Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

San Antonio in July is just about the last place on earth Jensen has any desire to be, but a job's a job and while he's doing much better on that front, he's not doing well enough that he can turn down a sweet assignment just because he doesn't like the weather. He tells himself it's only for a couple of days.

He needs to be there early in the morning, early enough that he's going to have to fly in the day before, which is fine, except there's a little voice in the back of his head--one that sounds remarkably like Josh--mentioning that maybe it's time to let go of the remaining shit between him and the family. As much as it kills Jensen to acknowledge that his brother might be right, he goes ahead and checks the flights. There's one that gets into DFW right around noon, and it's like a sign, so he steels himself and picks up the phone.

He's almost overwhelmed at the eagerness in his mother's voice when he calls to see if the tenuous bonds they've reformed--not much more than phone calls at the holidays--will extend to an actual visit; a lot of things have been said about how disappointed everyone is in his choices, but maybe Josh has been right all along that it doesn't have to mean the end of the world.

Jensen sets it up so he's only going to visit for a few hours; not jumping into the deep end on his first time home in years is probably the smarter strategy. He knows he made the right choice as soon as he sees his father's jaw tightening when the conversation turns to the details of Jensen's life. Still, they manage to be civil long enough to eat a late lunch together. Jensen doesn't miss Dallas, or the life he'd thought he wanted; the only disappointing part is not having more time with Mackenzie. She'd been a freshman that last Christmas, ridiculously grown-up for fourteen, but still with braces and a not-quite-polished charm. She's a rising senior now and Jensen barely recognizes her, at least not until she flies into his arms and demands, "Tell me everything," just like she'd always done even as a little girl wanting him to vett her reading choices before she'd condescend to spend her time on them.

Jensen would be lying if he said he wasn't happy to be able to tell them all he was working on a story for a national magazine, and it's a bonus that his mother reads Saveur religiously. His father, of course, makes sure to point out that Jensen's only interviewing a reality show contestant. "It's hardly a great contribution to society."

Jensen's been feeling a little ridiculous for cutting himself off from everyone; it's good to know he'd made the right call years ago. It's still too bad it took as long as it did to verify that.

His mom is disappointed when he makes his excuses and says he has to leave, but he's fairly certain his dad has reached his limit on not explicitly listing all the ways Jensen's let them down. Adding one more to the list is probably nothing more than is expected of him. Mackenzie follows him out to his rental car, chattering about school and classes and an internship she wants to apply for, like it hasn't been more than two years since Jensen's been home, and he's suddenly and overwhelmingly grateful to her.

"Mom has a copy of everything you've ever had published, you know," she says, cocking her head and watching him intently. "She has a deal with the reference librarian at school. She had it even before you started talking to them again--they have a search or something for your name. They go and find anything that pops up and make a copy of it. Dad pretends like he doesn't know that she does it, but she leaves them out where he can find them and he reads them, too."

"Honey," Jensen says. "I appreciate what you're saying--more than you'll ever know, but I--I'm finding it a little hard to believe."

"You don't believe it, or you're scared to believe it?" Mackenzie asks, and Jensen wonders just when his little bratty sister grew into this shrewd, compassionate young woman.

"I want to believe it, Princess," Jensen says. "I just can't quite get there."

"I'm glad you're here anyway," she says. "Can you believe that?"

"Absolutely," Jensen says, hugging her. "Absolutely."

"I wish you could stay longer, but I'm so glad you came at all," she whispers in his ear.

"Me too," Jensen whispers back. He promises he'll call her--every week, she says firmly--and gets in the car for the drive down to San Antonio. He barely makes it to I-35 before his phone rings, with his brother's number on the display.

"Yes, Josh, I'm still alive," Jensen says, without preamble. "Not planning on driving the car off the road or anything".

"I told you it wasn't going to be a big deal," Josh says. "I'm just calling to tell you--"

"I told you so," Jensen finishes for him. Getting back to a closer relationship with Josh has been the best thing about being estranged from the rest of the family. They'd lost their way while Jensen had been in school; the more they talked, the more Jensen realized how much they'd both missed each other.

"More like congrats for getting in and out in one piece, but yeah, sure, I told you so works, too." If there are times when Jensen wants to kick himself for not listening to what Josh was trying to say, even as Josh was distancing himself from the family, at least Jensen had the sense to answer the phone when Josh called after everything blew up that Christmas.

Jensen snorts as he hangs up, but he appreciates the call regardless. It makes it easier to get his head back into the real reason he's back in Texas, the one that has to do with, as his father so graciously pointed out, a reality show contestant and a paycheck.

Everything cooperates and Jensen's at his hotel and checked in with enough time to get in a little research before he goes out to find dinner. He's already been through the press packet from the network and fast-forwarded through a half-dozen shows. He's a little surprised that there isn't a pathetic excuse for a cookbook that he'd be obligated to read; he thought it was standard operating procedure for the network, to "prove" that the winner of their ridiculous little reality charade was a real "chef," but as far as he can tell, Jared Padalecki, the most famous and successful winner of America's Next Celebrity Chef, has never actually published so much as a holiday collection of his favorite foods to serve family and friends. Jensen supposes he shouldn't be looking a gift horse in the mouth. He's read and reviewed enough atrocities from Jared's fellow "chefs" to know the drill--frozen meatballs cooked in Kraft Catalina French dressing was what really sent him over the edge--but it's still a bit of a surprise. As far as he knows, the network leaves no stone unturned in wringing every last cent out of their pretty shills.

Jensen never considered not taking the assignment; no one in his right mind would turn down a shot at getting something into Saveur. He doesn't really care why the editors want to break with a decade of adamant opposition to the cult of celebrity chefs or why they've decided to start with a guy who's little more than a pretty face, an untrained good ol' boy from Texas. As long as their check cashes and Jensen can add another article in a national to his portfolio, he's good.

Out of habit, he stops at the front desk and asks for restaurant recommendations. The hotel is in a neighborhood that boasts a couple of non-chain restaurants where he has a chance of getting food that hasn't been salted, greased, and drowned in a "special sauce," but it never hurts to get a local opinion.

The first two places sound horrific, but once he convinces them he seriously wants to know where they go when they want something good, he ends up with a meat-and-two-veggie diner that they swear has for-real country cooking and a bar that smokes its own brisket. He really shouldn't be drinking, not on the night before an interview, but he's never found anyone outside of Texas who has even the first clue how to smoke brisket and it seems like a waste to be so close to the real thing and not try it out. Plus, the bar is close enough that he can walk, while he'd have to drive to the diner, so he lets that be the deciding factor even if it's still almost too hot to breathe on the short walk over.

The place is in a strip mall between a craft store and a chain burrito place, which is generally not a good sign in Jensen's experience, but even though it's a Monday night there aren't any parking spaces nearby. Jensen figures he can always leave if nothing looks good, and pushes open the first set of doors. Inside it's dark and noisy, three pool tables in the back, ESPN's talking heads gearing up for the baseball All-Star game on TVs with the sound off, and a solid foundation under it all of old-school Waylon Jennings on the sound system. It's like stepping back ten years in his life, but--aside from his parents--that's not an entirely bad thing. Most of the tables are taken but the bar's less crowded, so Jensen starts there, and when the bartender circles back by to recommend a couple of locally brewed beers and adds that Jensen can get whatever he wants off the full menu, he settles in to check it out.

There's not much on it, which makes it easy to read the whole thing as the one waitress delivers her orders around him, and slowly, he feels the last of the tension from the earlier part of the day leach out of his shoulders.

* * * *

Being back home again is... weird, Jared thinks. Not any weirder than the rest of what his life's become, but it's still strange to be hanging out with a crowd at the corner table at Enrique's, rather than back in the kitchen plating orders and fighting with the deep fryer so the chips wouldn't be charred. He's lucky so many of his friends are around. He hasn't seen much of anyone since his life stopped being about this place, and it's good to catch up even though so many things are different now.

"JT!" Alexis calls. "You did not finish that entire plate? Again?"

The plate--more like a platter--of chiles rellenos is, as advertised, empty. Jared would feel a whole lot guiltier, except he knows she's not going to do anything but pick at one. Plus, it's not like they can't get more.

"Hey--I need to stock up for the rest of the time when I'm not here," Jared says, standing up and heading over to the bar to put another order in. He could just catch Rafael's eye behind the bar and save himself the trip, but everyone else at the table is coupled off and he could use a break from the reminders of how he's not. Again.

It's a fairly decent crowd for a Monday; Rafe's got his hands full with the bar, plus he's got one guy sitting there studying the menu like there's going to be a test on it, so Jared settles in for a little bit of a wait. There's no way Rafe's going to rush the guy: he's got a double-dose of the need to feed people from his parents and he doesn't get to exercise it as often as he'd like when he's behind the bar.

The guy at the bar already has a bottle of Shiner Black in front of him, which Jared absolutely approves of, and when he orders he goes for the smoked brisket and, like it's an afterthought, adds on an order of chiles rellenos.

"Good call," Jared says. He can't help talking to people, even if they do occasionally turn around and eye him like he's barged in on their religious experience. For all that he's not giving out warm, fuzzy vibes, though, Bar Guy is seriously good looking: cool green eyes and broad shoulders under a crisp white button-down. Jared gives the guy one of his best smiles, adding, "Nobody does either of those like Enrique and Clara do."

"Nobody would know that better than you, JT," Rafe says, reaching into the cooler for a bottle of Jared's favorite--coincidentally, the same beer that's sitting in front of Bar Guy, and handing it over. "What are you on, your third order tonight?"

"Well, yeah," Jared answers, smiling a little sheepishly. "And I'm here to make it four, okay?"

Rafe laughs, punching the orders in, and Jared turns back to Bar Guy, who is still as good-looking as Jared had initially thought, possibly even more so, especially as he drinks his beer--strong wrists and forearms and a mouth that Jared can barely look away from. It occurs to him that he and Sandy are pretty much done--and he's sure it's for good this time--and he's allowed to do more than just look.

"I'm Jared," he says, keeping it simple.

"Yeah," Bar Guy sighs, like Jared is this huge complication. "I know."

"Fan of the show?" Jared asks, and gets a less-than-excited expression in reply. "Fan of somebody I beat?"

"Not really," Bar Guy says. "I'm supposed to interview you tomorrow."

"Oh." Jared hopes the smile doesn't completely fall off his face, but the only reason he's doing this interview is because every suit at the network had insisted. Cooking magazines hate everything he supposedly represents, and he doesn't hold out much hope that this guy--he knows the name, Meg had told him earlier when they were going over his schedule, but it isn't coming to him now--is going to be any different. "Okay. I guess we'll just meet up at the studio tomorrow, then."

The guy nods and turns back to the TV, and Jared heads back to the table where the news of more food, at least, is greeted with enthusiasm. They are his friends, after all, and food is generally high on the list of things that make them happy. People have work and classes in the morning, though, so it's not all that late when Jared's back on his feet saying good-bye and then heading up to the bar to settle the tab.

The same guy is still there, a couple of plates in front of him, and once Jared wins the argument with Rafe to take his credit card--which he does by threatening to come over the bar and swipe it himself--Bar Guy turns to Jared. Jared smiles as politely as possible, but then Bar Guy says, "You were right. Haven't had anything that good in a while."

"Oh, yeah." Jared relaxes a little, his smile genuine now--and if he'd ever had any doubts about Clara working magic in the kitchen, they're gone, because he sure as hell hadn't expected to be talking to the guy again before their appointment the next morning. "Pure comfort food--first place I hit when I'm back in town."

There's a little silence while they wait for Rafe to run their cards; awkward but not horrendous. It's still a surprise when the guy nods toward the TV set, where the Home Run Derby is in full, cheestastic swing, and says, "Josh Hamilton is in a serious groove."

"Yeah?" Jared takes his card and receipt and signs quickly, glancing up at the TV and the new-to-Texas centerfielder. "I didn't figure you for a Rangers fan."

"Grew up outside of Dallas. They're not high on my list, but I keep an eye out, enough to know who's playing for them anyway."

"I don't do much more," Jared says, folding the receipt into smaller and smaller squares. "Not these days." He hesitates for a long second because, contrary to family legend, he's not entirely reckless and idiotic, but then the guy is about to lose interest, and Jared jerks his head toward the TV. "How serious of a groove?"

"That's number ten and nobody else has more than eight, so, pretty damn serious."

Hamilton hits numbers eleven and twelve over the right-field wall in Yankee Stadium while Jared stands there and watches and the crowd is really getting into it. "Hey Rafe," Jared says, as he slides onto the next bar stool. He's fully aware that this really isn't one of his brighter ideas--wanting this guy is one thing, but staying around and hanging out with him is playing with fire--but he's doing it anyway. "Can we get sound on that?"

* * * *

Hamilton keeps hitting them, and Jensen finally introduces himself.

"Thanks," Jared says, with a lopsided smile. "My sister--she's my assistant--she told me your name, and I know it's on my schedule, but I've been sitting here drawing a complete blank."

The bartender cycles back down to where they're sitting, and Jared doesn't hesitate when he asks if they want another round. Jensen honestly couldn't care less about who might win, but it's his fourth beer and it's been a long time since he's just hung out and let a night unfold. It's the kind of place that believes in feeding everyone who walks through the door, so there are baskets of chips and snacks up and down the bar, and the bartender is quick to bring out samples of a couple different kinds of salsa that they make on the premises. After a while they end up with a basket of peanuts in front of them, and Jensen finds himself watching Padalecki's hands, quick and competent and strong, cracking the shells.

He tells himself to snap out of it, but the rhythm of Padalecki's movements is distracting, almost mesmerizing. It doesn't matter how many times Jensen drags his eyes away and figures out what's happening on the TV, makes himself say something that's not ridiculous or completely inane, a minute later he's back looking. He makes it all the way to the end, though he has no idea who actually wins the stupid contest, but the last time he looks up Padalecki's looking back at him, and there's not much Jensen can say.

"Thanks, Rafe." Padalecki tosses a couple of bills on the bar, watching Jensen with steady, open eyes. Jensen follows him out into the lingering heat of the night and waits while he signs an autograph for a woman who walks out after them. When he turns back to Jensen, he doesn't do anything to hide his interest. "Okay," he says, taking a deep breath. "This is probably the stupidest thing I've done in a long time, but, uh, how good are you at compartmentalization?"

Jensen looks at him, really looks, and stops trying to ignore everything he's been noticing all night, from the shaggy hair his fingers are itching to comb through, to the way the hard muscles Jensen can see in his forearms are all but masked by the loose, baggy shirt he's wearing, and everything circling back to how Jensen's just spent an hour watching those hands and pretending like he doesn't want them on him.

"Hell," Jensen mutters.

"Come again?"

"Yeah," Jensen says, shaking his head, almost not believing he's going to do this. "It's probably the stupidest thing you've done in a long time, and yeah, I'm good at compartmentalizing." He doesn't mean for the last part to come out quite as sharply as it does, but his whole life's been all about not letting one part bleed over into the next. Especially this last year. It's kept him going but maybe just once he'd like it if he wasn't feeling like half of him isn't allowed to talk to the other half. Now's probably not the time, though. "How about you?"

"I've gotten a crash course, lately." Jared takes a deep breath, then says, "My place is--I stay over on the river, and my buddies chipped in for a going-away present of a bottle of Herencia Mexicana, if you're not ready to call it quits."

"I don't think I am," Jensen says, even if adding tequila to everything else he's drunk isn't the best idea. Jared's smile flashes out, and after seeing that smile a thousand times while mainlining Jared's entire season of Celebrity Chef episodes Jensen should know this one isn't anything special, but he's having a hard time remembering that as they sort out that neither one of them has a car they need to worry about, and that Jensen is fine walking the few blocks to Jared's condo. They make the trip in silence, which strikes Jensen as odd--it's not awkward, and Jensen's more than okay with not having to come up with polite conversation, but it doesn't seem to be Jared's style.

"Cat got your tongue?" Jensen can't help asking as they make the final turn to Jared's unit.

"Can't think of anything to say." Jared shrugs, and fumbles with the key. He looks sidelong at Jensen, then says, in a voice that's little more than a whisper, but that goes straight through Jensen, "Can't think of anything that's not you--what you're gonna taste like, how you like it, what kind of noises you'll make when I get my hand on your dick--"

"Get the fucking door open," Jensen interrupts, losing the battle to stay quiet or, hell, even to get his voice to keep from shaking in the rush that Jared's words bring."Now, before I--"

Jared finally gets the key turned; he's shouldering the door open and dragging Jensen inside, slamming him hard against the wall, one hand wrapped tight around Jensen's upper arm, the other twisting in his belt loop.

"Before you what?" Jared rasps, hissing as Jensen gets his own hands into that wild, shaggy mop that's as much Jared's trademark as his smile. Jensen doesn't bother to answer, just pulls Jared down into a bite masquerading as a kiss.

"What do you want?" Jensen asks, when Jared finally breaks the kiss long enough that they can drag some air into their lungs. Neither one of them is letting go of the other, and Jensen can't remember the last time he's skated so close to losing control. "Tell me," he insists, as Jared gets one big hand up under his shirt, and God, he's shaking and Jensen knows he hasn't had that effect on anyone for longer than he wants to think about.

Jared tips his head back and looks through his bangs at Jensen, breathing in quick, sharp pants. "Suck me," he whispers, as though it's the most deviant thing in the world. "That's--I want you to suck me."

"Oh, baby." Jensen smiles, and lets the tip of his tongue trace along his lower lip, smiling wider when Jared can't pull his eyes away from it. "No problem at all." There's a couch not far away, big and deep enough that even Jared can stretch out on it, and when he nudges Jared moves easily, letting Jensen steer him right toward it.

"Right there." Jensen pushes him down until he's sprawled out, all long legs and lean, hard muscle under Jensen's hands. Jared starts fumbling with his belt and the waistband of his jeans, but Jensen slaps his hands away. "Mine," Jensen says, and if it's more of a purr than he intended, well, there are a hell of a lot of things not going as he intended this night, and that's the least of them. He takes his time with Jared; the thick, soft leather belt, and the worn cotton of his jeans, as though he's unwrapping an unexpected but eagerly anticipated present. Jared doesn't push him, even though he's practically shaking by the time Jensen's done, his hands digging into the soft cushions on the couch hard enough that Jensen can see the veins in stark relief.

"Fuck, man," Jared chokes out, as Jensen sits back on his heels and just looks. It's a gorgeous sight. "Don't tease--"

"I'm not." Jensen slides both hands along Jared's thighs. "I'll give you exactly what you want." Jared jumps at the first touch of his tongue, nothing more than a quick, flickering lick along and under the crown; Jensen grins and ignores the wordless plea for more, and settles into working the base, short strokes with the flat of his tongue that wet the skin, give Jensen a chance to get to know how Jared tastes.

Jared stays still, somehow--Jensen feels the tension and need in the muscles under him, but otherwise he doesn't move--so Jensen rewards him, licks long and careful up the length of his dick, teases again under the crown, and then drops back down to start everything over again.

"Oh, God," Jared whimpers. "Godgodgod, please." His voice breaks at the end, and Jensen wants more, wants to hear him come apart, wants to be the one making him come apart. He takes just the head of Jared's dick into his mouth, works the slit with the tip of his tongue, sucks hard. Jared keens high in his throat and Jensen eases off, looking up until Jared meets his eyes before he relaxes and swallows Jared deep.

It's been a while; he's not quite as good at this as he used to be, but he doesn't stop, just does it again, and again, and that's all it takes: Jared's hips arch up and he's deeper still in Jensen's throat, gasping Jensen's name and coming apart just like Jensen wanted.

Jensen holds Jared there as long as he can, until he has to let him go to breathe, but even then he goes back for more, more touches, more tastes, until Jared's breathing settles and he lets go of the couch to stroke his hands over Jensen's head and neck and shoulders.

"Come here," Jared rasps, pulling Jensen up so he's straddling Jared's lap, hands braced on Jared's shoulders. Jared stares up at him, eyes still almost black from arousal, serious and intent, and it's a little hard to breathe, having all that focused on him. His dick is hard and aching inside his jeans, even before Jared slides his hands down and traces a long, slow path along the waistband, easing open the top button before stopping. "You like to tease," Jared whispers against Jensen's mouth. "You're real good at it, but what I want to know..." He trails the back of his fingers down along Jensen's zipper, ghosts them over the line of his dick so light Jensen almost can't feel it, except for how he can, every nerve lighting up at the slightest brush of those long fingers. "What I want to know is if you like it when somebody does it to you."

