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When Ianto Jones walked up to his car at the end of a long Friday workday, he wasn’t expecting to see his boyfriend sitting in the driver's seat, wearing a grin worthy of the Cheshire Cat himself.
“What the hell are you doing in my car?” Ianto asked once he’d sat down in the passenger seat.
“Waiting for you,” Jack replied and promptly turned the key, starting the ignition.
Ianto reached for his pocket to check that he did still have his car keys and that Jack hadn’t somehow stolen them at some point during the day.
“I have a spare,” Jack explained, despite Ianto not even voicing his question.
“Course you do,” Ianto grumbled. He reluctantly pulled his seatbelt on. “What are you doing?”
“Driving,” Jack unhelpfully answered. His voice was teasing and smug, and Ianto wanted to wipe the grin off his face.
“I can see that,” Ianto said evenly. “Why are you driving my car? And where to?”
Jack just smiled wider, reaching over to turn the radio on. As they pulled out into the Friday evening rush hour traffic, the crackling settled, and some upbeat pop song filled the car. Ianto sighed, leaning back against his seat to look out of the window. It was dark outside; winter had settled upon the city quickly, the early January cold no longer having the festive excuse that December did.
“We’ve got the weekend off,” Jack finally said, breaking into the silence.
“We do?”
Jack shrugged. “So the boss says.”
Ianto resisted an eyeroll. “I’ll have to remember to thank him on Monday, then.”
“Hm,” Jack hummed in agreement, flicking the car’s indicator on as they pulled to a halt in a queue running up to a roundabout.
“Have you - we - got plans?” Ianto asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Nope.”
“Where are we driving then?”
Jack glanced at him as the car inched forwards another length. Cardiff City was busy at the best of times, let alone on a Friday evening directly after work ended.
“Just going to the supermarket.”
Ianto frowned. “The supermarket?”
“Yeah,” Jack said slowly, finally pulling out onto the roundabout. “You know. The big Tesco?”
“I know what a supermarket is!” Ianto snapped, trying to figure out Jack’s plan.
“Stop thinking so much,” Jack admonished after a few moments of silence. “It’s the start of the weekend, and we need to go to the shops because you’re running low on food. There wasn’t any pasta when I checked this morning.”
“Pasta? Why were you checking my cupboards for pasta?” Ianto asked, trying to remember what had happened when he got up that morning. He remembered waking to an empty bed, though he’d presumed that Jack had been up doing some work or standing on a rooftop somewhere across the city. Not checking his kitchen cupboard for pasta.
Jack shrugged. “I was hungry.”
Ianto decided he wasn’t going to grace Jack with a response, because he didn’t trust himself to stay calm if Jack’s eating habits were brought into question.
“Right. Tesco, then. No alien sightings? Rift alert?”
“Am I not allowed to want to have a lazy weekend with my partner? Go out shopping together on a Friday, just because ?” Jack asked.
Ianto had to school his expression to hide the way Jack’s words made something glow inside him.
“You couldn’t have waited until tomorrow morning though, when I was planning to go shopping?”
Jack sighed. “Ianto, we’ve had takeaways for the past three days. I thought it might be nice to have something different, for a change.”
Ianto paused and raised an eyebrow. “Also... you woke up with a pasta craving?”
“Shut up.” Jack glowered as Ianto smirked. “Fine. I woke up with a pasta craving. Happy?”
Smiling in victory, Ianto settled back to watch as Jack casually turned the car into the car park entrance, his right hand gliding over the wheel as his left reached down to change gear. Ianto didn’t often get to see Jack driving his Audi, but the car suited him.
There weren’t many spaces in the carpark at this time of day, but it didn’t seem to bother Jack. He pulled the car forwards before reversing backwards into a tight spot, making Ianto a little glad that he wasn’t the one driving.
“Only slightly over the white line,” Ianto goaded as he peered out of the wing mirror, and received a flick on his ear in response.
The inside of Tesco wasn’t much emptier. Ianto grimaced as a young child ran directly in front of him, mindless of everybody around her.
