Chapter Text
Cregan let out a long breath and lugged up the dorm tower with the grace of a dying horse. He was sure the stairs were not up to code, and he perhaps was entrusting too much faith, and weight, on the railing that groaned with him. But Cregan did not slow. He thought of the centuries of feet that had also made this climb; warriors and servants that had, at one stage, been in a worse position than him. A top floor dorm was also not a privilege granted to many, so Cregan wore his bravest face and soldiered on.
He got up extra early to hit legs, and leg day was shit enough without his headphones dying on him halfway through. He managed to hit none of his PR’s and his shoulder was still fucked from the incident, which also costed him from making any waves at his new team’s preseason match.
He’d kill for a massage, or a warm bath — the kind his mum would run for him after practice.
But this year was all about second chances. Cregan could reclaim the day. He’d revise the draft his tutor deemed ‘just passable,’ and if he was extra good, perhaps he’d treat himself to a little company. Cregan had the dorm to himself on weekends, after all.
He reached his room and went straight for his bed. His tendons cried out in relief. Cregan allowed himself a minute of repose before rolling to where his charger was. He plugged his phone and frowned when the battery icon stayed red. He bent and twisted the cord, hoping to get something out of it, and when that didn’t happen, Cregan was just about ready to put something through the wall.
His crisp morning start had officially turned into an ever building pile of shit.
Rather than fall to despair, he thought of his friend’s mantra:
Don’t let a bad day fuck you twice.
So Cregan forced his achy legs back on the floor and searched the living room. His roommate usually had a charger laying about somewhere. Of course, such wasn’t the case today.
He could always count on Jace to leave the heater on, though, because what person didn’t enjoy living in a sweltering hellhole.
After aggressively switching it off, he walked over to Jace’s room. When Cregan opened his roommate’s door, he walked in on something he wasn’t meant to see.
Jace, lying on his back, with another man’s hand in his pants.
The exchange was quick. There was a round of glances, all uncomfortable, then a graceless dance of hands and blankets to cover what had already been seen. And Cregan, the idiot still in the doorway, couldn’t even mumble up an apology when Jace cursed something angry and breathless at him.
He closed the door, soft and awkwardly punctual. There was some shifting on the other side and he was left to distill in the shock.
Cregan retreated to the kitchen — still connected to their living room — and ran a hand through his hair. He pulled out a pan and a carton of eggs. He leant over the sink while he waited for the oil to warm. The dorm felt even smaller than it was. He stared at the ceiling to keep his eyes from Jace’s door.
For a long time, Cregan gripped the kitchen counter. Of course this would happen to him. It was the fucking day for it. He’d already fumbled everything else — why not walk in on his roommate getting a handy? A gay handy, actually — a gay, lazy, Sunday morning handy.
A few more seconds passed before there was any change. Jace came out in a sweatshirt, grey and down to his knees and shielding any sign of the wreckage Cregan had just witnessed.
He was still wearing those same pants though. Just flaccid, Cregan assumed, supposing they had time to finish.
Jace gently shut the door behind him. He tucked his hands across his chest, body reserved but face full of conviction.
“So that was something,” he said.
“Yeah, ah — I shouldn’t have burst in like that.”
Jace didn’t respond to that. His eyes did it for him — small and dark and full of ‘you think?’
Cregan looked at his feet. “I didn’t think you’d be home. I was just looking for a charger.”
He folded his arms, Jace still just looking at him, and rocked on the back of his heel.
“You think I could still borrow it?” Cregan asked.
Jace blinked his disbelief. “Wait here.”
Jace disappeared back into his room. For Cregan, the other image lingered — the slipped hand, the plaid pyjama pants, the whole ass man nestled behind him.
He’d been living with Jace for one whole month now and not one weekend had he stayed. Not once. Why today?
Jace returned to their kitchenette. It seemed different, the outstretched hand offering the charger. Cregan was slow to take it.
“Thanks.”
