SPN Fic: Run for Cover
Title: Run for Cover
Author: deirdre_c
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: Hard R
Spoilers: through mid-Season 6
Word Count: ~3,200
Summary: Jensen has a favorite blanket that Jared intends to keep.
A/N: For lazy_daze's prompt "old blanket" in the silverbullets challenge. Does this even count as schmoop? IDEK!
So, maybe it isn’t an accident that Jared ends up with the blanket.
When Jensen decides to get his own place after Season Four, Jared helps him pack up his stuff with a smile slapped on and a scooped-out hollow in his chest.
They fill up boxes big and little for the movers with Jensen’s clothes and his collection of coffee mugs with stupid sayings and his street hockey gear from the games they used to play on set, back in the first season.
It takes a whole afternoon to divvy up their DVD collection, mostly because Jensen keeps holding up cases and quoting lines from each movie and how is Jared supposed to resist coming back at him? By the time they make it through Lighten up, Francis and 28 days. 6 hours. 42 minutes. 12 seconds. That... is when the world... will end and Hey Vasquez, have you ever been mistaken for a man? it’s almost midnight, and in the end Jared lets Jensen take Moulin Rouge even though it isn’t his copy, because that damn movie always makes Jared cry anyway.
The end of the week arrives, and there’s nothing left to pack, so Jensen slips into the driver’s seat and pulls away from the curb, drives down the block, turns right, and disappears around the corner without looking back.
Jared knows because he watches the whole way.
It’s then that Jared walks back in the house and pulls Jensen’s ratty old UT blanket from the back of his bedroom closet where he’d stashed it, wraps it around his shoulders, props some pillows against the headboard, and quietly drinks three-quarters of a bottle of Beam.
*
Jensen used to keep the blanket on his bed. Then at some point it had migrated out to their living room couch, where for the longest time it doubled as a throw, a towel for spilled beer, a makeshift pillow, and a sometime dog bed.
It had probably started out a proper Texas burnt-orange color when Jensen got it as a kid, but it’s now a washed-out peachy-grey with one corner starting to fray. It’s soft-napped and thick, covered in pills and pulled threads.
It’s too short to cover Jared’s feet and head at the same time.
It smells like Jensen.
*
“Hey, man,” Jensen asks soon after. “You seen my UT blanket around the house? I couldn’t find it when I unpacked.”
“Um. Yeah, I’ll look for it when I get home.”
It isn’t technically a lie.
*
Jared doesn’t get the blanket out often, just in true emergencies: Paris coming to guest star on an episode, when Allison calls to tell him about the dogs they’d had to put down at the shelter, Jensen’s engagement announcement. Otherwise it stays safely tucked away where it won’t accidentally be discovered, mostly because Jared doesn’t feel like having to explain why he kept it (stole it). Not even to himself.
*
“I think I’m gonna sell the house,” he tells Jensen one afternoon over a game of Call of Duty: Black Ops.
“Yeah?” Jensen glances at him out of the corner of his eye, but keeps shooting.
“Yeah. It’s pretty big, just me there.”
“What about the kids?”
“I’ll find an apartment that allows dogs. They’ll still get the morning run and, you know, Erica takes them out every day when I can’t anyway.”
“Yeah?” Jensen says again, like he isn’t convinced, but not like he cares much. Then, “Die, you fuckers!”
Jared keeps shooting.
*
He has to shed a lot of stuff to go from a house the size of his into an apartment. Jensen insists he should have a garage sale, just to see how many random items end up sold to fans on Ebay. Jared gives him the finger and continues sorting through things to give to Goodwill.
The blanket he keeps.
*
In February- out of the blue it seems- Jensen and Danneel break off their engagement. As is his bounden duty, Jared takes Jensen out to the Red Card to get him shitfaced.
The bar is crowded, but not too crowded, the music loud, but not too loud, just the way Jensen likes it. Jared buys a round of ten shots, lining the glasses up between them in a neat row.
“Go big or go home,” Jared says.
“Nothing ‘bout you small, Padalecki” Jensen retorts, but his heart clearly isn’t in it.
Jared obligingly flexes an arm-- he’d bulked up considerably for the Conan audition and Jensen has gotten a lot of mileage teasing him about it-and then palms his crotch. “Nope, nothin’ small.” He picks the first glass up and knocks it back and waits for Jensen to match him.
