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It’s not unusual for Jesse to dream about hunger.
When Todd had him, when he was a fucking prisoner, Jesse never had enough to eat. He usually had just enough so that he didn’t pass out while cooking - but even that was only a regular thing after Jack had a serious talk with Todd about the importance of feeding his “pet”, to keep their purity level up. Fucking psychopaths.
Jesse’s never dreamt about eating before.
Jesse wakes up slowly, and for a moment his dream is just as real as the faint light he can see coming through the window. There is all sorts of lavish food laid out before him, or there was - he was eating all he wanted, everything delicious, in his dream.
He blinks leisurely, and feels the heat of Will beside him, still asleep. He can hear the dogs - all the dogs, he thinks they’re in double digits now - asleep on the floor around the bed, and Jesse sinks further into his soft pillow.
It’s nice to have a morning start like this, to wake up naturally and not because of fear and shock - his own or Will’s. Jesse lets his eyes fall shut again, slipping back to where he’s sitting in front of an elaborate spread of food that tastes as good as it looks. He’s not quite asleep, but he can taste the smokiness of the meat, the sweet tang of the roast, and it’s such a nice switch to dream about this, food more delicious then he thinks he might have had in years, instead of dreaming about being stuck in a hole in the ground, listening to Uncle Jack’s gang of Nazis eat pizza just 100 feet from him…
The full memory of his dream, and with it awareness of what - of who - he’s eating, slams into Jesse, and it feels physical, like an actual blow to his stomach.
His eyes are open, he’s awake, and he remembers his dream now.
He remembers the meat, laid out and delicious, and he can almost taste it in this mouth, still —
It’s that memory, the taste, that has Jesse scrambling out of the bed, swallowing compulsively as he struggles out of the sheets and dives for the bathroom.
He barely makes it, and his knees slam into the cold linoleum as he hunches over the toilet bowl, ejecting whatever’s left in his stomach from the night before. Dinner was just fish and vegetables, he knows, no real meat, definitely not like his dream, but knowing that doesn’t help, not when he can still taste it. He manages a gasp of air before he jerks forward, retching again.
The overhead light flicks on.
Jesse wants to tell Will to go back to sleep, wants to tell him that he’s fine, definitely doesn’t want to tell him about his dream. He wants to stand up and take Will in his arms and remind himself that he’s there, that they’re both there, but all he can do is take a couple breaths, finally able to fill his lungs, before spitting into the bowl in front of him.
“Did I poison you with dinner last night?” he hears Will ask, his voice thick with sleep and sympathy. “Or is this something else?”
Jesse is deciding whether he’s done, whether it’s safe to move, when he feels Will’s hand, warm like he always is, skate across his shoulders, gentle and faint. They’ve done this part before, although doing it in the bathroom after Jesse pukes his guts up is new, and Jesse knows Will is doing what he can to ground him, while trying not to spook him like touch sometimes does, right after waking.
Deciding he’s done, Jesse leans back into Will’s hand. He wipes his mouth with the long sleeve of his shirt, grimacing at the taste in his mouth. “No poison,” he says, his voice raspy.
Will doesn’t ask any other questions, but his hand drops away as he grabs a washcloth from a shelf above Jesse. He wets it at the sink, the bathroom so small he doesn’t have to move, before handing it to Jesse and taking a step away from him. He moves carefully, taking a seat on the floor, his back against the tub.
Jesse wipes his mouth - and halfheartedly swipes at his sleeve - before throwing the washcloth back in the sink. He scoots across the small bathroom to sit next to Will, their sides pressed together.
Jesse knows that Will is doing that - his thing - and he hates it, not because it’s weird and embarrassing for Will to understand how upset he gets about dreams - Jesse got over that after seeing Will wake up, gasping and whimpering, soaked in sweat and shaking after his own nightmares - but because he knows Will’s gonna end up upset. That he’ll pick up on Jesse’s feelings and take them on, and feel as shitty as Jesse does right now.
Knowing that, Jesse takes a deep breath, counts to ten in his head, and tries to calm down. Tries to even his breathing.
“You wanna go outside?” Will says after a minute, and god does Jesse love him.
