Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jared has a weird feeling about this. Not bad, exactly. Just weird. It’s an ugly, rainy night, the kind that makes even the most level-headed person jump at shadows, and if Jared were a more superstitious man, he probably wouldn’t have taken this call at all.

Alright, if he’s being honest, he took the call because he’s behind on bills, and he needs the money more than he needs to listen to the minor case of heebie-jeebies he’s getting as his truck crawls along winding, poorly lit streets, eyes scanning the side of the road for a stalled car and the cagey guy who requested his help.

He’s got a good head on his shoulders—that’s what his mama used to say, and even if she wouldn’t stand by it today, Jared’s gotta believe she was right. Someone out here is having a worse night than he is, and it’s his job to ignore the little voice in the back of his head saying turn around.

The more he looks, though, the more it seems like there’s something sinister hidden in the trees, following him as he drives. Jared hasn’t lived here long, but he’s spotted deer by day and heard there’s foxes and even coyotes living in these woods. Nothing that would follow him for miles of road, unseen but shaking up the branches as he passes. It’s probably just wind accompanying the rain. Or Jared’s imagination.

Despite all the effort he’s putting into finding the wreck, Jared almost misses it when he finally turns yet another bend and passes the slip of road the driver was able to pull onto. The car’s lights are all off, the paint is a dark color, either black or deep blue, and it blends into the gloominess of the scene around it.

What catches his attention is the bright green light shining out from inside. That makes Jared look again, closely enough to notice the frame of the car and the slight glint of his headlights bouncing off the polished surface.

Jared immediately slows, driving his truck onto the small shoulder off the paved road as near to the stranded vehicle as possible. He sits for a moment in his car, waiting to see if anything happens, if that weird feeling he’s been trying to outrun will catch up to him now that he’s not moving. He’s relieved to find that, although it hasn’t gone away completely, the unnerving sensation has dispelled a little, enough that he feels a bit silly for thinking of turning back.

Still, the rain is coming down hard, and Jared can’t see the driver that called him anywhere. The only thing he can distinguish through the thick cloud of falling water and fog is that emerald green light shining through the windshield of a sleek luxury coupe, blinking out every few seconds, but not in any discernible pattern. It could be a phone, Jared thinks, but it’s much, much too bright.

“Here goes nothing,” he mutters, grabbing his umbrella from shotgun and stepping out into the downpour.

His boots are soaked through as soon as he sets foot onto the muddy ground, and he’s not sure why he even bothered with the umbrella, because the wind is whipping around so much that he’s covered in water in seconds. Jared laughs at that, figures he’d been pretty grimy with motor oil and sweat after a long day at the garage, so a little water won’t do him any harm.

He pushes on, walking through one big puddle until he reaches the BMW, which he can now confirm is midnight blue as his flashlight passes over it, trying to get a look at the driver through the glass. All he can see is a shadowy person-shaped outline, but the light becomes more defined, and Jared realizes that it’s coming from two fine points rather than being the one strong beam he’d thought it was from far away.

Jared raps his knuckles on the window, and the person inside hesitates for a moment before lowering it. Once he sees the driver, Jared forgets the discomfort of being out in the rain and the fact that this is a client; he gasps and steps back on instinct.

“Please tell me JD sent you,” says the man.

Jared swallows hard and nods, unable to respond verbally for a long few seconds. The unnatural green light that he’d seen goes out and then on again, shining right at Jared, and there’s a reason for that. It’s literally blinking, because it’s coming from the stranger’s eyes.

“You’re, um,” Jared says stupidly.

“Stranded, yes,” the man agrees, though his jaw is set tight, his teeth gritted, and Jared can tell he knows as well as Jared does that that wasn’t what he was about to say. “Are you going to help me or not?”

“Of—of course,” Jared stutters, giving the man his most disarming smile. He can remember how to be a professional and stop gawking. He’s still got some southern manners buried in him somewhere. “I can have your car set and ready to be towed in twenty minutes or so. It’ll take a little longer than usual with this rain and the dark. Will that be alright?”

“Well, I wasn’t going anywhere in the next twenty minutes either way.” The man shrugs, still looking a little wary of Jared, but good naturedly enough, like he’s content to pretend Jared didn’t almost freak out at him five seconds ago if Jared will.

“Great!” Jared says. “Do you wanna just wait in my car for me to finish? The passenger’s side is unlocked. I can open the door and you make a run for it?”

The guy frowns a bit, looking to the truck parked up ahead of them and then to Jared, green light tracking the movement in a way that fascinates him, even if he’s learned to keep his fool mouth shut about it.

“You sure? Should I be helping you instead of leaving you to get rained on?”

“Hey, you’re the customer,” Jared replies, smirking. “I won’t even charge for giving you a warm place to sit while you wait. We’re good like that at JD’s.”

“Yeah, I don’t doubt it,” the guy says, voice a little quieter than before. “Y’all were the only towing company that would take my call.”

Jared opens his mouth to ask, then realizes what the guy isn’t saying and instead he puts a hand on the door and tells him, “On my count now, I’m gonna let you out and you haul ass over to the truck.”

The stranger smiles, nodding his head, and waits until Jared says go and pulls the door open to do as instructed.

Once he’s got the client comfortably settled away, Jared gets to work on loading the car. He notices that there doesn’t look to be any damage on it, no quick easy answer to what made it malfunction, but every time he touches it, that weird sensation he’d felt before arriving starts to eat at him again.

Finally, he finishes and climbs up onto the driver’s side of his truck, slamming the door as quickly as possible to try to shut the rain out. The stranger is staring ahead with his glowing green eyes, but he turns when he hears Jared return, the light bright and unexpected enough to be almost blinding for a moment before Jared adjusts.

“All good to go,” he says.

Jared smiles and looks in the guy’s direction, trying not to be too obvious but wanting to take in more detail now that they’re so close and both sitting under the ceiling light. He notices that in addition to the freaky glowing eyes, the man has long ears with a sharp point at the end. Aside from those two things, he could almost pass for normal. But there’s something else that Jared can’t pinpoint that’s off about him, an air of otherness and a beauty that seems untouchable.

“So were we gonna leave, then?” the man asks impatiently. Jared can’t fault him for that. It probably gets old, being stared at.

Jared blinks a few times and turns his attention to his seatbelt. “Where do you live? I can drop you off at home before taking your car to the garage.”

“No, that’s fine,” the guy says. “I’ll find a way home. Just get me out of Rock Creek and back into civilization.”

Jared huffs a laugh. “We aren’t exactly stranded in the desert. It’s still D.C.”

“Not at night it isn’t,” he replies. “At night, it’s wild.”

For a moment, Jared just lifts an eyebrow, trying to figure out what the hell that means, but he decides to leave it. He’s made enough of an ass of himself tonight.

Instead, he holds his hand out and introduces himself. “I’m Jared.”

“Jared,” the man says, looking at him suspiciously before deciding to go ahead and shake. “I’m Jensen.”

“Jensen,” Jared repeats. “That’s an interesting name.”

“It’s more common than Jared where I’m from,” says Jensen.

“Right…” Jared bites his bottom lip and turns away, internally cursing himself. “Right, that makes sense.”

To his surprise, Jensen laughs. “When JD gave me your number, I kind of assumed he’d call to make sure you were okay with this. But he didn’t tell you, did he? You looked like you’d been run over by your own truck when you saw me.”

“No, he didn’t,” Jared admits, a little flustered. Jeff’s been in big cities for near on twenty years now. He’s probably used to this kind of thing, thought nothing of it. But Jared really could have used the heads-up, especially if Jeff knew. “I’m sorry, it just took me by surprise is all. I’ve never seen a—one of you guys.”

“Fae,” Jensen corrects. “We’re called fae. You can say that.”

Jared nods, making a mental note. There are lots of words that get thrown around to refer to what Jensen is, and Jared wasn’t sure which ones they use themselves. Though there are certainly a few even Jared knows enough not to use to Jensen’s face.

“I’m really sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to, I mean, I just didn’t know how to…”

“It’s okay,” Jensen says, though he turns so that he’s looking out the window, hiding his expression from Jared. “I’m used to it. Get it a lot.”

“That doesn’t make it okay,” Jared replies.

Jensen turns back to him quickly, observing Jared closely before guessing, “You’re not from here, either.”

“What gave it away?” Jared jokes, letting his Texan drawl really seep into his words.

“Just moved to town,” Jensen adds. “Two, maybe three months ago.”

“Yeah,” Jared confirms, though he feels unsettled by the confidence in Jensen’s voice as he guesses. “Two and a half as of yesterday.”

“Relax,” says Jensen. “I can’t read minds or anything. I just figured you would have met at least a few fae around the city if you’d been here any longer.”

Jared feels a little silly, because, okay, the thought that Jensen might be able to hear his thoughts had crossed his mind. They can do magic, right? That’s what everyone says, and Jared’s never really gotten a clear idea of what exactly that entails.

