitude of yours?”
Uhh…
“I don’t know. A few months?”
“Exactly my point.”
“Which is…”
“Dude, you’re dumber than you look, and that says a lot.” Chad’s laugh is seriously cramping his style, because it’s Chad, and you just don’t get laughed at by Chad fucking-Michael Murray.
“Fuck you.”
“I don’t think that’s what you need,” his friend replies calmly, and then adds, “Not from me anyway.”
Hold the fucking phone.
“Watch your fucking mouth.”
But that’s not what Chad does. He just doesn’t, and Jared fucking knows it.
“You’ve been calling me for what, two weeks now, about how you’re obsessing over this, and I paraphrase, totally intelligent, talented, gorgeous, perfect of a creature who happens to be your male co-star on this new show you said you were so excited about, but still haven’t said a single word about it to me.”
“I’m not obsessing, I’m just…”
“Talking about how totally intelligent, talented, gorgeous, perfect of a creature he is. Yeah, I think the whole North America’s got the picture.”
Jared’s speechless for two seconds. Two whole seconds, speechless, and that doesn’t happen every day.
“I don’t have a crush on Jensen Ackles.” Those two seconds must have been the longest two seconds in the history of time, and Jared sure is glad he’s survived them.
Chad’s chuckle is clear as bells. “Excuse me, Mr. Padalecki, what are your holding in your hand again?”
Jared bites his tongue, hard. Fuck you, he mutters silently. “A PSP.”
“A brand-new PSP that you’ve just bought for the one co-star you totally don’t have a crush on because…” Chad pauses, which is killing Jared and the fucker knows it, “because what again? Oh, right, just because.”
“Fuck you.” This time his muttering isn’t so silent.
“I stand corrected,” Chad says, and fucking giggles.
“I don’t… It’s not…” Jared tries to find the right retort, the affective one, but all he can come up with is, “You’re just jealous you’ve never worked with someone who actually appreciates your friendship and not what’s in your pants.”
“Oh, I’m sure he appreciates whatever you have to offer. After all, he hasn’t told you to shut up yet. But I assure you the day will come, Jarebear, and when it does, you’re gonna come crawling back here, crying over this fucking phone with me on the other end.”
Another ‘fuck you’ and Jared clicks off the phone. This is one of those times he wishes they still use those old phones where you can actually slam the receiver back in its cradle so the person on the other end could fully relish the experience of being hung up on.
* * *
The first time Jensen tells him to shut up Jared doesn’t come crawling back to Chad, and Jared has an urge to pick up the phone and call the fucker just to show him how wrong he has been about the whole thing. Jared doesn’t have a crush on Jensen fucking Ackles. He just really, really likes the guy, especially when the said guy gets completely wasted and ends up crashing on his couch.
It’s Jared’s first birthday celebration together - together as in him and Jensen, and Jared’s been so fucking over the moon the entire night, from the on-set party, the off-set party, to the post off-set party where he swears he has drank some bootleg he’s sure wouldn’t be illegal anywhere in the world any time soon, something that’s probably destroying his brain cells as we speak, because that’s the only logical explanation for what he’s doing right now - flopping on the cold granite floor against his couch, watching his co-star’s socked feet hanging weightlessly at its end with an amazement of unknown origin. And then, God, those slender fingers brush his arm as the sleeping man shifts to get the more comfortable position. Jared’s sure it’s because of the booze, because he’s fully clothed, in layers, and yet his skin there, where those fucking fingers have touched, burns like the entire room’s on fire, and that can’t be happening because his ass is numb from this fucking freezing floor. In fact every part of his body except for those few square inches on his arm is numb. This can’t be normal, or healthy for that matter.
“I’m numb,” Jared blurts out, doesn’t even direct it to anyone in particular.
The other man, of course, doesn’t know that, because this is Jared we’re talking about, and Jared’s always talking to get someone to respond. Jensen grunts some inaudible syllables.
Jared turns around to look at the other man as he’s so far seen only his limps. “Jen?” Jesus, are those lashes for real? Jared blinks away the thought and presses on his curiosity about… uh, right, about the numbness. “Are you numb?”
Eyes closed, Jensen still gives him meaningless syllables, but Jared finds himself okay with that, with seeing his co-star/friend like this, even though he’s sure his balls are turning to icepacks right about now.
