Work Text:
They don’t always sit together on the couch. They don’t always need to be all up on each other during Jeopardy! It’s been twenty years, after all, and sometimes a man needs his own space.
But sometimes. Sometimes after dinner, after they’ve finished dessert and moved the plates to the coffee table, Jack will tilt his head in Bitty’s direction and open his arms, an invitation to slide on over and share the space like they used to back in that first Providence apartment, when the couch was smaller and they couldn’t get close enough.
That’s how they are tonight, the two of them squished together on one end of their big sectional, when Ellie walks in from a late hockey practice. Jack has one hand in Bitty’s hair, lazily massaging his scalp while they watch a documentary about the National Parks.
Well, Jack’s watching it. Bitty is halfway to asleep. Not, he would like to clarify, because it’s boring. It’s because he’s had a long day and Jack’s fingers in his hair are so darn relaxing.
“Gross,” Ellie declares, the opinion of a teenage girl apparently the last word on the matter. “What is wrong with you two?”
Bitty opens his eyes but doesn’t move. Who does Ellie think she is, his mother? No need to “leave room for Jesus” when it’s his husband, his couch, his rules. They’re adults and they’ll PDA in their own home if they want to.
“Dad’s deadline for the first draft of the new book is next week,” Jack says, his hand stilling. “He’s had a long day.” There’s a gentle chirp in his tone, almost undetectable if you don’t know Jack Zimmermann’s tells, and Bitty silently thanks him for not stating the obvious: that he wouldn’t have had to lock himself in his office for twelve hours today if only he’d stuck to the schedule he created and abandoned three weeks into this project.
“Well,” Ellie huffs, plopping down on the other side of Jack and leaning into him, “I did too.”
“Oh, honey.” Bitty rockets up, accidentally elbowing Jack in the stomach. Jack winces and reflexively tightens his grip around Bitty. Calm down, that little squeeze says. Don’t overreact. “What’s wrong?”
Ellie sighs as if she’s been bearing the weight of the world on her narrow shoulders. “Nothing,” she mumbles.
“El,” Jack says gently. “Did something happen at practice tonight? It can take some time, adjusting to a new team.”
This boy, Bitty thinks fondly. Jack thinks everything is about hockey.
“Papa.” Ellie rolls her eyes. “It’s a boy, okay. There’s this boy I like, and I thought he liked me, but today he told me there was something he wanted to tell me. I thought he was going to ask me to the winter formal, but instead asked me if I would help him ask somebody else out.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Bitty murmurs. He reaches across Jack to take her hand. “It’s okay to be sad about that.”
“This boy is on your team?” Jack asks, still somehow stuck on the idea that this must have something to do with hockey.
Ellie nods.
“Oh,” Bitty says, utterly at a loss for words. This is so much information he wasn’t prepared to take in all at once. His daughter wants to go to a school dance? With a boy? Who is interested in someone else? And somehow, hockey is involved? Not that Bitty is ready for his little girl to be dating, but who on earth wouldn’t want to date Ellie?
Ellie takes a shuddering breath. “It’s another boy. He wants to go out with another boy. Not me.”
Oh. Well, that changes things. Bitty might be able to help with this part. He does have a little experience with unrequited crushes that might be useful here.
“When I was—well, I was in college, so a little older than you, I had an unrequited crush on one of my best friends. I was gay—”
“Obviously.” Ellie sniffles and Jack offers his sleeve to wipe her nose on. Gross.
“And he was straight. Um, I thought, anyway. And it was a horrible thing, to feel that way and know I never had a chance.” It’s funny; the pain has never quite dulled, even if that “rejection” was entirely a product of Bitty’s imagination. Sometimes it comes back unexpectedly and even now, he has to remind himself that it all worked out, that Jack chose him.
“Did you tell him how you felt?”
“Bits,” Jack murmurs, a low warning.
Bitty ignores him and chuckles, remembering. “I made a lot of cryptic allusions to it on my old baking vlog because I needed to vent somewhere but no, I never told him. Not then. I was out to him, but he had a lot going on and I didn’t want my silly crush to add to that by making him feel, I don’t know, guilty, I guess, for not returning my feelings. And he was my teammate; making things awkward between us personally might’ve wrecked our dynamic on the ice, and I couldn’t risk that.”
“Oh my god.” Ellie bolts up the way Bitty did moments ago, elbowing Jack in the stomach from the other side.
“Come on,” Jack groans.
“Oh my god,” Ellie repeats. “Are you talking about Papa? Are you trying to pretend this situation is the same, when it is in no way actually the same? It is not the same at all, and you are not being helpful.”
Bitty looks to Jack for help, but Jack just smirks and says, “You talked your way into this one, bud. You can talk your way out of it.”
“My point,” Bitty stammers, “is that it’s okay if a crush doesn’t work out. Even if it hurts in the moment. And it’s okay to let it hurt for as long as it takes to feel better.” Next to him, Jack nods in agreement. “It sounds like you’ve been a good friend to him, if he felt comfortable coming out to you,” Bitty adds. He’s suddenly flooded with memories of coming out to Shitty, and a new thought occurs to him. “Do his parents know? Does he have support at home?”
Ellie shrugs. “I don’t know. He didn’t, like, tell me his life story.”
“Listen, you let him know that he’s always welcome here,” Bitty says emphatically. “Even if he has the most supportive family in the world, it might take him some time to be able to talk about it with them. If he hasn’t already, I mean. Sometimes it’s just nice to be in a place where you feel understood.”
“Your dad has to tweak a few recipes for the book. He just wants more taste testers,” Jack chirps.
“Mr. Zimmermann, I will have you know—”
“Yeah, I’ll pass.” Ellie interrupts, her dry delivery sounding just like Jack’s. “I can’t bring friends home to this. I might get a reputation for having gross parents who are actually madly in love or something.”
“Can’t have that,” Jack says, pulling Bitty closer and planting an exaggeratedly loud kiss on his cheek. Bitty melts.
Ellie gags. “I’m going upstairs,” she announces. “I’m about to get a cavity from being around you two.”
“You could use a shower anyway,” Jack notes.
“Come back and sit with us when you’re ready,” Bitty adds, because Ellie may protest but he knows Jack’s hugs make everything better. Once she’s out of earshot he pokes Jack. “‘You could use a shower?’ Really?”
Jack shrugs. “Sometimes a shower makes everything better.”
“Funny,” Bitty says, “I was just thinking that cuddling with you makes everything better. But that’s good. Probably better than whatever I said. Lord, next time just stop me from running my mouth.”
“If I did that,” Jack chuckles, “you’d never speak again.”
“Rude,” Bitty says, moving to put some distance between them, but Jack’s too quick and pulls Bitty back against him before he can escape to the other end of the couch. Gosh, there really is nothing better than being in his husband’s arms.
“Now,” Jack says, picking up the remote with one hand and resuming Bitty’s massage with the other. “Where where we?”