He’s itching to start asking questions, but he can tell Jensen’s already had a long day, and some small town boy’s ignorance is the last thing he needs right now, so he pushes them away.

“Let me apologize by taking you home,” Jared insists. “I won’t charge you more for it, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“It’s alright, you don’t need to inconvenience yourself any more than you already have. I’ll just ride to the garage with you and find a way home from there.”

“At this time?” Jared asks. “In this weather?”

Jensen is quiet for a long time, and Jared knows what he’s thinking about. The same thing Jared didn’t want to say. No cab is going to stop for someone like Jensen in the middle of the night. Not without charging triple the fare, at least.

“I live on the Hill,” Jensen finally says. “If that’s not too far out of your way, I would love a ride.”

“There,” Jared says, smiling as he starts up his truck. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“I guess not,” Jensen admits, huffing with amusement. “You aren’t one for giving up, are you?”

Jared slants a smile his way and winks. “Not until things get tough.”

Jensen flat out laughs at that. There’s a moment where they could either settle into comfortable silence or strike up a conversation, and he’s surprised that Jensen decides to go for the latter.

“So what did you move up here for?” Jensen asks. “You don’t seem like the D.C. type.”

“I’m not. Just needed a change. Came to work at my uncle’s garage,” Jared answers, omitting the grittier details. “How about you? What made you decide to leave your, uh…community?”

“Wanted to fight the man,” Jensen says, grinning. “Make a difference. I work for Faer Shake as a lobbyist.”

“I’m sorry,” Jared says for the millionth time tonight. “I’m not familiar.”

“I must not be very good at my job, then,” Jensen jokes. “It’s a fae rights nonprofit.”

Jared shoots a quick glance over at Jensen, at the expensive suit he has on and the casual way he wears it, and thinks of the luxury car he secured to his truck not five minutes ago. “Uh, no offence, but you don’t really strike me as a guy who works for a nonprofit.”

“Yeah,” Jensen says with some bite. “Senators don’t exactly take people like me seriously when we show up in our traditional robes.”

“Oh, I’m…” Jared wants to kick himself more than he wants to parrot out another apology only to mess up again thirty seconds later. It must sound pretty disingenuous to Jensen at this point, but he doesn’t know what else to do. “Sorry. That’s really shitty, man.”

“It is what it is,” Jensen tells him, smiling weakly. “Anyway, not sure why I bother some nights, they don’t really respect us when we dress like them either.”

Jared licks his lips, wonders if he’s prying too much, but decides screw it, what’s one more chance to stick his foot in his mouth? “Jensen, I’m gonna venture a guess and say you were driving home from a bad meeting with a senator tonight.”

To his relief, Jensen laughs. “That obvious?”

“Maybe I’m the one that can read minds,” Jared replies, turning from the road for a moment to waggle his eyebrows at Jensen.

Jensen lets his head drop back as he laughs at that, looking relaxed for the first time since Jared joined him in the truck, so he decides to give the guy a chance to vent, in case it’ll help. “Anything you want to talk about?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Jensen shrug. “Just an asshole who’s never heard the word ‘no’ in his life.”

Jared puts both hands on the steering wheel, trying to brace himself before he gets too upset. “Did he hurt you? Did he try to force himself on you? Because I can—”

“Not what you’re thinking,” Jensen says, and when he reaches out to place a hand on Jared’s wrist, a warm, calming sensation spreads throughout him. “He said he would vote for the bill I’ve been trying to drum up support for, but only if I—”

“I will turn this truck around, so help me,” Jared says.

Jensen finishes, “Only if I did magic for him.”

“Oh,” Jared replies, feeling his face flush. “That’s not what I expected you to say.”

“It’s not much different, to be honest,” Jensen tells him. “Using our brio—what you would call doing magic—is a very sacred thing. It’s an intimate, powerful experience. It’s incredibly draining and it can be beautiful, rejuvenating even, at the right time, but it’s a terrible violation when someone forces it. It’s not a party trick.”

“I didn’t realize,” Jared admits. “That’s terrible that he expected that. Just to do the right thing.”

“I certainly think so,” Jensen says, sounding put out. “But now I’m going to have to defend myself at work tomorrow, explain why I couldn’t get the vote. If the bill fails, it’ll be on me.”

“Surely the people you work with understand?” Jared asks. “They’re fae too, right?”

“Half of them already hate me, for dressing like this and driving that car and living where I live, and the other half hate me for not bending over backwards to give every powerful human what they want in order to make the right impression. There’s no winning.”

“Don’t say that,” Jared tells him. “I bet you’ve had some wins. Even small ones make a huge difference, right? Think of all the fae out there who don’t have to hide anymore because of people doing what you’re doing.”

Jensen is quiet so long that Jared eventually turns to see his expression, to try to determine if he upset him. Jensen is watching him with a soft smile on his lips, but he shakes his head when he sees Jared looking at him and says, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be ranting at you about this. You’ve already put up with enough between the rain and driving out to find me. I don’t usually talk so much. I guess I just had some stuff to get off my chest.”

“It’s cool,” Jared tells him. “I was a bartender back in Texas, so I guess you could say I qualify as a shrink.”

“You’re a weird one,” Jensen says through a laugh. “I like you.”

“Thanks, I think,” Jared replies.

Jensen turns the exchange around then, asks Jared how he likes being a mechanic, and the conversation flows so easily that he’s pulling up in front of Jensen’s townhouse on Capitol Hill before he’s really ready to say goodnight.

Jared’s got his head buried under the hood of Jensen’s luxury car, trying to get a better look at the problem without losing his hands by holding a flashlight to it. So when the green light falls on the carburetor, he’s so thankful for it that he doesn’t even bother to wonder where it’s coming from. Instead, he immediately leans forward and starts fiddling with pieces that shouldn’t have gotten loose in the first place and fixes them as quickly as he can, hoping to get it done before he starts feeling nauseous again.

“I got a call,” comes a deep, rich voice next to him, and Jared stands up so fast he nearly hits his head. “JD said the car wasn’t ready yet, but that you wanted to talk to me.”

“Jensen!” Jared exclaims as he collects himself enough to look Jensen over. Jensen is immaculate, perfectly pressed blue suit and tie, and Jared is wearing more car grease than clothes at this point.

“Jared,” Jensen replies, smiling like he’s walking a red carpet instead of standing in the middle of an auto shop surrounded by sweaty middle aged men in filthy uniforms. “It was Jared, right?”

“You remembered.” The idea that someone like this would remember his backwoods ass throws Jared off even more than seeing Jensen, and seeing Jensen is pretty overwhelming all on its own. He lifts a hand to scratch at the back of his neck, then realizes he’s probably just smearing oil everywhere and drops it. “I wasn’t expecting you. I mean, I did tell Jeff to ask you to come. So I guess I should have been. But I wasn’t.” He pauses and nearly cringes at how stupid he sounds, even to himself, as he finishes, “Anyway, here you are.”

“Yeah,” Jensen agrees, cocking an eyebrow. “Here I am.”

“Right there,” says Jared, gesturing to where Jensen is standing. “In front of me.”

Jared starts cataloguing differences between what he thought Jensen looked like in the dark the other night and the man standing in front of him now. Jensen seemed slighter, small or even frail, but he’s almost imposing, just an inch or two off Jared’s height. His eyes are still a dramatic shade of green, but the light gets lost in the day, so a person could only tell they’re supernatural if they fall on something dark, like when he was looking at Jared under the hood. There are freckles glittering like small diamonds across the bridge of his nose that Jared couldn’t see at night and his teeth, which were turned away for most of the drive they shared, seem just a little sharper than a human’s.

“I’m definitely here,” Jensen confirms again while Jared is looking him over. He waits a few moments as Jared just blinks at him vacantly, and then adds, “Is there a reason I’m here, Jared? I rushed out of the office because it sounded urgent.”

“Fuck,” Jared curses. “Yes. Sorry. I—”

“Do I make you nervous?” Jensen asks. “I’m a very nice guy once you get to know me.”

“I tend to get flustered around attractive people,” Jared blurts out.

Jensen opens his mouth to respond but seems to get stuck when he hears what Jared said. He closes his mouth and suddenly a purple blush spreads over his cheeks, exaggerating the freckles.

“And here I thought you were just,” Jensen licks his bottom lip, “gawking at the freak.”

Jared shakes his head, wondering if he could be any worse at this. “Your car,” he says, pointing to the BMW next to him.

“I did recognize it,” Jensen tells him, a playful look in his eye. He’s enjoying Jared’s suffering entirely too much.

