oh won't you come on over, stop making a fool out of me

inception fic: go up to the resting place (3/3)

indysaur — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 01:19:37 GMT

There’s a knock on his hotel room door, their last night in Montreal. When Arthur opens it, Agnes moves past him, falls back onto his bed.

“I don’t like that you let Tavia go,” she says. “You should have asked me. I would have had an opinion.”

Arthur closes the door, stands at the foot of the bed, hands in his pockets. “If you’d wanted her to stay that badly, you should have told her.”

Agnes contemplates it, frowns. “Ugh,” she says. “No.”

Arthur laughs, and she smiles, too. He pulls a chair from its place at a desk, sits near her.

There’s a clock that ticks very loudly in the room. A hum of noise from the radiator. A full, and living soundscape.

“What did we used to talk about?” Agnes wonders.

“Our sisters,” Arthur says. “Mostly.”

“Tavia is terrible.” Agnes sucks at her teeth.

Arthur looks down at his hands, smiles. He cracks his knuckles.

Agnes sits up, glares at him. “You’re awful at this. You should agree that she’s terrible, and bring up some long ago grudge you’ve been tenderly stroking, and then I’ll help you come up with a plan to enact a profound justice.”

Arthur’s smile broadens. He meets her gaze. “It’s just been a long time,” he says. “I’m out of practice.”

“Of engaging in a conversation?” She studies him. “Well, faster, put your hands up,” she says. “We have sisters more to get to.”

“I love you, you know,” he says. It comes out of him, the product of courage.

“Arthur,” she says, poised for action. Her hair a curling mess. “Don’t startle me like that.”

****

Arthur wakes up the next morning, with only a hazy recollection of how he’d fallen asleep. One minute talking to Agnes, the next--

He drags himself out. The sun hasn’t risen yet, and there are heavy clouds anyway, signs of a storm. He walks into a coffee shop, asks for an espresso, turns to see Eames and Agnes sharing a table.

Eames nods at him, signals at the empty seat with his head.

Arthur walks over, sits. He’s very aware of the emptiness of his stomach. “What are you two talking about?”

Agnes looks wide awake. “I’m trying to drag stories of you out of Eames. He’s digustingly close-mouthed on the subject.”

Eames raises an eyebrow, takes a long sip of his coffee. “I’ve told you a little.”

“Yes, but nothing interesting enough to retell.” She leans forward, towards Eames, “I’d offer you a fair exchange -- and I have many stories of Arthur to bargain away.”

“Are you sure you want to play that game?” Arthur asks her. He taps his fingers on the table, meeting Agnes’ eyes.

Eames smiles, cool. “Arthur has never really trusted me with any of his stories. It might be best to cut our losses.”

Agnes laughs, then, that roll of mirth. She stands, shrugging, and squeezes Arthur’s shoulder, then goes to the counter, moving from one thing to the next just that easily.

“I’m surprised at your self-censorship,” Arthur says, turning his attention to Eames. “Aren’t your insights crestfallen that they aren’t on parade?”

Eames leans back in his seat, lets out a long breath. “I’m not really a morning person.”

Arthur looks closer. “You’re hungover,” he observes.

Eames looks annoyed at that. It’s a surprise. “You’ve turned me into a miser,” Eames says. “Hoarding what I can of you.”

Arthur fights the urge to snap back. “What do I say to that?”

Eames drinks the dregs from his cup, leaves it empty. He stares past Arthur. “You could offer me your condolences.”

They sit in a silence, and Arthur look around the room; Agnes must have slipped out somewhere during their conversation, no longer at the counter, speaking with the baristas.

Eames sighs heavily. “I’m terrible company right now.”

Arthur glances at him, gauging. “I’d forgotten what you were like when you aren’t groveling,” he tries.

Eames laughs. “I’ve never been made so keenly aware of the power of a tactic I thought I knew well.” He meets Arthur’s eyes, warming. “How magnetic, the withholding of approval.”

“I’m not toying with you.”

“No.” Eames licks his lips. “I do know that.” He says it quietly.

****

Cobb gets in touch again.

“Yusuf is too indiscriminate with his news of you,” is the first thing he says. “I think it’s a mistake to work with Eames on this,” is the second thing.

Arthur files away the first observation, responds to the second. “Eames is useful. He’s got a particular skill set.”

Cobb narrows his eyes. “Is that really what it is?”

“What else would it be?” Arthur asks.

“You’re going to let him off the hook.” Cobb frowns. “You’re already doing it.”

Arthur sighs. “You’re being obnoxious as fuck right now, you know that?”

“I’m impressed that he could spin you. How’d he explain it all away?”

“He didn’t.” Arthur ran both hands through his hair, raking his scalp. “I don’t know. How much more could I have expected him to bet on me? As a mark, I’m a sure thing, as someone to, to give a fuck about?” Arthur laughs. “I’m hard to know.”

Cobb stares at him for a little while, then crosses his arms over his chest. “You’re being too easy on him.”

“It’s--. Honestly, it’s hard for some reason. To be really unkind to him.” He blows out a breath, nervous, then jokes, “Is empathy that bad a look on me?”

“I’m not a fan.”

Arthur laughs again. “Well. I’ve been warned then.” He takes in Cobb’s tenseness, strangely reassured by it. “Have you ever noticed,” he asks, “that we’re never in the same state of mind at the same time? The tenser you get the, the calmer I feel, and vice versa.”

“Shut up.”

Arthur smiles, feeling almost fond. “How are you?” he asks. “Have you adjusted to life without Mal?”

Cobb sighs, unfolding his arms. He rubs one hand across his mouth. “Some days I’m glad that memory fades,” he finally says. “Others I’m not.” He says it simply.

****

Arthur has developed a tic: he tosses the heavy coin Eames had given him.

I will restore the rest of my sisters. Heads.

There is a crossroads ahead, closer than I’d thought. Heads.

I could be forgiving. Heads.

He should decide, really, what heads signifies. But he likes the game.

****

At the harbor, Arthur stands next to Agnes as three pelicans fly in, low over the water. Eames is sitting on top of a pile behind them.

Arthur doesn’t feel the same sort of anxiousness; today it feels ritual.

The birds bob in the river, and Arthur and Agnes get onto their bellies, put three jackets over their wings, watching the brambles soak up water and go dark with it.

“Once,” he says. “I had six sisters. Five with thunder in their voices, and the sixth clever and curious.”

The birds dive, and when they surface again, it’s as his sisters, their teeth chattering.

“The youngest turned us into birds: her five sisters, her brother,” Emeline says. Her brow furrows, lost in thought. “Accidentally, I know, but honestly I forget how. Did she ever tell us?”

“Just as honestly, that part of the story is boring as fuck,” Eleanor says. She shrugs. “We all ended up as birds.”

Edith wipes at the water beading on her face. “And the next part is that she found out that she had to stay silent for seven years, sewing us shirts of starwort.”

“It went pretty well until she met up with a man who wanted to marry her,” Emeline says. “A piece of sisterly advice, delivered with some disbelief that it has to be made clear at all: if a guy falls in love with you while you can’t speak, there is likely trouble to be had.”

“She was accused of being a witch. She couldn’t defend herself.” Eleanor shrugs. “She ended up on a pyre. This is a pretty exciting part, and I would tell it with more color if I wasn’t freezing.”

Edith laughs. “We flew in from the east, six swans, and she threw the shirts up into the air, watched as they settled onto our backs. We tumbled to earth, human again.”

“Except for you,” Emeline says to Arthur.

“She didn’t have time to finish. Who knows why. Seven years seems like long enough.” Eleanor is shivering. “Your shirt was missing a sleeve.”

“There you were,” Edith says. “All of us whole, and you one-winged. Our hobbled brother.”

They fall silent.

“What an interesting retelling,” Agnes says.

Arthur frowns.

Eleanor rolls her eyes. “Don’t look so put out, Arthur. The ritual doesn’t have to feel so funereal, though I know where your tastes run.” She lifts her arms to Arthur, and he pulls her up onto the pier. He nods thankfully to Eames, who brings them a towel, and wraps the terry around her.

Agnes has helped Emeline up, and Arthur puts his hands out for Edith.

She’s dragged the jacket off his shoulders, spread out the sodden cloth in front of her. She looks up at him, eyes dancing. “The fact that you went so far as to make each of us a tailored jacket is uniquely hilarious to me,” she says.

“The teasing I didn’t miss,” he replies.

“You may not have missed it, but let me tell you now.” She splashes at him. “Your self-importance has grown wild without it.”

****

“Triplets,” Eames says, very casually.

“Yes?” Arthur raises an eyebrow.

“Oh, nothing. It’s nothing.” Eames draws a thumb across his eyebrow. “It just makes one curious is all.”

“Here’s what I admire about you,” Arthur says. “That when confronted with something new or unfamiliar, one of your earlier thoughts is, ‘Maybe if I stick my dick in it.’”

“Don’t be perverse, Arthur,” Eames says, chiding. “I was only wondering about the typical things. How they all fit in one womb, for one.”

Arthur snorts.

“You’re very nearly done, aren’t you?” Eames says. “By my count, that’s five sisters.”

“One more to go.” Arthur lets a smile twitch on his mouth. He’s torn between the relief of being so close, the anxiety of still having something so unsecured.

“What will you do after?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought that far ahead.” He rubs at his throat. “Tavia was of the opinion that I’ve been misspending the precious moments of my life.”

“She loved being an owl,” Eames says. “The hooting, the mice. It was a bone-deep thrill.”

Arthur laughs. “It’s not that. It’s--. She’d told me not to make a quest of it. She’s always been concerned about my singular focus.”

“There is a very intimidating mystique surrounding it.”

“But she does make me wonder about some things.” He looks at Eames, the broadness of him. The inscrutability of his face. “Did I really waste so much of my time?”

Eames laughs, and then the laughter fades away, leaving only shades of itself in Eames’ face. He brings up a hand to Arthur’s face. The calloused pads of his fingers alighting on Arthur’s cheek. “I think you would be surprised,” he says, “at how much you’ve built without knowing.”

Then:

“What are you searching for, when you look at me like that?” Eames’ voice hushed and grave.

****

He isn’t surprised when Edith, Eleanor and Emeline decide to go a separate way, but is when Agnes tells him she won’t be accompanying him either.

“We’ll check in on each other,” she says. “I’m sure you’ll hear stories of my exploits.”

“I’m sad you’re going,” Arthur says. He tries to say it stoically.

She smiles fondly. “If I thought you would collapse without me, I would stay. But you won’t be alone, will you?” She nods at Eames over Arthur’s shoulder then returns her attention to Arthur. “Thank you, by the way. Have any of us said that yet? For coming to find us.”

Arthur grimaces. “I’m an asshole. I kept you waiting for longer than I’d wanted.”

“I heard of some of the obstacles that came your way.” She glances again at Eames. She bends down to hug Arthur close. “How lucky we are then,” she says. “For you and your tenacious heart.”

Arthur knows this gift now when he sees it. How generous it is to say, ‘Look. Here is a thing valuable in you.’

****

Arthur is tempted to get really fucking drunk. Just rage. He could get into a bar fight, break a few bones.

He’s run out of ways to forestall what feels inevitable, when Eames shows up at his door. “What are you doing here?” Arthur demands.

Eames is dressed to work out, a long-sleeved tee, boxing shorts. “I thought you might want to spar,” he says.

Arthur clenches his jaw.

“You’re very tense,” Eames says. “Rather rabbity, in truth. It’s dear.” He blinks lazily.

Arthur bites his tongue, nods. “Let’s go.”

The hotel gym is small, but empty, and they find some dusty mats stacked high in a corner. They go a few times; Eames circles, and Arthur unleashes a few flurries, growing frustrated as Eames lets himself be pushed, leaching the strength from Arthur’s attacks.

Arthur throws up his hands, steps back from Eames. “Don’t fucking slip me.”

“Are you asking me to go easy on you?” Eames asks, the disbelief mild but genuine.

Arthur breathes hard. “I want you to be an opponent, not a target.”

Eames’ eyes darken. He doesn’t smile, but he comes at Arthur, and there’s a--a joy to the fight. Arthur doesn’t know how to describe it any other way.

****

They finish after an hour. It’s about what they can sustain at that level of exertion. Eames is unwrapping his knuckles. He makes a quick noise in the back of his throat, then looks at Arthur where he’s stretching against the wall.

“You’ll have a bruise on that shin,” Eames says.

“It’s not bad,” Arthur says. He feels the muscles in his thighs strain, lengthening. He glances at Eames’ hands. “Do you want me to--?” Arthur rubs his palms against each other.

Eames lets the tape fall to the floor. He puts his hands on his hips, staring at Arthur.

“What?” Arthur asks.

Eames opens his mouth, closes it. He rubs thoughtfully at the stubble on his neck.

Arthur goes back to stretching, an old twitch in his back unsnarling.

“It must be good to have your sisters restored. To know that they’re out in the world, and able to come back to you.”

Arthur sits up. He moves, putting his back to the wall, leaning against it. He lets his head hang.

“You seem happy,” Eames says. There’s such an evenness to it, a part of the message lacking. It could be said with such a variety of intentions.

Arthur looks up, and Eames, he looks very satisfied, very warm. His hands hanging at his sides, full of ease, and Arthur, of all people, knows how much Eames mirrors people without thinking, a habit in him, to find the things beautiful, essential in someone.

How could this love have lasted, Arthur wonders. He can feel it wound tight around his heart, the thinned strings.

****

“This last one will be the hardest,” Arthur says.

“A weak attempt at scaring me from this commitment,” Eames says.

Arthur shakes his head. “It’s just that I don’t quite know how to get to her. She’s hidden pretty deep.” He hesitates. “I think Izanami could help. Would she?”

“Yes.”

“Would it come with strings?”

Eames shrugs. “More tolerable ones than you might imagine.”

****

The rainbow springs up -- it’s been a long time, and Arthur feels okay to say that he’d loved this way of travel. How you could walk from here to there, cushioned amongst stars, summoning a safe kind of dark.

He’d forgotten how imposing Izanami could be. The three of them walk together in silence for a while.

It’s Izanami who speaks first. “It’s strange -- I know mine was a bigger deception than your theft, but, still, I didn’t think I would feel such a debt. I thought I would feel better about where we stand.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” Arthur says.

“Hold on now,” Eames says. “Don’t give away your bargaining position so lightly.”

She ignores him. “I liked you too much,” she says to Arthur. “What’s a little trickery between friends?”

Arthur laughs. “No wonder you found Eames.”

“Drawn together by our shared charisma.” Eames smirks, a twist of his lips.

“Was that what brought us together?” Izanami asks him. She smiles, then says to Arthur, “I’m jealous of you, you know. That you’ve found a way to restore your sisters. I want to know so much about it. I’ve found my curiosity about it is insatiable.”

Arthur looks to Eames. “I’m surprised you haven’t said anything to her.”

“Where would I have found the time?” Eames shrugs. Then, when Arthur’s gaze doesn’t lift, he sighs. “I keep your secrets,” he says, lightly.

“How things have grown,” Izanami says. She says it almost warmly, but there’s a tension in her voice, an undercurrent stretched tight.

She doesn’t ask about Arthur’s sisters again, but she wants to, Arthur can see that. He should have understood earlier; that she had been searching, still, for a way to restore something that had been lost. To bring him back from his own kind of metamorphosis.

She and Arthur had often walked the same road.

Arthur matches his steps to hers. He wants to say something kind. “My sisters showed me more mercy than I thought they would, after all that time.”

She laughs, seizes Arthur’s hand. “I --.” She is cool, and strong, and Arthur realizes suddenly, how much she reminds him of Tavia, how they wear self-assurance like it’s something that’s been hard-earned. “Do you really think,” she asks, “that Saito might have felt comforted? That he might be patient, even after all this time?”

“I don’t know. If I were in his position, I think that I could have been,” Arthur says again. He isn’t sure how much that’ll matter to her.

“Sorry,” Eames says. He puts a hand on Arthur’s shoulder. “The bow will touch down soon, and if Izanami was right, we won’t have much time before the fog will push it back. Look hasty.”

Arthur holds onto Izanami’s hand for a second longer, his palms warming and he can feel all the bones she’s broken, the healed-over places.

“The person I am has drifted over all this time, despite my best efforts.” She is shining down upon him. “I’m so afraid of what will happen after I restore him.” She lets him go. “What if he finds a stranger’s heart, where his wife’s once was?”

Eames ahead of him. “Arthur, run!” he shouts.

Arthur, he flies.

****

Eames had always told his own stories.

This is what Arthur can’t forget:

The two of them thrown awake by their deaths while pulling a job, hidden under the briars that had grown up around them.

Arthur had woken up with an angry laugh, adrenaline jittering in his fingers. He reached for Eames, made a fist in his shirt.

“You’re a fucking gambling man,” Arthur said to him.

“It’s not a gamble if you know how the chips will fall.” Eames pressed a hand to Arthur’s back, kissed him hard. “Breathe,” he said.

Arthur fought the rush, willed his heart to calm. He pressed his forehead to Eames’ chest, moving with the the ebb and flow of him. “Fuck,” Arthur said. “I wish I knew what to fucking expect from you.”

“I know.” Eames turned away from Arthur, laid flat on his back. “Why do you think I tell you so many stories?”

Arthur got up on one elbow, looking down at Eames. “I never thought about it.”

Eames smiled wearily. He was looking up, beyond Arthur. “This is a good reminder for me,” he said, “that what I would want if I were you, and what you actually want are different things.”

Arthur narrowed his eyes. “Are you--I can’t tell how serious you’re being right now.”

Eames flicked a gaze at Arthur quick. He pulled a heavy coin from his pocket, spun it between his fingers. “Let’s play a game,” he said. “Heads, I love you; tails, you lose.”

He went to throw the coin, and Arthur, without knowing why, gripped his wrist, stopping him.

“Heads, I love you,” Eames said. Unadorned, and staring past Arthur.

Arthur laid down next to him. “What are you looking at?” he asked, and turned his face to see the briars retreating, windows of sky exposed: here, there. Thorns falling away in the face of that unconquered expanse.

****

He’s feeling pretty sure of himself, standing now in the fog on the side of this volcano. Arthur has to laugh, because of course that’s where his youngest sister would choose to return, of course this is where he would stop and turn to Eames, and feel a cataclysm coming.

“Hey,” he says. “Do you want to hear something?”

Eames faces him. His lips chapped, the skin over his cheeks red, flaking a little.

“Honestly,” Arthur says, “I didn’t care about the wing. It was weird as fuck, and I could see the kind of shit that might come my way, but I would have adjusted.” Arthur laughs. “I adjust; have you noticed?”

Eames looks confused. “Arthur, what are you doing?”

“No, shut up -- I want to tell you. Will you let me? I think it’s important that I tell it to you, this last part.”

Eames takes an aborted step forward. He nods.

Arthur feels a wave of relief, barrels into the story again. It pours out of him. “My sister hated that I had the wing. I thought it was a smaller kind of hate, like it reminded her that she hadn’t quite been able to finish the job cleanly. She’s finicky like that. She’s got this sweet face, but when she comes up against something she can’t do, she doubles down.” Arthur holds his smile sharp-edge up.

Eames, stays quiet, his unreadable face.

“Anyway, I woke up one morning with two arms restored, but no sisters. A miracle and curse. I thought, for a little while, that maybe she tricked the rest of them into making the trade for me, but it makes more sense, now, that she had persuaded them into going along with her. I’m sure she started with ‘If it were you’.” Arthur pauses. “Tavia said she swore up and down that I would be so much quicker. A year; two maybe.”

There’s a fear in him, suddenly, crawling up his edges, and Arthur, he shakes it off, takes two steps forward, outrunning it. He lets it chase him out onto the precipice.

He pulls an eyelash from Eames’ face, brushes at the water from the fog beading on Eames’ brows. “I knew for a long time, all the steps I would take. I thought I could never be swayed.” Arthur drops his hands. “Anyway. That’s it,” he says. He can feel the blood in his veins, the rush of its turn from blue to red upon exposure. “All my beginnings.”

Eames is staring at him hard, his brow furrowed.

Arthur bucks under the gaze. “What are you thinking?”

Eames laughs shakily. “I don’t know, too many things.”

He puts a hand on Arthur’s back, pushes the hood of Arthur’s coat back off of Arthur’s face.

“I’m thinking--How incredible it is that you can put your hands on something and make it new.” Eames shakes his head. “How, if I were anyone else, I would be telling you what a terrible idea it was to forgive me.”

And then he kisses Arthur, his mouth warm, a hand on Arthur’s hip, his fingers cold where they find the gaps and lie against Arthur’s skin.

He stays close. “I’m thinking how glad I am to know you. Every part of me, glad.”

Arthur kisses him again. They’re standing on a volcano. Once the sky filled with ash here, and the oceans steamed, and Eames pulls away from Arthur, breathing heavy, their foreheads touching--a world that had expired under their feet.

Let me tell you a story, Arthur thinks. This is fertile ground.

He hears a bird, calling in the distance.

The end.

inception fic: go up to the resting place (2/3)

indysaur — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 01:12:30 GMT

part one

Arthur doesn’t run. He wakes up in a bed empty of Eames, he puts on some underwear, then walks to his closet. There, in the back, the space where his jackets used to hang stands empty. Framing the untouched panel in front of his decoy safe.

Eames might as well have left a note. Did you think you could fool me. That my eye wouldn’t find what you value most.

‘Should have known,’ says the voice in Arthur’s head. ‘Should have known, should have known.’

****

He has an idea of where Eames might be, and the prism will take him there quickly. If he runs. Arthur dresses, runes in his pocket, reminds himself of where he could lay his hands on a person’s body. He can break what he can put together.

He finds an alley, just wide enough to accommodate, throws the prism down, feels shocked for the first time, when it shatters.

****

He makes his way to Yusuf.

“No, I had no idea,” says Yusuf.

“No, I didn’t help him,” says Yusuf.

“Would you hit me if I said I was sorry,” says Yusuf.

“Yes, Arthur, there could be an explanation,” says Yusuf. “Should you hold your breath?”

****

Arthur finds a coin in his bag of runes, put where he couldn’t help but find it. Silver amidst dull stones that will go shatteringly, destructively glowing with a word.

There’s a coyote’s smiling face on one side. Empty space on the other. Arthur throws it into the air, flips it over and over.

It lands on heads. Heads. Heads again.

****

Cobb calls. He’s pacing. “I heard about your predicament.”

“How?” Arthur answers evenly, ignoring the throbbing behind his eyes.

“I don’t know. People talk.”

His stomach rolls.

“Are you okay?” Cobb finally comes to a stop. “You don’t look well.”

Arthur laughs grimly. “Humiliation doesn’t agree with me, I guess.”

“I think I contained the rumors.”

“How unexpectedly useful of you.”

“Don’t be a jackass, Arthur.”

Arthur sighs. He unclenches his jaw.

‘Yusuf says you’ve been morose. He thinks eventually you’ll bore yourself to death painting the world as nothing but blighted landscapes and merciless edges.”

“Colorful,” Arthur says.

“After all this time, we might finally have stepped into sync. Humorless at the core.” Cobb’s crossed one arm over his chest, gestures at Arthur with the other.

Arthur keeps his lips zipped.

“The fact that that didn’t make you stumble back in horror is really fucking troubling me,” Cobb says.

“You’re not humorless,” Arthur says, accusing.

****

Arthur insists that Cobb retire to his usual attitude of benign neglect towards Arthur.

Yusuf tells him over dinner, “He was upset you didn’t call him. He said that you’d agreed that silence would mean you were fine or beyond help.”

Arthur raises an eyebrow.

“You aren’t fine,” Yusuf says. He pushes his bowl away.

Arthur brings a spoon to his lips, swallows a mouthful of soup.

“You aren’t beyond help either.”

“Yusuf,” Arthur says, voice bright and full. He leans back in his chair, palms flat on the table. “You look so angry.”

****

Arthur can’t sleep much these nights. He lies in bed and sprawls across it, thinking only, ‘Stupid, how could I have been so fucking stupid.’

At least he’s learned this once before: how to let shame stoke ambition. To let it make you better.

He can’t sleep. Before on those nights, he would walk, seven colors beneath him.

Robbed of that, too.

****

Arthur goes to an island town. The weather very balmy. It’s the kind of atmosphere that urges you to melt, just a little, and at the edges.

He used to live in a place like this. He knows it isn’t possible, but he can’t help but wonder if Eames knew that, somehow.

This was where Eames resurfaced, as near as Arthur can pinpoint. The night he arrives, he walks into a beach bar, well-positioned tourist bait, with straw fringe glued to its roof, a paper lantern at the door.

Arthur feels almost relaxed. He’s determined to find Eames, and thinks he can do it in time. He tries to keep from counting the days excessively. He allows himself to do it once, when he wakes up, to remind himself of his very long-awaited deadline.

Arthur takes a long pull from his mixed drink, scans the crowd as he puts the back of his hand to his mouth, the wet of alcohol on his lips. The mix is decent, the people friendly. There’s an asshole a few tables away wearing a suit jacket over board shorts, which Arthur is initially amused by, and then, upon closer examination --

Arthur feels possessed by a rage, the way it starts as a seed in his chest, shakes itself out until it’s rooting into his limbs. He would embarrass himself, strip himself of dignity, to mete out punishment.

He finishes his drink.

After that, he goes to the man, taps his shoulder. “Excuse me,” Arthur says. He puts an apologetic smile on his face as the guy turns. “Can I ask you where you got this jacket?”

“This?” The guy looks over his shoulder at his friends, then back to Arthur. “I bought it from a guy who was selling them from the back of his car this morning. It’s not bad, right?”

“No, you didn’t.”

The guy narrows his eyes at him. “Look, get off my back.”

Arthur reaches around him, takes the kid’s beer and sips it, puts it back on the table. “Where’d you get the jacket.”

“Jesus. I don’t know. It was hanging in the coat closet here. I figured someone forgot it, what was the harm?”

“It’s mine.” Arthur smiles. The guy meets and holds his gaze for a few seconds, which Arthur gives him credit for, then shrugs out of the jacket, holds it out to Arthur.

“You’re a fucking psycho, you know that?”

Arthur knows. He takes the jacket, keeps himself from looking at it until he’s outside.

On the beach, there in the sand, he runs his hands over it, searching for any trace of a flaw, of any break. He concentrates too hard, and the fibers start to stretch, breathing under his hands, brambles sticking to his skin, little points of red dotting his fingertips like so many burning stars.

He forces himself to let go, to drop the jacket at his feet. He puts his hands on his hips, staring out at the ocean rolled out to the horizon, then seizes, ripping the shoes off his feet, throwing them as hard as he can.

Fury, that he had protected his secret for so long only to find his hopes scattered across the world like so much trash. His face hot with it, and he feels small in the face of his terrible anger, so little equipped to satisfy it.

****

“Do you want to hear something funny?” he’d said to Eames once. “I can put bones back together, force a heart to beat, other fucking amazing things, but this?” He lifts his arm, exposing the soft, thin skin over his tricep, how it’d been split like so much tissue paper. He puts a hand to it, only hisses, the wound refusing to close. “I’ll have to get stitched.”

“Arthur,” Eames had said. “We’ll need to work on your delivery.” He got up, put his hand high on Arthur’s side, let the pads of his fingers press in, staking a casual claim. “No matter. Break, and I’ll put you to rights.”

That had been longer ago. Not during the most recent time they had spent together. Arthur doesn’t think Eames saw him as a mark then.

Here’s another thing he thinks about: that he’s never heard stories of Eames giving back something he had stolen.

Arthur won’t beg at first, but he will if he has to. He knows that about himself now.

****

Arthur goes home wearing the jacket. It’s not the relief he thought it would be, having one back. If anything, he wants to crawl out of his skin, loosed from his body to fly around the world again, seeking his quarry from up high.

He’s walking home. He needs new shoes. He hadn’t taken care of these, and the leather is abraded, scuffs clawed into the once-gleaming surfaces.

His ears prick up -- this strange gap sensed behind him. He turns around and sees the bow touch down, the void spinning out behind it.

It’s Eames walking toward him. His arms are full of the jackets Arthur had made.

He holds them out. “You should take these,” he says. “So that I don’t drop them when you hit me.”

Arthur is upset that he doesn’t have his runes tucked away on his person. Still, he knows where he could put his hands on Eames, which nerves he could pluck away at. He takes the jackets from Eames. He runs his hands across the bundle, his eyes never wavering from this man in front of him.

Eames puts his hands in his pockets. He looks immaculate. “I--” He clears his throat. “I thought it would be charming, to have them waiting for you in all the places I thought you might look for me. I should have thought to keep them safer. That git in Kingston wasn’t supposed to--” He coughs. “Anyway. Bad idea.”

“You thought it would be charming.”

Eames grimaces. He takes one hand from his pocket, drags it across his forehead, and Arthur narrows his eyes, catches the trembling in Eames’ wrist. “I did say it was a bad idea.”

He tries to smile, and Arthur, suddenly, feels immensely wearied. Only now feeling the heavy weight of the fury on his back. He wants to want to cry. He thinks there might be catharsis in it.

“I imagine you have some words for me.”

Arthur tries to snatch a good place to begin from his thoughts. “I promised Yusuf I would have a joke ready, for when I finally tracked you down. He thought it was very important that I open with a joke.” Arthur smiles thinly. “Knock knock.”

Eames eyes him warily, doesn’t answer.

Arthur sighs. “I guess--” Arthur stoops to put the jackets down at his feet. He counts them quickly, then stands again. “I guess I want to know how I gave myself away. I’ve had prowlers in my dreams before. It’d be helpful to know where I fucked up.”

Eames shakes his head, opens his mouth to say something, and Arthur, he feels a real alarm. A bone-deep fear that he’ll be refused this, and then where will he be? Wearing armor with a break somewhere he can’t find.

There must be something in his face of it.

Eames’ protest is delivered stillborn. When he speaks again, he sounds resigned. “I had the distinct advantage of being welcome in your life. When you were awake. And even when you were sleeping; your subconscious was tolerant of me.”

Arthur laughs.

“You were very well-defended in your dreams. I thought it might be easier to get you talking. I pushed hard, and was maybe unsubtle.” Eames looks rueful there. “But it worked to my advantage, that you were knocked off-kilter. You checked your defenses.” He meets Arthur’s eyes then. “You went to your closet every time you woke up.”

“The safe didn’t distract you?”

Eames smiles then. “That was a lovely touch, actually. It should have occupied me, but--” He shrugs. “I don’t know. It never really seemed to be the capture of your interest. And by that point I’d become quite expert at gauging your interest.”

Arthur nods. He picks up his jackets, straightens up slowly. He takes care not to stumble. “Okay. Thank you, Mr. Eames.”

“You’re welcome.” Eames takes a step forward. “Don’t you--do you want to know why I stole from you?”

Arthur grins, a wonderful stretch on his face. “What does it matter why? I know that you did it.”

Eames’ voice ravels tighter. “I didn’t think you would be so civil.”

Arthur searches Eames’ face. He wishes he could read it, drag a line with his finger to mark his place as he spoke aloud the volumes written across Eames’ brow, his eyes and mouth, working in concert. “Like you said, you stole from me. But you returned what you stole, and I think--you seem sorry, at least.”

“I am.” Eames steps closer.

“So. Good.” Arthur makes himself smile again. “Let’s not--” He lets his eyes close for a second. “I don’t really want to do the whole fireworks thing. I’m really tired.” He blows out a sigh, hates, briefly, the quaver in it.

“Arthur,” Eames says, and maybe his face is saying something, something important, but really, who can tell, when it speaks in such a foreign tongue? It was Arthur, after all, who had been mistranslating all along.

****

Arthur, at home, unfolds each jacket, places it on a hanger and then back on the rack in his closet. In front of the safe he leaves exposed now.

He feels unburdened, the way he thought he might, but hollow, too. Like he’d just heard a sad song, and it’s rattling inside of him.

The last jacket is heavier. Arthur reaches inside the pocket and finds a prism. When he holds it up to the exposed bulb of the lamp beside him, it casts rainbows like tabs of color.

He decides to get it over with. Rip the band-aid off. Taking some fucking skin with it, if you have to.

****

Arthur walks, one foot in red, the other in yellow. He sees Eames and Izanami, a pair in the distance, there at the vertex. They’re arguing, Eames’ arms spread wide.

As he nears, Izanami catches sight of him, nods over Eames’ shoulder at him. Eames turns around, then steps back, shoves his hands into his pockets. “You came,” he says.

“You came quickly,” Izanami says.

“I didn’t want to drag this out.” Arthur pulls carefully at one earlobe, looking from Izanami to Eames, back again. “I was curious, anyway. How involved you might have been in this.” He looks at Izanami.

“I should make myself plain,” she says. “I asked Eames to find out what you were hiding. I had some suspicions, and when they turned out to be right -- well, I hired him to take your work from you. I had my reasons, but Eames has told me that they wouldn’t matter much to you. Would they? Should I share them with you?”

Arthur keeps his face placid, currents churning far from the surface, in his depths. “No.”

A brisk flash of emotion on her face, and then she speaks again. “No. That’s fair.” She straightens, drawn up to her full height. “Eames and I have negotiated a new deal.”

“A new deal?” Arthur looks between the two of them.

“She’s a difficult customer to satisfy,” Eames says, nearly drawling it. He seems fine. The same Eames he’s always been. Arthur’s teeth clench.

“He failed to deliver what was promised.” She folds her hands together in front of her. “Eames has agreed to our redefined contract on the condition that you give your approval.”

“Why mine?”

“I require that he remain in proximity to you for the time being.”

“Why?” Arthur looks to Eames, but Eames is observing his nails.

“I have reasons, but you didn’t want to hear them, remember?” She cocks her head. “Well?”

Arthur doesn’t hesitate. “No.”

“Very well,” Izanami says. She turns to Eames. “We’ll negotiate again.”

Arthur blinks at her back, a little thrown by her pace. He turns, too, and is walking away when Eames says his name.

Eames is close to him now. “I’m sorry that she asked that of you. I was against it from the first. Do you believe me?”

Arthur laughs. “Why would you lie?” Eames’ lips tighten at that. Arthur pulls a coin from his pocket, his thumb on the coyote’s laughing face. “This is yours. I wanted to give it back.”

Eames ignores him. “I wouldn’t force my company on you now.” He says it like it’s half-joke, his whole self collected.

“You should take it.” Arthur holds the coin out.

“I didn’t tell you that I was sorry, unprompted the last time. And I am. I thought I might be a little sorry as I was skulking away, but it was...” He laughs, the smatter of charm he wears so naturally glinting. “Worse than I thought.”

“Your coin,” Arthur says. He pushes it at Eames.

“Fuck, please!” Eames says, and Arthur blinks at the voice from Eames’ mouth, the drop of the urbanity from it. He’s hoarse. “Arthur, please, will you keep it.” Eames’ coolness a slipping mask. “If you would keep it, I’d be--will you keep it.”

Arthur shrugs, too numb to force it upon Eames now. He closes his hand around the coin.

****

Arthur walked away, back down the bow. At the bottom of it, where it sinks into the asphalt, he takes one last look back. He won’t travel this road again.

Eames is there, a little distance away. He raises a hand.

“Do I have to watch for you now, Mr. Eames?” Arthur asks.

“No. Only I remembered something you’d want to know.” Eames covers the distance between them, stands at the mouth of the bow as Arthur steps back, feet on solid ground. “You asked me before how you gave yourself away, but I forgot to tell you this bit.” He licks his lips. “In the first dream, do you remember? You pulled a sewing kit from under the table to repair the coat you were wearing.”

“That was my tell?”

Eames shrugs. “People dream of things to come unbidden. You always had the needle and thread.”

“Thank you.” Another piece of his defenses restored.

Eames nods at him carefully, then sighs. “I wish you would hit me.”

“I don’t think it would be the solution you think it’d be.”

Eames studies him. “I think you’ll need help. Your lovely jackets, whatever they’re for--you haven’t finished that job yet, have you?”

“How do you know it’s a job?”

Eames smiles, a quirk of his lips. “I know a long con when I see one.”

****

Arthur has six sisters, and a great need.

****

Arthur abandons his lease.

“It will be a long time before I come back,” Arthur tells Eames. “And I won’t come back here.”

Eames glances over at Arthur, and Arthur tries to still his jittering knee. He looks around the apartment, at the many boxes littering the hardwood floors, the emptied rooms reduced to space. “Will you miss this place? I think I will.”

“Eames,” Arthur says. He drops his head into his hands. “Will you go away for a second?”

“Of course,” Eames says, and he puts his hands in his pockets, wanders away into another room.

Arthur, relieved, catches his breath.

****

Anyway, there’s a new thing that Arthur has learned. That Eames could be biddable.

****

They don’t have to travel far at first -- up to the north of California, where the forests are thick with old, silent trees. Redwoods like columns, foundation roots for the world they carry high above this one. Yusuf comes with them; he’s useful here.

They turn off the path, and Yusuf clears a new one for them. The undergrowth retreating the way the briar does when Yusuf wakes from sleeping.

“Handy that,” Eames says. The sun is going down overhead, and Eames borrows the shadows elongating, turns them into his own brand of light.

It’s faster, working with the two of them. They had made a good team before, and they make a good one now, too. That hasn’t changed.

They come across fallen trees, their trunks so wide they tower above the three of them. Arthur throws a rope, braces his feet on the sloughing bark, climbs up, then watches Yusuf and Eames come up after him. At the top, the three of them look out, the pillared forest ahead of them, the coolness outside of Eames’ warmth.

“How much longer?” Yusuf asks mournfully.

“Cheer up,” says Eames.

“What does it say about my nature,” Yusuf asks, “that I find your best behavior so irritating?”

“Good news!” Eames grins, wolfish. “We’re kin souls.”

“You don’t have to play sweet for me, Eames,” Arthur says. He drops from the top of the tree, hard, cushioned by the pine and leaves.

****

Eames has never made it so easy for Arthur to ignore him before. At nights, when they make camp, Eames will set off without a word, and Arthur never wonders where he goes.

Tonight, Yusuf asks him for the umpteenth time, “What are we doing out here?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

“There isn’t a single comforting thing in that statement.”

Arthur digs in his pack for something to eat, idly reaches out to pat Yusuf’s arm. “You shouldn’t ask questions you don’t want my answers to.”

Yusuf grumbles. He opens his mouth, challenging. “I think it’s a stupid idea, to bring Eames into it, whatever it is.”

“You’re here to keep an eye on him.”

“And will he leave when I do? I can’t traipse around the world with you. It was all I could do to make the time for this excursion.”

Arthur pulls out two rolls, throws one to Yusuf. “I told you Mendocino is lovely this time of year.”

“Yes,” Yusuf says, holding his roll up distastefully. “And the amenities are remarkable.”

Arthur sighs. “I thought you would be happy that I wasn’t nursing my anger.”

“I’m a complicated man.”

“What purpose would it serve.” Arthur finishes the roll in three precise bites, makes himself chew, then swallow.

“Eames is a necrotic tooth. The lack of pain a sign of death at the root. Pull, before the poison.”

“You’re very judgmental for a man who would sell me out for the right price.”

Yusuf meets Arthur’s gaze, unperturbed. “What can I say. I hate to see in others what I know is in me.”

Arthur smiles. He raises a hand, wiggling fingers. “You forget, the power I hold.”

****

You can’t call it a clearing, really. It’s this tight ring of trees, younger redwoods, sprouted up from the same bed of roots in the ground, and Arthur and the rest squeeze inside of it, one by one.

Arthur isn’t sure how, exactly, this will go. The sun is rising, maybe, somewhere above the canopy above them. Soon, the light will filter down, only the greenest of it making it to where they’re standing.

“What are we waiting for?” Yusuf asks. “I worry now that you brought Eames out here to serve as human sacrifice. I worry for myself, too, but I’m comforted in knowing that you would probably rather gut Eames.”

Arthur looks up: these trees, their living branches. They shift, they rustle. Then, finally, a shadow detaches from them, floats lazily down, closer, until its form comes into view: a raven, as big as a child. It perches on a limb just above Arthur’s head.

“Is it going to grant us wishes?” he hears Yusuf mutter.

Arthur pulls a jacket from his backpack. His hands are shaking. There are still so many things that could go wrong.

“Once,” Arthur says. His voice catches, an ingrained instinct to recoil from the next fact, to keep it swallowed. He spits, “I had five sisters. They were tall and strong. They had laughter like the thunder. I loved them, and while they were still young, I cursed them.”

The raven, it lights upon the ground and fixes an eye upon Arthur. From the corner of his eye,, Arthur can see Eames take a predatory step forward, but Arthur outpaces him, he drapes the jacket over the bird. “I’m full of regret,” he says.

There’s a soft, stretching shimmer. For a moment it reminds him of Eames, the shift and change. Then the brambles of Arthur’s jacket burst into fruit and thorn, and fall away as quickly, leaving his oldest sister there.

Arthur hurries to put his coat over her. He drops to his knees, a roar in his ears, his chest split open: grateful, grateful to the core. He touches her face, her tangled hair.

Agnes opens her eyes. She looks wild, the light of recognition in her stare faint. “When he was twelve,” she says, “I taught my brother how to sew. I took his hands in one of mine, because they were small and I could. I showed him how to hold the sides of my wound together. I told him, ‘You won’t want to hesitate. Be sure, and get it over with as quickly as possible.’ And then I smiled at him while he pierced my side. I grit my teeth.”

“Masha’allah,” says Yusuf.

****

He spends as long a time as he can with his sister. When night falls, she sleeps almost immediately. It’s been a long day, but Arthur remains next to her, taking comfort in her presence.

Eames is there, too, standing beside him.

“Do you want to sit?” Arthur asks, then shifts over to make some room when Eames does.

“You know,” Eames begins. “I would never have guessed this.”

Arthur has to smile at that. “How could you have?”

“I had a few outlandish theories. I might have gotten closer if I’d known you had family somewhere in the world.”

“My silence about them was a prerequisite to bringing them back.” Arthur shrugs. “Otherwise, you know me. My loose lips would have sunken ships.”

Eames snorts, shaking his head, then says, more soberly, “I wouldn’t have come so close to ruining your chance at this, if I had known what was at stake.”

“You already apologized.” Arthur shifts away from him.

“Yes.” Eames nods. “That’s true. Anyway.” He leans back, shifting his weight onto his planted hands. “I don’t think I’m a fan of your sad and haunted backstory.”

“No?”

“It makes you disturbingly human.”

Arthur laughs. He reaches to pull a blanket up higher over Agnes, and something in the action feels striking: her strong shoulders, the crease between her brows as she dream. He looks over at Eames, and that feels like the first time in a long time, too: Eames’ profile almost new to him. “It makes you feel guiltier, doesn’t it?” He feels a sudden rush of amusement at the seriousness in Eames’ face. “I had all this fucking shit in my life, and there you were adding to it.”

Eames startles, takes a sideways glance at Arthur, laughs, and it’s careful only at first. “No, Arthur, please don’t hide your delight at this turn.”

Arthur looks away from Eames and again at his sister, still smiling. “And Yusuf thought you and I would never laugh together again.”

“Could it be that everything can be made new?” Eames asks, and his voice is full of wonder.

****

That last thing Eames said, it stays on Arthur’s mind.

He’d met a storyteller in Portland once, who’d seemed mediocre as fuck. She’d looked young, though, and reminded him, a little, of his youngest sister. She was telling tales in a coffee shop, almost completely ignored, background noise as people worked, sat with friends.

Arthur went over to her, when she finished her set. “You were fine,” he told her.

She laughed. “Um, great. Thanks. No need to bowl me over with compliments.”

Arthur smiled. “We all find our callings.”

She went serious then, annoyance in her brow. “I’m pretty sure this is mine. Thanks, man,” and turned to leave.

Arthur sighed. “Wait, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to -- I was presumptuous.”

She turned back to him warily. “Look, you seem fine,” she lilted over the last word, “but I have a girlfriend.”

Arthur laughed. “Sorry, I’m coming off like an asshole. That’s not what I’m -- I’m not available either.” He paused. “I don’t want to take up too much of your time. I’m an idiot about storytelling. I never understood the point of the career.” He grimaced at the words escaping his mouth. “I’m shocked you’re not finding me charming,” he said, joking.

She rolled her eyes, but there was a reluctant kindness in her face. “It’s an act of creation,” she said, explaining. “Not just the stories I spin on a stage, but the stories we tell about each other, and ourselves, every day.” She stopped. “I don’t know.”

Arthur was only half-engaged, and he must have shown it on his face.

“You should care,” she said, beginning again, a ribbon of strength in her voice. “People will build images of you with what they think about you. If you can’t tell a story, they’ll make you speak with a voice that isn’t yours, with histories they imagine.”

“So?”

She lifted the strap of a messenger bag over her neck, got ready to go. “You know the story of Pygmalion and Galatea? The statue that came to life?” She waited for Arthur’s nod, then continued. “She was stone for so long, letting him spin long stories of her, of what their life could be together. And when he prayed for stone to become flesh, she was praying, too. For a voice.” She paused. “He was kissing her when she came to life, but she was saying her name.”

Arthur frowned. “I think it’s supposed to be a love story.”

She laughed, hopped off the stage. “How did I tell it?” she asked, then tilted her head. “What’s your name anyway?”

Arthur smiled smoothly, prepared to lie.

****

It’s not that he’s beginning to feel like a real boy, or anything ridiculous like that. There are just--fewer parts of his life that have to lie behind stone.

“Jesus,” he says. “You make things new twelve times a day.” He nods at the canteen Eames is carrying, filled to the brim with water that Eames had poured into it from a fistful of sand.

“I need a little bit to hold onto. I can’t create something from nothing.” Eames stops under the desert sun, wiping the sweat from his brow. “I think I told you that once, already.”

“Arthur,” Agnes says. She shouts, from far ahead of them. A heat rising from the sand, obscuring his vision of her, making her flicker and wax. “We’re getting closer.”

****

It’s night by the time they reach the spires, the desert plunged into darkness: thrown into the depths with a weight tied to its feet. Arthur can’t sleep. He walks to the base of a spire, puts his hand on it. He can feel a phantom warmth, the rocky outcropping resembling nothing more than a finger.

There’s a god here, under this sand and buried alive. His hand pushing outward, his fingers breaking the surface. One day, he’ll dig himself out.

There’s a coldness in me, Arthur thinks.

“What are you thinking?” Agnes asks from behind him.

Arthur turns around. He takes the sight of her in, shakes his head. “You’re so fucking tall. I’m pissed as fuck that I’m not tall.”

“You’re of average height.”

“That response to this particular insecurity is about as comforting as it’s ever been.”

She smiles. “I’m happy after all this time to make you feel better.”

There’s something in the wording of it that makes Arthur wince.

“You know,” she says. “One day, I look forward to seeing you look at me without any guilt in your face at all.”

“Do you really?”

“It’s a terrible burden for me,” she says, her tone joking. “Your pinched, sad face.” She comes close, kisses his cheek. “My Arthur. Will it bring my years back to me, your misery?”

****

Later, when the sky is graying, a wind beating like a sheet snapping over the desert, Arthur takes a stance, follows through the motions of a tai-chi form. He closes his eyes, feels his breath come in and out, a circular motion.

Halfway through the technique, he feels a presence. There’s a familiar weight to it, and Arthur, he inhales, he roots his feet, he exhales. Maintaining the rhythm of it, trying very hard not to think of the dream where Eames had corrected his form while wearing Cobb’s face.

It takes him another fifteen minutes, maybe, to finish the technique, and he pushes the awareness of company to the back of his mind.

Unmoved , he thinks.

He withdraws to rest, then opens his eyes, ready, now, to engage, only to be surprised to find that there’s nobody there.

****

An owl flies in with the sun, her taloned feet, that threatening beak.

“Once,” Arthur says. “I had five sisters, with laughter like the thunder, and a sixth on the way. They warned us of her; that she would be the end of us -- that if she lived, there would be pain and loss on the horizon. When my sisters refused to help me kill her, we fled.”

His second sister, draped in feathers. Agnes drops to their sister’s side, holds her hands.

Tavia swallows, her voice graveled, “I had a brother,” she says. “And when he said he wanted to kill her, our baby sister, I laughed at him. And later, when she had grown, when she had come to find us, he hid her from us, afraid for her life.”

Arthur he bends down, kisses her cheek. “What can I say.” He smiles at her. “Fickle.”

“We’re the same,” she says. She touches his face. “Blind to where our hearts will set.”

He’s missed her very much. Maybe most. “What can I say,” and he turns, hiding his tears from her.

****

They had had this conversation, the night following. Tavia, still at home in the night; she stood at the mouth of the cave they had taken shelter in, staring out at curves, the belly and hips of sand.

“The triplets will be waiting for you,” she said. She rolled her eyes. “Good luck.”

Arthur grimaced. “I wish you would come with me. They loved you best.”

She laughed at him. “They loved you, too.”

“They tolerated me.”

“Don’t disparage being tolerated.” She tsked. “It can be its own, precious sort of love.”

“You really won’t come?”

“You have Agnes, and Eames. And I have a life to catch up with.”

Arthur crossed his arms, leaned against the rock at his side.

“Who is Eames to you, exactly? He doesn’t seem the most trustworthy of people.”

Arthur shrugged one shoulder. “Agnes seems to like him.”

“Agnes is willfully bad judge of character. I think she hopes to take in bad seeds so that she can beat respect into them when they turn on her.”

“Eames isn’t a bad seed. Well.” Arthur hummed. “He isn’t malicious, anyway.”

“Oh, good. ‘Not malicious’.” Tavia turned to face him, her hands behind her back. “That’s exceedingly comforting.”

Arthur laughed. “I have a hard time believing people would judge me virtuous upon first sight.” He faced her, too, standing tall. “What do you see when you look at me now?”

