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When Carole Bradshaw dies, Bradley’s given all of her jewelry.
He’s given a lot of other things, too. That’s what happens when you’re an 18-year-old orphan; you become the sole possessor of everything your parents ever owned. So Bradley Bradshaw is 18, with his mom’s house and credit card debt, his dad’s pension and Ford Bronco, and a medium black velvet jewelry organizer, with pink padding and full of trinkets.
Carole Bradshaw was never a particularly ornate woman. Practical to a fault, she would eschew most personal indulgences. Buying gifts for her was near impossible because she would always say there was nothing she wanted or needed. One birthday, Maverick bought her a new vacuum. Another, Bradley got her a T.J. Maxx gift card. Apparently, Nick was the flair and the sentimentality in their relationship.
This practicality extended to her jewelry. In all of Bradley’s memory, he’d never seen her wear more than two pieces at a time. Her staples were small stud earrings or hoops, and the occasional ring. Never fussy necklaces or bracelets, and only rings when she didn’t have something to do. Carole Bradshaw liked being ready to jump in at any moment, prepared to change a tire or unclog a drain or tend to a garden with barely any notice. And jewelry, she once told her friend, only served to get in her way.
A few months after the funeral, when Bradley’s relationship with Mav has gone up in smoke, along with his Academy aspirations, he’s packing for UVA and comes across the box. He has to lean against the dresser for a second, suddenly breathless.
He’d forgotten about the jewelry box.
It’s been sitting on his mom’s dresser for months, collecting dust. Curiosity has him opening it, surveying the contents. Most of it is costume jewelry, cheap stuff that she wouldn’t mind losing down the kitchen sink or falling off while chasing young Bradley around the bases on the baseball diamond. There are a few more expensive pieces that Bradley knows she got as gifts and never wore, unless it was a special occasion.
He had asked her once, why she kept the sapphire earrings and the ruby ring, when she rarely wore them. “You could probably get a good deal for them at the pawn shop on 17th,” he had suggested, one February when Carole was trying to scrape enough money together to pay for the heating bill.
She had looked up from a kitchen table scattered with bills, eyes tired but admonishing. “I would never sell that stuff, Brad. Your father gave them to me, and I want you to give them to someone special, too.”
Looking over the jewelry now, Bradley can’t imagine he’d ever want to give any of it to someone else. It’s his mom’s; it’ll always be his mom’s. The diamond necklace she wore to her cousin’s wedding, the emerald earrings she sported to Mav’s promotion ceremony, the gold hoops she wore whenever she remembered to put on earrings for the day. Even the costume jewelry is so deeply Mom’s that he can’t imagine it on anyone else. If he gets close enough, Bradley can almost swear he can smell her perfume.
(They had given him a bag at the morgue full of what she had been wearing when she died. Her pressed linen dress, sensible shoes, and her wedding ring. He donated the clothes and shoved the wedding ring in a drawer he hasn’t looked at since.)
Bradley runs his fingers over the jewelry, pausing on a pair of studs.
He’d gotten his ears pierced at 15, in a fit of truly inexplicable teen angst. Maverick had taken him, because even in his self-righteousness, Bradley knew his mom would kill him if she found out. Which she obviously did, when he came home with a low-rent mall piercing and an allergic reaction to the nickel posts.
Carole hadn't been mad. In her 18 years as Bradley’s mom, she was rarely ever actually mad. Instead, she took Bradley into her bathroom, cleaned the piercing, and offered her simple gold studs to keep the piercing open. Bradley still has those earrings, buried somewhere in his nightstand.
Now, looking down at the jewelry, he just wants that moment back. So he picks up an earring.
When he slides that diamond stud into his earlobe, Bradley almost cries.
His piercing, now almost four years old, has nearly closed up. The delicate skin stretches over the hole, a thin webbing that he forces the post through. The pain is dull, almost unnoticeable, and it feels necessary. Right. To pierce himself with the last remnants of his parents, to ensure that there’s something tying him to them at all times.
-
He starts to wear whatever jewelry he can get away with. Which isn’t much, in ROTC and basic. His mom’s silver chain, tucked under his white uniform shirt, is usually the most he can wear. Earrings for male service members are prohibited, and any rings would just get in the way. But off duty, in his civvies, Bradley wears as much of the jewelry as he can. Sometime after he finishes flight training and gets his wings pinned, he settles on the gold earrings as his favorite piece. They’re subtle hoops, small enough not to be flashy but noticeable enough to catch in the light when he goes out. His mom would wear them almost every day; they were her one staple piece. Well, except for her wedding rings.
