CW RPS: Already Too Close (Tom Welling/Jared Padalecki)
Title: Already Too Close
Pairing: Tom Welling/Jared Padalecki (with some unrequited Jared/Jensen and references to Tom/Mike)
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Drinking. Lots of talking. An unforeseen amount of Jared!angst. A totally forseen amount of schmoop. Porn. Approximately 7700 words.
Note: I have read very little Tom in fic, so I don't know the usual fanon interpretations of the man. Therefore, this is probably a little odd. (But not as odd as if I'd tried to write him with Ian Sommerhalder, which was actually the thing that prompted this fic.) Also, I'm perfectly aware Tom Welling is married. I choose to ignore that for the purposes of, you know, writing fiction. In general, I'm making all this up. Oh, yes I am.
Somebody smarter than me posted pics of the various CW folk that featured in her latest RPS. I thought I'd oblige and do the same. You know, because one can never have too many pictures of Tom Welling (AKA my newest obsession)
Jared Padalecki:
Tom Welling:
All four boys involved in the story (and some woman we don't care about): Jared, Tom, Michael Rosenbaum, and Jensen Ackles:
Now the fic…
Already Too Close
Tom hated sitting around in some smoky-ass bar half the night, talking over bad music from the jukebox-because it was always a jukebox, because the two of them apparently only frequented the redneck part of town-but he liked getting to shoot the shit with Jensen and Jared for once, during one of those times they squeezed it in to the constant press of their hectic schedules, so he usually just sucked it up and dealt with it. But tonight, the bar wasn't the problem, it was his own introspective mood. So he was relieved-no, he thanked his lucky stars-that Jensen was for no good reason apparently in the mood to entertain Mike for a while on his own, so he didn't have to carry on with the mindless chatter or play any piss-poor games of pool.
Jared collapsed into a corner booth after he shook his hand, and Tom could already see that he was a few shots behind Jared and several hours of sleep ahead. Smallville had been on hiatus for a few days now, but Supernatural didn't close up shop until the next night, after which the cast and crew had a couple of weeks off. The four of them had already decided to celebrate their simultaneous hiatuses by spending at least half of their downtime totally trashed.
But tonight wasn't supposed to be anything yet, so why they were tempting fate with liquor, Tom couldn't say. Jensen was atypically cryptic in his summons, and Mike hadn't asked. When Jensen called, Mike just usually came running, and that meant he did, too.
"You look like shit," Tom said, settling in across from him, his black slacks sliding easily against the vinyl. He regretted that he hadn't had time to change clothes, throw on jeans and t-shirt instead of the black button-down shirt he'd had on at that boring-ass club they'd been in when Jensen called.
"Hello to you, too," Jared replied. "It was a long day."
"I didn't think there was any other kind."
"Long and exhausting. Standing around in this damp drizzly shit. Hours of Sam looking freaked out."
"Over what?"
"Life. Because Sam's life is…" He grinned. "…so fucking hard, Tom, it's a constant tragedy, you have no idea."
Tom laughed. "And Clark Kent's life is pie?"
"Do-gooding pie. Frequently shirtless do-gooding pie. Speaking of, you sure you should drink that?"
"Not many calories in whiskey."
"Plenty of drunk, though."
"Well, you're in a mood." A getting-wasted-on-a-work-night mood, apparently. But he knew better than to try to talk him out of it. Jared would do it just to spite him if he had to. That much he knew.
"Yeah. Why do you think Jen grabbed Mike and ran for the hills."
"His sparkling personality?"
"Sure."
"I'm serious. He'd have you over whatever this mopey shit is in no time."
Jared said, "Well, I'd rather sit back here where it's quiet. Got a headache."
"Alcohol won't help that."
"What are you, my mother? Besides, I've been around Captain Focused all day, and he's starting to get on my nerves. And that might make me punch Mike in the face and then I'd have to suck up to his crazy ass for weeks. And I'd rather talk to you, anyway. I haven't seen you in…ages."
"Yeah."
Something shifted then, as if Jared sort of came to a standstill, took a breath and stopped talking. And Tom, rather than prod him into rattling on, just let him be.
Jared settled against his seat in the booth and watched the people milling around, glancing every so often over Tom's shoulder to where he could hear Mike's voice giving Jen shit about his shots. The man looked like he could use at least a minute or two to decompress.
With his lapse in attention, Tom took the opportunity to give Jared the once-over, remembering how he'd looked when he walked in to find him sitting at the bar, long legs stretched out in a pair of frayed jeans and this green t-shirt hugging his shoulders. He looked tighter, more cut, but somehow bulkier, too. Tom sometimes forgot that Jared wasn't the skinny, doe-eyed kid who always bounced around the lot like a big loveable puppy but rather this unaccountably tall, broad-chested guy who probably could kick Mike's ass if he was as cranky as he seemed.
Or as he had seemed, because after a couple minutes sitting in that comfortable silence, drinking down his glass of whiskey, he was noticeably more calm. Not that he wasn't still throwing off more subtle waves of tension-enough, somehow, to set Tom a little on edge. Seemed like he was always a little on edge around Jared.
Finally, Jared said, "Sorry I'm such bad company tonight."
"It's fine."
"I'm glad you're here."
"We camping out at your place or Jensen's tonight?"
It really didn't matter, though; not anymore. You couldn't talk to one of them without hearing about the other, as though they were a unit. Hell, Jensen was beginning to talk about Jared's dogs like they were his own. Tom was glad for both of them, that they had someone not just to depend on but that they liked to spend time with. Their situation was potentially even more precarious than his on Smallville because there were no real supporting cast members, just the two of them against the world. It was the kind of thing-long days and nights, almost exclusively scene partners-that either made a bond too strong to break or made the whole show implode. So Tom was happy they had each other and that it worked, but their easy bond managed to make him jealous on both sides, and in a way he never was about Chad or anybody else. He wondered if that's what people felt about him and Mike.
"We'll straighten that out later," Jared said with a wave of his hand, finally allowing himself to really smile. "Anyway, since production is shut down tomorrow-"
"What?"
"He didn't tell you? Yeah. We're down. That's why we're out tonight. Something about last-minute problems securing some bass-ackwards location they've never used before, so they're scrambling. They said maybe-maybe-the afternoon, but that just means be ready in case something flies up Eric's ass and he decides to waste some film rather than sit on his hands. This being our last day before the break, I'm not thinking he will."
"Why didn't you say something? Hell, why aren't you…?"
"I don't know," he said with a shrug. "But, yeah, I think we're pretty much on hiatus already."
"So the drunken debauchery starts early," Tom said, raising his glass.
Jared clinked his against it and said, "Yep. It's been weeks since I was good and loaded. You up for it?"
"Do I have a choice?" Tom laughed.
Jared's easy smile stopped cold. "Yeah. Of course. I just thought-"
"Hey," Tom said, cocking his head to the side. "Sounds good. It's been a while since we got you drunk enough to do karaoke."
"This is not a karaoke bar."
"That's never stopped you before."
Jared flipped him off and leaned back against the seat, stretched his legs out even farther, halfway out from under the table. His eyes suddenly focused on something over Tom's shoulder then flickered away, so fast he might've missed it. But he didn't miss the way Jared sat up and looked straight at him, almost like he was trying not to look at the bar.
About the time Tom finally turned and looked over, he heard Mike's voice cutting through the dull background noise. The only thing at the bar was Mike and Jensen.
They were scooping up more longnecks and carrying them toward the pool room, oblivious to Tom and Jared's presence in the back corner. Then Tom heard Jensen's low drawl call out shit, and shortly he stumbled back into the main room and plunked a handful of napkins off the bar. Jared's eyes followed him from the doorway to the bar and back, and it was obvious that for a moment he forgot Tom was even at the table with him.
And then Tom finally saw it, that thing he'd been seeing for months without knowing how to interpret it. Or maybe without wanting to.
It wasn't about Jared's eyes tracking Jensen's movements. It was about the expression in those eyes-a combination of confused, forlorn, and desperate, all covered over with a veneer of disinterested observer, a guy just keeping tabs on his friend. Unconsciously careful and self-protective, and not particularly convincing if you were paying any attention. It was an expression he knew all too well, but only from making it.
Tom's fingers moved before he could stop them, to snap and bring Jared back to reality, and as Jared's head whipped around, a faint flush crept over his face, and he wouldn't look him in the eye.
"My god," Tom said before he could stop himself.
"What?"
"Nothing."
Jared's eyes drilled into his, and he made the conscious but perhaps stupid decision to just bring it out into the open. He'd already tipped his hand, and probably the guy needed someone to talk to before he made himself fucking miserable.
Tom said, "I'd've never believed it is all."
"You wanna tell me what you're talking about?" But Jared looked like he already knew and was halfway begging him not to keep going and halfway begging him to just, for God's sake, say it.
So Tom said it: "Jesus Christ, Jared, you want him. Like, seriously want him."
"Tommy…"
"He might be oblivious," he snapped, "but I'm not." And knowing why he wasn't-that he'd spent too much time watching Jared's every move not to read him too well sometimes-made something squeeze in his chest, and he wished to God he had just shut up.