She narrowed her eyes, then sighed. “How much the world has changed. You’re looking older, Arthur.”

“Sometimes I forget to moisturize.”

She laughed, came close to touch at the wrinkles at the corner of his left eye. “You ignored my advice, didn’t you?” She dropped her hand. “I told you not to put your life in stasis, too.”

“I didn’t,” he insisted. “I just--I had an order I followed. First, to restore all of you. Everything else, after. I can shape the rest of my life later, still.”

Tavia fell back against the cave wall again, smiling. “It’s nice to know that some things in this world have remained the same. You,” she said, “still so foolish to think that you’ll never run out of time.”

****

Eames has been occupying Agnes, which Arthur is grateful for, sometimes.

Agnes is wilder at heart than Arthur is, and when they spar, Arthur gets caught up in the fucking messiness of her technique, in the way she’ll throw her weight too far to one side and leave herself open for too strong a counterattack. He’ll wait and wait, absorbing blow after blow from her, his body curling, his hands up and around his face until she lunges, her knee wobbling almost imperceptibly, and then Arthur will lash out with a roundhouse and knock her flat on her ass.

It leaves her angry, and Arthur with purpling bruises.

When she fights with Eames, they dance, Eames weaving back and forth, drawing back, making her chase him. He’ll jab, measuring the distance, swing a cross at her when she’s within arm’s reach.

He’s good. Relaxed, sweat matting his hair to his forehead, and Agnes opens up, the fury she takes out on Arthur growing into a measured discipline.

This is an Agnes that Arthur recognizes: stalking prey.

****

In Montreal, Arthur walks down avenues, takes in the glint of glass, the buildings that soar into the sky and seek a ceiling to brush up against.

They’d all separated when they’d entered the city, eager for solitude, or different company. But when Arthur walks into a bar and sees Eames there, he moves forward on instinct, takes the open seat next to Eames.

“Hello, darling,” Eames says. He’s had a few drinks -- his eyes shining with them. He licks his lower lip, and Arthur can’t help the reflexive way his stomach drops.

Arthur catches the bartender’s eye, orders a beer.

“It’s a lovely vest you’ve got on.”

“Thank you,” Arthur says dryly. It’s strange to feel embarrassed about the vest; nothing in Eames’ compliment should be taken as an indictment of Arthur’s vanities, and yet.

“I’ve upset you.”

“No,” Arthur says. “I’m upsetting myself. You’ve been...” Arthur searches for the right words. “You’ve been kind to my sister. And helpful to me.”

“Cheers.” Eames raises his glass at Arthur, takes a drink.

Arthur barrels forward, hurdling his inhibitions. “This is going to sound conceited as fuck,” Arthur says, “But I hope you’re not jumping through hoops for me. You don’t need to work off a debt you owe me. You can go.”

“You should let me stay. It would be good of you.” Eames finishes his drink, voice rough, his syllables rubbing up against each other. “I’ve never seen so many colors of you, Arthur. Your silences were so legion.” He smiles. “I used to think that knowing just one of your secrets would be satisfying.”

Arthur stares down at the bar.

The stories Eames has heard of him now. Collected, filed away in that mind of his.

There’s a question Arthur had wanted to ask of Eames. He’d wanted to be drunk to do it, but fuck that. “Why did you come back?” Arthur turns to Eames. “After you’d finished your job on me. Why bring what you’d stolen back?”

Eames rolls his cup between his palms. He glances over at Arthur carefully. “It’s funny, isn’t it?” He clears his throat. “You know what I think about repeatedly? How much a story can shift.” He nods at Arthur. “When you tell Izanami’s story, it’s full of devotion. That isn’t the way I tell it. And if you ask her to tell it herself, she won’t. ‘I don’t like the current ending,’ she’ll say.”

Arthur takes Eames’ cocktail napkin, slowly begins to fold it, occupying his hands.

“I respect that she says that. It’s a fascinating transformation, really: how much a story can change depending on where you choose to end it.” Eames moves one hand closer to Arthur’s on the bar. “I thought that it was the possibility of simply being another cautionary tale for you that had me panicking.”

“But it wasn’t.” Arthur presses a crease.

“No,” Eames says. “It just seemed there were so many chapters ahead of me. Enough to grind me down, if empty of you.”

Arthur takes Eames hand, holds it, palm up. He puts the crane he had folded in the middle of it, his every action deliberate, built upon the precise awareness of Eames, who’s been drinking, who owns a persuasive tongue. “It’s a pretty abstract reason.”

Eames laughs. “Maybe it was simpler then. Maybe it had become a habit when I wasn’t looking.” His smile is fond. “Coming back to you, who claimed never to miss me.”

Arthur wishes he could look away from Eames’ gaze. Wishes he wasn’t such a fucking sucker for a dare.

part three

inception fic: go up to the resting place (1/3)

indysaur — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 00:41:32 GMT

Go Up to the Resting Place
Inception: Arthur/Eames
Rating: PG13
18,752 words
A not-quite AU, in which instead of a PASIV, they use magic to break into dreams. Some foundational inspiration from Fables, but this is a pretty different, and, let's be real, lesser thing. Arthur and Eames are good at being strangers.

But I, I am compassionate and I am cruel.

Be on your guard!
- The Thunder, Perfect Mind

Arthur is careful to speak.

****

"Quickly," Arthur remembers Eames saying, "quickly, quickly."

"Dear Eames," Yusuf had said, the calmness in his tone belied by the pressure with which he was gripping Arthur’s forearm, "Patience."

"Dear Yusuf," Eames had said, his voice slipping into the worn-smooth groove that was his mocking register, "cast a damn spell if you have to, just wake us up."

"You know he isn't a spellcaster," Arthur had interjected. He reached with his opposite hand to pry gently at Yusuf's grip. "We're at the mercy of the thorn."

"There are better ways to sleep," Eames muttered. "I don't know why we continue to rely so on our beauty here."

"Because I'm reliable," Yusuf snapped.

"What he said," Arthur agreed. He turned to face Yusuf, took Yusuf's hand. Flipped it so the palm was facing up, watched a drop of blood bead at the center. "There," Arthur said.

Eames looked over Arthur's shoulder, watched the pinprick tip of a briar thorn work its way out of Yusuf's palm. "Lovely," he said.

"You can keep us hidden us for a few seconds more?" Arthur asked Eames.

"Yes," Eames said, then said to Yusuf, "Does it hurt?"

"You ask that every time," Arthur glanced up at Yusuf's face, the sweat breaking across the man's brow. "You're fine, aren't you?"

"Yes, I will be. As long as you don't let go," Yusuf replied.

"Such talented hands," Eames said.

"Shh," Arthur said firmly, soothing. He felt his way down the nerves in Yusuf’s hand, their branching paths. It still feels like a revelation after all this time: how easy it can be, sometimes, to put aside pain.

****

Arthur had known Eames long before they had been introduced by Izanami, but it was only afterwards that they became something like friends.

Izanami travels. She’s wiser in the ways of worlds, but some of that leads to pretension, which Arthur can't blame her for but is amused by anyway.

"You say amused when what you really mean is annoyed," Eames noted.

"Keep your armchair analysis to a minimum. It'd be polite to at least pretend discretion."

"Why shutter my insights when there's so much more fun to be had by parading them?"

"It is ostentatious," Izanami says.

"As is using the word 'ostentatious'," Eames said. He quirked his eyebrow, touching thoughtfully at his lower lip.

Arthur refused to smile. “Back to business, if there aren’t any objections," he said. "Izanami, what can we do to help you?"

"There are benefits to a world revealed by magic rather than science," Izanami began, and it was all Arthur could do to keep from rolling his eyes.

"Gatekeepers and bridge-builders," Eames had said later, after Izanami was gone. "Whether it's a rainbow or ice or a beam from the moon, they walk from here to an impossible there and think they're gods."

"It's a pretty impressive power," Arthur said, fiddling with the cuff of his shirt. He frowned at the missing cuff link, wondering whether he'd lost it, or had entirely forgotten to put one in this morning. The latter would be a slip.

Eames scoffed, snapped his fingers: a gleaming gold pin appearing in the space between his thumb and knuckle, which he then handed to Arthur. "Oh, you love the mole sauce at that restaurant?" he said, adopting a voice. "I suppose it's fine, I just really can't be impressed with anything outside of Mexico since the time I backpacked across Central America."

"It's hardly the same," Arthur said, unable to stop a quiet laugh. He put on the cuff link, nodded his thanks.

"It's exactly the same," Eames said, stretching, the bottom button of his shirt now conspicuously missing, exposing a slice of taut belly. Eames noticed the direction of Arthur’s gaze, raised an eyebrow. "I can't create something from nothing, you know."

Arthur looked away, occupied himself with confirming he had his runes in his pockets, the weight of the die. "Except for flirtations."

"No," Eames said. "Not even that."

****

Eames will tell his own stories sometimes.

“Once,” he’d said, “there was a man who walked the Pacific coast, where the river meets ocean. So virile was he that one glance from him could get a woman pregnant.”

“Hmm,” Arthur had said. He’d heard this tale before. He’d forgotten where.

“It sounds more dazzling than it is.”

“Does it sound very dazzling?” Arthur wondered.

“Well, of course it all depends on context, but virility can be admired in certain circles. Lustiness recognized. It’s when it begins to descend into licentiousness that most everyone will scoff.”

“These all seem like grades of the same thing.”

“Ah,” Eames said. “But it’s the gradations that are so important.”

Arthur had looked up at him, only just catching up to the sudden seriousness of Eames’ tone. Eames, who was leaning forward, his elbows on his knees. “You have a strange way of trying to impress.”

“That isn’t what I’m trying to do,” Eames said.

“Then what?” Arthur waited, then shrugged. “I’ve heard this story before by the way. It’s a good call to repeat it. When your material is this good...” He whistled.

Eames smiled, sat back in his chair, the fabric of his pants stretched tight across his thighs. “I can introduce a few new details, if that’s what you’re hinting at, Arthur.”

Arthur ignored him, returning to his papers.

Eames sighed. “Anyway,” he said. “The people chased him away, kept him far from their villages for his keen reproductive powers.” He scratched across his chest, his big hand, the chewed tips. His nails glowed a bit, buffed and polished nearer the nail beds.

“Fuck,” Arthur had said with feeling, “the vulnerability behind your mask. How true after all, that every blessing can be a curse.”

“Now, Arthur. These are the little lonelinesses that come with everything that makes us unique,” Eames said, and slapped his thighs, came to his feet.

*****

Arthur grew up with six sisters, all of them older but one. He learned from his kind of family how to stand out quickly; already put in the open by the fact of the dick between his legs, Arthur figured he should take the start given to him and put as much distance between himself and his tall, laughing sisters as he could.

Not in a cruel way, Arthur wants to be clear about that. He loves his sisters. It’s just that five older siblings means that there are so many already-beaten paths ahead of you, and Arthur had always liked to do his own clear-cutting. There is a satisfaction to be had in shaping the world.

He fell into dream-walking later, after setting himself apart became an obsolete and foreign pursuit. There was potential in the calling. So many different ways to sleep, whether they be apples or lake water, brambles or a ghost ship crew’s liquor. Arthur was canny, not cautious, and he learned what he could from the people he worked with and kept moving, always an eye on the prize.

The second time he met Eames, Eames looked at him and said, “For fuck’s sake, hold still,” and Arthur, all the vibration went out of him.

Careful, Arthur remembers thinking.

****

Arthur uses a prism that he’d filched from Izanami that last time she’d been orating. He finds a good, cleared-out space in the city. Not the transit-meadow, mostly because it’ll be so trafficked, and Arthur doesn’t feel like sharing his road with someone who happens to be going in the same general direction he is.

He holds the prism up to the sun, watches it catch, then flicks it to the ground, like a lit match he wants to keep from burning his fingers. It bows up, seven colors springing into the air, and Arthur steps up and on, walks.

Izanami falls into step with him halfway to his destination. “Thief,” she says accusingly. “You might have asked.”

“Asking’s so pedestrian.” Arthur shrugs. “You can have it back after this.”

She nods.

They walk in silence for a bit. Bows aren’t Arthur’s preferred method of travel, but there’s something fine about them when you have one to yourself. The black sky below his feet.

Izanami walks like she’s been burdened, her hands clasped behind her back, her head bent forward, looking at the ground a few steps ahead. She’s tall, though, and once in a while, her arm will brush Arthur’s shoulder, and he’ll note the tone of the muscle, estimate her reach.

Arthur only realizes he’s reached his destination when he stumbles onto asphalt, hard on his soles. He turns to Izanami. “Thanks for walking with me,” he says.

“Don’t steal from me again,” she says.

“It’s beneath me, anyway.”

She nods. “You aren’t bad company,” she says. She straightens up, stretches a bit, then cocks her head, as if she’d heard her name. “I should go.”

“Don’t your feet ever get tired?” Arthur asks.

Izanami already has her back to him. “What does it matter? I only go where I want to go.” She turns again for a second, tosses a piece of glass towards Arthur. “Here,” she says. “This one you can keep.”

“That’s nice.” He’s surprised.

“Out of the goodness of my heart. Because you didn’t ask.”

“I didn’t ask for the other one either,” Arthur points out, then: “I mean, thank you.”

****

Arthur has sex with Eames after the second job they pull for Izanami together. Mostly because he isn’t able to talk himself out of it. When he told Eames that, Eames said, “Flattering.”

“I can’t tell you to feel flattered or not,” Arthur said. “But it was intended as a compliment. I talk myself out of fucking almost everyone I meet.”

Eames reflected. “You know, in your own way you’ve learned to live alone as thoroughly as I have.”

“And you were worried we didn’t share any common ground.”

Eames raised up onto one elbow in bed, blinking blearily. “The life looks worse on you. I bring a a charm and noble-bearing to it.”

“You bring an accent to it.” Arthur busied himself with his tie.

Eames fell back onto his pillow. “It’s a good thing I’m much less discriminate in choosing partners than you are. Otherwise it would have taken an act of god to get the two of us into bed.”

Arthur came over, braced a hand on Eames’ chest and bent down to kiss him. “Now who’s the flatterer,” he asked.

****

Eames took Arthur out to lunch the day after. They were still working a job: extracting a true name, or something else like that. Arthur forgets the details -- he packs his head full with every new job, and wipes the slate clean after.

Lunch, they went to some Burmese restaurant that was bustling, full of people who didn’t work by choice and through privilege, grabbed two seats at the bar. They chatted and it was easier than Arthur had expected.

Later, Eames told him that he takes everyone he works with out to lunch alone. He likes to know who he’s joining hands with. “And besides, everyone surprises you a little.”

“What surprised you about me?” Arthur asked.

“What an embarrassing question.”

“Fuck it,” Arthur said. “I want to know.”

Eames laughed. “You talked more than I thought you would. You were practically conversational. I didn’t expect that.”

“And what were you correct in expecting?”

“That you’d want to talk about trivial things. Health policy, the pros and cons of freelancing, my shoes. Your last date.”

Arthur curled his lip. “I sound terrible.”

“Don’t you, though?” Eames said, in full agreement. He waved both his hands in Arthur’s direction. “And yet, paradoxically.”

****

Eames wanders often, going from here to there, usually on foot. He likes to traverse terrains. From what Arthur hears, sometimes Eames will stumble upon someone he likes, and they’ll go to bed, and then Eames will trick them into giving something up before moving on. A good breakfast, sometimes; virginity, others. Rings.

The egregiousness varies with some rhyme, some reason.

Eventually, Eames will wend his way back to Arthur’s bed. He’ll greet Arthur with a kiss, and then pull away and sigh. Arthur will watch his shoulders loosen.

“You again,” Arthur will say.

“It sounds very fond when you say it like that,” Eames will say.

Then Arthur will say, “It’s not meant to,” and kiss him again. Eames has nice lips, and it doesn’t bother Arthur as much as it should, that they’re beginning to feel familiar.

****

This is strange.

Eames is lying in bed, naked and above the sheets. Just airing everything out. Arthur is sharpening a halberd. It’s more ornamental than anything, but it’s nice to keep an edge on those types of things. Remind them of their true intention.

Eames had braced a foot on Arthur’s back, and Arthur when he finishes with the stone, leans away from the pressure, slides the halberd under the bed where it’ll be out of the way until he’ll go to hang it again, and falls back onto one arm, slaps at Eames’ dick.

“Christ,” Eames says. “Careful.”

Arthur says, “I don’t need to be careful with you. I’ve heard the stories.”

“Stories of what.”

“The wool you pull over people’s eyes. Your impervious nature.”

“Go on,” Eames says, his lips curved up. “What else do you hear about me?”

“That your lies lead to harm, but enough times bear out into kindness. What a line you walk,” Arthur says, looking up at him and laughing. He stretches his throat up and croons out a low howl.

Eames slips his fingers into Arthur’s hair. “And what if I began to tilt to one direction? What if I wanted to be more admirable than not?”

Arthur looks away, rests his forehead against Eames’ thigh. His hand on Eames’ opposite knee.

“What if I want to be all good, and not at all evil?” Eames asks, his voice a little louder, lilting.

“It’s not in your nature,” Arthur points out.

“Why isn’t it?”

Arthur sits up, then, feeling tugged just a bit from his sockets. “It isn’t.”

“You seem scared that it might be.” His eyes assessing.

Arthur stands, stretches. He reaches for the halberd under his bed, his head in the blue dark, his arm outstretched and searching for steel.

“I could tell a story of you, too,” Eames says.

****

Arthur dreams of Cobb, which is very far out of the ordinary. It’s been a long while since he’s heard from him. They’re in a nondescript field, broad expanses of ankle-high grass, a breeze skittering across the blades, sending them rustling. No one but the two of them for miles.

Arthur closes his eyes, and opens them, puts the two of them in the middle of a restaurant that Cobb used to like to frequent in Westwood, packs it full of patrons. Projections at the ready in the case that this Cobb isn’t one Arthur had conjured up.

“Good, Arthur,” Cobb says, approvingly.

Arthur shrugs, smiles at the waitress who’s appeared at their table and asks for a glass of water. He looks at Cobb, the way he leans forward onto his forearms, his big hands clasped together. He’s handsome. It always takes seeing him to remind Arthur of that. Arthur lets the silence grow.

“Arthur,” Cobb finally says. “We should talk.”

“Okay,” Arthur says. He takes off his coat, drapes it over the empty seat next to him. “Let’s talk.”

And then it’s Cobb’s turn to fall silent. He’s busying his fingers with something, toying with it under the shadow of his palm.

“Jesus, this is ominous.” Arthur rolls up his sleeves. The dream is odd, but he’s spent at least a few weirder nights with his cryptic-as-fuck subconscious.

Cobb nods at Arthur’s bared forearms, watches as Arthur loosens his tie. “Are you getting ready to throw a punch.”

Arthur smiles, lets it shrink slow over his teeth. Cobb is still hiding something in his hand. “No,” he says. “Well. I don’t intend to yet, but it never hurts to be prepared.”

Cobb shakes his head at that, but he smiles, too, then leans back in his seat, relaxing, and it’s then that Arthur extends his arm, claps one hand over Cobb’s, which is lying face-down on the table.

“What’s that you’re playing with, Dom?” he asks, then turns Cobb’s hand over, sees the top.

Arthur’s projections turn to look as one, and the waitress comes striding over, a steaming carafe of coffee in hand. Arthur waits for her to reach them, to smash it against this intruder’s head.

Instead, she flips Arthur’s mug over, fills it with coffee to the brim. “Cream?” she asks. “Sugar’s on the table.”

Arthur’s grip on Cobb loosens in surprise. “No, thank you.”

She nods, touches Arthur’s sleeve, then walks away. Chatter breaks out across the room again.

Arthur sighs, lets his head fall back a bit, weigh heavy on his neck. “I hate dreaming naturally.” He straightens, drags a hand across his face, sips at the coffee. “There’s too much uncertainty. I like to know what to expect.”

He pulls his coat off the seat next to him, looks it over, piece-by-piece. Finds a gap where the arm is pulling loose from the torso of it, and frowns. He digs into his pocket and finds the sewing kit he keeps there amongst his other runes, pulls out a needle and thread.

Cobb’s keeping quiet, and Arthur can still feel the brief wash of adrenaline that had come with the concern that this was an extraction. That suspicion hasn’t entirely left, but it’s of a low enough grade that Arthur would like to continue sleeping, dream or no. He’d been tired this evening.

He repairs the tear in his coat. There's always been something calming about the pull of thread, of putting an error to rights.

He hears Cobb order for the both of them, but when the food arrives and Arthur looks up, Cobb is gone.

****

In the morning, Arthur wakes up the sound of someone yelling outside of his window.

“Get out of the fucking street,” she shouts. “You can’t play in the street, how many times have I told you?” And kids laugh, laugh, laughing.

Arthur looks at both palms, traces the smoothness there, the lack of any ache left behind by a thorn.

Eames comes out from the adjoining bathroom, a billow of steam with him. He’s rubbing a towel against his hair, tosses it aside, and then sits at Arthur’s hip, running a hand along his beard. “Should I trim this?” he asks.

Arthur reaches up and tugs at it hard.

“Steady on,” Eames says. “Hands.” He grips Arthur’s wrist, presses it against Arthur’s stomach, then leans down to kiss him. “Did the racket wake you?” he asks.

Arthur kisses Eames back. Thorns aren’t the only way to get into another’s dream, he reminds himself. It wouldn’t hurt, really, to be guarded.

****

Arthur has become a kind of waystop for people who can’t see an actual healer for this reason or another. He hadn’t intended it, and it’s often actively an inconvenience, but there are upsides: Arthur likes gathering favors to call in.

When he’s not on a job, he doesn’t bother trying to hide, and the broken arms, the burnshot, petrified and fleshtorn are a steady stream.

In the afternoons, when Eames comes to Arthur’s for shelter from a high sun, he watches, and Arthur introduces him as “a disciple who came to study at my feet. What they don’t tell you about hero-worship is how humbling it can be.”

Eames just grins like a dope, then clasps his hands behind his back and looks over Arthur’s shoulder, very serious.

Arthur likes treating bones best. He counts, “1,” wrenches an arm back into place with a grunt, then finishes, “2, 3.”

“My god,” Eames says. “You’re not exactly Florence Nightingale.”

“Sometimes the body requires an application of force,” Arthur says. He sighs and falls back against the wall, gloved hands at his sides.

Eames shakes his head. He moves in front of Arthur, his eyes steady. He reaches up and puts a stray lock of hair back into place. “Interesting,” he says.

Arthur smiles.

Eames cocks his head toward the man behind them. “This one fainted,” he says, dry.

****

Arthur keeps dreaming of Cobb. He makes a call.

“I never knew you felt that way about me,” Cobb says, his visage hazy in the pool.

“I don’t.”

“How naked do I get in these dreams?”

Arthur grimaces. “Not at all naked. My subconscious shows me at least that mercy.”

“So it’s strictly a romance,” Cobb muses. “Do I sweep you off your feet? Are there flowers and jewelry and gifts of deadly weapons?”

“The restoration of your humor isn’t as welcome a development as you might think.”

Cobb laughs quietly. “Arthur,” he says. “It’s nice of you to call. I’m fine.”

“For now,” Arthur says, and then regrets the import.

“Then if I won’t be fine in the near future, I’ll have been well-warned.”

“In my dreams you’re obsessive about your totem. Again. That fucking spinning.”

“Okay, Arthur.”

Arthur fights the instinct to rattle the calm in Cobb’s tone. He sets his jaw, nods to himself. “Okay.”

Cobb sighs, and Arthur watches him rustle idly through a book. “We agreed, Arthur. Silence means that things are fine, or that we’re beyond each other’s help.”

“Yes.” Arthur touched at the small sewing kit in his lapel pocket, imagined the glint of his needles.

“I hope that you won’t hear from me in a long time. I hope I won’t hear from you.” And then nothing but empty water, clear straight down to the bone-white bowl.

****

Eames is a fucking nightmare. He cheats at cards, which is painfully ridiculous, and does it down on the waterfront to be as much of a cliché as possible.

Eames comes walking into Arthur’s apartment, throws a jacket onto Arthur’s couch. He nods at Arthur, says, “Hello, sweetness,” then makes his way to the kitchen, rummages through the refrigerator.

He reappears with an apple and knife in hand, leans against the counter. Arthur narrows his eyes. “You look like you’re expecting someone.”

“Not at all. What’ve you mixed yourself up in today?”

Arthur stands. “Are you--”

He’s interrupted by the crashing of three men through his door, and Arthur swings around, grabs the heavy-bottomed tumbler he’d been drinking from and hurls it at the head of one of the men rushing Eames.

Eames catches a fist to the stomach, doubles over, then slams a knife into his attacker’s thigh.

The man Arthur beaned is on the ground, and Arthur steps hard on his kidney and then on his neck. He looks up for the third, but Eames has him by the nape and is smashing his head against Arthur’s counter top.

“Don’t get blood all over my fucking apartment,” Arthur says, slightly winded.

Eames drops the man, raises both hands.

“You’re a fucking nightmare,” Arthur says then.

****

They fight about it. “Don’t you think it’s too fucking easy for you to cheat at cards?”

Eames’s smile is as thin as one on that mouth gets. He pulls a card from what seems like nowhere, makes it flicker, from club to heart, and back again. “Just because something is easy doesn’t mean it isn’t worth doing.” He’s fucking sparkling. “Haven’t we earned a drink, you and I?”

“So why didn’t you lose these assholes instead of leading them back here?” Arthur demands. He’s down to his undershirt, holds a knife wound on one of the goons’ stomach closed, concentrating, and watches it knit together slowly.

“They were a long time angry. They would have found me sometime.” He’s found tumblers, unbroken ones, holds one out to Arthur. “Why delay?”

“Jesus, I don’t want a fucking drink, alright?” Arthur knocks his hand away. “You didn’t even try to slip them, did you?”

Eames wipes a spot of blood from his jaw with his arm. “Your place could do with some redecorating.” He points. “Only just a splash of red, and the whole flat is transformed.”

****

Arthur is dreaming again. He’s impatient with it, and switches the setting: hamlet, to island, to fortress, to stream. He’s sitting with Cobb, and the world keeps changing around them.

“Why do you think you keep dreaming of me?” Cobb asks.

Arthur lies back in the grass. There are a half-dozen reasons not to do it when he’s awake. He’s almost never wearing clothes he can afford to get a stain on. It appears child-like in the extreme. More.

“You’re going to make yourself motion sick,” Cobb says.

“Do you want to hear a story?” Arthur asks. He watches the shifting sky as it clicks from view to view. “Once, there was a man named Dominick. He was one half of a whole. When things were good between him and his other half, they were perfect. When they were bad, it was cataclysmic.”

Clouds stream overhead, a backlit, glowing white.

“And when the day came that he disagreed with her about something fundamental, they split down the middle. She disappeared. All that was left was his shadow.” He looked down at Cobb’s back, the spread of it. “You used to be a two-headed god. Was I supposed to watch your back forever?”

Cobb’s head lowers. “Do you always tell the story like that?”

“It’s a cautionary tale,” Arthur says, and he looks back up at the sky. Like this, he can pretend he’s alone here, waiting to wake up.

“Then tell me your mythology. It’s only fair.”

Arthur laughs. “Mine’s a cautionary tale, too.”

****

Eames looks like he’s still sleeping when Arthur wakes up. His broad chest rising and falling under Arthur’s sheets. Arthur forgets how long he’s had this place. He forgets where he bought this bed they’re in.

Eames seems peaceful, but then he wakes up with a gasp, eyes flying open. Arthur rears back, carefully holds himself out of the way until Eames settles.

“Bad dream?” Arthur asks.

Eames sits up, rubs at his eyes. “A good one. Left too soon.” He smirks in a way that reminds Arthur of those times when Eames is performing for someone, the composed jocularity.

“Liar.”

“Call me that every time and you may be right one in two.”

Arthur shakes his head, gets out of bed, goes to his closet. He fingers the jackets hanging there, the fine weave.

“Wear something adorable for me today,” Eames says from bed.

Arthur goes to the doorway. He looks at Eames disheveled. “You’ve been here for a longer time than usual,” he says.

Eames laughs. “Are you worried that I’m missing out on trouble to be had?”

“No,” Arthur says, feeling very serious. “I don’t worry about that.”

****

He speaks with Yusuf. “I can’t put a finger on what’s making me so damn prickly.”

Yusuf nods. “It’s more difficult to share a dream with someone if one isn’t in proximity. But not impossible.” He crosses his arms. “And you don’t know what an intruder may be after?”

“Does it matter?”

“Easier to protect one thing than everything.”

Arthur feels himself smile. “I disagree.”

“Ha,” Yusuf says. “Very terrifying, Arthur.” There’s the sound of a cat, and Yusuf looks down, murmuring.

“I--” Arthur begins. “You wouldn’t sell me out, would you, Yusuf?”

Yusuf turns back to Arthur. “I would ask a very high price,” he says coolly.

****

Arthur has concerns, and he feels justified in them. Hasn’t Eames always been known to lie? Aren’t all his kindnesses easy for him, giving away things that were never his to begin with?

“I steal from the rich to give to the poor.” Eames is very and deliberately casual.

“I don’t mean to question your character.” Arthur sighs. “I don’t want to.”

They’re talking quietly, in the lobby of Arthur’s building. Eames looks out of place in a such an everyday setting. He has, as Mal had said so admiringly once, a distinctiveness, no matter the context.

Arthur is standing very straight. He has his hands in his pockets, drawn up to his full height. He had made independent inquiries, of course. Had checked up on people who thought of themselves as his enemies, sought out word.

“Arthur,” Eames says. “Out with it. What do you want to ask me?”

“My dreams. I might have mentioned; the ones with Cobb.” Arthur keeps his tone clipped. “Something isn’t right about them.”

“Okay,” Eames says.

“Have you heard anything?” Arthur licks his dry lips. “Is someone running a job on me?”

This smile grows on Eames’ face. He scratches at one eyebrow with his thumb, exhales through his nose. “No one’s come skulking around, no.”

“Are you?”

Eames laughs at that. “Bald,” he says. “I like the look on you.” He shakes his head. “No, darling, I’m not.”

Arthur nods, feels a little knot in his back squeeze tighter, strangely. “I’d understand if you were upset that I asked.”

Eames mulls over that. He lets his fingers brush Arthur’s wrist. “Better to have been asked than to deal with your wondering.”

Arthur smiles, jerky but sincere. “It’s the clockwork in my brain.” Raises a finger. “Tick, tick, tick.”

“Yes, well.” Eames leans in, presses a firm kiss to Arthur’s cheek. “I’m going to bed somewhere else tonight.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Arthur pulls back, looks Eames in the eye.

Eames laughs again, this quieted rumble. “Yes, but it’ll make the both of us feel better. For tonight at least, you’ll be blissfully alone.”

Arthur nods his assent, and the knot in his back slackens, a genuine bit of relief.

Eames walks away, nearly to the door, before he doubles back. “What is it, exactly?” he asks. “The dreams. Why so sure they aren’t the product of your subconscious?”

“They might be.” Arthur stays tight-lipped. “Who knows.”

“Right.” Eames hums thoughtfully. “Alright, then.”

Arthur lets his posture slump a bit. His hands are cold. “This went better than I was expecting. Can I tell you that?” He laughs.

Eames smiles back at him. “Yes, you can tell me.”

****

He has a dream that night, too.

He’s training. San Shou kickboxing in an abandoned plaza. The buildings remind him of Lyon. It could be disquieting, how silent and emptied the city’s been, but Arthur concentrates on his form, his technique, his bare feet gripping the stone underneath.

He works himself to exhaustion, to the point where it’s difficult to think. He has to stop, catch his breath as he tries to remember the next sequence. He steps into a resting stance, centers, pushes into a Tai Chi form.

“Step through. Good. Keep your upper body relaxed, light. Your torso should float over the movement in your lower body. Good. Raise the right leg. And hold this position.”

Arthur holds, looking forward. Arms bent, hands at the ready. He breathes freely, feels the sweat slipping down his forehead.

A hand at his back. “Straighten up here. Let the tension bleed from the shoulders. Your foot planted, all your weight traveling down into the ground.”

It’s Cobb’s fucking voice. Of course it is.

Cobb comes around, stands a comfortable distance from Arthur, looks on with his arms crossed in front of him. “Could anybody move you?” he asks.

Arthur drops his leg. He rests his hands on his hips, breathing hard. “Cobb doesn’t know the first fucking thing about Tai Chi.”

“It seems a very mysterious art,” Cobb says, amused.

“Fuck off. What would be the point if it wasn’t practical?”

“You should really stretch before these sessions,” Cobb says. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”

****

Eames stays away for another day, then another. That grows into a week, and Arthur begins to figure that Eames has finally set to wandering again. They have interludes, Arthur reminds himself. It’s what works best for them, and anyway, Arthur can’t be distracted.

He’s grateful, he supposes. He requires focus, this close to the finish line. There’s a job that he’s been running for far too long, with a deadline fast approaching.

****

Arthur wakes up in his empty bed, and brushes his teeth quickly, pulls on a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt. He’s out the door within ten minutes, running the path that he used to take, sometimes, with Eames. He lets his feet feel fleet.

There’s a trail that maws open at the side of the sidewalk, after a mile or so, and Arthur turns. He forgot to bring a water bottle, but there’s a fountain here, which will serve.

Eames is standing there, wiping the back of his mouth with his hand. “Look at you,” he says.

Arthur doesn’t expect to feel pleased at the sight of him, can’t stop the smile that bleeds onto his face.

“You look flushed,” Eames says.

“It’s hot.”

Eames dips a hand into the water flowing out the mouth of some stone creature. He flicks droplets at Arthur, and Arthur watches them glitter as they leave Eames’ hand. A tiny snowfall. “Cool down, then,” Eames says, and then he smiles, too.

****

He and Eames run together for another hour, and at the tail end of the trail, they slow to a walk. The sun had come early, with a gentle and drying heat. “It was strange that first night away,” Eames says.

“Lonely?” Arthur asks with a laugh.

“Hm,” Eames says. He lets his hand graze Arthur’s, then catches it, his thumb against Arthur’s palm. “It was strange,” he says again.

Arthur’s thrown. “Did something happen while you were traveling, before you showed up at my door?” Arthur asks. “Are you--fuck. I don’t know. Are you healthy?”

“Maybe I’ve changed,” Eames says. He lets go of Arthur’s hand, bounces a bit on his feet. “But I wouldn’t trust it.” He turns Arthur a bit, kisses him briefly. “I’ve got an appointment to keep. See you.”

****

It makes Arthur glad that Eames has been so near, and anxious that Eames has been here so long.

This is Arthur at his most honest. You could press a finger to his skin, and lift, but you’d wait a long time for the blood to run back in, restoring paled skin back to its full flush. He carries those marks.

****

There’s someone at Arthur’s door when he comes home. Arthur sees the stranger from down the hallway and repositions his key -- metal between his knuckles.

“Can I help you?”

“Are you Arthur?”

Arthur nods.

“I came to ask you in person. Call your guy off. There’s not a dreamer in town who’s heard about a job on you.”

Arthur relaxes. “This guy,” he says. “He shaped like a Brit?”

The man nods, then barrels along. “I’d ask you to take a look at my fingers, but you don’t seem in the mood.” He looks hopeful anyway.

There’s an unbidden ease beginning in Arthur’s chest. “Let me see.”

The stranger extends his arm, and Arthur takes a look at the index finger, the way it hangs. He grips it, then shoves it up firmly, hears the clack of bone. “Jesus Christ,” the man grits out.

“This will knit,” Arthur says, feeling very charitable, “if you hold still.”

****

Arthur calls Eames. The water churns for only a few seconds, then goes still and murky. It’s dark, silted through. “Hello?” Arthur squints.

“Arthur, fuck, hold on. I haven’t changed the water in god knows how long. Can you see anything at all?”

“No.”

“Shit. Can I get you back? I can run the sink in a minute.”

Arthur shakes his head. “It’s fine, don’t bother. I was only calling to remind you that many nights more than the one have passed.”

“Are you giving me permission to return to your home?”

Arthur flexes his toes inside his shoes. “Basically.”

“I would have come back anyway. I’ve run up quite a bill here at the hotel.”

“I’m not lending you money.”

“Just a penny or two. I can promise you won’t miss it.”

Arthur snorts. “We can talk,” he says neutrally.

“What a nice answer.” There is a settling in Eames’ tone. “I have my own money, you know.”

“Yes, I know.” Arthur touches the surface of the water, lets the tips of his fingers break that translucent skin.

“Did you dream last night?” Eames asks.

Arthur pauses. He flicks his fingers up out of the water, watches the arc of droplets. They fly up, then are drawn back to his hand, drip down his wrist, and return, restored, to the body of water below. “I don’t know why they shake me up so much,” he says, sidestepping a direct answer. “I guess didn’t think I could dream such pedestrian dreams.”

“What a blow to your conception of self as stunning enigma.”

“Thank you, I appreciate your condolences,” Arthur says, very sincerely, and smiles when Eames laughs.

****

Arthur takes a walk that night. He hadn’t been able to sleep very well, a rare thing these nights. There’s something almost novel about it. Eames was a stone beside him, and Arthur slipped out of bed, downstairs, then out into the street.

There’s a wind blowing, and Arthur hadn’t bothered to put a coat on. He blows on his hands, quick, then tosses the prism out, hurries onto the bow.

He’s only a little while alone. Footsteps behind him, and then Izanami, again, at his side.

“Jesus,” Arthur says. “Did you put a bell on me?”

“I watch for good companions. I walk very much.” Izanami, her head bowed, looks at Arthur, something nearly friendly in her face.

“I didn’t realize I’d count as a good companion.”

Izanami nods. “The lonely make do.”

Arthur grins. He looks down at the road like Izanami does. Watches his bare feet press, from heel to toe. “What would happen?” he asks. “If I stepped off the bow? All this black space around. Would I fall?”

“Are you curious enough to find out?”

“Not today,” Arthur says. “Have you ever been?”

“Yes, once,” and she ends the sentence with finality. She lets out a short breath, rolls her shoulders back. “So,” she says. “I hear Eames has recently waged a war on your behalf.”

Arthur laughs. “Did you hear that from Eames? Maybe a skirmish, at best, and that’s if I’m being generous.”

“You have trouble,” Izanami says.

“I’m having dreams of Cobb,” Arthur says, still laughing. “That’s a kind of trouble, I guess.”

“Hm.” Her pace slows. “You know I have a husband.”

“I’d heard.”

She looks accepting of that. “What else have you heard?”

“I wouldn’t know where to start.”

“The end. Let’s skip all the quiet in the middle.”

Arthur hesitates. “It’s only what I’ve heard,” then, at Izanami’s eyebrow, he continues, “You had a husband. He died. I’m sorry, by the way.”

She nods. “Thank you.”

Arthur lets his back bow. “He died, and you mourned him. Driven to madness by your grief, you traveled a hidden road and sought him out in the world below. Down, many levels. And you found him.”

“A joyous moment.”

“If only the story ended there,” Arthur tried to bring some levity to it. “Do you want me to keep going?”

“Yes, let’s finish. I found my most loved,” she prompts.

“Most loved.” Arthur’s sure step doesn’t falter. “Such was the depth of your love, and so dark was the world below, that your husband appeared unchanged to you. Even his reluctance to leave with you, to follow you into the bright light of day, you thought was...”

Izanami laughs here. “Based on unfounded fears? An entrenched stubborness? I don’t know. Nothing that mattered.”

“So you convinced him.”

“Yes.” She gets taller with every step.

“You told him that you would lead the way. He made you promise that you wouldn’t look back. But as you rose higher, and higher, and finally saw, there, the break of day, the possibility of relief and restoration so close at hand...” Arthur trails off again. “I don’t blame you, you know. I might have looked back, too.” Izanami doesn’t respond, and Arthur sighs, steps into the story again. “You looked back.”

“And he was monstrous.” Her voice thick.

Arthur shifts his gaze a respectful half-turn away from her. Avoiding his peripheral vision. “A corpse rotting. Without teeth; his flesh draped over his bones. Maggots.”

“I threw him from the road.”

“You struggled, and while locked together, he begged you to allow him to return.” Arthur licks his lips, his throat dry. “But then, yes, you threw him from the road.”

“There’s more, of course. But that is usually where they end the story.” Izanami pauses. “You told it well. You have a talent.”

“Thanks,” Arthur says. A mood had come and sat on his shoulders, and Arthur shakes to get it off.

“I don’t know your story at all.”

Arthur shrugs. “By design.”

“Your secrecy could provoke curiosity.”

Arthur smiles, rueful. “Yeah, well. I try to pretend I don’t have secrets.”

“That sounds difficult to work.”

“It’s been effective this long.” Arthur stretches, suddenly, his arms in front of him, cracking the bones in his fingers. “Do you ache? I think I asked you this before. I could give you my hands.”

Izanami looks taken aback. “I appreciate the offer. I’m fine.”

“It’s not a big deal. You did give me a prism.”

She smiles. “Are we exchanging kindnesses now? Will this make us even?”

“Close enough.” Arthur taps her pocket with his knuckles, hears the clatter of glass. “Though I started at a deficit.”

“Ah,” she turns, leads Arthur the way they came, back to home. “We will make that even, too, one day, I’d imagine.”

****

Eames is still asleep when Arthur gets in again. Arthur slips into bed as subtly as he’s able, but he can see Eames come awake, the roundness of movement under the thin skin of his eyelids.

Eames’ eyes don’t open, but he shifts more fully onto his back, takes in a deep breath, then lets it out noisily. “Where’d you get to?”

“You look almost innocent when you sleep. Did you know?” Arthur tugs at the sheet wrapped under Eames, then makes himself comfortable, lets a hand come up to slide into the short hair above Eames’ ear.

“Hmm,” Eames says. “My most cunning disguise.”

“News of your exploits as my sentry has traveled far and wide.” His hand sliding down, a thumb on Eames’ jawline.

“Sentry feels a bit demeaning, doesn’t it?”

Arthur touches Eames’ eyebrow. Drags a finger across the arch of one. “How long are you going to be staying?” he asks.

Eames opens his eyes. “It sounds like there’s an answer you want to hear.”

“There is.”

“Am I supposed to guess it?”

Arthur leans in, kisses him. Pulls away, then kisses him again, a hand on Eames’ neck.

Eames’ eyes are closed again. He stays close, and Arthur mimics his longer breathing patterns. “Let’s say it together, then,” Eames says. “On the count of three.”

Arthur waits for Eames to count, waits for Eames to inhale -- his chest curving, waiting to be filled with breath.

****

Arthur is in his closet. There’s a panel in the back. Behind it is a safe, inside of which there are things that hold at least a little value. And at the back of the safe is a hidden panel, and behind that is another safe, set deep into the wall.

In front of it all, Arthur’s jackets, hidden in plain sight. He’d made these, learned to tailor during a long stint overseas. He picks up skills easily when they’re important for him to know, and the construction of fabric spoke easily to his natural talents.

Arthur touches one of the empty arms, searches for any loose threads, the panel at his feet set aside for now.

He’s not sure what it is, exactly, that makes him realize that Eames is behind him. Arthur lets his hand fall to his side. He picks up the panel, replaces it over the exposed safe, smooths his hands over the edges so that they’ll disappear. He tries not to hurry.

He turns. “Jesus Christ,” he says, inflating his voice with surprise. “How long have you been there?”

Eames takes up most of the doorway. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“There’s a touch I’m losing,” Arthur says. He shakes his head. “That you could sneak up on me.”

“If you’re planning to remain easily surprised, here’s a tip.” Eames broadens his stance, lowers his center of gravity, hands out. “You’ve got to plant your weight. Catch the brunt of the blow low.”

Arthur steps toward him, then slams out with his foot, a side kick that Eames easily meets, But Arthur follows with a cross, his left arm a whip, stopping just short of lashing Eames’ temple.

“Good,” Eames says.

****

“There’s something of Mal in Izanami’s story, isn’t there?” Cobb asks.

They’re strolling through a preserve, the dusk the texture of chalk. Behemoth shadows against the horizon, moving in herds. Mammoths, elephants, rhinoceroses. “I don’t know,” Arthur says. “There’s a little of both of you.”

“We borrow, we borrow,” Cobb says. “Have you heard the ending I’ve heard?”

Arthur watches the herds grow nearer. Their raising and lowering heads. Their thundering.

“Though they were still struggling, it was clear that Izanami would take the upper hand.” This version of Cobb raises his voice, almost chanting it. “How her husband raged, then, when he was close to being overcome. But she only laughed, filled with disgust at his decay, and hot with victory.”

The glint of tusks and horns. Weapons to fall upon, to look down to find yourself pierced by, through and through.

“He screamed that he would bring destruction, a hundred times over, because of her treachery. But Izanami laughed again, and promised that she would restore and bless everyone he harmed, and their children besides, until the last day.” A pause. “Does ending it here make the story better or worse, do you think?”

“She made a decent vow.”

“Out of spite.”

Arthur shrugs. “Who cares?”

“Oh, Arthur,” in Mal’s voice, but maybe it’s always been Mal in this dream, the many dreams before. The way she used to burn bright on the other side of Cobb, lighting him up. It could have been her.

The animals are nearer. The sky smoked by dying embers. It’s hard to hear anything above the sound of stampede.

“You don’t think that she was taunting him?” Mal raises her voice above the din. “Isn’t there cruelty in what she says to him, when he is on the brink of losing her, torn to fury by the thought of being without her?”

“Maybe a little of that,” he says. “But there's also a pledge that her days would always in part be a reaction to him, that every day she would think of him, until the last day.” He knows a promise when he hears one. Knows, too, how they endure.

“What a generous interpretation.” Mal puts out a hand, and when the first of the elephants arrive, she catches it by the tusk, lifted into the air and lands astride the animal’s head.

“If I had been him--”

Mal shakes her head, cups her ear.

Arthur shouts. “If I had been him, I would’ve been comforted, I think. I could have been patient.”

“Really?” A shout back. “I wouldn’t have trusted it.” Thunder, and then the elephant rears, and the silhouette on its back goes broad at the shoulders, very and dearly familiar.

“You this whole time,” Arthur says, drowned out by the bellow, the din.

part two

inception fic: lives i've pursued (1/1)

indysaur — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 23:24:36 GMT

Lives I've Pursued
Inception: Arthur/Eames
Rating: PG13
7,551 words
Arthur could live like this, or this.
Unbeta-ed which will become extremely obvious during the reading of, I'm betting.

The job on which he first met Eames ended poorly. When Arthur finally came bursting through the door and onto the roof, Eames shouted, "Where the fuck have you been? Someone woke up O'Neill--"

"Shut up," Arthur said. "I need to think."

"You don't need to bloody think, we need to jump."

"There's still time," Arthur said. He tore off his jacket, touched distractedly at a spot on his shoulder, assessing the depth of the wound there. "If you can lay down some cover, I can still reach the safe, it's two floors down. There should be rope here; I planned for grappling. Do you see--"

He turned around just in time to see Eames coming at him, found himself wrapped up in Eames' embrace, pulled backwards, falling.

They woke up to company, to O'Neill, getting the tar kicked out of him. Arthur reached for his weapon but discovered he'd been disarmed.

****

An hour and a half later, Arthur was in the backseat of a cab, battered and bruised, with Eames driving.

"You're shit at your job," Eames bit out.

"Fuck you," Arthur said. "If you'd given me two minutes--"

"What the hell is the point in seeing an objective completed if you're not alive to appreciate it?" Eames demanded. He jerked hard at the wheel. "Tell me that."

****

Arthur, he learns to prioritize.

****

After the Fischer job, Arthur finds himself in Los Angeles without a clear idea of where to go. He sits in a Starbuck's, ankle propped up on a knee, with a black coffee at hand and a newspaper spread out in front of him. It feels unfamiliar to flip the wide pages. His fingertips feel dusty, as if they've been smudged with newsprint, but when he checks, they're clean.

He thinks maybe he should keep this one. One day it will be a relic, and Arthur will unfold thin pages with careful hands and tell his children, "This is how we used to know what had happened."

****

When he's finished at the coffee shop, he calls the office that manages his assets, asks for Mackenzie.

"Hello?" she says.

"Mackenzie, it's Arthur."

"Arthur!" He can hear her smile. "It's been a long time."

"It has. How are you?"

"I'm great. I'm really great. How are you? I actually thought about you the other day."

"Oh?"

She laughs. "Not in any kind of bad way. Well, morbidly, maybe. I was going over your portfolio and suddenly I thought that it's completely possible that you'd died and that our fees were just being drawn from your bank account, and would continue to be drawn, ad infinitum. Your investments would just go on accruing the income to pay for our services."

"Lovely," Arthur says.

She laughs again. "I told you it was morbid."

****

He asks for the address of the property he owns in Costa Mesa, and she gives it to him without question, keeps him on the phone for a little while longer. "It's slow here," she says, "and chatting you up on the phone makes me look like I'm extremely dedicated to customer satisfaction."

"Too bad it's a front," Arthur says, smiling.

"Arthur," she says, chiding. "Nine times out of ten, appearing to be something is the same thing as being it."

He laughs. "You remind me of someone," he tells her.

"Really? Who?"

"Someone I work with," he says.

****

He pulls off the 5 and pulls up in front of a condo. He doesn't have a key, but he does have his lock-picking set, and he jimmies the door open, shoves in. There are boxes, half-unpacked, a couch positioned diagonally across the living room to the left, a TV blaring a baseball game, a kid in jeans and a Henley with a beer in hand.

"Uh," the guy says.

"This is my house," Arthur says.

"That's funny, because I'm pretty sure I'm paying 1800 a month to live here."

Arthur sighs. "You weren't supposed to be here until Monday."

