Work Text:
“Are you sure you don’t want one of these? They’re good.”
Robby sinks as much bitchy distaste as he can into his single, “No.”
“I’ll convert you one of these days,” Jack says, completely impervious to Robby’s face, letting the screen door to the patio slam behind him.
“I don’t need to be converted, I’m perfectly happy with this lager.”
“Everyone’s an IPA hater these days. I’m secure in my masculinity and allow myself nice things. Move over, you big lug.”
Robby reluctantly slides three inches to the right on the wooden bench. Jack collapses next to him, also completely impervious to Robby being a massive grouch.
It’s become Robby’s favorite time of year - late july, early august, when the sun has baked itself into every stone, brick, and pavement slab in Pittsburgh and the evenings last forever. The sun will creep slowly across the horizon as Robby invades Jack’s home and complains about his beer, while they argue about what music to play as they exist, calmly, on this patio together.
“Here, put your leg up.”
“Just shove the pillow under- yeah, thanks.”
He drinks beer at Jack’s house year round, of course. There’s spring beer and early summer beer, fall beer and winter beer. But these are Robby’s favourites.
There’s something about the orange blaze in the sky that allows for all kinds of topics, all kinds of painful or lighthearted conversations. They’ve cried out here, both of them. They’ve laughed, and they’ve argued. They toasted the dead and cursed out the living, and sat in complete and comfortable silence for hours.
Tonight, Jack’s relaxed and comfortable, the set of his shoulders a lazy slope. His fingers are a little busy though, curling around the bottle of his highbrow microbrew, nails catching on the edge of the label a little. Robby watches him work those cogs quietly. Jack is a man of action, but only once he’s decided on a course of one, and that can take anywhere from 0.03 seconds to a full calendar month.
“Something particular on your mind, brother?”
The offer is one they make each other often, no strings, no demands, no hard feelings if it’s not taken up on.
The corner of Jack’s mouth twitches a little, a half-grin.
“Yeah,” he says, after a little while, squinting directly into the setting sun. “Yeah, I got something. There’s a phrase the kids on nights taught me, don’t know if you know it.”
Robby wracks his brain for the most obscure term he’s ever heard from the new kids on rotation.
“…based?”
“What? No. What’s based?”
“No idea. What’s yours?”
“It’s called shooting your shot.”
“That’s.. Jack, everyone says that. That’s been around for a long time.”
Jack shoots him a look of betrayal and disbelief.
“You have no idea what it means.”
“It’s the concept that we’ve been re-inventing since before current events. Carpe Diem. That's Horace's shit. Nothing new under the sun.”
“And yet you didn’t get that one tattooed.”
“Mmh. Too cynical,” Robby says, gesturing to his whole self.
“Well, Carpe Diem is a simplification. Shooting your shot pertains to specific situations.”
“Alright, Dr Abbot. I’m listening.”
“It’s specifically about making a bold move for something or someone out of your league.”
“Okay.”
“And it’s usually romantic.”
Robby feels his eyebrows do someting a little complicated. He takes a sip of his lager to hide it.
“So you’re thinking about shooting your shot?”
“Yeah.”
Robby nods and smiles a little at Jack’s profile.
“Been a while. If you feel ready to get back out there then that’s great. Who’s, uh- is there someone in particular that you- or is it more of a general-”
“Jesus, Robby, you deal with patients with those social skills?”
The laughter feels good, like it can shake loose the tight thing in Robby’s stomach if he keeps it up.
“Fuck you, I’m trying to be supportive.”
“Please stop, you’ll injure us both.” Jack shakes his head and smiles around the neck of the bottle. “It’s someone in particular,” he says after a sip.
Robby swallows.
“Who?”
Jack looks away from the sun and back at Robby.
“You,” he says. Simple. Soft. That tight space in Robby’s stomach opens suddenly, echoing like a cathedral, all resonance and stained glass window light.
“Oh, yeah?” he manages.
The grin at the corner of Jack’s mouth doesn’t budge.
“I think it’s a pretty solid idea. We fit, Robby.”
Robby can’t disagree. Jack leans forward a little, the same look in his eyes as when he’s suggesting an absolute banana-pants procedure, as when he’s resolutely pretending rules and policy doesn’t exist because getting a kid medical care is more important. Except now the setting sun is bathing him in gold, and he’s gesturing with a bottle of overpriced IPA instead of a scalpel.
“We’ve both got a lot of shit we’re dragging along. We’re dealing with it though, in the best ways we can. Most likely we’ll pick up more shit the further we go in these lives, but we’ll figure out how to deal with that too. The important thing is that we get each other. You know my shit, and I know yours. I don’t scare you, and you don’t scare me.”