Jensen doesn't answer, but then he doesn't need to, not with how he's playing along with Jared's little game. He could reach down and take care of things himself, and Jared knows that, but since Jared's finally fucking doing something, Jensen doesn't have to break the mood.

"Yes," Jensen hisses, as Jared works a hand inside his jeans to wrap around his dick. He holds Jensen for an endless few seconds--Jensen grits his teeth and makes himself stay still--but then starts jerking him, slow strokes; careful at first, then turning rough, enough to drag a growl low out of Jensen's throat. "Oh, fuck yeah."

"Let it go," Jared's saying, his nails dragging the length of Jensen's dick, a bright, hot trail slashing through Jensen's control as though it never existed. Jensen digs his hands into Jared's shoulders, holding on like he's going to drown if he doesn't. "Yeah," Jared breathes, doing it again, base to tip and back down, his eyes locked on Jensen's. "You do like it."

His hands are wicked--rough and sure one second, barely there the next, teasing Jensen to fucking death--but it's his eyes that Jensen can't fight. He should look away, close his eyes, do something to keep Jared at a distance, there but still separate, but he can't do anything but look back and hold on and let Jared make him come.

Jared holds him steady through the after-shocks but lets go as soon as Jensen lifts his head, shifting over so Jensen can ease down to sit next to him on the couch. It still takes a bit for Jensen's breathing to even out, but Jared radiates a laid-back sort of calm, enough that Jensen doesn't feel like he needs to rush, at least not until he starts thinking about what he's just done, because fucking the guy he's supposed to be interviewing just screams of class and professionalism.

He sneaks a glance a Jared, and thinks maybe there's a little sobering reality catching on there, too, but Jared only sits up a little straighter and tugs his t-shirt down. "There's a bathroom off the kitchen," he says, quietly.

"Thanks." Jensen makes his way with as much dignity as he can--which isn't much, not when his thighs feel like he's just sprinted a mile. The bathroom's not much bigger than a closet, just a powder room, but all he really needs is a little water and a couple of minutes to pull himself together. He stares at his reflection, at the reddened mark not quite covered by his t-shirt, and splashes a little more water on his face before he goes back out.

Jared's cleaned up, too, standing in the little open kitchen with a bottle of water in his hand and one on the counter for Jensen. Jensen's prepared for the whole scene to be as awkward as hell, but Jared's mouth quirks up into a half-smile that looks to be equal parts smug and rueful and Jensen can't help echoing it.

"Just water?" Jensen twists the cap off and takes a swallow. "I distinctly remember something about tequila."

"Oh! Yeah, right," Jared says, with a couple of spectacular flailing motions. "I really do have--Do you want--"

"Relax," Jensen says, lifting his bottle. "This is probably a much better idea."

"This is where I should admit I don't really do this, right?" Jared studies his own bottle of water with enough intensity that Jensen half expects it to burst into flames. "I have no idea how it's supposed to go, but I'm guessing I'm not supposed to be acting like a dork."

"It's not really my thing either," Jensen says. He can hear Chris laughing in the back of his head, because whatever Jensen's issues are, slutting around has never been one of them. There are days when he wishes he could do the casual thing, but so far, that's not been happening. "So, y'know," Jensen adds, shrugging. "Your dorktastic style is safe with me."

"Yeah?" Jared's still focused the bottle of water, peeling the label off with careful hands. "So, I'm just that special?"

Jensen snorts, and Jared's smile flashes out again but Jensen sees a little uncertainty under the surface.

"I...The last break-up was a bad one," Jensen admits, which is the understatement of the fucking decade. He takes his own turn studying his water bottle, not sure where the words are coming from. He's not into talking about his private life with anyone but, well, no one, lately. Josh knows the basics: Jeff and he broke up. Chris and Misha know a little bit more, but only because they see him a couple of times a week and not even Jensen can keep shit that ugly and public separate from the rest of his life. When he glances up, though, Jared's listening, like he gets it. "It's been a while since I've been out there looking."

"I've been in this on-again, off-again thing for so long I think I've forgotten anything I might have ever figured out about actual dating," Jared says. "We're off. Again." He shrugs.

"How's that work?" Jensen asks, before he thinks. "Sorry. That's--I'm just... I don't have enough left after a break-up to think of going back." It's a little more honest than he intends, but that seems to be the theme of the night.

"Man, I don't know," Jared answers, with a startled half-laugh. "I guess--we just keep coming back to something we know? I don't--she's awesome, and when it's good between us, it's really good, and I keep thinking I'll get it right this time." He shakes his head, like he's not expecting to be talking so much either. "Except I never do."

"I guess maybe you get points for trying?" Jensen feels a little stupid, talking about stuff like this when he's barely got his dick back in his pants, but his mouth won't shut up. "That's not something I can do."

"It keeps getting rougher. Every time we do it, it's--it gets worse at the end," Jared says, quiet and low, like it hurts just thinking about it. "I don't know if it was worth it."

"That's the question, though, isn't it?" Jensen asks. He and Jeff--there had been some good times, but he's never going to be able to think of them without the ugliness of Jeff's secrets--and Jensen's own complicit, thoughtless stupidity--coloring them, tainting them.

"Yeah, I guess it is." Jared smiles, not big or showy, but it looks real. "Sorry, man. Like I said, I'm not up on these kinds of things, but I'm pretty sure getting all emo on you isn't how it's supposed to go."

"Let's just call the whole night an anomaly and be done with it," Jensen says.

"You got it," Jared agrees, and the silence that follows is--well, not entirely comfortable, but not entirely horrible either.

"I should probably take off," Jensen says.

"I can--do you want a cab?" Jared reaches for the phone on the counter. Jensen doesn't, but it's the middle of the night and he's in a strange city; walking probably isn't the best idea, and this is seriously why he doesn't do random hook-ups, because fucking hell, he hates this. Jared punches a number into the phone and hands it to Jensen, murmuring his address when Jensen hesitates.

"Can we--is there any possible way this could not be awkward as hell tomorrow?" Jared said, in a single rush of words. "Not so much because of the interview, just because I... I didn't expect any of this, and it's been good. It'd suck to have it end up weird."

"So, what--just pretend like none of this happened?" The thought of ignoring everything should make Jensen's night, but even just saying the words ends up making him feel vaguely slimy.

"No," Jared answers, drawing the word out as though he's trying to buy some time to think. "I don't want to pretend like it didn't happen, because it was fucking hot, and I liked it." He looks at Jensen with a shrewd, open intelligence. "I think you liked it, too."

Jensen rolls his eyes, but nods, and Jared smiles at him.

"I just don't want it--us--to be awkward," Jared says, simple and direct, like Jensen can make it all better if he just tries. Jensen wants to tell him to grow the fuck up, but there's something in the dark eyes that tells him that Jared knows exactly what he's asking for, how impossible it is, but he's asking for it anyway.

"Fine," Jensen sighs, not examining why he's going along with the whole idea when he knows better. "We'll just wave our magic wands and make it be shiny and happy."

"Thanks." Jared nods, serious for all of a second before his mouth quirks up. "Magic wands, huh? I'll bet yours is pink and sparkly," Jared says, his laugh low and warm, intimate.

"Basic black," Jensen answers, unable to resist the laugh no matter how idiotic the conversation is, or how much he's telling himself not to get sucked in by the charm. Up close and personal, it's no wonder Jared won the show. "No sparkles."

The cab pulls up outside, its headlights flashing through the windows, and Jensen puts the water bottle on the counter. Jared walks with him to the front door and puts his hand on Jensen's when he reaches to open it. "Thank you," Jared says, back to being serious. Jensen isn't sure what exactly he's being thanked for--the blow job or what--but he nods, equally serious.

"See you tomorrow," Jensen says, and Jared lets him open the door.

"Yeah," Jared says, leaning against the door frame and smiling. "You will."

It's only a short cab ride back to the hotel, and the shower in the room is unexpectedly decent, but nothing short of a spa is going to distract Jensen's brain, so he just goes with it. He's on auto-pilot as he gets set up for the morning, wake-up calls and the alarm on his phone as a back-up and making sure he's got maps and stuff printed off. When he'd been planning things out, this time was going to be for him to review the rest of the notes he'd made before the interview, but that plan's been more or less overcome by events. Ending up back at the guy's apartment and on his knees will do that.

He doesn't expect to get much sleep--he figures his brain is good for at least a couple of hours of recrimination--but something about the way Jared hadn't just shoved him out of his apartment sticks with him and he ends up crashing not long after he crawls under the sheets. It's not quite sunrise when the alarms go off, but he's rested and relatively not-stressed about whatever it was that happened the night before. Maybe he's setting himself up for a giant fall, but he can't make himself be realistic about it.

When they'd set everything up, Jared's assistant--his sister, Jared had said--had called three times to make sure Jensen didn't mind meeting Jared at the local TV affiliate, squeezing in the interview between some segment Jared's doing for the local morning talk show and the flight he has to catch to meet up with the crew for his own show on the network. Jensen hadn't really cared, but once he gets to the studio and they let him hang around while they shoot, he's actually glad he's there, pre-sunrise wake-up call notwithstanding.

Jared's already on the kitchen set, in jeans and boots with a bandana tied around his head to keep his hair out of his eyes. He's wired and miked, working his way through the segment with a producer, with serious intent behind the non-stop jokes. As Jensen gets settled in a chair beyond the lights and cameras, Jared catches sight of him and waves, like they're buddies instead of a couple of strangers who've fucked, and Jensen finds himself nodding back in the same way. He's a little relieved that Jared's attention snaps back to the producer and the show; they're going live in under a minute and Jensen is just as happy to be forgotten.

Jensen doesn't usually do interviews; most of his published articles have been about places or food in general. Trying to get the feel of an actual person is like trying to put together one of those puzzles where the pieces are printed on both sides and the picture on the box isn't clear; it always takes a while to figure things out and try to get a sense of the whole from the bits.

The editing on Celebrity Chef is notorious for manipulating actual events, so watching Jared do his thing live is an unexpected bonus for Jensen, even if Jared is only standing around making endless variations on breakfast burritos. He has a smile and a joke for everything; when one of the hosts introduces Jared's segment as ideas for brunch and Jared gestures to the jeans and boots and asks if he looks like the kind of guy who does brunch, Jensen's got the perfect hook for the interview.

* * * *

Jared feels a little guilty when he sees Jensen waiting for him as he's coming out of the studio. "Hey, man, I'm sorry I took so long," Jared says, tucking his bandanna in his back pocket. His hair is still a little wet--collateral damage from where he'd washed off the make-up they'd used on him--which at least means it sort of stays back when he rakes it off his face.

"No problem," Jensen says, and maybe he really doesn't mind that Jared's stopped and talked to everyone he knows, and anyone who comes up to him, posed for pictures, all that. It's what Jared always does, but today it's eaten into the time he has with Jensen.

"I'm all yours now," Jared says, and Jensen nods.

"So if you're not the kind of guy who does brunch," Jensen starts, as they head outside to the parking deck, "what kind of a guy are you?"

"Pretty much just what you see," Jared answers, shrugging and pushing his hair off his face again. Jensen watches him closely; Jared slams down the memory of those eyes looking at him, green and intense and knowing, right as Jensen had opened his throat and let Jared fuck it hard. He takes a deep breath and finishes, "Just a guy."

"Yeah," Jensen says. "That's what it says all over your PR package."

"So that automatically makes it a lie?" Jared doesn't exactly snap, but he can't keep the edge out of his voice, and of course Jensen picks up on it.

"No," he answers. "But it does make it boring. Everybody knows you're 'just a guy.' I thought maybe there was more."

"I don't know," Jared says. "I started working in the kitchen with Enrique and Clara--where we were last night--when I was 14 and I never left, not until I got the Celebrity Chef gig."

"And you came back," Jensen says. "We're shoehorning this interview in now because you're doing a guest bit on a local morning show in a third-tier market on your break from your own show."

"It's no big deal," Jared says. "When I got the audition for Celebrity Chef I'd never done anything in front of a camera, but they gave me a crash course here. Filmed me, showed me how to work the camera, let me get a little bit comfortable. I'd have bombed out the first week if I'd gone in as cold as I was."

"Yeah," Jensen says. "It was touch and go with you early on in the show."

"It was rough," Jared says. "I was rough. I mean, I'd been in the kitchen for a long time, but I think I was the only guy there that year who hadn't had any formal training. Add no experience in front of a camera and I'd have been right back here. I'm just paying them back a little. "

"Sure," Jensen says, nodding. "You've been working around the industry for a lot of years--you never considered going to the Culinary Institute? Apprenticing with someone?"

"Not at first," Jared answers. "I got the job to save money for a car, and I kept on working there because it was easy. I kept promising my folks I'd go to college, but they kept expanding the place, bringing in more food, stuff from Clara's family, Enrique's dad's secret recipe for the brisket and ... I don't know. It was fun, but more than that, they trusted me, taught me stuff. Gave me the run of the kitchen when I was a kid."

"Like you're an old man now," Jensen says, and Jared rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, you too," he says. "Then the whole Celebrity Chef thing came up and--well, I guess you know the rest. It's all over the PR crap."

"You got talked into entering by a friend, charmed your way through the interviews, and the rest is history."

"More or less," Jared says, shrugging. "Look, do you want to do this here? In the parking lot of Channel 5?" Jensen shrugs; Jared shoves his hands in his pockets. "Rafe--from behind the bar last night--he thought it'd be hysterical. Which it was, for the most part, and then I won."

"You just stayed on?" Jensen watches Jared closely, the way he's got his hands shoved into his pockets, the lack of anything close to his usual smile. "For how many years?"

Jared looks at him for a long time before he says, "Look, we can talk about that, but seriously, man, not here. I either have to get something to eat, or pack. I'm running out of time."

"If you're leaving the choice up to me, I should go with the packing," Jensen says, with just as long of a look.

Jared nods slowly. "Sneaky. Trying to keep me off-balance so I'll spill something juicy?" He sighs. "Here's the truth: I hate doing interviews like this, okay? I'm trying to get better at it, but I've still got a long way to go. I'm not trying to blow you off, but really, me standing here talking is going to suck." He's got that look, he knows it; the one that makes Chad throw things at walls. Jensen just looks back at him.

"What'd make it not suck?" he asks, and he's sincere, even if it's clear he feels like Jared's playing him.

"For real?" Jared hesitates again, then shrugs. "Food is always good, but cooking would be better." Jensen looks at him sharply, and Jared holds his hands up. "Yeah, I know the whole no-really-see-how-into-food-I-am angle is a bit much, but..." He shrugs again. "It gives me something to do, helps me not think about how you're only talking to me so you can tell everybody else in the world about it."

"Well, the last time I checked, Saveur didn't have quite those circulation numbers," Jensen says dryly. "But okay. Sure. I'm not supposed to completely antagonize the subject, right?"

"Cool," Jared says, exhaling like he's been holding his breath for a month. "And yeah, I guess my place is probably not the best idea--"

"What, your magic wand is out of commission?"

"I'm good, but I'm not that good," Jared fires back, but he's grinning again. Jensen rolls his eyes. "Okay, I have an idea, if you want to ride with me." He gestures toward his truck. She's old and her paint job is faded, but she still looks like somebody loves her, which is the God's honest truth, even if Jared's a little biased

"Sure," Jensen says, following him into the truck. "Is that actually an eight-track player?"

"Watch it, watch it," Jared says, backing out of the space. "I was a kid when I got her; all I knew was that the guys I thought were the coolest drove trucks."

"Not saying a word," Jensen answers, but he's watching Jared like he's putting together a puzzle. Jared's still not comfortable with stuff like this--stick him in front of a crowd and he's all over it, but letting people in, people who don't know him and don't give a damn about him, still makes him twitchy as hell. He switches into tour guide mode, anything to put a little distance back in the equation, pointing out local landmarks and occasionally throwing out a personal comment. Jensen nods along, paying more attention than Jared expects, even though Jared would take any bet against Jensen ever coming back to San Antonio. The scenery shifts to a comfortable suburban sprawl, houses that are nice but not ridiculous, and Jensen doesn't seem at all surprised when Jared pulls into a driveway and says, "My parents'. It's the only other kitchen in town that I know where everything is."

"Okay," Jensen says. "First time I've ever interviewed someone while hanging out in his parents' kitchen, but whatever."

"Oh, crap, you don't have to say where we talked, do you?" Jared asks, horrified by the thought. He really hadn't thought things through to the logical conclusion. "My mom's probably going to kill me anyway, bringing you here without her having the place scrubbed down." He gets the back door unlocked and moves automatically to block out the dogs who're wildly excited about having company during the day. "If it winds up in the magazine, they'll never find my body."

"It's just supposed to be a sidebar. Very short," Jensen says. "I think your life is safe."

Jared gets the dogs back out of the kitchen, but without them the house is too quiet. He detours through the family room and gets some music going, which helps, and starts considering what he's got to work with for breakfast, which helps even more. He points Jensen to a bar stool on one side of the island, then opens the refrigerator and drapes himself over the door, studying the contents and muttering to himself. There are eggs and some of the applewood-cured bacon his dad likes. Eggs and bacon are pretty mundane and boring, but they're a cliché for a reason. He investigates a bowl covered with foil and discovers what looks like plain steamed redskin potatoes, and he can definitely work with that. He comes out juggling everything and stops singing along with the music--Skynyrd, now--to make sure that Jensen doesn't have any food allergies.

"I've had a lot of odd stuff in my life," Jensen says, thoughtfully. "But so far, nothing's put me in the hospital."

"All systems go, then," Jared answers, and goes back to singing, but softer now, not much more than humming.

"This--can I call this off the record?" Jared asks, not looking up from where he's quartering the potatoes. "I mean, for real not in whatever you're going to write? Can you do that?"

"No problem," Jensen says, dryly. "We'll lump it in with last night."

"Yeah," Jared says, half-laughing and shaking his head. "Okay." He hesitates for a couple of seconds, weighing his words, trying to decide whether he can trust Jensen. It's probably way too late to be thinking along those lines, he reminds himself. "Clara was sick for a while, pretty bad. Enrique and Rafe needed to take care of her, but they're strictly a family business and there's not a lot of margin in the restaurant world." He glances back at Jensen finally, and Jensen nods. "I stayed on for about a year after I'd planned to leave, ran the kitchen for Rafe, gave him a little breathing room until she was back on her feet and they could think about the business again."

"That's not such a horrible thing," Jensen says. "You sure you want it off the record?"

"It's not my thing to tell," Jared says, simply. He keeps his eyes on the garlic clove he's smashing and mincing, and the bacon he's chopped and tossed into a heavy, cast iron skillet, but it's more of an excuse to not look at Jensen, and he gets the feeling Jensen knows that. "I don't know how much they said to any of the other family. I--You asked if I ever thought about doing anything professional and I did--had a job lined up in New York, crap pay, but I worked it out so I could live, sort of, but then all that happened and I--there really wasn't anything else I could do. We're not blood, but we're family."

He catches the garlic on the flat of the knife he's been using and drops it into the skillet, watching it carefully as it starts to brown, focusing on that and not the year he'd spent barely talking to his parents, who couldn't understand why he wasn't "doing anything" with his life, the year basically everybody he knew felt the same way. If he never hears another supportive lecture about how it's okay to be scared of change but you have to push through it anyway, it'll still be too soon. He could have told his parents, but he'd gotten mad at the lectures and nursed a grudge. Not one of his finer moments, but there you go.

He's caught up in the past, not really paying attention to Jensen, until he turns around and Jensen's leaning on the counter next to him.

"Just trying to figure out what you're doing over here," Jensen says.

"This and that," Jared answers, happy enough for something to focus on that he'll give Jensen a pass on being the one who dredged up all the memories. "I'm just making it up as I go along." Jensen reaches for the stuff piled on the corner, cocking an eyebrow at Jared for permission. "Sure, go ahead," Jared tells him, as he grabs an onion and starts in on it, his knife working fast and true.