The guy stands up. "I'm early. Don't tell." He points at Arthur with his bottle. "You really shouldn't break into people's homes. Are you going to rob me? Will you wait until the game's over to take the TV?"

****

Brady has a job at Cal State Long Beach, working as a career counselor for students.

"You look like you are a student," Arthur tells him.

"Therein lies the magic, bro," Brady says. He swings a jacket off the floor, shoves an arm into a sleeve. "I'm starving. You want to grab some food?"

****

They go to a ramen place nearby. Arthur sits on a stool at the bar, orders a large bowl, adds an egg and tonkatsu to his noodles. The girl next to him bumps his elbow and apologizes, blushing, touches her fingers to his forearm.

"It's fine," Arthur tells her, smiling. He rides out the small rush of adrenaline that had swung through him at the unexpected touch. Reminds himself that this is not a dream, with projections everywhere at hand.

When he turns back, Brady's grinning. "Cute," he says.

Arthur ignores him. "Look, dinner's on me tonight," he says.

Brady's still studying the menu, but he makes an okay sign with his hand. "Excellent."

"Get whatever you want," Arthur says.

Brady laughs. "Look, man, I'm going to let you stay with no complaints, all right? You are the landlord. Just fix my fucking shower head."

****

Brady is easygoing, and Southern California is easygoing--dead of winter and the sun blinkers out for only a few days at a time, sky a cool gray at its worst, sowing a thick and clarifying rain.

Arthur isn't easy-going, not really, but he adapts like he's learned to do in almost any situation. He remembers just how rigid he isn't.

****

When he worked with Cobb, Arthur handled almost everything. What Cobb did do, though, was find the jobs. He had a network that ran deep, and he kept them both busy, leaving a gap of a few days, maybe, between one job and the next. He had been motivated to make money. Arthur hadn't had any time off, really, in a long time.

"Dude, so what do you do?" Brady asks over breakfast one day. "Besides own my house, I mean. What is your profession?"

"I keep busy."

Brady laughs, wipes some milk off his chin. "You're an enigma, friend." He puts his bowl and spoon into the sink with a clatter. "Look, Arthur. I'm going to have a BBQ here next Saturday. You should come, but invite someone, okay? I need, like...reassurances that you're not a sociopath." He claps Arthur on the shoulder.

****

Arthur goes running in the mornings. He pulls on long athletic pants, good shoes, an undershirt. It's misting a little, and goosebumps rise on his skin for the first ten minutes, and then he's sweating. He licks his lips and tastes salt.

It's six, and very quiet. A car rushes past him once in a great while. He makes it to the beach, and he sits on the fence along a stretch of sand. He cools down, and as his heart rate slows, he becomes slowly aware of a pain at his stomach. When he looks down, he sees a bloom of blood. He's not sure when he got cut. He takes off his shirt, uses it to press against the wound.

The sun breaks through the clouds. He can feel the new warmth of it across his bare shoulders.

****

They hadn't worked with Eames often, but when they did it was for jobs that ran for a long stretch of time.

They went out for drinks in Montreal once. This was after Cobb's shock-and-awe campaign designed to convince anyone who was paying attention that he was the best extractor in their business, but not long after.

Eames had been laughing at him. Arthur doesn't remember why, exactly, but he remembers the way Eames looked doing it, eyes amused, his shirt sleeves pushed up around his elbows. Then Eames' phone rang, and he looked down to see who it was, went serious before answering, flicking an apologetic look over at Arthur.

"Hullo," he said. "Oui, in Montreal." He smiled. "That's the extent of my French and you know it." He listened. "Yes, things are fine. It's work." The smile growing. "Okay," he said, quietly. "Alright. Sweetheart, I have to go. I'm with somebody." He laughed. "I need the warmth of a body next to me, of course. Can you fault me? Okay, I do have to go. Okay. Bye then." Eames pocketed his phone, sighed, took a sip of his drink. "Sorry about that."

"It's fine," Arthur said. "I didn't know you were seeing someone."

"Gina," Eames said. "What about you, Arthur? I believe we've come to the locker room portion of our evening."

Arthur shook his head. "No, I'm not--things have been busy."

Eames looked at him. "You aren't actually an extension of Cobb," Eames told him. "No need to adopt his celibacy."

Arthur laughed. "Who said anything about celibacy?"

Eames grinned. "That's a lad."

****

They walked back to their hotel, mostly in silence, three blocks down. The warm glow of lights spilling from doorways everywhere. People moving in groups, laughing.

"Why do you work with Cobb?" Eames asked. "You're young. What keeps you with him?"

"Why not work with him?" Arthur asked. "My reputation grows with his."

Eames's brow furrowed. "People will begin to think your defining trait is loyalty."

"So?"

"I don't think it's loyalty keeping you with Cobb." Eames lit a cigarette. "It's a misconception, is all."

Arthur smiled. "Don't worry, Mr. Eames, I'm well aware that you're the smartest boy in the room."

****

Cobb calls on Monday. "Hey," he says. "I need you to do something for me." No preamble.

"What is it?" Arthur asks, snapping to.

Cobb sighs. "Eames called in a favor, but I can't come through. Will you go to his P.O. Box in Los Angeles and pick up a package he's expecting? I'd do it quick; he sounded like he was up shit creek."

"Yeah, fine." Arthur grabs a jacket, opens the safe he'd installed under the floorboards in his closet. "Can you text me the details?"

"Done. Arthur, thank you."

"It's nothing, Dom."

"And take a gun."

"What an excellent reminder."

Dom huffs out a laugh. "Hey, wait. Arthur. How are you? What've you been up to?"

Arthur frowns, searching the room for the holster he could have sworn he'd hung in the closet. "Look, do you want me to tell you about my daily routine or get off my ass and get your errand done?"

"I want you to tell me about your daily routine," Cobb says.

Arthur straightens. "Oh."

"Do you start your day with a healthy breakfast?"

Arthur laughs. "Dom, I have to go," he says. It's nicer than he'd expected, hearing from him.

****

It takes him two hours to get through traffic, and when he arrives at the post office, he realizes he won't have the time or shelter to pick the lock of the P.O. Box without drawing suspicion. "Shit," he says. He gets in line to speak with the employee behind the counter, puts on a harried expression, tries to decide the best way to cajole the man into helping him.

Wheedling is not his strong suit. Eames owes him.

****

Arthur picks up a tail on his way home, and only realizes halfway to Costa Mesa. He pulls off the freeway. They're in an industrial section of some town: warehouses, big rigs galore. Arthur pulls into a mostly-empty parking lot, leaves the car idling and ducks around the corner of a flat of offices.

Headlights cut across the lot a few minutes later and Arthur listens to car doors slamming, to the step of shoes moving away.

Three, two, then Arthur walks back to the lot. They'd left the driver behind, and Arthur waves with both hands at him, jogs toward his car. "Hey," he says, sounding friendly. "Excuse me, can you help me out?" He makes sure to stay out of the light.

The man rolls down the window, and Arthur reaches in, slams his head into the steering wheel--twice to be sure--and then shoots out all four tires.

He's back on the road before the rest of his pursuing detail returns. He drops the car off at John Wayne airport, picks up another at Avis. It's a Prius. Quiet. Nice.

****

When he gets home, Brady says, "Dude, where have you been?" He's playing some video game in bare feet. The noise of simulated warfare. "Did you eat?" He looks up at the lack of response. "Arthur?" He shrugs, turns back to the TV. "I made jambalaya. Grab some, there's plenty."

Arthur goes to the kitchen, fills a bowl, then goes back to the living room. He sits on the arm of the couch; watches Brady navigate a soldier through swampy terrain. He takes a bite. "This is really good."

"Yeah?" Brady grimaces. "It's salty, right? I was gonna get some tomatoes at the farmer's market, but I got lazy. Not my best."

"No, it's incredible. Thanks." Arthur sighs, leans back against the wall. He lets his eyes close for a second.

"You seem beat, man."

Arthur opens his eyes again. Brady's distracted, concentrating mostly on the game, but has his head tilted back toward Arthur, ready to half-listen. Arthur takes another bite of the jambalaya, then says, "My job it's--you have to stay on your toes. I forgot how quickly I can get off my game if I'm not focusing."

"Sounds rough. I'd go out of my mind."

Arthur laughs. "Yeah."

Brady sets off an explosive, then grins, satisfied, at the MISSION ACCOMPLISHED that stamps itself across the screen. He holds onto the controller with one hand, slaps Arthur's knee with the other. "Stay sane, friend," he says.

"That's the goal," Arthur says.

"And look, if you ever want to switch careers--" Brady spreads his arms. "You know where to come for guidance."

Arthur's phone rings, then. It's Eames. "I have to take this."

Brady waves him off.

Arthur raises the bowl again in thanks, then goes upstairs, answers the phone. "Hey, Eames."

"Arthur, how did things go?" Eames asks. Cobb was right; he sounds frayed.

"How did you find trouble so quickly? It's been less than a month since the Fischer job."

"Who says I found trouble?" Eames asks.

"I have your package. I had to lose a team."

Eames groans. "Alright. Can you hold onto it? I'll be there tomorrow, if everything goes well."

"How alert should I be, Eames? Are these guys going to look for me?"

"Did you piss them off?" Eames asks.

"I knocked out their driver and disabled their rental."

"How upset would you be if you lost the deposit on your rental car?"

Arthur shrugs. "Not very."

"There you are. I'll be there soon."

"Don't bring menace into my life," Arthur says.

Eames laughs. "Who was it that called you into my little job in the first place, Arthur? Shall I spell his name for you? It ends in a double 'b'."

"I'm just saying be careful."

Eames sighs. "Yes, but if you'd say it more sweetly."

****

There's always a point on their longer jobs where Eames begins to ignore Arthur's weekly updates, the files that he hands Eames every Monday.

In Sana'a, Arthur said, "There's information in there you need to know. Your files are a third as thick as those going to the rest of the team because I filter yours down to only what I think is most crucial. Fucking read it."

"I've reached my saturation point, Arthur. Truly."

"You need these details."

"I don't." Eames stood firm. "At the risk of sounding incredibly pretentious, forgery is an art, not a science. I have what I need."

Arthur loomed over Eames. He flipped open the folder. "This is a fire escape Pankti added to the bank. It's only accessible from the sixth floor. The fifth floor is blank space. If you take the elevator there, it will open onto nothing. These are details you need to know that have nothing to do with your role and everything to do with your job. Read it."

Eames leaned back in his chair, slouching, staring up at Arthur. He'd been chewing on a toothpick. Finally, he said, "I have a massive headache. Can I read this later or are you going to stand there and insist on watching me read it now?"

Arthur studied him. The tightness around his eyes. The unsteady rolling of the toothpick between his lips. Arthur clicked his jaw, then dragged a chair over and sat. "Close your eyes. Listen. The kick will be scheduled for twenty minutes, signaled by a recording of Piaf--"

Eames had closed his eyes. He'd listened. Arthur saw the tightness ease, and when Eames lifted his hand and let his fingers rest on Arthur's wrist, Arthur continued to read, no change in his voice.

****

Saturday morning, Brady knocks quietly at Arthur's door.

"Come in," Arthur says.

Brady opens the door, peeks his head in. "Hey, I'm sorry. Can I put my wetsuit on your balcony?"

Arthur nods, sits up in bed, watches Brady cross the distance. He rubs at his eyes. "Did you go surfing?"

"Yup." Brady comes back inside. "Thanks, man." He slides the glass door closed, then turns back to Arthur. "Barbecue’s tonight. You gonna be around? I mean, I want you to be around. You should be."

Arthur nods. "I'll be here. I cleaned your grill yesterday and bought some quick-lighting coal. Bacon, too."

"Dude, I am glad to know you," Brady says, grinning. "Who're you bringing?"

Arthur sighs. "I don't know."

"It's a rule, buddy. Invite someone."

Arthur wonders, quick, how he'd found himself living this kind of life.

****

It pains Arthur to imagine Cobb at a barbeque thrown by Brady. It pains Arthur to imagine Cobb's thoughts on his current living situation. On his current life situation.

He calls Mackenzie. "You live around here, right?"

"Arthur," she says. "If this is Phase A in your elaborate plan to sweep me off my feet, let me warn you that I'm not in a hurry to find a man, I'm extremely confident and happy with my life, and I am not a cheap date."

"Thank you; I'll adjust my plan of attack accordingly."

"It's just that you should know," she says. "I'm a pretty big deal."

"Understood."

"I dated a prince once."

"This is getting over-the-top."

"He was the prince of the moon. The entire moon," she says.

****

He picks Mackenzie up at her apartment. When she comes to the door, she takes him in, then pulls him into a hug. "You know this is only the third time we've seen each other in person?" she asks, holding onto him.

She says, "Look at that, you really are more than just a voice."

****

There are more people at the barbeque than he'd expected. It's a party, and the sun, as if summoned by collective good will, shimmers against blue sky--offering light, if not warmth. There's still a bite in the air.

Arthur introduces Mackenzie around--Brady says, "Hey now, lady friend,"--but thirty minutes in, and he's feeling...out of his depth. This hasn't been his world for a long time. It's strange to know that this is what other lives could be like.

He goes out onto his balcony; looks down at the front door, watching people come in and out. He lights a cigarette, leans his elbows against the railing.

"Bad habit," comes a voice from below, and to his left.

Arthur finds him. Hands in his pockets, in corduroys and a sweater. Still heavily stubbled. Still Eames, squinting into the sun. "You made it," he says.

Eames presses a hand to his heart. "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair."

Arthur flicks his cigarette butt at him.

****

He gives Eames the package. "What's in it?" he asks.

"Hell if I know," Eames says. "I don't open anything on retrieval jobs anymore."

Arthur smiles, remembering Palermo. "How long are you in California?"

"Another week."

"I would offer a place here, but--"

Eames grin comes slow, spreads wide. "Believe me, Arthur." His gaze travels over the balcony, taking in the noise of the people below, the wetsuit drying on the railing, the jeans Arthur's wearing, his bare feet. "I wouldn't stay anywhere else."

****

He introduces Eames to Brady and then Mackenzie, and then nobody else. It's better to limit the points of exposure. Brady's had a bit to drink. "You're fucking CIA," Brady says to Arthur, immediately after shaking Eames' hand. He grips Arthur's shoulder. "This guy's James fucking Bond. Just tell me the truth, man."

Eames smirks. "Arthur, you're keeping this poor boy in the dark? Aren't the two of you shacking up?"

"Yes," Brady says. "We're fucking shacking up. Tell me. This was supposed to be a goddamn single."

****

Mackenzie is vegetarian, but she'd made a huge pot of her mother's laucki chana dal for the barbeque, and the thing got licked clean.

By nine, most everyone has left. Eames is playing poker with Brady and a couple of his friends, and Arthur sits in the grass in the backyard with a bottle of beer, Mackenzie next to him.

"I think I'm going to leave my job," she tells him.

Arthur's surprised. "Really? Why?"

She shrugs. "It's not what I want to do anymore. I took it on because I needed the money, and then stayed because I was good at it, but--I think my time there is just up, you know?"

Arthur nods. He finishes his beer.

"I'm glad you invited me today. That we're friends."

Arthur smiles. "Me, too."

"My mom says that people come into our lives for seasons. Like. Some are lifelong, and others are for a little while. Like, college, or high school. And then others are in your life for moments."

Arthur tilts his head up, watches the moon fade into place. The smoke from the dying grill clouding the sky.

"We probably won't be friends forever, will we?" she asks.

Arthur shakes his head. "No," he says. "But I'm glad I know you now."

****

Brady has a sleeping bag he lets Eames borrow. "Look, man. The pillow's built in," he says to Eames, proudly.

Arthur grins. "Beat that for service."

****

After they've both washed up, after they get into bed and the lights come off, Eames says. "Incredible, Arthur. It's as if you live to defy expectation."

Arthur smiles up at the ceiling. "How do you know this isn't a job?"

"Is it?" Eames demands. "Brady lived in Beirut for three years; did you know that?"

****

Arthur had taken a job in Mombasa. "It'll take you a few days, at most," Cobb told him. "If you nail this, Cobol will drop consideration of the Nabokov team for this next job. Can you go alone?"

So he went alone.

Eames was on the team. "What the fuck are you doing here?" Arthur asked.

"I live here," Eames replied, smiling. "Lovely to see you, too."

****

Anyway. Eames ended up running this guy down, vaulting across rooftops in a simulacrum of a half-dozen Arabian cities. Arthur noted the direction the target was heading, then went through the map laid out in his head, pinpointed the one alleyway that he would most likely be funneled toward.

Arthur strode through markets, picked up a custard apple and sliced it in hand with his pocketknife. He took his place in the alleyway, eating through slices. He heard pounding footsteps, bit the apple's flesh, holding it in his mouth, then conjured up a bat, swung hard into the stomach of the man who came sprinting around the corner.

He had the bat on his shoulder when Eames came into view.

"Holy hell," Eames said.

"Apple?" Arthur offered.

****

When they woke up, Eames came over with purpose. He put both hands on either side of Arthur's head, leaned in and kissed him.

His lips against Arthur's. Arthur sucked, a little, at the bottom one. He couldn't help it.

When Eames pulled away, Arthur gripped his chair's armrests, said, "What the fuck was that?"

"Isn't it funny?" Eames asked. "I could swear I taste apples." He turned away. "Up, now. We should move."

****

The thing that Arthur keeps trying to remember is that people are never only one thing. They change. What doesn't, what is more constant, is who you think someone to be.

"If you want to get abstract about it," Eames said once, "I could never truly be another person. Luckily, I only ever have to be who someone else thinks you to be. Simpler to be someone's wife, or brother, or friend. Different from being Arthur, or Thomas, or Jana."

"So if you went into my mind and forged Cobb, it would be a representation of who I think Cobb to be? Cobb-as-friend rather than a catch-all imitation?"

"Accurate enough. Though to the outside observer, Cobb may more truly be a man made selfish by grief, to you--Yes, I would go with Cobb as friend, as mentor, as many good and whitewashed things."

"Christ," Arthur said. He stood up. "We don't have time for this."

Eames drummed his fingers on the tabletop. "If only someone would pay you to indulge in some introspection," he called after him, anger afloat upon the surface.

****

In the morning, Arthur goes downstairs and finds Brady half in his wetsuit, his surfboard propped up next to the front door.

"Your buddy's cool," Brady says.

Arthur stands on the second-to-bottom step. "I'll let him know you think so. It's okay that he's here, right?"

Brady shrugs. "Fine with me."

"You're going to go surfing?"

"Yup. You wanna come?"

"I might meet you there," Arthur says.

"Cool."

Brady turns to go, but Arthur says, "Brady. I wanted to say thank you."

Brady grins. "Hey, no worries. One of the better roommate situations I've ever had." He scratches at his nose, winks. "I'll see you in a few, maybe."

****

He wakes Eames up, packs the contents of his safe, the few changes of clothes he has.

"Where are we going?" Eames asked.

"I have a safe house in Billings. We should leave before whoever's after you catches up."

"I didn't leave anyone behind me to catch up with me."

Arthur nods. "Good. Still."

****

They decide to go their separate ways at the airport. Eames has commitments to keep in California. "Why Montana?" he asks. They're sitting at an airport bar; Eames's fingers running around the rim of his cup.

"No reason. It's a house. Montana is big."

Eames shakes his head. "You know, people have been asking after you. Do you want a job?"

"Should I take a job?" Arthur asks. He props his feet on the bottom rung of his stool. Lets the raised heels of his dress shoes catch.

"You should do whatever you want to do." The sentiment sincere.

****

In Montana, he calls his asset management offices, and when the voice on the other end is unfamiliar, Arthur hangs up and books a flight out to Japan.

****

Arthur books a room at a hotel Saito owns. On the third day, he walks into his suite and Saito is there, sitting at Arthur's desk, drinking tea. He looks up when he hears Arthur come in. "Good, Arthur." He picks up the pot of tea, pours another cup. "Sit down."

Arthur sits.

"I have a proposition for you."

Arthur takes a sip of his tea. "I thought you were paying for the extraction I'm working on now."

Saito nods. "I am, but it's not important. I am only curious about Hong Kong's financial practices." He leans back in his chair. "Come work for me, Arthur."

****

Arthur gets a letter from Eames.

Dear Arthur,

It's summer in Australia.

I've joined a rugby team here. I'm aching in places I never used to before. Thirty isn't old, but it isn't young either, is it?

I suspect you know how to surf.

Eames

****

Saito expects every skill Arthur has in the dreamscape to transfer over to the waking world, so Arthur makes sure that they do.

It's different from working with Cobb. He outlines all the ways that it is. In this case, Arthur is the linchpin of his every team. In this case, Arthur feels like he can say no to certain jobs. In this case, the stakes are not heightened with the sense of loss, of fatherly guilt.

Saito has a son. Arthur meets him at the family estate, a plot of land at the base of a mountain that has been handed down for generations. Kento is six, and serious. When he breaks into a smile, his face is transformed. Saito spends hours with him.

Kanae is lovely, which Arthur expected, and warm, which Arthur did not. She's tall, but she worries about her weight, always spooning out half of the rice she's served at dinner. Once, Arthur comes round a corner and finds her and Saito talking quietly, Saito's arms around her waist, her hands on his chest as she stares him in the eye. Her fingers catch where his shirt is open, around the lapel. He's nodding. He curses, looking away. He pretends not to see Arthur.

Later, Arthur goes over the plans for a scheduled extraction while Saito sits with Kento on his lap. Totoro on the TV screen.

When they've finished, Saito says, abruptly, "I'm a good father, but not a good husband."

Arthur says, "We do our best."

"There are things I was raised to believe were my right."

Arthur laughs. "I pray to God you've never used that line on your wife."

Saito smiles, rueful. He dips a finger into his son's sock, tugs at the cotton.

****

He gets an e-mail from Brady.

Dude, you can't just give me a condo. What the fuck is property tax? Tell me, man. You're a spook.

Arthur replies: boo.

****

He sends a letter to Eames. He feels like he's obligated to, so he puts a pen to paper.

Eames,

I've surfed once in the last ten years, but before that. Yes, I know how to surf.

Saito has a family, which I knew, but I don't think I could have imagined what it would be to see him with them. It brings him down to earth in a way that defies the distance Cobb falls when he's with Philippa and James.

I ate whale the other day without knowing.

I think it can be hard to be good. Harder to be good to someone else, always.

Eames, be safe.

Arthur

****

Saito had security, but Arthur winnows the team down, has two men living in Saito's home. Better to keep bodyguards close, to draw them into the intimacy of family. They'll sacrifice more for you, and more instinctively this way.

Kanae comes home one day; Arthur is in the front room, ready to step out, and he watches her press the door closed with both hands, turn the locks one by one.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

She starts. "It's nothing." Her English is gently accented. "Really, it was nothing. I felt frightened. There was a car that was behind me, I thought all day, but." She laughs, embarrassed.

"It's good you told me," he says. He reaches out but doesn't touch her, letting his hand hover over her elbow.

"I worry too much, I think." She's still smiling, but she looks down at the floor. She takes Arthur's hand, squeezes it. "My husband is a dangerous man. It's hard to forget, even when he is not here." She doesn't sound scared. Weary, maybe.

****

Dear Arthur,

When I was sixteen, I had a dog that I was bloody awful to. I wasn't violent towards it, but I didn't walk him. Mum insisted I keep him outside, so I did, and there were days I only went out there to feed him. I gave him away, finally. Relieved myself of a burden. He used to whimper, right outside my bedroom window.

I told that to a girl once--Gina, do you remember her? She told me later that that was the beginning of the end. I had to laugh.

It's much easier to talk to you when I can't see your lifted eyebrow. Your thinning mouth.

I almost took a bullet in the shoulder yesterday, but then I didn't, because I remembered you told me to be safe. Handy, that.

I would tell you to be safe, but I think you might take it as a disparagement of your capability. I remain confident in your ability.

Eames

****

An alarm wakes Arthur up at four a.m. He jackknifes up, pulls on pants and shoes, grabs his automatic.

He's padding down a hallway when he hears a scream. It sends him racing to Saito's bedroom, safety undone, and when he bursts in, one of the bodyguards is already there, restraining Saito who is shouting furiously in Japanese.

At the sight of Arthur, he switches seamlessly to English. "The bulk of your pay does not go towards securing your protection for me, but for my family. Do your job." His eyes wild.

Arthur runs out. On his way to Kento's bedroom, he slows down, then kicks the door open, shoots the man-on-watch directly across.

Arthur takes a shot in the shoulder from a man to his right, and the shock of it makes him drop his gun. Arthur swears, picks up a chair and rams it toward the man. It takes three shots splintering through heavy wood before Arthur pins him with the legs. Arthur drops the chair, grabs the man's shoulders and brings his knee to crotch, cracks the man's nose with his elbow. The man drops to the floor and Arthur retrieves his gun, shoots him in the knee.

Arthur knocks on the door of the locked closet. The splintering wood. "Kanae. Are you okay? Is Kento okay?"

There is the quietness of held breath--a weight in the air--and then Kanae keens and Kento cries, and Arthur, he feels the pain in his shoulder: a burst of pent-up sensation, overwhelming and red.

****

Arthur, he dreams for the first time in a very long time.

****

When he wakes up, Saito is at his bedside. He's wearing glasses, looking down at a computer screen.

Arthur clears his throat, and Saito closes the laptop, straightens in his seat. "You're awake."

"How long?"

"Half a day. It's good that you were unconscious for that time. It allowed me the opportunity to think through my actions. My first instinct was to fire you."

"My first instinct is to quit."

Saito smiles.

"Well. Something worth considering, then." He stands. He puts his hand on Arthur's chest. "You are an asset, Arthur. I hope we work together again." He pats Arthur twice. "Thank you."

****

Which is how he finds himself in Chicago, in a small, furnished apartment. He'd kept company since the Fischer job, not by design, but it had happened. Before then, he'd been used to Cobb, in the room across the hall, or next to his. In the same building, at least.

He writes a quick e-mail to Eames.

I had a dream of you in the subject line. Blank inside.

****

One thing Arthur has learned is that people are not predictable, that they are constantly mutable; shifting, in the course of a day, between several faces. Ariadne, who could spend hours worrying about her thesis--"Arthur, you're assuming that the current level of consumption is widely-sustainable. Incorporating small-scale organic farming into green urban spaces is well and good, but in a city like Los Angeles, where those green spaces aren't prevalent, you need to rezone the entire space."--is also the Ariadne who can shape a bishop with a lathe.

Eames had her hold it up for him. "You left a bump, there."

"So I know it's mine," she said.

He nodded. "It's well-crafted. Teach me how to do that."

"Sure," she said, laughing. "But first, what’s your totem?"

Eames tutted. "There, now, sweetheart. Where's the fun if not in discovery?"

She rolled her eyes. "Seriously off-putting. I'm not sure if it was the 'sweetheart', or the forced mystery."

He laughed. "It's my lack of reciprocity. A character flaw." He put out a hand for her to shake. "Apologies."

Ariadne, who looked at the dreamscape with the joy of discovery, still. Who was still developing the composure that would come with experience. The fear that had bristled through her before Arthur distracted her with a kiss.

In the plane, before they landed, Arthur leaned over, whispered, "It was a nice kiss, though."

"What?" She looked over, confused, then blushed as the memory returned. "Oh. Right."

He grinned. "You forgot. I take offense."

Her blush grew deeper, but she shrugged, nonchalant. "You kissed me like I'm chaste, Arthur." She met his eyes. "I'm not chaste."

He tries not to forget after that. How revealing a kiss can be. How deceptive the receipt of one.

****

He's healing, but in fits and starts. He goes to a doctor, a real one, with an office and a receptionist.

When the nurse unwraps the wound, her eyebrows lift, but she doesn't say anything. The doctor goes, "Whoa. How did you come by a bullet wound?"

Arthur stares him down. He could answer, but this is more fun.

****

Arthur,

I've left Australia.

London, which used to be free of any inkling of you, has taken a turn with the winter; snow on every surface. Inescapable, really.

I've been informed that you took a bullet wound. Well done. I suppose this should shake my faith in your intrinsic ability to take care of yourself, but you're alive, and I'm glad for that. God knows why.

I can't quite hear your voice when you write. I don't know the why of that either.

Eames

****

Saito calls. "How is your recovery going?"

"Fine. I'm almost there. You know you don't have to foot my bills, right? I can't buy airlines, but I'm what most people would consider wealthy."

Saito laughs. "It's upon the insistence of my wife."

"How is Kanae?"

"She's fine." Saito pauses. "I am attempting to woo her again, I suppose."

"Hey, pull your usual line." Arthur asks. "Tell her men have needs. Bam, marriage repaired."

"The triviality with which you see me now is disquieting," Saito says.

****

There's a swimming pool at his gym, heated. Arthur likes to go--he hasn't used the PASIV in a long time, and the splash of one medium to another, from air to the cool hiss of water, offers a kind of comfort.

He has a leanness suited for swimming, and he pulls through the water with long, steady strokes, and after two laps he feels streamlined. Knifing through the water, coming up for air in steady beats.

Long expanses of the world muffled, the rhythmic splash of air. Little breaks of clarity.

There's a time for everything.

****

He calls Eames. "Can you come to Chicago?"

"Is that where you are?" Eames asks.

Arthur rolls his eyes. "Yes, that's where I am. Or." He fiddles with his duffel bag, makes sure he has his boxing gloves, his hand wraps. "I could come to you, if you want. I mean, if that's easier." Arthur takes a deep breath, straightens. "I can come to you, if you can't get away there."

"Why am I coming, Arthur?"

Arthur waits. "I'd just. I want to see you." He feels unarmored, and his legs tense, ready to flee.

"Can I ask you something?" Eames says.

"You can ask," Arthur says.

"Why were you living with that Brady character? Why Saito after him?"

Arthur scratches at his brow. He wipes sweat off his nose. "I showed up and they let me stay," he says.

"Is that all it takes?" Eames asks.

****

He has a lot of nervous energy, lately. There's a job that he's been contracted for, but it doesn't kick in, really, for another week or two yet, and Arthur remains in preliminary preparations, gathering the information that is most available to him.

He's been doing a lot of boxing. It's not his favorite style of fighting, but there are times when the brutal efficacy of it can't be denied. He should get better at it.

He's sparring with a partner, landing blows to his torso, thud, thud, thud. He takes a hit to his headgear, shakes off the ringing and steps in close, jabs at his opponent's chin. He's dripping sweat, and taps at his cheeks, forcing himself to keep his hands up.

"Hey," he says, tugging his mouth guard out. "Can you just throw a flurry at me? My slipping's weak."

His opponent nods. "Yeah, can we take a break, though? I need some water, and you've got company."

When Arthur turns, he sees Eames, leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. He grins. "Hey."

Eames lifts a hand. "Look at you," he says.

Arthur pulls his headgear off, ruffles at his hair. "You got here quick."

Eames shrugs. "There was reason to." He comes closer to the ring, and Arthur sees that he's already wrapped his hands, that he's found gear somewhere. "You're a partner down," he says.

****

Eames is a couple of weight classes above him, but Arthur makes up the difference by not adhering as strictly to traditional boxing rules as he could.

He takes a hard hook and returns with a cross-counter. Eames comes in tight, a slow stalk, and Arthur stays high, pushes off the balls of his feet, ducks under a jab and catches Eames' arm, propels him back against the ropes.

They're both breathing heavy, and Eames chuckles. "You're cheating," he says.

Arthur shrugs, and Eames laughs, taps Arthur's back with his glove. "Let's take a break, shall we?" He keeps Arthur close.

****

Eames kisses Arthur, but this time he sees it coming. He wraps his arms around Eames' waist and takes the kiss, and when Eames goes to pull away, Arthur doesn't let him.

****

In bed, Eames has his arm curled around Arthur's neck. He has his fingers in Arthur's hair.

"What was your dream of?" he asks.

Arthur turns into him. The lights are off, and the room is dark. Shadows across Eames' face, cast by his nose, his lashes. "What dream?" he asks.

Eames waits, his chest rising and falling.

Arthur sighs. He rolls onto his back, staring up. He puts his hand behind his head. "It was after the whole Saito uprising. By the way, you don't want to kidnap Saito's kid; the man will flay you alive."

"Circling," Eames says.

Arthur blows a breath out. "It was a dream," he says. "You were there. Chased by someone, for the usual myriad of reasons. You were talking, going on about some book you'd read, and you didn't see the man taking aim, but I did."

"You took a bullet for me. In your dream." Eames rests his hand on Arthur's hip.

"I think so," Arthur says. He shakes his head. "I can't remember. All I remember is being on top of you. The way you were looking at me. There might have been blood, maybe."

"Quite a gesture," Eames says.

"Easy to make when you're sleeping," Arthur laughs.

****

He left out that the dream made him think of this. Made him remember:

In Montreal, the extraction they'd been working had gone smoothly, for the most part. The team gets caught in an explosion but they'd extracted the information they'd needed already, and most of the team is killed and woken up instantly.

Arthur wasn't so lucky. His face drained white at the gaping hole in his thigh, and he scrabbled for his gun, fighting off shock.

Eames was laughing, shrapnel studding his chest. "Jesus Christ," he said. "Jesus Christ."

Arthur grabbed his gun, and shot him, then pressed the barrel to his temple, thought, I could want to be good to him. Someday.

****

Arthur plans out a letter while Eames is sleeping. It's easier to tell him some things on paper. It puts Arthur's thoughts in an order that they typically lose, when faced with Eames himself.

He would start with Dear Eames.

He would say--

He would say--

He would say that it's easy to feel unmoored. He would say that life never really seems to present him with crossroads, only people to catch a hold of, for a short time or another. He would say he could make peace with nuclear winter, even, with Eames at his side. That life could be easy and full of surf and sun, and only when Eames showed up, would it feel complete.

He would say it makes him feel like a different person, wanting something so much. Wanting so badly, to be good.

He would say love.

inception fic: plate tectonics (1/1)

indysaur — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 06:11:22 GMT

Plate Tectonics
Inception: Arthur/Eames
Rating: PG
5,637 words
Arthur is forced to move in with Eames. The world moves.
Unbeta'ed: Sorry! All mistakes are mine. I just had to get something out.

Arthur is the worst roommate in the entire world. "This is a fact," Eames declares.

"Opinion," Arthur says, "unless you can prove your awareness of every living situation on our seven continents."

"You silly fuck," Eames says.

"This degenerated quickly," Yusuf opines.

****

Arthur had shown up at Eames' flat in Mombasa, with a bag slung over his shoulder.

"Jesus," Eames said. "Even your carry-all is poncy."

"You really like it?" Arthur asked and brushed past Eames on his way inside.

Eames closed the door behind Arthur, turned and crossed his arms. "It must be an awfully tight scrape for you to lower yourself to staying at my humble abode."

Arthur had already shrugged off his jacket, and was booting up Eames' laptop. "One of my many enemies is after me. It's nice that this one's putting the energy into making a passable attempt on my life. Keeps me on my toes." The words flippant, but Arthur is wound as tight as Eames has ever seen him.

"You can stay here for one week," Eames said. He held up a finger. "One."

"Seven days will be more than enough to clear this up." He squinted at the screen, nodded in Eames' general direction. "Thank you kindly."

****

"How long has it been?" Eames asks Yusuf.

"17 days." Yusuf pours a cup of tea, blows on it a bit before passing it over to Eames.

Eames groans, swallows half the cup, heat searing his throat on its way down.

"Is it such a horror?" Yusuf asks.

"He doesn't shower nearly as often as you might have guessed," Eames says viciously.

****

The truth is, Eames hasn't lived with another person since he skipped out on boarding school. He enjoys his personal space. A man's home should be sacred, a place of freewheeling selfhood. It would be difficult to adjust to just about anybody moving in with him, really. On this particular matter, he is set in his ways to the point of calcification.

Arthur has taken over Eames' living room. He has schematics strung across the back of the couch, a whiteboard mysteriously procured that stands in front of the TV set with surveillance photos held up by magnets. By the fifth day, Eames refuses to navigate the mess gingerly and barrels through, piles of paper be damned. It's a matter of principle, and if it gets Arthur to move out more quickly, well, masha'Allah.

Instead, what happens is that Arthur becomes neater. He slides the whiteboard underneath the couch in the evenings, produces crates in which he stacks folders and pushes them up against the wall. He takes down his schematics every evening and only re-hangs them when Eames has finished banging about the place. It almost makes Eames feel guilty for his silent seething.

"Thank you," he says to Arthur one morning over coffee.

Arthur grimaces. "This is taking me longer than I thought. I should find another place to stay."

Eames tries not to seem too eager. "I know a good hotel."

****

Arthur's hotel room gets shot up within the day. Eames shows up to take a look, strolls past the shattered windows, examines the crater in the wall where the sniper's round had erupted into many, very sharp fragments.

"Jesus Christ," Eames says, curiosity refusing to be dispelled now. "What did you do?"

Arthur is collecting the shells from his own weapon, carefully dropping them into a plastic bag. "Look," he says, frustrated, "is it my fault that the country collapsed so totally? You ask for destabilization, and destabilization is what I deliver."

Eames surveys the ruined room. The air still clearing from the several tear bombs involved in the attack. "This doesn't feel like revenge of the professional kind. This feels personal, dear heart."

Arthur stands, cracks his back. The wound on his shoulder is clotting, oozing dark. "Seduction is a tool," he says smoothly. He seals the Ziploc bag, shakes the many casings. "Fuck," he says, wearied.

****

Arthur moves back in with Eames. His passport has been flagged and Eames agrees that there's no point in running. Better to hunker down in a safe place and get a sense of how long this particular tempest will roil.

Eames briefly considers foisting Arthur off on Yusuf, but Yusuf has been a good and kind friend. Besides, Eames and Arthur are forming a sort of rapport.

Eames has a job of his own that he's working, tailing a poacher who's exporting hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of ivory and rhinoceros horn, but perhaps it isn't of the most vital importance. There are pachyderms at stake, true, but Arthur's life is of some value, too, Eames is sure. He sips his tea, staring at Arthur's suspect board in the morning. For a fairly lethal man, he has one too many living enemies.

He waits until Arthur stirs on the couch, blinks awake. He gestures at the board with his mug, says, "Want help with all this?"

Arthur sits up and runs two hands through his hair. He grunts.

"Speak up, Arthur."

Arthur glares up at Eames. "I'll manage," he says. Then, sighing: "I'll come to you when I hit a wall."

"My breath is bated," Eames says.

****

Eames comes home late one night that week, near four, but Arthur is still awake. He's all askew, stripped down to his undershirt and slacks, barefoot, ink on his lip from the pen he's gnawing down to a nub.

"You're a vision," Eames says. He can't help it.

"Fuck," Arthur says. "Fuck this fucking shit to hell." He pulls a hand over his face.

"Amen," Eames says.

"This is embarrassing." Arthur has his hands on his hips.

"You know," Eames says, stripping the linen shirt off his back as he heads to his bedroom, "I begin to wonder whether this is all an elaborate ploy for you to bask in my admittedly charming presence."

"Yes," Arthur calls after him. "Because it's long been my dream to cohabitate with a man who subsists on a diet of cigarettes and meat pies."

"Ha," Eames says. "I see into the dark recesses of your heart."

****

Yusuf brings a meal over the next evening. He's a more than fair cook, an extension, Eames likes to think, of his background in chemistry.

Arthur tucks in, ravenous, and Eames nods in emphatic agreement with the stew currently in his mouth. He agrees with every delicious point it's making.

"Yusuf," Arthur says. "Let me kiss you on the mouth."

"Are you sure you want to do that, Arthur?" Eames asks. "Isn't that sort of behavior part of what got you into this mess in the first place?"

"Yes, Arthur," Yusuf says. "Heed Eames' advice about self-control and learning from one's mistakes. In these things, he is just spectacularly well-versed."

"Fuck off," Eames says.

"Yusuf, really," Arthur says. He wipes sauce from his chin. "We should be much better friends, I think."

"I fear you may require even more upkeep than the friend I already have," Yusuf says.

"You can afford to have more than one friend," Eames points out.

Yusuf fixes him with an appraising gaze. "Can I?" he asks.

****

Eames is thankful that his flat is, at least, large. He's been at home for the past several days, painting a duplicate of a Chagall that has long been locked away by private collectors. He could steal the real thing, he supposes, but this client isn't paying him enough for that. He'll get a lovely forgery, though.

Arthur is pacing the finish off of Eames' wooden floors, but he's doing it two rooms away. Eames makes sure to close the door and finishes the painting with time to spare. He's kicked open the door and propped up the windows to air out the room and is carefully transferring a partial print onto the frame when Arthur coughs behind him.

Eames pulls the cellophane away easily, then looks back at Arthur. "Yes?"

Arthur leans against the door jamb, hands in his pockets. "Nothing. It looks nice. You're talented."

"I was expecting something more along the lines of constructive criticism," Eames says. "A note that the colors are too dull, or that my line work is a millimeter too thick."

Arthur shrugs. "You're the expert in this field. Why should I presume to know better?"

"It's your job to know more than anyone."

Arthur smiles. "No," he says, looking down at the floor. "It's my job to know what will keep me one step ahead. And even that sometimes I can't do."

Eames stares. "Will wonders never cease," he says.

****

"I think Arthur's decided to take a break," Eames tells Yusuf. He's babysitting the sleepers in Yusuf's backroom, Yusuf's usual decrepit keeper at the dentist.

"What do you mean he's taking a break?" Yusuf asks. He checks the fluid levels of a new client, a man extremely large.

"Exactly what I said. He hasn't set up his ridiculous whiteboard in days. He spent most of yesterday fixing the sink. He told me to ask you to show him how to make nyama choma and ugali. He's taking a break."

Yusuf nods, distracted. "I think this man is using recreational drugs," he announces. "His body is not reacting at all appropriately."

"Should we wake him up?" Eames asks.

"No, I don't think he'll die. Let's see what happens." He takes off his glasses, rubs at the bridge of his nose. "So, Arthur. Will he go back to work, then?"

"Too much to risk taking on a job in the midst of all the sudden color in his life, I think. But who knows? Maybe if he lies low for long enough, his jilted lover will lose interest."

Yusuf rests his hands on the stomach of the man in front of him. "And you think this is a good idea?"

"It's not a bad idea."

"And so he will be living with you indefinitely?" Yusuf looks very skeptical.

"I'll give him three months. And of course he'll pay rent."

"Of course," Yusuf says. "I wonder how long it will be that your detente lasts. Could it be a permanent peace?"

Eames leans back in his chair. "I live in hope," he says.

****

Arthur has time on his hands, but he is also exceptional at finding things to occupy that time, a product of his vast and varied interests. He's made it clear that he is grateful for the sanctuary Eames is providing and does his best to stay out of Eames' hair, especially when Eames is consumed by the delicate art of crafting master dies for American currency, an engraving he is two days late delivering.

Eames throws up his hands around seven, goes out to the restaurant around the corner. Arthur is sitting in the back, feet up on the chair across from him, sitting under a flickering light bulb in a short-sleeved shirt, lightweight pants. He looks admirably native. He also has food on his table.

Eames sits across from him, pushing at Arthur's feet, steals a spoon and dives in. He hasn't eaten since this morning.

"By all means," Arthur drawls.

"Apologies," Eames says. He signals for the waiter, but Arthur pushes his dish closer to Eames.

"No, it's fine. I ordered too much." He picks the newspaper up from where it sits at his side, snaps it open, and folds it neatly by columns. He reads for a little while, letting Eames eat, then asks casually, "Can I offer some advice?"

"I long for it," Eames says.

"Get your dies to your client tomorrow if you want to get paid. The mint's going to announce a redesign on the hundred dollar bill on Friday."

Eames wipes his mouth with a napkin. "Sources say."

Arthur smiles at his paper. "Sources say."

****

Eames gifts Arthur with a present.

"You bought me a cot," Arthur says. His face carefully blank.

"It has to be better for your back than the sofa. I don't even remember how I acquired that sorry piece of furniture."

"Hm," Arthur says. "Thank you." He sits on it, testing the spring, then lies down. His feet hang off the edge.

Eames purses his lips at that. An unanticipated flaw in an otherwise successful display of the depths of his consideration.

Arthur smirks.

"Comfortable?" Eames asks.

"Extremely," Arthur says. He's trying not to laugh. "The height of luxury, Eames. You spoil me."

"Your feet should dangle, actually. It's good for the circulation."

"Oh, I'm aware," Arthur says. "I don't have enough superlatives to accurately sum up my feelings for this cot."

"And to think you thought me boorish once," Eames says, shaking his head.

****

They live, still, distinct lives. Arthur begins his inquiries again and finds some of his accounts frozen, many of his contacts blackmailed or simply paid to keep silent in response to Arthur's probes. It's not debilitating, exactly, and vastly preferable to surprise firefights, but it's enough to be obnoxious. "I don't think I have to stay in Mombasa," Arthur says. "It doesn't make sense that your apartment is somehow particularly mystifying to anyone they'd hire to come after me."

"No," Eames says. "I'd avoid any of your own homes, though. And the hotels you typically frequent."

"Right," Arthur says. He's shaving over the kitchen sink, bare to the waist, while Eames takes apart a broken pocket watch at the table. "I'll look for a place available for sublet. In Chicago, I think. I haven't been to the U.S. in a long time."

Eames chews on his lip as he pries at a tiny, wedged spring. "Just leave a note when you go, love. I worry."

****

Eames gets called out to Harbin for a job. "I dread the ice," he tells Arthur. "The only reason I left England was because of the cold."

"I'm excited to have the place to myself," Arthur replies.

Eames clicks his tongue. "No parties. I like my flat as-is."

"Yes, there is a pure and Spartan sophistication to it." Arthur looks around the place, making a show of taking it all in. "Maybe I'll invite Yusuf over. Have a few boys' nights out."

"Stop trying to steal Yusuf from me," Eames says. "It's painfully unsporting and you'll only embarrass yourself in the end."

"Should we lay a bet?" Arthur asks.

****

In Harbin, Eames follows a Russian bureaucrat around, notching the details of the man's monotonous routine on his belt. One Wednesday night, Mr. Solovyov picks up his petite mistress as always, but instead of taking her for sukiyaki, he has them driven to the ice sculptures set up along the river, massive constructions of frozen water that glow against the black night sky in a Technicolor display.

It's garish, almost, in pink and green and blue, but there's something to be said for that kind of blatancy. The ostentatious trumpeting of beauty. Mr. Solovyov holds his mistress' hand; he settles her fur-lined hat lower on her head to keep her ears warm. They wander through castles and pagodas, quiet under the watchful eyes of gods, of snow-formed goddesses. She kisses him tenderly in a rare bit of shadow, there, under a sphinx.

People can surprise you, Eames remembers. Small sparks of romance, of pathos in even the most humdrum of lives.

They leave, eventually, but Eames doesn't follow. He stays at his perch, watching the sun rise, the colored spotlights clunk off, transparent monuments of ice transforming the dawn into a refracting, uncageable light.

****

Once, early on, Arthur had said to him, "Do you ever think that what we do is wasteful?"

"How so?"

"I don't know." Arthur stared, hard, at the scene below them, the both of them standing at the tip of a cliff. "We could do beautiful things in these dreams. Something really...breath-taking, instead of this."

Eames tore his gaze from the explosions, the unfurling of smoke and fire below. He could see militarized projections rushing toward them over razed ground. "We'll have to indulge this dewy-eyed streak of yours later, Arthur," Eames clipped out. He dreamed up a flamethrower. "I need you on your game, please."

Arthur had snapped to attention. His face going smoothly planed. "Of course," he said, then grabbed Eames high up on his arm and kicked off the ground, taking them both plummeting toward the earth; the last thing Eames sees, Arthur's teeth, gritted tight.

****

Yusuf picks Eames up at Moi International. He's wearing a black hat of some sort, which Eames assumes is supposed to be an attempt at a chauffeur’s cap, and is holding up an emphatically unflattering photo of Eames, in which he is both drunk and armed.

"Hilarious," Eames says, snatching the photo from Yusuf's grasp.

"I thought so," Yusuf says smugly.

He reaches for Eames' bag, but Eames slaps his hand away irritably. "Enough with the pantomime, I didn't sleep a wink on the flight."

Yusuf shrugs, doffs the cap and tucks it under his arm. "Do you still want me to drive, or would you rather?" he asks once they arrive at the car.

"You do," Eames says, throwing his bag into the back, then settling into the passenger's seat. Once they're on the road, he asks, fiddling with the radio, "So is Arthur gone?"

"No," Yusuf says. "Did you want him to be?"

"I had dared to imagine the possibility," Eames says, blithe.

Yusuf shrugs. "I think you might be stuck with him for a while longer yet." He cuts a glance over to Eames, slumped in his seat. "He checked into another hotel, caught a beating in the stairwell a few nights ago."

Eames sits up. "How bad a beating?" he asks.

Yusuf brakes for a stoplight. "It's Arthur," he says, infuriatingly oblique.

****

Arthur is mostly fine. He has a few bruised ribs, two sprained toes, a split lip and dark, yellowing blossoms under the skin over his cheekbone, along his sides and thigh. The kind of pummeling he's been trained to take.

Eames checks the stitches Yusuf had run, tightens the bandages around Arthur's chest, takes a satisfaction in hearing Arthur hiss when he pulls. When he's done, he asks, "Did you shoot them?"

Arthur huffs. "Contrary to popular belief, I don't constantly carry around a firearm." He touches lightly at his lip, freshly bleeding again where he'd bitten it. "I knifed them," he says, enunciating, eyes carefully blank.

****

Arthur wants to spar, in the weeks following. When he asks the first time, Eames rolls his eyes and digs his fingers into the massive bruise on Arthur's right thigh, smirks when Arthur shouts, leg collapsing under him. Eames finishes off his piece of chapati, sucks a crumb off his thumb, then pats Arthur's shoulder reassuringly as he walks off.