Robby nods in solemn agreement, fighting a grin tooth and nail.
“Yes, that would be the basis of the very good friendship we share.”
“Stay with me here, I’m not done. Questions and arguments at the end, please.”
Robby doesn’t trust his voice so he waves magnanimously for Jack to go ahead and then drinks some more beer.
“We’re old and worn.”
“Wow.”
“We are. But we’re not fucking dead, Robby.” His eyes are fire when he glances over at Robby. “We’ve got a lot of life left, and we should be filling it with a little something. With some magic.”
Robby can’t help his eyebrows climbing, nor his blush.
“Some magic? What exactly would that be?”
Jack is a man of action, once he’s set his course. He’s not fearless - Robby is intimately familiar with the many things Jack fears - but he’s astoundingly brave. He twists a little on the bench, pulling his leg up, pressing his knee and stump alongside Robby’s thigh. Fingers that are a little cold and wet from condensation dance up the inside of Robby’s forearm.
“It’s been a while - and Ben often informed me I was very bad at the whole thing - but I do believe the standard operating procedure involves dates, dinners, maybe some movies, that sort of thing. Which in turn might lead to physical intimacy.”
Robby has to drink some more beer, suddenly. When he’s drained his glass he sets it down on the deck, takes a breath, and tangles Jack’s dancing fingers in his own.
“Here’s a question. You might not be at the end, sorry, but I do have a question on this particular topic.”
Jack looks up from where he’d been staring at their linked hands.
“I'll allow it.”
“I’ve never mentioned guys.”
Jack allows himself a slightly arched eyebrow and a half-shrug.
“You didn’t need to.”
“What gave it away?”
“Why? You trying to control how much queer you’re giving off?”
“Fuck you. No, man, I’m just curious.”
Jack strokes his thumb across Robby’s palm, trailing fire in its wake.
“It’s the way you touch me sometimes. Men our age don’t do that. Ever.”
“I grew up with my grandmother. Maybe I just didn’t have enough men around to police my masculinity.”
“Maybe you just really like how my body feels under your hands.”
Robby has to take a deep breath at that, blink a little into the last rays of sun shooting over the horizon.
“When you shoot your shot, you sure don’t fuck around, do you?”
“Never did see a point in half-assing things. Hey.” Jack squeezes his hand until Robby turns back to look at him. “I think we could be something really good, Robby. Something I didn’t think I’d get once, let alone twice. And I know you’ve been hurt in ways I haven’t-”
“Fuck, Jack, I’ve been dumped, you’re a widower-”
“It’s still different. Ben was taken from me. He didn’t choose to leave me because we didn’t work. But I’m asking you trust me here. Don’t spend anymore time thinking about how they hurt you, ‘cause I won’t. Not like that. And I won’t let you hurt me like that either.”
Robby’s stomach, his heart, his entire chest, is cracked wide open, but his throat is suddenly tight, and his eyes are stinging suspiciously. Jack clears his throat a little.
“So. What do you say, brother? Wanna take this show on the road?”
And Robby must be sitting silently for too long - must be projecting hesitation or outright rejection, like he’s trying to let Jack down gently - because Jack gives a small nod. His face doesn’t outright fall, but there’s the slightest hint of tension around his eyes. Robby knows well enough to see it. Someone less versed in Jack’s face would’ve missed it.
“Or we can just forget it,” he says, his grip on Robby’s hand loosening. “Doesn’t have to change anything.”
Robby tightens his grip in response, tugging on Jack’s arm, reeling him in, and damn that feels right.
“If I kiss you,” he asks, leaning in close enough to see Jack’s pupils widen dramatically, “do I have to stop calling you ‘brother’?”
“If you do, I’ll fucking riot.”
Robby’s other hand finds the hinge of Jack’s jaw, and Robby’s mouth finds Jack’s mouth, and Jack’s small moan slides down Robby’s throat, and damn that feels like coming home.
It’s a careful, exploratory kiss, almost a greeting, until suddenly it isn’t. Until suddenly, Jack slips his tongue into Robby’s mouth, and Robby tugs him closer and closer, until Jack climbs into his lap and makes a noise like he’s gonna bury himself in Robby’s mouth and never come back.
“Are we skipping ahead?” Robby gasps between kisses that make his head spin. “This is pretty far down on the SOP list.”
Jack Abbot is a man of action, once he’s set on a course. He buries a hand in Robby’s hair and sets his teeth to Robby’s neck, rumbling like a revving engine.
“We already did all the other shit, Mikey. Take me to bed.”
