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amberdreamsTitle: The First Law of Holes
Author: amber1960
Recipient: delanach
Genre: J2 AU
Rating: NC-17
Words: c9000
Warnings: manhandling, bare backing, swearing, almost infidelity (sort of), British spelling and Britishisms.
Summary: Jensen and Jared are American students studying archaeology at a British university. Jensen is a post grad, Jared a second year undergraduate, so they haven’t had much to do with each other until, during the summer break, they both join an expedition to Italy. Neither of them is looking for a relationship, yet somehow, stuff happens…
Author’s note: A gift for SPN J2 Xmas Fic Exchange on
spn_j2_xmas. One of the prompts Delanach asked for was a Geeky/nerdy J2 AU, and from a list of likes I went for something slashy with rough sex, manly schmoop, bare backing, first times (with each other) and smut. Hopefully this fits the bill!
Many thanks to
tesserae_ and blackrabbit42 for their thorough, thoughtful betas – I’ve addressed most but not all of your comments, my friends, but hopefully this is now a better story because of both of you! Any remaining errors are all mine.
For those of you who don’t know, it’s not my dodgy grammar – the British School at Rome is its actual name, though I’m sure you’ll be thinking it should be ‘in’ Rome. Branchester University fictional but is based on the UK model for Universities, and so is (in my limited experience) much less formal in some areas than US ones seem to be. Certainly, I’d expect lecturers to be on first name terms with their students (where they know their names at all!) and there certainly never used to be any barrier between post grads and under grads having relationships, probably because it’s rare for a post grad (MA student) to have a teaching role. PhD students might teach, but many don’t. Botromagno is a real place, an archaeological park just outside the town of Gravina in Apulia, Italy. There are real rock cut tombs there…
Alternative link - read on AO3
The First Law of Holes
A good archaeologist will always follow the First Law of Holes: if you are in one, carry on digging.
A-M Byrne 2013
November 21st, Branchester University Sports Centre
Jensen wipes his sweaty hand on the matte-painted wall of squash court #3, and grins at his panting opponent. Jared is bent over with hands braced on his strong thighs, and Jensen tries not to think about what else he might like to be doing to Jared in that position right now, instead of thrashing him at squash. Jensen’s hand tightens unconsciously, rolling the small ball between his fingers. The rubber is pleasantly smooth and warm to the touch…
“My serve, kid,” he says and bares his teeth in a predatory smile. Jared scuffs at the polished wooden floor where his sweat is making a small puddle, and grins back.
“Think you can take me, old man?” Jared says, and Jensen feels a small shiver at the heated challenge in those sharp hazel eyes.
“Oh yeah, Jay, you know I can take you any way I like…” he pauses and wiggles his eyebrows suggestively before throwing the ball up to take his best shot. Jared is on his toes in the T of the court, clearly thinking he’s ready for anything, but the tiny rubber missile shoots past him at ankle height and lands perfectly just above the backboard before dropping just out of Jared’s reach.
Jensen’s whoop of victory is cut off when Jared crowds him against the wall, looming like the freaking Colossus of Rhodes, bracketing Jensen with those steely thighs. Jensen swallows hard.
“So I’m a Colossus, eh?” Jared’s voice is dark as the promise in his eyes, and Jensen flushes. Had he really said that out loud? He really needs to be more careful what he lets slip when Jared’s in this kind of mood. The one thing guaranteed to ignite Jared Padalecki’s ardour beyond reason is Jensen talking ancient history.
And Jensen can’t help remembering back to the summer it all began…
1 Agosto, Roma
It wasn’t that Jensen had forgotten, but the Prof still made him jump when she stuck her head around the library door and yelled, “Students will be here in an hour!” before disappearing into the depths of the British School at Rome. Jensen frowned as the emphatic clicking of her heels on the corridor’s marble floor faded into the distance. He let his head drop with a dull thud onto the pile of reference books on the table in front of him.
Fucking undergraduates with their high squeaky voices and disturbing enthusiasm for beer and their unbridled libidos. At the ripe old age of twenty-four, Jensen felt those times were well behind him. All he knew was, his peace was about to be shattered.
Jensen sighed. Why had he ever agreed to help Professor Campbell babysit over the summer when he had all this research to do? The question was hypothetical, of course. He knew the answer – he needed this trip to get the data he needed to write his thesis, which was why he’d begged the Prof for a place on her annual expedition to Botromagno in Apulia, right down in the instep of Italy’s boot. He really needed to see those southern rock-cut tombs for himself. He had measurements and a boatload of information about the Etruscan rock-cut tombs like the ones in Viterbo and Tarquinia. The northern Italian sites had been subject of research since the 18th century, but the ones in the far south of Italy had barely been touched except by tomb-robbers, and he, Jensen Ackles, wanted to be the first to write them up.
Dominic had never understood Jensen’s passion for archaeology, but then after a year with Dom, Jensen had come to the conclusion that the only passions his British ex-boyfriend had the brain capacity to understand were cricket (a game that, as an American, Jensen had never quite fathomed) and fucking. Not that Jensen was adverse to the latter, but there was more to life than having a nice dick stuck up his ass. He was, after all, not just a pretty face. Or ass. He’d told Dom exactly that, and Dom had promptly ditched Jensen for a younger, less uptight guy. Which explained why Jensen was here in Rome alone, while Dominic Forde was back in England eating cucumber sandwiches with his latest squeeze from the cricket team, Bodger or Boffer or some equally stupid British nickname.
Jensen risked another heavy sigh. So what if he was being gloomy, he was entitled. He hadn’t seen any action apart from the self-inflicted for over two months, and it wasn’t as if he could even attempt a no-strings shag with just anyone. Jensen wasn’t comfortable with one night stands, and his options for anything more meaningful were somewhat limited as most of Branchester’s LBGT community seemed to be made up of lesbians and fresh faced undergraduates. Like the ones whose voices he could hear echoing off the walls as they bundled off the minibus to disrupt the British School’s carefully maintained eighteenth century atmosphere. Even though the under grad/graduate culture was looser in the UK, Jensen still felt the constraints of the US system. All of which meant he’d feel it was unethical to hit on one of the younger students. Assuming any of them was even interested in an older perpetually disgruntled guy anyway. Dominic had been quick enough to replace him with some fresh piece of ass, after all.
