[50 Prompts fic] I should bite my tongue before I tell you how I really feel
THESE TWO. I have wanted to write them FOREVER but somehow they just wouldn't come out on paper right. I'm not particularly satisfied with this fic, but at least their story has been told...? I'm not sure why I can't seem to get them to how I want them, it's not like I haven't worked with characters with similar personalities before? My baseball knowledge is drawn mostly from my experience with Oofuri, so.
Title: I should bite my tongue before I tell you how I really feel
Prompt: Games from hellozinnie
Summary: Being fourteen is like an enormous guessing game.
Jake Mercury’s goal is a two-parter: he wants to be the team’s cleanup hitter and he wants the team to make it to the playoffs this year for their league. He’s very invested in making this happen so he tries his hardest during every practice. Once, his father said his youngest son only had eyes for the pretty lady called Baseball, and although he’s not too fond on the metaphor, Jake has to agree. Baseball is in his blood, and he loves it.
There’s a spot above Chris Green’s head he always aims for when he bats during practice, and he almost always hits it because he’s always looking at Chris’s direction. Chris is the only one who bothers to watch the school’s baseball team practices after school and he sits by himself on the top bleacher. The team has since lost interest in wondering why the quiet boy appears every afternoon, but Jake knows.
Because, while he has an inexplicable infatuation with the boy, Jake knows Chris is in love with his brother. He hadn’t wanted to know, but Shiloh had thrown the information at him, your stupid classmate, my dumb baby brother, likes Jasper, haven’t you noticed? Tell him not to bother, because he’s mine, and when he had confronted Chris with this before practice once, the boy had blushed and mumbled and said, please don’t tell him, please don’t tell anyone.
And while Jake’s head swims with statistics and players and dream games, it has made room for Chris since that day, and he finds his eyes following Chris if they pass in the hallways. He doesn’t think it’s really a crush, because he doesn’t spend every moment thinking about Chris and he doesn’t make embarrassing phone calls like Jasper, but it’s something.
And he knows the reason Chris is always waiting for him after practice isn’t because the boy has any feeling toward him, it’s because there’s always the possibility that Jasper might come to pick Jake up and while he was there, could he give Chris a ride home too…maybe? His teammates heckle him for it, but Jake ignores them and hitches his bag over his shoulder a little more and meets Chris over at the bleachers.
(“You don’t have to pick me up after practice anymore,” Jake tells Jasper one night, and his brother looks at him. “I can walk home, it’s no problem.”)
Jake’s forgotten how many times he’s walked (Chris home) home with Chris, but it hasn’t changed that they don’t say much. Their similarities start with their brothers liking to be all over each other, and they end there too. Jake doesn’t think Chris would be very interested in his comparisons between wooden and metal bats (he learned how to play with a wooden bat but now he uses metal bats).
“Do I look like Jasper?” he asks suddenly.
Chris looks up at him. Jake keeps his head forward; he doesn’t want to see Chris study him, and half of him doesn’t want to hear the answer. He wears out his stamina during baseball, and then he wears himself out mentally worrying about what Chris thinks of him, is he just another baseball nut? Nicolas keeps telling him he’s in the prime of his youth so things aren’t supposed to make sense yet.
“Not really,” Chris says softly, his dark eyes still cast on Jake’s face. “You definitely look like his brother, but it’s not like you look the same.”
Still, he worries; even if he were able to win Chris’s heart, he wouldn’t want to be a replacement for Jasper. If they were to be more than just friends (which they aren’t even now, more like classmates or acquaintances), he wants Chris to like him for him. Jasper didn’t make being fourteen seem this complicated. It’s like an enormous guessing game.
Jake gets the funny feeling he gets in his stomach whenever Chris smiles at him when he drops him off at his house out of his mind by going home and playing on the X-Box, even when his mother tells him to turn off that garbage and do his homework.
[=]
“Your batting average’s improved a lot since the beginning of the season,” his coach tells him proudly. Jake nods. This is good. Cleanup hitters are the ones who get the job done when it needs to get done. He’s only a freshman at the moment, but the current cleanup got his position when he was a sophomore, so he’s got a chance. The Academy’s team is pretty decent in the area, so it would mean a lot.
