Thanksgiving 9/100
Title: Thanksgiving
Prompt: #93
Author: alifeofourown
Pairing: Alex Gaskarth/Jack Barakat (All Time Low)
Rating: Teen
Summary: "Thanks for the gay turkey. I’ll hang it up next to my pictures of all the boys I’ve fucked.”
Warnings: Gay Turkeys, Thanksgiving and True Colours
Dedication: To anyone who enjoys my writing, to Michelle for being spaztacular and falling hardcore in love with All Time Low and to Caity, Nebby and Sep for having to listen to me talk about this as I post it.
Beta: havah24601
Disclaimer: If I owned the people mentioned in here...damn, I wouldn't be writing about them.
Author Notes: Uh, yeah...I've subjected myself to this fun thing where I will write one-hundred oneshits involving All Time Low. This is going to be interesting.
If you want a prompt dedicated to you, go to the main post which is located here and post a comment saying the prompt and a preferable pairing. You will get the dedication, but I cannot completely promise on the pairing, seeing as my brain likes to malfunction often.
Otherwise, enjoy!
Alex has had this planned for a long time. He’s been waiting for just the right moment to put his secret plan into action, and with an unplanned Thanksgiving show added to their tour schedule, the boy couldn’t have been more pleased. Thanksgiving was all about getting together with family and joining in a nice celebration of togetherness, but for Alex, this was his chance to expose a hidden part of himself, a part that he knew would probably make things a whole lot better or extremely worse.
It was only an hour into the show and the second band had just started, but Alex was already nervous when it came to his plan. The ideas that said plan had once been foolproof were slipping from his mind faster than he could think about it, and right now, Alex was just nervous. He knew that the crew had been plotting out a major late night dinner at Denny’s after their show, and Alex was excited for that, despite the fact that he was going to miss Flyzik’s traditional Thanksgiving cooking.
“Hey.” A voice behind Alex startled him out of his nervous thoughts that tonight was going to fail, mostly because he knew that no one other than Flyzik knew about his current plan, so his band was going to be in for a slight surprise when he mixed up the set list with the current plan. He turned around and spotted Jack lazily lounging against one of the many sound systems that were kept backstage for entertainment purposes.
“Hi,” Alex responded in a soft voice before his thoughts steered themselves right back to worries on failing and messing up. This was a weird feeling, because Alex Gaskarth didn’t usually fear of messing up, but tonight, he was terrified of failure, and more terrified of disapproval from the one person that he was setting out to impress.
Jack raised an eyebrow at the weirdly acting singer, but thought nothing of it. “So,” he said in an attempt to strike up a conversation with the nervous man. “You missed doing the hand turkey drawings with the fans. It was pretty fun if I do say so myself. I drew one for you.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper before he handed it over to Alex.
The singer raised an eyebrow as he unfolded the sheet of paper, revealing the hand drawing. He couldn’t help but smile at the rainbow colored turkey and the name ‘Gayskarth’ at the top. “So you’ve discovered my secret have you?” he asked with a small laugh as he looked at Jack. “Thanks for the gay turkey. I’ll hang it up next to my pictures of all the boys I’ve fucked.” Jack laughed as he looked at Alex, instantly glad that he was able to make his best friend smile.
“You know, I’m aiming to be up on that wall some day,” he joked, wondering slightly how Alex was going to react to what he said and if he realized that that was how Jack really felt. “I’d like to be put right between Pete Wentz and Pat Brown, my two homies thank you very much.” He earned a laugh from Alex, and without a doubt, he knew that he was cheering up his friend. What he was cheering him up from, he didn’t know, but hopefully it would make the boy at least smile enough to get their set going at a nice, happy pace. After all, fans all across southern California were skipping out on family dinners to be at All Time Low’s concert.
“That wall is a lot bigger and scarier than you might think,” Alex said as he smiled, forgetting all about his prior nervousness. “I only bring a portion of it with me on tour, just so that I don’t forget about the hottest people in the world that I’ve fucked.” He winked, knowing that Jack knew that the only pictures in his bunk were pictures of his close friends, Pat Brown and Pete Wentz included, somehow.
