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Cougar is talking. He is talking. Albeit, in Spanish, but his mouth was moving, and unless Jake is gravely mistaken, those are indeed words coming out of his mouth.
He takes a moment to marvel at this miraculous turn of events, before he switches his attention to the man Cougar is talking to. Good looking guy, Jake observes over the rim of his pint. Steady. Calm, in a zen kind of way. Jake can see why Cougar likes him. Jake likes him too, and he hasn't even exchanged five words with him.
The guy had given Jake a quick greeting and introduced himself when he showed up. Jake didn't quite catch his name, but it doesn't matter much. He doesn't care. All he gathered was that he went to basic with Cougar, that they are friends, and they have been talking in rapid-fire Spanish for about an hour now.
Jake props his head up and stares, point blank, at Cougar. Because this really is kind of groundbreaking, and because Jake is an obnoxious fuck and he wants to see how long it would take for Cougar to finally notice.
He doesn't.
Part of Jake is looking for awkwardness in Cougar. A slight strain in his laughs. A shift in his posture. Something to indicate that this is a front he's putting up, some sort of mask--that he is pretending to be who he was before Afghanistan.
Jake blinks.
And isn't that a fucking epiphany and a half. Jake downs the rest of his beer and stands up, finally catching the attention of the men at the table. Cougar raises an eyebrow at him.
"Heading back to the base," Jake says, waving vaguely at them. "Catch ya on the flip side, Cougs."
Cougar nods at him, and Jake throws down a few notes to cover his bill.
Jake starts towards the general direction of the base, because he wants to clear his head and because to do that, to really do that, he needs a smoke. He digs around in his pockets and manages to find a pack of cigarettes that must've been sitting around for several months, and the zippo he carries around because you never know if it'd come in handy.
The smoke is stale, and as soon as Jake takes a drag he wonders why he thought it was a good idea. It's a fucking conundrum, that’s what it is--as soon as your head is clear you realize that the decision that brought you there wasn't a smart one.
Jake keeps smoking anyway, slowly making his way towards the base.
Cougar made him quit, because they sometimes share a room and the man gets prissy when Jake brings the smell of tobacco inside with him. When they first started working together, Jake was a chain smoker--because coding and tech wasn’t like the movies, really. It involved a lot of idling and waiting for scripts to do their thing, and more waiting around for code to compile, and sometimes it involved staring off into space and daydreaming. Jake had needed something to do with his hands.
Cougar, however, would give him a dirty look and shift further whenever Jake came near him smelling like tobacco as if he had the olympic medal in passive-aggressiveness, and Jake is nothing if not completely susceptible to that kind of assholeish behavior, so at some point, Jake stopped smoking inside. Then the hassle of having to go outside whenever he itched for a light basically outweighed his desire to actually light up, and he stopped smoking at all. The day that Cougar realized Jake didn't even have a hint of tobacco smell on him was the first time Jake had ever seen him smile.
The second time Jake saw Cougar smile was ten minutes ago, inside that pub.
Jake hates it. That he isn't looking forward to seeing the scowl--or worse, disappointment--on Cougar's face when he smells the tobacco. That he is looking forward to seeing the scowl on Cougar's face, because if Jake can't get him to fucking smile, then he'll get another rise out of him.
He hates that he doesn't know whether Cougar was faking his smiles or not, because he has no basis of comparison.
He hates that he didn't know him before Afghanistan.
He hates that there's someone who did.
He's almost back to the base when someone suddenly grabs his shoulder. He starts, and tries to turn, when a hand presses a cloth over his mouth and nose and holds it painfully tightly on his face. Jake tries basically everything in the book: he kicks, he squirms, he holds his breath, but a minute or two in, he has to take a breath.
Jake wakes up with a massive hangover and the taste of copper, tobacco, and foulness in his mouth. He tries to grab his head, only to find his hands zip-tied to the back of the chair he's currently sitting on. He lifts his neck, and much to his delight, finds that it's only a little bit less sore than his head. At least they gave him a matching set.
He blinks blearily at the room around him. It's dark--a basement of some kind. There's a small window on one of the walls that indicates that it's still night time, which means that he's either been here for less than a few hours or more than a day.
He groans and squeezes his eyes shut. He could really use a smoke right now.
There’s a click, and the door opens, letting in a small beam of light. Jake's glasses were taken away at some point, and all he sees is a blurry silhouette of a woman enter and flick the light on.