Jared looked like he was about to bark at him, perhaps retort with a question he couldn't answer about why Jared wanting Jensen seemed like a puzzling and disconcerting turn of events to his one happily bisexual friend. But he just frowned and said with uncharacteristically soft resignation, "Yeah," then he scrambled out of the booth rather ungracefully and set a wobbly path to the bar.
By this, Tom knew two things: Jared was halfway to trashed and he himself was more than halfway to completely fucked.
When Jared came back shortly, he brought with him a full bottle and a lit cigarette, but he set down the bottle like it didn't signal some massive inner turmoil he was ready to obliterate with more whiskey, and he was already taking drags off the cigarette like him smoking was a perfectly natural, everyday occurrence.
"You don't smoke," Tom said.
"I do when I drink."
"I've never known you to."
Jared just waved the cigarette vaguely at him, and somehow that gesture pissed him off, literally made him feel the anger burn in his gut and curl up his fists. He could deal with him shutting him out. That's what guys did-hell, that's what the sort of friends he attracted always did, male or female. It's why he'd gotten better and better at reading people. But this absolute denial of Jared's was just stupid.-understandable but stupid.
Tom pursed his lips, and let himself sound a little bitchy; sometimes Padalecki needed pushing: "So we gonna pretend you didn't just admit to having a thing for your costar?"
"It's not a thing."
"No? Whatthefuckever, Jay. I know you. And he's a guy."
He tapped his cigarette against the ashtray and took a melodramatic drag. He made a pissy, bored face: "What, I'm scandalizing you or something?"
It took some powerful mojo to turn Jared into this person, and Tom wasn't sure he could pull him out of it, not as half-tipsy and three quarters to too honest as he was.
Tom said, "This is stupid shit, you know?"
"I know."
"Does he know?"
"Absolutely not," he said emphatically. Then he rolled his eyes. "Like you said, it's stupid."
Tom poured himself a shot and downed it, determined to made some headway in catching up. "So you're gonna act like this is no big deal? Having a thing for your co-star is no big deal?"
"That's right."
"And you're not even gonna talk about how I'm the pot calling the kettle black?"
"Look," he said, leaning over the table, tapping the table with the hand that held the cigarette. Tom watched the ashes drift over the beat up wood surface. "I'm not you. You have no idea what's going on in my head, okay. Don't sit over there all smug like you found out some big dirty secret."
"Not dirty. Just crazy is all."
"I know that. Believe me, I know." He properly ashed the cigarette then, in the little plastic ashtray, and Tom watched the way he held the Newport between his fingers, too tight, like he might drop it. "How'd you even…?"
"The way you look at him."
He shook his head and his nostrils flared. "Goddammit, you're making me sound like a-"
"Just chill the fuck out." Tom held his gaze, and he let out a long breath even as he kept his lips pursed. "You know I'm not out to give you shit about this. You know that's not how I am, man. Me, of all people. I'm just trying to make sense of it, that's all."
"Nothing to make sense of," he said with a shrug that didn't quite succeed in looking apathetic. "I'll get over it."
"He'll find out."
He chuckled sardonically. Sardonic didn't look good on him. "He won't even fucking notice."
"And why not?"
"He's straight," he said, like he was trying to be ironic about the biggest catastrophe in the world, and Tom almost laughed, except he couldn't.
He swirled his finger around the rim of the glass, then he looked at him without turning his head up, just his eyes. "Yeah, well so are you last I heard."
"Yeah," Jared said, almost grimacing before he drained his glass and pushed it back onto the table.
"It's funny how people change sometimes," Tom said. He let a slightly mischievous smile come over his face, in the curve of his lips and the crinkle at his eyes. "'Course, sometimes it's not a change at all. Just...figuring things out. I always kinda wondered…" He only needed to glance at Jared once, knowingly.
"Dude? Just because you're a switch hitter doesn't-"
Tom held up a hand. "Look, I wondered, but I finally figured…"
"What?"
"You put off these vibes sometimes, man. With everybody."
"Vibes?" He wrinkled up his face, smirking at him.
"Shut up. I'm serious. That's why I thought maybe…" He waved his hand at him. "Anyway, I realized it's not that you mean to do it. It's just the energy coming off you."
"How do you know it's not that I'm…?" He raised his eyebrows and smirked, indicating Tom with a nod of his head.
"I don't."
"Huh," Jared replied in a quick exhalation of air. He leaned back against the booth, but his hand stayed on the table, worrying his glass.
Tom bit his lip, then he said, "It's the way you smile at people, I think."
"Well, not all of us got to spend years modeling and perfecting that aloof, I'm-dead-sexy pout." Jared rolled his eyes at him, almost, but his glance flickered over his lips. Quickly, it landed on the table again, at his hands, before he looked up-and maybe he didn't even know he was doing it-over Tom's shoulder, to the corner Mike and Jensen were in.
Tom said, "Now if we're talking sexy pouts…"
"Shut it." He sighed, and Tom could see the hard set of Jared's jaw, hear the strain in his voice, as he said, "You and he never…?"
"No," Tom said, throwing back the rest of the shot. But Jared was still staring. Tom said, "Come on, I'd tell you. Hell, you'd know."
Jared smiled. "Yeah."
"Like you said, he's straight." As Tom poured himself another generous shot, he added, "Like, not even messing-around-with-guys-when-he's-drunk straight. I always knew better than to even try with him."
Jared just nodded. "You and Mike still…?"
"Yeah, we're still not doing that anymore," he replied. "I hate to say it, but I think the man is finally settling down. You know, just in time for his mid-life crisis."
"You miss him," Jared said softly, with a barely-there grin.
"No, I don't. I'm with him almost every day. You," he said with a nod, "I miss."
Jared smiled at that-God, did he love that easy smile-and finally took his hand off his empty glass if only to scratch at his neck and duck his head. Then he looked at him again and said, "But I'm not… You and Mike are…"
"Friends. Always have been, long before the other. Even after."
"Friends."
"Like you and Jensen."
"Friends."
"You keep saying it like it's impossible. But I know you, and I know him. I know what I've seen, too. That guy"-he nodded his head in the direction of the pool room-"would do anything for you."
Jared's face pinched up into one of those expressions Tom couldn't read except to know they meant he was trying not to show how much something affected him and doing a spectacularly bad job of it.
Jared forced his face to relax, and he added with a chuckle, "Including, apparently, keep Mike out of our hair."
"Mike's probably drunk by now. You know how easy he is to amuse when he's drunk. Now, if he can just get the marble god plastered…"
Jared shook his head, smiling. "You know, he's not as-"
"No, no. But he is a little too serious sometimes. And so closed-off."
"Guarded."
"Better word. Yeah."
Jared smiled wistfully before his voice got quiet, almost contemplative. "You kinda wanna…I don't know, solve him like he's a puzzle."
"As opposed to people who seem so open and honest but are really pretty fuckin' mystifying when you get right down to it."
He rolled his eyes. "You still trying to sell yourself as the strong, silent type?"
"I meant you."
Jared's eyes got round and large, then they squinted down, confused. No, not confused-incredulous, as though he couldn't believe anyone would call him on it.
Tom said, "Four years. Haunting the lot with you all those nights when we should've fucking been home already, terrorizing Vickie at craft services and drafting PAs to play four square between calls. Four years before I really knew you."
"I don't mean to-" His head rolled against the back of the seat.
"I know," Tom said, nervously pulling his hands out of his lap and laying them on the table. "Anyway, that's how I know you'll figure it out, this thing. He's already too close for you to just let it-"
"Yeah," Jared said, cutting him off with a nod of his head. "Like you and Mike."
"Which is funny, because I've always said you and Mike are so much alike it's-"
"Don't you make me knock you flat on your ass."
He grinned at him, mostly because Jared still came over all Texas when you pissed him off. Tom said, "Still true."
Jared straightened up, slinging one arm across the back of the seat. "Why are we having this deep-ass conversation anyway?"
"'Cause you're lonely."
"Fuck off," Jared muttered with a glare.
"Jen told me Morgan's gone for good."
"Yeah. Damn shame."
"Seemed like a nice guy."
"Is."
"Is it true he's not completely straight?"
"Mostly, anyway. But, yeah." Tom looked him in the eyes and saw him contemplating something, to tell or not to tell. His head came to rest against the back of the seat again with a soft thud as he took a shallow breath. Then he huffed it out: "I kissed him once."
"Yeah?" Tom took his shot and tried not to look at him too hard as he poured another, and one for Jared.
Flatly, he said, "He got me high. I kissed him."
"I wouldn't mind…"
Jared pretended to be shocked, but not for very long. It wouldn't be the first time he heard Tom talk about guys that way. That was really the odd thing about their friendship, that Jared was one of the few straight guy friends he had who didn't mind him talking like that. In fact, there were a whole lot of ways in which Tom felt really comfortable around Jared, like he was with few other people, but he realized then that they'd never really settled into a day-to-day, predictable sort of friendship. It was always just these fleeting moments of strange connection that only seemed to happen when they were out in a large group and found themselves out of mood with everybody else, tucked away in a corner like this, talking and drinking.
"I didn't know you had a thing for Morgan," Jared said with a grin.
"Not really. He's not my type. But he's definitely hot."
"But the beard…" Jared grumbled.
"You learn to kind of like that part."
