The Staring Game 1/3
The Staring Game 1/3
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: R
Words: 3,500
Artist: inanna_maat
Disclaimer: I own nothing. The people mentioned here are not mine and never did any of this. The Men Who Stare At Goats (movie and book) belong to their creators and contract holders, it was used as an inspiration only. The plot is very different and very fictional.
Warnings: psychic!Jared, paranormality, craziness, humor, some angst, language and minor violence, mentions of dead goats etc.
Summary: Jensen works as a personal trainer for the rich and bored crowd. It’s not adventurous but it pays the bills. That is until he meets Jared Padalecki, the crazy hippie kid who claims to be a trained psychic, and things start to spin off the axis. Jared tends to stare at people and Jensen really doesn’t feel comfortable with that… if only that were his only problem.
Story Master Post | Art Master Post
Hazel eyes were fixed on Jensen as he fidgeted in the uncomfortable plastic chair he was tied to. The rope that was wound tightly around his wrists stung from him trying to free his hands for what felt like days although objectively could have been no longer than a few hours. He wasn’t sure if the man sitting opposite him had even blinked, since they had been dragged in there and left to stew, until their captors decided what to do with them. His companion was just staring, and that gave Jensen the creeps. Large hands were closed into tight fists, and a pearl of sweat was collecting on his scalp, growing, until it slid down a tan face.
“Dude. Stop staring!” Jensen snapped with annoyance written all over his face. How had he ended up tied to a chair, while being ogled by a crazy person?
+++
Rich people have servants for everything. There were chauffeurs to drive their cars, cooks to prepare the meals, sitters for children and dogs, maids to take care of their houses and personal trainers to take care of their bodies. Jensen was pretty sure that the composition of the staff varied from household to household depending on individual needs, and since he was a fitness trainer who attended a lot of very rich clients in their homes, he had seen quite a bit of crazy stuff, because apparently money makes for eccentricity.
Hence it wasn’t much of a shock when his latest client, Brenda, told him that the weird smell of incense in the living room came from her mother consulting with a psychic in the study. People who had studies and sitting rooms and sun rooms - and actually had the need to title every room in their house, because there were so many - and living room one, two and three was just not sufficient - had long since proven to do a lot of things he and the normal working population might find a waste of money and time. Well, his clients had both, and so they could indulge in whatever they thought could kill the time until their next appointment with their plastic surgeon.
Jensen was aware just how superficial people were, and he had no illusions that he would make anything like as much money as he did if he wasn't good looking, even without the muscles he got from working out for several hours every day.
When Brenda was all flushed and sweaty, Jensen started packing up the small amount of equipment he'd brought along, so he could get home, pop open a beer and kick back on the couch. He might forbid his clients such luxuries, but they expected him to be cruel and against all tasty food and drink, so he just did his job, telling them to not drink any alcohol and to eat vegetarian. It didn’t mean he did so himself, and he was pretty sure that most of his clients enjoyed their t-bone steaks just so much more, because of the knowledge that they really shouldn’t have it. This was a service industry, and Jensen was good at what he did.
The door to the illustrous sitting room opened, and Jensen couldn’t help his grin when he saw a young man step out. He was tall. with broad shoulders and longish brown hair that hung unruly around hazel eyes. The guy was more lean than hunky but he definitely took good care of himself. He probably preferred real sport to bench pressing, Jensen’s professional eye told him.
As the young man was accompanied by the lady of the house, and there didn't seem that anybody else had been in the room with them, Jensen wondered if the kid really was a psychic, or if that was an excuse for something a lot more scandalous. Somehow, he doubted the latter though. He took a moment to check out the guy’s clothing while closing the zipper on the duffel bag he had been filling. There was an abundance of bright colors and patterns that might make any person with a sense of fashion cry. The only thing that was not coloured was the white wife-beater that stretched over a muscled chest underneath an open pink and turquoise, hawaiian style shirt. On the white fabric lay two necklaces, one made of colourful beads and ending in a pendant that looked a lot like an Indian dream-catcher, complete with a feather dangling from its middle. The other was a plain silver chain with several pendants hanging on the end, overlapping and making it hard to see what each of them were.
