Palace of the Brine: 6. Flower Girl
**
Flower Girl
It's quiet in the room when Jensen leaves, slowly detaching himself from Jared.
"I gotta go, catch my flight," Jensen says in that far-off distant voice.
"Call me when you land," Jared worries his lower lip. "Surgery's in a week."
Jensen nods.
"You don't…" Jared closes his eyes. "You don't have to be here, if you can't. I understand-well I mean I know this kind of thing, I'm just trying to say," Jared pauses, trying to find the words. "Do whatever it is you need to do right now."
Jensen's silent again, but presses his lips to Jared's, barely moving them in any semblance of a kiss.
"I'll call you when I land in Dallas."
"Sure," Jared says, and Jensen slowly shuffles out the door.
**
"I forgot to say 'I love you,'" Jared says into Jensen's voicemail when he doesn't call.
**
"Oh my baby boy!" Jared's mother says when she comes to see him. She hugs him around the shoulders, and then stands back up. "You seem bigger this time around. Were you this big when you had Eve? My god, the mind plays tricks on you, doesn't it!"
"Hi Mom," Jared says.
Jared's mother clasps her hands together. "Sorry, I'm sorry, I don't mean to, oh baby!" She leans in again to hug him. "What you must be going through! All by yourself! My little baby boy!"
Jared coughs. "Um, why are you calling me 'baby boy', Mom?"
"Oh, but I always called you that, didn't I? Well if I didn't, I meant to." Jared's mother squeezes his shoulders. "Wait, no I called your brother that! Oh I remember what I called you, though!"
"Mom, you don't have to," Jared says. "Really."
"You were mommy's little doormouse! When you were born you were just so tiny I thought I could slip you into a teacup!"
"Mom!" Jared says.
Jared's mother sighs. "I'm sorry, I'm just trying to distract you, sweetheart. I am so, so sorry you have to go through this and Jensen's had something so horrible-how did it happen again?"
"Heart attack," Jared says. "The doctors say it went too quickly for them to do anything."
"How horrible, I've had your father send them our deepest condolences and some lovely flowers, along with a donation to the Heart Association in her name."
Jared blinks. "Um… thanks? That's, really wonderful of you," he says, stunned at the thoughtfulness behind the gesture.
Jared's mother sits down on the side of his bed. "Jared, we love you, we'd do anything for you and for Jensen too. He's practically our son too."
"Is that why you make incredibly awkward comments about him at dinner?" Jared says, then claps his hand over his mouth.
"Well, we make incredibly awkward comments about you too, don't we? And you call your brother a yuppie and he calls you a hippie and all three of you tell me what a monster your father is, and he tells your sister that I'm a lush, and she tells him that I'm a nag. And well, you know how the rest goes."
"Are you trying to actually say that having a messed-up family is a good thing?"
"I mean, we'll never be the Cleavers, but it's what works for our family, yes? Your father's the controlling one, but he does keep our finances stable. Your brother's just like him, not the best socially but excellent at finances and providing for his family.
"And well, your sister and I have a taste for the finer things, certainly-but look where her exquisite taste is bringing her! Interning at antique galleries, and her boss tells me soon someday she'll make an excellent buyer! And who taught her that love of aesthetics?"
Jared mumbles. "Too much Antiques Roadshow on PBS?"
"You and I, my darling boy."
"So what about me?"
"You were the sensitive one, and you would have grown into being shy and weak and this world would have crushed you beneath it's boots if you didn't have us pushing you and prodding at you and forcing you to build yourself up into an independent person, and not the shy little thing clinging to the back of my legs.
"My god, Jared when you finally stood up to your father and chose to go to an Art school? I was cheering! And well, your father certainly didn't deserve the violence-by-proxy, but your brother was definitely asking for a big smack for what he said to you and Jensen at Thanksgiving, in my humble opinion."
"…You told me you were disappointed in me."
"Really, I thought I said 'don't disappoint me'? Well, certainly that's what I meant."
Jared rolls his eyes.
