Title: Don't Let It Go To Waste (Part 2 of 3)
Author: ![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
kinkynicky
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Growing up in Texas is hard. Growing up in Texas and realising at the age of 16 that you’re in love with your male best friend? Is harder.
Disclaimer: No tiny Jareds or Jensens were hurt in the making of this story. Apart from little Jared. Who broke his arm. But that wasn’t really my fault. Title stolen from a Matt Willis song.
Warning: NOT. BETA. READ.
Dedication: keepaofthecheez once again, cause she wins at life.
AN: This one is longer than the first part (by about 3,000 words).
[Don't Let It Go To Waste - Part 1]
Part 2:
( “Wait.” Jared grabbed Jensen’s arm. “When did we start liking girls? They’re gross, Jensen. And stupid.” He got no answer, and held onto his friend harder. “Gross and stupid, don’t you remember?!” )
“Jared…” Jensen was hard to understand around his panic, clinging to Jared’s undamaged hand as the younger boy lay sniffling quietly in the hospital bed. A fairly lucky fall, as far as broken arms go, the doctor had said. Jared’s break was clean and would heal quickly enough.
“I’m sorry.” Jensen mumbled, eyes fixed on the cast that now clung to his best friend’s arm. “I shouldn’t have been up that tree. I should have known you’d follow me. I’m older. Supposed to be resp…” Jensen frowned trying to find that word, before looking back to Jared. “Supposed to know that stuff.”
Jared couldn’t bring himself to smile, so instead he thrust his arm in Jensen’s direction, and whispered through his tears, “Write your name on my cast?”
~.~
Jared turned eight just before Jensen’s little sister turned two, and in celebration, both families went on holiday to Disneyland.
“I’m rooming with Jensen!” Jared yelled above the mayhem inside their minibus, McKenzie crying, Alan and Donna disagreeing about directions, and Jeff making a fuss of his heavily pregnant mom.
“Shut up, Jared.” Jeff snarled, turning in his seat to glare at his brother. Jensen was halfway to Jared’s defence when Jeff received a sharp tug on his shirt and a “For god’s sake, sit down!”
Both boys in the back of the van gave Jared’s big brother a smug look, before turning their smiles on each other. “I’m so rooming with you.” Jared stated again.
~.~
They’d been inside the Disney theme park for just over an hour when Jensen turned to Jared with a nod and moved swiftly away from their group, ducking behind a row of stuffed Mickey Mouse toys and signalling for Jared to do the same. Once both boys were out of sight, they took off at a run.
“Small World was so lame.” Jensen called. “Lets find some fun of our own.”
From around the corner, Donna Ackles turned with a frown. “…where are the boys?”
~.~
Halfway through their game of ‘Zombie Attack!’ Jensen found a quarter in his pocket and they squished a coin with a machine so that it had Mickey Mouse’s face on it. Jensen swore to keep it forever, but when the Jared!Zombie got a little vicious five minutes later, he flung the thing at his head and ran away.
“You can’t catch me!” he yelled, loud and excited as he began to move backwards, a little breathless, two hours of their game having worn him out a little. Turning at the last minute, he ran straight into the legs of a chubby park officer.
“No, but I can.” The park guard smiled, taking hold of Jensen gently by the arm. “Son, are you Jensen?” From ten feet away, Jared took off in a run, launching himself at the park’s member of staff and, fists clenched, began to rain blows against the man’s legs. “Boys! Stop! Your parents reported you missing an hour ago.”
Suddenly pausing, Jared blinked, risking a look behind the officer. Meeting the disapproving eyes of all adults in their party, he smiled sheepishly. “…oh.”
The next day, sitting in their hotel room and playing cards while everybody else except Jensen’s dad was out at the theme park again, Jensen gave Jared a look over his set of cards and smiled.
“Totally worth it.” He grinned while Jared nodded, exposing his gummy, tooth-loss-induced smile, and from across the room, Alan Ackles lowered his newspaper and shook his head, fighting a smile of his own.
