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He had this...thing about him.
Mark couldn't really describe it all that well, but Jack had this...thing. Whenever he lied, his right thumb would curl into a fist underneath his fingers.
It was a subtle thing that honestly he didn't notice at first.
But the first time he picked it up, was over something simple.
He'd come home that night looking for his package of gum, knowing he'd had at least three pieces left of it when he asked his crazy, home-body roommate if he'd eaten it.
Jack scoffed, said no, and returned to watching the movie on the television screen.
But his thumb curled into his hand and later, Jack confessed to having eaten it.
It fell into place after a while.
~~
He had a feeling it was unconscious.
It wasn't like Jack wanted him to know he was lying. That was the whole point of lying, wasn't it? So people didn't know?
The second time it happened, it was something a bit larger. A quick, late-night spat that was resolved by morning. But both of them were supremely tired, and Jack got really cranky without coffee. One thing led to another, and Jack hissed, “I wish you'd just shut up, you know that? I hate listening to you talk.”
Mark hadn't realized until later, and after they'd made up, that Jack's thumb curled into his fist when he said it.
~~
He began to call him out on it, eventually.
Mark never mentioned his little habit. But he started calling him out on his bullshit, and Jack cracked extremely easy once Mark challenged him.
“Did you take out the trash?”
“Yes.”
Curl.
“No, you didn't.”
Then, he would sigh, and go do said chore, mumbling something under his breath that Mark knew was in good nature but nevertheless was rude as fuck.
It was kind of a shitty thing to do, but he started using it to his advantage. At first, things like shared house chores—did you do this, did you do that, so on and so forth. But it turned into more elaborate things like, do you plan on moving out soon? Do you like anyone right now?
The last one was more self-serving. It had been no secret to him for a while of his overwhelmingly unbearable feelings for his roommate, and at that question, Jack had gotten really flustered and said no.
But the curl in his finger told Mark what he needed to know.
Then Felix came along, and Mark was crushed.
Jack talked about the man excessively. Mark wrote it off as just a schoolboy crush, or Jack had just found a new playmate, but the way that his eyes lit up whenever he talked about him was painfully obvious.
He had feelings for him.
So one day, Mark asked, “Do you like Felix?”
“No?” Jack answered. “Why?”
No flustered face. No stuttering. No curled thumb.
~~
Their first real fight was saved from disaster only because of the weird little tic.
Mark couldn't really remember what the fight was about. It had something to do with stress and pent-up frustration and Mark's insanity of wondering who it was Jack liked and who he could hear making songs for in the middle of the night (because their walls were, unfortunately, not soundproof).
But screaming had ensued. Jack had a wild temper, and it had been the first time Mark had ever truly seen Jack angry. Mark had said a lot of things he wasn't proud of, and has since apologized for, but at the time, he couldn't stop spewing them off.
Almost a hit. Jack was so angry, Mark thought he might actually hit him. But it didn't. The rage stayed contained in his smaller frame, and he seethed, “I hate you so fucking much.”
Then, just briefly, his thumb curled into his fist, and that was all the incentive Mark needed to challenge him, all of his anger flushing out of him in an instant, as he said, “No, you don't.”
That night was the first night they kissed.
~~
All good things must end.
Mark learned that the hard way.
Breakups were always rough. They'd lasted a few months before Jack, inundated with work and his life and the overlap of family and friends, severed the relationship because it was the most recent, the most fresh, and the thing that would hurt the least in ripping off. Mark tried to understand his decision but god, it killed him.
But Jack didn't move out for a while. So Mark had to be around him every day, unable to touch or to kiss him silly in the hallway or so much as brush his hand without Jack jerking away from him. It was torture, and it about ruined him. It ruined him so badly that one day, with a quiet calm he didn't know he possessed any longer, he said, “You need to leave.”
Jack said nothing, but only nodded.
~~
It was not quite the tearful goodbye at airports, but it was something close to it.
Him and Jack had made so many memories in the apartment together, and watching Jack box up his stuff, tucking it away for when he managed to find someplace new broke his heart. A suitcase was by the door, full of overnight clothes and other necessities, as Jack mentioned he was going to stay with Felix for the time being.
If someone had told Mark that he would be here, nearly a year later, he would have laughed at them. Because never could he have expected to have such shitty luck.
Jack swallowed, resting his hand on the doorknob. He stalled.
“Jack?”
He turned.
The words left him before he could think about them.
“Do you love me?”
And then. And then. The quiet overtook them. In the silence of the house, Jack whispered. “Not anymore.”
It was a slap to the face. A stab to the chest. The breaking of each individual bone in his body. He sucked in a breath.
But involuntarily, it happened.
Jack's thumb curled ever so slightly into the fist he was making.
Mark breathed out, “Yes, you do.”