Chapter Text
Somewhere off to the left, his phone vibrated, sharp and insistent. He shivered underneath the covers, feeling oversensitive, strange colors playing behind his eyelids. Though he couldn’t remember what he’d dreamt, he had a strange sense memory of snow, of warm breaths, of a pleasant sort of dizziness. He imagined this was how champagne might feel, if it were a person. Dizzily golden, hazy and fleeting.
For a disorientating moment, Jack couldn’t remember where he was. He cracked an eye open, his cottony brain taking in the musty red blinds, rays of daylight pushing into the dim room. The starchy covers he was huddled under smelled vaguely stale, like they were power washed with industrial strength lemon-scented cleaner at some point. Definitely not the soft flannel ones he kept on his bed back home. His skin itched under these, and he was so chilly he could barely feel his toes.
Jack yawned and winced, taking in the small, kitschy room, the queen sized bed he was curled up in, the huge flatscreen TV, the glossy desk in the corner that held a pamphlet of advertisements for local restaurants and stores.
Right. He was in a hotel. Post--con. The pounding in his head that usually warned of a migraine was actually a hangover. All of these things made sense now. This type of thing happened at least once, sometimes twice, and occasionally up to three times a year.
On the nightstand his phone buzzed again, twice in quick succession. Jack wanted to ignore it, or preferably chuck it into the furthest corner of the room . He reached out blearily, feeling around blindly on the night stand until he found the familiar shape.
There was a text from Mark. Well, multiple texts.
It was freezing and not even seven in the morning yet, and somehow he already had texts from Mark.
Jack groaned, setting his phone back down on the small night stand. Now that he was out of the haze of sleep, everything felt sore and stiff and cold, like his limbs had frozen overnight and were just starting the painful process of thawing. Being Irish apparently hadn’t made him immune to any of the effects of terrible hangovers.
He ran his tongue along the edge of his teeth, cotton-mouthed and tacky with dehydration. It smelled like a small mammal had crawled into his mouth and died there overnight.
He shivered, still not ready to wake as he burrowed deeper under the covers, like maybe he could sink in deep enough for the mattress to swallow him whole. The room felt off kilter. Jack felt like he was floating maybe, his brain hovering somewhere just a few inches away from his actual body.
Buzz.
Jack squinted under the darkness of the covers.
Last night, had they gone to two, or was it three bars? There were dark booths, sticky coasters, expensive beers. Expressive eyes, a sly smile and a wild laugh. Only bits and pieces of memory stood out to him, the rest lost somewhere between drunkenness and dreams.
His phone buzzed again, insistent. Jack could feel the buzz vibrate in his teeth , like an electric shock to the head. Shit like this always happened when he was hungover, his body a live wire to sights and sounds. Everything was too much.
He took a breath, and unbidden, felt a strange rush of deja vu. They’d stayed out for a long time, until the sky turned lilac as they stumbled against each other, trying to hail down a cab.
Outside in the early mornings of not-quite dawn, they’d huddled against each other. From there, his memory was spotty...he remembered trying not to fall asleep, the sharp winter wind cutting against his cheeks... replaced by a warm breath against his ear, whispering for him to stay awake. He shivered, for a completely different reason other than cold this time. Had he just dreamt that part, or was it real?
Buzz!
Jack pressed fingers against his temple, breathing through the stabbing pain behind his eyeballs. An aspirin or a coffee. He needed one or the other, stat. His entire brain was one giant, ashy chalkboard, and every ten seconds, a fork scraped down it.
“Fuck,” Jack muttered, reaching over to grab his phone. He squinted against the brightness of the screen, fumbling until he could dim it down to tolerable levels.
Markipoo
Goooooooood morning!!
Or should i say
WAPUUSH TOP O’ THE MORNIN’ TO YA LADDIE
My NAmE iS JAcK sePTiC EYe
Jack groaned. His headache gave a cursory pulse in complaint; reading the texts in loud, boisterous caps. Everything hurt.
Markipoo
Have you checked your flight status yet?
Because uh
I’m grounded. It snowed a lot last night. bad sky = no fly
It took a full second for Jack to decode what the fuck Mark was saying, and when he did, Jack suddenly felt ten times more awake.
It started snowing last night while they were walking out of the last bar, swirling gently at first, then harder and harder, until the world around them was a snowglobe. They had to walk the last three blocks, because the cab they were in couldn’t drive through the fast-piling snow on the streets.
Jack remembered sticking out his tongue out and looking at the dark inky sky, trying to catch a snowflake. Mark did the same thing, eyes closed, face turned towards the stars. How Jack had wanted to take a picture because Mark looked like a little kid, cheeks pink with cold, staring up at the sky in impish wonder.
Jack shook his head, hard, and swallowed down the sour bile that pooled in his mouth at the motion. Note to self: moving your head around feels like your fucking skull will detach.
With one eye squinted shut, Jack focused his attention back on his phone, navigating over to his email app, impatient as the app stalled and crashed twice.
The wifi in the hotel was absolute shite--he and Mark had recorded a few minutes of them doing various stupid Snapchat filters before heading down to the panels the night before, and neither of them had been able to upload anything to YouTube, or any other social media platform. They’d even paid a few extra bucks to get faster internet speed, but it hadn’t helped.
It irked Jack to no end that he wasn’t able to tweet, or upload, or respond to the flood of kind messages and comments from fans who’d met him the last two days. It was literally his job to respond and interact, and he couldn’t even do that.
“Fucking wifi,” Jack muttered, going into settings and enabling cellular data. It was going to be expensive as hell because he wasn’t on an American cell phone plan, but it was an emergency. If his flight was cancelled--
All at once, two dozen or so emails loaded, one after the other, stalling the app again. At this rate, his data plan was going to rest in fucking pieces by the time all of the messages were loaded.
Jack scrolled, ignoring notification emails to look for--there. A new email from American Airlines, sent within the last three hours, with the headline: FLIGHT RESCHEDULED - REBOOKING OPTIONS AVAILABLE, CLICK TO SEE MORE
Fuck.
This was bad. This was bad for a lot of reasons, not the least of which meant that he definitely wouldn’t be home in time for Christmas. This meant he’d be breaking the tradition he had with Mark.
He would have to say goodbye.
Jack never said goodbye.
It started as an accident, the first time. They were in an elevator after one of Jack’s first conventions, and he didn’t want to make things awkward by standing in the jamb and making the other passenger wait for him to finish saying goodbye. So he held out his hand, and they shook hands, and Jack awkwardly left.
Jack felt guilty about it, afterwards. Spent days (weeks) beating himself up over not giving Mark a proper goodbye. It was high up on the list of cringey moments in his life. He was certain at the time that Mark probably thought he was a giant asshole with the social skills of a hermit crab. But then the next time they were at a convention together, Jack couldn’t bring himself to give a proper goodbye, because he didn’t know how to do it without tearing up and crying like a sentimental baby. To actually open himself up and say goodbye, knowing full well that it would be months before he’d be able to see Mark in person again.
So he did the same thing, intentionally. An awkward handshake, but on purpose. Cringemas throwback, right? Mark found it funny.
It was their inside joke now; on the last day of the convention, or the last time they hung out before one or the other of them had to leave, they’d stoically shake hands and purposefully not make a big hullabaloo about saying goodbye. A good old no-homo’ pat on the back between pals.
And then somehow over the years, the awkward handshake had morphed into an awkward dinner and handshake and THAT had evolved into an awkward dinner, then drinks then a handshake. Being drunk made things less awkward. And that was perfectly fine with Jack. He hated saying goodbye. He sucked at it. He hated the hollow ache of being homesick for someone. He was always so stupidly emotional leaving conventions, and leaving Mark.
But now that their flights were cancelled, it would be a dick move not to see Mark again. Which also meant that there was no way they could do their standard handshake-pat-on-the-back, which meant Jack would actually have to say goodbye sober, and that was going to be Bad.