~.~
Jared’s sister was born not long after that, and following the pattern of JJM (Joshua, Jensen, McKenzie) the baby was called Megan. Sherri asked Donna to be the baby’s godmother, and Jared and Jensen had to attend the Christening ceremony in suits.
Left to their own devices while their mothers cried over the new little girl, Jared and Jensen blessed each other with the holy water from the back of the church, and once the ceremony was over, proceeded to get muddy playing hide and seek around the graves outside.
They spent the after-party that way, stuffing their faces, mud on their shoes and grass stains on the knees of their trousers, but the smiles on their faces completely made up for the mess.
Baby Megan was put to bed at 5pm and the party continued, before Jared and Jensen were finally chased up to Jared’s room at 8, full of sausage rolls and lemonade.
That night as they’d lay in bed listening to the ongoing party downstairs, they’d guessed what superheroes, actors and basketball players the other had been thinking of, before drifting off to sleep, Jared stealing the covers and earning himself a flick on the ear from Jensen.
~.~
Jensen’s ninth birthday was spent with his Grandma and Grandpa in Austin, and not seeing his best friend for a week, Jared was lost.
He and his mom had spent hours in the mall picking out the perfect present, and so on the first of March, at 9am, Jared was awake and waiting by the phone for Jensen’s call. It barely got through one ring before he’d picked it up.
“Have you opened it?!” he called without even saying hello, voice high-pitched and excited, bouncing on his toes and ignoring Jeff laughing at him from the corner.
“No.” Jensen whispered on the other end, breathless too. “Got it in my hand. What is it?”
Giggling, Jared rolled is eyes. “Open it.”
There was a deep breath followed by silence and distant rustling, and Jared found himself holding his breath, already smiling. The small, amazed, puff of air from Jensen made his smile impossibly wider.
“Jared.” More silence, and then a quiet, “Jared…you got me a Han Solo.”
Being dragged along by his mom, Jared had dug in his heels at the window of the sci-fi shop, eyes falling upon a Han Solo figurine matching his Luke Skywalker. Eyes lighting up, he’d pointed. When his mom had told him he already had a Star Wars toy that Jensen could play with, Jared shook his head vehemently, telling her that she didn’t understand.
“You can’t have Luke without Han Solo.” He mumbled in explanation. “Kind of like you and me.”
~.~
Since they spent so much time at Jared’s house, Jensen decided to keep Han Solo there, on his stand, right next to Luke. Every day when he woke up and Jared caught that silhouette against the morning like from the window, he couldn’t help but smile.
~.~ ~.~ ~.~ ~.~
Blinking awake, despite the fact that the room he lay in was not his own, Jared could see the silhouette of those figures behind his eyelids. The memory of them against the sun made him think of where they lay now, on the floor of his room, him having violently shoved them and everything they stood for out of his way as he left in a hurry.
~.~ ~.~ ~.~ ~.~
At some point around eleven and twelve they reached a communication problem.
“Wait.” Jared grabbed Jensen’s arm. “When did we start liking girls? They’re gross, Jensen. And stupid.” He got no answer, and held onto his friend harder. “Gross and stupid, don’t you remember?!”
Despite the desperate note in his friend’s voice, Jensen’s smile was somewhat dazed. “Erica kissed me on the mouth today.”
All at once Jared let go of Jensen and tucked his arms into his body, stepping back, his expression horrified. “EW! Are you infected?!”
Jensen grinned around his newly broken voice, and smiled wider. “No, man. It was nice.”
~.~
“Just cause your voice is all broken now doesn’t mean that you have to start liking girls and acting like Jeff or Josh you know.” Jared mumbled around the chicken strips they’d been allowed to eat up in his room. His mom never failed to notice his pout, and so she’d ran her fingers through his now shaggy hair and sighed, handing them both their plates with a wink. “You boys don’t have to eat at the table if you don’t want.”
Thankful, Jared took his and marched back up the stairs, waiting for Jensen to sit down before starting their talk. Pretty much the second after he’d said it, Jensen looked up, offended. “I’m not acting like Josh! She kissed me Jared. Wait until a girl kisses you. Then you’ll understand.”
