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Jensen dribbled the basketball, enjoying the sensation of the ball pounding into his hand and the sound of it springing back up from the blacktop of Josh's driveway. He took his shot, holding his breath as the ball arced through the air, grimacing when it bounced off the rim, right into Josh's waiting hands. Josh dribbled the ball himself and looked up at Jensen.
"So, what's going on?"
"Well, you know, show opens day after tomorrow. Got a few more weeks off after we close, then back up to Vancouver for filming."
Josh tossed the ball through the net and caught it neatly. Holding it in his hands, he shot Jensen an exasperated look. "No, dumb ass." He returned to dribbling, punctuating each word with a bounce as he passed the ball from hand to hand. "What's. Going. On. With. You?"
"I'm good." Jensen watched as Josh took his next shot and stretched up to slap the ball away from his hands, claiming it for himself. "What do you think's going on?"
"Dunno, bro, but you're acting about as nervous as you did when you were scared of telling Mom you were moving to LA."
Damn Josh for knowing him too well, too long. Jensen kept the ball bouncing with one hand and wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of the other hand. Hot outside, that's all. Hot enough to have Josh's wife and the kids inside in the a/c.
"I'm just nervous about the play." Jensen took his shot, relieved when it wobbled on the rim for a split second but fell through the net.
"Yeah, sure." Josh grabbed the ball from Jensen's fingers. "Mom and Pop might believe that, but I don't buy it."
Jensen shrugged like he didn't know what Josh was talking about. Less than a week until Jeff came into town to catch closing night of the show. Less than a week before he unleashed more hell with his family than the Winchesters had back in that nasty-smelling phony graveyard. Less than a week, and maybe this was the last time he played basketball with his brother.
~~~
Opening night of A Few Good Men, and it was amazing, a whole different thrill than seeing yourself on TV or seeing your face blown up three feet high on a bus stop. The lines were alive inside his mind, and the crowd fell away, consumed by the lights until they rose up at the end, applauding him for his work when the buzz of the words still thrummed through his veins. Afterward, he made his way through the crowd of fans feeling like he still hovered about six inches above the ground.
Back at his hotel room, Jensen grabbed a beer from his minifridge and fell back on the bed, running the closed bottle over his forehead. The cold glass felt perfect against his skin, his body still flushed with heat from the lights, the hours onstage generating energy and burning it up.
His phone trilled in his pocket, and he flipped it open to see Jeff's leering mug smirking at him. Jensen knew he loved that crazy picture far too much. He hit the button to accept the call.
"Hey!"
"I'm sorry, who is this? I was trying to reach Tom Cruise."
"Aw, shut up." Jensen laughed and sat up on the bed so he could talk and drink the beer without pouring it on himself and shorting out the phone.
"So how'd it go? Any fans rush on stage and rip the medals off your uniform?"
"Jesus." Jensen shuddered at the thought. "No, it was awesome. I can't wait to do it again tomorrow, seriously."
"Glad to hear it." Jeff's voice sounded so close that Jensen could close his eyes and imagine they were in the hotel in New York a few months ago. He took a long swallow of beer and let it soothe his throat. "I hope I didn't interrupt you in the middle of some wild post-show celebration."
"Oh, nah, I'm back at the room. I know I need to rest up for tomorrow, but I'm pretty buzzed. It was just…"
"Awesome?" Jensen could hear the grin in Jeff's voice.
"Yeah. I wish you were here, could put some of this energy to good use."
"Who says we can't?" Jeff's voice dropped an octave, dirty promise in every syllable, and Jensen shifted on the bed, his pants already snug at the crotch from just the thought.
Then he thought about Jeff coming down on Sunday, how unfair it would be to let him end up in the middle of the family hell Jensen knew was going to ensue when he came out to his parents. He'd meant to tell Jeff before leaving LA, but every day felt too nice to ruin with that kind of conversation.
"Jeff, I've gotta tell you something. I'm sorry, I should have told you before."
Silence fell over the phone line for a moment before Jeff answered. "That doesn't sound good."
"Well, it's--I'm going to tell my parents. About me. About us. And I don't think--it's not going to be pretty."
