Jack/David, College!AU. Takes place in their junior year, with fun cameos by almost everyone and artistic liberties taken advantage of; title from a poem by e. e. cummings. First fic, please give constructive criticism, as it would make the author very, very happy.
my body when it is with yours
-or,
five times Jack almost slipped
(and one when he totally did)-
1.
It's weird, dating your roommate's sister.
Granted, when David had taken Jack to his house over the summer, he hadn't really expected Sarah to be home. Oh, he knew about Les and Mayer and Esther; he knew about how he would be mothered to death and about morning coffee and newspapers with Mayer and about giving enough piggyback rides to need a chiropractor.
He hadn't known about Sarah. More specifically, he hadn't known about how Sarah Jacobs looked exactly like David.
Because, you see, despite the five girlfriends in two years of college, and the many hook-ups, and the countless times David had come to pick him up drunk from a room he didn't know, Jack thought David was the most beautiful person he knew.
(- except not said like that. Maybe "just too pretty" when he was joking at lunch with Race and Blink and Mush and all them, maybe "goddamn sexy" when he was ridiculously drunk and David pretended that he couldn't hear him over the noise at the bar. Maybe "the one person I'd give up everything in the whole damn world for" in his head. Never beautiful.)
The point – oh yeah, the point – the point is that when Jack met Sarah, she smiled, and that was all it took, really.
And it was fun – kissing in the backyard (and he knew David was in the kitchen), going to the movies for the empty back rows and the dim lights (and he can't help wondering what David would've said about the plot and the acting and whatever else got him riled up), and sneaking into her bedroom at night and locking the door (and ignoring that David's room is right down the hall). It was fun.
He broke up with her in August, the week before they went back; more specifically, they had sat together and decided this wasn't going to work out and she'd smiled and kissed him on the forehead after and then said have fun with Davey, kay?
(He tried to ignore the expression on her face when she said that, just like how he tried to ignore the expression on her face when he sat next to David that night, but he's found that stuff like that never seems to work when it comes to his roommate/best friend/boy of his – )
They get back to college at midnight a week later, and honestly Jack just wants to sleep for the next nine hours, but then David says can we talk?, and he can never say no to David because he has it just that bad.
"So, why did you break up with Sarah?"
Jack stands there, halfway to pulling off his t-shirt, his mind whirling and now gears are spinning and think, think, think. His mouth starts opening and the wrong kinds of words are on his tongue and then –
"It just wasn't going to work out."
2.
It's the monthly Thursday Night Newsies Movie Party Thing, after the newspaper has finally gone to bed, and it seems like the whole staff is crammed into Jack and David's dorm room. Even Spot Conlon from the Brooklyn dorm showed up asking for Racetrack; when Race comes back, he's adjusting his shirt and holding a couple of six-packs.
Halfway through the movie – Jack and David always sit on the one bed, due to room rules and general David-is-the-editor-in-chief-after-all perks; Blink and Mush and Race are crowded on the other; Skits and Snitch and Gabby from Op-Ed and Itey and his girlfriend are all sprawled below, with a couple of other staffers that Jack still doesn't remember the names of mingling in the doorway and getting rid of Spot Conlon's booze – David starts falling asleep.
It's an action movie, so Jack is both surprised and not: surprised because action movies are loud, and with a dozen staffers in their dorm room, even more so; not surprised because David hates action movies with a burning passion that extends into ten-minute rants (and because David has gotten almost no sleep in the last week, and honestly it's a little worrying to see rings around David's eyes, but he wouldn't say so).
However, when David (who had previously been sitting upright with his back on one wall, his legs crossing over Jack's as he sat on the other side of the corner, sometimes watching the movie and sometimes watching Mush and Blink whisper and Race fiddle with his shirt again) started to lean his head back onto Jack's shoulder, started to curl his arms up and clutch at Jack's shirt while he slept, two courses of action presented themselves to Jack. There was the honorable one, where he could get up, lay David down with a blanket, and sit between the beds. Or –
It's so, so easy, the way his arms move around David's torso, his hands clasped somewhere around David's shoulder, letting David, fully asleep, shift against him and put his face on Jack's neck until he can feel the hot breath and thank God that the room is fairly dark and no one is looking in his direction.
The movie ends. Jack watches Itey and his girlfriend stumble out sleepily while Blink and Mush quietly argue over the merits of having hot girls compared to more explosions. David is still asleep, his breath still tickling Jack's neck. No one has looked their way for more than a few seconds.
When everyone has left, he picks David up (really, it isn't fair that Esther kept calling him skinny when David is this light) and sets him down in his own bed. He gets under his own covers, and watches while David's chest rises and falls and rises again until Jack finally falls asleep.
In the morning, David doesn't remember a thing.
3.
When David runs in, breathless with his blue eyes sparkling (it's straight out of a romance novel, and Jack hates his thoughts so, so much), shouting that Pulitzer is trying to cut the journalism program, the staff reacts by sitting in silence. Personally, Jack is pretty sure that he just got punched in the gut, in a metaphorical fashion (and thank you David for reminding him what that word even means). Minutes pass, and David's chest keeps heaving for lack of oxygen, and Jack is trying so hard not to stare at it that his head hurts.
Then: "We should do something."