The second time, Eames goes for Arthur's ribs, but Arthur grabs Eames' wrist, pushes Eames' hand backward--as if he's trying to make it touch Eames' forearm--and drives Eames to the ground. He has a foot planted in Eames' crotch, ready to slam down then asks, politely, for a proper sparring session.

So now they fight regularly. Eames uses every advantage--out of habit, really, an ingrained tactic when taking on an opponent that might outclass you--and abuses Arthur's injuries, steps heavy on the toes he knows are only just recovering. It's not spite; more a reminder to Arthur that he's human, really.

Yusuf watches a few times, when he arrives early for their card game, full of helpful hints for Arthur about Eames' weaknesses. His reattached Achilles. The bullet wound that still aches over his liver.

"Thank you, Yusuf," Arthur says smugly, his knee at the back of Eames' neck.

"It's a sad thing when a friend betrays you," Eames huffs out.

"What can I say?" says Yusuf. "I am all for the underdog."

****

"Right then," Eames says, walking out into the living room in his boxers, "this has gone on long enough."

Arthur's brushing his teeth over the kitchen sink. He spits. "What has?"

Eames crashes onto the couch, tosses the pillow there onto the cot behind him. He tugs a crate over, spreads dossiers across the coffee table. "You have to tell me what you did. This sort of retaliation...Arthur, I don't think you'll be able to wait them out."

Arthur sighs. He gargles water, pats at his mouth with a hand towel. His hair is growing, longer than Eames has ever seen it. "Eames," he says, already beginning a sidestep.

"Out with it, Arthur. Fucking hell. At this point, I wouldn't be surprised to hear that you married this mark's target."

Arthur's mouth tightens, almost imperceptibly.

Eames raises his eyebrows, studying Arthur. "Arthur--"

"Affianced," Arthur says, quickly. Like he was always going to tell of his own free will. "And not to the target. His daughter."

Eames can only laugh. "You are a font of newly discovered delights," he says.

Arthur groans. He rubs at his eyes, and says, quietly, "Don't, Eames. It wasn't--I'm not proud of it. She was a good person, who didn't deserve to have me dick around with her life because her father happened to be in a position of power."

Eames takes him in. The guilt staining his face. "We do shameful things with every job. Why does this bother you so much?"

Arthur laughs, then. "I don't know," he says. He leans back against the kitchen table. "Because she made sure I knew, how I'd hurt her."

****

Eames makes Arthur go over his exit strategies for this particular dilemma many times over. It turns out that Arthur has known exactly who was after him from the start, but that he investigated the threat as thoroughly as he knew how from the beginning anyway.

"A waste of time," Eames declares.

"You have to practice thoroughness," Arthur says calmly. "It doesn't come naturally. But I've made decisions before without realizing the extent of the consequences. Seeing everywhere the path branches comes with time and effort."

"All that self-satisfaction must weigh heavy on your brow," Eames says.

"Oh, good," Arthur says. "Our sparkling work relationship has remained unsullied by our living arrangement."

****

They spend several nights discussing everything from borrowing from the wit-sec program ("I'm not changing my name to Mortimer, no matter how suited you think it is.") to Eames' favored and tried-and-true strategy: throw a bomb, blow it up.

Finally, Arthur scrubs his hands over his face and says, "Look, I appreciate your help, but I need you to get the fuck out of here for a little bit. What did you used to do with your nights off before I dragged you into my shit? Go do that."

Eames' level of frustration is running high, to the point where he would throttle Arthur's stubborn neck if he refused to take any kind of serious action one more time. He shoves away from Arthur and pulls a clean shirt from the closet, heads out to a hotel bar he's patroned before.

Mhairi is visiting Africa for the first time and finds Kenya beautiful. She is long-legged and red-haired. He smiles at her, and she trails her fingers over the edges of the tattoos that are visible. When she asks him what they mean, he spins stories--that this one he'd gotten with his mates after crushing at a rugby tournament, the other while serving with the VSO in Laos. This little one, there, he'd had done by a man here in Kenya, with the black of charcoal.

She agrees to walk back to his flat with him and kisses him, sweet, at his door. He pushes it open quietly, does a quick scan, and Mhairi tiptoes, looks over his shoulder and spies the cot, Arthur's bare feet hanging off the edge.

"Who is that?" she asks.

"A friend," Eames says, and takes her to bed.

****

In the morning, Eames wakes up naked. There's a looseness to his bones he hasn't felt in a while, right up until he hears laughing from outside his bedroom, and realizes Mhairi isn't in the bathroom as he'd assumed. He wraps his comforter around himself before investigating. He has a feeling he'll want to be armored.

He finds Mhairi sitting at the kitchen table, laughing at something Arthur's said, and Arthur is grinning at her, so big he's dimpling. He's attempted what look like pancakes, and Eames watches as Mhairi spoons preserves onto her short stack, then onto Arthur's.

Arthur is wearing a worn t-shirt rather than going bare-chested as he normally does in the mornings. Out of a misguided sense of propriety, Eames is sure, but it feels strange to see him covered up, paradoxically more stripped down thus than he ever was with the show of skin.

"Good morning," Eames says, needing, suddenly, to be a part of their conversation.

"Good morning," Mhairi says. "Your friend is lovely."

"Did you hear that?" Arthur asks, still smiling. He doesn't shy from Eames' gaze.

****

Eames isn't working now, turning down every job offered to him. It's a boring set of clients, he tells Yusuf. A stretch of unimaginative job after unimaginative job.

He's home at all hours of the day. He discovers that Arthur works out at two o'clock in the afternoon every day. When the flat is at its hottest. He's set up a make-shift pull-up bar in the doorway leading into the bathroom, his back flexing muscles that fly out, like wings should be attached there, and dripping with sweat.

He'd have had to be blind not to know that Arthur is attractive. It's a fairly objective observation. He'd have to be a fool, now, not to know that he is, for the first time, sincerely interested.

****

Eames has had relationships in the past. People, who had shaped the unformed clay that was his heart, pressed it into its current form. Kaya, who had sunk her teeth into him, who had cried, a little, when they lost their virginity together, whose even row of very white teeth he had loved to trace with his tongue.

Kento, who had pulled little pieces from him to roll between his fingers. Who let Eames use him in the end.

Sarah, after that, and then a few others. And with every year, he settles more into his chosen form. A little less malleable, despite his talents in the dreamscape.

Eames watches Arthur carefully, now. On his toes, now that he knows the magnitude of the threat.

****

Arthur, on Saturday, comes back from the market with food to overflowing. A veritable cornucopia. "Hey," he says to Eames, who is twisting a paperclip into a makeshift tension wrench. "I'm going to make dinner."

"Should I ring Yusuf?" Eames asks.

"Sure," Arthur says. "And get off my cot."

Eames lies back into the pillow, bracing his feet on the back of the couch. "My cot, technically."

Arthur ignores him, empties his bags. Tosses a cabbage between his hands, sends it spinning toward the ceiling as he surveys his bounty. That bruise over his cheek has yet to fade. Eames could press his thumb into it. Watch the skin blanch, then flush when he lifts, the blood rushing in.

****

Yusuf is late, and by the time he rushes in, the table has been set, the flat flooded with the smell of good food.

"I'm sorry," Yusuf says, "I had a request for extra time in the dream and I couldn't turn the man down. He was extremely eloquent."

"It's fine," Arthur says. "You're here for the part that matters."

Yusuf surveys the table. Arthur carving the leg of lamb. "Jesus," Yusuf says, turning to Eames, "You should have told me this was a goodbye dinner."

Eames shrugs. "Is that what this is?" he asks, spreading his napkin over his lap.

****

On the drive over to the airport the next morning, Arthur says, "I found her, you know. They'd done a good job of hiding her away, but I'm close to sure I know where she is. I think I can end this. Make it right. So it's not just the last in a long line of regrets."

"You should take someone with you. I can still get a seat on your flight. You can have Cobb meet you there, I know."

Arthur shakes his head. "I can mop up my own messes."

"I have evidence to the contrary," Eames says. They're close, now. Eames can see the runways, jets taxi-ing. He rolls down a window. "What is it about this job? You're a career criminal."

Arthur laughs at that.

"Did you fall in love?" Eames asks, finally.

Arthur undoes his tie. "No," he says, shoving the silk into his pocket. "But I remembered I could."

****

Arthur has a little time before his flight. They walk through the terminal and Eames strides past security, all the confidence in the world.

"I can see why you chose Kenya," Arthur says, his hands in his pockets. His collar open a couple buttons down at the neck. The both of them looking out a long, floor-to-ceiling window at the planes, earthbound.

Eames shrugs. "I'm not married to it. Mombasa has been good enough for a long while."

Arthur nods. "There's some of it in you, I think. The heat. A little of the ease."

"It's not an easy place, really."

Arthur smiles. "It has been for me."

Eames crosses his arms. Looks down at them, the skin bronzed from many months in the sun.

"I think it's beautiful here," Arthur says, and it's quiet, words whose wake is strong enough to crush the heart in Eames' chest, a ball molded inside Arthur's fist.

****

When the plane starts boarding, Arthur says, "Thank you."

"Fuck yes, you should thank me," Eames says.

Arthur laughs. "You didn't have to wait with me for this long, you know. It probably says something that you did."

"You can't pin it down any neater than that?" Eames asks.

"When I have time I will," Arthur says, a promise.

Arthur hefts his stupid bag. Hand-crafted leather, Eames knows now. Stitched together by monks in the north of Nepal, from the hides of cows they'd raised from calfdom, no doubt.

"Look, I feel more than a handshake's deserved at this point," Arthur says, then hugs Eames awkwardly, pats him firmly on the back twice. He laughs at the stiffness of it, then nods at the plane. "I have to go."

Eames wants to say more, but he's always known the importance of timing. He watches Arthur go. "Arthur," he calls. The name unbidden, rising from his lips.

****

Eames' life is changed. It's not dramatic, but the space in his flat seems to be infinite. He folds the cot up and stands it against the wall. Arthur didn't leave a thing he needed behind; Eames' living room is his again.

Maybe he'll leave for a little while. There's a job in Sydney that's more than routine, an extractor with a flash of brilliance.

He spends an especially hot day with Yusuf, in the back room of his pharmacy, all these people dreaming. Their faces serene, lips tipped down at the corners. There are a few who have been sleeping for almost two days now and Yusuf dons rubber gloves, slips ice chips over chapping lips.

Fans are whirring, and Eames says, in the dry cool of the room, "You've got to be richer than Croesus."

Yusuf smiles at that, bats the swinging chain from a light bulb out of his way. "I get by," he says.

"Is this satisfying to you?" Eames asks. "Where's the joy in acting as steward over these bodies?"

Yusuf stands straight. He taps the readout of a PASIV. "This man," he says, "pays me what he can. He is the child of a third-class citizen in a third-world country, who worked to arrive at his station, driving goods from the port here in Mombasa to towns across Kenya. A good living, and a good man." He slides ice across the man's lips. "But sometimes he likes to dream. What the world would be if he had been luckier and born to a more prosperous land. He strives to change even those circumstances. In sleeping, he grapples with the world."

Eames surveys the stillness of the men and women sleeping here. The hidden activity. "And all of them, their stories are so noble?"

Yusuf spreads his hands. "A matter of perspective." He rests his hand on the chest of the man in front of him. "But his story. His I like."

****

Eames gets a text message from Arthur.

alive and in bolivia. copacetic.

Out of character, somehow, in so few words. A change.

Then another:

meet me here.

****

In Bolivia, they go out to the salt flats. They park the car on the road, a couple miles outside of their destination and hike the rest of the way.

They both gasp for breath in the altitude. Arthur's stride never breaking. When they break into and upon the salt flats, there is nothing but an expanse, white and blue and glassy, like the world would shatter at the touch.

Eames watches Arthur drink it in. The distance distorted by how vast an unbroken meeting of firmament and earth.

"This used to be a lake," Arthur finally says. "Lifetimes ago."

Eames nods. Eames waits for Arthur to turn around, to look at him from where he stands, suspended in nothing but blue sky, cloud reflected in the film of water across the plane of crystallized salt.

"What I mean to say is things can change." Arthur looks at him, grinning. "Paths I chose long ago, I can still leave."

Eames opens his arms.

Arthur steps close. "What I mean to say is that I can still make my life what I want it to be."

In the circle of Eames' arms. The warmth of him exhilaratingly unfamiliar. We can have even this, Eames thinks, and says, "Then kiss me," ready again to be made new.

inception fic: They Tried to Blow Me Down (1/1)

indysaur — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 07:02:59 GMT

They Tried to Blow Me Down
Inception: Dom/Mal, Arthur/Eames
Rating: PG
2,268 words
Written for the Inception Kink Meme - Prompt: Can I please please please have a fic where Mal tries to go on with her life in the real world, as an architect/extractor/whatever, without Dom, who's still asleep?
It's impossible that you haven't already, but just in case, read the incredible, superior other fill here: I Am the Hero of This Story (Don't Need to Be Saved)

He hasn't been asleep for so very long.

"Should you be keeping him at the house?" her father asks. "It can't be what's best for the children."

She furrows her brow, surprised by the question. She slowly pulls the razor over Dom's chin, keeping him clean-shaven the way she's learned to like him best. He looks young, underneath it all. "This is his home," she says. "I wouldn't want him to wake up somewhere sterile."

Miles goes to the window, looks out at Phillipa and James. He doesn't say anything, but she can almost hear him gnawing at the inside of his cheek, the way he has since she was a child, making her first important decision. "Make a choice, love," he'd said, then nothing more at all.

"Would you miss me very much?" she asked, holding on to his hand. She was six, and her mother had promised her a room of her own--a whole floor!

"Mallorie," he said. "Heart of my heart."

That's how he was for years. Holding silent, or as good as.

Once, in her third year of college, she'd said, "I'm asking you to tell me. Just tell me what you think I should do."

He'd sighed, pulled the glasses off of his face, rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

"Tell me," she'd said, slapping the ring down onto the desk, the little gulp of a diamond scratching into the soft sheen of polished wood.

He'd looked up at her. "You would have my blessing if you decided to say yes."

She'd scoffed. "I'd have it if I said no."

He smiled a bit, nodded, rueful.

"Does he love me?"

He laughed at that. "Do you ever ask a question you don't know the answer to?" Then the lapse into a familiar rhythm of breaths, his cheek nipped in where his teeth bit.

The way he's composed his face now.

Mal wipes the blade of the razor on a towel at her side, puts everything in its place, sponges excess foam off of her husband's jaw. She touches Dom's dark brows. "Does he scare them?" she asks, and holds her breath.

****

Arthur is very busy, but in the course of professional duty, their paths do cross. In Nice, at an alley cafe, she finds him sitting at a table, cross-legged, a half-eaten order of socca in front of him. He watches her walk toward him, a quirk at his lips that she likes to call a smile.

She sets her bag on the table, sits in the chair across from him, and leans forward, tucking errant hair behind her ear.

When she's settled, he says, "You're wearing shorts."

She rests her chin in her hand, smiles at him happily. She nods at the torn socca, his very well-cut suit. "I see crumbs."

When he glances down, she laughs.

****

They order another socca, and it arrives piping hot. You can see the air above it shimmer.

"You'll burn your fingers," Arthur warns, but Mal is already absorbing the pain, forgetting it for the taste of food on her tongue.

"Wonderful," she says.

****

He finds her, the next day. He seems to stumble across her, there in the place du Palais, but one can never assume with Arthur.

"How long are you in Nice?" he asks.

"Oh, not very long. I'm flying home tomorrow."

"And how's Dom?" he asks, no change in his demeanor, no adopted stoicism. As if it's the next question in a natural sequence of questions to ask. She loves him very much for that.

She reaches out, unbuttons the top button of his crisp, white shirt. "We are in Nice," she whispers conspiratorially. "In the summer." She rests a palm on his chest, smiling."He's sleeping," she says. "I suppose I've worn him out." A little joke.

"The best things in life require so much effort."

"Do they?"

He nods. "Love's exhausting enough. It's why I make do with just-short-of-best."

She laughs. "For shame, Arthur. If Eames heard you describe him in such a way."

"He'd be thrilled," Arthur says drily. "Just-short-of-best is an achievement miles above his highest aspirations." He kisses her cheek. "Make sure to call me when he wakes."

"I will," she says, without a break in her voice.

He walks away, strides brisk. Halfway gone, he turns, calls, "I met a girl who asked about your husband. On this job. My job. Do you know her?" and then he's disappeared.

****

She likes to be home. To make lunches in little brown bags for her children. To read Philippa to sleep. To watch James sweep the kitchen floor with his toy broom, a cape around his neck.

But just the other day, when she went to pick James up at 2, she'd scooped him into her arms only to have him wriggle away so quickly, she'd had to stoop to make sure he didn't fall far. She knelt in front of him, ran a hand over his head, cupped his cheeks. "Would you like to walk?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, then ran.

She was sad through the night. For one reason or another.

In the morning, she laid down next to Dom, a needle in her arm. She doesn't like to enter his dreams, truthfully. She almost never has enough time to see him, killed too-quick by a phantom who wears her face.

And what if she stays?

****

She should have killed him. That is her greatest regret.

On the first level of his dreaming, she is lucky if she gets a glimpse before she is shocked awake by a knife or bullet. Dom's projections are well-trained. She is upset with her lack of ability as a forger.

"You're monolithic," Dom told her once. "Mal, through and through."

Sometimes, though, if his consciousness is sleeping, she can find the time to slip next to him, to sink down to his second level.

He has a whole team with him. Arthur, of course, more solemn, more silent than the one she knows. Eames, of whom Dom has only seen pictures and heard stories about; but the stories Arthur had told couldn't help but leave an impression. A lasting one, it appeared.

Saito who had introduced her to Dom on their first job. She'd built a world in Saito's head of white cloth and gray stone. Trees towering with branches bent. "Beautiful," he said.

"Am I ready?" she asked.

"You could not have done better," he said, offering assessment and affirmation in one double-edged sentence.

Yusuf, whom she's loved terribly since the moment he sat next to her at the Acadamie Montessori in Montreal and asked if she would mind very much if he placed a container of horse urine on their shared laboratory desk. "I'll keep it on this corner here," he'd assured her.

"Not so close to the edge," she'd chided.

Her brother is the mark in Dom's latest scheme. Poor Fischer.

All the faces most loved by her, Dom keeps at a close but safe distance.

The girl, the one he whispers to, she doesn't know.

****

She finds Arthur sleeping in Mombasa. She sweeps in through the door, pulls the glove off of her right hand and shoves Arthur's chair back, but before it can hit the floor, Eames comes in from the kitchen, catches the back of the chair and rights it.

"Jesus. Consider your entrance made, love," he says. He has a dish towel tucked into his pants, sleeves rolled up.

"I have a question to ask Arthur," Mal says.

"I do admire a woman of action. If you can hold for--" he checks his watch, "another ten minutes, I'd be happy to leave him at your disposal." He pats Arthur's cheek genially.

She sighs, then pulls the strap of her dress more firmly over her shoulder. She looks around the room. Waiting doesn't suit her.

"You're making me uncomfortable," Eames says.

"There's nowhere to sit," Mal says, an eyebrow raised.

Eames nods, puts one fist on his hip. "And Arthur's lap is so painfully bony. I wouldn't recommend it. Screams of a desperate measure."

She touches her lips, the pressure of her fingertips calming. "Do you know her?" she asks. "Did Arthur say something to you about a woman asking about Dominic?"

He studies her. Deciding whether it would be of importance to lie or not. "Ariadne," he says, finally.

She lets out a long breath. "Thank you."

He shrugs.

She settles on a way to soften him, to put them on an even keel. "Do you ever feel tempted to--" she wields an imaginary pen "--draw a little picture on his hand, or steal his wallet?" She meets Eames' eyes. "I used to paint Dom's toenails. He wouldn't even realize for days."

Eames doesn't say anything. He moves in front of Arthur, opens Arthur's jacket. The shirt underneath buttoned all wrong, just slightly askew.

Mal laughs.

"Tsk," Eames tuts, his lips turned up at the corners as he studies his handiwork. "Childish."

****

"Dom thought he had to convince me," she says. "But." She stops.

"But?" Ariadne asks. She's older than she was in Dom's dream, but her expression is equally untroubled. The smooth, well-assembled face.

Mal laughs. They're at the coffee shop around the corner from the university housing where she and Dom had first made a home. "But I was very old. We were both very old. Why not die for the chance at more life? It's so simple a decision."

Ariadne sips from her coffee. A dab of whipped cream left behind on her lip.

"And to know I truly had children waiting! It was like opening a treasure box of little, cherished secrets."

"So you knew it was a dream?" Ariadne says. "In limbo?"

Mal shakes her head, lifts the curls from the nape of her neck. "No." She smiles. "Yes."

"It's only when we wake up that we realize something is strange," Ariadne says. "I taught all my students that."

"Is it true?" Mal asks, suddenly curious. A little annoyed. "No suspicion at all, until we awake? My dreams have never been full of certainty."

"You don't agree."

"I have a question," Mal says. "About inception."

Ariadne winds her scarf around her neck. "We plant ideas in other people's heads in the course of a day. A turn-of-phrase we repeat. A song skipping from person to person in snatches."

"This is the strangest conversation," Mal says. She stands. "I'd like to wake up now," then steps backward into traffic.

****

"Well," Ariadne says upon Mal's waking. "That was fun."

"Do you insist on a dreamscape for every introduction?" Mal asks.

"No," Ariadne says. "But this way I got to be extremely mystical."

****

Ariadne has worlds all over her house. Snow globes. Scale models. "I used to want to design sets. I even did, a few times. But I'm not budget-minded."

"No," Mal says. She traces the long spire of a skyscraper in miniature with her finger. The sweep of a cable bridge. "You taught Dom?"

"My only real student. Before I divested."

"I used to think he sprang up, fully-formed." Mal turns to face Ariadne, her arms crossed in front of her. "He's teaching you now, you know. In his dream."

"Is he?" Ariadne asks, delighted. "Classic. And what else does he dream about?"

"Capers," Mal says. She laughs. "Work."

"And you?"

Mal closes her eyes. "I used to build magical things," thinking of fog and balled lightning, of her children, of staircases blooming and climbing ever upward.

****

She gets an e-mail.

Mal,

I'm happy we met, and sorry it was under poor circumstances.

I've been wondering how to wake a person up, someone who's lost to dreaming. One helpful thing is that Dominic wants to wake up. Or would want to wake up. It's a step further than other people in his situation.

You told me he dreams in work. In goal after ordered goal. He's set mundane parameters, to convince himself he's awake. That the dream is not a dream.

So make his world fantastic.

Ariadne.

P.S. How old would you say I am, in Cobb's dream? I hope 26.

In the background, she hears a song. Philippa and James watching their favorite movie. A song about bobbing along and beautiful briny seas.

She kisses her husband. The man she'd happened upon, once already, and claimed for herself.

****

In Dom's dreams, her specter is furious and possessive and destructive.

Mal builds their dream home. Dark wood, and a backyard with no fence, a long gentle slope down to a river, covered in grass made of green.

She does it in pieces, between little deaths.

She makes her father very kind to Dom. A fantasy if there ever was one.

She plants a magnolia in water.

She fills in the faces of her children, older, more beautiful. Philippa with her father's mouth.

She sets a top to spinning, spinning, spinning.

****

He took her to a concert on their first date. White lights in trees, acoustics awful, but there was a blanket and stars, and Dominic, holding her hand.

"What did you think of me, when we first met?" she asks, suddenly. She wants to demand the answer, feeling strong and very brave.

"I don't want to tell you," he says, laughing.

"Why not?" she asks. She straightens, hair a tumble. She looks at his profile, the angle of his brow. She knows. "You were scared of me!"

He sighs, laughing again. He looks down at their joined hands. "Is this perfect?" he asks.

inception fic: i strive (1/5)

indysaur — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 04:24:12 GMT

I Strive
Inception: Dom/Mal, Mal/Arthur, Arthur/Eames
Rating: R - sex, violence, rock and roll.
25,532 words
Love means something different to Dom, to Mal, to Arthur.
Thank you to kittyzams, who went above and beyond. <3 Arthur quotes an uber-random portion of The Brothers Karamazov, and the stupid-long cut-tag quote is from the Völsunga Saga. Pretension! Let me show you it.

The dream of artists—which is simply the dream of friends and lovers, magnified—is to plant themselves in other people's heads. Tad Friend

Dom’s waiting in the hallway, when she comes out of Professor Miles’ office. They look up at the same time, and he's startled to find that they’re both operating to the same rhythm, so much so that he says, "Hi." Automatic, as if she'd pressed a button.

"Hello," she says, smiling politely.

"Is the professor in?" he asks. He realizes he's slouching, still, against the wall and scrambles to his feet, to his full height.

Her smile warms. "Yes. The professor is in."

"Oh. Good."

She nods, amusement on her face. She’s waiting, he knows, but he can't find another thought to verbalize. "Okay, then," she says, and turns to go.

"Wait," Dom says. He aborts an attempt to touch her arm. "What's your name?"

She turns halfway, stopped in the middle of the hall, looking at him from the corner of her eye. Assessing. "What's yours?" she asks.

"Dom," he says. "Dominic."

"Mallorie," she replies, then, glancing down at a watch, "I'm so sorry. I'm late for a class."

He watches her take a step, then another away from him, and he can't stop himself from calling, "Mallorie!"

She turns around, again, the beginning of exasperation in her shoulders. She raises an eyebrow.

"You have an accent." He finds he's been swinging his arms, back and forth. He puts his hands in his pockets.

She laughs. "Oh, no," she says.

****

He's decided on one of two places to take her on their first date. He can't take the leap beyond that, to make a choice between the two.

The professor had asked Dom to call him Miles and Dom can't figure out if it's because he knows that Dom is neck-deep in lust bordering on—something, something else—for his daughter, or if it's because Dom has agreed to teach one of his sections next semester.

He toys with asking the professor—Miles—if Mallorie is the kind of girl who expects candlelight and linen tablecloths. If she'd think being taken to eat ribs on a first date screams of over-posturing.

He knocks on her door instead, hours and hours before they're scheduled to meet. When she opens the door, he says, "I don't mean to be early. This isn't the start of our date."

She nods, taken aback. "Okay."

He sighs. It occurs to him that he might have been heavy-handed with his cologne this morning. "I wanted your input for dinner." He drags a hand across his brow. This might have been a bad idea. "I've narrowed it down to a couple of choices."

She opens the door fully. Framed in dark jeans and a v-neck. "Which restaurant wouldn't require a change in clothing?" she asks, with what might be affection in her voice, and Dom smiles, feels a knot in the back of his neck loosen.

****

He takes her hand after dinner, in front of her building. Night air heavy with heat, sweat beading at his nape. Her face lit by the cold fluorescent light illuminating the steps.

"You're beautiful, beautiful," he tells her.

She's standing a step above him. She traces his hair line. "Gorgeous." She cups his cheek. "Ravishing." She touches his bottom lip. "A face to break a woman's heart," she tells him, dancing eyes belying her grave tone.

It’s late. I don’t know you at all, he thinks. He is upon a precipice.

He wonders what it would be like to kiss her.

****

They're engaged, quick. "Lock that down," his roommate told him, and he did.

His parents throw a party in his hometown, at the community hall he knows from countless high school sports team dinners, debates. Elizabeth is there. Dom had prayed against her, when they'd sent out invitations, but her parents were old family friends, so there was no getting around it.

She keeps her distance, but after dinner, and drinks, she comes around and hugs Dom, takes Mal's hand. "So this is you," she says to Mal.

Mal nods. "It's nice to meet you."

Elizabeth narrows her eyes. Her smile is brittle. "You should really know who I am," she says, then walks away.

Fucked, Dom thinks when Mal turns to look at him, cool and calculating.

****

He tells her as they're getting ready for bed. The reasons Elizabeth has to be angry. The very short overlap between relationships. When he's finished, Mal is sitting on the bed, cross-legged, wiping the polish from her nails in short, savage strokes. "Damn it, Dominic. I'm embarrassed for you."

"I didn't do anything wrong," Dom says, stung. "Not really."

"Then why look so guilty?" she asks, throwing a hand in the air in his direction. "Why, if you believe that?"

She's waiting but he has nothing to say. She looks him straight in the eye but he breaks her gaze, looks to where the wallpaper is peeling in his parents' guest bedroom.

"Shit," she says.

The silence drags on. Dom steps into the adjoining bathroom to brush his teeth, spitting, rinsing. When he comes back into the bedroom, Mal is in bed, the covers pushed down to her ankles, sheets twisted around her form. "So," he asks, casually, like he doesn't care one way or the other. "What? Should I call the couch into service? Has its number come up already?"

She pushes up onto one elbow. "No. Get into bed."

He obeys. He feels unsure of what he's allowed, but after he turns off the lamp at the bedside, he dares to touch her wrist.

"I'm still so angry at you," she says, a voice in the dark.

"I know. I'm sorry. I should have told you before."

The sound of her breath. "This is not who I wanted to be," she says, finally. She curls around him. "It's not who I thought you were," her mouth against his shoulder.

****

They have a wedding under a tent. Every time they kiss, the sound of ringing glass.

"Mallorie Cobb," she whispers in his ear between toasts. "It sounds so American."

During the maid-of-honor’s speech, Mal buries her face in his neck, hiding the blush that creeps along her cheeks at some story from her misspent teenage years, and he thinks, I was a man who didn’t know love, once.

****

During that first year, he'd wake up some mornings with her beside him, her back to him. He'd press up against her, impatient for her to open her eyes.

She'd turn her head, and he'd kiss her cheek. "Good morning," she'd say.

"Good morning," he'd reply, and then slide a thigh between her legs, a hand low on her belly. "And what should we do today?" he'd ask. All his hope replaced by certainty.

****

Mal speaks four languages, one of which is Arabic. She’s intelligent to a near-intimidating degree, and perhaps the most capable person he knows. He tells her she should consider the offer, that it isn’t a total surprise. That dismissing a job out of hand for its ties to the Department of Defense is short-sighted. “The funding alone—you could do great things. Imagine the stories you’d have to tell,” he says.

“But I wouldn’t be able to tell those stories,” Mal says. “I don’t like it. Everything so shadowy.”

“The cloak and dagger is the majority of the appeal,” Dom says.

“How revealing,” Mal says dryly.

****

She recruits him after their second fight over her distance. “This is not worth sacrificing our marriage over,” she tells him.

“You could quit,” he points out.

“And do what? Have a four-course dinner waiting for you on the table when you get home?” She rolls her eyes. “Besides, I think you’d be perfect for this phase of our project. Something new.” She emphasizes the last word, drawing out all the specific allure it holds for him.

“Do you need someone extremely competent? A structural genius? An architect to rival all other architects, dead and living?” Dom pulls off his socks, cursorily examines a hole in the heel of his left one.

“Yes, and debonair, too.”

“Well,” Dom says, putting his hands on his thighs. “I’d say you’ve found your man.”

Mal leans back against their bedroom wall, her hands crossed behind her. “So humble a heart,” she says.

He blows out a long exhale, holds her gaze. “We’ll be together. Will I be working in one wing and you in another, two floors away?”

“No,” she says.

“Then yes,” he says.

****

She shows him the PASIV device on his fourth day, after orientation. The security surrounding the project is—to be generous—frustrating. It takes him fifteen minutes to get from the door leading into the building to his office. “No wonder the covert operations in this country fail to achieve their best. Efficiency is being sacrificed at the altar to the false idol that is confidentiality.”

“Another well-considered Cobb opinion,” Mal says, opening what looks like a briefcase.

“Good as gold,” Dom says.

Mal holds up a Trocar needle. She has a look in her eye, a secret she’s eager to tell lighting her up. “Do you trust me?” she asks.

“Yes,” he says. “More than the ground I’m standing on.”

Her gaze goes soft. She kisses his temple, hands searching for a vein, murmurs, “Now. You’ll feel a small pinch.”

****

He wakes up in a campsite. It’s night, and through a hole in the crowd of trees above, the stars are slowly fading in and out. Clouds pulling apart around them. Like the shadow of a colossus who tears at cumulus is falling, shifting across the sky.

“It’s quiet,” he says.

Mal’s arms wrap around him from behind. They’re sitting on a fallen tree, and with every shift he makes, he can feel the bark dropping away from the bone-trunk underneath. “No,” she says into his ear. “Listen.”

And she’s right. Crickets. Twigs snapping under the feet of an animal that calls this forest home.

“Build me something,” she says. She points to a clearing in the near distance. “There.”

“How?” he asks.

“You know how.”

“I couldn’t. We’d need to survey the land. Assess the environmental impact. I’d need a project manager I can rely on and a contractor—”

She laughs. “Close your eyes,” she says, then puts her hand over his lowered eyelids. She wraps one leg around his waist. “You’ve called the contractor. You’ve filed plans with the appropriate regulatory bodies. You watch them level the earth, the foundation setting.” She hums. “Do you see it? Tell me when it’s ready to build upon.”

He lays his head back on her shoulder. “It’s ready,” he says.

“Intuit the structure. Every intention fulfilled. See the foundation laid.” She takes his hand and holds it up in front of him. “Feel the beams rising.”

He can feel the place where his heart would be beating, the pounding pace of it.

“Can you do it more quickly?” she asks.

A stream of lumber. Paint flooding up walls. Dust filling the air with an uncountable number of motes, suspended in the sun. Through his wife’s hand, through the pluckable-thin skin of his eyelids, blackness turning to a hazy, glowing red. “It’s there, isn’t it?” he asks.

He can feel her smile against his neck. “It looks like a house a wolf would try to blow down.”

“I’m sweating,” he says.

“You’ve made it very hot,” she agrees. “Would you like to see?” She pulls her hand away, and the instant he opens his eyes, he has to close them again, pupils shocked into dilating by the brilliance of vision. When he opens them again, he sees a house you could pull on like a sleeve, there on a flat-topped hill. Matchsticks held together by twine, so tall it could block out the sun, a breeze sending sheer curtains fanning out like banners.

“I'll huff and I’ll puff,” Mal says.

****

It’s exhilarating. He coaxes spires out of the ground. He moves mountains. He carves cliffs, then houses into those cliffs, every filigree and molding in layered sandstone.

Mal knits landscapes together, bare-branched trees adopting faces, a different profile from every new angle.

Their projections tolerate each other's presence. Dangerous, still, when provoked—Dom has looked for bruises upon waking that are never actually there—but manageable.

"The same isn't true for other minds," Mal warns him.

"No?"

"You seem to tolerate invasion."

"Hm," he says. He pulls at her hair, gently. "You occupy my thoughts."

****

Miles comes to America; a move he'd justified with a stint guest-lecturing at Georgetown. In the car on the way home from the airport, he says, "It's unfathomable to me that you have yet to enter a dream without Mallorie. You are developing an altogether skewed vision of what construction within a foreign mind is truly like."

"Dad," Mallorie says, twisting in her seat.

"You're hobbling him," Miles insists.

"So good to see you," Dom says.

****

Men in uniform seem to multiply in the halls, rapidly. "Jesus Christ," Dom says. "One day you have two, and the next sixteen."

"The problem was allowing in a mating pair," Mal says, lowering the back of a sleeping chair.

The soldier in the chair grips the armrests, settles back into the deep cushioning. "What is this, ergonomic?" He looks up at the ceiling, no sign of a reaction when Mal slides the needle into his arm. "Who paid for this?"

Mal tears a piece of tape off with her teeth, delicately secures the soldier's line. "The army," she says, concentrating.

"Ah," the soldier says. "The army."

"Incredible, the point on that comment," Dom says, closing his eyes. "And with such little inflection."

"Men," Mal says. Then: "Good night, Arthur." And: "Remember, peace and calm. You're walking into an empty plaza. Buildings unpeopled. The sun is setting. You are untroubled and not alone..."

Arthur's eyes close.

"Little dreamer," Mal says. The last thing Dom hears before he sleeps.

****

They're in an empty square, the architecture speaking a common, yet unspecified language. Shadows are pooling at the bases of buildings, waiting out a fiery, blowing-out sun.

Arthur has his back to Dom and is dressed all in black, not an identifying mark on his clothing. Lean, and corded. Dom imagines a rope, wet, fibers contracted, hemp ready to sting—and without prompting, it coils into physicality, braiding around the perimeter of the plaza. It sinks into the cobblestones.

Arthur turns sharply, searching for the hand behind the act of creation, and Dom sees a glint in the clock tower above, a rifle rising, a split second warning before a bullet slams into his shoulder. He falls back onto his ass, his hand flying up to pat at the blood, the tearing pain. "You've got to be fucking kidding me," he roars.

The sound of soles against pavement echoes, and Arthur sprints toward Dom, arms knifing through the air. He barely slows to loop an arm under Dom's good shoulder, dragging him to his feet and getting him to move.

Dom shoves him away. "You fucking shot me."

"Come on." Arthur slips under Dom’s arm again, taking some of his weight. "We need to get through that gate."

"This hurts, you son of a bitch," Dom says, jogging. He winces in pain at the impact of each footfall, his vision hazy at the edges.

"To be fair," Arthur says coolly, "you did play with my toys without permission."

"You're a fucking psychopath."

"I don't do things by halves, no," Arthur says.

****

In Arthur's dreams he is an efficient machine. Gears humming everywhere, just under the surface. His projections run on a schedule. Mal built a train for him and it's a favorite setting: ten cars, each with their designated purpose, doors and compartments. Always headed toward a destination.

Dom and Mal are walking down a hallway together. Mal seems to enjoy Arthur. She presses her hand to each door they pass by. "In compartment two, your parents. In three, your brother. In four, a child. Not yours, I don't think, but sweet, all the same. In five, a girl." A rundown of the reconnaissance she has done.

Arthur keeps forging ahead in front of them.

"She's very lovely," Mal whispers to Dom, taking his arm.

"Your prying is not appreciated," Arthur says, pushing his way into the dining car.

"And yet you never get shot," Dom whispers to Mal.

She turns to the first booth on the right as they step into the dining car. “Bonjour, Monsieur Costello," she says, deliberately provocative, but the projection only stares after her, grips the edge of the table until its knuckles are white. "Very good, Arthur," she calls.

He grunts.

****

The work is fitted with seven league boots, leaping ahead with every day. They have new recruits, all the time.

"It's exciting, isn't it?" Mal asks. She turns in bed, onto her stomach, looking down at Dom. "This woman they've brought in, she's fascinating. She's someone completely different in her dreams. Androgynous, or—or...I don’t know. That’s not quite the right word. Not herself.”

"Don't bite your nails," Dom chides.

She makes a noise of protest. "Did you hear what I just said?"

"Yes," Dom says. He takes her hand and kisses the back of it. "Maybe we're more of ourselves in our dreams. There's no real reason to expect the reflection in your mind's eye to match the one in the mirror."

"I didn't—" Mal chews at her lip, staring at nothing as she thinks. "God!" She drops her head into his shoulder, voice muffled by the pillow. "How could I have dismissed so many thoughts as mere curiosities?”

"No harm's been done," Dom says.

"What happens if you die, do you think?" Mal asks. "In the dream."

"Let's not find out," Dom says.

She groans, rolling onto her back, away from him, but he follows her, lays his head on her chest. He curves his hand around her hip. "Do you think you're different, in your dreams? Do you feel the same as you do awake?"

She's quiet for a while, thinking. Her hand in his hair. "I feel unleashed," she says finally. "And you?"

"Heady with power and control."

She snorts. "You only think you're joking."

He smiles against her breast. "What will they do with the woman?" he asks.

"I'm not sure, yet," Mal says. "I don't think we know which question to ask first."

Dom flicks through a half-dozen, until he settles on one. "How mutable is she?" He breathes in the smell of her: his wife, whom he would know if blind, if deaf, if dumb.

****

He meets the woman, Kit, on a Sunday. He wakes up in a forest she's dreamed up. Thick and overgrown; it’s strictly by instinct that he knows that the sun is high up in the air, shining bright, only the petals of its light sifting down to the floor where he is. Trees so tall he can't see where their branches begin.

Kit comes striding, slipping between trunks, around shrub and bush.

"Hail, Brynhildr," Dom says. He can't help it, a greeting that occurred in his mind too strong to keep from saying.

She stops, looking at him. "You must be Dominic," she says.

"I'm sorry," Dom says. "I don't know why I said that."

She shrugs. "You've been spending a lot of time in Arthur's head. He calls me that."

"Why?"

She laughs. She's standing in jeans and a t-shirt that she holds gathered up in one hand, turning it into a makeshift pouch. The smooth, tanned skin of her thickened waist. "I made the mistake of telling him the nickname my high school volleyball team gave me. He promised to tell me his, but here we are, 18 months out of Kandahar, and I still only know to call him Arthur." She sits, and lets down her shirt a little, revealing fruit. She flips him a strawberry.

Dom sits across from her.

"So do you know what exactly we're doing today?” Kit asks. “I just heard tests."

"That's what I hear."

"Like what, though?" She takes a piece of her hair, and he watches the dark brown shift toward black, so subtle it could be a play of light.

She's nervous, he realizes. "I'm not sure," he says honestly. "Nothing major, I'd bet." He holds on to the strawberry.

"Your wife," Kit says. "I can probably trust her, right?"

"Yes," Dom says.

"She's got a little bit of badass in her, you know? She’s got intent behind that face."

Dom laughs. “Not an inaccurate reading." He looks around. He digs his hands into the rotting leaves blanketing the ground underneath him. The wet mulch. "This is an interesting construction. The details are strong."

"I used to daydream about a forest like this," Kit says. "One that’s all old-growth. Trees thousands of years old that knew what California looked like before it was strip malls and Spanish-style homes." She laughs. "I was probably a weird kid."

"Why forests? What would you imagine doing here?"

She looks up, and up. High enough to get lost. She says, “Climb.”

****

Dom slips away to peek in on Mal's debriefing with Kit. Kit is striking in person, too, her shoulders held confidently. The shape if not the details recognizable. "I appreciate your desire to understand, ma'am," Kit says. "But it would serve us both best if we had this conversation sleeping. I could be more helpful to you."

Mal mirrors Kit's posture, her pen tap-tapping. She jots a quick note, then uncrosses her legs, leans forward. "Can I be honest with you?" At Kit's raised eyebrow, Mal sits back in her chair, wipes the air in front of her clean with both hands. "Truly honest."

"Fine. Yes, I’d appreciate that."

"I'm worried," Mal says. "I mean to say...I'm thankful that you've given so much of your time to us. You've been accommodating in every way a person in your situation could be." She puts her hands, palms up, on the table. "But we've already asked you to spend so much of your time in the dreams. We've had you sleep for days. The technology is still so new."

"What is it that you're afraid of, ma'am?" Kit asks.

Mal clasps her hands together. "I'm worried that you won't want to wake up. I understand that. I want to ask, sometimes, for a few minutes more."

Kit looks down. When she looks up again, Dom can't quite see her eyes, but Mal straightens suddenly, struck. "Would it be so wrong?" Kit asks. "I'm who I want to be when I dream. And every time I wake up, to look down and see—these hands again." Her voice shudders under the weight of her words. "These arms and legs. Is it so wrong, not to want to wake up?"

Mal takes her hands. She grips them tight. "No," she says, firmly, her eyes earnest. "No, of course not. Of course."

Kit bows her head, shakes it back and forth. "Can I have just one minute, ma'am?" she asks.

Mal stands. She puts a hand on Kit's shoulder as she passes.

"I'm sorry," Kit says. She shakes her head, pulls away from Mal’s hand. "God, I'm fine, really." She chokes on a laugh. "I'm not usually like this."

"I'll be right outside," Mal says, then crosses, quietly, to the door. She closes it behind her, watching the latch click, and when she looks up to find Dom, waiting, she makes this broken noise.

"Hi," he says.

"I'm crying." She laughs, wet. "I don't know why." She steps close and touches the lapels of his shirt, straightens his collar.

He wipes the tears from her face, the one clinging to her jaw.

She drops her forehead to his chest. "But won't she be lonely?" she asks.

****

Dom sees Kit more now than he did when she was counted among the awake.

He's waiting for Mal to finish up so they can go home when he walks past Kit's room. A body nourished to keep alive her mind. Arthur is sleeping next to her, and Dom thinks, 'What the hell,' rolls up his sleeve.

He wakes up in a city of neon lights, buildings sizzling with color: Shinjuku and Times Square and Blade Runner scissored together. He'll need to get lucky, to find Kit and Arthur. He turns in place, once, then again, and sees them standing at a food cart.

Arthur stabs the air with his hand, anger on his face, and as Dom muscles through a crowd of Kit's projections, he hears him say, "It's self-aggrandizing, major."

"Arthur, did you come here just to yell at me? That’s fine, but I’d like to know if I’m riding this out in hopes for an eventual shared drink, or if I should really buckle in," Kit says. She accepts a bowl of noodles, wields chopsticks. She's tall here, taller than Arthur and she takes advantage of it, looks down upon him.

Arthur holds her gaze, no sign of intimidation. "You're static. You used to call that the kiss of death. We learn, we educate ourselves, we adapt or die."

"I'm not adapting?" Kit says. "Do I need to show you more of my tricks?" Her features blurring, variations on her face, one after the other as she whistles a circus theme.

Arthur is not amused. "It's a closed feedback loop, Kit. Who's going to challenge you?" He grabs a projection walking by, a man in black tie. "Him?" He shoves him away to point at a Harajuku girl walking past. "Her? You'll be raving to yourself. There's no one but you here."

"And you," Kit points out, obstinate.

The projections shove against Dom harder. He's having a hard time getting closer than this, just outside the circle of their argument. "Kit!" he calls, and the projections near him turn to look at him as one.

Arthur grabs Kit, up high on her arms. He shakes her. "This isn't real. This role you're acting out here is not who you really are."

"Arthur, stop," Kit says, her projections turning toward him.

"Don't kid yourself—"

"Stop!" she shouts, and a mob swarms Arthur, tearing at his clothes, at his limbs, so sudden he can't get another word out, going down in a whirl of fists and knees.

Wake up, Dom thinks. He sees not a scrap of Arthur. Wake up, wake up, wake up, panic in his belly, shuttering the sky into day, the square of street beneath him erupting high. He has wandered into a hostile land.

"Dom."

When he looks down, he can see Kit there at the base, a speck. Her clothes, too, torn.

"Dom. Don't tell me I killed him," she says, her voice far away. "Please don't tell me that." The city plunged into a mourning black.

****

Dom wakes up with a jerk, sees Arthur standing in front of him with tubing hanging in his hand, the cannula that had recently occupied one of Dom's veins dripping onto the floor. Dom hisses at the sting in his arm. "There's got to be a better way to wake someone up than that," he says. "You're alive," he says.

"Ta-da." Arthur's smile is grim.

"She'll want to know." Dom looks at Kit's sleeping face. "Arthur, you know how impossible it is to control your projections, even with other minds at their most unobtrusive."

"I was particularly un-unobtrusive," Arthur allows. He hasn't let go of the tubing, a puddle forming underneath the needle. He's digging his nails into his palms, Dom notes.

"Arthur," Dom says, careful. "Maybe you should sit down."

Arthur nods. "Maybe."

"At ease, soldier," Dom says, adopting a more familiar language under the guise of jest.

Arthur hisses out a breath. He laughs, angry. He lifts an arm, points at his wrist. "I could feel the bones here, grinding. Twisting just the wrong way. All I could think was that this was my shooting hand. That was my trigger finger, splintering."

"Let's speak with whatever professional you're supposed to speak to." Dom stands, puts a hand on the span of Arthur's shoulders. "I know there's some overpaid asshole on staff. Come on. Mal, too. We can talk to her."

Arthur wets his lips. His throat bobbing. "Yeah. Mal will want to know," he says, and Dom can see him force himself into action, into movement. The careful detaching of needle from tube. "Now we know what happens when we die during a dream." He disposes of the cannula in the biohazard waste bin, winds the tubing around his fingers in efficient circles.

"Utilitarian as always," Dom says.

Arthur glances at Kit in repose.

"She had no intention," Dom says, gentle.

Arthur pretends not to hear. "Maybe I was wrong," he says. "The pain felt real enough. More than real."

"Hey," Dom says. He squeezes Arthur's shoulder. "You're fine. You're okay."

"Sure," Arthur says easily. He smiles with serrated teeth. "But when I first woke up, you could have fooled me. Easy to think otherwise." He wiggles his fingers in front of his face. "Look, ma," he says.

****

Mal starts to spend more time with Kit, down there. "There's an opportunity to learn," she says. "What it feels like to sleep for so long."

"A silver lining," Dom says.

"Something like that," Mal says, and she looks—far away, for a moment.

****

"She doesn't believe me, not completely in any case," Mal says. She's hissing, a tone of voice that makes Dom note the placement of every exit. He stops, half through the door, cranes forward a bit to see the unfortunate target of Mal's anger.

Arthur is standing stock-still, chin lifted. Mal is finishing the knot in his tie and makes a gesture as if to pull it over-tight, when Arthur captures her gaze, raises an eyebrow.

She throws her hands up. "You do it, then! You're right to think I might choke you."

Arthur rolls his eyes. "Mal, would you give me a break?"

"Just dip under, that's all I'm asking you to do," she says. "Show her your handsome and unbearable face."

"If she wants to know I'm alive," Arthur says, "she can wake up and see for herself."

"She's made her choice. The best one she could make," Mal says. Her arms crossed. "I don't want to fight about this with you."

"So we won't fight."

Mal scoffs, but a smile plays around her mouth. "I hate when you retreat so fully into this persona," she says, gesturing at his suit. The clothes a new affectation Dom has openly wondered about.