Huffing, Jared had shoved his plate aside and crawled down onto the floor next to where Jensen was sitting, laying his head on his friend’s shoulder with a huge sigh. “I don’t want you to abandon me.”
“For a girl?” Jensen asked, shaking his head seriously despite speaking around a mouthful of chicken. “Never.”
He wasn’t lying. Jensen kept on kissing girls, much to Jared’s dismay, but never once did he put a girl before his best friend.
~.~
When Jensen was fourteen he moved up to high school, leaving Jared on his own. The two schools were only minutes away from each other, and yet the time between 9am when they parted to go in different directions, and 3pm when they met back up again, Jared felt lost.
He spent the first two weeks eating lunch alone, staring at the tuna sandwiches his Mom was still making for him, since he’d never confessed that he and Jensen used to switch, and in fact, he hated tuna. It was ridiculous how much time he spent wondering what Jensen’s new friends were like, how many of them sat around the table, laughing and joking.
The fact that Jensen met him everyday after school, alone, didn’t reassure him any, and around that and his breaking voice, Jared found himself supremely uncomfortable.
Chad found him kicking stones outside their next classroom after another lonely lunch hour.
“Jared.” His smile was almost sinister enough to make Jared take a step backwards, but at thirteen he was already taller than most kids in their class, and instead just lifted his chin, ready to stick up for himself like Jensen had always told him to.
“What do you want, Chad?” He put as much sneer into the words as he could, despite the cracking of his breaking voice, but Chad’s smile only got wider.
“Do you remember on our second day of school, you got your big friend Jensen to yell at me, and make me leave you alone?” Despite Chad’s casual tone, Jared knew there was something behind it, and rolled his eyes.
“I didn’t get him to do anything, that was the first time we met…but yeah, I remember. So what?”
When Chad’s eyes met his, the mischief behind them almost knocked Jared over. “Not here now, is he?”
Within his next breath, Chad’s fist had met his jaw and sent a hot heat sinking into his skin, inside him, travelling right to his stomach where it turned to fire, and before he was even aware of it, Jared dealt out a punch of his own. Completely ready to hit Chad again, he raised his other fist, making to grab Chad’s coat, but the other boy shook his head. “Whoa!”
Stumbling back and holding his hands up in surrender, Chad was still wearing an enormous smile. His eyes were bright and wide, and he nodded at Jared with a laugh. “Just checking how much of a bitch you are.” He offered in explanation.
Jared raised a brow. “And the verdict?”
With another nod, Chad turned to walk back in the direction of the cafeteria, shouting over his shoulder as he went. “You’re alright, Jared.”
Standing, bemused, and watching the retreating form of the kid who’d just hit him in the face, Jared found himself smiling at the bizarre exchange.
~.~
That day when school was let out, he ran like usual to wait for Jensen outside of the high school, hands in pockets, unable to forget about the bruise on his face since the teachers had made such a fuss about it.
“J-Pad.” Jensen called out, mockingly in his deep voice, slapping his friend on the back and letting out a sigh. “Man, I hate high school. Think yourself lucky. Everything gets so much harder when-…hey, what happened to your face?”
Smiling sheepishly, and kicking at an empty can on the floor, Jared mumbled “Chad.” and carried on walking.
“He hit you?!” Jensen yelled, coming to a stop, fists clenching at his sides as he breathed heavily through his nose. “You wanna come and kick his ass?”
Shrugging, Jared shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat and looked down at his shoes. “Nah. We’re kind of cool now.” When Jensen only looked confused, Jared shrugged again and smiled. “I hit him back and then he told me I was alright.”
Jensen couldn’t have looked more confused if Jared had confessed to marrying a purple hippo with a belly-dancing fixation. “Told you that you were alright?”
All he got from Jared was a shrug, a smile and a mumbled “I’m not a bitch.” Before Jared carried on home, his grin forcing Jensen to drop the subject.
~.~
Being forced to spend this much time away from Jensen made Jared think about things. He decided it maybe wasn’t such a good idea.