Tall guy was waring flip flops and green and yellow striped boat shorts that clashed terribly with the shirt and the red and purple leather ribbons that were wrapped around his wrists. The whole look was finished by a bandanna of navy blue that sat on his head but miraculously did nothing to keep his bangs away from his eyes. All in all the man looked like a color-blind hippy surfer… or a mentally challenged person who thought they could connect to spirits and speak to the dead. Too bad he was awfully hot too.
+++
He didn’t even blink when Jensen snapped at him, instead clenching his jaw shut as his eyes stayed focused on Jensen’s chest. “Shh! Don’t distract me”, he whispered, and Jensen only rolled his eyes at the concentration the other man exuded while doing nothing.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“Concentrating.”
“On what?”
“I’m trying to loosen your bonds.”
“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” Great, fucking great.
+++
It seemed that the psychic had worked his way into Brenda’s mother's weekly schedule, because every time Jensen would come by, the man who had introduced himself as Jared the last time they crossed paths would be there too. From what Jensen could tell from the few minutes he had seen the man so far, Jared was not one of those gloomy psychics who would claim to feel the pain of the dead and foresee bad things happening. Instead, he was always grinning… and always staring.
When the door to the sitting room opened once more, allowing Jensen a free view of Jared in his latest collection of bright colours and nauseating patterns, he didn’t even have to look to know that Jared was staring at him with intense eyes. But today, instead of leaving with a short nod or a friendly comment, Jared stayed and cocked his head at the personal trainer, who looked around himself for a moment to see if there was anything amiss.
“I can give you a ride, if you want”, Jared said with his usual smile, hands buried deep in the pockets of his shorts.
Jensen answered with a small apologetic smile of his own. “I got my car outside, but thanks for offering.” It wasn’t like he’d say no to Jared if the guy asked him out, because he was definitely Jensen's type and didn’t seem half as crazy as most psychics he'd met so far - if one ignored his hideous sense of fashion - but he had his car outside and couldn’t leave it there. Jared answered with a shrug before leaving, giving Jensen and Brenda a short wave of goodbye.
Ten minutes later, Jensen had finished giving Brenda her exercise schedule for the next week and was walking to his car, only to stop dead when he saw the wheel clamp on the front tire of his car. He groaned loudly, stomping over and ripping the ticket that was tucked to his windshield off, staring down at the hefty fine and the information that clamp removal services were only available until 5pm, which was long past, since Brenda was his last appointment of the day. Fuck.
He closed his eyes, calculating the hole this would rip into his budget and being thankful that he had a good enough clientele to charge quite a fee per hour. Still, he now had to call himself a taxi to get home, and another one in the morning to get back here in order to pick up his car after paying the fine. Life was not being good to him that day. So much for a nice evening of relaxation.
“Hey, you sure you don’t want that ride?”
When Jensen turned around, he was surprised to see Jared leaning against a car on the other side of the road.
“How is it that my car is clamped, and yours isn’t?”
With an apologetic smile and a shrug, Jared pointed at the sign Jensen was standing under. It was a ‘no parking’ sign, and obviously that regulation only applied to this side of the road, damn it. He sighed, resigning himself to his fate and crossing the street towards the other man. At least he wouldn’t need a taxi. “Thanks for waiting.”
Jared shrugged again before getting in the car, which was thankfully not an old Volkwagen mini-bus - which would not be beyond Jared judging by his new age looks - but a newer Ford. The car wouldn't have been too noticeable if it didn’t have a custom paint-job in all the colors of the rainbow.
“Nice car… it fits you”, he said, trying to keep a straight face and getting a wide grin from Jared.
“Thanks.”
They pulled out, and Jensen gave the other man his address - not that he asked for it, but he needed to know where they were going, right? “Good thing we seem to live at the same end of town”, Jensen commented, feeling the need to say something. Jared just shrugged again, and Jensen started to find that nearly as annoying as being stared at all the time. “When did you see that there was a clamp on my tire?”
“When I walked out of the house.”
“But you offered me the ride before you walked out.”
“Yes.”
Jensen huffed out a laugh and leaned back in the seat. “Right, you’re a fortune-teller. I forgot.”