“There’s something off about it,” Jared says. He glances around to make sure no one is in earshot, and then continues, “This is probably going to sound stupid. And crazy? I didn’t want to say it over the phone because I didn’t want to freak you out and…I don’t know how to explain it. But I think…I think what happened to you the other night wasn’t an accident. The things that malfunctioned here shouldn’t have. I haven’t found any evidence of tampering, but it just doesn’t make sense, and…” Jared ducks his head, realizing this sounds even dumber out loud. “I just get a really bad feeling when I touch it. If I’m under there too long, I start to feel queasy and unwelcome. I wanted to warn you. It’s probably nothing, but I had to say something just in case, so, there it is. I think someone might be trying to hurt you.”

Jensen doesn’t laugh at him like he’s expecting. In fact, he doesn’t have much of a reaction at all, except a small frown. “I know.”

“You know?” Jared asks.

“Yes. I’m sorry. I didn’t think you would be able to sense it.” Jensen tangles his hands together and pushes his thumb over his palm. “Whoever it was, I had to fight them just to gain enough control of the car to get it safely off the road.”

“You didn’t say anything about that!” Jared responds, voice rising until he sees Jensen’s discomfort with Jared drawing attention to their conversation and adjusts his volume back down to an angry whisper. “How could you just not tell me?”

“It was about survival,” Jensen says evenly. “I was stranded in the woods with someone who was trying to kill me. Whoever they were, they were incredibly powerful. Channeling energy like that from a distance? My brio was hardly a match for theirs. I was exhausted by the time you found me. If you had refused me service like all the others I called, if they’d found me before you…” Jensen looks guilty as he turns his face from Jared. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

“You should have called the police,” says Jared. “Not a mechanic.”

“The police,” Jensen replies, scoffing. “To a place with dark, decidedly illegal magic in the air? Jared, the police would have seen that I was fae and assumed it was my brio before I even had a chance to explain myself. I was as likely to die calling them as waiting for my assailant to find me.”

“We could have both been killed.” Jared crosses his arms over his chest. “You can’t put people in situations like that without telling them.”

Jensen’s perfect composure buckles under that, and Jared watches as a guilt-ridden expression settles on his face. “I know. I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to put you at risk. But I knew any fae attacking me would back off if they saw that a human had gotten involved. And you were already so nervous when you saw me. I half thought you were going to turn me away just for being fae. I didn’t want to frighten you more. You were my only chance.”

“I wouldn’t have left you out there to die if you’d told me,” Jared says, but then he remembers that ugly feeling that had been hovering over him like a cloud until he’d found Jensen and how close he had come to bailing on the job before he even got there.

“It wouldn’t have been your fault if you had,” Jensen reassures him. “Whatever was in those woods was evil. We don’t—fae don’t practice that kind of magic. It’s forbidden. But it’s powerful. The fact that you got through it…I thought for sure that meant you couldn’t sense it. If even just the residue left on the car is making you sick, I can’t imagine how you resisted it.”

“I did feel it. I felt it on the Parkway before I even found you.” Jared shakes his head. “I thought I was going crazy.”

“You aren’t. You weren’t.” Jensen reaches out but pulls back before laying a hand on Jared’s grimy shoulder. “Please don’t report me. It would set fae rights back years if someone as prominent in my community as I am was taken in for putting a human at risk, no matter what the circumstances were. I’m sure you want to see me punished, and I know I deserve it, but the rest of my kin do not. I’ll pay handsomely for your silence. And, if you want nothing more to do with this, I can take the car elsewhere for repairs. You’ve already done more than your job.”

“Why did you get in my truck?” Jared asks, instead of acknowledging Jensen’s offer to take his problems elsewhere. “I was a stranger. I could have been working with whoever—”

“There’s no artifice to you, Jared. You were very easy to read,” Jensen pauses to laugh a little, “You said everything wrong, but in just the right way.”

Jared puts a hand on his hip. “I thought you couldn’t read minds.”

“I can’t, that I know of. I certainly couldn’t in the state I was in the other night. I just picked up your energies. They were good. You felt…very good. It could have been a lie. Things like that can be manipulated, even without magic. But I had to trust it. I had no other options.”

“You were so calm,” Jared says. Looking back on the night, Jensen had seemed diminished compared to the presence he has right now, and the way he’d spoken on the phone when Jared got his call had been a little off. But it wasn’t anything obvious. Jared had chalked it up to frustration with the car troubles, with the discrimination he’d faced from the other tow companies, and the bad meeting he’d been driving home from. He never would have suspected Jensen was in a life or death situation. “Does this kind of thing happen to you often?”

Jensen laughs, and somehow the room feels lighter. “I promise the fae life isn’t that exciting. I’m no one special. The idea of someone working that hard to try to stop me never would have occurred to me.”

“You played it off like—”

“Truth be told, I wasn’t playing at anything. Your aura was calming. It was easy to be disarming to you. Because you yourself were disarming.”

“Naw, you’re making me blush,” Jared jokes.

“Turnabout is fair play,” Jensen says with a sharp grin. He holds Jared’s eyes for a few long moments, then looks to the car. “What about this piece of junk, is it salvageable? Or did my mysterious friend succeed in killing something after all?”

Jared is disappointed by the pivot from flirting, but he does his best to be professional. “The car will be fine in a few days. Not sure you can get that weird magic stink off it, but the mechanics aren’t gonna be an issue.”

“Spiritual cleansing I can do,” Jensen replies. “Tinkering, not so much.”

“We’re a perfect team, then.” Jared smiles and is considering asking Jensen out when someone puts a hand on his shoulder.

“This pixie freak bothering you, Jayman?”

He looks over to see Mark Pellegrino, not his favorite of his co-workers, and shakes the asshole off. By the time he turns his attention back to Jensen, the warmth has all gone out of his face and been replaced with something sad, defeated. Jensen doesn’t look nearly as indignant as Jared feels, more like he’s used to hearing things like that.

“Mr. Ackles is my client, Mark,” Jared replies. “Have a little respect.”

Mark looks from the car to Jensen and then whistles. “This little girl is yours?”

“That’s my car, yes,” Jensen says, overtly formal. Respectful. Jared thinks of the senator who upset him the other night and wonders how much of his life Jensen spends being deferential to assholes.

“Well, how about you walk out of here and leave the keys, and we don’t call the cops to look into how someone like you could ever afford a car like that.”

“I didn’t steal it if that’s what you’re implying,” Jensen says. “I have all the paperwork.”

“Paperwork tends to get lost,” Mark replies, taking a step toward Jensen and straightening his back, obviously trying to look as intimidating as possible.

Jared knows Mark fights professionally on his time off and that, if things came to blows, he would have the skills to back up his silent threat. So he steps between the two men, facing away from Jensen, and gives Mark a light shove in the chest.

“How about you back off and mind your own business?” Jared asks. “We aren’t running a damn chop house here.”

“Don’t talk to me like you know more than me.” Mark shoves Jared back. “I’ve worked here for fifteen years. You’re only here because the boss is your uncle.”

Jared’s hand curls into a fist, and he’s about to throw a punch, but someone else catches his arm before he can do it. He looks over to see Jeff and nearly curses out loud at being caught about to start a fight in the middle of a workday. Especially when what Mark said is kind of true. Jeff did him a big favor by giving him this job.

“Actually, Pellegrino, you only got this job because your sister used to babysit my kids and she said no one else would hire you. You kept it because you’re not a bad mechanic, but you’ve always been an asshole. Been wishing for a good reason to fire your ass for a decade and a half. Get walking.”

Mark stares from Jeff to Jared to Jensen and then back again, obviously deciding he can’t fight all three and win. His lip curls as if he’s smelling something rotten, and he angles his head at Jared and Jensen as he tells Jeff, “I don’t need to work somewhere that’s collecting fairies anyway.”

They watch him march out and then Jeff turns to face Jared. “You make a lot of friends, kiddo.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, hanging his head.

“Don’t be sorry.” Jeff claps him on the shoulder and then looks to Jensen, smiling. “We don’t discriminate here, sir. I’m sorry you had to deal with that.”

“JD, I presume?” Jensen holds his palm out for a handshake. “I can’t say how much I appreciate the service.”

“Please, call me Jeff. JD’s is just what I named the garage because I thought it sounded cool back in the 90’s. We were all young once, right?” Jeff huffs a laugh and puts a hand in Jared’s hair, mussing it. “Some of us still are.”

“Young or not, your nephew has been a tremendous help,” Jensen tells Jeff as they shake hands. “A literal life saver. And you, uh. I wanted to thank you for what you said the other night, when I asked if you accepted work from fae. I can tell you’re running a business with a lot of integrity here, and I appreciate it.”

“Don’t gotta thank me for anything.” Jeff winks. “As long as your credit card doesn’t decline, we’re happy to help.”

Jensen’s lips turn up in amusement and Jeff tells him to holler if there’s anything else he needs as he walks off. Then Jensen looks to Jared and his warm expression softens. “Were you about to get in a fight to defend my honor?”

“In my defense, I’ve been wanting to fight that guy since day one.” Jared bites his lip. “But I guess I was.”