"I guess." Jared's hand absentmindedly rubbed at his own face, over noisy but slight stubble, but his eyes were on Tom's jaw, and it made him suddenly self-conscious of his clean-shaven face, the aftershave he'd put on, how it made him look younger, even now.
But Jared continued, "What I'm saying, I'm pretty sure it's not just about…him."
It was an admission, but a vague one and not the kind Tom cared to probe at too much, or else Jared might very easily retreat into that snappish mood. Or it could be even worse: he'd smile and laugh and grab the bottle from the table and head back to where Mike and Jen were camped out, as though nothing were wrong.
Tom swirled the amber liquor around in his glass, staring into it because it was easier looking at that than the warm brown-green of Jared's eyes. He swallowed down the shot, then, and he was already beginning to mentally lose count.
"Guys," Jared said. "Plural. Not just Jen." His eyes went over his shoulder again. "He just made me…think."
"Well, stop thinking. About him. Stop."
If he'd been casual or funny about it, Jared would have laughed it off, but Tom knew the tone he'd taken without meaning to. He just didn't understand it except to know he had felt a sudden spike of ill-defined but almost physical protectiveness about the boy. His tone hadn't been one a person could laugh off.
Jared's arm came down off the back of the seat and rested by his side. "Yeah." Then he slid himself out around the table without a word and went toward the bathroom
When the door clicked shut, Tom realized he'd been holding his breath, clenching his diaphragm so tight it hurt. Jared could be so easy to be around, but he could also instantly be touchy as hell, and Tom had never known quite how to deal with his moods except to ride them out. Tonight, Jared was a regular ball of tension, and it wasn't the smiling kind, and he wasn't entirely sure it was just about Jensen, not with the way Jared kept looking at him, curious and appraising. If that made him hopeful, it also made his gut twist into a knot, because it meant he apparently hadn't done as good a job as he thought of burying this attraction he'd always had to him. Just the idea of Jared being into guys…
Tom poured himself more than a double and drank it down, hoping like hell the liquor would finally start to kick in and he'd calm down, because the last thing they needed was for both of them to be jumpy and weird around each other.
When Jared came back a minute or two later, he slid into the booth, but instead of stopping caddy-corner from him, where he'd been, looking at him almost across the table, now he sat dead center in the booth, more or less beside him, and his shoes knocked against his. He turned to face him, taking his glass from the table and cradling it in his hands.
"What?" Tom said.
"You were right. I'm…lonely, I guess. I work too much, and when I don't, I don't know…"
"You don't call me."
"I know."
"You call Mike."
Jared looked pained for a second, then his face softened into a faint grimace. "Because he doesn't make me think too much." He took a drink. "And I don't call him that often either."
"And I don't call you." Tom had to admit to himself that he didn't know precisely why that was, but he didn't expect Jared to grill him on it anyway.
He nodded and smiled. "Because you're so busy being Superman."
"Clark Kent. He's not superman yet."
"No tights."
"No tights."
"Tom," he said, and there was such a different tone to it he could feel every muscle in his body poised, waiting, every molecule already starting to tumble forward into something new and scary. Like the sensation just as you start to fall, and you know you can't stop it.
Jared said, "Did you ever used to think about me that way?"
Not do you, but did you. Do you was too close. Tom couldn't look at him. But he couldn't not, because that would be a confession.
"Maybe," he said.
"Maybe?" Jared said, eyes taking in every curve of his jaw, his lips, landing at his eyes and staying there like he was looking for something.
"If you think I'm gonna do something as stupid as…" Tom shook his head, all of a sudden too aware of Jared's body so near his, his hands that were cradling the glass of whiskey nearly bumping his knee.
Biting his lip, suppressing a smirk, Jared said, "Do? Who said anything about do?"
"Jared, you're sitting too close to me and you know it. Now, you're…you know you're…" He looked him up and down, unable to say words like attractive or handsome, let alone hot. "And you smell nice. But you're drunk and this is a really, really bad idea."
Jared didn't move. He just let his clear brown eyes slide all along his skin and finally sink into him, like they could grab him and refuse to let go. Whatever this was, he'd set his mind to it. It only remained for Tom to decide how bad he was willing to fuck things up. For those eyes, probably real bad.
Suddenly, Jared leaned back a little, just out of his personal space. It didn't lessen the tension even a little, but it was still a relief.
But then he set the glass on the table and said, "I had a dream about you once."
"Jared."
He continued, almost like he hadn't heard him or wasn't aware of how pretty much every word he said now just made his palms sweat more and his whole body feel too hot.
"I'd forgotten it," Jared said. "Was a long time ago." His head cocked to the side, and he said evenly, looking straight at him, "You tangled your hands up in my hair, and you kissed me."
Tom swallowed hard. "And…?" he said as casually as he could, like this was just an amusing story. He didn't even buy it himself, and he knew it wouldn't fool Jared.
"That's it," he said, shaking his head. Then he grinned at him, somewhere between friendly mischief and subtle seduction. "And I think it was Clark Kent anyway." His tongue darted out over his lower lip.
"Fuck you, man."
Laughing, he said, "He's so damn earnest"
"Young."
"Yeah. And you're…" He raised his eyebrows.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he said with a roll of his eyes, nodding indifferently. He could do this. He could force things back to normal, back to two old friends talking. "I tell you, Jay," he said as he sat back. "I like thirty. Thirty feels good."
"Looks good on you, too."
He said it quietly, and though Tom was used to compliments-he'd heard all his life how beautiful he was, even teasingly from his friends, sometimes seriously from Mike, when Mike was drunk enough-this wasn't Mike and this wasn't teasing.
"Padalecki, I'm getting the distinct impression you're…flirting with me."
"Does it bother you because you think I'm teasing you or because you didn't see it coming? Or because you think it's about Jensen?"
"It is about Jensen. I'm not an idiot. But you've always been this way, with me at least. And it doesn't bother me." But it did; it always had-just enough it could've made him crazy if he wasn't careful and sort of blindly devoted to making this thing he felt not be a factor.
But Jared didn't seem to hear the last part, didn't seem to know what sort of invitation it was, what sort of veiled plea, even if Tom felt a little like he'd just laid himself out against the vinyl seat and said take me, Jared, please, now. Instead, Jared focused, naturally, on himself.
"Always?" he said, shaking his head in amazement. "Always. Well, I didn't see it coming. Didn't plan this."
"Didn't plan what?"
"Nothing." Jared let out a long breath and then laughed to himself, as if he found himself pathetic and amusing. Firmly but with a lazy smile, he said, "Just nothing. You're my friend, and you can go on being my friend and be gorgeous and it doesn't have to-"
Maybe it was the word gorgeous that felt genuine enough to make his stomach drop, or the phrase it doesn't that felt like it needed disproving, but whatever it was, Tom found himself leaning across the space between them, his hand against Jared's jaw to angle it into a kiss.
He felt the soft flesh of his lower lip roll against Jared's, taking it in, and he let their mouths keep falling together, into a wet pucker, everything so soft and Jared so surprised. Then Tom flicked his tongue out and let it trace along the inside of Jared's lower lip before he probed it into his mouth, and if he had thoughts at all, they were obliterated when Jared's tongue slid against his and Jared's hands grabbed his shoulders and held him fast as he turned his head to make the kiss deeper, effectively taking over.
Being tongue-fucked by Jared Padalecki must have an amplifying effect on alcohol, because as soon as Tom's hand slid around his neck, into the wild, messy hair at the nape of his neck, and Jared worked at pressing him back against the booth, one palm hot over his chest, Tom suddenly felt every bit as drunk as he was. Like when you stand up and you realize you've had one too many, but he wasn't even standing, just sitting there being kissed, and he felt almost lightheaded, maybe just from the smell of Jared's cologne and the taste of the whiskey and cigarettes on his tongue.
About the time Tom started to lose track of where they were, Jared apparently remembered, because he jerked out of the kiss, his hands still on his chest and arm but his eyes scanning the bar. Jared was panting a little, and Tom just sat there shell-shocked at first, then waiting, wondering if this was when it would come, the freaking out and the long weeks or even months of not talking. He and Mike had bypassed that because they couldn't help but work through it, right there in a few tense and crazy days on set, but Tom had lost more friends than he'd ever kept to ill-advised nights of drunken groping. Never one, though, that he'd worked so long and hard to keep despite how much he wanted to put his hands on him every time he was in the same room with him.
Jared's eyes went all over the place and vacillated between so many expression Tom couldn't read him for shit, but only for a long moment. Tom tried to sputter out an apology, but Jared cut him off with a serious look and then all of a sudden let him go. Tom thought it was coming then, but Jared just slid out from around the table, kicking at his legs and mumbling to him to come on, follow him. If there was confusion in Jared's eyes as he stumbled into the back door to push it open and turned to see if Tom was behind him, it wasn't anything compared to the need in his expression, strong enough to cut right through the alcohol. Tom could only wish it was that clear for him, but he sort of felt like he was moving in slow motion. Until he crossed the threshold and Jared dragged him into the alley, into cool, damp air and the dim glow of a faraway street light, and pushed him up against the wall, his whole body holding him to the cold, rough brick as his hot mouth sought his out again.