Jake packs up and puts the equipment away with the other freshmen, and when he meets Chris at the end, he hears a car horn from the parking lot. He turns, as do most of his teammates who are scattering away from the school grounds. Jake recognizes the faded blue, and with horror, realizes his brother is in the parking lot.
“Jasper?” he hears Chris whisper. It makes Jake grimace and he storms ahead of Chris to the car, where he sticks his head into the window.
“Jasper, what are you doing here?” he hisses. “I told you you didn’t have to come meet me anymore.”
“Can’t a big bro pick up his little bro?” Jasper asks incredulously. “Anyway, mom wants you home immediately today. She says you take too long when you walk home by yourself.”
“You…” But he’s cut off when Chris reaches the car. He turns and sees the sweet smile Chris has on his face for Jasper. Jasper blinks and breaks into a grin.
“Hey, Chris. Why are you still here?”
“I had a club meeting,” Chris lies. “Um…if it wasn’t too much of a problem, could you give me a ride home?” He isn’t even purposely looking coy, Jake realizes; he’s genuinely shy and excited. It makes him a little angry. He throws his baseball gear in the backseat and slides in, fuming to himself. He hears Jasper agree and is surprised when the backdoor opens and Chris gets in next to him.
“Why don’t you sit in the front?” Jake asks under his breath as Jasper pulls out of his spot and maneuvers around the random baseball players sprinkled in the parking lot. Chris shakes his head quickly and looks down; he must be too nervous to be that forward, Jake thinks. The car hits a speed bump sitting at the exit and he feels Chris lean into him.
His heart is beating just as fast as it does whenever he hits the rare homer during games.
“Sorry, it must smell like a baseball team back there,” Jasper laughs, rolling down the windows and ignoring the kick Jake aims at the back of his seat. “Were you watching my bro, Chris? Do you like baseball?”
“It’s alright,” Chris says softly.
“I was surprised when Shiloh told me his brother was going to the same school as Jake. Jake got in with a baseball scholarship, you know. You must be pretty smart. The Academy’s supposed to be a really prestigious school.”
“Shiloh must be really stupid then,” Jake says acidly.
“He didn’t want to go.” Jake turns away when Jasper shoots him a look from the rearview mirror. He usually isn’t this much of a jerk to Jasper. They get along, in the way brothers do. It’s usually Nicolas who pokes fun of Jasper’s relationship with Shiloh.
“When we moved here, Alex was already in college, and Shiloh didn’t want to go to the Academy, but I didn’t mind. My mom was really happy about that.”
Jasper nods, and signals to turn down a street. Before Chris can speak up, Jake finds himself opening his mouth to say, “It’s the next street over.” This is a mistake, though he doesn’t realize it at the moment; it is just instinct. But when they drop off Chris and drive away, Jasper breaks into a massive grin.
“Have you been walking Chris home everyday? Is that why you take so long to get home?”
Jake sulks and refuses to answer.
[=]
But the attack on his defenses is not over. Jake may have fended off against Jasper’s advance, but Shiloh is ready for him when he comes into his own kitchen and sees his brother’s sophomore boyfriend sitting at the island and staring at him. Jake decides to leave him alone and go to the fridge to get some milk.
“So I heard you like my brother?” Shiloh asks.
Jake never really liked Shiloh too much. From the first time he met the boy, Shiloh seems possessive and has a mean streak. He also does not have tact, obviously. Jake turns to him from the fridge and returns to rummaging around to find the milk carton.
“I heard from Jasper you’ve been walking Chris home. That’s cute. He really doesn’t have a lot of friends, from what I heard. He doesn’t get out a lot.” Jasper probably hasn’t really seen this side of Shiloh a lot, Jake thinks ruefully as he drinks straight from the carton (his mom is ironing in the other room). Jealousy is unbecoming. He shouldn’t even be jealous; Jasper is the most stubbornly loyal guy Jake knows.
