Jared and the Undead Bartender 4/5
J2 RPS AU
NC-17
Part 4 of 5
Master post
Art
Jensen apparently decides he has better things to do than lick Jared clean, because he pulls away, kisses Jared quickly, and gets up. Jared watches his back and shoulders and ass as he gets dressed. Jensen really is a good-looking man. Jared feels obscurely lucky. His ex certainly wasn't bad-looking, and he's been with other attractive people, but maybe the pretty is another condition of being undead, like the not breathing and the not carrying diseases and the needing to drink blood. Maybe people just get more attractive in undeath.
“Well?” Jensen says, favoring Jared with a raised eyebrow. “Are you just going to lie in bed all night?”
Jared rolls to his feet, puts on some clothes, gets his towel and soap, and goes to use the campground's shower facilities. The RV's shower is very small and he doesn't want to use up all the water. Besides, now that his brain is working again, he needs a little time away from Jensen to think.
There's a dad trying to wrangle his kids in the shower facilities. Jared gives the guy a nod and a sympathetic smile before stepping into a shower. He stands under the spray and scrubs himself and wonders how he got here, not just this shower in this campground, but on the road in a camper, having quit a good job with benefits and a regular salary in favor of uncertain freelance work, traveling with a vampire who happens to be a. his best friend, and b. probably now his boyfriend. He and Jensen should have a talk, just to clear some things up.
For one thing, how much will it complicate things that Jensen doesn't eat real food, doesn't get sick, barely needs to sleep, can't go out in the sun, and will never age and die? How long can Jared put off thinking about that? How long can you be involved with a bloodsucker before you have to face the fact that your best beloved survives by drinking blood and might bite you, and not in a happy-fun sexy kind of way?
“Shit,” he mumbles into the spray. Normally he'd talk to Chad, but this is something no one else can know. Jensen gave him his very own heavy secret to bear alone, and if Jared could dislike him for anything, it would be that.
Well, at least he can bring up the boyfriend stuff. He doesn't feel like a relationship with one of the undead is something he can just wing.
“Do you really think being boyfriends will be that much more complicated than just being friends?” Jensen asks, when they're both sitting in the RV's dinette and Jared suggests they talk about this new development.
“Yes?”
“I don't. At least I won't have to hide my relationship. But if you're not ready, you're not ready, that's fine, just tell me. We can go back to just being friends. No harm, no foul. I promise.”
“I don't think I can do that. I mean, I'll look at you and picture you naked. I'm not going to forget how you kissed me.”
“Normally people let you breathe, huh?” Jensen grins.
“Can you take this seriously?”
“Okay, okay, sorry.” Jensen composes his face into seriousness. “I mean it, though. If you don't want that kind of relationship, that's fine. I won't kiss you again and we won't have sex any more, but I'll feel the same about you either way. That won't change, whether we're boyfriends or not.”
Jared sits back in his seat and thinks about that. It's true that he feels more emotionally close to Jensen than he has to anyone since his ex, and he felt that way long before Jensen kissed him. It's also true that if he thinks about it, really considers it, he can't go back to sitting next to Jensen on his couch, watching movies and eating popcorn, knowing that's as far as they'll ever go. The sex was amazing, but it was really just the last piece of a puzzle he didn't realize he was assembling. If Jensen hadn't kissed him, Jared would have eventually wanted to do it himself.
“I already said I don't think I can,” he repeats. “Go back to being just friends. I think part of me was just waiting for something to happen. Chad's been telling me you're hot for me for months.” Jensen snorts. “Shut up. That's just the way he is. My sister told me I should ask you out.”
“She did?”
“Yeah. I guess I talk about you a lot. It's not like I had a lot of other things going on. She was really glad I'd made a friend, and she thought maybe it was time I had a boyfriend too.”
“Maybe it is.”
Jared leans down and gently thunks his head on the dinette table. “But you're dead. Undead. Whatever.” He sits up. Jensen has a tiny smile on his face, affectionate and amused. “How does that work? What if you try to eat me?”
“Why would I suck your blood when I could suck your cock?” Jensen gives Jared an exaggerated leer.
“Stop it.”
Jensen gestures under the table at the little cooler. “I buy my blood. I don't eat people. Look. I was with Christian for thirty years. We made it work, in a time when we thought it was safer to hide, and he didn't even know what I was. We'll figure it out as we go.”
“But if we stay together, I'll grow old and die and you won't.”
“Jared. How old are you?”
“Twenty-nine.”
“You probably have fifty years of being a goofball ahead of you. I really don't think we need to talk now about what's going to happen when you're eighty.”
“I'm trying to plan. I can't keep doing shit without thinking it through. Dating my ex was a spontaneous decision. Planning to move in with him was. Moving to Boston was. I don't want you to be, especially since these things don't turn out so well for me.”
“Well, I won't lead you on and then spring it on you that I've found someone else.”
Jared thunks his head on the table again. “What did I get myself into?”
Jensen pats him on the head. “Think of it as a great adventure. I'll even leave the bar with you once or twice. Next year we can go down to the Esplanade for the fireworks.” His fingers comb through Jared's hair. “Do you want to go back to being just friends, no sex?” His tone is earnest. Jared shakes his head against the table. Jensen chuckles. “I didn't think so. Nothing's really changed. My feelings for you aren't any different. We're not going to do anything different when we're together.”
“Aside from the fucking.”
Jensen chuckles again. “Aside from that.” He tugs on Jared's hair. “Come on. You had your run, you had your shower, I think the sun is almost down. I might even go out to say hi to the neighbors. You'll eat, we'll keep driving. We can talk about this on the road. Okay?”
Jared lifts his head. Jensen is serious and earnest and Jared trusts him, and he realizes part of this is new for Jensen too - he won't have to hide his boyfriend behind euphemism and deflection like he had to with Christian. And Jared knows what Jensen is, and the two of them can plan accordingly.
The blood still grosses him out, but he'll just have to learn to live with it. He's never gotten into a relationship expecting it to end, and if nothing else, he can trust that Jensen will never cheat on him and will never deliberately be a dick to him.