Jake squints at the blurry woman. "Can I help you?" he asks.
"You don't remember. Figures,” the woman says, her arms crossed and leaning against the wall by the door. She holds a police baton loosely in one hand, as if she isn’t too sure how to use it, but isn’t afraid to give it a few good shots.
"No offense, lady," Jake says. "But I have no idea who you are. To be fair, I might remember you if I could make out your face. Which I can't because you took my glasses."
The woman slinks up to Jake and leans close enough that he could smell her perfume.
"Ok, too close. Not that you're not a pretty lady or anything, but I usually call for at least a dinner--" She slaps him across the face.
"Do you ever shut up?" she asks, mildly.
Jake coughs, the sting of the slap and the pounding of his headache knocking his breath out. He spends several heartbeats gasping, trying to catch his breath, before he turns back to the woman.
"On occasion, yeah. Not often, but sometimes I have to pretend to be a corpse, and I tell you, if I wasn't a badass soldier, I would think about becoming an actor--" He cuts himself off when she winds up again to slap him, and quickly changes the topic, "Wait, lady. I do know you. Vanessa, right? You were dating Clay, what, last month? Two months ago?"
Vanessa puts her arm down. "A month ago," she says.
"See? You're very memorable. Now what can I do you for? For you! Do for you!"
"I need you to get me on base so I can see Clay."
"Uh.... huh.” Jake paused to consider this. “Sorry, lady, no can do. Actually, this has very little to do with Clay, you can have his balls for all I care, but I might be dishonorably discharged if I let a vengeful ex onto the base to have her wicked ways with my CO--" She hits him over the head again, this time with her baton.
Jake chokes again, tasting blood in his mouth. His head is throbbing, and he's having a hard time focusing.
"Seriously, lady?" Vanessa looks down at him coldly, as if expecting him to give in. Jake throws his head back and makes a frustrated noise. Stomps his foot too, for good measure. If he's gonna throw a tantrum, he might as well go all nine yards. "What is wrong with you!? Just call him like a normal human being!"
"He refuses to come meet me, and he stopped taking my calls, even from anonymous numbers. In fact, I have it on good authority that you're involved in this."
"Damn fucking straight I'm involved in it, what with you being a crazy person! Just get over him!”
The spot where Vanessa hit him is bleeding sluggishly, and she drags the tip of her baton through it and onto his lips. Jake blinks up at her.
"This would be hot if it wasn't so fucked up--" another blow. Blood was pouring down his face now, getting into his eyes, making his already bad vision worse. She waves, and two men come in through the door to stand beside her, and she hands one of them the baton. He moves to stand in front of him.
"Still think this is hot?" she asks.
Jake looks up at the man. Tilts his head sideways, squints. "Well, I mean--" This time it was a punch to the stomach, and he swears he hears a crack.
"If you won't take me to him, then I'll just keep you here until Clay comes looking for you," she says. She then scoffs. "How did they even stand to have you on their team? I've heard Clay talk about you. Motormouth. Attention span of a gnat. Emotional maturity of a teenager."
"Me? Immature?" Jake asks incredulously. "That is so rich coming from you I don't even know where to--" another punch, this time to the face, and Jake growls. "Are you going to let me finish a single sentence!?"
Vanessa crosses her arms and leans against the wall again, a cold smile on her lips. She inspects her nails as she says, breezily, "What else did he say about you? Oh, yes--obnoxious little shithead, inappropriate, out of line--"
All of this is so in line with what Clay calls him on nearly a daily basis that Jake just spits at the ground. Vanessa's expression grows stormy.
"--needy, oh so needy. And who was it that you have a crush on? Jaguar? Cougar? That you follow him around like a pathetic little puppy, even though he obviously doesn't want you around?"
Jake freezes. He feels his blood run cold, like the world has suddenly stopped, like all he can hear is his own harsh breaths and rapid heartbeat. Vanessa notices, her scowl slowly morphing into one of glee.
"He says that you've somehow imprinted on Cougar, and that he's been fending off your attention since." She places a hand to her chest and coos, "How does it feel, being unwanted? Knowing that he can barely tolerate your existence? At least your Cougar will tolerate for the sake of your team, Clay, on the other hand..." She drifts off, her eyes glazing over. When she snaps to attention again, there's a fury in her eyes and her hands are clenched into fists.
