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1.
“You really shouldn’t eat such a heavy breakfast before flight sim,” a voice sounds in Bradley Bradshaw’s ears somewhere to his left. Bradley had decided this morning to set about constructing something of an epic breakfast bowl - a double helping of eggs, shredded cheese just the right side of melted, green pepper, red onion, hot sauce, and of course, sausage and bacon. Quite proud of his concoction, he pauses from taking his first what is sure to be absolutely delightful bite to stare at the intruder.
First thing Bradley notices is that the man is a total smokeshow. Tall, long legs, golden skin, golden hair, blue-green eyes, long lashes, pretty, perfect pout with lips currently pinched in a frown. Bradley has seen him in passing the last two weeks of ground school – around classrooms while instructors droned on about each and every detail of their aircraft systems, emergency procedures, and course rules. It was important to build a strong foundation, but Bradley is a tactile learner. And it’s not like this will be his first time in a fighter jet – Pete Mitchell had seen to that many, many moons ago.
“Not my first time in a jet, sim or not,” Bradley replies back with a raised eye brow, before stuffing an absolute behemoth of a bite into his mouth. The groan he lets out is almost pornographic.
The blond blushes just a little bit, but the pinch to his brow doesn’t go away. “You’re going to hurl,” he insists. “Seriously, who the hell eats something like that before they’re supposed to be subjected to 4 G’s of pressure?”
Bradley frowns back now. The second thing he notices is this guy is kind of an ass. “I do. Now if you excuse me, I’d like to enjoy my breakfast in peace.”
A handsome, dark-skinned man comes up behind the blond holding a tray containing two plates of buttered wheat toast, water bottles, and two shiny red apples. “Jake,” the man says, “breakfast.”
“See, that,” the blond – Jake – continues, unbothered by Bradley’s request for peace and quiet, pointing to the tray the other man is holding, “is what a sensible person eats before flight simulator.”
“Dude,” the dark-skinned man looks incredulously at Jake, “do you even know this guy?”
“Not the point, Javy, look at what the man is eating before flight sim,” Jake nearly whines back.
The dark-skinned man – Javy, Bradley now knows, rolls his eyes at Jake before turning slightly to Bradley, who is still shoveling his delicious breakfast into his mouth, a shade from unbothered. “Man,” he intones, “sorry about him. Jake, c’mon, leave the dude alone.”
Jake makes quite a show of leaving - he huffs, rolls his eyes, throws his hands up as exasperatedly, as if a total stranger's choice to disregard his advice on breakfast is a personal affront.
And that is the first, but certainly not the last time, Bradley Bradshaw is nagged at by Jake Seresin.
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2.
“You have to actually push the throttle if you want to take off, you know,” Jake Seresin is saying behind Bradley Bradshaw’s back. They’ve moved onto to flying actual jets, now, two weeks later. Bradley is in the driver’s seat today, Jake his back-seater currently, much to his chagrin. In his few interactions with Jake, Bradley overwhelming opinion is that the dude is the opposite of a butter face. Gorgeous, but-his-personality, is more the thing.
“I’m literally taxiing to the runway,” Bradley sighs back.
“You could taxi faster,” Jake insists. “I could walk faster than you are taxiing right now.”
“Why would I rush to taxi to the runway when Smith and Lennox haven’t even taken off yet?!” Bradley insists back. It’s true – the two fellow pilots in the jet ahead of them are just going through pre-flight checks. They haven’t even pushed the throttle yet themselves.
“We’d have beat them up there if you’d taxi’d faster than my literal walking speed,” he hears Jake mutter.
“When it’s your turn in the driver's seat, you’re free to cut in front of anyone you’d like, Seresin,” Rooster grumbles back.
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3.