“Misha's going to be so pleased,” Jared says.
“I can just picture his smug face,” Jensen adds. “He won't be surprised. I know he was just trying to get me to make friends, but he'll be so excited it was more. He's one of those people who has such a great relationship with his wife that he's always trying to get other people to find their perfect partners.”
“You think I'm your perfect partner?”
“I don't know. Do you think I am?”
“Perfect for me? Right now, I guess. I mean, you're great in bed, you're a great kisser - especially since you haven't really kissed anyone in, what, a hundred and fifty years? - we're great friends, and I really needed a friend. When I met you I didn't know anyone. It's like god put you in my path because he knew I needed someone like you.”
“I think he prefers to be called 'Misha'.” Jensen grins and they both laugh.
“I really wasn't expecting this to happen,” Jared says. “You and me and - “ He waves towards the bed - “that. I just thought we'd be two friends on a road trip to Pepperland. I'm not sorry it happened. I can tell Chad we're a thing now. He'll say 'I told you so' and start giving me sex advice.”
“I'm excited to meet him.”
“You really need a warning about the sex advice. I love him like a brother and he's a really great guy but he's... he's Chad. You'll see.”
“Do you feel better now?”
“Yeah, I think so. It's going to be weird. I've never dated a vampire before.”
“Neither have I. I promise not to bite you.”
“What if I ask?” Now it's Jared's turn to make an exaggerated sexy face and Jensen's turn to laugh. And Jared does feel better. He knows weird shit will come up and complications will happen, but he's also pretty sure that Jensen was right about one thing - in practical terms, aside from the kissing and the sex, nothing between them is going to change. He can think about the future when they get there.
Right now all he really needs to think about is how long it will take to drive to the next campground, and how much time he and Jensen have to kick back and relax at this one.
It turns out that he likes RV camping, because he likes the chance to meet other travelers. Not everyone wants to meet strangers on the road, but just talking to one or two makes Jared realize how closed off he'd become. The only real friends he's made in Boston are Jensen and Misha, and usually he's much more outgoing than that. But out here, on the road, people seem to be more willing to say hi. It helps that he rediscovers the chatty extrovert side of him that can talk to strange adults and coo at strange babies and pet strange dogs. And it helps that once the sun sets and Jensen feels safe leaving the darkness of the camper, he wants to channel his inner extrovert too.
At a campground in Oklahoma they meet Jim, who's driving around for the summer with his daughter Maddy, checking out kitschy tourist sites for her and sites of cinematic interest for him. Once Jensen learns that Jim teaches film theory, criticism, and appreciation at Rice University in Texas, and that he's written books about American cinema and TV westerns, there's no separating them. Maddy tries to feed them. Jensen politely declines, but Jared accepts a grilled turkey burger with mayo and homemade cranberry relish.
“I made it myself,” Maddy says, beaming, and even though it isn't the same as his grandmother's cranberry relish, Jared tells her it's very good.
On the other side of Jared and Jensen at that site are four Norwegian boys criss-crossing the country in a converted schoolbus so they can make a movie of their adventures. Only two of them have international driver's licenses, which hasn't stopped the other two from occasionally taking the wheel. Jared suggests they talk to Jim, and in exchange they teach him how to swear in Norwegian. Jensen, meanwhile, learns how to say “Call your mother” and “Stop snoring” in Romanian, from a middle-aged woman whose son has gotten them lost on the way to San Diego.
Jared is amused, but also takes the point. He calls home. His mother wants to know why he hasn't planned to stop in San Antonio to see his family. He apologizes and says they'll come by on the way back.
The one thing he would change about RV camping, in fact, is that he seems to spend most of the trip driving from campground to campground. The stops he planned are very far apart, and his itinerary hasn't left him and Jensen much time to relax at each campsite. They'll do it differently on the way home.
And in the meantime, they spend their nights driving and talking, listening to the audiobooks Jensen loaded onto his phone, arguing about music, and riding in comfortable silence. There are few other vehicles on the road so late at night, mostly trucks and eighteen-wheelers, and Jared feels as if he and Jensen are traveling in their own little bubble, the night sky shielding them from the rest of the world and giving their companionship an intimacy it didn't have in Jensen's apartment or at his bar. Jared realizes how little things have changed between them, despite the memory of Jensen's cock inside him, Jensen's mouth on his. He doesn't want to have sex again in the middle of a campsite, for the simple reason that it doesn't feel very private, so each time they stop to bed down and hide from the sunlight, they kiss for a little bit and then go to sleep.
This works until Texas. Texas is full of nothing, as Jensen remembered. Even the train that seems to run the whole length of the interstate does little to anchor them to the civilized world of trailers and gas stations and campsites with sewer hookups. Since the distance between the campground in Oklahoma and their next stop in Santa Fe is the shortest leg until they drive down to the pepper farm, they decide they can take a break. Jared turns south from Amarillo and then east until they seem to be in the middle of enough nothing to stop.
“Does it make you nostalgic?” he asks Jensen, cutting the engine and the lights so they're sitting in the dark and the quiet of northern Texas. They're too far from the interstate to hear the eighteen-wheelers or see the train's one brilliant headlight.
“Yes and no,” Jensen says. He leans against the dashboard to peer out the windshield. “We're not at risk of Comanche raids. There was something about Dallas I loved, but it was a very hard life compared to Boston. We thought we were going to civilize the west. We thought it belonged to us. It didn't.” He sits back and looks at Jared. Jared's vision is adjusting to the darkness but Jensen's face is in shadow. “But Boston did. We made it ours. Boston was the country's birthplace, but at the time Dallas was its future. And the future isn't yours yet. It isn't anyone's.” He unbuckles his seatbelt and heads back into the camper. Jared turns to watch as Jensen flips on the light over the bed. “Come here,” he says, sitting on the mattress. Jared goes.
Kissing is definitely better when you know it can lead to mad monkey sex and no one will hear your cries or see the camper rocking on its axles. Jared's tongue is down Jensen's throat and Jensen's hands are on Jared's ass and Jared wonders, briefly, what it would be like to fuck outside, under the wide open night sky and the million prairie stars, with no one around for miles and nothing to hear them.