Jack was pretty sure that the way Mark had stared up at the inky sky last night, drunk and dopey and happy, had shifted something in him. He would never be able to unsee the image of Mark looking so lovely, standing under the flickering yellow street lamps, as snow drifted down around them. It was one of the only things that survived Jack’s drunk memories of the night before, and now it was stamped in Jack’s memory, possibly forever.
Markipoo
Heeeellllooooooo
Do i need to go over to ur room to wake you up
Jack stared back down at his phone.
He wasn’t 100% sure, but he was 98% sure that he wasn’t wearing any pants at the moment, and his breath smelled like death. He also hadn’t showered before he’d passed out. So Mark busting down his hotel room door while Jack was a rank ball of naked nastiness would be really, really bad.
Jack started typing, but before he could even send a message, there was another one from Mark.
Markipoo
Aha! The baby boy lives. I can see your typing bubbles.
Jacksepticeye
No.
Markipoo
:(
Jacksepticeye
I have the wrst hangover in the history of man kkind and i feel like its ur fautl
Jack closed his eyes, getting a little bit of reprieve against the brightness of his iPhone screen. God, was there really not an option to turn the brightness down further? Jack watched the little typing bubbles appear and disappear, before jumping in with another text.
Jacksepticeye
No good comback? So it IS ur fault
Markipoo
Hey you did that last irish car bomb of your OWN volition! I didn’t make u do anything
Jack groaned. So that’s why he felt like he’d been run over by a ten ton truck. He fucking hated Guinness, and a combination of Guinness AND whisky was probably the root of his current predicament.
Jacksepticeye
Bye
Markipoo
Nooooo come back! Did you get my text from earlier? About the flight?
Jacksepticeye
Ya, mine’s cancelled too. But it won’t b too long rite? I mean its philly, they’ve gotta have flights comin and goin. They’ll clear out the tarmac soon
Markipoo
I mean, it’s a cyclone snow storm. It’s supposed to b the worst storm since the 50s.
Twitter said theyre grounding all flights for the next few days
Are you so eager to lave me? :(
leave**
:(
Jacksepticeye
Lave.
Markipoo
It was a TYPO
I have big thumbs ok!!!!!!
Jacksepticeye
That’s not the biggest thing u’ve got
The second Jack hit send he immediately wanted to smack himself. What the fuck was he doing, sending a text like that to Mark? Jokingly flirting with each other was their thing, but they always did this shit in person, so it couldn’t be misconstrued as anything but a joke. Sure they joked about sucking each others massive dongs, slapping each other’s bulbous asses, but never in a serious way. It was so easy to misinterpret tone through text--
Markipoo
Oooh baby, don’t you kno it ;)
Pray tell, what IS the biggest thing i’ve got??
;)
Jacksepticeye
Ur fuckn giant head
Markipoo
RUDE
Jack let out a sigh of relief. Bullet fuckin’ dodged, they were back on neutral territory. Easy. Casual.
He was going to need a lot of damn coffee before he was an actual functional human being that could say things and have them not sound completely idiotic.
Jacksepticeye
Brb need to shower this hangver away
Markipoo
Think of me while u do that, boo ;)
Jack rolled his eyes.
***
By the time he’d showered, gotten dressed, and tamed his hair into something slightly more acceptable looking than a bird’s nest, he felt slightly better, and ready to inhale some coffee.
Markipoo
I want breakfast
Do you think cafes are open rn
I want mcdonalds
Nope, change my mind. I want waffles. nice, thicc waffles. Like, thiccer than a bowl of oatmeal wafles.
Get food w me. You better not have already eaten breakfast
Did u go back to sleep??
Jack bit down on his toothbrush to hold it in place while he typed out a response.
Jacksepticeye
Yep. BIG breakfast, i’m eatin huge fkn waffle rite now
Jack hit send.
Before he could even set his phone down to finish brushing his teeth it was buzzing angrily with a Facetime request.
Jack hit accept before he could actually consider what he was doing. On screen, a disheveled looking Mark popped up. His mop of unruly dark hair carelessly tossed to one side of his head like he’d slept on the other side all night. It made him look a little silly, like a rooster, but somehow, the look suited him.
On screen, Mark was pouting, staring at him like Jack had just told him he couldn’t have cake on his birthday.
“God, you SUCK,” Mark said, after ascertaining that Jack wasn’t in fact eating a big delicious breakfast, but had a toothbrush hanging out of his mouth and white paste all around his lips.
“Gotcha,” Jack mumbled around the toothbrush in his mouth. He took it out and spit into the sink.
“Are you...did you? Did you pick up my Facetime in the middle of brushing your teeth??” Mark said, incredulous. Mark was staring at his lips. Or at least that’s what it looked like. He was probably staring at Jack’s face, but the surface of the screen was too small so it looked like he was staring at his lips.
Jack quickly stuck his head under the faucet, rinsed and wiped his lips with the back of his hand.
“I don’t know, I thought it was urgent!” Jack said, voice cracking halfway through the sentence. God, he sounded so dumb.
“Well, you’re right. It is urgent. I’m hungry.”
Jack rolled his eyes. “I’m hanging up.”
“Wait, wait!”
Jack watched Mark’s eyes flick across the phone screen, reading something.
“I’m looking up some restaurants on Yelp. There’s this place that’s close enough to walk?” Mark said, as he clicked something on his phone, before closing out of the app and turning his attention back to Jack’s face.
Jack raised an eyebrow, pretending to be unamused.
“C’mon, please?”
Jack sighed, pretending to sound put-upon.
“Pleeeease? C’mon, whose dick do I have to suck to make you come to brunch with me,” Mark said. “I’ll do it. My word is my bond, I’m a man of my word. I would suck 10 dicks for a waffle.”
“Would you? Would you really? Ten massive schlongs for some sweet bread?”
“So is that a yes?” Mark said.
Jack sighed again, dramatically. Like he had to think about it. Though of course he was going to have brunch with Mark. Mark could have asked him if he wanted to go skydiving during a snowstorm with no parachute, and Jack would have said yes. Because it was Mark, and Jack would do any amount of stupid things to make Mark happy, including but not limited to eating waffles with him. Definitely not limited to eating waffles with him. Which, the more he thought about it, definitely sounded like a euphemism for something.
“I guess,” Jack said, sounding as fake-reluctant as possible.
“Fuck yes. It’s called “Not Your Mother’s Waffle House.’”
“Mark...was that a “your mama” joke?”
“No, swear to God! That’s the name of the restaurant. Here, I’ll send you a link, hang on,” Mark said, focusing back on his phone.
This close to the camera, Mark looked a little cross-eyed as he stared back down at his screen. It was completely ridiculous and somehow wildly endearing. Jack’s phone pinged with the new link Mark sent him, and he clicked on it, skimming through the menu. Four stars, not bad. A few Instagram photos of people who had uploaded what their meals looked like. The waffles did look pretty tasty.
“Sure,” Jack said, because it sounded less desperate than “of course,” or “yes, please,” or “how do you look so good waking up in the morning.”
Mark beamed. Jack felt his heart stutter.
“YES, I’m in room 402. See you soon!”
And before Jack could get in a word edgewise, Mark hung up.
***
When he made it to Mark’s room fifteen minutes later, Mark wasn’t even dressed yet. Or at least, Jack hoped that was the case, because there was no way Mark would survive the frigid cold wearing a pair of grey sweatpants and a stained Pokemon t shirt that had a hole in the armpit.
“Have you just been sitting here the entire time?!”
Mark gave him a kicked puppy dog look, which was all the answer that Jack needed.
“My hair takes a LONG time to do,” Mark said plaintively. It didn’t look that much neater than before. Jack supposed it didn’t matter either way, since the floof always looked nice, no matter how tousled or nappy it was. But he wasn’t about to let Mark know that.
***
By the time they actually made it out of the hotel and out onto the snow covered streets of Philly, it was past 10am, still fairly early if Jack had anything to say about it, but the cutting wind was going a long way towards curing his hangover.