Jared’s eyebrows raised, and he stared at Jensen for a long moment. The moment was drawn out so far that Jensen nearly snapped at him to look at the goddamn road, before he killed them both.
“I’m not a fortune-teller. I am a trained psychic. My mind is a very sophisticated tool.” It was nearly scary that Jared could say something like that with a straight face. He actually seemed to believe that, and wasn’t that just wrong?
+++
“That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. What did I do to deserve to be kidnapped and stuck in a storage room with a rambling lunatic?”
Jared shot him a glare, eyebrows furrowing. “Will you shut up? I am concentrating.”
“Jared, there is no way in hell you are going to do anything just by staring at me.”
“Oh really? And why are you so sure of that, Mr. Sceptic?” Obviously Jared had given up his concentration in favor of their argument.
“Because there is no such thing as psychic powers.”
“Ha! That’s where you’re wrong!” Jensen was rather sure that he would have Jared’s finger stabbing at him in a condescending fashion, had the taller man’s hands not been tied behind his back as well. “My father knew a guy who could stop the heart of a goat just by staring at it.”
Jensen was dumbfounded for a moment. Was this guy serious? But Jared’s angry features showed him that he really did believe that people could kill with their minds.
“If that is true… don’t you dare staring at my chest like that ever again!”
+++
Jensen sighed, giving the orderly who removed the clamp from his tire a tight smile. He'd had to postpone his two morning appointments in order to take care of the car, and his mood was really low. He had only grumbled a hello when half an hour earlier Jared had walked up to the house in a blindingly pink shirt over orange floral print boat shorts that had clashed so much that it just HAD to be on purpose. Obviously, the lady of the house had even more psychic consultations than Jensen had known of.
It was only noon, but by the time his car was freed from its shackles of government suppression - okay, so that might be slightly dramatic, but he was just that annoyed - he already had a blooming headache of a dimension he'd last experienced before taking up yoga to get rid of the kink in his shoulders and stop the tension creases that had started forming on his forehead. His clients paid for a good looking, young guy to show them how to do the exercises they would try to avoid doing at all costs. Half of what he was paid for was to be drooled over after all and getting premature worry lines was definitely not the way to stay in business.
Sadly, he felt like no lotus seat could unravel the ball of pain that was forming between his eyebrows. He had paid the fine and waited at his car for a very long while, until the guy who had to unlock the wretched wheel clamp had shown up. Not that he minded the sun he got while waiting, but he had work to do, and buttocks to tighten and, all in all, looking at his stuck car was just such a mood killer.
When he finally watched the service guy drive off again, he couldn’t even enjoy the knowledge that he had his wheels back. He grumbled to himself loudly enough that he nearly hadn’t heard the door slamming up at the house. He turned to see Jared speeding down the walkway, ignoring Jensen’s loud “Is everything alright?” as he fumbled with the batik style linen bag he sometimes dragged around with himself and practically ran for the car. “Jared?”
The rainbow colored Ford pulled away from the curb, and Jensen felt half annoyed and half worried at being ignored. Obviously Jared’s latest psychic session had not gone too well, and Jensen sighed, shrugging and turning back to his own car. He froze when he saw something lying on the white stone of the expensive walkway of the villa: Jared’s wallet.
+++
Jared sighed, eyes narrowed, shaggy brown hair half obscuring his face. “No one likes a skeptic, Jensen.”
“I’m not a skeptic. I’m a realist. So far I have seen nothing that would prove to me that you and your staring can do anything but annoy the crap out of me.”
“A real believer doesn’t need proof.”
It was Jensen’s turn to sigh, and he let his head fall back as he resigned himself to Jared’s stubbornness. “But I am not a real believer.”
“Could you at least stop blocking every effort I make with your bad karma?”
His head snapped back up at Jared’s words glaring back at the taller man. “Oh, so now your non existent powers are my fault? Well, fuck you, Jared.”
“You are a real potty mouth…”
“Maybe I am. But someone should tell you that it’s not the seventies anymore! And what is it with the clothes anyway? Do you want to make people blind?”
