Chapter Text
Memorial Day dawns hot and humid, with the thermometer outside the Bittles’ kitchen window already reading 77℉ in the shade when Eric stumbles into the kitchen for a bowl of cereal. The parade down Main Street, led by the American Legion band, sets off at nine o’clock sharp followed by the flag raising ceremony in Town Park. Then from ten to four there’s an arts and crafts fair, with face painting and a few local bands playing rotating sets -- clog dancers, a blues band, a man with a banjo who’s been telling stories and singing songs for the under-fives since Eric was under five himself.
Eric’s been enlisted to help his mother at her booth, which means getting up at seven and being ready to leave the house at eight so that all the wares (which they loaded into the Toyota Sienna the night before) can be in place by ten.
“Dicky? Could you run out to the garage and get the blue cooler?” Suzanne asks, from where she’s assembling sandwiches at the kitchen counter. There’ll be food trucks at the fair, a few of which Eric actually wants to try, but he knows from experience that his mother never leaves the house for more than a few hours without enough food to feed an army. (And his teammates wonder where Eric learned how to feed a house full of college athletes…they have clearly not spent enough time with Suzanne Bittle.)
He goes out to the garage and unearths the blue cooler, then fills it with ice from the storage freezer nearly emptied in preparation for this year’s garden harvest. The shelves above the freezer are also nearly cleared of last years’ preserves. He remembers he needs to make sure he gets his mother’s peach salsa recipe before going back to Samwell -- or maybe he can just can up enough while he’s home to last the Haus through to Halloween, at least.
It’s not until they’re halfway through unloading and setting up Suzanne’s tent that Eric realizes that exactly one week ago he was back at the Haus helping Jack choose which tie to wear to graduation.
He fumbles and nearly drops the jewelry display he’s assembling. After a reflexive save he feels his teammates would be proud of, Eric puts the half-built wire framework down on the table and looks around for somewhere private -- anywhere private -- on the bustling public green where he can pull out his phone and call Jack.
He knows Jack is out on an early morning bike ride with his parents today. Some sort of charity event that Bob Zimmermann helped organize, to raise funds for MS research, from Dennis to Wellfleet along the Cape Cod Rail Trail. But it frightens Eric, a little, how he didn’t realize until now that this is their one-week anniversary. He just needs to leave Jack a message, at least, say something.
They’ve been together for seven days and in some ways it feels like it’s been so much longer than that. It feels so easy, so familiar, most of the time that Eric struggles during the day -- when they’re both awake and trading texts and sending photographs and Jack’s voice is there on the other end of the line reassuring Eric that Jack is as excited and shy and wanting as Eric is -- to remember what it felt like before. When he had been certain that Jack was someone Eric would never be able to claim in this way. That Eric would never, ever be able to say “we” and mean him and Jack.
The night before, Jack had phoned just as Eric was beginning to doze off in bed watching an old episode of Chef! on his laptop.
“How was the beer?” Eric asked, sleepily.
“Good,” Jack responded. “It’s nice to be able to drink without worrying that the campus cops are gonna bust the Haus or some tadpole’s mother is gonna blame me for her son’s irresponsible underage drinking.”
“Is that why you never drank at the kegsters?”
There’d been a nearly imperceptible pause. Eric closed his laptop and rolled over on his back to stare at the yellow glow of the streetlights outside on his ceiling, filtered through the swinging shadows of chestnut leaves blowing in the night breeze. He wondered if the fact he can tell the difference between a hesitation and Jack’s usual quiet deliberateness can be put down to his already-‘swawesome boyfriend skills -- or if anyone who’s played with Jack for two years would be able to tell that there’s something he’s deciding.
“You don’t have to--” he began.
“That was part of it,” Jack interrupted. “But I also -- I had some bad experiences when I was younger. Back in the Q. There were rumors, after I overdosed on my meds, that I’d mixed alcohol and party drugs -- all kinds of wild shit.” Eric forced himself to be quiet and still, listening to the tone in Jack’s voice -- sad, a little tight, but determined to share this little shard of himself with Eric. “The truth is actually really boring, Bits. I just had an anxiety disorder that I was really good at hiding. And I was spending most of my time around a bunch of teenagers my own age who didn’t know any better than I did that this wasn’t how it was supposed to feel. And the coaches and host families who were looking out for us -- they’ve actually made some changes since then, my parents pushed them to start mandatory trainings in the league so people know what to look for.”
“That’s good. That’s real good,” Eric murmured, his eyes drifting closed against his best intentions. Jack’s voice is always soothing. Even when Jack is telling him stuff that makes Eric want to kneecap someone with his hockey stick and wrap Jack in his fleeciest fleece blanket and cuddle with him until dawn.
“Yeah, it is. But apart from that, I had a few experiences -- there were times when I drank and -- I ended up doing stuff. Letting people do stuff that seemed like a good idea at the time. Because when you’re a little blurry around the edges it’s harder to come up with a reason why you should say no to someone. Especially when it’s someone you care about impressing?”