“I’m just saying, if you flew a little faster, you would’ve been able to keep up with Hammer,” Jake Seresin is telling a very annoyed Bradley Bradshaw. It’s only their second day of their precision acrobatics portion of their training. One of the flight instructors, a lieutenant called Hammer, thought it’d be a great idea to pair up Bradshaw and Seresin, oblivious to the fact that at the best of times, Bradley wanted to punch Jake in the face, and at his worst, he wanted to kill him outright. God, he was pretty, but at what cost?
“I didn’t ask you for your opinion, Seresin,” Bradley snaps back, annoyed.
Jake ignores the warning growl to Bradley’s tone. “Why is it so hard for you to just push the throttle, Bradshaw?! You can’t fly like that out in the real world! I know this is training, but we’re supposed to pretend like it’s real and in a real combat, you’d have been left beh-”
“Seresin, I am going to punch you, I swear to God,” Bradley mutters through gritted teeth.
A distraction arrives in the forms of Natasha Trace and Javy Machado. They’d lucked into being paired together, which is a shame because Bradley kind of likes Machado when Jake isn’t around. Unfortunately, Jake is nearly always around Machado, long-time friends from as far back as their freshmen year at the Naval Academy. Natasha is becoming fast friends with Bradley and has an equally distasteful, if more amused, opinion of Jake Seresin.
“Hey,” she says to Bradley, ignoring Jake pointedly, “we’re headed up next, any advice?”
“You’ll do fine, Tasha,” Bradley tells her, glad for the distraction, now also ignoring Jake (who is glaring at the intrusion of what was sure to be yet another thorough chewing-out of Bradley’s every choice when flying), “he seems to like to ride the hard deck, so just try to keep at his level and be ready for whatever he tells you to do.”
“He was only riding the hard deck because you were, Bradshaw,” Jake cuts in, “if you’d have been flying faster-”
Javy looks bored, like this is an everyday occurrence, which at this point, it pretty much is.
“Jesus, Seresin, give it a rest!” Bradley snaps. Natasha looks both amused and affronted, hopefully on Bradley’s behalf. Bradley is really beginning to like her – she's going to make an excellent pilot, and has potential for any team leader position that comes along in her future with her cool and collected demeanor.
“Well, thanks, I guess,” she snorts, quickly putting on her helmet and gestures to Javy to follow, leaving the other two men to it. They manage to make it inside the building to head towards the rec room to watch the next few students before Jake opens his mouth, no doubt to start up again. Bradley sees his escape in the form of a restroom and steals inside to lock the door before Jake can say another word.
“This discussion isn’t over!” Jake shouts at the bathroom door.
Bradley drops his head into his hands, downright refusing to take the bait. There’s a beat of silence until he hears Jake’s feet start to walk away. He listens carefully for Jake’s footsteps to quiet down, before groaning loudly.
Tilting his head upwards, Bradley sighs out, “Jesus Christ, why is he so punchable?” willing God or whoever might be listening to give him some answers.
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4.
It’s a relief when, after their 6-month stint for primary flight training, Bradley gets a break from Jake Seresin. Jake and Javy had been shipped to Texas for strike training, while Bradley and Natasha received their orders to report to Mississippi.
It’s a wonderful reprieve from the overbearing nagging. Bradley is doing exactly what he’d always meant to do, albeit a little later in life that he had hoped for – his days and even nights are spent perfecting the art of flying, learning every minute detail of his aircraft and how to navigate it at any time, in any weather, with any other number of fellow pilots in any manner of formation.
Of course, the peace Bradley’s feeling from his Jake-less months can’t last.
After a particularly bad grade, a pitch-dark night flight gone wrong, Bradley’s cellphone buzzes with a text notification. It’s after 1 AM on a Friday night. Bradley ignored Natasha and a couple of the other pilots who tried to goad him out for a night of drinking, to get him out of his head, Natasha had said.
Instead of downing too many overpriced, watered-down drinks in some shitty bar, Bradley is up and agonizing over the day he’d had... he’d been up in the sky just hours ago, entirely alone on a cloud-covered night, not even the moon for company, relying solely on his instrumentation and prior knowledge to follow the course through. Unfortunately, he’d maybe had a minor panic attack and was ordered to end his flight early.