Will waits patiently for an answer, not looking at Jesse, but ready to go out in the cold - in just his shorts and t-shirt, if past nights are any indication - beside him, just so Jesse can remind himself that he is not there. That he’s here, way out here, on the huge-ass piece of land Will actually owns like a proper responsible adult, where it’s not hot and dry like the desert Jesse knows too well, but cold and snowy. To remind himself that he’s here by choice, not stuck at all, and that he could get in his ghetto as fuck truck and go anywhere, if he wanted to. That he’s not underground.
“Nah,” Jesse says after a minute, trying for casual. “Wasn’t that kind of dream.”
Will turns his head to look at Jesse, who’s still facing forward. “No?”
Jesse’s mouth floods again at the memory of the dream, and he swallows, twice, makes sure he’s not going to spew everywhere, before he tries to speak.
“I dreamt about you,” Jesse admits, and pretends he doesn’t notice Will’s wince. He thinks just saying it is easier, because otherwise it’s gonna be weird, and so even though he doesn’t want to, he keeps going. “I dreamt I was - I dreamt I, that I... ate you.”
There’s a long pause where Jesse keeps his gaze forward, giving Will all the privacy he can manage when they’re sitting so close. He’s jealous, for a minute, of Will’s powers, wishing he could understand, just from the tension he feels in the body next to him, what’s going through Will’s head. What he can do to make it better. Or maybe just not worse.
“Oh,” Will says softly, eventually.
And suddenly Jesse’s telling him all of it, doing that - that thing that Mr. White hated, talking and talking without thinking about it, like Mr. White was right and there’s nothing between his brain and his mouth, like the drugs eroded any sense he had.
“You were - I guess it was Hannibal, I don’t fucking know, who cooked - who made the, the dinner.” Jesse’s never met Hannibal, but he’s heard enough about him - even though he’s Will’s least favorite topic, most times - to know where his dream comes from. “It was pretentious, all kinds of shit I don’t think I’ve ever really eaten, just seen on TV, you know? And - fuck, it was good, but then - I looked up and I saw you,” he stops, not certain he won't be sick again as the image of Will - of Will's body, his fucking carcass - floods his mind. He tries to remember that was just a dream dammit and he’s not sure if he’s shaking or if he’s feeling Will shaking, but either way he knows hearing more won’t help either of them.
“And I saw it was you,” he finishes after a moment, wishing he hadn’t ever opened his stupid junky mouth when he hears Will take a shuddering breath beside him, wishing he could go back to the morning he thought they were having, where both of them woke up from the sun and not from memories or nightmares.
Charlie, one of the bigger dogs, picks that minute to wander into the bathroom, and Jesse, swear to god, he could kiss him. When nothing else calms Will down, the dogs do, and Jesse’s just glad to have an excuse to shut up. Charlie’s clearly excited to see his owners on the floor, presumably ready to play. His big tail thumps against the porcelain base of the toilet as he shoves his face into Will’s, and Jesse can smell his gross breath and kinda loves him for doing what he can’t at that moment.
Will barely reacts to Charlie, however, ignoring him except to push him gently away. “I’m sorry,” he tells Jesse, finally.
Jesse whips his head up, turning to face Will, Charlie doing all he can to get in between them. Will’s gaze is locked on his own hand curled in the fur of Charlie’s back, however, and isn’t looking at Jesse. Jesse’s trying to think of a way to be sensitive - to not be a fucking asshole about it - when he tells Will to shut up, that he’s sorry, but Will speaks again before he figures it out.
“I’m sorry I’m rubbing off on you,” Will’s tone is flat, but the white of his knuckles, locked in Charlie’s fur, betray how much this is affecting him and Jesse hates it.
Jesse nudges Will’s shoulder with his own, trying to save the moment and not make it worse, trying to keep either of them from falling downward in that way that both of them do, sometimes. Please not now.
“Yo, I love it when you rub off on me,” he says, his tone purposefully light. Jesse leans over, letting his head fall into the space between Will’s shoulder and his chin, speaking against his collarbone. “And I bet I can make you fucking love it when I eat you,” he says, his voice low.
Will exhales what’s almost a laugh, and Jesse considers that victory enough. Will turns his head, his mouth seeking Jesse’s, but Jesse pulls back quickly.
“Ew, man,” he says, making an exaggeratedly disgusted face. “Let me brush my teeth before you mack on me, don’t be fucking gross.”