All the curtains in the camper are open. Out of every window, he can see stars.
“Do you know what I want?” Jensen murmurs against his lips.
“For me to suck you off?” Jared answers. He can feel Jensen's amusement in his mouth.
“I'd like that. I want to fuck you under moonlight.” He flicks his tongue at Jared's lips and they kiss some more. “I want to turn you on your hands and knees and take you from behind, so we can both look out the window at the land and the stars.”
“You're such a romantic.” But this is exactly what he wanted too, the first time they had sex, for them to be able to open the curtains and see the stars, for them to be alone in the middle of nowhere so they could do what they wanted and not have to worry about drawing anyone's attention.
“Sometimes.” Jensen lifts his head and pulls at Jared's t-shirt. Jared sits and pulls it off, then flops down on his back and wriggles out of the rest of his clothes. There has to be a more dignified way to undress on this tiny bed. He's growing hard from all the kissing and he can tell Jensen is too, and as much as he loves Jensen's mouth, he loves Jensen's cock as well and can't wait to taste it.
He pulls Jensen to the edge of the bed, gets him out of his jeans, his underwear, kneels between his thighs and wraps eager fingers around his cock. Jensen lays a hand against his cheek. Jared ducks his head and goes to town.
The light is still on inside the camper, but Jared doesn't mind, because when he looks up, he can see Jensen watching him, smiling, lips parted so he can make noises of pleasure and tell Jared how good his mouth feels, how hot he is, how Jensen can't wait to fuck him.
Jared realizes he can do this until his jaw gets tired, because Jensen really wasn't lying about how long he can last. Jensen has other ideas, getting his hand under Jared's chin and pushing his head up until he's sitting on his knees and Jensen can lean down and kiss him.
“Now I'm going to fuck you,” Jensen murmurs against his lips. “Get up here.”
Jared's legs shake a little as he climbs onto the bed, as Jensen reaches over him to flip off the light and grab the lube, as they maneuver into position, as Jensen fingers his ass and grips his hip with one hand guides himself in with the other.
“You feel so good,” he murmurs. “Just as good as the first time.”
“So do you,” Jared says.
Jensen leans down and presses his lips to the back of Jared's neck, and then he sits back up and stars to move.
They rock in concert, Jared panting and Jensen grunting, both of them moaning with growing arousal, and if Jared concentrates he thinks he can feel the camper shaking beneath them. Jensen's hips are strong, his fingers digging into Jared's hips with enough pressure to leave bruises, and all Jared wants is for Jensen to fuck him harder, deeper, filling him and surrounding him and taking as much pleasure as he's giving.
“Harder,” he pants. “Jesus, come on.”
Jensen obliges, pounding his ass with such force that Jared's hands slip on the mattress. He's so fucking hard, he wants Jensen to touch him. He wants Jensen to keep pounding into him. He wants to come, and he never wants to come, and he finally stops thinking about what he does and doesn't want and concentrates instead on the thrusting of Jensen's hips against his ass and the pressure of Jensen's fingers digging into his flesh and the slap of skin against skin and the grunts and moans coming from both their mouths.
“God, you're amazing,” Jensen murmurs. “I could do this all night. Just... bury myself inside you.” He leans forward, presses his lips to Jared's shoulderblade. “You're so warm and tight, you're - Christ, you're everything.”
Jared is slick with sweat and breathless with arousal and so hard, so very hard. He's going to come.
And then Jensen stops, wraps an arm around Jared's chest, and sits up and back, pulling Jared with him until Jared is resting on Jensen's thighs. He can barely see out the window now. He has to tilt his head to see the sky and the stars. He can feel Jensen's hips moving against his ass, thrusting shallowly. He tries to catch his breath, but Jensen turns his head and kisses him and he stops breathing.
It's awkward, even with Jensen's hand on his chin to keep his head steady. He's too conscious of Jensen's cock inside him, his own cock stiff and swollen, his skin hot, his thighs trembling with his need to come. He can't concentrate on anything else. He pulls Jensen's arm away, trying to guide his free hand. Jensen takes the hint. It only takes one touch before Jared arches his back and comes with a cry.
He sags against Jensen when he's done. He still can't catch his breath.
“How do you want to get me off?” Jensen whispers in his ear. “I can fuck you until sunrise if you want. I can fuck you until you get hard again, so I can make you come again.”
“Shit,” Jared pants, impressed and intrigued. “You've got a dirty mouth.”
“Surprised?”
“Kinda turned on.”
Jensen chuckles. “That was the goal. Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to come.”
“I need more detail.”
Jared probably needs another few minutes before he can make his brain work again. “I want to watch you.”
So Jensen pushes him forward and pulls out. Jared stretches out on his back, lifts his legs, and beckons with a finger. Jensen guides himself inside again.
“Oh yeah,” he murmurs, starting to thrust. “Ohh... Jared... you're perfect....”
Jared squeezes Jensen's ass with both hands, encouraging him to thrust harder, deeper. They rock together, and even though Jared is empty and soft, he can't help but moan at the feel of Jensen pushing inside him.
And then Jensen is coming, straining against Jared and groaning with his release. He ducks his head and licks Jared's lips.
“How was it?” he asks. “Better than the first time?”
“Yeah.”
“Next time we'll fuck outside.” He's grinning but Jared can't take that suggestion seriously.
“Among the pepper fields?”
“Under the stars. We could wait until the full moon to see if either of us turns into a werewolf.”
“Dork.”
“Yeah.” Jensen drops another kiss on Jared's lips before pulling out and rolling off. “Let's go outside. Dressed.”
Jared's eyes have adjusted enough to the darkness that he can see Jensen climb off the bed and pull his clothes on. He's impressed that Jensen has the energy to do so, because all he wants is to lie there and recover. He can't imagine how they're going to do this on a regular basis, but maybe the more they fuck, the more he'll get used to it - no. No. He never wants to get used to it. He wants sex with Jensen to always be a surprise, to always excite him as much as it does now.
Jensen is looking at him, eyes gleaming in the dark. “Well?” he says. “Are you coming or not?”