Jensen pokes around, finding the potatoes and smoked salmon, not saying anything but not giving off any kind of a foodier-than-thou vibe, so that's something. Jared drops the potatoes into the skillet with the onions and garlic and bacon, crushing them roughly, and flips them as soon as they brown on one side. The water in the other saucepan has been at a bare simmer for a while, and once the potatoes are under control Jared gives the water a quick stir to make sure it's not too hot. He cracks four eggs and slides them smoothly in, then starts setting up the plates.

"No timer?" Jensen asks, and Jared laughs.

"I've poached so many eggs I could probably do it in my sleep," he answers, splitting the potatoes and salmon between the plates and going back for the eggs in exactly three minutes.

"If you say so," Jensen says a little doubtfully, but Jared just hands him a plate and a fork and they settle back at the bar.

* * * *

Jensen takes a bite and then another and it's good--eggs perfectly poached, crispy bits of bacon-infused potato skins mixed into the soft interiors. He looks up to see Jared watching him and rolls his eyes. "What? I like food."

"Yeah, I noticed," Jared says. "I was watching you last night."

"Yeah." Jensen manages to answer casually, which is a freaking miracle given the way his entire brain flashes back to the night before. "Like to cook, too."

"Yeah?" Jared asks, and Jensen's more than a little happy to hear the strangled undertone to his voice. It's nice to know it's not just him with the inappropriate flashbacks.

"Yeah. I--some friends and I... we run an underground restaurant. I do most of the cooking."

"Dude, that's cool," Jared says. "We keep talking about trying to get into one when we're in LA, but so far we haven't made it."

"It's mostly an excuse to play around with recipes I'd never try on my own," Jensen says. "But it's fun."

Jared laughs. "This is stupid, but you're the first person who's interviewed me in a long time that's actually been into food, much less cooking. What kind of stuff do you do? In the restaurant." His voice sounds less strained, and if Jensen thinks he sounds a little too enthusiastic to be real, at least it's a distraction from thinking about the night before. Jensen's happy to play along. "Do you specialize?"

"No, no," Jensen laughs. "We do anything, really. One of us comes up with a theme and we go with it." Jensen glances at Jared, who nods encouragingly. Jensen doesn't think it's all that interesting, but whatever. "We started off staging it at a friend's place--we could get about ten people in if we shoved all the furniture into the bedroom and ran a table the length of the living room."

'Table' was maybe too grand of a word for a sheet of plywood on sawhorses, but Misha had come up with enough chairs that wouldn't collapse, and once they threw a blanket and a pressed linen sheet over the raw wood it looked better than it had any right to. "We kept it pretty simple for a while, but people liked it, so we kept going."

"And got more complicated?"

"The last one was a little fussy," Jensen admits. "I kinda went overboard--crepes stuffed with a lobster-mascarpone filling and a ginger-carrot emulsion, some pea shoots on top, and then a--"

"Wait, there's more?" Jared interrupts, laughing.

"Yeah, yeah, I told you I went overboard," Jensen says. "It's all from Keller's first cookbook. They--my friends who do all this with me--dared me." Jared doesn't stop laughing, but motions to Jensen to keep going, so Jensen runs through the rest of the menu as quickly as he can. "That was the salad course; for the soup course I did a cod filet on top of a cod cake with clam chowder over it all, then a lamb chop on a bed of rosemary-infused summer beans and a strawberry terrine for dessert."

Jared's still laughing helplessly, and even if it's not a mean laugh Jensen feels compelled to add, "But my friend Danneel did the terrine."

"Oh, good," Jared all but chokes out. "I was worried there for a second. Thought you might have overreached, but now that I know somebody else did dessert, I'm good."

"Dude," Jensen says, around another forkful of eggs and bacon and potatoes. "I don't even know you and you're giving me shit."

"It's a gift?" Jared snickers. "You take it so well? Seriously, you're just not what I expected. I mean, I know a lot of people who liked that book, and I know it's titled The French Laundry At Home, but I think you're the first person I've met who's actually jumped through all the hoops and cooked something from it. Much less four courses of the same meal." He cracks up again, shaking his head at Jensen.

"Well, ditto, on not being what I expected," Jensen fires back, finishing up his breakfast. "You normally cook for things like this?"

"Not hardly." Jared sobers up fast. "Normally I'm rushing through these things, and it's either somebody from a morning radio show and they have exactly 96 seconds to talk to me, or it's a PR thing for the network and I'm just one in the line. Either way, everybody generally knows what they think about me already, so it doesn't really matter what I say."

"Yeah, well, if it makes you feel better, I usually do this over the phone and know that I'm about third or fourth on the the multi-tasking priority list, so..."

"New experiences for everyone," Jared finishes, carrying the plates to the sink, stopping to stretch before he tosses them in the dishwasher, his back and arms one long, lean arc. Jensen winces in sympathy as his spine pops. "What else do you want to know?"

"Any cookbooks on the horizon?"

"Not as long as I'm on the road as much as I am." Jared makes short work of the dishes, and is wiping down the counters in minutes. "Not that I'm complaining. I fucking love doing the show; it's just pretty time-consuming. Next question?"

"Why that format?"

"Are you kidding?" Jared's laugh booms out again, and as much as Jensen had wanted to label it a pretty fake for the TV audiences, it sounds even better and more sincere up close and personal. "I get to bounce around the country, eat awesome food, hang out with people who love what they do, and eat some more. What could be better?" He gets serious after a second, and adds, "It's my thing--it's like getting to hang out with a dozen of the people who taught me to cook every season. Different food, different places, but the people who love it and do it to make their living--they're almost always someone I want to get to know. Besides, there are fifty different shows with somebody in a kitchen, and only a couple out on the road. It seemed like a good place to not get lost in the shuffle."

"Okay, fair enough," Jensen says. Jared has the kitchen back in order and Jensen has the feeling their time's about up. When they set the interview up, there'd been all kinds of muttering from Jared's side about how tight his schedule was, so Jensen's fairly happy with how much time he's gotten, and no, he tells the part of his brain that doesn't want to shut up, he's not counting the night before in that.

Jared goes back into tour-guide mode on the way back to dropping Jensen off at his car, which is fine with Jensen. It's a good wind-down to the whole process. Jared's phone starts vibrating almost non-stop with texts and e-mails and voice-mails as they're pulling into the parking lot. Jensen expects a quick good-bye, but Jared catches him with a touch to his wrist as he's getting out of the car.

"Thanks," Jared says. "Really."

"You're welcome," Jensen answers. "But, for what?"

"For making it not be weird," Jared says, with about as serious a look on his face as Jensen's seen yet.

Jensen's first instinct is to roll his eyes and make some kind of a joke; in the end, though, something inside him doesn't want to be flip about any of it, so he just says, "No problem."

Chapter Text

Being on the road is one of the best and worst things about the life Jared's currently inhabiting. For a guy who'd never been, well, anywhere before he'd left home on a lark to go do a reality TV show, he's a little surprised at how much he loves rolling into someplace new fifteen times in five months. It amps him up and gets him excited, and most of the time people are excited right back at him.

It wears him out, too, but it's the kind of worn out that means he doesn't have time to think about might-have-beens or all the ways he's not doing things how they're supposed to be done. He's lucky with his crew--he's known that all along and he says it every chance he gets. That's mostly Chad's doing: as obnoxious as he is, he rocks as a producer, somehow managing to find the talent, and then taking care of all the shit and making it so everybody can focus on doing their job.

So, yeah, the crew is great and all, no doubt about that, and Jared is having a great time, but occasionally, he misses being home. Of course, whenever he goes home, then he's supposed to be the same Jared he's always been, the guy who was everybody's friend but was wasting his life cooking in a dive bar. He is that guy still, except for the part where doing what he likes isn't such a waste--and, if you ask him, it never was.

He might be getting a little too much satisfaction from knowing that, but since he'd just sort of accepted the judgment at face value for years right along with everyone else, he doesn't feel like he can really let loose with the I-told-you-sos.

He kind of feels caught between two lives with no idea how he's supposed to navigate them.

"Christ," Jared mutters to his reflection. "Could you be any more melodramatic?" It's dim and quiet in the stateroom at the back of the bus; he needs to get out into the lounge and out of this emo mood. He grabs a t-shirt and runs his hands through his hair in the usual useless effort to get it under control.

"Yo," Chad says from where he's crashed out on the couch, as Jared wanders in. The TV is on mute, a DVD that for once isn't porn frozen on the screen, and Chad's got his laptop balanced up against one knee. "I fucking hate the long hauls."

"And you're bitching to me, why? I'm not the one who planned the itinerary," Jared says, detouring into the kitchen area to grab a bottle of water out of the fridge. "Take it up with, oh, right, you're the one who figures this shit out."

"Watch it, Diva Boy," Chad answers. "I'll have you investigating the joys of New England cooking in the winter so fast you won't know what hit your Boston-baked beans."

"That'd be a scary threat if I hadn't seen you turn pasty white at the thought of snow," Jared answers. He drops into the captain's chair in the lounge and props his feet on the ottoman. "I hate the long hauls, too."

"Here," Chad says, throwing him the courier bag from the network. "Make yourself useful and go through the letters from your adoring fans while I try to figure out who fucked up the advance arrangements in Little Rock. Jesus, I can't believe I give a shit about anything in fucking Arkansas."

"Sucks to be you," Jared murmurs, dumping the top third of the letters and crap out of the bag.

"Remember, I get first crack at any of the chicks propositioning you," Chad says. "Perks of the job."

"Such slime, man," Jared answers, on automatic. For all of Chad's attitude, he's pretty well-behaved enough in public. "Don't we pay you enough to make use of more professional services?"

"Waste not, want not," Chad says, but then turns his attention to whatever poor moron who had the misfortune to have answered the phone. Jared shakes his head and flips idly through the mail. It's almost all fan mail and Megan will help him go through it, and take care of requests for autographs and stuff, but the PR department at the network always sends along copies of anything that he's mentioned in, which is yet more weirdness. In fact, Jared thinks it might be the weirdest of all the weirdnesses, but here he is in the middle of it all. This time, there's a copy of Saveur and from the cover--The Toxic Cult of the TV Chef--Jared can tell it's not going to be a fun one.

He sits there with the magazine on his lap for a long time and finally makes himself admit that it's not so much that there's yet another article tearing him down (really, his favorite one is the one that blames him and his kind for the death of honest cooking in society today), it's more that he doesn't want to open the stupid thing and see how much he'd fucked up trusting Jensen.

It's not like they're best friends or anything--hell, it's been three months and they haven't even talked--but it still bothers Jared.

* * * *

It's more or less the middle of the night, but Jensen gets some of his best work done then and everybody knows it, so it's not odd for his phone to ring. Misha's at that stage of just-short-of-obnoxiously fussing because Jensen hasn't come up with a menu for the next restaurant night yet. They have the wine--Chris called a week ago about picking up a couple of mixed cases from some of the smaller Russian River vineyards, mostly gamays but at least few of bottles of pinot--and Danneel has already nailed down dessert.

"It's October, babe," she'd said to Jensen. "That's autumn and nothing says autumn like tarte tatin." Jensen isn't stupid enough to argue with the woman over apple pie.

So they had a start and it isn't the first time Jensen's picked a menu to go with the alcohol or the dessert, but he hasn't quite found the right thing yet. The phone ringing is a good excuse to swim up out of the stacks of cookbooks and take a break. He doesn't bother to look at the display--it isn't going to be anyone but Misha--just thumbs the phone on and starts talking.

"Would pot au feu be too retro-precious?" he asks, in greeting.

"I, uh, guess it depends on how far you'll go to channel Julia Child," answers a deep, vaguely familiar voice that definitely isn't Misha's. Jensen pulls the phone away from his ear and no, the number on the display isn't familiar at all. "--m sorry; I know it's kind of late," the voice is saying when he gets the phone back to his ear. "This is Jared."

Jensen's brain is still running a little bit behind, so the voice and the name click into place right about the same time as Jared adds, "Padalecki," sounding really uncomfortable.

"No," Jensen says. "I mean, yeah, I'm with you and no, it's no problem. I'm--I was expecting it to be someone else."

"Sorry," Jared says, still sounding stiff and awkward, but before Jensen can think of something to say, he takes a deep breath. "You, uh, you left your contact info with Meg; I was just calling to, um, the issue with the interview you did with me came out this week, and--uh..."

"Let me guess," Jensen says, sighing. "They put together the whole thing as a hatchet job."

"Yeah, pretty much," Jared answers. "But I'm the only guy they didn't completely eviscerate, so, you know, thanks for that."

"You shouldn't have to thank me for anything," Jensen says, leaning back in his chair and stretching the kinks out of his back and shoulder muscles. "I wrote what I saw."

"Yeah, well, I know a couple of the others who were profiled and I think there's a pretty good chance you were the only interviewer who didn't write what they expected to see, even before we get to the stuff that happened between us, so I figured I could at least call and tell you thanks."

"You're welcome," Jensen says, and there's another second of quiet, like neither one of them is ready to hang up but nobody's quite sure what to say, and before it can get any more painful, Jensen says, "But you didn't answer my question."

"Pot au feu?" Jared asks. "Seriously? For what? Francophile Day?"

"That's what I was afraid of," Jensen sighs. "What can I say? I have these slightly insane friends, and I'm shit at saying no to them, so I need something that works with a gamay. Oh, and tarte tatin, because trust me, that is not changing."

"I figure you for the kind of guy who knows when to fight and when to just let it be, so I'll take your word about the dessert," Jared says, not quite teasing. "I think you're on the right track, but do you seriously want to serve boiled beef? I mean, yeah, it's classic and all that, but--"

"Yeah," Jensen agrees. "Which sends me back to my thirty cookbooks with nothing."

"What about coq au vin?" Jared suggests, and that's--Jensen can't believe he didn't think of it, but he'd been stuck in the red-wine-equals-beef rut. "Use the wine to braise the chicken and it definitely won't clash with the tarte tatin..."

"That is, yeah, that could work," Jensen says, his brain skipping ahead to what else he can serve with it. He's sure it won't be a problem finding tiny red-skinned potatoes at the farmer's market, and if he does a separate course with a green salad and cheese, it'll add a little bit extra to the whole dinner without being a huge hassle. "That could definitely work."

"Hey, even us dumb Texas boys get lucky every now and then," Jared says, and his voice is mild enough, but Jensen thinks there's a little bit of an edge under all that good humor.

"Yeah, don't lay that shit on me," Jensen says. "I'm the one who didn't trash you, remember?"

"Really? You sure you weren't thinking that even a little bit?" The edge is a little more pronounced now, but Jensen isn't sure if Jared even knows it's there.

"No more than you were a couple of months ago when we established that I'm not an idiot in the kitchen," Jensen answers. It's not the most tactful thing he's ever said, but he's pretty sure Jared'll give him points for honesty. There's a couple seconds of silence where Jensen isn't thinking about why he even cares if a guy he fucked around with once thinks he's a stand-up guy, but then Jared half-laughs, half-sighs, and that little bit of tension eases.

"Okay, yeah," Jared says. "We're even."

"No," Jensen says, as his call waiting beeps with Misha's number on the display. "I think I might owe you for the coq au vin." He should really take the call, but Chris might have a point about letting Misha stew for a while. It's always entertaining. "So what else is going on?" he asks, leaning back in the chair.

 

* * * *

 

It never fails that if they have an outdoor location shoot it ends up raining. Especially if they're already behind schedule. The first season, they usually just hung around for half the day and then said the hell with it and shot in the rain. Jared doesn't want to know how they didn't end up electrocuting themselves those times; he's just grateful they didn't.

The second season is going a lot better, though, because Katie, the new supervising producer, disguises her iron will with a cute ponytail and keeps everybody happy and on track and ready to go in the narrowest of weather windows. Even then, though, it's good when they catch a break--the worst week of storms ends up blowing through when they're shooting at a little diner in Georgia. It's hotter than hell and humid enough that Jared walks around with damp shirts and jeans for days, and the diner itself is so small that they're practically standing on top of each other, but at least they're all inside.

The second day they're shooting, the storm takes out the power in the late afternoon. Jared ends up squashed at the end of the counter with Katie, watching giant streaks of lightning and counting one-Mississippis like they're kids until the thunder crashes down. Katie jumps every time.

"I swear, if you tell Chad about this, I'll… I'll… I will do something you won't like," Katie threatens. She has a pretty credible fierce expression but it's ruined by the lightning striking right outside the diner. Her shriek is lost in the almost instantaneous boom of thunder, but since Jared practically levitates off the stool himself he's not going to give her any grief about it.

"I know who makes sure I get breaks at reasonable times," Jared tells her, a little breathlessly, because that last one was seriously close. "And who keeps track of the candy bowl."

"Not that it's going to matter," Katie squeaks, as another flash and boom hit just as close. "Even if we don't die right here, our equipment is going to be fried."

The next round is a tiny bit less intense, though, and the one after that is definitely moving farther away. Katie still looks freaked, but she sounds more like her normal self when she hisses, "Okay, next time we do this, we need someplace that has a liquor license."

"We'll just have to make it through with sweet tea," Jared says, laughing and pushing his glass over toward her.

"That's not tea," Katie says, making a face. "That's sugar syrup tinted brown."

"Welcome to the South, California Girl," Jared says and swallows half the glass, smirking at her while she shudders.

His phone vibrates on the counter with a text; he smiles when he sees it's from Jensen. Jared isn't sure what he expected when he'd ended up impulsively calling Jensen after reading the hatchet-job-that-wasn't, but it's not this offbeat thing they have going where they call and text at random times. Sometimes it feels like the guy's in the next room, yelling things out as they happen, except for how Jensen is entirely too polite to yell.

Cooking in a ship's galley: not all it's cracked up to be. Jared can almost see the exasperated roll of Jensen's eyes.

Wuss, Jared texts back, and looks up to find Katie watching him.

"Sorry," he says. "That was rude of me."

"I'm fine," Katie says, waving her Blackberry at him. "It's the life. It's not like I'm not glued to this thing 24/7."

Jared's phone vibrates again. Yeah, I'd like to see you do this. We'd have to hack you off at the knees just to get you in here.

"It's about the only way I manage to keep in touch with people," Jared says, while he texts back to Jensen, Threats? That's cold, man.. "That and calling in the middle of the night." Sandy had hated that, never being able to talk at normal times. Jared couldn't blame her; they'd been together a long time, and then all of a sudden, everything changed. Doing Celebrity Chef had been one thing--that was a game, an adventure. Short-term and exciting. But then he won, and and it wasn't even that he'd been on the road half the year, it was that his whole life was running at opposite times from hers.

"Yay for technology?" The lights flicker on; Katie perks up immediately, holding her breath until they stay on for more than a few seconds. "Okay, everybody," she yells, scrambling out from behind Jared. "Let's see if we can get going again. We have NO TIME on the back end of this shoot. Jared and Chad are on a plane to New York in less than 24 hours."

Jared gulps down the rest of his iced tea and goes to find somebody from make-up to fix everything he's messed up during the rain delay. Right before they're ready for him and the diner owner back in the kitchen, he gets one more text from Jensen. shit. crabs escaping. two bushels of hard-shells all looking for freedom. He doesn't have time to text back, but he's grinning like a loon when he walks into the kitchen.

* * * *

Jensen has been faithfully calling Mackenzie every week since his visit. They mostly chat about Mackenzie's life, because that's what Jensen wants to hear about--what classes she's taking and where she's going on her final tour of colleges and why it doesn't really matter because she's 99% sure she'll end up a Pi Phi at UT. Jensen gets a little terse when she says stuff like that, but when he calls her on it, she only says, "It's fine. It'll make the whole entire family happy--God, I'm like a quintuple legacy, between Mom and all the cousins--and then it'll be easier to do what I really want."

"That sounds familiar," Jensen tells her quietly. "I think I told myself the same thing when I was your age. I said it for a lot of years and I was… God, I was wrong." He doesn't mean to be quite that blunt, so he adds, "But that was me, and you're you, so just… think about it, okay? Don't wake up and realize you're living somebody else's life."

"I will," Mackenzie says, after a few seconds of silence. "I don't really know what happened, though. With you."

She says it as though she knows exactly what Jensen's been doing, letting her talk about herself and never letting the conversation turn back to him; and she says it as though she's fine with it, but Jensen suddenly isn't. That doesn't mean he doesn't choose his next words carefully.

"I… needed some time after I finished my dissertation," Jensen says, searching for the right words, the ones that are honest even if they're not the ones that will spill the whole ugly story.

