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Dirk’s relationship with Jake is sustained on not asking questions and wearing long sleeves.
It’s hot in their office today, cramped and sticky, their ancient fan having creaked out its death rattle almost an hour ago now, leaving them to melt in the low, humid ache of summer afternoon heat. Sweat beads on Jake’s forehead even as he fans himself distractedly with the document he’s reading, and Dirk leans his head out the window to fruitlessly seek cool, fresh, air, his shirt unbuttoned all the way down to where it’s tucked into his pants, cursing himself for being pathetic enough to keep the charade going. It’s not even as if the Consort Kingdom needs ruling- beyond defusing the occasional salamander-iguana conflict that flares up and pretending to understand the intricate web of deception that is the second iteration of the LOHAC Stock Exchange, there isn’t really much for him and Jake to do at their monthly meetings. For Dirk, they’re little more than an excuse for him to see Jake again; Jake’s reasons for attending remain unknown, his best guess being the mixture of obligation and pity Dirk’s always seemed to inspire within him rearing its well-meaning head once more. It’s another thing he’s come to accept will always be there, like the tattoo that marks his right shoulder, and the knowledge that things will never be the way they once were. One of the things he tries not to think about, doesn’t ask questions about. One of the things that lets him be near Jake.
He assumes it’s that same mixture of pity and obligation that keeps Jake’s jacket firmly on his body, even as more sweat crystallizes down the line of his neck, sparkling like drops of ocean water where it clings to his hair. Part of him is thankful for it- Dirk’s not certain what the sight of Jake’s bare, empty shoulder, the confirmation that his presence in Jake’s life has been erased like sandy footprints taken in by the tide, would do to his head. The rest of him, however-
Well.
It’s better that the rest of him doesn’t get a say in the matter.
With long sleeves comes not bringing up the past. Not bringing up the past means he gets civility. Civility means they can be friendly with one another, although never anything that could be called friends.
Friendliness means he gets to see Jake again, to watch him tap his pen against his bottom lip thoughtfully before leaning down to circle something on the paper in front of him. Friendliness means being at the receiving end of one of those painfully bright sunbeam smiles of Jake’s every now and then, means a cheerful clap on the back when he offers a particularly useful thought, a lingering touch that leaves his chest warm and his skin tingling. Friendliness means things are better than when they first broke up, when each of them moved in circles as though sizing the other up for a fight, when Jake cringed with each accidental brush of skin on skin and Dirk felt as though he was breathing thick, noxious smoke if he looked at him for too long.
Friendliness isn’t perfect, but it’s… Better. It’s fine.
It’s the best he’s ever going to get.
Or so he thinks, until Jake, wrapped up in whatever document it is that he’s reading, absentmindedly shrugs his jacket off and lets it drop onto the floor, and Dirk catches sight of that same stupid, goofy, face still grinning at him from where he’d drawn it almost ten years ago.
“You kept it.” He blurts hoarsely, before he can stop himself, and the way Jake startles and claps his hand over his shoulder makes him feel like a mosquito trapped in amber, time slowing to a freeze-frame of the instant his heart ceased to beat.
“Oh! Uh. Yeah. Apologies. Gadzooks, I’d forgotten that was even there.” Jake laughs awkwardly, light and airy, saccharine and empty. “I try to keep it covered up when you’re around, since you probably had yours removed and all. I can put my jacket on if I’ve made you uncomf-”
His voice cuts out as Dirk silently slides his right sleeve all the way up his arm.
“Huh.” Jake says, his tone indecipherable. He leans forward, as though trying to get a better look, as if he can’t quite believe that what he’s seeing is real, and Dirk instinctively leans back in response, catching himself just before he can fall from the window and then instantly regretting not taking the easy out. It’s not like he can die anymore, anyway, as much as he’d like to sometimes. At times like this, especially, as Jake pushes his glasses up his nose, studying him, and Dirk tugs at the collar of his shirt, a bead of sweat rolling down his spine that isn’t entirely due to the stifling heat of the room. The whole situation makes him feel caught somehow, trapped by Jake’s gaze, like a specimen pinned and wriggling under a microscope, ready to be examined. Out of his element, wondering if it really is too late to backflip out the window and run into the woods and hope that Jake’s forgotten it entirely by the time next month rolls around.
“Why didn’t you get rid of it?” Jake asks, after the silence has stretched out, long and thin like pulled sugar, hardening and almost ready to snap.
Because I’m a pathetic loser, Dirk thinks, one that started pining for you when we were fourteen and shows no signs of stopping. “Why didn’t you?” Is how he replies, though, features carefully schooled, voice almost bored, one eyebrow carefully, painstakingly arched.
Jake chews at his lower lip, fingers absentmindedly stroking the skin of his shoulder. “I’m not sure.” He decides after a long moment, and from anyone else Dirk would take it as a cop-out but Jake has never been capable of being anything except horrifyingly sincere, even to Dirk. He stands, then, coming around to lean against the side of the desk closest to Dirk, moving carefully as if trying not to spook a skittish animal. Dirk steps away from the window in an attempt to put distance between himself and the easy way out, shutting it behind himself and meeting Jake’s gaze, hoping the protection of his glasses is enough to keep his face impassive.
“Do you regret our relationship?”
Dirk opens his mouth to respond-
“Don’t turn it around and ask me how I feel. It’s your turn to answer a question.”
-and closes it.
“No.” Dirk grits out eventually, the honesty in his voice feeling rusty and unfamiliar from lack of use. “I mean, I hate how badly I fucked it up, but I don’t regret that it happened.” He swallows, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. “Only the way it ended.”
“I miss it, sometimes.” Jake gets out in a rush, and Dirk watches his fingers flex as he grips the desk behind him. “A lot of the time, actually. I mean, not all of it, obviously. The relationship itself was nothing short of disastrous. But you…” He shakes his head. “I hope you don’t think this is too bold of me to say, but I find myself missing you an awful lot.”
“Yeah.” Dirk agrees, and it’s too much, too real, but he can’t not say it. Not when Jake’s still watching him, so nervous, so genuine, so clearly afraid of being rebuked. “Uh. Same.” He tacks on lamely, but it seems to be enough for Jake, who relaxes, leaning back against the desk.
“I wish we hadn’t been so… Dumb.” Jake sighs, running a hand through his hair. “So much of what went wrong could have been avoided if we’d just… Talked to each other. Really talked, about things that mattered.”
“We were kids. We were too young and scared and stupid to know what to do about our feelings. There’s not much we can do to change that now.” He shifts uncomfortably, feeling oddly cold, despite the sweltering heat that still sticks to his skin. “Sure, it’d be nice to go back and have a do-over, but I kind of feel like we’ve done enough fucking around with time already, with John’s retcon and all.”
For a long moment, the room is silent. Jake rocks slightly against the desk, still watching Dirk with wide, imploring eyes. When he speaks, it’s as slow and quiet as the evening tide.
“Who said we had to go back in time?”
Dirk’s brain feels as though it’s short circuited. “What?”
Jake steps towards him, and in the cramped space of their office the hand he reaches out is almost close enough to touch Dirk’s skin, makes him wish he’d left the window open, or better yet, already jumped. “Jake English.”
“What?” Dirk repeats, hopelessly ineloquent and an octave above his usual speaking voice. Jake’s hand is unwavering, hovering between them like an unsolvable riddle as he looks up at Dirk, eyes kind, always so fucking kind, but with an entirely unfamiliar sturdiness, a resolve that must have grown within him somewhere in the time that Dirk has failed to truly know him.
“My name is Jake English.” He continues. “I’m twenty three years old, I think you’re incredibly handsome, and I very much hope you’re not allergic to cats or opposed to vegetarian food, because I’d like you to come to my house on Friday night for dinner.”
