At Home In Love!Verse #11
Title: At Home In Love!Verse #11
Author: lolee921
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: Mature (not me...the story)
Spoilers: Not a one
Warnings: May contain excessive schmoop, inappropriate people climbing, and boy touching
Disclaimer: It's all a load of bull, so sue me.
*So the internet at the hacienda doesn’t work and the internet at work is now being closely monitored to the point that we get little notices about talking to our bosses about why we needed to be on that site during working hours. I RESEARCH AND WRITE FOR A LIVING. Do you know how many times I’ve defended myself this week? But clearly LJ is off limits so I’m holding out and doing this from coffee shops when I have the time. Moral of the story…be patient with me please.
He had a drink at the airport and another on the plane. When the car dropped him at the hotel he dodged as many photographers as he could, including the asshole from TMZ who had made it his mission to torture Jay, and headed to the lounge with the intention of having another drink. But as he sat at the bar, thick crystal tumbler of liquor in front of him, he found it too hard to drink his problems away. He couldn’t say whether it was the sound of his ring clinking on the glass or the distinct smells and sounds of San Antonio, but it was clear to him that it just wasn’t going to happen, he was here for another reason. He dropped a bill on the bar and thanked the man who’d poured his untouched drink before heading up to his room.
He sat at the tiny table by the window of his fourth floor suite. His thumb kept running over the ‘2’ button on his phone. All he had to do was press it and he knew he could get Jensen on the line. It was getting late and he was tired and all he really needed or wanted was some kind of reassurance that he was doing the right thing. One word from Jen would mean it was the right thing.
But he fought off the urge and called Alisha instead.
"Hello". No matter how late it was, she always answered the phone and she always ready to listen.
"Hey Al. It’s me". He heard a deep sigh and some rustling.
"Jared? How are you doing, hunny?"
He loved that she knew to fall into her maternal tone when he needed it. "I’ll be better when all of this is over with", he sniffled. "Did you check on Jen?"
"I’m at the house now. Gave him his meds and tried to get him to eat but he doesn’t want anything". She stopped and took a deep breath. "He’s a mess Jay".
"I know". It was sorrowful and accepting.
"You’re not far behind him, either".
He cleared his throat loudly hoping it would cover the choked sob that had escaped him. "I know".
"Well. Brandon is at home with Aiden now and I’ll stay here for as long as I can, but he’s got a meeting in the afternoon and I can’t bring Aiden here. He wouldn’t understand it ".
Jared’s breath hitched, "Please don’t leave him alone".
"No, no. I’m not gonna let him be alone", her voice was laced with love and sympathy. "I called Maggie and she’s gonna come and sit with him when I leave. Don’t worry about him Jay. Try to concentrate on what you’re doing there".
Jared was holding in tears on the other end. "O-okay. Thank you Alisha. You mean more to us than you will ever know".
"Don’t thank me. I’m a mama, it’s what I do", he could feel her warm smile over the phone line. "Now I want you to eat something and go to bed so you can get an early start tomorrow".
"Yes maim", he whispered..
"I love you boys and I know that everything is going to be fine".
"I love you, too Al. And could you tell Jen that I -"
"He knows sweetie. But I’ll tell him anyway".
"Thanks". He hung up the line and called room service. She told him to eat and knew that somehow she’d know if he didn’t. He ordered a medium rare hamburger and iced tea and ate it all before he cried himself to sleep in the dim light of the hotel room.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"What is that?" Jensen sat up in the bed and stared at the tray Alisha placed in front of him.
"Oatmeal and a banana. Now eat it, you need something on your stomach if you’re gonna take your pills", she directed.
"I always have pop-tarts for breakfast", his fingers start to coil in the duvet. "Jay makes me the blueberry ones with frosting. They’re in the pantry. A whole box of them".
"Well I’m not Jared and you’re not getting pop-tarts", she replies sternly as she peels the banana and holds it out to him.
