Chapter Text
They get back from the Cape mid-afternoon and decide to order dinner from Rasoi rather than go back out for groceries. Both Eric and Jack have had enough being in the car and enough interacting with other people for one day -- even just fellow shoppers at the Eastside Market. Going down to collect a delivery from Leon at the desk is about what they have left between.
“I can make you a grocery list for tomorrow?” Eric offers, as he’s cleaning out the fridge. In the living room, Jack sits on the couch assembling the Foodler order on his laptop.
“Phew, this milk has gone sour,” Eric emerges from behind the refrigerator door with a dramatic grimace, holding the open milk contain before him. They hadn’t bothered to empty the fridge before their impromptu holiday and apparently not all of the food survived their three-day absence.
“When do you have to leave in the morning? I could go first thing,” Jack offers, opening a new browser tab to Google grocery store hours. “But it looks like none of the stores around here open before eight.”
“Well there’s nothing for it,” Eric affects a long-suffering sigh as he pours the milk down the drain. “You'll just have get me up for a run, and then we can go shopping together before I leave.”
“You want to go running with me.”
“What, you think I can’t keep up?” Eric turns, empty milk carton in hand, and smirks at Jack. He leans back against the counter with his arms crossed, an eloquent eyebrow raised.
“I think someone hasn’t exactly kept up his training over the summer.”
“Yeah, well,” Eric’s smirk turns into a grin. “Let’s just say I had other things on my mind.”
“Uh-huh.”
He shrugs, pushing away from the counter and tossing the milk carton in the recycling before going back to the fridge clean. “Coaches’ll whip me back into shape.”
“Said with the nonchalance of a twenty-year-old. Your body isn’t going to thank you.”
“I can’t believe I’m being lectured about not overdoing it by Jack Zimmermann.”
“I’m lecturing you--” Jack says, finalizing their dinner order, “--about not flinging yourself heedlessly toward the next injury.” He’s been reviewing the order one last time, his mind only half focused on the words they’re tossing back and forth, until the words next injury leave his mouth. That’s when his brain chooses to present him with an all-too-vivid memory of Eric lying motionless and on the ice that final game of his freshman year.
Diminished had been the word that had come unbidden to Jack’s mind at the time. Despite how much the team teases Eric about his slight frame, small is never a word Jack's associated with Eric. Even when he thought his obsessive interest in Eric had to do with Eric being annoying and loud and attention-seeking rather generous and bright and sexy as hell. Eric has a way of making every space he inhabits come alive. Which is why his stillness on the ice had been so terrifying. Why turning to see Eric crumpled and unresponsive, seeing him carried off the ice in a stretcher, seeing him curled up in hospital bed for overnight observation, had sent Jack trembling for a dark and quiet corner where he could shake until the meds kicked in. Because that light and energy he'd come to associate with Eric had been...absent.
Eric must see Jack's expression shift because he's closing the door of the fridge and crossing the room to where Jack sits on the couch, lifting Jack’s laptop out of his lap so he can settle himself -- a familiar and grounding weight -- into Jack’s lap instead.
“Honey,” he says softly. “It’s you I’m worried about.”
Jack, unsure of how to respond to that, just looks down to where Eric’s interlacing their fingers on his lap and shrugs. He’s long accustomed to the denial required to get out on the ice and do what he does, knowing that every game comes with the risk of a career-ending injury.
He just hasn’t had to think about that risk in relation to someone he loves since...well, it’s been awhile. And this is harder than last time because in the Q at least he could imagine flinging himself between Kenny and whatever harm was coming his way.
This season, Eric will be on the ice without him. He won’t be alone, Jack knows that. He knows anyone trying to hurt Bitty will have to get through Ransom and Holster first, Chowder, Nursey, and Dex second, and after all that if Eric needs even a single stitch whomever is responsible will have Lardo to answer...and that will all be before Jack shows up with an excuse not to keep his temper in check.
It’s still...terrifying.
And tomorrow morning, with Eric off to Samwell so he can help Ransom and Holster and Lardo air out the Haus and get things ready for tadpole orientation, it feels like the semester is beginning and Eric will be in jeopardy. It’s suddenly freaking Jack out, a little bit.
He squeezes Eric's hands and shakes his head, unable to put into words what he wants to say. Eric looks at him narrowly but lets it go for the moment.