“I thought I just did.” Jared grins.
“Now who's being a dork?” Jensen swats at his feet. “I'm going outside.” And he does.
Jared hauls himself to his feet, gets dressed, and follows. He leaves the camper door open, to air the place out, and leans against the side of the vehicle next to Jensen.
“I remember it like this,” Jensen says quietly. “Away from the city, closer to the fields. The land was quiet and scrubby and full of grass and little scuttling creatures. Dallas wasn't even that big, but once you left it there was nothing. Sometimes you could see a light in a distant farmhouse, but you could easily imagine there was nothing out there but wild animals and Comanche.”
“I thought there wasn't anything out there but wild animals and Comanche.”
“There were Rangers and settlers. During the Civil War there could be soldiers. But there was so much land, and so few people, we thought there was room for everyone. Well, everyone except the natives, we didn't want them around. There's a lot of history we should be ashamed of.”
Jared doesn't say anything. He was raised on Texan exceptionalism, on stories of the Texas Rangers and the Alamo and the civilizing of the west. He knows not everything the growing country did was good, and not everyone was treated equally and well. He knows about the dark periods. But he also knows that he's proud of where he came from, and he's proud of the people who raised him, and right now he wants to agree with Jensen, because Jensen is telling the truth, but at the same time he doesn't want to talk about what his ancestors did wrong.
He takes Jensen's hand and listens to the night. It's very quiet. They can't even hear any wildlife, insectoid or avian or mammal. There's barely any wind to rustle the grass. Jared realizes he's waiting for Jensen to say something else, to confess to more.
“It's beautiful out here,” Jensen goes on, eventually. “Sometimes I miss it.”
“Would you go back?”
“No. The Texas I knew is gone. It's been buried by its own progress.”
“You said Boston was too, when you went back.”
“It was. But it was still home. They'd filled in the bay and built streets and brownstones on the rubble, but there was still enough that I knew. I could make myself fit back in.” He squeezes Jared's hand. “And now I have Abigail's. And Misha, and you.” He turns to look Jared in the face. Jared kisses him.
It's a short kiss, comparatively. Jared rests his forehead against Jensen's. He still can't believe this is his life - driving across the country in a camper, going to visit a pepper farmer because she's trying to breed the hottest peppers in the world, because his brand-new boyfriend is a vampire and can only taste things if they're hot enough to send lesser mortals to the hospital. He wouldn't change it for anything.
“Can you hear that?” Jensen murmurs.
“Hear what?”
“It sounds like horses.”
Jared concentrates. He can't hear anything besides his own heartbeat. Maybe vampires just have better hearing than normal people. He closes his eyes, and then he hears it. It sounds like a distant herd running across the prairie. He knows he and Jensen stopped near a canyon, but he didn't think they'd passed any ranches, and he thought all the wild herds were gone from Texas.
“Is there a ranch near here?” he asks.
“Shh,” Jensen whispers. “Listen.”
Jared turns away from him just enough to watch the landscape, waiting for the herd to appear on the horizon, and he's stunned when it does - it looks like hundreds of horses, the light from the moon and stars enough to illuminate their multicolored hides, patterned like the wild ponies the Comanche rode in the illustrations in his history textbooks, like every painting he's ever seen of the wild west before white settlers drove the natives away.
“Holy shit,” he breathes. “Where did they come from?”
Because they're still coming, thundering across the grass like a history lesson come to life. But the ground should be shaking with the force of their run, and it's still firm and flat under Jared's feet. As the horses get closer, he realizes he can almost see through them, but that could be a trick of the moonlight, the effect of Jensen's history and so much empty landscape on his sex-addled brain.
He can feel the ponies' joy as they pass, their delight in the freedom to race as they please. They come close enough that he could feel the rush of wind from their transit if there was any wind to feel. Their manes and tails stream behind them, their heads lean forward, necks straining with the pleasure of their run, every muscle working, hooves pounding the dirt and grass. It's as if he and Jensen are caught in the best surroundsound that ever was, the most immersive movie experience that has yet to be invented - they can hear the horses thundering past them, can see them in perfect detail, but they're still like horses on a screen, all sound and vision but nothing to touch.
And then they're gone. Jared's heart is pounding in his chest. He remembers to breathe again. No one is ever going to believe that he just saw a herd of ghost ponies racing across North Nothing, Texas.
“What was that?” he asks.
“The ghost horses,” Jensen says. He sounds almost reverent. “I remember hearing about them when I was still in Dallas. They were Comanche ponies that the army had captured, and soldiers killed them all to keep the Comanche from taking them back.”
“They looked happy.”
“Of course they did. They're free.” Jensen takes Jared's hand and they just stand there for a while, thinking their own thoughts, watching the now-empty prairie.
Eventually Jared lets go of Jensen's hand to climb back in the camper. They still have a ways to go, and he doesn't know how long it is before sunrise.
They take their seats in silence, head back to the highway, continue on to Santa Fe. After about an hour Jensen turns the radio on, but there are no good stations out here so he turns it back off.
“I have a secret,” he says.
“Yeah?” Jared says. “What?”
“I never punched Alexander Hamilton in the face. I was involved in a bar brawl and I did punch someone, but it wasn't him. It was just some kid who happened to get in the way of my fist.”
Jared isn't as disappointed as he would have expected. It doesn't change the fact that Jensen was walking around Boston the same time as the Founding Fathers, and that he could have gotten into a bar brawl with Alexander Hamilton before Hamilton was famous and Jensen was undead.
“Did you know Betsy Ross?” Jared asks.
“Did I what?”
“Did you know Betsy Ross.”
“No. I did not know Betsy Ross. Why did you think I did?”
Jared shrugs. “Just because you lied to me about Hamilton doesn't mean you didn't know anyone famous. I can tell people I saw ghost horses, right?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“I can't tell anyone about you. I mean I can't tell anyone you're a vampire.”
“That's because I don't want anyone hunting me down. I don't think the horses will care if curious travelers drive out to see them.”
“I can't believe that happened.”
“I guess we're charmed.”