“Basket or trolley?” Jack asked.
“Basket, unless you need anything specific,” Ianto replied. Jack shook his head, picking up a basket before walking back towards Ianto. Ianto glared at Jack as he swung it back and forth, reaching his hand out to wrap over Jack’s and hold it still. Jack grinned and wiggled his fingers, fitting them in between Ianto’s so that they were awkwardly holding both the basket and each other’s hand. Ianto let out a fond, yet exasperated sigh, but squeezed Jack’s hand nonetheless.
Whilst a very nice gesture, the position wasn’t particularly practical for shopping around a busy supermarket, so Ianto wasn’t surprised to soon be left holding the basket himself whilst Jack went to investigate whatever was on special offer in the first aisle.
“Look,” he told Ianto, returning with an array of items. Ianto could make out a branded fajita kit, a large packet of Doritos, and two different coloured dips. “All this for just five pounds.”
“Which is both a rip-off and the entire reason they put it on the ‘special offers’ aisle at the front of the shop,” Ianto said, rolling his eyes. He let Jack put the items into the basket though, as he knew from past experience that nothing would defeat the pout that Jack was giving him.
“Just remember to get some chicken and peppers to go with it,” Jack told Ianto, and then he was bounding off to the next display. Ianto dutifully followed.
“Dairy Milk is on special offer too,” Jack said as Ianto reached him.
“I thought you were the one who wanted me to eat more vegetables?”
Jack sighed dramatically. “So you’d rather we had salad tonight?”
Ianto pulled a disgruntled face, and Jack burst out into laughter. “Besides,” Jack continued. “I’ve survived the terrible period of my life where Dairy Milk hadn’t even been invented yet. Oh, Victorian England.”
“You’re older than Cadbury’s?” Ianto asked.
“Not Cadbury’s, they were already around. But I can remember the day they first released Dairy Milk like a childhood birthday.”
Ianto snorted, deciding not to let thoughts of Jack’s immortality get him down this evening, not when it was going well. “I’m sure you do.”
“There’s nothing quite like twenty-first century confectionery,” Jack went on, getting that faraway look in his eyes that Ianto knew too well. “Of course we have chocolate in the future, but nothing can ever beat the original.”
“In that case,” Ianto finished, reaching across to add the chocolate to their growing basket. “We should treat ourselves.”
“That sounds like a wonderful idea.” Jack grinned. “Now, where’s the pasta aisle?”
By the time they made it back to Ianto’s flat, it was gone seven.
“I’ll put the kettle on and pack the stuff away if you start frying the onion and garlic,” Ianto suggested as they dumped the shopping bags on his table. Jack nodded and started finding the utensils they would need, knowing where everything was in the kitchen. Ianto felt something tug inside him but really didn’t have time to unpack how the domesticity made him feel. Instead, he started putting the new food into the fridge and cupboards, passing along pasta and the sauce ingredients to Jack.
It wasn’t like Ianto was a bad cook, per se—the weeks spent at Serenity Plaza could attest to that. But finding the time and effort to cook was something entirely different, considering the job he worked. Jack, on the other hand, had over a hundred years of experience and had picked up cooking somewhere down the line. Nothing special, just the kind of cooking where he could make a meal out of scraps left in an empty kitchen cupboard.
“Pass the salt?” Jack asked Ianto as he finished putting the food away. Ianto handed it to him, watching as he added it to the boiling water and then dropped the pasta in.
“That’s far too much pasta,” Ianto tutted.
“Leftovers?” Jack offered.
“So long as there’s enough sauce,” Ianto conceded. “I’m going to go change.”
Jack hummed in response, turning back to the sauce.
When Ianto returned, he snaked his hand out towards the chopping board, reaching for a bit of mozzarella. Jack caught him, pushing Ianto’s hand away as he glared. The meal slowly came together: plates and cutlery were placed on the table, the mozzarella was added to the sauce, and the pasta was drained in the colander over the sink. Jack kept up casual contact and conversation throughout, putting a hand on Ianto’s shoulder as he reached for the cupboard or holding a spoon of the sauce out for Ianto to taste.