He watched as Jace swept past him and opened the mini fridge to grab a bottled water. He drank it calmly, hair still rustled. Cregan wasn’t sure how he could be so composed when his own face felt beet-red.
The oil started to bubble. Cregan decided to disarm some of the tension. “So that’s —”
“You know Harren,” Jace answered.
Did he? There were a lot of people here. Maybe he could place him if he tried.
“I didn’t know you two were —”
“It’s still kind of new.” Jace screwed the lid on, then held the bottle with two hands. “He um, he lives across town. So it’s just easier here.”
Cregan nodded slowly, back to the stove.
“I was going to talk to you and see if you’re fine with him staying the night sometimes.”
“Yeah. I guess,” Cregan said, scratching the back of his neck. “Maybe just put a sock on the door or something.”
“Or you could knock,” Jace said flatly.
“Yeah, I’ll knock.”
Most of the time Jace diverted eye contact. It never seemed like Cregan had his full attention. This was new. This was a beady, dark stare that made him feel too present, too much for the cramped space between them.
The heavy air stayed even when Jace left. Some part of Cregan was curious to know why he hadn’t brought a girl over. He was a good-looking guy, the kind of face you’d expect on a teenage girl’s wall. It made a hell of a lot more sense with this context. Jace was a male model, after all. Cregan really should’ve clocked it sooner.
He’d thought Jace was a little peculiar. A little vain. But Cregan knew he was artsy and loaded. And Jace never made a pass at him. He had no real reason to suspect he was —
The oil started to burn, and Cregan realised he’d been standing in the kitchen for too long.
He grabbed the smoky pan and dumped it in the sink. He turned the tap on and sighed, looking once more at Jace’s door.
Cregan didn’t mind living with Jace, he just didn’t want to see that.
***
They moved with the white-hot sun. The Riverlanders promised a view that was worth it, but Cregan didn’t think anything was worth sweating through this heat. He was at the tail-end of the group, drinking lukewarm beer and adjusting shorts that felt like wet plastic between his thighs.
There were about twenty of them total. Cregan stuck with his teammates – the three that showed up anyway. Davos, whose backpack rattled only of beer, and the two freckle-faced Tully twins he couldn’t tell apart. On a team where everyone knew each other since they were toddlers, Cregan found it easy to keep to the freshers.
Perhaps that’s why he’d initially found some comfort in Jace’s presence. They were both outsiders — two new faces trying to make sense of this strange, old land. Though Cregan quickly learned that Jace was privy to about half a dozen different organisations and seemed to have absolutely no trouble making friends.
Jace was walking a few people ahead of him. He was in all black; the swanky, breathable kind of material that billowed off his skin. Every time he turned around he saw his fancy, bug-eyed sunglasses. He looked smart against the landscape, like a man surveying lands for purchase.
Cregan wasn’t ecstatic to learn that on-campus housing meant he had to share, but Jace was cool. He never saw him, really. He was always out or holed up in his room. He was a high-functioning workaholic; early to rise, late to retire.
The first time he met Jace, two guys were hauling out the dorm’s lumpy, default mattress. They shook hands and that was that for a while. He was friendly enough. Somewhat neat. A little distant.
The second week, Cregan found Jace trying to build a bookcase from a box. They made smalltalk while Cregan twisted the screws. Jace swam, so they chatted a little about lifting and protein. It took another week and a student mixer for the ice to really break.
Jace had been more receptive since. He’d take an AirPod out to talk to Cregan now, rather than just acknowledge him. When he caught Jace watching the game on his phone, he bullied him into watching it on the big TV together. Sometimes he’d see Jace in the mornings; bright and early for a shoot, or weary from an allnighter, so Cregan started making his famous caramelised banana oatmeal for two, and slowly but surely Cregan had lured this stranger out of his room and into cohabitation.