Jack laughed as he nudged Alex gently in the shoulder. “Whatever Gaskank,” he said as he rested a hand on Alex’s shoulder, laughing still. “Okay, this was fun, but I have a guitar to find. I’ll see you on stage soon, right?” The nerves that Alex had just gotten to calm were back to bouncing around in an anxious, freakish manner.
“Right, the show,” Alex said as he nodded, his movements slow and unintentionally shaky. “Go and find your guitar. I’ll see you on stage when they let us on.” He offered Jack a smile, hoping that his nervousness wasn’t seeping out through it before he shoved the guitarist off to where he was supposed to be hunting for that thing that he used every night.
Alex slipped into nervous pacing until Jack returned, and the guitarist promptly banned him from pacing after Alex had almost knocked him over in one of his sharp turns. Alex grabbed the guitar that Flyzik had last minute shoved into his hand, his favorite old acoustic that he refused to part with, and the security blanket was enough to calm Alex down so that he could focus on what he was about to do.
“You don’t usually open with a guitar Gaskank,” Jack said as he looked at the beat up acoustic in Alex’s hand. “What’s with the sudden change?” Alex smiled lightly, his nervousness definitely seeping into that smile, but luckily for him, Jack was too distracted to pick up on it.
“Flyzik and I decided on a slight set list change today. I’m playing a special song, since it’s a holiday and all.” That was good enough for Jack, and the guitarist shrugged as he watched Flyzik waiting for their manager to cue them on when they were supposed to hit the stage. The second he got the cue, he bounced out into the open and grinned as a bra was instantly thrown at him. Some things never changed, and for that, Jack was glad. He liked traditions.
Alex took his place in front of the microphone and looked back to Rian, silently telling him not to count them into a song before he faced the audience. “Hey,” he said with a small smile. “Welcome to our badass All Time Low Turkey Day show.” Screams erupted from the crowd, and Alex was already beginning to feel at home. “Well, for today, we decided to switch things up a bit, and we’re going to open things up with a cover that’s actually pretty touching. Ready for this shit?”
The screaming of the fans was enough to set Alex up and he grabbed the stool that Flyzik conveniently had placed on the stage during the setup and sat down on it. “What do you say we start this off with a really awesome song?” The crowd screamed again, and Alex had to resist the fact that he wanted to laugh at the screaming fangirls who probably thought he was going to play the Umbrella cover or something like that.
Alex began to pluck the opening chords on his acoustic, and as he was thinking about it, the song that he had picked to put his plan into action tonight wasn’t really an upbeat one. It was more along the fixing the angst line of thinking songs, but Alex knew that this was one of his favorite songs growing up, and he also knew that the person he was playing it for loved it so much. In fact, Alex remembered how it had gotten the two of them through their high school angst phase.
With that, Alex began to sing, and the second the first words escaped his mouth, he heard the gasp from his right. He knew that Jack was listening.
You with the sad eyes
Don’t be discouraged
Oh I realize
It’s hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small
Alex was gaining more courage when it came to singing the song, and with a sideways glance to Jack, he knew that the guitarist was becoming really touched by Alex’s cover of a childhood memory. He only hoped that he didn’t screw up. As he slipped into the chorus, he began to smile, thinking of the hand turkey that Jack had drawn for him. The simple gift had been enough for Alex to see Jack’s true colors, and he loved them.
But I see your true colors
Shining through
I see your true colors
And that’s why I love you
So don’t be afraid to let them show
Your true colors
True colors are beautiful
Like a rainbow
Alex continued to sing, and he didn’t realize that his gaze had locked onto Jack until he began turning towards the guitarist. At that point, he had to restrain himself from falling under the spell that he frequently associated with himself when it came to his stage performance. The Jack spell, he called it; an enticing experience where during songs he didn’t have to play guitar to, he ended up becoming close and personal with Jack, often crossing the boundaries between friends and others.
He finished up the song, and there was surprising silence from the crowd for a few seconds before they erupted into screams and applause and whatnot. Alex handed the acoustic to a passing tech, and he grabbed the microphone in front of him. “Okay, that was my Thanksgiving tribute. Now, let’s fuck some shit up.” He knew that Jack’s eyes were on him right now, but he ignored the gaze, letting his set list go by without a single speed bump.