“Do me a favor,” Shiloh says. “Take him out once in a while. Oh, and do me another favor. Get Jasper down here, please.” He gives Jake a smile and the ginger rolls his eyes.
“Jasper, your boyfriend’s waiting for you,” Jake says when he passes Jasper’s room, loud enough for Nicolas to poke his head out of his room with a leery grin on his face. Jasper runs out of his room a couple seconds later to attack Nicolas on the stairs.
[=]
“Can you get Chris for me, please?”
It isn’t anything unusual, really. A lot of kids go to the other freshman homerooms to talk with their friends. The girl who meets him delivers the message without so much as a second thought. But when Chris comes to the door to see him, he’s got such a flustered face that it makes Jake hope no one really is looking at them. “Yes?”
“I just wanted to tell you I’ve got a game today so there’s not going to be practice.” There’s been a lot of games lately, and they’ve been winning a lot. It’s a really big inspiration to the rest of the team. The principal has been referring to them as his ‘dream team’ during the spring season. “The field’s away, so you can just go home without me.”
“Oh.” Chris’s eyes meet the floor. “Do you want me to come watch?”
“No,” Jake says, almost frantic at the mental image of Chris watching him play, and it isn’t until he’s back in his seat in homeroom and his teacher is making the daily announcements that he realizes he could have added, unless you wanted to and spends the rest of the day agonizing over his one moment where he doesn’t just say what he thinks.
[=]
They win that game too, of course.
[=]
“You’re going to the final two, right?” Chris asks, beaming at him in a rare show of a smile as they walk home. True to his word, Jasper no longer shows up unexpectedly. Jake wonders sometimes if he should just tell Chris Jasper won’t be showing up, but he figures Chris won’t let him walk him home anymore. “That’s amazing.”
“It’s making all the seniors really anxious,” Jake says. “It’s their last chance to get anything. They’ve been threatening the underclassmen not to mess up if they’re playing.” He’s one of the few freshmen who have made it onto the roster; the coach has hinted to him subtly if he plays well during this game, he just might make cleanup hitter next year. There’s a lot riding on this game for him too.
He takes a deep breath. It doesn’t have to mean anything. He’s already asked a lot of his friends the same thing too. “I was wondering…” Jake says hesitantly, hoping it might work. “If you’d like to come to my game, my…”
“Oh, sure!”
“…brother will be there.” But Chris has already agreed even without this incentive. Jake is taken aback. Chris stammers after his quick agreement.
“I…I mean, there’s going to be a lot of people there, right? And it’s a really big game so you need a lot of support.” Chris barely says good-bye to him once they reach the Green house and practically runs into the house away from him.
[=]
The ending score is 12 - 7. The bus breaks down when all the gear is loaded, so the seniors cannot even sulk in the privacy of their own homes. Some of the players go home with their parents, but most linger. While a mechanic is called, Jake sits under a tree at the back of the college stadium with Chris. He doesn’t really like Shiloh, Jake thinks, but he had his good points. He could hear Shiloh attempting to distract the opponent’s batters occasionally.
“It was close,” Chris tries.
“It wasn’t,” Jake says. But while the seniors brooded in the dugout, the coach had gone up to him and told him he played well with a wink. He thinks he’s going to be cleanup next year. So he doesn’t feel that bad. “I guess there’s always next year.”
“Yeah.” Chris fidgets and Jake turns to him. The shade shifts and Chris leans over and kisses him gently on the lips, his eyes sliding close. Jake is too surprised to do any such thing. His surprised face stays even after the kiss, and it makes Chris panic. “Oh, god, I shouldn’t have done that, it was a mistake, oh god, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…” Color creeps into his face and he’s blinking frantically.
“No,” Jake says. “You can do it again, if you want to.”
Chris shuts up. “I…can?”
“Yeah. Go ahead.” Why is this suddenly the best day of his life? He lost the last game of the season, but he’s crazy happy. Chris came to see him immediately after the game was over instead of loitering around to look at Jasper and now he kissed him. Best day ever. Chris hesitates so Jake leans over and kisses him back. God, he loves baseball.