He watched now as Jace stopped along the track, camera aimed at a bird being tousled by a windy oak. Jace made a comment on not knowing the species, but that they were beautiful. Cregan might’ve told him it was a Kingfisher if it didn’t mean getting stuck into a conversation with Harren.
It had been a week since he walked in on Harren churning Jace’s butter.
Cregan’s been committed to moving past it.
He was by no means a prude, after all. Privacy meant nothing to a team of 14-year-old boys bunked together, taking turns with a fleshlight when such a thing was new and exciting. His first time was in a tent well within earshot of all his other mates.
Still, their arrangement bugged him. The shock could only be credited to the gay thing. He grew up in the rural North. He didn’t see a lot of that. Maybe one or two of his sister’s friends swung that way, but it wasn’t something flaunted. Up there, people believed in minding your own business.
So Cregan’s been doing exactly that — minding his own business. He didn’t have negative feelings about those kinds of people. Some guys liked sucking dick. Whatever. It was just a lot – to take in. Right in front of your face. That was only natural. Straight men didn’t want to think about another guy getting railed.
He was learning to live around the one unwanted memory.
Then Harren unlatched his hand from Jace’s and fell back to Cregan.
“Hey man.”
They didn’t need to talk. God, why was he trying to talk?
“I just wanted to make sure everything wasn’t weird with us.”
Cregan smiled, tight-lipped. “Shit happens.”
Harren patted him on the shoulder. It was an uninviting weight. Cregan rolled his shoulders back to dislodge the hand that had already left, the hand that was now moving down the curve of Jace’s spine while he fiddled with his camera.
Harren wasn’t a bad lad, he just took up space. Yesterday Cregan woke to Harren in their kitchen, fixing a cup from their coffee tin, crumbs and milk rings left on the counter. In way of greeting, neither have matured past a head nod. He hadn’t been loving the idea of a stranger hanging around his dorm.
There was also a weird kind of energy tied to Harren; the way he shamelessly disappeared in and out of Jace’s room. A closed door permitted many things — things Cregan clearly wasn’t woke enough to handle. They’re discreet but it was somehow even worse; the squeaky bed, the glass of water Harren drank down too quickly, gearing up for a second round; that flushed, messy, satisfied look that made Cregan feel sick. He hated Harren because that’s all his presence signified — I’m here because I want to fuck your roommate.
And Jace was taking it. No doubt. Cregan may not know a whole lot about the gay thing, but he knew that.
Such things were just the law of nature.
They reached the river a little after noon. Cregan and his teammates set themselves up by a couple tree stumps. The Tully twins flapped about the water’s edge while Davos fiddled with his switchblade. It was, indeed, a gorgeous view. The clouds gathered above them and delivered a much-needed chill. He breathed a little easier, listening to the water tickle over the rocks.
Jace chased the dwindling sunlight. He laid out on a flat rock by the river and spun a feather between his fingers. He let it fall with the wind, one thick curl hanging over his nose. He looked deceptively innocent, like his family weren’t actively destroying rainforests to ramp up personal profits.
Cregan walked along the river’s edge. He knelt by Jace’s rock and splashed his face with the cool water. Jace was sitting cross-legged now, a book rested on his ankles. Cregan pulled his shirt up to wipe his neck and stood over him.
“What are you reading?”
Jace looked up at him for a second. “You’re blocking my sunlight.”
Cregan swiped the book from between his thighs.
“The Loves of Queen Nymeria,” he read outloud, pulling a face. “Romance?”
“History.”
He flipped over to the page Jace was on, lifting a brow. “That’s a pretty graphic description for a history book.”
Jace’s sunglasses took up half his face, but Cregan caught the frown. “It’s symbolic,” he said. “You’re meant to look for the subtext.”
Cregan smiled to himself. “She awoke with Ser Davos Dayne and found pressed against her back his sword of the morning.”
Jace dropped his gaze with a curt breath. “Can I have it back now? It was just getting good.”
He held out his hand. Cregan was about to read another line until he saw Harren swimming closer, so he handed the book over and left Jace alone.