"Maybe I should just kill you," she says. "I'll do you and Cougar both a favour. Put the both of you out of your misery.”
Jake is breathing raggedly, gasping every few breaths. There's an ache in his chest that flares up whenever he breathes too deeply, and a wet, rattling sound in his lungs that he isn't too in favour of. He takes a slow breath, and levels Vanessa with a look.
"You're crazy, you know that?" he asks.
One of the men punches him, right below the ribs, and the pain is so blinding that Jake isn’t sure if he whites out. He hisses, trying to take deep, painful breaths through his teeth. The taste of blood is getting stronger, he can smell it with each haggard breath. The idea crosses his mind that maybe he should stop provoking her, but that idea is quickly struck down by another idea that he is Jake Jensen, and he will unlock every achievement for being an obnoxious asshole and plat this motherfucker.
Vanessa walks over and leans close to Jake, lifting his chin to look straight into his eyes. "Cougar won't miss you," she says.
Jake's nostrils flares, and his hand snaps forward, grabbing Vanessa by the neck. He smashes his lips into hers, smearing his blood all over her face and lips, and pushes her backwards, launching himself at the man with the baton.
The man is just as surprised as Vanessa, and it gives Jake a slight edge, although the fact that he can only see out of one eye and can barely focus on the ground in front of him quickly takes that edge away. He manages to wrestle the baton away from the man and hits him over the head hard enough to knock him out. Then he whirls around and, before the other man even has time to react, picks up the chair and breaks it over the man's head.
It was over in a matter of minutes, and he falls to his knees, trying to catch his breath. When he looks up again, Vanessa is gone, the door ajar.
"'Just like Clay doesn't miss you...' Goddammit, wish I thought of it a second ago."
Sighing, he wipes his face as much as he can with his disgustingly dirty hands, hissing as the blood touches the burns on his wrist. He picks at the plastic that has melted into his skin, and decides that it's more trouble than it's worth at the moment. He looks around the room for his zippo, squinting and squatting, having trouble seeing much without his glasses. He finally finds it again underneath one of the unconscious men, and flicks it to check if it still works. He slips it back into his pocket.
He manages to get back to base by mid morning, and by the last few miles, he was practically in a trance, being aware of very little except for the ground in front of him and staying upright. He can’t even really remember how he got through the base guards, but he must have made up some kind of story or explanation. By the time he gets back to his bunk, he was just barely upright, irrationally relieved that none of his other teammates were around to see him. He isn't in the mood to deal with questions or fussing.
All he wants is a horizontal surface, and he's getting increasingly lenient with the definition of such. He manages to make his way into his room and face-plants onto his bed, not even caring that he's getting dirt and blood onto his carefully starched sheets.
When he comes to again, he's happy to find that he is now face up--take that, suffocation-- and Pooch is hovering over him with a concerned expression. He's holding a butterfly bandage in his hands, and blinks when he notices Jake waking up.
"Why didn't you go to the hospital wing, you idiot?" is the first thing he says.
Jake screws his eyes shut. "Fuck off, Pooch, I just wanted to sleep."
Pooch puts the bandage on Jake's face and frowns at him. "You can sleep at the hospital."
"First, your face is gonna get stuck like that. Second, You can't possibly be expecting me to make smart, rational decisions running on blood loss and empty." His voice is hoarse, his throat sore, and he has the headache of the century. He tries to turn his face into his pillow, only to be stopped by, oh yes, blinding pain.
"Where else are you hurt?”
Jake tries to raise his arm over his face, only to be stopped by the pain in his chest. "Do I look like a Goddamn medic to you? Fuck off and let me sleep."
"His chest. Ribs, maybe." said another voice.
Jake nearly jumps, and his head snaps up, only for the motion to be aborted by his headache. He groans, and glanced down at the foot of the bed, where Cougar was standing, arms crossed, expression murderous. He let his head fall back against the pillow. Great.
He needs a little bit more emotional preparation before he can deal with this. Maybe a year's worth, give or take a century.
"Yeah?" Pooch said. He leans forward and presses his hands on Jake's ribs lightly, stopping when he hears his hiss of pain.
"Not too serious," Jake says. "Bruised, maybe. I don't know. Whatever, I'll go to the medic later."
Pooch sighs. "What happened? When you didn't come back last night we just assumed you'd crashed at some girl's place."
