(no subject)
The O.C. and One Tree Hill were cast at the same time. Both were offered to Chad Michael Murray. The Aquaman SV spin-off isn't the first one they floated around.
Happy Birthday, Nan. Only for you.
Green
Jensen meets Chad when they both got tapped for the Smallville spin off Doris Egan's writing. It's called Green and stars Jensen as the Green Arrow and Chad as the Green Lantern. A buddy cop kinda thing, but with superheroes, you know.
They'd both put their time in on the Creek, but had always missed each other at parties and industry functions. Somehow they'd never met. Chad shows up the first day of script read-throughs with a black eye and a fist full of blow-pops.
"Blow-pop?" He plops down right next to Jensen and offers him all the suckers but the red ones.
"I like grape anyway." Jensen smiles at him and Chad smiles back.
"Only bitches like the grape ones." Chad lets Jensen take the candy, still smiling. Doris sighs on the other side of the table.
Jensen unwraps the sucker and looks Chad in the eye. "You tryin' to feel me out for a date here, sugar?"
Chad's eyes wrinkles when he bends over laughing. Jensen sort of knows even then that he's probably committing to something a whole lot more permanent than simple friendship with this guy.
"Got any gummi bears?" Jensen asks.
*
The first two serious hitches in season one are that Jensen and Chad both hate their fans, and that Chad starts dating Rachel Bilson before the pilot is even in the can. Jensen thinks maybe that's better than him dating Rachel, because the tabloid bullshit over the on-screen Green Arrow and Black Canary dating would be enough to make him take an o.d. He already went through the wringer on Dark Angel and he doesn't need his mom reading that shit in the grocery store.
Jensen and Chad maybe spend more than a normal amount of time together-pretty much every waking minute that Chad's not with Rachel, actually. They play Madden and work out and Chad tags along to Jensen's archery practice-he's much better than Jensen, to be honest-and Chad's fucking dogs go everywhere with them. They're friends.
Which is why Jensen has absolutely no compunction being straight with the guy.
"This Rachel thing is gonna blow up in your face." Jensen's standing barefoot in his kitchen looking over the bar-divider at Chad who's sitting in the living room flipping through rewrites.
Chad bobs his head. "Uh huh."
"Man, I'm serious here." Jensen doesn't really appreciate being put in this position, but he knows a thing or two about this situation. "Happened to me."
Chad lifts his head, his hair's died darker than usual for his part, making him look paler, his eyes much bluer. The look on his face isn't the usual sarcastic one, the sparkly look of manic glee before he pops you in the shoulder way too hard to be friendly. "Yeah, but she was married, dude."
Jensen finishes his peaches in silence. Everything he has to say now would lead to a brawl, and it's not even directed at Chad. Why the fuck can't people keep their goddamn mouths shut?
*
The really weird thing is that Jensen feels depressed and anxious more than anything over the Chad and Rachel thing. He knows it's gonna end in blood and tears, and it's not even so much about the show as it's about the fact that Jensen can read people, and he has absolutely no doubt that Chad's gonna self-destruct when the relationship goes south.
He's at Welling's listening to his relationship woes when Chad calls him.
"Dude, we're getting married!" He's Chad-all excited and humming with it. He'll burn the world down with his enthusiasm one day.
"Really, man? That's fanfuckingtastic!" Jensen's an actor, he lies well.
Tom raises an eyebrow. Well, he lies well enough over the phone.
"I can't believe she said yes!" Chad starts to chatter away and Jensen rubs his forehead.
Tom wanders into the kitchen and wanders back out with two tumblers full of straight scotch. Tom's a man after Jensen's heart. The scotch is smoky, earthy, and burns the lining off of Jensen's throat. He lets Chad wind down, lets him be happy. Jensen really wonders what it would be like to be so oblivious about himself, to be so transparent in his motivations. Chad's not just an open book, he's a fucking book on tape.
"I'm really happy for you, man."
"Be in the wedding?" Chad sounds unsure of the answer, and Jensen, not for the first time, wants to choke Chad's mother to death.
"Of course, man, naturally. Can't let you go to your doom alone." He makes it sound like a joke, and Chad laughs. Jensen's done with his drink by the time the conversation ends.
"Mike's going to love this." Tom laughs, short and bitter. Tom got all of Chad's allotment of cynicism for sure.
*
The really weird part is that the relationship doesn't bomb the way Jensen expected. Rachel isn't insanely jealous and Chad doesn't get blown by strippers.
Rachel fucking cheats on Chad. Which, you know, Jensen hadn't seen coming at all. Adam Brody comes out of the thin blue, and Jensen is as floored as everyone else by it all.