"Shit, Jen. When are you going to do it?"
"Monday. I don't want to have to get up on stage after it all goes to hell, you know?"
"Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I'm glad you told me; it must be tough, stressing about it all on your own and trying to focus on the play."
Jensen coughed out a dry laugh and took another swallow of beer to smooth it over. "I'm just playing the denial game as best I can and pushing everything I don't want to think about so far down that they don't surface too much, you know?"
"Babe, you need to relax or you're going to be a mess by the end of the week."
"You're probably right." Jensen sighed.
"Take off your clothes." The concern in Jeff's voice was gone, replaced by heat and promise and insistence.
"I--oh," Jensen stammered, having lost the erotic thread of their conversation in the middle of his worry about the future. "Okay."
He put the phone down long enough to strip his shirt up over his head and unbutton his jeans and push them down. He picked the phone back up and listed to Jeff breathing on the other end of the line while he kicked off his shoes and shook his jeans the rest of the way to the floor. "All I have on is my briefs."
"Good." Jeff drew the word out slow and deep. "Turn off the lights and get back on the bed."
Jensen clicked off the main light in the room and then climbed onto the bed. The heavy hotel curtains kept out all but a slight glow of streetlight that seeped in around the edges. "It's dark in here," he said to Jeff, feeling like an idiot.
"Good. Now put your hand on your chest, feel your heart beat."
Jensen closed his eyes and pressed his hand flat against his skin. His pulse reverberated through his hand, his chest, his throat.
"Remember in Riverside, when it was just the two of us in the dark. The room was cold, and you were hot under my hands, your body rising up to meet me."
Jeff's voice rumbled through Jensen as he remembered that night, how much he'd needed Jeff's hands on him. How much he'd needed. He slid his hand down his chest and over his belly until he cupped his stiffening cock through the cotton of his briefs.
"That night, I wished I'd been able to get you naked, strip you bare so I could feel every inch of you along my skin. So take off your underwear. Push your hands down your hips and feel my hands the way I'd be touching you if I could."
"Oooh," Jensen moaned breathily, lifting his ass off the bed and resting the phone against his shoulder as he followed Jeff's instruction. His hands would never be as broad as Jeff's, but there in the dark with Jeff's voice working its way through his body he could spread his fingers over his hips and forget the difference. Suddenly he needed to know where Jeff was, needed to see him in his mind. "Where are you now?"
"On the couch in the living room. My jeans are on the floor." Jeff didn't have to say it - the couch where they'd been together that first time. The couch where Jensen had learned what it felt like to fly apart with a man's head between his legs, to feel the power of taking a cock in his mouth.
"Wrap your hand around your cock. Not too tight, just stroke it smooth and slow because we've got all night."
Jensen let the instructions flow from his ear to his hand, but even stroking so lightly it almost tickled he hardened quickly, his jangling nerves pulling the tension in his balls tighter. "I'm not gonna last," he panted into the phone.
"You don't have to. I'm right here with you, I--" Jeff's voice caught on a shuddery gasp, and Jensen could imagine Jeff's cock rising up to meet his belly, Jeff's lower lip trapped between his teeth the way it always was when he was so close to coming.
"Fuck, oh." Jensen curled his hand tighter and pumped his cock until he came all over his fingers, no time to grope for a tissue. As his own breath slowed down he could hear Jeff panting roughly on the other end of the line.
Most of the tension in his body gone, Jensen felt the exhaustion of the day tugging him down into sleep. "Love you," Jensen whispered. "T'morro--"
When Jensen woke up in the morning, he found come in his hair and his phone's battery dead.
~~~
As he tossed his bags into the back of the cab and gave the driver the name of his hotel, Jeff cursed the delayed flight that had kept him in LA three hours longer than expected and the delayed landing that kept him from the Dallas airport for an additional hour. He had planned to get in early enough to meet Jensen for dinner before the evening performance--a quiet meal of room service in Jensen's hotel suite near the theater. Now, with all the delays, he'd barely have time to drop his crap in the room, change into fresh clothes, and get in his seat before the house lights went down.