The look of pure shock on Jared’s face was very satisfying. “What? At least my clothes are fun.”
“Yeah? If cars brake unexpectedly when you walk down the street, it might be because they mistake you for a traffic light.”
In a surge or energy, Jared’s whole body jerked in his chair as he tried to hobble his bound body close enough to Jensen to kick him with his tied foot. In an astonishing struggle he managed to get within reach, but he couldn’t do much more than poke Jensen with his toes.
Wow, now they were playing footsy too!
+++
Jensen walked across the lawn towards the front door. He wasn’t quite sure why he didn’t just look Jared up in the phone book and call the guy to tell him that he had lost his wallet, instead of bringing it by personally after a long day of work. Jensen had pushed one of his morning clients in after the rest of his appointments, because the lady had refused to miss tightening her buttocks because of his car-problems. The result was a tired and grumbling Jensen who still drove quite a way past his own home to return the possessions of the psychic who had such a great connection with the powers-that-never-were, that he hadn’t even noticed losing something important. It just made Jensen roll his eyes.
He had never believed in spirits or what-not and probably would not have bothered that much if Jared wasn’t just irresistible even with his horrible taste and weird profession. But who was Jensen to look down on anybody. He was a gay man, who lived from wiggling his ass in front of lazy ladies and lusty, luxury daughters to make sure they enjoyed themselves while trying to lose enough hip fat to fit into the latest slutty dress.
Jared’s home was a small townhouse with a slightly overgrown lawn and a not quite white anymore layer of old paint. It wasn’t flashy or mysterious, but seemed comfortable for one person. It wasn’t as scarily colorful as Jensen had feared - although there was a rainbow painted on the garage door, and a disgustingly kitschy pink flamingo standing on the lawn, erasing all doubts that Jensen had picked the wrong address off Jared’s license.
He sighed, shaking his head as he made a wider than necessary circle around the offending piece of decoration and jumped up the few shallow steps to the landing in front of the door, digging in his jacket pocket for the wallet he wanted to return, before even taking the time for knocking. He wondered if Jared already missed it. Jensen was pretty sure he would have done if it had been his, and that he would have gone frantic by then, backtracking his steps of the day, but somehow Jared seemed to be more of the disoriented type with a short attention span, and Jensen wouldn’t be surprised if the tall man were misplacing his own stuff quite regularly.
His hand closed around the wallet, but he hadn’t even got it out when an arm came around him, and a hand with a wet rag clamped down over his mouth and nose at the same moment. Instant panic shot through Jensen’s body, and he jerked away with his whole body, landing a sharp elbow in something soft enough to be a belly - which was probably true judging by the pained groan behind him. Jensen had learned enough Taibo in his years on the job to be able to lay down some solid kicks and punches. Sadly he didn’t get the chance to even twist free fully, when the stinging smell made his head twist and his vision fade.
+++
“Stop kicking me!”
“You started it.”
Jensen huffed out a sigh and shot his fellow captive a dirty look. Jared was pouting, and maybe under other circumstances it would have been cute. But they were in quite a bit of trouble right now, and Jensen felt his survival instinct pressing in and making him bitchy. He felt that he had every right to be, too.
“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t even be here!”
“It’s not my fault they caught you.”
“Of course!” Jensen snapped. “If you hadn’t left your wallet lying on the goddamn street, I would never have shown up on your doorstep!”
“You were on my doorstep?” Jared’s genuine surprise made Jensen falter in his bitching.
“Yeah… why do you think I’m here?”
Jared frowned for a moment with a serious thinking face before shrugging as well as his fixed arms allowed. “I thought you would know why we’re here.”
“So you don’t know why we’re here?” Jensen had no idea, and so far he had been sure that this was all about Jared, and the other man would know exactly what was going on. Jensen had refrained from asking, because he figured the less he knew the better were his chances to be cut loose by the captors. But if Jared knew nothing… they were screwed.
“Errrm… bugger?”
“Bugger? That’s all you have to say? What are you? Some crazy British palm reader?”
“Hey! I’m a professional.”
“Professional what exactly?”
“Psychic soldier.”
Jensen blinked once. Twice. Then he started laughing. They were so screwed.
