Title: When You’re Home
Fandom: Newsies
Pairing: Jack/David
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 950
Disclaimer: I own nothing. I probably never will.
Notes: The title? Stolen from the song from “In the Heights”
A/N: I’ve missed Newsies. So I’m posting. <3. Plus, lawyer!David and fireman!Jack. That’s fanservice for you.
The only good thing he could ever see about being alone was that he didn’t have to pretend like he wasn’t exhausted. He fell into the bed and let his mind run free. He smiled as his head filled with images of brown curls and pale skin and a grin that made him sigh into his pillow. He rolled over on the bed, every muscle in his body was screaming. Then he remembered that he shouldn’t have been able to roll over without feeling David’s hot breath on his back, yelling at him for being a bed hog.
He rubbed his face and sat up. He glanced at his phone on the table. He checked the clock. He looked back at the phone again and sighed. It was too late to call. David would be home from school and work and be sleeping happily in his bed. He sighed and scratched the back of his neck and pouted a little.
He flipped on the TV and tried to sleep again. He flopped over into different positions, trying every channel on the set and every way to lay down he could think of, and when this didn’t work, he grabbed his phone and sent a message.
“i miss u”
He dragged himself out of bed and padded into the kitchen to grab a beer. He threw his shirt into the hamper because the sweat it had collected made it cling to his back. He sipped the cold beer and lowered himself back onto the bed slowly, the muscles in his legs begging him to drop.
When he looked over to his bedside table to click the lamp off, his phone was glowing. He grabbed it like a toddler clamors for a cookie and opened the message, grinning like a maniac when he saw who the sender was.
“Your spelling pains me. Thanks for waking me up.”
Which wiped the smile right off of his face. He missed David and it made him more scared than ever that he wasn’t going to come back to him. He understood that he had to go off and live his dream and become some hotshot lawyer and that meant law school at Harvard. He understood. Really. No matter how much he understood why they had to be apart, it didn’t make him miss David any less. It didn’t make him any less afraid that David would find someone better in Boston. It didn’t make the fear of everything falling through his fingers any less gnawing. He drained the rest of his beer and lay back down in the empty bed, clicking the TV off at the same time.
He sighed. He’d worked hard. Getting his degree. Passing the fireman’s test. Studying right by David. He’d gotten accepted the same day David had. That day had been the best one of his life. He was working still, going to firefighters’ school at the day and working at night at the gas station to pay the bills.
David had seemed distant all week though. Maybe he was just paranoid, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that David was getting too important for him. He deserved someone smarter and less paranoid and who made more money and didn’t pass out every night because he was so tired.
He fell into half sleep, glancing at the clock every few minutes, thanking god that he got to sleep in tomorrow. Images of Davey flicked through his mind. When they were just kids and they flew around town on their bikes. The first time they kissed and David got that stern expression and went back to editing his paper. The look he had when he asked him to move in together. The look he had when he graduated. The look he had every time he came.
He tossed and turned, thinking of how David seemed to be getting further away and how much that it made him want to throw up. He thought about how he was sick of working so hard. He drifted into a half-sleep, filled with images of David loving him. Then the bed sagged a little.
He woke with a start, getting ready to hit whoever had broken into his apartment. Then he felt lips on his neck and smelled the sent of books and soap and apples. “David,” he couldn’t work any more noise out of his throat than a low moan. Instead he grabbed onto his back and pulled him down on top of him hard.
Jack laid sprawled on his stomach, long limbs stretched out over the bed and David. He was grinning like a madman into the pillow with his eyes shut. He held the image of David, sitting up peacefully in the bed with a thin sheen of sweat and a contented smile on his face.
“You look tired, Jack,” David said, tracing a finger down his sweat drenched spine.
“I am tired. Thank you for coming back,” he opened his eyes and looked up.
“Shh. Don’t,” David said, laying himself down and stroking Jack’s hair. “I wanted to surprise you. I’m sorry that I didn’t talk to you enough this week. I had to do extra work to get away. And I knew I would end up telling you if I talked to you too much. I wanted to tell you so badly when you texted me earlier. I don’t know how I didn’t get a speeding ticket,” he chuckled. “I love you. I know it’s hard, but-”
Jack kissed him on the mouth. “It isn’t really when you’re home. Love you, Davey,” falling asleep, resting in the crook of David’s neck while he stroked his hair. “Love you, Davey.”