The normal intimacy between Jack and Alex didn’t happen during their stage performance that night, and while there was less to talk about and act upon, Jack got more bras than he ever had before, and actually began to start using Alex’s mic stand as a bra holder. It hadn’t bothered Alex…much.
The set had ended too soon for Alex’s liking, and while the fans were either dispersing to leave, buy a shirt or wait for someone to come out and do autographs and photos, Alex slipped back into the wings, hoping that he wouldn’t get confronted by Jack the second he walked off the stage.
As per usual, Alex wasn’t so lucky.
When Jack stormed off the stage (and yes, he stormed), he instantly went over to Alex, not even caring that his guitar was still hanging on his shoulder. “What the hell was that?” he asked as he looked at his friend. “That was our angst song when we were teens. What the hell were you doing playing it tonight?”
Alex sighed softly before he bit down on his lip. “I saw that look in your eyes Jack. You knew just as well as I did why I was playing our angst song tonight.” Jack paused and he kept his eyes locked on Alex, watching silently as Alex moved forward and draped his arms over Jack’s shoulders. “You know.”
In instinct, Jack wrapped his arms around Alex’s waist, tugging the older man closer to him. “I do know,” he whispered. “But I never figured that you would…”
“I do,” Alex responded softly, smiling at Jack before he leaned forward and closed the gap between their lips, catching his best friend in a gentle kiss, something that was a lot different than their quick, harsh stage kisses that fucked with the fans. This one was perfect.
They pulled away after a chorus of snickers came from the people behind Alex who were clearly trying to not hide their amusement. “Happy Thanksgiving fuckers,” Jack said with a laugh as he looked at Zack and Rian, pulling Alex closer to him so that the boy could rest his head on Jack’s chest. “What do you say we go have the best night of our lives?”
“At Denny’s?” Alex asked with a brief chuckle. “That’ll never happen, but awesome.” He kissed Jack’s jaw bone lightly before throwing up a middle finger at Zack, who had grabbed a camera off of one of the backstage photographers and had started taking pictures. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Agreed,” Jack said before he pulled Alex towards the exit, smiling. This was the best Thanksgiving ever.
Prompt: #93
Author: alifeofourown
Pairing: Alex Gaskarth/Jack Barakat (All Time Low)
Rating: Teen
Summary: "Thanks for the gay turkey. I’ll hang it up next to my pictures of all the boys I’ve fucked.”
Warnings: Gay Turkeys, Thanksgiving and True Colours
Dedication: To anyone who enjoys my writing, to Michelle for being spaztacular and falling hardcore in love with All Time Low and to Caity, Nebby and Sep for having to listen to me talk about this as I post it.
Beta: havah24601
Disclaimer: If I owned the people mentioned in here...damn, I wouldn't be writing about them.
Author Notes: Uh, yeah...I've subjected myself to this fun thing where I will write one-hundred oneshits involving All Time Low. This is going to be interesting.
If you want a prompt dedicated to you, go to the main post which is located here and post a comment saying the prompt and a preferable pairing. You will get the dedication, but I cannot completely promise on the pairing, seeing as my brain likes to malfunction often.
Otherwise, enjoy!
Alex has had this planned for a long time. He’s been waiting for just the right moment to put his secret plan into action, and with an unplanned Thanksgiving show added to their tour schedule, the boy couldn’t have been more pleased. Thanksgiving was all about getting together with family and joining in a nice celebration of togetherness, but for Alex, this was his chance to expose a hidden part of himself, a part that he knew would probably make things a whole lot better or extremely worse.
It was only an hour into the show and the second band had just started, but Alex was already nervous when it came to his plan. The ideas that said plan had once been foolproof were slipping from his mind faster than he could think about it, and right now, Alex was just nervous. He knew that the crew had been plotting out a major late night dinner at Denny’s after their show, and Alex was excited for that, despite the fact that he was going to miss Flyzik’s traditional Thanksgiving cooking.
“Hey.” A voice behind Alex startled him out of his nervous thoughts that tonight was going to fail, mostly because he knew that no one other than Flyzik knew about his current plan, so his band was going to be in for a slight surprise when he mixed up the set list with the current plan. He turned around and spotted Jack lazily lounging against one of the many sound systems that were kept backstage for entertainment purposes.
