J2!Scrubs: "Costume" (J2 AU, NC-17)
Title: Costume
Pairing: Jared/Jensen (J2 AU)
Rating: NC-17 for pervery, boys-being-boys, cussin', and adult-style snark wars.
Disclaimer: Lies, lies, lies.
Word Count: 4000
Beta(s): havenward and mini_moue
Summary: Jared's a harried, hassled, frazzled, frustrated resident at Saint Francis of Immaculate Mercy General. Jensen's a cranky, bristly, snarky attending physician in serious denial. Or is he? Features toppy! (if confused) Jared and pushy-bottom!Jensen. Fifth in the J2!Scrubs series of stand-alones.
Costume
Today's one of the more unusual days Jared's ever had the pleasure of experiencing at Immaculate Mercy. Which is saying a lot.
"This makes no sense."
"No one said it had to, especially not here. Hold still."
"I don't wanna play." Jared crosses his arms. And pouts, but in a manly way.
"Tough." Sophia's busy doing up the buttons of his borrowed, upsized coverall. "You're going to look terrific, Big Bird. I mean, Chewbacca." She dimples at him, then pinches him in the side. "So stop complaining."
"Halloween was weeks ago. Why again are we doing this now?"
"Because it's Lehne's favorite holiday and he was down with the flu on the day itself, remember?"
Jared does. It was awesome. Lehne would like to think he's as scary as Ackles. In his own way, Lehne underestimates himself. With him gone for a whole weekend, it had been like living in a Downy fabric softener commercial, with peace and harmony and teddy bears and the fragrance of fresh spring flowers wafting through the air.
For fifteen whole glorious minutes they'd sung and danced in the hallways until Dr. Ackles came along and cut in on the ninth chorus of "We Are the World", megaphone in hand, promising he was going to tell everyone's parents if they didn't get back to doing their goddamn jobs.
"Jerk," Jared mumbles.
"Excuse me?" Sophia puts one hand on her hip. Uh-oh. "I spent hours putting this together. Costumes don't exactly come right off the rack in your size, you know. Especially not on one day's notice."
Jared looks down at the faux-grunge, Cantina-style tribute to George Lucas's drunker moments complete with Wookie-fur arms. Sophia's work, every stitch of it. And under her guidance, he's back-combed his hair into something Don King would weep with envy over. Under her iron fist, he and everyone else on the floor has agreed to participate. They look positively festive, if out of season. Color me impressed. And stylish. "I owe you, Sophia."
"Damn right you do." She breathes on a bit of his costume's gilt rick-rack and polishes it with her sleeve. "And I'm gonna take it out in nights you spend away while I commit unspeakable acts wherever I please in the apartment. Deal?"
"Fair enough." Except… "I thought you and Chad weren't talking."
The tip of her sewing needle pokes dangerously close to the underside of his nose. Holy crap, that was fast. "Catwoman," Jared blurts.
"No, I'm Martha Stewart. Why? I'll tell you. Somehow, every yahoo in this place who doesn't know how to sew got wind of my skills and if I'm going to whore myself out I needed a proper role model. Now stand still. How's my hair?"
To Jared--and, he suspects, everyone else--Sophia with a blonde bouffant is incredibly, incredibly wrong. "You look spectacular," he lies with a happy-puppy smile, because Sophia is not only a nurse, she is a nurse with a needle, and she can do far worse with it than puncture his septum. He fears her. And most other women, come to think about it.
"I do?"
"One hundred percent really, really… um, pretty. That does wash out, doesn't it?" He tries to touch the bubble and is repelled three inches away by the force-field might of her hairspray.
"Watch the hands, Big Bird."
"Yes ma'am." Jared subsides, distracted by the gilt trim. Shiny. "When'd you get away from work to go buy all of this?"
"Who has time to shop? I got most of the sparkly stuff from the lost and found box, the buttons from the ass box, and for the fabric I cut apart two of Kane's uniforms, sewed them back together, and dyed them black."
Jared's heart stops. He hopes someone who knows how to operate a crash cart is standing by. But with this kind of bad mojo working against him, Kane would probably divert the leads to an electric chair.
Sophia scoffs and tugs the last button on his vest closed. "You worry too much about that guy. You're what, two feet taller than he is?"
"You will rarely if ever hear a man say so, but in this case, size doesn't matter."
"Good to hear you finally admit that," Dr. Ackles says, his presence heretofore unannounced, from behind the supply cabinet.
Jared's sure he saw a glimpse of the white light that time, and loved ones beckoning him to walk toward them.
"So jumpy," Sophia chides. She checks to make sure the seams of her hose are straight on the back of her legs--if Jared swung that way he might be tempted to fight Chad for her--and leads him toward the front of the nurses' station. "Leave the grumpy doctor doing God-knows-what creepy stuff alone and go do your job. Lehne wants you to stop by Pediatrics first to show off your Wookie warble."
"I don't think I know how to warble."
"Oh now, that's just not true," Dr. Ackles mocks, still completely hidden from view. "There's this amazingly embarrassing noise he makes mid-orgasm that's like a cross between Yma Sumac and a dying elephant. Give that one a go."
"Do not rise to him. Come with me. A man like him, it hurts him far more to be ignored so keep walking, okay?" Sophia pats the inner bend of Jared's elbow, which he offers to her as a proper gentleman--Wookie--should.