Jensen glanced at his watch. He had at least half an hour before the kids got settled, dumped their gear and his babysitting duties began. He pushed his glasses up his nose with a decisive gesture. There was still time to make some more notes…
0x0x0x0
Jared was on a high. Okay, most of his friends would say Jared always behaved like an overexcited puppy, but this time he had good cause. A year of pining over Alison Mills had finally concluded on the very last day of the summer session, when Alison approached Jared to ask for help moving furniture out of her student flat. Of course Jared had said yes, because he was a sucker for helping people, even if this hadn’t been the woman who he’d been fantasising about since he’d set eyes on her in their Greece in the Dark Ages class. So when it turned out that Alison’s request was a precursor to her telling him she might possibly want to go out with him in their final year, and then very shyly kissing him on the lips, Jared’s heart might just have exploded.
He couldn’t believe his luck. He couldn’t believe he had to survive a whole six weeks before he could see her again. The anticipation might just kill him. So it was just as well he was used to waiting, and that he had a lot of practice with his right hand. And that he really, really loved that he was spending his summer in the best way possible. At least if he couldn’t spend the summer getting to know Alison better, here in history-saturated Italy Jared could indulge his other big passion. He couldn’t get over the fact that with every footstep he was touching two millennia’s worth of the past. If there was one thing that got Jared Padalecki as excited as being in love, it was archaeology. The sheer depth and richness of Europe’s history had drawn him irresistibly to a school in the UK rather than the US, and when this British School at Rome dig had come up, he’d jumped at the chance of an excavation in Italy’s deep south. The addition of a visit to Rome and the Bay of Naples had been a glorious bonus and more than made up for saying goodbye to Alison for six whole weeks.
So he refused to let his spirits be dampened on his arrival at the British School, even when Prof Campbell told him he had been assigned as intimidating grad student Ackles’ assistant for the duration of their expedition. The guy was a fellow American, in fact they were both from Texas, so the Prof had probably thought the two of them would get on well, being compatriots and all. And really, the Prof would have been right in any other circumstances. Jared was the sort of guy who could get along with anyone. Anyone but Jensen Fucking Ackles.
Jared just stood there like a giant dork while the tiny rotund Prof delivered the news. He cringed inwardly at the disgruntled expression currently marring Ackles’ too-pretty face, and tried not to be intimidated by it.
Jared didn’t know what it was about Ackles, but the tall handsome Texan with his ridiculous bowlegs and equally ridiculous bowed lips scared the hell out of him. Jared knew he was good at his subject, and he was aiming for first class honours because he wanted to go on to do research (like Jensen) and direct digs around the world (like the Prof) one day. He knew all of that, yet somehow when he was in Jensen’s presence, he forgot. When he was with Jensen Ackles, he felt like a first grader, an intellectual pygmy. Not that he had spent a lot of time with the post grad student before this trip, in fact Jared didn’t think Jensen even knew his name, even though as editor of the Department’s Archaeology magazine for a year, Jared had accepted several submissions from the guy.
“Look, I’m not saying some help wouldn’t be appreciated, there’s a lot of tombs to assess in only two weeks, but…” Jensen was saying, and Jared shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, getting the message loud and clear that the post grad didn’t want Jared tagging along. A message Prof Campbell seemed immune to.
“Yes, so that’s why I thought you and Jared could get more done together instead of trying to do all that surveying on your own.” She said brightly, craning her neck to look up at both of them. Jensen shot Jared an impenetrable look from under those thick lashes, and Jared had to supress the sudden flare of electricity that rushed through him. And there was the other reason Jensen Ackles made Jared uncomfortable. That towering intellect was accompanied by more scorching hotness that should be allowed on any university campus.
Jared swore silently under his breath as the Prof walked out of the room, leaving him alone with Jensen.
Who was still staring at him, his expression now more thoughtful than antagonistic.
“You’d better make the most of the next week’s study-sightseeing trip then, Padalecki. Once we get to Apulia you aren’t going to have a moment to call your own.” He said, before turning to follow the Prof, leaving Jared blushing like a schoolgirl.
Fuck it. Jared was not going to be that guy – you know, the one who’s being drawn into unfaithful, naughty thoughts before he’s even had a chance to more than kiss his sweet, innocent girlfriend-to-be.
0x0x0x0
As it turned out, the first week of the field trip wasn’t too bad for Jared. This part was a study tour in name rather than in deed, most of the week taken up with soaking up the hot Italian sun as much as soaking up knowledge. Having Jensen around in the background was distracting, sure, but there was so much to see and do, Jared was proud of how well he was coping. He revelled in the fascinations of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and was only mildly aroused when Jensen, acting as their tour guide, expounded on the glorious proportions of the Greek temples at Paestum. When his best bud Alan Williams noticed him staring at Jensen’s lips a little too fixedly and teased him about it, he was quick to defend himself.
“Hey, Williams, back off! Any self respecting bi would be interested in someone as pretty as Ackles, especially when he’s talking about suggestively phallic columns…”
“Nah, only a perve like you, Padders. Normal people don’t get aroused by some nerd in specs enthusing about ancient architecture or tombs or dating evidence. If we did, there would be an embarrassing amount of wanking going on in the lecture theatres.”
Jared rolled his eyes.
“Williams, you are such a philistine. I have no idea why you are even here!”
Alan grinned at him and gestured over his shoulder at four scantily clad female members of the team.
“Bikini tops and short shorts, matey, plus lots of opportunities, why else? That Meredith is definitely interested in me…”
Jared had his doubts about that. It didn’t look as though any of the quartet were paying the slightest attention to either Alan or Jared. Instead the girls were currently either pretending to check out the 24 flutes (as opposed to the usual 20) on the columns of the Temple of Hera that Jensen was pointing out to them, or checking out Jensen’s perky ass, depending whether they were standing in Jensen’s eye line or not.
Jared’s eyes were irresistibly drawn to said perky ass, and the tantalising patch of sweat that darkened the back of Jensen’s green cargo shorts. It was forming an arrow pointing right to the cleft of … Oh my god. That was a seriously gorgeous ass. He wrenched his gaze away before his treacherous dick took even more interest in the proceedings, and manfully resisted swatting Alan on the back of the head when his so-called friend laughed at his attempts to hide his obvious predicament.
So yes, Jared was doing fine, except for when he wasn’t.
But that was okay. Jared knew this was just his libido, not his heart, speaking, and Jared had it under control. Whenever he imagined Ackles’ exquisite pink lips wrapped around his cock, those thoughts like stealth ninjas sneaking their way into his mind when he watched Jensen talking, or when Jensen laughed at one of Jared’s ridiculous jokes, he would imagine how Alison had looked at him, full of shy promise, and his raging hard-on would subside.