Arthur tugs down on the tie knot, pulls his mouth as he tries to get a good look at it. "Ugh," he says.

"Problem?" Mal asks.

"No, nothing." Arthur tightens the knot, squares it away at his collar. "Windsor knots are for dicks," he amends.

"How fortuitous, then, to have accidentally tied a knot appropriate to the man."

"I let you have that one," Arthur says. He reaches for Mal's arm, squeezes it. "You say she's made her choice. So let her deal with the consequences."

"I would never have thought you petulant—"

"She chose to live in a world where nobody else exists, Mal. Not you, not me," Arthur says, raising his voice, at his very limits.

"Arthur—"

"Don't push me," he says.

"Why not?" Mal, full of flame.

****

They have the argument frequently. To the point where one or the other will pick it up at any opportune moment, a disagreement carried around in back pockets.

Cobb's dream. A cemetery, rows and rows of crumbling headstones—here lies Cobb-at-16, Cobb-at-17 and so on, just short of Cobb-at-31, currently strolling—among grass a well-fed green. One minute Mal is studying epitaphs, the next she says, "It makes me feel as if you would tear me out, too, if I made such a mistake."

Arthur strides with back bent, hands held behind his back. "You wouldn't make that kind of mistake."

"I make mistakes all the time," Mal laughs. "I do a new thing wrong every hour."

"I'll vouch for that," Dom says, and Mal looks up at him, narrows her eyes, digs fingers into his side.

"I wouldn't tear you out," Arthur says quietly. “Anybody else, maybe. But not you.”

Mal sighs, leans her head against Dom's shoulder, a hand worrying at her lips. "Oh," she says, soft, and watches Arthur pick up his pace, put distance between them.

Dom presses a kiss into her curls. "If I should bow out gracefully now," he whispers, "would I be rewarded with the privilege of giving you away at your wedding to Arthur?"

"I couldn't guarantee," she says, immediately. She pulls his face to hers, kisses him ardently. When she pulls away, she pinches, hard, at his waist. “I don’t like this place,” she tells him. “I want to dig up all your graves.”

****

Dom goes in with Mal to see Kit after that. As often as she asks Arthur, Dom goes.

The first time, they find themselves walking up a stairwell, and when Mal pushes open the door, they walk out onto a tall building's roof. It's a bordered square, three large steps in any direction, and a fourth to send you soaring. The wind grabs at his hair and his clothes, in a hurry to strip him to his skin.

"Kit," Mal calls, and the figure leaning against the edge's railing turns, Arthur's borrowed lips saying, "Hi, Dom."

Dom stops. He slides his hands into his pockets. "Kit," he says.

"Do you like the new look?" She shakes out Arthur's cuffs, straightens his jacket—a perfect simulacrum wearing the suit she last saw him in.

"He'll hate it," Dom says, flat. He doesn’t know why he’s so angry, and it’s the sudden flood of it, as much as the strength, that tests his self-control.

"Dom!" Mal says.

"I wish I could change this," Kit says. She scrubs her face with her hands, exhausted. "Believe me." Every surface going matte.

****

"I need a vacation," Dom tells Mal over breakfast. She's made two perfect poached eggs. Orange yolks quivering.

"Me too." She picks toast out of the toaster, quick-steps it onto their shared plate then blows on her hot fingertips. "You are not allowed to buy Wonder Bread anymore," she says. "There isn't a crumb of wonder involved."

"Vacation," he repeats.

She breaks her yolk, dips the edge of her toast in it. "I wish we had time," she says.

Dom nuzzles her neck. "I hear dreaming’s nice this time of year," he says.

She stills. Then: "Maybe." She puts down her fork. "Maybe."

****

They sleep, and then sleep again. Two levels under. Kit had shown them how. She'd said time passes even slower, in the second level. "We could reduce it to a crawl, maybe, one more level down."

"Not yet," Mal says.

"I think we can be bolder," Kit says. "We've yet to face any truly troubling complications."

"You're not Arthur anymore," Dom says. He lights a match easily, leaning against a bit of statue, scuffing his shoes.

Kit looks over at him, her mouth tightening a little bit. "The sun sets," she says.

They wade into dreaming for their vacation, just his and Mal’s. Nestled into a low valley. A fog tumbling, slipping across their feet. He can feel the wet on his bare skin.

"We'll go down in history, eventually," he tells Mal. "They'll want to know our story." They are giants in a landscape made to hold the weight of their bodies.

"What comes first?" Mal asks. "Will they ask you to write a book?"

"We'll all write books," Dom says. "Bestsellers, every one." He hums. "Maybe not Arthur's."

Mal laughs. She pulls his arms around her, steps up onto her toes to look him in the eye. "And who will you dedicate your story to? It's very important."

"To my wife."

She drops onto her heels. She wraps her arms around his waist, smiles into his chest. "It's short."

"Is it?"

"But not lacking sentiment." She touches his belt.

"To Mal, of whom there never was—" He clears his throat. "Of whom there never was, there never will be, there is no other."

"That one's nice, too," she says. Swaying.

"To you. Today it's raining a little. Wear a coat. I love you."

She grips his shirt in fistfuls. She looks up at him, in the way that had first made him love her. Reading the lines of him, as if there was much to learn. As if there were more to him than the parts that make up his body, more than the feet under him that keeps him standing.

"And yours? Who would you dedicate yours to?" He raises an eyebrow, an exaggerated displeasure clouding his face. "Arthur?"

She lets go of the cotton of his shirt. She smoothes her hands over him, her fingertips questing, Braille rising on his skin. "To my husband. Whose every good morning stirs my heart," she says, her voice unraveled at the seams.

Part Two

rps fic: and behind this door... (1/4) j2_everafter

indysaur — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 07:27:18 GMT

and behind this door...
SPN RPS: Jared/Jensen
Rating: PG-13 for language
21,125 words
I will never write anything but AU again, probably. Sigh. A love story based on Pixar's Monsters Inc., in which, as the inestimable Spice Girls would put it, two become one. Written for j2_everafter .

Thank you to fourfreedoms for her astute observations and for not mocking my lame-o Shakespeare reference too much; to historiography for being the light of my life; to deirdre_c for her incredible generosity and always spot-on, always kindly-delivered critiques; and finally, to kittyzams who is a hoser of the highest magnitude, a hosebeast if you will, hosing it up right nice. In the words of a great woman, "every time i try to fly i fall // without my wings, I feel so small // I guess I need you, baby". In this case, you are wings and the baby, and I am the plummeting, shrunken lady.

Well, we talked like that for awhile and then I said to him, I said, "You have the advantage on me. You know my name and I don't know yours." And, and right back at me he said, "What name do you like?" Well, I didn't even have to think twice about that. Harvey's always been my favorite name. So I said to him, I said, "Harvey." And, uh, this is the interesting thing about the whole thing: He said, "What a coincidence. My name happens to be Harvey." - Elwood P. Dowd, Harvey

The first time they meet, Jared says, "You just stumbled out of the closet."

"Ah," Jensen says. "A statement applicable both literally and figuratively."

"What the hell is going on?" Jared slaps on his bedside lamp, pulls his comforter up high over his bare chest.

"Boo?" Jensen tries.

Jared stares.

"Yeah, that was probably a longshot."

"Are you going to rob me?" Jared demands.

"No, no. The key word here is 'scare'."

"I'm scared," Jared says immediately.

Jensen tilts his head. "A scream just for proof?"

Jared gapes. He squeezes his eyes closed. "This," he says, "is not actually the weirdest dream I've ever had."

****

It figures that Jensen would get stuck with a dud. It's the story of his life. He's disaster-prone, Mike says. A judgment made worse because it’d come from a green eyeball on legs who'd never let an opportunity for a pratfall slide. But Sully was clear that he wanted management to know how the job was done, so here Jensen was, making the best of a bad situation. He's learned to get good at that.

Anyway, pretending the whole thing is a dream gets Jared to calm down some. Enough to start asking questions. "So you collect the energy from kids' screams to fuel your world?"

"Lightbulbs, Kindles, electric foot warmers, all powered by that adrenaline rush of fear."

"Twisted," Jared says.

"Recycling!" Jensen replies. "Effective use of what may be considered a waste product!"

"Two things." Jared counts them off on his fingers. "I'm seventeen. And you're not a monster."

Jensen raises both arms above his head, wiggles the lower half of his jaw. "I'm a bundle of youthful angst and hormones compounded by sexual confusion. Mikey considers me his crowning achievement." He lowers his arms, squints at Jared. "You're scrawny for seventeen."

"Thank you," Jared says. "My fear has now completely given way to annoyance and indignation."

"Ugh," Jensen says. "Useless."

****

The second time, Jensen just kicks open the door, strolls inside Jared's bedroom and drops onto his bed.

Jared groans, blearily opens one eye.

"It's me," Jensen says. "Jensen." He grins, snapping his teeth together.

"God," Jared says. "I was really hoping this wasn't going to be a recurring nightmare."

"Guess what," Jensen says, "I'm having an identity crisis."

"That's super great." Jared yawns. "I bet it'll provide a lot of fodder for your future memoirs."

"That's what I like about you," Jensen says. "You always look on the bright side."

"You don't actually know me."

"Sure I do." Jensen lies across the width of the bed, Jared's knobby knees digging into his spine. "I'm not a monster," he says, tone bright as the glint off high noon sun. "I'm just an orphaned kid Sully couldn't leave behind."

Jared hasn't turned on the light. It sounds like it's raining outside, a steady patter on the roof, like distant drumming. The room's warm, just this side of stuffy. Jensen blinks slowly at the ceiling.

"Did you hear me?" Jensen asks.

"Yeah," Jared says. He throws a corner of his comforter over Jensen's face.

"Are you going to say something bright-sided?"

Jared sighs. "No." He pats Jensen's shoulder twice with his big hand. "That blows."

Jensen sucks in a slow breath, lets the smile he'd grafted onto his face fade. "Yeah," he exhales in a whoosh. He feels a wobble in his chest, all his anchors cut from their chains. "I wonder what happened to my folks."

Jared turns a little in his bed, the mattress dipping. "Whatever it was, they were probably really sad to lose you." His voice is warm and dark. "I bet they didn't want to be away."

Jensen nods from under his portion of comforter. He puts his hands palm-down on the bed, riding out the little ripples Jared makes as he shifts.

"You're not a figment of my imagination, are you?" Jared asks.

****

The next time, Jared is wide awake. He has this monstrous TV in his room. It's demonstrably and emphatically not a flatscreen. It looks a million years old. He's playing Modern Warfare on it.

"Where did that thing come from?" Jensen asks. "The Stone Age?"

"Unlikely," Jared says. "But I appreciate your attempt at dramatic effect."

"It looks like something Fred Flintstone would buy with his end-of-the-year bonus."

Jared pauses his game, puts down his controller. "So are you just going to pop into my bedroom randomly for the rest of my life?"

"We're friends," Jensen says.

Jared narrows his eyes. "I could be doing stuff in here."

"Like what?"

"Private stuff."

Jensen laughs. "You're kind of uptight."

Jared stands; he's a lot taller than Jensen had expected. "I'm not uptight, I'm territorial. This is my room. It's my domain."

Jensen holds his hands up. "Alright, alright. I'll knock, how 'bout."

Jared sighs. "And if I need my sleep, you have to leave. Or be quiet."

"Silently watching you slumber?"

Jared grimaces. "Okay, if I require sleep, you will exit the premises."

"Well, we'll figure out all the details a little later." Jensen grabs Jared's game controller. "Find some wiggle room where it's called for."

Jared crosses his arms over his chest, chewing on his lower lip. "This doesn't seem like it's on the up and up," he says. "Are you allowed to just hang out with me?"

"Not technically." Jensen's got his guy stuck in a corner and there's a lot of shooting happening. He's not sure where, exactly, the gunfire is coming from, so he just kind of fires off into the air, hoping for the best. "But I'm guilt-tripping Sully pretty hard, and he's a marshmallow to begin with. How he became the company's executive-in-chief I'll never know."

"What if I tell everyone all the sordid details you've shared with me? It's a secret, right?"

Jensen looks up from the game. "You won't," he says.

Jared holds Jensen's gaze. He chews at his cheek before sighing. "Give me that," he says, snatching the controller from Jensen's hands. He easily extricates the marine from the corner of the bunker Jensen had rammed him into, then tosses the reins back to Jensen.

"Look at that," Jensen says. He nods at Jared's Muppets t-shirt. "Nice pj's."

"Mm," Jared says. "Kermit’s an institution." He points at the top left corner of the screen. "Throw the grenade back already!" He shakes his head. "Sloppy."

****

Jensen does some poking around back at headquarters. Jared's door was supposed to be sealed off and sequestered a long time ago--right around the time he left elementary school--but it got mixed up into the active doors somehow. Jensen tuts as he goes through the files. That's the problem with big corporations--it's hard to lay culpability at any one person's feet, what with the trail of little oversights that leads to every major error.

"It's a good thing I caught this one," he tells Jared. "Who knows what would have happened if I hadn't gotten your door thrown my way."

"I have a question," Jared says. "Why do you stay over there? You're not a monster, despite the convincing argument your face puts up. Just hop over here full-time."

"Hello," Jensen says. "Did you not hear what I just said? I am putting out fires all over Monstropolis."

Jared rolls his eyes.

"Holy smokes," Jensen says.

****

Jensen's already crossing over more than he should anyway. There are a lot of eyes on him; one especially large eye in particular seems to be concentrated on his back at all times. Jensen has never been more grateful for the fact that Mike is easily flustered. A few drops of hot sauce in Guido's morning coffee has him belching fire, and the drill in Mike's department is enough to put Jensen in the clear for weeks, what with the paperwork involved in follow-up.

"I have to start being careful," he tells Jared. "I think they're beginning to suspect."

Jared is doing pull-ups on the bar he'd hooked over the closet door. "Well," he grunts, "a fire drill, flood, and bomb threat in the span of three months doesn't really scream normal working conditions."

"Says you." Jensen scrolls through Jared's phone, snooping through his text messages. "And besides, I still don't think bomb threat is the appropriate term."

"We agreed to disagree, Jensen."

Jensen rolls his eyes, tosses Jared's phone aside. He watches Jared’s back strain. "How many of those can you do?"

Jared blows out an exhale. "This is eight."

"You're putting a little more meat on your bones, I guess."

Jared pulls his chin up above the bar, holds steady. If he straightened his legs, he could still press his feet flat to the floor, easy.

"Have you thought that through?" Jensen asks. "At least before I had the reassurance of knowing you wouldn't immediately be singled out for consumption if I ever dragged you into Little Hades."

Jared snorts, slowly lowers himself until his elbows are extended.

Jared's being incredibly boring, and his devotion to the bulking up of his body is near inexplicable. "Dude, do you have a girlfriend?" Jensen demands. He's already certain halfway through the question. "I can't believe you're holding out on me."

"I don't."

"You do!" Jensen says. "Say it. Say you have a girlfriend."

Jared drops to the ground, turns around. He's blushing as he stretches his arms behind his back. "No, I don't have a girlfriend. Don't twist yourself up into a knot."

Jensen shrugs, drops back onto the bed. "I was momentarily electrified by curiosity and shock."

"Settle back. All is as it should be." Jared falls face-first onto the bed next to Jensen, too fast for Jensen to get a good look at the expression that flickers across his face.

Jensen pinches Jared's wifebeater with two fingers, peels the wet cotton off the small of Jared's back, takes a kind of sick pleasure in it. He's not sure if there was a twinge in Jared's voice just then, a little bit of humiliation at Jensen's disbelief that Jared could land a girl. "Hey," he says, finally. "I mean. I think anyone would be lucky to have you."

"Mm," Jared says into his pillow.

"I'm serious."

Jared grunts.

"Hey," Jensen says. He puts his hand on Jared's shoulder, pats him awkwardly. He squeezes. "I'm serious."

Jared rolls up onto one side, looks over at Jensen. He holds Jensen's gaze, chews thoughtfully on the inside of his cheek. "Okay," he says. "That's really sweet of you."

Jensen rolls his eyes, flips him off.

"Jensen, no. You're the sweetest," Jared says, smirking. "I'm serious."

****

So it turns out that Jared is on the water polo team, and they're getting further along into the season than anyone thought they would. "It's not just water polo," he tells Jensen. "It's varsity water polo."

"You are sleeping all the time," Jensen says. "I think there's something wrong with your thyroid."

"My thyroid is top notch, okay?" Jared yawns. "Coach is making me bulk up on top of practice, which is on top of debate team, which is on top of pounding out my college applications."

"Okay, well, get a new video game. Because I've smashed all your records, and there's nothing left for me to achieve here. I've attained, just," Jensen lifts a hand, "the pinnacle of my current being."

Jared groans. He puts his face down into the open textbook on his desk. "You're cramping my style," he says.

Jensen slaps Jared on the back. "Chin up. Would it be extremely helpful if I read this book aloud to you? 'Section 1.1: Four ways to represent a function--'"

"Oh my god," Jared groans. "I'm doomed. I'm done for."

Jensen laughs. "Come on, Jared. Relax. You can do this. I promise, I'll be quiet. I'll leave, if you need."

Jared turns his head, one cheek pressed to text. "I think I took on too much. I should probably drop this math class."

Jensen squeezes Jared's shoulder. "I think you can do it."

"Says the guy who lives in my closet."

Jensen smiles. "Says the guy who lives in your closet."

****

Jensen usually gets bored pretty fast. Monstropolis is sensory overkill, and Jensen got used to being assaulted with new things to see, or touch, or hear. It's a big city, and home to a massive industry, and there are, inevitably, monsters who take their jobs home with them, which leads to screaming, and roaring, and the occasional city rampage. It's not violent, really, mostly just a way to let off some steam.

"There's kind of an art to it," Jensen tells Jared. "Cutting swaths across municipal buildings."

"Taking graffiti up a step too far, don't you think?"

"Do I criticize cultural aspects of your society, Jared?" Jensen asks. "I don't think I do. Because I'm respectful."

"Oh my god," Jared says. He sits on his bed, leaning over to grab his calves. "I'm sore like you wouldn't believe."

Jensen sighs, drops into Jared's desk chair and wheels it over. "Did you stretch before you worked out?" he asks.

"Yes," Jared says. "A little."

Jensen raises an eyebrow.

"I touched my toes," Jared says. "I thought I was good to go."

Jensen leans back in his chair, spins away. "Go take a warm bath, Jay. You need to soak. I'll see you another night."

Jared kicks out a leg to catch Jensen's chair, groans immediately following. "Wait," he says, still wincing. "You're going to leave?"

Jensen thumbs at his nose. "Yeah. You need your rest, superstar. Besides, I do have duties to attend to. I'm pretty important."

"Come back Friday night. I've got a big game I can tell you about."

"Okay," Jensen says, hands gripping the rounded curves of the armrests. He puts one foot under his thigh. "I wish I could go," he says.

"What's stopping you?" Jared asks.

Jensen smiles. "Monsters have a curfew. Unless you're planning on playing around midnight, I think this is a match I'll have to miss."

Jared closes one eye, studying Jensen. "Do you like hanging out in here? I don't--it's not a huge room."

"Hm," Jensen says. He takes in the four walls, the framed jerseys, trophies and photos strewn across shelves. The overflowing hamper, the yellow light of bare lightbulbs, the Thomas the Train Engine sheets stretched threadbare over the too-small bed. He shrugs. "I wouldn't come back if I didn't."

Jared runs a finger across the end of one eyebrow, smiles to himself.

****

Jensen shows up Friday night, but the room's empty. He waits around, and at 2 a.m., Jared crawls in through the window. He's weaving. Jensen suspects he's drunk.

"Celebrating?" Jensen asks.

Jared beams. "We crushed them. You should have seen, Jensen. We beyond dominated."

"Never had a doubt," Jensen says. He walks over to Jared, gets his shoulder up under Jared's arm and guides him to the bed. "Sleep it off, champ," he says, tugging the covers up and around Jared.

"Yeah," Jared says, and then he's out.

Jensen goes through the closet door, back to the abandoned training facility where he'd installed Jared's door. He's pretty sure it's reasonably safe here. Sully had been asking about Jared lately, wondering if Jensen was visiting him too often with just enough of an edge that Jensen took warning.

It's not exactly roses in the city but this is the place Jensen grew up. Sully, for all his overprotective tendencies, is family. For every doubt Jensen has had about whether he belongs in Monstropolis, he's found a reason to feel welcome, and wanted.

He wonders if he could leave. He wonders if he could ever really make his life on the other side of that door. He touches it, the familiar white paint, stained wood showing through the places it had worn thin, the pennant hanging on the doorknob. Small tokens of the person it leads to.

****

The next several weeks, every time Jensen drops by, Jared is either already asleep or just gone. The nights Jared is asleep, Jensen lingers, putting the TV on mute while he cycles through a campaign he's played twenty-two times already.

Jared might have been sick one of those nights, and Jensen worried. He touched the fine, sweat-soaked hair at Jared's temples. The kid didn't look too hot, so Jensen snuck down the hallway and wet a washcloth, laid it across Jared's forehead. It's a risk--Jensen keeps freezing at noises coming from the master bedroom down the hall--and Jensen is annoyed that Jared made him take it, so he leaves pretty quick after.

Anyway, Jensen keeps missing Jared, so he tries to make an appointment, once, scrawling a note on a Post-it he sticks to Jared's chin, but when he shows up on the specified date, he finds a note stuck to the TV offering Jared's apologies. There's a dance at school.

Jensen doesn't sulk, at least not for very long. He wanders around the room, poking into drawers, rifling through Jared's backpack. He respects Jared's privacy, usually, but he's not feeling very generous tonight. He picks up a ball cap that's hanging off a nail Jared had pounded into the wall and puts it on.

Jensen imagines, briefly, that Jared went with someone he likes. Someone he goes to school with, that he can share the fullness of his life with, day to night. He sighs, and puts the hat down on Jared's bed, closes the door gently behind him. He'd almost thought the adage wouldn't apply to him, that maybe not every door would outgrow its monster.

It seemed to happen so fast.

****

Sully says that it isn't unheard of, for monsters to form an attachment. Especially now that they've been experimenting with a transition over to laughter--the accidental discovery that it was exponentially more powerful than screams was a revelation. Not a revolution quite yet--they still had technological and institutional hurdles to jump--but they were slowly but surely taking the first steps toward some sort of switch.

They'd expected the possibility that monsters would become more prone to creating bonds with their wards, but they hadn't expected just how quickly and easily those relationships would take root. The comedy routines were more amenable to the forming of friendships, and Imaginary Friends, Ltd. had already lodged a formal complaint and requested a court-ordered injunction on any further encroachment upon their bread-and-butter.

At Sully's request, Jensen had taken on the duties of liaising with IF's legal team. To be completely honest, he understood their concern, and had his own about the pace at which Monsters, Inc. had been reallocating their resources. They needed to slow down and lay tracks for a whole new infrastructure, including some sort of system to monitor Monster-Ward interaction. He'd told Sully that a curriculum needed to be developed, teaching monsters to maintain the illusion of a child's dream or overactive imagination, insuring some distance.

Out of the blue, during another slip into the same sort of lecture over the dinner table, Sully puts a paw over Jensen's hand and asks him about Jared.

Jensen puts on a good front, saying he hasn't seen Jared in almost a year, but Sully quietly tells Jensen that he'd kept track of the traffic on Jared's door. "Did you really think nobody would notice an extra door plugged into our mainframe?"

Jensen sighs. "Caught." He puts his fork down. "But I really haven't visited him in weeks. I learned my lesson." He smiles lightly at Sully. "But see, I'm just as worried about our employees as I am about the kids. They can't stay friends with their wards forever." He laughs. "I don't know if we could afford all the worker's comp for emotional distress."

Sully chews thoughtfully. "It sounds like you're speaking from personal experience," he says.

Jensen shrugs.

"You and Jared had a different story, though, didn't you?"

Jensen laughs. "Well, yeah. He was a teenager. Way less lovable."

****

The truth is, Jensen had needed to quit cold turkey. It had taken him a little while to realize that, human though they both might be, his and Jared's friendship wasn't built to last. Jensen couldn't sacrifice everything else in his life just to hold on to a good buddy. He knew that.

It makes him think of Jared again, though, that conversation.

He asks Mike about the door while they’re walking out of a meeting. If it was still where Jensen had left it.

Mike hustles him into the nearest private space, checks to make sure there are no feet or tentacles or flippers occupying the toilet stalls. He hops up onto the counter, stands so he’s at eye level with Jensen. “Jensen. Buddy. Tell me you’re not thinking about going back to see that A-level chump again.”

Jensen shrugs. “What’s the harm in looking in on him?”

“There’s plenty of harm! Oceans of it! Planets!”

Jensen sets his jaw, turns on the faucet next to Mike, washes his hands.

Mike sighs. He puts a hand on Jensen’s shoulder, tentative, careful with his talons. “Have you said anything to Sully?”

Jensen shakes his head.

Mike looks at Jensen in the mirror, analytical. Seeing all the ways Jensen is different. Jensen remembers that look from when he was just a kid, the way it had used to make him angry. He’d glued fur to his face for months.

It’s easier now to stand it. Mike is honest to a fault, every emotion on his sleeve. Still. “Stop looking at me like that,” Jensen says.

“You know, Sully, he didn’t mean to take you away. He’s never stopped feeling guilty about it; I don’t know what it is, a family thing, probably--the way his grandmother could make you sorry, whoo!” He puts his hands on his hips, a rickety smile under his eye. “But once you were here, Sully went all in. The big galoot always said it was you who chose him.”

“Never let it be said that Mike Wazowski couldn’t charm a fourth wish from a genie.” Jensen dries his hands on his pants, swipes them over his ass. “You would like Jared,” he says. “He’d laugh at your jokes.”

“Okay.” Mike throws up his hands. He hops off the counter, looks down to say to his feet, “Jensen, a guy gets used to having you around. I did.” He heads toward the door. “I’ll leave the door active,” he calls over his shoulder, toenails clicking on the tile.

****

Jensen walks down hallways. Their familiarity's faded a little, but he's in front of Jared's door and the red light over it is glowing as usual. He almost knocks.

Jared's awake and bent over his keyboard. His back is broader than Jensen remembers, the sleeves fitting a little tighter.

Jensen had planned on barging in like he used to, collapsing onto Jared's bed and kicking his feet up, but Jared has a new comforter, something in blocks of blue and red, and--the whole room looks different. Older.

Jensen closes the closet door quietly behind him, rocks back on his heels and spreads his arms out wide. "Boo," he says.

Jared jumps up out of his chair, literally spins in the air.

"Whoa," Jensen says. "Agile."

Jared points. "You. You scared the shit out of me."

Jensen can't help but laugh. "I'm sorry," he says.

Jared leans over, bracing his hands on his knees, catching his breath. He shakes his head, then straightens, strides over and crushes Jensen into a hug.

He's a lot taller than Jensen remembers. More expressive, too. This is probably the first time they've ever hugged. "Okay," Jensen says, patting Jared's side.

Jared steps back, but his hands stay on Jensen's shoulders, holding Jensen firmly as he takes a good look. "I was beginning to think I really did make you up."

"You got big," Jensen says.

"I doubted my mental health for a few weeks there."

"Why is your face like that?" Jensen asks.

"Where the hell have you been?"

"You're talking a lot," Jensen says. He doesn't know why he feels so suspicious.

Jared laughs, and Jensen notes the straight whiteness of his teeth, the way his laugh almost booms from some newly discovered reservoir. "You have good timing. It's my birthday."

"Is it?" Jensen asks.

"It is. I'm eighteen now." He drops his hands suddenly, and Jensen can feel the warmth dissipating, too fast.

"Happy birthday!" Jensen says.

"You don't sound like you mean it," Jared says.

"I do." Jensen grins, ignoring the sweet little drop in his stomach. "You're an adult now."

Jared smiles huge. He claps his hands together. "Can you believe it?"

Jensen laughs. "I don't know if the world's ready."

Jared chuckles. He swings his arms back and forth, then finally sits on the bed, tapping the space next to him. "So tell me everything, dude. What've you been up to? Where have you been? Did you meet the three-eyed man of your dreams?"

"You've changed a lot," Jensen says. "In a good way," he adds quickly.

Jared laughs, runs one hand down the front of his shirt, nose wrinkled. "You think?"

"Not just--" Jensen swallows, suddenly nervous. His mouth feels dry. "You seem really happy. Kind of comfortable in your skin, you know?"

Jared smiles. "Thanks. I guess I blossomed. People always said it would happen. I feel good."

Jensen sits down next to Jared. There's barely enough space for the two of them on the edge of the bed. "I'm glad," Jensen says.

Jared nods, waiting for Jensen to pick up the conversation, but Jensen can't seem to get his act together, the room feeling very small, his sweater confining.

He remembers how furiously Jared had been typing when he came in and he looks up at the computer. "You seemed busy when I came in," Jensen says. "Maybe I should get going."

"No, man," Jared says. "It's just homework. It's not even due tomorrow."

"Are you sure?" Jensen asks.

"Definitely." Jared leans over and roots around under the bed, comes up with two video game controllers. "Look who got another controller for his birthday." He waggles his eyebrows.

It's a relief, and Jensen laughs, thankful for the mindless company that Call of Duty allows. He leaves after a round, though, making something up about needing to check in with Roz and the CDA, and it's only after he goes through the door that he feels like he can breathe.

He closes the door behind him, studying his shoes. When he looks up, Sully is standing in front of him, a clipboard in his hands.

"Things are different for you," Sully says. He'd been waiting. "You're lovesick."

****

Which, actually, makes things simpler. The next step after discovering one loves somebody is to then tell that person. Sure, you could kill some time between the two points by conflicted inaction--to tell or not to tell, that is the question--but Jensen's always thought it best, when found in a sea of trouble, to take up arms. It’s the pragmatist in him.

"So, anyway," Jensen wraps up. "I like you."

Jared's sitting up really straight at the foot of his bed.

"In the spirit of full disclosure, there's a possibility it could tip toward love territory. But I'm going to hold onto that word until after I find out whether or not you're going to shut me down." Jensen's pretty anxious. He sounds like he's reading from a Powerpoint presentation, he knows, but he can't really help it.

Jared nods. He scratches the bridge of his nose. "That's big news," he says.

"Yeah," Jensen says. "Take some time, if you need. That's understandable." He rocks back on his heels, chews on his lip.

"I'm kind of--" Jared shakes his head, like he's clearing it of cobwebs. He looks up, smiling ruefully. "I don't even know if I'm gay, Jensen."

"Yeah," Jensen says. "You're a late-bloomer. I think that might be your thing." He looks away decidedly, doing his best not to give Jared the next in what's already been a long series of look-overs.

Jared snorts. "Just tell me I grew up good, already; get all the creepy out of your system."

"Hey," Jensen says. "In my defense, you're at least one growth spurt and fifteen pounds away from the Jared I first met."

Jared sighs, pokes at his bicep. "I'm still the twiggiest guy on my team, you know that?" He pokes it harder. "Grow, damn you, grow."

"Oh, good," Jensen says. "A more important conversation has come along to replace the bullshit we were swapping earlier."

Jared laughs. "It's so nice to be loved," he says.

Jensen doesn't know what to do with his hands. He leans forward. "Is it?" he asks. He wants to know.

****

They talk about it a little longer after that, but Jared seems a little skittish. He still makes Jensen stick around for a few episodes of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, but Jensen sneaks out when Jared falls asleep halfway through the last one and once Jensen's back in Monstropolis, he starts to beat himself up.

"Hey," Sully says, pressing the call button for the elevator in the company lobby the next morning, "Don't get stuck inside your head. I've learned it's best not to overthink things."

"Ha," Mike says. "A lesson you unequivocally took to heart. Your head's emptier than the beauty salon floor the day of Celia's annual visit."

"You can't change what you said in that room. Let it be." Sully pats Jensen gently on the shoulder.

Jensen nods, walks into the elevator that just sprang open, jabs at the button for the 13th floor. He lasts until the doors close before blurting out, "I put too much pressure on him, though, right? What happens if he says yes? If he feels the way I do?" He falls against the back wall of the elevator. "I'm serious, what happens next?"

Sully clears his throat, looks away, studying the deepest recesses of the top corners of the elevator box.

Mike taps one foot. "You hold hands? Exchange a smooch or two? The moon, dinner, candlelight." He swoons. "It's the stuff of fairy tales."

Jensen clenches his jaw, staring straight ahead, shaking his head slightly. "I just--I couldn't ask him to come to Monstropolis." He's worried. "Really, the only realistic play is for me to leave here."

Sully makes this small noise in the back of his throat, and it pricks Jensen, lets out all of his air.

"You'd really go?" Mike asks.

"I don't know," Jensen says. "Could I make Jared a reason to leave my whole life behind? He's still a kid."

Sully bumps Jensen's shoulder with his own. "You're still a kid."

The elevator door opens. "Yeah," Jensen says, looking down at his shoes. He steps over.

****

He gives Jared more than a few days to think. Truthfully, it's as much for his own sake as it is Jared's. He hadn't realized how terrifying it might be to get a real, honest-to-god answer. 'No' feels more knowable in a way: If Jared isn't interested, if he just wants to be friends, then the status quo is fine. Jensen will stay in Monstropolis, the city he'd grown up in, and Jared will grow up and go off to college. And maybe Jensen would peek into his room during the holidays, when Jared was home from school; they'd share a few laughs, some egg-nog, and fill each other in on their separate lives. It could be nice.

Jensen spends most of his time worrying about what will happen if Jared says yes. "First off," he tells Roz, "I don't know anything about making a life there. How am I going to get a job? I don't have school records that could transfer over."

"Of course you do," she rasps. "You've been an irrepressible source of paperwork for me since the day you stowed away on Sully's inobservant back."

"Do you actually do paperwork?" Jensen asks.

"I am more of a take action kind of gal," Roz monotones.

Jensen leans on the counter of her station, both elbows planted on the formica. "I don't think I could do it," he says. "Say goodbye to my life here. I've heard the stories about Bigfoot. If there's any truth to it, he's not handling banishment all that well."

"There's a difference between exile and emigration." Roz says. She slithers to the back of her office, files away the last few folders of the day. "About twenty pages of paperwork, for one." She slams the cabinet closed, makes her way back to the service window. "We're not separate worlds, genius. Yetis, closet doors, North Poles. Don't waste your time with maudlin."

Her tone of voice is the polar opposite of sentimental, and it makes Jensen smile. He pokes his head through the window of the Plexiglas partition. "I'd miss you, Roz."

"Ha!" She shoos him back with a flick of her wrist, rasps, "Watch your head," slams the window shut.

Door One, Part Two

FNL Fic: Stranger at My Shoulder

indysaur — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:23:46 GMT

Stranger at my Shoulder
Incredibly short! Unbeta'ed.
Jason doesn't waste his time thinking about Tim. There's usually more important.

Jason used to worry about Tim a lot. Things just started that way, he guesses. Way early on, this kid, Tim, came sidling onto the field, nose running. He lifted up his shirt to wipe at it and he asked, "Do you need another?" and Jason straightened up before Derek Walter could open his mouth, said, "Go wait over there. We'll rotate you in."

He just noticed the kid around a lot after that. Always raggedy. Always looking in need of a bar of soap.

"What's going on with that Riggins kid?" Jason asked his dad, once, and his pops, he shook his head. "Jason, I borrowed these game tapes; we're not gonna have them forever--" and Jason said, "No, don't pause it. I'm sorry, sir, it's just that who's taking care of that kid?"

His pops pointed at the screen, "You see that? You see the way he dropped back, found some time? You look for opportunity, Jason, you don't lose your head."

Jason nodded. Later, over dinner, Jason said, "Tim Riggins, he's been playing ball with us on the weekends."

"Oh yeah, sweetie?" his mom said.

Jason spoke through his mouthful of mashed potatoes. "He's pretty good," he said.

And then his dad looked up.

****

Life just got rosier. Things were real easy and Jason never questioned it. Why shouldn't it happen that way? He had a gift.

Tim started drinking for real at thirteen, but he went out of his way not to pop a tab in front of Jason until the day he turned fourteen, when Jason laughed, handed Tim a beer from his own hand.

He didn't want to be the golden boy everywhere and all the time, right? He didn't want to be that guy who made Tim feel bad about who he was, but maybe Tim could have used that. Jason used to wonder a lot, but probably it wouldn't have made a difference. Probably it would have happened just the same, whether Jason watched him drink that beer or not. Tim was gonna be a drunk.

****

Anyway, everyone lucky needs a screw-up sibling, and Jason got one. Even though he was an only child! That's how gold Jason was, 24 karat, shine a light.

****

They were friends. They used to get rumors floating around, usually after the Panthers had stomped another team into the ground. That Tim was Jason's bitch. That the two of 'em shared jockstraps. Stupid shit like that. Reeked of poor sportsmanship.

The closest it got was Jason hugging Tim after a good game, Tim's sweat just getting everywhere.

****

After Jason broke his back, him and Tim, they went through a rough patch. Tim's not real good to lean on. Or he wasn't anyway. For anybody but Lyla, maybe.

But Jason spent a whole night, a long time ago, chewing over every detail of that first year after the accident, and then he packed it away. "QB, you need more than one look," Herc said, once. "That's some repressed shit if I ever heard it."

Jason gripped the wheels of his chair, forced it to a stop. "It was a real long look," he said.

****

That hot second he spent coaching the Dillon Panthers, he pulled Saracen aside and said, "You watching out for Tim? You're QB 1. You're QB 1."

Saracen looked at the ground, looked to the side. Who knows what at. "Yeah," he said. "I've kinda got a lot on my plate right now. Besides, Riggins doesn't really seem like the kind of guy who wants a keeper--"

"On the field," Jason said. "Goddamn, Matty."

****

Lyla, she said, "Tim's not a fuck-up. Everybody thinks he is--"

"--I don't think Tim's a fuck-up--"

"--Everybody thinks he is, but he's not, Jason. He just--He doesn't think to say no to anything he can grab a hold of."

Jason put his hands between his legs, leaned forward. "So you're saying my best friend--your boyfriend--is dumb. That's what's happening here. Behind his back--" and Lyla smiled despite herself, tilted her head back like her ponytail suddenly gained five pounds, said, "No, I'm not saying he's dumb. God, Jason."

She held Jason's hand, looked down at their interlocking fingers. "He wants what he can get," she said. Simple as that.

"He wants copper wire?" Jason asks.

****

Tim spent a lot of time waiting around when they went to New York. Jason let him have one of the suits he bought. "You look sharp, Timmy," Jason said, and Tim tugged on the lapels, looked down at Jason. This smile on his lips.

That's what he can see best of Tim from that trip. The rest of the time Jason barely remembered Tim was there.

****

Life is pretty great. But Erin. Jason's still getting used to her sometimes. He likes to bend over backwards for her, but at some point, he told her tonight, he'll run the risk of breaking his spine in two places.

She laughed, and towered over him, and told him that she wasn't going to talk to him when he was like this. She was going upstairs, and it was all Jason could do to hold onto the rims of his wheels, to not force her to sit down.

After she goes, Jason pulls his phone out of his pocket, lets it sit in his hands. He's not sure who to call. He's gotta talk the mean out, but Herc would tell him to fuck Erin, take the fruit of his loins and come back to Texas.

He calls Lyla, but Tim picks up. "Six?" Tim says, scraped out of his throat.

"I'm sorry," Jason says. "Y'all were sleeping. I'll call tomorrow."

"Hey, hold on," Tim says. Rustling. "Why? What's going on?"

"Nothing." Jason stares at his toes, curls his fingers into his palm, into the pad.

"Um." Tim breathes in, clears his passages. "How's life on a coast?"

"I'll call back, Tim. It's--I'm sorry, I didn't realize how late it was."

"Jason," Tim says. "Jason. Come on. Lay it on me." He sounds like he's standing up, maybe. At a window. Rocking back and forth on his heels. "Jason," Tim says.

Jason puts his hand over his eyes, squeezes his temples. He lets out this long breath and it creaks out of him, his shoulders unlocking. "Hey, I'm okay." I feel small tonight, Jason wants to say, but he doesn't.

Tim, he stays on the line. That's Jason's friend. His very oldest, shine a light.

RPS Fic: Fading Silhouettes (1/) J2_Remix

indysaur — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:49:59 GMT

Fading Silhouettes
SPN RPS: Jared/Jensen
Rating: PG-13
26,699 words
More AU to the max. Zombie fic, balla's. Written for j2_remix. Thank you to light_up for her unflagging encouragement. And to kittyzams for countless drafts, long phoneless conversations over Gchat, and one epic all-nighter. Basically, she co-wrote this! Any good thing here wouldn't have been possible without these two incredibly talented and generous ladies. A remix of Lower the Curtain Down All Right by cathybites. An intense, perfectly compact story with teeth. I hope I did right by you.

The problem is, Jared is days, miles, light years away.

****

So. This is how it goes.

There's a pickup truck in the middle of a cornfield, key in the ignition. Half a tank of gas and a dead body hanging out the driver's side door.

"You think he was alone?" Jared asks.

"Probably," Katie says. "In my experience, guys like that usually kill everyone they're with before they--" She mimes putting a gun to her forehead, the self-inflicted death.

"Big damned heroes," Jared says.

Jensen keeps his mouth shut. He scans the countryside. Fields wild and weeded. The sky heavy and unbroken over them. He can feel the pressure of it, the heat and weight bowing his shoulders. There isn't a sound. He is his eyes and skin, reduced to nothing but.

Jared touches his arm. "We can set up here. In that barn." Jared points, maybe a mile away. "For a little while. Truck'll get us far enough, fast enough if it comes to that."

Katie tugs the drawstring of her hoodie all the way out, leaves it hanging. Makes a show of looking away from Jensen. "No sign of people. Alive, anyway."

"And you know the corpses go where the people are," Jared says.

Katie shrugs. "It's an issue of hipness. They know where it's at."

Jared snorts. "Rotting flesh is in?"

"Hello? Why do you think I insist on smelling like this?" Katie tosses her hair.

"Alright," Jensen says. He squints at the barn. It looks sound enough, from this distance. He'll have to see. "In the truck." He grips the short end of the drawstring at Katie's neck, pulls it down until it hangs perfectly even. Ignores her smirk.

The visibility is good. They have enough ammunition to keep from worrying. Jared looks tired. And they all could use some time: to sit, to wash. To breathe. He prays, sincerely, that the barn still has a door. It's the height of his hopes.

****

Katie's sitting deep inside one of the horse stalls in the barn. You can only see her shoes: ratty white sneakers she keeps freakishly clean, covered in little markered dashes that count off bundles of five. Jared drew the stars that sit over her toes. They scream Jared. The way a kindergartener learns to draw stars, starting with an upside down 4, uneven points, a total lack of symmetry. Just big and bold.

Jensen's leaned up against the open barn door, his shotgun up against his shoulder. Moon's high, and Jared looks like a ghost there, only thirty feet away. He's at the water pump, faint light a strip of bone across his broad and moving shoulders. Jensen's gaze sweeps out into the night: nine o'clock, ten, eleven, hits Jared at high noon, then ticks away. Moving with his feet stock still.

The pump sighs, water a rushing beat. Katie's shoes kick in time at four.

Jared stoops lower, then rises, a pail in each hand. The pump hisses to a stop.

Everything drains out to quiet.

Jensen squints. He tries to hear past his own breathing. Jared's walking towards him, skinny but wide. Don't get stuck looking at his face, Jensen thinks. The features forming out of the dark, out of the distance.

For a second, there's the barest scent of something fetid in the air. He could have imagined it.

Wait for it. He breathes deep, dragging breaths.

There. There's a rustle, there, and there. Jensen aims careful, past Jared still walking, pumps two rounds out into the corpse on the left, then swings around to the right flank, holds his breath. Little muscles in his eyes flexing, working to scrape away the dark.

"Okay?" Jared asks.

"Sh." Jensen licks his lips. "I lost him. Pick it up, Jay."

Jared trots. He's being too careful about spilling water. It's so fucking stupid.

"Faster, please," comes Katie's voice from behind him. "Pamplona."

Jared jogs. The fucker.

Jensen doesn't get the time to curse out loud before there's a burst of noise, a roar and pounding. A corpse erupts from the overgrown fields of corn, sheaves furious in its wake. It's sprinting, and Jared goes stiff then small. He doesn't even look behind himself, just draws in his shoulders, ducks some. He doesn't run.

Jensen shoots and pumps, shoots and pumps. He counts: one, two, three, four. The corpse staggers, but doesn't slow. Over his shoulder a rat-a-tat-tat from Katie's rifle, and the thing's close enough that Jensen can see the bullets slam into its chest, sinking into the putrid flesh.

Jensen sprints out, braces the shotgun, leans into it and fires, blows a hole in the corpse's waist. Races past Jared, screaming, "Drop the fucking water, you bitch!" then watches the corpse fall back, and he's on it before it can sit up, stomping the thing's head into the fertile, loamy dirt.

He grinds his heel. Like he's making a paste to spread on crusty bread.

He pants. Looks out into the fields, reloading his shotgun with shaking hands. There were two, he knows. But that other one. That other one went down, but who knows whether it got done. He counts to sixty Mississippi.

He backs up slow. Holds his breath, so there's no rise and fall to interfere with his aim. He's got true aim, he knows. Steady when other things aren't.

As soon as he steps back into the barn, he draws the door closed, flips three locks, top to bottom.

Katie's putting away her firearm. She grimaces. "You're spattered." She holds one hand over her nose, places the other firmly on Jensen's shoulder, to wipe off some goop. To help him lower his gun. "And yes, for all you folks at home, zombie matter still reeks." She looks over at Jared who's got one pail over the fire and is watching the water steam. "It's too close to food. There's a reason I gave up hamburger way before this."

"Mm. You talk so pretty." Jared stretches. He rubs his hands over his face. He fixes his eyes on Jensen.

He's being studied. Jensen can feel every bit and piece of body that stains his clothes and skin. He drags a hand through his hair, lets himself close his eyes. Leaves his hair thick and sticky. The adrenaline's fading. He's fucking exhausted. Frayed, ground down between molars.

Jared sighs. "You're fucking lucky I have enough water to clean up your goddamn mess," he says.

"Corra, amigo," Katie says.

****

How did you first hear?

Usually Jensen says it like this: "A prophet; the quivering, spitting messenger of America's doom."

Jared says it like this, always half-directed at Jensen: "You were in the living room, wearing my boxers. He had the TV on. Yup, I was with my--what do I call you now? You just another ex, Jen-Bob?"

Katie doesn't remember. "I was probably eating," she says. "Peanut butter on Wheat Thins. God. Do you even know how good?" She shakes her head.

****

They can have a backpack because there are three of them, and they're armed. Lucky enough to be armed. Jared carries it mostly. "Because I'm the man," he says, and this is the cue for Jensen to work the pump on his shotgun, and then for Katie to laugh.

Still. They've already lost eight backpacks, somewhere, ditched in favor of life-saving speed. Jared's held on to this one for almost a month now. Complete with two blankets. Jensen stands at the window they pried the boards off of, watches Jared and Katie make a bed near the fire. Jared sweeps Katie into a hug, squeezes her until she yelps and swats at him. Jensen rolls his eyes, and, on cue, Jared looks at him, smirks. Comes to Jensen, wearing this grin. When he's close enough, he leans in and kisses Jensen's temple, then stands there with him for a little while in silence.

Jared hums before he speaks. "Your hair smells clean-ish."

"It has shine." Jensen turns to fully face Jared, chest to chest. He steps onto Jared's feet, finds a little more height. He stares Jared in the eye, noses brushing. "Thank my new conditioner."

"I would like to shave your head."

"Dead man walking," Jensen says.

Jared kisses him. His lips are chapped. He pulls away, hums in the back of his throat. "Go to bed, okay? I'll watch."

"You don't even have a gun." Jensen wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. He spits. Scowls at Jared before leaning in for another kiss.

Jared pulls his handgun from his waist, waves it in the air. Like it's a toy. "Says you."

Jensen smirks. Looks so lightweight. "I'll be," he says gravely.

"Go to bed, baby. Daddy'll take good care of you."

Jensen yawns. He raises his middle finger, heads toward the fire.

"You are cordially invited to suck it." Jared grabs his crotch.

Jensen lies down onto the blankets next to Katie. Her eyes are closed, so Jensen lets out a long, slow breath, feels his eyelids droop. Shifts to find some comfort, blanket drawn over one leg, earth at his back, heat seeping across one plane of his face.

Katie curls up beside him. "I wish I had a boyfriend," she says. "You fucking suck."

Jensen holds her hand. "He's not my boyfriend," he says.

"And whose fault is that?" Katie asks. Her knees are touching his, and her hand feels small, every bone like a bird's, strong and hollow.

****

They leave in the morning, as soon as there's sun. It's the longest Jensen can let them wait. Katie's swimming in this Columbia Sportswear jacket Jared gave her, breath curling around her face. Jensen remembers, vividly, what she used to look like made-up. All colored in.

She's tying her shoe, now, an apple clenched between her teeth, foot braced on the dashboard. He reaches over and pulls a piece of straw from her hair. She winks at him, then twists to face the back, slides open the window to shout at Jared. "Having fun out there?"

Jared whoops. Jensen can picture him. Long legs stretched out. Back to the cab, handgun between his legs, held snug against his crotch. Shirt open one button past appropriate. Slut.

"Should he be yelling like that?" Jensen asks.

"Jared," Katie yells, "Jensen would like to know if you're interested in fighting."

"What kind of fighting? Fist?"

"No," Katie says. "In the manner of two people with a long and twisting history."

"Oh," Jared says. "Tell him 'No, thank you', sweetheart."

Katie turns to Jensen, raises an eyebrow.

Jensen clicks his teeth together. Raises his voice over the noise. "I shouldn't still be pissed off about this morning. Alright? But you know I fucking hate that game. Always have."