“Hi,” Alex responded in a soft voice before his thoughts steered themselves right back to worries on failing and messing up. This was a weird feeling, because Alex Gaskarth didn’t usually fear of messing up, but tonight, he was terrified of failure, and more terrified of disapproval from the one person that he was setting out to impress.
Jack raised an eyebrow at the weirdly acting singer, but thought nothing of it. “So,” he said in an attempt to strike up a conversation with the nervous man. “You missed doing the hand turkey drawings with the fans. It was pretty fun if I do say so myself. I drew one for you.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper before he handed it over to Alex.
The singer raised an eyebrow as he unfolded the sheet of paper, revealing the hand drawing. He couldn’t help but smile at the rainbow colored turkey and the name ‘Gayskarth’ at the top. “So you’ve discovered my secret have you?” he asked with a small laugh as he looked at Jack. “Thanks for the gay turkey. I’ll hang it up next to my pictures of all the boys I’ve fucked.” Jack laughed as he looked at Alex, instantly glad that he was able to make his best friend smile.
“You know, I’m aiming to be up on that wall some day,” he joked, wondering slightly how Alex was going to react to what he said and if he realized that that was how Jack really felt. “I’d like to be put right between Pete Wentz and Pat Brown, my two homies thank you very much.” He earned a laugh from Alex, and without a doubt, he knew that he was cheering up his friend. What he was cheering him up from, he didn’t know, but hopefully it would make the boy at least smile enough to get their set going at a nice, happy pace. After all, fans all across southern California were skipping out on family dinners to be at All Time Low’s concert.
“That wall is a lot bigger and scarier than you might think,” Alex said as he smiled, forgetting all about his prior nervousness. “I only bring a portion of it with me on tour, just so that I don’t forget about the hottest people in the world that I’ve fucked.” He winked, knowing that Jack knew that the only pictures in his bunk were pictures of his close friends, Pat Brown and Pete Wentz included, somehow.
Jack laughed as he nudged Alex gently in the shoulder. “Whatever Gaskank,” he said as he rested a hand on Alex’s shoulder, laughing still. “Okay, this was fun, but I have a guitar to find. I’ll see you on stage soon, right?” The nerves that Alex had just gotten to calm were back to bouncing around in an anxious, freakish manner.
“Right, the show,” Alex said as he nodded, his movements slow and unintentionally shaky. “Go and find your guitar. I’ll see you on stage when they let us on.” He offered Jack a smile, hoping that his nervousness wasn’t seeping out through it before he shoved the guitarist off to where he was supposed to be hunting for that thing that he used every night.
Alex slipped into nervous pacing until Jack returned, and the guitarist promptly banned him from pacing after Alex had almost knocked him over in one of his sharp turns. Alex grabbed the guitar that Flyzik had last minute shoved into his hand, his favorite old acoustic that he refused to part with, and the security blanket was enough to calm Alex down so that he could focus on what he was about to do.
“You don’t usually open with a guitar Gaskank,” Jack said as he looked at the beat up acoustic in Alex’s hand. “What’s with the sudden change?” Alex smiled lightly, his nervousness definitely seeping into that smile, but luckily for him, Jack was too distracted to pick up on it.
“Flyzik and I decided on a slight set list change today. I’m playing a special song, since it’s a holiday and all.” That was good enough for Jack, and the guitarist shrugged as he watched Flyzik waiting for their manager to cue them on when they were supposed to hit the stage. The second he got the cue, he bounced out into the open and grinned as a bra was instantly thrown at him. Some things never changed, and for that, Jack was glad. He liked traditions.
Alex took his place in front of the microphone and looked back to Rian, silently telling him not to count them into a song before he faced the audience. “Hey,” he said with a small smile. “Welcome to our badass All Time Low Turkey Day show.” Screams erupted from the crowd, and Alex was already beginning to feel at home. “Well, for today, we decided to switch things up a bit, and we’re going to open things up with a cover that’s actually pretty touching. Ready for this shit?”