Dirk stares at Jake’s hand until a nervous cough startles him out of his frozen state. “That is. If you’d like to come.” Jake says quietly, and it’s the whispered “Please.” That he tacks onto the end that spurs Dirk to reach out and take it, hoping to God that Jake can’t tell how much he’s sweating.
“Dirk. Dirk Strider.” He manages. “And yeah. I’d like that.” He swallows. “I’d like that a lot.”
Jake breaks out into one of those sunbeam smiles, and later, when he turns off the lights and shuts the door behind him, Dirk has to take a moment to pinch himself before he can let his answering grin spread across his face.
When Jake opens the door to his apartment on Friday night, it’s with a smile and a relieved sigh. “I was afraid you weren’t going to come.” He confesses, stepping aside to let Dirk in, and he doesn’t have the heart to tell him that he very nearly didn’t.
The apartment is small and cozy, freckled with mysterious and official looking Skaianet documents across most flat surfaces and a variety of plants that hang from the ceiling and litter the space underneath Jake’s wide living room window, each with their own name and dramatic backstory that Jake eagerly explains to him as they eat. Dramatis Personae include Lady Dorchester, his delicate maidenhair fern, who is entangled in a sordid lesbian love affair with the dashingly roguish but incessantly prickly cactus growing beside her in spite of the disapproval of her guardian, the matronly Spanish moss that watches over them all from within her hanging terrarium, and her arranged marriage to his stern spiderwort plant, Count von Hochberg. The low table in the living room that they eat at is an island amongst a sea of soft blankets and pillows and bean-bags, lit by the golden fairy lights sprinkled across the wall beside them alongside a flag striped in pink, purple, and blue. A fluffy white cat that Jake informs him is named Pandora winds her way between them before flopping on her side at Dirk’s ankles, yowling indignantly until he yields and provides her with the requisite belly rub, her soft purrs and the gentle smell of jasmine floating through the air filling him with sleepiness and warmth. The apartment is so lovely that it makes him almost feel out of place, an eyesore amongst so many beautiful things, until he catches sight of Jake’s soft smile out of the corner of his eye, genuine and gentle and lighting his heart up as bright and golden as the fairy lights, sparkling and hopeful. Making him feel like maybe, this is a place that he could someday belong.
In return for the meal, surprisingly good considering Jake was behind it, Dirk catches Jake up to speed on the changes in his life that have occured since they last properly spoke. He tells him how he still draws, sometimes, and teaches himself to play the guitar he found in the attic of his house, how he’s practiced it to the point where he’d consider himself almost decent. Less successful have been his attempts to crochet tiny blankets for the grubs under Rose’s stern and terrifying tutelage, having produced about three hole-riddled and useless squares in as many months of learning that could barely keep an ant warm, let alone a growing wriggler. His newfound love of woodwork, however, has produced infinitely better results than his attempts at crocheting- a rocking chair for his own house, a bed frame big enough for three people for Jane, Calliope, and Roxy, and an elaborately carved dining table as a wedding present for Kanaya and Rose.
“I know that I said this in the speech Rose made me give at the reception, but it is beyond crazy that they’re married now.” Dirk says, shaking his head. “I mean, I’m still so happy for them, and I did cry for, like, the entire ceremony. But the concept of us being adults makes my brain collapse in on itself every time I think about it for too long.”
“It’s remarkable, isn’t it?” Jake says, resting his head on his hand, his elbow propped up on the table between them. “How… Grown up we’ve all become.”
“Yeah. Fucked up.” Dirk agrees, “Especially since I don’t think any of us expected to make it past sixteen.” He shrugs, absentmindedly scratching Pandora under her chin. “I think things got easier for all of us after we stopped worrying about who we thought we had to be and just started figuring out who we actually were. What we actually felt and liked and wanted to do instead of what we thought we were expecting each other to do.”
Jake hums thoughtfully, leaning in closer across the table. “Life became a lot better when we collectively came to the realisation that to be quite frank, none of us really give two shits about what we’re all doing as long as we’re happy. We don’t have to try to be what we think everyone wants us to be. We can just… Live, however it is that we want to. Whatever our own happiness looks like.” His eyes flicker to the flag on his wall, and his next words are soft, somewhere in the space between a murmur and a whisper. “We don’t have to be so afraid of ourselves as we once were. Of wanting the things we thought we weren’t allowed to.”
For a moment, feeling stretched out and thick with the weight of the past, the room is silent. Jake takes a breath, his hand curling tight and white-knuckled, gripping the table’s edge, and when he speaks his voice is quiet, as fragile as the delicate spiral of a seashell.
“Are we going to talk about it?”
“Might as well, right?” Dirk responds, even though his natural urge is to deflect, to turn the question around and take the spotlight off himself. It’s that same strange feeling that Jake always seems to bring out in him- of wanting to do better, to be better, even if it means letting his guard down. “That’s what the point of this is. To talk about all the things we were too stupid and scared to get into when we were kids.”
Jake nods, clearly not ready to speak again so soon. Dirk swallows the nerves he can feel curdling in his throat and takes the lead.
“I sort of always felt like I owed it to Roxy.” He begins, his voice awkward and coarse. “You know, with us being the last two people on earth and all. It was our duty to fall in love, get married, repopulate, somehow. It was how it was meant to be, and me not feeling anything romantic for her… It would just be selfish and impractical.” He runs a hand through his hair. “At least, that’s what I thought then, anyway.”
Jake nods encouragingly, chewing on his lower lip, and the understanding in his eyes is enough to steady Dirk, to anchor him against the flood of emotion he can feel rising in his chest. “She was the person I loved more than anything.” He continues. “And since I’m a guy and she’s a girl I thought that had to mean I was in love with her, to care about her as much as I do. Back then, I still thought I had to prove to everyone that I was a guy to make everyone believe that I am one and not just… I don’t know. Faking it to be more like my bro, or whatever.” His hand is shaking now, gripped into a fist, thrumming with nervous energy because this is the thing that it scares him the most to talk about, to even think about. “Because that’s what I thought I had to do for everyone to accept me as a man. Like women. Ignore how I felt. Take responsibility and put aside what I wanted in favour of what needed to be done.”
The room is as still and silent as the glittering void of space, and Dirk feels like he’s hurtling through it, his blood pounding in his ears as Jake watches him, quiet but imploring. “And then you happened to me.” He says, so softly it’s barely audible under the thud of his pulse. “How I felt about you- it wasn’t anything like how I felt about Roxy. I knew as soon as I realised that I couldn’t keep pretending that I.” His nails dig into his palm. “You know. Wasn’t.”
Jake’s eyes widen, his lips opening just enough for a quiet “Oh.” to escape, a whisper falling as softly as a leaf drifting to the ground. “Is that the reason you-”
“Tried to be all stoic about it?” Dirk cuts him off. “Dealt with it in the same way I dealt with everything, by refusing to talk about it or let anyone else talk to me about it so I could pretend it didn’t matter?” Jake nods, and the laugh Dirk gives in response is humourless, bitter and cold. “Yeah. I’m sure I convinced everyone I was just fine with that one. Because nothing says ‘totally secure in my identity’ like pretending it doesn’t exist.”
Dirk’s head swims, thick and foggy. For a moment, Jake seems poised to reach across the divide between them and take Dirk’s hand where it rests on Pandora’s belly as she sleeps, rising and falling as she purrs. A streak of disappointment shoots through Dirk’s chest as his fingers curl, seemingly thinking better of it and retreating to rest in his lap.
“I thought I was safe.”
Dirk jumps, dragging his eyes from Jake’s hands to his eyes, faintly glinting behind his glasses as he watches Dirk’s face. “Whuh?” He responds, clueless and inarticulate, caught off guard as Jake straightens his back, that same, newfound firmness and resolve in his posture as he takes a deep, slightly shuddering, breath, and continues.