"Jensen," Katie shakes her head, smiling a little. "He pulled the car away three times. It was like the shortest game of keep away ever. Everybody does that. My dad did it to my mom all the time. It's a joke."

Jensen grits his teeth. He wishes he could let it go. "You're right. You're right, it's stupid. We have bigger shit to worry about." Jensen feels a hand on his shoulder. Glances back to see Jared, chin on his bicep, hair a fucking disaster in the wind. Arm threaded through the window.

"It's not stupid," Jared says. "I do know you hate that." He squeezes Jensen's shoulder hard, then cups the side of Jensen's neck. Palm of his hand running hot, cold fingertips stroking Jensen's Adam's apple. "I'm sorry. Should've said sorry first. Right off."

Jensen nods. They drive, the fuzz of the radio almost waist-deep.

Jared moves his hand, a few minutes later, but Jensen clears his throat, and it comes back. Rests there, over the right side of his chest.

****

Back when he was a kid, Jensen would wake up at five on Sunday mornings. It was best in the spring. Light so cold and faint you could scare it away if you moved too fast. He'd pull on thick socks, all the way up to his knees, then pad out to the kitchen, out the sliding glass doors, into the backyard where his dad was sitting on a fold-out lawn chair.

There was always a chair for Jensen. He'd sit and fight a yawn. Taste his mouth.

His dad would have the Bible spread open on his lap. He would pray with his eyes open, and Jensen would look with him: at the rising sun, the penumbra of night. Purple to gray to gold. The lawn Jensen had mown yesterday, shorn, and wet with dew, with trembling light. His ears would twitch at every noise: breath and wind, leaves. An owl he never actually saw. Things alive and stirring.

"God is great," his dad would say.

And Jensen would open his mouth, dry and sticky, and say, "All the time."

"All the time--"

"God is great."

Every Sunday morning. To greet a world brand new.

****

The needle on the fuel gauge hovers over empty. Jensen tries not to look at it so damn much. He snaps off the radio. He can't listen to it anymore. There's nothing there. There won't be anything there. He bites the inside of his cheek, then nudges Katie who's dozing. She groans, rolls onto her side, face pressed flat against the glass of her window.

"Katie," he says. "Are you asleep?"

She whimpers, then straightens in her seat, blinking heavily. "I want juicy dish."

"What?"

"If you're waking me up right now, I want it to be for something awesome. Okay? I know the next words out of your mouth were going to be, 'How're you holding up', or 'Talk to me', but you know for a fact that I'm holding up grade-A awesome, and, also, that you are putting me out. You are waking me up and asking me for the favor of my consciousness, knowing full well that I'm grumpy when woken. So you talk to me."

Jensen stares hard out the windshield. The road's empty. He drives in the middle of it, straddling that double yellow line. He's veered around a few wrecks already. He keeps noticing his heartbeat. "I'm just--" He blows out a breath, smiles over at Katie. "Don't know why but I just got the creeps."

She looks at him. She scoots over, close, stick shift pressing into the soft flesh at her side. "Put your arm around me," she says. She rests her head against him.

He holds her close. It makes it easier to be brave, pretending she needs protection.

"You should tell Jared," Katie says. "That you're--" She twirls a hand in the air.

Jensen glances in the rearview mirror. "He's sleeping."

"When he's awake then."

"Okay," Jensen says. "When he's awake."

"You can talk to me about it. Whenever you need." Gently prodding.

Jensen wags his head. "I know. Same goes."

They stay like that for a few minutes, her cheek pressed into the cushion of his shoulder. Both of them staring out windows. Then two things happen. An orange light blips on on the dashboard. And Jared raps at the back window. "Get out the china," he says.

Jensen lowers his head, looks into the side view mirror. A wave of corpses closer than they first appear. He can see their mouths, even from this distance. You always see their mouths.

****

The day after his nineteenth birthday was a Sunday. Jensen's dad called, early. Jensen was hungover. Probably still drunk.

"Hey, Pop."

"Mmhmm. Have a good birthday?"

"Yes, sir."

There was silence, long enough that Jensen almost fell back asleep. "I was just thinking about you today," his dad finally said. "How small you used to be."

"Mm." Jensen sighed heavily. His head throbbed. His dick was half hard. He really didn't want to be on the phone with his dad.

"Anyway."

Jensen buried his face in his pillow. Got out: "Okay, Dad. Thanks for calling."

"Son." A pause. Like it was going to be something really important. "You're grown now."

Something jumped in the pit of Jensen's stomach. He was going to throw up if he opened his mouth. He'd fucking throw up, guaranteed. He should've been able to hold his tequila better. It was a fucking disgrace.

"Just. God is great."

Jensen heaved. "Damn it. Dad, I'm sorry, I have to go. I do. Bye. Love you." And he hung up, made a run for the toilet.

He thought about it later, when he'd sobered up. Right in the middle of dinner, on a date in Beverly Hills, in a restaurant he couldn't really afford. We're different, he thought. He's from a different time.

He sounded old, Jensen thought.

****

Jensen gets pretty close to a gas station before the truck gives out. They sprint the remaining quarter mile, down shimmering asphalt, then over the railing and into the untended brush. Jensen's sweating. His shirt sticks to his skin, bunches up under his arms. Grass knee high and dry as dust.

The station's alone and waiting. Jared shoves his way into the convenience store, does a quick 360, takes everything in at once. "Fuck it," he says. "It's all fucking glass."

"Two doors," Katie says. She's pulling her hair back into a quick bun. "I swear to fucking God," she says. "Someone's going to fucking cut my hair the second we're done with the new wave."

"The pretty princess will do it," Jared says, nodding at Jensen absentmindedly. "Did you see how many?"

"Eighteen, maybe," Jensen says. "Right?"

Katie nods. "I counted that. Six for each of us."

"Not if I snake one of yours," Jared says.

"Please." Katie lifts a shoe, points at the dashes there in blue and orange marker. "Uh oh, look at that. I'm up on you by at least nine."

Jared winks, slips a new cartridge into his piece. They take position in silence: Katie behind the counter at the register, Jared in the doorway leading into the bathroom, Jensen pressed into the corner along the door's wall, looking straight down towards the entrance. They wait. Jensen runs through a checklist: reminds himself of how much ammo they have left, pats his belt where his knife hangs, then his left pocket where his lighter waits. He steadies his breathing.

It's still light outside. The sun's simmering high up in the sky.

"I wish they'd get bored, you know?" Katie peers out the window. Looks for first signs. "Distracted, or tired, or anything. I hate this." Her voice is too loud. "I hate knowing they're coming. They're always going to be coming."

Jensen licks his upper lip.

"Shit," Jared says. The word drops and clatters. That epic brow of his is furrowed. Icicles could hang there. It's a familiar thought. If it was winter. Jensen wants to run the heel of his palm against it.

He's really tired. His gun is ten and a half pounds at the ends of his arms, a dragging-down weight.

****

Jared said this thing sometimes. When they were on set at two a.m. and Jensen was swaying on his feet, staring at the set dresser's hands. Or when Jensen was loaded, one too many tokes from Danny's bong, laughing quietly on the long end of her sectional sofa. Or early mornings, surrounded by the smell of his long-owned feather pillows, light divided up by the blinds into easy-to-swallow strips: "Hey," Jared would say. "Come back to me."

And Jensen would look up, and blink away whatever daze he'd fallen into and Jared would be there. Right there in front of him, smiling. Bright and solid.

"Sorry," Jensen would say.

Jared would shake his head fondly, or laugh, or punch him, but the best reaction, the one Jensen waited for, was a kiss. This quick, dry brush of lips.

It's sentimental, Jensen knows. But Jared used to say it all the time.

They're still waiting in the convenience store here, now. Jared's slid down to the floor, knees up, gun hanging limply in his hand. His feet are dirty, black except for patches where his skin shows through, burnished brown by the sun. He needs real shoes. The flip flops are worn down to nothing. He's rubbing at his beard, staring down at the floor between his legs. Jensen can hear Jared's fingers scraping through the bristly hair.

He wants Jared to look at him. Right now. Just look up and see me watching you.

"Heads up," Katie says. "Shadows on the move."

****

Jensen doesn't know how long it's been. The windows have shattered all around him, their remains glittering under the late afternoon sun. Everything's bathed in the glow. He's killed four, and Jared is alive, and Katie is alive. He can see them holding their breath. He can feel every bead of sweat, dripping down his scalp, over his eyebrows, one clinging there to the lashes over his right eye. He can feel the dirt caked under his fingernails, the blood seeping from his knee, bent against the sharp edge of glass.

His hands are soft and pliant around the bucking gun in his hand, the smoke and fire. This is how I scream; mouth open, the crack of his weapon a noise that comes from the depths of his throat.

He gets off two more shots. Quick and organic, like he's reaching out and touching each corpse: there, at its temple, and there, at its nose. Gaping spaces blossoming where rot used to be.

The quiet drifts in. It comes in ringing.

He's crouched down low. His blood feels thick and hot, burning through his body; sweat and dirt patching him together where the blood breaks past his skin. He remembers being ten, and staying up on New Year's Eve for the very first time. At church for the countdown to midnight, Jensen had crouched just like this under the pews, when his dad took the stage. Pop's amplified voice rolling through him, quickening his tired breath.

We were created from dust in the image of God. Granted dominion over the fish in the seas, over the birds in the air, over every living thing that walks along the earth. The breath in our lungs holy, this body dirt and water.

Jensen can't clear his head. Adrenaline still ringing in his ears. It's over, he tells himself. We're done. For now.

He can't find relief.

"Oh fuck," Jared shouts. So damn loud, it's all anyone can hear. Jensen looks up. Jared's hefting a bottle of green liquid, beaming. "You don't even fucking know how obsessed I am with mouthwash."

Katie stands, stretching. "Please, Jesus, let there be tampons. I will kiss you on the mouth if there are tampons."

"I'll be minty fresh, friend."

Jensen gives himself a shake, hard. He rocks back onto his heels, cocks his head at Jared. "You know that's not a substitute for a toothbrush, right?"

Jared breaks open the bottle, takes a chug. He swishes it in his mouth, pointing at Jensen with both middle fingers. He spits, drags the back of his hand against his mouth, leaving a streak of black in its wake. He's bleeding from a scrape under his eye, red-black a crust on his cheek. His feet are practically bare, skin burnt red on his lean forearms. His hair is snarled beyond salvation, his beard thick and unruly.

Dirt, and sweat, and blood, Jensen thinks.

Jared flashes a smile, a cut of pearly white.

****

They sleep in shifts. He doesn't know what time it is when Katie gets up from beside him and Jared takes her place. Jensen just sprawls across Jared's chest, half awake, face buried in Jared's neck. "You reek," he says.

"Step number one would be to stop breathing me in, then," Jared says. He shoves at Jensen halfheartedly. "Kinky motherfucker. You like my stench."

"Mm. Fucking hot," Jensen says. He humps at Jared's thigh.

Jared laughs.

Jensen opens his eyes, looks at the profile of Jared's smile. White lines where he creases, pale against the darkness of his stained skin. "Kiss me, dude," he says.

Jared turns his head, studies him. The moon's brighter than anything. "Nah," he says.

"Yeah." Jensen grins. "I don't find you sexy anymore, either."

Jared's smile widens. "Well, your lips are all chapped."

"And?"

"They're the source of all your powers!" Jared's voice is quiet, full of glee. "The source of all your powers is chapped."

Jensen's too exhausted to laugh. He kisses Jared firmly.

When Jared pulls away, he says, "Under duress," and cups Jensen's cock.

"Noted."

The hour shutters by, in fast, moving pictures. Jensen feels rooted in every one, present under Jared's hands and mouth, under the moon he sees three seconds in the past, under stars whose light is older than anything moving across the face of a stilled and darkened earth.

****

He asked Jared about it, once. "Why do you say that?" It was late. They were trudging across the lot, faces freshly scrubbed free of makeup. Jensen's cheeks were burning in the cold.

Jared shrugged. He cleared his throat, looked up at the sky. "Did you know that it takes light 2.56 seconds to travel from the moon to the earth?"

Jensen yawned.

"Every time we see the moon, we're seeing a snapshot of what it looked like three seconds ago. We never see it as it is. You know? Now, at this instant."

Jensen ground at his eyes. "I'm fucking beat. No one has ever been more tired than I am."

Jared laughed, pulled open the door to the van home.

The engine started, and Jensen felt himself fading. He could identify this van based off the sound of its engine alone. The chug and hum. It rumbled around him, the sound of the tires on asphalt like a high tide, rushing forward, rushing up. The heat was turned up; the hot air smelled like mildewed leaves and Jared's deodorant. Jensen was dozing when Jared spoke again.

"I'm just saying--" Jared paused. "I always wonder what you’re thinking. You know? I want to know who you are, right now. I don’t--I don’t want to be that guy, who used to work with you on that show, a long time ago.” He drew in a slow, steady breath. "You're important to me." He laughed, embarrassed. "Fuck. I'm not saying it right."

Jensen kept his eyes shut. His body rocked to the rhythm of the van. He patted Jared's armrest, his thigh and knee, before finding his hand. He squeezed it so hard he could hear Jared's knuckles crack.

"Ow, motherfucker, that hurts."

Jensen snickered, then released Jared's hand. He let his fingertips rest, there, in Jared's big palm. He still ached. "I don't really change," he said.

"Hmm." Jared shifted in his seat. He was falling asleep, his breaths lengthening.

Jensen opened his eyes, then. He hoped, hard, that the van wouldn't stop. That it wouldn't stop for a long time. He fingered the lines in Jared's palm.

****

Jensen has his hand splayed on Jared's stomach, right under Jared's belly button. Jared's soft there. His guts protected by tissue that gives. Jensen could slit him open, right here. It'd be so easy. He draws his thumbnail across the yielding flesh.

"Stop," Jared says. He grabs Jensen's wrist. "That tickles."

Jensen flexes his forearm in Jared's grasp. Tests his strength.

Jared releases, stretches, forcing Jensen to move off of him. He nods toward Katie. "Think it's your turn, buddy."

"I've got a little more time."

Jared yawns. "You heard her earlier. I think she's got the creeps. Don't make her wait."

Jensen sighs. "I'm covered in jizz," he says accusingly.

Jared fights off a smile, puts a hand to his heart. "I'm not the one who started it."

Jensen pushes up onto his knees, tucks himself away, zips up his pants. Jerks through each action, unwilling. "She's gonna be mad we fooled around on the blankets."

"You think?" Jared puts a hand on Jensen's knee, waits until Jensen meets his eyes. "Hey. I'm just--I'm worried about her, a little bit."

"Trying to get rid of me," Jensen says.

Jared shrugs, grin satisfied. "Got mine. And now, to sleep." He closes his eyes, hands behind his head.

Jensen watches him for a second. He leans over, hands braced on either side of Jared's head. Inside the space cordoned off by Jared's arms, the crook of his elbows. He puts his face close, tilts so their mouths could touch if he lowered just another bit.

Jared doesn't stir. His lips are relaxed, turning up at the corners.

They don't kiss. Jensen's not sure, all of a sudden, if he's allowed.

He's probably out of time.

****

They head out early. Jensen watches the sun get up off the ground, then touches Jared low on his back, shakes Katie awake.

They walk along the highway. They learned early on that there's no real need to seek cover. It's not about avoiding visibility; the corpses always find them. They argued about it once--what gave them away. Not sight, everyone agreed. Smell, maybe. Hearing; dead ears carefully attuned to the sound of breathing. Jensen thinks it's heat. Their decaying faces drawn to it, like flowers turning with the sun. It would explain a lot. He remembers how much soup he ate that first winter up in Vancouver. The warmth of it was as much of a reason to consume as the taste--the way it spread from his stomach in radiating circles.

Jared's not bothering to shorten his strides up ahead. Jensen doesn't try to catch up; Jared's rapping. Jensen can hear the faint rhythms of it, see it in the set of Jared's shoulders. Jared knows exactly one Lil Wayne song, and Jensen's heard it enough he could match Jared, word for word.

Katie's got her eye on the horizon at his side, licking the dust off her upper lip. Jared's voice floats back to them, and Katie absentmindedly whispers along: "Call me what you want, bitch, call me on my sidekick. Never answer when it's private, damn, I hate a shy bitch. Don't you hate a shy bitch--"

Jensen groans.

Katie looks at him, startled out of her reverie, then laughs. "It's catchy," she says.

"It's the devil's music," Jensen says.

Katie snorts. She eyes a collapsed freeway sign, far ahead in the distance. "Should we bother to check that?"

Jensen shrugs. "We can if you want. We're headed in the right direction if that's what you're worried about."

"How much longer, do you think?"

"Another week and a half, if we're lucky."

"And we're always lucky." She blows on her knuckles, shines them on her shirt.

"Chock full." Jensen grins.

Katie looks down at her feet. Her voice doesn't waver: "What do you think we'll find there?"

Jensen squints into the sun. "Jared heard a lot of people got safe, at the Fort, and the Air Force bases. But--" Jensen follows Katie's gaze. Counts the dashes on her shoes, each one a kill. Their feet carrying them forward. "I don't know."

"Look!" Jared's twisted around, arm pointing at a corner of the sign that still stands. "San Antone!" Grin a mile wide.

****

Everyone has a story of where they were when.

Jensen's is this: He was cutting his toenails in Jared's living room, one foot up on Jared's coffee table, the other planted in Harley's side, keeping him at a safe distance. Sadie was curled up next to him on the couch.

Glenn Beck was shouting on the plasma. "This is just one more thing in a long list of travesties that this government is either unwilling to stop, or, more likely, actively encouraging. That this doctor--Dr., Dr. Joseph Vilner--would not only create this, this pathogen, this bacteria, but would then presume to inform us that it's for our benefit!

That it's the first step to, what did he say, 'the mass production of human hormones, leading to a more affordable and precise application which could have many repercussions in our fight against cancer, against AIDS,' and this, this is my favorite part, 'against the degradation of the human body'. What the hell does that even mean?"

Jensen watched Glenn Beck's cheeks quiver in high definition from the corner of his eye. "This guy," he said to Sadie, "would be a good actor. Shakespearean. Look at that, girl. Look at his face go." He wedged the clipper in under his toenail. He'd let them grow too fucking long. "Travesty," he mimicked. He blustered, let his cheeks drop and go round.

"A travesty! But, and this is my real point, federal money is going into this guy's pocket. What are we doing funding research like this when we're still unprepared to deal with an outbreak like swine flu, this, this H1N1. I'm telling you, things are adding up, the czars in charge here are not messing around."

"Czars!" Jensen boomed.

Sadie perked up beside him, ears twitching. She jumped off the couch and padded to the door just as it burst open. Jensen checked the clock. Long run today.

"Hey, girl." Jared mopped up his usual flood of sweat, pressing his towel to his forehead, then under each arm before slinging it over his shoulder. "How are you, baby?"

"Dude," Jensen said. "Harley keeps trying to eat my nail clippings. Feed the dog."

"Dude," Jared said, walking into the kitchen, "Protein. Keratin, or whatever. It's good for him." He slammed open the cupboards, hefted the tub of protein powder onto the counter.

Jensen turned down the volume on the TV, watched Jared meticulously spoon powder onto his food scale. "You're embarrassing," he said.

Jared didn't look up from reading the measurement, flexed one arm and pressed a distracted kiss to his bicep.

"I'm hungry," Jensen said, twirling the nail clipper between his fingers. He still had shit to do, grooming to finish, but--Jared was here.

"I'll make you a shake." Jared turned, grabbed two glasses from the sink. Swept the 51 grams of protein powder into his cup, then doled out Jensen's portion onto the scale, squinting at the reading.

"Don't make me a shake."

"I'll make you a shake." Jared looked up, raised an eyebrow. "What the fuck are you watching?"

"I don't know." It was Glenn Beck, and Jared hated him. Jensen turned up the volume, the shouting reverberating out of the speakers. You could almost feel the spit on your face. "It soothes me," Jensen said.

"And the gall!" the speakers bellowed. "Listen to his closing statement--listen to this, you're not going to believe it: 'Ladies and gentlemen, in creating life, we have delivered the first stroke to death.' Who do you think you are, Dr. Vilner, to presume to play God? That's what really gets me. The sheer arrogance! And our government! Twiddling its thumbs."

Jared shook his head. "Shit, son--"

"--I'm not your son--"

"Shit, son, that's bananas." He opened the freezer, swung a plastic bag full of frozen bananas out. "Is he flipping out over that synthesized bacteria thing?"

Jensen nodded. "Four bananas in mine. And some of those blueberries. And honey."

"This is why you're doughy." Jared leaned over the island, grabbed the honey from off the dining table. "I heard about that on NPR."

"Misha," Jensen said automatically.

Jared laughed, then shrugged. "Kind of weird, though, right?"

"What do you mean?" Jensen scratched Harley's chest with his toes.

"I don't know." Jared didn't look him in the eye. He used to get embarrassed, sometimes, to admit that he'd put thought into something.

"You know, Jay."

"You ever give real thought to that idea? Living forever? Scares the shit out of me."

Jensen flopped back onto the couch, spread his arms wide. Sadie came trotting back, hopped up onto Jensen's lap. "Nobody likes a funeral."

"Yeah, but--" Jared chewed on his bottom lip, broke the frozen bananas in thirds. Forearms flexing. He tossed everything into his Magic Bullet, sent the sound of whirring steamrolling through the room. "Everybody goes." He clicked it off after a few seconds. "It's the last even playing field. What do you do if you're not marching to a finish line?"

On TV, Glenn Beck's mouth dropped open. His chin doubled. "I just have to repeat that. I have to. Really soak in the conceit of this statement. We have delivered the first stroke to death. This is the country we live in. This is the United States of Amer--"

"Okay!" Jared clapped his hands together. "Shake's ready, Jenny pie."

That's Jensen's story. The day the world was told. The eve.

Part Two

drive-by rec

indysaur — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 18:09:08 GMT

You guys! This is fun! Um. It's a WIP, though the author has stated that the end is coming soon. But fair warning! Other warnings: It's really fun. It's a college AU in which Jared is a college football player (also, there should be a J2 fic about college football in which Jensen is a diehard sports nut/alma mater devotee who never misses a home game and whose home page is set to ESPN and obsessively analyzes recruits in between business meetings) and Jensen is a hipster chemistry major. Their relationship is right off the bat antagonistic, and their dialogue is biting and funny and totally reminiscent of how much you love/hate that guy you shouldn't be thinking about. Love to hate! A+

and when we kiss, (1/2)
standing_fic
j2 college au;
4500k;
pg13 for language, and kisses (duh);
jensen is not amused by the the tall football douche who sits in front of him in organic chem. in fact, he prefers to torture him whenever possible.

no good very bad day

indysaur — Tue, 05 May 2009 07:46:28 GMT

Hi everybody. I'm sorry for the long silence; everybody who's left feedback for my fic that I haven't responded to: I'm truly apologetic and grateful that you've still said such nice things. And thank you, estei , and winterweathered , for asking after me, I'm sorry I fail at life and responding.

ANYWAY. To get depressing news out of the way, I ended up losing my job. But it's almost been a relief, because things at work were so frantic and panicky. I don't know. I've got a few leads on other things, and a couple interviews, but I hate the process of looking for a job. I was really looking forward to not doing this again, but, haha, I'm not entitled to job security anymore than anybody else is, so. Oh well. Gotta roll with the punches.

Also, I REALLY wanted to finish my story for Big Bang, but failed at that business, too. I thought if I gave up all fandom business except for writing, I could get that thing done, but no good. I'm paralyzed with it. I'll think about it on the drive home, and come up with all these scenarios and situations and bits of dialogue, and then when I sit down and reread the last paragraph so I'm in context, I freeze up. I'm committed to finishing it, though, and I guess the silver lining is that if I do soon, I can put it up without waiting until June.

Okay, hi! How have you guys been? I miss you, and missed you, a LOT.

!!

indysaur — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 05:05:50 GMT

Did anyone watch Kings?? Please say yes! It was so good! Um, definitely overreaching, sometimes? And the final image required a 100% buying into of the heavy-handedness and metaphorical weight, and even still there's a whiff of cheesiness, but, MAN. So ambitious and grand and INTERESTING. I had, like, three ideas for fic just watching the Pilot episode. I'm so thrilled.

ugh, this again. reccing is tough business

indysaur — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 20:45:59 GMT

Okay, I know I rec her stuff ALL THE TIME, and YES, it is only because she is my friend and I am hoping to get her to write me High School Musical RPS. I have a sick fascination, and DISNEY IS ALL THE RAGE NOWADAYS. ZANESSA, PLZ.

Great Lengths - light_up
Jared/Jensen, adult, 5,600 words. This story is about dating! Kind of badly.

That is a bad summary. Mainly, this is the greatest story ever told about what would happen if everything in the universe was awesome. It might be one of my favorite things she's ever written. It's just incredibly SEXY; Jared is hot like fire: super confident of Jensen and flirtatious and funny. Jensen is shell-shocked the whole way through, managing to get off some sarcastic one-liners whilst swept along. It's romantic and sensual and hilarious. You should totally read it!

OKAY. It's pouring rain here. I'm going to get to that one meme, I promise. I'm just LAME and my big bang is at 10,000 words AND YET. Jared and Jensen aren't even FRIENDS. I'm unfamiliar with this thing you call progress.

it feels weird to rec!

indysaur — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 20:42:51 GMT

Hi everyone! How's your Monday going? It is overwhelmingly rainy here and I also found out that my bank is nickel-and-diming me like no other. SIGH, SIGH.

Real quick, you should read this:

title - If You Care To Stay
rating - NC-17
wordcount - ~14,000
characters - Jared/Jensen, Chad/Sophia, Jensen/Misha, random other familiar faces.
summary - Jensen's got a thing for his roommate... he just doesn't know which roommate.
notes - My whenboymeetsboy fic, based on The Night We Never Met, an old Matthew Broderick movie. I appear to be the only person who's seen this movie, so, um, BLAME ANYTHING YOU DISLIKE ABOUT THIS STORY ON THE MOVIE. There may be a lot on that list. I'm not crazy about it myself. Also, this now has a soundtrack.

It's by hkath , and it's like, the whole reason whenboymeetsboy was invented. A perfect little romantic comedy in fic form, where the boys are all adorably yuppies, and Jensen is a cheesemonger and Jared plays chess and builds planters! I have a thing for handy Jared! I have made him build planters in fic myself! It's super sweet, and fun, and just. All good things! And it's a super easy, fluid read. It makes me feel the way a really good episode of HIMYM makes me feel!

HAHA, okay this was a super weird rec, probably, but I liked the story a lot.

RPS FIC: Keepsake (1/3) J2 Ever After

indysaur — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 23:14:50 GMT

Keepsake

SPN RPS: Jared/Jensen

Rating: R

19,943 words.

AU to the max. Written for j2_everafter. Thank you to light_up for making this the most fun I've ever had writing fic, and to deirdre_c for making it the most rewarding. This would have been an incredibly different and lesser thing if it wasn't for you guys.
Based loosely on Disney/Pixar's Wall-E.

Jared is oriented to solve problems. He is solution-oriented.

He is not prone to damage. If an accident does occur, he has a healing protocol: a stream of glowing nanocytes that leave a patch, shiny and new. Very similar to a scar. Jared has three. One on his elbow. Another on his brow. One long one across his side. He rubs them, sometimes, when he's idle.

He collects Styrofoam. It's suited to his purposes. Extremely durable. He creates rafts from it, to float across bodies of water. He builds shelters with it. He breaks it open and examines the inside, the crumbs, little spheres all packed together. He listens to the noise his Swiss Army Knife makes when it punctures the surface and scrapes inside.

His knife is red; he likes that it has a corkscrew, and a bottle opener. He finds others, mostly in ruins. He hurries a little, towards them, and dusts them off, and unfolds them. He likes to see what they hide. Ruins are good for that in general. He likes to reconstruct things, to see how they might have functioned. If possible. Sometimes it's not possible.

He made the plumbing work once, in a small cabin at the edge of a lake, after working through twenty-six sunrises. He jumps when he turns on the faucet and it gurgles and spits out brown, sludgy liquid. He watches until it clears. Until it's recognizable as water. He smiles, so big that he notices.

He touches his face, with his hands. He feels along his upturned lips, his appled cheeks. He touches the skin bunching at his eyes. The wrinkles are soft and fine. He turns off the water and jogs out to the lake. It might be Lake Tahoe. He holds his expression.

He studies his reflection in the water. It's a nice smile, for one that came so spontaneously. He learned it well. The smile in the reflection grows.

Everything is very quiet. There is no wind. It is 42 degrees Fahrenheit here. The lake stretches and spills out in front of him, glassy blue.

Maybe this time. Jared stares at his reflection. He traces the scar along his right side with his left hand.

"Hello," he says.

The trees come right up to the shore. He can hear the water lap quietly at their trunks.

He leans forward. He touches his fingers to the water. He stays there, fingertip to fingertip with the man in the lake. Until he can't feel them anymore.

"Hello," he says. A little louder. It’s really been a long time.

****

Jared mostly stays up in mountains, or down in valleys. There are more things to look at. More that's unexpected in the places protected. The ruins, though, are usually at sea level, where the terrain is flat. These emptied-out places. No cover. Just baked earth, and white sky.

There are things to like here, too. He lies on his back, spread eagled on a brick of sand that extends for miles and miles. He can feel motes eddying over him, and he seals his eyes closed. He blows steadily out, through his nostrils, keeping them clear. He soaks in the sun. He pulses with it, charging.

He puts a hand out to his side, palm up. So someone could take it, if they wanted.

There's a landfill to his right. He will search through things thrown away, things abandoned. He likes to put them to use, if he can. If he can't--still, he likes to touch the things that have survived.

****

His standby sequence, lately, has been flawed. He doesn't go to black. Instead, he replays selective data in his memory.

It starts at the beginning.

Day zero was strange. He woke, in a bedroom he knew was his. There were pictures of him along the walls. Some even as a child. Awards he had won. The tall trophy, with a baseball player on top. He had won that three years, two months, and four days ago.

His whole family was in his bedroom. Mother, father, brother, sister. Two of them were on the verge of tears. That was to be expected.

The rest of the week went smoothly. He shoveled down his mother's cooking. He stole his brother's cigarettes. He grumbled good-naturedly at his sister's piano recital. He laughed at his dad's jokes, when everyone else groaned. It was going very well. Jared was proud.

His sister sat him down, on Sunday. It was late afternoon. The sun streamed through the window across from Jared, into his face. He didn't have to squint.

"You're really close," she said. She put a hand on his knee. "Really close to perfect."

Jared rebalanced his weight. "Thank you."

It took him a short while to realize she had begun to cry. When he did, he felt something dim, low in his torso. He put a hand over hers, but she only sobbed, gasps coming from somewhere deep, and suddenly, everything in that room, flooded with light, shadowed.

And that's how it is for a very long time. The harder he tries, the more his family falters. He doesn't know how to fix it. He tries very hard.

Everything is so dim.

****

Jared sifts through the landfill. He's at the peak. He repairs, and puts things whole. He keeps an eye out for the right part, or the right tool. There's something wrong with his optics. He would really like to put it right.

****

The landfill is an embarrassment of riches. He finds a pair of binoculars, and he scrapes the lenses free of caked-on dirt with his nails. He licks his thumb and swirls it in circles against the glass.

When he looks through them, he can see clear across. There's nothing in his way. He can see almost to the ocean. He laughs. He can see really, really far. Probably to Asia. He lowers the binoculars and whoops, so loud it's like he can see it, a visible noise that travels across cracked earth.

He runs down the slope of trash, scattering debris left and right. He stumbles, braces himself with one hand, and keeps running. He sprints as fast as he can, hard, hard, harder. Legs churning, arms pumping. He is ably made.

He skids to a stop. He fits the binoculars to his eyes. He looks for a long time. He sees a rock, there, sailing across the surface of rippling sand. He looks so long that night falls.

He realizes it slowly. Slow because he doesn't want to realize. It's not quite right. It's close, but not quite right. He can see further but not more clearly. He lowers the binoculars, then slides them, carefully, under the crook of his arm. It's not their fault. They can only do what they know. Probably he will carry the binoculars around for a while. He holds them up in front of him again, studies them. He adjusts the eyepieces, moving them up and down, leaves them drooped slightly. They look like eyes.

Yes. He'll hang onto them for a while.

****

He walks into the desert, and something falls from heaven. A sphere, extremely large and glowing blue. It arcs across the sky.

There's a sandstorm rising. Jared can see the foaming churn of it in the distance, dusty and brown. There are clouds behind it, bruised dark, stretched tight full of rain. Lightning strikes. It crackles in capillaried lines.

There's nowhere to run. The sand hits him like a wall. Everything is black. A pound of thunder, and a sheet of rain drops from above. It slams the sand to the ground. Jared opens his eyes.

The world is mud. It looks like a whole other planet.

The sphere hits the ground, bounces, bounces, rolls to a stop, miles away. The blue field around it flickers off.

Jared sits. He tucks his knees up to his chest, fits his head between them. He waits. He counts the color groupings in the last image of the landscape in his visual cortex. There are two. Black. Brown.

He counts the rain drops that land along his surface.

****

When the rain stops, the sky is a deep and dirty yellow.

The sphere blooms. Jared puts his binoculars to his eyes.

There's a man there! It--looks like a man. Jared adjusts the binoculars.

Yes. There are hands, five-fingered, dexterous. He wears a white space suit, flight-powered as evidenced by the wing emblem, 'E.V.E. Corps' emblazoned across the chest. 'Jensen' stenciled under it.

Jared is pinned down. He holds very, very still.

Behind his helmet, the man, Jensen, smiles. Jared mimics it.

Jensen stretches, twists at the waist. He bends over and touches his toes, and when he rises, he stretches his arms up over his head and floats up into the air. A slow, drifting ascent.

Jared pushes up onto his knees. He bites his lip. His hand comes up, reaching anxiously. He can barely make out Jensen's face anymore.

That might be a grin. Jensen pauses in the air, quavering, before plummeting towards the ground in a dive. He rolls at the last second, skimming the earth on his back, before pushing off with his heels, soaring, soaring.

The sky is twelve hues of yellow. The sun is a burning red. The earth around them is barren, and Jensen leaves no trail behind him, but for the echo of a joyful shout.

Jared sits back on his heels.

He feels lit up inside.

****

Jared is surprised by the sun setting. That it still sets.

Jensen had descended hours ago, started to walk steadily in Jared's direction. Jared is cross-legged on the high slope of a dune. Jensen is an estimated fifteen miles away.

Night is a black and rhythmic thing. Jensen flips on three lights. Two beams on either side of his head, one on his right palm. They cut swaths. Pebbles throw long, moving shadows.

Jared watches Jensen come towards him. It's too late to move when he remembers that he's naked, that nudity is not customary and may be off-putting. That he is only outfitted with two languages. That anyway, language is an evolving, idiosyncratic thing.

He touches the tip of his finger to the scar on his elbow. His brother had done that with a knife. He'd said, "If I cut you, do you not bleed?" He'd squeezed Jared's shoulder with his free hand, laughing. "That's a joke, Jaybird."

Jared is uncertain.

Light sweeps over him. In the 1.86 seconds it takes for his receptors to adjust, he hears a noise like the crack of a dead branch. The sand erupts in front of him. A molten glob hits Jared's thigh, sizzles.

Jared scrambles up, hands out. Everything he's carrying falls. "Wait! Wait," he says. "Please," he says.

Jensen closes the distance quickly, his armored arm raised, a weapon. "Down!" he shouts. "Get down! On your stomach, now!"

Jared drops without looking, lies with his left cheek on the ground. There's so much to process. His face is right next to the pock of the blast. It shines dimly, lined with sudden glass. He's on top of his binoculars. "I'm unarmed," Jared says. "I'm unarmed, my name is--"

"Quiet!"

Jared feels every footfall as Jensen circles his body.

"On your knees."

Jared rises in three fluid motions.

"Identify yourself." Jensen's face is lost in light.

"Prototype J, Resurrection Droid," Jared says, "Common designation ReD, model specification J-ReD 3268M, moniker Jared." He shakes his head and wets his lips. He brushes the clump of cooling sand off his thigh. Nanocytes hum, blue and white, converting into new skin and construction. He's going to run out soon, Jared notes. "My name is Jared."

Jensen drops his arm to his side. The lights dim and lower. His face is struck. He squints, studying Jared, his mouth hanging open. "Well, shit."

Jared smiles. "You're Jensen," he says, voice low. "Nice to meet you, Jensen."

"Well, shit," Jensen says.

****

Jared watches Jensen set up camp from a short distance. A silver cuff off Jensen's arm expands into a dome of matte gray fabric. Jensen traces an entrance onto the skin of the shelter with a fingertip, and it cuts away, hanging stiffly. He steps inside, and when he closes the flap, it leaves no seam.

It could be a stone, Jared thinks. Shaped and smoothed by wind-streaming sand. He curls his toes.

He doesn't stop himself; he walks to the shelter. He presses a palm to the place Jensen disappeared. It's cool and almost slick to the touch. Deceptively thin. He can hear Jensen's movements. They're quiet and sure. The shelter breathes with its inhabitant, a steady in and out.

He listens until all there is is breath.

Then: "How're you still tickin'?" Jensen's voice is muffled.

"I don't know."

Jared waits. There's no reply, though Jensen's respiration doesn't indicate a sleeping state.

"I'm sorry I don't have a better answer."

Jensen hums an acknowledgment. He says, suddenly, "I'm sorry you took damage, earlier. Meant to be a warning shot's all."

Jared shrugs. "I don't feel anything like pain, really."

"That right?" A shuffle. A yawn.

Jared lies out on the ground next to the shelter; a tangent to its circle.

"Still," Jensen says.

Jared presses the side of his pinky against the tent. "It's a mild sensation. Um. A lack, like I'm empty somewhere I'm not--supposed to be." Jared searches for words. "Besides, my self-repair systems are dope."

"Dope?"

"Oh. Dope. Slang. In this context, an adjective indicating agreeability and/or a state of excellence."

Silence.

Jared says, "It used to be--People used to say it."

"Man." Jared hears Jensen laugh. "Man. Were you ever built to last. Tickin' away here, all this time."

Jared smiles. "Not all of time," he says. "Just a long while."

There's no response. Jensen's breathing pattern elongates and sinks. He's sleeping.

Jared had stopped breathing a very long time ago; it's a play mechanism. But now. He listens carefully, to Jensen. He initiates, he breathes: In, one, two. Out, two, three, four.

Jensen's vocal tones fall, very roughly, between an E two octaves below middle C, to the D above. He clips his words, losing the consonants at their ends. Most notably, the letter 'g'. He laughs.

Jared lies awake. He listens. He looks. The earth and sky are scattered with grains: of sand, of starry light.

****

Jared had slipped into standby when his battery had run low. By the time he starts back up, it's morning. Jared takes in the sky. It's been morning for some time.

Jensen is a shadow, limned by the sun. The shelter is gone, a trinket on Jensen's wrist. He stands at ease, his jaw set and his arms crossed. "I didn't know how to wake you." He clears his throat. "If there's a button or something."

Jared stands, smiling. He tests his physical operations, rolling his shoulders, stretching his neck. "I respond to voice commands. You know. Just tell me to wake up." He tries for levity. "Move my ass, or something similar."

Jensen nods. He's not looking at Jared. He's scanning the expanse around them. Making plans. "I can't take you with me." Jensen's gaze meets his. "I have orders to follow. My time here isn't permanent. I will be leaving. And my pod," Jensen doesn't look down, "It's one-occupant."

"Okay," Jared says.

"Okay?"

Jared nods. There's nothing else to do.

Jensen unfolds his arms. "Alright." He strides across the sand, purposefully. The general direction of west.

Jared trails him. There is evidence of last night's storm, proof that it happened. Pools only an inch deep along the shallow curves of the desert. Mud, drying already.

Jensen leaves footprints and Jared avoids them carefully. He hopes they bake into the sand. The prints come closer and closer together. Jensen's shortening his stride. Jared looks up just as they come side to side.

Jensen walks at Jared's shoulder. He doesn't look anywhere but forward. They push west in silence.

Jared files the memory away. It's special. A thing to remember, when Jensen's gone. Jared glances over his shoulder. He really hopes the footprints last.

****

Later, Jensen says, "You can talk, you know." He still doesn't look at Jared. Eyes moving at steady ticks, back and forth across the terrain ahead.

"Oh." Jared licks his lips.

"Why do you do that?" Jensen asks immediately.

"Do what?"

Jensen flicks a gaze over. "Lick your lips." He demonstrates the quick swipe.

Jared pauses. He keeps his tongue behind his teeth. "Well." He plods steadily. "Chapstick got discontinued a while back. So."

"What's that."

Jared smiles. "Lip balm." He shakes his head. "The humor doesn't translate if you require an explanation."

The corner of Jensen's mouth turns up.

"Maybe if you had a broader base of knowledge." Jared's smile widens.

Jensen laughs, short and low. "Humor in that," he says.

"At your expense," Jared points out.

"Thanks," Jensen says dryly.

****

They don't speak much the next few hours. Mostly, Jared catalogues a thousand different things about Jensen. His height. An approximation of his weight. Measurements. That he favors his right side, and steps heavy on his heels. His heart rate is uncommonly low; beyond athletic and approaching bradychardia. Jared flags it.

The suit offers some obstacles. The viewing window in Jensen's helmet is a tight frame on his face. "What color is your hair?" Jared asks.

"Brown," Jensen replies.

"I'm not sure you have to wear the suit. Almost all of the radioactive isotopes have fully decayed, even in the empty places. Unless you’ve evolved significantly, you should be suited to the environment." Jared's brow wrinkles. "This is your planet."

"Not really. Not the way it is yours." Jensen sniffs. "How much distance we cover?"

"18.4 miles."

"Kilometers."

"Oh. 29.6"

"Right." Jensen stops. He looks up at the sun. "Okay." He sits, feet planted, knees up, arms hanging over the caps.

Jared sits next to Jensen. A little close, but Jared can't help it.

Jensen pats his chest--the suit--fondly. "It's good to me. Hydration, nutrition, temperature regulation, waste management." He waggles his eyebrows at the last. Then hangs his head between his knees, catching his breath.

"Like a womb," Jared says.

Jensen throws back his head and laughs. When he's done, he drops his head onto his shoulder, looks at Jared. It's the first time all day.

Jared touches the scar on his thigh. It's new.

"Man. You're all kinds of naked," Jensen says.

Jared hunches over his lap a little. "Looks that way."

"Nothin' to be shy about," Jensen says. "Guess they wouldn't have put anything on you that wasn't made to be seen."

Jared shrugs. He doesn't look at Jensen. His new scar is a blue yellow. "Guess not."

"Shit." Jensen whistles. "The things they could do, then. Look at you. The resources we must've had."

"Yeah." Jared stands, suddenly. Jensen is peering at him. Studying him. It's only fair, Jared tells himself. "Maybe we should--Do you still need to rest?"

"No." Jensen pushes up to his feet, but he doesn't start walking. "Hey," he says. "Something I said?"

"No."

Jensen nods. "Maybe," he supplies.

Jared looks at Jensen. Jensen's still studying him. He lets out a breath, smiles. "Maybe."

Jensen starts walking.

Jared falls in, lock-step.

"Apology number two," he says.

****

Jensen doesn't speak for the rest of the day. Jared thinks he might be angry. He's not quite sure. If he could get a clear look at Jensen's face--

It's dusk, and Jensen's not turning on his lights. Jared wants to mention it, but Jensen might have a reason for his actions, so he bites his tongue. When the sun sets, leaving the landscape gray, Jared clears his throat. Jensen ignores him; it's also possible that Jensen doesn't hear him.

The night slips in by gradients: dim, dimming, dark.

"Shit," Jensen says. "The fuck did it get black out."

"We're done for the day?"

"What's it look like?" Jensen grasps at his forearm, tugging at the shelter ring. He struggles with it.

"Why don't you turn on a light?" Jared asks.

"Just!" Jensen freezes. "Give me a second. This fucking thing won't--"

Jared steps in towards Jensen. He touches him. Hands closing around the plastic and cloth of Jensen's suit. Gripping the shape of Jensen's forearm. He pulls at the ring until it expands, coming loose, and slides it over Jensen's hand. He puts it in Jensen's palm, fingers at his pulse.

This is the closest I've come, Jared thinks.

Jensen nods at Jared. He sets the ring down, watches it grow. After he's inside, Jared sits with his back to the wall of it. He listens to the noise of the man inside.

"Thanks," Jensen says through the shelter wall. "Got all fumble-fingered."

"A lot of people were afraid of the dark."

"I'm not afraid of the fucking dark, alright."

"Okay." Jared leans his head back, tentatively. "But it'd be okay to be, you know? If you wanted to be."

Jensen's quiet for a while. "There's just no one fucking here," he finally says.

"Yeah," Jared says. "I know." He looks for the old constellations, takes in the ways they've stretched and skewed.

Jensen breaks the long-spinning silence. "I've been thinking. You shouldn't--No. Um." He clears his throat. "Just because someone's made, that doesn't mean they're not someone, you know?"

He waits for a reply but Jared doesn't have one.

"Okay, so. How long have you been around?"

Jared thinks, is surprised by his conclusion. "I don't know."

"Centuries, plural." Jensen sounds sure. "I promise you: No one built you for that."

"Lucky, I guess."

"Fuck. I'm not saying it right."

"Try again."

Jensen sighs. "You have--they look like scars."

"Yeah," Jared says. "Four."

"Twelve. Gotcha beat." A sound, like Jensen's turning over. "I like scars. They're your own, you know? Marks of a life you lived." He yawns. "Anyway. I think I made you feel like parts before. You're not parts."

Jared holds very still.

"Jesus." Jensen's mumbling. He sounds tired. "Gets so damn dark here. Enough to scare a guy."

Jared laughs. "Sure. Even the toughest guy in the whole damn town."

Jensen hums. He's drifting. "Must've been lonely," he says with his last, conscious breath.

Jared laces his fingers together. "It was." His legs are out in front of him, his back to a respirating wall. The night is blue and white. Only the shadows are black.

****

The days are long, and they only lengthen over time. The sun's high. You couldn't throw a thing that high.

"So," Jensen says.

"Yep."

"You don't talk as much as I thought you would." Jensen's plodding along.

Jared's gotten used to talking at the side of Jensen's head. "What should I say?"

"Dunno. Whatever you want."

"You could talk."

Jensen laughs. "Yeah. Probably."

Jared looks over at Jensen. He watches the momentum powering Jensen's body. The work of his neck, the swing of his arms. Torso and hips and legs, all striving towards something. "I'd like to know about you. Where you came from."

"Well. The starliner's carrying a pop' of--"

"No," Jared interrupts. "You."

"Huh." He cuts a glance at Jared. He wipes his helmet clean with his forearm. "Going crazy, to be honest. Lot of sand. Seein’ things."

"Mirages," Jared says. "Pools?"

"Yeah, sure. You see 'em too?"

"No." Jared sees dunes, and ribbons of colored sand. He sees a desert rippling, reformed by every new gust of wind. Jensen in the center of it all. "But it's normal to."

"Okay." Jensen sighs. "So what other words you got? Let me at 'em. What was that one before? Dope?"

Jared laughs. "Well. You seem like the kind of guy who might have said 'dude'. Bro. Broham, brother, homes, bud."

"Whoa. Lob 'em a few at a time." Jensen's smiling.

"Do people still say, uh. Any of those?"

Jensen shakes his head. "Brother-self comes close, maybe. But that's a little formal."

"Brother-self?"

Jensen nods. He touches a finger to the letters across his chest. "E.V.E. It's a clone corps."

Jared's surprised. "That's common practice, now?"

"I know, you believe it?" Jensen circles a finger, quick, around his face. "Six guys out there with this. It's a menace."

"Your brother-selves."

Jensen shrugs. "And you with the best of the bunch."

"No doubt."

"Hey, now. Careful going along with my ego like that."

Jared laughs. Jensen moves a little closer; Jared doesn't think it's conscious.

"Makes sense," Jensen mutters, quieter. "Why let good stock go to waste."

Their shoulders brush. "You're not parts," Jared says. Already a mantra. "You're more than your parts."

Jensen huffs. His lips are turned up. "That's a kind, wise thing to say."

Jared laughs. They walk in silence. He hums a tuneless song.

****

Jensen spends the sixteenth day marking out their time, calling out cadence. "Left. Left. Lefty, right, layo!

Jared obeys at first. Much later, he asks, politely, that Jensen consider giving his vocal chords a rest.

"Left," says Jensen.

"Shut it," Jared says. A last ditch effort. "Lest I shut it for you."

Jensen laughs. "Pushing luck, dude."

"Got it to spare."

Jensen appraises him. He opens his mouth.

Jared raises an eyebrow. "Gonna risk it?"

"Pain! In my gut; Pain! In my knees; Pain! In my shins; Mind over matter! If you--," says Jensen, propelling them forward at double-time.

Jared punches Jensen's deltoid at 8% of his force capacity. Just enough to be painful.

"Ow, fucker." Jensen grabs the spot. He shoves his shoulder into Jared. "Tin can's got an attitude."

"You're all about the thin ice today." Jared's been smiling for days. He's used to this, he realizes. Already, he's used to it. He takes in Jensen's smirk. It rises two millimeters higher on Jensen's left side. Not every time, but this time.

****

"Fuck! Motherfucking--" Heavy breaths. "Shitty fuck, goddamned hellhole!"

Jared's lain out next to the shelter. Hands under his head, ankles crossed. "Full moon, tonight," he says. Serene.

Jensen snorts. Hand slaps against the tent from the inside, right at Jared's head. "Fucker. There's nothing fucking here."