“Thank god,” Chris whispers. “Thank you, thank you.” They kiss until Jasper comes around to find them to tell them the bus is ready and then makes awkward sounds until they acknowledge him. And Chris, Jake notices with satisfaction, does not try to explain themselves and snakes a hand in his.
Title: I should bite my tongue before I tell you how I really feel
Prompt: Games from hellozinnie
Summary: Being fourteen is like an enormous guessing game.
Jake Mercury’s goal is a two-parter: he wants to be the team’s cleanup hitter and he wants the team to make it to the playoffs this year for their league. He’s very invested in making this happen so he tries his hardest during every practice. Once, his father said his youngest son only had eyes for the pretty lady called Baseball, and although he’s not too fond on the metaphor, Jake has to agree. Baseball is in his blood, and he loves it.
There’s a spot above Chris Green’s head he always aims for when he bats during practice, and he almost always hits it because he’s always looking at Chris’s direction. Chris is the only one who bothers to watch the school’s baseball team practices after school and he sits by himself on the top bleacher. The team has since lost interest in wondering why the quiet boy appears every afternoon, but Jake knows.
Because, while he has an inexplicable infatuation with the boy, Jake knows Chris is in love with his brother. He hadn’t wanted to know, but Shiloh had thrown the information at him, your stupid classmate, my dumb baby brother, likes Jasper, haven’t you noticed? Tell him not to bother, because he’s mine, and when he had confronted Chris with this before practice once, the boy had blushed and mumbled and said, please don’t tell him, please don’t tell anyone.
And while Jake’s head swims with statistics and players and dream games, it has made room for Chris since that day, and he finds his eyes following Chris if they pass in the hallways. He doesn’t think it’s really a crush, because he doesn’t spend every moment thinking about Chris and he doesn’t make embarrassing phone calls like Jasper, but it’s something.
And he knows the reason Chris is always waiting for him after practice isn’t because the boy has any feeling toward him, it’s because there’s always the possibility that Jasper might come to pick Jake up and while he was there, could he give Chris a ride home too…maybe? His teammates heckle him for it, but Jake ignores them and hitches his bag over his shoulder a little more and meets Chris over at the bleachers.
(“You don’t have to pick me up after practice anymore,” Jake tells Jasper one night, and his brother looks at him. “I can walk home, it’s no problem.”)
Jake’s forgotten how many times he’s walked (Chris home) home with Chris, but it hasn’t changed that they don’t say much. Their similarities start with their brothers liking to be all over each other, and they end there too. Jake doesn’t think Chris would be very interested in his comparisons between wooden and metal bats (he learned how to play with a wooden bat but now he uses metal bats).
“Do I look like Jasper?” he asks suddenly.
Chris looks up at him. Jake keeps his head forward; he doesn’t want to see Chris study him, and half of him doesn’t want to hear the answer. He wears out his stamina during baseball, and then he wears himself out mentally worrying about what Chris thinks of him, is he just another baseball nut? Nicolas keeps telling him he’s in the prime of his youth so things aren’t supposed to make sense yet.
“Not really,” Chris says softly, his dark eyes still cast on Jake’s face. “You definitely look like his brother, but it’s not like you look the same.”
Still, he worries; even if he were able to win Chris’s heart, he wouldn’t want to be a replacement for Jasper. If they were to be more than just friends (which they aren’t even now, more like classmates or acquaintances), he wants Chris to like him for him. Jasper didn’t make being fourteen seem this complicated. It’s like an enormous guessing game.
Jake gets the funny feeling he gets in his stomach whenever Chris smiles at him when he drops him off at his house out of his mind by going home and playing on the X-Box, even when his mother tells him to turn off that garbage and do his homework.
[=]
“Your batting average’s improved a lot since the beginning of the season,” his coach tells him proudly. Jake nods. This is good. Cleanup hitters are the ones who get the job done when it needs to get done. He’s only a freshman at the moment, but the current cleanup got his position when he was a sophomore, so he’s got a chance. The Academy’s team is pretty decent in the area, so it would mean a lot.