...next Part...*hugs* Birdie
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: R
Words: 3,500
Artist: inanna_maat
Disclaimer: I own nothing. The people mentioned here are not mine and never did any of this. The Men Who Stare At Goats (movie and book) belong to their creators and contract holders, it was used as an inspiration only. The plot is very different and very fictional.
Warnings: psychic!Jared, paranormality, craziness, humor, some angst, language and minor violence, mentions of dead goats etc.
Summary: Jensen works as a personal trainer for the rich and bored crowd. It’s not adventurous but it pays the bills. That is until he meets Jared Padalecki, the crazy hippie kid who claims to be a trained psychic, and things start to spin off the axis. Jared tends to stare at people and Jensen really doesn’t feel comfortable with that… if only that were his only problem.
Story Master Post | Art Master Post
Hazel eyes were fixed on Jensen as he fidgeted in the uncomfortable plastic chair he was tied to. The rope that was wound tightly around his wrists stung from him trying to free his hands for what felt like days although objectively could have been no longer than a few hours. He wasn’t sure if the man sitting opposite him had even blinked, since they had been dragged in there and left to stew, until their captors decided what to do with them. His companion was just staring, and that gave Jensen the creeps. Large hands were closed into tight fists, and a pearl of sweat was collecting on his scalp, growing, until it slid down a tan face.
“Dude. Stop staring!” Jensen snapped with annoyance written all over his face. How had he ended up tied to a chair, while being ogled by a crazy person?
+++
Rich people have servants for everything. There were chauffeurs to drive their cars, cooks to prepare the meals, sitters for children and dogs, maids to take care of their houses and personal trainers to take care of their bodies. Jensen was pretty sure that the composition of the staff varied from household to household depending on individual needs, and since he was a fitness trainer who attended a lot of very rich clients in their homes, he had seen quite a bit of crazy stuff, because apparently money makes for eccentricity.
Hence it wasn’t much of a shock when his latest client, Brenda, told him that the weird smell of incense in the living room came from her mother consulting with a psychic in the study. People who had studies and sitting rooms and sun rooms - and actually had the need to title every room in their house, because there were so many - and living room one, two and three was just not sufficient - had long since proven to do a lot of things he and the normal working population might find a waste of money and time. Well, his clients had both, and so they could indulge in whatever they thought could kill the time until their next appointment with their plastic surgeon.
Jensen was aware just how superficial people were, and he had no illusions that he would make anything like as much money as he did if he wasn't good looking, even without the muscles he got from working out for several hours every day.
When Brenda was all flushed and sweaty, Jensen started packing up the small amount of equipment he'd brought along, so he could get home, pop open a beer and kick back on the couch. He might forbid his clients such luxuries, but they expected him to be cruel and against all tasty food and drink, so he just did his job, telling them to not drink any alcohol and to eat vegetarian. It didn’t mean he did so himself, and he was pretty sure that most of his clients enjoyed their t-bone steaks just so much more, because of the knowledge that they really shouldn’t have it. This was a service industry, and Jensen was good at what he did.
The door to the illustrous sitting room opened, and Jensen couldn’t help his grin when he saw a young man step out. He was tall. with broad shoulders and longish brown hair that hung unruly around hazel eyes. The guy was more lean than hunky but he definitely took good care of himself. He probably preferred real sport to bench pressing, Jensen’s professional eye told him.
As the young man was accompanied by the lady of the house, and there didn't seem that anybody else had been in the room with them, Jensen wondered if the kid really was a psychic, or if that was an excuse for something a lot more scandalous. Somehow, he doubted the latter though. He took a moment to check out the guy’s clothing while closing the zipper on the duffel bag he had been filling. There was an abundance of bright colors and patterns that might make any person with a sense of fashion cry. The only thing that was not coloured was the white wife-beater that stretched over a muscled chest underneath an open pink and turquoise, hawaiian style shirt. On the white fabric lay two necklaces, one made of colourful beads and ending in a pendant that looked a lot like an Indian dream-catcher, complete with a feather dangling from its middle. The other was a plain silver chain with several pendants hanging on the end, overlapping and making it hard to see what each of them were.