Jared recollects the phase of the moon when Jensen had arrived. "It's been almost a month," he says.

"Is there anything but fuckin' sand?"

"Actually." Jared turns his head, puts his ear to the ground. "There's an aquifer, pretty close to the surface here. It's fairly extensive."

"Can I see it? Does it look like fucking sand?"

"You're not your best at night," Jared notes.

"So what. I'm a grouchy sunuvabitch."

Jared scrapes off the crumby top layer of sand until he reaches red. "You want a story?"

"No. I'm thirty."

"You're like a baby," Jared says, aping surprise.

Jensen laughs. "Fuck off. I'm going to sleep."

"Good night, Jensen."

"Yeah," Jensen growls. "Night."

Jared stands. He digs, cutting lines and form into the earth.

****

"What the fuck is this?"

Jensen stands in his door, looking out. Jared surveys his work with Jensen. Geometric patterns spiral out from the center of the tent, in stenciled lines of rust and mineral-rich black. Dizzying in the heat shimmering off the earth.

"Jesus."

Jared picks at the sand under his fingernails. "It's a maze."

Jensen bobs his head. "I kinda have shit to do, brother."

Jared rolls his eyes.

"I saw that." Jensen's pointing. "I'm a bad influence on you."

Jared shrugs. He thinks the sand might be breeding under his nails. "It's a picture on the ground. No one's fencing you in."

Jensen clasps his hands behind his head, elbows winged out. He steps into the maze. "Waste of time," he says.

"You're gonna hurt my feelings," Jared says.

"You have feelings?" Jensen cocks his head at the ground. He strides quick along the lines, only stopping to make decisions at corners. He's assessing. He'll escape sooner than Jared had anticipated.

"Hilarious. Did they augment that gene in your test tube?"

"What you are," Jensen says. "Is a racist."

"You're not using that word right."

"Oh yeah? What about a little fuck you?"

Jared laughs. "Sure, I'll take some."

Jensen stops. He looks up. He stares at Jared. "You laugh a lot."

Jared shrugs. He falls onto his ass, sprawls back on his hands. "It's like I'm a real boy."

"Well." Jensen nods, smirking as he goes back to studying the maze. "That is a big boy dick there, swinging in the wind."

Jared tries not to move too quickly. So it doesn't look like he's covering himself up. He doesn't know why he's embarrassed.

Jensen laughs as he follows a path back behind the shelter. "Was that not a compliment back in the day? 'Cause guys sure like hearing that now."

Jared stretches his arms out in front of him. He sweeps his hands back and forth across the sand. "Dead end," he calls out.

"Shit," Jensen says.

****

The moon is a waning crescent. Jensen has been here a long time. Jared tries another maze, days later, but Jensen kicks through it.

"Sorry," he says, setting off.

He grunts at Jared's questions. Jared tries other things. Songs. He mimics the cadences Jensen had called earlier. He steers them, subtly towards landmarks. Towering rocks. Drifts of salt. Mesas.

At the last, Jared says, "Like someone took piano wire to a stone giant's throat."

"Is it me," Jensen says. "Or do you get weirder every day. Where's the robot-speak, dude."

"1000101."

Jensen clips the back of Jared's head. He blasts a hole into the side of the mesa, casually destructive.

Jared watches the dust billow. His throat feels tight. "You shouldn't do that," he says.

Jensen sighs, heavy.

****

It's the middle of the night. Jensen had fallen asleep hours ago. Jared sits, chin resting on one raised knee. He pats at the shelter. There's a strong wind, tonight. His hair's dancing.

He slaps the tent with his palm.

"Fucking what?" Jensen clears his throat, groggy.

"I know why I haven't asked," Jared says. "But why haven't you asked me?"

"What the fuck are you talking about? Is it morning?"

"Why haven't you asked me? Whatever you're looking for. I know this place. Better than any person's known it. If it's here, I know where it is."

Jensen sighs. "I'm going to sleep."

****

Jared starts up to the toe of a boot in his side. Jensen's ready to go. So they walk.

Last night's wind has wilted in the sun. It whips, low around their ankles.

"You asked me a question," says Jensen. He trudges toward the horizon. "If you weren't here it would be taking this long."

"Probably longer," Jared concedes. "You have a worryingly disproportionate reaction to boredom."

Jensen smiles wryly. "Take it as a sign of my youth."

Jared claps his hands together. "Done." He bumps Jensen's shoulder with his own, friendly. "Is it a security issue?"

Jensen shakes his head. "Be frank? I don't want to take the short way out. This wasn't meant to be a three-day mission. No one briefed me about the possibility of--whatever you are. Life. I wasn't meant for a guide."

"So what? You don't want to cheat? Because I admire the integrity, but you're taking it kind of far, don't you think?"

"It doesn't feel like cheating." Jensen's chin juts out. "Feels like theft."

Jared’s blinking falters. "Theft?"

Jensen growls, annoyed. "Fuck." He stops, grips Jared's shoulder to stop him too. "Look. This is how long it would take me if I were alone. This amount of time. A month, easy. I ask you to help me, and I'm gone in a few days." He cracks his jaw, his eyes at Jared's chin. "I don't want to take that from you. I want to let you have the time you would have had." He swears, embarrassed.

Jared's hands are shaking. Tiny tremors, undetectable to the human eye. He crosses his arms, hides them away. He could fly apart. He could freeze there. Anything could happen. He laughs shakily. "Like your company's so great."

Jensen lets out a surprised bark of laughter. He taps the glass of his viewing panel, smiling into the distance.

Jared turns it over in his mind. Jensen’s enduring this for me, he says to himself. He repeats it silently. He doesn't know how to absorb the thought. "Thank you," he says. It's not enough, he knows. He'll be grateful for a long time.

Jensen looks him in the eye. He nods. He takes a step away.

Jared grips Jensen's forearm. He studies Jensen's face. He looks tired. Pale. He's carving wrinkles into his forehead. Lines that won't go away. Jared's fingers twitch. "What are you looking for, Jensen?"

Jensen's chin rises. His eyes are clear and determined. He points at the E.V.E. painted across his chest. "V is for vegetation."

Jared memorizes everything. He lets himself hold Jensen's arm for too long.

*****

Jared points out a direction, a line straight through, northwest. "There's a cliff," he says. "You can't miss it. It's a solid border mark."

Jensen nods. "We can walk."

"No," Jared says. "It's five days, pushing hard. If you fly, you'll be there by sundown." He claps Jensen's shoulder. "Don't worry. I'm a strong runner."

Jensen's hesitation is brief and then it's gone. "Okay." He pushes up onto his toes and shoves off, hovering. Like he's let go of something heavy. He grins at Jared. "Keep an eye on me."

Jensen turns and blasts up into the sky, crowing. His arms are spread wide, and when his ascension starts to slow, he brings them in tight to his body, dips a shoulder and corkscrews his way up, rising higher.

Show off, Jared thinks. He leans his head back and back, smiling.

Jensen disappears into the sun, then tumbles down, head over heels, somersaulting as gravity clutches at his shoulders, then knees. The tumbling gets clumsier as his speed increases, hands and feet being forced apart.

Jared's smile fades. Terminal velocity, he notes. Pull up.

At this speed, Jensen will hit the ground in just under a minute. Jared squints. Jensen's eyes are closed. Jared starts to run. The suit shouldn't malfunction. It hasn't so much as hiccupped.

"Pull up," Jared says. He sprints. "Pull up!" It overloads his vocal capacity, unbidden frequencies keening.

Jensen's eyes snap open, his limbs furl out. Spread-eagled for a second before he twists, booming back along the ground towards Jared. He comes screaming past Jared, cutting a 'u' around his body before coming to a dead float in front of him. "Whooooo-ee!" Jensen whoops. He winks. "Good watching out."

"What the fuck were you thinking?" Jared shapes the word precisely, emphatically.

Jensen raises an eyebrow. "You swear like a goody-goody."

"You were forty seconds from death by impact. Seconds."

Jensen furrows his brow, confused. He shrugs. "Sure, if you'd let me down."

Jared gapes. "You're a fucking idiot."

Jensen winces. "Agh. It hurts to listen to you cuss. Try it like you're not a fifty-four year old woman."

Jared crosses his arms. "If not instantaneous, your death would have been extremely painful. Your internal organs would have burst on impact; the majority of your bones would have shattered. You'd be a bag of slurry."

"Anyway," Jensen says brightly. "Meet you there, yeah?" He soars off without waiting for an answer.

"I'm not so much as glancing your way, asshole," Jared mutters. He runs after Jensen. "Fuck," he says, more guttural. "Fuck." He makes a glottal stop.

****

When he reaches the top of the cliff, Jensen is under the shade of a tree. His hands are palm down on its trunk. He's almost still, just the steady pump of his heart, the pull of his lungs. The sun is setting, flooding the desert bed with a red and gleaming tide.

"I signaled my ship." Jensen doesn't turn. "It'll be a while, before."

Jared walks toward Jensen, every step light through concerted effort. He feels drained. Sustaining an elevated running speed had been difficult. Jared leans back against the tree, slips down so his knees are bent, sitting in an invisible chair. "Is it what you pictured?" he asks.

"I never thought about it." Jensen shakes his head. "We had a field manual, but I vaporized mine. Accident."

Jared laughs. He doesn't ask.

Jensen lets out a breath. He moves, mirrors Jared's position. He rests his hands on his thighs. He looks out, the glass of his helmet dark and reflective, tones of the sky.

A crisp wind stirs the leaves, just enough that Jared can almost smell them, a trace of resin. There's a storm coming, he thinks. This is the hush before.

"It's bigger than I'd pictured." Jensen's voice is low. "I don't know. Different kind of green." His head thunks against the trunk when he looks up into the crown of leaves. "It's all--" He draws a shape with his hands. "Bubbly."

Jared chuckles. "Sounds like you had some sort of an expectation. Unbubbly, for one."

Jensen grins. "Guess so. One of those things you didn't know you were waiting to find." He straightens suddenly, turns to stand in front of Jared. "Fuck, how are you doing this. My thighs are killing me."

Jared snickers. He bats the back of his hand against Jensen's stomach. "Not everything's a competition, Jensen. Sit like a normal person. Take in the view."

Jensen turns his head over his shoulder, looks out. He squints. "Yeah."

Jared looks up at Jensen. His jaw and profile. The light is so thick you could count the atoms in the air. The breeze is a touch at Jared's neck. He can smell the things that are growing; he can feel in his chest one, arresting thrum. Like someone had set something ringing.

He takes a long slow breath in. "It's a Texas madrone," he says. "See? The bark peels, exposing this trunk. When it's white like this, it's soft. Like leather. You could cut it now, and it would sustain that damage for its lifetime." Rise and fall. "Darkens over time. It gets this coral red color."

Jensen smiles down at him. "Why're you whispering?" he asks.

Part Two

ALRIGHT, DEADLY SERIOUS BUSINESS, FOLKS

indysaur — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 22:07:50 GMT

AAAH. A REC:

Shake The Leaves Off The Trees - light_up
Jared/Jensen, adult, 12,500 words.

Nisha is one of my favorite writers; she handles the guys expertly. Jared's in a post-breakup funk, with an adult kind of regret, and Jensen is brutally honest and unruffled by anything. Their relationship is hilarious and poignant and it comes together in fits and starts. Every bit of this is a joy. They're not in a bubble; they're two guys in the context of the world they live in, figuring out what's right for them.

ALSO, she is the QUEEN of memorable scenes set in BATHROOMS. READ ALL HER FIC.

meme!

indysaur — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 03:00:57 GMT

stolen from the friendlist:

Comment with a story I've written, and I will tell you something I knew, learned, or wondered about while writing it that didn't make it onto the page.

List of fic here.

RPS Fic: Winter Blue (1/1) Sweet Charity

indysaur — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 11:53:02 GMT

Winter Blue
SPN RPS: Jared/Jensen
Rating: PG-13
5,522 words.
Unbeta'ed. Sweet Charity fic. For destina . I hope it measures up. Jared has really broad shoulders. Jensen does, too. They're good to each other. A little schmoopy.

One night, Jared stumbles into the house pretty late. He's not fall-on-your-ass drunk, just, you know. Stumbly. He'd been pretty spectacularly bad at beer pong. He has the wingspan, he'd explained to that new PA, of a mighty, mighty gryphon. He requires a table the length of an Olympic-sized pool. He can't be expected to play well when he's hampered by something as puny as a regular sized ping pong table.

The PA doesn't get it. He laughs, sure, but that's because the kid still thinks Jared has any sort of influence on set. Which is untrue. Jared, most days, is just glad that he's not being fired, or used as a human test subject for some new, hideous, placenta-based makeup. Anyway, that's what Jared gets for talking to a PA when he has Jensen, who is an extension of Jared's psyche, really. An imaginary friend come to life.

So Jared goes home.

He can hear Harley barking as he turns the key in the door. He cracks it open, and shoves one knee inside to keep Harley in, shoves his dog back.

"Sh, baby. Or no treats for a week."

Jensen's in front of the TV, asleep. Sadie's wedged between him and the back of the couch, so Jensen's hanging off the cushions a little, one foot braced on the floor. His mouth's open--there's this little puddle of drool on his shoulder--and his hair's smashed flat. From this angle, he looks a little like Ellen Degeneres. Prettier.

Jared gets it, all of a sudden, that he's really damn drunk. He shouldn't have insisted on driving home. He's an ass. His mom would kill him, if she ever found out.

Harley gnaws a little at Jared's fingers.

It's cold. Fucking Canada. All cold and shit. Jared shivers. He walks through the dark house. Jensen never turns on the lights, and he never turns on the heater, and every time their energy bill comes, he says, "Fuck, yeah. Eat it," to nobody. Usually standing in the kitchen, in his boxers, so Jared can clearly see the dude is head to toe gooseflesh. Jensen is, like, this enormous douche in secret.

Jared's footsteps kind of echo, and he gets this all over shake that starts at his spine, and the house smells empty, like there's snow on their hardwood floor. He goes into Jensen's bedroom, and grabs the comforter, dumping piles of dirty laundry onto the ground in the process.

He drags it back down the hallway. Harley comes clicking toward him, and sniffs at the blanket, puts one paw on it, and gets dragged along for a little bit.

Jared stands at the foot of the couch. The TV's buzzing. It's just all noise. He grabs the comforter at two corners and snaps, and it billows up, then down over Jensen. Only Jensen's hair pokes out from underneath.

Jensen says, muffled, "You're home." He clears his throat. "Honey bear."

Jared asks, "What are you watching?"

"Sports bloopers."

"You're this forty-two year old guy," Jared says. "And your kid plays Pee-Wee, but you're not the coach because some kid on another team had their mom take out a restraining order against the over-involved football dad."

Jensen grunts.

"You're this whole other person." Jared sits on the floor, lays his head back against Jensen's shins, his legs stretched out under the coffee table.

He can see the tips of Jensen's fingers out from underneath the comforter. He presses the soft fleshy pad of Jensen's middle finger.

"Boop," Jared says.

"Dude." Jensen sounds sleepy.

"You should never wear my basketball shorts," Jared says.

"Take 'em off, then."

"You think I wouldn't do it." Jared turns his head a little, so Jensen's kneecap digs into the side of his skull. "Anyway. You have scrawny legs. Scrawny chicken legs. You shouldn't wear shorts in general."

"I," Jensen takes a deep, resigned breath, "have big, beefy thighs."

"I can do a million more squats than you."

Harley comes back from patrolling the perimeter of the house. He collapses onto Jared's legs. Like his doggie joints only go from one to another. Jared lays his hand over Harley's muzzle, the short fuzz there like felt against his palm.

Jared feels Jensen move behind him, this resettling. "You woke me up, and now I have to talk to you, all night fucking long. And tonight could have been the night I have an amazing, epic dream. Seventy two virgins."

"You wouldn't know what to do with one virgin."

"Step one: Remove clothing from the lower half. Step two: Pop--" Jensen yawns, big -- "Pop the cherry."

Jared snorts. He flips the comforter back off Jensen's face.

Jensen doesn't flinch. His eyes are closed, lashes a shadow on his cheeks. He's pretending to sleep, but he's awake around his mouth. Smirking a little.

Jared grimaces and swipes at the drool on Jensen's bare shoulder with the side of his hand. "Your Bible just burst into flame." He rubs his hand clean on Harley's fur.

"Overdue."

Jared stretches his arms out, one hooked over Jensen's foot. He puts his other hand palm down on Jensen's face. Just sitting there, because Jensen lets it.

"In the morning," Jensen says, "I'm going to hock a loogie in all your socks." His breath is warm.

Jared can feel Jensen's lips moving. Brushing against his skin. "All squishy. Between my toes."

"Ugh. You're fucking disgusting." Jensen's face scrunches up. He swings his arms up, knocking Jared's hand away.

It's dark, and the shades are drawn, so there's not even streetlights, or moonlight, just tv light, and the room kind of flickers with it. And it's really cold, except for where he's touching Jensen. The nape of his neck. A line along his arms and across his shoulders.

Jensen starts to breathe a little slower. Steadier.

"We should just be boyfriends. Big, gay, celebrity boyfriends." Jared turns to face Jensen, and Harley huffs at the jostling, pads away. "Did you hear me?"

Jensen doesn't answer for a little while. And then he says, "Yes." He pulls his arm out from where it's pinned by Jared's shoulder, lets it swing off the couch. "If I wanted a big, gay, celebrity boyfriend, I would have a big, gay, celebrity boyfriend. And his name would be Neil Patrick Harris."

Jared doesn't say anything.

"I'm Doogie-sexual."

Jared still doesn't say anything. He just presses his mouth to the inside of Jensen's elbow. It's right there. He rubs his lips against and over the hollow, against thin skin and veins.

Jensen opens his eyes. He looks really awake.

Jared just exhales slow, and hot. He drags his lower lip up, across Jensen's skin. He feels a little dumb, doing it.

Jensen clears his throat, looks at Jared for a few seconds. "You're drunk." He rolls his eyes, turns and shifts on the couch until his back is to Jared.

Sadie whines. Her glare is baleful.

Jared tenses his jaw, rubs his eye tiredly. It is pretty damn late.

Jensen looks over his shoulder. "Also, you're sporting massive pit stains."

Jared feels his eyelids droop. He lies back on the floor. "So I have sweat glands," he says, half asleep. "So what?" He yawns, so hard his ears pop.

"Overactive sweat glands."

"I'm built for performance, bu-ddy." He draws the last out.

Jensen grunts. He puts his foot on Jared's chest.

Jared lies there for what feels like a long time. It could have been minutes, all strung together. The ball of Jensen's foot is pressing against Jared's nipple, and that's not entirely bad. Jared crosses his arms under his head.

He hopes Jensen's feet are clean.

He's not sure when he falls asleep.

****

Jared spends a couple weeks working up the courage. Then, one morning, in hair & makeup, in front of Jeannie, and Shannon, and everybody, he says, "I would make a great boyfriend. Better than Doogie. I would be legendary. See? I didn't even make you wait for it."

And Jeannie kind of puts her head down a little lower and fusses at Jensen's hair, like it's all-consuming, while Shannon freezes. She probably wishes she wasn't there. In hindsight, Jared wishes she wasn't either.

But Jensen laughs. Then he asks, "Done?" and when Jeannie nods, he gets up, and shrugs off the hair cutting cape and on his way out, he kisses Jared on the cheek and says, "Whatever you want, pookie. This mancake's all yours."

It cuts the tension, he guesses. A lot of people laugh in Jensen's wake. Jeannie, Shannon, the PA who was standing outside the door. Almost everybody.

****

At the end of the day, Jared follows Jensen to his trailer. They're quiet. It was long today. Jared feels a little slow, but Jensen's in front of him, putting one foot in front of the other, and it makes it easier, somehow, for Jared to do it, too.

He's really tired, and Jensen's always made things simple. It's why they're friends. So, Jared walks into Jensen's trailer. He closes the door. He sits on the couch.

He says, "You're blowing me off."

Jensen doesn't stop. He walks into the bathroom, and leaves the door hanging open. "When?"

"This morning." Jared lays his head back along the top of the couch. He closes his eyes. He listens to Jensen take a leak. "Yesterday, too."

The liquid rush stops. Zip zipping.

Jared opens his eyes.

Jensen's framed in the bathroom doorway, his forearm braced against the doorjamb. He stares hard. "I didn't know I was supposed to take you seriously. The way you said it--" Jensen shrugs.

"Wash your hands, you fucking skeeze."

Jensen rolls his eyes, swipes his tongue deliberately up his left palm. He waggles his eyebrows before he turns back to the sink. Jensen's in a mood.

Jared grins. He looks at Jensen's bowed head in the mirror. He can see a crease between Jensen's eyebrows. He has an urge to deepen his voice, to really intone the thing he's going to say next, but then he remembers he's not really looking for a laugh. "I think we're more than friends."

Jensen looks up into the mirror. His eyes are just normal.

"I think we're more than friends, and I'm glad."

The water's still running.

"Are you glad?"

Jensen's hands are braced on the sides of the sink. His shoulders are really broad. His back is wide. If it wasn't for the mirror, Jared wouldn't see anything but Jensen's broad, wide back.

"The water's still on, man." Jared breathes in, deep. He closes his eyes again, rests his head. "You're wasting it."

"Shit." The water stops running. A towel rustles. "I'm trying to go green," Jensen says.

Jared laughs. He rubs his nose, the ball of his hand against his lips. "I know."

Footsteps. And a quick beat of silence. Then Jared feels lips, Jensen's lips, pressing against his. Firm, and dry, and they slot together, Jared's bottom lip fitting between Jensen's. It lasts, for a good length of time.

It's really warm, and then it's over.

Jared opens his eyes, but Jensen's walking away.

****

They're already friends, and they're already living together.

"I really hate dating," Jensen says.

"Can you not talk?" snaps Roger. Roger's kind of anal. He says stuff about requiring a smooth canvas. And the difficulties and subtle rewards of creating art on the most organic of mediums. Like he's not just a monster makeup guy who's prone to flipping out.

Jared ignores him, narrows his eyes. "You said it was fun, when everything's new. Go forth and multiply, was your advice after Sandy." He flips his finger against the tip of Jensen's nose. "There's nothing new about you."

"Thanks," Jensen drawls. His eyes are closed, but Jared still gets the general idea of a glare.

"Anytime." Jared lets his fingertips hover over Jensen's side, at the soft spot right above Jensen's hips. "Just to clear it up, what I meant is that you're old."

"Yeah, I got that."

Roger whaps Jared's wrist with the handle of a makeup brush, glares.

Jared mouths a 'yeah, yeah' at Roger. He settles back on the counter, long legs reaching almost across the width of the trailer. "And some dudes age really well. Take me for example. My masculine beauty has really started to come into play in just the last few years."

"Mm." Jensen nods. "True."

"But you." Jared sighs regretfully. "I think your heyday may have been Dark Angel. Mid-20's. Right after that real androgynous phase, before the bow-leggedness and wrinkles really set in."

"Short window," Jensen says.

Jared leans forward, puts his palm down on Jensen's knee. His tone drips with sincerity. "You still have the remains of your beauty. Around the edges. Peeking out from the inside."

Jensen holds back a laugh. It's hard to tell, but Jared can see the corners of Jensen's lips twitching.

Roger huffs. "I swear on my mother's lonely, flowerless grave, if I have to do this again, the fucking hand of God won't be able to save your goddamn donkey-fucked asses."

Jared looks up. "The scary part, Rog, is that you never yell these things. I think I would feel better if you yelled shit like that."

"Ah-ah," Jensen says. "Don't call him Rog."

"Shut the fuck up, Ackles." Roger slaps down the edges of the prosthetic broken nose on Jensen's cheeks.

Jensen grunts. "Wow. Firm."

"That's what she said," Jared says.

"The height of comedy," Jensen says.

"Jesus Christ." Roger straightens. "I'm going to the bathroom. Jared, I want your ass gone by the time I get back. Jensen's supposed to be on set in fifteen fucking minutes. And don't get your fucking come all over my shit."

"Mine is moisturizing," Jared points out. "It'd be a favor."

Roger grabs his supply bag, takes it with him, holds up the bird his whole way out.

Jensen laughs.

"Roger's cheery today."

"You're a pain in his ass."

Jared goes to stand behind Jensen, arms hanging down, hands on Jensen's chest. He drums out a beat. "You look hot with a broken nose."

Jensen raises an eyebrow. "You think I look good beat up? I'm pretty sure that's a warning sign."

Jared winks at Jensen in the mirror, touches the tip of his tongue to his upper lip. He's still drumming against Jensen, lightly. "So, I mean. For real.” He doesn't meet Jensen's eyes. “You're not getting bored? Or, I don't know. Are we moving too fast, you think?"

Jensen reaches up, wraps a hand around Jared's forearm. "Why? Do you think that?"

Jared chews on his cheek. "No." He claps his hands on Jensen's shoulders, squeezes. "But you dated a lot more than I did. It was your thing."

"I had a lot of oats to sow. It was an obligation." Jensen's face is grave, and he strokes his chin, turns his best side toward the light.

Jared laughs. "I have oats."

"You're still young. Old guys like me prefer massages to anything." Jensen purses his lips, bounces his shoulders, hinting.

Jared laughs. He digs his thumbs into the back of Jensen's neck, then eases up, rubs. "You're marrying age, is all."

Jensen twists so he can look up at Jared. "That was a shitty ass proposal. I hope to hell that wasn't how you proposed to Sandy."

There's a second, where Jared decides how to react, and then he laughs quiet. "You know what I especially miss? When you're two weeks into dating someone and they're still real considerate of your feelings and it's all just a lot of peace and harmony. And no one brings up proposals, or exes, or times of great heartbreak."

"And the world's sunshine and rainbows, and the Northern Lights dance in the sky every night, no matter where you are." Jensen bites at a hangnail, then studies his cuticles.

"Yep," Jared says. "You just get me."

"Yeah? What brought it home? Northern Lights?" Jensen's reply's muffled because he can't get his fucking nails out of his mouth. Damn oral fixation. Jared shouldn't watch. It's just encouraging the asshole.

"The Aurora Borealis." Jared nods.

Jensen reaches back, gut punches Jared out of nowhere. Hard enough to get an 'oof'. "You know I hate people who call it that."

"This relationship's a joke." Jared cuffs Jensen over the head.

Jensen makes kissy lips at him in the mirror.

Jared glowers. He absolutely does not laugh. "You're making a mockery of our commitment to each other."

Jensen rolls his eyes. He spins in his chair until he's facing Jared. "This from the guy who's freaking out two weeks in."

"I'm not freaking out. I just. Sometimes I feel like I forced you into something." Jared crouches down, bouncing on the balls of his feet. He rests his forearms on Jensen's knees. "There wasn’t a normal progression, you know? We're two weeks in, but we have a house together, and you walk my dogs and the next step is, like. Marriage." He tests it. "After two weeks."

"Dude, I'm not thinking about marriage." Jensen presses his thumb against the tip of Jared's nose. Like he's checking for doneness.

"Really?" Jared's brows knit together. "You're thirty."

Jensen splutters into a laugh. "Man. On second thought, I, too, might enjoy this land of avoidance and consideration and the Northern Lights."

"Aurora Borealis."

Jensen stands up so fast Jared gets a faceful of his crotch. Jensen snickers as he walks over Jared, gets up close to the mirror. "Quarter in the swear jar when we get home, buddy-o-mine."

"It's not a swear jar if it's not for swears." Jared lays back, twists to fit on the floor.

"They're swears."

"Nugget, pillow-lips and Aurora Borealis aren't swears."

"If I think they're swears, and you know I think they're swears, every time you say 'dental dam', it's the equivalent of fuck, shit 'n ass." Jensen pauses. "Swears. Sweeeearrs." He stretches the word out, tests the consonants and vowels.

Jared peers up at Jensen's ass. It's really a pretty decent ass. "I almost never say dental dam any more."

Jensen laughs. He turns away from the mirror, and goes to stand over Jared. His feet on either side of Jared's hips. Jensen bends at the waist, like an ostrich. "That's true." Jared sits up a little, so Jensen can kiss him.

'Pillow lips,' Jared thinks. He gives Jensen's ass a good squeeze.

Jensen doesn't move away. He's really close. Jared keeps anticipating the touch of Jensen's nose, his lips. Waiting. "I like this," Jensen says. "I like what we have right now, and I liked it three days ago, and probably I'll like it in the next twenty minutes. And I know that's not a lot, but you're the best friend I've got, and that makes it more. I think."

"Yeah, okay." Jared makes this frustrated noise in the back of his throat. He bites that muscle, right where Jensen's neck becomes his shoulder. "That's enough."

"Good." Jensen straightens, falls back into the chair. "Then help me fix my face, man. It's like you took a chisel to my make-up. Roger's gonna get your ass fired."

Jared nods and pushes himself up onto his feet. He brushes his ass off. "I should get it taken out of my contract. That whole clause where pretty much anyone can fire me."

"Yeah, dude. That's SAG 101. Come on." Jensen closes his eyes, lifts his face up towards Jared expectantly. "You'd spend a lot less time being forced to blow me in exchange for your continued employment."

Jared rolls his eyes. He grabs a tub Roger left behind, reapplies sloppily. "Good thing. Jaw's sore all the time." He lets his voice go a little breathless, lisps. "Your dick's just so big."

Jensen chokes. When he settles, he braces his hands on his knees and looks up at Jared, grins. "I'm never gonna get out of this trailer. Roger's gonna destroy you."

Jared does a quick sweep. "He's still not back. I'm pretty sure he imploded at some PA somewhere."

"Maybe he sensed our little lover's spat."

Jared grimaces. "Swear jar."

"For lover or spat?"

"That's fifty cents, homes." Jensen sucks his teeth, ignoring the bait, and Jared smirks. He admits, "Don't even remember, really, what I was worried about, before."

Jensen shrugs. "Whatever. You're all into me or something." He smiles at Jared, and it's the one Jared likes the best. Just this normal smile. Really sincere. Like he wants Jared to smile back.

He smiles back.

Jensen's grin goes wider, then he claps his hands together. "Now make me look more bad-ass. Roger's too light with the blues and purples, man. I wanna look fucked. up."

So this is their thing, Jared figures. And it's a good thing.

****

Friday night, they drink beer at home, and play every video game they own combined, which is more than Jared had anticipated. And then they download Street Fighter 2 onto their Xbox and Jensen kicks Jared's ass at that, too.

The twelfth time Dhalsim ends up sprawled across the bottom of the screen and Chun-Li's flashing her stupid fucking peace sign, Jared tosses his controller aside. "I don't want to play anymore."

Jensen takes a pull of his beer. "You big baby. Let's go another round."

"What's the point." Jared grabs Sadie around the waist from where she's sniffing at the discarded controller, pulls her into his lap and squeezes. "There's no fun in losing constantly. Isn't that right, Sadie girl?" She whines and he lets her loose instantly. Whining is just a precursor to teeth.

Jensen looks sideways at him. "I won't play Chun-Li anymore." All conciliatory.

"Screw this." Jared stretches, his shirt riding up over his belly button. "Let's fuuuuuck." He sings out the last part. Reveling in it.

Jensen groans, falls back into the recliner. "Come on."

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," Jared roots. He pounds his fists against the floor in time.

Jensen laughs and rolls his eyes. He spreads his legs.

****

Sometimes, when they're still sweating and Jared's just starting to catch his breath, and the sheets are twisted around his calves, Jensen will flop onto his back next to Jared, all satisfied. He'll put his arms up, head cushioned on his hands and say, "And the crowd goes wild-" and then make that fake crowd roar sound, and Jared will be thinking that he kind of misses condoms because they make clean up a lot fucking easier.

He used to pay more attention to the crowd thing. He thought maybe Jensen was doing it for his benefit; that he should, like, be an active audience, or respond in some way.

He doesn't anymore. Jensen just does it, for his own private amusement. It's not weird. Jensen does shit like that all the time.

****

Jared doesn't find out a lot about Jensen that's new, besides, you know. Sexy things. But one thing is that Jensen dances, a lot. Probably more than your average person with a penis. Probably more than your average person with genitalia.

It's not even that Jensen likes to dance. He just. Dances. He does this shuffle kick step thing whenever he wins at anything. Like a touchdown celebration. But stupider.

He takes stairs at a rhythm, bounding up three, two-stepping up the next—stomp. Stomp-stomp. Step, two, three, four. Jared gets in the habit of counting it out.

Every once in a while, they'll be sitting, on set or at home, and Jensen will have his earbuds in, and, out of nowhere, he’ll jump up and start doing these arm-rolling guitar strums, biting his lower lip. Slamming imaginary power chords and generally looking intensely, aggressively white.

And depending on both Jensen’s belt-wearing status and Jared's mood, Jared will come up behind Jensen and pull down his pants. Jensen always continues, undeterred, but this way, there's more for Jared to look at.

He mentions it, once. “Twinkle-toes,” he says.

Jensen freezes one foot planted on the landing, the other on the stair below. He raises an eyebrow, slowly. He spins, lands on two feet, strikes an Elvis pose. “Thank you, thank you very much.”

Jared’s cat-call echoes in the stairwell. He leans forward, gripping the rails on either side. He just wants to get closer.

Jensen laughs, eyes wrinkling at the corners. Jared wants to run his thumb across Jensen’s crow’s feet. Jensen straightens, dusts himself off, and pops his collar. “I’ve got a question, Jay. Where’re we heading again?”

Jared straightens immediately. He thumbs his nose, sniffs. Puts both arms up into a double bicep pose, fingers pointing up. “Eet’s zat way, girly man.” Gets his veins a poppin’.

“Simmer down.” Jensen kisses him. Then he sprints up the stairs with a whoop.

It’s unsportsmanlike, Jared thinks as he scrambles up after him. Racing without call.

****

“Dude, if anything we’re having more fun than before.” Jensen’s folding laundry, phone tucked up under his ear. “Yeah, man. No, it’s no drama, nothing crazy. It’s the same, plus sex. Which is an appreciated development.”

Jared’s working his way through a bunch of bananas. They’re gonna go bad if someone doesn’t eat them. He peels and chews.

“He’s right here, ask him if you want.” Jensen shakes out a shirt, catches Jared’s eye. ‘Josh,’ he mouths. “Relax. You love Jared. You’re just pissed off that I get to have sex, like, a million times a day. I’m having sex right now.”

Jared salutes.

Jensen throws the shirt over his shoulder. He’s still looking at Jared. Like it’s fine, to hold his gaze for that long. Like lingering eye contact is normal, and comfortable, and expected.

Which it is, Jared realizes. That’s one thing different. He shakes a long string of banana peel off his fingers.

“Yeah, I’m fucking Jay as we speak. It’s pretty good.”

“Yeah, baby,” Jared shouts. “Buttfuck me s’more.” Jared chews loudly. He squirts honey into his open mouth, onto the banana mash there. That look in Jensen’s eye is lust, Jared decides. Has to be. “Riiiiiide it, cowboy. Whoo-whee. That’s what I call Texas-style!”

Jensen laughs. “See?” he says into the phone. “It’s just Jared.”

****

There’s this part. A lead. It could be a cool movie. Jared reads for it, does the tape thing, then flies out to LA on a red-eye, straight from set to the airport.

His agent says it’s his to lose, and Saul never says shit like that. Jared checks his breath, makes sure his eyes are clean and sleep-free. He feels scratchy and cramped from the plane, but he lets himself want this job. Really want it, and that does the trick.

The casting director’s bright-eyed, and Jared feels himself respond to that, matching it.

“You ready for this?” she asks.

He beams, showing off perfect, white teeth. “When you are.”

****

His parents are having a hard time. Jared sends them money. He can afford it. He has minimal expenses, and a steady income. The first time, it’s really cool. His mom laughs and says she’s not even going to cash the check, just frame it.

But then he checks his bank account, a few months later. It doesn’t bother him that she cashed it, but it’s strange she didn’t say anything, maybe. He’s not sure if it’s something worth bringing up.

On the phone, his mom starts talking about how hard his dad works. She talks about tuition hikes at Meg’s school. He knows she’s not saying anything, but he hears stuff anyway.

He sends her checks, because it’s only right. He feels grown-up and weighed down. In a solid way. He feels good about it, every time he signs his name, there, in the corner. He feels really good about it, mostly. He thinks about it all the time.

****

Genevieve is sitting on Jared’s back as he does push-ups. As a favor. He’s pretty sure she feels weird about it, but he’d won her over. He’s good at winning people over.

She fidgets, though. Jared doesn’t say anything, because it makes it harder. It’s a better workout. To keep her balanced, to shift tiny muscles, pectoralis minor and the brachialis. His trailer’s small, down-sized after budget cuts, and with Gen on his back, he feels like he’s coloring, very carefully, inside lines.

She grips his t-shirt. “Vanity or necessity?” she asks.

He huffs out a chuckle. “Both,” he says. He likes to be honest, unless he can’t be. He lowers his body down, straining. He trembles on the way up and that’s a good place to stop. He doesn’t want to tip his passenger over.

She finds her feet, and so does he. Jared wipes his face on his sleeve. “Thank you,” he says.

She tucks her hair behind her ears, her smile quick and fleeting. “Yeah.”

She’s still nervous around him. Maybe not nervous, but something. Unsure. That’s ok. He wants to let her know that that’s ok. “I’m glad you’re around, you know?” he says. It’s the easiest thing.

“Thank you.” She lets her smile linger this time. “Anyway. Of the people here, it’s you carrying the show, not me.”

She leaves pretty quick after that. It’s a good note to end on, but Jared feels really tired all of a sudden, when he’s alone.

He wishes Eddie were still around to play some hoops, but most of the assistants were downsized a few weeks ago. Jared wonders when the studio would stop slashing, if he said he'd take a cut in pay.

****

Jensen’s really happy, and Jared feels good about that. He’ll watch Jen--grinning, flirting, mugging--and think, ‘He should always look like that.’

Jared chews his lips raw. If they’re alone, Jensen usually kisses him. It’s this whole cycle.

Jensen’s his best friend, and things have mostly stayed the same. Only everything’s less easy.

****

The shitty thing about things being yours to lose is that, when you lose them, you have no one but yourself to blame. His agent calls with bad news.

“They went another way,” he says. “We should talk, Jared, when you get into town. About the direction of your career. We’ll reassess.” Saul keeps the call short.

He’s quiet all day. Hits his marks, delivers his lines. He gets chattered at a lot, like air whooshing in to fill a negative space.

In the car, on the way home, Jensen turns to him and says, “Dude. What’s up.”

Jared scrunches his eyes closed, takes a deep inhale, then lets it out in a rush. He smiles. “Just tired.”

Jensen takes his hand. He turns it palm up, presses his lips to the center. He blows. Shakes his head at the failed attempt. Tries again and gets this big belching noise. He smirks up at Jared.

Jared laughs. He scratches at his hairline. “Things are just kind of heavy right now.”

“Because of me?” Jensen straightens. He goes more serious than Jared’s seen him in a while.

“No,” Jared says. “It’s not because of you. Swear to God. Okay?”

Jensen looks at him. He doesn’t seem suspicious, just. Watchful.

“I need, like, four naps and I’ll be good.” Jared winks. He’s being reassuring.

Jensen nods. “Okay.”

Jared nods. He closes his eyes, like he’s falling asleep. He keeps the hand Jensen’s holding really still.

Jensen lets it go a few seconds later. Jared sighs, pretends like he’s just stirring in his sleep. It’s so dumb, really. People get overwhelmed all the time. It’s not new.

****

When they get dropped off, Jared shakes himself out, starts up the walk to their front door. Jensen’s behind him.

The house is dark and cold. Jared keeps his jacket on. He goes to the kitchen, does a quick scan of the fridge, freezer and all. He grabs a lime popsicle.

Jensen comes in, and turns on a light. He’s got the dogs with him, leashes. “I’m gonna take ‘em out real fast. Been cooped up for a while.”

Jared nods. “I’ll come with.”

The neighborhood’s quiet, and it’s so cold Jared can see his breath, so cold the popsicle he takes bites of sticks to his lips. There aren’t a lot of streetlights. So the stars are close.

Harley and Sadie snort, their nails clicking against the pavement. Jensen’s right next to Jared. Their arms swing past each other, the fabric of their jackets making sound against each other.

Jared gets the last bite of his popsicle. Sickly sweet where all the syrup dripped down, burning the back of his throat. He chews on the stick.

It’s not quiet. There are all these little noises. Breath and footsteps.

Jensen says, “I love you.”

There isn’t anything else. No qualifiers. Like it’s okay for them to say that to each other. Like that’s normal, for two best friends who have sex, and live together.

Jared looks up. The sky’s that weird, lit black. He can see the moon behind some house’s chimney, and it’s big and round and full. He can feel every inch of it.

They don’t stop. They keep walking. Their hands brush until Jensen catches his. “Give me one thing,” Jensen says. “One thing to make it easier.”

Jared squeezes Jensen’s hand, tight. Jensen's hand is almost as big as his. He wants to answer, he doesn’t want to leave Jensen hanging, but.

He can’t think of a single thing.

It’s really late. Almost three.

THE END

SPN Fic: Contrary (1/1)

indysaur — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 21:55:17 GMT

Contrary
SPN Fic: John/Mary
Rating: NC-17
2,237 words.
Unbeta'ed. Spoilers through 403. Mary loves a lot of things. John loves one, then two, then three.

Mary loves to garden. The morning after they move in, John wakes up and finds her in the front yard, breaking ground for a flower bed. He stands in the front doorway, dew-heavy air tightening his nipples, unashamed in his show of skin. This is his house.

Mary pushes the shovel deep into the earth with her foot, smiles tightly up at him. "It's so." She shrugs. "It needs something."

"You need color," he nods. "A fence of flowers."

Her smile blooms, and he can feel it like a touch to his chest. It ripples through him. She looks at him, for a long time.

His name is John Winchester. This is his wife. This is his home. Look, he wants to say. Look at my life.

****

Mary loves their home.

John says, "This is going to sound strange."

Mary looks up, quickly, and he can see the possibility of tightness on her lips.

"No," he says, "It's not a bad thing."

She raises an eyebrow, but smiles in relief. "I'm eating my chicken," she says.

He laughs. "Alright then. You finish doing that."

She nibbles at a chicken leg, dabs her mouth primly with her napkin. She takes her time.

He smirks. "You weren't such a lady when we were going out."

She beams. "I'm a woman of many facets."

He studies her. "You ever feel like we're playing house?"

"Yes." She spoons more mashed potatoes onto his plate.

"And?"

"And?" She bites her lip, poutily. "Are you saying you don't want to play with me anymore, John Winchester?"

He stands, goes over to her and swings her into his arms.

Their food goes cold on the plate.

****

"Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?" John sings it through the window.

Mary looks over her shoulder, hands still planted in dirt. "Home from work early, Mr. Winchester!" She smiles delightedly, and pushes up, about to stand.

"Oh no, sweetheart, don't get up on account of me." John clambers out of the Impala, jogs around to lean against the passenger side door. He poses, one ankle over the other, arms crossed over his chest.

"And why not?" Mary asks, already up one knee, half turned toward him.

"It was quite a view, ma'am," he says sorrowfully.

She laughs and runs to him. She kisses his cheek soundly. "Pig."

"I'm your husband," he protests.

Mary smiles. "How did you get so lucky?"

She throws her arms around his shoulders, and he wraps his around her waist. "My favorite thing," he says into her ear, "is the way you hug me."

She squeezes him tighter, her breasts flat against his chest. She's so damn strong. They're a stone, buried in layers of silt at the bottom of a pond; an anchored, immovable object. John turns his face into her hair.

"Hey," he says after a bit. "The flower bed's a real work of art."

He feels her shoulders shake. "Shut up. The flowers won't grow." She sighs. "Sarah Nathanson said that Epsom salt's supposed to work wonders, but." She shrugs.

"It'll work out."

She pulls away, just a bit. She looks into his face. "How do you know?"

He touches her face, leaves a spot of dark grease on her cheek. "Everything else has."

****

Mary loves their church. On Sundays, she goes to dawn prayers, and he listens, half-awake, as she moves through the dark house.

He goes with her, sometimes. He sits in the back pew, watches as she kneels near the altar, looks at her lips move. He likes when the sun rises and light streams in, filtered through stained glass. He rises, then, and flicks the panel of switches, one by one, hanging lamps acquiescing to the day.

He waits for the sheets of light to shift and stretch from the base of the windows. Until they wash over her, hair a shining beacon against stained wood, tarnished gold, the thick and heavy scent in the air.

A virtuous woman, he had once heard in a sermon, is a crown to her husband, her worth greater than that of rubies.

Their priest says to him, "John. We all have idols in our lives. A love so consuming--We serve a passionate and jealous God."

****

They wait a long time to have a baby. In bed, after she's pregnant, sometimes he'd press a hand to her stomach and sing in a gruff whisper, "Mary has a little lamb..."

She would groan, and push his hand away.

"What?" He'd ask. "Is it my fault every song is about you?"

****

When Dean is born, before he has a name, John says, "We can name him Samuel, if you want."

And Mary says, "No. I don't--"

"Too soon," John says. "Okay."

"Dean, maybe." Mary says, one finger on the baby's little chin.

It's harder, John figures. She had to see him die.

****

"My trove of treasure," Mary says about Dean. "My crazy little boy."

He bounces off the walls, so sure of his place in the world, of the fact that he's loved. That nothing is unforgivable.

"Dean," his preschool teacher says, "Is high-spirited. And so intelligent. His confidence is a real testament to your home, Mr. and Mrs. Winchester." She is unfailingly polite. "If only he realized he is not the only person worth considering."

His father says, "Now you know how it feels. You were more than a handful, kiddo. Dean's not even half as bad." He's a doting grandfather. He slips Dean rock candy, and gunpowder snaps.

Janet Lupinski, the old woman next door, yells, "Dean Winchester is a menace!" and Dean comes barreling through the door, laughing at the top of his lungs, three years old, yelling, "Call me Dennis, call me Dennis!"

****

"John!" Mary screams. "Of course things have changed. We have a child now! He relies on us."

"Well, I rely on you," John bites out.

"Oh my god." Mary sinks into the armchair. "I can't do this. I can't, John. This is not a competition. He's your son."

"I know that. Don't you think I know that? Dean's my life, just as much as he is yours." He turns away, grabs his jacket. "I don't think it's too much to ask for something besides macaroni or chicken nuggets for dinner once a week. Jesus Christ."

"John." She clasps his arm, fingers digging into his skin. "I'm just asking you to think of him, a little."

"I do. All the time." He pulls out of her grasp.

"He deserves everything." She wrings her hands. "He'll only be our little boy for so long."

He tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear, kisses her forehead. "I give him all I can." He opens the door. "I'm going to the diner. I won't be back too late."

It's the first time, but not the last, that he thinks his love is not unselfish.

He can't stop wondering, through his meatloaf, past his pie, if they woke Dean up.

****

On their ninth anniversary, John cooks dinner. Rack of lamb, and buttered peas, and biscuits. Dean helps to make a salad. Tosses most of the lettuce right onto the floor, but it's a clean floor. John makes a pie.

Mary teases him all day. She ties an apron around his waist, and swats his ass, and calls him Holly Homemaker.

Dean eats two slices of pie for dessert, and then they drive him over to Buddy Henry's place for a sleepover and he declares in the backseat that wedding anniversaries are his favorite holiday.

John takes Mary out to a movie. He holds her hand in the dark, and he feels nineteen all over again.

At home, in their bedroom, he kisses her the way she likes to be kissed. Simple, and sweet. Little sips at her lower lip. He cups her breasts. "Ah, second base. My old friend."

She laughs, pushes him onto the bed before following him down, straddling his waist. "This isn't exactly seven minutes in heaven."

"Oof. Seven minutes? I'm an old man."

Mary presses down against him, wet heat seeping through her panties. "Wake up, John Winchester. I have plans for you."

He groans, strains against her. She hurries up, shimmying out of her underwear, and he has barely enough time to unbutton, and pull his cock out before she's on top of him, all around him.

He moans as he sinks inside her, throat rusty. He'd gotten used to bottling noise in. "I love you," he says.

"I love you, too," she says, winking. She rides him smoothly, hair sticking to her cheek, breasts heavy, and he can feel the stretch marks on her hips. He runs his fingers across them, traces them across her stomach, thinks, 'Look'.

****

They don't find out she's pregnant until late, mostly because Mary won't even entertain the idea when he brings it up. When he finally drags her into the hospital and she hears the news, she goes white.

The doctor says, "Don't worry, Mary. This pregnancy should be easier, now that you've had some experience with it, I promise."

In the car on the way home, Mary tells him to pull over into an empty parking lot. "I have something to tell you," she says.

John's heart seizes. "The doctor said you were healthy."

"It's not that."

"It's--" He licks his lips. "It's mine."

"What? Of course."

He lets out his breath in a chuckle. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have jumped to the worst possible conclusion. I don't--I do trust you, I just. Sorry. Phew." He shakes it off. "What do you need to tell me?"

She stares at him a while before shaking her head. She forces a smile. "No, I just--I want a home birth, is all. Somewhere safe, with the people I love around me."

****

Mary takes up gardening again.

"A second try," she says, "Never hurt anyone. It's been almost ten years. I can get those flowers growing this time, I know it."

"I want to help," Dean says.

"No way, Jose." She kisses the top of his head, swings a bag of salt into her arms. "You've got playing to do."

****

The birth goes smoothly. Mary knows a very competent, if overly mystical, midwife.

Dean comes home a little early though, before John has a chance to throw away the bloody towels. Everything on his face goes very round.

"Is mommy okay?" he asks.

"Yeah, buddy, she's fine." John picks him up, cuddles him. "She's resting."