Jared can't argue with that.
Next!
NC-17
Part 4 of 5
Master post
Art
Jensen apparently decides he has better things to do than lick Jared clean, because he pulls away, kisses Jared quickly, and gets up. Jared watches his back and shoulders and ass as he gets dressed. Jensen really is a good-looking man. Jared feels obscurely lucky. His ex certainly wasn't bad-looking, and he's been with other attractive people, but maybe the pretty is another condition of being undead, like the not breathing and the not carrying diseases and the needing to drink blood. Maybe people just get more attractive in undeath.
“Well?” Jensen says, favoring Jared with a raised eyebrow. “Are you just going to lie in bed all night?”
Jared rolls to his feet, puts on some clothes, gets his towel and soap, and goes to use the campground's shower facilities. The RV's shower is very small and he doesn't want to use up all the water. Besides, now that his brain is working again, he needs a little time away from Jensen to think.
There's a dad trying to wrangle his kids in the shower facilities. Jared gives the guy a nod and a sympathetic smile before stepping into a shower. He stands under the spray and scrubs himself and wonders how he got here, not just this shower in this campground, but on the road in a camper, having quit a good job with benefits and a regular salary in favor of uncertain freelance work, traveling with a vampire who happens to be a. his best friend, and b. probably now his boyfriend. He and Jensen should have a talk, just to clear some things up.
For one thing, how much will it complicate things that Jensen doesn't eat real food, doesn't get sick, barely needs to sleep, can't go out in the sun, and will never age and die? How long can Jared put off thinking about that? How long can you be involved with a bloodsucker before you have to face the fact that your best beloved survives by drinking blood and might bite you, and not in a happy-fun sexy kind of way?
“Shit,” he mumbles into the spray. Normally he'd talk to Chad, but this is something no one else can know. Jensen gave him his very own heavy secret to bear alone, and if Jared could dislike him for anything, it would be that.
Well, at least he can bring up the boyfriend stuff. He doesn't feel like a relationship with one of the undead is something he can just wing.
“Do you really think being boyfriends will be that much more complicated than just being friends?” Jensen asks, when they're both sitting in the RV's dinette and Jared suggests they talk about this new development.
“Yes?”
“I don't. At least I won't have to hide my relationship. But if you're not ready, you're not ready, that's fine, just tell me. We can go back to just being friends. No harm, no foul. I promise.”
“I don't think I can do that. I mean, I'll look at you and picture you naked. I'm not going to forget how you kissed me.”
“Normally people let you breathe, huh?” Jensen grins.
“Can you take this seriously?”
“Okay, okay, sorry.” Jensen composes his face into seriousness. “I mean it, though. If you don't want that kind of relationship, that's fine. I won't kiss you again and we won't have sex any more, but I'll feel the same about you either way. That won't change, whether we're boyfriends or not.”
Jared sits back in his seat and thinks about that. It's true that he feels more emotionally close to Jensen than he has to anyone since his ex, and he felt that way long before Jensen kissed him. It's also true that if he thinks about it, really considers it, he can't go back to sitting next to Jensen on his couch, watching movies and eating popcorn, knowing that's as far as they'll ever go. The sex was amazing, but it was really just the last piece of a puzzle he didn't realize he was assembling. If Jensen hadn't kissed him, Jared would have eventually wanted to do it himself.
“I already said I don't think I can,” he repeats. “Go back to being just friends. I think part of me was just waiting for something to happen. Chad's been telling me you're hot for me for months.” Jensen snorts. “Shut up. That's just the way he is. My sister told me I should ask you out.”
“She did?”
“Yeah. I guess I talk about you a lot. It's not like I had a lot of other things going on. She was really glad I'd made a friend, and she thought maybe it was time I had a boyfriend too.”
“Maybe it is.”
Jared leans down and gently thunks his head on the dinette table. “But you're dead. Undead. Whatever.” He sits up. Jensen has a tiny smile on his face, affectionate and amused. “How does that work? What if you try to eat me?”
“Why would I suck your blood when I could suck your cock?” Jensen gives Jared an exaggerated leer.
“Stop it.”
Jensen gestures under the table at the little cooler. “I buy my blood. I don't eat people. Look. I was with Christian for thirty years. We made it work, in a time when we thought it was safer to hide, and he didn't even know what I was. We'll figure it out as we go.”
“But if we stay together, I'll grow old and die and you won't.”
“Jared. How old are you?”
“Twenty-nine.”
“You probably have fifty years of being a goofball ahead of you. I really don't think we need to talk now about what's going to happen when you're eighty.”
“I'm trying to plan. I can't keep doing shit without thinking it through. Dating my ex was a spontaneous decision. Planning to move in with him was. Moving to Boston was. I don't want you to be, especially since these things don't turn out so well for me.”
“Well, I won't lead you on and then spring it on you that I've found someone else.”
Jared thunks his head on the table again. “What did I get myself into?”
Jensen pats him on the head. “Think of it as a great adventure. I'll even leave the bar with you once or twice. Next year we can go down to the Esplanade for the fireworks.” His fingers comb through Jared's hair. “Do you want to go back to being just friends, no sex?” His tone is earnest. Jared shakes his head against the table. Jensen chuckles. “I didn't think so. Nothing's really changed. My feelings for you aren't any different. We're not going to do anything different when we're together.”
“Aside from the fucking.”
Jensen chuckles again. “Aside from that.” He tugs on Jared's hair. “Come on. You had your run, you had your shower, I think the sun is almost down. I might even go out to say hi to the neighbors. You'll eat, we'll keep driving. We can talk about this on the road. Okay?”
Jared lifts his head. Jensen is serious and earnest and Jared trusts him, and he realizes part of this is new for Jensen too - he won't have to hide his boyfriend behind euphemism and deflection like he had to with Christian. And Jared knows what Jensen is, and the two of them can plan accordingly.
The blood still grosses him out, but he'll just have to learn to live with it. He's never gotten into a relationship expecting it to end, and if nothing else, he can trust that Jensen will never cheat on him and will never deliberately be a dick to him.
“Misha's going to be so pleased,” Jared says.