Jack can feel the incipient panic lodged in his chest but fights is, and thinks he's tamped it down until after dinner when they're in the kitchen putting away leftovers and he's thinking about what he'll do tomorrow when Eric is up at Samwell. It's at that moment his traitorous brain decides to present him with a scenario in which Eric is involved in a car accident on the way to Samwell and no one knows to call him or...
He puts down the remains of the naan he’d been wrapping in tinfoil and leans over the counter to concentrate on his breathing.
“Jack?” Eric’s voice sounds a little distant in his ears, and he realizes that Eric’s asked him a question -- or responded to a question he’s asked? -- and Jack has missed it. He can feel his breathing is too shallow and forces himself to count to five as he sucks the air into his lungs and then from five back to one as he lets it out again.
“I’m okay,” he says, “I’m okay,” blinking his eyes open as Eric puts a hand on his chest in concern. He turns to look at Eric’s worried face at his shoulder. “I’m just --” he pauses, reaching for the right words. Anything he says about Eric’s vulnerability makes it sound like he doesn’t trust Eric can stand up for himself which he knows Eric has the strength and tenacity to do.
“It’s hard, thinking about…how much you’ll be away during the semester,” he settles for which sounds toothless but at least it doesn’t sound like he thinks Eric’s made of glass. “It’s...I didn’t expect to get used to this --” he gestures between the two of them “--so quickly.” The motion of his hand takes in their proximity, the remains of dinner, the apartment that he’d organized to accommodate Eric’s presence. The apartment that has already filled so readily with Eric that when he’s sleeping away more nights than he’s here Jack is afraid he won’t actually be able to sleep as deeply or as long as he does when Eric’s heat-seeking form is pressed to his side, his back, his front, everywhere and anywhere. Reminding him even in sleep that he’s no longer quite so alone.
Eric hitches himself up on the counter top next to where Jack has gone back to fumbling with the tinfoil. “We’ll make it work,” he offers, a statement with an almost imperceptible lift at the end that turns it into a question.
Jack puts the wrapped naan in the fridge, takes the plastic containers of saag and malai kofta Eric hands him from the counter and slides those in as well. Closing the fridge he turns back to stand in front of Eric who spreads his thighs in their worn flannel pajama pants to accommodate him.
Jack lets his mouth turn up in a smile at the welcome, pushing his hips forward and curling his hands around the jut of Eric’s hips.
“Mmm,” Eric murmurs appreciatively, “I like this.” Sitting on the counter top he’s roughly the same height as Jack, able to kiss him without standing on tiptoe and without Jack leaning down to meet him. Jack closes his eyes and parts his lips just enough to allow Eric access as he presses kisses along Jack’s jaw, against the corner of his mouth, tugs at Jack’s bottom lip with his teeth.
Jack mirrors his movements in silent synchrony, a wordless orchestration of bodies that’s becoming as familiar as skating with Bitty on the ice.
Eventually, Eric pulls back. “Did you hear me earlier?” he asks, his head bumping into the cupboard door as he tries to put enough distance between himself and Jack so that his eyes can focus. “I’m meeting Ransom and Holster at ten. I mean, that’s when they’re gonna be shooting to make it to the Haus with their IDs activated and all. It’s not an exact science. Anyway, Rans and Holster and Lardo are the ones with the elaborate hazing rituals to plan. I think they just invited me because I promised them pie,” he winks at Jack. "I have to make sure Betsy II is still in working order after a summer of neglect."
“We’ll get you on the road by nine,” Jack says, “that should give you enough time, if you stay off 95 and stick to the local routes.” He has a feeling he’ll be learning all the local routes this year.
They’d talked, vaguely, back in July about coordinating schedules. About how often they could see each other. About how wonderful it is the technology exists to allow them to remain in near-constant contact when Jack’s game schedule and Eric’s Samwell obligations keep them apart for weeks at a time. They had been extremely adult about it, and rational, and Jack is certain now that the entire approach is bullshit and needs to be scrapped because he’s not going to survive without a regular infusion of this, of the way Eric’s hands feel pushing eagerly up under his t-shirt and the way Eric’s sweat tastes in his mouth, the way Eric’s breath catches against Jack’s lips when Jack reaches between them and awkwardly presses in, rubbing the back of his hand against Eric’s groin.
Eric arches into him, hips pushing forward, legs spreading wider, so he’s sliding off the edge of the counter top to press himself as close as he can against Jack’s belly.
“Crisse,” Jack mutters, pushing forward in turn to meet him. “This okay?”
“Please?” Eric makes the word a question in turn so Jack answers it with a nod.