“Well, I don’t know the first thing about fist fights, so I definitely needed the backup. You called me over here to warn me that I was in danger just because it was the right thing to do. And you undoubtedly saved my life the other night. I think at this point I owe you lunch.”

“Oh, no, that’s not—” Jared waves him off. “That’s not necessary at all.”

“Let me put this another way. As soon as I got home the other night, I was kicking myself for not asking you out. When I got the call to come over here, I was really hoping I’d see you, and then I totally froze again. I guess you’re not the only one who gets tongue-tied around beautiful people.” Jensen glances at him from under impossibly long eyelashes, the purple blush creeping back into his cheeks. “I’m looking for any excuse to take you to lunch, so are you interested or not?”

“Twist my arm,” Jared replies, grinning.

Jensen picks a place near Eastern Market for lunch and Jared jokes that he’ll earn his meal by playing chauffeur, since Jensen’s car is still pretty far from driving condition. The restaurant is nice, though a little more upscale than Jared’s used to, especially going directly from work.

There’s a tense moment at the door as the hostess decides whether to seat them, but she seems to be weighing Jared’s grungy tank top and stained jeans against Jensen’s well-cut suit and doesn’t even blink at the fact that Jensen is fae before going ahead and guiding them to a table. Jared guesses that has something to do with why Jensen comes here. Most of the restaurants in Northwest have policies against someone like him even walking through the door, so he’s probably had to learn where else he can go to wine and dine politicians to the degree he would need to in order to get an hour of their time.

“Yeah, I know,” Jensen says, giving Jared an apologetic smile as he begins to take his seat, loosening his tie as he does so. “The place is a bit stuffy. But wait until you try the cheese plate. It’s orgasmic.”

Jared lifts the menu the hostess had handed him, gets a quick look at the prices, and winces as he sets it back on the table. He’s so thrown by just how much this place is charging for a damn cheese plate that he forgets to filter what he’s thinking before saying, “Well, now if I don’t like it, you owe me an orgasm.”

He wants to shove the words back in as soon as he’s realized what he’s said, but Jensen just throws a smirk his way. “I should have taken you somewhere with a worse cheese plate.”

Jared is relieved he didn’t take a sip of water as a laugh bursts out of him, and he feels reassured that Jensen hadn’t been weirded out by his too-forward joke.

Once they’re settled, a waiter comes by. Jensen orders appetizers and drinks from the server, a college-aged kid who gets skittish after taking one look at Jensen and hurries away from the table as soon as possible with his order pad clutched to his chest. Jensen pretends not to notice, and Jared decides to try to dispel the moment by getting a conversation rolling.

“So what’s it like to be a big deal?” he asks. “Eating $30 cheese plates with celebrities all day? I googled your organization after I got home from dropping you off,” he admits, hoping it doesn’t sound as creepy as he knows it could. “Saw all those pictures of you with Lady Gaga and the Clooneys. Are you best friends with Beyonce?”

Jensen rolls his eyes. “Ah, most of them show up for photo ops with a big check and don’t want to hear a word I have to say once the cameras are gone. Katy Perry actually had a personal assistant on call to give her sanitizer after she shook our hands. They’re just reading speeches some publicist wrote them about fae rights to prove how progressive they are.”

“Man, that’s fucked.”

“A big check is a big check, right?” Jensen jokes. “That money still spends. And I did get to meet LeBron. He was actually lovely. Tall, though. Taller than you. I got a neck cramp talking to that guy.”

Jared laughs. “Was that before or after Dallas kicked his team’s ass?”

“I don’t follow your human sports,” Jensen tells him, lifting his hands as if in surrender. “Honestly, I think I talked to him about football the whole day because I thought that was the one he played. He was too polite to say anything.”

Jared’s laugh is boisterous enough that it makes their waiter jump as he attempts to set down the famous cheese plate, so the guy drops it on the table without ceremony before making another hasty retreat.

“Okay,” Jared says once he and Jensen are alone again. “I’m going to try this cheese and you tell me more funny stories about famous people you didn’t recognize.”

“Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing,” Jensen says, shaking his head. He reaches across the table, placing his hand over Jared’s before Jared can attack the food in front of him, and Jared can’t help noticing that same slight warmth that spread through him in the car the other night as soon as Jensen touches him. “It won’t work. You’re trying to distract me so I don’t make you talk about yourself. But I already rambled about my job enough. I want to know about you.”

“There’s not much to know,” Jared admits, realizing that, whatever miracle it took to get Jensen to notice him, it’s not going to last for long. “I’m just your average mechanic.”

Jensen huffs and when Jared looks up at him, he’s shaking his head. “You have no idea how absurd what you just said to me is.” He leans forward, focusing on Jared with an intensity Jared isn’t used to. “You think I’m interesting, why? Because I can do some magic?”

“Well…yeah.” Jared shrugs. “It’s magic.”

Jensen sits back, but his eyes are still trained on Jared, his expression just as engaged as he folds his hands on the table. “You’ll have to forgive me for saying so, but it’s foolish to think that what you do isn’t just as incredible to me as my brio is to you.”

“Fixing cars,” Jared says, incredulous. “You’re really comparing that to—?”

“Where I come from, everyone has brio,” Jensen reasons. “I hadn’t seen a car until…” He pauses like he’s doing some quick math, then continues, “About four years ago, when I first moved here. We’d heard stories, of course, of the humans that lived outside the forests and their modern curiosities, but to actually understand it? To know how to put your hands on something with all those different parts and bring it to life, teach it to move so quickly or fly or any of the other wondrous things your kind has accomplished?” Jensen’s eyes are shining now, but he stops himself, ducking his head like he’s embarrassed by how excitable he’s gotten. He relaxes his voice, waving his hand dismissively. “Magic is studied, too. We learn it as you do your sciences. It’s…well, not mechanical in a literal sense, but in the sense that it becomes rote. Easy to do without thinking. Easy to forget what a marvel it is. That doesn’t mean it’s not as awe-inspiring as you think it is, but by my measure, you’re the one working miracles.”

“Huh,” says Jared. “I guess I never thought of it that way.”

“You can see how puzzling it is, then, for me, to see someone as interesting as you put yourself down.”

Jared flushes, turning his face away as he struggles to find some response to that. “Fine, I guess you’re right,” he finally admits, hoping to return to the playful flirting they’d been sharing earlier. “I’m almost unbearably fascinating.”

“That’s better,” Jensen says, biting his lip as he smiles at Jared across the table. “There’s the smartass that towed my car and stole my heart.”

“I don’t love working at the garage,” Jared admits. “It’s not bad, in fact, Jeff and most of the other guys who work there love it, and they’re smart guys. But it’s not what I wanted to be doing. So…I guess I’m a little harsher than I need to be about it.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” Jensen frowns slightly. “What would you rather be doing?”

“I wanted to go to college. Study engineering. I wanted to be someone who designs things, not someone who fixes other people’s designs.”

“I can see how that could be frustrating,” Jensen says, clearly hanging onto Jared’s every word. “Do you have any plans to go to school now that you’re more settled here? I’m sure your uncle would let you set your schedule around classes if you needed to. He seems very understanding.”

Jared appreciates Jensen not asking why he ended up here instead of where he wanted to be, but he still has trouble thinking up an answer that doesn’t make him sound and feel like a loser.

“Uncle Jeff is great,” Jared agrees. “Honestly, I haven’t looked into anything. It’s been…I’ve been kind of trying to find my feet the last few months.”

“I understand.” Through the strange green glow, Jared can see that Jensen’s eyes are concerned, that he realizes he pried too far, and Jared almost wants to ruin the moment by thanking him when he starts to do the work of backing them out before Jared has to say anything else. “It’s such a culture shock, coming to this big city from what we’re used to.”

“I’m not sure my little border town was much like where you came from,” says Jared.

“You’d be surprised.” Jensen gives him a mischievous look, like he’s got a great secret. “I’m a Texas boy, too.”

“Shut up,” Jared says on reflex. “We don’t have fae in Texas.”

“That you know of,” Jensen replies. “My forest was right outside of Dallas.”

He snorts. “I think I’d have heard of it if there was a big ass forest full of fae near Dallas.”

“Our lands are mostly still hidden from your kind, Jared,” Jensen says. “Each of our enclaves voted when the first was discovered, whether to announce ourselves and drop our barriers or not. Most decided not to trust humans. I guess…I can’t blame them, after what happened to the first few that were found.”

Jared looks down at his plate, ashamed, but Jensen reaches out again, squeezing his hand. “I don’t blame you, either. I just understand why so many of my kind are so untrusting. The same reasons yours are. If more of us would do this, sit down with each other over a meal and just talk…I believe that could truly change everything.”

“So you’re saying there’s more fae out there than we think?”

“Oh yes,” Jensen confirms. “The forty or so societies that came forward were just a drop in the bucket. Of course, our numbers are nowhere near those of humans. All those centuries of hiding meant we did have to check our growth. But there’s probably an enclave within an hour or two of where you grew up. I’m almost certainly not the first fae you’ve met.”