Chad, naturally, moves into Jensen's spare room without actually asking. Dogs, basketball hoop in the driveway, Xbox in the living room, constantly sprawled sullenly on his side of the couch. Smoking.
They're about a week from shooting the finale, which is on total lockdown, a two hour Smallville style cliff-hanger with explosions filmed in hi-def. The ratings are through the roof with the Smallville lead in and they're already picked up for next season, a guaranteed run of twenty-two. Jensen feels comfortable for the first time ever in his career. The low-burning fear that everything's two seconds from washing down the drain is gone. He was on the fucking cover of TV Guide, man. Teen Beat and fan websites and crazy, crazy fangirls on TWOP talking about his dicksize. It's all good.
Except for the Chad situation.
Jensen's sort of watching basketball, really staring at the hard set of Chad's jaw and wondering what the fuck he can do to fix this, when Chad clears his throat. "I don't think I can do this."
And Jensen knows automatically Chad's contemplating tanking his career over this. He already got the damned tattoo when Al and Miles said it was verboten. Jensen is totally convinced he's capable of just about any sort of self-destructive bullshit conceivable by the mind of man.
"We’re about to go on vacation. You'll have a couple months to get your shit together." He isn't sure what he can say here. Chad is gonna do what Chad's gonna do. Jensen really can't stand to see him so torn up, but this is part of life, and Chad set himself up for it. Fuck, Rachel, though, man, seriously. Who can't see that Chad's got some kind of attachment disorder? What is wrong with people? Why people can't just act right is beyond Jensen.
"You mean I have time to get my annulment." His voice has flipped over to anger, and Jensen really doesn't need this today. They've already scuffled a couple times when Chad tried to call Rachel's parents and cuss them out for her being "a total cuntface bitch".
Jensen doesn't answer, because he doesn't want to get into this all over again. Hiatus is gonna be fucking great. He needs a drink.
*
Jensen thinks he's going to spend two months in Texas. That turns into about three weeks in Texas.
"Seen the news?" Tom's non-work voice always comes across as sullen. Maybe because it is, maybe because people take him the wrong way. It makes Jensen smile for no real reason. Fucking Welling.
"Something about the war?" Jensen's standing in his parents' backyard barefoot in a pair of threadbare shorts and no shirt with four-days' worth of beard, and barrettes in his hair from playing Beauty Shop with his little cousins.
"You should go to L.A." Tom cracks his neck.
"You still in Vancouver?" Jensen can feel a sunburn coming up on his shoulders. More freckles on top of his freckles from that. He knows Tom's still in Canada. The guy hates L.A.
"Hm." Tom's done with the conversation.
"I'll call you when I get there." Jensen knows this is part of the job. Whether it's part of his job job or part of being a friend, he's not sure right that second, but whatever, man. His mom's cooking is gonna make him fat anyway.
"Mike's down there." And that's Tom being a sarcastic asshole right there.
"Har-har. Yeah, the minute I have to call Michael Rosenfuckingbaum in as the cavalry is the day I admit defeat." He wants some tea and needs to call someone to book him a flight, pack some things, deal with his mom.
"Make sure he doesn't fuck up too bad. I like him." The line goes dead.
Tom's actually a good guy under all his moodiness and bitchery. Most people don't make the effort to realize someone might get a little defensive and rude when they've been expected to be brain dead all their lives because of how they look. Or when they've been expected to fuck their way into their jobs. Jensen relates to Tom on a level he doesn't most people, really.
*
So, Chad punched a reporter. No shock there.
Jensen doesn't even have to roust him. Chad shows up on Jensen's doorstep in L.A. a couple hours after Jensen gets in from LAX.
"You know what the word image means. Right? In theory at least?" Jensen has to give at least token bitchslap. Chad rolls his eyes and flips him off. Jensen's heart isn't really into it, which is clear from his delivery. "Fine. I brought tequila with me."
Chad slouches through the foyer into the living room, hoody and baggy jeans and untied sneakers.
"I thought you were gonna go home for a while, get some family time in…" Jensen stops mid-lecture when Chad looks up at him, his eyes half-closed and his mouth drawn down. Some people wear their hearts on their sleeves, man, but Chad just tosses his right out there, lobbing at whoever cares to catch. The guy's a total trainwreck.
"I can't do this." His voice breaks in the middle, and Jensen's heard that tone from him before, but only when he was acting, not like this, not the real deal. He reaches out and grabs Chad's shoulder.
"You can and you will, ok?" Jensen's not a counselor, but he's an actor. It's his job to be empathetic. Chad really pushes the line with all his emotional distress, though. Jensen didn't grow up with this kind of thing, men crying and showing their feelings all the time. This is hard to deal with.