"Well," Jake says, "That's not an entirely false assumption, I guess." A thought occurs to him. "Oh, hey, I totally got to first base!" He beams at Cougar.
If anything, Cougar's face gets even more murderous, which is startling consider that Jake doesn't think his expression actually changed, it just got angrier.
"Do not joke," he says.
Jake sighs. Back to the monosyllables and grunts and manly silences. He should have known better than to expect the same level of participation that Cougar gave that other man he knew.
"I'll tell you guys in full detail later, okay? Please, please, let me sleep."
Cougar's expression softens, and Pooch looks concerned, but nods. He gets up to pull the blinds down and leaves, with Cougar following behind him. As he is leaving, he pauses by the door and looks down at Jake.
"You smelled like tobacco, " he says, quietly.
Jake thought he would leave, to get the last word in, but he doesn't. He stands by the door, as if expecting a response. Jake stares at the ceiling and idly wonders what kind of reply Cougar possibly wants to hear.
"Fuck off, Alvarez," he manages.
Cougar stands there for a few more beats, his expression unreadable in the dimness. Then he leaves and shuts the door behind him.
He does manage to make his way to the hospital the next day, and they basically tell him what he already knows. Concussion, bruised ribs, cuts and bruises all over his face and stomach, burns on his wrist. The burns are probably gonna scar, but whatever. Chicks dig scars.
Pooch, the mother hen he is, was the one to take Jake there, so he was the one who gets the whole story along with any embellishments that Jake may have added for entertainment's sake. He manages to find a pair of spare glasses somewhere, and thanks his lucky stars that his prescription hasn’t changed much.
He gets a couple of days of bed rest, and a few more days of light duty, and at some point while he was sitting in bed Clay comes in to apologize. At least, Jake thinks he does. He bursts into the room and hovers awkwardly until Jake tears his eyes away from his laptop and looks at him.
"Yes? Can I help you? By the way, those are the exact words I said to your crazy ex when she tried to kill me. "
Clay winces. "I'm-- I apologize for the entire situation, Jensen. It shouldn't have happened, and even if it were to, it should've happened to me."
"Damn fucking straight," Jake mutters, shifting his attention back to his laptop.
Clay keeps hovering, and he finally sits at the foot of Jake's bed. "I'm really sorry, Jensen. You shouldn't have been dragged into this entire mess, and I'm not even sure why they picked you off in the first place."
"Because I helped you screen her calls, you dipshit," Jake snaps.
Clay runs his hands through his hair and sighs, clearly miserable.
"I'll be honest, you're taking this a lot worse than I thought you would," he says.
They sit in silence for a few minutes, Jakes eyes never leaving his screen. He tries to ignore Clay and keep reading Hacker News, but he knows that his concentration is shot. The feeling of betrayal and misery that's been building up in his stomach since he got back has done nothing but grown thicker when Clay apologized.
He actually is surprising himself with the hostility he feels towards Clay. Towards Cou-- towards Clay.
"Well," he finally says. "It wasn't your fault."
Clay gives him a surprised look, and Jake scowls at him. "What am I saying? Of course it was all your fault. Do you have to date the crazy ones? I distinctly remember warning you against her too. I kissed her, by the way," he said, vindictively, "I hope you stew on that."
Clay blinks. "You-- What? Why?"
"Because she was hot, and I was pissed. I was pissed. Do you know how pissed? I actually want to punch you in the face right now pissed."
Clay holds his hands out. "Wait, wait. Stop.”
"I will not stop," Jake hissed. "Your crazy ex decides that I'm an easy target and grabs me because I helped you with your stupid call screening bullshit. And guess what? She knows all about me. What's that? Obnoxious fuck? Attention span of a gnat? Pathetic?"
Clay's eyes grow wider as Jake's tirade continues. He holds his hands out. "I've said all those things straight to your face and it's never bothered you before. You have to know that I don't-- well, I mean it, but affectionately."
Jake is breathing hard, his hands are shaking. Clay's right. Those things never bothered him before. He's gotten captured and tortured before on account of Clay, and that's never bothered him before. He figures that as long as he gets out okay, all's good.
"What's this really about, Jensen?" Clay asks, quietly.
Jake knows exactly what this is about.
And he doesn't want to answer.
Instead, he gets out of bed and storms out of the room, grabbing his jacket on the way out.