Bradley likes his mom’s accessory rings as well, but they get less use. Most of them are too small to fit on anything but his pinky, anyway, and Bradley quickly learns that his mom had a point about practically. Early on, while Bradley’s still trying to figure out what, exactly, he’s doing with a box of costume jewelry that belongs to a dead woman, he’s wearing a ring while doing mechanical work on the Bronco. It’s one of the bigger ones, so it slots over his right pointer finger. He figures his mom wore the band over her thumb, the triangular cut racing towards her knuckles. It’s one of his favorites, a subtle design that his mom loved.
At the moment, though, the only feeling the ring elicits is frustration. With every turn of his wrench or pull of the cables, the ring clatters against the metal in the car with a loud clang that startles Bradley. Plus, he can’t bend his finger all the way in. Every time he tries to grasp a tool or lift something to get a better look, his pointer finger meets resistance, and his grip loosens.
After the fifth clatter of the ring against the hood of the car, Natasha, who was keeping him company while reading, grunts an exasperated sigh. “What the hell is that noise, and could you stop making it? Some of us are reading.”
“Uh,” Bradley starts sheepishly, pulling himself out from the car's hood and turning to Nat. “It’s my ring.” He holds up his hand in explanation, the metal glinting in the sunlight filtering into the garage.
Phoenix sets down her book, stands, and stretches before walking over and taking his hand in hers, inspecting it., Her brow scrunches at the ring on his finger. “Is that a woman’s ring?”
“Er, yeah,” Bradley confirms, feeling his heart rate start to ratchet up. Blood rushes to his ears as his attention narrows on Phoenix and her reaction, already planning a path out of the mess.
“Huh,” is all she says. “It’s pretty.” She turns back to lounge in the saucer chair they brought out for he to relax in whenever she joins Bradley.
“You’re not gonna ask me about it?”
She raises an eyebrow over her sunglasses and picks up her book again. “Would you tell me if I did?”
And they both know the answer to that, so Bradley stays silent.
“Besides,” Natasha continues conversationally, “I’ve never asked about the earrings. Why should I care about the ring?”
-
People notice intermittently over the years. Bradley never tries to hide it, and when they ask why he’s wearing gold studs or a heart ring on his pinky, he’ll usually just shrug and tell them that he likes the look. It’s not a total lie; Bradley enjoys how the metal will glint in the light and how the earrings frame his face. But the whole truth is just a bit too amorphous and sad to truly convey to a drunk Payback at the Hard Deck.
Jake notices the first time they sleep together, after the adrenaline rush of the mission, in a delicate and cautious step towards a start.
It’s less frantic than Bradley would’ve expected. It starts out a little frenzied, an edge of desperation to both of their movements. But once their clothes are off and they’re splayed over Bradley’s bed, it all slows down to something more tender and sweeter.
After, when Jake is lying across Bradley’s chest, propped up just enough that Bradley can look into his eyes, they start to talk. Really talk.
“Are your ears pierced?” Jake asks softly, tracing the lobe gently with his finger. The action sends a shiver down Bradley’s spine. They’re close enough that Jake’s face blurs with proximity, Bradley nearly going cross-eyed trying to look at him.
“Yeah,” he whispers back, bringing his hand up to fiddle with the lobe. The hole is old, but he makes sure they never close by wearing earrings whenever he’s off duty. “I got them pierced when I was 15.”
Jake smirks. “Was teenage Bradley Bradshaw a rebel?”
Bradley rolls his eyes. “Hardly. I cried when my mom saw and then only wore earrings for like two months. Hardly a bonafide rebel.”
Jake frowns, scrutinizing Bradley’s ear. He can feel Jake’s breath, slow and warm, fan out across his cheek. “These are definitely still open. It’s been two decades; why haven’t they closed?”
“Uh, I wear earrings, usually, when I’m not on duty.”
“Really?” Jake asks, and Bradley doesn’t miss how his breath hitches on the word, like the image is a little overwhelming. “Where are you getting them? Why haven’t I ever seen?”
“Well, you probably haven’t seen it because we’re never really around each other when I’m off-duty,” Bradley answers the easier question first. “You’ll definitely see them now. And it's all my mom’s. Stuff she left me when she died.”
“Oh,” Jake says, immediately softer. He’s not asking for anything more, but Bradley can’t help but offer it anyway.