"Right, you went to Paris," Mackenzie says. "I know all that; I mean, how could I not know--Mom told, like, everyone, all about how it was like the Grand Tour or something. You know how she gets."

Jensen does, indeed, know. Occasionally, her talent for spin has helped--the face she put on accepting Jensen coming out was nothing short of incredible--but mostly it's just exhausting.

"It was more like I was running away," Jensen confesses. It's been a long time--years--and the gut punch of finding out that the guy he'd been in love with, the one he'd thought was it, forever, had other plans that included the daughter of Jensen's doctoral advisor and an overdone white dress, has faded, but it's still not fun to think about. Especially since, in hindsight, Jensen can see all the things he'd missed.

"That sounds like Dad," Mackenzie says, quick and sharp. She's not wrong, but that doesn't mean Jensen doesn't agree with his father on this one. "Going someplace I know you'd always wanted to visit, living on the money I know you'd saved and not bothering anyone doesn't really sound like running away to me."

"I did a lot of thinking," Jensen says, sidestepping her unspoken question, which is an answer in and of itself, one he knows she understands. "I was writing, too, and right before I came home, I sold a couple of articles." Three, to be exact, and every editor had asked him if he had anything more he thought they might be interested in. It wasn't much, but he remembers sitting in Charles de Gaulle Airport, waiting for his flight back to Dallas and realizing that the whole trip had been less about getting away from Michael and more about how very much he didn't want the adjunct professor position he'd worked his ass off to get.

"I know Mom and Dad weren't happy when you got back and told them you weren't going to be following their master plan, but… you came home for Christmas and I thought everything was going to be okay."

She sounds young and uncertain, suddenly, and it's the one thing about the break that Jensen's always regretted.

"I'm sorry I didn't say good-bye," he tells her. "I thought everything was going to be okay, too, but…" There hadn't been a fight, or even any raised voices. That's never been the Ackles way. His father had--very calmly and rationally--laid out all the ways in which Jensen was disappointing his family, how he was letting them down, how extraordinarily difficult it was for them to see him throwing his life away. They were concerned that he was hiding other things from them, possibly even using drugs. The coup de grace had been that they worried he might be a destabilizing influence on Mackenzie. She was, of course, at a vulnerable age and they had to be extremely vigilant in who she associated with.

"Dad told me you needed to leave, and you know, I think he was in denial enough to think I believed him." Mackenzie makes a sound that would have their mother in a dead faint from how vulgar it is.

"I actually did need to leave." Jensen's not sure whether not telling her that she was the proverbial straw that day is fair or not, but he is sure that he's still not quite ready to talk about it, if only because he still gets a savage sense of satisfaction when he remembers how the calm, careful smile on his father's face had faded as Jensen had assured him that he wouldn't be bothering the family further. "It was my decision."

"Jensen," Mackenzie says, with another rude noise. "I'm number three on the list. I might have been really young when they blew it trying to run Josh's life, but I had a ringside seat to the stuff they did with you. I'm not stupid, okay?"

"No, princess, you definitely are not," Jensen says. "But…"

"But we're still not talking about it," she mutters. After a second, she adds, "Okay, fine. I'll drop it, but can I see you when I do my Georgetown interviews? I looked up your address and I know you're kind of on the other side of the city, but--"

"Absolutely," Jensen says, firmly. "Are you sure about--"

"Leave Mom and Dad to me," Mackenzie says, breezy and casual. "Really. I'll call you when I know more. Bye!"

* * * *

"Seriously, man," Chad is saying as they get off the elevator and work their way through the crowded lobby. "We need to get you laid or something. You are strung way too fucking tight."

Jared's tired and ground down, and wired at the same time. Everything around him is a blur, but he makes himself pay attention because Chad's just spent the last week covering his back, putting the attitude to work to keep the show--and by extension, Jared--a working entity. The least Jared can do is listen to him.

They're a victim of their own success, Chad says. When they were just the unlikely winner and the loud-mouthed producer, nobody gave a shit what they did. The winner of Celebrity Chef gets his (or her) own show, but that didn't mean anyone ever expected them to succeed. Now that they have, everybody wants a piece of them, and nobody gets what makes them work.

"No," Jared says, absently, holding the door for a pair of older women. They recognize him, but they don't say anything and he doesn't think he's ever been more grateful to just keep walking. "We need to get you laid. I'm too beat, dude."

"Don't say that," Chad hisses. "That's, like, a jinx or something." He walks next to Jared quietly, but that only lasts for a few seconds, which isn't a surprise. "I'm not kidding, Jared. You sure you and Sandy aren't going to give it another go? Because we can fly her up here, no prob--"

"No," Jared says. "She wouldn't take my call anyway."

"Yeah, probably not," Chad sighs. "But it'd solve a lot of problems."

"Could you give it a rest?" Jared tries to be forceful and firm, but he's pretty sure he's pleading. "Besides, getting laid is what works for you, not me."

"Getting laid is what works for everyone, padawan," Chad says, serenely. "Booze and blow are just stops along the way to sweet, sweet fucking. But while we're on the topic, I would like to register my thanks for you not fucking around with the crew."

"You're welcome." Jared rolls his eyes. "Like I'd do that."

"Well, while you were being your chaming good ol' boy self, I was hanging out with the PAs and they all--girls and boys--want to come work with you because they have it on good authority that putting out is not a part of the unwritten job description. I think I can have my pick of the lot, professionally speaking, so we're sitting pretty for filling in any gaps around the edges. We should set up some interviews--"

"Chad, man," Jared interrupts, laughing. "I love you, but I'm beat. Go have fun or set up interviews or whatever is going to make you happy." A cab pulls up in front of them, letting out a couple of hipsters, and Jared flags it down before anyone else can snatch it away from him. "I'm going back to the hotel."

"Okay, well, I didn't want to say anything before, on account of how delicate you are and all, but you and those bags under your eyes could probably do with some sleep."

"Right." Jared climbs in the back seat. "Sleep. Wasn't that my idea in the first place?"

"Details," Chad says, as Jared slams the door. The cab pulls away before he can say anything more, but Jared's phone rings ten seconds later. "Call me when you're finished with your beauty sleep and we'll go see if your name is good enough to get us into Nobu or if you really are nothing but a D-List wannabe."

"Ass," Jared says, hanging up and leaning forward to give the driver the hotel address. He showers when he gets there and wanders around the room for a while, still restless. It's never a good idea to let on that Chad might be right about his personal life, but he's maybe not so wrong. Except that Jared doesn't want Sandy. He knows who he wants, even if he's too scared to do anything about it.

* * * *

"Hey," Jared says when Jensen picks up the call. He sounds like he's sleepwalking, and Jensen doesn't think it's just that it actually is the middle of the night. For whatever reason, that's about the only time he and Jared ever talk, so he's used to the sound of Jared being tired, and this isn't that.

"You sound like shit," Jensen says. "Did you burn down another kitchen?" Jared swears the whole episode with the gas-fired cookers deep-frying catfish out on the Cannelton Dam tailwaters of the Ohio River was cursed from the start, but even he has to admit that letting a couple of vats of oil catch fire was pretty spectacular.

"It was a shack," Jared says. "Not even a shack--a lean-to. It was built to be burned down. And it wasn't me; it was Chad."

"Yeah, yeah," Jensen says. Jensen thinks he saw where it was their highest-rated show, but he still likes to give Jared a hard time about it. "He's your producer, right? Same thing."

Jared snorts. "Dude, what you see on the show is exactly what you get with Chad--you don't really think he pays attention to me, do you?"

"I'm still trying to figure out how he manages to run your dog-and-pony show without ever wiping that smirk off his face."

"He's gifted that way," Jared says. "But man, don't tell anyone I said this, but I'll totally take having to explain a small brushfire to the volunteer fire department of Hawesville, Kentucky over these last couple of days."

"I told you you sounded like shit," Jensen says.

"I'm okay," Jared says. "Just tired of trying to make people understand that if they want me to be the Offbeat Guy, they probably should stop with the stylists and the demographics."

"Well, you know… Losing the ugly shirts probably wouldn't kill your creativity," Jensen says.

"Maybe," Jared says. "But working out of the studio in New York would."

"Yeah," Jensen says. "It would. That would suck--you really can't do that."

"That's what I keep saying. This time they made me come up and say it in person about a hundred times."

"How'd it go?"

"Okay, I guess," Jared says. "I still have a show, and it's still going to be me running around the country. I'll take it as a win." He gets quiet for a second but then says, "You know what? Scratch the whiny shit, okay? I'm getting paid to run around the country and play with my food."

"Just because it's a cool job doesn't mean it's not hard sometimes," Jensen offers.

"Thanks," Jared says. "I'm fine. Really. What's Misha's latest scheme?"

Jensen snorts at the lack of finesse in topic-changing, but it's Jared. He's kind of getting used to the fits and starts and unsignaled left turns that conversations with Jared always take. "Well, after the near disaster that was crab feast on that boat out in the Inner Harbor, he's back to letting me pick the menus."

"Dude, that's too bad," Jared says, laughing. "It was like my own private comedy show, getting your texts that night."

"Yeah, well, I guess having to chase the damn crabs down after the cooler got knocked over triggered some childhood trauma or something," Jensen answers. "I'm threatening to retaliate with something impossible--something from Alinea or Le Champignon Sauvage--"

Jared groans. "Forget my number if you're planning on feeding a crowd with anything from either of those two guys. There's having fun watching somebody in the trenches and then there's sadism, and last time I checked, that wasn't what was floating my boat."

"I said I was threatening, not that I'm insane," Jensen answers. Someday, he's going to clear his schedule for a month and see what it would take to do a menu from either place, but he's not crazy enough to try it out for anyone but friends. "I sent Misha copies of both cookbooks. He hasn't said a word since. It's been very peaceful." He saves the article he's been working on and gets up from his desk, working out some of the tension in his neck and shoulders before he stretches out on the couch.

"You sound like you're itchy for something complicated," Jared says. "I'll bet you have fifteen cookbooks on your desk. Sticky notes all over everything. Different-color pens."

"You don't have to make me sound like an addict," Jensen answers, avoiding the rest of the comment, but only because there's no need to mention the twenty books on his desk. They're completely necessary, but it's late and he's too tired to get into it.

"Yeah," Jared says, laughing. "Sure. So what's the real plan?"

"Cassoulet," Jensen answers, propping his feet up on the back of the couch. "Do the confit and everything myself." He has a plan of attack already laid out: he's set to try the confit recipe already--he's never made it before and there's always the chance he might be the one burning down a kitchen. There's a lot of fat to render before he can preserve the duck legs. So if he does it early and it doesn't work, he can try it again. And he knows exactly where he's going for the sausage and the pork--there's a farm outside of Fredricksburg that makes their own sausage onsite. He's been itching to have a reason to try them out.

"That'll take you at least a couple of days, so yeah, sounds perfect," Jared says, still laughing. "Tell Chris to get you a decent pinot and you're good to go." He hesitates for a second, and when he starts talking again his voice is serious. "This is for next week, right?"

"A week from Thursday, yeah," Jensen answers. "How'd you know?"

"I'm--I think I'm going to be in town then. Can I--would it be weird if I came?" The words rush out, as though Jared's expecting Jensen to cut him off. "I mean, I found your website and it says you're sold out, but if there's a cancellation--"

"Of course," Jensen answers immediately, so quickly he surprises himself. "Don't worry about it; I'll tell Misha," he says, more quietly. "We'll make it work for you and a guest…" he doesn't want to sound like a stalker and he doesn't know her name, but generally, every time Jared shows up in a gossip column there's someone--usually someone small and petite and very female--with him.

"If you're sure," Jared says. "I don't want to put you guys out any more than I have to."

"No," Jensen says. "It's no big deal; don't be leaving your girl at a hotel or anything."

"Okay," Jared says. "Thanks, man. I--I'm really looking forward to this."

"Me, too," Jensen says.

* * * *

Jared manages to sound casual enough about taking a quick detour before he joins back up with the crew.

"Yeah, sure," Chad says, distracted by whatever disaster has happened most recently. "As long as you can meet up with us, I've got everything I need from you for the next couple of days."

Jared never even thinks about going alone--he's going to need some kind of moral support to not make a complete idiot of himself. Katie's fine with going with him, though he realizes that she doesn't get that it's a big deal until right before they leave. Him asking for opinions on shirts is the tip-off, he guesses. She manages not to fall down laughing and Jared gets them out of the hotel without her calling to rat him out to Chad.

Luckily, she's intrigued enough about the whole underground restaurant thing that he can distract her on the cab ride over to the address Jensen had texted to him.

"They do this every month?" she asks, and Jared can almost hear the wheels in her producer-brain engaging. "No advertising, nothing?"

"Word of mouth," Jared says. "And trust me, we're only here because I know one of the guys who runs it."

"Good," Katie answers. "We won't just be guests, then. You can get us a little bit of a behind-the-scenes look."

"Katie--" Jared starts, panicking at the thought of Katie in full research mode meeting up with an unsuspecting Jensen. The possibilities of humiliation are endless, but the cab is pulling up in front of a small, meticulously restored townhouse a few blocks off the Potomac and there's not much Jared can do. Katie's out of the car in a flash; Jared takes a deep breath and follows.

They're the first guests to arrive, and Katie takes the opportunity to find her way around and check everything out, Jared trailing helplessly behind her. Jensen's in the kitchen, of course, surrounded by controlled chaos and and about a dozen perfectly dressed white-haired ladies--the kind who scare the crap out of Jared, because sooner or later he's going to knock something over or trip over one of them.

"They come with the house," Jensen mutters. He sounds a little spooked by them, too. "They raised the restoration money--I swear to God they think I'm going to burn the place down around them." He flashes them a blatantly insincere smile right about the time one of them recognizes Jared and they all descend on him in some kind of fluttering rush. Jared has to steel himself not to take an involuntary step back.

Katie smirks at him from across the room, which means she's going to give him all kinds of shit about it later, but he doesn't much care because he also catches a flash of relief in Jensen's eyes as they suddenly have something other than keeping watch over him to keep them busy. It's ridiculous how much that little smile in Jensen's eyes makes it perfectly okay for Jared to switch on the charm and take them off his hands.

Katie flits around being her usual chipper self, introducing herself to the other guests like it's no big deal that Jared's dragged her here, but Jared knows that look in her eye and knows she hasn't forgotten his little freakout earlier. Luckily, there's some pretty decent sparkling wine for an aperitif, and she's semi-distracted by flirting with the guy who's acting as bartender. From the bits and pieces Jensen's mentioned, Jared's going to assume that's Chris.

Jensen comes out of the kitchen once or twice, but leaves all the talking to a dark-haired guy who by default has to be Misha. Jared and Katie look to be the only first-timers; the rest of the guests have clearly done this before and, in a lot of cases, know each other well enough to make the whole thing feel like hanging out with friends rather than dinner out at a restaurant. Just, you know, hanging out with friends who cook as well as most chefs Jared's met, because the dinner is outstanding, starting with the crudites scattered around the room, every bite simple and perfect, so fresh-tasting that Jared would be surprised if they weren't picked that morning, and moving straight through to the cassoulet. Jared's only had it once or twice before and he can see where it could turn into a greasy pile of pork and duck and beans, but Jensen's is rich and decadent without being overwhelming. Chris pours a pinot noir from a small vineyard in Oregon good enough that Katie gets him to hold a bottle out so she can take a picture of the label. Jensen comes back out with a light salad, citrus and beets, just enough to clear the heavier flavors of the main course in time for Danneel's sorbets.

Katie moans, all but licking her plate clean. "I may not move for a week." She pokes Jared in the shoulder. "It's your fault that I'm here--you better put in a good word for me tomorrow when I'm moving like a sea turtle, right?"

"Lightweight," Jared tells her, with a little more sympathy than usual, because Jensen's on his way over and at least if Jared's joking with Katie, he isn't looking quite as obsessive as he really is.

"How was everything?" Jensen asks, and Jared tells himself that he's only stopping at their table first because it's one of the tables closest to the hallway to the kitchen.

Katie whimpers again, and Jared rolls his eyes at her. "Dude, you really do like to channel Julia Child, don't you."

"WWJD," Jensen says, solemnly. "What Would Julia Do?" Jared snickers and Jensen's serious face cracks into a brilliant smile. Jared has a little trouble breathing for a second; he doesn't think Jensen notices before he moves off to talk to the next table, but Katie totally does.

"Whoa," she says. "And here I thought it was the dessert girl you were after."

"Oh, God, am I really that obvious?" Jared says, wondering if he can just sink into the floor, but Katie waves him off.

"Well, I was looking for it," she says. "I knew there was something up, but who knew I was gender-limiting myself unnecessarily."

"Oh," Jared says, and his face has to be flaming what with how hot it feels. "I, um, yeah."

Katie laughs, one long peal of utter delight that has heads turning across the room. She leans in and kisses Jared affectionately. "You're cute--when I took this job, everybody told me you were a good guy, and Chad, too, even if he is a pain in the ass, but nobody told me what a dork you are."

Jared shrugs, a little sheepishly, and she smiles at him again. "I'm going to go ahead and take a cab back to the hotel and not wait up for you. See you in the morning?"

"Yeah," Jared says, not looking across the room to where he knows Jensen is talking to a little cluster of guests, because he'll lose it if he catches Jensen's eye in the middle of all this. "See you in the morning."

* * * *

Jensen really is pleased with the menu and how everything comes together. Misha's so happy not to be dealing with a menu from Alinea that he went out and found some old wooden boxes just the right height and depth to hold the crudites. They're perfect--Jensen loves how the colors of the baby vegetables pop against the linen napkins they line the boxes with, enough that he almost doesn't care about the dozen white-haired ladies keeping an eagle eye on every single move he makes in their--thankfully not period-accurate--kitchen. Of course, once Jared shows up Jensen doesn't much notice them.

Jared's in his usual jeans and boots, but his shirt is an almost normal blue-and-white stripe, which Jensen counts as a win even if it is a little on the bright side. He charms the historical society ladies with little visible effort, and manages to deflect attention from himself with the rest of the guests. Katie is a good match for him, just as outgoing, and more than capable of of keeping up with him.

Jensen privately admits that he spent extra time on the menu once he knew Jared was coming, but he doesn't think he's gone overboard. The only thing that's a little over the top is dessert: they end up with a half-dozen flavors of sorbet. That's all on Danneel, though Jensen hadn't done a thing to stop her.

Jensen will also admit that he's probably paying a little bit more attention to Jared than to the rest of his guests. He's not going to admit it to Chris or Misha or Danni, but he can be honest with himself. He probably needs to be honest with himself, because Jared and Katie are obviously very comfortable with each other, lots of little touches and laughs and a few quick, affectionate kisses.

In the rush of cleaning things up and clearing out (still under the watchful eyes of the white-hairs), Jensen misses how and why Jared ends up still hanging around, but he's the one helping carry the last box of shit out to Jensen's car and he's the one with the bottle of ice-cold water that Jensen always needs after a gig.

Chris is back on the road in the morning, so he's gone, and Misha always saves a bottle of whatever Chris has found so he and the partner du jour can properly finish off the night. Jensen usually just goes home and watches whatever trashy reality show is on his DVR, but tonight there's Jared, and Jensen's honest enough with himself to admit he doesn't want the night to end just yet.

It's not really quiet or peaceful--they're only a few blocks off the main drag, and the party people are out in full force--but Jensen leans against the trunk of his car, and breathes and lets the buzz of the day go, keeping only the high of pulling everything off again. Jared hangs out with him, leaning back, long legs crossed in front of him, close enough that Jensen can feel the heat he puts out. He's not quiet, of course, but most of what he's saying only requires Jensen to nod, or hum in agreement, and it's nice not being totally alone at the end of everything.

"That was good," Jared says. "Kind of crazy--is it always like that?"

"That was about as smooth as it has ever gone," Jensen says, laughing. "Nothing caught on fire; all the deliveries came in on time; there weren't any suddenly discovered food allergies among the guests--"

"Ouch," Jared says.

"Yeah," Jensen says, with feeling. "Working around EMTs in the kitchen is one of those things I never gave much thought to before I was trying to flash-fry scallops for twenty while stepping over two guys and all their equipment."