Tall guy was waring flip flops and green and yellow striped boat shorts that clashed terribly with the shirt and the red and purple leather ribbons that were wrapped around his wrists. The whole look was finished by a bandanna of navy blue that sat on his head but miraculously did nothing to keep his bangs away from his eyes. All in all the man looked like a color-blind hippy surfer… or a mentally challenged person who thought they could connect to spirits and speak to the dead. Too bad he was awfully hot too.
+++
He didn’t even blink when Jensen snapped at him, instead clenching his jaw shut as his eyes stayed focused on Jensen’s chest. “Shh! Don’t distract me”, he whispered, and Jensen only rolled his eyes at the concentration the other man exuded while doing nothing.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“Concentrating.”
“On what?”
“I’m trying to loosen your bonds.”
“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” Great, fucking great.
+++
It seemed that the psychic had worked his way into Brenda’s mother's weekly schedule, because every time Jensen would come by, the man who had introduced himself as Jared the last time they crossed paths would be there too. From what Jensen could tell from the few minutes he had seen the man so far, Jared was not one of those gloomy psychics who would claim to feel the pain of the dead and foresee bad things happening. Instead, he was always grinning… and always staring.
When the door to the sitting room opened once more, allowing Jensen a free view of Jared in his latest collection of bright colours and nauseating patterns, he didn’t even have to look to know that Jared was staring at him with intense eyes. But today, instead of leaving with a short nod or a friendly comment, Jared stayed and cocked his head at the personal trainer, who looked around himself for a moment to see if there was anything amiss.
“I can give you a ride, if you want”, Jared said with his usual smile, hands buried deep in the pockets of his shorts.
Jensen answered with a small apologetic smile of his own. “I got my car outside, but thanks for offering.” It wasn’t like he’d say no to Jared if the guy asked him out, because he was definitely Jensen's type and didn’t seem half as crazy as most psychics he'd met so far - if one ignored his hideous sense of fashion - but he had his car outside and couldn’t leave it there. Jared answered with a shrug before leaving, giving Jensen and Brenda a short wave of goodbye.
Ten minutes later, Jensen had finished giving Brenda her exercise schedule for the next week and was walking to his car, only to stop dead when he saw the wheel clamp on the front tire of his car. He groaned loudly, stomping over and ripping the ticket that was tucked to his windshield off, staring down at the hefty fine and the information that clamp removal services were only available until 5pm, which was long past, since Brenda was his last appointment of the day. Fuck.
He closed his eyes, calculating the hole this would rip into his budget and being thankful that he had a good enough clientele to charge quite a fee per hour. Still, he now had to call himself a taxi to get home, and another one in the morning to get back here in order to pick up his car after paying the fine. Life was not being good to him that day. So much for a nice evening of relaxation.
“Hey, you sure you don’t want that ride?”
When Jensen turned around, he was surprised to see Jared leaning against a car on the other side of the road.
“How is it that my car is clamped, and yours isn’t?”
With an apologetic smile and a shrug, Jared pointed at the sign Jensen was standing under. It was a ‘no parking’ sign, and obviously that regulation only applied to this side of the road, damn it. He sighed, resigning himself to his fate and crossing the street towards the other man. At least he wouldn’t need a taxi. “Thanks for waiting.”
Jared shrugged again before getting in the car, which was thankfully not an old Volkwagen mini-bus - which would not be beyond Jared judging by his new age looks - but a newer Ford. The car wouldn't have been too noticeable if it didn’t have a custom paint-job in all the colors of the rainbow.
“Nice car… it fits you”, he said, trying to keep a straight face and getting a wide grin from Jared.
“Thanks.”
They pulled out, and Jensen gave the other man his address - not that he asked for it, but he needed to know where they were going, right? “Good thing we seem to live at the same end of town”, Jensen commented, feeling the need to say something. Jared just shrugged again, and Jensen started to find that nearly as annoying as being stared at all the time. “When did you see that there was a clamp on my tire?”
“When I walked out of the house.”
“But you offered me the ride before you walked out.”
“Yes.”
Jensen huffed out a laugh and leaned back in the seat. “Right, you’re a fortune-teller. I forgot.”