“Christ,” Jack muttered, trying to tug the collar of his peacoat higher. The snow was nearly up to their ankles, still falling from the overcast sky in swirling flakes, peppering in Mark’s black hair. The temperature itself wasn’t that bad, but the wind was unforgiving, so cold that Jack’s chest ached a little every time he breathed in.
Their shoes crunched against the fresh snow with every step, puffs of air escaping their lips into the chill. There was little traffic on the road. It was peaceful, the kind of sleepy morning that stretched on long into the afternoon. The world, quiet, turned seconds into minutes.
Jack dug his numb hands deeper into his pockets, resisting the urge to reach out and brush the snow from Mark’s hair. Mark caught his stare before he could glance away.
“You cold?” Mark said, teasing. He’d come much more prepared for the weather than Jack, in a red Canadian goose down jacket and maroon scarf, pulled up high around his neck.
“Of course, it’s fuckin’ freezing,” Jack said, sniffling. It was true--when he’d glanced at his weather app as they were leaving the hotel, it was 24 degrees fahrenheit, and that wasn’t including the windchill. He was always caught off guard by how cold it could get in America. Probably because he was used to Skyping with Mark, who lived in warm and sunny Los Angeles was.
“You’re Irish! Shouldn’t you be used to shitty freezing weather?” Mark said.
“I’d flick you off if I didn’t think my finger would freeze and fall off,” Jack muttered. He hadn’t anticipated staying longer than the weekend, and figured most of it would be spent indoors anyway. So of course the one time he didn’t think he’d need his winter coat, he’d get stuck in a city with a literal Polar Vortex sweeping through it.
Mark chuckled, bumping Jack gently with a shoulder. The sidewalks in the city were narrow from snow piling up on the sides. Walking next to each other like this, Jack was close enough to feel Mark’s body heat emanating from him in waves. Par for the course, Mark was a goddamn space heater while Jack was a step away from turning into a snowman.
There weren’t any other pedestrians on the road with them. From a distance, Jack thought he could roughly make out the shape of a roughly constructed lean to, snow resting atop the blue tarp. A homeless person’s makeshift cover against the unforgiving weather. Jack felt a pang of pity--it would be miserable not to have somewhere to go in this city, at this time of year.
“How much further?” Jack said, the next time they stopped at a crosswalk, trying not to let his teeth chatter. It felt like his veins were slowly icing over. The city hadn’t sent out snow plows yet. A few cars inched down the street, doing their best to drive in the tire tracks of those in front of them so they wouldn’t fishtail.
The snow was up past their ankles now, and fast turning into a dirty, cold sludge. Jack could feel it melting and soaking into the bottom of his jeans. It was his last pair, which meant that either he was going to have to deal with dirty clothes until whenever he was able to schedule another flight, or see if the hotel had a laundry machine. Or maybe borrow something from Mark, though his clothes would probably be too large to fit Jack. Something about the idea warmed him.
Mark glanced over, eyebrows furrowing.
“You’re shivering. We’re pretty close I think, but...here,” Mark said, and before Jack knew what was happening, Mark unlooped his red scarf from his neck and slung it around Jack’s.
God, it was warm.
The scarf was warm, and soft, and smelled so much like Mark that Jack was dizzy with it. His cologne was spicy and good , like pine needles and mint and irish spring soap. Jack breathed in deep.
It smelled like every time Mark slung his arm around Jack’s shoulder, like every time they hugged and Jack felt warm just from being so close to him. Except now the scent was all around him, wrapped around his face, heady and close, and oh God, it was like someone had poured liquid gold into his veins.
“Better?” Mark said, smiling, his breaths misting in the air, his chocolate eyes meeting Jack’s. Jack nodded. He couldn’t even think of something witty to say; the scent of Mark’s scarf had turned Jack’s brain into mush, and it’d be hilarious if it also wasn’t the most pathetic thing ever.
Jack nodded, not fully trusting his voice.
Mark glanced over at Jack with his usual dorky smile, and the sight of him grinning was nearly enough to make Jack grin too.
Lord, it was going to be a goddamn Christmas miracle if he made it through the day without making an ass of himself.
***
The diner, when they finally made it inside, was relatively empty. Only two other couples had braved the weather and were sitting at booths in the back, murmuring quietly to each other.
The diner was like something out of the 70s; red leather booths, tile checkered floor, and a jukebox in the corner. The barstool area even had a requisite drunk guy, slouched over, picking at the leftovers of what looked like a greasy omelette.
The second they stepped into the heat of the diner, Mark’s glasses started fogging up. He took them off in annoyance, waving them around in the air to try and get them to adjust to the temperature. Jack was suddenly glad he’d remembered to put in contact lenses after showering.
Jack uncoiled the scarf from around his neck, holding it out to Mark.
“Thanks,” Jack said. He almost didn’t want to give it back to Mark, it was so comfortable.
“You’ll need it later, when we go back out and you gotta protect that pasty little neck of yours,” Mark said, waving Jack off. Jack scowled at him, though there was no heat behind the gesture. He was secretly glad.
“And plus, it looks good on you,” Mark amended, and Jack had no idea how to react to that. It was a damn lie, if he’d ever heard one, because even though red was Jack’s favorite color, there wasn’t a single person he’d ever met that looked better in red than Mark.
“Liar,” Jack snorted, but left it at that.
They stomped their shoes against the welcome mat, shaking off the snow the best they could. Now that they were out from the cold, Jack could feel the unpleasantness of soggy socks and wet jeans settle in. The sooner they could finish their meals and get back to the hotel, the better.
There was only one waitress working all the tables, which made sense, considering that most places had shut down, and hardly anyone would be trying to brave a winter storm.
She gave them a friendly wave, strolling over after she dropped off a plate of pancakes to the other customers.
“Anywhere you like,” she said, motioning for them to take their pick of empty tables and booths.
Mark looked at Jack.
“Booth.” They said, at the same time.
They meandered over to a booth on the other side of the restaurant, with a window overlooking the street outside.
Jack scooched into the booth, taking off his jacket so he could have more room to maneuver. Outside the window, the snow looked pretty, coating the rooftops of Philly in white. It gave everything an odd sense of tranquility, like maybe it was okay for the world to fall asleep for a few months. It softened the harsh angles of the skyscrapers, made everything just a little more dreamy. When it looked like this outside, Jack could understand why people believed in miracles, and love.
Jack didn’t even realize he’d zoned out until Mark waved a hand in front of his face.
“Earth to Jack?”
“Sorry,” Jack said. “Still kinda hungover.” Which was the truth. Well, part of the truth, anyway. The other part was that his chest felt a little funny, like his lungs were too big for his body. He was here in America with Mark during Christmas . It was like all of his wildest dreams had come true, except now that it was happening, Jack had how to act. He felt like he’d forgotten all the lines to the most important theater performance of his life.
“Me too,” Mark said, and it took Jack a moment to remember what he’d said. Right, hangovers. He was pretty sure Mark hadn’t had nearly as much to drink last night. Jack remembered Mark saying he’d quit drinking for health reasons, though every now and again he still would drink, just in moderation.
“How long do you think the flights are going to be grounded?” Jack said.
“Dunno. Sometimes when the snow got really bad in Cincinatti, people would have to land in Indiana and take a train.”
“Well, there’s no way I can take a train back to Europe,” Jack said.
“Guess you’ll just have to stay awhile.”
“Yeah. Guess so,” Jack said.
Mark hummed, playing with one of the containers of sugar at the table, fingers nimble and quick as he spun the tiny sugar spoon on his knuckles. He was a fidgeter, like Jack, never able to sit still or shut up for too long, always kinetic, always responding and reacting and observing. That was something Jack loved about him. Mark could come off as loud and obnoxious, but he was actually very keen, picking up on things that people normally wouldn’t notice. It’s what made him a good gamer.
The waitress bustled over to them, handing them faded menus that had seen better days; the laminated plastic peeled at the corners, and the menu had typos and items crossed out with sharpie marker.