Jared laughs again, but then gets quiet. "I'm really glad you were okay with me coming--I mean, I know we've talked some, but--"

"No," Jensen says. "It's cool that you wanted to come. This--it's not anything big, but it's still a lot of fun."

"I had a really good time," Jared says, his voice trailing off, and before Jensen knows it, there's a hand on his jaw, and Jared's mouth is on his. "I--God, I keep thinking about you, about being with you." He kisses Jensen again, harder this time, rougher. "Can't get you out of my head."

"Yeah," Jensen whispers, getting his hands up and into Jared's hair, like they've been itching to do all night. "Can't stop thinking about you, either."

Jared groans at that, pulls Jensen closer so that he's half-sprawled on top of Jared, one hot kiss after another, hands roaming everywhere, like he can't get enough and doesn't want to miss anything. "So fucking much I want to do to you."

They're in public, practically out on the street, nothing but the curve of the alley hiding them from people walking past, and Jensen should stop this, should step back and catch his breath, get his brain back online, but Jared's sliding to his knees, hands working at Jensen's waistband and there's not a chance in hell that Jensen's going to say no.

"Can I?" Jared breathes. "Please, can I?"

"Fuck, yes," Jensen chokes out and then shoves his fist in his mouth as Jared licks across the head of his dick, then traces along and under the crown with just the tip of his tongue. "Jesus, like that, yeah," he babbles, trying hard not to shove his dick down Jared's throat.

Jared makes an encouraging noise and his hands tighten on Jensen's hips and Jensen can't help pulling Jared's hair, not when every time he does it Jared whimpers around his dick like it's the best thing he's ever felt. Jensen forgets how tired he is and how strung out he is from the dinner and just lets everything go, nothing but Jared's mouth and Jared's hands and how fucking good they're making him feel.

"Go on," Jared says. "Let it go, fuck my mouth." His voice is shaky and rough-sounding and when he swallows Jensen back down Jensen does exactly what he says, even when he knows Jared's gagging and half-choking, because Jared never lets go of his hips, never lets him stop until Jensen's coming, Jared's throat working frantically around his dick, milking him dry, and Jared's hands the only thing holding him up.

It takes Jensen a couple of seconds to get back to breathing normally, get to a place where he can offer to reciprocate, but before he can do more than take a deep breath Jared sits back on his heels and takes his dick out and Jensen loses whatever small amount of brain power he'd managed to recover.

Jensen tears his eyes away from Jared's hand and how it's working his dick, flicks a look at Jared's face and finds him watching Jensen, his eyes hooded, shadowed in the near-darkness. "Jen," he whispers, as though he's asking permission again, as if he's not sure that Jensen is with him. "God, I'm so close already, so close just from sucking you."

"Slow down," Jensen says, and it's amazing how calm he sounds. Jared breathes in, quick and sharp, but he does like Jensen wants, long, slow strokes that make Jensen want to scream. He's not sure how Jared isn't. "Good--fuck that's so good, Jared."

Jared spreads his knees more and pushes up into his fist, almost groaning with every stroke but still keeping that slow pace. Jensen can see the strain in his muscles, and when he reaches out and lays his hand along Jared's jaw, Jared turns his face into it desperately. He doesn't ask for more, even though Jensen can feel the need shuddering through him.

"Easy, yeah," Jensen murmurs. "You like to be teased, don't you." Jared shakes his head, gasping, but Jensen laughs softly. "You do."

"Jen," Jared pleads. "I can't--please--"

"Go on," Jensen tells him, stroking with his thumb along the curve of Jared's jaw. "Let me see you." Jared makes a quiet sound, raw and helpless, and comes. Jensen finally lets himself admit he's the most fucking beautiful thing Jensen's seen in a long, long time.

"I was thinking," Jared says a little later, after they've cleaned up as well as they can and Jensen's driven him back to his hotel. The lights from the marquee spill into the car, throwing shadows on Jared's face but leaving his eyes dark. Jensen gets a little thrill at how hoarse and used he sounds. "I--we're on the road for a couple of more weeks, almost done with the show this season… Maybe you can come hang out with me?"

Somewhere inside Jensen, a lot of things feel like they slot into place, but then he remembers pretty, outgoing Katie, and he can't pretend any longer.

"Jare--" he starts, shifting the car into Park, setting the parking brake for no reason other than to give himself something to do, something to give himself a little time to think what to say. Jared rushes to interrupt.

"I mean, I know you've got your life and all, and I'm not saying it's not important and I don't know what your schedule's like, I just thought maybe it'd be good, even if it's only for a couple of days--"

"Jared," Jensen says, and Jared shuts up. Jensen could let it ride, let Jared think it's because he's too busy or whatever, but he's not really thinking straight, half fucked-out and stupid, half hating himself for that little hum of satisfaction, at how easily he'd forgotten how much of a shitstorm being the piece on the side always brings down on people who aren't at fault. "I can't--I'm not gonna be that guy again."

"What guy?" Jared goes still in the seat, and Jensen knows without looking that the lazy glint in his eye is gone. It's quiet around them, nothing but their breathing and Jensen's heart slamming hard in his chest. "What guy, Jensen?" Jared asks again, but sharper, with an edge, like he's so fucking offended at Jensen's morals and how they're messing with his nifty little plan.

"Your dirty little secret," Jensen snaps, jerking around to face Jared, even if they can't really see each other. "The guy you fuck on the side while the pretty girl's at home missing you."

"My what?" Jared sits up straight and runs his hands through his hair, every movement as stiff and furious as his voice. "That's what you think this is?"

"I don't know, Jared. You tell me what I'm supposed to think, when you have a date inside." Jensen's so angry--at Jared, but mostly at himself, for doing this again--that his hands are shaking as he fumbles to turn the fucking radio off, because the last thing this scene needs is some country singer whining about how his woman did him wrong.

"Oh, yeah, because the only possible answer is that I'm enough of a sleaze to want a little fucktoy on the side." Jared's getting louder and louder with every word, and Jensen is just tired of it all, just fucking sick and tired of trying.

"Maybe it's not the only possible answer," he says, holding on tight to the steering wheel, trying not to think how it hasn't even been an hour since he had his hands tangled in Jared's hair. "But it's the one that pretty much always seems to be the truth."

"And what if it's not?" Jared demands. "What then?"

"I really wouldn't know," Jensen says, finally looking back at Jared, and not doing anything when Jared gets out of the car and slams the door hard behind him.

Chapter Text

Katie takes one look at Jared's face the next morning and the teasing light fades out of her eyes. Jared hasn't looked in the mirror at all, not even when he brushed his teeth, but he doesn't think he slept more than a couple of minutes and every time he blinks, it feels like sandpaper scraping over his corneas.

"I'm driving," Katie says, stooping to dig through her bag. "You can sleep--"

Jared laughs at that; he can't help it that it sounds more like he's choking. "Yeah, I don't think so, K."

"Ambien, right here," she says, standing up and holding out the prescription Chad had hassled Jared into filling back when he and Sandy were falling apart and he spent half the night trying to figure out how getting everything he'd never even dreamed about somehow meant he had to fuck up the one good thing he'd ever managed to hold onto. "I know you don't want it, but you look like shit and you have to be on camera in less than twenty-four hours."

Jared shakes his head, but takes the bottle from her anyway and lets her get behind the wheel, even though it's generally agreed that driving with Katie is taking your life in your hands. She gets them out of the city with only a single incident that requires her to flip off the driver of the car she'd just passed--Seriously, bitch, did you not think I'd notice how you suddenly hit the gas as soon as I put my blinker on?--and navigates her way around and through the construction east of the city.

"Thanks," Jared says, finally.

"I was planning on driving anyway," Katie answers, with a quick glance at him. "Just, you know, thought it'd be more because you had an awesome night of sex, not because… Well, not because someone kicked your teeth in."

"The sex was awesome," Jared says. "And then I asked him if he wanted to come hang out with us for these last couple of weeks."

"And he said no?" Katie asks after a couple of seconds.

Jared shrugs. "He started to say yes, I saw it." Katie stays quiet this time. Looking at her, Jared knows she won't push any further, but the words come spilling out anyway. "He thought we were together. You and me."

"Did you tell him that that it's not just no, it's holy crap, no?"

"It doesn't matter," Jared makes himself say. "He honest-to-God thought I'm the kind of guy who'd fuck him in the alley and set him up like, like a fucktoy on the side."

"Jared--" Katie starts, but Jared cuts her off.

"It doesn't matter, K." He's gone over this again and again, all night long, and it always comes back to the look in Jensen's eyes as he told Jared it never seemed to work out any other way. "I missed the call on the guy, okay? I'll live."

Jared closes his eyes and leans his head back against the window. It's not subtle--he hears Katie snort--but she doesn't say anything more for the rest of the drive out to the Eastern Shore and the family-run hard-shell crabbing business that's next on the shooting schedule.

* * * *

Jensen keeps Chris and Misha at bay for a week with increasingly flimsy excuses, which is quite the accomplishment given that Misha not only owns the converted warehouse Jensen's lived in since he landed in DC, but lives and works there, too. Chris is easier: he's out on the road a lot, so all Jensen has to do is return calls when he knows Chris can't take them, but all the whole exercise does is delay the inevitable. He's not especially surprised when they show up with a fifth of Chris's favorite bourbon and barbecue from the place down by Fredricksburg that's little more than a cinderblock deathtrap but has the best ribs known to man.

"Jesus Christ, have you even showered this week?" Chris demands when Jensen opens the door and blinks owlishly in the light from the setting sun. "Eat, goddamnit," he says when Jensen can't come up with anything to say. "And then you're telling us what the fuck is going on if I have to pull it out of you myself."

"How appetizing," Jensen says, but he lets them in and gets down real plates and heavy glasses for the whiskey. The apartment is spotless, scrubbed to within an inch of Jensen's life. He can see Misha taking it all in with a single glance; what Misha can't see is that every file, every drawer, every cupboard is just as spotless, and reorganized to boot--plus, every project, even the little things that generally aren't worth the time it takes to write them up and e-mail them, are done and filed and there are a dozen outstanding proposals waiting for editors to get back to him.

Jensen's subconscious isn't subtle, but just because he knows that about himself doesn't mean he's felt the need to stop it in the last week.

Chris props his feet up on the table in front of the sofa and accidentally on purpose kicks the stack of magazines there to the floor. Jensen lets it go.

The ribs are good, as always, and maybe Jensen isn't quite as far gone as he's been thinking, because he doesn't even get twitchy about how they're using paper towels for napkins or how they're just tossing them into a pile on the floor once they need new ones.

"Okay," Jensen says, before they can get going on him again. "You have to let me tell this from the beginning." Chris rolls his eyes but nods, and Jensen starts with San Antonio and the bar and the Home Run Derby.

"You're fucking kidding me," Chris says, right before he all but falls off the couch laughing. "You hooked up with the guy you were interviewing? You?"

"Shut up," Jensen grumbles, finally giving in and collecting all the dishes and crap to take over to the sink. Chris ignores him and keeps right on laughing. "You act like I'm a monk or something."

"Or something," Chris agrees. "Seriously, man, this last year I've lost count of all the guys you've left crying in their scotch because you won't give them the time of day, and you go off and screw a guy you have to work with the next day? Were you high?" He turns to Misha. "Does he even get high?"

"Remind me why I let you in my house again?" Jensen flops back down on the couch and eyes Chris sourly. Chris snickers at him again, but reaches back and grabs the bottle of bourbon and pours another slug into Jensen's glass.

"Because I put up with your shit," Chris says. Jensen snorts. "And I bring the good stuff."

"Yeah, yeah," Jensen mutters, taking another drink. It really is the good stuff--single-barrel, hand-drawn bourbon from a tiny distillery in Tennessee that Chris swears is located on a creek that flows straight from heaven. There are times when Jensen wonders if Chris goes to Tennessee for Nashville or because it's a good excuse to head out and buy another case. "Trust me, I wasn't exactly planning on anything like that happening. It just... happened."

"And then you got up and went and did the interview?" Misha makes an impatient gesture; Chris pours himself another half-glass. "Just like that?"

"Yeah," Jensen answers. "I did." He doesn't actually say believe it or not, but he can't keep it completely out of his voice.

"How'd that work out?" Chris's voice is curious, but not unkind.

"Easier than you'd ever believe," Jensen says, thinking about the morning and breakfast; Jared's hands moving, clean and sure. "I just needed enough for a sidebar--they were doing profiles of the reality show winners. It ended up being the easiest thing I've written in a long time. Even with the, uh, complications," he adds quietly.

"Good," Misha says, just as quietly. "On both counts, especially since it's been a while since you've let anything complicate your life."

"Guys--" Jensen starts.

"Seriously, Jen," Chris says. "It's been almost a year. I know all hell broke loose there at the end, but it's about time you got back out there."

"One random hook-up isn't--"

"Save it, Ackles. One random hook-up isn't much for me or Misha, or, hell, half the city, but for you? It's like signing the Declaration."

Jensen shrugs, watching the amber liquid slosh around in his glass, and Misha says, "Plus, it wasn't just the once, right?"

"Oh, yeah, it gets even better," Jensen answers. The other two shut up and let him get through the whole disaster after the last dinner, not saying anything until he finishes, and even then there's a long look exchanged between them before Chris says, "Not that I'm jumping on you or anything, but maybe you were wrong?"

"Given my track record?" Jensen asks, and the three of them go back far enough that he doesn't try particularly hard to keep the bitter edge out of his voice.

"Look," Chris sighs. "Two guys don't make the entire world bad."

"I appreciate the pep talk, but seriously." Jensen can't help it; he can't sit there and watch them watch him. It's probably not any better that he's up and pacing around the room--Misha's psychoanalytic brain has got to be having a field day--but it at least burns off some of the jittery tension talking about this, any of this, always causes. He's changed a lot about his life, but the part where he should never acknowledge that he's allowed it to get messy is something he's not sure he's ever going to get past. "I'm close to thirty and I've had two serious relationships in my life, let two guys get close, and both of them--"

Jensen closes his mouth with a snap, before it all--all the ugliness, all the humiliation and the self-loathing--comes spilling out. It could happen to anyone once, but twice? Jensen is just fooling himself that he has any kind of judgement when it comes to getting naked with guys.

"At least you've had two that were serious," Chris says, in the voice that says they're probably not stopping until the bottle of bourbon is gone. Judging from his sigh, Misha recognizes it, too. Jensen has absolutely no problem with that plan.

"You two are definitely a pair tonight. Made for each other," Misha says, like he's doing much better.

Chris snorts. "As long as it doesn't involve getting naked, yeah, we're made for each other."

"Moron," Jensen says, tossing back the rest of what's in his glass in one breath. "As if you're my type at all."

"Hey," Chris yells. "Treat that with respect--it didn't sit in an oak barrel for eight years for you to knock it back like it's rotgut."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Jensen says, holding out his glass. "C'mon, hit me again. And you're behind. Both of you."

"Christ, this is going to get ugly," Chris says, but he fills Jensen's glass and adds more to his own. Jensen's been all about the control this last week, making sure his life was as orderly as he can make it, and that's done shit for him.

Time for a change.

Sometime in the night, before things get too blurred--so it's before dawn, because Jensen definitely remembers seeing the sky starting to lighten and not being able to figure out why for a couple of minutes--Chris takes his glass out of his hand and makes him pay attention to Misha, sitting on the floor in lotus position. "I think you want to go see if you were wrong, and I don't think that's such a bad idea," Misha says.

Chris nods solemnly. Jensen pretends like he doesn't understand, but he's sure Misha knows he's gotten his point across, even if all Jensen does is roll his eyes and reach for the bottle.

All in all, it's not a bad way to spend the night, other than the part Jensen always forgets: bourbon hangovers suck.

"Hey, look," Jensen says, as Chris finally manages to get himself vertical and out the door the next day. "Thanks. For all of it."

Misha had disappeared sometime after dawn. Based on prior experience--and a deeply held suspicion that he must have a hyperbaric chamber to speed-cure his hangovers--he'll pop up shortly and continue to harass Jensen until he makes a decision.

"What are friends for, if not to invite themselves over and flirt with alcohol poisoning?" Chris is still pale, but the shower had helped. At least he's not green anymore. "Catch you later, man."

Jensen watches him head down the hall toward the stairs, and Jensen is finally, blessedly alone, even if that does mean he doesn't have much of an excuse not to think things through.

It's only a little after five--neither one of them had so much as twitched before three--so Jensen fishes the loaf of Wonder bread out of the freezer--he keeps a stash of its comforting blandness for emergencies like this--and makes himself a dinner of peanut-butter toast to go along with the gallon of water he's choking down while he thinks about his options.

They're pretty basic: play it safe, assume he was right and move on; or take a risk. Since his lizard brain is all about never saying Jared's name out loud again, Jensen is pretty sure he should be doing the exact opposite of that even though he's also aware that if he was wrong, Jared would be fully justified in taking one look at him and decking him.

Jared had said he had a couple more weeks of shooting, but he hadn't said where. That's okay, though; Jensen can research. It's his specialty, after all. Dealing with people gets him into trouble, but research? He can do that. Later, though. After he stops feeling like he's going to throw up all his internal organs.

It doesn't take him long to find Jared's crew the next morning. There are a trail of stories in local papers along the Eastern Shore, and in one of them Jared mentions that he's really looking forward to an extended visit in Williamsburg. The dates match, and when Jensen calls the newsroom at WTKR the nice intern tells him that yes, Jared Padalecki's still in the area, filming at one of the restored buildings in the colonial village.

Before Jensen can talk himself out of it, he showers and gets in the car. It's only a couple of hours and if he focuses on something else he can make it there before he talks himself out of it. The weather is okay--cloudy and cold, but no rain or sleet or snow--and traffic is light; he makes a conscious choice to see that as the universe helping him along. He's made it around Richmond and almost to the split to Roanoke when Chris calls. Jensen's tempted to let it go to voicemail, but he's done that too often lately so he braces himself and takes the call.

Chris laughs when Jensen admits where he is, but only a little. "Want me to go find Danneel so she can give you the sincere, supportive friend speech?"

"Nah," Jensen says. "I'll live without it. Look, I'm almost to my exit--"

"Yeah, yeah," Chris says. "I don't hear from you in the next couple of days and I really will sic Danni on you."

"I'll be in touch," Jensen promises. Chris makes a rude noise. "I will--I mean, I might only be telling you to leave me alone, but I swear I won't go underground."

Chris just grunts and the call beeps off, which leaves Jensen with nothing to do but navigate his way through all the tourist crap that lines the outskirts of Williamsburg. He parks and finds the bus and buys a ticket and figures out where Jared's actually shooting and gets all the way to the inn before he hits the unmovable roadblock, in the form of the security team that isn't buying his story of being there for an interview.

"I'm sorry, sir," the guy at the door keeps saying. "But if you're not on the list, you're not on the list, and I will lose my job if I let you in."

Jensen's about to let it go--trying to get on set was worth a shot, but if he's gotten this far with the whole stupid idea he can keep himself from bailing for a few more hours while he waits around for Jared to finish up and come out on his own--when Chad comes out and sees him.

"I got it, Mike; thanks," he says to the guard while he motions Jensen over. "Dude," he hisses to Jensen. "You have exactly one minute to convince me why I should let you near my boy, and the only reason you're getting even that long is because he's a fucking mess and nothing I've got has worked so far."

"We left some things… hanging," Jensen says, after a couple of seconds. "I'm here to finish the conversation, but I'm not making any promises that it'll be better if I do."

Chad looks at him for a long moment, then shrugs. "Yeah, it's a crapshoot, but I guess you're better than nothing."

Jensen should probably object to that characterization, but since he mostly agrees, he keeps his mouth shut. He follows Chad inside the inn, stepping carefully over cabling and power cords and all the trappings of the twenty-first century duct-taped to the eighteenth-century background. They're shooting in the kitchen, at the back of the house; Chad leaves him just outside the door with another hiss to stay out of sight until they've got the last shot.

They have the door propped open to get a little air into the room; Jensen can stay mostly out of sight but still see where Jared's set up behind a big oak table with an enormous fireplace at his back, people milling around dealing with lights and microphones. They have blackout curtains blocking the light from the outside doors and windows, and cutting the good-sized room down to a tiny section around Jared that feels claustrophobic even though Jensen's standing on the other side of the door.