Heard you had to land a plane a little early today. the text reads, the number unknown.
who is this? Bradley texts back.
Who do you think, Bradshaw? is the response, and immediately Bradley knows. Blue-green eyes and a stupid, smug smile on a hazardously handsome face pop into his brain.
how the hell did u get my number?!
Friend of a friend.
What the hell happened?
im not talking to u
You don’t have to tell me, I already know anyway. Got a little scared flying at night, Bradshaw?
how do u even know?!
Bradley is furious. It’s obvious who the friend of a friend is – which means somehow Natasha had thought it’d be an okay idea to give Javy his number, and of course, of course Jake would get it from there. Bradley thinks Javy has enough sense to not have given his number to Jake willy-nilly, which means the bastard probably found out Javy had it and jacked it from Javy’s phone.
I know everything.
Rumor is they’re calling you Rooster, now. Afraid to leave your perch without the sun up.
oh my god seresin stfu
It’s a cute little callsign, isn’t it?
well we cant all be hangman can we
You keeping tabs on me, Rooster?
another little birdie told me, not like i cared to ask
Ah yeah, Trace is going by Phoenix now, isn’t she? Much more badass than Rooster. How’d she get that one?
thought you already knew everything
Only when it comes to you fucking up, Rooster.
Bradley lets out an indignant huff, marveling at Jake’s ability to find out about a mistake and nag him on it from states away. He types back furiously, nearly forgetting what he’d even been agonizing over.
im going to bed
delete my number you jackass
or ill block u
His phone buzzes back almost immediately. Bradley manages to hold out for 4 whole minutes before he snatches it from his nightstand to read the reply.
Not in a million years. Someone has to make sure you make it to Advanced.
and whys that ur job?
I basically dragged you kicking and screaming through Primary, Bradshaw.
omg u did not!
I thought you were going to bed?
I am u jackass, leave me alone, cant sleep with the phone buzzing away because u always have to have the last word!!
Bradley stares at the phone for several minutes after that. Typical of Jake to defy expectations, because he doesn’t reply right away, but Bradley waits just the same.
Bradley startles when he realizes he’s been waiting for over 5 minutes for a reply that he’s now certain isn’t going to come. Plugging his phone back into the charger, he settles down into the pillows, replaying Jake’s insufferable texts in his brain until he’s tired himself out to the point that he’s just about to drift off to sleep.
The phone buzzes. Snarling, Bradley sits up, furious, to grab the offensive object, to see whatever obnoxious reply the great Jake “Hangman” Seresin has come up with now.
Good night, Rooster.
Bradley just knows that fucker is cackling somewhere in Kingsville.
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5.
Bradley is inexorably thrilled when he gets his orders to report to TOPGUN. After making it through Advanced strike training and some three years odd on his first tour, he’s confident in how he flies, now, and clearly the Navy agrees that he’s among the best they have to offer.
Take that, Pete Mitchell, is his first bitter thought.
Bradley’s second thought is of a tall blond with an attitude problem. Take that, Jake Seresin.
The last few years have included rare interactions with Jake. Somehow, without fail (and Jake MUST be keeping tabs on him), Jake manages to hear about it when Bradley fucks up and texts him to nag at him for what he could’ve/should’ve/ or Jake would’ve done better. Thank God for small miracles, but it’s been almost 10 months since his last minor fuck up and subsequent text thread from Jake.
Sending a photo to Jake of the letter telling Bradley to report to TOPGUN is exactly what he should do, he thinks, smugly. That will show him that Bradley is seriously good, now. No more nagging required.
Jake doesn’t reply to Bradley’s photo, and he absolutely does not let it bother him at all in the two days journey to Miramar. Doesn’t spare a single thought to Jake Seresin. Doesn’t check his phone at any given opportunity, thank you very much.