Luckily, things were starting to turn in his favor: the cab made good time from the airport to the hotel in Fort Worth, the front desk had a key on hand for him, and when he walked back out fifteen minutes later the cab driver was still waiting like he'd promised. He blended with a crowd of people walking into the theater and made it to his seat without being recognized--at least not by anybody given to raising a fuss. The rest of the audience trickled in, filling up the room with heat and color, the sound of shoes rasping on carpet, and the cresting wave of murmuring voices which broke when the theater went dark.
Jensen was good, damn good. The lights loved him, glowing off of his skin, his uniform. Jeff had never thought of himself as having a kink for men or women in uniform. Team uniforms, basketball uniforms--maybe. Thin shorts hanging low on sweaty hips, the fabric soft and damp under his hands as he dropped to his knees… Basketball uniforms, definitely.
He'd had enough misbegotten fun when he was younger that a police uniform still meant danger, the end of a good time. Every time he'd looked at himself in his firefighter costume he thought it gave him about as much shape as a potato, and he'd never get how that could be sexy. He had respect for people in the armed services, sure, but the sight of a uniform had never before made him shift in his seat, tugging at his pants to make room for his demanding cock.
Then again, the uniform didn't do good things for Jensen so much as Jensen did good things for the uniform--the solid breadth of his shoulders stretching the cloth tight across his back, his trim hips and ass showing off the straight lines of the trousers. Jensen could have been playing Nameless Officer #2, and Jeff still wouldn't have been able to take his eyes off him.
When intermission came, Jeff followed the directions Jensen had texted him and made his way backstage to the door with Jensen's name on it. The linebacker stuffed into a suit standing next to the door made Jeff feel better about how easy it had been to get backstage.
"Hey," he said, nodding to the man. "Jensen's expecting me. Jeff Morgan." The guard checked his clipboard, and when he gave the go-ahead Jeff knocked on the door.
"Come on in." Jensen's voice sounded tight, wired, and when Jeff pushed open the door he saw that Jensen's eyes looked the same way.
"Hey," Jeff said. He heard the door click shut behind him and reached back to flip the lock. "C'mere."
He stepped closer and wrapped his hand behind Jensen's head, pulling him in for a kiss. He let his lips linger on Jensen's for a moment and then brushed across his cheek to whisper in his ear. "I like the outfit."
Jensen huffed out a breath and pulled away. "I look like a tool. And I'm sorry, I think I'm screwing up out there."
"Don't know what you're talking about--I think you've got the crowd eating out of your hand."
"I think I'm lucky to be remembering my lines. Every time I stop to breathe I start to think about tomorrow."
Jeff reached out and squeezed Jensen's shoulder. "Tomorrow's going to happen soon enough. Tonight you're doing a great job out there. And that uniform…" Jeff stroked his hand down Jensen's chest and fingered the buttons there.
"As good as this thing looks on you, it would look even better all balled up on the floor with you all fucked out on the bed, all that gelled up hair screwed to hell by my fingers."
Jensen hummed and closed his eyes. "You think they'll let me get away with skipping the second act? 'Cause if you do I say we keep the door locked and get right on that."
"I think I better get back to my seat. You still want to go to the cast and crew party after?"
"Yeah, we don't have to stay long, but I wouldn't feel right missing it. Meet me here?"
"Will do." Jeff heard a woman in the hallway calling out a one-minute warning. "Okay, that's my cue." He couldn't think of anything else to say that wouldn't lead to an hour long conversation or a serious wardrobe and make-up emergency so he just turned around and left.
Jeff was the last person in his row to sit down, and when the curtain rose again Jensen was as beautiful and talented as he had been in the first act. But Jeff could see, every now and then when another character was talking, Jensen's eyes shift as though his mind were drifting off in another direction for just a few seconds.
I know where you're going, Jeff thought. The best he could do, when it came down to it, was make sure Jensen didn't have to go there on his own.
