Dirty Talk
Since the AC is broken it's about 80 degrees in the house. So I can't sleep. Thought I would post this up here like I had been meaning to for ages. And by ages I mean, roughly, a week.
A Javid oneshot. Fluff. I don't own Newsies or the song. Any song. I am not musically gifted. I own nothing. I don't even own a working air conditioner anymore.
As always, CC is loved. Will bake you cookies for CC.
David was sitting at the computer screen. The movements of his fingers were terse and led all the way up to stiff shoulders. He was in the midst of a fight with Jack, but still desperately plucking at keys to finish his story. It was what caused the entire debacle anyway. He could at least devote some of his time to it now that Jack wasn’t speaking to him.
It had all started with a whistle.
Jack had the Saturday off from work. He was a mechanic. (This in itself had started many an argument between David and Jack. The sheer amount of motor oil David attempted to get out of his hair every morning sent David on a half hour long daily tirade about proper washing habits and how much it smelled and that, no, it being a good lubricant is not reason enough not to wash your hands.) Jack was a mechanic and had a Saturday off. These two things almost never happened to the same person at one time.
David understood why his Jack was always working Saturdays. Working people had to take their cars in sometime. He had held his whining to a minimum. He was really quite proud of the first month. He hadn’t even complained once as Jack woke him up by singing in the shower, or about how alone he felt, or about not having anyone to go the movies with.
After a while, David became very fond of his Saturdays alone. He had been able to, in the four months Jack had been working down at Earl’s, clean out the closets, dust, vacuum, rearrange the furniture, compile every week’s grocery list, called his mother, bought gifts for his nieces and nephew, and gone to see them three times. He had also alphabetized everything in his house; from his books, to Jack’s ever growing music collection which was getting more eclectic every day. David swore he had found a disk of symphonies, Born to Run, and a New Pornographer’s CD all sitting together on Jack’s bedside table, next to an ancient walkman. He laughed at Jack’s strange collection of lullabies, though he was a little relieved that he had a reason for that dream he had about Bruce Springsteen’s ass.
David was also able to get caught up on all his stories for the paper. There were two reasons that David loved this. The first was that he got to spend more time with Jack when they were both home. The second, and he would never admit this, was that Jack was not there to irritate him while he tried to work.
David had come to enjoy his Saturdays. On this particular one, he planned to finish all the work he had missed when he had to take a day off because he had the head cold to end all head colds and catch up on everything for the next week. After that, David planned to start The Impossible Task.
He had bought Jack an mp3 player two Christmases ago. Jack said that he loved it and sighed in a way that could only mean, "Oh my sweet David, I shall never be able to upload everything. Would you please, my love, help me with this task that shall cover me in an avalanche of jewel cases?" And David had caved and planned to do it, too. It was just that new jobs and moving in together had gotten in the way of his plans. And there were just too many of them. There was no way he would ever get it done.
That was until he won his ten hours of freedom a week.
David had gone to sleep Friday night with a surge of dedication through his veins. He was even a little excited. That is, until he woke up like this:
"Jack! Jack, wake up! You were supposed to be at work two and a half hours ago. Jack!" David said when he rolled over and saw the clock say nine. He shook Jack who was sleeping very soundly, and was sprawled over the bed and David.
Jack barely had to wake up to hear and speak. "Don’t have to work," he said in a groggy slur. And he barely had to take a breath to be back in a sleep so deep that David would have been sure he was dead if he hadn’t been sleeping next to him every night for a year and a half.
David crawled out from under Jack’s limbs and padded in nothing but his pajama bottoms to the dining room table where his laptop set, with all his notes paraded around it. He clicked the computer on and went to start a pot of coffee.
He was just about to go and grab his first cup when Jack came bounding in. He started to pull things out of the refrigerator in a furry. "Eggs and french toast?" he called to David. "David Jacobs you are really a wonderful man", David thought of himself as he held his groan in for Jack’s benefit.
He really wanted to groan.
David could never really fathom how Jack was so peppy in the morning. Sure, it took a fire alarm going off in his ear to wake him up, but once Jack was up, he was completely awake, ready to start his day. David, who woke up when Jack snored too loudly, took at least twenty minutes to force sounds beyond primal grunts come out of his mouth.
There was a second groan bubbling in the back of David’s throat as Jack put butter in a hot skillet. Jack could make beautiful breakfast food. Of course, that was the only thing he could cook, but David was one to see the glass half full. David was sure, however, that Jack’s beautiful breakfasts should be reserved for Sundays. Sunday was the day that Jack would be especially careful not to wake Davey until he had cooked him pancakes. It was the day that Jack was the sweetest. Saturday was David’s day to be alone and as crabby as he liked. All David wanted to eat on Saturday was at least one pot of coffee and possibly half a bagel. He did not want to force feed himself french toast.
David picked at scrambled eggs and drank gargantuan swigs of coffee as he searched through notes and typed out perfectly phrased sentences on some horrifically boring story about tomatoes. He couldn’t concentrate on what was happening to those tomatoes.