Of course, that means when Bradley walks into The Hard Deck the night before they’re all to report at 0700 for their introduction to TOPGUN, Bradley is blindsided by the megawatt, shit-eating grin he finds aimed at him when he meets eyes across the crowded place with the man himself. Jake is holding a pool cue, in his khaki’s, as infuriatingly gorgeous, untouchable, and punchable as ever.
Next, he clocks Javy and Tasha at the bar attempting to get the attention of one Penny Benjamin. Blatantly ignoring Jake is always a great way to get a rise out of him, so he makes his way over to them.
“Didn’t know they let just anybody into TOPGUN,” he half-shouts from behind. Tasha turns around with a shriek of glee.
“Bradshaw! What, you couldn’t call?!”
“Didn’t know you’d be here either, Tasha,” he replies primly, but he can’t contain the smile he knows is taking over his face. They’d lost some contact after Advanced, both sent out to different squadrons and different tours per Navy requirement. Keeping in touch on different ships wasn’t the easiest thing to do, but damn is he glad to see her.
“Always knew you’d make it here,” he tells her sincerely when she reaches out to embrace him. The smile she gives him is fond.
“You, too,” she says intimately, then leans back from the hug to shout, “what’re you drinking? Javy offered to buy the first round when I bumped into him and Seresin here,” while she nods to Javy who has turned around to greet Bradley with a cursory nod.
“Whatever is on tap is fine,” he shouts back over the crowd at the bar, “I’m easy.”
Bradley must be imagining because he thinks he hears Javy mutter something about ’not that easy’.
They get their drinks and head over to the pool table, where of course Jake is kicking some poor other pilots ass- he might as well be doing it with one arm behind his back for how lazily he sinks ball after ball into the pockets, like it requires very little effort for him to excel at everything.
“Bradshaw, as I live and breathe,” Jake greets him with a smirk.
“Hangman. You look good,” Bradley snarks back, exasperated already and he’s just barely entered the Jake Seresin orbit.
“I am good, Rooster. I’m very good.”
--
And, much to Bradley Bradshaw’s dismay, that turns out to be entirely true over the next few weeks. It’s honestly infuriating how good Jake is. The only saving grace is how it pushes Bradley to do better – to fly further, and faster, attempting to keep up.
Of course, everyone here is good, that’s pretty much the whole point. There are days where he heads home and can barely manage to change into pajamas before he passes out, head spinning from new techniques, new maneuvers, new formation – only to wake up and do it all over again the next day.
Jake keeps up a nearly constant stream of nagging at Bradley, who is for the most part unshakeable after so many years of this. It’s easier now, almost like exposure therapy after so long to let Jake’s words flow in one ear and out the other. Bradley has a cool sort of quiet confidence now, feels on top of the world now he’s finally where he always intended to be, and in turn, Jake nags at him harder than ever.
“Still can’t keep up, huh, Bradshaw?” Jake says one day when he’d beat the time of even their instructor on the simulated course they were flying that day. Bradley rolls his eyes and returns to the book he’d been reading.
“Glad you survived the dog fight,” Jake says another day, him and Javy joining Natasha and Bradley at their lunch table, on a day when they were flying two-vs-two and practicing some of the new techniques they’ve been taught, “but it’s too bad you missed shooting me out of the sky because you hesitated.”
And Bradley just shrugs, shoving a handful of french fries into his mouth with a sardonic smile. “Made it back,” he replies easily.
Natasha and Javy seem to find it endlessly entertaining, and luckily, it’s mostly at Jake’s expense. Where Bradley used to lose him temper often, he’s much harder to rattle now. After 5 on and off years, he’s starting to get that Jake likes to try to push him until he snaps, and if Jake doesn’t get the reaction he’s hoping for, he tends to disappear to lick his wounds for a little while, and those moments are blissful.
It’s only once in a little while that he truly wants to punch Jake Seresin in the face anymore.