“Don’t you worry that thinking about Alison actually makes your todger wilt?” Alan asked, after suffering through another session with Jared drinking too much wine at dinner and wanting to confide all his deepest darkest secrets to anyone and everyone. Fortunately for Jared, Alan was usually on hand to make sure the only person he spilled his inner ramblings to was his best friend and not the world. Although Alan had the outward appearance of an ox, all muscles and bland bovine placidity, he was sharp as a razor and had a huge heart. Together they made a formidable if unlikely pairing, both physically and intellectually.
Jared thought about what Alan had said, but then dismissed it. He didn’t want to face any uncomfortable implications when he was trying so hard to be faithful to his future girl.
Jared Padalecki was not a cheater. What? He wasn’t.
0x0x0x0
Jensen would never admit it, but he was kind of enjoying this trip. The undergraduates were not too juvenile, once you got to know them, though the gang of four girls the Prof kept calling the Four Marys (it was a comic book story, Jensen, you wouldn’t understand) would keep making Jensen blush with their constant flirting. He’d tried telling them he wasn’t interested – hey, gay man here! – but they didn’t seem convinced. One of them, the skinny blonde called Rosie or Rachel or something like that, had even pointed to Padalecki, saying he likes men and women, you know? As if that meant anything. Just because one gangly, shaggy haired guy was bisexual didn’t mean Jensen was a closet bi too.
Jensen tried not to think too hard about Jared Padalecki maybe liking guys. Because he was no cradle-snatcher and Padalecki was just a kid, with his gawky long limbs that sprawled everywhere and his dimpled smile.
Dimples for chrissakes!
He’d seen Padalecki around the University before, of course he had. The Department was small, only a hundred and fifty students and a handful of postgrads, and a guy thatattractive tall was hard to miss. But he’d never allowed himself to really look at any of the younger students. It had seemed ill advised to mix his sex life with his academic life, so though he’d been all too aware of his fellow Texan, he’d had Dominic and his studies, and that was enough.
Mark had argued with him often enough. Mark, post grad in geophysics and Jensen’s best friend at Branchester, had hated Dominic with a passion.
“You are wasting your chance of finding someone special, who’s right for you, instead of putting up with that utter pratt, and doing nothing but work the rest of the time,” Mark had told him many times, and Jensen always gave the same negative response.
“There’s more to life than academia, you know,” Mark would argue, but Jensen wasn’t convinced then and nothing was different now. Love was all very well, but archaeology was life itself. Okay, Branchester wasn’t Oxford or Cambridge, or even Princeton or Harvard, but his doctorate course was led by the Prof, and she was the foremost archaeologist in her field.
Mark was much happier now Jensen split up with Dominic. Jensen had been careful not to tell his friend that actually he’d been the dumpee in the equation. Life was easier that way. Though knowing Jensen was back on the market did mean Mark felt free to don the mantle of matchmaker, and his friend was endlessly pointing out prospective love, or at least lust, interests to Jensen.
“Why don’t you take your own advice, Mark? Go find yourself a nice girl and stop meddling with my life. I’m sure you’d be less interested in whether I’m getting some or not if you had someone warming your bed at night.”
“Fuck you, Ackles,” was Mark’s less than witty retort.
“Nah, you’re not my type,” Jensen replied, and the topic was shelved until next time.
So now Jensen was being careful and maintaining a distance between himself and all the kids, but especially Padalecki and his beguiling dimples. Jensen performed his shepherding duties, rounding up the flock and pointing them in the direction of the culture and heritage they were supposed to be there to study, and when they finally arrived on the dig site at Botromagno, he supervised the first few days of the excavation while looking forward the start of his research project.
But that was where his problems really started. Italy wasn’t Texas, but it was hot, especially here in the far south in the middle of summer. The hill top site they were excavating was peppered with ancient olive trees, none of which encroached onto the dig enough to offer even minimal shade, and after the first hour of attempting to open a new trench in the rock-hard ground, everyone was down to the bare minimum of clothing.
Bare being the operative word.
“Here, have a tissue. You’re drooling, Jenny,” Mark said with a grin as he passed by with his resistivity meter over one shoulder, laptop bag over the other.
Jensen tore his gaze away from the test pit with an effort so he could give Mark the requisite two fingers. After two years in the UK he had picked up that the Brit ‘fuck off’ sign was more effective than giving someone the middle finger. They really were two countries divided by a common language.
Jensen took off his glasses and allowed the world’s colours to blur while he wiped sweat off his face with the back of his hand. One thing he hated about being shortsighted was having his glasses sliding down his nose when he got sweaty.
Jensen wasn’t going to give Mark the satisfaction of admitting that he had been mesmerised watching the flex of Jared’s back muscles as he wielded the long-handled shovel full of loose dirt as if it was nothing. Everyone else was struggling with the Italian equipment – a shovel with a six-foot long handle was surprisingly difficult to wield. Il Sindaco, the old guy who was apparently the mayor of Botromagno, and his equally wizened friend from the town were very amused as they stood next to Jensen, giving a running commentary in thickly accented Italian. From what little Jensen could understand, the gist of it seemed to be how pathetic the students’ performance was. Jensen’s job was to keep the local dignitaries amused while the Prof was sorting out the excavation plans with Regina in the site hut, but he’d been somewhat distracted by the fact that Jared was building up a very nice tan, and by the way the sweat gleamed as it trickled over all that glorious golden skin.
So distracted that he noticed too late that the Mayor had decided enough was enough, and he and his friend had waded in to show the kids how it was done. Pushing aside the Four Marys, Alan, Roy and Malcolm, the two ancient yet wiry Italians hefted their pickaxes and went at the baked earth as if it had insulted their Momma. The students stood open mouthed as the two tiny men broke up the ground with metronomic precision, moving the earth like twin jackhammers. Jared was the first to react, grabbing his shovel and starting to clear the soil as quickly as he could. The others caught on and soon all the students were shovelling like crazy, trying to keep up with the local guys.
Mark came up on Jensen’s shoulder and the two postgrads watched, grinning. Malcolm, also known as Conker - because, Mark explained as if it was obvious, he had dark red hair and a shiny face like a conker, oh look it up, Yank - got redder and redder until Jensen took pity on him, and pulled him off shovelling duty to wheel away barrow-loads of spoil. The Four Marys were allowed to stand back from the fray and were clearly appreciating the show as Jared, Alan and Roy competed with the Italians and each other, muscles rippling and sweat dripping.