“Yeah,” he says, and then because Eric seems to like it when he talks French in bed, “Ouais.” Shaping the words with his lips and tongue against the shell of Eric’s ear. “Amène-moi au lit et baise-moi, s'il vous plaît,”
“Oh my God that’s unfair, you’re cheating!” Eric says, breathlessly, half laughing, as Jack pulls him off the counter and then gives him a little push toward the bedroom.
“How is that cheating if I know you like it?” Jack asks, half teasing, half serious.
Eric, flushed, just shakes his head as he lets Jack steer him across the floor, toward the bed, pull his t-shirt up over his head, and tug the ties of his pajama pants loose before shoving those down as well. He doesn't stop until every inch of Eric’s skin exposed and inviting beneath Jack’s palms.
“I don’t know -- it’s not -- it’s just … indecent. Somehow. I feel indecent.” Eric’s blushing a hectic mottled pink across his cheeks and down toward his chest now, Jack can see it even in the mellow light of the bedside lamp as he flicks it on. But as he looks, Eric forces his eyes up to meet Jack's and Jack knows he doesn't mean indecent bad. He steps back, clearing his throat, and strips his own shirt and pajama pants off (fair’s fair) before crawling onto the bed and reaching out to draw Eric down after.
“Hmmm,” Jack pretends to reflect on the indecency of what they’re doing, letting his brow gather into a frown and his lips purse in thought. “Well, as long as you aren’t indecent for anyone except me,” he says with a grin, leaning down to capture one of Eric’s nipples lightly in his teeth.
Eric draws in a sharp breath in surprise, but arches up on the bed underneath Jack’s lips and teeth and tongue, urging him on to greater contact. Jack has learned in the -- Jesus, it’s only been, what, less than two weeks they’ve been physically together? -- he’s learned this summer that once Eric decides he wants, he’s all in. He's greedy and demanding and...wanton stretched out naked on the bed under Jack’s gaze. Tonight, Jack lets himself look at Eric, kneeling between Eric’s legs, eyes lingering on Eric’s dick curving full and heavy against his belly, as shameless as the rest of him. He kneels forward, pushing a hand up Eric’s thigh as he goes, up over the curve of Eric’s erection, closing his fingers around it and tugging, smoothing, pushing up with his thumb and feeling the silky foreskin move under his fingers.
Eric makes small, approving noises, asking for more with a lift of his hips, fingers fisted in the sheets, neck stretched and head thrown back against the pillows as he leans into the building tension. Jack sees his nostrils flare and thinks it may be one of the sexiest non-sounds of pleasure Eric displays.
He pushes himself up and drops to the mattress along Eric’s right flank so he can press himself, rocking, against Eric’s hip while he keeps his hand moving: smooth, squeeze, dip down, back up, pulling just a little harder, then a little more.
“Là, tu es là...” Jack murmurs against Eric’s cheek as Eric pushes himself up into Jack’s palm. “Je t'aime, je t'aime tellement,” and he knows Eric doesn’t understand what he’s saying but it doesn’t matter because it’s nothing he hasn’t said before, said already too many times to remember. “You gonna come for me?” he whispers, and then Eric is doing just that. He’s twisting up and toward Jack, letting Jack pull the orgasm out of him until he’s fumbling between them, laughing, shaking slightly, slurring his words as he grabs Jack’s wrist like a vise stop stop stop and don't go don't go don't go all at once. “Good, it’s good, just -- just too much -- too much --” he’s trying to say as their fingers tangle together, slippery, and Jack let’s go, reaching up to trace damp fingers down Eric’s trembling arms, soothing. Shh, he’s whispering, shh. It’s okay, I’ve got you. You’re good.
“Very good,” Eric mumbles, with a drunken-sounding giggle as he presses a suddenly-sweaty forehead against Jack’s temple.
Jack turns his head to brush a clumsy kiss to Eric’s forehead, and then another. He lets himself rock gently against Eric’s, the pressure and fiction not enough but enough for now.
“Mmm. Impatient,” Eric murmurs, rocking uncoordinated hips back toward him in response. Jack tries to pull back, apologetically, but Eric throws a heavy arm over his ribs. “Nope -- no going anywhere mis-ter,” he instructs, making the honorfic into two distinct syllables. “Like it that you want me.”
“Oh,” is all Jack can muster in response. “Thanks good.” It’s stupid and inadequate to his own ears, but Eric must know what he means all the same. Because he hums in satisfaction and wriggles in closer to finish what he started.