"He - he like’s banana’s in his cheerios every morning", he’s mumbling and staring at the fruit, lost. "Did you talk to him? Would you call him and make sure he’s eating his cheerios and not a box of donuts for breakfast?" He scrubs his face with his free hand and Alisha finds it very hard to watch. "Cause he’ll eat a bunch of donuts and by the time he’s done he’ll be sick from all the sugar and there’s no-no one to take care of him there".
Alisha sits down on the edge of the bed and puts the fruit back on the tray before holding a tissue out to him. "Jen".
"They don’t love him anymore. At least that’s what he thinks. And I love him, Ali, I do. I love him more than anything in this world and I’ve hurt him so bad I don’t know if he’ll come back to me. I’m so scared he won’t come back to me".
He’s a mess and he’s mumbling to comfort himself. Alisha can’t stand to see him this way so she does all she can do and pulls him into a hug and holds him like she would her own little boy. "He’s coming back, you just have to trust him".
His racing heart slows down and he leans back and looks at her with those bright green eyes then starts to eat his breakfast. He felt like he had to…he couldn’t do one more thing to upset someone he loved. He just couldn’t take the chance he might lose someone.
She sat quietly with him for a few minutes then asked him what she needed to know. "What happened Jen?"
He took a deep breath and put his spoon down. "I broke a vase at the office and slipped in -"
"No", she shook her head, "With Jared".
Jensen lifted his head to look her in the eye. "A lot of things happened. I screwed up and I did the wrong thing and stuff got out of hand".
"Just tell me what happened, Jensen".
"I lied to him. Over and over. He kept asking how work was, if I’d gotten offers on any of the proposals or if backers were interested in us. And every time he asked I looked him in the eye and lied to him and gave him excuses". His hand went up and he wiped a tear away. "He wasn’t asking for anything, just showing interest in my work, and all I could think to do was lie and hide the truth from him".
Alisha knew it wasn’t the whole story so she waited, "And Thanksgiving. There a reason you freaked out on all of us and yelled at him like that? I mean…Jen he said you wouldn’t even sleep in your bed that night".
"I lost the booking at the chapel and you guys kept asking me about the wedding and I just lost it a little. Work is stressful. Disappointing, you know? Getting turned down every day…I felt like a failure. Like I should just go back to acting and being pretty. And you factor in the deal with his mom and the way he refuses to talk about it and I just get so upset. I mean, I just want to help and he won’t talk to me about it. But I get a little tense and he’s barking up my tree about giving speeches and keeping things bottled up".
Ali took his hand and stroked her thumb across his open palm. "You honestly have no idea why he doesn’t talk to his mom?"
Jensen shook his head as he bit his bottom lip. "No, he just won’t talk about it".
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"Hey Dad", Jared stood stock still in the morning sun, waiting for an answer he already knew he wasn’t going to get. "I uh, I figured it was time to come home and sort things out and somehow you seem easier to talk to then mom". He chuckled nervously, "I’m a grown man, still afraid of his mama".
Birds were chirping all around him and the air was light and crisp for a Texas November. He shifted his feet and wished that Jen could have been there with him while he did this. But Jen was home where he belonged, so Jared took a deep breath and readied himself to do it on his own.
He sat on the ground above his father and spoke to the headstone. "I know you were mad at me when you died. You didn’t want me to get into this thing with Jen , you wanted me to meet a nice girl and start a family like Jeff. But he makes me happy dad", Jared looked up to the sky for a moment. "I know you liked him before we told you about us, back when we were just friends. I think you would like him now if you really got to know him. He’s just like you, really, quiet and reserved and totally set in his ways".
It’s then that Jared takes a deep breath and puts on his best ‘hard-ass’. Even if his father is gone, he still has to stand up and be the man he claims to be. "When you died you were so mad at me. You yelled and you were so mean". And here come the waterworks, so many tears falling in such a dramatic way that Dean would be proud. "If you hate me for who I fell in love with I can have deal with that, but I lost a mother and a father. Why did you have to do that to me?"