“Your boy is rather well built, isn’t he,” Mark observed. Jensen dug a vicious elbow into his friend’s ribs in a vain attempt to shut him up.
“Jared’s not my boy,” Jensen hissed. Mark glanced at him, a wicked gleam in his blue eyes.
“Righty ho, he’s not. So how did you know which of those three handsome studs I was talking about then?”
Jensen flushed redder than Conker. The sooner their fellow postgrad Christine finished off her holiday in Sicily and arrived to take over supervision of the dig the better.
Of course, Jensen was forgetting that when Christine took over, he would be free to start his research project. With Jared as his personal assistant.
Jensen was so screwed.
0x0x0x0
“Padders, Lord Snooty’s watching you again,” Alan said, poking Jared’s bicep unnecessarily hard, in Jared’s opinion.
“Jensen’s not snooty, he’s just a bit…”
“A bit what? Grumpy? Grouchy? Stand-offish?”
“Reserved! I was just going to say reserved. Anyway shut up about him, I don’t know why you are so obsessed with Ackles any how.”
“I’m not the one who’s staring at him all the time, Jared. You look like a lovesick puppy,” Alan chuckled, pausing for a moment to rest on his shovel. “Heh. A Paddapuppy.”
“Oh very funny, and fuck you.”
Jared was not lovesick, no way. He had Alison waiting for him - so no extraordinarily attractive, fascinatingly intelligent, freckle-speckled guy was going to tempt Jared into licking his way down that golden treasure trail to discover the tantalising reward that nestled inside those tight denim cut offs Jensen was wearing today. Jared was absolutely not noticing how Jensen’s short spiky hair was starting to get blond highlights, or that his light skin was beginning to turn to pale bronze in the southern Italian sun, so that he resembled a Phidias statue of a Greek god. With the adorable anachronistic addition of steel-rimmed glasses, of course.
And Jared was so not lying awake at night in the student’s shared make-shift dormitory listening to Alan snoring and Conker jerking off, wondering how he was going to cope when he had to spend time alone with this fucking Adonis who had insinuated himself into every one of Jared’s wet dreams since he arrived in Italy.
Okay. Jared was man enough to admit it. He was totally screwed.
0x0x0x0
It was somewhat of a surprise when Prof Rosie Campbell stuck her head round the door to the postgrads’ bedroom well after all had gone quiet in the rest of the lodgings. The Prof tended to be very single minded and hadn’t bothered to knock, just launched straight into her business without a thought for the lateness of the hour.
“Christine will be here by ten o’clock tomorrow. If you want to begin surveying your tombs in the morning, Jensen, you and Jared can take my Land Rover. Get started on the ones in the western ravine.”
She was met by twin squeaks of protest from Mark and Jensen who were in various stages of undress. Jensen grabbed a towel to cover his groin while Mark dived behind the half open door.
“God, Prof, a little privacy, please!”
Professor Campbell just shrugged and smiled beatifically. “Nothing I haven’t seen before, boys. Here. Catch!”
She chucked the keys to the Land Rover at Jensen’s head, and he dropped his towel to snatch them out of the air before they took his eye out. He glared, blushing furiously.
“What?” she said, while raising an appreciative eyebrow at the display. “I’m a career archaeologist. Everyone knows women archaeologists can’t throw for toffee. In fact, my very first excavation, we proved it by a scientific experiment. Each sex aimed nine-inch nails at targets. Us girls missed every time. I can safely say, it’s all in the elbow.”
Having delivered her parting shot, fortunately without using a nine-inch nail, the Prof disappeared, leaving Jensen to pull on his tatty sleeping boxers. Mark threw himself onto his camp bed with a groan.
“You lucky bugger. Wish my thesis was about something useful that would get me somewhere nice and secluded with that gorgeous totty Debbie…”
Jensen carefully ignored Mark’s insinuation, deflecting with a question.
“Which of the Four Marys is Debbie, then?”
“You know, the one with the long blonde hair and fine arse.” Mark demonstrated with hand gestures how much he appreciated Debbie’s curves.
Jensen snapped off the light before lowering himself down onto his bed with a little more care than Mark. Those metal framed beds were none too strong and he was sure it was just a matter of time before Mark’s collapsed on him. He reached up to put his glasses on the windowsill. Botromagno was a minimalist sort of expedition. Budgets were tight these days and didn’t stretch to furniture. Jensen was just grateful they had a stone building with walls and toilets that flushed instead of a tent.
“God, Mark, you’re fickle. I thought you liked Meredith,” he said. “Anyway, I always preferred brunettes.”
“Like Padalecki, right. So remind me why you were fucking that tow-haired cricket pillock again?”
“He might have been an idiot, but he was a good lay! And he said he loved me.”
Mark snorted derision into the dark. Jensen winced a little. Yeah, he deserved that one.
“Well, that Jared kid seems okay. At least he makes you laugh, Jen. Haven’t seen that for a while.”
Jensen almost heaved a sigh of his own, but held it back. No point in baring his soul any more than he already had done. Mark always said he was transparent as crystal anyway.
“That ‘Jared kid’ isn’t available, Mark. I heard him talking to his buddy Alan about the girl he’s got waiting for him back home.”
“But he’s bi, right…”
“Don’t, Mark. It doesn’t matter anyway. I’m not that desperate for a ride that I’d do an undergraduate. I’m happy to be single. I am.”
Mark somehow managed to imbue his silence with scepticism. Jensen flipped off his friend, unseen in the heated darkness. The gesture was a little half-hearted. He didn’t want to admit it, but Mark was right. Jared might be good for him. Jensen wasn’t that great with people, so being trapped in close quarters with a bunch of archaeologists for a whole month was a kind of torture for him. So far, Jared was the only one in the team who hadn’t driven Jensen crazy with irritation. Jared was intelligent and wasn’t afraid to show it, asking pertinent questions when the Prof had explained the finer points of the theories of migration versus trade for the distribution of proto-Corinthian pottery, while the rest of the undergraduates had sat there with blank expressions. Jared also had a dry wit that was offset by a childlike sense of humour that Jensen increasingly found endearing instead of aggravating.
Jensen hadn’t been lying when he’d said he wasn’t desperate for a fuck. It was much worse than that. Jensen was becoming desperate for Jared, period.
In short, Jared was pretty much the kind of guy Jensen had been searching for all his life.