He tried to protest, he really did. In between kisses, in the space where Jared's mouth would pull back and he would gasp a breath before crushing their lips together again, Tom would tell him to stop, but it was so half-hearted he would be surprised if it wasn't spurring him on. Jared's thigh came up between his legs and rocked into his already-hard cock, making Tom all but groan into his mouth. As it was, he couldn't get his breath back; all he could do was hold on and feel how Jared was pressing their bodies together so tightly he might not ever untangle some part of himself from this lust he couldn't believe was so strong for all he'd denied it. In fact, maybe that was the problem. As Jared suddenly sucked at his neck, he began to believe that maybe Jared had been denying for a while, too.
But Tom still felt like he should object. "You're drunk," he sputtered, but if this was him dissuading Jared, his body belied him by the way it writhed against Jared's, already in a rhythm, rough and jerky and sloppy and desperate.
"I know," Jared said in his ear. "So are you."
"Jay," he whined as he felt large hands circling his waist, pressing his hips back against the stone to grind into him.
"Don't you want this?"
Tom couldn't tell whether that had been seduction or confusion or both, but he knew the answer: "God, yes, but-"
"No. Don't do that. Don't be that way. Just let me…"
For the second time that night, something in Jared came to a halt. His face fell against his neck for a moment, and he stopped kissing and biting at him, just breathed out all the tension against his skin.
Tom took a shuddering breath, and he felt their bodies still rolling, melting together, and he knew he wouldn't stop this now for anything.
His hand came up off Jared's ass and clapped over the back of his neck. "Okay," he said quietly. "Okay, Jared." Then he nudged at Jared's legs until he was turning, letting Tom press him into the wall and look at him.
"You here with me?" Tom asked him, not taking his eyes off his now-dark pupils.
Jared just nodded as his hands seemed to twist and twine carefully around Tom's body, settle in at his lower back. He looked curiously vulnerable, but on purpose, like he was letting himself be, and that made Tom pause for a moment.
But Jared just stared at him as if he were finally looking at him like he wanted to, and he might as well have been stroking a thumb over the head of his cock for the effect it had on Tom's body. So he pressed his lips to Jared's again and felt him practically shiver. This was going to be damn difficult to endure but entirely worth it.
He tried to kiss him slowly, deep and wet and careful, exploring his lips with his tongue and tasting the inside of his mouth, tongue slipping and tangling against Jared's purposefully. But the deeper he kissed him, the harder the kisses became, until he was basically doing what Jared had done before to him, rocking his body into Jared's and tongue fucking him until their chests heaved hard together. About the time Jared started to make these small grunting noises of need, Tom's mouth left his and worked its way over his scratchy jaw to the soft place just under his ear, where he sucked at the skin and laved his tongue over it, and Jared's entire body bucked and then melted against the wall, his hands pulling Tom in closer.
Tom mumbled, "You have any idea what you're doing to me?"
"Me?"
"You. God, yeah."
Tom's hands had been on his shoulders, his neck, but once he started talking, he couldn't stop them from moving, one drifting down the damp front of Jared's t-shirt to his stomach, and it stopped curled under the waistband of his jeans, already slung so low Tom could feel the heat and dampness from his cock. Practically purring into Jared's ear, he said, "I like you like this, Jay. Want you to know that." He rolled his hips almost involuntarily against Jared's thigh, and Jared responded by taking his head in his hands and kissing him again, so hard Tom paused, but only for a moment, before he popped the button on his jeans and forced down his zipper.
Jared nipped at his lips at he pulled down the waistband of his boxers and drew out his cock, long and heavy, hot in his hands. Tom just held it for a moment, brushing his thumb over the soft skin, coaxing out a little warm, sticky fluid to make things easier. When he finally started fisting him, firm and slow, Jared's mouth tore away from his and his head fell back against the brick wall, eyes closed, and Tom eagerly watched as all the lines disappeared from his face and his mouth rounded into an O.
Tom almost kissed him again, but instead he nudged his mouth up into the space under Jared's jaw. Now, he was so hard and desperate, but he didn't trust himself to do anything but keep up his pace on Jared's cock and kiss at his neck, murmur affirmations against his skin. He needed Jared to come, and fast, or else he'd simply explode from all this friction, the way he was rocking himself into Jared's thigh, feeling the zipper press against the crown of his cock through two layers of fabric. It almost hurt, but he managed to deal with it reasonably well until Jared started rocking back.
At first, Tom thought it was just that Jared was close-and he was-but then he began to feel it, how Jared was trying to find a way to get him off. Then, about the time Jared started to respond to every slip of his palm with a groan, he proved it: Tom felt Jared's hand work between them, he fingers worrying the fly of his pants.
"No, stop," Tom said, trying to hold his hips too close for Jared to manage what he was doing. "Just let me-"
"Please."
"You put your hands on me, I won't last. Just-"
"Tommy," he groaned, arching into his touch.
"Let me do this. This-"
But Jared had finally gotten to the button on his pants, and his hands were already brushing too much over his erection through his pants, so Tom impatiently pushed down the front of his pants and let Jared's long fingers close over his shaft and pull him out of his boxer-briefs.
Tom grunted against his shoulder. "Oh God," he mumbled, maybe even whined. That was all it took for Jared, apparently. He didn't even try to tug at Tom's cock, just squirmed against the wall, every muscle tight to the point of straining. Tom pumped him a few more times, and Jared came with a series of sharp gasps, giving Tom's cock a squeeze as he came in Tom's hand.
Tom was going to just finished himself off, but Jared's wouldn't take his own hand away, so he closed his fist over Jared's and jerked himself hard, maybe too hard. When Jared's thumb swirled against the head of his cock, Tom jerked himself faster and came on the ground between them, feeling it like electricity all down his spine, this almost painful spike of pleasure, then of coming back to reality, to cold brick and Jared's hot body against his.
It wasn't until he finally took his hand off Jared's that he realized he'd sunk his teeth into Jared's shoulder, all but breaking the skin. He swiped his tongue over it, and Jared hissed, but it was a good sound. Sated. Still drunk. Now Tom's head was literally spinning, and he pulled away from Jared and leaned back against the wall, tucking himself back into his pants.
Jared did likewise, then he turned and stood with his hands pressed into the wall, his head down, like he was maybe a little dizzy.
"Sorry," Tom said finally.
"What for?"
"Attacking you."
"I started it. And did I seem opposed to…any of that?"
"No."
"I always like you best when you're being bossy, y'know?"
Tom took a chance on glancing over at him, and Jared was smiling. "No, I didn't," he said.
Jared raised his head and took his hands off the wall. "You're blushing."
"Too much talk," Tom said with a groan, closing his eyes. "Too much talk and entirely too much alcohol. You motherfuckers always get me in so much trouble when we go out." Tom peeled his eyes open again, finding that he needed to watch Jared now, read his reactions, watch for signs that this was as big a mistake as he almost knew it was.
"I didn't hold a gun to your head," Jared said with a smirk, but behind that was this knowing and halfway worried expression. Because he really had sort of held a gun to his head. Jared sighed and added, "We should probably go rescue Jen anyway."
Tom shook his head. "You're still…pink."
"Still feel it." But it sounded and looked like Still feel you. At least now Tom knew he wasn't the only one with a body still reeling, and not simply from the whiskey.
"Yeah." Jared settled back into the wall, his shoulder brushing Tom's.
They stood there for a few silent moments, and Tom tried not to think about the future or anything, really, except the way his body felt a deep calm but a surface tension, because there was so much uncertain now, and it went beyond the way he was always a little on edge around Jared.
When he finally start to feel like his heart wasn't racing and his body wasn't too warm, Tom said, "It'll get easier."
"Huh?"
"Being around him."
Jared gave him a look, like maybe Tom really had obliterated Jensen from his mind for a while.
"I know."
"You don't. Not yet."
Jared put his hands over his cheeks, then he shoved himself lazily off the wall with his hips and went toward the door. As he hauled it open, he said, "So, what does the guru recommend for lust over hopelessly straight men you can't have?"
"Stare at his ass a lot. Try not to jerk off thinking about him. Be his friend."
"That's it?"
Tom just nodded and followed him inside. Jen and Mike had already caught sight of them and were coming to meet them at the bar.
Tom sat down then, his heart pounding again, and he knew he was going to say it. For some reason, he just couldn't stop himself tonight. Later on, he'd blame the alcohol. But in the moment, he knew it had nothing to do with anything besides the sudden possibility of Jared Padalecki.
"There is another option."
"Yeah?" Jared replied.
He caught Jared's eye and said, "Stupidly hope that one day he'll kiss you in some dive bar in Vancouver."
Jared gave him a sharp look, not angry but surprised.
Tom was practically holding his breath, but he let it out when Jared smiled, the kind that lit up his face slowly, like cranking up a bulb on a dimmer switch, and leaned over, clapping his hand over the back of Tom's neck to say in his ear: "Do you hope for handjobs, too?"
Tom drew back, feeling blood rise to his face at the same time as he felt Mike's hand stingingly slap his back.
He looked at Jared out of the corner of his eye. He muttered, "Not if you plan to stay sane."
As Mike bought the next round, he looked a little too long into Tom's eyes, but Tom just shook his head at him and prayed that maybe, for a little while, they could all just be stupid drunk guys, like they always were and hopefully always would be, doing nothing they'd have to regret in the morning.
But, really, when Jared bought the round after that, and he looked a little too long into Tom's eyes, Tom was pretty sure he wouldn't regret it at all.