“I’d sort of… Well. You know how you know? Even when you’re too young to even really feel anything, not as you do in adulthood, but you know that what you do feel isn’t as it’s supposed to be?”
It amazes Dirk how something can be so vague and yet so jarringly accurate at the same time. “Yeah.” He says, and it comes out as more of a grunt than an actual word. “When you don’t have the words for it yet, but all you know is that there’s the way everyone else is, and that the way you are just… Isn’t it.”
Jake nods, his lower lip caught between his front teeth. “So when I reached a certain age and became inundated with salacious thoughts about bodacious blue babes, I was... Indescribably relieved. I could write off everything that I’d been thinking and feeling before then as childish fancy. As a phase. As meaningless, an adventure that I’d taken myself on before settling into normality. Because if I liked women, I liked women, and that was the end of it. I didn’t have anything to worry about. I could put my feelings on men out of my mind.”
It takes Jake a second before he can continue, his face so vulnerable, so familiar, so young, like they’re sixteen and holding each other for the first time that it makes Dirk ache for the weight of him in his arms again. To brush back his hair and kiss his forehead, to quietly tell him that someday they’ll be okay. “And, well. You know how it goes from there.” Jake continues, sentence broken by a quiet, humourless laugh. “I began a dialogue with a boy from the future, and he made the feelings that I’d thought that I’d finally outrun so overwhelmingly, frighteningly inescapable that I didn’t know what to do with myself.”
When Jake meets Dirk’s eyes again it feels as though a pair of exposed wires in his chest have touched, a spark that sends chills throughout him jumping into his throat. “I couldn’t run from my own feelings, so instead, I ran away from him. I disappeared and stopped responding to him and waited for it all to just go away so I could go back to being normal again.” He finally, mercifully, breaks his gaze, looking down at his hands, and Dirk can breathe again, measured and mechanically calm. “It never worked.” Jake admits. “I never stopped caring about him. All that came of it was loneliness and regret.”
Dirk’s next breath is jagged, stilted, a break in his control rough enough that it makes Jake look up at him again with concern in his eyes. “If it makes you feel any better,” he begins, knowing it’s too emotional, too honest but unable to stop himself regardless, “he never stopped either. And besides, it wasn’t all bad. We grew a lot in the time we weren’t together. The fact that we’re at the point where can even have this conversation is proof of that.”
Jake gives a little laugh, a genuine one this time, soft and joyful. “I’ve been spending a great deal of time talking to Rose, when she has a moment outside of caring for the wrigglers. She’s been remarkably helpful.”
Dirk grimaces. “She tried with me for a minute, but decided that there was a conflict of interest because of me technically being her father and made Kanaya do it instead. The results were… Mixed.”
Jake raises an eyebrow at him. “Well. In any case, you’ve certainly come a long way from where you were when we were sixteen. I’d even go so far as to say you’re well adjusted.”
Dirk snorts. “You still talk like Indiana Jones fucked a cookbook from the forties, but at least it’s about things that matter now.”
“Hush up, you.” Jake giggles, kicking him lightly under the table. Dirk sticks his tongue out at him, feeling younger than he has in years, lighter, more hopeful. Like there could be more for him and Jake than mistakes and miscommunication.
Like maybe someday, he could make Jake as happy as he’s always deserved to be.
Conversation’s lighter, after that, with Dirk explaining the various functions of the table he built Kanaya and Rose, including several secret compartments and a flamethrower hidden in one leg, to an enraptured Jake, and then the two of them washing up the plates together despite Jake’s insistence he’s fine to clean on his own. He’s not really sure what to expect afterwards, when he gives Pandora a parting scratch under her chin and Jake walks him to his door- if they should kiss, or hug, or… High five, or something. He lets Jake take the lead, and gets a brush of fingertips in return as Jake steps in close to unlock the door, looking up at him cautiously from underneath his lashes, as if to ask if it’s okay.
Dirk flounders. “Same time next week?” he manages to get out, and Jake beams at him.
“Certainly! After all, it’s your turn to treat me.” He says, and as Dirk nods and steps past him, he almost misses the quiet “I’ll be looking forward to it.” That Jake murmurs after him.
Dirk rides the high of the elation it brings him right up until he reaches his own front door and realises that he now has to plan a date of his own.
Shit.
He spends entirely too long choosing a movie, especially considering Jake will enjoy literally anything he puts on.
Jake’s coming to his house for this date- it’s only fair, after all, considering he let Dirk into his space the first time. Dirk knows better than to attempt to cook for him, though, considering he’s been living off instant noodles and frozen pizza since birth and Jane’s attempts at teaching him to bake end in fires at best and food poisoning at worst. Maybe a movie date was a little... basic. Played-out, even. But they’d always been one of his favourite ways to spend time with Jake, even at the very beginning, before they’d started dating. When they’d been of an excuse for Dirk to listen to him babble excitedly with some background noise, to watch him leap out of his skin at the most obvious jumpscares, gasp at every heavily-foreshadowed twist and turn, well up in tears when the guy got the girl against all odds, no matter how inevitable it was. Movie dates were easy. Simple. Something that wasn’t too big, or too much, something that wouldn’t scare Jake off or put pressure on either of them. Just comforting, safe, nostalgic, even. Just… Nice.
At least, it would be. If he could fucking decide on something for them to watch.
The tinny, half-dead screech of his broken doorbell makes Dirk say a mental fuck it and slide Sixteen Candles into his DVD player, refusing to let himself worry over if Jake will find the whole set-up classic and retro or outdated and kitschy as he tumbles off his couch in his rush to get the door. Jake greets him by handing him an already microwaved bag of popcorn, long-cold by now but a sweet gesture all the same, and then, after a pause in which he seems to be psyching himself up, stepping closer to give Dirk a hug. It’s a cautious little thing, warm and achingly gentle, so quick that he doesn’t even register it until Jake’s stepping away again, watching him to gauge his reaction. All Dirk can do is grab his wrist, careful and loose enough that Jake could get away if he wanted to, and tug, guiding him into his living room and indicating for him to sit.
Dirk’s house is… Falling apart. There’s no polite way to put it. But he likes it that way, rusted roof and rotting wood and all, slowly being knit back together from the condition he found it in as he finds new things to repair when he’s bored. Something for him to put his time into, to nurse back to health, in a sense. Something to heal with. His living room is semi-organised chaos, a dilapidated galaxy littered with scattered spare parts, crumpled blueprints, crochet needles and wool thrown down in frustration forming a clustered whorl around his well-loved guitar, resting on its stand. The walls are a mess, “decorated” by crude scrawlings courtesy of Dave and Karkat along with frankly adorable scribbles added by Roxy and Calliope, all splattered across an abstract slapdash of colour from Terezi that looks like something Jackson Pollock might have feverishly composed while high as giraffe pussy, left over from times Dirk had allowed them to visit when he’d foolishly left coloured markers within grabbing distance. Jake picks his way across the floor, curling up against the arm of his couch, and pats the seat next to him when Dirk moves to sit in his rocking chair in an aborted attempt to give him some space. Dirk takes it after a precarious second of indecision, careful not to get too close, as if Jake is some kind of easily startled fucking woodland creature he’s trying not to spook. It would almost be funny, how unfamiliar they are with touch, always have been, even more so when they’re learning how to be near each other again, if it wasn’t so sad to think about. If it didn’t come with memories of wide oceans and empty apartments, of missed calls and long silences. If he didn’t ache for it deeply, constantly, miss it in every brush of fingers and whisper of breath. If the ghost of its warmth didn't chase him every time Jake stepped into the room.