He lay awake for a long time, staring at the stars as they appeared, framed by the glassless window.
0x0x0x0x0
Onwards to Part 2
Author: amber1960
Recipient: delanach
Genre: J2 AU
Rating: NC-17
Words: c9000
Warnings: manhandling, bare backing, swearing, almost infidelity (sort of), British spelling and Britishisms.
Summary: Jensen and Jared are American students studying archaeology at a British university. Jensen is a post grad, Jared a second year undergraduate, so they haven’t had much to do with each other until, during the summer break, they both join an expedition to Italy. Neither of them is looking for a relationship, yet somehow, stuff happens…
Author’s note: A gift for SPN J2 Xmas Fic Exchange on
spn_j2_xmas. One of the prompts Delanach asked for was a Geeky/nerdy J2 AU, and from a list of likes I went for something slashy with rough sex, manly schmoop, bare backing, first times (with each other) and smut. Hopefully this fits the bill!Many thanks to
tesserae_ and blackrabbit42 for their thorough, thoughtful betas – I’ve addressed most but not all of your comments, my friends, but hopefully this is now a better story because of both of you! Any remaining errors are all mine.For those of you who don’t know, it’s not my dodgy grammar – the British School at Rome is its actual name, though I’m sure you’ll be thinking it should be ‘in’ Rome. Branchester University fictional but is based on the UK model for Universities, and so is (in my limited experience) much less formal in some areas than US ones seem to be. Certainly, I’d expect lecturers to be on first name terms with their students (where they know their names at all!) and there certainly never used to be any barrier between post grads and under grads having relationships, probably because it’s rare for a post grad (MA student) to have a teaching role. PhD students might teach, but many don’t. Botromagno is a real place, an archaeological park just outside the town of Gravina in Apulia, Italy. There are real rock cut tombs there…
Alternative link - read on AO3
The First Law of Holes
A good archaeologist will always follow the First Law of Holes: if you are in one, carry on digging.
A-M Byrne 2013
November 21st, Branchester University Sports Centre
Jensen wipes his sweaty hand on the matte-painted wall of squash court #3, and grins at his panting opponent. Jared is bent over with hands braced on his strong thighs, and Jensen tries not to think about what else he might like to be doing to Jared in that position right now, instead of thrashing him at squash. Jensen’s hand tightens unconsciously, rolling the small ball between his fingers. The rubber is pleasantly smooth and warm to the touch…
“My serve, kid,” he says and bares his teeth in a predatory smile. Jared scuffs at the polished wooden floor where his sweat is making a small puddle, and grins back.
“Think you can take me, old man?” Jared says, and Jensen feels a small shiver at the heated challenge in those sharp hazel eyes.
“Oh yeah, Jay, you know I can take you any way I like…” he pauses and wiggles his eyebrows suggestively before throwing the ball up to take his best shot. Jared is on his toes in the T of the court, clearly thinking he’s ready for anything, but the tiny rubber missile shoots past him at ankle height and lands perfectly just above the backboard before dropping just out of Jared’s reach.
Jensen’s whoop of victory is cut off when Jared crowds him against the wall, looming like the freaking Colossus of Rhodes, bracketing Jensen with those steely thighs. Jensen swallows hard.
“So I’m a Colossus, eh?” Jared’s voice is dark as the promise in his eyes, and Jensen flushes. Had he really said that out loud? He really needs to be more careful what he lets slip when Jared’s in this kind of mood. The one thing guaranteed to ignite Jared Padalecki’s ardour beyond reason is Jensen talking ancient history.
And Jensen can’t help remembering back to the summer it all began…
1 Agosto, Roma
It wasn’t that Jensen had forgotten, but the Prof still made him jump when she stuck her head around the library door and yelled, “Students will be here in an hour!” before disappearing into the depths of the British School at Rome. Jensen frowned as the emphatic clicking of her heels on the corridor’s marble floor faded into the distance. He let his head drop with a dull thud onto the pile of reference books on the table in front of him.
Fucking undergraduates with their high squeaky voices and disturbing enthusiasm for beer and their unbridled libidos. At the ripe old age of twenty-four, Jensen felt those times were well behind him. All he knew was, his peace was about to be shattered.
Jensen sighed. Why had he ever agreed to help Professor Campbell babysit over the summer when he had all this research to do? The question was hypothetical, of course. He knew the answer – he needed this trip to get the data he needed to write his thesis, which was why he’d begged the Prof for a place on her annual expedition to Botromagno in Apulia, right down in the instep of Italy’s boot. He really needed to see those southern rock-cut tombs for himself. He had measurements and a boatload of information about the Etruscan rock-cut tombs like the ones in Viterbo and Tarquinia. The northern Italian sites had been subject of research since the 18th century, but the ones in the far south of Italy had barely been touched except by tomb-robbers, and he, Jensen Ackles, wanted to be the first to write them up.
Dominic had never understood Jensen’s passion for archaeology, but then after a year with Dom, Jensen had come to the conclusion that the only passions his British ex-boyfriend had the brain capacity to understand were cricket (a game that, as an American, Jensen had never quite fathomed) and fucking. Not that Jensen was adverse to the latter, but there was more to life than having a nice dick stuck up his ass. He was, after all, not just a pretty face. Or ass. He’d told Dom exactly that, and Dom had promptly ditched Jensen for a younger, less uptight guy. Which explained why Jensen was here in Rome alone, while Dominic Forde was back in England eating cucumber sandwiches with his latest squeeze from the cricket team, Bodger or Boffer or some equally stupid British nickname.
Jensen risked another heavy sigh. So what if he was being gloomy, he was entitled. He hadn’t seen any action apart from the self-inflicted for over two months, and it wasn’t as if he could even attempt a no-strings shag with just anyone. Jensen wasn’t comfortable with one night stands, and his options for anything more meaningful were somewhat limited as most of Branchester’s LBGT community seemed to be made up of lesbians and fresh faced undergraduates. Like the ones whose voices he could hear echoing off the walls as they bundled off the minibus to disrupt the British School’s carefully maintained eighteenth century atmosphere. Even though the under grad/graduate culture was looser in the UK, Jensen still felt the constraints of the US system. All of which meant he’d feel it was unethical to hit on one of the younger students. Assuming any of them was even interested in an older perpetually disgruntled guy anyway. Dominic had been quick enough to replace him with some fresh piece of ass, after all.