“No, you are,” Jared insists. “Maybe we don’t notice hidden villages, but if someone showed up with pointy ears and glowing eyes, I would have remembered them.”

“I’ve passed for human before,” Jensen says. “When I wanted to run out to the store without having to deal with…It’s not that difficult. A baseball cap over the ears, sunglasses. Most people don’t look past themselves enough to notice much. They see what they expect to see.”

The idea of it seems impossible. Jensen could never be mistaken for someone ordinary. But Jared isn’t about to call him a liar; he clearly knows more about this than Jared does.

“I think it’s disgusting,” he decides. “Making people feel like they have to hide themselves. Even in their own homes.”

Jared realizes how closely he relates to what Jensen is describing and takes a sip from his wine to try to drown the bitterness before it can rise.

“We make our own choices, too,” Jensen says softly. “I’ve seen fae go to all lengths to be accepted. Contacts to block the light, teeth filed, surgeries to reshape ears. I once even heard of a man who gave up his…” Jensen shudders, shaking his head as if to clear the thought. “That’s why I came to live here after the Discovery, when my enclave elected to stay hidden. Leaving before was, of course, out of the question. It would have required altering ourselves to pass for human or risking exposing all of our kin. But once it was out of our hands? I couldn’t stand the idea of hiding anymore when we could finally walk through the world freely.”

It makes Jared sad, hearing how full of hope Jensen is, how much he still believes. They haven’t spent a lot of time together, but already Jared has seen so many ways Jensen doesn’t move through this city with any real freedom.

“This is a little heavy for a first date, isn’t it?” Jensen asks, playfully enough that Jared glances up to catch a sharp-toothed, strained smile.

“We could still be talking about the time you met Beyonce if you’d let me have my way.”

Jensen’s fond look seems to warm Jared just as much as his touch does, and before they can go too deep in conversation again, their entrees arrive, a steak for Jared and some kind of orange-infused salad for Jensen. He’s not entirely surprised that the waiter who brings them their food and checks in on them for the rest of the meal isn’t the guy who had been so visibly upset by Jensen earlier, but if Jensen notices, he doesn’t let that dampen his spirit. The rest of the meal goes by the same way everything has since he met Jensen: pleasant, comfortable, and entirely too quickly.

It’s not until the check comes that Jared even remembers the first waiter. Instead of the polite man who brought their food and took their dessert order, the boy from before arrives with the bill. He sets it down in the center of the table and scrawled across the list of food and prices, the word “PIXIE” is written in huge, bright red letters.

Jared’s instinct is to see how Jensen reacts, so he brings his eyes up just in time to see Jensen’s face as a pained expression crosses it, unbearably sad to watch after all the easy smiles Jared has seen from him over the last hour or so.

He’s about to say something, to call the waiter out for being such a bigoted asshole, but Jensen grabs for the check so fast it’s almost dizzying, and the smile is back on his face as soon as Jared has blinked.

Jensen laughs, apparently taking whatever expression Jared is making as a response to his aggressively snatching the bill instead of the slur written on it in permanent marker. He says, “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. Just wanted to be sure today was my treat.”

Jared realizes from the cheerful tone and trained smile that Jensen is hoping Jared didn’t notice what just happened at all. And he looks so desperately hopeful that Jared can’t ruin the moment by making a scene, even if the waiter deserves to be told off and fired.

Instead, Jared does his best to seem oblivious as he brushes Jensen’s ankle under the table with his foot. “Next time, it’ll be on me.”

They’re holding hands by the time they’re strolling out of the restaurant, and Jensen pauses on the sidewalk before they reach Jared’s car, turning to face him.

This isn’t Jared’s first rodeo. Maybe he’s never been on a first date quite this good before, but he knows where this is going. So when Jensen reaches up, letting his hand slide into Jared’s hair as he draws closer for a kiss, Jared is ready to meet his lips, eager to learn the taste of him.

What he isn’t ready for is what happens when their mouths actually touch. Because this is no first kiss. This is something completely new, something Jared never could have dreamed up.

It’s hard to understand what happens well enough to put it in words. Some people talk about the spark they felt the first time they kissed someone special, but this isn’t a metaphor. The warmth Jensen radiates is there, spreading through Jared rapidly, and as it settles in his bones, Jared starts to…see things.

His eyes are closed, but that doesn’t matter. He knows what’s happening has nothing to do with that kind of sight. There are flashes of moments, all bubbling up within him, almost overwhelming in force. There are people there in some of them, friends or relatives he recognizes, sometimes strangers he doesn’t know, while in others, they’re alone. The only consistent thing is that in every image, Jensen is by his side. Sometimes they look as they do now, sometimes a few years older, once or twice they look much older. Jared feels the emotion of each moment—joy like he’s never experienced, excitement, wonder, even sadness with a faint undercurrent of comfort. Every flicker is accompanied by a powerful emotion, and although it’s all out of context and jumbled, Jared knows somehow that the emotions he’s experiencing are his own.

There’s no telling how long it goes on before they break apart, Jared stumbling back as if he’d been physically shocked by the kiss. He’s a little surprised to realize, once he’s taken a few ragged breaths and collected himself enough to meet Jensen’s eyes, that Jensen looks just as shaken as he feels.

“What the hell was that?” Jared asks.

Jensen moves slowly, lifting his fingers up to touch his own lips as if he’s investigating a theory, and then he whispers, “That was…us.”

“I could have used a warning, man,” Jared tells him. “If that happens when you kiss someone, you gotta—”

“I’ve never…that’s never…” Jensen shakes his head. “I’ve kissed other fae. I’ve kissed other humans. That’s never happened before.”

Jared feels his eyebrows draw together in confusion at what Jensen just said. He almost asks him to run it by him again, but when Jensen lifts his face, there’s a giddy energy in it, and he repeats himself without Jared prompting him.

“That wasn’t normal,” he says, and like it’s bursting out of him, he throws his arms around Jared’s neck. “That was us. That was us.”

Two nights later, Jared is in the middle of making a late dinner when there’s a knock at the door. He’s not expecting anybody and it’s not like there are a lot of people in his building who just swing by to say hello, so he’s not sure what to expect as he sets his food to simmer and heads for the door.

There’s another pound, impatient this time, and he’s about to be pretty annoyed when he hears Jensen’s voice call out, “Jared, it’s me. Please let me in.”

He puts a spring in his step as he hurries across the apartment, thrilled by the thought of seeing Jensen, though he wishes he’d known. He’s still a mess from work and his apartment could use a lot of tidying up, but it’s not like Jensen hasn’t seen him covered in filth before and still, for whatever reason, wanted to be near him.

After a day or so of steady conversation via text, Jared hasn’t heard from Jensen all day. He’d been worried, in fact, that he had somehow said something to offend Jensen, but reviewing the conversation had been unable to figure out which of his flirtatious emojis might have upset Jensen after everything else they’d shared. Now all of that worry dissolves as he swings the door open and sees the green glow of Jensen’s eyes on his doorstep.

“Jensen, hi,” Jared says. “How did you—? I never told you where I lived.”

“I followed your energy here from the garage,” Jensen replies, peering past Jared’s shoulder and into his apartment.

“If that was supposed to make you being here less creepy, you did a bad job,” Jared jokes.

Jensen doesn’t seem nearly as charmed by him as he was the last time they spoke. Instead of laughing, or even acknowledging Jared’s gentle teasing, he pointedly asks, “May I come in?”

“Yeah, of course,” Jared tells him, moving aside so that Jensen has plenty of room to step inside before Jared shuts the door behind him. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I need to…talk to you,” Jensen says, his voice slow, like whatever he came here to say, he’s not really looking forward to it.

Jared didn’t think this was a booty call, but any hope he might have felt that it was some kind of impromptu date quickly gets replaced by a sour feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Okay, of course. Just…I was in the middle of cooking, so let me turn off the stove.”

Jensen follows Jared to the kitchen, and when he faces Jensen, pushing the pan of ground beef onto the counter, Jensen drops an envelope down next to it.

“What’s this?” Jared asks as he picks up the packet and removes the contents. It’s a series of large photos, and Jared realizes as he flips through them that the focus of each shot is them. Out on the sidewalk, after their date.

In the first few, they’re holding hands as they walk, but Jared watches as the pictures capture Jensen’s abrupt stop, the moment he turned to Jared, that kiss Jared hasn’t stopped thinking about and still can’t describe. His heart wells up seeing this as he remembers all those emotions rushing through him, but he can tell when he looks up at the expression on Jensen’s face that this isn’t some grand romantic gesture he had up his sleeve.

“I don’t get it,” he admits, tossing the photos back down on the laminate countertop.