"And if we didn't force you to grow a tough skin, would you have ever survived all this chaos and tragedy surrounding you to begin with?"
Jared blinks. She has a point. Damn it.
**
I love you, okay? Take all the time you need, but just don't disappear completely from me, Jensen. Please? I know I can do this by myself, but God I don't want to.
It runs through Jared's mind as the frogs hop around his legs and Heqet sits in front of him on her golden throne.
"I've been cursed for real this time, haven't I?"
Heqet cocks her head as her ram-headed consort brays at him, making him jump forward and fall to his knees at her throne.
Heqet scoffs, "Cursed? You're fucking kidding me." She says in an uncharacteristically informal tone. Well, uncharacteristic in the way that Jared had previously characterized her in his mind. Then again, they've never had much conversation until now.
"You think this is a curse? You'd know if it was a curse, kid. Trust me. Flesh melting off of faces, eyes turning to hot coals, birds and insects tearing at your hair. That's a curse. What you're talking about is your life."
Jared stamps his feet. "Exactly! This is my fucking life and it's all going the worst ways it could go! I don't know what I'm doing any more, except just kind of swimming in this current that never stops flowing."
"Well, if it stopped, where's the fun in that?" Heqet says with a shrug.
"I just want a normal life after this is all over. No more crazy frogs chasing me in my dreams, no more tragedy, no more people in my life using me as a mediator and fighting! All the fighting! And I want no more of this actually agreeing with my Mom stuff happening. It's fucking wrong."
"Well, you want to know something? Sometimes, marriages don't work. Sometimes couples argue, and sometimes parents and step-parents don't get along. Sometimes good people die for no reason, and sometimes you can't control when it happens, or how you'll react to it. And sometimes you realize you love your family even if they kind of messed you up in the head. That's what happens in normal lives.
"And in extraordinary lives, on top of all that, sometimes you get a gift. Maybe it's a talent for art. Perhaps you get the chance to be with the one you love for a lifetime. Or maybe you get a chance at a family you couldn't have without a little help from someone like me.
"Don't squander these gifts. Share them with the world. Love them and deal with all the crap your normal life gives you in your own time.
"It's not a curse, it's a life. It's a gift." Heqet says, as the room pulls farther and farther away from Jared.
**
Here's how it should happen:
A moment before the gas mask is slipped over Jared's face, the doors of the operating room burst open, and Jensen's there, panting to catch his breath with Nurse Roberts following him in, trying to finish getting his gloves on and scrubs all tied off.
Jared smiles and sighs with relief as Jensen goes to him, and grabs his other hand and whispers "I'll always be here for you," or something equally grand and romantic. And then Jared's mom strokes his hair and they give Jared the gas and he counts the seconds away as his eyes slip shut and he knocks out.
When he wakes up, Jensen's right by his side, holding their little baby in his arms.
How it really happens, is that they slip the mask over Jared's face and he's pretty much gone in an instant.
A timeless, dreamless blink that when it's over, he's in a hospital bed and he can't move or bend his arms or legs and everything's dizzying. His mouth is dry and tastes like metal. There's an IV in one arm, and another connected to a blood bag slowly emptying into him and he feels another whoosh and passes out once more.
**
Jared dreams this time. Dreams of the museum hall only now it's not as empty, patrons walk by him, unnoticing of the fact that he's accompanied by a seven-foot tall goddess with a frog on her head.
"You know, I've quite enjoyed our conversations," Heqet says and Jared nods.
"So I take it you're moving on?" Jared asks and around the corner Jensen's there, sitting on the ground, his back to the chunk of temple wall.
"All things must end in order to begin," Heqet says as Jared goes to Jensen's side, kissing his temple. "Though I will leave you with something."
"What is it?"
Heqet smiles. "Just, a small piece, a trifle of a thing…"
Jensen's mouth opens and water pours out, a frog landing in his lap and Jared jumps back, gasping.
**
Jared wakes up feeling even sicker and his body screaming and aching as the numbness starts to ebb from his lower half. He can taste sickness on his tongue and when he leans his head to one side, he sees the pale-yellowy discoloration of his skin.