They spent another hour there. Most of the group hung around the river until Davos pulled a dead rat out of the water and chased some of the girls with it. Cregan kept dry, savouring his last beer as he aimlessly flicked through his phone.
He heard a noise and looked up to find Harren pulling Jace to his feet. Harren was a head taller than Jace and rested his chin on his shoulder, swaying while they hugged. He said something in his ear and squeezed his ass once.
Davos, who’d returned to his stump, caught on and snorted. “Think he took fuck-a-fresher week too seriously,” he said.
Cregan looked at Davos as if he might divulge more information – some intel on Harren that would explain the disdain he was feeling in his gut. Davos, however, was more interested in using his pocketknife to shotgun a beer, and had nothing more to say about the matter.
No one else seemed particularly bothered by the PDA. Two guys smacking mouths was just another day around here. These artsy schools were just like that. Even Cregan’s team ended training with breathing exercises and meditation.
He was used to a rougher climate. He was out of place here.
It took half the time to make the trek back. What started as a refreshing, afternoon shower had evolved into a full-blown storm. The Riverlander’s were prepared, their umbrellas bouncing off each other as they scurried. Davos used his backpack as a shield while Cregan took the rain head on. It soaked through everything and turned his thin layers obsolete. He felt like a wet frog by the time they reached the carpark.
Half the group ran for cover at the public toilets. Jace and Harren joined them, dripping and laughing and pushing off each other. Harren’s left side was covered in grass and dirt, and on Jace’s cheek was a mud handprint.
Harren grabbed Jace’s camera and pushed it towards someone else.
“Can you get a photo of us?” he asked.
Harren pulled Jace back into the rain and hung a chummy arm around him. They posed like they were brothers. Jace’s smile was awkwardly polite. He seemed shyer with the attention, eyes flickering between the on-lookers huddled together. After a couple of clicks, Jace grew emboldened. He tip-toed to kiss Harren, curling a hand on his chest. As they pulled away, Jace stared up at him with a devoted smile.
The rain fell harder. Cregan crushed his can and turned to Davos. “Reckon I could get a lift back with you?”
***
The weather was like that for the next couple of days. Streaky windows and grey afternoons. Practice was cut short because everyone wanted to watch the semi-final. Cregan caught a ride with Davos to the liquor store and it seemed like everyone else in town had the same idea. The doormat was more mud than it was fibre.
Davos was still a month from eighteen so Cregan grabbed them each a six pack and the lemon raspberry seltzer Jace drank. Davos eyed the fruity drink but didn’t ask who he was watching the game with, and guessing that he wasn’t in a rush to invite Cregan, was also watching it with someone he didn’t plan to mention.
They opened a beer for the drive back. Davos texted with one hand at red lights, neither of them on a topic very long. He'd cut Cregan off to shit-talk whoever was driving in front of him, and anything else he answered with a hum or nothing at all.
He dropped Cregan back at the gate and shouted something about his team before he drove off. Cregan started on the path back to his dorm. He felt rather presumptuous carrying the seltzer through the hallway. He hadn’t texted Jace to make sure they were still on. Neither had made plans to be ‘on’ in the first place. Cregan just assumed they would. They watched the last three together, and Jace’s team was playing his. The implication was there, right?
Cregan tucked the seltzer under his arm to grab his keys. When he opened the door, he stiffened.
“Cregan.” Harren welcomed him like an old friend. “Backing the black?”
Cregan ducked his head. “Always,” he said, side-stepping Harren to get to the kitchen.
Jace was standing on the other side of the counter. He acknowledged Cregan with a small smile and went back to typing something on his phone.
“Good to know they have shooters all the way down here,” Harren said. “Well, a shooter.”
Cregan forced a hum and stashed his drinks in the mini fridge. He aimlessly shifted the food inside to stall small-talk with Harren. In the lull, Harren’s phone went off. He picked up, reciting a few filler words of ‘uh-huh, yep, okay,’ then ended the call.