Jared’s eyebrows raised, and he stared at Jensen for a long moment. The moment was drawn out so far that Jensen nearly snapped at him to look at the goddamn road, before he killed them both.
“I’m not a fortune-teller. I am a trained psychic. My mind is a very sophisticated tool.” It was nearly scary that Jared could say something like that with a straight face. He actually seemed to believe that, and wasn’t that just wrong?
+++
“That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. What did I do to deserve to be kidnapped and stuck in a storage room with a rambling lunatic?”
Jared shot him a glare, eyebrows furrowing. “Will you shut up? I am concentrating.”
“Jared, there is no way in hell you are going to do anything just by staring at me.”
“Oh really? And why are you so sure of that, Mr. Sceptic?” Obviously Jared had given up his concentration in favor of their argument.
“Because there is no such thing as psychic powers.”
“Ha! That’s where you’re wrong!” Jensen was rather sure that he would have Jared’s finger stabbing at him in a condescending fashion, had the taller man’s hands not been tied behind his back as well. “My father knew a guy who could stop the heart of a goat just by staring at it.”
Jensen was dumbfounded for a moment. Was this guy serious? But Jared’s angry features showed him that he really did believe that people could kill with their minds.
“If that is true… don’t you dare staring at my chest like that ever again!”
+++
Jensen sighed, giving the orderly who removed the clamp from his tire a tight smile. He'd had to postpone his two morning appointments in order to take care of the car, and his mood was really low. He had only grumbled a hello when half an hour earlier Jared had walked up to the house in a blindingly pink shirt over orange floral print boat shorts that had clashed so much that it just HAD to be on purpose. Obviously, the lady of the house had even more psychic consultations than Jensen had known of.
It was only noon, but by the time his car was freed from its shackles of government suppression - okay, so that might be slightly dramatic, but he was just that annoyed - he already had a blooming headache of a dimension he'd last experienced before taking up yoga to get rid of the kink in his shoulders and stop the tension creases that had started forming on his forehead. His clients paid for a good looking, young guy to show them how to do the exercises they would try to avoid doing at all costs. Half of what he was paid for was to be drooled over after all and getting premature worry lines was definitely not the way to stay in business.
Sadly, he felt like no lotus seat could unravel the ball of pain that was forming between his eyebrows. He had paid the fine and waited at his car for a very long while, until the guy who had to unlock the wretched wheel clamp had shown up. Not that he minded the sun he got while waiting, but he had work to do, and buttocks to tighten and, all in all, looking at his stuck car was just such a mood killer.
When he finally watched the service guy drive off again, he couldn’t even enjoy the knowledge that he had his wheels back. He grumbled to himself loudly enough that he nearly hadn’t heard the door slamming up at the house. He turned to see Jared speeding down the walkway, ignoring Jensen’s loud “Is everything alright?” as he fumbled with the batik style linen bag he sometimes dragged around with himself and practically ran for the car. “Jared?”
The rainbow colored Ford pulled away from the curb, and Jensen felt half annoyed and half worried at being ignored. Obviously Jared’s latest psychic session had not gone too well, and Jensen sighed, shrugging and turning back to his own car. He froze when he saw something lying on the white stone of the expensive walkway of the villa: Jared’s wallet.
+++
Jared sighed, eyes narrowed, shaggy brown hair half obscuring his face. “No one likes a skeptic, Jensen.”
“I’m not a skeptic. I’m a realist. So far I have seen nothing that would prove to me that you and your staring can do anything but annoy the crap out of me.”
“A real believer doesn’t need proof.”
It was Jensen’s turn to sigh, and he let his head fall back as he resigned himself to Jared’s stubbornness. “But I am not a real believer.”
“Could you at least stop blocking every effort I make with your bad karma?”
His head snapped back up at Jared’s words glaring back at the taller man. “Oh, so now your non existent powers are my fault? Well, fuck you, Jared.”
“You are a real potty mouth…”
“Maybe I am. But someone should tell you that it’s not the seventies anymore! And what is it with the clothes anyway? Do you want to make people blind?”
The look of pure shock on Jared’s face was very satisfying. “What? At least my clothes are fun.”