~~~
A short visit to the party turned into a very long night. Jensen introduced Jeff to the people he'd been working with for weeks, and it seemed like just about everyone wanted to give Jensen a hug or a pat on the back and hand him a beer or a shot. Every time Jeff turned around Jensen's hand was empty so he'd assumed that Jensen was leaving a trail of barely-started beers throughout the room. Jeff got into a long conversation with one of the crew guys about motorcycles and the craziest rides they'd ever taken, and when he looked for Jensen he found him leaning up against the wall, about five minutes away from sliding down and landing on his ass.
"Jen." Jeff shook his head and cupped a hand around Jensen's cheek. His face was flushed pink and warm, his eyes glassy from the alcohol and red from exhaustion. "You about done?"
"Jjjjefff." Jensen closed his eyes and rolled the back of his head against the wall. "I c'n still…think."
"Aw, babe. I'm pretty sure that as soon as you lay down you're not going to be thinking at all, so how about we get out of here while you're still walking."
"Oookey."
Jeff wrapped an arm around Jensen's back and shepherded him toward the door, snagging a bottle of water on their way out. Jensen had driven them over in his rental car, so Jeff got him settled in the passenger seat and fished the keys out of his pocket.
Once he had the car started he cracked the top of the water bottle and wrapped Jensen's lax hand around it. "Drink."
"Yes, ma'am," Jensen slurred and Jeff couldn't help laughing as he plugged the hotel's address into the GPS and started toward the hotel.
Jensen managed to stay ambulatory long enough to get into the hotel and up to his room, but that was as far as he could go. Jeff stripped him down to his boxers and tucked him into bed before getting ready for bed himself. He sat up in bed watching cable news with the volume down low until he felt like he could fall asleep himself, but all the time he kept a hand on Jensen's head. Absently combing his fingers through Jensen's hair he turned the remnants of all that hair gel into clear flakes on the pillowcase.
~~~
Jeff woke in the morning to the sound of Jensen heaving up his guts in the bathroom. He rolled his face into the pillow and, for just a minute, allowed himself to contemplate the possibility of leaving Jensen to suffer the consequences of his fuckup on his own and granting himself a couple more hours of sleep. The sheets smelled good and the bathroom was sure to smell not so good, but soon they could get showers and coffee and everything would smell great.
Jeff pushed himself up and forced his eyes open to look at the clock. 9 am. Four hours until they were due at the Ackles residence. In the bathroom, he found Jensen still bent over the toilet, panting a little but not throwing up any longer.
Jensen flushed he toilet and sat back against the bathtub. The red that ringed his eyes made a nasty contrast to his milky pale face, and Jeff cringed at the unsurprising stench of bile and regurgitated alcohol in the room. He sat down on the rim of the tub with his hip brushing Jensen's shoulder.
"You doin' okay?"
"Feel a hell of a lot better than I did ten minutes ago." Jensen sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. "Think I'll live."
"Oh good." Jeff sat still and let Jensen lean against him until the cold narrow porcelain under him started to hurt. "Hey, you want the first shower?"
"Mmmm, I think I need to sit here a little longer." Jensen splayed a hand against his stomach. "But you can go ahead if you don't mind me in here."
"Sounds like a plan." Jeff stood up, brushing a hand over Jensen's head. "Just gonna go get my kit."
Ten minutes later, when Jeff emerged from the shower with the accumulated stink of airplane travel and the smoky party and a damn long day washed away, he found Jensen brushing his teeth.
"Your turn if you're ready."
Jensen spat into the sink and turned around, his face hazy through the steam. Jeff felt Jensen's gaze travel up and down his naked body.
"Yeah. I'm completely freakin' disgusting. God, I wish I hadn't drank so much last night. I want to suck you off so bad but I'm afraid I'd hurl again."
"That would be bad." Jeff smirked and dried himself off enough to pull on the hotel bathrobe without dripping all over the carpet. "Get cleaned up. I'll make coffee and order us some breakfast."
"No food," Jensen protested as he pulled off his boxers.
"I'll get you some toast."
"No food."
Jeff just chuckled and left the bathroom, closing the door quickly to keep the heat and steam inside.