“Those were on my desk this morning when I went in to work,” Jensen explains. “No mention who left them. No note explaining why. There’s no footage of anyone bringing it in—not on the cameras and not in any of the magic surveillance we have set up, either.”

Jared huffs a laugh. “I guess the secret’s out about us, then.”

“It’s not funny,” Jensen says, voice so snappish that Jared takes a step back without even thinking about it.

“Are you that ashamed?” he asks. “Of being caught kissing a human? I know…I know there are people who disapprove of these kinds of relationships, but I didn’t think when you decided to kiss me in the middle of the day on Pennsylvania Avenue that you gave a shit about people like that.”

“Yes, there are people in my community who will treat me differently if they see these,” Jensen admits, gesturing to the photos. “Some fae see it as a betrayal if we date humans. Just as humans judge each other for mixing with us. But that’s not why I’m upset.”

“Enlighten me, then,” Jared demands. “If you’re not worried you’re going to lose your job or some street cred by being with me then why are you so on edge over a couple of pictures?”

“Don’t you get it?” Jensen demands. “It’s a threat, Jared. Whoever this person is, they’ve already tried to kill me. They’re competent enough to get away with this without being detected. And now they want me to know that they’ve seen me with you.”

“That’s insane,” Jared says. “I’m nobody. We went on one date. No one is going to target me because of one date.”

“You’re probably right.” Jensen swallows hard and turns his glance away, so that the green light bounces off Jared’s counter. “If it’s just one date, whoever they are, they won’t think you mean that much to me. They wouldn’t risk hurting a human, not with how strict the laws are. Not unless they were sure it would hurt me.”

Jared shifts, trying to get Jensen to look up at him again, but Jensen staunchly refuses. “So what? You’re going to let them win? They want to drive us apart, they want to take what you have from you. Don’t let them.”

“I can’t…I couldn’t…keep putting you at risk. You’ve saved me so many times and all I’ve done is bring you danger. I have to do what’s safe for you.” Jensen bites his lip as he looks up. “Don’t worry. I covered my tracks and disguised your energies before I came here. I can’t have been followed this time.”

“Hey,” Jared says, forcing a wide smile and wrapping an arm around Jensen’s middle. He ducks his head so that his mouth brushes the tip of Jensen’s pointed ear and whispers, “Maybe I like danger.”

Jensen shoves him away, shaking his head. “You’re not taking this seriously.”

“Of course I’m taking it seriously,” Jared yells. “You tell me someone is trying to kill me, I take it seriously. I took it seriously that they were trying to hurt you, didn’t I? I just don’t follow the leap from someone trying to hurt us to it being a good idea to part ways. If anything, we’re both safer if we can watch each other’s—”

“No!” Jensen crosses his arms over his chest. “I brought you this mess. It’s not your problem. I won’t let it become your problem.”

“How can you say that?” Jared asks, lowering his voice until it’s soft enough that, hopefully, Jensen will listen better than he did to Jared’s anger. “I care about you, Jensen. I know we don’t know each other that well, but I really like you. If someone wants to hurt somebody I care about, that’s already my problem.”

Jensen’s face seems to shimmer as he struggles to get his emotions under control. “I’m sorry. I really am. I wanted to see if…if we could make this work.”

“You did see it,” says Jared. “We both saw it. How can you just walk away from what we saw?”

“We saw only one possible future,” Jensen says sadly. “I’ve seen others. I’ve seen the ones where you get hurt because of me, and I’ve seen the ones where…” He shrugs, forcing a cool laugh. “We probably couldn’t have stayed together, anyway. There are too many barriers. It’s not as fun as it sounds, dating a pixie.”

“I would never call you that,” Jared says, recoiling at the word.

Jensen is infuriatingly calm as he says, “I know you wouldn’t. But your co-workers will. Your friends will. They’ll stop inviting you when they go out for drinks. Your neighbors will say it. Suddenly you won’t be able to find a building that’ll let you move in when they know what’s going to visit you. Random strangers on the street will say it every single time we go outside. It’s one thing to get treated a certain way in a restaurant one time, but when it’s constant? All that struggle for something you could just opt out of? It’s not worth it for you, Jared. I mean, am I really the kind of person you want to take home and introduce to your family?”

“Fuck you,” Jared says. It hangs heavy in the air between them until Jared feels tears stinging at his eyes, and he decides he won’t let Jensen have that. He won’t cry for him. “You don’t know the first thing about my family.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“What did you mean?” he asks coldly. “Do you want to know why I moved here, Jensen? I told my parents I was gay and they said I’d be welcome back home when I changed my mind. I don’t need you to make my family hate me. I was enough to do that all on my own.”

“I didn’t know,” Jensen says, reaching out, but Jared doesn’t want to hear it.

“I moved to this awful place because I had nowhere else to go. Uncle Jeff, with his big city sensibilities—he was the only person I knew who didn’t have anything horrible to say. He don’t get me, but he still accepts me, at least. I don’t understand anyone here. And then I met you. And I thought, ‘Finally! Someone I can really connect with.’” Jared wipes at his eyes, having lost the battle to keep his emotions in check until Jensen left. “I know I haven’t gone through what you go through. I know I don’t understand everything about your kind. And that I’ve screwed up a few times. But I wanted to try to understand. I thought maybe you’d let me understand.”

“I’m sorry, Jared,” Jensen tells him. “I really am. I wanted that, too. You don’t know how much.”

“Not enough, huh?” Jared says bitterly. “Get out of my house.”

“Please, Jared, try to see it from my—”

Jared is surprised by how sharply he looks up at Jensen and by the fact that there’s no tremor in his voice as he says, “You came here to dump me. Mission accomplished. I want you to leave.”

Jared powers through the rest of his work on Jensen’s car as quickly as he can, relieved that Jensen washed the bad mojo off it that first time he came to the garage so that touching it for extended periods of time no longer makes him feel ill. Of course, that does nothing to fix how miserable the constant reminder of Jensen makes him, but Jared is a professional, and that means pushing past his own feelings until the car is ready to go back to its owner.

Once it’s done, Jared washes his hands of the whole situation. He gives the keys to Jeff and asks him to notify the owner that it can be picked up, and if Jeff is as surprised by Jared’s cold demeanor as he appears to be, he’s at least kind enough not to say anything about it.

So Jared expects not to have to see Jensen again. He even trades a few shifts with co-workers so he won’t be in during the times he expects Jensen to pick the car up.

But Jared’s never been a lucky man. He’s just heading to the door, going to grab lunch, when someone steps in front of him, and Jared has to lift his hand to shield his eyes from the bright green lights suddenly blocking his exit.

Great, he thinks. Just great.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, moving out of Jensen’s path, but Jensen reaches out, catching Jared’s elbow as he tries to push past him.

“Jared, hey,” he says, casual. As if he didn’t shatter Jared the last time they spoke. “I was hoping I’d see you here.”

“Your keys are with the manager in the office,” Jared tells him, still not glancing up. Knowing how weak his resolve will be if he looks into that ethereal face. “I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

“Please,” Jensen urges him. “It’ll only take a moment.”

“Why?” Jared asks. “Is it safe for you to be seen with me now? Not too embarrassing, I hope, if someone spots you.”

“It’s safe enough here,” Jensen says. “We have cover. I came for the car, not for…”

Jared finally looks up at him, hoping his expression is as icy as those words made him feel, and if the way Jensen steps back from him is any indication, he got his point across.

“I wanted to give you something,” says Jensen.

“Pay at the office,” he insists. “I’m on lunch.”

Jensen doesn’t try to pull him in again, but when Jared sees what he does do, he can’t help stopping in his tracks, enraptured. Jensen opens his palm and holds it out to Jared, and Jared watches as colors begin to swirl around, green and purple and yellow that meet in a pulsing center, where a strong white glow seems to swallow the others. And from that light, something solid begins to grow. Something that Jared recognizes as soon as the shape takes form, a thousand childhood memories of running through fields overgrown with bright flowers blurring together into a sense of safety and uncomplicated belonging.

“These are native to your part of Texas, I believe,” Jensen says, holding out a small plant as the wildflowers bloom right in front of Jared’s eyes. “This won’t die here. You don’t have to worry about watering it. I know how much you miss home, so I thought you might like a small piece of it.”

Jared accepts the gift as Jensen hands it over, too overwhelmed by the gesture, and by the manner with which it was created, to remember to be angry. “I thought you said doing magic for humans was a violation?”

“For some humans,” Jensen agrees. “Doing it on command. We’re not really supposed to show just anybody.” Jensen licks his lips and reaches out toward Jared, brushing his hand gently along Jared’s cheek. “I told you the first time we spoke. If it’s with the right person, it feels good. With you…” He laughs, but it’s a sad, dull sound. “I kept doing it by accident.”

“Why would you give me this?” Jared asks, closing his eyes and leaning into the warm touch on his face. “It was your idea to break up.”

“I can’t stand the thought of you hating me,” Jensen admits. “I don’t want you to hate me.”