Jake packs up and puts the equipment away with the other freshmen, and when he meets Chris at the end, he hears a car horn from the parking lot. He turns, as do most of his teammates who are scattering away from the school grounds. Jake recognizes the faded blue, and with horror, realizes his brother is in the parking lot.
“Jasper?” he hears Chris whisper. It makes Jake grimace and he storms ahead of Chris to the car, where he sticks his head into the window.
“Jasper, what are you doing here?” he hisses. “I told you you didn’t have to come meet me anymore.”
“Can’t a big bro pick up his little bro?” Jasper asks incredulously. “Anyway, mom wants you home immediately today. She says you take too long when you walk home by yourself.”
“You…” But he’s cut off when Chris reaches the car. He turns and sees the sweet smile Chris has on his face for Jasper. Jasper blinks and breaks into a grin.
“Hey, Chris. Why are you still here?”
“I had a club meeting,” Chris lies. “Um…if it wasn’t too much of a problem, could you give me a ride home?” He isn’t even purposely looking coy, Jake realizes; he’s genuinely shy and excited. It makes him a little angry. He throws his baseball gear in the backseat and slides in, fuming to himself. He hears Jasper agree and is surprised when the backdoor opens and Chris gets in next to him.
“Why don’t you sit in the front?” Jake asks under his breath as Jasper pulls out of his spot and maneuvers around the random baseball players sprinkled in the parking lot. Chris shakes his head quickly and looks down; he must be too nervous to be that forward, Jake thinks. The car hits a speed bump sitting at the exit and he feels Chris lean into him.
His heart is beating just as fast as it does whenever he hits the rare homer during games.
“Sorry, it must smell like a baseball team back there,” Jasper laughs, rolling down the windows and ignoring the kick Jake aims at the back of his seat. “Were you watching my bro, Chris? Do you like baseball?”
“It’s alright,” Chris says softly.
“I was surprised when Shiloh told me his brother was going to the same school as Jake. Jake got in with a baseball scholarship, you know. You must be pretty smart. The Academy’s supposed to be a really prestigious school.”
“Shiloh must be really stupid then,” Jake says acidly.
“He didn’t want to go.” Jake turns away when Jasper shoots him a look from the rearview mirror. He usually isn’t this much of a jerk to Jasper. They get along, in the way brothers do. It’s usually Nicolas who pokes fun of Jasper’s relationship with Shiloh.
“When we moved here, Alex was already in college, and Shiloh didn’t want to go to the Academy, but I didn’t mind. My mom was really happy about that.”
Jasper nods, and signals to turn down a street. Before Chris can speak up, Jake finds himself opening his mouth to say, “It’s the next street over.” This is a mistake, though he doesn’t realize it at the moment; it is just instinct. But when they drop off Chris and drive away, Jasper breaks into a massive grin.
“Have you been walking Chris home everyday? Is that why you take so long to get home?”
Jake sulks and refuses to answer.
[=]
But the attack on his defenses is not over. Jake may have fended off against Jasper’s advance, but Shiloh is ready for him when he comes into his own kitchen and sees his brother’s sophomore boyfriend sitting at the island and staring at him. Jake decides to leave him alone and go to the fridge to get some milk.
“So I heard you like my brother?” Shiloh asks.
Jake never really liked Shiloh too much. From the first time he met the boy, Shiloh seems possessive and has a mean streak. He also does not have tact, obviously. Jake turns to him from the fridge and returns to rummaging around to find the milk carton.
“I heard from Jasper you’ve been walking Chris home. That’s cute. He really doesn’t have a lot of friends, from what I heard. He doesn’t get out a lot.” Jasper probably hasn’t really seen this side of Shiloh a lot, Jake thinks ruefully as he drinks straight from the carton (his mom is ironing in the other room). Jealousy is unbecoming. He shouldn’t even be jealous; Jasper is the most stubbornly loyal guy Jake knows.
“Do me a favor,” Shiloh says. “Take him out once in a while. Oh, and do me another favor. Get Jasper down here, please.” He gives Jake a smile and the ginger rolls his eyes.