Pairing: Tom Welling/Jared Padalecki (with some unrequited Jared/Jensen and references to Tom/Mike)
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Drinking. Lots of talking. An unforeseen amount of Jared!angst. A totally forseen amount of schmoop. Porn. Approximately 7700 words.
Note: I have read very little Tom in fic, so I don't know the usual fanon interpretations of the man. Therefore, this is probably a little odd. (But not as odd as if I'd tried to write him with Ian Sommerhalder, which was actually the thing that prompted this fic.) Also, I'm perfectly aware Tom Welling is married. I choose to ignore that for the purposes of, you know, writing fiction. In general, I'm making all this up. Oh, yes I am.
Somebody smarter than me posted pics of the various CW folk that featured in her latest RPS. I thought I'd oblige and do the same. You know, because one can never have too many pictures of Tom Welling (AKA my newest obsession)
Jared Padalecki:
Tom Welling:
All four boys involved in the story (and some woman we don't care about): Jared, Tom, Michael Rosenbaum, and Jensen Ackles:
Now the fic…
Already Too Close
Tom hated sitting around in some smoky-ass bar half the night, talking over bad music from the jukebox-because it was always a jukebox, because the two of them apparently only frequented the redneck part of town-but he liked getting to shoot the shit with Jensen and Jared for once, during one of those times they squeezed it in to the constant press of their hectic schedules, so he usually just sucked it up and dealt with it. But tonight, the bar wasn't the problem, it was his own introspective mood. So he was relieved-no, he thanked his lucky stars-that Jensen was for no good reason apparently in the mood to entertain Mike for a while on his own, so he didn't have to carry on with the mindless chatter or play any piss-poor games of pool.
Jared collapsed into a corner booth after he shook his hand, and Tom could already see that he was a few shots behind Jared and several hours of sleep ahead. Smallville had been on hiatus for a few days now, but Supernatural didn't close up shop until the next night, after which the cast and crew had a couple of weeks off. The four of them had already decided to celebrate their simultaneous hiatuses by spending at least half of their downtime totally trashed.
But tonight wasn't supposed to be anything yet, so why they were tempting fate with liquor, Tom couldn't say. Jensen was atypically cryptic in his summons, and Mike hadn't asked. When Jensen called, Mike just usually came running, and that meant he did, too.
"You look like shit," Tom said, settling in across from him, his black slacks sliding easily against the vinyl. He regretted that he hadn't had time to change clothes, throw on jeans and t-shirt instead of the black button-down shirt he'd had on at that boring-ass club they'd been in when Jensen called.
"Hello to you, too," Jared replied. "It was a long day."
"I didn't think there was any other kind."
"Long and exhausting. Standing around in this damp drizzly shit. Hours of Sam looking freaked out."
"Over what?"
"Life. Because Sam's life is…" He grinned. "…so fucking hard, Tom, it's a constant tragedy, you have no idea."
Tom laughed. "And Clark Kent's life is pie?"
"Do-gooding pie. Frequently shirtless do-gooding pie. Speaking of, you sure you should drink that?"
"Not many calories in whiskey."
"Plenty of drunk, though."
"Well, you're in a mood." A getting-wasted-on-a-work-night mood, apparently. But he knew better than to try to talk him out of it. Jared would do it just to spite him if he had to. That much he knew.
"Yeah. Why do you think Jen grabbed Mike and ran for the hills."
"His sparkling personality?"
"Sure."
"I'm serious. He'd have you over whatever this mopey shit is in no time."
Jared said, "Well, I'd rather sit back here where it's quiet. Got a headache."
"Alcohol won't help that."
"What are you, my mother? Besides, I've been around Captain Focused all day, and he's starting to get on my nerves. And that might make me punch Mike in the face and then I'd have to suck up to his crazy ass for weeks. And I'd rather talk to you, anyway. I haven't seen you in…ages."
"Yeah."
Something shifted then, as if Jared sort of came to a standstill, took a breath and stopped talking. And Tom, rather than prod him into rattling on, just let him be.
Jared settled against his seat in the booth and watched the people milling around, glancing every so often over Tom's shoulder to where he could hear Mike's voice giving Jen shit about his shots. The man looked like he could use at least a minute or two to decompress.
With his lapse in attention, Tom took the opportunity to give Jared the once-over, remembering how he'd looked when he walked in to find him sitting at the bar, long legs stretched out in a pair of frayed jeans and this green t-shirt hugging his shoulders. He looked tighter, more cut, but somehow bulkier, too. Tom sometimes forgot that Jared wasn't the skinny, doe-eyed kid who always bounced around the lot like a big loveable puppy but rather this unaccountably tall, broad-chested guy who probably could kick Mike's ass if he was as cranky as he seemed.
Or as he had seemed, because after a couple minutes sitting in that comfortable silence, drinking down his glass of whiskey, he was noticeably more calm. Not that he wasn't still throwing off more subtle waves of tension-enough, somehow, to set Tom a little on edge. Seemed like he was always a little on edge around Jared.
Finally, Jared said, "Sorry I'm such bad company tonight."
"It's fine."
"I'm glad you're here."
"We camping out at your place or Jensen's tonight?"
It really didn't matter, though; not anymore. You couldn't talk to one of them without hearing about the other, as though they were a unit. Hell, Jensen was beginning to talk about Jared's dogs like they were his own. Tom was glad for both of them, that they had someone not just to depend on but that they liked to spend time with. Their situation was potentially even more precarious than his on Smallville because there were no real supporting cast members, just the two of them against the world. It was the kind of thing-long days and nights, almost exclusively scene partners-that either made a bond too strong to break or made the whole show implode. So Tom was happy they had each other and that it worked, but their easy bond managed to make him jealous on both sides, and in a way he never was about Chad or anybody else. He wondered if that's what people felt about him and Mike.
"We'll straighten that out later," Jared said with a wave of his hand, finally allowing himself to really smile. "Anyway, since production is shut down tomorrow-"
"What?"
"He didn't tell you? Yeah. We're down. That's why we're out tonight. Something about last-minute problems securing some bass-ackwards location they've never used before, so they're scrambling. They said maybe-maybe-the afternoon, but that just means be ready in case something flies up Eric's ass and he decides to waste some film rather than sit on his hands. This being our last day before the break, I'm not thinking he will."
"Why didn't you say something? Hell, why aren't you…?"
"I don't know," he said with a shrug. "But, yeah, I think we're pretty much on hiatus already."
"So the drunken debauchery starts early," Tom said, raising his glass.
Jared clinked his against it and said, "Yep. It's been weeks since I was good and loaded. You up for it?"
"Do I have a choice?" Tom laughed.
Jared's easy smile stopped cold. "Yeah. Of course. I just thought-"
"Hey," Tom said, cocking his head to the side. "Sounds good. It's been a while since we got you drunk enough to do karaoke."
"This is not a karaoke bar."
"That's never stopped you before."
Jared flipped him off and leaned back against the seat, stretched his legs out even farther, halfway out from under the table. His eyes suddenly focused on something over Tom's shoulder then flickered away, so fast he might've missed it. But he didn't miss the way Jared sat up and looked straight at him, almost like he was trying not to look at the bar.
About the time Tom finally turned and looked over, he heard Mike's voice cutting through the dull background noise. The only thing at the bar was Mike and Jensen.
They were scooping up more longnecks and carrying them toward the pool room, oblivious to Tom and Jared's presence in the back corner. Then Tom heard Jensen's low drawl call out shit, and shortly he stumbled back into the main room and plunked a handful of napkins off the bar. Jared's eyes followed him from the doorway to the bar and back, and it was obvious that for a moment he forgot Tom was even at the table with him.
And then Tom finally saw it, that thing he'd been seeing for months without knowing how to interpret it. Or maybe without wanting to.
It wasn't about Jared's eyes tracking Jensen's movements. It was about the expression in those eyes-a combination of confused, forlorn, and desperate, all covered over with a veneer of disinterested observer, a guy just keeping tabs on his friend. Unconsciously careful and self-protective, and not particularly convincing if you were paying any attention. It was an expression he knew all too well, but only from making it.
Tom's fingers moved before he could stop them, to snap and bring Jared back to reality, and as Jared's head whipped around, a faint flush crept over his face, and he wouldn't look him in the eye.
"My god," Tom said before he could stop himself.
"What?"
"Nothing."
Jared's eyes drilled into his, and he made the conscious but perhaps stupid decision to just bring it out into the open. He'd already tipped his hand, and probably the guy needed someone to talk to before he made himself fucking miserable.
Tom said, "I'd've never believed it is all."
"You wanna tell me what you're talking about?" But Jared looked like he already knew and was halfway begging him not to keep going and halfway begging him to just, for God's sake, say it.
So Tom said it: "Jesus Christ, Jared, you want him. Like, seriously want him."
"Tommy…"
"He might be oblivious," he snapped, "but I'm not." And knowing why he wasn't-that he'd spent too much time watching Jared's every move not to read him too well sometimes-made something squeeze in his chest, and he wished to God he had just shut up.
Jared looked like he was about to bark at him, perhaps retort with a question he couldn't answer about why Jared wanting Jensen seemed like a puzzling and disconcerting turn of events to his one happily bisexual friend. But he just frowned and said with uncharacteristically soft resignation, "Yeah," then he scrambled out of the booth rather ungracefully and set a wobbly path to the bar.