“I think it’s the booze the guys sneaked in,” Jared tries. “Jen, this feels weird. I feel weird.” He starts to get desperate, and, honestly, concerned as he sees no response from the older guy, and Jared’s left with no other option.
“Jen.” Jared shakes the other guy’s arm gently, hoping to see some signs of life, any sign. “Jen!”
And thank the Lord, Jensen grunts out two words, firmly and clearly, “Shut up,” and then turns away from Jared, settling back into Jared’s couch.
Over the next five minutes Jared sits there, considering calling Chad, telling him how HE is NOT crying on the day Jensen says those two words to him. In fact hearing them kind of makes him smile, a lot, and that’s when Jared decides against the idea because, really, Chad’s a sneaky bastard, and the fucker’s sure gonna twist everything Jared has to say into something Jared doesn’t understand, or want to hear, or isn’t ready to hear, or what-the-fuck-ever, and that’s not something Jared can handle while totally shitfaced.
* * *
Jensen says them to Jared a lot. Those two words, you know. It’s kind of become their routine - Jared will mouth off some nonsense and Jensen will tell him to shut the hell up, and like most people, Jensen doesn’t really mean it, as in expect Jared to really shut up. But there are times when Jensen means it, and unlike with most people, Jared doesn’t know what the hell to do, except the obvious, you know, to actually shut up. Sure, he’s been put in his place before, by his friends, his family, but with Jensen, it’s different. Like when he's ranting on the most random things, when Jared doesn’t expect to get such a life-and-death serious reaction, Jensen will get in his face, all defensive, and tell Jared to shut his pie hole and storm off. It’s ridiculous, really. It’s not like he’s even lying. All he says is how Jensen’s eyelashes make about 70% of world’s female population go insanely jealous, and teases him just a little how that’s considered some kind of a sin if your really think about it, because, hello, they’re on a show where people literally believe in the Deadly Seven Sins. Okay, maybe he shouldn’t have teased him a little in front of fifty-plus people during lunch after one of the hardest Dean angst scenes, but come on, it’s essentially a compliment. Jared’s sure he’s not the first one to bring it up.
Ten seconds afterward, Jared still freezes where Jensen has shoved pass him to go anywhere but there, to get away from him, and that’s left Jared a black void in the pitch of his stomach. It’s not that he can’t breathe, because that would be ridiculous. He’s more convinced that it’s because he doesn’t know how to deal with the fact that his eyes might have played tricks on him, and makes him see things like those freckled cheeks flushing and those ears reddening a few seconds right before they are gone, right before Jensen’s gone. Jared knows Jensen’s shy, but he can’t be that shy. He’s a goddamned actor, for Christ’s sake, and an excellent one at that. So there’s only one explanation left, and that’s Jensen hates his eyelashes. Only that’s even more ridiculous, because… well, just because.
Jared finally realizes how dumb he is when one of the makeup girls walks up to him and smacks him in the arm, hard, (he’s sure she would have smacked him on the back of his head if he isn’t so abnormally tall), and says, “You’re really are a dumbass. Don’t talk about the lashes in front of the Ackles! Ever! It’s like… blasphemy.”
“Ow!” Jared jumps, turns around, and rubs the sore skin. “Sorry, I didn’t get the memo.” He turns to look at the trailer where Jensen’s slammed its door less than a minute ago, frowning. “What’s his fucking problem anyway? I was just fooling around.”
The girl gives him a desperate glare. “Just not the lashes, okay? The guy’s self-conscious enough as it is, and having you of all people call him a woman isn’t exactly helping.”
“A wo…? What? I wasn’t… That’s not what I meant!”
“Who the hell knows what you mean around here anymore, you freak?” The girl twists the sore skin again before Jared can get away. “Now, go in there and fix it, or Eric’ll have your ass for ruining half a day of shooting.”
Jared wants to ask how the hell he could do that, ‘fix it’ as she’s suggesting, but she’s already gone and he’s left alone in the sea of curious eyes, and that’s when he’s starting to realize how Jensen must have felt just now, only multiply that with at least a hundred.
“Fuck,” Jared mutters and starts walking.