Will rolls his eyes, but his face has changed, is open now, his gaze locked on Jesse - and that is a victory, Jesse’s sure. He’s not shutting down or turning inward like he can, and Jesse’s not sure when his nightmares started meaning that both of them were at risk for a meltdown, but figures it was probably when he started dreaming about Will’s personal monster. He can only hope this doesn’t mean Will is gonna start waking up screaming about Todd or Mr. White or something.
Will stands up, suddenly, pushing Charlie aside and out the door so there’s room for him to offer a hand to Jesse. “Come on, it’s still early,” he says, as Jesse accepts the help up. He lets go of his hand quickly, but he smiles, first. “Brush your teeth,” he says, before ushering Charlie back into the bedroom.
Jesse moves to the sink and looks in the mirror for a long moment. He’s pale, which makes the scars on his face stand out more, and his beard’s maybe getting a bit long - he’s kept it since moving out here, worried someone would recognize him, but he thinks it makes him look like a rogue lumberjack. Not like Will’s scruff, which makes him look - as Jesse gets so much glee pointing out to him, at every opportunity - like a male model.
He’s the happiest he’d ever been, with or without nightmares and scars and out of control beards.
He brushes his teeth and flushes away the evidence of his nightmare before making his way back into the bedroom, their bedroom. Will’s already back in bed, laying on his side facing away from Jesse.
“Yo, seriously?” Jesse says. His side of the bed has been taken over, with Charlie and two of his friends - Badger, one of the mutts Jesse named, and Millie, the littlest - reclining comfortably, watching Jesse with their happy dog faces.
Will doesn’t move, his words muffled slightly by his pillow. “They want to cuddle with you,” he says, sounding serious.
Jesse rolls his eyes as he pushes all three dogs gently off the bed - he’d taken a while to warm up to Will’s dogs, mostly since Will had so freaking many of them, and Will still thinks he's hilarious when he tries to force their affection on Jesse, which he does whenever he can.
Once the bed is dog-free, Jesse pulls his shirt off - there’s still puke on his sleeve - and crawls in, under the covers (brown, with gray sheets. Not yellow. Never yellow). Will’s heat, and Jesse admits, probably also the dogs, has the bed warm and cosy, especially compared to the coldness of the air.
“Well, I wanna cuddle with you,” Jesse says, pressing himself against Will’s back, as close as he can. He wants to roll his eyes at himself, at his cheesy talk, but fuck - Will makes him to want to be cheesy, and Jesse’s kinda given up on even fighting it.
Will is slow to react, used to Jesse waking up and wanting his own space. Jesse only presses closer, moving Will’s arm out of the way so he can wrap his own around Will’s chest, pushing his icy feet into the back of Will’s legs.
“Asshole,” he hears as Will starts at the cold but doesn’t pull away, and Jesse smiles against the back of his neck.
His usual nightmares bring back memories of bodies against him, in him, pressing into him while others yell and hoot and smell of beer, treating Jesse like some kind of blowup doll, their’s entirely to hurt, shove, move as they want. Of Kenny sitting on his legs and carving a swastika into his hip, of Todd forcing his fingers into Jesse’s mouth while he rutted into him, talking about that hard-ass Lydia the whole time.
Jesse supposes the only bright side about this new variation of nightmare is that he isn’t scared to be close to Will - on the contrary, he wants to be as close as possible, to remember that he’s here, and Will’s here, and nothing’s happened to Will - no, that’s not right. To remember that no matter what did happen to Will - and to Jesse - it led them here and he’s here now and Will’s here too, with Jesse and safe.
Jesse is mouthing at the back of Will’s neck as he begins tracing a hand down Will’s chest. His feels Will’s firm muscles, warm under his worn t-shirt. He’s bigger than Jesse, as much as Jesse hates to admit it, from cutting and carrying firewood, from working with the motors and machinery all day. His hand runs over Will’s scar, a ridge across his stomach, and Jesse spreads his hand out when he reaches the edge of Will’s shorts —
Will catches his hand before he can get any further, and while most of his blood might be running to Jesse’s dick, he’s not so far gone that he doesn’t pick up on Will’s shaking, though the tremors are slight.
“Are you sure?” he hears Will ask quietly, and Jesse almost rolls his eyes at Will, always so careful with Jesse, even though he’s not the one shaking.
