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Jack was tired.
Part of that had to do with the wound slowly closing in his shoulder, of course, and he suspected he’d always be in some level of pain. He often despaired to Nick whenever he came over that he’d become one of those grumpy old men that bitched about their old wounds paining them and alerting them to the rain.
Nick stared at him for a second, then sighs and goes back to his paperwork, patting him on his good shoulder almost absently, “At least you’ll get the chance to BE an old man, Jack. That has to count for something.”
Immediately, any venom or vitriol Jack might have been feeling drains away once more.
His ex was a lot quieter than he had been before Jack had come back and nearly died. Almost as if some fire had left him, leaving only smoldering embers in their wake. Not to say it was a bad change, or that embers couldn’t just as easily start a forest fire if left untended, but the change disquieted Jack in a way that few things ever could.
He’s taken to staring at Nick when he thinks he can get away with it, when Nick is too busy tending his wounds or checking the leads attached to him, or passed out in the chair next to him because Jack had found he’d been having violent night terrors over the events of a few days prior, and had torn out his IVs. Having Nick nearby (not Bobby, nor Angel, nor Jeremiah, the only family he truly had nowadays, those he considered his main protectors throughout his childhood, but his ex-best friend and ex-boyfriend) seemed to calm him in some incalculable way so as to allow him to at least attempt restful sleep.
Restful, of course, is at best hand-wavy and at worst an outright lie, but it was better than night terrors, in Jack’s now-humbled opinion.
Still, he stared at Nick. It was fast becoming his favorite pastime, given that his music player had been crushed when he went down in the snow and tv became one long blur of endless cooking shows and reality tv that seemed so popular for some godawful reason. Part of him wanted to understand the new Nick, the one that had become a surgeon on accelerated courses and was practically a prodigy when it came to working with the human body.
The one all of the nurses and other doctors gushed and whispered about, throwing envious looks at the half-dead but not actually sleeping form of Jack himself, as if they wanted to be in his position just to get Nick to look at them with that worried intensity. Part of him was pleased to have his attention, part of him also wanted to slap himself for the pettiness of being thankful he got shot at all.
Another part still was jealous at the idea that someone else had noticed Nick, that they were staring in awe at his defined, muscular form while he couldn’t stand up to close the door himself without probably collapsing and needing their help. Perhaps that part was also mourning the fact that they each had a better chance with Nick than Jack did, currently- and maybe ever again.
That stung, far more than he ever thought it would.
Jack had chosen to leave. Not Nick. Nick would have been perfectly fine with a long-distance relationship while he was in college and Jack was pulling a band together. Jack knew Nick would have loved taking time off from school to go see him play, and he’d have absolutely been willing and able to sneak into Nick’s dorm room to quietly fuck him so that the stress he was constantly under was more bearable, even for a few sweaty minutes.
But no. Of course not.
Jack’s brain sent up alarms at the very thought of commitment that went beyond a few giggling handjobs and steamy make-out sessions in the car Jack had bought via a summer job at a shitty fast food place. Not that he hadn’t been best friends with said man since they were in kindergarten, just after Evelyn had managed to adopt him out of the foster care system, and right before Nick’s father got into a car crash that left him with a mean limp, an addiction to painkillers of any sort he could get his grimy paws on, and an attitude of a small man with zero power suddenly getting a gun.
Jack could admit that while his life had started shitty and improved, Nick’s did quite the reverse, and nothing Evelyn ever did could make it better for him aside from giving him shelter from the rain and cold occasionally. He knew that, sometimes, Nick had slept under bridges or in parks or under abandoned houses in order to escape his father, especially when his mind conjured up a hundred and one reasons why he couldn’t ‘bother’ Jack and his family, despite both Evelyn and all of her sons stating he NEVER bothered anyone.
He also knew that Jack had, accidentally at least, taught Nick all the best methods for stealing shit, but Nick was far smarter than he was, and never got caught. After all, he only ever stole food. Things he could consume quickly so there was no evidence left behind. Never half the junk he did because stealing was all he had ever known.
Actually, one of Jack’s deep-seated fears and insecurities was that, somehow, knowing him had made Nick’s life hell. Logically, they were little kids when the axis shifted for each of them, and he wasn’t even in the same city at the time of Nick’s father’s accident- and he was a kid, so what could he have done to realistically fuck him over? The insecure part of his mind suggested that he had switched luck with Nick, and maybe he wouldn’t have been so bad off if he had never met Jack at all.
Stupid, pointless little mental hangups that added to the perfect storm in his brain, which led to him leaving a note for Nick in his car and ghosting off to who knows where.
That was before phones were so prevalent, y’know, or at least weren’t in Detroit. Not exactly conducive to good jobs and nice gadgets. At least, not legally acquired ones, for sure.
Off Jack fucked, seventeen and stupid. Evelyn tried to get him to come back, and he did for holidays, sure, but he knew she was disappointed in him for his cowardice. She hid it well- one didn’t become so powerful and well-loved amongst the Detroit troubled youths without being capable of staring down the devil himself and wearing a kind expression to boot. But Jack- even he was disappointed in himself, once he came down from the high of being young and stupid, so anything less from his mother was unlikely, in his own opinion.