By this, Tom knew two things: Jared was halfway to trashed and he himself was more than halfway to completely fucked.
When Jared came back shortly, he brought with him a full bottle and a lit cigarette, but he set down the bottle like it didn't signal some massive inner turmoil he was ready to obliterate with more whiskey, and he was already taking drags off the cigarette like him smoking was a perfectly natural, everyday occurrence.
"You don't smoke," Tom said.
"I do when I drink."
"I've never known you to."
Jared just waved the cigarette vaguely at him, and somehow that gesture pissed him off, literally made him feel the anger burn in his gut and curl up his fists. He could deal with him shutting him out. That's what guys did-hell, that's what the sort of friends he attracted always did, male or female. It's why he'd gotten better and better at reading people. But this absolute denial of Jared's was just stupid.-understandable but stupid.
Tom pursed his lips, and let himself sound a little bitchy; sometimes Padalecki needed pushing: "So we gonna pretend you didn't just admit to having a thing for your costar?"
"It's not a thing."
"No? Whatthefuckever, Jay. I know you. And he's a guy."
He tapped his cigarette against the ashtray and took a melodramatic drag. He made a pissy, bored face: "What, I'm scandalizing you or something?"
It took some powerful mojo to turn Jared into this person, and Tom wasn't sure he could pull him out of it, not as half-tipsy and three quarters to too honest as he was.
Tom said, "This is stupid shit, you know?"
"I know."
"Does he know?"
"Absolutely not," he said emphatically. Then he rolled his eyes. "Like you said, it's stupid."
Tom poured himself a shot and downed it, determined to made some headway in catching up. "So you're gonna act like this is no big deal? Having a thing for your co-star is no big deal?"
"That's right."
"And you're not even gonna talk about how I'm the pot calling the kettle black?"
"Look," he said, leaning over the table, tapping the table with the hand that held the cigarette. Tom watched the ashes drift over the beat up wood surface. "I'm not you. You have no idea what's going on in my head, okay. Don't sit over there all smug like you found out some big dirty secret."
"Not dirty. Just crazy is all."
"I know that. Believe me, I know." He properly ashed the cigarette then, in the little plastic ashtray, and Tom watched the way he held the Newport between his fingers, too tight, like he might drop it. "How'd you even…?"
"The way you look at him."
He shook his head and his nostrils flared. "Goddammit, you're making me sound like a-"
"Just chill the fuck out." Tom held his gaze, and he let out a long breath even as he kept his lips pursed. "You know I'm not out to give you shit about this. You know that's not how I am, man. Me, of all people. I'm just trying to make sense of it, that's all."
"Nothing to make sense of," he said with a shrug that didn't quite succeed in looking apathetic. "I'll get over it."
"He'll find out."
He chuckled sardonically. Sardonic didn't look good on him. "He won't even fucking notice."
"And why not?"
"He's straight," he said, like he was trying to be ironic about the biggest catastrophe in the world, and Tom almost laughed, except he couldn't.
He swirled his finger around the rim of the glass, then he looked at him without turning his head up, just his eyes. "Yeah, well so are you last I heard."
"Yeah," Jared said, almost grimacing before he drained his glass and pushed it back onto the table.
"It's funny how people change sometimes," Tom said. He let a slightly mischievous smile come over his face, in the curve of his lips and the crinkle at his eyes. "'Course, sometimes it's not a change at all. Just...figuring things out. I always kinda wondered…" He only needed to glance at Jared once, knowingly.
"Dude? Just because you're a switch hitter doesn't-"
Tom held up a hand. "Look, I wondered, but I finally figured…"
"What?"
"You put off these vibes sometimes, man. With everybody."
"Vibes?" He wrinkled up his face, smirking at him.
"Shut up. I'm serious. That's why I thought maybe…" He waved his hand at him. "Anyway, I realized it's not that you mean to do it. It's just the energy coming off you."
"How do you know it's not that I'm…?" He raised his eyebrows and smirked, indicating Tom with a nod of his head.
"I don't."
"Huh," Jared replied in a quick exhalation of air. He leaned back against the booth, but his hand stayed on the table, worrying his glass.
Tom bit his lip, then he said, "It's the way you smile at people, I think."
"Well, not all of us got to spend years modeling and perfecting that aloof, I'm-dead-sexy pout." Jared rolled his eyes at him, almost, but his glance flickered over his lips. Quickly, it landed on the table again, at his hands, before he looked up-and maybe he didn't even know he was doing it-over Tom's shoulder, to the corner Mike and Jensen were in.
Tom said, "Now if we're talking sexy pouts…"
"Shut it." He sighed, and Tom could see the hard set of Jared's jaw, hear the strain in his voice, as he said, "You and he never…?"
"No," Tom said, throwing back the rest of the shot. But Jared was still staring. Tom said, "Come on, I'd tell you. Hell, you'd know."
Jared smiled. "Yeah."
"Like you said, he's straight." As Tom poured himself another generous shot, he added, "Like, not even messing-around-with-guys-when-he's-drunk straight. I always knew better than to even try with him."
Jared just nodded. "You and Mike still…?"
"Yeah, we're still not doing that anymore," he replied. "I hate to say it, but I think the man is finally settling down. You know, just in time for his mid-life crisis."
"You miss him," Jared said softly, with a barely-there grin.
"No, I don't. I'm with him almost every day. You," he said with a nod, "I miss."
Jared smiled at that-God, did he love that easy smile-and finally took his hand off his empty glass if only to scratch at his neck and duck his head. Then he looked at him again and said, "But I'm not… You and Mike are…"
"Friends. Always have been, long before the other. Even after."
"Friends."
"Like you and Jensen."
"Friends."
"You keep saying it like it's impossible. But I know you, and I know him. I know what I've seen, too. That guy"-he nodded his head in the direction of the pool room-"would do anything for you."
Jared's face pinched up into one of those expressions Tom couldn't read except to know they meant he was trying not to show how much something affected him and doing a spectacularly bad job of it.
Jared forced his face to relax, and he added with a chuckle, "Including, apparently, keep Mike out of our hair."
"Mike's probably drunk by now. You know how easy he is to amuse when he's drunk. Now, if he can just get the marble god plastered…"
Jared shook his head, smiling. "You know, he's not as-"
"No, no. But he is a little too serious sometimes. And so closed-off."
"Guarded."
"Better word. Yeah."
Jared smiled wistfully before his voice got quiet, almost contemplative. "You kinda wanna…I don't know, solve him like he's a puzzle."
"As opposed to people who seem so open and honest but are really pretty fuckin' mystifying when you get right down to it."
He rolled his eyes. "You still trying to sell yourself as the strong, silent type?"
"I meant you."
Jared's eyes got round and large, then they squinted down, confused. No, not confused-incredulous, as though he couldn't believe anyone would call him on it.
Tom said, "Four years. Haunting the lot with you all those nights when we should've fucking been home already, terrorizing Vickie at craft services and drafting PAs to play four square between calls. Four years before I really knew you."
"I don't mean to-" His head rolled against the back of the seat.
"I know," Tom said, nervously pulling his hands out of his lap and laying them on the table. "Anyway, that's how I know you'll figure it out, this thing. He's already too close for you to just let it-"
"Yeah," Jared said, cutting him off with a nod of his head. "Like you and Mike."
"Which is funny, because I've always said you and Mike are so much alike it's-"
"Don't you make me knock you flat on your ass."
He grinned at him, mostly because Jared still came over all Texas when you pissed him off. Tom said, "Still true."
Jared straightened up, slinging one arm across the back of the seat. "Why are we having this deep-ass conversation anyway?"
"'Cause you're lonely."
"Fuck off," Jared muttered with a glare.
"Jen told me Morgan's gone for good."
"Yeah. Damn shame."
"Seemed like a nice guy."
"Is."
"Is it true he's not completely straight?"
"Mostly, anyway. But, yeah." Tom looked him in the eyes and saw him contemplating something, to tell or not to tell. His head came to rest against the back of the seat again with a soft thud as he took a shallow breath. Then he huffed it out: "I kissed him once."
"Yeah?" Tom took his shot and tried not to look at him too hard as he poured another, and one for Jared.
Flatly, he said, "He got me high. I kissed him."
"I wouldn't mind…"
Jared pretended to be shocked, but not for very long. It wouldn't be the first time he heard Tom talk about guys that way. That was really the odd thing about their friendship, that Jared was one of the few straight guy friends he had who didn't mind him talking like that. In fact, there were a whole lot of ways in which Tom felt really comfortable around Jared, like he was with few other people, but he realized then that they'd never really settled into a day-to-day, predictable sort of friendship. It was always just these fleeting moments of strange connection that only seemed to happen when they were out in a large group and found themselves out of mood with everybody else, tucked away in a corner like this, talking and drinking.
"I didn't know you had a thing for Morgan," Jared said with a grin.
"Not really. He's not my type. But he's definitely hot."
"But the beard…" Jared grumbled.
"You learn to kind of like that part."
"I guess." Jared's hand absentmindedly rubbed at his own face, over noisy but slight stubble, but his eyes were on Tom's jaw, and it made him suddenly self-conscious of his clean-shaven face, the aftershave he'd put on, how it made him look younger, even now.