"You look terrible," Jensen says from wherever he is in the room, Jared can't be bothered to whip his head around that quickly to find him. "Hey, I'm right here," Jensen says again, coming to sit on the other side of the bed.
Jared mentally scoffs. If Jensen thinks he looks bad? He should take a look at himself, clothing all disheveled and bags under his eyes and face unshaven-
Okay, maybe Jared doesn't think the extra facial hair is a bad thing, actually. He's all scruffy and worried sick and Jared wishes he had the voice to say, well, anything to Jensen but post-surgery feels like recovering from being hit by a freight train.
Jensen turns his head. "Was it this bad the last time?"
Jared does his best to move his head in a nodding motion.
"Dr. Ferris said pretty much that. Last time you were so weak from the blood loss you could barely speak," Jensen leans in closer to Jared. "God damn it, you're so pale."
Big dark circles under my eyes too, right? Jared thinks.
Jensen clears his throat. "So um, I'm here? Surprise?"
Jared almost laughs at the pathetic way Jensen announces that and ends up coughing and shaking and Jensen goes back into doctor mode and then he blacks out again.
**
"You shaved…" Jared says when he wakes up again, and Jensen's there, flipping through his chart.
"Jared!" he says, smiling this time and he's there at the side of the bed again. "How are you feeling?"
"Where's my kid?" Jared mumbles and then his eyes are too heavy to stay open on their own.
**
Jared wakes up, and cracks his knuckles, feeling the movement returning to his body, muscles feeling like they need to be stretched and so he obliges. Pulling his arms over his head and bending his knees to bring his legs up to his chest-
"Ow! Shit!" Jared yelps at the network of nerves firing off pain. Okay, going to be still kind of tender there, I remember that now.
There's a small sound from the corner of the room, somewhere between a breath and a sigh, and Jared turns, the curtain drawn shut. It slides open staring right at him, is the entire Ackles family.
"Jared?" Jensen says and Jared gapes at all of them. Jensen's brother and his sister-in-law and his little sister and father and who Jared assumes are the Aunts and Uncles and cousins he's only ever heard of before, since they all share the same fair-freckled complexions as Jensen and-
There's a little baby wrapped in white in Jensen's arms.
"Oh my god," Jared breathes and Jensen breaks out in the biggest smile ever.
"You feeling strong enough now to hold her?" Jensen asks as he stands up from the adjacent hospital bed, walking over to Jared and slowly easing her into the crook of his arms.
"Her?" Jared asks and Jensen nods.
**
It was Jensen's father's idea.
"He's always been stubborn like that," Jensen's father explains as he tickles his baby granddaughter's nose.
Jensen rolls his shoulders. "I didn't know how to tell them, 'Hey everyone, I can't stay past the funeral, Jared's having a C-section on Friday,' without them committing me to a psych ward."
"He was moping around just like the rest of us, only he wouldn't talk about you. Wouldn't tell us anything about what was going on with him and so I just kept on prodding," Jensen's father laughs to himself.
"Maybe it was easier to try and focus on getting him to open up about this than it was to think about," Jensen's father pauses.
"I'm a good distraction, it seems," Jensen interjects.
"And we all know how much you love to share," Jared adds in.
"Didn't believe him at first, I mean, who would?" Jensen's father goes on. "But the story, it was just so earnest. He told us all about you and Eve the first time around. Even got so curious I called up the Padalecki house."
"Oh, god," Jared moans, slapping his forehead. "Whatever my father says is a lie, okay?"
"Well, actually your mom talked my ear off for about three hours about my son abandoning you in your time of need," he says.
Jared shakes his head. "She um, has a flair for being a tad overdramatic."
"Well to me, it shows how much she loves you. Anyway, he refused to let me get him a ticket back here," Jensen's father says, poking his son in the side.
"So I asked him to ride with me to the grocery store, and instead I got him to the airport. Told him I was getting on that plane to San Francisco and seeing my grandbaby born, with or without him.