Once he's outside, he starts rummaging through his pockets. He finds the cigarettes--the same ones he smoked the day he got captured, no doubt, and pats himself down for his zippo. He makes an annoyed sound when he can't find it.
"Looking for this?"
Jake jumps, his heart in his throat, and he snaps around to see Cougar step out from behind a corner, holding his zippo out.
"Goddammit, Alvarez, we need to get you a bell or something." Jake reaches out for it, only to have Cougar pull it out of reach.
"Hey, buddy, that thing saved my life. If nothing else I want to keep it for sentimental reasons."
Cougar frowns, but doesn't respond to Jake's obvious deflect. He gives Jake a constipated look that Jake is sure he is supposed to interpret as interrogative. Jake doesn't know what Cougar wants to ask--it could be any number of things: why Jake stopped calling him Cougar, why he is smoking again, why he isn't in bed--but if he isn't even gonna bother to use those nice things he has called vocal chords, Jake isn't either.
He turns and starts to walk away, abandoning his lighter, only to be stopped by Cougar grabbing his sleeve.
Jake wrenches his arm away.
"Look, I just..." Jake takes a few deep breaths. Cougar looks severe, as usual. There might be concern there that Jake is choosing to construe as contempt. Who even fucking knows anymore, apparently Jake has been reading his expressions all wrong. "I just need some time. To... process."
"Process what?"
"Just, things. It's not you, it's me. I'm like, major fucked up and I have daddy issues. And I need to like, read Psychology Today and listen to This American Life and pretend that I'm a suburban white mom who needs to find her center or something."
Cougar gives him a confused frown, and waves at him to explain, and that's it, that's the last straw. Jake holds his breath for a few long beats, and exhales. He holds his hand out, palm up, and when Cougar glances down at it, he motions to the lighter and flicks his finger up.
Cougar blinks and places the zippo in his hand. Jake takes it and leaves.
Jake still doesn't smoke inside, because contrary to popular belief, he isn't a complete asshole, and he knows that the smell of tobacco drives Cougar completely batty.
But he still smokes. In fact, in the three days since he talked to Cougar, he's gone through about two and a half packs of cigarettes, which is a startling amount considering he didn't even smoke this much before he quit.
It just happens, Jake can't explain it. He gets restless, then he fidgets, then his hand lands on his zippo and his pack of cigarettes, and then he just needs to get out and clear his head, then--
On the fourth day, Pooch finally stages an intervention, which Jake kind of saw coming, to be honest. He corners him just as he was putting his cigarette butt out and was about to head back inside.
"What's going on between you and Cougar?" he asks.
Jake feels his hands itching to light another one up. "Nothing, Pooch," he replies mildly.
Pooch snorts. "You two were attached at the hip until the thing with Vanessa happened, and now suddenly you can't stand to be in the same room anymore?"
Jake gives into temptation, and fishes his pack out of his pocket again. "Well," Jake explains, cigarette between his teeth as he looks for his zippo, "It was a wild whirlwind romance between me and Vanessa, we fell in love at first sight, I tell ya. We were gonna go to Vegas and get married when Vanessa dumped me for our resident latin lover, who had seduced her psychically while I was captured--- Surely you can't blame us for a bit of tension."
Pooch seems to process this while Jake lights up his cigarette and takes a drag.
"When did you start smoking again?"
Jake shrugged. "Well, y’know. I’ve never stopped, really. I smoke, here and there."
"So this thing between you and him, it wasn't because of Vanessa."
Jake stiffens, and his eyes dart away.. "There's no thing, Pooch. Can't two bros do our own thing and still be bros?"
Pooch sighs. "Fine, okay. If you're sure you're cool. If you're not cool, then get cool before we sit you down for marriage counselling." He leaves, muttering, "bros, right," under his breath.
Jake lets the cold war drag out for a few more days because he's the king of the Nile and because confronting his problems has always been that thing he fills out on forms as “needs work”. Well, it's not so much that he has any specific plan for this than that he's sealed the whole situation up in a folder that has a big red label on it that says NOT THINKING ABOUT THIS with a vague outline of allowing this to continue for the indefinite future.
As such, it's Cougar who lets it drag out for a few more days, the silence he extrudes going from questioning to frustrated to increasingly concerned until he finally gets fed up.
He sits down beside Jake one evening when he's going through the last quarter or so of his daily pack and levels him with his best, most expressive stare.