He moves to stand up, placing both hands on the ground and forcing his body up through the strength of his biceps. He wipes hi face and leans down to lay a kiss on the top of the headstone. "I’m gonna be the bigger man here Dad. I won’t be angry with you anymore and I won’t hold you responsible for all this pain. But one day, a long time from now, when you see Jensen on the other side…I want you to thank him. Cause the man I am now is because of him. What you started, he’s finished. And you owe him more than you could ever repay". Jared wipes away another tear and knocks his knuckles on the top of the headstone. "See ya’ old man", and he walks away.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"I’m leaving", Ali rushes around the table,slipping a coat over her scrubs. "Your next dose of antibiotics is at two and there are three ice packs ready in the freezer." She puts a sandwich, an apple, and a pop-tart on the coffee table with a bottle of water. "Is there anything else you need before I go?"
Jensen looks up from the TV to the spread in front of him. He smiles and stands up to hug Ali. "Thank You Ali. I - we’d be lost if you weren’t here".
"I know, you’re just like every man I know", she chuckles and kisses him on the cheek. "Now", she steps around him as he sits back down, "Maggie will be here in about an hour, so just sit tight till then".
"Yes Maim".
She smiles around the door, "Be good Jen".
He sits in his pile of blankets after she leaves and slowly eats what she left out for him, going through everything in his head. He has to find a way to fix things and be better at this.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Shaking paparazzi in San Antonio is just as hard as shaking them in LA and maybe harder than it is back at home. He’s got on his hat on and a pair of shades, but towering a foot over the rest of the population makes him stick out and that nose and those dimples give him away easily. So he rents a car at the airport rent a car and drives the long way to his mama’s house. The long way being all the way to Sommerset and back through the heart of the city, just taking in this place he grew up in.
When he does finally pull onto Seigen Ave. he feels his chest tighten and wishes for nothing more than to be able to walk in the front door and find Megan and Jeff screwing around in the living room with Dad while mom cooks. He wants to go back in time when all of this was easier. But Meggie is at school in Lubbock at Tech and Jeff is a husband and father now. On top of that, their father is in the ground and his mother won’t even look at him. No, this is reality now and as much as it hurts he has to deal with it.
He parks in the street in front of the house and takes off his cap, running his hand through his hair to straighten the curls the best he can. He gets out of the tiny SUV and walks up the pavement to the house, all the while reminding himself to breathe. His mind replays his last trip here when his mother wouldn’t even see him, the way she opened the door to find him there, then took her own keys and walked out of the house and disappeared.
He couldn’t focus on anything but the present and future. So he pulls his old set of keys from his pocket and lets himself into his childhood home. Inside he can hear Patsy Cline singing and filling the whole house. He walks through the living room and into the kitchen, not saying a word or giving his mother the chance to walk again.
When he turns the corner into the dining room he can see his mother at the counter pouring chocolate chips into a bowl and smiles when he smells it. She’s making his favorite, cowboy cookies, and he can’t help but smile at the memory of her baking them special for him.
"Mama", he says softly. But Patsy is loud, so he has to say it again to get her attention. "Mama".
Sherry looks up from her work and drops the spoon in her hand. "Jared". It’s a mix of shock and recognition, and with the recognition comes the need to flee. She looks around for an exit to find that Jared is blocking the only one she has.
"I know you don’t want to see me and you don’t want to talk to me, but I need to talk to you. My life depends on you listening to me Mama", he tells her.
"Jared, I can’t -", she starts.
"It doesn’t matter if you think you can’t. You’re my mom. So sit down and let me talk".
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Maggie got to the house around five only to find it empty. She had walked through the back yard to check on the girls before strolling through the house to check on Jen. When she found the kitchen and couch empty she paced the floor screaming his name and hoping he was okay.