“I started wearing them a few months after she died. There was this box of jewelry, most of it not worth much, and I just couldn’t bear throwing any of it away. And, I dunno, I guess it’s a way to feel closer to her. I’m carrying her with me whenever I can.”
Jake’s eyes are soft as he traces from Bradley’s ear across his face, running a finger along the hollow of his cheek and resting his fingers at the corner of Bradley’s mouth. Bradley presses a kiss to the pads of Jake’s fingers, a tiny thanks for caring.
“Now I feel a little like an asshole for thinking about hot you’d look with them on,” Jake says, but the tone is so incredibly tender that Bradley can’t feel anything but love at it.
He smiles, Jake’s fingers moving as his lips do. “You’re not wrong. It’s the Bradshaw legacy, to look hot in a mustache and gold jewelry.”
Jake scoffs out a laugh, dropping his head to the crook of Bradley’s neck. His stubble scratches Bradley’s sensitive skin, sending a spark down his spine. “Thank you for telling me,” Jake whispers into his neck, and Bradley can’t see him, but he can hear the earnestness in Jake’s voice. “I like learning this stuff about you. About all of it, good and bad, big and small.”
Bradley’s smile widens, and lifts a hand to start tracing patterns on Jake’s back. Big loops, small hearts, a few letters. “I like sharing with you,” he responds. “And I want all of that from you, too. The good, the bad, the silly. Every version of Jake Seresin.”
Jake shivers against him, and Bradley presses his palm into the small of Jake’s back to ground him. “Okay,” Jake agrees, voice a little meeker. “Just know you asked for this.”
-
When they move in together, Bradley takes the box of jewelry.
Over the past year, the collection has grown, mainly through gifts from Jake. The bulk of the contents are still his mom’s, but now, there are rings that fit fingers other than Bradley’s pinky and a few sturdy gold chains. His favorite new edition is a pair of earrings, gold with a light green gem set in a teardrop that hangs just off the edge of Bradley’s ear lobe. It’s like Jake walked into the store and used his own eyes as a reference picture.
A lot of the nicer pieces still sit unused. Bradley’s too worried about losing them, losing these gifts from his dad to his mom, that he rarely even touches them, much less breaks them out of their velvet prison to wear them. Occasionally, Bradley catches Jake running his hand over them when the box is open, picking one up at random to study.
One night over dinner, Bradley broaches the subject.
“My mom left me a lot of jewelry,” Bradley starts, eyes trained on Jake’s face to track his reaction. The other man simply raises an eyebrow. “If you ever wanted to borrow, or even take, anything, let me know. My mom would want nothing more than for the man I love to wear her jewelry.”
Jake smiles shyly when Bradley refers to him in that way, though his overall expression is still one of worry. “That’s a very sweet offer, but,” Jake pauses, fiddling with his napkin, “I'm not a big jewelry person.” he admits.
Bradley looks at him skeptically. “You’re one of the most ostentatious people I know, and you don’t wear any jewelry?”
“Hey, why distract from the main show?” Jake wiggles his eyebrows, and Badley can’t feel anything but extremely fond. “Thank you for the offer, though. I know how much those pieces mean to you.” Jake’s eyes are soft and warm when they meet Bradley’s.
Bradley reaches across the table to squeeze Jake’s hand. “I just saw you looking at them a few times. Thought maybe you were interested and didn’t know how to ask.”
“Okay, first of all, when have I ever been shy in asking for what I want?” That gets an involuntary flush to cover Bradley’s cheeks and ears. “And second of all, I just want to see what your favorites are, so I can make sure to get you things you’ll wear.”
Bradley grins, fond. “I’d wear anything you give me.”
Jake flashes him a signature smirk. “Don’t give me that kind of power. You know I’ll abuse it.”
-
Maverick’s P-51 Mustang sometimes feels like an almost Sisyphean task, like Bradley and his godfather are doomed to spend at least two weekends a month taking the thing apart and trying to figure out, what, exactly, went wrong with her this time.
Bradley doesn’t mind. When he first started working on the plane with Mav, it was an excuse to be in the same room together, a way to give their relationship a task to focus on, a direction to work in. And though their relationship has healed significantly since then, sometimes it’s good to just work side by side with Mav. Besides, Bradley’s certainly sunk enough of his own time and effort into the thing to feel significantly invested.