“Hey, buddy,” says Jake. “Nice evening we’re having.” He forces his face into a semblance of a smile, and hopes that Cougar is as bad at reading him as he apparently is at reading Cougar.
He frowns at Jake and presses his lips into a thin line. It's funny that he's there, because he has never voluntarily sat next to Jake while he's smoking. In fact, Jake can count on one hand the number of times Cougar has sat down next to him instead of vice versa.
Fuck, he must be blinder than he thought.
"You said you were processing,” Cougar says, cutting right to the chase. “Are you still?“
Jake takes a drag. “Hm,“ he says. “Yeah, maybe. You know me, my brain’s always churning, so I don't think I ever stopped. Good ‘ol quad core you're looking at right here, man. All those daddy issues take a lot of processing power.“
“How can I help?” Cougar asks.
“I dunno man,” Jake replies breezily. “These are some pretty personal issues here. I might need to talk to a therapist or something.”
“We all do.” Cougar says. Jake grins at him, paper thin, which makes the other frown. “Why did you start smoking again?“
Jake looks down at his smoke. It feels so comfortable sitting there between his fingers. He's gotten so much more productive since he started smoking again.
“Why did I stop, Cougar?” he asks.
Cougar peers at him curiously. “Because it's bad for your health, and it smells foul.“
Jake shakes his head. “No, man. I stopped because you wanted me to.”
They sit for a few minutes when Jake suddenly stands up. Cougar's head snaps up, as if he thinks that Jake wants to take off again, but he just walks around Cougar and sits down on his other side on the bench. He can feel Cougar's stare on the side of his head.
“You were sitting downwind of me,” Jake finally explains. “It's like... Murphy's Law or whatever. If a non-smoker is with a smoker, the wind will always get all the smoke up in the non-smoker’s business.“
Cougar's face goes through a complicated dance of emotions, and finally settles on something Jake chooses not to interpret. Jake says nothing, and if Cougar says nothing also, then they're not having a conversation.
“Why did you take up smoking again?” Cougar finally asks.
Jake laughs. “Are we really gonna talk in circles?“
He feels a hand on his arm and he nearly jumps. Cougar is leaning forward slightly, and Jake looks back up at his face.
“You say you stopped because I wanted you to. So why do you not care what I want now? If I ask you to stop, would you?”
Jake laughs again. “I dunno, why do you want me to? I don't smoke inside, I try not to get the smell everywhere, I think I've done an okay job.”
“Is that why you refuse to see me? Because you don't want the smell on my things?”
Jake shrugs. “Yeah, sure. It's as good a reason as any.”
“What is your worse reason?”
Jake runs a hand down his face. “Jesus Christ, Cougar, what is this, interrogation hour?” He flicks the butt at the ground and watches the ember glow in the evening. “And God, you're talky today. Practically verbose. It's like we're actually communicating.”
Cougar frowns at him. “We have always communicated, Jensen. But you stopped listening.”
Jake stiffens and he carefully looks everywhere but at Cougar. Not two minutes since he put his last cigarette out and he already wants to light a new one. He's going down, hard.
“What did I do?” Cougar asks, quietly. “Should I apologize? Was it-- the other day--”
Jake can only see death and destruction where this is headed and he cuts it off with a flick of his wrist.
“No, no. I said it's not you, it's me. Daddy issues, you know? Abandonment. No father figure. Et cetera.”
Cougar seems genuinely surprised. “Do you have daddy issues? I thought you were joking.“
Jake nods gravely. “Up the wazoo,” he admits.
A few more minutes of silence stretches between them as Cougar contemplates this. This is what Jake simultaneously likes and hates about him, that he listens to what he actually has to say instead of all the things he says to bury what he doesn't want people to hear. Jake isn't sure what he said was very worthwhile, but while he's sure everyone here has their own issues, his own had never driven him to become a chain smoker until several weeks ago.
“Do you think I've abandoned you?” Cougar suddenly asks, and damn if he isn't a sharp motherfucker. Jake takes a breath, and contemplates the slow heat death of the universe while tapping his cigarette on the top of his pack. As he fishes for his zippo, Cougar snatches the cigarette dangling from his mouth, and gives him his darkest look yet.
He sighs. Back to this.
“No,” he says. “I just realized I never had you in the first place.”
Cougar looks startled.