But Jared continued, "What I'm saying, I'm pretty sure it's not just about…him."
It was an admission, but a vague one and not the kind Tom cared to probe at too much, or else Jared might very easily retreat into that snappish mood. Or it could be even worse: he'd smile and laugh and grab the bottle from the table and head back to where Mike and Jen were camped out, as though nothing were wrong.
Tom swirled the amber liquor around in his glass, staring into it because it was easier looking at that than the warm brown-green of Jared's eyes. He swallowed down the shot, then, and he was already beginning to mentally lose count.
"Guys," Jared said. "Plural. Not just Jen." His eyes went over his shoulder again. "He just made me…think."
"Well, stop thinking. About him. Stop."
If he'd been casual or funny about it, Jared would have laughed it off, but Tom knew the tone he'd taken without meaning to. He just didn't understand it except to know he had felt a sudden spike of ill-defined but almost physical protectiveness about the boy. His tone hadn't been one a person could laugh off.
Jared's arm came down off the back of the seat and rested by his side. "Yeah." Then he slid himself out around the table without a word and went toward the bathroom
When the door clicked shut, Tom realized he'd been holding his breath, clenching his diaphragm so tight it hurt. Jared could be so easy to be around, but he could also instantly be touchy as hell, and Tom had never known quite how to deal with his moods except to ride them out. Tonight, Jared was a regular ball of tension, and it wasn't the smiling kind, and he wasn't entirely sure it was just about Jensen, not with the way Jared kept looking at him, curious and appraising. If that made him hopeful, it also made his gut twist into a knot, because it meant he apparently hadn't done as good a job as he thought of burying this attraction he'd always had to him. Just the idea of Jared being into guys…
Tom poured himself more than a double and drank it down, hoping like hell the liquor would finally start to kick in and he'd calm down, because the last thing they needed was for both of them to be jumpy and weird around each other.
When Jared came back a minute or two later, he slid into the booth, but instead of stopping caddy-corner from him, where he'd been, looking at him almost across the table, now he sat dead center in the booth, more or less beside him, and his shoes knocked against his. He turned to face him, taking his glass from the table and cradling it in his hands.
"What?" Tom said.
"You were right. I'm…lonely, I guess. I work too much, and when I don't, I don't know…"
"You don't call me."
"I know."
"You call Mike."
Jared looked pained for a second, then his face softened into a faint grimace. "Because he doesn't make me think too much." He took a drink. "And I don't call him that often either."
"And I don't call you." Tom had to admit to himself that he didn't know precisely why that was, but he didn't expect Jared to grill him on it anyway.
He nodded and smiled. "Because you're so busy being Superman."
"Clark Kent. He's not superman yet."
"No tights."
"No tights."
"Tom," he said, and there was such a different tone to it he could feel every muscle in his body poised, waiting, every molecule already starting to tumble forward into something new and scary. Like the sensation just as you start to fall, and you know you can't stop it.
Jared said, "Did you ever used to think about me that way?"
Not do you, but did you. Do you was too close. Tom couldn't look at him. But he couldn't not, because that would be a confession.
"Maybe," he said.
"Maybe?" Jared said, eyes taking in every curve of his jaw, his lips, landing at his eyes and staying there like he was looking for something.
"If you think I'm gonna do something as stupid as…" Tom shook his head, all of a sudden too aware of Jared's body so near his, his hands that were cradling the glass of whiskey nearly bumping his knee.
Biting his lip, suppressing a smirk, Jared said, "Do? Who said anything about do?"
"Jared, you're sitting too close to me and you know it. Now, you're…you know you're…" He looked him up and down, unable to say words like attractive or handsome, let alone hot. "And you smell nice. But you're drunk and this is a really, really bad idea."
Jared didn't move. He just let his clear brown eyes slide all along his skin and finally sink into him, like they could grab him and refuse to let go. Whatever this was, he'd set his mind to it. It only remained for Tom to decide how bad he was willing to fuck things up. For those eyes, probably real bad.
Suddenly, Jared leaned back a little, just out of his personal space. It didn't lessen the tension even a little, but it was still a relief.
But then he set the glass on the table and said, "I had a dream about you once."
"Jared."
He continued, almost like he hadn't heard him or wasn't aware of how pretty much every word he said now just made his palms sweat more and his whole body feel too hot.
"I'd forgotten it," Jared said. "Was a long time ago." His head cocked to the side, and he said evenly, looking straight at him, "You tangled your hands up in my hair, and you kissed me."
Tom swallowed hard. "And…?" he said as casually as he could, like this was just an amusing story. He didn't even buy it himself, and he knew it wouldn't fool Jared.
"That's it," he said, shaking his head. Then he grinned at him, somewhere between friendly mischief and subtle seduction. "And I think it was Clark Kent anyway." His tongue darted out over his lower lip.
"Fuck you, man."
Laughing, he said, "He's so damn earnest"
"Young."
"Yeah. And you're…" He raised his eyebrows.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he said with a roll of his eyes, nodding indifferently. He could do this. He could force things back to normal, back to two old friends talking. "I tell you, Jay," he said as he sat back. "I like thirty. Thirty feels good."
"Looks good on you, too."
He said it quietly, and though Tom was used to compliments-he'd heard all his life how beautiful he was, even teasingly from his friends, sometimes seriously from Mike, when Mike was drunk enough-this wasn't Mike and this wasn't teasing.
"Padalecki, I'm getting the distinct impression you're…flirting with me."
"Does it bother you because you think I'm teasing you or because you didn't see it coming? Or because you think it's about Jensen?"
"It is about Jensen. I'm not an idiot. But you've always been this way, with me at least. And it doesn't bother me." But it did; it always had-just enough it could've made him crazy if he wasn't careful and sort of blindly devoted to making this thing he felt not be a factor.
But Jared didn't seem to hear the last part, didn't seem to know what sort of invitation it was, what sort of veiled plea, even if Tom felt a little like he'd just laid himself out against the vinyl seat and said take me, Jared, please, now. Instead, Jared focused, naturally, on himself.
"Always?" he said, shaking his head in amazement. "Always. Well, I didn't see it coming. Didn't plan this."
"Didn't plan what?"
"Nothing." Jared let out a long breath and then laughed to himself, as if he found himself pathetic and amusing. Firmly but with a lazy smile, he said, "Just nothing. You're my friend, and you can go on being my friend and be gorgeous and it doesn't have to-"
Maybe it was the word gorgeous that felt genuine enough to make his stomach drop, or the phrase it doesn't that felt like it needed disproving, but whatever it was, Tom found himself leaning across the space between them, his hand against Jared's jaw to angle it into a kiss.
He felt the soft flesh of his lower lip roll against Jared's, taking it in, and he let their mouths keep falling together, into a wet pucker, everything so soft and Jared so surprised. Then Tom flicked his tongue out and let it trace along the inside of Jared's lower lip before he probed it into his mouth, and if he had thoughts at all, they were obliterated when Jared's tongue slid against his and Jared's hands grabbed his shoulders and held him fast as he turned his head to make the kiss deeper, effectively taking over.
Being tongue-fucked by Jared Padalecki must have an amplifying effect on alcohol, because as soon as Tom's hand slid around his neck, into the wild, messy hair at the nape of his neck, and Jared worked at pressing him back against the booth, one palm hot over his chest, Tom suddenly felt every bit as drunk as he was. Like when you stand up and you realize you've had one too many, but he wasn't even standing, just sitting there being kissed, and he felt almost lightheaded, maybe just from the smell of Jared's cologne and the taste of the whiskey and cigarettes on his tongue.
About the time Tom started to lose track of where they were, Jared apparently remembered, because he jerked out of the kiss, his hands still on his chest and arm but his eyes scanning the bar. Jared was panting a little, and Tom just sat there shell-shocked at first, then waiting, wondering if this was when it would come, the freaking out and the long weeks or even months of not talking. He and Mike had bypassed that because they couldn't help but work through it, right there in a few tense and crazy days on set, but Tom had lost more friends than he'd ever kept to ill-advised nights of drunken groping. Never one, though, that he'd worked so long and hard to keep despite how much he wanted to put his hands on him every time he was in the same room with him.
Jared's eyes went all over the place and vacillated between so many expression Tom couldn't read him for shit, but only for a long moment. Tom tried to sputter out an apology, but Jared cut him off with a serious look and then all of a sudden let him go. Tom thought it was coming then, but Jared just slid out from around the table, kicking at his legs and mumbling to him to come on, follow him. If there was confusion in Jared's eyes as he stumbled into the back door to push it open and turned to see if Tom was behind him, it wasn't anything compared to the need in his expression, strong enough to cut right through the alcohol. Tom could only wish it was that clear for him, but he sort of felt like he was moving in slow motion. Until he crossed the threshold and Jared dragged him into the alley, into cool, damp air and the dim glow of a faraway street light, and pushed him up against the wall, his whole body holding him to the cold, rough brick as his hot mouth sought his out again.