"Far be it from me to correct a lady, especially when she's…uh, correct. And as you damn well know given the number of times you've been up close and personal, and by that I mean begged me to fuck you harder, I do not have a small dick!" Jared might have maybe possibly shouted that last bit. Loudly. In the direction of the file cabinet.
Nurse Ferris, occupied with her nineteenth game of Minesweeper this hour, turns away long enough to size him up, gaze lingering. "Don't take it so hard," she says, running the tip of a pen over her chin. "Maybe you're a grower, not a shower."
"If this is small to you? You frighten me."
She shrugs.
Women? Women are crazy. And to show them they're wrong, "Someone else around here--" and okay, he's man enough to admit he is shouting "--when he was bent over his desk, called it a towering monument--"
"Enough!" Sophia pushes Jared forward, away from the desk. "I'm separating you two if you can't play nicely."
Jared's momma raised him to be nicer, it's true, but it's the principle of the thing which leads him to finish what he started, which is to say, low and sexy like Barry White wishes he could match, "Too bad he's not getting any more of it. Ever. Not even if he begs."
"You'll break long before I do, Newbie."
"Try me. Don't make the mistake of thinking I don't know you want a piece of this."
Dr. Ackles lifts his hand above the stack of copy paper boxes he's lurking behind and flips Jared off to the tune of an irritated growl.
Sweet, sweet music. Ahh. Jared follows her around the counter, already reaching for a handful of charts. His faux-fur gets caught in the rack and he cusses under his breath, trying to unhook the snarl.
He looks sharply up at the sound of someone running at the speed of "Oh God, General, we're all going to die!" In a hospital that particular gallop usually means someone is about to die, or right in front of someone who's going to kill them, and Wookie or not Doctor Padalecki is there to save the day--
Chad thuds to a stop by the nurse's station, sucking for air and glistening like a racehorse.
Jared deflates. "You ruined my moment."
"Sorry." Chad straightens and wipes his face on the hem of his shirt. "Look, is Sophia still not talking to me?"
Jared glances dubiously between Chad and Sophia, who appears not to have detected even a flicker of movement. "Not sure, but I'm going to guess the answer is no."
"Shit. I was afraid of that."
"Do you have any idea what you did?"
"Not a clue. Women are nuts, dude."
They bump knuckles silently.
Chad drags a newspaper-wrapped bundle from beneath his arms. Once the sweaty advice column has been stripped away, there's what Jared would consider to be a rather nice bouquet of brightly-colored, if slightly tangy-smelling, flowers. "Can you tell her, for me, that this is a peace offering?"
"Wookie," Sophia says without looking up, "If you happen to see Chad today, could you tell him women are not crazy, we're sane, which of course appears crazy to someone with more testosterone than brain cells. Also, please inform him that baby's breath and carnations are not the way to a woman's heart unless she's also his mother."
"Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" If the number of aitches in there is any indication, this has been going on for a lot longer than Jared realized. When was the last time Chad got his Spaghetti's O'd? Huh. He does tend to wander off in his own head and lose track of what's going on around him, but…
"Do you mind?" Dr. Ackles growls. "I'm putting on a costume back here. Let a man concentrate."
"Why not use the men's room?" Sophia asks.
"Are you kidding me?" Dr. Ackles retorts. "I've seen Kane's mop water today, and my naked genitalia are going nowhere near where those germs have been."
"Good point. Carry on."
"Sophia." Chad has the desperate, slightly crazed look of a man who has indeed not tasted pasta in days if not weeks. "Whatever I did. I'm sorry. Okay? So sorry."
"That's right. You are," Sophia says without looking up.
From behind the supply cabinet, Dr. Ackles delivers a perfect imitation of a whip cracking.
"Catwoman," Jared murmurs. He shakes it off and shifts to comforting friend mode, easy when it's Chad. There's not much he doesn't know about Chad. At first guess, this has something to do with a) an attractive woman, b) sports, c) beer, d) toilet humor or e) all of the above.
See? Easy.
Now to begin the elimination process. No, wait. First, a word from the heart. "Chad, the thing with relationships is that you've got to be patient," he says, making eye contact and projecting his best top-notch "no really, it's okay that you only have four months to live" empathy. "No matter what kind of speed bumps you hit along the way, if it's meant to be she'll see that too and forgive you."
"I doubt it," Dr. Jensen says. "Anyone who knows the true nature of a man would do well to run as far away as quickly as they possibly can."
"Is that so?" Jared challenges.
"It's so very, very so, Newbie, that it's a needle pulling thread. Listen." A suspicious rustling of fabric follows, along with the twanging of something alarmingly elastic. "The first thing you need to know is that in any case of wrongdoing, you can blame it on a man's libido. We think with the downstairs brain. The upstairs brain almost never, ever gets a vote."
Jared bristles. "What about the middle brain?" He pats his chest. "Right here."
"That's what I like to call indigestion, not emotion." Dr. Jensen snorts. "Where was I? Oh, yes. Men are, down to our microbial level, liars as well as shameless whores when it comes to getting laid or wheedling our way back into the lives of someone we'd like to continue bonking. There's nothing we won't do, say, or try to excuse in ourselves later."
"God, you're a romantic." Sophia says, visibly offended.
"No. I'm a realist. Sophia, listen to me because this is good advice that I'm giving away for free. One-time special only. If you meet a man you find moderately attractive, use him for what he's worth. A good fuck. Use them for sex, then drop it like it's hot, because the magic's gone before the condom's even been tied off. Splat."