Most of the menu items listed were hearty, quintessential American things. Burgers, sandwiches, a handful of salads, some steaks, and an assortment of breakfast foods, as well as smoothies and shakes. Jack wasn’t quite sure if he was up to the task of eating anything too oily or greasy.
Mark, meanwhile, poured over the menu like it was a textbook, reading everything on the page like it was the utmost importance that he get it right.
“You boys know what you want yet?” The waitress said, setting down two slightly grimy plastic cups of water with ice cubes, taking out a pad of pen and paper. She was cute, objectively. Big doe eyes and full lips, hair done up in a messy bun with a sharp little nose with a sterling steel loop through it. In her young 20s, most likely a college student working in the area.
“I...think we need another moment?” Jack said, mostly because sometime between getting the menu and her coming back, he’d spent half the time staring at the menu without actually reading it, and the other half staring out the window, watching the snow drift down. He was spacy on a good day--with a hangover, getting him to focus on anything for more than a few seconds was a lost cause.
“Well, just let me know when you’re ready, hon.” She smiled, before turning away.
“Know what you want yet?” Jack asked, a little lost.
Mark shrugged. “I’m getting waffles.”
Right, he’d said that before they left. Jack felt a little bad that he’d sent the waitress away instead of letting Mark order, since Mark obviously knew what he wanted from the start.
“I’m thinking pancakes.”
“I’m thinking that’s a good think.”
“Thanks,” Jack snorted.
“Anyway. That waitress was definitely flirting,” Mark said, nonchalant, unwrapping one end of his straw.
“She was?” Jack said. He was pretty sure she was just being nice. Everyone in America was smiley and friendly. It was a thing he’d noticed, that Americans smiled more than Europeans.
“I’m pretty sure.”
“I mean, if anything, she’d be flirting with you, Marki-I’ve got 2 million subs-plier,” Jack shot back.
Mark ripped off the paper at the end of his straw and stuck it in his mouth, blowing into it so the rest of the straw wrapper hit Jack in the face.
“Fucker,” Jack growled, wadding the straw wrapper up into a ball and tossing it--straight into Mark’s cup of water.
“BULLSEYE!”
“Fuck! Fuck you,” Mark said, sticking his fingers into the icy water to fish out the soggy paper while Jack laughed.
“It’s what you deserve, ” Jack said.
“Well, so is this,” Mark said flicking the soggy paper back at him. Jack narrowly dodged, moving his cup away so Mark couldn’t do anything else to it. They both started giggling at the same time--Jack tried to compose himself when he saw the waitress looking over at the commotion, making her way back towards them.
“Having fun, boys?”
“Just enough,” Mark said with a smirk. Jack glared.
“You boys know what you want?”
“Yeah, I’m gonna take #14, the Belgium waffle, no whipped cream, extra strawberries please. For the side, can I get sausage links, hash browns, and a fried egg?”
“Sure,” she said, jotting that down. “And you, hun?”
She turned to look at Jack. Her eyes were an electric blue that jolted him, because they looked strangely similar to Signe’s.
“Uh,” Jack said, skimming down the menu. “I’ll take the--#3? Pancake short stack?”
“Any sides for you?”
“Uh, no. Syrup on the side, no whipped cream. And a coffee,” he said.
“Sugar or creme?”
“Neither, thank you.”
Mark made a face.
“Black coffee? What are you, a witch?” he said.
“Well I’m certainly not a little bitch who can’t take it black,” Jack said. Next to them, the waitress blushed and giggled.
“Oh god, I’m sorry, I swear, I’m not usually like this, I’m just really hungover--” Jack started.
“He’s always like this,” Mark said, barely containing his laughter.
“No, I’m not! I’m nice, I swear, I’m just in desperate need of caffeine,” Jack finished, lamely, because Mark was totally right, he was totally like this all the time. He was totally an asshole. It was in his job description.
The waitress smiled. “Well, anyway I’ll be back with your orders in a bit. If you need anything in the meantime, gimme a holler.”
After she left, Jack pressed his forehead against his glass of ice water, faux-glaring at Mark.
“I’m not an asshole.”
Mark pressed a hand against his chest, mock-offended.
“I was just telling the truth.”
“Cock-blocking me?”
“She doesn’t deserve you if she can’t handle you at your worst,” Mark said, still snickering.
“You’re right, you’re the only one that knows all my dark sides, boo-boo.”
Mark made a kissy-face at him. “You know it, bae.”
Jack flushed.
“Pretty sure you’re the bae, if your followers have a say in it,” Jack said.
“Are you kidding me? Have you read the comments on your videos?”
“Have you?” Jack said.
“Hey, listen, listen, listen, I need to scope out my competition. So sometimes if I watch a video of yours--doesn’t happen often , but when it does--I’ll check out a few comments, sure. And they’re always about you being cute or handsome or the bestest sweetest green bean--”
“And you know what? They’re all correct.”
“Well...blah, blah,” Mark said.
“No good comeback?” Jack smirked.
“I’ll think of one, just give me a few minutes.”
He’d missed this, their casual banter, teasing and ribbing each other like they’d grown up together. He’d missed Mark . Though they still played games together every once in a while, Mark was so occupied all the time that those times were becoming fewer and further between. Everyone on the entire platform clamored to work with him, and that wasn’t even including the ridiculous companies that were asking for partnerships; Jack was just grateful that he even got the light of day from Mark.
From across the table, Mark was grinning at him like a damn fool too, just looking at him. The sight sent a warm flutter through Jack’s stomach.
“What’d you think of the con last night?”
“Every year there are just more and more people,” Jack said.
“Yeah, and the new fans that subscribe aren’t any older. Like, every time I meet new fans, they’re all in their teens. It’s kinda weird having an army of 14 year olds come up to you. I feel like maybe I should tone down the profanity on my channel, so I stop corrupting the youth,” Mark said.
Jack nodded. It was a little weird, being almost twice the age of some of the kids who watched his channel. Probably wasn’t a good thing, considering the fact that every single one of his videos contained swearing and insults. He tried not to think about it too much, but at conventions he had to face the music. Or the crowd, rather.
“What’s even weirder is when they come up to you and burst into tears. It’s sweet, but also it’s just so...I don’t know, too much. It’s like, imagine having a stranger come up to you in the middle of the street and just start saying your name and crying. I always feel weird about it,” Jack said. He was already awkward in his daily life, but to have someone literally burst into tears when they met him was a lot to handle. Truth be told, he still didn’t know how to handle it when fans did that.
“You kinda just gotta pat them on the back and tell them it’s okay,” Mark said, shrugging, “not much else you can do. Doesn’t make it less weird though, that’s for sure.”
“Yeah,” Jack said. “Our jobs are just...fucking weird, in general.” And it was . Because he was alone, recording videos, and people commented and interacted but it was different seeing them in the flesh. The magnitude of people who watched him day to day, manifested, was overwhelming. He wasn’t sure if he would ever get used to it.
Mark nodded, eyes looking somewhere over Jack’s head.
“Yessss, finally. Our food,” Mark said. Their waitress was back, carrying the serving platter on her shoulder. It dwarfed her, but she was balancing everything with impressive ease.
“Here you boys are, and your coffee,” she smiled, setting their food down as they shuffled things around to make it fit. “Anything else you need?”
“I think we’re good,” Mark said.
“Okay, well just flag me down if you need anything!”
She hadn’t left their vicinity yet when Mark unfolded his napkin in his lap and dug into his food, slicing the waffle squares neatly and dipping them in syrup.
The pancakes smelled delicious, going a long way towards making Jack actually feel hungry. But first, coffee. He took a sip--it was hot, and burnt to the point that it tasted a little like battery acid, but strong enough that Jack already felt a little more awake.
“So. I guess we’re stuck here for the next few days,” Mark said, in between shockingly large bites of waffles. It’d been ten minutes and he was already nearly halfway through his waffle. Jack had barely finished his first pancake.