~~~
By the time Jensen washed himself thoroughly and then stood under the pounding hot hotel shower for a few extra minutes he felt about 75% human. Soft, warm terrycloth against his skin and fresh air in his lungs as he stepped into the suite's main room pushed him up closer to 80%. And that was a B, right? Or a C? Either way, he figured, it was better than average. Also better than average was the sight of Jeff spread out in the kitchenette with his feet propped up on an extra chair, the newspaper open in his lap, mugs of coffee and a collection of plates on the table.
Jensen sat down in front of the full coffee mug and leaned forward to rest his head in one hand. The couple of Advils he'd taken in the bathroom were starting to kick in, but he could still feel his pulse pounding through his temples like something wanted out out out out. "Thanks for getting me home last night."
"Not a problem. You feeling any better?" The gentleness of Jeff's tone told Jensen that he didn't just mean the hangover.
Jensen nodded once and reached for his coffee. "I'm okay. I just want to get today over with and then go back to LA and spend the next few weeks in a coma until it's time to be Dean again."
"If you replace 'coma' with 'lawn chair' I think I could be down with that."
"Same difference." The coffee felt good on Jensen's throat and his stomach gurgled for a moment and then settled down for the warm, sweet liquid. A plate with toast, scrambled eggs and fruit salad sat untouched on his side of the table, and Jensen drew it closer, looking at it uncertainly. The toast was okay--not too buttery, not too hard--but the fruit salad tasted like acid and the eggs had a slimy sheen to them that made Jensen push the plate away.
"Can we get out of here?" Jensen stood up from the table and looked around the room--the pull-out couch, the door to the bedroom, the door to the hallway with its instructions for in case of emergency. "I don't know how I'm going to get to 1 pm without going nuts. Do you mind if we just--I don't know."
"How about we drive around? You could give me a tour, show me this place through your eyes."
"Yeah. That wouldn't be too boring?"
"No, it'd be cool. We could head in the direction of Dallas, drive around there for a while, and then head out to your folks. That makes sense, right?"
"It does, yeah. Okay, I'm going to get dressed."
In the bedroom, Jensen sat on the edge of the bed and let himself run through the nightmare images he'd had in his head for weeks now. His father turning away, disowning him. His mother telling him that she was ashamed of him, that she wished he'd never been born. His brother hitting him, pushing him out, telling him to stay away from his niece and nephew. Mackenzie was off on a mission trip to Louisiana, so he didn't have to prepare for his sister's eyes looking at him with disdain and disappointment
Jensen startled out of his thoughts at the feeling of the bed dipping beside him and Jeff's hand on his shoulder pushing the collar of his robe back. He jerked away without thinking and then looked over at Jeff hoping his apology was visible there.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you. I just didn't hear anything for a while and thought you might have fallen back to sleep."
"No, I just--" Jensen looked at the big rumpled bed behind them and then back at Jeff. "I wish we could just spend the day in here, but I can't--I only want to be with you when my head is with you, you know?"
"I know. Come on, let's get dressed and get out of here so that the time passes fast enough that we don't go nuts."
"Okay." Jensen watched as Jeff turned around and dug clean clothes out of his suitcase. With a sigh to let go of some of the tension in his body, Jensen stood up to do the same.
~~~
Driving around Dallas and Richardson with Jeff felt weird--half tour guide expedition, half count-down to arrival at his parents' house. He took Jeff around Dallas, pointing out the monuments and historical places he'd gone on school trips and the theater where he performed in a play the summer after high school. In Richardson, he drove past his family's church and the smaller one they'd attended when he was little, the donut shop where he and his friends had hung out sometimes in high school, the park where they almost got arrested for trespassing after dark even though they weren't even drinking.
Each landmark of his past felt like a heavier weight on his chest and it reminded him of something he couldn't put his finger on until they drove past the second-run movie theater. That stupid sappy movie, Say Anything. His friend Ashley in middle school had made him watch it, and he remembered John Cusak driving around town listing all the places he'd gone with his ex-girlfriend.