Thinking, Jared realised, generally meant having to face up to the fact that the sudden attraction to girls that had gripped Jensen at the age of twelve had just never taken hold of him. He’d been waiting for it, like Jensen had said, once a girl kissed him he’d understand, but he spent plenty of time around girls and although he’d grown up enough to get over the idea of them having germs, he’d still never caught onto the idea that kissing them was a good thing.
And Jensen. Lately, he’d been thinking about Jensen some. About how much he missed him, and spending time with him, and about how he’d maybe like to kiss Jensen.
~.~
Once Jared moved up to the high school, things went back to normal, and just before Jensen’s fifteenth they got drunk for the first time at a family party of his, something they counted as a milestone of utmost importance.
“Howdy gayboys.” Jensen’s older cousin Christian laughed, slumping into a seat, beer in hand, toeing off his boots. “Not made your attempt on the beer yet?”
Jensen grinned at his cousin, mischievous expression darkening. “We’re waiting for an opening, doofus. None of the adults are drunk enough to not notice us, yet.”
Chris shook his head and smiled in a patronising way that made Jared want to punch him in the nose. “Ah, the ‘rents are long gone at this point boys. Make your move.”
Taking his advice, the two boys stood, shuffling out of the room, Jensen chuckling at Chris’s expense as Jared asked, “Dude, did your cousin just say ‘rents?”
Having figured weeks ago, in preparation, that they’d only get one or two chances at the beer, they grabbed as many bottles and cans as they could manage, before racing off into the bedroom that they’d been designated for the evening.
Shoving beer bottles underneath the pillows, they sat side by side at the foot of the bed, Jared removing the bottle tops with his teeth, amused at Jensen’s horrified expression, and they drank the bitter liquid with glee.
“Argh, this tastes like crap.” Jared muttered, not spilling a drop, the knowledge of its effects enough to keep him drinking it.
“Shut up and be a man.” Jensen laughed, nudging Jared hard, and as he raised the bottle neck to his lips again, Jared wished away the butterflies in his stomach from them sitting so close.
~.~
Not that his every thought revolved around that stuff now. Jensen was still the same Jensen that he’d grown up with.
Lying quietly and staring up at the wooden slats of the bed above, Jared grinned drunkenly. “Hey Jen…” he slurred slightly. “Bet you can’t guess what mental illness I’m thinking of.”
He drifted off to the sound of his best friend’s muffled laughter.
~.~
Pretty much the same way it had worked before, Jared fit in well with the friends that Jensen had made while on his own at high school, but while the two of them still spent most of their home-time alone, they took to eating most days with all the guys.
“So, Jared…” Mike grinned, wiggling his brows. “How many girls have you made out with?”
Sandwich halfway to his mouth, Jared froze. Eyes moving around the table, he finally locked onto Jensen, who had his head tilted in a thoughtful frown. The truth? Jared had never made out with a girl. Not that he hadn’t had offers, girls told him he was cute all the time, not to mention the time that Sandra McCoy had tried to put her tongue in his mouth.
But with that as his only almost-kiss, and no excuses that he wanted to say outloud, Jared sat, embarrassed and unsure, as Jensen’s friends all stared expectantly at him.
“Well, I...” He sighed. “I, um-”
“Just one girl.” Jensen suddenly interrupted him, throwing him an odd smile before looking around to meet the unimpressed faces of the other guys. “Um, my cousin.” Jensen nodded, stuffing some food into his mouth. “Yeah, Jay here dated my cousin for a long time, so…just one girl.”
Nodding suddenly, Tom smiled. “Ooh! A long-time girlfriend. Yeah, that’s cool.” Suddenly adopting a proud expression, he grinned. “I dated a girl for a month and a half once.”
Jensen just raised a brow and continued to eat.
~.~
“Jared.” Jensen said casually as they walked home, voice quiet and thoughtful, his head once again tilted as he look up at his friend. “I guess I never realised until today that you’ve never had a girl kiss you.”