Sophia shudders. "You're a pig."
"Maybe so, but more people than you'd think love bacon."
With that bon mot, Dr. Jensen subsides. Pins of some kind scatter across the floor as a grace note.
"Don't listen to him, Chad," Jared starts to say, determined to continue with the heart-to-heart that was so rudely interrupted. Chad turns, posing against, er, leaning on, the counter, ready to respond with sincere gratitude for the life lesson.
Right up until two seconds later when Mechelle, the hospital's newest, very French phlebotomist, saunters past with a flip of the hip and a saucy wink for Chad.
"Hey, I was looking for you. Got those lab results on Mrs. Phenergan for me?" Chad calls after her.
"I have many things for you." Mechelle blows him a kiss. "Come see me before you leave if you want any of them."
"Okay, sure." Chad sighs and rearranges his pose. "Damn, she's fine." Then, with nary a beat, "Sophia's gonna hate me forever, isn't she?"
"I'm not sure, but I'm going to go with yes," Jared says, eyeing him warily. "Chad, did you even know she was--"
"I'd say no man in his right mind could have missed it, but I honestly think it flew right over his head. Which makes him far stupider than even I gave him credit for," says Dr. Ackles.
"What huh now?" Chad looks confused. Jared can tell because his eyes are barely open.
"Sweet God in heaven!" Dr. Ackles's forehead slap positively reverberates. "You honestly didn't even notice that Mee-chelle, ooh-la-la, was more or less inviting you down to the lab so she could have her wicked way with you? Wow. You suck like a Hoover there, champ. And since you missed that, there's one thing I think you really ought to know." There's a lot of suspicious movement back there, and Jared's torn between keeping an eye on it and looking away as if he couldn't care less. A man's stand, once taken, cannot be deviated from. So there.
Chad is not as experienced as Jared when it comes to staying on his guard against Ackles Evil. "What don't I know? Wait, she was hitting on me? Seriously?"
"No, 'she' wasn't," Dr. Ackles says, loud and clear. "'He', on the other hand, was."
Chad rears back and stares at Jared.
"Not that 'he', moron. 'He' as in Mee-chelle, as in Mikey, who's from New York, not France. Queens, to be specific. Crazy world. Go figure. Women are nuts? You betcha. Sometimes, they were even given a pair by the grace of God. Sophia, could you help me with this zipper?"
"Not if my life depended on it."
"Holy fuck," Chad says, as if he needs to sit down. "He's hot!" He grabs Jared by the V-neck collar of his scrubs and nearly chokes Jared as he slides to the floor. "Does this mean I'm having a gay crisis? At the same time my woman's dumping me for something I don't even understand? And you're dressed like a Wookie?"
"I have no idea. Can't breathe. Chad? Need oxygen." Jared goes to his knees beside Chad to keep from getting choked, and wow, not a mental image he'd ever have come up with on his own. He loves the guy, but there are limits. Also, Sophia would castrate him with a melon scooper.
Chad stops mid-hyperventilation, squinting at Jared at nearly eye level. "Dude. Why the fuck are you dressed like a Wookie?"
Carnations rain down on their heads. Mmm. Fragrant. Jared gets one in his mouth, petals first. Sophia looks down at them from on high. "Because it's Belated Halloween. You forgot your jackass costume."
"At least she spoke to me," Chad says hopefully.
Jared tongues out the loose flower fragments and slumps on the floor beside his idiot friend. It's going to be another one of those days, isn't it?
"I always knew you secretly spat daisies and shat rainbows," Dr. Ackles says so cheerfully that someone actually must be dying somewhere. "God, life is good today."
Large, scuffed shoes come to a stop by Jared's hand. "Someone want to tell me why there's carnations all over my clean floor? And interns? They're a bitch to clean up. It's something in the blood composition." Kane stops. For a long time. Jared looks up.
Kane's dressed as a clown, a choice Jared will have nightmares over later, but his costume doesn't exactly project good cheer. Maybe because he's rocking more of an Alice Cooper than a Fun-Time Bozo vibe. The makeup gives the same impression, too. "That's an interesting costume. Chewbacca. Looks familiar somehow."
This is the moment in time in which Jared wishes someone with helpful advice would descend from above. They'd arrive bathed in radiant gold light with a gentle yet invisible breeze tousling their hair and the sound of electric harpsichords with the dial turned up to eleven.
Instead, they get Sandy, thumping down beside Chad and bouncing a little. "Hi Kane! Eww. I hate flowers. So, what are we doing down here?"
"Did you find 'her' attractive?" Chad ignores Sandy to ask, nay, beseech Jared.
"No. I don't think so." Now Jared's the one who's confused. "Why?"
"Because."
"I'm gonna need a little more to go on."
Chad looks at him like he's a moron. "Why do you need more? Is this not a simple question or something? Answer me!"
"Don't mind me," Kane says, pulling up a broom to lean on.
Jared tries to hide the rick-rack on his mutilated janitorial coverall-cum-cantina costume, has an awful moment when he realizes his dick is resting where Kane's dick usually does, knows Sandy and Sophia and Ferris and Dr. Ackles are all waiting to hear this too, and is understandably more than a little thrown when he says, "I don't know."
"Excuse me." Sophia uses the counter as a fulcrum to lean off the far side and pats Jared's cheek. "All the nice men want to know is if you think transvestites are sexy. Give them an answer and they'll go away, I promise."