And, honestly, he’d come back to talk to Nick this time around, to try and mend the broken heart and connection they once had. Sure, it wasn’t the best timing- Evelyn had been killed, Bobby and Angel had been on a rampage, and he wasn’t exactly talking them down from the ledge, either. But in truth, he was scared, of the situation, of the implications, and of losing even more people, despite having pushed this one particular person away himself.
Sure, he had hoped to do the talking when he wasn’t bleeding out on the snow, staring up into a face that had only become even prettier with age, the slight crinkle of his eyes indicating he had at least found time to laugh some in his constantly busy schedule. He had hoped that he could snag Nick’s number from Jeremiah, rather than bribe a nurse for it using his ice cream cup (it was chocolate, too, which was an even bigger deal to him). He had hoped they’d text, maybe even fight and argue through that before he could convince Nick to meet him somewhere so the smaller man could deck him properly, rather than text pain levels and if he needed anything when Nick was off doing his work and Jack was alone and tired and in excruciating pain.
He had hoped-
Well, fuck. He had hoped for too much, it seemed.
A vicious little voice in his head tells him he always does, and then cries when nothing goes right at all. Cynical, malicious- and it sounded like his birth mother, right before she OD’d when he was three or four. You’re not supposed to remember a lot from that period, but Jack- he could never forget. No matter how he tried, or which therapist he saw.
Oh, yes. Jack was in therapy. Had been since Kindergarten, although back then, it was a lot more difficult to get in to see one than it was these days. After he was seventeen, he quit for a few years, then started up again when he was twenty-one and verging on becoming an alcoholic. That entire situation scared him straight- figuratively speaking.
Can’t exactly be straight when your first and only love was a guy, right? Especially when you tried sleeping with any and everyone that consented to be near you like that for years, chasing a feeling you knew, deep down in your wretched little heart, would never be achieved with anyone but the one you left behind. Tough break, kid.
He didn’t know how to go about smoothing over the issues he and Nick had, especially when Nick was doing his level best to keep him alive despite probably wishing he wasn’t many times over. How do you even explain half the shitty reasons he ditched so suddenly to a person who dove into active gunfire to save his life and shot two people just to keep them from finishing you and your brothers off?
Jack was, for once, at a loss for words. He didn’t understand how anyone could fix this, but he knew he had to, somehow.
And so, he studied Nick like his sleeping or turned away or thinking face would hold all the answers to the universe.
Jack wasn’t good at being a decent human. Perhaps he never had been, but time with Evelyn had given him practice at pretending. That was his biggest fear, y’know. That he was somehow, deep down inside, as broken and cold and cruel and whatever else as his parents were, that he couldn’t ever become a better person because he was destined to keep up the cycle.
Perhaps he needed a new therapist, after all.
Well.
Acknowledging your fear is one step, right? It had to be good.
Out of nowhere, he says to Nick, who was reading and doing paperwork off to the side, “My entire life, I thought I was the one who had fucked up yours. By being found and adopted by Evelyn, I switched fates with you, and my very presence in your life was the reason your father crashed, became an asshole to you and your mom, and instigated all the times you had to steal to survive or sleep under bridges or whatever. It’s not logical, sure, but anything good in my life was treated with suspicion and fear, that it would be snatched away because I’m actually a horrible person, broken, inherently evil, and others would find out someday.”
Nick pauses in his reading, freezing, before looking up at him from over those glasses he had at some point taken to wearing to read, “You were the best thing that ever happened to me. And then you weren’t. You’ve never been a bad person, though, or particularly evil,” he pauses, then amends, “Unless you count pitting the nurses and interns against one another because you’re bored and they’re stupid, sometimes. But I dunno if that’s evil, or them being sleep deprived.”
“A little of both, maybe,” he shrugs as best he can, unrepentant. “You weren’t answering your phone.”
“I was in a surgery, I told you-”
“I know. Which is why I found my own entertainment,” he interrupts with as cheeky a grin as he can manage.
Nick doesn’t flush like he used to when Jack smiled at him like that. The knowledge cuts deep into his heart and ego, and he doesn’t flinch only because he physically can’t without it hurting.
“Half of me can’t wait til you’re discharged and you can actively torment your brothers, and half of me is worried that all four of you will be back here in two days flat because you collectively cannot exist near each other without some form of chaos erupting around you,” Nick says blandly.
“Aw, you think it’ll take two days? I’m flattered at your belief in us.”
“Scratch that. Ten minutes, tops.”
“Eh, more accurate, I suppose.”
Nick sighs, “Did you leave because I came on too strong or something? Because I was just excited to be with you without possibly being killed by my father-”
“No. It wasn’t you. It was never you. I am, will always be, scared if things are going too well,” he averts his gaze. “I thought what we had was a fluke. Turns out, you’re the only real thing I’ve ever had, and I was an idiot for ever losing you.”
Nick studies his face carefully for a minute, before admitting quietly, “No one was ever like you, y’know. I tried to get over you, but I don’t think I was ever successful. I’d turn to show you something I found, only for you to never be there. Perhaps I was a fool for holding on so tightly to a memory, but-”
“No,” Jack interrupts quickly, “I was- am the same. No one else ever felt right, at my side or whatever. No one ever fit. I know you can never forgive me for me being an idiot, but I-”
Nick presses a finger to his lips, grinning at him, “Maybe not immediately, no. You can work for it, though.”
Jack kisses the digit as he pulls back, “For you? Of course I can.”