"Sasquatch," Chad yells from where he and a couple of other guys are clustered around a monitor, sheets of paper in hand. "We are so close I can taste the first round you're buying for everyone. Mr. Director here tells me we need one last setup of you manhandling that stuffing; one good, clean shot of the ham while you're stuffing it with the stuffing" -- there's a burst of tired laughter from everyone, like it's a lame joke but it's their lame joke and they'll laugh at it until they kill someone -- "and one prettypretty shot of the whole thing going over the fire. Three setups, three shots, and we are done for the week." There's a ragged cheer at that and Jared takes a deep breath and nods.

"Let's do it," Chad says, and the whole production moves into action. Jensen stays outside, but he edges closer as they work. With all the lights in Jared's face, Jensen might as well be standing in a cave. Jared takes another couple of deep breaths and Jensen sees him step into whatever headspace it is that lets him talk individually to every single person who's watching him. They hand him a couple of big spoons to mix the stuffing, but he laughs and says everyone knows he's not going to miss a chance to play with his food as he leaves them on the table and digs into the huge bowl with both hands. He stops and lets them reset so they can get close-ups, not losing the attitude, and they keep moving fast, getting him a butterflied, bone-in ham to stuff and roll and tie. They stop twice for close-ups there and Jared's a little more subdued each time they come back, but it still looks and sounds good. He hangs on until they finally get the last shot of him moving the huge cast-iron dutch oven over the fire before he lets go of it all, and Jensen steps back out of range as they kill the lights and call it a day.

He hears Chad call Jared over and into a low, murmured conversation--more quiet than he would have thought either of them capable of--and he's not surprised to see Jared at the door a couple of seconds later, no smile at all in his eyes.

"I don't--I know you're in the middle of work," Jensen says. "I just wanted to talk for a couple of minutes."

Jared doesn't move for a few seconds, then nods his head toward the front of the inn. "Sure," he says, flat and even. It's not right, Jared's voice with no emotion, no animation, but Jensen can't really do anything about it. He walks back out the way he came, Jared close and silent behind him. Once they get outside it's loud and bright, the street full of tourists and school groups, with little groups of costumed interpreters milling around. He lets Jared lead them around the side of the building, away from everything, but once they're alone again, he still doesn't know what to say.

"I'm sorry I just left," Jensen finally says, because that's the truth, at least. "It wasn't fair."

Jared nods, a small, contained movement that's really not like him, but something around his eyes relaxes. "I wish you hadn't, but staying probably wouldn't have made much difference. It was more what you said. I don't know that your being here now is going to change anything."

It's what Jensen expected to hear, but it's still a disappointment. "You were there with a date," he says quietly. "And we were fucking on my car. That's not what I want my life to be."

"Katie's the supervising producer," Jared says. "She's inside now, if you want to talk to her, but we hang out when we're on the road. Keep each other out of trouble." He gets quiet again, then adds, "I would have told you that, if you'd asked."

"Maybe you could have told me that before things got going," Jensen said.

Jared sighs. "Maybe I should have, but it didn't occur to me--I mean, it's just Katie, we don't think of each other like that, and besides, I was too wound up, being there with you. And then, I--just. You said some really bad stuff, about me, and you, and--"

"I have had some pretty craptastic luck in the relationship department," Jensen says. "Or, no, not luck, because that makes it sound like it's all out of my control, and that's not right. I just, you had a date and we were fucking behind her back and how was I supposed to know she wasn't a date?"

"I--look, you just assumed I'd do something shitty like that." Jared pushes his hair back off his face and he doesn't look happy, but he's at least talking to Jensen, not at some point over his shoulder. "That's what I--what I can't--"

"What you can't get past," Jensen finishes for him.

"Yeah," Jared says. "I mean, I get that I was all over you and it was hotter than hell, me sucking you off in that alley, like, my brain wasn't working, I get that I should have said something, but knowing you thought that about me… That, it hurt and I can't figure out how to let go of it."

"I thought about Katie, and I was back to being second-best," Jensen says. "I couldn't believe I'd done it again, and yeah, it hurt."

It gets quiet, and it's not exactly comfortable, but it's better than it was. Jensen thinks he's going to have to live with that.

"So," Jared says after a bit. "Where does that leave us?"

"I don't know," Jensen answers. "Maybe we should leave well enough alone and let it all go."

"Maybe," Jared says. He's quiet for a few seconds. "We could still talk, though. Right?"

"I don't--" Jensen breaks off, because Jared's looking at him again, looking at him, not over his shoulder, and Jensen isn't going to be the one who makes him stop, no matter how bad an idea keeping in touch is going to be. "Yeah, I guess."

"Okay," Jared says, a tiny smile in his eyes. "Look, I have to get back in there, but we'll be going out after, do you want to --"

"No," Jensen says. "I think it's probably better if I go, but thanks." There's an awkward second where Jensen doesn't know whether to shake Jared's hand or what, but in the end, he just nods and starts back toward where he parked his car.

"Jen," Jared calls. When Jensen turns around, he shrugs. "I was wrong; it does make a difference that you came."

"Good," Jensen says. "I'm glad."

* * * *

His cell phone ringing jolts Jensen out of the first real sleep he's gotten since everything fell apart with Jared. "Are you awake?" Mackenzie says, as soon as he manages to answer. "I need you to be awake, Jensen. I'm set for interviews and stuff in two weeks."

"Terrific--"

"Jen," Mackenzie interrupts, her voice dropping in dramatic fashion. "These aren't admissions interviews. They're the final round of this scholarship I applied for," she finishes in a whisper.

"What happened to Pi Phi at UT?" Jensen teases. "How it was going to be easier to just go with the flow…?"

"Ninety-nine percent sure," Mackenzie answers. "That's plenty of room to change my mind."

"Of course."

"And, okay, here's the big thing--can I stay with you?"

Jensen is dumbfounded, enough that she hurries on before he can answer. "The only time I could schedule the interviews, Mom has some stuff going on and I know it's a huge imposition, and I totally understand if you don't want me all up in your business--"

"No!" Jensen finally manages to say. "No, it's good. Of course you can stay with me if you want to."

"Oh, thank God," Mackenzie says. "You weren't saying anything and I thought I'd messed everything up there for a couple of seconds."

"I was just… surprised that-- Have you--Does Dad know about this?"

"He said it was fine with him, but that he didn't want me to get my hopes up because you'd made it clear you didn't want to be bothered with family."

"Let me guess," Jensen says, through gritted teeth. "It was all very quiet and civilized."

"Well, of course," Mackenzie says. "I brought it up at dinner, because you know it's easier when they're both in the same room and haven't had time to get their stories straight--" Jensen doesn't, actually, but there's another reason why his little sister is going to take over the world-- "and I was just as polite, because it's easy to be that way when I know I'm right, but then you were quiet and I thought maybe he was right after all and--"

"No," Jensen says. "He's not."

"Good," Mackenzie answers. "And not just because I need a place to stay. You know that, right?" Jensen mmms a quiet affirmative, because she's off on her next tear. "Oh, God, this is really happening. Okay, okay, I need to be calm and have Mom get my flights and think about what I'm going to wear--How much luggage do you think I can bring with me?"

Jensen closes his eyes for a second, and then looks around his tiny apartment with its one bed and practically nonexistent bathroom. Now might be a good time to invest in an air mattress. And maybe ask Misha where he gets the coat racks they use when they're staging a dinner in somebody's house.

* * * *

"Okay," Katie says, on their last night. The season's wrapped and it's just the three of them and a fifth of Wild Turkey Special Reserve, back on the bus. It's a bad idea, since they all have early morning flights, but splitting the bottle was the best compromise they could come up with. "I have kept my mouth shut," Chad snorts, but Katie ignores him, "for a week--shut up, Chad--but we're done now, and I'm not going to just leave it like this."

"Yeah," Chad says, the righteous look on his face not hiding the the evil smirk in his eyes one bit. "She's not going to leave it like this."

"Leave what like what?" Jared asks. He's not stupid enough to think Katie'll get distracted, but he can at least make her work for it.

"You," Katie says, closing in on Jared. "And the effing gorgeous guy from the underground restaurant." Jared squirms away from her on the couch, even though he knows it's useless, and sure enough Katie follows right along until Jared's trapped at the end. "He tracked you down. And?"

"Oh, come on," Jared says. "Don't tell me you were watching us."

"Dude," Chad says. "You were a freaking zombie after that shit went down. Of course we were watching you; we'd been watching you the entire goddamned week. I still don't know how you didn't set yourself on fire a couple of times."

He gives Jared that Jesus-Christ-I-don't-know-why-I-even-care look, but Jared recognizes the stubborn glint in his eye.

"We talked, okay?" Jared's going for calm and mature; what he ends up with is sulky teenager.

Katie sighs. "You talked. We saw that. And?"

"He apologized. I apologized." Jared shrugs. "We've talked, like, twice, since then. Just talking," Jared adds, before Chad can put words to the leer forming on his face.

"And you're good with that," Katie says, her tone so neutral she might as well be screaming liarliarpantsonfire.

"Sure," Jared answers, just as neutrally. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Don't ask me," Katie mutters, giving up and reaching for the bourbon. "I just work here."

Jared lets her refill his glass and pretends he's not thinking about all the reasons he's not okay with how things stand between him and Jensen.

* * * *

"I like Misha," Mackenzie says from her perch on Jensen's couch, where she's been ensconced since her arrival three days before. "But I probably shouldn't tell you that, should I?"

Jensen thinks about his sweet baby sister and Misha, and shakes his head. "God, please don't, at least not for a couple of years."

"Well," Mackenzie says, motioning impatiently for Jensen to hand over the caramel corn that they finally managed to make without burning, "if it makes you feel any better, he looks at me like I'm a little girl he wants to spoil, not like anything more grown-up."

"Good," Jensen says. "Really. Good."

"Yeah, that usually bugs me, but I think it's probably for the best this time." She crams a handful of popcorn in her mouth and Jensen breathes a sigh of relief that unfortunately turns out to be short-lived. "Now, Chris, on the other hand…"

Jensen counts to ten, because he's pretty sure she's yanking his chain, and sure enough, she's laughing at him, a long peal that reminds him of summers and the brat who always wanted to tag along with him.

"God, your face," Mackenzie says, still giggling, and he throws a handful of popcorn at her on principle. "Like he's treated me like anything but an extra sister. Anyway. I really like your friends--they're awesome and funny, and Danneel is gorgeous and she's going to take me shopping tomorrow, so I need to go get some cash, okay? You have a great life, which is what I've been imagining you having for years since you've been in your not-talking-to-people-at-home mood--which I totally understand and support, because hi, I live there, too; I know how all up-into-themselves they can be, but are you just not introducing me to your boyfriend, or do you really not have one?"

Jensen is proud that he doesn't choke on his own popcorn, but that doesn't last long because there's still a question to answer. "Free as a bird," he manages to say, but he knows before he's finished that it's not going to satisfy her.

"Why?" Mackenzie watches him closely. "You're funny and smart and gorgeous--and I know you; you're the biggest romantic I've ever met."

"It just is what it is, princess." He'd thought he was to the point where he believed that, but then Jared happened.

"Yeah, so I'd like to think, but everybody gets this look when I mention it, and then they change the subject really fast." She cocks her head at him. "Like you're doing right now. Was whatever happened really all that bad?"

"Nobody died, if that's what you're asking," Jensen says.

"I know you've grown up thinking I'm this bubble-headed princess, because that's what everybody thinks and it's easier to let them think that and go do my own thing while they're not paying attention, but I'm really not, and--"

"No," Jensen says. "I know that. I do. I'm sorry I let you get caught in the crossfire of all the stuff between Dad and me. I'm so sorry I missed the last couple of years."

Mackenzie smiles at him, dazzling, and Jensen does not envy the poor saps who have fallen or are going to fall into her web. Then again, he's not going to mind the company. "Thank you." She puts down the bowl of caramel corn and crawls over to join him on the floor and hug him. "You're sweet, but are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Jensen answers. "I just swore off dating for a while. And maybe I let it get to me a little too much. That's what Chris thinks."

"What does Misha think?"

"Misha likes it when I'm miserable," Jensen says. "Means I spend ridiculous amounts of time on his crazy ideas."

"I think he came up with the crazy idea to get you out of your funk, but hey, I'm just the little sister, what do I know?"

"Not that I am for a second doubting your evil genius, but I honestly don't think that's what got Misha all cranked up about the supper-club thing."

She smiles at him as though he's completely brainless but she loves him anyway, and moves on for her next surgical strike. "So there's been, like, nobody since the stupid moron who stomped on your heart?"

From the way she says it, he can tell she knows about Jared. She probably wormed it out of Chris. "There was somebody, but… I jumped to conclusions and he took offense and… It didn't really work out."

"Did you want it to?" she asks. "Or did you just mess up to get out of it?"

"You are too young to know that much about how to sabotage a relationship," Jensen says, honestly shocked.

"Please." Mackenzie waves her hand, airy and dismissive. "I go to an all-girls boarding school. Half the girls who go there are in therapy and the other half should be. You really don't want to know what I know."

"Dad must be thrilled at the extra value he's getting for his money," Jensen mutters.

"He'd stroke out if he knew even a tenth of the drama that goes on. But really, he should be impressed. I mean, there's all this stuff happening but our SAT scores are aces and everybody looks fabulous at the deb balls. You think that happens by accident?"

"I'm afraid to ask, but I probably should--"

"Oh, no," Mackenzie says. "I'm fine. Number One: I am too smart to get caught up in it all. People-smart, not book-smart, though I'm doing pretty damn okay there, too. Number Two: I do have a therapist and she's awesome, so I don't cut or drink or snort coke or starve myself or puke anytime I eat something or sleep with any guy who smiles at me or blow them in the back seat and claim I'm saving myself for marriage." She stops to take a breath and Jensen feels a little sick at the horrors she's just blithely rattled off. "And Number Three: don't think I'm forgetting that you haven't answered my question yet."

"Number One--I know you're smart, but that doesn't mean things can't happen that are too much for you, so, Number Two--you call me if you need to talk to somebody who isn't a shrink." Jensen glares at her, waiting for her nod of acknowledgment before he finishes with, "And Number Three… no, I think I just messed up."

"Did you tell him that?"

"Yeah, I did." Jensen takes the popcorn she offers and pokes through it. "It's better--we're at least on speaking terms now, but… That's about as far as we've gotten."

"Would you want more if he did? I mean, he screwed up, too--seriously, don't look at me like that; you didn't do whatever you did in a vacuum."

"I don't know, princess," Jensen says. "Maybe."

"Well," Mackenzie sighs. "At least you're talking. That's something, right?"

"It is," Jensen says, quietly. "It really is."

* * * *

"Man, you know I love you like a brother," Rafael says, as Jared reaches over the bar for another beer. It's late, and he's been drinking for the whole night, but he's mostly just mellow and he can walk back to the condo if he needs to. "But if you're still here in five minutes, you're helping me break down the range for spring cleaning."

"I could do that," Jared answers, shrugging. "It always goes faster if we both do it."

"It does." Rafe wipes down the bar and eyes Jared curiously. "I figured you'd have better things to do by now."

"Man, not you, too." Jared drinks half the beer in one go. "I'm on vacation, okay? I can do any damn thing I want."

"Not sayin' you can't," Rafe agrees. Jared waits, but he doesn't say anything more. But Jared knows that look in his eye, the one that says he's not going anywhere if Jared wants to talk about it, and if he doesn't, well, Rafe will just make him.

"I'm just… really tired of everybody thinking I'm something I'm not," Jared finally offers, coming around the bar so they can head back into the kitchen together. They break down the range twice a year, tear it apart for cleaning and reassemble it in the space of a night. If Jared thinks about it, he can remember every single time he's done it, him and Rafe; every year from the time he was fifteen until the first year after he won. It's disgusting, but there's always a bottle of tequila around to ease the way and there's something therapeutic about getting everything clean enough to shine.

Rafe doesn't say anything, not until Jared's stripped down to a 'beater and jeans and they have the front panel off and soaking. The kitchen's still hotter than hell; the near-boiling water they're dumping over the dissassembled parts in the sink only adds to the humidity and the shot Rafe pours for them just amps everything up even more.

"And that's different from the way it's always been, how?" Rafe finally asks.

"It's not," Jared sighs, tossing the burner guards into the sink to soak.

"Never bothered you before," Rafe says. "Or were you just going along with it?"

"Nah, it never really did," Jared says. "I never cared." He reaches back for a wrench to loosen up the last couple of bolts holding the cooktop shield on. "I still don't, mostly."

If it had been anyone other than Rafe, they'd have smacked Jared upside the head and told him to get on with it, but that's why Jared only talks like this to Rafe; always has, from the time he was sixteen on.

"You remember when I was in here last summer?" Jared says, after a while. "The All-Star Game was on."

"Yeah," Rafe says, nodding. "You left with a guy."

Jared laughs, because trust Rafe to be keeping an eye on him, even now. "Yeah, I did. He's kinda still around." It's a half-hour and another three shots each before Jared finishes telling him everything that's happened.

"Seems pretty simple to me. The ball's in your court, man." Rafe wipes the sweat out of his eyes with the back of his wrist.

"I guess," Jared says. "I don't really know what I want, though."

"Bullshit," Rafe snorts. Jared starts to object, but Rafe fixes him with a cut-the-crap look and he ends up shrugging.

"You know exactly what you want." Rafe pours out another two shots. "You just don't want to admit it."

"Maybe," Jared mutters.

"Now, there's a surprise," Rafe says. "Look, you skate by on whatever, it's all good--because you honestly don't care. Until you do."

"Shut up and give me the damn tequila," Jared says.

Chapter Text

The first time Jared calls after Williamsburg, Jensen isn't surprised--Jared wouldn't have asked to keep in touch if he hadn't meant to follow through--but he does assume that's going to be it. The conversation is short and about as awkward as they've ever been with each other.

The next time Jared calls, Jensen tells him he doesn't need to keep up the front. Jared goes quiet for a long time.

"Do you not want to do this?" Jared asks. "I know it's not the smart thing to do, but--"

"Oh, you're so right," Jensen sighs. "But no, I'm good. I just wanted to make sure you weren't doing it out of some weird sense of obligation."

Jared makes a rude sound, and that's that, enough that Jensen picks up the phone himself a few days later.

"Hey," Jared says, sounding a little preoccupied. "I'm glad you called."

"Always good to hear," Jensen says.

"I have--I wanted to ask you something."

Jensen waits for a couple of seconds, but Jared's quiet again. "Okay," Jensen says. "Ask away."

"Come be my sous-chef?"

"Come be your sous-chef?" Of all the things Jensen might have expected, that's probably not even on the list. "Don't you have someone to do that already?"

"Yeah, on the show," Jared says. "But I need somebody for a thing in a couple of days, and when I was in DC--" Jensen doesn't think he's imagining that Jared's delivery falters a little when he mentions his visit, but it's the first time they've even skated close to talking about it so he gives Jared credit for that. "Y'know, I got to watch you do your thing, and you do good live."

"You're serious," Jensen says slowly. "Start from the beginning."

"Right," Jared sighs. "Sorry--there was this auction, a couple of months back; the network sponsored it, to benefit Share Our Strength?" Jensen makes an affirmative sound; he vaguely remembers seeing a promo or two when he was zapping commercials through Jared's show. "Anyway, I was one of the lots--dinner for twelve at this place in Napa, with a couple of cases of Vinoce cab."

"Tell me it's not the Reserve, because Chris has been trying for six months to get his hands on a bottle of that."

"You want me to start lying to you now?" Jared says, laughing as Jensen all but moans at the thought. "Yeah, the 2006 Reserve. Anyway, we're set to go for next week, and I'm gonna need an extra set of hands. I can get somebody from the network, but, I don't know, I thought maybe you'd be interested..."

"What're you doing?" Jensen asks, and then sits through a long moment while Jared doesn't answer. "Wait," Jensen says, sitting up straight. "You have cases of the 2006 Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon from Vinoce and you don't know what you're going to serve with it?"

"I'll figure it out. I want to taste it first," Jared says, and Jensen can hear the whatever shrug in his voice. "I have a couple of days before the thing with nothing on the schedule. It'll be fine." Jensen doesn't say anything but he knows Jared can't be as nonchalant as he's trying to be, so he just waits until Jared sighs. "Okay, fine. We're supposed to be serving outside, so anything formal is out, which, y'know, is probably a good idea given that they've got me for a chef. I'm thinking about short ribs, braised in some of the cab. I can get my hands on some really excellent grass-fed beef."