The screaming of the fans was enough to set Alex up and he grabbed the stool that Flyzik conveniently had placed on the stage during the setup and sat down on it. “What do you say we start this off with a really awesome song?” The crowd screamed again, and Alex had to resist the fact that he wanted to laugh at the screaming fangirls who probably thought he was going to play the Umbrella cover or something like that.
Alex began to pluck the opening chords on his acoustic, and as he was thinking about it, the song that he had picked to put his plan into action tonight wasn’t really an upbeat one. It was more along the fixing the angst line of thinking songs, but Alex knew that this was one of his favorite songs growing up, and he also knew that the person he was playing it for loved it so much. In fact, Alex remembered how it had gotten the two of them through their high school angst phase.
With that, Alex began to sing, and the second the first words escaped his mouth, he heard the gasp from his right. He knew that Jack was listening.
You with the sad eyes
Don’t be discouraged
Oh I realize
It’s hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small
Alex was gaining more courage when it came to singing the song, and with a sideways glance to Jack, he knew that the guitarist was becoming really touched by Alex’s cover of a childhood memory. He only hoped that he didn’t screw up. As he slipped into the chorus, he began to smile, thinking of the hand turkey that Jack had drawn for him. The simple gift had been enough for Alex to see Jack’s true colors, and he loved them.
But I see your true colors
Shining through
I see your true colors
And that’s why I love you
So don’t be afraid to let them show
Your true colors
True colors are beautiful
Like a rainbow
Alex continued to sing, and he didn’t realize that his gaze had locked onto Jack until he began turning towards the guitarist. At that point, he had to restrain himself from falling under the spell that he frequently associated with himself when it came to his stage performance. The Jack spell, he called it; an enticing experience where during songs he didn’t have to play guitar to, he ended up becoming close and personal with Jack, often crossing the boundaries between friends and others.
He finished up the song, and there was surprising silence from the crowd for a few seconds before they erupted into screams and applause and whatnot. Alex handed the acoustic to a passing tech, and he grabbed the microphone in front of him. “Okay, that was my Thanksgiving tribute. Now, let’s fuck some shit up.” He knew that Jack’s eyes were on him right now, but he ignored the gaze, letting his set list go by without a single speed bump.
The normal intimacy between Jack and Alex didn’t happen during their stage performance that night, and while there was less to talk about and act upon, Jack got more bras than he ever had before, and actually began to start using Alex’s mic stand as a bra holder. It hadn’t bothered Alex…much.
The set had ended too soon for Alex’s liking, and while the fans were either dispersing to leave, buy a shirt or wait for someone to come out and do autographs and photos, Alex slipped back into the wings, hoping that he wouldn’t get confronted by Jack the second he walked off the stage.
As per usual, Alex wasn’t so lucky.
When Jack stormed off the stage (and yes, he stormed), he instantly went over to Alex, not even caring that his guitar was still hanging on his shoulder. “What the hell was that?” he asked as he looked at his friend. “That was our angst song when we were teens. What the hell were you doing playing it tonight?”
Alex sighed softly before he bit down on his lip. “I saw that look in your eyes Jack. You knew just as well as I did why I was playing our angst song tonight.” Jack paused and he kept his eyes locked on Alex, watching silently as Alex moved forward and draped his arms over Jack’s shoulders. “You know.”
In instinct, Jack wrapped his arms around Alex’s waist, tugging the older man closer to him. “I do know,” he whispered. “But I never figured that you would…”
“I do,” Alex responded softly, smiling at Jack before he leaned forward and closed the gap between their lips, catching his best friend in a gentle kiss, something that was a lot different than their quick, harsh stage kisses that fucked with the fans. This one was perfect.
They pulled away after a chorus of snickers came from the people behind Alex who were clearly trying to not hide their amusement. “Happy Thanksgiving fuckers,” Jack said with a laugh as he looked at Zack and Rian, pulling Alex closer to him so that the boy could rest his head on Jack’s chest. “What do you say we go have the best night of our lives?”
“At Denny’s?” Alex asked with a brief chuckle. “That’ll never happen, but awesome.” He kissed Jack’s jaw bone lightly before throwing up a middle finger at Zack, who had grabbed a camera off of one of the backstage photographers and had started taking pictures. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Agreed,” Jack said before he pulled Alex towards the exit, smiling. This was the best Thanksgiving ever.