What he was concentrating on was Jack starring at him from across the table. Jack was gobbling his food, in much the same way he always gobbled. Only today David was finding that he did it... louder. Or for longer. Or something. Something he was doing was making David feel the urge to fling a fork at him.
Once he was done eating and Jack was done complaining about how little David had eaten, Jack went to do the dishes, and David was granted a few moments of peace. He had moved on to another equally boring freelance piece about the process of using sugar cane pulp to make paper. This was the piece that he was working on when Jack came back in and plopped down in a chair, backwards, watching David as he typed.
"Need something?"
"Nope."
"Then why are you staring Jack?"
"Because I can’t stand not to look at your face."
"Good answer," a wicked grin formed on David’s face, despite how much he wanted to shut Jack’s starring down. "I’ll be done soon." From the look in Jack’s eyes he wanted to be done soon. He was going to be done or he was going to start writing about sugar cane in a way that would get him a very successful career as a romance novelist. "Oh god, I hope I’m done soon." Jack was licking his lips and running his fingers through his hair in the way he knew David couldn’t resist. He laughed a cocky little laugh and muttered something about predictability.
David didn’t care that he was predictable. As soon as he finished his work he was going to organize his notes. Then Jack would be naked on the table. Then he was going to wipe the table off with lots of antiseptic. This was David’s plan. He had much more work than he thought. David had also far overestimated Jack’s attention span.
He started to whistle. Not a melodic whistle, it was just noise coming from his crooked teeth. Then David recognized the tune. He could have started to sing it. It was almost pleasant. Then Jack took two pens and started to drum on the table. It was beginning to shake the notes.
"Jack. Stop," he said tensely and overemphasized the ‘p’ in stop.
"Aw David. I’m bored. Let me have a little fun."
"Jack, go do something to entertain yourself."
"I wanted to. You just wouldn’t let me."
"What wouldn’t I let you do?"
"You!"
David simply rolled his eyes and then tried to get back into a story about some city council-man who was trying to save a playground from demolition. Jack seized this opportunity to start making music again.
"Jack, go away. I’m trying to work!"
"I can’t believe that you would be working on the one Saturday I have off!"
"Well, maybe if somebody had told me they didn’t have to work I could have cleared my schedule!"
"That’s not the point," Jack said and flew away in a huff. He was always the first one to leave. He was usually the first one to forgive too.
David could hold a fight for weeks really. He could argue until he was blue in the face. Jack, who had grown up in a house where there was real fighting, couldn’t stand the sound of David’s raised voice clashing with his own. Whenever David thought about this, he felt bad. But then he went back to his work, as stubborn as ever. He convinced himself that this one was really Jack’s fault, although it didn’t make him feel any better.
When he was done, instead of taking on The Impossible Task, he flopped down on the couch and shut his eyes. This day had gone terribly. It was only one o’clock and it was a truly terrible day. He knew where Jack was, sitting on their bed and listening to some record. He would be flipping through albums, searching for the right song to fit his feeling. David rubbed his temples, because all he wanted to do was make this better. But he didn’t know how and he couldn’t make his feet go find Jack.
Instead he just listened harder. He thought he could hear Jack singing. He loved it when Jack sang along, no matter how hard he protested it. Jack’s voice wasn’t flawless, but David thought when coupled with his charming smile he knew he could sell records of Jack to millions of teenage girls. He never voiced this thought. It would inflate Jack’s ego to the size of Pompeii. And he knew how that one ended.
Listening more he became surer that Jack was singing. And it was coming closer. "‘You never act the way you should, but I like it. And I know you like it too, the way that I want you. I gotta have you. Oh yes, I do.’"
"Jack? Is that... Poison? You’re singing? During an argument? Poison?"
Jack’s smile was full of mischief. It was a dangerous smile. He nodded and continued to sing. "‘I never, I never ever stay out late. You know that I can hardly wait, just to see you. And I know you cannot, wait, wait to see me, too. I gotta touch you.’"
"Oh god help you." David rolled his eyes, but he stepped closer to Jack.
Jack kept walking closer to David and put his arm around him. "‘Cause baby, we’ll be at the drive in, in the old man’s ford, behind the bushes, till I’m screamin’ for more. Lock the cellar door, and baby, talk dirty to me.’" His smile was wicked, but his eyes were all apology.
David really couldn’t be mad at Jack for very long. He kissed him very hard on the lips, with his own pulling up into a giddy grin that he couldn’t suppress.
"I’m not in trouble anymore?"
"No. Though, I’m not sure about the song choice."
"It’s nice. And true. I love you Davey."
"Yes. So show me."
"On the couch?"
"Yes."
"Well, it’s not a Ford or a basement, but it’ll do."
As David went to kiss Jack’s neck, he was almost sure that he could hear the first few bars of "I’m on Fire," being hummed. He let it go, because he liked Springsteen and he loved Jack. Music fetish and all.