“Pizza’s stuck at admin,” Harren announced, then touched Jace on the arm. “I’ll be back.”
Jace smiled at him, not moving his own two hands from the back of the stool.
When Harren left, Cregan placed the four-pack of seltzer on the bench. “Got these for you.”
Jace tilted his head. “You picked me up drinks?”
“Yeah, they were on sale, so.” He slid them a tad closer.
“Thanks,” Jace said, tearing a can free. “Um, cheers?” He raised his drink and Cregan toasted him back.
They walked over to the couch, as was the next natural development, but before Jace sat down, he lingered.
"Harren’s seminar was cancelled, so he came early.”
Cregan nodded.
“Is that okay?” Jace asked.
“Yeah,” he said, impassive.
“Are you sure?”
Cregan shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me.”
“Cool.”
Cregan ran a finger along the lining of the cushion. “He’s just — around a lot now, isn’t he?”
“Well yeah, we’re dating,” Jace said, moving onto the couch. “I know that’s a new concept to you.”
“What?”
“You’ve never brought the same girl back more than once, and the one you did robbed us,” Jace said with a cheeky grin, then took a sip.
“Alright,” Cregan scoffed.
She only took cash. And he only knew her through Jace.
Jace was a photography student, so that meant a lot of models hanging around their place. Girls of a calibre that Cregan, and most of Winterfell, had never been exposed to. He was no raging fuckboy — this was just the first time in his life he’d been able to entertain such company. He sewed some oats but one took and he was a father at sixteen.
He didn’t want Jace to think of him like that. He didn’t really know why.
For the next five minutes they sat in silence. Jace scrolled through his phone while Cregan watched the pre-game ceremony.
It shouldn’t be so hard to make conversation, but the words weren’t coming to him. Not like they used to. When Harren came back it was no less awkward. They were all on the three-seater, pizza boxes on their laps, with Jace crammed in the middle.
The game wasn’t very interesting at first. Cregan observed Jace meticulously wipe the same napkin over his mouth. At one point Jace stretched, brushing the soft fabric of his pants against Cregan’s knee, before he draped his right leg over Harren’s. Harren rested his hand inside Jace’s thigh. Before long Cregan slid onto the ground and sat his back against the couch.
Jace kept the same slice of pizza hostage and locked his gaze onto the TV. He got louder as his team — Harrenhal’s Ghosts — pushed forward. He made a frustrated sound when their winger lost the ball, leaving the Wolves to steal it. The stadium noise carried through the speaker. Jace chucked his half-eaten slice back into the box and crossed his arms.
“Beautifully done,” Cregan teased.
Jace gave a prickly look. “That should’ve been ours.”
“Not with that lazy drive.”
“Your guys are all tweaking on something,” Jace objected. “I wouldn’t want to go near them either.”
“Cregan’s right, that’s a weak offence,” Harren said.
Jace pouted. “We’ll see what happens.”
Harren chuckled and rubbed Jace’s shoulder in consolation.
Half-time came and went. The Wolves were up ten points. Jace’s face twitched little grimaces throughout, while Harren seemed more focused on touching Jace than whatever was happening on screen.
Did Harren even like rugby? He was probably just ogling the players.
A little while later, the Wolves got a penalty for a high tackle. Jace rushed from the kitchen with his second seltzer, popping the tab and sucking the bubbles before they could spill out.
Cregan watched the hope die in Jace’s eyes as his team fumbled their goal kick. He thought about making another smart comment, but Jace looked gutted enough. Cregan resigned to take another sip of his beer.
“We need Slynt back. I’ll never forgive them for trading him,” Jace said.
Harren cocked his head and smiled. “You just think he’s dreamy.”
“He’s an excellent strategist,” Jace contended. “And the hair doesn’t hurt.”