"Thank you," Jensen answers. "I knew you had a plan in there somewhere."

"It could all change," Jared says. Jensen snorts. "Okay, probably not. I've had their non-reserve a couple of times. It should work well. The question is: are you going to come with me?"

A million Danger, Will Robinson alarms go off in Jensen's head: he doesn't need to be spending time with the guy he's lucky to even be speaking to, but he still barely hesitates.

"Yeah," Jensen says, ignoring every one of those alarms. "Sure."

"Awesome," Jared says, and Jensen really, really hopes he's right. Jared has an airline confirmation number to him the next day, and leaves a message saying he'll meet Jensen at SFO because he's planning to be in the city for a massive farmer's market shopping spree anyway. Jensen takes it as a good sign that Jared's at least thinking about what the hell he's going to be serving, even if it's only a day before the actual event.

Chris and Misha both think it's a stupid idea, and tell Jensen so in no uncertain terms. Misha's quiet, as always, but Chris gets loud enough that Jensen's upstairs neighbor pounds on the ceiling to let them know he's about to call the property manager and complain. Jensen finally gets them to shut up when he admits that he agrees with them, but he's still not going to say no.

After a long look between the two of them, one that makes Jensen think Mackenzie might not have been entirely wrong about some things, Chris sighs and says he'll come by and pick up the mail, and Misha tells him to take notes, and that's it. Jensen figures their good intentions won't last long and it's only a matter of time before they crack and start yelling at him, but with a little luck it won't happen until he's back.

It's a smooth flight, and Jared's waiting outside baggage claim in an enormous SUV with tinted windows and every bell and whistle Jensen's ever heard of in a car. More importantly, he's got lunch: vegetable spring rolls wrapped in rice paper so thin it's nearly transparent, with a shock of fresh mint tucked into the neat bundles of julienned carrots and peppers and a super hot and rich peanut sauce to dunk them in.

Jensen maybe makes an embarrassing noise at the first bite, but after a four hours on a plane plus the hellish hour in Dulles before they took off, he thinks he's entitled.

"It's just to take the edge off," Jared says, steering with his elbows for a second while he grabs one for himself. Jensen closes his eyes so he won't see himself die. At least they're in a big enough car that it'd take a semi to really flatten them, but he makes sure his seatbelt is latched, just in case. "I mean, I usually end up trying out pretty much everything I'm thinking about buying," Jared says. "If that's not cool with you, we can stop and get something more."

"'m fine," Jensen says quickly. He doesn't have any problem with that agenda, and if he had, he'd have shut up anyway just to keep Jared's attention on the road. He gets another spring roll and hands it to Jared, working the timing so that all eyes are kept on the road and he can relax and finish off the last few rolls.

The Alemany Farmer's Market is a good one; permanent fixtures and a friendly, comfortable vibe. Jared loads up with a stash of bags and sets off, just wandering at first. He's wearing sunglasses, aviators, but he keeps pushing them up on the top of his head to look more closely at things--and to steal glances at Jensen. Jensen manages to keep his mouth shut long enough that Jared finally caves and says, "Okay, I know this is killing you, but I really do have a plan."

"Hey, I'm just the assistant here," Jensen answers. "Nobody has any clue who I am, so if it ends up a mess I'm free and clear."

"Shut up," Jared mutters. "Okay, I'm sticking with the short ribs. The delivery came in this morning and they're gorgeous. I don't have to fool with appetizers or dessert; we're covered on those." Jensen arches an eyebrow and waits patiently, and Jared rolls his eyes and digs into his pocket, handing over a crumpled piece of paper filled with surprisingly legible notes. "They're starting with grilled watermelon," he continues, while Jensen scans the page. "And then some braised white asparagus and flash-fried quail, and ending with chocolate cream pie--"

"Valrhona crème pie," Jensen corrects in a distracted murmur, making note of the rest of the accents: black truffle and a chicken liver mousseline with the watermelon; a Meyer lemon sabayon and a chocolate merlot reduction with the asparagus; and nothing but the quail, which is a little surprising given the rest of the accompaniments, but Jensen definitely approves. All the quail needs is a few herbs--anything else would overwhelm it. Jared makes a rude noise and Jensen looks up to see him grinning.

"Yeah, yeah." Jared rolls his eyes. "Valrhona cream pie, whatever. It's still chocolate cream pie, like you can get in every diner in the South. Just amped up a little."

"That's kind of the theme of this dinner, right?" Jensen looks at the page of notes again. "Down-home, but upscale."

"Yeah." Jared shrugs. "We worked it out with the winner, and that was the deal. You'd think if you paid as much as he did for this thing, he'd go a little more exotic, but whatever."

"Do I want to know how much this went for?"

"You probably don't," Jared says. "It makes me freak every time I think about it. Like, seriously, somebody paid more than my mom makes in a year for dinner? For me to come cook them dinner?"

"Yeah, you're right; don't tell me," Jensen answers, trying to sort through what's already nailed down and what they can play with, how many different competing flavors they're going to have to juggle. "Uh, do we have a budget?"

"Nope," Jared snorts. "Or, well, we do, but I don't think I could actually spend that much if I tried, so whatever you're thinking, we got it."

"So... the short ribs, and the wine--stuff that good, we don't want to take away from it, right?"

"Yeah," Jared answers, drawing it out. "Meat and potatoes, right? Over the top, of course." He spins on his heel and starts down the first row, already calling out to the woman in the first stall. Jensen rolls his eyes and follows along.

"Really. Don't you have somebody to do this for you?" he mutters as Jared waits for the woman to check if she has the case of baby carrots he's decided he needs.

"That'd be you," Jared says, laughing. "Oh, yeah, nice," he says to the woman, taking a bite of the carrot she holds out to him, tiny and vivid orange, and so sweet it's like candy when Jared passes it along to Jensen. Cash changes hands and Jared promises to be back to pick up the case and they're off again. "Seriously, though, I don't. Have anybody to do this for me--I mean, I could, but this is half the fun, y'know?"

He flashes that million-dollar grin again and Jensen can't really argue.

Once Jared gets going, he adds ideas, layers on top of layers, until they barely make it back to the car with everything they're going to need. He goes with a shrimp and potato and corn soup, sort of a Frogmore Stew, to start, and hunts down turnip greens for the salad. Somewhere in there, he decided they could upgrade the ribs by enriching the sauce with foie gras, so they have to make a side trip to buy a cooler to carry that in, but finally they're loaded up and ready to go with the baby carrots, another case of haricots verts, and tiny pattypan squash with such delicate skin that Jensen thinks about packing it in cotton. They have about fifteen pounds of potatoes and parsnips, and then there's an armload of herbs cut fresh while they watched.

Jared drums along to the satellite radio, album tracks that were classic before either of them were even born, navigating out of the city to the quiet murmurs of the GPS. It's surprisingly peaceful--Jared's even keeping his eyes on the road--and Jensen finds himself relaxing into the leather seat.

"Sorry," Jared says, with a quick flickering glance. "For dragging you straight off the plane and into the whole thing. You look wiped out."

"No, it's fine," Jensen says. "It's what I'm here for, right?"

"It's only another hour," Jared says, and lets Jensen zone out until they're pulling into the estate--there really isn't any other word for it, Jensen thinks--and climbing past the main house and around to a low, one-story building on the edge of a pool and some terraces.

"The wine house," Jared says, dry and matter-of-fact, but his expression matches Jensen's frame of mind. This is about as far from people paying him and Kane and Misha to throw food on the table as Jensen's ever thought about getting. Farther. "I know," Jared says. "Three days ago I was in hip waders out on the Brazos, gutting fish with 70-year-old brothers, and then I get off the plane and pull in here."

"Hard life," Jensen says.

"Weird, anyway," Jared answers. "But I gotta tell you, you're gonna love the kitchen. Man, I almost cried when I saw it." He circles around to the back and grabs a box from their haul before leading Jensen in the front door. "The wine cellar is over there--" he nods to the left--"and the rest of this is the kitchen."

The room they walk into--floor-to-ceiling windows facing out over the terraces, cherry woodwork and acres of black granite counters, a table that'll seat at least twenty, dramatic lighting and an endless sweep of pots and pans hanging over the cooking island in the center--is straight-up kitchen porn, but Jensen has a pretty good idea that isn't why Jared so happy with it. Seeing that the pots and pans hanging over their heads are solid, heavy copper, well-used and polished to a blinding gleam, is almost as much of a relief as the eight-burner stove and the double convection ovens. It might be kitchen porn, but it's kitchen porn they can work in.

"I don't know," Jensen says. "I'm not sure I can function in conditions like this." He turns slowly on his heel, taking it all in. "I'll probably end up having nightmares about burning the place down or something."

"There's a pizza oven outside," Jared says. "We could--"

"No," Jensen says, as he starts unpacking the crate he'd carried in. "We can't. No changing of the menu. We've got everything we need already."

"Come on, it's an Acunto," Jared wheedles. "One thousand degrees of pure wood-fired awesomeness… Everything done and perfect in three minutes."

Jensen's tempted. Severely. Who knows when he'll get another chance at an Acunto. But--

"No," he repeats. "No pizzas. They don't go with the rest of the menu."

"It's a good thing you're so pretty," Jared says. "Because you are no fun at all." He goes back out to the car, leaving Jensen standing in the middle of a million-dollar kitchen, his hands full of organic parnsips and carrots, staring after him and wondering if he's hearing things. After a few seconds he goes back to laying everything out on the counter, deciding that he's reading way too much into how Jared runs his mouth.

"I am, too, fun," he mutters, though. It's the principle of the thing.

Jared actually does have a plan; one that coordinates with the other two chefs and their assistants, even, though with the size of the kitchen it's not really a big deal. He and Jensen are the only ones there early; the rest of the team isn't getting in until the next day. They start a stock for the base to braise the ribs in, Jared quick-roasting the bones while Jensen makes short work of the aromatics for the broth. Apparently from nowhere Jared comes up with sandwiches, and fires up a deep fryer to make them chips for dinner.

There's a small courtyard on the other side of the house, away from the pool, and they eat out there. The sandwiches turn out to be bacon, tomato, and arugula on a sourdough that pops off the plate, and the chips are perfectly done.

"They booked us into one of those all-suite hotels," Jared says while they eat. "It's just down the road, so we don't have to add an hour's commute onto whatever time we're gonna need to be here tomorrow morning."

"I'm just along for the ride," Jensen says, watching the shadows from the clouds play over the vineyards spread out in front of him. "But it's probably good not to count on me being coherent in the morning."

"Yeah, you seem to be more of a night person. Either that or you're really good at waking up to keep me entertained in the middle of the night." Jared's voice trails off, like he's just heard what he said. "You know what I mean."

"Yeah," Jensen says, losing the battle to keep a straight face.

"Okay, so there are times when I don't think before I speak," Jared says. "But I'd say we're doing pretty good, because this is the first really awkward moment we've had."

"I guess if we're looking at it like that, we're way out in front of the curve," Jensen answers.

"I don't usually hang out there. In the front, I mean," Jared says. "I plan to enjoy it while it lasts."

Jared's trying too hard, but instead of it being grating and annoying, Jensen's filled with a sort of grateful affection at the stubborn idiot who won't give up on them, even if he is breaking Jensen into tiny little pieces. The least Jensen can do is play along.

"I, on the other hand, actually do find myself on the high end of the curve," he says. "Too many years in school not to know how to play the game."

"Yeah? What'd you study?"

"Linguistics," Jensen says, and laughs at the expression on Jared's face. "Got a nice, shiny PhD and everything. Took a couple of months off after my dissertation defense to bum around France and ended up falling down the rabbit hole." He leaves out the part about Michael and Dr. Jonas's daughter, but more because his time in France feels less and less about them, and more like finding his own way for the first time in his life. "Figured out I could more or less make a living writing about food while I was eating it, too, and never looked back."

"Okay," Jared says. "That was about the last thing I expected to hear, but now it's not all that hard to picture you in a library all night long, studying 'til you fall asleep on your pile of books--"

"Shut up," Jensen says, laughing at how Jared's suddenly doing a pretty spot-on impersonation of Jensen squinting at an imaginary book. "God, you're an ass."

"I am," Jared says, suddenly serious, and they're not talking about school anymore. "I'm stupid and selfish way too much of the time, but I'm trying to be better."

"Jay," Jensen says, equally serious. "That was more about me than you, okay?"

"It's not," Jared says, leaning forward, not quite in Jensen's personal space but close. "It's not okay, because I need to think before I spout off, but we'll let it be for now."

"The way I remember, I was the one who jumped to conclusions," Jensen says.

"Yeah, and I ran right with you, so we're going to call it even, all right?"

"Fine," Jensen sighs.

"Good." Jared settles back in his chair. "Okay, so, linguistics to writing, I got that, but the underground restaurant?"

"That would be Misha's fault," Jensen says, gratefully going along with the change in topic. "And Chris's. But mostly Misha's. He is the master of insane ideas and the thing about it is, he always comes across as not-crazy."

"Yeah, he seemed pretty pulled-together when I met him," Jared says.

"Exactly. I've known him for years--he owns the building I live in, this converted warehouse, in what is thinking about being a revitalized neighborhood. A couple of years ago, it hadn't even started thinking about it, but--it was cheap." Jensen smiles, and shakes his head. "I had no idea what I was getting into with him back then, but I should know better by now--there's photographic evidence of him involving sparkly pink tutus and fucking tiaras, and even so I still have to remind myself that whatever he's got in mind, it's probably not a good idea. Except this time he was going on and on about underground supper clubs and… I tried logic, especially the part about how they're all kinds of illegal, but before I could really get going Chris, of all people, was figuring out how we could stage things and I was doomed. Metaphorically speaking."

Jared laughs, and Jensen smiles back at him, and it's time to go pack up for the day.

* * * *
Jensen isn't kidding about not functioning well in the morning, but Jared came prepared with coffee and a set of whites for him to wear, and besides, a half-asleep and bitchy Jensen is still about twice as organized and on top of things as Jared is on a good day. He's got lists and notes--everything cross-referenced on his laptop--and if his tone's a little sharp, Jared can almost see the caffeine hitting his blood and getting him ready for the day. Jared actually has a checklist of his own--in his head, of course--and he's still a little fussed about Jensen not having clogs. It's going to be a really long day and he doesn't know if the sneakers Jensen's wearing are going to get him through it.

"I always wear these," Jensen says, shrugging. "I'll be fine--the kitchen floor's hardwood, right?"

"Well, yeah, but--"

"I'll be fine, Jared." Jensen looks pointedly at Jared's own boots, which are a different story, because they're broken-in and awesome and Jared could probably run a marathon in them if he had to. He settles for drinking his own coffee and promising himself he'll keep an eye out for if it starts to get to Jensen. Jensen glares like he knows what Jared's thinking, but then, once they get back to the wine house, there's a spread of breakfast stuff laid out for the teams, fresh-made doughnuts and eclairs, and Jensen starts to relax.

"Good to know you're not immune to the charms of sugar and grease," Jared says, watching Jensen demolish his second plate.

"Special occasion," Jensen says, making another one of those little noises, like he had the day before in the car. Jared ignores it as best he can. "I'm telling myself it'll counteract the jetlag."

"I'm not going to ruin your happy place," Jared says. He's also not going to go into how much he likes watching Jensen gradually re-enter the world of the awake and functioning; if he thinks about it, it's a little too close to how it might be to watch him wake up for real, and Jared's pretty damn sure that's not a good place for them to be.

"My happy place?" Jensen gestures to Jared's plate; his third--or maybe fourth? But who's counting, right?

"Hey, you never said anything about it being exclusive," Jared answers, with a smirk. "You'll share, right?"

"Sure," Jensen drawls. For a brief second Jared can hear the Texas in his voice, and he can't help smiling at it for real. Jensen shakes his head, like Jared's crazy, but Jared can see the answering smile in his eyes.

A timer goes off behind them--one of the dessert chef's--and it reminds Jared that they're here for a reason and it's not to see if he can tease a real smile out of Jensen. He's not supposed to care about whether Jensen's smiling. He wrenches his brain back to reality and reaches for a bandana and an apron.

"Nice touch," Jensen says, gesturing to Jared's pants--not white, of course, and they look checked, but they're really black with a pattern of white skulls.

"I have to get everything custom-fit anyway," Jared says, tying the bandana around his head to keep his hair back and then rolling up his sleeves. "I figured, why be boring?"

"God forbid," Jensen says, dry as the desert. He takes the apron Jared hands him--plain white, to go with the classic white coat Jared gave him earlier--and Jared's not thinking about how good he looks in white, how it sets off his eyes. Instead, he picks up the cleaver to start working on the short ribs.

"Please do not cut off any vital bits of your anatomy." Jensen eyes the cleaver with a disturbing lack of confidence in Jared's ability to use it. "I don't think we have time for a trip to the ER."

"No problem," Jared says cheerfully. "I have it on good authority that my assistant has mad skills at working around EMTs."

* * * *
For all that they're cooking for people who spent a fortune on the dinner, Jared's main course is uncomplicated enough that Jensen's not sure why he's around. The stock they made the day before is the base for the liquid they're braising the short ribs in, and it doesn't take Jensen more than twenty minutes to reduce the wine and rough-chop the carrots and shallots and leeks to make up the rest of what they need. The only reason it even takes that long is that they're starting off with an entire case of wine; the first ten minutes are devoted to getting the bottles open, and it takes a good amount of time to bring all that liquid to a simmer.

"A bottle per person?" Jensen asks, as Jared wanders back over to the cooktop and takes over the rest of the burners to start searing the meat. "You don't think that's a little over the top?"

"Coming from the guy who cooks from the French Laundry for fun, I'll take that as a compliment," Jared says. Jensen snorts and keeps an eye on the simmering wine, trying not to get high off the steam. Jared makes quick work of the short ribs, searing them in batches with four saute pans going at the same time. Jensen finishes crushing the thyme and garlic right as Jared pulls the last round off the heat, and then it's less than five minutes to saute the vegetables and herbs.

"Smells awesome, doesn't it?" Jared shakes the pans, keeping everything moving enough to brown, not burn, timing it just right to deglaze the pans with the wine reduction and add the short ribs back. "Okay," he says, nodding to where Jensen's got the stock at a simmer. "Add just enough to cover the ribs…" He steps back to give Jensen enough room to reach all the pans. "And we're good to go for a couple of hours."

The guy who owns the place comes in then, and Jared goes off to talk to him. Jensen deals with the detritus from the morning--scraps of carrots and garlic peels and the trimmings from Jared's mad butchering spree--and it's a little pathetic how happy he is to discover that the kitchen is set up with multiple commercial dishwashers. Anything that keeps him from scouring pots and pans is a good thing, even if the view out the windows over the sink is a thousand times more spectacular than his usual one.

"Hey, man," Jared calls, sticking his head around the door to the outdoor kitchen. "We've got lunch going out here when you're done."

Jensen nods and finishes up hand-washing the knives and the cleaver before heading out to find Jared lounging against one of the pillars of the hardwood arbor and spinning a long-handled pizza peel like a bo.

"You were right about pizza not working with the menu," Jared says, grinning. "But no way was I going to miss out on playing with one of these babies." He waves the peel in the direction of the wood-fired oven. The interior is glowing from the heat.

"I'd have been disappointed if you hadn't," Jensen says.

"Wouldn't want to do that," Jared says. "You're my guinea pig, okay?" He slides the peel under the pizzas on the floor of the oven and shakes them off onto a cutting board on the table nearby. "I don't think I have the timing down yet, but these don't look too bad."

"They have things called timers," Jensen says. "Many people find them useful."

"Useful but no fun at all," Jared says, cutting the pizza with a couple of quick strokes and pushing half of it toward Jensen. Jensen watches skeptically as Jared tries to take a bite without burning his mouth. "'s good, ow, hot."

Jensen lets his half sit for another minute before giving it a try. Jared starts with the next round; between them they decide to let them go for another 30 seconds or so.

"What do you want on yours?" Jared gestures to the array of toppings he's got laid out on the granite counter next to the oven.

"You don't have to do this," Jensen says. "This and the coffee and the whites and dinner last night--you don't have to take care of me."