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+1.
“Jake, I swear to God, if I come in there and you’re not in bed I’m going to throttle you,” Bradley warns.
It’s several years later, at this point, over a decade since Bradley was first accosted by a mother henning Jake Seresin in a mess hall where he’d been shoveling an epic breakfast bowl in his face. Bradley is proud to say that they’ve managed to figure it out, after all. It might’ve taken what essentially equated to a hammer to the head from Natasha, but Bradley likes to think they finally got there, in the end.
“I’m not sick, Bradley!”
“Bullshit, Jake, you literally have a fever. You made me check it three times because you refused to believe it.”
Bradley is in the kitchen of their shared home on the outskirts of San Diego. It’s been theirs now for nearly 10 months, no longer just Bradley’s. Small touches point to evidence of Jake’s permenent presence here, like the absolutely pristine kitchen, meticulously organized linen closet, and beige stetson hat that lives lovingly on its own hook near the front door.
Bradley is heating up some tomato soup on the stove. When he’s woken up this morning feeling like he’d fallen asleep next to the furnace, to see Jake covered in a thin layer of sweat and shivering despite having stolen all the covers, Bradley knew right away that Jake Was Officially Sick. Bradley figured it’s probably from the commercial flight Jake had taken down from Lemoore a few days back, having finished his latest tour.
Bradley himself is instructing at TOPGUN, and doing a fairly decent job of it, if the extended contract offer he received yesterday is anything to go by. Simpson has declared loudly that they were looking for two more, if Bradley had any suggestions.
“You literally have a fever,” he hears muttered from the open bedroom door. Bradley rolls his eyes.
“I’m making you soup,” Bradley responds to the open door in which Jake is just on the other side of, choosing to ignore the petulant child that is his partner, “and you are going to rest, in bed and eat it. Do you want me to pop out to get some nyquil and tylenol?”
“No, Bradley, because I am not sick.”
“Whatever you say, sweetheart,” Bradley can’t keep the fondness out of his voice. “We’re out of your bodywash anyway. And milk.”
“Well, I mean, if you’re going out anyway,” Jake responds, all casual-like.
Bradley snorts, stirs the soup one more time and turns off the burner to let it cool down just a little bit. He busies himself next with getting a glass of orange juice, and a water bottle from the fridge, then pours the soup into a bowl. Jake will nag at him when he’s feeling better for not letting the pot soak, and Bradley will be glad for it. Carefully balancing, he brings his hoard to the bedroom.
Jake is in bed, looking for all the World like he’s been shackled there against his will, propped up against some pillows and the most adorable pout on his face.
“Good morning, sweetheart,” Bradley smiles at him. “How are you feeling?”
“I’d feel a lot better if you’d come cuddle me, Bradshaw,” Jake snaps back.
“Poor boy, do you need some attention?” Bradley drops his voice an octave, and is rewarded immediately with a fresh flush across Jake’s cheeks, deeper than his I-have-a-fever-flush.
Jake doesn’t respond except to make grabby hands through glassy eyes for the glass of orange juice, which Bradley hands him. He sets the soup and water bottle on the nightstand, and crawls up the bed to settle himself back against the headboard. Jake immediately flops back against him, sipping at his orange juice until it’s half-gone and grabbing the soup next.
Once Jake has finished his soup, Bradley takes the bowl and sets it down, runs a hand up to Jake’s forehead, unsubtly feeling his temperature.
“You’re still pretty warm. Did you take that ibuprofen I brought you earlier?”
Jake rolls his eyes. “Yes, Bradley.”
“That’s why I gotta go get tylenol, I swear it breaks a fever faster,” Bradley mutters, already ready to head out immediately to complete his mission to Make Jake Better.
Jake burrows further into him, instead, unwilling to let him go. “Not yet,” he whines, then, “I’m gonna get you sick.”
“Worth it, baby,” Bradley responds with a smile into Jake’s sweaty hair.