“I can just picture his smug face,” Jensen adds. “He won't be surprised. I know he was just trying to get me to make friends, but he'll be so excited it was more. He's one of those people who has such a great relationship with his wife that he's always trying to get other people to find their perfect partners.”
“You think I'm your perfect partner?”
“I don't know. Do you think I am?”
“Perfect for me? Right now, I guess. I mean, you're great in bed, you're a great kisser - especially since you haven't really kissed anyone in, what, a hundred and fifty years? - we're great friends, and I really needed a friend. When I met you I didn't know anyone. It's like god put you in my path because he knew I needed someone like you.”
“I think he prefers to be called 'Misha'.” Jensen grins and they both laugh.
“I really wasn't expecting this to happen,” Jared says. “You and me and - “ He waves towards the bed - “that. I just thought we'd be two friends on a road trip to Pepperland. I'm not sorry it happened. I can tell Chad we're a thing now. He'll say 'I told you so' and start giving me sex advice.”
“I'm excited to meet him.”
“You really need a warning about the sex advice. I love him like a brother and he's a really great guy but he's... he's Chad. You'll see.”
“Do you feel better now?”
“Yeah, I think so. It's going to be weird. I've never dated a vampire before.”
“Neither have I. I promise not to bite you.”
“What if I ask?” Now it's Jared's turn to make an exaggerated sexy face and Jensen's turn to laugh. And Jared does feel better. He knows weird shit will come up and complications will happen, but he's also pretty sure that Jensen was right about one thing - in practical terms, aside from the kissing and the sex, nothing between them is going to change. He can think about the future when they get there.
Right now all he really needs to think about is how long it will take to drive to the next campground, and how much time he and Jensen have to kick back and relax at this one.
It turns out that he likes RV camping, because he likes the chance to meet other travelers. Not everyone wants to meet strangers on the road, but just talking to one or two makes Jared realize how closed off he'd become. The only real friends he's made in Boston are Jensen and Misha, and usually he's much more outgoing than that. But out here, on the road, people seem to be more willing to say hi. It helps that he rediscovers the chatty extrovert side of him that can talk to strange adults and coo at strange babies and pet strange dogs. And it helps that once the sun sets and Jensen feels safe leaving the darkness of the camper, he wants to channel his inner extrovert too.
At a campground in Oklahoma they meet Jim, who's driving around for the summer with his daughter Maddy, checking out kitschy tourist sites for her and sites of cinematic interest for him. Once Jensen learns that Jim teaches film theory, criticism, and appreciation at Rice University in Texas, and that he's written books about American cinema and TV westerns, there's no separating them. Maddy tries to feed them. Jensen politely declines, but Jared accepts a grilled turkey burger with mayo and homemade cranberry relish.
“I made it myself,” Maddy says, beaming, and even though it isn't the same as his grandmother's cranberry relish, Jared tells her it's very good.
On the other side of Jared and Jensen at that site are four Norwegian boys criss-crossing the country in a converted schoolbus so they can make a movie of their adventures. Only two of them have international driver's licenses, which hasn't stopped the other two from occasionally taking the wheel. Jared suggests they talk to Jim, and in exchange they teach him how to swear in Norwegian. Jensen, meanwhile, learns how to say “Call your mother” and “Stop snoring” in Romanian, from a middle-aged woman whose son has gotten them lost on the way to San Diego.
Jared is amused, but also takes the point. He calls home. His mother wants to know why he hasn't planned to stop in San Antonio to see his family. He apologizes and says they'll come by on the way back.
The one thing he would change about RV camping, in fact, is that he seems to spend most of the trip driving from campground to campground. The stops he planned are very far apart, and his itinerary hasn't left him and Jensen much time to relax at each campsite. They'll do it differently on the way home.
And in the meantime, they spend their nights driving and talking, listening to the audiobooks Jensen loaded onto his phone, arguing about music, and riding in comfortable silence. There are few other vehicles on the road so late at night, mostly trucks and eighteen-wheelers, and Jared feels as if he and Jensen are traveling in their own little bubble, the night sky shielding them from the rest of the world and giving their companionship an intimacy it didn't have in Jensen's apartment or at his bar. Jared realizes how little things have changed between them, despite the memory of Jensen's cock inside him, Jensen's mouth on his. He doesn't want to have sex again in the middle of a campsite, for the simple reason that it doesn't feel very private, so each time they stop to bed down and hide from the sunlight, they kiss for a little bit and then go to sleep.
This works until Texas. Texas is full of nothing, as Jensen remembered. Even the train that seems to run the whole length of the interstate does little to anchor them to the civilized world of trailers and gas stations and campsites with sewer hookups. Since the distance between the campground in Oklahoma and their next stop in Santa Fe is the shortest leg until they drive down to the pepper farm, they decide they can take a break. Jared turns south from Amarillo and then east until they seem to be in the middle of enough nothing to stop.
“Does it make you nostalgic?” he asks Jensen, cutting the engine and the lights so they're sitting in the dark and the quiet of northern Texas. They're too far from the interstate to hear the eighteen-wheelers or see the train's one brilliant headlight.
“Yes and no,” Jensen says. He leans against the dashboard to peer out the windshield. “We're not at risk of Comanche raids. There was something about Dallas I loved, but it was a very hard life compared to Boston. We thought we were going to civilize the west. We thought it belonged to us. It didn't.” He sits back and looks at Jared. Jared's vision is adjusting to the darkness but Jensen's face is in shadow. “But Boston did. We made it ours. Boston was the country's birthplace, but at the time Dallas was its future. And the future isn't yours yet. It isn't anyone's.” He unbuckles his seatbelt and heads back into the camper. Jared turns to watch as Jensen flips on the light over the bed. “Come here,” he says, sitting on the mattress. Jared goes.
Kissing is definitely better when you know it can lead to mad monkey sex and no one will hear your cries or see the camper rocking on its axles. Jared's tongue is down Jensen's throat and Jensen's hands are on Jared's ass and Jared wonders, briefly, what it would be like to fuck outside, under the wide open night sky and the million prairie stars, with no one around for miles and nothing to hear them.