Chad sags against him. Jensen pats him awkwardly on the back feeling his spine through his t-shirt and hoody. Clearly, while Jensen had been packing on a few pounds, Chad hadn't been eating at all.
*
Things devolve from there.
First, there's the episode with Joshua Jackson at the strip club, which Jensen doesn't even remember the next day, or thankfully ever. He will swear to his dying breath, though, that he would never holler "Ride 'em, cowgirl" to some chick giving him a lapdance.
Then Mike decides to "intercede" by setting Chad up on "dates." The transvestite joke is funny the first time, but by the fifth, Jensen's ready to break teeth. Mike really is a colossal pain in the ass. Then Tom "intercedes" by threatening Mike somehow. Jensen doesn't ask.
The real problem arises at ComicCon. Chad and Jensen both hate doing press to begin with. This? This is something like the tenth circle of hell to them-screaming teenaged girls and people dressed up like Jedi and flash bulbs everywhere and having to act nice and pretty, always polite above all else. Also, by the way, Rachel's there.
Jensen's ready for a total meltdown on Chad's part, whether it be out of anger or depression, he has no idea, but he takes Xanax before they leave the house just in case. So, Jensen's cool with signing tits and smiling wide with teeth. He says he's never counted his freckles, no he's not dating anyone, oh really your mom loves the show too? He keeps a calm eye on Chad, who is very good with his fans, really, sweet as pecan pie and funny as the day is long. Chad lets the girls touch his recently cropped hair, jokes around about his broken nose, signs sparkly notepads and Batman comic books. Jensen watches him smiling.
Rachel he has to suppress serious anger-management issues over, however. She's all lip-gloss shiny and giggling. Her shirt's too tight and her hair's too perfect. Jensen feels like cold-cocking her on principle. They stand shoulder to shoulder and Jensen puts his arm around her, work work work, all smiles and sure we're friends. Chad is easy-going and repressed.
Fine, so the actual issues don't arise until they leave ComicCon and head to airport to fly back to L.A. Chad's jaw is tight the whole time, his shoulders folded in, his chin on his chest.
"Fuck her, man." Jensen's riding a bubble. Drugs are his friend.
Chad's eyes lift to Jensen's. In that second, Jensen can't read him, he has no idea whatsoever what Chad's thinking. It's a strange feeling. Chad's shoulder bumps his as his sits up. Jensen tilts his head to the side a little to watch him, wait out whatever's going on. He's ready for the explosion, fists flying and screaming. He's not so much ready for Chad to lean over just a little and brush his open mouth against Jensen's. He smells like bubblegum and vodka. Chad's fingers come up and curl into the collar of Jensen's t-shirt and he pulls at Jensen's top lip with both of his, pulls Jensen's mouth open just enough to slide his tongue between Jensen's top teeth and his lip. Chad presses him back into the seat when Jensen doesn't resist, when Jensen sort of melts down into the leather of the car seat and lets Chad's hand on the middle of his chest ride him down into a lump.
Chad has a tiny bit of hair under his bottom lip, under the swell of its fullest point, and it brushes against Jensen's bottom lip, tickling and making Jensen open wider, making him spread his legs for Chad's knee, making him touch the soft bristle of Chad's short hair.
Making him close his eyes and let Chad unbutton Jensen's jeans.
The Xanax and the booze weigh him down, and Chad's tongue on his cock turns his bones to pipe cleaners, bending the wrong way and crooked. Chad rubs against his leg, sucks just enough to make Jensen's neck snap back, and they ride enough other down into the floorboard.
Yeah, so ComicCon is a fiasco.
*
The thing is, Chad's totally normal about all that stuff, so Jensen's cool with it, too. Shit, he has more to worry about than making out with Chad. It's not like he hasn't done a lot worse. Say, maybe, with Welling high on coke in a bathroom stall, so whatever.
Chad's in Jensen's house in Vancouver when Jensen unlocks the door with his carry-on bag over his shoulder. He doesn't even explain himself or acknowledge that this is Jensen's house. He just stands there in the kitchen in jeans and nothing else, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, cutting up carrots.
"I bought season tickets to the Canucks, dude. I think me and Mike'll drag your ass out to some games this season. Doris's giving me a hard time about being skinny again. Think maybe I'll start on those protein shakes and shift from cardio to more weight-training. Fuck, I guess I should invest in Tiger Balm."
He keeps going, but Jensen wanders out of the room rolling his eyes heading for the bathroom for a shower.
"I think I'm going to ask Kristen out," is the last thing Jensen hears before he slams the door to his bedroom.
*
Anna betaed this and didn't know that by Kristen I mean Kreuk. I thought that was obvious by the rest of the cast, but I will say so explicitly. HAHA, Chad's an idiot. YAY Nan's birthday!