Jared finishes scattering corn meal on the peel and wipes his hands on the heavy black-and-white-striped apron he's got tied around his waist. "I know we don't really know each other all that well, but… It's what I do," he says, like he's feeling his way through the conversation. "I don't mean to imply that you're stupid or incapable, I just…It's what I do."

Judging by the look on Jared's face, Jensen's hit some kind of nerve he didn't mean to, which is typical of the two of them. Jensen's tempted to laugh at the sheer predictability of it all, except that laughing at Jared right now is probably a really bad idea.
"I'm supposed to be here to help," he says. "Not make more work for you."

"If it makes you feel better, I'm feeding the entire crowd," Jared offers, relaxing into a smile at Jensen's, "Yeah, okay."

Jared's not just trying to blow him off: for the next hour, any time someone wanders by, Jared feeds them, and cracks jokes and generally is the guy Jensen didn't believe was real when all he knew was what he'd seen on TV. In a way, he still thinks that's true: it's Jared, but it's not the Jared he's gotten to know. It's like a projection or something; not a lie, but not the truth either; something bright and shiny that makes everyone happy but keeps them away. Jensen probably should be worried about how much he likes knowing that there's more underneath, but he'll think about that later.

The team that's making the hors d'oeuvres has the kitchen first, but they finish with their set-ups about the same time the waiters and bartenders arrive, and Jared drops the attitude and kicks into gear. He has Jensen peeling shrimp and making a quick stock from the shells, while he deals with the parsnips they're going to mash with potatoes for the main course. The ribs are holding at a slow simmer, and Jensen's already cleaned the other vegetables so they're ready for their time in the sauté pan. The appetizer team clears out and Jensen lays the soup plates in rows down the counter. Jared keeps watch on the guests, and as soon as they start to straggle slowly toward the table, he says, "Go." Jensen adds the shrimp and corn to to the potatoes and broth, and then nearly drops the strainer as Jared slaps a timer on.

"Yeah, yeah," Jared says, grinning. "Timers are boring, but I hear they can be helpful."

Jensen rolls his eyes, but there's a lot going at the moment; he's sure as hell not going to say anything that will change Jared's mind. When the timer goes off, he gets the soup plated; Jared does the final garnish and okays the waiters to start serving. Jensen has the salad plates laid out as soon as the last soup plate leaves the kitchen; Jared dresses the turnip greens and starts plating the salads. Jensen looks up from checking the parsnips to find Jared smiling at him.

"What?" Jensen asks.

"Nothing--I just--I knew we'd work pretty well together," Jared answers, smiling even bigger.

"Not if we overcook the main course," Jensen says, gesturing to where the ribs are threatening to scorch, but he's smiling, too, and Jared knows it.

* * * *
It's close to one in the morning by the time Jared walks back into the kitchen from doing his best meet-and-greet with the guests and the host. It's as big a part of what people pay for as the actual food, and he's fine with it, but still...

"I am done," he says, dropping onto one of the high stools around the island and stripping off his bandana. He scrubs one hand hard through his hair. "They're not going to stop out there until they pass out, but I've signed everybody's menu and all the wine bottles and told every embarrassing story about the show I can remember. I got nothing."

"Wow," Jensen says, looking up from his laptop. "Who knew it was actually possible to shut you up?"

"Aw, baby, why you gotta be that way," Jared says, with an automatic smirk that he thinks hides how happy he is that Jensen's relaxed enough to joke with him again. "And here I was gonna share and everything." He hauls himself back up again and takes a quick trip into the wine cellar, picking up the bottle set aside for him earlier, a very nice bottle of Screaming Eagle cab. He shows it to Jensen with a flourish. "A little thank-you from the group, and now it's looking like I get to keep it for my very own self."

"Well, you know," Jensen sighs, playing up the drama quotient. "I guess I could be nice for a little while."

"You're so easy. I knew it," Jared says, pulling his messenger bag off the counter and tossing the car keys in the air.

"And all it took was a $900 bottle of wine," Jensen says. He closes his laptop and stuffs it into his own messenger bag, and Jared feels a little guilty for having kept him half the night. The kitchen is spotless, and Jared hopes Jensen didn't do it all by himself, but he's not going to interrupt whatever easiness they've got going now to ask.

"Easy but not cheap, is that what you're trying to tell me?"

"You say the sweetest things," Jensen deadpans, following Jared out to the SUV.

"Dude, if the shoe fits…" Jared throws his bag in the back seat, but hands the wine carefully over to Jensen.

"Keep your eyes on the road, moron," Jensen says, cradling the bottle close. "Do not make me shake this up and bruise it before we even get it open. Some of us don't get handed tips like this on a regular basis. Or ever."

"Yeah," Jared snorts. "The last tip I got was a cooler full of fresh-butchered pork bellies. Good stuff, but not quite up to this level." He does pay attention to his driving, though, and they make it back to the hotel without any incidents.

"Okay, here's the plan," Jared says, digging through his messenger bag for a corkscrew. "We're going to open this and let it breathe. I'm going to shower and check SportsCenter and see what the Spurs have done, and then we are going to pour this outrageously good wine and drink all of it, just the two of us, even if we have to drink it out of water glasses."

"Oh, good, as long as we're not being pretentious about it or anything," Jensen says. Jared draws the cork, sweet and clean; extracts a promise from Jensen not to touch it until he gets back, and escapes into his room. Somewhere along the way, the part of his brain that reminds him that he and Jensen have agreed just to be friends has completely switched off, and he needs a little time to remember all the very good reasons they made that decision in the first place.

* * * *
Even if he spent the last few hours sitting around, it's been a long day--a shower doesn't sound bad to Jensen either, and when he wanders back out, Jared's managed to find actual wine glasses. Stemless, and not just pressed glass, and Jensen's impressed.

"It's Napa," Jared says when Jensen asks how he pulled it off. "I think even the gas stations stock corkscrews. I called down to the front desk and all they asked was whether we were drinking red or white so they could send the right glass." He hands Jensen a glass that's a little over half-full and adds, "And they said they'd see what they had in the kitchen that'd work with it."

"I'm thinking whatever they send up might be a travesty," Jensen says, after the first sip. "We should have repurposed some of dinner. They wouldn't have missed a rib or two."

"I think we could have backed a truck up to the kitchen and nobody would have noticed," Jared says. "I did tell room service we had the good stuff, so maybe there's hope."

There's a waiter knocking on the door before they take more than a couple more sips, and maybe it really is just that it's Napa, but they have three kinds of crackers, and some local cheeses and sausages, and all of them are fairly decent. Definitely not travesties.

"Thanks for doing this," Jared says as he pours another round. "I mean, I know it was last minute and unpaid, and you spent a hell of a lot of time doing scut work--"

"I had a good time," Jensen interupts. "It's like another world."

"Yeah," Jared says, shaking his head. "For sure."

"You ever think about doing stuff like this full-time?"

"After the show? I dunno." Jared shrugs. "It's not like I've exactly planned any of the rest of my life, but--no. I don't think so. It's cool to do it like this, raise some money or whatever, but I don't think I'm built to deal with people who throw cash around like this on a daily basis."

Jensen nods and turns the glass idly in his hand, watching the way the low light hits the liquid, teasing deep red highlights out of the darker base. When he looks up again Jared is watching him, serious and intent.

"I didn't expect you to say yes when I asked you to come," Jared says. "I thought you'd tell me I was crazy."

"Everybody told me it was stupid to do this," Jensen says. "I couldn't argue."

"You came anyway," Jared says.

"You asked," Jensen says, simply, and he hasn't exactly thought about it, but that's what it boils down to. It's what almost everything between them has boiled down to. "I wanted to come, but yeah, you asked, even after everything."

"I wanted you to come," Jared says. "I thought--I don't know what I thought, I just--" He leans in close and kisses Jensen, light quick brush of lips, pulling back after a second and watching Jensen carefully.

Jensen hasn't eaten anything much during the day; the wine's hitting him a little faster than normal, but that doesn't have anything to do with how he tells the overthinking part of his brain to shut up as he puts his glass on the table, or how he takes Jared's glass out of his hand and sets it carefully next to his own.

"Jen," Jared whispers, right as Jensen lets his hand settle along the curve of his jaw, but if there's anything else he wants to say it's lost in the next kiss. Jensen knows he's the one who starts it, but Jared meets him halfway and doesn't let him go, big hands pulling him close every time Jensen shifts, never mind that he's sure as hell not trying to put any distance between them--not even when they have to break off the kiss to breathe, not even when Jared takes a shaky breath and says, "Maybe... maybe we should… I don't know, go slow?"

"Right. Slow," Jensen says, but he doesn't move, and neither does Jared. After a long few seconds, Jared smiles; small and lopsided, but real.

"Then again," Jared says. "For us, we are going slow. It's been more than a day."

Jensen smiles back. "True," he agrees. "We set a world record sometime in the middle of the farmer's market yester--" He loses the rest of what he's going to say when Jared closes the last few inches between them and kisses him again, but it wasn't anything big, certainly nothing more important than kissing Jared back, opening his mouth and letting Jared taste him, pressing closer and sliding his hands into Jared's hair.

"We're not doing this on the couch again," Jared breathes against Jensen's mouth, and when Jensen nods he hauls Jensen to his feet but then just holds him there. Jensen slides his hands up under Jared's shirt, warm skin and hard muscle, and Jared sighs into his mouth. "Yes, please," he whispers.

Jensen takes his time, lays his hands flat and smooths them in slow, measured strokes all along the long line of Jared's back. Jared stays still against him, so close Jensen can feel his heart pounding, his own hands hard on Jensen's hips. Jared tilts his head back in clear invitation, one that Jensen has no intention of turning down. Jared hisses, then moans quietly as Jensen bites where his neck curves into his shoulder, and that's even more of an invitation. He licks over the mark he's left, and bites down again, and then one more time, and Jared stands there and takes it.

"Bed, Jen," Jared gasps. "I don't want to do this on the floor, but I can't--I need--" Jensen nods, backing him toward the room he's been sleeping in.

"Want you so much," Jensen whispers, and Jared's fingers tighten on Jensen's hips, keeping him close as they stumble through the living room of the suite, ruining Jensen's plan to get rid of as many clothes he could, as quickly as possible. As if he understands, Jared stops them before they crash down on the bed and skims Jensen's t-shirt up and over his head.

"What do you want?" Jared murmurs, his hands back on Jensen's hips, thumbs slowly stroking in circles that dip below the waistband of Jensen's track pants, mesmerizing, teasing, so close to where Jensen wants. "The first time you asked me, and the second time I just did what I wanted--"

Jensen manages to choke out an objection, because he certainly hadn't minded that what Jared wanted was to suck him off.

"No, I did," Jared insists, smiling. "I did exactly what I wanted." He stops the movement of his thumbs, watching until he has Jensen's complete attention and then stripping Jensen's pants and boxers down and off with a smooth, quick motion, leaving Jensen naked in front of him. "I want to know what you want this time," he says, his hands back on Jensen's hips, skin to skin now, and if it made Jensen want to squirm before, now it's all he can do to keep from writhing.

"Tell me," Jared repeats, not giving an inch, though he lets Jensen take his hands and lace their fingers together, and lets him step up close enough that Jensen can feel the heat of his body, see the pulse beating hard at the base of his throat. "Please."

"I want you to fuck me," Jensen says quietly, every word dropping clear and precise into the silence of the room. "I want you flat out on that bed, and I want to ride you until we're both screaming."

"See?" Jared says. "That wasn't so hard, was it?" His mouth crashes down on Jensen's and his hands clutch greedy and rough at the back of Jensen's thighs, his ass. "Stay right there," he adds, turning and digging through the overflowing duffel bag on the floor, dumping it out in his impatience but coming back up with a triumphant grin, a travel-sized bottle of hand lotion, and a strip of condoms. "I knew they were there somewhere."

"Boy scout," Jensen teases--or at least tries to, because it's close to impossible with the way Jared's eyes sweep over him, never breaking contact as he strips off his shirt and pants and finally, finally is naked, too. Jensen swallows hard and takes the condoms out of Jared's hand. "On the bed," he whispers.

The bed is neatly made, deep-blue comforter folded back to show the crisp white sheets, and Jared rips it apart with one sweep of his arm. He drags Jensen down with him, twisting so they land on their sides, bellies and legs and cocks pressed close, until Jensen bites the curve of Jared's neck and Jared rolls them so Jensen's straddling him. Jensen rocks down on him, one slow press of his hips and then another, cocks sliding together, hot and slick with pre-come, and Jared's hands are back on his hips like they can't stay away. Jensen can feel the bruises starting, one for each one of Jared's fingers, and the thought of it makes him move again, push against them to try once more to grind his cock into Jared's.

"Jen," Jared half-gasps, half-laughs, his fingers tightening until Jensen moans. "If you want to get fucked, you have to stop that."

Jensen nods and makes himself relax, leaning down so Jared can kiss him, shivering a little as Jared slides his hands back to tease him open. "Don't stop," he whispers, and Jared works one long finger into him dry, moving carefully and never taking his eyes off Jensen's face. It hurts a little, the stretch and burn sharper without lube, but Jensen can't help pushing down on it, taking it into himself. "So fucking good, Jay," he says, barely recognizing his own voice.

Jared works him open, pulling out to fumble with the lotion, going back with three fingers once his hand is slicked, never once looking away from Jensen's face--and that, that shouldn't ground Jensen; it should make him crazy, has always made him want to run and hide, except it's never been like that with Jared, even in the beginning when they were nothing more to each other than a quick, nearly anonymous fuck. Jensen keeps his eyes open, lets Jared see everything, and Jared does the same, his eyes dark and hungry as Jensen tears open the condom and smooths it on him. Jensen loves the first press of a cock inside him, his body opening to take it in, the first few seconds when it only barely seems possible, the heavy fullness edging deeper.

"God," Jared groans, as Jensen slides down onto him. He holds Jensen steady, his hands strong and careful now, and lets Jensen set the pace, holding back until he's shaking under Jensen. Jensen keeps it slow, but he takes Jared deep on every thrust, losing just a tiny bit more control every time. "You feel so good, like that, God, don't stop."

Jensen tries not to stop, tries to stay with the slow, rocking pace--but it's too much, Jared's cock so deep in him, his own aching and hard, and he needs to come, has to come. He reaches for his cock but Jared's quicker, grabs his wrists and holds them tight, panting, "Keep going, you wanted it like this; keep going."

Jensen holds onto his voice like a lifeline and moves faster, wilder, all finesse gone. Jared doesn't let go of his wrists, and he starts moving with Jensen, rough and hard, every stroke pushing Jensen closer to the edge, to where he's going to have to beg, to plead with Jared to let him come. Jared knows how close he is, though; knows just when to let go of Jensen's wrist and wrap his hand around Jensen's cock; knows how Jensen likes it, two long, hard strokes, nails dragging in a twisting path that all but rips the orgasm from Jensen, slamming up into him at the same time, coming with a hoarse cry that echoes Jensen's own keen.

* * * *
Jared doesn't let go of Jensen except to deal with the condom and grab a t-shirt off the floor to clean them up a little. Jensen doesn't seem like the type who likes to cuddle, but he doesn't pull away or stiffen up when Jared keeps touching him, so Jared doesn't stop. It's late, almost three in the morning, and Jared's fucked out, practically boneless, but he doesn't want to sleep, not while Jensen's still awake and he can still kiss him and taste him and find more places that make him shiver. He could keep on like that all night, but Jensen yawns finally, and that sets Jared off, too.

"Sorry," Jared whispers. "I'll stop now."

"No problem," Jensen murmurs. "'s nice."

Jared takes Jensen at his word, which works out well since it's exactly what he wants to be doing anyway, but eventually despite himself the touches slow and he's almost drifted off when Jensen stirs against him.

"What do you want from this?" Jensen asks, and Jared can feel the tension creeping into the muscles under his hand. He doesn't have be able to see Jensen to know this is it; this is what he needs to get right.

"You," he answers, keeping it as simple as he can. "I don't know how it's gonna work, but I want you."

"Me too," Jensen says, but the tension under Jared's hand doesn't go away.

"Good," Jared says. "I'm--it's what I've wanted for a long time."

"Right. After Williamsburg, I knew that, but--" Jensen shrugs, and Jared stays quiet, and after a long few minutes Jensen continues. "When we fought about it, in the car--I wanted it, too, but I couldn't see any way it was going to be right, any way that it wasn't going to play out like it had before." Jared starts to say it's okay, but Jensen shakes his head. "Just--let me say this, okay?"

"Sure," Jared says. "Whatever you want to tell me."

"I really don't want to tell you this, but I--you probably deserve to know." Jensen's even more tense; Jared concentrates on keeping physical contact.

"When we fought," Jared says quietly. "You told me it never worked out any way but badly."

"Yeah," Jensen says. "Poor little me. Except--What I didn't tell you was that I knew Jeff was married; I just told myself it wasn't a big deal."

Jared makes his hand keep up with the same slow pattern he's been tracing over Jensen's hip; no falter, no hesitation. There are a million things racing around in his head, but none of them are important right now, not with how flat and lifeless Jensen's voice sounds, and all the bad stuff Jared can sense underneath. "When you say you knew, you mean he told you, or--"

"No," Jensen says, with a laugh sharp and hard enough to cut glass. "No, he told me he traveled a lot for business, and I told him I liked having the breathing space. I--when I was in grad school, the guy I was with decided it was easier to get ahead by proposing to the daughter of one of the department heads, and I managed to miss every single sign, right up until their engagement announcement showed up in the paper. It was a very nice picture of the two of them." Jared does miss his rhythm there, but only because he can't help pulling Jensen closer. "So, yeah, I was pretty stupid then, but at least I recognized all the same BS when Jeff started with it. He was the one who called me, never on the weekends; I only had his cell number, not his office, never met his friends... stuff like that. I just told myself it wasn't my thing to worry about, played along like I was dumb, right up until the end."

"You didn't know for sure--" Jared starts, but Jensen interrupts him.

"No, I knew, and I got it confirmed for real when his kids, his kids saw us making out outside of a gallery in Kalorama." He shakes his head, and his voice is bitter when he continues, "I thought I had it all worked out, but I never thought about something like that. Never thought about anybody but myself."

"What did you do after?" Jared asks. "Did you keep seeing him?"

"No," Jensen says. "I--there was a taxi on the corner and I flagged it down and got into it and never talked to him again. He called, left messages, told me he could explain, that I was just running away, but--"

"I swear to you," Jared says, furious with the assholes of the world, and himself, too, for what it's worth, for being such a fucking baby about it all. "I swear that Katie and I have never had anything going on, and, and Sandy and I really are done--like she probably never wants to speak to me again done--and, God, I'm sorry, but you're going to be stuck with Chad at least for the next couple of years, and Rafe's going to try to scare you off, but if you just act like you're hungry he'll get distracted and start feeding you--"

"Jared," Jensen says, leaning up on one elbow and covering Jared's mouth with his hand. "Jay. I know, okay? I know that's not you--I--Nobody else knows about Jeff, the kids. I just wanted you to know why I flipped out."

"Thanks," Jared says around Jensen's hand, catching hold of it when Jensen moves it away. "For telling me." For trusting me, he means. "I meant what I said, too. I want you, in my life. Which is currently complicated and crazy and sucks for whoever I'm trying to be with, but I love it."

"I'm good with loving your life, whatever it is," Jensen says. "We can figure it out."

Jared's not sure which part makes him happier: the part about figuring things out, or the part where Jensen said we, but whichever it is, he's suddenly aware that he's gotten through this without screwing it up. He tugs Jensen closer, letting go of his hand only when he can cup Jensen's face in his palms. Jensen lets him, rests his forehead against Jared's and Jared can feel the tension draining out of him.

"We should sleep," Jared murmurs. Jensen nods, but his breathing doesn't change. He's relaxed; Jared's relaxed; neither of them are even close to sleep again. "Or," Jared whispers, his mouth suddenly dry. "You are really good at entertaining me in the middle of the night."

"Why, yes," Jensen says, in a low purr that ebbs and flows over Jared's skin. He traces a path with the tip of one finger along Jared's collarbone and down the center of his chest to tease at his navel. "Yes, I am good at that."

Weird life, Jared thinks, trying not to gasp and squirm. But good. Very, very good.