Jake tags along with him when they’re both home, but he never comes to help. He comes to raid Maverick’s kitchen of snacks and lounge on the couch. Not that Bradley complains. Any kind of time spent with Jake is time well-spent, even if it’s Jake taking a nap while Bradley tries to figure out why the left rotary blade is spinning a fraction too slowly.
He and Maverick speak in low tones, trying not to wake Jake, while passing tools back and forth. Conversation with Maverick has become progressively more manageable over the past two years. They no longer rely on the tenets of small talk, and have no problem diving straight to the heart of things.
“You know, I have your dad’s ring,” Mav says conversationally, and Bradley snaps his head up, almost braining himself on the side of the Mustang.
“Oh?” he asks, breathless at the implication.
“Yeah, your mom gave it to me, since we, uh, lost his dog tags. You know, for safe keeping. I was going to give it to you when you turned 18, but then, you know...” Maverick trails off, the reference to the Academy still too sensitive of a subject to tread over for both of them. “Anyway, I’m not sure where hers is, but if you want Goose’s, I have it.”
“I have mom’s,” Bradley says. “Back home. It’s just in some drawer, collecting dust.”
“Oh, so you don't need your dads?”
“No,” Bradley rushes out. “I want his, too. I have an idea.”
-
Bradley proposes in the middle of their kitchen, on a Tuesday night, right after dinner.
There’s not much fanfare, but there is a speech that he spent way too long writing and rewriting. Jake lets him get through exactly six words of it before he’s grabbing the ring and tackling Bradley flat on his back, muttering ‘yes, yes, yes” against his lips.
When they break apart, slightly breathless, Jake holds up the ring, rolling it between his hands.
“This ring...” Jake starts, studying where the two rings meet. It’s one band, fit to Jake’s ring size, with another soldered to it. The second band is split in half, one half on either of the ring. It’s an unusual design; the second band is clearly smaller than the first, and the two metals are different colors. It looks almost like a key ring, they way the metal bands double up.
Bradley shifts on his feet sheepishly. “I can get you something else. Maybe something a bit more traditional, if you don't like it.”
Jake fixes him with a stare over the edge of the band. “That’s not what I’m saying, Bradshaw. I was just wondering if there was a story behind it. There usually is.”
And God, Jake has always been able to read between the lines, at least when it comes to Bradley. “Yeah, there’s a story,” he says softly, reaching over to cover Jake’s hand with his own. He feels the ring press between them, grounding him. “Uh, it’s my parents’ wedding bands. Both of their rings. I had my mom’s, and it turns out, Mav’s been keeping my dad’s safe. So once I got your ring size, I took them to a jeweler, and she soldered them together. Or, as best she could. I know it’s not the most beautiful of rings, though.”
“Bradley,” Jake breathes out, looking like he’s in the process of getting dragged under by the tides. “I don’t - I don’t deserve this.”
Now it’s Bradley’s turn to read between the lines. “You know, my mom made me keep all of her old jewelry. She said she wanted me to give it to someone special, so they could feel what she felt when my dad would gift her something beautiful. But I know you don’t like jewelry, so I was hoping this could give you at least some of that feeling. Because there’s never been anyone that I’ve wanted to give my parents’ jewelry before. Not before you. So if you’re not gonna take any of it, at least take the most important pieces.”
-
Jake Seresin doesn't wear jewelry.
He never has, not even his Academy ring. The metal is uncomfortable against his skin, and he’s never seen a need to add anything flashy. Plus, whenever he sees an earring he might like or a necklace that catches his eye, he can hear his father’s voice, deep in the back of his head, telling him that real men don’t wear jewelry.
So, Jake doesn’t wear any jewelry. Even though his fiance has an ever-growing collection (that he adds to), Jake doesn’t touch anything. The only piece of jewelry he ever wears is his wedding ring, fused together with love and grief, and hope.
Bradley wears a lot of jewelry, though. Earrings and rings, necklaces and bracelets, inherited from his parents or given by Jake. Jake’s dislike of jewelry has never extended to Bradley. How can it, when he looks almost magical with something glittering around him? And Bradley knew this, knows Jake’s weakness for it, and will play it up. When they’re out to the bar together, Bradley’s draped in jewelry: his mom’s earrings, the rings Jake got him, the gold chain that was his dad’s.
But on their wedding day, Bradley keeps it simple, with his favorite pair of small gold hoops. Jake’s seen them on Carole in her and Goose’s wedding photos. Well, those and the cufflinks Jake had gotten made for him, from the two diamonds that sat on Carole’s engagement ring.