Jensen doesn’t disappoint.
They make quick work of the shots and speed through a couple rounds of beer before Jared realizes that he needs to cut himself off. Right now.
Because he’s watching Jensen say something clever to the bartender and there's a rough line of stubble along Jensen's jaw and Jared finds himself wondering what it'd feel like to run his finger across it, or his tongue. Wondering if he'd get beardburn on the insides of his thighs if Jensen sucked his cock.
He presses his forehead to the cold lacquered wood of the bar, squeezing his eyes shut.
"Hey, you good?"
He looks over and Jensen’s peering down at him, concern clear in his wide, drunk eyes. And all Jared wants is to show him just how good he is.
"I'm alright," he says instead. "Just sort of hit me all at once."
Jensen smiles at him and, dork that he is, crosses his arms and lays his own head down on them so that they’re looking at each other nose-to-nose. "Lightweight. You get old all of a sudden?"
"At least I’ll always be younger than you, asshole," and another time Jared might reach out and squeeze Jensen’s shoulder, just to feel the warm skin through his tee, but tonight he simply sits up and pushes away from the bar, knows Jensen will follow him, stumbling, out to the curb.
By the time they get to Jared’s new place, Jensen’s snoring, head lolled back on the cab’s seat. Jared doesn’t hesitate, just hauls him inside, resting him against the elevator wall and then the hallway as he fumbles with his keys, before towing him in and rolling him down onto the couch.
“I love you, man,” Jensen slurs into a throw pillow. “You don’t even… so good to me.”
It hurts to hear, spoken out loud like that, not at all the way Jared wants it to mean.
And then he does hesitate. He stands there, swaying a bit in the middle of the living room, looking down at the now inert lump that is Jensen, trying to decide if it’s worth the risk to cover him in the blanket for a few hours. It’s an entirely selfish thing; Jared really wants it to soak up Jensen’s smell again.
*
Genevieve calls his cell a few nights later.
“I heard they called it off,” she says gently, not even bothering to say hello.
“Yeah. He hasn’t really told me much about it. Gave me the whole ‘it was mutual, it just wasn’t meant to be’ shtick.” Jared sighs. “He’s taking it pretty hard.”
“How about you? How are you taking it?”
Jared doesn’t answer. What kind of shitty friend is happy when his friend’s fiancée dumps him? A jealous, lying, dog-in-the-manger son-of-a-bitch, that’s what kind.
Genevieve listens to his silence and replies, “Honey, you want us to break up too? You don’t need me for cover anymore. You can tell him now.”
“God, I wish-I can’t- He’s straight, Gen. And whether he’s with Danneel or not, he’s straight and the only thing that happens if I tell him that I’m not is everything goes to hell.”
“Jared.” They’ve been through this. When she first asked him out, when he confided in her why not, when he got up the nerve to ask her for a favor to give him an excuse for not dating since Sandy, any number of times since.
“Can you gimme a few more weeks and then we’ll tell people we’re not together anymore? I know you need to move on, you’ve already done more than I deserve. “
“Sure, baby. I can do that.”
*
Filming and partying and flights to cons and dinners together in craft services and pranking the ever-living hell out of Misha and to Jared it all goes by in a blur. Every night- or morning more often than not- after work, Clif drives to Jared’s apartment and drops him off before heading on to Jensen’s. Until, finally, the entire cast leaves everything out on the field for the finale and it’s the wrap party and Season Five is in the can and it’s the last time Clif drives them home until they start back up again.
Three hundred and sixty four days. That’s how long it’s been since they went home to the same place.
Not that he’s counting.
*
June, and Jared’s down in LA for a few weeks, and there’re a few nights when he goes out to find some guy for a hookup. He has to be supremely careful, too many paparazzi floating around, but it’s easier than in Vancouver, where there are fans and crew members popping up everywhere, and Jensen.
Sometimes Jared just needs to fuck or get fucked, get out of the headspace he’s in, blow off some steam.
And he usually has a great time, too. Until he gets back to his place, that is, where he rediscovers Jensen’s blanket on his unmade bed, swirled together with the sheets and comforter, and he finds himself crawling in, gripping it and twisting around and around so that it binds his wrists, falling asleep in its hold.
*
The new season starts shooting and it turns out playing Sam without his soul is great. It’s different; it’s a challenge.