Of course he fixes it, but it isn’t the kind of experience he wishes to undergo ever again. He starts with clever statements like,
“I’m a freak, you can’t blame me. It’s like blaming Mother Nature, and that’s just stupid.”
And the word ‘stupid’ sounds so stupid Jared wishes someone, preferably Jensen, would just shoot him then and there, in Jensen’s trailer.
Jensen’s a lot crueler than that though. He just shoots Jared a death glare only rapists and racists and scum of the earth deserve from the couch where Jared swears Jensen hasn’t moved a muscle since Jared gingerly stepped inside. Everybody says he’s a giant freak of nature, and he wholeheartedly agrees, but in that trailer, during those stretched minutes, in the eyes of Jensen Ackles, Jared feels he’s the world’s smallest midget.
“I wasn’t implying you were a woman, Jen.” God, and the fucking nickname. But he loves calling Jensen ‘Jen.’ It fits just right in his mouth. “I mean, Jensen. I wasn’t implying you’re not manly just because you have these incredibly long and most luscious eyelashes I have ever seen…” Wait, what the hell…
“I mean, you’re perfect, Jen. I mean, Jensen, and there’s no reason to be ashamed…” Jared feels his cheeks burning as he meets those green eyes, which are now a bit softened, but not without a hint of doubt. Jared just wants to turn around and run off, and never comes back until next year.
“I… I didn’t know that you… I just thought it was…” He’s babbling now, and it’s bad, even for him, so he settles with, “I’m just sorry, Jen.”
Fuck. Jared squeezes his eyelids together.
“Fuck, I mean, Jensen.”
“Will you just shut the fuck up?”
Jared opens his eyes, and Jensen’s staring at him like he is some kind of a babbling freak that he is. And then the sigh comes, and Jared knows this is working. Something he’s said is actually working, and for the better.
Jensen pushes himself up and off the couch, and starts taking steps toward the door, toward him. Jared suddenly feels the need for air, and he inhales a little too sharply, and when Jensen is close enough for Jared to smell his cologne, Jared takes in another deep breath, completely out of necessity, he convinces himself. And then he realizes he doesn’t have words in his head. None. Nada. Zip. Not even his favorite curses. Jared’s head has never been this blank since, well, since ever.
“I’m gonna go back out there and finish my lunch, and when you’re ready to shut up, you can follow and finish it with me.”
And then Jensen brushes pass him to get the door. The fucker doesn’t step aside and walks around Jared, no. He fucking brushes pass Jared, and damn it if the sensation doesn’t linger and leave goosebumps all over his skin.
Jared’s not sure how long he stands there, replaying the words ‘finish it with me’ in his fucked-up head. This has never happened to him before - he’s lost his fucking appetite.
* * *
Sex with the girlfriend always helps. At least that’s what he’s been telling himself, praying and chanting that it would, that it does, before, during and after the sex. Not that there’s something psychologically wrong with seeing his co-star’s face behind his eyelids while jerking off or fucking Sandy into the mattress. It happens. Things happen. He tries not to think about his life philosophy - about how everything happens for a reason. He’s sure there’s a good reason for it, he’s just not sure he wants to know, or that it’s even necessary for him to know at all. At any rate, he’s sure he’ll move on after the first few weeks. He’s had man crushes before. This is totally normal. And to think about it, he’s not the one to blame, not really. It’s totally Jensen’s fault for not locking the fucking door to his trailer when the fucker decides to dance around half-naked like a lunatic, well, a professional dancer with a glorious body of a lunatic, to Eric Huchinton’s “Rock & Roll.” The song will always be the death of him, Jared curses, for he loves the song, and Jensen’s just completely ruined it for him.
“Fucking knock, would you?” Jensen jumps, turning around as the cold air slips in and licks the creamy skin. Jared hears his own breaths catching.
“You dance.” Jared blurts out like it’s the truth of all truths.
“And you fucking barge in people’s private properties.” Jensen’s hands suddenly glue to his own bare chest as he turns to the stereo and switches it off. Those cheeks are reddening, and they never fail to make Jared grin. They kind of have that effect on him, Jared has come to realize after months and months of working with the guy.