Jared stayed silent. See, the truth, he’d been thinking since Mike had asked at lunch, was that confusion in terms of his sexuality and stuff had gotten much more confusing, in that Jared only really ever thought about Jensen now. Not always kissing him, because the idea of that was still a little weird to him, but thinking about life and his future, he always imagined that it was Jensen with him. And yeah, sometimes he imagined cuddling with Jensen and sleeping in the same bed like they used to, but that didn’t mean anything enormous, did it? Curiosity was normal at his age.
Having not got an answer from Jared, Jensen coughed. “How come, dude?”
Resorting to his usual shrug, Jared sighed. “Sandy McCoy put her tongue in my mouth once.”
Jensen rolled his eyes, mouth lifting slightly into a smile. “Yeah, and then you ran away from her and spat on the ground, so it doesn’t count.” Nudging Jared, he looked ahead at their path home. “We should find you a girlfriend, man.”
For the sake of leaving the conversation alone, Jared nodded. “Yeah.”
~.~
He didn’t expect to find himself two weeks later at a party with Alexis, a girl from science class, sitting on his lap, her hands in his hair and mouth on his.
Two minutes into the party and Jensen had kind of shoved her at him, before wandering off to find the girl he’d brought with him. Jared found that he didn’t mind so much, she was nice to talk to and when she danced with him she was tiny, curling herself around him and holding his hand as he spun her around and danced to the music.
Three cups of beer from the illegal keg that this party had somehow acquired, and Alexis sitting next to Jared had become Alexis sitting on him, and when she leaned up to kiss him, he didn’t fight it or push her away, just let her lips brush his, soft and gentle, no forcing of tongue like Sandy.
It was nice.
Alright, not nice. But it was okay. Not unpleasant. He could do this.
At some point, Mike walked past behind the sofa and whistled, patting Jared on the shoulder, and when Alexis leant back and giggled, Jared found himself smiling.
Yeah, he could totally do this.
~.~
Two weeks after that, Jared and Jensen were walking their usual route home, in comfortable silence as it sometimes was with them, when Jensen turned to him with a frown.
“So, you and Alexis are dating, huh?”
His tone of voice made for a mirrored frown from Jared, who shrugged, his status as Alexis’ boyfriend common knowledge among their group of friends. If he wasn’t positive that Jensen wasn’t like that, he’d have sworn that it was jealousy he heard in his friend’s voice.
~.~
In the months after Jensen’s eighteenth birthday and his own seventeenth, Jared dated a total of five girls, made out with nine others and flirted with most that he came across.
He found that he was good at it, oozing charm and fake interest in all the right girls, the ones that Mike, Tom and the guys would approve of, even though he found that most of that type were either boring, vain, stupid or all of the above.
The more girls he dated, the more bored he got, and the more his curiosity about guys in general grew. Maybe he was bisexual? There had been a few girls that he’d really liked spending time with, and kissing them hadn’t been so bad, especially if it meant they got to spend more time together.
A complete lack of sexual interest in girls didn’t make him gay.
Only it did, didn’t it?
~.~
By the time he reached seventeen, Jared was a mess. His reputation among fellow students for being a ladies man was contrasted completely by his stack of porn magazines featuring only men and his constant wet dreams and shower fantasies about his best friend.
Jensen had no idea.
Jared lay in bed at night, wet with sweat and tears, hand wrapped tight around his dick as he jerked himself, body tensing more and more as he saw Jensen behind his eyelids, pretty Jensen with his lips and his eyes and his hair. Broad shoulders that seemed to come from nowhere and just suddenly pumped a ton of blood to Jared’s crotch one day.
Simultaneously pleasuring and punishing himself for his thoughts about his best friend, thoughts he never planned to act upon or even confess.
Biting into his lip to stop the whispered ‘Jensen’ from escaping him, Jared came, hard and intense like always, a burst of happiness inside a lie.
~.~
When it happened, it wasn’t even his fault.
They’d been stumbling home from a house party, drunk, Jared using the wall to keep him upright as they walked, and Jensen using him. They barely remembered the way, but as they neared his block Jared began to nod, recognition become present in the fog of his mind.
He’d been turning to tell Jensen how close they were when Jensen’s hand slipped. He fell onto Jared, who stumbled, back against the wall he’d been leaning on, as he caught his friend.