As they sat down together at his table to eat, Ianto wondered if anything had brought on Jack’s mood today. Nothing spectacular had happened at work that day, but Jack was an enigma who was often harder to read than alien dialect. (Ianto would know because he’d spent a good portion of the previous week trying to translate and archive an extraterrestrial notebook that had somehow found its way to Cardiff.)
A soft kick against his own leg had Ianto coming out of his thoughts.
“Eat up,” Jack said, nodding down to the meal that Ianto hadn’t touched yet.
By the time they'd finished eating, there was enough leftovers to last at least one more meal, if not two, and Jack got to putting it away in tupperware as Ianto got a start on the washing up. Whilst Jack was certainly a good enough cook, one thing he wasn’t good at was keeping tidy. Funnily enough, it was always Ianto who had to deal with the aftermath.
Ianto almost jumped out of his skin two seconds later when he felt two arms snake around his stomach, and spun around in shock. Jack jumped backwards, almost as startled as Ianto, and before he knew what had happened, Ianto had splashed water all over Jack’s shirt.
“Hey!” Jack shouted, pouting.
“I didn’t mean to,” Ianto said defensively. “You can’t just creep up on me like that!”
“I wasn’t creeping,” Jack argued, starting to unbutton his shirt. “You soaked me.”
“Poor baby,” Ianto mocked, rolling his eyes as he turned back around. “Go put it on the radiator to dry.”
He heard Jack stomp off and couldn’t stop the grin that fell across his face. He reached for the saucepan, pulling a face as he saw how much sauce was left at the bottom.
A few minutes (and cleaned kitchen utensils) later, Jack padded back into the room.
“If I tell you I’m gonna hug you, will you let me this time?”
“If you must,” Ianto sighed, hoping Jack couldn’t see the reflection of his smile in the window.
Two seconds later, a pair of hands once again found their way around Ianto’s waist, but this time he didn’t shake them off. Ianto felt Jack press up against him, resting his chin on his shoulder to lean in the crook of his neck. Ianto could feel the faintest hint of scratchy stubble against his skin, before it was replaced by a pair of soft lips, carefully pressing gentle kisses over his neck.
Letting himself lean back into the touch, Ianto hummed contentedly. He felt warm - cared for, even - in Jack’s embrace, the close contact chasing away all the tension in his muscles that he’d been carrying throughout the day. Jack felt hot against him, almost as if-
“Did you even bother finding a new shirt?” Ianto asked, feeling Jack’s grin grow at his shoulder.
“Just saving time for later.” Jack squeezed his arms tighter as Ianto turned the washing up bowl over, finally finished with the dishes. He dried his hands on a teatowel and twisted around in Jack’s grip, letting Jack crowd him against the surface behind.
“That’s awfully presumptuous of you,” Ianto teased, reaching his own hands up to link around the back of Jack’s neck.
“I’ve often found,” Jack began, leaning forward to kiss the very corner of Ianto’s mouth, “that you’re quite easy to persuade.”
Ianto didn’t respond - let Jack pull him into a hot, soft kiss, one that travelled all the way down Ianto’s body. His hands toyed with the hair on the back of Jack’s neck, encouraging Jack to press closer.
“Come on.” Ianto pulled away, after a few minutes of languid kisses. “It’s the Masterchef final tonight, and I wanted to catch it.”
“You wanna watch TV?” Jack let out a long, exasperated sigh, dropping his arms from Ianto. “But I’m cold and in need of warming up!”
“It’s January, and you’ve got no top on. Whose fault is that?”
When it became obvious that Ianto wasn’t quite as easily persuaded as Jack had claimed, Jack begrudgingly followed him into the living room. He went to grab one of the blankets from where Ianto kept them on the side of the room, dramatically falling back onto the sofa to lie the whole way across it.