Thinking about touch sparks another memory in him, though, a borrowed one that sneaks up on him and knocks a laugh out of his chest. “Did Dave ever tell you about the first time Karkat ever made a move on him?”
“No?” Jake responds, drawing the word out inquisitively.
Dirk grins. “You know the old yawn and stretch trick, right?”
“You mean the move in which one pretends to be yawning-” Jake stretches his arms above his head to mirror his words, and Dirk almost loses track of what he’s saying entirely to the strip of his stomach, soft and lightly dusted with hair, that peeks out where his shirt rises with his movement, “-and then reaches their arm around their date’s shoulder, as if it were falling there as a coinky-dink?”
Holy shit, Dirk thinks, but does not say, as he feels Jake’s arm settle lightly around his shoulders. “Yeah. Well. Apparently, it’s not nearly as common in troll culture, where courtship tends to be a little more blunt than it is in human society. So Karkat pulls it on Dave, thinking he’s being slicker than Spades himself, and that Dave will have no idea what he’s up to.”
Jake gasps, his eyes sparkling with twin lights of horror and glee. “No.” He breathes.
“Oh, yes. And at first Dave is like, he’s fucking with me, right? This has to be some kind of bit. There is absolutely no way anyone would try that seriously, even Karkat. So he plays along.” Dirk leans his head back, rolling it into the crook of Jake’s neck, hears his breath catch as he curls up against him, as relaxed as he can be when the feeling of their bodies pressed together makes his heart feel like it’s about to beat its way out of his chest. “He moves right up close to him. Basically snuggling the guy, expecting him to take the joke and run with it. Only, he doesn’t.”
“What happened next?” Jake asks, and Dirk almost forgets the whole story as Jake’s thumb begins to idly rub little circles where it rests on his bicep.
“Uh. So. Karkat wasn’t expecting it to go so well. He froze. Blushed from here.” Dirk lightly rests his hand at the base of Jake’s neck, skin against skin, and under his fingers, his pulse flutters. “All the way up to his horns. Dave didn’t want to move, so they just sort of stayed like that until the movie ended. After, Karkat shoved him onto the floor, said he needed to go talk to Terezi immediately, and then Dave didn’t see him for another three days.”
There’s a pause, tense, but not uncomfortable, the air thickening with the feeling of fingers on skin, and then Jake tilts his head back and laughs. “Fiddlesticks,” he wheezes, and Dirk grins and shakes his head.
“Yeah, damn. Karkat almost screamed his head off when Dave told me it. The only other time I’ve seen him that embarrassed is when Dave told me about when he tried to convince him trolls didn’t know what kisses were so Dave would demonstrate one to him.”
“Oh, my sweet fuck.” Jake sputters out, slapping his thigh as if desperately clawing for stability, jostling Dirk, who uses the opportunity to lean in closer, grip him tighter, ostensibly for support, riding it out as Jake shudders with laughter. “It sounds as if you see a lot of them, if you’ve managed to get this many stories out of Dave without Karkat murdering the pair of you.” He continues, once he has his breath back, and Dirk shrugs, his fingers curling into a ball where they rest against Jake’s throat.
“Well. Yeah.” He ducks his head, avoiding eye contact. “Dave and I are scheduled for our T shots at the same time, and Karkat usually tags along for moral support. I see them about every 8 weeks or so. We catch up.”
“Oh. Ah!” Jake says, and Dirk watches as he chews on his lower lip, the gears in his brain turning underneath his furrowed brow. “So,” He continues, after a moment, “Are you and Dave, uh, are- Um. Are your cycles synced, or-”
“What? No! Jake.” Dirk cuts him off, fighting the urge to laugh as Jake’s forehead wrinkles in confusion, and the urge to press a kiss to it to smooth it out. “That’s not how it works, like, at all. It’s just that he didn’t start on testosterone until the game was done, and he was nervous about it. So I thought I’d do the brotherly, or fatherly, or whateverly thing and get Roxy to give him his shot at the same time she was giving me mine, so he could see that it’s not really that scary. And now it’s kind of a tradition of ours to get our asses pumped together. Rose comes too, when she can, to help Roxy out. Like it’s the worst family bonding exercise ever.”
“Get your- Oh!” Jake brightens, and then pauses. “Wait, does it really go-”
“Yeah. Right up in the cheek.” Dirk confirms. “I don’t know what to tell you, dude. It’s a big, juicy muscle. More of a wide, flat muscle, in Dave and I’s case, but still. It gets the job done.”
“Well.” Jake nods, slowly. “I suppose that makes sense. I can’t imagine it would be agreeable getting it alone.”
“Yeah, it’s way better to have someone with you, especially the first time. God knows I couldn’t have done it without Roxy there to give it to me. When I tried to do it by myself my fuckin’ hands were shaking so bad that I couldn’t get myself in the thigh. It’s part of why I waited so long to do it, even though I had all the stuff to self administer before we entered the game, from going through my bro’s leftovers and what I could scrounge up when I raided abandoned hospitals I found for medical supplies.” Distantly, he catches the quiet drone of dialogue from the movie, long forgotten, a low buzz he can’t quite tune out. “Well. That, and…”
“And?” Jake prompts, and the way he squeezes his shoulder in gentle encouragement makes Dirk’s heart feel like a bird between a cat’s teeth.
“And… You.” Dirk admits quietly, and the jarring quiet that erupts throughout the room makes him feel as though he’s hurtling through space, the stars a mere blur around him as he plummets.
It throws Jake, makes him lean back, blinking at Dirk through his glasses. “Me?” He echoes, and Dirk gives a tense nod, hands balled into fists on his lap.
“It was stupid. I- I thought I’d have a better chance with you if I didn’t... Change too much about myself. Because you weren’t really too open about the whole liking guys thing, and I thought I’d throw any shot I had with you down the drain if I moved any further with transitioning.” He can’t look at Jake, not now, not without jumping off the couch and running until his legs give out, so instead he locks eyes with his TV, scenes from the movie dancing before his eyes like spinning ghosts. “I thought it would be easier if you saw me as a girl.” He admits in a rush, his voice so horribly small and fragile that it hurts to hear it, to know it’s coming from him. “That I could at least have you like a version of me, an idea of me, even if it wasn’t who I actually was. That I could have you, any way I possibly could, because I was so awfully, completely, pathetically in love with you.” And still am, and probably always will be, Dirk thinks, and barely holds himself back from confessing.
Jakes take a sharp breath and Dirk raises a hand to silence him, composing himself before continuing. “But… Fuck, dude. I couldn’t hold myself back from starting T any longer. I was going fucking crazy without it. And… I knew I couldn’t keep dating you if you were seeing me as something I wasn’t. I had to know.” He swallows roughly, so desperate to get everything he needs to say out. “So I sort of… Went nuts with texting you, when you started dropping off, because it was at the same time that I was getting more masculine looking. My brain started making connections between how I looked and when you’d started avoiding me, and honestly? I still don’t know how real they are. I was so desperate to know that you still felt the same way you did when we started dating, that you hadn’t just been seeing me as some kind of weird, short haired girl the whole time. That I wasn’t another fucked up adventure for you to go on.” His voice cracks, and he squeezes his eyes shut to avoid the face he knows Jake must be making, the one does when he doesn’t know what to say. When he wants to escape. “I had to know if I was losing you because it hadn’t been me you liked all along.”
Holy shit, he is about to cry. He is a grown-ass, twenty three year old man, and he is about to cry in front of God, Jake, and Molly Ringwald, in that order of importance, to finally break under the weight of words left so long unsaid. The little choking noise that escapes him is subtle like a brick through a window, so small and pitiful that he’s beyond certain it’ll trigger the Patented Jake English Coping Mechanism™ of running and hiding and pretending that It, whatever It is, and It is usually Dirk, just isn’t happening. He can feel it in the tensing of Jake’s arm around his shoulders, the jump in his heartbeat, knew it then as unanswered texts and knows it now as the way Jake seems to forget how to breathe. Knows it as a silence. Knows already to brace himself for when Jake leaves.