Jensen glanced at his watch. He had at least half an hour before the kids got settled, dumped their gear and his babysitting duties began. He pushed his glasses up his nose with a decisive gesture. There was still time to make some more notes…
0x0x0x0
Jared was on a high. Okay, most of his friends would say Jared always behaved like an overexcited puppy, but this time he had good cause. A year of pining over Alison Mills had finally concluded on the very last day of the summer session, when Alison approached Jared to ask for help moving furniture out of her student flat. Of course Jared had said yes, because he was a sucker for helping people, even if this hadn’t been the woman who he’d been fantasising about since he’d set eyes on her in their Greece in the Dark Ages class. So when it turned out that Alison’s request was a precursor to her telling him she might possibly want to go out with him in their final year, and then very shyly kissing him on the lips, Jared’s heart might just have exploded.
He couldn’t believe his luck. He couldn’t believe he had to survive a whole six weeks before he could see her again. The anticipation might just kill him. So it was just as well he was used to waiting, and that he had a lot of practice with his right hand. And that he really, really loved that he was spending his summer in the best way possible. At least if he couldn’t spend the summer getting to know Alison better, here in history-saturated Italy Jared could indulge his other big passion. He couldn’t get over the fact that with every footstep he was touching two millennia’s worth of the past. If there was one thing that got Jared Padalecki as excited as being in love, it was archaeology. The sheer depth and richness of Europe’s history had drawn him irresistibly to a school in the UK rather than the US, and when this British School at Rome dig had come up, he’d jumped at the chance of an excavation in Italy’s deep south. The addition of a visit to Rome and the Bay of Naples had been a glorious bonus and more than made up for saying goodbye to Alison for six whole weeks.
So he refused to let his spirits be dampened on his arrival at the British School, even when Prof Campbell told him he had been assigned as intimidating grad student Ackles’ assistant for the duration of their expedition. The guy was a fellow American, in fact they were both from Texas, so the Prof had probably thought the two of them would get on well, being compatriots and all. And really, the Prof would have been right in any other circumstances. Jared was the sort of guy who could get along with anyone. Anyone but Jensen Fucking Ackles.
Jared just stood there like a giant dork while the tiny rotund Prof delivered the news. He cringed inwardly at the disgruntled expression currently marring Ackles’ too-pretty face, and tried not to be intimidated by it.
Jared didn’t know what it was about Ackles, but the tall handsome Texan with his ridiculous bowlegs and equally ridiculous bowed lips scared the hell out of him. Jared knew he was good at his subject, and he was aiming for first class honours because he wanted to go on to do research (like Jensen) and direct digs around the world (like the Prof) one day. He knew all of that, yet somehow when he was in Jensen’s presence, he forgot. When he was with Jensen Ackles, he felt like a first grader, an intellectual pygmy. Not that he had spent a lot of time with the post grad student before this trip, in fact Jared didn’t think Jensen even knew his name, even though as editor of the Department’s Archaeology magazine for a year, Jared had accepted several submissions from the guy.
“Look, I’m not saying some help wouldn’t be appreciated, there’s a lot of tombs to assess in only two weeks, but…” Jensen was saying, and Jared shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, getting the message loud and clear that the post grad didn’t want Jared tagging along. A message Prof Campbell seemed immune to.
“Yes, so that’s why I thought you and Jared could get more done together instead of trying to do all that surveying on your own.” She said brightly, craning her neck to look up at both of them. Jensen shot Jared an impenetrable look from under those thick lashes, and Jared had to supress the sudden flare of electricity that rushed through him. And there was the other reason Jensen Ackles made Jared uncomfortable. That towering intellect was accompanied by more scorching hotness that should be allowed on any university campus.
Jared swore silently under his breath as the Prof walked out of the room, leaving him alone with Jensen.
Who was still staring at him, his expression now more thoughtful than antagonistic.
“You’d better make the most of the next week’s study-sightseeing trip then, Padalecki. Once we get to Apulia you aren’t going to have a moment to call your own.” He said, before turning to follow the Prof, leaving Jared blushing like a schoolgirl.
Fuck it. Jared was not going to be that guy – you know, the one who’s being drawn into unfaithful, naughty thoughts before he’s even had a chance to more than kiss his sweet, innocent girlfriend-to-be.
0x0x0x0
As it turned out, the first week of the field trip wasn’t too bad for Jared. This part was a study tour in name rather than in deed, most of the week taken up with soaking up the hot Italian sun as much as soaking up knowledge. Having Jensen around in the background was distracting, sure, but there was so much to see and do, Jared was proud of how well he was coping. He revelled in the fascinations of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and was only mildly aroused when Jensen, acting as their tour guide, expounded on the glorious proportions of the Greek temples at Paestum. When his best bud Alan Williams noticed him staring at Jensen’s lips a little too fixedly and teased him about it, he was quick to defend himself.
“Hey, Williams, back off! Any self respecting bi would be interested in someone as pretty as Ackles, especially when he’s talking about suggestively phallic columns…”
“Nah, only a perve like you, Padders. Normal people don’t get aroused by some nerd in specs enthusing about ancient architecture or tombs or dating evidence. If we did, there would be an embarrassing amount of wanking going on in the lecture theatres.”
Jared rolled his eyes.
“Williams, you are such a philistine. I have no idea why you are even here!”
Alan grinned at him and gestured over his shoulder at four scantily clad female members of the team.
“Bikini tops and short shorts, matey, plus lots of opportunities, why else? That Meredith is definitely interested in me…”
Jared had his doubts about that. It didn’t look as though any of the quartet were paying the slightest attention to either Alan or Jared. Instead the girls were currently either pretending to check out the 24 flutes (as opposed to the usual 20) on the columns of the Temple of Hera that Jensen was pointing out to them, or checking out Jensen’s perky ass, depending whether they were standing in Jensen’s eye line or not.
Jared’s eyes were irresistibly drawn to said perky ass, and the tantalising patch of sweat that darkened the back of Jensen’s green cargo shorts. It was forming an arrow pointing right to the cleft of … Oh my god. That was a seriously gorgeous ass. He wrenched his gaze away before his treacherous dick took even more interest in the proceedings, and manfully resisted swatting Alan on the back of the head when his so-called friend laughed at his attempts to hide his obvious predicament.
So yes, Jared was doing fine, except for when he wasn’t.