Jensen sat at a stop light, staring blankly into the distance until the tap of a horn behind him let him know that the light had turned green. That was it--he felt like he was breaking up with everything he'd ever thought of as home, like he'd maybe never have this all again without the bitterness of knowing--knowing he wasn't wanted.
"Um." Jensen cleared his throat and cut a glance over at Jeff. "This is the park where I used to go fishing with my dad sometimes when I was in elementary school."
"How far are we from your folks' place?"
"Five minutes, maybe."
"Okay, well, it's only 12:30. How about we walk around in there for a while? Get some fresh air?"
"Yeah, okay." Jensen pulled into a parking space, feeling the crunch of gravel under tires and wished for a moment that he had a couple of fishing poles in the back seat, some line and hooks, bobbers and sinkers. He didn't think he'd been fishing in fifteen years or more.
~~~
They walked around the park for twenty minutes and Jeff imagined it was probably a nice place to fish, if dead boring for a little kid. No swing sets or concrete tunnels to run through. Just small trees, brush, water and a walking trail. They walked quietly with their hands at their sides, but Jeff made sure their shoulders brushed from time to time, the comfortable rasp of cotton against cotton. When Jensen turned their meandering path back toward the car, all Jeff could do was follow.
At the car, Jensen opened the driver's side door and then stood leaning against the hood for a minute instead of getting right in.
"I don't want to go," he said. Panic sparked in his eyes, and Jeff thought of Bisou sitting in the back of his car outside the vet's office and refusing to jump down.
"You don't have to." Jeff held Jensen's gaze because he couldn't hold his hand and he saw the panic settle into determination.
"Yes, I do." Jensen sat down in the car and shut his door; Jeff did the same.
~~~
Mrs. Ackles greeted them outside the front door, wrapping her arms around her son and then shaking Jeff's hand. As far as she knew, Jeff was just a friend of Jensen's who'd flown in for the last night of the play. Everything felt bright and false and fragile, and Jeff had to fight to keep his hand off of Jensen's back as they stepped inside the house. He shook hands with Jensen's father and brother and everybody got on a first name basis. They were all uncomfortable and they all knew something strange was going on, and they all sat down to eat lunch in the Ackles' colorful dining room.
The fried chicken was delicious, but it sank like a stone to the bottom of Jeff's stomach and Jensen barely ate a bite, asking Josh and Alan questions about their work, their yards, what they planned to do with the rest of the summer. Jeff felt Donna's eyes on him, and all he could do was smile and compliment the fluffiness of the rolls and wait for the true business of the afternoon to begin.
Jensen and Josh got up to clear the plates and when the table was empty Jensen stood in the doorway with a hand wrapped around the corner of the wall. "I need to talk to y'all about something."
Jeff felt his heart pounding and wished right then that he could walk out the door, that he didn't have to be there for such a fucked up family moment, but Jensen didn't deserve to go through it alone.
"Okay, sweetie," Donna replied, standing up and pushing in her chair. "We can go talk in the front room while your friend and Josh watch TV."
Jensen shook his head and slowly released his grip on the wall. "No, I want all of us to be here."
"O-okay." Donna sat back down and Jensen walked around the table to sit next to Jeff.
"I have to tell you something and I-I know it's not what you're going to want to hear, but I need to be honest." Jensen's face was pale, the corners of his eyes tight, and Jeff could see his fingers trembling just slightly where they sat in his lap.
"Are you sick?" Alan's voice was low, not quite steady.
"No." Jensen tilted his head to the side and paused before shaking his head. "No, no I'm not."
"For God's sake, bro," Josh muttered.
"I'm gay. Okay? I'm gay and I'm with Jeff."
Jensen's family sat looking at them in shock, and Jeff reached across the space between their seats to take Jensen's hand in his.
Donna drew in a deep, shuddery breath, put one hand over her face and started weeping. "I'm sorry," she choked out.
"Mama," Jensen whispered.
"You can't--" Alan stood up, almost knocking over his chair before hastily righting it. "I won't--" His eyes went hard, his jaw tight. "Get out."
"Dad, please." Jensen's hand felt cold in Jeff's before he pulled it away and stood up, looking wildly back and forth between his parents.