Jensen is cranky and uncomfortable. He complains that the distance between Dean and Sam has him struggling with scenes. On the contrary, Jared is thriving. It turns out that bottling things up as Sam makes it that much easier to bottle things up as Jared.
I don’t care about you. I don’t care about you. I don’t care about you.
The blanket has long since lost its Jensen smell.
*
But half-way through the season’s shoots and it’s as if the respite makes the return of his crush on Jensen even more intense. Once Sam gets his soul back, Jared’s desire for Jensen- so recently and successfully walled off- comes roaring past his defenses. It doesn’t help that Jared notices Jensen touching him more, seems like he has a hand on Jared all the time. It’s simultaneously disconcerting and addictive and Jared’s searching desperately to find his calm again.
They’re sitting in Jensen’s trailer running lines and Jensen stretches out an arm along the sofa, and suddenly he’s got a wide-palmed hand cupping the back of Jared’s neck. Jared twitches, shrugs him off irritably.
“Dude. What is this, character bleed?” Honestly, he doesn’t know whether he’s talking about Jensen or himself.
Jensen just laughs and deliberately ruffles Jared’s hair. “Hey, little brother, can’t help it. I’m just glad to have you back.”
*
Genevieve stays with Jared when she comes to film Episode 15, even though they are officially “split up.”
The blanket stays in the closet.
*
When they go out, Jared makes sure to invite Misha. Misha’s fun and he’s safe and it’s nice to have a buffer from the full force of Jensen’s attention.
Misha also comes up with some weirdass drinking games.
“Strangest sounding word outside of context. Go.”
“Weasel,” Jensen says.
Misha nods and takes a hefty glup from his bottle. “Approved.”
Jared has no idea what will pass muster. “Boobs?”
“I will accept boobs.”
Jensen snorts and reaches out to grab Jared’s pec and give it a squeeze. “Jared’s got a nice rack himself right here.”
Jared knocks his arm away, mock-growling, “Do that again and I will snap your fucking hand off at the wrist, bitch.”
“Then I guess you’d be stuck jerking me off the rest of the season, cause my left hand don’t cut it, bitch.” Jensen leans back, smirking, and it’s the same meaningless locker-room banter that they’ve thrown around for years. But for some reason, Jared catches Misha shooting him a strange look- kind of wary and concerned and pitying- and it’s not that funny after all.
Jared spends the rest of the night staring into his beer, thinking back over how he’s been acting the past few weeks, whether he’s giving anything away, how to get back under wraps.
*
It’s all ruined anyway, when Jared kisses Jensen in the produce section of the local grocery store over in Jensen's neighborhood.
Some kind of temporary insanity must've grabbed hold of him, because one minute they’re debating the ripeness of avocados, the next he’s got his mouth on Jensen’s, no reason, no thought for why now after all this time. Jensen’s lips are just as full and warm as Jared always imagined, his familiar scent magnified tenfold in taste. Jared’s instantly punch-drunk on it, his gut swooping and plunging. Jensen actually leans into the kiss for a long minute, until Jared opens up to touch his tongue to the seam of Jensen’s lips, then Jensen’s jerking away, his ears pink and his eyebrows up to his hairline in shock.
Jared drops his basket full of food and practically runs out of the store.
*
An hour later, Jensen throws open the door to Jared’s apartment and walks right in. Jared had forgotten he’d given him key in case of emergency, and he never expected to be found, wrapped in the blanket, staring at the muted screen of the tv.
Jared sits up, tries to squash the blanket into a ball, hide it behind him so Jensen won’t see it, but it’s too late.
Jensen sits down on the couch. Jared automatically scoots over to make room.
“Pretty sure that’s mine,” Jensen says, nodding at the blanket half-stuffed behind the back pillows.
“Yeah. Sorry.” Jared presses his lips together so hard they hurt. He slowly pulls the blanket out, focuses carefully on doubling it up, smoothing his hands across the folded bundle one last time before passing it to Jensen. “Sorry for… everything.”
“Jared-” Jensen begins, then pauses, picking fitfully at one of the blanket’s loose threads. Under different circumstances, it might be comforting to see that Jensen’s nervous too, but right now Jared’s too tense to appreciate it, shoulders hunched, every muscle trying to pull itself from the bone, waiting for the blow to fall. “Dude, don’t be sorry. Unless you didn’t mean it?”