All the curtains in the camper are open. Out of every window, he can see stars.
“Do you know what I want?” Jensen murmurs against his lips.
“For me to suck you off?” Jared answers. He can feel Jensen's amusement in his mouth.
“I'd like that. I want to fuck you under moonlight.” He flicks his tongue at Jared's lips and they kiss some more. “I want to turn you on your hands and knees and take you from behind, so we can both look out the window at the land and the stars.”
“You're such a romantic.” But this is exactly what he wanted too, the first time they had sex, for them to be able to open the curtains and see the stars, for them to be alone in the middle of nowhere so they could do what they wanted and not have to worry about drawing anyone's attention.
“Sometimes.” Jensen lifts his head and pulls at Jared's t-shirt. Jared sits and pulls it off, then flops down on his back and wriggles out of the rest of his clothes. There has to be a more dignified way to undress on this tiny bed. He's growing hard from all the kissing and he can tell Jensen is too, and as much as he loves Jensen's mouth, he loves Jensen's cock as well and can't wait to taste it.
He pulls Jensen to the edge of the bed, gets him out of his jeans, his underwear, kneels between his thighs and wraps eager fingers around his cock. Jensen lays a hand against his cheek. Jared ducks his head and goes to town.
The light is still on inside the camper, but Jared doesn't mind, because when he looks up, he can see Jensen watching him, smiling, lips parted so he can make noises of pleasure and tell Jared how good his mouth feels, how hot he is, how Jensen can't wait to fuck him.
Jared realizes he can do this until his jaw gets tired, because Jensen really wasn't lying about how long he can last. Jensen has other ideas, getting his hand under Jared's chin and pushing his head up until he's sitting on his knees and Jensen can lean down and kiss him.
“Now I'm going to fuck you,” Jensen murmurs against his lips. “Get up here.”
Jared's legs shake a little as he climbs onto the bed, as Jensen reaches over him to flip off the light and grab the lube, as they maneuver into position, as Jensen fingers his ass and grips his hip with one hand guides himself in with the other.
“You feel so good,” he murmurs. “Just as good as the first time.”
“So do you,” Jared says.
Jensen leans down and presses his lips to the back of Jared's neck, and then he sits back up and stars to move.
They rock in concert, Jared panting and Jensen grunting, both of them moaning with growing arousal, and if Jared concentrates he thinks he can feel the camper shaking beneath them. Jensen's hips are strong, his fingers digging into Jared's hips with enough pressure to leave bruises, and all Jared wants is for Jensen to fuck him harder, deeper, filling him and surrounding him and taking as much pleasure as he's giving.
“Harder,” he pants. “Jesus, come on.”
Jensen obliges, pounding his ass with such force that Jared's hands slip on the mattress. He's so fucking hard, he wants Jensen to touch him. He wants Jensen to keep pounding into him. He wants to come, and he never wants to come, and he finally stops thinking about what he does and doesn't want and concentrates instead on the thrusting of Jensen's hips against his ass and the pressure of Jensen's fingers digging into his flesh and the slap of skin against skin and the grunts and moans coming from both their mouths.
“God, you're amazing,” Jensen murmurs. “I could do this all night. Just... bury myself inside you.” He leans forward, presses his lips to Jared's shoulderblade. “You're so warm and tight, you're - Christ, you're everything.”
Jared is slick with sweat and breathless with arousal and so hard, so very hard. He's going to come.
And then Jensen stops, wraps an arm around Jared's chest, and sits up and back, pulling Jared with him until Jared is resting on Jensen's thighs. He can barely see out the window now. He has to tilt his head to see the sky and the stars. He can feel Jensen's hips moving against his ass, thrusting shallowly. He tries to catch his breath, but Jensen turns his head and kisses him and he stops breathing.
It's awkward, even with Jensen's hand on his chin to keep his head steady. He's too conscious of Jensen's cock inside him, his own cock stiff and swollen, his skin hot, his thighs trembling with his need to come. He can't concentrate on anything else. He pulls Jensen's arm away, trying to guide his free hand. Jensen takes the hint. It only takes one touch before Jared arches his back and comes with a cry.
He sags against Jensen when he's done. He still can't catch his breath.
“How do you want to get me off?” Jensen whispers in his ear. “I can fuck you until sunrise if you want. I can fuck you until you get hard again, so I can make you come again.”
“Shit,” Jared pants, impressed and intrigued. “You've got a dirty mouth.”
“Surprised?”
“Kinda turned on.”
Jensen chuckles. “That was the goal. Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to come.”
“I need more detail.”
Jared probably needs another few minutes before he can make his brain work again. “I want to watch you.”
So Jensen pushes him forward and pulls out. Jared stretches out on his back, lifts his legs, and beckons with a finger. Jensen guides himself inside again.
“Oh yeah,” he murmurs, starting to thrust. “Ohh... Jared... you're perfect....”
Jared squeezes Jensen's ass with both hands, encouraging him to thrust harder, deeper. They rock together, and even though Jared is empty and soft, he can't help but moan at the feel of Jensen pushing inside him.
And then Jensen is coming, straining against Jared and groaning with his release. He ducks his head and licks Jared's lips.
“How was it?” he asks. “Better than the first time?”
“Yeah.”
“Next time we'll fuck outside.” He's grinning but Jared can't take that suggestion seriously.
“Among the pepper fields?”
“Under the stars. We could wait until the full moon to see if either of us turns into a werewolf.”
“Dork.”
“Yeah.” Jensen drops another kiss on Jared's lips before pulling out and rolling off. “Let's go outside. Dressed.”
Jared's eyes have adjusted enough to the darkness that he can see Jensen climb off the bed and pull his clothes on. He's impressed that Jensen has the energy to do so, because all he wants is to lie there and recover. He can't imagine how they're going to do this on a regular basis, but maybe the more they fuck, the more he'll get used to it - no. No. He never wants to get used to it. He wants sex with Jensen to always be a surprise, to always excite him as much as it does now.
Jensen is looking at him, eyes gleaming in the dark. “Well?” he says. “Are you coming or not?”