But that was okay. Jared knew this was just his libido, not his heart, speaking, and Jared had it under control. Whenever he imagined Ackles’ exquisite pink lips wrapped around his cock, those thoughts like stealth ninjas sneaking their way into his mind when he watched Jensen talking, or when Jensen laughed at one of Jared’s ridiculous jokes, he would imagine how Alison had looked at him, full of shy promise, and his raging hard-on would subside.
“Don’t you worry that thinking about Alison actually makes your todger wilt?” Alan asked, after suffering through another session with Jared drinking too much wine at dinner and wanting to confide all his deepest darkest secrets to anyone and everyone. Fortunately for Jared, Alan was usually on hand to make sure the only person he spilled his inner ramblings to was his best friend and not the world. Although Alan had the outward appearance of an ox, all muscles and bland bovine placidity, he was sharp as a razor and had a huge heart. Together they made a formidable if unlikely pairing, both physically and intellectually.
Jared thought about what Alan had said, but then dismissed it. He didn’t want to face any uncomfortable implications when he was trying so hard to be faithful to his future girl.
Jared Padalecki was not a cheater. What? He wasn’t.
0x0x0x0
Jensen would never admit it, but he was kind of enjoying this trip. The undergraduates were not too juvenile, once you got to know them, though the gang of four girls the Prof kept calling the Four Marys (it was a comic book story, Jensen, you wouldn’t understand) would keep making Jensen blush with their constant flirting. He’d tried telling them he wasn’t interested – hey, gay man here! – but they didn’t seem convinced. One of them, the skinny blonde called Rosie or Rachel or something like that, had even pointed to Padalecki, saying he likes men and women, you know? As if that meant anything. Just because one gangly, shaggy haired guy was bisexual didn’t mean Jensen was a closet bi too.
Jensen tried not to think too hard about Jared Padalecki maybe liking guys. Because he was no cradle-snatcher and Padalecki was just a kid, with his gawky long limbs that sprawled everywhere and his dimpled smile.
Dimples for chrissakes!
He’d seen Padalecki around the University before, of course he had. The Department was small, only a hundred and fifty students and a handful of postgrads, and a guy that
Mark had argued with him often enough. Mark, post grad in geophysics and Jensen’s best friend at Branchester, had hated Dominic with a passion.
“You are wasting your chance of finding someone special, who’s right for you, instead of putting up with that utter pratt, and doing nothing but work the rest of the time,” Mark had told him many times, and Jensen always gave the same negative response.
“There’s more to life than academia, you know,” Mark would argue, but Jensen wasn’t convinced then and nothing was different now. Love was all very well, but archaeology was life itself. Okay, Branchester wasn’t Oxford or Cambridge, or even Princeton or Harvard, but his doctorate course was led by the Prof, and she was the foremost archaeologist in her field.
Mark was much happier now Jensen split up with Dominic. Jensen had been careful not to tell his friend that actually he’d been the dumpee in the equation. Life was easier that way. Though knowing Jensen was back on the market did mean Mark felt free to don the mantle of matchmaker, and his friend was endlessly pointing out prospective love, or at least lust, interests to Jensen.
“Why don’t you take your own advice, Mark? Go find yourself a nice girl and stop meddling with my life. I’m sure you’d be less interested in whether I’m getting some or not if you had someone warming your bed at night.”
“Fuck you, Ackles,” was Mark’s less than witty retort.
“Nah, you’re not my type,” Jensen replied, and the topic was shelved until next time.
So now Jensen was being careful and maintaining a distance between himself and all the kids, but especially Padalecki and his beguiling dimples. Jensen performed his shepherding duties, rounding up the flock and pointing them in the direction of the culture and heritage they were supposed to be there to study, and when they finally arrived on the dig site at Botromagno, he supervised the first few days of the excavation while looking forward the start of his research project.
But that was where his problems really started. Italy wasn’t Texas, but it was hot, especially here in the far south in the middle of summer. The hill top site they were excavating was peppered with ancient olive trees, none of which encroached onto the dig enough to offer even minimal shade, and after the first hour of attempting to open a new trench in the rock-hard ground, everyone was down to the bare minimum of clothing.
Bare being the operative word.
“Here, have a tissue. You’re drooling, Jenny,” Mark said with a grin as he passed by with his resistivity meter over one shoulder, laptop bag over the other.
Jensen tore his gaze away from the test pit with an effort so he could give Mark the requisite two fingers. After two years in the UK he had picked up that the Brit ‘fuck off’ sign was more effective than giving someone the middle finger. They really were two countries divided by a common language.
Jensen took off his glasses and allowed the world’s colours to blur while he wiped sweat off his face with the back of his hand. One thing he hated about being shortsighted was having his glasses sliding down his nose when he got sweaty.
Jensen wasn’t going to give Mark the satisfaction of admitting that he had been mesmerised watching the flex of Jared’s back muscles as he wielded the long-handled shovel full of loose dirt as if it was nothing. Everyone else was struggling with the Italian equipment – a shovel with a six-foot long handle was surprisingly difficult to wield. Il Sindaco, the old guy who was apparently the mayor of Botromagno, and his equally wizened friend from the town were very amused as they stood next to Jensen, giving a running commentary in thickly accented Italian. From what little Jensen could understand, the gist of it seemed to be how pathetic the students’ performance was. Jensen’s job was to keep the local dignitaries amused while the Prof was sorting out the excavation plans with Regina in the site hut, but he’d been somewhat distracted by the fact that Jared was building up a very nice tan, and by the way the sweat gleamed as it trickled over all that glorious golden skin.
So distracted that he noticed too late that the Mayor had decided enough was enough, and he and his friend had waded in to show the kids how it was done. Pushing aside the Four Marys, Alan, Roy and Malcolm, the two ancient yet wiry Italians hefted their pickaxes and went at the baked earth as if it had insulted their Momma. The students stood open mouthed as the two tiny men broke up the ground with metronomic precision, moving the earth like twin jackhammers. Jared was the first to react, grabbing his shovel and starting to clear the soil as quickly as he could. The others caught on and soon all the students were shovelling like crazy, trying to keep up with the local guys.
Mark came up on Jensen’s shoulder and the two postgrads watched, grinning. Malcolm, also known as Conker - because, Mark explained as if it was obvious, he had dark red hair and a shiny face like a conker, oh look it up, Yank - got redder and redder until Jensen took pity on him, and pulled him off shovelling duty to wheel away barrow-loads of spoil. The Four Marys were allowed to stand back from the fray and were clearly appreciating the show as Jared, Alan and Roy competed with the Italians and each other, muscles rippling and sweat dripping.