He tried to protest, he really did. In between kisses, in the space where Jared's mouth would pull back and he would gasp a breath before crushing their lips together again, Tom would tell him to stop, but it was so half-hearted he would be surprised if it wasn't spurring him on. Jared's thigh came up between his legs and rocked into his already-hard cock, making Tom all but groan into his mouth. As it was, he couldn't get his breath back; all he could do was hold on and feel how Jared was pressing their bodies together so tightly he might not ever untangle some part of himself from this lust he couldn't believe was so strong for all he'd denied it. In fact, maybe that was the problem. As Jared suddenly sucked at his neck, he began to believe that maybe Jared had been denying for a while, too.
But Tom still felt like he should object. "You're drunk," he sputtered, but if this was him dissuading Jared, his body belied him by the way it writhed against Jared's, already in a rhythm, rough and jerky and sloppy and desperate.
"I know," Jared said in his ear. "So are you."
"Jay," he whined as he felt large hands circling his waist, pressing his hips back against the stone to grind into him.
"Don't you want this?"
Tom couldn't tell whether that had been seduction or confusion or both, but he knew the answer: "God, yes, but-"
"No. Don't do that. Don't be that way. Just let me…"
For the second time that night, something in Jared came to a halt. His face fell against his neck for a moment, and he stopped kissing and biting at him, just breathed out all the tension against his skin.
Tom took a shuddering breath, and he felt their bodies still rolling, melting together, and he knew he wouldn't stop this now for anything.
His hand came up off Jared's ass and clapped over the back of his neck. "Okay," he said quietly. "Okay, Jared." Then he nudged at Jared's legs until he was turning, letting Tom press him into the wall and look at him.
"You here with me?" Tom asked him, not taking his eyes off his now-dark pupils.
Jared just nodded as his hands seemed to twist and twine carefully around Tom's body, settle in at his lower back. He looked curiously vulnerable, but on purpose, like he was letting himself be, and that made Tom pause for a moment.
But Jared just stared at him as if he were finally looking at him like he wanted to, and he might as well have been stroking a thumb over the head of his cock for the effect it had on Tom's body. So he pressed his lips to Jared's again and felt him practically shiver. This was going to be damn difficult to endure but entirely worth it.
He tried to kiss him slowly, deep and wet and careful, exploring his lips with his tongue and tasting the inside of his mouth, tongue slipping and tangling against Jared's purposefully. But the deeper he kissed him, the harder the kisses became, until he was basically doing what Jared had done before to him, rocking his body into Jared's and tongue fucking him until their chests heaved hard together. About the time Jared started to make these small grunting noises of need, Tom's mouth left his and worked its way over his scratchy jaw to the soft place just under his ear, where he sucked at the skin and laved his tongue over it, and Jared's entire body bucked and then melted against the wall, his hands pulling Tom in closer.
Tom mumbled, "You have any idea what you're doing to me?"
"Me?"
"You. God, yeah."
Tom's hands had been on his shoulders, his neck, but once he started talking, he couldn't stop them from moving, one drifting down the damp front of Jared's t-shirt to his stomach, and it stopped curled under the waistband of his jeans, already slung so low Tom could feel the heat and dampness from his cock. Practically purring into Jared's ear, he said, "I like you like this, Jay. Want you to know that." He rolled his hips almost involuntarily against Jared's thigh, and Jared responded by taking his head in his hands and kissing him again, so hard Tom paused, but only for a moment, before he popped the button on his jeans and forced down his zipper.
Jared nipped at his lips at he pulled down the waistband of his boxers and drew out his cock, long and heavy, hot in his hands. Tom just held it for a moment, brushing his thumb over the soft skin, coaxing out a little warm, sticky fluid to make things easier. When he finally started fisting him, firm and slow, Jared's mouth tore away from his and his head fell back against the brick wall, eyes closed, and Tom eagerly watched as all the lines disappeared from his face and his mouth rounded into an O.
Tom almost kissed him again, but instead he nudged his mouth up into the space under Jared's jaw. Now, he was so hard and desperate, but he didn't trust himself to do anything but keep up his pace on Jared's cock and kiss at his neck, murmur affirmations against his skin. He needed Jared to come, and fast, or else he'd simply explode from all this friction, the way he was rocking himself into Jared's thigh, feeling the zipper press against the crown of his cock through two layers of fabric. It almost hurt, but he managed to deal with it reasonably well until Jared started rocking back.
At first, Tom thought it was just that Jared was close-and he was-but then he began to feel it, how Jared was trying to find a way to get him off. Then, about the time Jared started to respond to every slip of his palm with a groan, he proved it: Tom felt Jared's hand work between them, he fingers worrying the fly of his pants.
"No, stop," Tom said, trying to hold his hips too close for Jared to manage what he was doing. "Just let me-"
"Please."
"You put your hands on me, I won't last. Just-"
"Tommy," he groaned, arching into his touch.
"Let me do this. This-"
But Jared had finally gotten to the button on his pants, and his hands were already brushing too much over his erection through his pants, so Tom impatiently pushed down the front of his pants and let Jared's long fingers close over his shaft and pull him out of his boxer-briefs.
Tom grunted against his shoulder. "Oh God," he mumbled, maybe even whined. That was all it took for Jared, apparently. He didn't even try to tug at Tom's cock, just squirmed against the wall, every muscle tight to the point of straining. Tom pumped him a few more times, and Jared came with a series of sharp gasps, giving Tom's cock a squeeze as he came in Tom's hand.
Tom was going to just finished himself off, but Jared's wouldn't take his own hand away, so he closed his fist over Jared's and jerked himself hard, maybe too hard. When Jared's thumb swirled against the head of his cock, Tom jerked himself faster and came on the ground between them, feeling it like electricity all down his spine, this almost painful spike of pleasure, then of coming back to reality, to cold brick and Jared's hot body against his.
It wasn't until he finally took his hand off Jared's that he realized he'd sunk his teeth into Jared's shoulder, all but breaking the skin. He swiped his tongue over it, and Jared hissed, but it was a good sound. Sated. Still drunk. Now Tom's head was literally spinning, and he pulled away from Jared and leaned back against the wall, tucking himself back into his pants.
Jared did likewise, then he turned and stood with his hands pressed into the wall, his head down, like he was maybe a little dizzy.
"Sorry," Tom said finally.
"What for?"
"Attacking you."
"I started it. And did I seem opposed to…any of that?"
"No."
"I always like you best when you're being bossy, y'know?"
Tom took a chance on glancing over at him, and Jared was smiling. "No, I didn't," he said.
Jared raised his head and took his hands off the wall. "You're blushing."
"Too much talk," Tom said with a groan, closing his eyes. "Too much talk and entirely too much alcohol. You motherfuckers always get me in so much trouble when we go out." Tom peeled his eyes open again, finding that he needed to watch Jared now, read his reactions, watch for signs that this was as big a mistake as he almost knew it was.
"I didn't hold a gun to your head," Jared said with a smirk, but behind that was this knowing and halfway worried expression. Because he really had sort of held a gun to his head. Jared sighed and added, "We should probably go rescue Jen anyway."
Tom shook his head. "You're still…pink."
"Still feel it." But it sounded and looked like Still feel you. At least now Tom knew he wasn't the only one with a body still reeling, and not simply from the whiskey.
"Yeah." Jared settled back into the wall, his shoulder brushing Tom's.
They stood there for a few silent moments, and Tom tried not to think about the future or anything, really, except the way his body felt a deep calm but a surface tension, because there was so much uncertain now, and it went beyond the way he was always a little on edge around Jared.
When he finally start to feel like his heart wasn't racing and his body wasn't too warm, Tom said, "It'll get easier."
"Huh?"
"Being around him."
Jared gave him a look, like maybe Tom really had obliterated Jensen from his mind for a while.
"I know."
"You don't. Not yet."
Jared put his hands over his cheeks, then he shoved himself lazily off the wall with his hips and went toward the door. As he hauled it open, he said, "So, what does the guru recommend for lust over hopelessly straight men you can't have?"
"Stare at his ass a lot. Try not to jerk off thinking about him. Be his friend."
"That's it?"
Tom just nodded and followed him inside. Jen and Mike had already caught sight of them and were coming to meet them at the bar.
Tom sat down then, his heart pounding again, and he knew he was going to say it. For some reason, he just couldn't stop himself tonight. Later on, he'd blame the alcohol. But in the moment, he knew it had nothing to do with anything besides the sudden possibility of Jared Padalecki.
"There is another option."
"Yeah?" Jared replied.
He caught Jared's eye and said, "Stupidly hope that one day he'll kiss you in some dive bar in Vancouver."
Jared gave him a sharp look, not angry but surprised.
Tom was practically holding his breath, but he let it out when Jared smiled, the kind that lit up his face slowly, like cranking up a bulb on a dimmer switch, and leaned over, clapping his hand over the back of Tom's neck to say in his ear: "Do you hope for handjobs, too?"
Tom drew back, feeling blood rise to his face at the same time as he felt Mike's hand stingingly slap his back.
He looked at Jared out of the corner of his eye. He muttered, "Not if you plan to stay sane."
As Mike bought the next round, he looked a little too long into Tom's eyes, but Tom just shook his head at him and prayed that maybe, for a little while, they could all just be stupid drunk guys, like they always were and hopefully always would be, doing nothing they'd have to regret in the morning.
But, really, when Jared bought the round after that, and he looked a little too long into Tom's eyes, Tom was pretty sure he wouldn't regret it at all.