Jack tipped a little more syrup onto his stack. He knew he needed to eat to cure the rest of the hangover, but he was a slow eater, and was still fighting a little bit of nausea from the hangover. Even on regular days, he didn’t eat much.
“Yeah, my mam isn’t gonna be happy about it,” Jack said, fastidiously cutting up his pancake. It wasn’t that he disliked being home for the holidays, he just hadn’t had a reason to the past few years, being in Brighton.
“Any New Years plans with your family? Or Amy’s?” Jack said, changing the subject. He didn’t want to dwell on Brighton, and Signe. Thinking about it all still made him ache. Somehow, it was almost worse that their relationship had gone out the way it did--with silence, and distance, their final days heavy with things they didn’t know how to say. No dramatic fights, no screaming matches. Just a slow, painful fade as they grew apart, the way sometimes flowers wilt and die for no reason.
Mark swallowed, and didn’t meet Jack’s gaze when he responded with a simple “nah. No plans.”
Huh.
Amy was noticeably absent from con this time around. Jack hadn’t asked, because he figured she was busy. She usually travelled with Mark wherever he went, a perpetual ball of sunshine at his side. Sometimes, it was almost overwhelming how cute they were, like their combined happiness could single handedly make the world a better place.
Jack didn’t see how anyone in their right mind could dislike Amy. Hating her was impossible, like hating kittens, or rainbows.
Jack didn’t push. He didn’t really need to. It was all written there in Mark’s expression. Mark had never been good at hiding his emotions. Now that Jack thought about it, it’d been a while since he’d seen Mark post any photos of himself with Amy.
Jack wasn’t sure how to feel. He felt guilty for feeling anything but sad. He genuinely liked Amy, and not just because she was with Mark. She was a really cool girl. And anyway, Mark hadn’t elaborated on what no plans meant. Maybe they weren’t broken up, just going through a rough patch. Hush, asshole. Stop being a dick and speculating like a prying fangirl.
“So it’s just you and me then, pal,” Jack said, changing the subject before he could dwell on it for too long, “you and me, and a shit ton of snow, in Philly.”
“Sounds like the beginning of a bad romcom” Mark said, polishing off the last of his sausage links. It was honestly impressive, how much food he could fit into himself. Jack had no idea where it could all be going.
“Rom com of the ages. The title’ll be “Two Loud Ass YouTubers, One City.””
“That doesn’t sound like a rom com, that sounds like a porno.”
Jack choked on his coffee, spitting a little back into the cup. Mark laughed, eyes crinkling up, laughs breathy and loose and wild.
“Hey man, don’t say things you don’t mean,” Jack said. Two could play at this game of Gay Chicken.
“I’m a man of my word, you know that.”
“We’re supposed to be on vacation. No videos, no thinking about videos.” Mark raised the napkin to his lips and wiped off the shiny grease.
They polished off the rest of their meals in comfortable silence. By the time Mark had finished his hash browns and plastic cup of water, Jack was still picking away at his pancakes. As far as pancakes went, they were pretty tasty, mixed in with oat grain and some kind of hemp or flax seed, but because of that they were hearty and thick, and he could already feel the uncomfortable press of his belt digging into his waist.
Jack nodded towards Mark.
“Wanna help me finish these?”
Mark stared at him with a raised eyebrow.
“You ate one and a half pancakes. Out of four.”
“I’m not hungry anymore,” Jack said. It was a half truth. He was still a little bit hungry, but only because his brain hadn’t actually caught up with his stomach yet. He knew that if he ate any more, 20 minutes later he would be suffering for it. The effects of keeping an irregular sleep schedule (and life schedule, who was he kidding) had started to rear its head in the form of stomach issues. On a good day, he’d drink three cups of coffee for breakfast, have a piece of toast for lunch, and order out for dinner. It wasn’t healthy, but that was the cost of keeping up his hefty workload and upload schedule.
“You’re a growing boy, you need your protein.”
“I stopped growing when I was 17,” Jack said.
“Doesn't matter, you need your strong muscles,” Mark said in a goofy voice, but there was real concern there. It made Jack feel a little uncomfortable. Mark was the one that needed people to rein him in from doing stupid things, not the other way around.
“I'm fine,” Jack said, flatly. “Seriously these are super filling. Try a bite.”
“Fork me one,” Mark said, waggling his eyebrows. Jack stared at him.
“Yeah that’s right, you heard me. Fork me one,” Mark said, a glint of challenge in his eyes. God, he was even more of a little shit than Jack had thought possible. But he didn’t mean any of it. This was just Mark--the guy who made lewd suggestive jokes for a living, who occasionally joked about sucking Jack’s dick, and sometimes said “I love you” when Jack saved him from death in video games. And Jack was doing what he always did, overthinking everything and turning it into a big deal when it really wasn't.
Jack sliced a quarter of a pancake and folded it in half with his fork before offering it out to Mark. Who, instead of taking it and feeding himself like a normal damn person, leaned forward with his mouth wide open, waiting for Jack to push the fork between his lips.
Oh god. What the fuck.
This was it. This was how Jack was going to die and disappear into the ether. Here, in this kitschy restaurant, Mark sitting across from him with his mouth wide open, those big doe eyes staring up at Jack waiting to have sticky pancake shoved into his mouth.
Jack was pretty sure he was blushing purple in the face. What the fuck is happening. He tentatively pushed the bit of pancake into Mark’s mouth, praying to every lord in the sky that Mark wouldn't notice the fine tremble in Jack’s hand.
“You big baby,” Jack said, though there was no heat behind it.
Mark’s closed his eyes, humming with approval. The sound did something funny to Jack. Made something in his gut go hot.
“That's a tasty pancake right there,” Mark crooned, voice low and dragged over gravel. Jack bit the insides of his cheeks to stop himself from saying anything dumb. Like why the fuck do you make eating food so sexual or your voice is more syrupy than these pancakes because either of those things would be utterly stupid and also he didn’t think he could say them with the correct joking tone. It would come out too serious. Shatter whatever weird fake-sexually charged rapport that they had.
“It's all yours,” Jack narrowly avoided adding baby to the end of that, but it was a close call, at that.
***
When they paid the bill and tumbled back out into the cold, the snow was past their ankles, nearly halfway up their shins. It was coming down thick and fast now, the sky above darkening into a pallid grey color.
Jack huddled underneath Mark’s scarf, and the scent of him was everywhere, everywhere. It sent a strange, hot thrill through him, wearing Mark’s scarf. Like he was a part of him somehow, this stupid red and soft scarf.
“God, feels colder than it was last night, and I was pretty sure I was going to get hypothermia last night,” Mark said, pulling the hood of his jacket up over his head. His glasses were frosting at the edges from the sudden change in temperature, and the tip of his nose was reddening.
“Want this back?” Jack said, muffled from behind Mark’s scarf. Mark shook his head. “Nah, it would just get my glasses foggy again.”
They trudged on--Jack’s socks sucked at the bottom of his shoes, cold and wet.
Most of the shops down the street were closed, though their store windows were lit up bright, mannequins decked out in holiday sweaters and tiny Christmas trees on display behind the glass. It hadn’t snowed in Brighton last year, and the one year it did, it never felt like this. Jack felt like he was walking around in a Christmas movie. America, apparently, was like a movie during the holidays.
“I feel like I should hit up this store sometime before I leave and get a Nintendo Switch,” Mark said, glancing into one of the shop windows. It was a tech store, but a local one, not a giant Best Buy or Staples. The display in front had a Christmas tree made out of refurbished Xboxs and PS4s.
“That display is awesome.”
“Yeah. We walked past it last night. Remember?” Mark said.
Last night. A good chunk of which Jack didn’t remember, and the bits that he did remember, he wasn’t sure were real, or if he’d dreamt them.
“Gonna be real with you, I don’t remember like. All of last night.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Jack saw Mark start, a flit of confusion scrunching his face.
“What...what do you mean you don’t remember? Did you black out??”