“Jasper, your boyfriend’s waiting for you,” Jake says when he passes Jasper’s room, loud enough for Nicolas to poke his head out of his room with a leery grin on his face. Jasper runs out of his room a couple seconds later to attack Nicolas on the stairs.
[=]
“Can you get Chris for me, please?”
It isn’t anything unusual, really. A lot of kids go to the other freshman homerooms to talk with their friends. The girl who meets him delivers the message without so much as a second thought. But when Chris comes to the door to see him, he’s got such a flustered face that it makes Jake hope no one really is looking at them. “Yes?”
“I just wanted to tell you I’ve got a game today so there’s not going to be practice.” There’s been a lot of games lately, and they’ve been winning a lot. It’s a really big inspiration to the rest of the team. The principal has been referring to them as his ‘dream team’ during the spring season. “The field’s away, so you can just go home without me.”
“Oh.” Chris’s eyes meet the floor. “Do you want me to come watch?”
“No,” Jake says, almost frantic at the mental image of Chris watching him play, and it isn’t until he’s back in his seat in homeroom and his teacher is making the daily announcements that he realizes he could have added, unless you wanted to and spends the rest of the day agonizing over his one moment where he doesn’t just say what he thinks.
[=]
They win that game too, of course.
[=]
“You’re going to the final two, right?” Chris asks, beaming at him in a rare show of a smile as they walk home. True to his word, Jasper no longer shows up unexpectedly. Jake wonders sometimes if he should just tell Chris Jasper won’t be showing up, but he figures Chris won’t let him walk him home anymore. “That’s amazing.”
“It’s making all the seniors really anxious,” Jake says. “It’s their last chance to get anything. They’ve been threatening the underclassmen not to mess up if they’re playing.” He’s one of the few freshmen who have made it onto the roster; the coach has hinted to him subtly if he plays well during this game, he just might make cleanup hitter next year. There’s a lot riding on this game for him too.
He takes a deep breath. It doesn’t have to mean anything. He’s already asked a lot of his friends the same thing too. “I was wondering…” Jake says hesitantly, hoping it might work. “If you’d like to come to my game, my…”
“Oh, sure!”
“…brother will be there.” But Chris has already agreed even without this incentive. Jake is taken aback. Chris stammers after his quick agreement.
“I…I mean, there’s going to be a lot of people there, right? And it’s a really big game so you need a lot of support.” Chris barely says good-bye to him once they reach the Green house and practically runs into the house away from him.
[=]
The ending score is 12 - 7. The bus breaks down when all the gear is loaded, so the seniors cannot even sulk in the privacy of their own homes. Some of the players go home with their parents, but most linger. While a mechanic is called, Jake sits under a tree at the back of the college stadium with Chris. He doesn’t really like Shiloh, Jake thinks, but he had his good points. He could hear Shiloh attempting to distract the opponent’s batters occasionally.
“It was close,” Chris tries.
“It wasn’t,” Jake says. But while the seniors brooded in the dugout, the coach had gone up to him and told him he played well with a wink. He thinks he’s going to be cleanup next year. So he doesn’t feel that bad. “I guess there’s always next year.”
“Yeah.” Chris fidgets and Jake turns to him. The shade shifts and Chris leans over and kisses him gently on the lips, his eyes sliding close. Jake is too surprised to do any such thing. His surprised face stays even after the kiss, and it makes Chris panic. “Oh, god, I shouldn’t have done that, it was a mistake, oh god, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…” Color creeps into his face and he’s blinking frantically.
“No,” Jake says. “You can do it again, if you want to.”
Chris shuts up. “I…can?”
“Yeah. Go ahead.” Why is this suddenly the best day of his life? He lost the last game of the season, but he’s crazy happy. Chris came to see him immediately after the game was over instead of loitering around to look at Jasper and now he kissed him. Best day ever. Chris hesitates so Jake leans over and kisses him back. God, he loves baseball.
“Thank god,” Chris whispers. “Thank you, thank you.” They kiss until Jasper comes around to find them to tell them the bus is ready and then makes awkward sounds until they acknowledge him. And Chris, Jake notices with satisfaction, does not try to explain themselves and snakes a hand in his.