"Because if I didn't to everything I could to get him there, she'd would've never forgiven me."
Jared doesn't know what to say to that, doesn't know if Jensen's father means his late wife, or his new granddaughter. He mouths a silent thank you.
Jensen sniffs the air, and rubs under his eyes. "Yeah, and, we would have made it in time before your surgery if we hadn't gotten stuck in the first thunderstorm of the summer when we were trying to take off, of all the luck," Jensen mutters.
"Language," Jensen's father warns and Jared snickers at the face Jensen makes.
"So," he says, changing the subject. "You boys thought up a name yet?"
Jared looks to Jensen, running his thumb along his daughter's cheek until she makes a little audible breath and Jensen's lost in the fascination of it.
**
"Jensen, you come up with any ideas?" Jared says the next day, when he's finally allowed to stand up and put on something other than a hospital gown. Jensen insists on making him sit down so he can tie Jared's shoes for him. Jared he kicks his feet to get his attention again. "Jenseeeeen."
"Hmmm?" Jensen asks.
"Any ideas yet? For a name?" Jared says. "Y'know, I was thinking we could name her after your mother. If you wanted to."
Jensen nods, "I was thinking about that too, kind of." Jensen bites his lip and finishes tying Jared's shoes, sitting next to him on the bed. "But then, I kind of had this thought, I want to call her Calla Lily."
Jared sputters. "Calla Lily? Seriously?" Jensen nods.
"I like it," Jensen says, quietly.
"C'mon, Jensen, you have to admit it's a bit 'out there.' Are we going to be those parents?"
Jensen tugs on his ear, saying. "I had this thought, when I was at home, and there's these pictures on the mantle, and I was looking at them. Thinking about her."
Jensen presses his mouth close, and moves on, Jared sitting in rapt attention. "So one of the pictures on it are of my mom and dad at their wedding. Instead of a bouquet, mom's holding maybe four or five Calla Lilies tied by a ribbon.
"On the other side of that picture is the photo of me and my brother and sister and them at their twentieth anniversary dinner, we all took her out and I remember she pinned a Calla Lily on my Dad's lapel.
"And when I was back home, I just started to remember the way she'd put them in pictures, one or two of them in these long-stemmed vases all in the kitchen, the mantle, the little end tables in the hallway-and I never noticed the significance of them before. They must have been her favorite.
"That's how she was though, she would be quiet about things, understated and elegant."
Jared sighs, putting his head on Jensen's shoulder, and Jensen nuzzles the top of his head with his cheek.
"Well then, Calla Lily it is," Jared says, when he finds the voice for it. "Callie, I like that too."
"Or Lily," Jensen adds.
"Whatever she likes better," Jared says. "Y'know, we'll get to watch her grow into it."
Jensen turns and kisses Jared, at first it's slow, soft but then Jared feels a rush of adrenaline and lust and kisses harder, faster. He paws at Jensen's clothing and they start to breathe heavy, Jensen pushing Jared back on the bed until he stops, Jared whines at the loss of contact.
"Um," Jensen says. "I don't want to pop your stitches."
Jared rolls his eyes and grabs Jensen by the back of the head. "We'll work around it," he says, drunk on hormones and need and he just wants Jensen naked and all over him; the mechanics of it a mere afterthought.
He nips Jensen's lip playfully and Jensen groans, falling into the kiss and the embrace.
"I have an idea," Jensen murmurs close.
**
Misha looks at Callie all tucked in her baby carrier with that weird, owlish turn to his head he makes when something's interesting. "So she just lies there? Doesn't cry or make goo-goo ga-ga sounds yet?"
"She's kind of like a kielbasa with arms at this point. She eats, sleeps, poops, wriggles her fists if you nudge her," Jared says, tickling her side and making a happy face for her.
Misha nods. "I'm used to dealing with kids once they have a personality."
Jared rolls his eyes. "She has a personality."
"The personality of an eating, sleeping, pooping sausage. Speaking of, where's your other kidlet?"