In the office she found the proposals they had worked on spread across the desk and floor. He’d inked them up, crossing out lines and re-writing them, scratching through whole paragraphs. The computer was on and edited versions were being typed up and his cell was plugged into the USB hub to charge up.
She sat in the chair and pulled out her phone, biting her lip trying to decide the level of panic this earned. She was a moment away from calling Jared when she heard theback door open and the dogs come barreling in with their daddy.
Jensen was standing in the kitchen against the counter, tumbling with the coffee pot when Maggie came around the corner with her hands on her hips, ready to chastise him.
"Oh, Mags", he lunged forward and wrapped an arm around her. "I am so sorry Maggie".
She pulled back from his ice cold skin and looked him in the eye, "Sorry? For what? Where were you?"
Jensen took a second to kiss her on the forehead and pull her flush against him again. "I’ve been a complete ass. I put you in an impossible position with the shit at work then I yelled at you and scared you and…I’m saying I’m sorry for everything I do that makes your life more complicated than it has to be. You’re too good of a friend and I just walked all over you".
Maggie pulled back from the hug and looked Jensen in the eye. "Have you been drinking?"
He let go of her and laughed, turning back to the coffee pot and pulling bottles of pills out. "I was at church".
"The chapel? Did you get the booking after all?"
"No", Jensen shook his head and counted pills. "I went to church. Always helped when I was younger so I thought I’d try".
"And?" She reached around and pulled a glass from the cupboard, filling it with tap water.
"Thank You", he took the glass and swallowed the pills. "I found what I needed". He smiled brightly for what seemed like the first time in a long time.
."Is there anything you need, something I can do?"
"Yeah", he slipped off his coat and headed back to the kitchen for an ice pack. "You can order a pizza and help me with these new proposals".
"Proposals?" She was confused.
Jensen smiled as he sat down on the couch, pulling his arm out of the sling and pressing the ice pack to it. "Yeah, new proposals…I’m gonna fix everything".
Author: lolee921
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: Mature (not me...the story)
Spoilers: Not a one
Warnings: May contain excessive schmoop, inappropriate people climbing, and boy touching
Disclaimer: It's all a load of bull, so sue me.
*So the internet at the hacienda doesn’t work and the internet at work is now being closely monitored to the point that we get little notices about talking to our bosses about why we needed to be on that site during working hours. I RESEARCH AND WRITE FOR A LIVING. Do you know how many times I’ve defended myself this week? But clearly LJ is off limits so I’m holding out and doing this from coffee shops when I have the time. Moral of the story…be patient with me please.
He had a drink at the airport and another on the plane. When the car dropped him at the hotel he dodged as many photographers as he could, including the asshole from TMZ who had made it his mission to torture Jay, and headed to the lounge with the intention of having another drink. But as he sat at the bar, thick crystal tumbler of liquor in front of him, he found it too hard to drink his problems away. He couldn’t say whether it was the sound of his ring clinking on the glass or the distinct smells and sounds of San Antonio, but it was clear to him that it just wasn’t going to happen, he was here for another reason. He dropped a bill on the bar and thanked the man who’d poured his untouched drink before heading up to his room.
He sat at the tiny table by the window of his fourth floor suite. His thumb kept running over the ‘2’ button on his phone. All he had to do was press it and he knew he could get Jensen on the line. It was getting late and he was tired and all he really needed or wanted was some kind of reassurance that he was doing the right thing. One word from Jen would mean it was the right thing.
But he fought off the urge and called Alisha instead.
"Hello". No matter how late it was, she always answered the phone and she always ready to listen.
"Hey Al. It’s me". He heard a deep sigh and some rustling.
"Jared? How are you doing, hunny?"
He loved that she knew to fall into her maternal tone when he needed it. "I’ll be better when all of this is over with", he sniffled. "Did you check on Jen?"