“No, no,” Jack amended quickly, because Mark looked seriously freaked out. And not the fake over-the-top freak out he liked to burst into when he was recording videos, but the quiet kind of panic that made Jack worried he was actually panicking.
“I remember most of it, I think. Just not all of it. I remember…” Jack paused on the sidewalk, glancing nervously at Mark. For some reason, it felt important to get this right. Mark stopped too, looking at him seriously. Jack took a breath. Having Mark’s full attention zeroed in on him was intense. He couldn’t remember the last time Mark had looked so serious.
“I remember...we got out of the last bar. It was snowing out.”
Hands. Mark’s warm hands wrapped around his own icy fingers. A warm breath against his neck.
“We got into a cab? Right?”
“It was an uber, but close enough,” Mark said, softly.
“Right. Uber. But it was taking forever. It got stuck in the snow. Road conditions were shitty. So...we walked back to the hotel.”
Mark looked at him, an inscrutable expression on his face.
“And that’s it?”
“And that’s it.” Because that was it. Wasn’t it? All that other stuff, it was all in Jack’s mind. Something his alcohol-addled brain came up with to placate his feelings. There was no way any of that had actually been real. There is no way I held hands with Mark while he nuzzled into my neck in the back of an uber.
Mark nodded.
“I think our hotel is just around the corner,” Mark said, quietly.
They walked the rest of the way in silence.
***
By the time he’d peeled himself out of his wet clothes, taken another shower, and flopped back onto his hotel bed, it was nearly 3pm. Jack suddenly realized that he had forgotten to tell his family not to pick him up at the airport. In a panic, he fumbled for his phone on the stand, texting his sister that his flight was cancelled. He waited a handful of minutes. No response.
He pulled up her contact on his phone and hit the Facetime button, hoping that the wifi and his cell data would last long enough for him to update her on everything.
Sitting on his bed in the hotel room, he tapped his hand against his leg impatiently as the phone blipped. And then his sister’s face popped up. Jack breathed out a sigh of relief.
“Hey you. I was literally about to drive to the airport,” Susan said.
“Don’t. Flight’s cancelled.”
“Yeah, I just saw your text,” Susan said, unzipping her winter coat, juggling her phone with one hand while she hung it back on the hook in the closet. It was strange, seeing his childhood home in the background. The cozy yellow lights, the mid sized pine Christmas tree in the corner by the living room--the nostalgia was almost overwhelming.
“Sorry, I should have told you earlier.”
“So, I’m going to go ahead and guess you haven’t told ma and pa yet then, right?”
Jack shook his head.
“Figured as much,” Susan said, “I don’t envy you that.”
“It’s not my fault I’m stranded.”
“No, but they’ll still be bummed. Are you at least there with someone?”
“Yeah, every flight out of Philly’s cancelled until after Christmas, at the earliest. Mark and I got breakfast this morning. We might hang out in the evening too, I dunno,” Jack said. It was strange to think about.
He and Mark were close, but despite how much they talked over the Internet, this would be the first time they’d spend an extended amount of time together, that also wasn’t jam-packed with video recording and planned activities. Since most of the town was closed, they’d have a lot of time to kill. Jack wasn’t sure how to feel about it.
“Markiplier, right? The lad you’ve got a crush on?”
Jack choked on air.
“Susan, the fuck?!”
“Hey,” Susan said, holding up a placating hand, “not judging, not hating.”
“I do not--”
“Hang on,” she said, motioning for him to quiet, and when she flipped her phone sideways, Jack could see his mother, in the kitchen in the other room, making her way over. She looked the same as she always did, salt and pepper hair twisted up into a tight bun on her head, apron tied sturdily around her waist. The sight sent a coarse rush of feelings through him. Though he talked to her a few times a month, it was different seeing her through the screen. More tangible, somehow. Unexpectedly, his eyes stung, and he was so homesick it felt like a stomach ache.
“Aren’t you supposed to be off to the airport, Susan? And you’re on the phone?”
“Uh. I’ll just hand you off to her,” Susan said quickly, passing her phone off to their mother. Who took one look at the screen, and frowned, eyebrows drawing together.
“Did you miss your flight, love?”
“No, there was too much snow falling. Everything’s cancelled,” Jack said, wincing as her face fell. “I’m sorry, ma.”
“And no other flights? You won’t be back for Christmas?”
“No, ma.”
She sighed again.
“Well. If there’s a church, you best be gettin’ to it before Christmas,” she said.
“I’ll try,” Jack said softly.
“I love you. Don’t forget to eat something nice on Christmas,” she said.
“Love you too. And tell pa sorry, too,” Jack said. It made him emotional, seeing his family all gathering in the house without him. It’d been years since they’d all gotten together. He hardly remembered what it was like, when they all celebrated the holidays with each other. Would they feel like strangers, the next time they gathered?
His mother handed the phone back to Susan, who stood up and walked through the house, until she was standing in front of Jack’s old room.
“Thanks a lot,” Jack muttered. He’d been hoping that she’d be the one to tell ma and pa, though he supposed it was unfair to put that on her.
“Well, I wasn’t about to ruin her Christmas telling her that you weren’t coming home.”
“Just play one of my videos while you guys are having dinner, the effect will be the same,” Jack said. Susan smirked as she continued walking through the small house and opened the door to his room, taking a seat on the mattress.
His room looked different than when he’d been living in it--it was his brother’s now, and while the general layout of it hadn’t changed, there were different books and knick knacks gracing the shelves, and all of his old recording equipment wasn’t there anymore. It was strange, noticing the small differences. How he had ever managed to get anything proper recorded in there, without proper lighting and setup, was beyond him.
“Anyway,” she said, “just, don’t overthink things, and have a good time in Philly, will you? Tell Mark I say hi.”
“I will.”
“And Jack?” she said, appraisingly. There was a look on her face that suggested he wasn’t about to like what she was about to say.
“I don’t like that tone,” he said. Out of all his siblings she was the closest one to him, the one who understood him sometimes better than he understood himself, the one who asked the hardest questions and called him out on his bullshit. It was something he loved about her, but dreaded because she told him things he didn’t want to hear, but needed to.
“Go easy on yourself and him, yeah? I know it’s easy to shut the doors when you’ve been hurt, but he’s a good guy.”
“I know,” Jack said, a little confused. Of course he knew Mark was a good guy. Everyone who had ever followed him knew he did charity streams every month, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to give away, was always kind to his fans, and truly supported his community. It wasn’t new information.
She shook her head. “What I mean is...sometimes, when you see a risk worth taking, don’t hesitate.”
He nodded, hesitantly.
“I’ll talk to you later, yeah? Love you, Jacky-boy,” she said.
“You too,” he said quietly, and then hung up.
He could read between the lines of what she was saying, but he knew she was wrong. Well, she was right about Mark, and right about how Jack felt about him. But she was wrong about Jack.
Here was the thing about Mark. He was someone who wore his heart on his sleeve, whose smiles were never forced, whose laugh filled up a room, who, when his attention was on you, it was like nothing else in the entire world existed, or mattered.
Who called Jack in the middle of the night in Los Angeles, so that it would be at a good time in Brighton. Who never forgot to send Jack birthday presents (a Spiderman plushie), Christmas presents (a mini marble hand painted Septic Eye), and congratulations texts on subscriber milestones. Who wasn’t a complete disaster of a human being and could actually record and edit all of his own content, who could sing and game and play instruments and hang out with his dog and work out and look nice and be functional in a way that Jack knew he’d never be able to achieve.
And what was Jack, compared to that?
***
At exactly 6pm, he got a text message from Mark. The sun had set an hour or so ago, and Jack was left staring out the window of his hotel room as one by one, Christmas lights and street lamps flickered on, illuminating the falling snow in a kaleidoscope of colors.
Markimoo
Pizza?
Jacksepticeye
Haiwain, pls & thx
Markimoo
Nvm
Jacksepticeye
Fuk u
Markimoo
U wish
Come over & i’ll play u for it
Jacksepticeye
Play?