Alan shook his head and turned to leave, long angry steps taking him out of the room before Jeff remembered to breathe.
"Dad!" Josh called out. "Shit, Jen, I gotta--" He looked like he didn't have any clue what he should do and Jeff knew that feeling well. "Dad!" He called out and then took off out of the room leaving Jensen and Jeff alone in the room with Donna.
She was still crying, and when Jensen moved closer she lifted a hand up to ward him off. Jensen pulled back looking shocked and sick and stumbled back a step until Jeff caught him. Jensen's whole body was trembling as he breathed roughly through his mouth. "I gotta get out of here."
"Okay. Okay, come on." As much as he'd wanted to bolt earlier, now Jeff wanted to stay, wanted to help Jensen try to fix this as much as it could be fixed. But it wasn't his battle, wasn't his decision. He was there to support Jensen so if Jensen said out, they were heading out.
Jensen moved through the kitchen and TV room with his head down, and when they made it outside he didn't slow, heading straight for the car.
Jeff heard a door slam from the side of the house and Josh's voice calling out, "Jensen, wait! Wait!"
Jensen stopped and turned around, his shoulders set as if waiting for a blow.
"Man, don't look like that," Josh said, and Jeff felt his own muscles relax. "I'm sorry I didn't say anything in there but I was surprised, okay? I don't know exactly what I'm supposed to say here, but you're my little brother, you know? I love you."
"Even now?"
"Don't be a jackass." Josh leaned forward and wrapped one arm around Jensen's back, pounding on him like he was trying to dislodge a foreign object. When he pulled away, he looked uncomfortably back and forth between Jensen and Jeff. "Come back inside?"
"No," Jensen answered, taking half a step closer to the car. "He said get out, I have to leave."
"Okay." Josh sounded sad and helpless. "Jesus, okay." Josh kept watching Jensen as he got into the driver's seat and then turned a meaningful look on Jeff.
Take care of him, the look said. Or else. Jeff held Josh's gaze and nodded his head. I will.
The car started up and Jeff got inside. Josh stood at the top of the driveway as they pulled away, his hands in his pockets and his head down.
Three blocks away, just before they got to the main road leading to the highway and Fort Worth, Jensen pulled over and put the car in park. "Can you drive?"
"Of course." Jeff got out and walked around to the driver's side while Jensen shifted over to the passenger seat. Jeff buckled himself in and fixed the seat and mirrors to his liking, and when he looked over at Jensen he was sitting with his arms crossed loosely over his stomach and his head bowed in exhaustion or defeat. Or both.
"He told me to get out," Jensen whispered.
"I think, if you give them some time--"
"No." Jensen turned to look out the side window. "Can we just--not? Can we just go back to the room?"
"Yeah, Jen. Sure." Jeff turned the car back onto the road and reminded himself again that it wasn't his place to fix this mess, if it could even be fixed.
~~~
Back at the room, Jensen shook off Jeff's attempts at comfort and settled himself on the bed with the remote in his hand. He flipped channels compulsively until he found what looked like a marathon of CSI on Spike. Jeff went back out into the main room and made some fresh coffee, counting the hours until their flight back to LA the next morning. Despite himself, his stomach growled and he looked through the take-out menus Jensen had collected.
Chinese menu in hand, he walked into the bedroom and sat down on the unoccupied side of the bed. Jensen looked over, looked down at the menu in Jeff's hand and shook his head.
"I don't want anything, thanks."
"You haven't really eaten anything today," Jeff pointed out, worried at how drained Jensen looked. He'd had a demanding few weeks and then this? Fuck it all, he was supposed to be on vacation.
"Seriously, I just can't. Please, Jeff? Leave it be?"
"Okay." Jeff's hands itched to reach over and rub all of the tension and sadness out of Jensen's body, but everything about the way he held himself said "back off".
A knock sounded from the suite's front door, and Jensen turned back to look at the TV. "Guess that's your food."
"I didn't order anything," Jeff answered, already on his way to answer the door. He expected housekeeping or somebody knocking at the wrong room, but when he looked through the peep-hole he saw Donna Ackles, somehow terrifying in her short-sleeved twin set.