“Jack--” Eric had felt his pulse climbing as he remembered standing outside Jack’s bedroom door, the tone in Kent Parson’s voice, the fear and anger in Jack’s. “Jack, did Kent--”
“I wanted … mostly, I wanted to. I wanted him.” Jack had almost turned it into a question. “But he only ever let me when -- when we’d been drinking. So. I came up with excuses to. Or exaggerated how much I’d. And I never knew whether--”
“Oh, honey.” Eric felt his heart breaking. He hated the distance between them. Some detached part of himself observed that probably this should be feeling weird, right now? To be on the phone with his boyfriend listening to said boyfriend remember how much he'd wanted to be with -- but somewhat to his own surprise Eric had realized that he doesn't feel the least bit threatened by Kent Parson. Kent Parson ... Kent Parson had made a note creep into Jack's voice that Eric knows he will do everything in his power to keep from ever returning.
It's not even about whether he and Jack are together (although he never wants that to stop being the case), it's purely about never wanting Kent Parson anywhere near Jack. Ever again.
"I wish I could give you a hug right now.”
“Yeah,” Jack said, his voice a little unsteady, “Yeah, me too.”
“Fuck, this sucks.” Eric laughed, a little unsteadily himself, squeezing the tears from the corners of his eyes with thumb and forefinger. “Not -- God, not you -- not us -- just. I don’t know how I’m gonna make it to August.”
“I’d like to see you before that, too,” Jack offered up, hesitantly. “I don’t -- I don’t know what my training schedule is like yet, but -- maybe I could fly down? Or -- or I could pay for you to fly up to Pawtucket? See my new place? You probably don’t trust me to outfit the kitchen. I--” he cut himself off abruptly, then continued, shyly, “I actually picked the apartment because I thought you might like the kitchen.”
“Jack. You signed that lease back in April. Are you saying--?” Eric was pretty sure his tired brain was scrambling the order of things.
“I know.” Again, Eric heard the verbal shrug. “I can’t -- I wasn’t letting myself -- but looking back, Bits -- I knew a long time before I let myself know, eh?”
Now, this morning, as the Legion band marches around the corner and onto the green, Eric ducks around the corner of the public restrooms, out of sight of his mother’s tent, and pulls up Jack’s contact profile on his phone.
He hesitates for a second or two and then presses “call."
“Hey Bits,” Jack answers on the second ring. Eric can hear Alicia and what is probably Bob’s voice in the background.
“Hey,” he hadn’t really been expecting Jack to answer and for a second he’s caught off guard. “Is -- is this a good time? How’s your ride going?”
“It’s a good time, yeah,” Jack must be stepping away from his parents because Alicia’s voice fades, “-- sure, Mom, I’ll tell him -- Mom says ‘hi’ --” Eric smiles at the long-suffering tone in Jack’s voice. He tries to imagine a future in which his own mother says the same, and like Alicia knows she’s saying hi to Eric’s boyfriend. Not just his teammate and Bob Zimmermann’s son.
“Pit stop,” Jack says. “Mile eighteen. We’ll be at the finish line by eleven, probably. But Papa will want to wait to cheer on the others.”
“I’m helping Mama until the end of the day anyway,” Eric says. “The fair opens in another hour. You can probably hear the parade in the background? They’re just starting the flag-raising hoo-ha.”
“That would be the technical term for it.”
“You betcha.” Eric takes a breath. “Jack.”
“Bitty.”
“It’s our one-week anniversary. I just -- I realized. And I wanted to call you.”
“Crisse.” Jack says softly. “I didn’t --”
“No! No I didn’t -- Please! Don’t feel bad, Jack. I’m not -- I forgot too. I mean, a week, right? It’s stupid even to think of it as a big deal, I just --”
“It’s not stupid,” Jack says, so softly that Eric has to press his free hand over his ear and lean against the white-painted concrete wall of the toilets in order to hear him. Over the loudspeaker across the park the mayor, or someone, is giving a speech and there's a toddler throwing a tantrum in the grass behind him.
“It’s not stupid," Jack repeats firmly. "It just feels -- longer? I can’t believe it’s only been a week.”
Eric laughs, “Right? I still pinch myself every morning when I wake up, just to make sure I’m not dreaming. I can’t believe I’m -- I never thought I’d get the chance, is all. Lord, Jack. I’m so glad you were brave for both of us, yeah?”
“Bitty.” Jack says. “Eric. It wasn’t -- I wasn’t being brave.”
“Yeah.” Damn it. Eric’s gonna start crying again. And then all these people, some of whom probably remember him from high school, are going to remember him as that guy, remember him? who was sobbing on his cell phone in the middle of Town Park on Memorial Day, 2015.
“Yeah, it was pretty brave, Jack. Believe me. I know. So I just. I wanted to call and say I’m glad you did.”