"I’m at the house now. Gave him his meds and tried to get him to eat but he doesn’t want anything". She stopped and took a deep breath. "He’s a mess Jay".
"I know". It was sorrowful and accepting.
"You’re not far behind him, either".
He cleared his throat loudly hoping it would cover the choked sob that had escaped him. "I know".
"Well. Brandon is at home with Aiden now and I’ll stay here for as long as I can, but he’s got a meeting in the afternoon and I can’t bring Aiden here. He wouldn’t understand it ".
Jared’s breath hitched, "Please don’t leave him alone".
"No, no. I’m not gonna let him be alone", her voice was laced with love and sympathy. "I called Maggie and she’s gonna come and sit with him when I leave. Don’t worry about him Jay. Try to concentrate on what you’re doing there".
Jared was holding in tears on the other end. "O-okay. Thank you Alisha. You mean more to us than you will ever know".
"Don’t thank me. I’m a mama, it’s what I do", he could feel her warm smile over the phone line. "Now I want you to eat something and go to bed so you can get an early start tomorrow".
"Yes maim", he whispered..
"I love you boys and I know that everything is going to be fine".
"I love you, too Al. And could you tell Jen that I -"
"He knows sweetie. But I’ll tell him anyway".
"Thanks". He hung up the line and called room service. She told him to eat and knew that somehow she’d know if he didn’t. He ordered a medium rare hamburger and iced tea and ate it all before he cried himself to sleep in the dim light of the hotel room.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"What is that?" Jensen sat up in the bed and stared at the tray Alisha placed in front of him.
"Oatmeal and a banana. Now eat it, you need something on your stomach if you’re gonna take your pills", she directed.
"I always have pop-tarts for breakfast", his fingers start to coil in the duvet. "Jay makes me the blueberry ones with frosting. They’re in the pantry. A whole box of them".
"Well I’m not Jared and you’re not getting pop-tarts", she replies sternly as she peels the banana and holds it out to him.
"He - he like’s banana’s in his cheerios every morning", he’s mumbling and staring at the fruit, lost. "Did you talk to him? Would you call him and make sure he’s eating his cheerios and not a box of donuts for breakfast?" He scrubs his face with his free hand and Alisha finds it very hard to watch. "Cause he’ll eat a bunch of donuts and by the time he’s done he’ll be sick from all the sugar and there’s no-no one to take care of him there".
Alisha sits down on the edge of the bed and puts the fruit back on the tray before holding a tissue out to him. "Jen".
"They don’t love him anymore. At least that’s what he thinks. And I love him, Ali, I do. I love him more than anything in this world and I’ve hurt him so bad I don’t know if he’ll come back to me. I’m so scared he won’t come back to me".
He’s a mess and he’s mumbling to comfort himself. Alisha can’t stand to see him this way so she does all she can do and pulls him into a hug and holds him like she would her own little boy. "He’s coming back, you just have to trust him".
His racing heart slows down and he leans back and looks at her with those bright green eyes then starts to eat his breakfast. He felt like he had to…he couldn’t do one more thing to upset someone he loved. He just couldn’t take the chance he might lose someone.
She sat quietly with him for a few minutes then asked him what she needed to know. "What happened Jen?"
He took a deep breath and put his spoon down. "I broke a vase at the office and slipped in -"
"No", she shook her head, "With Jared".
Jensen lifted his head to look her in the eye. "A lot of things happened. I screwed up and I did the wrong thing and stuff got out of hand".
"Just tell me what happened, Jensen".
"I lied to him. Over and over. He kept asking how work was, if I’d gotten offers on any of the proposals or if backers were interested in us. And every time he asked I looked him in the eye and lied to him and gave him excuses". His hand went up and he wiped a tear away. "He wasn’t asking for anything, just showing interest in my work, and all I could think to do was lie and hide the truth from him".