Chad rises to his knees in transparent hope. "Sophia, I--"
"The creepy bastard will leave too," she reassures Jared.
"What did he do? If not, you know, that?" Jared has to ask. "'Cause I'm pretty sure it's not that, what with the crisis and all."
Sophia snorts eloquently and retreats.
"What did he do?" Sandy asks.
"I'll tell you later, sweetie."
Jared raises his eyes toward heaven and sees Kane in his flight path instead. "Fine! Okay! I didn't think Mee-chelle--" crap, he's pronouncing it like Dr. Ackles now "--was sexy. Even if she was a he, she wouldn't be. He. Um."
"They look too much like actual women for you to get turned on?" asks Chad.
Jared squirms. "I never really thought about it, guys. Honest. I'm pretty sure it's not one of my hot buttons, though, and she--he--isn't my type anyway."
"What is your type?" Sandy asks.
Dr. Ackles and Kane make the whip-cracking sound in perfect harmony.
Jared glares at them. He's wet, he smells like befouled carnations, and he's wearing a costume that is starting to both itch and make his skin crawl. "I hate you all."
"I thought she was damn fine," Kane says, trading broom for mop and setting to. "Your loss, the both of you."
Jared blinks. "Seriously?"
"Hell, yeah. Legs like those?" He whistles. "I'd like to get those wrapped around my neck. Oh. Pardon my language, miss." He nods to Sandy, who dimples at him. "Terrible of me to forget my manners in the presence of a lady."
Jared's temporarily speechless. Is there any way in which this day could possibly get worse?
He remembers, half a beat too late, never to ask that.
"I agree, Fido," Dr. Ackles says. From the crescendo of rustling noises Jared deduces he must have stood up, though no way he's giving Dr. Ackles the satisfaction of turning around to look, and from the stunned silence he suspects whatever costume the good doctor has chosen must be the stuff of nightmares but he's still not looking, nope, nope, nope.
"Agree with what?" Jared hates it when his mouth moves without permission. Sometimes words come out. Words that should never have seen the light of day, because they're construed as invitations. Opening sallies in a battle of wits, if you will. The first cannon blast.
"Everything else aside, Mikey makes one smokin' woman," Dr. Ackles says. Whatever shoes he's wearing make strange tock, tock, tock sounds as he approaches.
Kane takes three steps back. At speed. "Damn," he breathes in open admiration for whatever costume Dr. Ackles has put on.
"Touch me and you die," Dr. Ackles says. He comes around the counter.
At first Jared can't believe what he's seeing. Then, he doesn't want to. Then he wonders if perhaps he hit his head when he joined Chad in the gutter or if that just comes with the territory.
Dr. Ackles whistles a sharp blast. "I'm up here, Newbie. Up, up, up. You can do it."
Yeah. Up is not the problem.
Jared can't go much faster than a crawl as his stare travels up the length of smoothly-shaven legs, the muscles seeming sleek without hair, to the barely-there hem of the hospital-white skirt, to the crop-top that possibly used to be a gleaming white scrub shirt (belly button ring, Jared's brain screams at him. He's got a belly button ring!).
Then further, past his chest waxed equally smooth, up his soft-as-a-baby's-ass cheeks and to the eyes ringed with smoky black guyliner. His lips are traced with something the rich hue of burgundy wine, velvety smooth and begging to be kissed until the color's natural. Dr. Ackles has done something to his hair, the spikes softened and curling over his forehead, beneath his starched nurse's cap with a proud red cross blazoned on the front.
Jared whimpers. He thinks he can be excused for that.
"So, you don't get turned on at all by drag, huh?" Dr. Ackles asks. He puts one foot, shod in a neat butter-soft white leather boot, on Jared's chest, and applies the daintiest of pressure as he moves in for the kill. He also gives Jared a clear look, which he cannot be blamed for taking, thank you, at the goodies barely concealed beneath his excuse for a skirt, encased in a whisper of burgundy lace.
(Garter belt, Jared's brain screams at him. Thigh-high sheer stockings attached to that scrap of lace with a garter belt!)
Dr. Ackles applies more pressure. "Tell the truth, or the Belated Halloween Fairy will strike you down."
"Mphurgle," says Jared.
"That's what I thought," says Dr. Ackles. He glides away from Jared like the brush of silk across bare skin, and Mee-chelle's stride has nothing on the sultry sway of Nurse Jensen's hips.
Sandy's frozen into wide-eyed immobility. Jared doesn't dare look at Kane. He turns to Chad instead, finds him biting his fist and staring in horror, eyes fully open. "Sophia? Can I come up there and hold you? Pretty please?"
"Why aren't you here already?"
Huddled close to Chad, it's a toss-up as to who's protecting who, which leaves Jared out in the cold. "Where's the love?" he protests, using his puppy eyes on them.
She shrugs helplessly and makes the whip-cracking noise. "Sorry, Big Bird. Dr. Lay-a trumps Chewbacca."
Jared thumps his head on the counter a little harder than he should. Ow.
"The costume's off, but that's not a bad Wookie noise," Kane says.
Giving up on the lot of them, Jared stares after Dr., er, Nurse Ackles instead and lets his wandering mind find a laser pinpoint focus. He's not copping an eyeful, mind you. Not, not, not. Damn it. Not. He's planning revenge.
Because that, that, THAT is so not fighting fair.