Markimoo
You’ll see…
Jack was already in his pajamas. But pizza. And Mark.
He pocketed his key card and headed towards the door.
***
Exactly four minutes later, Jack knocked on Mark’s hotel room door. In his pajamas. He immediately felt better when he saw that Mark was also in his pajamas--the ratty sweats and holey Pokemon t-shirt again.
“Oh thank god, I thought I was going to have to change into actual clothes,” Jack said.
“You ARE wearing actual clothes,” Mark said, which technically wasn’t wrong. Jack was wearing a pair of sweatpants and a t shirt that was holey enough to compete with Mark’s Pokemon one.
Mark grinned at him, sweeping his hand in a grand gesture and stepping back from the doorway.
“Well, welcome to my humble abode.”
“Why thank you, my good sir,” Jack said, in a silly posh accent.
Earlier in the day, he hadn’t actually had enough time to take in Mark’s room, but now that he stepped inside, he noticed a few subtle differences from his. Mark’s bed was larger than the one in his room, noticeably so. A King sized bed, so huge that it could probably fit Mark four times over with room to spare. There was also a little mini bar area with a few small bottles of beer and wine, and some expensive looking shots of alcohol on the counter, along with a bottle opener and wine glasses. This suite was obviously meant for two. A honeymoon suite.
“Damn, dude,” Jack said, “did they give you a bigger room because you’ve got more subscribers than me or something?”
“What?? I thought our rooms were the same.”
“Nah,” Jack said, meandering over to the mini bar, running his fingers along the labels, “I mean, it’s not bigger by much, but they gave you a bigger bed and everything. And a mini bar.”
“You can take some of it to your room, if you’d like.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Jack said, “I’m just giving you shit for it. But maybe I’m a little jealous, you know. Being Irish and all. You know how important our booze is to us. It’s disappointing that they don’t have any whiskey.”
Behind him, Mark flopped onto the giant bed, where his laptop was resting on top of the rumpled covers, clicking on stuff on his screen.
“Well, how’s this. Here’s the pizza place,” Mark turned the screen around so Jack could see the order menu, “and we’re going to play a game for what type of pizza we get. Winner gets their toppings of choice”
“Play what game?”
“Your choice. Because I’m going to kick your ass no matter what you pick,” Mark said, an impish glint in his eye.
“Oh, you’re fuckin’ ON.”
“AND. I feel like we need to up the stakes,” Mark said, grinning. Because he was a little shit, and Jack kind of loved him for it.
“Go on,” Jack said, not about to be daunted by whatever punishment Mark decided on. Mark was such a goddamn slut for masochism, and this was going to no doubt end in disaster for one or the both of them.
“The loser takes a shot of the winner’s choice from the bar,” Mark said. Jack stared at him.
“Mark. Did you forget that you can’t fuckin’ drink.”
“I know I can’t fuckin’ drink. That’s why that’s the punishment. Because I’m not gonna lose, and you’re gonna be drunk off your ass,” Mark said. Smug bastard.
Jack wasn’t about to take this one on the chin.
“You’re on.”
“You can pick the game,” Mark said, confident. Like he already knew he was going to win.
Jack settled on Plague Inc. It’d been years since he played it, and he had to go back to his room to get his laptop, and the Wifi was shit, but it was worth it to see Mark’s competitive streak show itself. Like all things Mark played, he picked up the basic concept quickly with barely any instruction.
And beat Jack in his very first game.
“Eat a dick,” Mark roared, as his plague, “Penis-itis” defeated Jack’s disease “Grundlemonia.”
“Fuck you,” Jack shouted back, laughing. “Fuckin’ beginner’s luck, won’t happen again. Lightning doesn’t strike twice.”
“Actually, it does--”
“Shut the fuck up,” Jack said before Mark could spiral off into another tangent, “we’re going again. We’re going again and I’m going to beat the pants off you.”
“I mean, you don’t need to beat me to get me to take my pants off,” Mark crooned, “but sure bud. Take a shot first.”
Jack glared. “Since I’m a man of my word, I will. Call it,” he said as he climbed off the mattress and stalked over to the mini bar. None of the drinks sounded appealing, and without any food in his system the booze was going to hit him hard and fast, but he was determined. And he wasn’t about to pussy out. Jack scowled down at his options. Tequila, vodka, and gin. None of which he really enjoyed drinking.
“Vodka,” Mark crowed.
“Oh fuck you,” Jack muttered. Vodka wasn’t nearly as bad as tequila, but it was up there. It wasn’t even pleasant to drink, it was the type of shit you pounded back for the express purpose of getting drunk, the type of thing you mixed into fruity cocktails.
“Only if you want to,” Mark amended quickly. When Jack turned around with the shot in his hand, Mark was staring at him, a little concerned.
“I know you were hungover yesterday, so--”
“I ain’t no bitch,” Jack shot back, and swallowed it in one gulp. It burned all the way down like liquid fire, and he couldn’t help the way his face twisted into a grimace while Mark laughed.
“Don’t look so gleeful,” Jack warned Mark. “You’re next.”
When Jack rejoined Mark on the mattress, he was suddenly aware of how close they were. Sitting cross legged on his mattress, knees nearly touching each others’. Jack felt warm all over, from the alcohol, but also from Mark.
It was strange. Not a bad kind of strange, just different. The same way he felt at the highest point on roller coasters--exhilaration before the fall, a momentum that pulled at his entire body. Over the years, Jack had gotten used to seeing Mark through a screen, but now that he was here in the flesh sitting inches away from Jack, it felt unreal. But Mark was very much here, solid, touchable, warm.
Mark glanced at him over the top of his computer screen, glasses sliding down his sweaty nose. On anyone else it would look 100% ridiculous, but on Mark it made him look like a dumb sexy librarian. Jack felt him warm under Mark’s stare.
Jack bit his vodka-tongue. The last thing he needed was to say something stupidly flirty. His face was quickly starting to warm thanks to the vodka, and if they didn’t start another game soon, Jack was probably going to start feeling the effects of the booze. He always got red drinking alcohol. For all the good being Irish did him, it hadn’t help raise his tolerance for drinks.
“I got them strats,” Mark said, before hitting “restart” on the game.
The second game, he nearly beat Jack again .
Jack couldn’t find it within himself to be that annoyed, because in the few years he’d come to know Mark, he expected as much. Mark was fucking smart.
It was one of the things that Jack looked up to, back when he was just starting Youtube, religiously watching Mark’s hundred-thousand viewed videos as Jack struggled to hit a couple hundred subscribers. He’d had to push himself to be better and smarter, because Mark had set the bar higher for all Youtube gamers. Even now, it was obvious why Mark rose so quickly to the top of the platform. Mark hadn’t even played the game before, and already he’d managed to beat Jack. That wasn’t luck, so much as it was talent, and intelligence.
“I’m hungry enough to call this a bust,” Jack said, after their third game hit a draw. They’d been playing for nearly an hour, and some of Jack’s appetite had actually returned, which meant Mark had to be starving. Mark had chosen gin as his shot of choice when he lost the second round, and now both of them were red in the face. It didn’t help that they were sitting on top of three layers of blankets on the bed, which was only adding to their combined body heat.
“Same,” Mark conceded, tugging at his shirt. Jack watched a bead of sweat roll from his temple down the side of his face. Mark caught him staring.
“I’ve got Asian glow, don’t I?”
“I’ve got Irish glow,” Jack countered. They grinned at each other. Jack felt that funny feeling again. The strange swoop in his stomach that usually pre-empted danger, a warning sign that meant caution, but Jack didn’t know how he could stop it. He didn’t know if he wanted to stop it.
They agreed to split the toppings down the middle, with half of it pepperoni, and the other half Hawaiian. Mark insisted on paying, waving a hand at Jack when he tried to protest.
“You get the next one. Anyway, I still don’t understand why you think pineapple on pizza is acceptable.”