“Lock the goddamned door, then, you freaking prude.” Jared says, but the words hold no real meaning because, really, he doesn’t even know what’s coming out of his mouth, for all he’s focusing on right the fuck now are the muscles on those arms, that stomach, and wait a fucking second, are those fucking freckles on the fucker’s chest?
Jared doesn’t have time to find out since Jensen decides to put a t-shirt on right that second, and this is not exactly the kind of question he can just out and ask his co-star who’s always encouraged Jared to be open and honest with him. Jared would love to know the answer, sure, because he’s a curious son of a bitch, but he’d love more to not sport black eye(s) on the next day. He’s not in the mood for another lecture from Eric, and especially not from those makeup girls whom Jared seriously believes possess psychic abilities when it comes to Jared and his fucked-up mind which has recently been more and more revolving around Jensen who usually sits all innocent at the opposite end of their makeup trailer.
“Stop ogling me, your perv.”
Jared blinks, and sees that Jensen is now fully dressed, with a jacket (the jacket Jared’s lent him, by the way, because Jensen’s said it’s warmer than his own), gloves and a beanie pulled over his ears, and has already grabbed his bag and car keys.
“What?” Jared’s response is genuine, but that almost always equals lame as he stutters, “I’m not… I… I wasn’t even…”
“Shut the hell up already, and get moving.” Jensen’s gloved hand is shoving him toward the door. “We have fifteen pages of dialogue to learn in eight hours.”
‘We’ is starting to have some disturbing effect on Jared too, and the way the word rolls off Jensen’s tongue so naturally isn’t really helping. Not to mention the mere thought of Jensen’s tongue doing anything, anything at all, is more than enough to put a healthy young man in his twenties in a temporary but oh-so-blissful coma.
“Fuck!” Jared hears himself groan, and then he feels the hands, the small hands, soft and comforting, rubbing his arms and back as he lands his last thrusts, and when it’s all over, he forces his eyes open and looks into those brown eyes, wide with sensations, and then questions, but they’ve never lasted long enough for Jared to feel the need to answer them. He leans in and whispers terms of endearment in Sandy’s ear, ignoring the nagging pain in the pitch of his stomach that is now hollow, and pulls her into his arms, and again, after four months since Jensen’s Dance of Doom, Jared stays awake for the rest of the night.
* * *
Jared’s a talker, sure, but that doesn’t mean he’s a mean liar. No, he’s the worst liar there is, though he doesn’t always admit it. So when Sandy says, not asks, but says, that Jared’s seeing someone else, he finds himself in the most ridiculous situation he doesn’t know whether he wants to laugh or cry, because he is NOT seeing anyone else, and that’s the truth, but that’s not the whole truth, and omitting the truth constitutes a lie, and Jared is not good with this shit, never was, with this gray-area shit where things can go both ways, or more precisely, can screw you both ways.
She says she won’t ask him who it is, and thank God she uses the neutral pronoun, because Jared knows all too well he will never pass the pronoun test if his life depends on it, and that will be the end of him, because it will be the beginning of a whole lot of things he doesn’t plan on going into with his ex fiancée. Ever.
* * *
He doesn’t cry. Not that night. Not the whole week after that. And it kind of surprises him because, come on, he’s a fucking Cancer, he’s a total drama queen. He remembers he used to tell Jensen that tidbit a while back while they were reading this horoscope section in one of those trashy magazines they love to buy just for kicks. Jared remembers laughing about it, and not because it was kind of embarrassing to read that with Jensen, but because he knew it was completely true, and Jensen said he’d already known it, like months before that magazine was even in print, and Jensen laughed, and Jared felt his face burning in the middle of winter afternoon, and laughing seemed the most logical explanation for that at the time.
He sleeps a little better, but still startles in the middle of the night, finds himself staring at the digital clock on the nightstand, develop a slight jealousy over his dogs who sound asleep in the corner of his room, and then back to staring at the clock and then his cell phone nearby, and imagining conversations that he would have with Jensen if he’d ever have the courage to make the call, but in the end, he always beats himself up for having such a monumentally stupid idea, and even though sometimes, mostly when he’s close to sleep, and it doesn’t seem so stupid to him, Jared knows it’s still a monumentally stupid idea to have that kind of conversation over the phone, and anyway, it can wait until they are back on the set for the new season.