But it was a great Wookie warble--um, roar--if he does say so himself.
Pairing: Jared/Jensen (J2 AU)
Rating: NC-17 for pervery, boys-being-boys, cussin', and adult-style snark wars.
Disclaimer: Lies, lies, lies.
Word Count: 4000
Beta(s): havenward and mini_moue
Summary: Jared's a harried, hassled, frazzled, frustrated resident at Saint Francis of Immaculate Mercy General. Jensen's a cranky, bristly, snarky attending physician in serious denial. Or is he? Features toppy! (if confused) Jared and pushy-bottom!Jensen. Fifth in the J2!Scrubs series of stand-alones.
Costume
Today's one of the more unusual days Jared's ever had the pleasure of experiencing at Immaculate Mercy. Which is saying a lot.
"This makes no sense."
"No one said it had to, especially not here. Hold still."
"I don't wanna play." Jared crosses his arms. And pouts, but in a manly way.
"Tough." Sophia's busy doing up the buttons of his borrowed, upsized coverall. "You're going to look terrific, Big Bird. I mean, Chewbacca." She dimples at him, then pinches him in the side. "So stop complaining."
"Halloween was weeks ago. Why again are we doing this now?"
"Because it's Lehne's favorite holiday and he was down with the flu on the day itself, remember?"
Jared does. It was awesome. Lehne would like to think he's as scary as Ackles. In his own way, Lehne underestimates himself. With him gone for a whole weekend, it had been like living in a Downy fabric softener commercial, with peace and harmony and teddy bears and the fragrance of fresh spring flowers wafting through the air.
For fifteen whole glorious minutes they'd sung and danced in the hallways until Dr. Ackles came along and cut in on the ninth chorus of "We Are the World", megaphone in hand, promising he was going to tell everyone's parents if they didn't get back to doing their goddamn jobs.
"Jerk," Jared mumbles.
"Excuse me?" Sophia puts one hand on her hip. Uh-oh. "I spent hours putting this together. Costumes don't exactly come right off the rack in your size, you know. Especially not on one day's notice."
Jared looks down at the faux-grunge, Cantina-style tribute to George Lucas's drunker moments complete with Wookie-fur arms. Sophia's work, every stitch of it. And under her guidance, he's back-combed his hair into something Don King would weep with envy over. Under her iron fist, he and everyone else on the floor has agreed to participate. They look positively festive, if out of season. Color me impressed. And stylish. "I owe you, Sophia."
"Damn right you do." She breathes on a bit of his costume's gilt rick-rack and polishes it with her sleeve. "And I'm gonna take it out in nights you spend away while I commit unspeakable acts wherever I please in the apartment. Deal?"
"Fair enough." Except… "I thought you and Chad weren't talking."
The tip of her sewing needle pokes dangerously close to the underside of his nose. Holy crap, that was fast. "Catwoman," Jared blurts.
"No, I'm Martha Stewart. Why? I'll tell you. Somehow, every yahoo in this place who doesn't know how to sew got wind of my skills and if I'm going to whore myself out I needed a proper role model. Now stand still. How's my hair?"
To Jared--and, he suspects, everyone else--Sophia with a blonde bouffant is incredibly, incredibly wrong. "You look spectacular," he lies with a happy-puppy smile, because Sophia is not only a nurse, she is a nurse with a needle, and she can do far worse with it than puncture his septum. He fears her. And most other women, come to think about it.
"I do?"
"One hundred percent really, really… um, pretty. That does wash out, doesn't it?" He tries to touch the bubble and is repelled three inches away by the force-field might of her hairspray.
"Watch the hands, Big Bird."
"Yes ma'am." Jared subsides, distracted by the gilt trim. Shiny. "When'd you get away from work to go buy all of this?"
"Who has time to shop? I got most of the sparkly stuff from the lost and found box, the buttons from the ass box, and for the fabric I cut apart two of Kane's uniforms, sewed them back together, and dyed them black."
Jared's heart stops. He hopes someone who knows how to operate a crash cart is standing by. But with this kind of bad mojo working against him, Kane would probably divert the leads to an electric chair.
Sophia scoffs and tugs the last button on his vest closed. "You worry too much about that guy. You're what, two feet taller than he is?"
"You will rarely if ever hear a man say so, but in this case, size doesn't matter."
"Good to hear you finally admit that," Dr. Ackles says, his presence heretofore unannounced, from behind the supply cabinet.
Jared's sure he saw a glimpse of the white light that time, and loved ones beckoning him to walk toward them.
"So jumpy," Sophia chides. She checks to make sure the seams of her hose are straight on the back of her legs--if Jared swung that way he might be tempted to fight Chad for her--and leads him toward the front of the nurses' station. "Leave the grumpy doctor doing God-knows-what creepy stuff alone and go do your job. Lehne wants you to stop by Pediatrics first to show off your Wookie warble."
"I don't think I know how to warble."
"Oh now, that's just not true," Dr. Ackles mocks, still completely hidden from view. "There's this amazingly embarrassing noise he makes mid-orgasm that's like a cross between Yma Sumac and a dying elephant. Give that one a go."
"Do not rise to him. Come with me. A man like him, it hurts him far more to be ignored so keep walking, okay?" Sophia pats the inner bend of Jared's elbow, which he offers to her as a proper gentleman--Wookie--should.