Jensen snorted in sudden laughter, wrapping his hands in Jared’s coat as he pulled himself upright, smile wide on his mouth as his eyes reflected the glow of the streetlamps. Jared offered him an equally drunken smile, but then Jensen wasn’t laughing anymore.
His face was suddenly lax and expressionless, his eyes serious, losing the glow as he leant forwards a little. Jared barely heard the whispered “Jay…” before Jensen’s mouth was on his.
If Jared gasped (and he was pretty sure he did) it was swallowed by his friend as Jensen opened his mouth, licking along Jared’s bottom lip in order to make Jared respond.
Raising his hands either side of Jensen’s face, Jared realised his hands were cold and probably not good for face touching, so instead he threaded one hand in the hair at the back of Jensen’s head and pressed him closer, mouth opening, stars bursting behind his eyes as he tasted Jensen, felt the warmth of his mouth.
The angle got easier when Jensen raised up onto his toes and leant heavier on Jared, hands still clenched in his coat, a rumbling moan against Jared’s mouth making him shudder.
The hotness and oh holy shit this is really happening was shattered suddenly when, pulling away, Jensen laughed drunkenly, slapping Jared on the shoulder as he turned to carry on walking.
Standing up against the wall, hard and confused, Jared blinked at his laughing friend, just as Jensen turned. “Come on, Jay. Gotta find home.”
~.~
The next morning, Jensen stumbled down the stairs fully dressed at midday, hair mussed and clearly hung-over, and walked into the kitchen, standing with his back to Jared as he made himself a coffee.
When he turned, his smile didn’t really meet his eyes and he coughed awkwardly, expression a little embarrassed.
“Listen, Jay…” He sighed, running a hand through his hair, and Jared nodded, waiting for it. “Last night, we’d drank a whole lot, you know?” As he spoke, Jared felt his stomach churning, his hands shaking a little as he just watched Jensen make excuses for the fucking amazing kiss they’d had the night before. “I don’t think its something we should…dwell on. You know, just, we were drunk and being stupid.”
It wasn’t like Jensen meant to hurt him. Not like he even knew how Jared felt.
So it was okay, wasn’t it?
~.~
Except that the more he thought about it, the less okay Jared thought it was.
That’s how he found himself three days later at Tom’s house, fighting his way through the crowd at the party he’d said he wasn’t going to come to. He’d been avoiding Jensen a little bit, but the time apart had only made Jared think more about how much he wanted Jensen. More than friends. How he’d had him up against the wall three nights ago, perhaps without the taste of beer this time.
Though, really, that was optional.
“Jayman!” Mike shouted, thrusting his beer can into the air in celebration of his friend’s presence. “Tommy said you wouldn’t be here tonight.”
Jared nodded, too busy looking for Jensen to actually stop and look Mike in the eye. “Changed my mind. Hey, where’s Jen?”
Mike pointed in the direction of the kitchen, and with a grateful nod, Jared made his way in that direction, finding Jensen stood between two pretty blonde girls that token smirk on his face as they flirted outrageously.
Without stopping to talk himself out of it, Jared stepped into Jensen’s line of vision and without letting Jensen react to his sudden arrival, pointed at the back door. “Jensen, can we talk?”
Looking shocked to see him, and maybe a little uncomfortable, Jensen still nodded and put his beer down on the side, moving out from between the two blondes and moving to follow Jared out of the back door.
When he stopped and turned to Jared, he looked confused and a little fuzzy from beer, though not quite drunk, and shrugged, a question in his eyes. “What’s up, Jay?”
“Jen…” Jared met his eyes, steady and sober, so serious that the smile melted from Jensen’s face and he stood up straight, focusing in on his best friend. The silence between them was stiff, palpable, and Jensen took a breath expecting Jared to say something stupid and break the tension. What he got instead was this:
“Jensen. I’m gay and I think I’m in love with you.”
</div>
Part One I Part Two l Part Three A I Part Three B I Epilogue
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
blah
curious
satisfied
happy