Alisha knew it wasn’t the whole story so she waited, "And Thanksgiving. There a reason you freaked out on all of us and yelled at him like that? I mean…Jen he said you wouldn’t even sleep in your bed that night".
"I lost the booking at the chapel and you guys kept asking me about the wedding and I just lost it a little. Work is stressful. Disappointing, you know? Getting turned down every day…I felt like a failure. Like I should just go back to acting and being pretty. And you factor in the deal with his mom and the way he refuses to talk about it and I just get so upset. I mean, I just want to help and he won’t talk to me about it. But I get a little tense and he’s barking up my tree about giving speeches and keeping things bottled up".
Ali took his hand and stroked her thumb across his open palm. "You honestly have no idea why he doesn’t talk to his mom?"
Jensen shook his head as he bit his bottom lip. "No, he just won’t talk about it".
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"Hey Dad", Jared stood stock still in the morning sun, waiting for an answer he already knew he wasn’t going to get. "I uh, I figured it was time to come home and sort things out and somehow you seem easier to talk to then mom". He chuckled nervously, "I’m a grown man, still afraid of his mama".
Birds were chirping all around him and the air was light and crisp for a Texas November. He shifted his feet and wished that Jen could have been there with him while he did this. But Jen was home where he belonged, so Jared took a deep breath and readied himself to do it on his own.
He sat on the ground above his father and spoke to the headstone. "I know you were mad at me when you died. You didn’t want me to get into this thing with Jen , you wanted me to meet a nice girl and start a family like Jeff. But he makes me happy dad", Jared looked up to the sky for a moment. "I know you liked him before we told you about us, back when we were just friends. I think you would like him now if you really got to know him. He’s just like you, really, quiet and reserved and totally set in his ways".
It’s then that Jared takes a deep breath and puts on his best ‘hard-ass’. Even if his father is gone, he still has to stand up and be the man he claims to be. "When you died you were so mad at me. You yelled and you were so mean". And here come the waterworks, so many tears falling in such a dramatic way that Dean would be proud. "If you hate me for who I fell in love with I can have deal with that, but I lost a mother and a father. Why did you have to do that to me?"
He moves to stand up, placing both hands on the ground and forcing his body up through the strength of his biceps. He wipes hi face and leans down to lay a kiss on the top of the headstone. "I’m gonna be the bigger man here Dad. I won’t be angry with you anymore and I won’t hold you responsible for all this pain. But one day, a long time from now, when you see Jensen on the other side…I want you to thank him. Cause the man I am now is because of him. What you started, he’s finished. And you owe him more than you could ever repay". Jared wipes away another tear and knocks his knuckles on the top of the headstone. "See ya’ old man", and he walks away.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"I’m leaving", Ali rushes around the table,slipping a coat over her scrubs. "Your next dose of antibiotics is at two and there are three ice packs ready in the freezer." She puts a sandwich, an apple, and a pop-tart on the coffee table with a bottle of water. "Is there anything else you need before I go?"
Jensen looks up from the TV to the spread in front of him. He smiles and stands up to hug Ali. "Thank You Ali. I - we’d be lost if you weren’t here".
"I know, you’re just like every man I know", she chuckles and kisses him on the cheek. "Now", she steps around him as he sits back down, "Maggie will be here in about an hour, so just sit tight till then".
"Yes Maim".
She smiles around the door, "Be good Jen".
He sits in his pile of blankets after she leaves and slowly eats what she left out for him, going through everything in his head. He has to find a way to fix things and be better at this.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Shaking paparazzi in San Antonio is just as hard as shaking them in LA and maybe harder than it is back at home. He’s got on his hat on and a pair of shades, but towering a foot over the rest of the population makes him stick out and that nose and those dimples give him away easily. So he rents a car at the airport rent a car and drives the long way to his mama’s house. The long way being all the way to Sommerset and back through the heart of the city, just taking in this place he grew up in.