Jake runs his hands nervously through his hair. He reaches out to take the cigarette back from Cougar, only for him to move it out of reach. “It's just, c'mon, man. Do you really want to be the one that I latch onto to deal with all my fuckery? My BFF, nurse maid and authority figure? Is this really what you want to be doing with your life?”
Cougar looks at him for a long moment. “No,” he finally says.
He is expecting this, but hearing it so clearly out of Cougar's mouth was still like a knife to the gut. This is why honesty and self-reflection is way overrated, in this soldier’s opinion. He takes a deep breath, about to explain himself, to give both him and Cougar an out, something, when Cougar's hand reaches up and covers his mouth.
“You listen,” Cougar says. “You talk so much but say so little.” His hand trails down and brushes lightly down the side of Jakes face, settling on his neck.
“No, I do not want to be your father,” says Cougar.
“Figure,” Jake supplies, and Cougar hand is on his mouth again.
“Father figure,” Cougar corrects. “Is that what you want from me? Be honest, Jake.”
“I'm honest,” Jake protests, muffled by the hand covering his mouth.
Cougar shakes his head. “You are not, in all the ways that matter.”
Jake can feel the pounding of his heart, hear the echoes of it. He slowly shakes his head. Cougar lifts his hand, and waits patiently. “What I want…” Jake shakes his head again. “I don't know if I'm ready to be that honest.”
“Why not?”
“Because I started smoking a pack a day when I thought you didn't want to be my friend. I don't know what I'd do if I thought you don't want to be my something else that I'm carefully not thinking about.”
Of course, talking about not thinking about it is making him think about it, hard. As such, he's already noticing the slow smile that's appearing on Cougar's face, and he helplessly observes to himself that it's the third time he's seen Cougar smile.
“I thought,” Cougar says, “when you came back from the abduction. You noticed.“
“Noticed what?”
“When you said you got to first base. I was jealous. I thought you noticed, and you were disgusted.”
Jakes brain stops. He squeezes his eyes shut and shakes his head, as if to dislodge whatever strange thing that's stuck there to make him hear things. He opens them again, just to stare, wide eyed, at a now smirking Cougar.
“Woah woah woah. There are so many things I have to say to that I don't even know where to start. You were what? And what? And that kiss was so incredibly unsexy, I mainly did it to piss her off. Well, I mean, she was getting all up in my business. It was either that or headbutt her, and I already had a concussion and several head wounds.” He trails off, Cougar watching him flounder with growing amusement.
He holds a finger up and wags it at him. “Don't you give me that look, last I heard you were jealous of someone who abducted and beat me senseless.” He turns away, his brain unable to process all this new information. It’s all so far out of left field for him that it's practically in orbit. It's like expecting a pitcher to throw you a you curveball only to be hit in the face with a football. It's like being hit in the face with a football and not being told to go to first base, instead being told to run around the track. And this baseball analogy is really not doing so hot, because Jake’s head is shutting down. “So you thought I'm a homophobe? I'm kind of offended, actually. And how did I miss jealousy, I, wait, I'm a bit overwhelmed right now.“
“Take your time,” Cougar says.
“How much time?”
Cougar glances at his watch. “Five minutes.“
Jake looks at him warily. “What happens in five minutes?” he asks.
“I'm going to kiss you.“
“Oh.” Jake blinks. “Okay.”
Cougar reaches out and places his hand on the back of Jake's head, running his fingers through the short hair in the back. “I do not seek you out because you are always there, and I may have taken it for granted. But it does not mean I don't desire your presence.” He says. “I haven't abandoned you. I will not abandon you.“
Jake can feel the hamsters in his head calm down, the near-panic of the overwhelming information ease up, slow down, to a near human speed. It's like he can think again, and he didn't realize how much he needed to hear those words until just now. And isn't that just pathetic.
Cougar leans in, suddenly close, and a thought occurs to Jake. He jerks himself backwards, almost slipping out of Cougar's grip, which suddenly tightens. Cougar's serene expression grows alarmed, and Jake can just see how his action would be interpreted.
“Wait, no. Just.” Jake says. “I must smell like an ashtray right now. I must be disgusting, I--”
Lips were suddenly on his, and Jake cuts himself off. The grip on the back of his head relaxes.
“I give you a pass this time,” Cougar says, softly. “You quit for real, cold turkey. I don't want the smell of smoke in my bed.”
“Yeah,” Jake breathes. “Okay.“
His fingers twitch for something, to light up, maybe. But Jake thinks he can suppress the urge.