“No,” Jared says, barely a whisper. “No, I meant it.”
“Then the only thing you have to be sorry about is that it took you so fucking long.”
Jared’s gaze flies from the study of his wringing hands to search Jensen’s face, sure that he’s misunderstood.
Jensen rests his hand high on Jared’s thigh and rubs small circles with his thumb, his fingers tucked along the inseam of Jared’s jeans. It sends a tiny shiver down Jared’s spine and back up.
"Quit it," he says.
“What if I don’t want to?” Jensen replies.
The things Jared wants to reveal rise up in the back of his throat: that he’s gay, that he's been in love when Jensen for years, that he never meant to hurt Jensen, never would. But he can’t say any of it. He’s still pretty certain Jensen’s going to massively freak out if all these secrets are spilled.
Then again, it’s really just a matter of when, isn’t it?
“'Cause if you keep that up, I'm gonna flip you over the arm of the couch and fuck you senseless. That’s what," he says, chin up, daring Jensen with the truth.
But Jensen doesn’t cringe, doesn’t pull away. He just leans in and murmurs in his gravelly Dean-voice, the heat of his breath sweeping Jared’s lips, “I prefer to call it ‘making love.’”
Jared rears back, he can’t keep up, the laughter lighting up Jensen’s eyes doesn’t compute. Jensen doesn’t give him time to get his bearings, just puts his hands to Jared’s face and reels him in, crushing their lips together in a kiss that leaves no more room for doubt.
Finally, Jared comes up for air, gasps, “Since when?” Since when has Jensen gone for guys? Gone for Jared?
“Since forever,” Jensen promises and climbs into Jared’s lap, sliding his hands farther back into his hair, nipping and biting at Jared’s mouth and jaw and ear and the fucker is grinning.
He’s running his hands over Jared’s body, shoulders, chest, flanks, up under his shirt to flick at his nipples and Jared’s hips jerk up uncontrollably.
“Jesus, Jensen.” So Jared lets go, drops years of defenses and restraint and makes it his goal to prove to Jensen he should never, ever stop doing… that.
He reaches down swiftly and pops the button on Jensen’s jeans, slips a hand into the open vee and squeezes, chuckling, low and pleased, at Jensen’s soft squeak.
"Good?"
"Fuck yeah," Jensen breathes, flexing and pushing up into Jared’s touch. His cock is stiff in Jared’s grip, skin hot under the fabric and Jared’s own dick aches at the feel of it, pulse ratcheting up and up, blood thrumming through him.
He strokes Jensen’s cock lightly, slowly, just getting started. Then he leans back to let Jensen see him as he licks his palm and reaches back down, slipping Jensen’s briefs down under his balls and freeing his dick, the slickness in his hand sliding, moving in time with Jensen’s thrusts.
"Come on, show me," he coaxes, watching the flush on Jensen’s cheeks deepen, beautiful mouth parting into a quiet moan.
He can’t help it, he reaches up his other hand to run his thumb over Jensen’s lower lip and then slips it inside. Jensen’s lips curl around it, and he sucks in time with Jared’s strokes, plunging down into Jared’s lap. He legs are spread wide so that Jared’s cock shoves against the cleft of his perfect ass, again and again 'til all at once Jared’s orgasm blindsides him, shooting down his spine like a lightning strike as he practically bucks Jensen out of his lap.
His grunt of completion is drowned out by Jensen’s shout as he comes undone right behind, rising up onto his knees, thick thigh muscles clenched, the first shot of his come hitting Jared’s cheek, the next his neck, spurting all over his shirt, Jensen’s jeans, the couch. Jensen collapses back into Jared’s lap, wrung out, and leans his face into the crook of Jared's shoulder. Jensen reaches out blindly until he hits upon the blanket and drags it over, using it to wipe futilely at the mess between them.
Jared huffs out an astonished laugh. “Guess I’m finally going to have to wash that blanket.”
“Guess so.” Jensen mumbles against his neck. "I mean, it's pretty wretched, man."
It’s too much, too suddenly. Jared can’t believe, can't make himself comprehend that this is really happening. All he can do is sprawl back onto the couch, still laughing, pulling Jensen with him and dragging the blanket over both of them.
"You know I'm not giving it back, right?"
"That's okay. How about we share?"