“I’ll forgive you,” Jared says in a rush, wishing he could be stronger than this, but knowing he’d rather have Jensen than hold onto whatever dignity his anger buys him. “If you take it all back, I’ll forgive you. We can still be together.”

Jensen gestures at the plant in Jared’s hand like it’s something he picked up at the local nursery and smiles at Jared as if they’re perfect strangers. “Thank you again for fixing my car. I hope you enjoy the flowers.”

Then he turns away from Jared and walks to the office to get his keys, and Jared knows Jensen never intends to see him again.

Jared doesn’t have a chance to feel surprised when he does see Jensen again. There’s no thrill of excitement at the possibility of rekindling their romance, nor is there even the satisfaction of anger for the way Jensen chose to leave things. One glance at Jensen and all of Jared’s thoughts turn to immediate, all-encompassing concern.

It’s a random evening, not unlike the first time Jensen showed up at his door unannounced, just under two weeks since that horrible night. Jared knows as soon as he hears the door that it’s Jensen. He’s not sure how he knows, but he does. Energies, maybe. That’s probably what Jensen would say.

There isn’t any impatient hollering outside like last time Jensen visited—in fact, the knock was so weak that Jared is surprised he heard it at all. He thinks maybe he didn’t. It’s like he feels Jensen’s presence and that’s what alerts him to the knocking.

When he opens the door, Jensen is propped up against the frame wearing a black suit with a white shirt under the blazer, and somehow his clothes are the most vivid thing about him.

Jensen is—not pale, pale doesn’t cut it. If Jared had to compare it to something, he would say that it looks like Jensen is on an old black and white television show, but plucked out of it and tossed into a world of color. His skin is ash gray, there’s no purple blush in his cheeks, no tempting red to his lips. If it wasn’t so terrifying, Jared would think it was cool.

Jared’s breath catches when he meets Jensen’s eyes. They’re still green, the only color left in him, but a muted shade that would be dull even for a human, let alone for someone who usually shines like an emerald beacon. Even as he stares into them, Jared thinks Jensen’s eyes are going grayer by the moment.

“Jensen, what the hell?” he asks, reaching out to catch Jensen as he tries to stumble toward Jared.

“Safe now,” Jensen says. “It’s okay now.”

“You don’t look okay,” Jared says, guiding Jensen into his apartment and toward the nearest seat. “I’m gonna be honest, you look pretty fucking far from okay.”

“’M not,” Jensen admits. “But you are. I made sure of it. I made sure. Every last drop, Jared. I would have given every drop. That first night, too, if she’d attacked you. I hope you know that. I didn’t mean to put you in danger. But I would have died to keep you safe if it had come to that.”

“That’s really nice and all, I think, but you’re rambling,” Jared tells him. “And you don’t have time to ramble.” He looks around, trying to figure out what to do next. Call an ambulance? Jared feels a momentary flare of annoyance at Jensen for putting whatever this is on him. He doesn’t know the first thing about medical care, even for humans, and, whatever Jensen is suffering from, it seems pretty clear it’s got something to do with magic. “Why did you come here? You should have gone to a hospital! I have to get you to a—”

“Won’t know how to treat me in a hospital,” Jensen says weakly. “Not human.”

“Some kind of fae doctor, then,” Jared tries. “There’s gotta be someone.”

Jensen catches Jared’s wrist as he tries to stand, about to start pacing the room, and he pulls Jared back in. It’s not reassuring that the grip is cool instead of the warmth Jared has learned to associate with Jensen’s touch.

“Too late for them to help,” Jensen says. “Only one thing can help me now. I know what I need.”

“I’ll bite,” Jared replies when Jensen falls silent. “What is it? What do I do?”

“Do you want to kiss me?” Jensen asks.

Jared blinks at him blankly for a long moment, the frustration building inside of him. He nearly grabs Jensen and shakes him. “Is now really the time for this?”

“You probably hate me,” Jensen says, looking past Jared, unable to look at him directly. “I wouldn’t blame you if you do. It won’t work if you don’t want…but I had to come here. Just in case. It’s the only chance I have.”

He scrubs a hand over his face, takes three long, settling breaths, and calmly asks Jensen, “Will you please pull yourself together and explain what’s happening? Because you’re not making any sense. And I’m really scared, Jensen.”

“I’ll explain if I can, after.” Jensen smiles weakly and reaches out for Jared. “Do you still want me, Jared? Even after everything I did to you?”

“Yes,” Jared admits. “Of course I do.”

Jared would bet anything he has that the force Jensen exerts as he grabs the collar of Jared’s shirt and tugs him in is the last burst of energy Jensen has in him. This isn’t like the first kiss—there’s no explosion of sights and sensations, no promises of a beautiful future. There is warmth, but it doesn’t spread through Jared like it had before. Instead it moves through Jensen as they deepen the kiss, which seems to go on forever.

As frivolous as it feels to make out at a time like this, Jared is relieved that the longer they continue, the more Jensen seems to regain not just strength but color, too. After a few minutes, Jared notices that the skin under his fingers is warm and when he finally opens his eyes, he sees that Jensen’s are once again bathing them in green light.

He pulls back from Jensen, and Jensen chases his lips for a shorter kiss before he also lets go and rests his forehead on Jared’s, taking several quick breathes.

“You owe me an explanation now, I think,” Jared says once enough time has passed that Jensen’s breathing seems to have evened out.

Jensen sits back, nodding, though he still looks pretty out of it and certainly not his usual perfectly composed self. Jared notices a few wet, bright purple patches soaking through the pristine white button-up shirt and realizes that it’s blood. He’d noticed Jensen’s blushes were a soft lilac instead of pink, but he’d never put it together that fae blood is actually this color. It makes Jared shiver, an unwelcome change from how endearing the shy purple blushes were when he and Jensen met. Even this neon blood was colorless when Jared let him in.

“You’re hurt,” he says, reaching out to try to touch one of the wounds. “What the hell happened to you?”

“You should see the other guy,” Jensen says, forcing a smile.

Jared doesn’t smile back. “Dude, you showed up on my stoop looking like death in a very literal sense and said you would only explain after I made out with you, so start talking.”

“I was nearly…” Jensen licks his lips. “The first time I touched you, that night in your car, I noticed something unusual. I put my hand on your wrist because you were angry. I wanted to comfort you.”

“I remember,” Jared says. “You used magic to calm me or something.”

“Not intentionally,” Jensen replies. “But yes. It happened every time we made contact. Something about my brio just responds to you on instinct. Every time I touch you, my brio flares up. I don’t know what it feels like for you. I wasn’t sure you could feel it at all. But for me it’s been…nice. Regenerative.”

“It was just kind of warm,” Jared tells him. “When I touch you, I get this warm feeling all the way to my bones. It feels safe. Like home…” He trails off, realizing Jensen hasn’t answered any of the questions he has. And if he goes any further down this path, he’ll forget he’s pissed at Jensen. “What’s your point?”

“I met her tonight,” Jensen says quietly. As if Jared will just know what that means. Jared gestures for him to continue, and Jensen adds, “The fae that was hunting me these last few weeks. I guess she got tired of waiting. She attacked me in the parking lot at work tonight. With a knife, of all things.”

“I guess that explains all the bleeding,” Jared observes. “Does it hurt? Are you in—?”

“Calm down,” Jensen instructs, but he keeps his hands to himself, maybe sensing that Jared has had all the fae magic tricks he wants for one night. “These wounds are superficial. They should heal overnight now that my brio is a bit restored. She had no idea what she was doing with that weapon.”

“Why a knife?” Jared asks. “Didn’t you say the person attacking you could have overpowered you with their brio if they hadn’t been at a distance?”

“Yes,” says Jensen. “I got incredibly lucky. If she had surprised me with an attack using that dark power, she would have had no trouble killing me. I only won the fight because I instantly countered her with my own magic. Even with the head start I hardly made it out.”

“So why would she even bother trying to stab you at all?”

Jensen frowns. “She wanted to make it look like it was a human that killed me. Not just any human, either. She was going to leak those pictures of us, make it out to be a lover’s quarrel.”

“She was gonna pin it on me?” Jared asks. “None of this makes any sense, Jensen. Are you sure you’re not loopy from blood loss?”

“From brio loss, maybe,” Jensen says, chuckling to himself like he made a very good joke. Then he looks back up at Jared, seeming to gather his thoughts for a moment before launching into an explanation. “The woman that attacked me is named Alaina. I know her from fae activist circles, but we never formally met. There is not a lot that her and her organization believe that I see eye to eye on. Maybe that’s why she decided to focus on me for whatever this plot was. No direct link back to her, but the message would suit her needs.”

“What message is that?”

“An extremist one,” Jensen explains. “There are certain fae that believe we are superior to humans, that our magic makes us godlike, and that instead of enjoying the power we deserve, we’ve spent centuries hiding from or being destroyed by humans.”

