Don't look now, it's around the corner
I’ll race you to underwear lane.
Pairing/s: Jared/Jensen
Genre: Romance
Word Count: 958
To say Jensen hated shopping was a complete and total understatement. If you ever saw him in a shop, run.
Any kind of shopping, even, food, books, clothes, he was a totally apathetic man, and wished his mum would do it for him. That being said, it was time for him to face his fears, because he needed to get a grip on this; fast - thirty years was long enough.
Taking a long, deep unneeded breath he walked inside Wal-Mart, giving a half-hearted smile at the greeter before hurrying off to the clothes section, carrying basket gripped in his hand. He needed new underwear. Great. Because the labels and brands and quality doesn’t confuse him. Not at all.
Maybe he should call his mum. No. That’s kind of pathetic. Scratch that, make it really pathetic. Jesus, Jensen, you’re an adult for fucks sake. He looked up to notice a woman staring at him a ways over; did he say that out loud? Turning to the rows of boxers, briefs and boxer briefs, Jensen inwardly cursed again. He hasn’t bought underwear in years, and by now most of the brands had changed, and he didn’t usually go to Wal-Mart for this. He sighed.
So he started out on his quest for simple underwear, giving everything a quick glance before examining each one closer. It was only about ten minutes later that he found a good brand he could trust and hoped that their promise of lifetime lasting was true so he wouldn’t have to come back here again, and when he went to reach for the last pack in his size, another hand enclosed over his.
He turned, ready to -if he wasn’t careful- possibly snap at the man and take his underwear and run. But he was stopped dead, standing face-to-face with one of the most beautiful men he had ever seen.
His brain short-circuited, mouth going a little dry as he tried to say something remotely intelligent, and then the guy smiled a gorgeous dimpled smile at him and stepped back.
“Hey, sorry man, you were here first, take them,”
Jensen gave him a little nod as he pulled the packaged underwear a bit closer to his chest, as if some part of him didn’t believe the stranger wouldn’t just take them and laugh in his face or something as equally stupid.
Jensen, ever so discreetly looked the guy over, and was overcome with the urge to take him back to his house and fuck him stupid. But he swallowed that down, giving the stranger his own smile before finally placing the item in his basket. (God, that sounded girly.)
“I don’t mean to be analytical, but you don’t shop here much, do you?”
Jensen gave a weak laugh, “Is it that obvious?”
The stranger grinned wider, and Jensen’s heart did a weird flip in his chest. “I, uh, no, just guessing,” he fumbled, looking a bit shy now. Jensen did an appropriate ‘Hmm’ sound, before saying “Well, I should,” and gestured over to the check-outs, taking a small step back.
And if Jensen wasn’t still partially blind-sided he would have noticed the stranger’s disappointed look. “Oh, yeah, right, of course, sorry for keeping you.”
“It’s cool, um, nice meeting you,”
Then the man was smiling again. “Yeah, yeah, you too,”
And that smile followed him all the way through the store, past the check-outs and to the parking lot.
As he was just about finishing loading up his car and about to open the driver’s door, he heard something behind him, and being the human he was, turned out of curiosity and saw him.
Yes, ‘dimples’ was running right at him. He didn’t know if he should be happy or scared.
“Hey, I’m, I’m glad I caught you,” he was puffing, understandably.
Jensen did not know what to say, and decided letting the man continue would be best.
“I, I wanted to ask you something…” he spoke, stepping an inch closer. Jensen gave him a questioning look, and then a nod for him to go ahead. “Do you believe in soul mates?”
Jensen was thrown for a bit, not sure what to make of this whole scenario. Based on what Jensen had seen of the man and the short conversation from before, he knew the man wasn’t a loon or something, and decided to give him a response. “Well, I’ve never given it much thought, but I guess if you believe in that stuff and find, well, ‘the one’ as people call it, then, uh, maybe,” Jensen was basing this off a conversation he had had with his friend Danni, so he was just giving the stranger something he hoped to hear, he guessed on himself.
The man smiled at him, but it was different this time, and Jensen didn’t know what to make of that. “Well, I think everyone out there has another half, someone who just gets them, and, well, I think you’re mine.”
And Jensen wanted to run, right then.
Never in his life had someone said that to him, nor had he ever imagined someone saying that to him. He was a difficult man, hard to live with, hard to entertain, hell, hard to love. Jensen had come to a truce of himself being a bit cynical about the world and, if he was being truly honest, had never in his life had a relationship.
It’s moments like these that scare him. But not this time. Not today.
As it turned out, the stranger, who turned out to be Jared Padalecki, soon to be lover, then husband, brought out the wonderful side of Jensen he didn’t know he had.
Sometimes in life, love happens in the strangest of places.
End.