He rested his head against the door for a moment and prayed for something good to come out of this. When the knock sounded again, he stood up straight and opened the door. "Donna."
She walked inside the room, clutching her purse under her arm and looking uncertain. Her eyes were still red from crying, the puffiness as obvious on her face as it was on her son's, and with most of her makeup wiped away she looked older. "I'd like to see my son."
"Let me tell him you're here," Jeff said in the most even voice he could manage. He turned around to walk back to the bedroom but stopped when he felt her hand on his arm.
"There's no need." She skirted around him, moving briskly toward the open doorway, and unless he was willing to physically pull her back there was nothing he could do. Instead, he just followed, his longer steps catching up to her as she entered the bedroom.
Jensen had turned off the TV and in the silent room he sat and stared at his mother. "Mom?"
Donna walked around to Jensen's side of the bed faster than Jeff would have expected and sat down with her knees brushing Jensen's. "I'm sorry. I didn't want you to leave."
Jensen's lips twisted into a bitter smirk, his eyes shining wet. "No? You just wanted me to be somebody I'm not."
"That's not true. I just never thought--" She moved suddenly and wrapped Jensen up in a hug, one arm going as far around his shoulders as she could reach, the other cupping his head to her shoulder. "I love you, baby. I love you so much."
Jensen coughed then, sounding like he was choking, and put his arms around his mother's back. The coughs turned into thick sobs that shook his body and rocked the bed.
Jeff stood stuck in his spot, unable to go any closer to the mother-son scene in front of him, unable to leave Jensen with so much grief, until Jensen unwrapped one hand from Donna's back and reached it out, palm facing up in Jeff's direction, fingers curling in.
In two steps he was on the bed, kneeing across it until he could take Jensen's hand and squeeze tight. He wrapped his other arm around Jensen's waist to hold him steady as his sobs trailed off into exhausted, shaky inhales and exhales.
"I don't understand everything," Donna spoke gently into Jensen's ear, "but I love you and I always will. I'm sorry if I made you doubt that."
"I love you, too," Jensen answered, his voice sounding like he'd scrubbed out his throat with bleach. "But Dad…"
Donna pulled back from Jensen and wiped her thumbs across the damp skin under his eyes. "You need to give him some time. I think, if we let him have some space on this, he'll come around."
"I don't think so." Jensen bit his lip like he was trying not to fall apart again and Jeff squeezed his hand tight.
"You're his favorite. And he's stubborn, just like you. He needs some time to make sense of this."
"Okay," Jensen said, clearly not believing like Donna did but hoping, maybe, that he'd be able to believe it in the future.
Donna stood up from the bed and smoothed the front of her shirt. She bent down to press a kiss to Jensen's forehead and then touched her hand to Jeff's shoulder. "I have to head home. It's going to start getting dark soon, and I don't do so well on the highway at night."
Jensen nodded, looking wrecked but far more peaceful than he'd been an hour earlier.
"I can drive you home," Jeff added. "If you don't feel safe driving."
"Oh, no thank you." She looked down at where their hands were still joined on top of the covers. "I think you belong here."
Jeff ducked his head and listened as her footsteps moved through the main room, as the door closed heavily behind her. Jeff felt the weight of the day pulling him down into lethargy, and he pulled his hand slowly away from Jensen's.
"I'll be right back."
Jeff threw the deadbolt on the door, turned off the lights and the coffee machine and stopped in the bathroom to take care of business. By the time he got back to the bed, Jensen was naked from the waist up and struggling to get his pants off.
Jeff pushed his hands away and undid his belt, popped the button, pulled down the zipper. He pulled Jensen up to stand for a minute and tugged down his pants and boxers until they were puddled on the floor. Jensen got back on the bed, crawling to the middle, while Jeff pulled his own clothes off and dumped them on top of Jensen's. The dim light of early evening filtered around the edges of the curtains as Jeff curled his body around Jensen's and held him close, skin against skin, as he slipped into exhausted sleep.
~~~
The next story (in which I promise porn) will be posted on Sunday.