Except, he doesn’t.
Instead, he takes a deep breath, shaky at first, but steadying as he exhales, settling into the couch. Instead of taking his arm away, he curls it tighter around Dirk’s shoulders, and takes his hand too, for good measure, with the one that isn’t currently tugging him closer against the warmth of his chest. As if anchoring himself, like Dirk’s grounding him, like a lifeline.
Like he’s someone that makes Jake want to stay. To try.
It’s then that Dirk remembers this isn’t the Jake he knew seven years ago. He’s similar, in that he still pisses Dirk off like no one else, still has a smile that makes him feel like he’s drowning, still seems like he wants to give Dirk the best he has, even when he can’t figure out what that is or how to give it.
The difference is, this one isn’t afraid. This one isn’t going anywhere, no matter what.
“Dirk.” His voice is quiet, so quiet that Dirk almost doesn’t realise he’s talking, too distracted as Jake laces their fingers together and pulls him closer. “I never thought of you as a woman. Ever. As long as I’ve loved you, it’s always been you.”
Dirk feels like he’s collapsing, then, imploding upon himself like the encore of an exhausted star. Not ‘when I loved you’, he thinks dazedly, he said it like it’s still going, like he never stopped, and then Jake’s talking again, distracting him before he can chase the thought. “That was what was so frightening to me. It terrified me, to know that I felt so deeply for another man. What that meant for me, about me. And… Well.” He laughs, quietly, like it’s the only alternative to bursting into tears. “You know how it goes from here as well as I. I fled.”
“Oh.” Dirk murmurs, still half-dazed, feeling almost drunk on relief, carbonated and sparkling in his throat. “So it wasn’t…”
“No. Never.” Jake interrupts, firm with conviction. “Just me, stumbling ass-backwards into a pit of my own devising without stopping to think how it might impact you, or making any attempt to tell you how I felt.”
“Fuck.” Dirk chuckles, face half-buried in Jake’s neck where he’s still pulled tight against his body. “Don’t I know about how that one goes.”
There’s a silence, then, but not a tense one, not awful or empty as Dirk had been expecting. Onscreen, Molly Ringwald babbles, and he fails to absorb a single word.
Jake’s the one to break it. “You said Karkat accompanies Dave to get his shot?”
“Yeah.” Dirk nods. “Holds his hand through it. Keeps him calm. It’s sweet.”
Jake shifts nervously, breaking his hold on Dirk just enough that he can get a look at his face, watch him as he chews at his lip. “Um. Would you. I mean. Would it be agreeable if-” He stops short, and Dirk squeezes his hand encouragingly, indicating for him to continue. “If I- I mean, this is only our second date. Second date this time around, anyway. So I’m aware it’s very presumptuous of me, but would you like me to-”
“Jake.” Dirk decides to show mercy. “No matter how we go with dating again, you’ll always be important to me one way or another. It would be an honour if you came with me next time I get my T shot.” He grins at him, and gets a small smile in return. “I truly can’t think of anyone I’d rather have holding my hand while I get a literal assload of hormones pounded into me by the ectobiological mother of my child as our brotherdadson looks on.”
Jake laughs then, quietly. “Will that be our next date, then?”
“No. I’m not due for my shot for another month, and I think I’d like to see you again before then. If that’s okay.”
“More than.” Jake nods. “Same time next week?”
“Absolutely.” Dirk agrees, lightly elbowing him in the stomach. “Don’t think I’m gonna let you skip your turn treating me.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Jake replies, and the sincerity, the tenderness of his voice almost catapults Dirk into the sobbing fit he’s been holding himself back from for what feels like years.
They stay tangled up in one another for the rest of the movie, Jake’s arm around his shoulders, Dirk’s head leant into the crook of his neck.
Neither of them complain.
If anyone had told Dirk ten years ago that Jane, Roxy, and Calliope would open a café together, he would have asked them why the hell they were talking to him and who the fuck Calliope was. If they had told him that he and Jake would be having a double date with them there, he probably would have asked the same questions, but to their unconscious body after having beat them senseless.
Despite everything, he’s here, crammed into a single booth amongst the café’s eclectic mishmash of 1950s diner and 2010s Pinterest aesthetics that shouldn’t work but does, its neon signage, rows of cutesy semicircular leather booths and old-timey jukebox somehow failing to clash with the exposed brick walls, lush hanging garden, and artsy bare lightbulbs that accompany them, the space as warm and inviting as its owners themselves. They’d opened it together after Jane sold Crocker Corp for more money than she knew what to do with and the novelty of being princesses had worn off for Roxy and Calliope, leaving the three of them with little else to do than settle down and build a sleepy, quiet life together. Calliope tends the hanging garden of herbs, vegetables, and mysterious alien fruits that supplies the kitchen’s ingredients, Roxy makes her own blends of tea, and Jane both handles the business side of the café and bakes its signature menu of alien-human fusion cuisine. He and Jake are currently being treated to a blur of the day’s leftovers, which include pancakes dotted with troll fruit, which taste somewhat of blueberries only far spicier, delicate spheres of pastry filled with sparkling cherub stardust, and cupcakes decorated with what Dirk seriously hopes aren’t real candied larvae. He passes on his share to be sure, offering them to Roxy, who takes them gladly. And then proceeds to make him immediately regret his decision by talking around a half-chewed mouthful of them, keeping up a steady stream of conversation with an arm slung around Calliope’s shoulders on one side of her, her legs stretched out across Jane’s lap on the other. The booth, already straining to fit five fully-grown adults, is left with even less space for Dirk and Jake to sit comfortably beside each other from her antics. Dirk shoots her a glare that could end lives, has ended lives, and she responds by smirking at him and stretching out even further, meaning that Jake has to sit half in Dirk’s lap to escape being jabbed in the ribs by her foot, one of Dirk’s arms wrapped around his shoulders, narrowly avoiding being crushed between them.
[timaeusTestified began pestering tipsyGnostic at 6:09]
TT: Stop it.
TG: <|:)
TT: Wipe that smile off your face.
TG: <|:
[timaeusTestified ceased pestering tipsyGnostic at 6:09]
Conversation flows around the table in a tangled, criss-crossed weave between the five of them, Jake and Roxy swapping phones to coo over each others cats as Jane fruitlessly attempts to explain the simplest fundamentals of baking to Dirk, growing increasingly more frazzled with each sentence. Calliope chimes in to either conversation as it suits her, mostly content to watch her girlfriends’ antics, a fond grin tingeing her mouth when she catches Dirk’s eye. It almost reminds Dirk of when they’d first entered the game, of the nights spent lying on the floor of what was left of Jane’s house, eating microwaved frozen pizza and catching each other up to speed on their new powers between rounds of card games played with Jane’s comically oversized deck that took two hands to hold. When being with other people was still so exciting and new, so golden and safe and warm- until Jake would kiss his cheek, or Dirk would wrap an arm around his shoulders, and then Roxy would flinch and Jane would grip the arms of her chair with white knuckles and the spell would break, leaving him guilty and cold and too ashamed to touch. Leaving him with the quiet whisper that teased at the corner of his every thought, parading itself as the ultimate truth- that he was never meant for a life where he was loved by others, and it could never really, honestly be his.