Author: deirdre_c
Pairing: Jared/Jensen
Rating: Hard R
Spoilers: through mid-Season 6
Word Count: ~3,200
Summary: Jensen has a favorite blanket that Jared intends to keep.
A/N: For lazy_daze's prompt "old blanket" in the silverbullets challenge. Does this even count as schmoop? IDEK!
So, maybe it isn’t an accident that Jared ends up with the blanket.
When Jensen decides to get his own place after Season Four, Jared helps him pack up his stuff with a smile slapped on and a scooped-out hollow in his chest.
They fill up boxes big and little for the movers with Jensen’s clothes and his collection of coffee mugs with stupid sayings and his street hockey gear from the games they used to play on set, back in the first season.
It takes a whole afternoon to divvy up their DVD collection, mostly because Jensen keeps holding up cases and quoting lines from each movie and how is Jared supposed to resist coming back at him? By the time they make it through Lighten up, Francis and 28 days. 6 hours. 42 minutes. 12 seconds. That... is when the world... will end and Hey Vasquez, have you ever been mistaken for a man? it’s almost midnight, and in the end Jared lets Jensen take Moulin Rouge even though it isn’t his copy, because that damn movie always makes Jared cry anyway.
The end of the week arrives, and there’s nothing left to pack, so Jensen slips into the driver’s seat and pulls away from the curb, drives down the block, turns right, and disappears around the corner without looking back.
Jared knows because he watches the whole way.
It’s then that Jared walks back in the house and pulls Jensen’s ratty old UT blanket from the back of his bedroom closet where he’d stashed it, wraps it around his shoulders, props some pillows against the headboard, and quietly drinks three-quarters of a bottle of Beam.
*
Jensen used to keep the blanket on his bed. Then at some point it had migrated out to their living room couch, where for the longest time it doubled as a throw, a towel for spilled beer, a makeshift pillow, and a sometime dog bed.
It had probably started out a proper Texas burnt-orange color when Jensen got it as a kid, but it’s now a washed-out peachy-grey with one corner starting to fray. It’s soft-napped and thick, covered in pills and pulled threads.
It’s too short to cover Jared’s feet and head at the same time.
It smells like Jensen.
*
“Hey, man,” Jensen asks soon after. “You seen my UT blanket around the house? I couldn’t find it when I unpacked.”
“Um. Yeah, I’ll look for it when I get home.”
It isn’t technically a lie.
*
Jared doesn’t get the blanket out often, just in true emergencies: Paris coming to guest star on an episode, when Allison calls to tell him about the dogs they’d had to put down at the shelter, Jensen’s engagement announcement. Otherwise it stays safely tucked away where it won’t accidentally be discovered, mostly because Jared doesn’t feel like having to explain why he kept it (stole it). Not even to himself.
*
“I think I’m gonna sell the house,” he tells Jensen one afternoon over a game of Call of Duty: Black Ops.
“Yeah?” Jensen glances at him out of the corner of his eye, but keeps shooting.
“Yeah. It’s pretty big, just me there.”
“What about the kids?”
“I’ll find an apartment that allows dogs. They’ll still get the morning run and, you know, Erica takes them out every day when I can’t anyway.”
“Yeah?” Jensen says again, like he isn’t convinced, but not like he cares much. Then, “Die, you fuckers!”
Jared keeps shooting.
*
He has to shed a lot of stuff to go from a house the size of his into an apartment. Jensen insists he should have a garage sale, just to see how many random items end up sold to fans on Ebay. Jared gives him the finger and continues sorting through things to give to Goodwill.
The blanket he keeps.
*
In February- out of the blue it seems- Jensen and Danneel break off their engagement. As is his bounden duty, Jared takes Jensen out to the Red Card to get him shitfaced.
The bar is crowded, but not too crowded, the music loud, but not too loud, just the way Jensen likes it. Jared buys a round of ten shots, lining the glasses up between them in a neat row.
“Go big or go home,” Jared says.
“Nothing ‘bout you small, Padalecki” Jensen retorts, but his heart clearly isn’t in it.
Jared obligingly flexes an arm-- he’d bulked up considerably for the Conan audition and Jensen has gotten a lot of mileage teasing him about it-and then palms his crotch. “Nope, nothin’ small.” He picks the first glass up and knocks it back and waits for Jensen to match him.