“Have you tried it before? It’s fuckin’ delicious,” Jack said, because it WAS. A little bit of pineapple on pizza made for the perfect combo of sweet and savory, the same reason why sweet corn on pizza was possibly God’s gift to man.
While they waited for the pizza delivery guy to arrive, Jack flicked through the channels on the TV while Mark fiddled with the thermostat in the room, turning it down as low as it would go, which was only a whopping 68 degrees.
“Fuck,” Mark muttered, tugging at his shirt collar again. He was face flushed, hair tousled, sweat on his neck. He looks fucked out . He looks good.
“Please tell me you’re not having an allergic reaction to gin.”
“I’m not,” Mark hiccupped.
“God, are you drunk after one shot? ”
“Listen...listen…” Mark said, holding up a hand.
Jack leaned forward, a hand cupped around his ear.
“Listen,” Mark said, stumbling away from the wall, nearly face planting on the mattress as he climbed on top of the mattress and crawled closer and closer and closer to Jack, on all fours.
“Listen,” Mark whispered, leaning closer, until he was directly in front of Jack’s face, so close Jack could smell the gin on his breath, close enough to touch.
“I’m just fun,” Mark whispered, directly into Jack’s ear and Jack felt that one straight in the low part of his gut, the words curling around his spine.
Jack shoved at Mark, who fell back against the pillows, laughing.
“I haven’t had anything to eat since breakfast! And it’s not my fault I’m a cheap date,” Mark said, flailing to right himself. He was laying horizontally now, face next to Jack’s knee, glasses pushed askew on his face.
“No, that’s a good thing,” Jack agreed, turning his attention back to the TV so he wouldn’t feel compelled to stare. He was pleasantly buzzed, but not buzzed enough to potentially say something stupid, something that would break whatever this was. Whatever it was that allowed him and Mark to flirt and make dick jokes with each other without it going too weird.
“God, I can’t wait for pizza,” Mark muttered into the duvet. Jack nodded.
“Let’s like. Watch something while we wait,” Jack said. Mark nodded, eyes half-lidded, still red in the face from his shot of gin. Eventually, Jack stopped flipping through channels and landed on one that was playing, of all things, Krampus.
Between one yawn and the next, Jack drifted off.
***
For a moment, Mark didn’t know where he was. The bed wasn’t his, and there was music in the background. The credits were rolling, Mark realized, as he glanced blearily at the television screen. Krampus, though Mark honestly couldn’t remember anything past the first 15 minutes of the movie.
Mark winced, shifting a little, wondering if it wouldn’t be a bad idea to just fall asleep again. His temples were pounding in time with his heartbeat, and he was chilly and cramped from falling asleep in an awkward position.
Mark rubbed his eyes until he saw stars. Sometime between falling asleep and now, his glasses had gotten slightly bent out of shape. He couldn’t be assed about it--he was the worst when it came to glasses. It was a true miracle of any of them lasted more than a few months, though considering the fact that they were stranded in Philly for at least another day or two, it probably wouldn’t be good if Mark accidentally crushed them.
When he adjusted his glasses and put them back on, he noticed two things at once. The first, that his own body had decided to betray him with a boner, and the second, that Jack was fast asleep less than a foot away from him.
Mark winced and tucked himself to the side, grabbing one of the pillows on the bed as quickly as humanly possible to cover his crotch area. Well, this was fucking awkward.
Luckily, Jack was asleep on his stomach, face turned to the side and pressed into the pillow, a thin line of drool leaking from the corner of his open mouth. His soft looking hair mussed and sticking up in every direction.
In sleep, his face was completely slack, open and innocent in the dim light from the TV. He was always handsome, but like this he looked positively childlike, features tamed into something gentle and peaceful. It was all too easy to see, in that instant, how much stress Jack usually carried around with him. How much anxiety he’d been hiding for the past few months.
Something in Mark’s chest squeezed at the sight.
Jack trusted him enough to see him like this. Jack, possibly the kindest person on planet Earth, harbored enough insecurities about himself to power a small country. Jack, even with literal millions of followers, still needed to be reminded sometimes that he was enough.
For a brief moment, Mark considered shaking him awake. It’d probably be less weird than if Jack woke up and freaked out about waking up in the same bed as him, right? Mark had already resolved to not mention the night before, though the guilt of it had been weighing on him all day.
So maybe they’d overdone it a little on drinks last night.
Maybe they’d overdone it a lot on drinks last night. Because apparently Jack had forgotten the part of last night where they stumbled out of BallyDoyle’s bar at 3am, arms slung around each other. Apparently he’d forgotten slipping against the snow-covered pavement and swooning into Mark’s arms like a goddamn Harlequin novel heroine, blue eyes bright, pupils blown wide and dark. The way Mark had, for just a moment, thought he wasn’t the only one who felt their hearts thump in unison. Jack had been close enough to kiss.
On the way back, when Jack’s head lolled back against the headrest of the uber, when he’d thrown a lazy, slow wink in Mark’s direction, Mark had leaned in, pressed his cold nose against the vein right next to Jack’s adam’s apple and inhaled.
Had Jack really forgotten all of that, or was he pretending for the sake of both of them that it’d never happened? Mark wasn’t sure which one was the worse alternative.
The truth of the matter was that he hadn’t even been that drunk last night. Tipsy, sure. Tipsy enough to know that it was a bad idea to let himself get loose around Jack? Definitely. But not tipsy enough to be brave and own up to how he felt, and now Mark knew that had been the right move. If he’d known Jack was anywhere close to black-out drunk he wouldn’t have even tried to hold his hand.
They hadn’t done anything, minus the part where Mark had honest to god sniffed Jack’s neck, like some sort of horny weird succubus. Maybe it was for the best that Jack had forgotten, or chosen to forget whatever strangeness had happened between them. Mark shuddered. Would Jack think Mark was fucked up, if he remembered Mark leaning in to him, eyes glowing with desire? Mark had thought, the whole time, that maybe Jack wanted the same thing he did.
But this was easier, right? Pretending, or not remembering whatever happened between them whenever they got a little drunk. This late in the game, Jack had probably figured out the facts. Mark knew full well he was the worst at hiding emotions, and he knew it was pathetic that he was so obvious and desperate in his flirtations.
At least Jack was being a good sport about it. At least he was being nice, by keeping up a guise of friendship. If the situations had been reversed, Mark’s not sure he would be so gracious. If someone he didn’t like romantically was being an annoying asshole about flirting, could he be as tolerant as Jack?
Was it bad that even now, under the blue-ish glow of the TV, and the incandescent yellow ceiling lights, Mark wanted to reach out, press his palm against Jack’s cheek and kiss his forehead? He wanted it possibly more than anything he’d ever wanted in his entire life. Forehead kisses were a dopey, dumb thing that Mark had, up until this point in his life, thought were things people only did in movies, or cheesy romance novels.
Apropos of absolutely nothing, Mark’s stomach grumbled. The fucking pizza. They’d forgotten about the fucking pizza. Oh god, they were such assholes.
Mark fumbled for his phone, trying to find it without also waking Jack up. It was underneath a pillow when he got it--with a notification that the delivery had been cancelled, due to bad weather. They were going to refund his credit card for it. Mark breathed out a sigh of relief. Chalk it up to another win for the weather being a blessing in disguise.
When he glanced back at Jack, he was still asleep, chest falling and rising with even breaths. Mark remembered that Jack had mentioned at some point that he wasn’t a very good sleeper. Both of them had pretty messed up sleep schedules compared to the rest of the working population, so Mark understood why every precious moment of sleep was important.
There wasn’t a pull out couch in the room, like most hotels had, but the bed was more than large enough to fit both of them, with an appropriate amount of space in between.
Mind made up, Mark got out of bed as quietly as he could and went over to the light switch, dimming it to the lowest possible setting, and turning off the TV on his way back to the bed.
He peeled back the covers on the other side of the bed and crawled under. In the darkness, Mark closed his eyes and matched his breaths to Jack’s, waiting for sleep to come.