"Chad took her there early with the rest of the party to get ready," Jared says. "Speaking of! Chad tells me you're forcing him to move in with you. Which I think is pretty awesome, gets him off our couch and keeps him close by to Eve."
Misha's eyes go wide. "Yeah right, I'm making him move in with me," he says sarcastically. "And I also made him take me out to dinner to ask me and then I made him drive me out to the park so we could count the stars. Because I'm secretly this hopeless romantic-but I don't want anyone to know about it,"
Jared laughs into his hands. "Seriously?"
Misha crosses his arms. "It's unnerving y'know? Everyone else he treats the same but when he thinks no one's paying attention he's really considerate and nice and sometimes I don't know what he's doing until I'm making out with him on the top of a Ferris wheel like I'm a fourteen year old girl."
Jared sits back in his chair and laughs long and loud at that thought.
"And then he calls me a fourteen year old girl so I tell him that makes him a pedophile that likes getting it up the ass from a fourteen year old girl; and then one thing leads to another and we're getting thrown out of the carnival for public indecency," Misha finishes with a deep breath.
"Hey Jensen, are you hearing this?" Jared shouts to Jensen in the living room.
Jensen raises an arm over the side of the couch and says "Feh," before dropping it back down.
"Is he still sleeping?" Misha asks.
"He says it's jet-lag," Jared says.
"From Dallas? It's only two hours!"
Jared shrugs. "Emotional jet-lag?"
Misha nods. "Ah yeah, you've got a point. Just watch out for him oversleeping like that. Could be signs of depression."
Jared blinks. "Actually, he sleeps less than I do. Unless he's napping at work."
"I'm not oversleeping, I'm not depressed. I'm just tired," Jensen says, mumbling as he shuffles into the kitchen. "Don't we have to go soon?"
Jared checks his watch, "Ooh! You're right, let's go!" Jared says picking up Callie's car seat and heading out with Jensen and Misha.
**
Katie's wedding is really lovely. They rent out a banquet hall with a lakeside view, so the ceremony itself is outdoors, next to the water. Jared leans over to poke Jensen in the side. "Isn't it gorgeous here, by the water?"
"Nnnghtnhgh," Jensen answers as his head flops over onto Jared's shoulder. He's still got an impressive grip on Callie though, even while both of them are dead asleep.
A camera flash goes off, blinding Jared and stirring Jensen awake. "Oh that was perfect!" Tom says, his face coming into focus as Jared blinks away the little fuzzy spots in his eyes.
"Tommy, what the hell?" Jensen says, rubbing his eyes and handing Callie to Jared.
"What? I'm just doing my job," Tom answers, pointing to his badge under the flower pinned to his jacket. It reads: All's Well Photography in calligraphy.
"You're the wedding photographer?" Jared asks. "How did I not know this?"
Tom shrugs. "No one's ever asked me what I do for my real job."
"You mean your real job isn't being Mike's secretary?" Jensen says.
"Oh please, that's not a real job, that's foreplay." Tom lifts up his camera again. "Say, happy couple!" he says and takes another picture of Jared and Jensen's stunned expressions before moving on to another row of guests.
The music slowly starts, a single musician strumming softly on a guitar and everyone in the audience gasps and awws as Eve walks down the aisle with a little basket, laying flower petals down with every step. Chad's already at the other end of the aisle, crouching low to the ground and encouraging her. Eve looks around at all the strangers snapping her picture and cooing over her that she dumps the rest of the petals out where she's standing and makes a run for Chad.
Chad laughs and swings her around as the rest of the people softly coo over how adorable her sudden attack of shyness is, he joins Jared and Jensen in their row.
Jared smiles at her as she sits back down. "You did a wonderful job baby," he whispers and she nods.
"Thank you, Daddy," she says busying herself by playing with Callie's little knit cap and matching socks. "She looks so pretty in them, doesn't she?"
Chad leans in, "Eve's kindergarten teacher made them for us."
Jared turns in shock. "He did not!"
Chad shrugs. "He knits."