Jensen doesn’t disappoint.
They make quick work of the shots and speed through a couple rounds of beer before Jared realizes that he needs to cut himself off. Right now.
Because he’s watching Jensen say something clever to the bartender and there's a rough line of stubble along Jensen's jaw and Jared finds himself wondering what it'd feel like to run his finger across it, or his tongue. Wondering if he'd get beardburn on the insides of his thighs if Jensen sucked his cock.
He presses his forehead to the cold lacquered wood of the bar, squeezing his eyes shut.
"Hey, you good?"
He looks over and Jensen’s peering down at him, concern clear in his wide, drunk eyes. And all Jared wants is to show him just how good he is.
"I'm alright," he says instead. "Just sort of hit me all at once."
Jensen smiles at him and, dork that he is, crosses his arms and lays his own head down on them so that they’re looking at each other nose-to-nose. "Lightweight. You get old all of a sudden?"
"At least I’ll always be younger than you, asshole," and another time Jared might reach out and squeeze Jensen’s shoulder, just to feel the warm skin through his tee, but tonight he simply sits up and pushes away from the bar, knows Jensen will follow him, stumbling, out to the curb.
By the time they get to Jared’s new place, Jensen’s snoring, head lolled back on the cab’s seat. Jared doesn’t hesitate, just hauls him inside, resting him against the elevator wall and then the hallway as he fumbles with his keys, before towing him in and rolling him down onto the couch.
“I love you, man,” Jensen slurs into a throw pillow. “You don’t even… so good to me.”
It hurts to hear, spoken out loud like that, not at all the way Jared wants it to mean.
And then he does hesitate. He stands there, swaying a bit in the middle of the living room, looking down at the now inert lump that is Jensen, trying to decide if it’s worth the risk to cover him in the blanket for a few hours. It’s an entirely selfish thing; Jared really wants it to soak up Jensen’s smell again.
*
Genevieve calls his cell a few nights later.
“I heard they called it off,” she says gently, not even bothering to say hello.
“Yeah. He hasn’t really told me much about it. Gave me the whole ‘it was mutual, it just wasn’t meant to be’ shtick.” Jared sighs. “He’s taking it pretty hard.”
“How about you? How are you taking it?”
Jared doesn’t answer. What kind of shitty friend is happy when his friend’s fiancée dumps him? A jealous, lying, dog-in-the-manger son-of-a-bitch, that’s what kind.
Genevieve listens to his silence and replies, “Honey, you want us to break up too? You don’t need me for cover anymore. You can tell him now.”
“God, I wish-I can’t- He’s straight, Gen. And whether he’s with Danneel or not, he’s straight and the only thing that happens if I tell him that I’m not is everything goes to hell.”
“Jared.” They’ve been through this. When she first asked him out, when he confided in her why not, when he got up the nerve to ask her for a favor to give him an excuse for not dating since Sandy, any number of times since.
“Can you gimme a few more weeks and then we’ll tell people we’re not together anymore? I know you need to move on, you’ve already done more than I deserve. “
“Sure, baby. I can do that.”
*
Filming and partying and flights to cons and dinners together in craft services and pranking the ever-living hell out of Misha and to Jared it all goes by in a blur. Every night- or morning more often than not- after work, Clif drives to Jared’s apartment and drops him off before heading on to Jensen’s. Until, finally, the entire cast leaves everything out on the field for the finale and it’s the wrap party and Season Five is in the can and it’s the last time Clif drives them home until they start back up again.
Three hundred and sixty four days. That’s how long it’s been since they went home to the same place.
Not that he’s counting.
*
June, and Jared’s down in LA for a few weeks, and there’re a few nights when he goes out to find some guy for a hookup. He has to be supremely careful, too many paparazzi floating around, but it’s easier than in Vancouver, where there are fans and crew members popping up everywhere, and Jensen.
Sometimes Jared just needs to fuck or get fucked, get out of the headspace he’s in, blow off some steam.
And he usually has a great time, too. Until he gets back to his place, that is, where he rediscovers Jensen’s blanket on his unmade bed, swirled together with the sheets and comforter, and he finds himself crawling in, gripping it and twisting around and around so that it binds his wrists, falling asleep in its hold.
*
The new season starts shooting and it turns out playing Sam without his soul is great. It’s different; it’s a challenge.