And yet, somehow, mysteriously, unbelievably: here he is. Still sitting, talking, laughing, with some of his favourite people in the world, but different to how it was before. Still as warm and laughter-filled, but lighter. Kinder. Calmer. Now, Roxy smiles gently as Jane lays out her plans for a new pie recipe, and kisses Calliope’s cheek to catch her off guard, just to hear the little noise of surprise she makes in response. Now, Dirk can barely restrain his laugh when Jane catches Jake leaning his head on Dirk’s shoulder, his eyes shut in an easy, relaxed grin, and gives a comical double-take and thumbs up that is nowhere near as subtle as she thinks it is. It makes his heart feel so oddly tender and warm, so organic and good to know that his friends are doing better, that they’ve healed so much from all of their mistakes, that they’ve rinsed out the stains of yesterday and learned better than to repeat.
It makes him feel, in a hope that doesn’t feel quite so distant, like he could be doing better too.
When the last of the baked goods have disappeared, Roxy pokes Jane lightly in the ribs with her toe, earning a blank stare in response. It’s not until Calliope clears her throat and gives her a pointed look that she quietly exclaims “Oh!” and invites Jake to help her read over some documents she has regarding the sale of the last of her CrockerCorp shares. Jake, lured by the prospect of business jargon and a potential opportunity to have his ass out on intergalactic television yet again, falls easily into her trap, obliviously wandering away behind her, Calliope trailing after him. Leaving Dirk alone with Roxy, who leans across the table towards him, fingers steepled and a sneaky look in her eye.
“So.” She says, eventually. “You and Jake.”
“Yeah.” He responds. “Me and Jake.”
A long silence stretches out between them.
“Roxy, I’m the one that taught you that staying silent gets people to talk. You can’t use my own tactic against me. I know what you’re doing. It’s not going to work.”
Roxy raises an eyebrow at him. “You’re talking, aren’t you?”
Shit.
“Fine.” He grits out. “Yeah. Jake and I have been… Seeing each other again.”
“And why wasn’t I told?”
“Well.” Dirk shrugs, splaying his hands. “He wants to come to my next T shot with me. I figured you’d find out if we made it until then, until he sprung a double date on me.”
This time, both of Roxy’s eyebrows go up. “You talked to him about your T shot?”
“I talked to him about a lot of things, Rox. The stuff we should’ve talked about when we were kids. It’s been… Good.” He laughs, short and disbelieving. “Things have been really fucking good with him and I, Roxy. I didn’t even know they could be this good for me, for the both of us. I still don’t even know if I deserve for them to be this good, especially after how badly I fucked it all up last time.”
“First of all, you’ve always deserved the world. Always. Remember that.” It’s so unexpected, so sweet and sincere that his throat tightens up, thick with so much emotion and love for his best friend in the entire world, heart full and warm- until she kicks him in the shin hard enough that he’s certain that it’ll bruise instantly, to remind him that she’s still talking. He scowls at her, and she winks, sticking her tongue out before she continues. “Second of all, I always knew you two would work it out. You’re good together, when you’re not being stupid. You just needed a little more time to cook before you could stop being angsty cavemen to each other, is all.” She shrugs, her eyes distant, warm and wistful. “We all did, really.”
“Uh. Yeah. About that.” Nervously, he rubs a hand across the back of his neck. “Are you sure you and Jane are cool with this? Because if I learned anything from the whole mess when we were sixteen, it’s that our friendship is always going to be more important than anything romantic. If Jake and I are going to get right with each other, we need to get right with you and Jane, too.”
Roxy blinks at him, once, twice, and then tilts her head back, erupting into peals of laughter. “Dirk. Dude,” she manages to get out. “We are like, way more than cool with you and Jake getting together again. We let you have a date at our fucking restaurant. If anything, we were worried you were never going to get your shit together on your own and we’d have to lock you in a closet together, like in that fic Callie wrote when we were younger.”
Dirk feels like he’s just been knocked off the top of a very tall building, and is hitting every possible obstacle on his way down. “Wait- What do you mean, you- Calliope wrote what?”
“Don’t worry about it.” Roxy waves a hand dismissively. “Anyway. Jane and I have always been a million times less emotionally constipated than you and Jake are. Which isn’t really saying a lot, but still. We made our peace with everything that happened. Jane and Jake talked their shit out. We talked out ours. The only reason that we even thought about you guys like that anyway was because we thought we had to, or because it made us feel a little more normal, or because we didn’t know we were allowed to just love you as our best friends and not… Y’know. Flushed.”
Dirk raises an eyebrow at her. “Flushed?”
“I’ve been spending too much time with Callie. Point is. I have Jane, Jane has me, and both of us have a cute alien girlfriend to worry about, too. We have a happiness of our own, Dirk. Even if it isn’t what we expected it would be.” She reaches across the table then, taking his hand in her own and squeezing it gently, tenderly. “And all we want is for you and Jake to have that too.”
All Dirk can do is squeeze back, just once, before the sound of footsteps prompts Roxy to grin at him one last time, letting go of his hand as she sprawls back against her side of the booth. “Did you fix it?” She asks, as the others
file back into the room, and Jake nods.
“Yes. Quite easily, actually. I’m surprised that you asked for my help on it, really, but in any case, I’m glad to be of service.”
Calliope begins gathering plates, and when Dirk stands to help her, Roxy grabs his arm to stop him.
“No. Sit. We need a moment to shittalk you and Jake together.” Calliope winks at him, so he knows Roxy’s joking, and then they’re gone, and Jake’s sliding into the booth across from him, and the record that’s been playing on the jukebox is slowly winding down, leaving them alone in the gentle, dusky quiet of the shop, as warm and lovely as the pink-orange tinge of the setting sun.
“They give you the third degree too?” Dirk asks eventually.
“Well, Jane asked more questions than Calliope did, and I’d describe it as more of a congratulation than an interrogation. Jane says that she’s happy to see I’m open to being flushed with someone again, after everything that happened between her and I.”
Dirk raises an eyebrow. “That’s how she phrased it?”
“Mmm. Understandable, considering how much time she spends with Calliope.”
Dirk nods. “So… You and Jane are cool, then?”
“With one another? Yes. Individually, however, is a work in progress.”Jake pauses, then, looking smaller, sadder, as if cowed by the weight of memory. “I don’t blame her for what occurred.” Jake says, after the silence has grown long, heavy. Dirk nods encouragingly, not pushing, just listening for what Jake so clearly needs to say. “I never did. She was under the Condesce’s influence. She couldn’t have done anything to stop it.” He sighs, quietly. “I spent a long time blaming myself for it- assuming it was some kind of divine punishment for how much trouble I’d caused everyone.”
“That’s bullshit.” Dirk can’t stop himself from interjecting. “You didn’t deserve what happened. No one does.”
Jake nods. “Jane said the same thing, when I told her. That if it had been her, or Roxy, or even you that had ended up in my position, I never would have thought that you had deserved it, no matter what you’d done. That I wasn’t treating myself fairly.”
“She was right.”
Jake hums in agreement, his eyes still mildly murky, as if far away in his thoughts. “After that, I blamed the Condesce, for taking over Jane’s mind, and when that didn’t help I blamed Aranea, and then that whole terrible, awful, God-forsaken game for putting me in that position in the first place- until I realised that all the blaming I was doing wasn’t making me anything other than resentful and miserable.” His fists clench and release, his breathing measured in a way Dirk knows Rose must have pounded into him with breathing exercises, his eyes focused and determined behind his glasses. “I can’t change what happened to me.” He says, finally. “There’s already been an excess of timeline tomfoolery. But what I can do to take control is to understand what I want from the future, and move toward it.”
“And what do you want?” Dirk asks, quietly, cautiously.
Jake pauses. “Shall we take turns?”
“Lightning round?”
A small smile catches his lips. “Absolutely.”
Dirk nods, thinking. “I want… To learn to cook. Eating real food again has reminded me that man truly cannot live off microwaved mac & cheese.” He sighs, exaggeratedly. “Unfortunately.”