“Yeah? If cars brake unexpectedly when you walk down the street, it might be because they mistake you for a traffic light.”
In a surge or energy, Jared’s whole body jerked in his chair as he tried to hobble his bound body close enough to Jensen to kick him with his tied foot. In an astonishing struggle he managed to get within reach, but he couldn’t do much more than poke Jensen with his toes.
Wow, now they were playing footsy too!
+++
Jensen walked across the lawn towards the front door. He wasn’t quite sure why he didn’t just look Jared up in the phone book and call the guy to tell him that he had lost his wallet, instead of bringing it by personally after a long day of work. Jensen had pushed one of his morning clients in after the rest of his appointments, because the lady had refused to miss tightening her buttocks because of his car-problems. The result was a tired and grumbling Jensen who still drove quite a way past his own home to return the possessions of the psychic who had such a great connection with the powers-that-never-were, that he hadn’t even noticed losing something important. It just made Jensen roll his eyes.
He had never believed in spirits or what-not and probably would not have bothered that much if Jared wasn’t just irresistible even with his horrible taste and weird profession. But who was Jensen to look down on anybody. He was a gay man, who lived from wiggling his ass in front of lazy ladies and lusty, luxury daughters to make sure they enjoyed themselves while trying to lose enough hip fat to fit into the latest slutty dress.
Jared’s home was a small townhouse with a slightly overgrown lawn and a not quite white anymore layer of old paint. It wasn’t flashy or mysterious, but seemed comfortable for one person. It wasn’t as scarily colorful as Jensen had feared - although there was a rainbow painted on the garage door, and a disgustingly kitschy pink flamingo standing on the lawn, erasing all doubts that Jensen had picked the wrong address off Jared’s license.
He sighed, shaking his head as he made a wider than necessary circle around the offending piece of decoration and jumped up the few shallow steps to the landing in front of the door, digging in his jacket pocket for the wallet he wanted to return, before even taking the time for knocking. He wondered if Jared already missed it. Jensen was pretty sure he would have done if it had been his, and that he would have gone frantic by then, backtracking his steps of the day, but somehow Jared seemed to be more of the disoriented type with a short attention span, and Jensen wouldn’t be surprised if the tall man were misplacing his own stuff quite regularly.
His hand closed around the wallet, but he hadn’t even got it out when an arm came around him, and a hand with a wet rag clamped down over his mouth and nose at the same moment. Instant panic shot through Jensen’s body, and he jerked away with his whole body, landing a sharp elbow in something soft enough to be a belly - which was probably true judging by the pained groan behind him. Jensen had learned enough Taibo in his years on the job to be able to lay down some solid kicks and punches. Sadly he didn’t get the chance to even twist free fully, when the stinging smell made his head twist and his vision fade.
+++
“Stop kicking me!”
“You started it.”
Jensen huffed out a sigh and shot his fellow captive a dirty look. Jared was pouting, and maybe under other circumstances it would have been cute. But they were in quite a bit of trouble right now, and Jensen felt his survival instinct pressing in and making him bitchy. He felt that he had every right to be, too.
“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t even be here!”
“It’s not my fault they caught you.”
“Of course!” Jensen snapped. “If you hadn’t left your wallet lying on the goddamn street, I would never have shown up on your doorstep!”
“You were on my doorstep?” Jared’s genuine surprise made Jensen falter in his bitching.
“Yeah… why do you think I’m here?”
Jared frowned for a moment with a serious thinking face before shrugging as well as his fixed arms allowed. “I thought you would know why we’re here.”
“So you don’t know why we’re here?” Jensen had no idea, and so far he had been sure that this was all about Jared, and the other man would know exactly what was going on. Jensen had refrained from asking, because he figured the less he knew the better were his chances to be cut loose by the captors. But if Jared knew nothing… they were screwed.
“Errrm… bugger?”
“Bugger? That’s all you have to say? What are you? Some crazy British palm reader?”
“Hey! I’m a professional.”
“Professional what exactly?”
“Psychic soldier.”
Jensen blinked once. Twice. Then he started laughing. They were so screwed.
...next Part...*hugs* Birdie