Jensen is cranky and uncomfortable. He complains that the distance between Dean and Sam has him struggling with scenes. On the contrary, Jared is thriving. It turns out that bottling things up as Sam makes it that much easier to bottle things up as Jared.
I don’t care about you. I don’t care about you. I don’t care about you.
The blanket has long since lost its Jensen smell.
*
But half-way through the season’s shoots and it’s as if the respite makes the return of his crush on Jensen even more intense. Once Sam gets his soul back, Jared’s desire for Jensen- so recently and successfully walled off- comes roaring past his defenses. It doesn’t help that Jared notices Jensen touching him more, seems like he has a hand on Jared all the time. It’s simultaneously disconcerting and addictive and Jared’s searching desperately to find his calm again.
They’re sitting in Jensen’s trailer running lines and Jensen stretches out an arm along the sofa, and suddenly he’s got a wide-palmed hand cupping the back of Jared’s neck. Jared twitches, shrugs him off irritably.
“Dude. What is this, character bleed?” Honestly, he doesn’t know whether he’s talking about Jensen or himself.
Jensen just laughs and deliberately ruffles Jared’s hair. “Hey, little brother, can’t help it. I’m just glad to have you back.”
*
Genevieve stays with Jared when she comes to film Episode 15, even though they are officially “split up.”
The blanket stays in the closet.
*
When they go out, Jared makes sure to invite Misha. Misha’s fun and he’s safe and it’s nice to have a buffer from the full force of Jensen’s attention.
Misha also comes up with some weirdass drinking games.
“Strangest sounding word outside of context. Go.”
“Weasel,” Jensen says.
Misha nods and takes a hefty glup from his bottle. “Approved.”
Jared has no idea what will pass muster. “Boobs?”
“I will accept boobs.”
Jensen snorts and reaches out to grab Jared’s pec and give it a squeeze. “Jared’s got a nice rack himself right here.”
Jared knocks his arm away, mock-growling, “Do that again and I will snap your fucking hand off at the wrist, bitch.”
“Then I guess you’d be stuck jerking me off the rest of the season, cause my left hand don’t cut it, bitch.” Jensen leans back, smirking, and it’s the same meaningless locker-room banter that they’ve thrown around for years. But for some reason, Jared catches Misha shooting him a strange look- kind of wary and concerned and pitying- and it’s not that funny after all.
Jared spends the rest of the night staring into his beer, thinking back over how he’s been acting the past few weeks, whether he’s giving anything away, how to get back under wraps.
*
It’s all ruined anyway, when Jared kisses Jensen in the produce section of the local grocery store over in Jensen's neighborhood.
Some kind of temporary insanity must've grabbed hold of him, because one minute they’re debating the ripeness of avocados, the next he’s got his mouth on Jensen’s, no reason, no thought for why now after all this time. Jensen’s lips are just as full and warm as Jared always imagined, his familiar scent magnified tenfold in taste. Jared’s instantly punch-drunk on it, his gut swooping and plunging. Jensen actually leans into the kiss for a long minute, until Jared opens up to touch his tongue to the seam of Jensen’s lips, then Jensen’s jerking away, his ears pink and his eyebrows up to his hairline in shock.
Jared drops his basket full of food and practically runs out of the store.
*
An hour later, Jensen throws open the door to Jared’s apartment and walks right in. Jared had forgotten he’d given him key in case of emergency, and he never expected to be found, wrapped in the blanket, staring at the muted screen of the tv.
Jared sits up, tries to squash the blanket into a ball, hide it behind him so Jensen won’t see it, but it’s too late.
Jensen sits down on the couch. Jared automatically scoots over to make room.
“Pretty sure that’s mine,” Jensen says, nodding at the blanket half-stuffed behind the back pillows.
“Yeah. Sorry.” Jared presses his lips together so hard they hurt. He slowly pulls the blanket out, focuses carefully on doubling it up, smoothing his hands across the folded bundle one last time before passing it to Jensen. “Sorry for… everything.”
“Jared-” Jensen begins, then pauses, picking fitfully at one of the blanket’s loose threads. Under different circumstances, it might be comforting to see that Jensen’s nervous too, but right now Jared’s too tense to appreciate it, shoulders hunched, every muscle trying to pull itself from the bone, waiting for the blow to fall. “Dude, don’t be sorry. Unless you didn’t mean it?”