“Well, yeah, I was,” Jesse says, holding Will’s hand against his stomach, against the scar, and rubbing his thumb across the back of it, an unconscious movement. “But your shaking is kinda killing my boner right now.” At just the mention, Will’s shaking harder, and Jesse can feel it wherever he’s up against him. “Are you shaking because you’re actually upset,” he asks, because if there’s one thing Will’s instilled in him during their months together, it’s that asking - not assuming - is best, “or because you’re, like, psychically reading it off me?”
Jesse knows Will hates it when he refers to his empathizing thing like it’s an actual super power, like the X-Men or some shit, and the fact that Will doesn’t comment on this says more than his trembling. Shit.
"I don't like that I've -" Will stops, and only speaks again after a moment of thought. He's obviously trying to hold himself still, his muscles are tense under Jesse where they're not still trembling. "I don’t like the idea of my past compounding the difficulties you have," he says, finally.
Jesse makes a face as he moves, reluctantly letting go of his hold on Will to allow him to roll onto his back, until they’re facing each other.
“My ‘difficulties?’” Jesse echoes. “You sound like you’re explaining my ‘disappointing academic performance’ at a parent-teacher conference." Will opens his mouth - either, Jesse thinks, to remind him that he was a teacher or to clarify that Will is nothing like any high school teacher Jesse might have had, or cooked with - both conversations they’ve had before, and neither of which Jesse is interested in having again, not now.
“Anyway,” Jesse goes on before Will can speak, “Isn’t that what your X power is? Isn’t that, like, what you do to me all the time - leach away my pain with your magic powers, so I feel better and you feel worse?”
Will sighs - they’ve had the X-Men conversation so many times that for a second Jesse is worried he might actually be pushing it - but then smiles slightly, as if despite himself. “Uh, yeah,” he says, his tone soft and all but dripping in sarcasm. “That's exactly how it works. I'm a regular superhero.” By the end, his sarcasm has turned into bitterness and his smile is fading.
Before Will can say anything truly negative about himself, Jesse leans over, bringing his lips to Will's fading smile, just lightly. He's relieved when Will makes a soft noise and opens up for him, welcoming Jesse into the warmth of his mouth. Jesse deepens the kiss eagerly, leaning over further until he's half on top of Will, reminding himself again that Will is fine and whole and with him, and wanting to remind Will of the same.
After a moment, Jesse pulls back slightly, keeping his face against Will’s and pressing into him again. “Look, since you seem intent on turning this into some kind of Hallmark fucking moment or whatever,” he says, his lips moving against Will’s cheek, “you - you make my present better, okay? So like - fuck the past, man. Or fuck nightmares, or whatever.”
The last word is barely out of his mouth before Will is pressing up, kissing him again, turning onto his side so he’s laying against Jesse, and Jesse can feel his dick, already thickening, through both their shorts. Jesse smiles into Will’s mouth - Will likes Jesse’s swearing, his coarse language, and although Jesse never met Hannibal, he’s googled videos of him enough to figure out that Hannibal was unlikely to have ever used contractions when he was in bed with Will, forget any actual curse words. He kinda likes that Will gets so obviously excited at the reminder that he’s not with Hannibal, but with Jesse - and his foul vocabulary, apparently.
Will is pushing against Jesse’s shoulder, manhandling him onto his back so he can start to climb on top of him, and Jesse breaks the kiss, leaning back onto the pillow behind him. “Now, can we please get these dogs out of the room? I want to fuck you and I don’t like it when that little bitch one looks at me during.”
Will laughs - laughs - and separates from Jesse only enough to grab one of the dogs' toys from his bedside table, throwing it out the door and kicking it closed when the dogs - well most of them - follow the toy gamely into the hallway.
Jesse smiles before Will is back on his mouth, licking into it, and Jesse lets him for a long moment before he moves, pushing at Will until he gets the message and flips over, letting Jesse crawl over him, straddle his hips.
“Now,” Jesse says, breathless, pulling back from another long kiss. He begins to move down the bed, trailing his hands down Will’s chest, onto his thighs. “I’m gonna suck you, but if you make one comment about me eating you - one! - i’m fucking done, okay?”
Will laughs again as Jesse pulls down his shorts.