But it seems Jensen has other ideas, because the first day of the second week after the Breakup, while Jared’s watching The Rock for the sixty-seventh time (yes, he counts) in his favorite couch, the fucking ‘Rock & Roll’ ringtone he once thought he was so clever setting it for Jensen, and Jensen alone, blares on the coffee table where his bare feet laid mindlessly, and he almost knocks off a half-full bag of chips and a dozen of empty beer cans onto the already littered floor. Once composed, he sits up in the couch and stares at the phone like it’s some kind of a deadly flesh-eating bug. It vibrates and keeps screaming,
If he wants to stay he stays
If he wants to go he goes
He doesn’t care how he gets there
Long as he gets somewhere he knows
and suddenly the image of the man who has once wiggled his ass like there was no tomorrow is now calling him, because he has waited for Jared to call him for the whole goddamned week, and Jared’s been too much of a coward to do it, and now his friend is breaking all the rules he believes in - giving people privacy and space, giving Jared time and whatever the fuck that Jared needs, and says ‘fuck this’ and picks up the phone and makes this call just to make sure this chicken shit of a man is still breathing living air, and hell, that just makes this whole thing ten times worse, because it makes Jared realize he’s that much worse of a person.
“Shut the fuck up!” Jared finds it’s weird to hear himself say those words out loud, but that’s not the weirdest thing. The weirdest thing is that the phone keeps on screeching, and Jared finds it a miracle that he hasn’t already been brutally murdered for not learning how to shut up when he was told.
* * *
He never likes being drunk. Not really. It’s pointless to him because when he’s boozed up, he doesn’t feel much of anything, and that’s not really what he constitutes fun. Being drunk is more of Jensen’s forte. The guy actually has a system worked to perfection for over a decade, and Jared laughs to himself when he thinks about how proud Jensen sounded explaining said system to him, like it was a goddamned dogma or something.
Some girl ask him something, maybe the way to the toilet or just as typical as his phone number, but whichever it is, he’s completely useless. A) he’s so trashed he’d go here if nature actually calls, and B) he has no intention of getting anywhere near that fucking phone in the next few days, or weeks, or maybe he should just go all phone-free like those hippies he once saw the documentary about on some boring channel Jensen always watches.
Fuck.
More girls bump into Jared as he leans in the bar to order more beer. They look at him, amused, like he’s a freak. Well, he is. So fuck him! And fuck them! He downs another glass, and then hears some sheering and whooping, ahh, more girls, and Jared starts wondering if this is some kind of bachelorette party he’s got lost into. And then from somewhere at the other end of the room the music starts, and it’s like something inside Jared’s switched on, like he’s programmed to physically and emotionally respond to this particular tune.
It’s an angry girl’s song, and though the words don’t really make much sense to Jared, they start poring out of his mouth, and when it reaches ‘now I know that I did something wrong, ’cause I missed you,’ he starts screaming the rest of the song like it’s a manifestation of his soul or something. And when it gets to ‘I think that I'm throwing, but I'm thrown. And I thought I'd live forever, but now I'm not so sure,’ he feels the sharp sting behind his eyelids, before ignoring it and blinking away whatever that isn’t there, and then he sees it, a scene from one of his lucid dreams he’s had too many times to count - Jensen standing there, in the midst of swaying crowd beneath the dim light in a smoky room, and those wide eyes are on Jared, and Jared only.
He blinks and waits for it to go away, like it always does, but instead, Jensen’s treading toward him like he’s a man on a holy mission, and the next thing Jared knows Jensen claps on his left shoulder and leans in, dangerously close.
“You’re a pathetic son of a bitch.”
Jared blinks again, and when the feel of the other man’s hand isn’t going away, he squints and slurs, “Jen?”
“I’m taking you home.” And then the other hand comes up and grabs Jared’s right arm, pulling him up.
But Jared’s not having it. He squirms out of Jensen’s demanding hands, and reaches out for the weary stubbled face, and pulls it in to taste those lips, and that’s because it’s what he always does in his dreams.
And when he does, he smiles against the slightly-parted lips and mumbles, “I’m home.”
But unlike those dreams, he doesn’t wake up right afterward.
For the first time in over half a year, Jared falls right to sleep and doesn’t wake up until eighteen hours later.
* * *
Part 2/2