“Not entirely wrong,” Jared admits, looking down at his feet.

Jensen reaches out and takes Jared’s hands in his own. There’s still no warm rush at his touch, but just the pressure is comforting. “More wrong than right. Even if her desire for blood was justified, which it wasn’t, the idea that we could overcome humankind with your superior numbers and technology and all that history of war—the slaughter would have ended my kin, not yours.”

“So how does killing other fae help when your population has already been stalled?” Jared shakes his head. “Am I missing something?”

“She said she was doing me a greater honor than I would ever do myself, pacifying as I am. She was going to make me a martyr.” Jensen takes a deep breath. “When word of my death got out, and when other fae learned that it had been my love for humans that led to the violence, they would polarize. Move away from trying to coexist and toward all-out war. And she believed we would win this war. She was deluded.”

“But you didn’t do anything,” Jared says stupidly. “I didn’t do anything.”

“I know that,” Jensen responds. “Try reasoning with someone so set in her views, though. I did try. I begged her to at least leave you out of it. I didn’t think I was going to survive, but she said you were a necessary sacrifice, like me. That’s when I got the second wind I needed to beat her. Losing just wasn’t an option when she told me what would happen to you.”

“Did you kill her?” Jared asks. “Do we know for sure she’s not still going to hurt us?”

At that, Jensen’s entire expression falls. He licks his lips and cuts his glance away, apparently deeply ashamed. “She isn’t dead. But I guarantee she won’t hurt anyone again.”

“Did the police get her? Is she in jail?”

“I managed to fight her just long enough for one of my co-workers to stumble upon us and alert the fae authorities. They came to…deal with her.”

Jared flails a hand in frustration. “Okay, but what does that mean?”

“We don’t have prisons, Jared. We don’t have the death penalty, either. Some fae think it’s a barbaric practice, imprisoning or killing your own, but honestly? What we do? I think it’s worse.”

“What did they do to her?” Jared moves away from Jensen, taking a seat on the sofa.

“They let her go,” Jensen says. When Jared balks at that, Jensen adds, “After they drained her brio.”

“That’s it?” Jared demands. “She’s still a threat, even if she can’t do magic. She’ll just be more pissed now. What were they thinking? I get that being human seems pretty unappealing to you, but—”

“You need to stop thinking of fae as humans with magic powers,” Jensen tells him. “We don’t lose our brio and just become like any human on the street. You are not some less evolved version of what I am, Jared. We’re completely different species. Losing your brio isn’t just a mild annoyance.”

“Okay, okay,” Jared concedes. “So explain it to me, because I’m really scared. And I want to know why you think I don’t need to be.”

“When I knocked on your door tonight, you saw the state I was in, correct?”

Jared nods. “You were pretty messed up, yeah.”

“You don’t know how close I was to never coming back from that.” Jensen swallows hard. “I’m trying to think of a good way to explain this that doesn’t completely dumb it down, but there aren’t words in any human language that capture the anguish of being drained.”

“Try,” Jared implores him. “Please, I’ll do my best to understand.”

“Think of brio being like the battery in your cellphone,” Jensen tells him.

“Really spotty if it gets rained on?” he teases.

Jensen smirks as he rolls his eyes. “I told you it would have to be dumbed down.”

“I’m listening,” Jared assures him. “No more jokes.”

Jensen returns to his analogy, “When your phone’s battery gets below a certain point, you lose some of the functions. You can use fewer and fewer of the programs the lower the level goes, but you can plug it back in at any point and, given some time, it will recharge all the way back up to full. If you don’t get a chance to do that before it runs out, though, the phone dies.”

“Right,” Jared says, so Jensen knows he’s following. “So if you use all your brio in a fight, your body loses colors and you can’t heal or do other magic you can do easily when you’re well-rested.”

“Exactly!” Jensen says. “The big difference is that if your phone dies, you can still plug it back in and it’ll recharge eventually. Once a fae’s brio is gone, that’s it. It’s all gone. It won’t regenerate again if we run out completely. Not for anything.”

“So she’s a dead phone now?” Jared asks. “But you said she was alive.”

“Depends on your definition of alive,” Jensen says, his lip curling in distaste. “A fae without their brio isn’t just monochrome and sad and a little less dangerous. There’s…nothing really left of who they were. Our brio is so intimately linked to our consciousness, our very being. A drained fae doesn’t feel joy or sadness or care about anything they cared about before. They breathe. They sleep. Maybe they can even remember to eat. But it’s no life in any real sense.”

“Like a lobotomy,” Jared guesses. “A really botched lobotomy.”

“Maybe? I am not familiar enough with the concept to say for sure, but it seems like an apt comparison. Honestly, I pity Alaina. I saw them do it to her. And I thought…” Jensen moves his hands between them. “If it hadn’t been for this, I would be like her by now. I had so little time left before you kissed me.”

“Your eyes,” Jared says. “Your eyes were still green. Just barely.”

“Yes,” Jensen agrees. “What you saw in my eyes was all the brio I had left. But it was enough to make recharging possible, if I could find something that could create a surge. After they drained her, the authorities turned their attention to me, and I could hear in their voices that they thought I was as good as gone. So much discomfort and pity and fear as they offered to take me to a healer, to ‘see what could be done.’ When I asked them to bring me here instead, I think they thought I was going to use the last of my brio to ask someone to put me down. But all I could think was of the way it felt when we kissed. If anything would give me the extra brio I needed to start healing, I knew it would be you.”

“Great,” Jared responds, feeling a sharp pang in his heart. “Well, it sounds like you’re all good to finish charging up on your own, so I guess I did my part. You don’t need me anymore, so it’s time for you to leave.”

Jensen seems taken back by that. He hesitates for a long moment before sitting forward, trying to catch Jared’s eyes. “You’re kicking me out?”

“Nothing’s changed,” Jared tells him. “I wasn’t going to turn you away if I could help you, but you’re the one that didn’t want anything to do with me until you needed me to help save your precious brio, remember?”

“That’s not what happened,” Jensen insists. “I was worried about you. I was trying to protect you. I still wanted you and—I felt that kiss, Jared. It wouldn’t have worked if there wasn’t something here. You do have feelings for me. Powerful ones.”

“I’m not denying it,” says Jared.

“Can’t we try to heal this, too?” Jensen asks, looking up at Jared with hope evident in his glowing eyes.

Jared wants to give in, but he stands instead, crossing the room and keeping his back to Jensen. “You’re not so beautiful that you can just throw people away when they get inconvenient and have them back the moment you change your mind. No one is.”

“I gave you up because I was worried she would target you. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever—”

“And apparently she was still going to ruin my life if she’d won tonight.” Jared turns to face him. “So what exactly did you accomplish by breaking my heart?”

Jensen looks away in shame, and Jared hears a waver in his voice as he responds, “I didn’t know. I didn’t know what she wanted or what her plan was. I just knew if you got hurt, I would never be able to live with myself. You kept protecting me and all I did was put you in one dangerous situation after another. I was a coward, but if you give me another chance, I’ve learned that your way was right. You were good for me, you were there to keep me safe when you had no reason to be. I want to do that for you now.”

“How am I supposed to trust you?” Jared asks. “How am I supposed to take you back when I know that the next time something gets hard you’ll shut me out again? You have no idea what that felt like, having no way to know if you’d been hurt, if whoever was after you had caught you. Trying to tell myself I shouldn’t care.”

“I’m sorry, Jared,” Jensen says, his voice soft. “I understand if you don’t want to give me another chance. I was hoping…but you’re right. I wasn’t thinking about what that was like for you. I was too caught up in my own fear. It wasn’t fair to you.”

“You should have respected my choice,” Jared tells him. “You didn’t even listen to what I had to say, to how willing I was to risk standing by you. It should have been up to me to give up on us if I was afraid.”

Jensen stands to leave. “You’re right. Of course, you’re right. And I’ve taken up enough of your time.”

Jared catches his wrist as Jensen tries to move past him toward the door and brings Jensen’s hand up, pressing his lips to the almost-warm palm. “You haven’t. Taken up enough of my time.”

He can hear that Jensen is holding his breath, waiting to see what Jared does. He lifts his eyes to Jensen’s and reaches out, cupping Jensen around the neck and drawing him closer.

“Forgive me,” Jensen begs, his voice hardly a whisper. “Please, Jared, say you’ll forgive me.”

Jared doesn’t say it. He doesn’t say anything. When their lips touch, those words become unnecessary. Jared sees his own forgiveness play out in the future that flashes in front of them as he chases Jensen’s tongue with his own.

He watches Jensen smile at him from the other side of a mattress he doesn’t own yet, the morning sun streaming in through large windows, his heart nearly bursting with love, and as Jensen tries to rise from their bed, he watches himself catch Jensen’s arm and pull him back in.

His lips form one word in the vision of their future: “Stay.”

So Jensen does.