“You ever hear him talk though? Or any of them? It’s painful to listen to,” Harren said. “Rugby players are so braindead they can’t string a single coherent sentence together.”
Why was Jace laughing? It wasn’t even funny.
“You got a favourite?” Harren asked Cregan, but before he could answer, he added, “Let me guess, Hornwood?”
Cregan reluctantly swallowed his sip. “He’s talented, but I think Roddy’s underrated.”
“Yeah he’s fearless.” Harren nodded. “I met him a few times actually. Past his prime though. No way old mate’s playing another year.”
“Think he’ll prove you wrong there,” Cregan mumbled.
Harren shrugged him off, bringing the bottle just before his lips. “You know more than me.”
Cregan knew, realistically, this was most likely Roddy’s retirement tour, he was just beefing with Harren for no real reason.
Cregan just couldn’t soothe this awkwardness between them. Maybe he should’ve been the bigger man and offset the tension earlier; addressed the incident with a laugh so it didn’t keep hanging over their heads, but it was hard for Cregan to even look Harren in the eye. He tried to be cordial — Harren just made it impossible. He drank low carb beer and called garlic bread ‘GB’ and paused for thought before every sentence like he was running for senator.
What the hell did Jace see in him? Cregan didn’t even know where Harren came from. Didn’t really care.
Sure, Jace was high-strung. Their dorm had — an honest to god — bidet. He got everything Uber-ed. They once had the same delivery guy bring Jace three separate orders of iced coffee in one day. He took twenty minute showers and photographed strangers in their living room and always dolled himself up because he was a model, an actual model, and he talked all proper and silky like he was raised by well-read swans. He went by Jace Strong even though everybody already knew who he was just to prove he was more than a nepo baby.
Harren did — what did he do? Cregan couldn’t remember. He had money, Cregan’s sure, but he didn’t have much going for him in the looks department. Harren was fit and tall but boxy looking. He had a nice beard, he’ll give him that, but his hair was too flat and his teeth too straight. There was a widely unremarkable plainness to him that just made them mismatched.
Because realistically, Jace could do a lot better. He was pretty in the way a woman was — shiny, full hair, skin smooth and hairless so he was quicker in the water. He had nice eyes and full lips that just made him dumb-pretty. And sure, he was beautiful like a woman was, but he wasn’t any less of a man. He had a killer jawline and lean arms. When he leaned forward, the gap of his jeans exposed two dimples on his back. A swimmer’s body. He’d seen it for himself — that toned little torso, the v-lines rising out of his hem, the tiny patch of dark hair above his bulge; the thick, wet head pressed against his —
Cregan swallowed, and risked another glance.
Oh shit.
He averted his gaze and fixed his eyes right back on the screen. He tried, and failed, to not think about how he was just checking his roommate out, and that he liked what he saw.
Cregan shifted his feet.
He was led astray.
That’s it.
It was just a thought. A silly thought he shouldn’t have followed. A silly little thought that thickened his blood and made his dick perk up a bit.
Cregan’s head felt light. He jumped up, muttered something about not feeling well, and left with a haste that earned weird glances from the pair of them.
There was a pang of confusion, then a spiralling number of questions. He was still processing it when his body hit the bed.
Jace was a fluke. He didn’t find other guys hot. When Cregan went round for dinner at Arra’s, he couldn’t get it up later because he kept thinking about how she looked like Mr Norrey with long hair.
He went to watch the rest of the game on his phone but stopped himself.
Maybe he could appreciate a man from an aesthetic standpoint. If they had the right physique.
Jace had a nice physique.
That flicker of something returned.
Cregan was a rational man, so he opened up incognito in search of something to shut this down. A bunch of saggy anatomy he felt nothing for. It would be an easy fix. Balls were ugly. He’d open up the gay category and look at one fat hog and shock his brain back to sanity.
Cregan’s thumb hovered over the tab. His heart jumped when his sister texted.
All on the line tonight.
She was talking about the game.
So Cregan swiped out and just watched the game.