Jake chuckles softly. “I think I’d like another cat. Pandora isn’t too lonely currently, seeing as I work from home and all, but,” he ducks his head, then, his cheeks flushing, “I believe that I will hopefully be spending many evenings out of the house in the future.”
Dirk leaves that statement where it sits, refusing to pay attention to his own pulse picking up. “I want to get better at guitar. Maybe start writing songs, or something, if I’m any good at it.”
“I want to hear you play.” Jake confesses, the shyness and sweetness of it making Dirk want to slide across the table and onto his side of the booth, to drag Jake into his lap and kiss him breathless for being so lovely, so annoyingly, stupidly adorable in a way no grown man should be.
“I’d like to play for you.” He says instead, because he’s a coward. Jake smiles goofily, but pauses, taking a second longer to respond than he had previously before he speaks again.
“I think I would like children, some day. Not ectobiological ones, though. Ones I can raise myself, that I could offer a better upbringing than the sort we received.”
It throws Dirk, tosses him into the air like a cresting wave, leaves him floating there, the knowledge that Jake is thinking that far ahead, planning to be around that far ahead, is sharing those plans with him, of all people. “Uh. Yeah. Same.” He croaks out, when his breathless, disbelieving euphoria is inevitably impeded by the realisation the silence his lack of response has brought is starting to get real awkward. “Like, I’d have to adopt them and stuff, but yeah. Kids.” He swallows. “Would be good. Eventually.”
“I’d like to keep seeing you. Like this.” Jake admits in a rush, which is a frankly miraculous statement considering the breathtaking display of ineptitude Dirk just performed. “I really, really like it.” He flushes, delicate spots of pink appearing along his cheeks. “I mean. If you want to keep seeing me as well.”
“Of course I want to keep seeing you.” Dirk says, before he can even think of how to respond. “I’ve liked it just as much as you do, and probably more. Besides.” He shrugs, smirking at Jake. “It’s my turn to treat you next. Wouldn’t be fair if I skipped out.”
Jake’s answering smile is like sunshine and ocean air. “Take me somewhere nice.”
The bar isn’t nice, exactly, not in a conventional sense. But it’s Dirk’s favourite place on what’s left of earth, so he considers it to be close enough.
He found the wreck of it, crawling all over with vines and moss, the door long caved in upon itself leaving a smashed window as its sole point of entry, while exploring the Consort Kingdom, after he’d been allocated co-ownership. It’s his favourite place to go when he needs to be miserable and doesn’t want Terezi breaking in through one of the many holes in his god-awful shack of a home to drag him on an adventure, to sit on a mouldy barstool with his head in his hands and wonder why, when, and how the fuck his life ended up this way. It’s atmospheric, ghostly, and Jake shivers slightly as Dirk slips through the window and offers a gentlemanly hand to help him through after, his fingers cold as he takes it. Wide-eyed, he gazes through the dimly-lit jungle that entangles the last remnants of the bar, crawling up the legs of the raggedy pool table and curling almost protectively around what’s left of the counter. “It’s beautiful,” he says, eventually, glowing under the dim light of the single bulb that hangs from the ceiling like a low-slung moon, and it’s the sunshine of his smile that lets Dirk know he really, truly means it.
The bar’s counter is surprisingly clear, considering the state of the rest of the building, and Dirk hops it easily, leaning against it with his hip cocked in a mockery of seduction, hitting Jake with the most sultry smile he can pull off.
“What’ll it be, handsome?” He coos, drawing out the twang of his accent into a honeyed purr, fluttering his eyelashes as Jake stammers, caught between a blush and a laugh at the performance he’s putting on for him.
“Well now, darlin',” Jake manages to get out, in the worst Southern accent Dirk’s ever had the misfortune of hearing, leaning in close from his own side of the bar, “I was thinkin' I’d buy a drink for the hottest guy in here. Only issue is, I don’t know what he wants.”
Dirk casts a cursory eye throughout the empty bar before sighing exaggeratedly. “Well, sugar, if you don’t know what you wanna get yourself I’m afraid that you need more help than I can give you.”
“I- You- Uh-” Jake’s attempt at an accent disintegrates as Dirk holds his gaze, and when he smirks and winks at him he collapses onto the bar, blushing face hidden in his hands. “You’ve won this round, Strider,” he admits, and Dirk laughs, reaching across the bar to ruffle his hair before cupping his cheek, gently tilting Jake’s head upwards so they’re looking each other in the eye.
“Always will.” He murmurs, and when he turns to examine what’s left of the bar’s stock for anything worth drinking, he hears Jake give a quiet, almost dreamy sigh that makes his heart turn in his chest.
Dirk tries to avoid drinking, considering his family’s history with alcohol, but two beers isn’t going to kill him, just make him a little warmer, a touch more relaxed, a gentle golden glow cast to turn the night hazy and soft at its edges, like an old, faded photograph. Jake, however, gets downright silly, goofy and giggly, neither of them drunk but definitely tipsy. A little more laid-back, less worried that they’ll say or do the wrong thing and bring everything crashing down around them, and certainly looser with touch. Handsy, even. Dirk’s arm keeps winding its way around Jake’s waist without him realising it’s happening, fingers resting possessively against the jut of his hip, and he’s sure Jake doesn’t need to grab his hand, bat a hand gently against his chest while laughing at something he’s said, skim a finger lightly, almost absently, up and down the length of his bicep as he listens to him talk, anywhere near as much as he does.
Not that Dirk’s complaining, of course.
“Have you ever played?” Jake asks, eventually, gesturing towards the pool table with his bottle, his other hand still resting on Dirk’s chest.
“Sorta? I mean, only by myself when I’m here alone.” Dirk shrugs. “You know what? I’m drunk enough to admit it. I was trying to reenact that scene from-”
“-Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff 18, Sweet to Bro Another Day, where-”
“-Yeah, when they outwit the pool hustler by-”
“-Fooling him into-”
“-Sinking the cue ball?” Dirk finishes, raising an eyebrow at Jake.
“Precisely!” He giggles, and Dirk huffs out a laugh, appreciatively squeezing his hip where his hand rests on it.
“Yeah. Well. Didn’t go great. It was sort of hard to play all the parts by myself.”
“There’s only two of us here,” Jake muses, “And we both know how the trick works, so we can’t use it to fool one another, either.”
“Wanna play anyway?” Dirk asks, and then smirks, slyly, teasingly. “On one condition, though.”
“What’s that?” Jake replies, and Dirk leans in, his nose in Jake’s hair, close enough that the quiet breath he exhales makes him shiver, his fingers curling into Dirk’s shirt.
“Don’t cry when I beat you,” Dirk murmurs, and then he pulls away, already missing the warmth of Jake’s body against his as soon as he moves, to find the pool cues, hidden in a dark corner of the bar.
The game, if it can even be called that, is a mess.
Dirk barely knows what he’s doing, and Jake is even worse; it’s not until the third time he’s scraped his cue stick haphazardly across the felt, completely missing any and all balls he should be hitting, that Dirk takes pity on him, draping his arms around his shoulders, chest pressed against his back as he lines up a shot for him and shows him how to position his hands. He’s helping, he insists, even if the congratulatory little squeeze he gives Jake’s hand when he finally sinks a shot isn’t entirely necessary, nor the arm he keeps wrapped around his waist when he’s not busy trying to concentrate. Trying being the operative word, considering Jake isn’t even pretending to be useful, though, dropping kisses like trails of breadcrumbs along the underside of Dirk’s jaw as he leans over him to adjust his grip and skimming a feather-light touch up and down the back of his neck as he tries desperately to focus on actually making his shots. Which is becoming increasingly more difficult, considering how fried his brain is between the alcohol and the constant babble of Jake’s presence, his voice, his touch, which makes it extremely hard to remember why he’s doing anything other than pushing him up against a wall and seeing if his lips are as soft, as plush against his own as he remembers them being, as they are when he feels them on his neck.