Ianto turned around from getting the remote and glared at Jack. Under his gaze, Jack sat up slightly but fell right back down the second Ianto sat in the corner. His head landed on Ianto’s lap, and he made himself comfortable, pulling the blanket up to his chin. Blinking up at Ianto, he stared at the bemused grin on his face, and knocked his head into Ianto’s arm.
“You’re so demanding,” Ianto said, rolling his eyes as he threaded fingers through Jack’s hair. Jack grinned happily, leaning to the side so he could see the adverts on the TV.
When the tense music started up, Jack felt Ianto’s attention turn back to the screen. He watched half-interestedly, not really understanding why they were taking so long to talk about the contestant’s backstories.
“Cooking shows are so boring, ” Jack moaned a good fifteen minutes later, when the cooking had finally started. He wriggled slightly under the blanket.
Ianto didn’t look away from the TV, intent on judging whether the quenelle of ice cream was perfectly smooth or not. “Don’t cooking competitions exist in the future, then?”
“They do,” Jack insisted. “Cutthroat Kitchen is just a bit more… well, cutthroat in the fifty-first century.”
Ianto raised an eyebrow. He was still toying with Jack’s hair, running fingers through it absentmindedly.
They stayed like that for the majority of the episode, content at the cozy domesticity of the evening. At one point, Jack realised that Ianto’s fingers had stopped their movement, and he rolled over to look up at Ianto. His eyes were lidded, fluttering shut every few seconds, and Jack bit back a grin.
“You’ll miss them deciding the winner,” Jack said loudly, and watched as Ianto’s eyes snapped open again.
“Hmm?”
Between low chuckles, Jack reached up one of his hands to poke at Ianto’s cheek. “You’re falling asleep, old man.”
“Am not,” Ianto replied, batting away Jack’s finger. “I was just resting my eyes.”
“O-kay,” Jack said in an almost patronising tone, letting his hand drop to Ianto’s arm. He pulled Ianto’s hand out of his own hair, bringing it down to his own chest to interlock fingers with. On an impulse, he brought the palm up to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to the hand as he delighted in the way Ianto’s eyes snapped down to look at the point of contact.
There was something in the way Ianto looked down at him - his smile small and soft, the faintest pink tinge colouring his cheeks. It made Jack’s stomach soar, knowing this version of Ianto - the unguarded, content person whose lap Jack lay in - was someone only Jack got to see. Wanting to keep his attention, Jack brought Ianto’s pinky finger to his lips, pressing the smallest kiss to its tip. One by one, he went through his hand, leaving his thumb until last. He couldn’t help take longer with that one, grazing it slightly with his teeth, even as Ianto tutted down at him.
“Not until the episode’s finished,” he reminded Jack.
Jack raised an eyebrow. “It has.”
Ianto’s eyes snapped up to the TV and realised that the shorter male contestant was indeed holding up the trophy, celebrating. Ianto groaned, and as Jack tried to move his attention back to Ianto’s thumb, Ianto pulled his hand away, reaching for the remote to turn the TV off.
Jack propped himself up on his elbows, leaning upward to meet Ianto’s lips full on. The angle was awkward, and Ianto knew Jack’s arms wouldn’t hold out longer than a few minutes, but Ianto didn’t care.
“Upstairs, then?” he asked, breaking away. Jack’s grin was answer enough.
A little while later, lying naked on their bed with legs entwined, Jack found himself in the half-awake state between dream and reality. His hand was drawing small circles on Ianto’s shoulder, the small puffs of breath almost tickling his collar from where Ianto lay.
There was a life, Jack thought to himself, that neither he nor Ianto would ever get to have. They’d had a taste of it this evening - barely enough to tease them with what they couldn’t have. Jack wasn’t even sure that Ianto would like a normal life, either way. But sometimes it was fun to pretend that the lives they ran were simple. That Friday evening grocery shopping, or cooking dinner together was their normal.
Jack knew that he’d never get enough time with Ianto Jones. But - he thought as he configured his vortex manipulator to divert any Rift alerts to someone else on the team - he’d let them have tomorrow.