Jared turns to his other side and sees Jensen rubbing his temples. "You okay?" he whispers.
"Mmm fine," Jensen says back as the music picks up and everyone stands to see Katie walking down the aisle on her father's arm.
"She looks amazing," Jared whispers and Jensen nods as a glowing Katie goes to join her man at the altar.
Jensen whispers back, "So how much you wanna bet Katie wasn't lying about him wanting to take her last name, and that at the end of this the priest and the rabbi are going to introduce us to Mr. and Mrs. Katie Cassidy?"
Jared blinks. "Seriously?"
"She told me he thinks his name would 'pop' better if he did," Jensen says, gesturing with his hand.
Jared puzzles. "What's wrong with being Zac Efron?"
"Zac Cassidy is catchy though," Jensen says.
Eve shushes the two of them. "I wanna hear what they're saying!"
**
"Congratulations the both of you!" Jared says, hugging Katie close. "You looked so beautiful!"
Katie beams at him. "Thank you so much!" she says, and lets go of Jared. Who is then surprised to find himself in a hug from Zac.
"And?" Zac asks, hopefully, not yet breaking the embrace.
"Um," Jared says and Katie coughs.
"He wants you to tell him he's beautiful too," she says.
Zac steps back, shaking his head. "What? No, she's joking!" he pauses. "But seriously, how's the hair look, is it good? And the bangs? I want formal but not too formal so I kept the bangs."
Jared nods slowly. "It, um... it looks good."
Zac claps him on the shoulder. "I know, right? Oh hey, that's my Aunt! Aunt Janey!" Zac says, bounding off in another direction.
Katie sighs "I really do love him, I do love him. I do. Even if he's prettier than me, and he knows he's prettier than me, but he still tells me I'm prettier."
"You had to fight over who got to wear the dress, didn't you?"
Katie sneers. "Very funny."
Eve tugs on Jared's sleeve. "Daddy! You have to come here!" she whines.
"Yes, Evie?" Jared asks turning to Eve.
"Daddy he's getting sick all over and he almost got it on my dress but he got it in Mikey's shoes instead and I wanna go home because I smell like throw-up!"
Jared takes her by the shoulders. "Wait, who's getting sick?"
**
It's a good thing the reception is held by the lake too, but not really that good for the native fauna, because Jensen's on the ground, puking his guts out into the water while Jared pats his back and Misha's taken Eve and Callie off to see if Chad's got the car from the valet yet.
Katie's trying to get Jensen to drink some water, Zac's right behind her, lifting her train up so it doesn't touch anything on the ground.
"Oh god, I feel so miserable right now," Jensen moans finally is able to stop heaving and sits down on a large rock by the water.
"You're okay?" Katie asks. "Was it anything you ate?"
"I'm fine, I'm fine, I just, maybe need some air?" Jensen says, looking around at the crowd that's gathered around them.
"Okay, people, clear out! Give the man some air!" Zac shouts and shoos the crowd away to the reception hall indoors.
"Baby," Katie says. "You can put my dress down now."
"Okay," Zac says, holding it up for another beat and quickly sneaking a look underneath and then dropping it as Katie smacks him in the arm. "What? I was just looking!"
"That's all you're gonna get if you keep that up, mister!" Katie says, huffing.
"Mr. Cassidy, to you," Zac says waggling his eyebrows and lifting her up to carry back in the reception hall as she laughs.
Jensen breathes heavy and takes the water from Jared. "You're gonna be okay for the car ride home?" he asks.
"Yeah," Jensen says. "I hope so."
"Any idea what's wrong?" Jared asks and Jensen shakes his head no.
"Maybe it was something I ate? Or maybe I'm coming down with a stomach bug. Hope I don't give it to you or Eve."
A frog hops out of the water, and lands right on top of Jensen's head. "What the-?" Jensen shouts before clamping a hand over his mouth and leaning over the back of the rock to face the water again.
The frog looks up at Jared and croaks.
"You sneaky little bitch," Jared whispers as the frog hops away.
**
Epilogue