“Your boy is rather well built, isn’t he,” Mark observed. Jensen dug a vicious elbow into his friend’s ribs in a vain attempt to shut him up.
“Jared’s not my boy,” Jensen hissed. Mark glanced at him, a wicked gleam in his blue eyes.
“Righty ho, he’s not. So how did you know which of those three handsome studs I was talking about then?”
Jensen flushed redder than Conker. The sooner their fellow postgrad Christine finished off her holiday in Sicily and arrived to take over supervision of the dig the better.
Of course, Jensen was forgetting that when Christine took over, he would be free to start his research project. With Jared as his personal assistant.
Jensen was so screwed.
0x0x0x0
“Padders, Lord Snooty’s watching you again,” Alan said, poking Jared’s bicep unnecessarily hard, in Jared’s opinion.
“Jensen’s not snooty, he’s just a bit…”
“A bit what? Grumpy? Grouchy? Stand-offish?”
“Reserved! I was just going to say reserved. Anyway shut up about him, I don’t know why you are so obsessed with Ackles any how.”
“I’m not the one who’s staring at him all the time, Jared. You look like a lovesick puppy,” Alan chuckled, pausing for a moment to rest on his shovel. “Heh. A Paddapuppy.”
“Oh very funny, and fuck you.”
Jared was not lovesick, no way. He had Alison waiting for him - so no extraordinarily attractive, fascinatingly intelligent, freckle-speckled guy was going to tempt Jared into licking his way down that golden treasure trail to discover the tantalising reward that nestled inside those tight denim cut offs Jensen was wearing today. Jared was absolutely not noticing how Jensen’s short spiky hair was starting to get blond highlights, or that his light skin was beginning to turn to pale bronze in the southern Italian sun, so that he resembled a Phidias statue of a Greek god. With the adorable anachronistic addition of steel-rimmed glasses, of course.
And Jared was so not lying awake at night in the student’s shared make-shift dormitory listening to Alan snoring and Conker jerking off, wondering how he was going to cope when he had to spend time alone with this fucking Adonis who had insinuated himself into every one of Jared’s wet dreams since he arrived in Italy.
Okay. Jared was man enough to admit it. He was totally screwed.
0x0x0x0
It was somewhat of a surprise when Prof Rosie Campbell stuck her head round the door to the postgrads’ bedroom well after all had gone quiet in the rest of the lodgings. The Prof tended to be very single minded and hadn’t bothered to knock, just launched straight into her business without a thought for the lateness of the hour.
“Christine will be here by ten o’clock tomorrow. If you want to begin surveying your tombs in the morning, Jensen, you and Jared can take my Land Rover. Get started on the ones in the western ravine.”
She was met by twin squeaks of protest from Mark and Jensen who were in various stages of undress. Jensen grabbed a towel to cover his groin while Mark dived behind the half open door.
“God, Prof, a little privacy, please!”
Professor Campbell just shrugged and smiled beatifically. “Nothing I haven’t seen before, boys. Here. Catch!”
She chucked the keys to the Land Rover at Jensen’s head, and he dropped his towel to snatch them out of the air before they took his eye out. He glared, blushing furiously.
“What?” she said, while raising an appreciative eyebrow at the display. “I’m a career archaeologist. Everyone knows women archaeologists can’t throw for toffee. In fact, my very first excavation, we proved it by a scientific experiment. Each sex aimed nine-inch nails at targets. Us girls missed every time. I can safely say, it’s all in the elbow.”
Having delivered her parting shot, fortunately without using a nine-inch nail, the Prof disappeared, leaving Jensen to pull on his tatty sleeping boxers. Mark threw himself onto his camp bed with a groan.
“You lucky bugger. Wish my thesis was about something useful that would get me somewhere nice and secluded with that gorgeous totty Debbie…”
Jensen carefully ignored Mark’s insinuation, deflecting with a question.
“Which of the Four Marys is Debbie, then?”
“You know, the one with the long blonde hair and fine arse.” Mark demonstrated with hand gestures how much he appreciated Debbie’s curves.
Jensen snapped off the light before lowering himself down onto his bed with a little more care than Mark. Those metal framed beds were none too strong and he was sure it was just a matter of time before Mark’s collapsed on him. He reached up to put his glasses on the windowsill. Botromagno was a minimalist sort of expedition. Budgets were tight these days and didn’t stretch to furniture. Jensen was just grateful they had a stone building with walls and toilets that flushed instead of a tent.
“God, Mark, you’re fickle. I thought you liked Meredith,” he said. “Anyway, I always preferred brunettes.”
“Like Padalecki, right. So remind me why you were fucking that tow-haired cricket pillock again?”
“He might have been an idiot, but he was a good lay! And he said he loved me.”
Mark snorted derision into the dark. Jensen winced a little. Yeah, he deserved that one.
“Well, that Jared kid seems okay. At least he makes you laugh, Jen. Haven’t seen that for a while.”
Jensen almost heaved a sigh of his own, but held it back. No point in baring his soul any more than he already had done. Mark always said he was transparent as crystal anyway.
“That ‘Jared kid’ isn’t available, Mark. I heard him talking to his buddy Alan about the girl he’s got waiting for him back home.”
“But he’s bi, right…”
“Don’t, Mark. It doesn’t matter anyway. I’m not that desperate for a ride that I’d do an undergraduate. I’m happy to be single. I am.”
Mark somehow managed to imbue his silence with scepticism. Jensen flipped off his friend, unseen in the heated darkness. The gesture was a little half-hearted. He didn’t want to admit it, but Mark was right. Jared might be good for him. Jensen wasn’t that great with people, so being trapped in close quarters with a bunch of archaeologists for a whole month was a kind of torture for him. So far, Jared was the only one in the team who hadn’t driven Jensen crazy with irritation. Jared was intelligent and wasn’t afraid to show it, asking pertinent questions when the Prof had explained the finer points of the theories of migration versus trade for the distribution of proto-Corinthian pottery, while the rest of the undergraduates had sat there with blank expressions. Jared also had a dry wit that was offset by a childlike sense of humour that Jensen increasingly found endearing instead of aggravating.
Jensen hadn’t been lying when he’d said he wasn’t desperate for a fuck. It was much worse than that. Jensen was becoming desperate for Jared, period.
In short, Jared was pretty much the kind of guy Jensen had been searching for all his life.
He lay awake for a long time, staring at the stars as they appeared, framed by the glassless window.
0x0x0x0x0
Onwards to Part 2