“No,” Jared says, barely a whisper. “No, I meant it.”
“Then the only thing you have to be sorry about is that it took you so fucking long.”
Jared’s gaze flies from the study of his wringing hands to search Jensen’s face, sure that he’s misunderstood.
Jensen rests his hand high on Jared’s thigh and rubs small circles with his thumb, his fingers tucked along the inseam of Jared’s jeans. It sends a tiny shiver down Jared’s spine and back up.
"Quit it," he says.
“What if I don’t want to?” Jensen replies.
The things Jared wants to reveal rise up in the back of his throat: that he’s gay, that he's been in love when Jensen for years, that he never meant to hurt Jensen, never would. But he can’t say any of it. He’s still pretty certain Jensen’s going to massively freak out if all these secrets are spilled.
Then again, it’s really just a matter of when, isn’t it?
“'Cause if you keep that up, I'm gonna flip you over the arm of the couch and fuck you senseless. That’s what," he says, chin up, daring Jensen with the truth.
But Jensen doesn’t cringe, doesn’t pull away. He just leans in and murmurs in his gravelly Dean-voice, the heat of his breath sweeping Jared’s lips, “I prefer to call it ‘making love.’”
Jared rears back, he can’t keep up, the laughter lighting up Jensen’s eyes doesn’t compute. Jensen doesn’t give him time to get his bearings, just puts his hands to Jared’s face and reels him in, crushing their lips together in a kiss that leaves no more room for doubt.
Finally, Jared comes up for air, gasps, “Since when?” Since when has Jensen gone for guys? Gone for Jared?
“Since forever,” Jensen promises and climbs into Jared’s lap, sliding his hands farther back into his hair, nipping and biting at Jared’s mouth and jaw and ear and the fucker is grinning.
He’s running his hands over Jared’s body, shoulders, chest, flanks, up under his shirt to flick at his nipples and Jared’s hips jerk up uncontrollably.
“Jesus, Jensen.” So Jared lets go, drops years of defenses and restraint and makes it his goal to prove to Jensen he should never, ever stop doing… that.
He reaches down swiftly and pops the button on Jensen’s jeans, slips a hand into the open vee and squeezes, chuckling, low and pleased, at Jensen’s soft squeak.
"Good?"
"Fuck yeah," Jensen breathes, flexing and pushing up into Jared’s touch. His cock is stiff in Jared’s grip, skin hot under the fabric and Jared’s own dick aches at the feel of it, pulse ratcheting up and up, blood thrumming through him.
He strokes Jensen’s cock lightly, slowly, just getting started. Then he leans back to let Jensen see him as he licks his palm and reaches back down, slipping Jensen’s briefs down under his balls and freeing his dick, the slickness in his hand sliding, moving in time with Jensen’s thrusts.
"Come on, show me," he coaxes, watching the flush on Jensen’s cheeks deepen, beautiful mouth parting into a quiet moan.
He can’t help it, he reaches up his other hand to run his thumb over Jensen’s lower lip and then slips it inside. Jensen’s lips curl around it, and he sucks in time with Jared’s strokes, plunging down into Jared’s lap. He legs are spread wide so that Jared’s cock shoves against the cleft of his perfect ass, again and again 'til all at once Jared’s orgasm blindsides him, shooting down his spine like a lightning strike as he practically bucks Jensen out of his lap.
His grunt of completion is drowned out by Jensen’s shout as he comes undone right behind, rising up onto his knees, thick thigh muscles clenched, the first shot of his come hitting Jared’s cheek, the next his neck, spurting all over his shirt, Jensen’s jeans, the couch. Jensen collapses back into Jared’s lap, wrung out, and leans his face into the crook of Jared's shoulder. Jensen reaches out blindly until he hits upon the blanket and drags it over, using it to wipe futilely at the mess between them.
Jared huffs out an astonished laugh. “Guess I’m finally going to have to wash that blanket.”
“Guess so.” Jensen mumbles against his neck. "I mean, it's pretty wretched, man."
It’s too much, too suddenly. Jared can’t believe, can't make himself comprehend that this is really happening. All he can do is sprawl back onto the couch, still laughing, pulling Jensen with him and dragging the blanket over both of them.
"You know I'm not giving it back, right?"
"That's okay. How about we share?"