Dean swallows, twisting his fingers in the cotton of John's shirt. John gets up, ready to take him to Mary. "What about the baby? Is this the baby's blood?" Dean's eyes fill with tears.

"Nooo," John draws out, fighting the urge to chuckle. "Not a chance. Your brother's fine, and big. Wanna check on him?"

Mary's sleeping, so John tiptoes into the bedroom, bouncing and jostling Dean in his arms. He leans over Sam's crib. They watch quietly for a few minutes.

"He doesn't do anything," Dean says, put out, and at that instant, Sam stirs, blinks. He opens his little mouth and burps.

Dean lets out a peal of laughter, shocked and thrilled. "Oh man! Oh man!" he says.

****

Mary is tense for days after the birth. She holds Sam, all the time, so tight he can see the muscles in her shoulders bunch. He keeps expecting Sam to cry, but Sam is still and quiet, as if making up for everything Dean was not.

"A perfect baby," he says to Dean. "How'd you get so lucky having a baby brother like that?"

Dean laughs, tries to cross his eyes at Sam. "Sammy, look. Watch me. Watch me." He curls his lip. "You're being boring, Sammy," he says warningly. He doesn't turn away.

Mary is on the verge of tears. She's always on the verge of tears.

At night, he strokes her back. "Are you depressed? The midwife said that might happen."

"It's not that." She turns, finds his mouth in the dark. "I want to paint the nursery," she says, and nips at his tongue.

****

He picks up one of the paintbrushes she'd bought. "This is tiny," he says.

She shrugs. "I might want to paint a mural or something. Stars."

But when he sees the finished product, every surface is blank, a smooth empty canvas laid over the walls, the ceiling.

She leans heavily against him. "Hold me up," she says. "I'm so tired."

****

He remembers three things. The sound of Mary screaming. A blankness, emptied until there's nothing left but panic. Then her face, wreathed by fire.

He'd yelled, "I'm here! I'm here!"

She'd gaped at him, fear, and pain, and sorrow. He burnt his hands. She can't die, he'd thought dispassionately. Not looking like that. A good person doesn't die looking like that.

So he didn't say it. He didn't say that he would always love her, for exactly who she was.

She couldn't die, looking the way she did. He watches her face, until there's nothing left to recognize.

****

After the funeral, when Father Michael expresses condolences, a hand lain on John's shoulder, John shrugs him off. 'You cursed me,' he thinks.

"Get out," he says.

Dean watches the father go, little arms crossed, firmly planted in front of Sam's bassinet.

This is my life, John thinks. He closes his eyes.

THE END

Sweet Charity

indysaur — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 18:04:21 GMT

I signed up for Sweet Charity; offering a short story of at least 4000 words. No real parameters beyond that, except for the fact that I'm hoping to write in a fandom I'm familiar with. Haha. I'd have a little trouble trying to write, say, Two and a Half Men fic.

Still, there are some awesome people to bid on over at the site, and Invisible Children is a really great charity serving child soldiers in Uganda. They filmed a really moving, really heartbreaking documentary that I would recommend if you're interested in their purpose or just in a well-crafted doc about the turmoil in Uganda that's indicative of the troubles facing third world Africa today. You can visit Invisible Children's website here.

And put in bids at Sweet Charity, here!

SPN Fic: Two on a Hill (1/1)

indysaur — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 03:38:41 GMT

Two on a Hill
SPN Fic: Gen. Mild Wincest subtext. Evil-ish Sam.
Rating: PG
3,214 words.
Unbeta'ed. Spoilers through 401. They have things taken from them, every one. Switches in perspective and timeline, into the projected future. I apologize for any confusion in advance.

"Do you worry about the body you're in?" Dean asks. He wipes the blade of his knife clean with a cloth from his back pocket. "Is that why you're such a pussy in a fight?"

"I am ever vigilant." Castiel bends to tie his shoe.

Dean flips the knife in the air, catches it by the hilt, blade down. "Great. Me too."

****

Sam calls Dean the morning after he leaves. "Hey."

"You're a little bitch, Sam."

"You shouldn't have lied to me."

"Who was lying?"

Sam grins. Fucking Dean. "Wow."

"Alright," Dean growls. "Technicalities. Don't get your panties in a twist."

"We could have a whole talk about letter versus spirit of the law right now. Be fun. You could teach me a thing or two, probably."

"You made your point." Dean's voice turns plaintive. "But did you really have to take my car?"

Sam sighs, grips the steering wheel. He takes in the familiar warmth, the odor of black leather under high sun. "It was a little harsh," he admits.

He can almost see Dean's tight smile. "Definitely earned yourself a little grief when I catch you, that's for sure, Sammy."

Sam beams ear to ear. "I can take you."

"Doubtful."

"Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall."

Sam listens to a breath, two. The asphalt of the highway stretches taut in front of him, wheels send it spinning behind.

"Dean?"

"I'll find you."

"Is that promise or a statement of fact?"

Dean laughs. "All I know is, I keep my promises."

Sam wants to say low blow, but it isn't. "I'll prove you wrong," he says to the dial tone.

****

This is exactly how Dean thought it would end. Ruby's blonde again. "I'll give you one thing. You always did pick pretty girls," he says.

She smirks. "I guess we share more than the one taste."

He pistol whips her.

She hisses, but comes back smiling. "That's the thing with you Winchester boys. Every day a little death."

He watches her lie.

"You hit hard." She smears the blood from her broken nose across the back of her hand. Streaks of red across her smile. "You wouldn't believe how muffled the sensation is under all this bone and skin and flesh."

He raises his rifle.

"This poor girl." Ruby stands, tucks her hair behind her ears. "You don't even know if she's dead or alive." She digs into her pocket, pulls out a driver's license. She stares down at it. "Oh, look, Dean. She just turned legal." She licks her lips clean.

Dean presses the rifle to her forehead. His hands don't shake.

"Wait." A hand settles on Dean's shoulder. He shakes it off. Shoulders won't bear the touch.

Dean watches the girl's eyes. He looks for Ruby inside. "Are you scared?"

Castiel is a presence at his back.

****

Lilith is a little girl in a public park.

"Hi, darlin'." Sam stops the ball rolling toward him. Then puts his foot on top of it.

Her smile is gap-toothed. She holds out her hands. "My mommy and daddy are waiting."

Behind her a man stands at a grill. A woman rises, hand shading her eyes. "They'll be more than fine without you."

"Can I tell you a secret?" She leans in, darting glances to the sides. She frames her mouth with small hands. "They think it's a miracle." She presses her hands to her mouth quick, quieting her giggles. "Their little girl, more vibrant than ever, like the sickness has gone away!" Her eyes dance. "Maybe the sickness has gone away."

"Maybe not." He reaches out one hand, pulls. Lilith writhes.

"Excuse me? Excuse me!" Sam looks up to see the mother start towards them, jog a little in tamped down haste. "Sweetie, what's going--"

He recovers too late. He sees the girl's eyelids flutter, her body sway. She falls slowly. He grabs at Lilith but there's nothing there.

****

Dean has a knife in one hand, a rifle in the other, and Latin on his lips.

He lets Castiel deal with it. He's got that eye-burning trick.

"Watching might not be prudent," Castiel says.

Dean goes to the doorway, stands with his back to the kitchen. He looks out into the rest of the small apartment. Ruby's nested.

"Are there others like you?" Castiel asks.

"Merciful one," says Ruby.

"You've confused me with someone else."

Dean studies the couch. It looks comfortable. Stuffing bunched up under clean, worn cotton. Something you'd call a find at a garage sale.

"I'm sorry for your anomaly." Castiel sounds like he means it.

"Please." Ruby's voice shakes. "Please. It'll be worse for me, there. It'll be worse. I'll suffer beyond what I deserve."

"He has spoken."

"So let Him speak again!" Her voice rises. Rises and rises.

Dean pushes forward into the room. There are hooks in the wall next to him. Jackets on those hooks. An open box of Trix on the coffee table, and frames, still displaying generic, happy, model faces. He presses eject on the CD player, and Coldplay spins into sight.

Dean bites through his cheek. He turns to watch.

Castiel squats against fading linoleum, flourescent lighting harsh on his face. His coat fanned out on the floor behind him. He's holding her hand.

Ruby cries like a man, Dean thinks. Quietly.

Dean kills her at twenty paces. She crackles, she dies. Castiel catches her before she hits the ground, a blade in her chest.

"Hey, look at that!" Dean beams. "Can you pull my knife out?"

Castiel turns, his face smooth in profile over his shoulder. Waiting.

Dean scowls. "You were taunting her."

Castiel looks him in the eye, cocks his head deliberately.

Dean clears his throat, looks down. "The body she was using was dead anyway."

"How did you know?"

Dean smirks. "I'm an excellent judge of character. You, for example, I immediately pegged as an all around joy." He winks.

Castiel rises, comes close. He presses a hand to Dean's chest. "Your weapon was unnecessary. We have tools at our disposal."

Dean sucks his teeth, glib. "Looking at a tool right now."

Castiel's palm burns. "So am I."

****

Ruby hopped from body to body. Fresh corpses, because Sam preferred it. Blondes, when she could, because Sam preferred it.

The first time she said, "I missed you," it was a lie. And worth it, to see that revulsion and need in his face.

He never said it back. That was okay. Almost all of those times, she never meant it.

Once, he said this: "What you're trying to accomplish, Ruby--Stop it. You don't want to hear what I have to say." He turns on his heel. "I have to get back. There's a necromancer, in Baton Rouge."

He spared me, she thinks with razor-sharp delight.

She's wearing a girl with long, blonde, curly hair the next time. It's not subtle, but Sam doesn't mention a thing about it. It's been months, since Dean's return, since they've last seen each other. He's covered in new runes, tattoo-bitten into his skin. He traces along the newest one, black lines on the back of his hand, still red around the edges.

He catches her looking. He smiles sheepishly. "Dean." Weary and fond.

She touches the reddest bit and he hisses but doesn't pull away.

She freely admits that she loves him in her way. Like a favorite, hard-won toy.

"I like the new place." Sam stands, pats the wall with a big hand. "When's the housewarming?"

She laughs. "This is it." She looks around at the half-furnished apartment. "I think I'll be staying for a while. It'll be nice to settle down." She laughs and laughs.

****

Nearer the beginning and further from the end, Sam argued with Dean a lot.

"I'm not an idiot, Dean." The laundromat is tiny, a row of four washers and two dryers along one wall of the boxed-in room. Sam's voice echoes under the reverberating hum.

"Stop acting like an idiot, then we'll talk." Dean wipes sweat off his temple with his sleeve.

"It's been a long fucking time, Dean. And Ruby hasn't done a damn thing but help me. I'm doing good."

"We're not talking about it. We made a decision."

Sam feels hot all over, the scent of detergent and clean clothes almost suffocating. "Dean. You should see me do it. You should see me. It's so fucking simple--"

Dean rears up, slams his hands down on one of the washing machines. Sam doesn't flinch. "Are you hearing yourself? It's like a bad joke you're getting reeled in so easy." He pinches himself hard, through flannel.

"Fuck." Sam shakes his hair out of his eyes. "It's damn hot in here."

Dean grips his arm tight. "You listen to me, Sammy. Please."

Sam looks down into Dean's eyes. He's fucking worried. Like he isn't sure what the hell Sam's going to do, like he can't fucking rely on Sam to do what's right.

Sam has a hard time breathing. He wrenches his arm away from Dean. "Jesus." He keeps his voice steady. "Okay, Dad."

****

"Does heaven exist?"

Castiel frowns at the coin-slot for the vibrating bed. "You carry the reality of hell with you, Dean."

"Not an answer." Dean pulls his socks off with a groan. He sniffs one warily, pulls a face.

Castiel meets Dean's gaze. "Maybe this is heaven. Maybe this is the reward, to be free of the unending torment of hell."

"No."

Castiel smiles. "Then you believe there is something better?"

"No."

His smile widens. "You're at an impasse."

"Yeah." Dean cracks his jaw. "We're coming to a lot of those, you and me."

****

Dean keeps his secret longer than Sam keeps his. He's not sure why. Truth is, he doesn't even try to tell Sam, doesn't worry about how to say it, or where, or when. He just doesn't.

He's not ready when the time comes. He pushes into the motel room; he smells like ashes.

Sam jumps up. "You ran evasive manuevers on me," he accuses.

"Sammy--"

Sam laughs, startling Dean. "I can't believe I fell for a car swap. I'm telling you, man, I swore to Bobby up one side and down the other that you'd never ditch the Impala. Guess he won your leather jacket fair and square."

Dean's smile comes slow but big. "What the hell are you doing betting my jacket?"

Sam falls back onto his bed, arms under his head. "It'll look real good made into a lamp. Bobby's expanding into home decoration."

Dean rubs his mouth with the back of his hand. "You're chipper."

Sam shrugs, a dimple digging deep into his cheek.

Dean remembers poking it, when Sam was still a kid and that was enough to make him laugh.

"Bobby," Sam continues, "wants to be the Tiger Woods of interior design. Oh." He sits up, pretends to explain. "Tiger Woods is--he's kind of like the Sam Winchester of golf, I guess is a good way to put it."

Dean laughs, lost but pleased. "Dude. What's with you?"

Sam rolls his eyes, flips onto his stomach to rummage for something in his duffel bag on the floor. He pulls out a vial of holy water, splashes it into his own face.

"Nice." Dean says. "Wasteful."

Sam grins, pushes his hair up off his face, water beading on his strong chin. "I don't know. It hit me today. This is real. This whole time I've been waiting to--wake up or something." He shoves his tongue into his cheek, face placid, eyes moving. "Three months. And you're still here." Sam looks at him like he's a gift.

His Sam. Dean feels it come up, a force out his throat: "I killed Ruby."

Sam shutters. "What? Why?"

"Castiel told me to."

****

A long time ago, Ruby liked Lilith. They were familiar to each other.

"I have a game for you." Lilith flicked long blonde hair over her shoulder.

Ruby smiled. "The prize?"

Lilith's teeth gleamed. "An awakening."

Ruby paused. "Of power?"

Lilith rises to her feet, pads away, across a dark floor. "We will be closer, more well-matched than ever before. Bound by the knowledge of lives."

Ruby yearns.

When she looks back on her great mistake, she can never decide. If Lilith's eyes truly shone with tears, or if it was a fault in her memory, a bout of castigating self-reproach.

****

The argument is short, once Dean explains who Castiel is.

"He's an angel?" Sam asks.

Dean nods, bounces a little when he collapses onto his bed.

"Are you sure? We've met 'angels' before."

Dean licks his lips. "I'm not sure. I'm not. Unconvinced, either." He sighs.

Sam clasps his hands. "I want to meet him."

"No."

"Why not?"

Dean sits up, ramrod straight.

Sam's voice deepens. "What did he say about me?"

"Nothing." He's not lying.

Sam bolts up with a sudden explosion of anger. "Bullshit. Dean, come on. It's a fucking trick. A demon in disguise, a, a spirit. To mess with your head, to get between us."

Dean spreads his legs, bows his head. "Maybe. You're right. Maybe."

"You don't believe me." Sam's incredulous.

Dean's shoulder burns. "He gripped me tight."

"I could have handled Ruby. I could have done it right."

"There's a plan, Sammy."

Sam laughs. "There's no plan, Dean. Jesus Christ." He grabs his jacket.

Dean gets between Sam and the door. "Where are you going?"

Sam squints and Dean's pinned to the wall, like a specimen, an insect on cork. "Fuck." Sam sounds tired. "Everything changes."

****

"He's a soldier," Ruby explained once. "Obedience is an admirable, life-saving quality in a soldier."

Sam clenches his jaw. "He's too stubborn to admit that maybe we can use my powers. That you've been useful."

"Maybe he's smart." She sows seeds. "Anyway, it's not you he's scared of. His hate is just real hard on for me." She smiles. "Right?"

Sam picks at the nubbins of fabric on the couch.

"Anyway." Ruby gets up, turns on the TV. "Give him time. The guy's just back from the fiery pit. It's an adjustment. Believe me."

Ruby finds ways to make it fun, unravelling Sam at the edges.

****

The first time Dean saw Ruby after Sam's admission, she was a brunette. The same brunette he saw in Sam's room.

"I never forget a face," he jokes. He grips her knife tight.

"Wanted a peek." She whistles. "Whoever got you out did a hell of a job."

"What the fuck do you want, Ruby?"

"Head's up, Dean. I spent a lot of time with your boy while you were indisposed." She zips up her jacket, pulls her hair out from underneath the hood. "Sam's put together all wrong. I'm trying to undo the mistakes, but someone else has to fix the mess I'm leaving behind."

"A real bleeding heart," Dean says. "I love it. Come on." He holds out his arms, knife glinting in his fist. "Let's have a hug."

****

Sam stops making promises he knows he can't keep.

In Minnesota, he says, "I'll stop whatever's doing this."

The girl's mother stares into the children's ward, at her child staring gleefully at the cowering heads of the kids around her.

"I promise," Sam says.

****

The third time, Dean asks, "That poor bastard. So what, is he just tagging along in the back of that skull while you control his body? How the fuck does he keep his job with you wasting his time every other week?"

Castiel looks down at his body, smooths one hand down the lapel of his suit. "I try to give him foreknowledge of my coming, for his convenience."

Dean chokes on his tequila. "So you're telling me the two of you sit down and pencil in a little possession into your weeks?"

Castiel ignores him. "We have work for you."

"You know who'd be a better choice for this?" Dean asks. "Anyone."

"I was sent for you."

Dean squints. "So. If I don't do this, then, what. I'm going back to hell?"

"No."

"Great." He turns away from Castiel, leans over the counter. "Jerry!" he roars. The bartender flips him off.

"I have to go." Castiel stands.

Dean squares his shoulders. "Why? Because Sam's coming?"

Castiel says nothing.

"This is our problem. I'm not doing shit you can't say in front of Sam."

"Our problem," Castiel says. "Is that a situation of this magnitude requires a being of omniscient wisdom and foresight and you, Dean Winchester, are under the delusion that you're it."

"Holy sarcasm!" Dean burps.

****

"Do it yourself," Dean says, the fourth time.

"There are those who do such things," Castiel says. "I am a messenger."

The fifth time, Dean says, "I just need to know the details. Everything, explained."

"Is it about Sam?" The sixth time.

"I won't. Not Sam." The seventh.

"I need to know."

"Done!" Castiel is grave and shining.

****

Lilith is slippery, but Sam grabs and grabs. He made a promise. He keeps his promises. He saves the people he promises to save.

****

Dean shows up too late. There's screaming in the hospital and he finds Sam at the center of it.

Sam breathes heavy. He sits at the edge of a child's bed. Little bodies all around.

"Sam!"

Sam looks up. He's so lucid. Dean fights back his lungs. "Dean. It was Lilith. She held on so damn tight inside, and kept jumping, and jumping, until." His eyes are clear. "I got so caught up. I."

"Hey." Dean puts his hands on Sam's shoulders. "We'll fix this. I'm gonna fix this."

Sam looks around, brow furrowed, lips drawn tight. "Maybe. Maybe it's alright. They were sick. Maybe it's better that they didn't have their suffering drawn out." Sam drags in a deep breath. "And Lilith. She's gone. I stopped her."

"You did." Dean can't think, he can't look at anything but Sam, here. Under his hands. There is no room for horror. "You did."

****

A witch, Ruby thinks. A witch!

"I am Lilith," she says, stroking Ruby's cheek. "Destroyer of children. Seducer of men."

****

Sam bows his head. He feels Dean's hands on his shoulders, his chest, his neck.

He hears footsteps, and when he looks up, he sees a man, stoop-shouldered, still of face. Just for a moment; then he erupts, wings a shade to his light, rising, rising.

****

Dean holds Sam, centered in the storm.

"Look away!" he shouts. "Look away!" His lips at Sam's ear.

He thinks, 'No', he thinks, 'Never, never, never.'

Sam's hands rise, a brace on Dean's shoulders. And a whining, a bleeding in Dean's ears.

****

"You are built for a purpose," he once told Dean. Dean said nothing, as if struck dumb.

'We are all built for a purpose', thinks Castiel.

"A message! A message from the Lord!" His voice is trumpets and chorus, from every depth to height, and Samuel! He hears.

****

Ruby clutches tight at the hand. She can see Dean, coming. She shakes.

"Remember me, when you go into your kingdom," she says.

The angel's eyes study her, curiously. He cocks his head. "I tell you the truth--"

THE END

Ratings News

indysaur — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:32:10 GMT

Whee. Supernatural kicked ass in the ratings last night, hitting a series high on the CW:

Supernatural's numbers were touched by an angel, as the season premiere drew 3.96 mil — a 33 percent surge over the previous opener and the series' best CW performance ever. - TV Guide

How great! And on a really solid episode, too.

SPN 401 - Lazarus Rising

indysaur — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 09:51:37 GMT

I AM PLEASED. Vastly, vastly pleased.

I will give time for the new actress playing Ruby to grow on me, but all in all, I'm thrilled that SPN is delivering an incredibly compelling narrative. Ruby's back, Bobby's sticking around, Sam's powers are back. Our story's circled up tight and gone full throttle.

Speculation on the Groundwork Laid:
I know some people will disagree but I've always felt like Supernatural required a higher force of good; without it, the show is fundamentally a story of holding back the natural chaos of the world. Interesting in its own way, but ultimately repetitive and predetermined. We've had three seasons of Sam and Dean spearheading guerilla strikes against an enemy stronger and better than them, while suffering heavy losses. Both boys have died, John's dead, the Roadhouse is gone. They're getting whittled down.

But with the addition of Castiel, an angel of the Lord, the whole plot's changed. The demons are scared. IMO, this is the biggest upheaval of the status quo we've had so far. The guerillas have just gotten the backing of a power equal to, or maybe greater than that of the demons. What was a slow march towards victory has turned into a full out declaration of war, and now there's uncertainty, now there's something to get invested in. Hell's been breached, motherfuckers. There's no going back. I love, love, love that Dean's mind has been blown, and with it, so have the conventions of this show.

Something that's always been interesting to me about the Christian supernatural worldview is that it started with unity, a oneness that was rent into two. God's glorious angel host is torn into those cast down and those remaining above, and we get this sense of loss, this yearning manifested through despair. It could be argued that good is best characterized by unswerving loyalty; evil, by the despair that rose from frustrated ambition.

Sam's been traveling a slippery slope for a while now. He knows he's saving people, and he's willing to lie to his brother to continue that, willing to go against his better instincts that are telling him not to trust Ruby for what he believes to be the greater goal. I mean, before Dean had returned, Sam had lost everything. His every attempt to bring Dean back utterly futile. What else does he have but to make those responsible pay, with any and every weapon at his disposal? He has utter faith in the ultimate rightness of his actions, that the salvation of mankind, the light at the end of the tunnel, is worth stumbling down a dark path. That his power is a good, effective thing.

Dean has no faith. Dean has no self-regard. Dean can't hear the voice of God (in related news, if Sam's visions return, I will be EVEN MORE AMAZED by these writers). Dean's traded his soul, been to hell, and when he's pulled out, the first thing he does is go after the son of a bitch that did it. He's not grateful for his own skin, or worried that he'll be tossed back, he's suspicious of the magnitude of that kind of power.

They're one coin, with two sides.

Up until now, the show has kept the boys muddling through and firmly planted in a gray zone. The awesome-sauce of the premiere is that it's started the clock ticking down to the point where they'll have to choose. I have almost no doubt in my mind which side Dean's gonna end up on. It's Sam I'm wondering about. I can't decide if Sam is a contingency plan put in place by the demons in case it ever came to this; if it was evil foreseeing Dean's role in the battle to come. Or if Dean is a check brought into place by the angels, responding to the threat of Sam; plucking Sam's greatest hope from the bowels of hell to serve as a guide back to a surer path. Either way, we're seeing forces at work that are deadset on pitting brother against brother, tearing apart something that's one and setting them against each other. Fun! Let's see if it works.

I think they're off to a good start. Sam and Dean are lying to each other. By the end of the first episode, both boys are deliberately keeping each other in the dark to powwow with their respective camps.

Quick Notes:

1. Castiel and Ruby seem tailor made for their respective targets, don't they? Ruby's abrasive, smart-mouthed, brash and protective ("I don't want to get between you two"), with swagger to spare. In both incarnations, she's conspicuously gorgeous. Castiel (so far at least) is well-spoken, empathetic ("You don't think you deserve to be saved") and rumpled around the edges. He almost slouches. Such great parallels, drawn almost completely through their physicality.

2. Bobby was great, I love how incorporated he's been into the show. They've had a hard time drawing characters around Sam and Dean in any permanent sense, but Bobby's a great presence.

3. And I'm so glad they kept Ruby around, even though I'm really saddened by the loss of Katie Cassidy. I guess it doesn't make sense that Ruby would return to that particular, badly damaged body, but still. Man, the possession thing's a real boon for their budget. As soon as an actor gets too expensive, they can recast without any real concern.

4. I wonder if they're gonna keep the new psychic around. She felt too "introduced" to be a one-off, but who knows. I'm 50/50 on her. There are aspects of her character that read feisty in a way that's more male-imagined than reality. Dean's "You are not invited" made me howl, though.

5. I was a little underwhelmed by Sam's reaction to a restored Dean. I don't know. Supernatural doesn't have the best track record of realistically treating what should be overwhelmingly traumatic emotional circumstances, especially in regard to Sam. He snapped back after John, after what happened in Heart, after living Dean's death over and over with the Trickster, and I'm bummed that he seems to be the same Sam he's always been. I'm not seeing a darkness in him that I feel should be there. Although, maybe that's a choice made by the writers? I love the thought of Sam's earnestness tugging him down the path of evil, but I'm not sure if that's pure fanwanking of a poorly managed bit of emotional terrain.

6. I know there's been wank, and that it's a topic that's been picked over to death, but man. Girls on this show get worked. Feel free to skip if you're sick of hearing about this but: I got a little uncomfortable in the opening scenes of the recap montage because: that was a lot of chicks getting smacked around. And Dean's casual slaps of the waitress demon. Ugh. I don't know.

If I could set aside real world discussions of authorial intent/awareness for now, and discuss within the world of the show: After that diner facedown, I got really, really sad for Sam and Dean, because man, their view of women is under serious attack. Neither of them have had a strong and long-term female influence in their lives. The good ones have been killed off, or sent running (Jo, Ellen, Jess, Mom) and in their place, there's this steady stream of demons wearing female faces.

I have little to no belief that this is a story choice by the writers, but it does, conveniently and remarkably, fit into this conflict they're building up, of a forced binary viewpoint, where it's us against them, where everything that isn't of me, is wrong. Ugh. Again, within the show text, it's almost as if demons are deliberately fostering misogyny within the boys, creating a hunting community that is so lopsided towards masculinity, that femininity becomes seen as something wholly 'other', either something to be protected or destroyed. Really disquieting.

7. In conclusion, everyone on this show is stupid hot. Whoooowee.

RPS Fic: Cohabitation (1/1)

indysaur — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 11:53:07 GMT

Cohabitation
SPN RPS: Jared/Jensen
Rating: PG-13
4,244 words.
Unbeta'ed. A little bit of fic because who can resist Jared and Jensen living in the same effing house. Oh, to be a fly on that wall. A sort of ode. :)

Jensen memorized his list last night. When he wakes up, he goes straight to the kitchen to recite it. He doesn't want to forget. Jared's on the stool at the counter, eating. Of course.

"I have ten reasons you should move out."

Jared barely looks up from his bowl of cereal. "Okay, well cull that down for me, yeah? I'm not--" He gulps down a spoonful, wipes milk off his chin. "Don't really have the time to listen to ten."

"You're listening to ten," Jensen states.

"Hey, start with the first one."

Jensen takes a deep breath. "You're a huge pain in my ass."

"Oh." Jared nods. "Pretty damning stuff."

Jensen shrugs. "You said it."

"I mean. Not much room for argument there."

"I hear the truth is cold and hard."

Jared sucks his teeth, hands braced on his knees. "I'm chilled," he admits. "And--hardened?"

"That's what she said." Jensen pauses. "He said?" He nods. "That's what he said."

"Well, great. Just. Something to think about?" Jared walks around the counter, rinses out his bowl in the sink. "This is kinda my house."

"I pay rent."

"Yeah, but--to me. I'm your landlord. Right? So."

Jensen narrows his eyes. "You said we'd be roommates. That I would have equal say. Mi casa es su casa, were your exact words."

Jared laughs. "Well, yeah. And don't get me wrong. I meant it at the time."

Jensen sighs, makes his way into the kitchen. He tugs open the refrigerator, squats down to inspect his neatly labeled shelf. His mozzarella's been opened. "Did you open this?"

Jared cranes over Jensen's shoulder on his way back to his seat at the counter. "I wanted to smell it. Anyway. At the time, you also promised you wouldn't try to run me out of my own house."

Jensen rolls his eyes. "I'm pretty sure I didn't promise that."

"Okay, technically." Jared peels a hardboiled egg, pieces of shell showering onto the kitchen tile. "But it's implied, don't you think? Just one of those unspoken rules. Like, agreeing to keep a respectful distance from strangers, or not to strip in public, or not, you know, down-the-line stage a takeover and kick your best friend out of the home he took you into."

Jensen raises a skeptical eyebrow at the romaine heart he pulls from the crisper. "Would you say, according to your own personal experience only, that unspoken rules get broken a lot?"

Jared eats his egg messily. "Hm."

Jensen turns finally, lettuce, tomatoes and mozzarella in hand. Jared's a picture. Heavily in thought, yolk crumbles clinging to his lower lip, smeared over his chin.

Jared grins, sunny, mouth wide open and filled with mashed up egg.

Jensen grimaces. "Thanks for that."

Jared winks. He swallows, then concedes. "You've got a point."

Jensen nods. "Glad you agree." He unties the bread bag, pulls out four slices.

"We own a cutting board." Jared wrinkles his nose as Jensen slices the tomatoes directly onto the marble countertop, guts a puddle around the red fruit flesh.

"Do you know where it is?" Jensen asks, concentrating on the shiny knife in his hand. It's sharp enough to cut through a penny.

Jared shuts up, watches him assemble the sandwiches until: "No meat?"

Jensen eyes Jared's midsection showily. "Donna says they don't have the budget to buy Sam a whole new supply of fat jeans."

Jared hums happily, flips him the middle finger. "Mayo?" he asks, hopefully.

Jensen sighs. "If you want it--" He looks Jared in the eye patiently. "Go get it your damn self."

Jared grins wider. Like he won something. Ridiculous.

He gets up and Jensen hears the refrigerator door open up behind him, a lot of rustling. He winces. He has a system. And that is the sound of shit getting messed up. He knows it.

Jared's arm reaches over his shoulder, a jar of mayonnaise plunked down directly in front of him. He stands next to Jensen, palms spread against the marble, one finger drawing out little lines of tomato water from the puddle. He points. "It's low-fat!"

"You should move out. I have nine more reasons." Jensen can see Jared open his mouth from the corner of his eye, and he cuts him off. "And the first one was that you're a huge pain in my ass."

Jared's mouth snaps shut. Then opens again. "Nothing wrong with needing a reminder. Hey, we can take a vote. Harley and Sadie should get a say."

"Oh, they did." Jensen scrapes a thin layer of mayo across a couple slices of bread. Then, off the sound of a throat clearing, rolls his eyes and dollops on a little more. "This morning. After I took them on their walk. While feeding them the scraps of bacon from last night's brinner." He fakes a wince. "Should I say how that went, or--?"

"No fair!"

"Oh, come on, Jay. Nobody likes a sore loser." Jensen slaps the sandwiches together and Jared scoops them into the Ziploc bags he'd gotten ready.

Jared squeezes his lightly. Lays it flat against the counter and pokes the soft bread. "This isn't toasted. And it's wheat." He sounds pretty morose.

Jensen grabs his sandwich from Jared's other hand, an apple from the fruit bowl. He hums sympathetically. "It's like the world's out to get you." He rummages through a cupboard. He hates rummaging. He hates a kitchen that requires rummaging. "Well, look." He emerges triumphant with a protein bar and turns back to Jared.

He looks up hopefully from poking the sandwich.

Jensen smiles kindly. "I'll completely help you move."

Jared laughs. "See, if I'd known that from the beginning."

****

On the phone to Josh, he says, "We have two Wii's, two Playstation 3's, two plasma TV's and one dented frying pan."

"I've known you your whole life," Josh says immediately. "Longer than Chris. Longer than anyone."

Jensen sighs. "Fine. You can have the pan."

****

Jared keeps his bedroom door closed. The first two weeks, Jensen sits in the living room and doesn't stare at Jared's closed door. He reads scripts, Paula Deen chattering low in the background.

He breaks eventually. He knocks on Jared's door, bellows, "Jesus Christ, you horny bastard, give it a rest before it falls off."

He can hear Jared laugh through the door. "It's open, asshole."

Jensen pushes the door open, leans against the jamb. He grins. Jared's sprawled on top of the covers of his bed, script in hand. "What are you doing in here?"

Jared waves the script.

"I'm doing that out there, too."

Jared smiles, nods. "I know. Just--"

"Worried I'm getting sick of you? Because I passed that point two years ago, so."

Jared laughs again, scratches his nose. "I just need some time to unwind."

"What?"

"It's not about you, it's--"

"No, I'm not mad." Jensen chuckles. He raps the doorjamb with his knuckles. He shakes his head, still smiling. "You're telling me I still don't know all there is to know about Jared Padalecki?"

Jared winks. "I like to keep 'em guessing. Switch it around."

"They zig, you zag." Jensen drags the back of his hand over his smile. "Alright, I'm gonna head back to my corner. Leave you in peace."

"Aw." Jared's eyes go gooey with empathy. "Jen Jen. Do you miss me out there?"

Jensen sighs. He examines his fingernails. "Fuck. I woke the beast." This is his own damn fault.

Jared jumps up, digs into his laundry basket. He holds out a worn t-shirt. "Look, take this. You can cuddle up to it and pretend I'm with you. So you don't get scared, all alone in the big ol' living room."

Jensen snatches the shirt and throws it back in Jared's face. He grabs Jared's shoulder, twists him around a little, searching. "Turns on so damn easy, it's the off button giving me issues."

Jared laughs. "Out of my room, asshole."

****

Jensen floats the idea of getting rid of some of their redundant shit. Jared is, predictably, horrified.

"No way!"

Jensen sighs. It's not like he hadn't anticipated this. "Jared, we don't need duplicate video game consoles. One of each is enough. You can take yours to your trailer, or we can sell the extras."

"There's no room to--" Jared waves an imaginary Wiimote. "--In the trailer."

"So eBay it is."

Jared grinds his teeth. "Fine. But sell yours. Not mine."

"What difference does it make?"

Jared glares mutinously. "If it doesn't make a difference, then just sell yours."

It's so stupid. Jensen chews his lip. He forces out, "I like mine."

Jared smirks. He rattles off: "Mine runs quieter, and Chad bought it for me, and Donny drew on it on the bottom."

"Great, it'll go for more as a custom Supernatural model."

"I'll fight it," Jared declares, drawing himself up to his full height. "I'll fight it, and drag your ass to court and never give in until the day I die."

Jensen stares. "Did you--I didn't even--Did you learn to use my espresso machine?"

"Fuck, no." Jared laughs, quiets. "I don't know. I'm very tired."

Oh. "Loopy." He pats Jared on the shoulder.

"I'll probably still put up a struggle. Just less epic."

Jensen shrugs. "I'll probably just slip it to Kim or someone when your back is turned."

Jared rolls his eyes. "Oh, look at the bigshot with his plan."

****

A lot of times, Jensen will go out into the kitchen in the morning and Jared will be watching the dogs eat, bowl of cereal in hand and Jensen will say, "Aw fuck. You again."

And Jared will grin and spit a Cheerio at him, and say, "You're dragging my perfect attendance record down with all these tardies, lazy ass. Move it."

****

Probably the third week, Jensen walks past Jared's room to go to bed and sees a sign on the door. It's on three hole punched, blue-lined paper.

It's scotch-taped lengthwise, and it says, 'Jared Padalecki's Room. KEEP OUT.'

There's a post-it. 'That means YOU. Guy. Initials JRA.'

Jensen snorts. He rips off a corner of the sign, scribbles, 'You're twenty-six years old' and slides it under the door with a quiet knock.

He hears footsteps from inside. Jared threatens softly through the door, "This better not be part of my sign."

****

Jared takes pride in the house. Jensen does too, but differently. He didn't pick it out, or fill out the paperwork, or sign his name on a deed. He doesn't even really know if deeds are involved. House-buying is a mysterious process, to him.

Jared cleans out the gutters in the fall, fishing dead leaves and brown sludge out with his hands. He clomps around the house in work boots on the weekends, knocking on things. Measuring shit.

Jensen buys a portable basketball hoop and sets it up in the driveway.

"Where am I gonna park my car?" Jared asks.

"Uh." Jensen stares at the garage, basketball resting on his hip.

"I wanted to put, like, a workshop in there."

Jensen squints. "What do you mean? Like a jigsaw and shit?"

Jared shrugs, blows on his hands and rubs them together.

"So you can make me a rocking chair?" Jensen asks, looking on the bright side.

"What? No. Dumb."

Jensen glares. "You're dumb."

"My dad had a workshop in the garage at home," Jared says. Jensen's pretty sure Jared thinks that's an explanation.

"If there's no rocking chair, I'm not really seeing a purpose."

Jared shivers, stamps his feet. "What do you want a rocking chair for. You don't look sixty-five."

Jensen flashes a grin. "Annie does good work, doesn't she? Wonder with a make-up brush." He preens.

Jared laughs then goes serious. "I want a table saw. So I can saw things."

Jensen eyes Jared. He's not wearing a jacket and it's pretty much winter in Vancouver. "Go put on a jacket."

"Bzzzzzz." Jared saws his arm back and forth.

"Yeah." Jensen bounces his basketball speculatively, crouches. "No."

Jared sighs. "I'll make you your damn rocking chair."

"No thanks." Jensen shoots.

"You miss I get my table saw and the hoop goes around back!" Jared throws after the ball.

Jensen's basketball drops straight down through the net. Jensen smiles, all teeth. "Swish."

Jared bites the inside of his cheek. "I never get anything I want."

Jensen laughs, jogs after the ball. "Maybe you can take up whittling. I'll buy you a knife."

"I'll play you Horse for the saw."

Jensen sighs. He tosses the basketball from hand to hand. "If you can promise me you'll still be using your table saw a month from now, we can talk about it."

Jared squints into the winter sun, one eye closed more than the other. "You know. You're a lot more like Jeff than I'd have bet."

****

Jared's sign's been patched with a new corner from another sheet of paper and a Band-aid.

Jensen marches into the living room and pulls out the folder on the bottom shelf of the bookcase. He takes out one of Jared's headshots and colors in some teeth, draws horns, a goatee, penises. A lot of penises.

He slides it under Jared's door. He sits with his back to the wall next to the door for a while. When he hears Jared get up and move around, he waits. He hears Jared's choked back laugh, then his exaggerated gasp of horror.

He laughs into his elbow, knees drawn up, breath shuddering out through his nose.

****

Some mornings, Jared tiptoes into his room and gently sits on the edge of Jensen's bed.

Jensen tries to ignore him. Ignore the smell of the coffee Jared has in hand, the rustle of the newspaper as he folds it out. Usually, at that point, he pulls his pillow over his head.

Jared clears his throat. "The major stock indexes were up Friday. The S&P 500 index gained .61% to finish at 1,232.04 and the Dow--" All sonorous and booming and impossible to ignore.

Jensen throws his pillow. Not in any particular direction. Just an instinct to fling. "Probably I'll kill you."

Jared sips his coffee. "Mm. Right now?"

Jensen blinks up at the ceiling, throws himself onto his back. "Did you do the dishes last night?"

"No."

"After that, then."

Jared hums, places the mug within arms reach on the night stand. "Great. Let's eat at Rosie's today."

"Why?"

Jared grins, lazily. "No clean dishes, remember?"

****

They don't really have a housewarming or anything. But everyone they know eventually sees the place over the next few months.

"This is a shithole," says Mike.

"What are you still doing here?" asks Jensen. "Didn't your ass get canned?"

"Fucker, shut up." Mike doesn't look at Tom.

Tom looks around at the lingering boxes, the empty beer bottles, wires upon wires corded in front of the TV. "It's not a shithole."

Mike rolls his eyes. "Fine. It's not a shithole. Great. Take it as a compliment if you want."

Jared laughs. "Thanks." He's easy.

Jensen shrugs. He can be easy, too.

Mike spins in place, soaking everything in, lips pursed. Chews his cheek, then whines, "Fuck, it's so damn BORING. Where are the posters of naked women? Fuck, where are the naked women? This is what the term 'bachelor pad' was invented for!"

"Jesus Christ." Jared chews on a hangnail. "This isn't Greek Row, Mike."

Tom laughs. "He's just having a hard time. I told him you two had been domesticated."

Mike collapses into an armchair. "Everything's falling apart."

Jensen jumps up. "Fine. I'll get a keg. Jared?"

He sighs wearily. "Yeah, yeah. I'll call the hookers."

****

One night, Jensen's sitting facing Jared's door, scrawling a crude sketch over last month's FHM, when it opens.

Jensen looks up at Jared, who's in his boxers. "Sup?"

"Holy mackerel."

Jensen makes a brief 'what-the-fuck' face at that and Jared grins, shrugs.

"You're so obsessed with me."

"Please." Jensen stands, brushing his thighs off.

"You're writing me little love notes outside my bedroom door."

"Dear Jared. Fuck off. Love, Jensen."

Jared grins, one arm bent up behind him, scratching at his broad back. "What were you planning on pushing under my door this time?"

Jensen shrugs. "Nothing. Whatever. It's not fun this way."

Jared pulls a serious face. "Jensen. You're thirty years old."

"Fuuuck." Jensen turns and knocks his forehead against the wall.

Jared snickers.

Jensen rests his head against the wallpaper. It smells glue-y. He hears Jared slide down to the floor.

"Hey."

Jensen turns to look at Jared who's cross-legged, arms holding his weight as he leans back.

"Do you get sick of me?"

Jensen shrugs. "Yeah. And then I go out on my own, or hang with someone else for a few hours."

Jared looks down at his chest, then sits up, scratching at a bite on his pec, chin scrunched down to get a better look at it. "Cuz. I was just thinking. Man, if we ever fight. We'd be screwed."

Jensen thinks about it. He'd have to move. Find a new place. Probably back to the hotel. Find a new best friend, a new co-star, shit. He licks his lower lip, watches Jared. "Yeah," he sighs.

Jared leans back, his head thunks against the wall.

****

Every once in a while, he'll wake up and Jared will be in this mood, like his run was amazing, or the sun was shining particularly bright that day. It's just--it's kind of like this wind that sweeps through the place and Jared will crow, "It's Jensen! Here in my kitchen. Morning, Jensen," and pull him into this bear hug, and they'll both hold on a little longer than they should and Jensen will fight the urge to smell Jared more than necessary.

****

"Another one of my reasons," Jensen begins. "Is that Harley keeps stealing my socks."

"A reason for what? Your reeking feet?"

Jensen shoves Jared with his boot. They're sprawled out in the backseat of Danny's van but there's not much room because Jared's there. Something thunks.

"Hey, guys, c'mon. I have equipment in here," complains Danny.

"Sorry," they say.

"A reason you should move. Out." Jensen stares hard. He doesn't look at the hickey on Jared's neck. "You have a hickey, by the way."

"Aw fuck." Jared slaps a hand over the mark. "She had a mouth like a fucking remora."

"You bring up remoras more than anyone I know."

Jared half-bows. "Thank you."

Jensen glowers. "Harley steals my socks. He shreds them on my bedroom floor. So I'll know. Like a serial killer who leaves a business card so the cop will bug out."

"Shit." Jared presses his knee to Jensen's side. Jensen thinks it's meant to be soothing. It's mostly uncomfortable. "I'm sorry. He has a bad habit."

"Maybe if he'd had better training--"

Jared stiffens. "Whoa."

"Look, I'm just saying. You're really busy and they don't get much time with you. You can't help their backsliding or whatever, just--"

"Shut up, Jensen."

Jensen clenches his jaw. He shoves up against the window. "Dude, what're you getting angry for--"

"Fuck you. You're just bitching at me because I let that chick--" Jensen can hear Jared's teeth click he shuts his mouth so fast.

Jensen doesn't know where he should be looking, but he can't help staring at Jared. Jared, who's got his nose buried in his shirt all of a sudden, just running his teeth over his bottom lip angrily and Jensen has to tell himself to breathe. Silence is--is a good thing right now. A good, safe thing.

Danny starts to whistle quietly in the front. Jensen really hates that guy.

****

They don't talk for half a day until Jared breaks. "Can we just forget it happened?"

Jensen passes him the script. "Let's just run this, okay?" He's tired as hell. Hadn't slept the night, freaking out in bed until he'd gotten up, looked up the phone number of the hotel he'd stayed in and dialed it a few times.

He can feel Jared watching him. Jared finally sighs, sits. "Okay."

Ten minutes in, Jensen mutters, "Nice," after one of Jared's lines and Jared's eyes fly up before he forces them down.

"Thanks."

Then. "Okay, wait, I like that, but then Dean's gonna turn into a shithead and this part doesn't make--here, see?"

Jared looks where Jensen's pointing, nods. "Yeah, yeah, but if Sam says that, then maybe you could do a nonverbal thing? We could take a beat, and then you go into--"

Jensen thinks Jared's head is too close to his and he backs away quickly. "Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. That's. Shit. I've been--Yeah, okay. Yeah."

And Jared's grinning, all proud, and Jensen looks at him and decides to just kind of let it go.

****

Things are weird for a week. Not different, exactly. Heavier? Or something. Jensen likes to ignore it. He falls asleep in front of the TV and wakes up to Alton Brown or Les Stroud.

He's nicer to Harley, too. Little bits of turkey, an extra rib bone. He carefully balls up all his socks and makes sure they end up in his hamper.

Jared's bigger, all the time. He leaves his door open at night, now, but Jensen doesn't go in. They play Mario Kart, but Jensen's pretty sure Jared's letting him win.

He keeps the hotel's number on his phone.

One morning, he walks out and Jared's not eating cereal. He's making sandwiches, and there are like. Muffins. And remnants of squeezed-out orange halves, all pulpy and white inside. Jensen laughs. "What are you doing?

Jared freezes, nervous smile on his lips. "Making a lot of food. For breakfast and, you know. To eat later."

"Why?"

And Jared kind of shrinks down a little and--he doesn't whisper exactly, but. "Look, I thought it--" he waves a hand around emptily "--would be better by now and. Maybe--I said what I said, and it was. I didn't mean to--"

"Augh." Jensen winces, smiles over at Jared wryly. "Can we not talk about it?"

Jared taps his fist against his mouth three times. "Yeah. Yes. Okay."

****

That night Jensen wakes up, because his bedroom door swings open. Jared's standing there. Jensen can see the nightlight in the hallway glowing behind his silhouette. The nightlights are stupid, Jensen thinks. Why would the dogs need nightlights? They sleep just like we do.

He thinks about that until Jared gets on the bed and curls up behind him and then really, he can't not think about what the hell is going on anymore. "Uh." Jared shifts closer, one arm falling over Jensen's chest. "Jared?"

Jared grunts, chin on Jensen's shoulder. "I'm sleepwalking," he explains.

Jensen raises an eyebrow. "Interesting."

"Not really." Jared's breath is warm.

"You sound awake." He waits for a response that doesn't come, lying still as he can. "Jared?"

"Urgh." Jared presses his face to Jensen's upper arm. His lips brush against Jensen as he talks. "You're not supposed to wake up a sleepwalker. I'll get brain damage or something."

"How much more damaged could your brain get?" Jensen asks.

"Haha. Good thing I'm asleep and not awake to take these blows to my fragile ego."

Jensen huffs, relaxes. He taps a finger against the wrist on his hip. "Good thing."

****

In the morning, Jensen wakes up alone. He stumbles out into the kitchen, boxers low on his hips. Jared beams at him through a mouthful of cereal.

"Jensen Ackles! Here in my kitchen." He looks like he's about to spout off the word delighted, or peachy, or gee whillikers. He gets to his feet and wraps one arm around Jensen's waist, the other holding his bowl up a safe distance away.

"Alright, alright." Jensen pushes at Jared's chest. He twists a nipple hard, in passing. "Freak."

Jared won't stop smiling. "Honey ham, today, please."

"Do I look like a deli service?" Jensen pulls open the refrigerator, tugs out the honey ham. "God, one day that metabolism's gonna turn off and you're gonna get so damn fat."

"Amount you talk about it, starting to think you're hoping for it."

"I'm just looking to the day the earth rumbles every step you take. It's gonna be neat."

"Neat," Jared repeats.

Jensen gathers up the sandwich supplies, a barrier of food between him and Jared. He plants his hands, looks straight at Jared. "You don't sleepwalk, do you, Jay?"

Jared grins. He takes a huge spoonful of Cheerios. "I've heard that can kick in out of nowhere, sometimes," he says, milk dribbling down his chin.

****

Jared sleepwalks for a few more days.

Thursday, Jensen turns Jared onto his back and leans over him, elbows on either side of Jared's head. It's six in the morning, and Jared's actually asleep, knocked out so hard an earthquake couldn't wake him.

Jensen breathes with him. Long pulls of air, chest rising and falling, until, all of a sudden, he's there, lips against Jared's and he has to think, kiss him, you fucking weirdo.

Jensen kisses him, slow and waiting, until Jared starts to respond, until he tastes tongue and teeth and feels firm, amazing pressure.

When he pulls away, his hand's on Jared's face, thumb sweeping just under Jared's eyelid. He says. "Wake up."

THE END