When he does finally pull onto Seigen Ave. he feels his chest tighten and wishes for nothing more than to be able to walk in the front door and find Megan and Jeff screwing around in the living room with Dad while mom cooks. He wants to go back in time when all of this was easier. But Meggie is at school in Lubbock at Tech and Jeff is a husband and father now. On top of that, their father is in the ground and his mother won’t even look at him. No, this is reality now and as much as it hurts he has to deal with it.
He parks in the street in front of the house and takes off his cap, running his hand through his hair to straighten the curls the best he can. He gets out of the tiny SUV and walks up the pavement to the house, all the while reminding himself to breathe. His mind replays his last trip here when his mother wouldn’t even see him, the way she opened the door to find him there, then took her own keys and walked out of the house and disappeared.
He couldn’t focus on anything but the present and future. So he pulls his old set of keys from his pocket and lets himself into his childhood home. Inside he can hear Patsy Cline singing and filling the whole house. He walks through the living room and into the kitchen, not saying a word or giving his mother the chance to walk again.
When he turns the corner into the dining room he can see his mother at the counter pouring chocolate chips into a bowl and smiles when he smells it. She’s making his favorite, cowboy cookies, and he can’t help but smile at the memory of her baking them special for him.
"Mama", he says softly. But Patsy is loud, so he has to say it again to get her attention. "Mama".
Sherry looks up from her work and drops the spoon in her hand. "Jared". It’s a mix of shock and recognition, and with the recognition comes the need to flee. She looks around for an exit to find that Jared is blocking the only one she has.
"I know you don’t want to see me and you don’t want to talk to me, but I need to talk to you. My life depends on you listening to me Mama", he tells her.
"Jared, I can’t -", she starts.
"It doesn’t matter if you think you can’t. You’re my mom. So sit down and let me talk".
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Maggie got to the house around five only to find it empty. She had walked through the back yard to check on the girls before strolling through the house to check on Jen. When she found the kitchen and couch empty she paced the floor screaming his name and hoping he was okay.
In the office she found the proposals they had worked on spread across the desk and floor. He’d inked them up, crossing out lines and re-writing them, scratching through whole paragraphs. The computer was on and edited versions were being typed up and his cell was plugged into the USB hub to charge up.
She sat in the chair and pulled out her phone, biting her lip trying to decide the level of panic this earned. She was a moment away from calling Jared when she heard theback door open and the dogs come barreling in with their daddy.
Jensen was standing in the kitchen against the counter, tumbling with the coffee pot when Maggie came around the corner with her hands on her hips, ready to chastise him.
"Oh, Mags", he lunged forward and wrapped an arm around her. "I am so sorry Maggie".
She pulled back from his ice cold skin and looked him in the eye, "Sorry? For what? Where were you?"
Jensen took a second to kiss her on the forehead and pull her flush against him again. "I’ve been a complete ass. I put you in an impossible position with the shit at work then I yelled at you and scared you and…I’m saying I’m sorry for everything I do that makes your life more complicated than it has to be. You’re too good of a friend and I just walked all over you".
Maggie pulled back from the hug and looked Jensen in the eye. "Have you been drinking?"
He let go of her and laughed, turning back to the coffee pot and pulling bottles of pills out. "I was at church".
"The chapel? Did you get the booking after all?"
"No", Jensen shook his head and counted pills. "I went to church. Always helped when I was younger so I thought I’d try".
"And?" She reached around and pulled a glass from the cupboard, filling it with tap water.
"Thank You", he took the glass and swallowed the pills. "I found what I needed". He smiled brightly for what seemed like the first time in a long time.
."Is there anything you need, something I can do?"
"Yeah", he slipped off his coat and headed back to the kitchen for an ice pack. "You can order a pizza and help me with these new proposals".
"Proposals?" She was confused.
Jensen smiled as he sat down on the couch, pulling his arm out of the sling and pressing the ice pack to it. "Yeah, new proposals…I’m gonna fix everything".