"Far be it from me to correct a lady, especially when she's…uh, correct. And as you damn well know given the number of times you've been up close and personal, and by that I mean begged me to fuck you harder, I do not have a small dick!" Jared might have maybe possibly shouted that last bit. Loudly. In the direction of the file cabinet.
Nurse Ferris, occupied with her nineteenth game of Minesweeper this hour, turns away long enough to size him up, gaze lingering. "Don't take it so hard," she says, running the tip of a pen over her chin. "Maybe you're a grower, not a shower."
"If this is small to you? You frighten me."
She shrugs.
Women? Women are crazy. And to show them they're wrong, "Someone else around here--" and okay, he's man enough to admit he is shouting "--when he was bent over his desk, called it a towering monument--"
"Enough!" Sophia pushes Jared forward, away from the desk. "I'm separating you two if you can't play nicely."
Jared's momma raised him to be nicer, it's true, but it's the principle of the thing which leads him to finish what he started, which is to say, low and sexy like Barry White wishes he could match, "Too bad he's not getting any more of it. Ever. Not even if he begs."
"You'll break long before I do, Newbie."
"Try me. Don't make the mistake of thinking I don't know you want a piece of this."
Dr. Ackles lifts his hand above the stack of copy paper boxes he's lurking behind and flips Jared off to the tune of an irritated growl.
Sweet, sweet music. Ahh. Jared follows her around the counter, already reaching for a handful of charts. His faux-fur gets caught in the rack and he cusses under his breath, trying to unhook the snarl.
He looks sharply up at the sound of someone running at the speed of "Oh God, General, we're all going to die!" In a hospital that particular gallop usually means someone is about to die, or right in front of someone who's going to kill them, and Wookie or not Doctor Padalecki is there to save the day--
Chad thuds to a stop by the nurse's station, sucking for air and glistening like a racehorse.
Jared deflates. "You ruined my moment."
"Sorry." Chad straightens and wipes his face on the hem of his shirt. "Look, is Sophia still not talking to me?"
Jared glances dubiously between Chad and Sophia, who appears not to have detected even a flicker of movement. "Not sure, but I'm going to guess the answer is no."
"Shit. I was afraid of that."
"Do you have any idea what you did?"
"Not a clue. Women are nuts, dude."
They bump knuckles silently.
Chad drags a newspaper-wrapped bundle from beneath his arms. Once the sweaty advice column has been stripped away, there's what Jared would consider to be a rather nice bouquet of brightly-colored, if slightly tangy-smelling, flowers. "Can you tell her, for me, that this is a peace offering?"
"Wookie," Sophia says without looking up, "If you happen to see Chad today, could you tell him women are not crazy, we're sane, which of course appears crazy to someone with more testosterone than brain cells. Also, please inform him that baby's breath and carnations are not the way to a woman's heart unless she's also his mother."
"Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" If the number of aitches in there is any indication, this has been going on for a lot longer than Jared realized. When was the last time Chad got his Spaghetti's O'd? Huh. He does tend to wander off in his own head and lose track of what's going on around him, but…
"Do you mind?" Dr. Ackles growls. "I'm putting on a costume back here. Let a man concentrate."
"Why not use the men's room?" Sophia asks.
"Are you kidding me?" Dr. Ackles retorts. "I've seen Kane's mop water today, and my naked genitalia are going nowhere near where those germs have been."
"Good point. Carry on."
"Sophia." Chad has the desperate, slightly crazed look of a man who has indeed not tasted pasta in days if not weeks. "Whatever I did. I'm sorry. Okay? So sorry."
"That's right. You are," Sophia says without looking up.
From behind the supply cabinet, Dr. Ackles delivers a perfect imitation of a whip cracking.
"Catwoman," Jared murmurs. He shakes it off and shifts to comforting friend mode, easy when it's Chad. There's not much he doesn't know about Chad. At first guess, this has something to do with a) an attractive woman, b) sports, c) beer, d) toilet humor or e) all of the above.
See? Easy.
Now to begin the elimination process. No, wait. First, a word from the heart. "Chad, the thing with relationships is that you've got to be patient," he says, making eye contact and projecting his best top-notch "no really, it's okay that you only have four months to live" empathy. "No matter what kind of speed bumps you hit along the way, if it's meant to be she'll see that too and forgive you."
"I doubt it," Dr. Jensen says. "Anyone who knows the true nature of a man would do well to run as far away as quickly as they possibly can."
"Is that so?" Jared challenges.
"It's so very, very so, Newbie, that it's a needle pulling thread. Listen." A suspicious rustling of fabric follows, along with the twanging of something alarmingly elastic. "The first thing you need to know is that in any case of wrongdoing, you can blame it on a man's libido. We think with the downstairs brain. The upstairs brain almost never, ever gets a vote."
Jared bristles. "What about the middle brain?" He pats his chest. "Right here."
"That's what I like to call indigestion, not emotion." Dr. Jensen snorts. "Where was I? Oh, yes. Men are, down to our microbial level, liars as well as shameless whores when it comes to getting laid or wheedling our way back into the lives of someone we'd like to continue bonking. There's nothing we won't do, say, or try to excuse in ourselves later."
"God, you're a romantic." Sophia says, visibly offended.
"No. I'm a realist. Sophia, listen to me because this is good advice that I'm giving away for free. One-time special only. If you meet a man you find moderately attractive, use him for what he's worth. A good fuck. Use them for sex, then drop it like it's hot, because the magic's gone before the condom's even been tied off. Splat."