“This is cheating,” he whines, almost petulantly, when Jake runs his nails lightly down the length of his back and makes him knock the cue ball right into a pocket, and gets nothing but a chuckle in response.
“How can I be bamboozling you if I don’t even know the rules of the sport?” Jake replies, and when he bends over to retrieve the ball from the pocket Dirk is certain he’s arching his back far more than necessary.
Not that he’s complaining.
Damn.
When they’re down to four balls on the table, one striped, two solid, and the 8 ball, Dirk’s certain victory will be his. He’s a point ahead of Jake, who makes most of his shots on sheer luck, anyway, and there is absolutely no way for him to miss the shot he has set up. Or so he thinks, as he draws back his arm like he’s pulling at the string of a bow, staring down the barrel of his cue, and taking a deep, steadying breath before aiming and-
“I missed the way you touch me.” Jake admits, quietly, just as he begins to push his arm forwards. “There hasn’t been another person that compares to it. I think I’ve always known that I’d come home to it, one way or another.” He continues, and Dirk chokes on air.
The shot only grazes the 8 ball lightly, just on its edge, but the speed which which it’s hit is enough to send it rolling across the table towards a corner.
“That was definitely cheating.” Dirk growls, as Jake steps closer, between him and the table, and both of them watch together as the 8 ball slows wobbles, and then gently falls into the pocket.
“I won.” Jake murmurs, astonished as he turns to stare at Dirk.
“On a technicality.” Dirk complains, crowding him closer to the table’s edge, hands on either side of his hips and a knee between his legs.
“I won.” Jake repeats, dazedly, and before Dirk can open his mouth to complain he grabs the collar of his shirt and drags him down to press their lips together.
Some parts of kissing Jake are familiar.
Dirk knows the way Jake sighs when he cautiously slides his fingers into his hair, his mouth opening soft and pliant as fingernails gently scratch at his scalp, like petting a cat behind the ears. Their glasses still click together awkwardly if they’re not careful, making Jake giggle against his lips before reaching up to adjust them, quiet and earnest and achingly lovely. There’s that same sweetness that Dirk remembers, too, the cautiousness and curiosity, each press of his lips and then tongue and then teeth like he’s asking a question, making sure that it’s okay to continue. It still makes Dirk kiss him back harder in response each time, as if to say yes, more, just don’t stop touching me. It’s the sweetness that makes him light up, urgent and wanting, makes a wildness thrum through him that very few things can ignite. He can feel it growling in his chest as Jake sighs again, his fingers curling into Dirk’s shirt as though he’s trying to anchor himself in the face of a storm, pulling him closer and closer still against his chest. No matter how old he is, how much he’s lived, how much he’s done, Dirk doesn’t think he’ll feel anything like it anywhere else. Not with anyone other than Jake.
But it’s not quite the same as it was, either. There’s an unfamiliarity that is not unwelcome to feeling stubble rub against his jaw, against the palm of his hand as he cups Jake’s face. Jake’s whole body feels more solid, too, more sturdy, and Dirk doesn’t feel quite as worried about holding him a little tighter, knows that he’s tough enough to handle a stronger grip, a harder kiss. It’s not quite as frantic as it had once been, either, when they’d been young and nervous and still treating kissing each other like it was sparring practice, a competition to be won. Kissing Jake had been like an adventure then- with all the newness, excitement, and pure terror that came with the concept, heady and intense and too much, at times, too enormous for either of them to handle. Now it’s softer, slower, albeit still exploratory as he discovers each little change that has occurred within Jake in the time since they last had each other like this. Comforting. Like coming home, in a sense. Like returning to where he belongs.
Human. That’s how kissing Jake feels, had always felt to him. A heartbeat against his own reminding him that it is blood that thrums inside his body, not electricity, that he does have veins and not wires and circuitry, that it’s flesh, not steel, that holds his bones together. Kissing Jake is real, genuine and earnest, like everything else about him. Then, reminders of his mortality had been terrifying.
Now…
Well.
It’s just… Nice. Knowing he’s alive, a human being capable of feeling, of caring, is sweetly, achingly nice.
Fuck, he missed it.
“... Golly,” Jake says when they break apart, and Dirk can’t contain the grin that overtakes his face, lips still tasting like sunshine and pure joy.
“That good, huh?” He asks, and Jake nods, resting his head on Dirk’s chest and looking up at him through his fogged-up glasses as if seeing him for the first time.
“Fiddlesticks.” Jake sighs after a long pause, and then giggles quietly. “Y’know what, Dirk?”
“What, Jake?” He replies.
“Call me a fool, but I think I’d quite like it if you were my boyfriend.”
Dirk laughs softly, hooking his hands underneath Jake’s thighs and lifting him onto the pool table, revelling in the little admiring noise of surprise it earns him in response, Jake’s arms wrapping around his shoulders for support.
“Jake English, you may well be the absolute stupidest bitch I have ever met.” He murmurs, stepping closer, crowding up against him just because he wants to, because he can now, leaning into him just to feel the warmth of his skin. “But I’d be more than happy to call you mine.”
The only reply Jake has to that is to press his lips to Dirk’s and kiss him until his jaw aches and his lungs feel stretched full with happiness and hope.
Dirk doesn’t know whose turn it is by now.
It’s been so many dates now that he’s lost count, his and Jake’s lives all knotted together like two tangled earbuds, so wrapped up in one another that pulling them apart would be unthinkable, thrumming with the same beat. All he knows is that it was Jake that prodded him awake while it was still cool and dark, dragged him out of bed and barely gave him enough time to get dressed and feed Pandora the treats she demands before guiding him up to this cliff’s edge, where the horizon is already beginning to light up, glowing faintly, just tinged softly with gold.
The sky is dappled with pink by now, like expertly applied blush, with darker orange and red at the edge of the ocean as the sun begins to creep into view. Jake has long fallen back asleep, even though this was his idea in the first place, head tucked against Dirk’s chest and hastily prepared mug of coffee wobbling precariously in his hand before Dirk takes pity and grabs it, setting it gently aside. His eyelashes dust the very tops of his cheekbones, his glasses slipping down his nose, the blanket Dirk grabbed on the way out pulled up to his chin, clutched in his fingers, breathing softly in his sleep and nuzzling his face into the side of Dirk’s neck.
Dirk tears his eyes away from him, watching the sun slink into view, and thinks about ink.
He’s not going to get anything tattooed, not yet, and he’s absolutely not going to be the one to suggest it first, not after how things went last time. There’s no rush for it, anyway. They have the rest of eternity ahead of them, after all, and if there’s anything to come after that, he plans to stick with Jake through it, too.
But he’s noticed Jake thinking about it, always so much less subtle about things than he thinks he’s being. Dirk notices the way Jake looks at him in quiet moments, how he traces a spot on the inside of his wrist in a pattern that looks suspiciously like the shape of a crescent moon. The way he likes to run his hand down Dirk’s right arm whenever he wanders around shirtless, which is becoming increasingly more frequent now that he knows he’s allowed to, hasn’t escaped him, either, nor Jake’s offhand comments about how impractical it would be for the two of them to wear rings, considering how much time they spend working with their hands.
No, Dirk still isn’t going to suggest anything, not until Jake makes it clear that he’s ready. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to plan ahead while he can.
He traces along the veins of his wrist with his thumb, feeling the blood pulse beneath the skin, warm and glowing in the faint light of the sky turning blue above him. A little sunshine would be nice, he thinks to himself, and leans down to kiss Jake on the forehead, to wake him up to the brilliance of the new day coming alive around them.