“I thought I just did.” Jared grins.
“Now who's being a dork?” Jensen swats at his feet. “I'm going outside.” And he does.
Jared hauls himself to his feet, gets dressed, and follows. He leaves the camper door open, to air the place out, and leans against the side of the vehicle next to Jensen.
“I remember it like this,” Jensen says quietly. “Away from the city, closer to the fields. The land was quiet and scrubby and full of grass and little scuttling creatures. Dallas wasn't even that big, but once you left it there was nothing. Sometimes you could see a light in a distant farmhouse, but you could easily imagine there was nothing out there but wild animals and Comanche.”
“I thought there wasn't anything out there but wild animals and Comanche.”
“There were Rangers and settlers. During the Civil War there could be soldiers. But there was so much land, and so few people, we thought there was room for everyone. Well, everyone except the natives, we didn't want them around. There's a lot of history we should be ashamed of.”
Jared doesn't say anything. He was raised on Texan exceptionalism, on stories of the Texas Rangers and the Alamo and the civilizing of the west. He knows not everything the growing country did was good, and not everyone was treated equally and well. He knows about the dark periods. But he also knows that he's proud of where he came from, and he's proud of the people who raised him, and right now he wants to agree with Jensen, because Jensen is telling the truth, but at the same time he doesn't want to talk about what his ancestors did wrong.
He takes Jensen's hand and listens to the night. It's very quiet. They can't even hear any wildlife, insectoid or avian or mammal. There's barely any wind to rustle the grass. Jared realizes he's waiting for Jensen to say something else, to confess to more.
“It's beautiful out here,” Jensen goes on, eventually. “Sometimes I miss it.”
“Would you go back?”
“No. The Texas I knew is gone. It's been buried by its own progress.”
“You said Boston was too, when you went back.”
“It was. But it was still home. They'd filled in the bay and built streets and brownstones on the rubble, but there was still enough that I knew. I could make myself fit back in.” He squeezes Jared's hand. “And now I have Abigail's. And Misha, and you.” He turns to look Jared in the face. Jared kisses him.
It's a short kiss, comparatively. Jared rests his forehead against Jensen's. He still can't believe this is his life - driving across the country in a camper, going to visit a pepper farmer because she's trying to breed the hottest peppers in the world, because his brand-new boyfriend is a vampire and can only taste things if they're hot enough to send lesser mortals to the hospital. He wouldn't change it for anything.
“Can you hear that?” Jensen murmurs.
“Hear what?”
“It sounds like horses.”
Jared concentrates. He can't hear anything besides his own heartbeat. Maybe vampires just have better hearing than normal people. He closes his eyes, and then he hears it. It sounds like a distant herd running across the prairie. He knows he and Jensen stopped near a canyon, but he didn't think they'd passed any ranches, and he thought all the wild herds were gone from Texas.
“Is there a ranch near here?” he asks.
“Shh,” Jensen whispers. “Listen.”
Jared turns away from him just enough to watch the landscape, waiting for the herd to appear on the horizon, and he's stunned when it does - it looks like hundreds of horses, the light from the moon and stars enough to illuminate their multicolored hides, patterned like the wild ponies the Comanche rode in the illustrations in his history textbooks, like every painting he's ever seen of the wild west before white settlers drove the natives away.
“Holy shit,” he breathes. “Where did they come from?”
Because they're still coming, thundering across the grass like a history lesson come to life. But the ground should be shaking with the force of their run, and it's still firm and flat under Jared's feet. As the horses get closer, he realizes he can almost see through them, but that could be a trick of the moonlight, the effect of Jensen's history and so much empty landscape on his sex-addled brain.
He can feel the ponies' joy as they pass, their delight in the freedom to race as they please. They come close enough that he could feel the rush of wind from their transit if there was any wind to feel. Their manes and tails stream behind them, their heads lean forward, necks straining with the pleasure of their run, every muscle working, hooves pounding the dirt and grass. It's as if he and Jensen are caught in the best surroundsound that ever was, the most immersive movie experience that has yet to be invented - they can hear the horses thundering past them, can see them in perfect detail, but they're still like horses on a screen, all sound and vision but nothing to touch.
And then they're gone. Jared's heart is pounding in his chest. He remembers to breathe again. No one is ever going to believe that he just saw a herd of ghost ponies racing across North Nothing, Texas.
“What was that?” he asks.
“The ghost horses,” Jensen says. He sounds almost reverent. “I remember hearing about them when I was still in Dallas. They were Comanche ponies that the army had captured, and soldiers killed them all to keep the Comanche from taking them back.”
“They looked happy.”
“Of course they did. They're free.” Jensen takes Jared's hand and they just stand there for a while, thinking their own thoughts, watching the now-empty prairie.
Eventually Jared lets go of Jensen's hand to climb back in the camper. They still have a ways to go, and he doesn't know how long it is before sunrise.
They take their seats in silence, head back to the highway, continue on to Santa Fe. After about an hour Jensen turns the radio on, but there are no good stations out here so he turns it back off.
“I have a secret,” he says.
“Yeah?” Jared says. “What?”
“I never punched Alexander Hamilton in the face. I was involved in a bar brawl and I did punch someone, but it wasn't him. It was just some kid who happened to get in the way of my fist.”
Jared isn't as disappointed as he would have expected. It doesn't change the fact that Jensen was walking around Boston the same time as the Founding Fathers, and that he could have gotten into a bar brawl with Alexander Hamilton before Hamilton was famous and Jensen was undead.
“Did you know Betsy Ross?” Jared asks.
“Did I what?”
“Did you know Betsy Ross.”
“No. I did not know Betsy Ross. Why did you think I did?”
Jared shrugs. “Just because you lied to me about Hamilton doesn't mean you didn't know anyone famous. I can tell people I saw ghost horses, right?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“I can't tell anyone about you. I mean I can't tell anyone you're a vampire.”
“That's because I don't want anyone hunting me down. I don't think the horses will care if curious travelers drive out to see them.”
“I can't believe that happened.”
“I guess we're charmed.”
Jared can't argue with that.
Next!