Sophia shudders. "You're a pig."
"Maybe so, but more people than you'd think love bacon."
With that bon mot, Dr. Jensen subsides. Pins of some kind scatter across the floor as a grace note.
"Don't listen to him, Chad," Jared starts to say, determined to continue with the heart-to-heart that was so rudely interrupted. Chad turns, posing against, er, leaning on, the counter, ready to respond with sincere gratitude for the life lesson.
Right up until two seconds later when Mechelle, the hospital's newest, very French phlebotomist, saunters past with a flip of the hip and a saucy wink for Chad.
"Hey, I was looking for you. Got those lab results on Mrs. Phenergan for me?" Chad calls after her.
"I have many things for you." Mechelle blows him a kiss. "Come see me before you leave if you want any of them."
"Okay, sure." Chad sighs and rearranges his pose. "Damn, she's fine." Then, with nary a beat, "Sophia's gonna hate me forever, isn't she?"
"I'm not sure, but I'm going to go with yes," Jared says, eyeing him warily. "Chad, did you even know she was--"
"I'd say no man in his right mind could have missed it, but I honestly think it flew right over his head. Which makes him far stupider than even I gave him credit for," says Dr. Ackles.
"What huh now?" Chad looks confused. Jared can tell because his eyes are barely open.
"Sweet God in heaven!" Dr. Ackles's forehead slap positively reverberates. "You honestly didn't even notice that Mee-chelle, ooh-la-la, was more or less inviting you down to the lab so she could have her wicked way with you? Wow. You suck like a Hoover there, champ. And since you missed that, there's one thing I think you really ought to know." There's a lot of suspicious movement back there, and Jared's torn between keeping an eye on it and looking away as if he couldn't care less. A man's stand, once taken, cannot be deviated from. So there.
Chad is not as experienced as Jared when it comes to staying on his guard against Ackles Evil. "What don't I know? Wait, she was hitting on me? Seriously?"
"No, 'she' wasn't," Dr. Ackles says, loud and clear. "'He', on the other hand, was."
Chad rears back and stares at Jared.
"Not that 'he', moron. 'He' as in Mee-chelle, as in Mikey, who's from New York, not France. Queens, to be specific. Crazy world. Go figure. Women are nuts? You betcha. Sometimes, they were even given a pair by the grace of God. Sophia, could you help me with this zipper?"
"Not if my life depended on it."
"Holy fuck," Chad says, as if he needs to sit down. "He's hot!" He grabs Jared by the V-neck collar of his scrubs and nearly chokes Jared as he slides to the floor. "Does this mean I'm having a gay crisis? At the same time my woman's dumping me for something I don't even understand? And you're dressed like a Wookie?"
"I have no idea. Can't breathe. Chad? Need oxygen." Jared goes to his knees beside Chad to keep from getting choked, and wow, not a mental image he'd ever have come up with on his own. He loves the guy, but there are limits. Also, Sophia would castrate him with a melon scooper.
Chad stops mid-hyperventilation, squinting at Jared at nearly eye level. "Dude. Why the fuck are you dressed like a Wookie?"
Carnations rain down on their heads. Mmm. Fragrant. Jared gets one in his mouth, petals first. Sophia looks down at them from on high. "Because it's Belated Halloween. You forgot your jackass costume."
"At least she spoke to me," Chad says hopefully.
Jared tongues out the loose flower fragments and slumps on the floor beside his idiot friend. It's going to be another one of those days, isn't it?
"I always knew you secretly spat daisies and shat rainbows," Dr. Ackles says so cheerfully that someone actually must be dying somewhere. "God, life is good today."
Large, scuffed shoes come to a stop by Jared's hand. "Someone want to tell me why there's carnations all over my clean floor? And interns? They're a bitch to clean up. It's something in the blood composition." Kane stops. For a long time. Jared looks up.
Kane's dressed as a clown, a choice Jared will have nightmares over later, but his costume doesn't exactly project good cheer. Maybe because he's rocking more of an Alice Cooper than a Fun-Time Bozo vibe. The makeup gives the same impression, too. "That's an interesting costume. Chewbacca. Looks familiar somehow."
This is the moment in time in which Jared wishes someone with helpful advice would descend from above. They'd arrive bathed in radiant gold light with a gentle yet invisible breeze tousling their hair and the sound of electric harpsichords with the dial turned up to eleven.
Instead, they get Sandy, thumping down beside Chad and bouncing a little. "Hi Kane! Eww. I hate flowers. So, what are we doing down here?"
"Did you find 'her' attractive?" Chad ignores Sandy to ask, nay, beseech Jared.
"No. I don't think so." Now Jared's the one who's confused. "Why?"
"Because."
"I'm gonna need a little more to go on."
Chad looks at him like he's a moron. "Why do you need more? Is this not a simple question or something? Answer me!"
"Don't mind me," Kane says, pulling up a broom to lean on.
Jared tries to hide the rick-rack on his mutilated janitorial coverall-cum-cantina costume, has an awful moment when he realizes his dick is resting where Kane's dick usually does, knows Sandy and Sophia and Ferris and Dr. Ackles are all waiting to hear this too, and is understandably more than a little thrown when he says, "I don't know."
"Excuse me." Sophia uses the counter as a fulcrum to lean off the far side and pats Jared's cheek. "All the nice men want to know is if you think transvestites are sexy. Give them an answer and they'll go away, I promise."
Chad rises to his knees in transparent hope. "Sophia, I--"
"The creepy bastard will leave too," she reassures Jared.
"What did he do? If not, you know, that?" Jared has to ask. "'Cause I'm pretty sure it's not that, what with the crisis and all."
Sophia snorts eloquently and retreats.
"What did he do?" Sandy asks.
"I'll tell you later, sweetie."
Jared raises his eyes toward heaven and sees Kane in his flight path instead. "Fine! Okay! I didn't think Mee-chelle--" crap, he's pronouncing it like Dr. Ackles now "--was sexy. Even if she was a he, she wouldn't be. He. Um."
"They look too much like actual women for you to get turned on?" asks Chad.
Jared squirms. "I never really thought about it, guys. Honest. I'm pretty sure it's not one of my hot buttons, though, and she--he--isn't my type anyway."
"What is your type?" Sandy asks.
Dr. Ackles and Kane make the whip-cracking sound in perfect harmony.
Jared glares at them. He's wet, he smells like befouled carnations, and he's wearing a costume that is starting to both itch and make his skin crawl. "I hate you all."
"I thought she was damn fine," Kane says, trading broom for mop and setting to. "Your loss, the both of you."
Jared blinks. "Seriously?"
"Hell, yeah. Legs like those?" He whistles. "I'd like to get those wrapped around my neck. Oh. Pardon my language, miss." He nods to Sandy, who dimples at him. "Terrible of me to forget my manners in the presence of a lady."
Jared's temporarily speechless. Is there any way in which this day could possibly get worse?
He remembers, half a beat too late, never to ask that.
"I agree, Fido," Dr. Ackles says. From the crescendo of rustling noises Jared deduces he must have stood up, though no way he's giving Dr. Ackles the satisfaction of turning around to look, and from the stunned silence he suspects whatever costume the good doctor has chosen must be the stuff of nightmares but he's still not looking, nope, nope, nope.
"Agree with what?" Jared hates it when his mouth moves without permission. Sometimes words come out. Words that should never have seen the light of day, because they're construed as invitations. Opening sallies in a battle of wits, if you will. The first cannon blast.
"Everything else aside, Mikey makes one smokin' woman," Dr. Ackles says. Whatever shoes he's wearing make strange tock, tock, tock sounds as he approaches.
Kane takes three steps back. At speed. "Damn," he breathes in open admiration for whatever costume Dr. Ackles has put on.
"Touch me and you die," Dr. Ackles says. He comes around the counter.
At first Jared can't believe what he's seeing. Then, he doesn't want to. Then he wonders if perhaps he hit his head when he joined Chad in the gutter or if that just comes with the territory.
Dr. Ackles whistles a sharp blast. "I'm up here, Newbie. Up, up, up. You can do it."
Yeah. Up is not the problem.
Jared can't go much faster than a crawl as his stare travels up the length of smoothly-shaven legs, the muscles seeming sleek without hair, to the barely-there hem of the hospital-white skirt, to the crop-top that possibly used to be a gleaming white scrub shirt (belly button ring, Jared's brain screams at him. He's got a belly button ring!).
Then further, past his chest waxed equally smooth, up his soft-as-a-baby's-ass cheeks and to the eyes ringed with smoky black guyliner. His lips are traced with something the rich hue of burgundy wine, velvety smooth and begging to be kissed until the color's natural. Dr. Ackles has done something to his hair, the spikes softened and curling over his forehead, beneath his starched nurse's cap with a proud red cross blazoned on the front.
Jared whimpers. He thinks he can be excused for that.
"So, you don't get turned on at all by drag, huh?" Dr. Ackles asks. He puts one foot, shod in a neat butter-soft white leather boot, on Jared's chest, and applies the daintiest of pressure as he moves in for the kill. He also gives Jared a clear look, which he cannot be blamed for taking, thank you, at the goodies barely concealed beneath his excuse for a skirt, encased in a whisper of burgundy lace.
(Garter belt, Jared's brain screams at him. Thigh-high sheer stockings attached to that scrap of lace with a garter belt!)
Dr. Ackles applies more pressure. "Tell the truth, or the Belated Halloween Fairy will strike you down."
"Mphurgle," says Jared.
"That's what I thought," says Dr. Ackles. He glides away from Jared like the brush of silk across bare skin, and Mee-chelle's stride has nothing on the sultry sway of Nurse Jensen's hips.
Sandy's frozen into wide-eyed immobility. Jared doesn't dare look at Kane. He turns to Chad instead, finds him biting his fist and staring in horror, eyes fully open. "Sophia? Can I come up there and hold you? Pretty please?"
"Why aren't you here already?"
Huddled close to Chad, it's a toss-up as to who's protecting who, which leaves Jared out in the cold. "Where's the love?" he protests, using his puppy eyes on them.
She shrugs helplessly and makes the whip-cracking noise. "Sorry, Big Bird. Dr. Lay-a trumps Chewbacca."
Jared thumps his head on the counter a little harder than he should. Ow.
"The costume's off, but that's not a bad Wookie noise," Kane says.
Giving up on the lot of them, Jared stares after Dr., er, Nurse Ackles instead and lets his wandering mind find a laser pinpoint focus. He's not copping an eyeful, mind you. Not, not, not. Damn it. Not. He's planning revenge.
Because that, that, THAT is so not fighting fair.
But it was a great Wookie warble--um, roar--if he does say so himself.