This comes from Jack; he isn't really aware that he said it aloud until Blink and Race nod their agreement. After that, his mind turns into a machine again, gears crunching and ideas forming and coming out of his mouth so fast that he can't keep up. He tells Blink and Mush to come up with a story idea, make it sing; he tells Gabby from Op-Ed to write something catchy and scathing; he sends Dutchy and Specs to go take photographs and Skittery and Snitch to go interview in some of the other dorms, except for Brooklyn, where he sends Race to go do business with Spot Conlon. Sometimes he hears David interjecting, cutting down some strategy or calmly telling someone to stay put, but mostly, it's just him and his head all the thoughts jumbled around in his brain. At some point he strode over to the whiteboard and started writing hundreds of quotes and messages and slogans, the gears in his head still whirling, until he stops, and finds that everyone is staring at him, an Expo marker in his hand.
Specifically, David is looking at him, his eyes bright, grinning enough to light up a whole damn planet, and Jack can't look away.
At some point, he tells the newsies to scatter and do your jobs, you morons in the nicest way possible, and then it's just him and David. (Scratch that, in his head, it somehow comes down to it always being just him and David.)
David comes up to him, and his eyes are still so damn huge, his grin so damn bright, and it almost physically hurts when he hugs Jack, because Jack wants this so badly and can never really have it.
When David pulls away, his hands are still on Jack, grabbing his arms (and if Jack stands still then nothing will give him away, right?). "I think we can do this. We can do this. Can't we?"
He forces his mind to quiet, forces his mouth shut until he can say something that isn't stupid (like, because you're here or you are so goddamn beautiful when you do this or even I lo-)
"Of course we can. I'm here, aren't I?"
When David punches him in the arm and calls him an egotistical maniac, the relief is overwhelming, and finally Jack is able to look away.
4.
Jack expected the door to slam open, really. He also expected the slam afterwards when it closed, and the stomping over to in front of him, and the feet stopping right by his own. Of course he did. That's why he looked up; he thought he knew what would happen.
It still hurts.
David doesn't look angry, exactly. Instead, he looks like he'd been halfway to crying, only to stop and turn furious instead, The clenched fists are trembling, the jaw is working in attempt to use all of those fancy words to tell Jack exactly how much of an asshole he was (is). Jack's ready to take it, but it doesn't make David's gaze any less painful, doesn't stop Jack from wanting to say something, anything so that David would just hit him and then it'd be over, wouldn't it? Then it'd be over.
"You asshole."
It doesn't work like that, though.
"You lied to me."
Jack nods. He tries to not look, only to find that he can't. David's good at that sort of thing, keeping Jack hanging, never letting him look away.
"Why?"
"Because it – Pulitzer threatened – they'll expel you, Davey."
It was simple, Pulitzer had said. Stop the exposé, or the person who's responsible for its publishing gets expelled. They both had known who he was talking about, whose name was by the tiny letters marking Editor-in-Chief. Jack had to hand it to him – it was a good punishment, a good solution, because Jack would never be able to really live with himself afterwards. So he stopped the publishing, took the CD and stuck it in his backpack and deleted half the files off of the hard drive.
And now, here he is, waiting for David to hate him, waiting for him to pack up and leave like Jack deserves. (At least he got to call him Davey, once.)
David sits on the bed, his breath falling out of him all at once, his hands unclenching and his eyes closing, just for a second. Jack watches the carpet, watches David's Converse scrape floor and hit the bedposts.
"What happens to me, why – why does that even matter to you?"
The answer is so, so easy. Jack doesn't say it.
"So… I guess… I don't know then." David sighs, leaning back until he's all the way lying down. "What the hell do we do?"
The CD is still sitting in Jack's backpack.
5.
It's fitting that as a celebration for their victory, they all get together at Tibby's diner down on 35th and drink too much caffeine and eat too much food and in general make themselves into walking, talking disruptions of the peace. But the newsies are happy, because the paper is saved, and, more importantly, David is saved.
That's what Jack thinks of, anyways, when he can't get David to look at him for more than a few seconds.
Jack isn't – resentful isn't the right word, because that would imply that he feels like he deserves David to look at him, which he definitely doesn't. He just – he's selfish. He wishes David would watch him like he watches David, would need Jack just as much as Jack needs him. He wants to go up to the corner booth where David is standing, talking to Race and Spot and giving his thanks to Brooklyn dorm, and grab David and leave Tibby's and then –
(He doesn't know what happens after that. Only that they leave, and David is happy, and therefore, by extension, Jack is too.)
One time he almost does it. He had a sip of Coke, felt the caffeine jolt him awake, and his feet were almost in motion before he stopped, and sat down, and didn't get up from the table where Blink and Mush sat.
After that, Blink and Mush start to shoot looks at him, almost asking what's wrong, but never quite getting there. Jack ignores them mostly, preferring to watch as their advisors go around smiling and passing out extra credit like handshakes; Medda and Denton are proud of them like that. Then he switches tactics, watches Skittery pull out a bottle from somewhere (he's 21, what does he care?) and Snitch drink half of it, sees Dutchy pull Specs out of the restaurant by his jacket and waits for them to come back with mismatched shirts and coats, watches everyone and everything except for –
His eyes keep coming back to David, and he can't stand up. He can't even say a word.
0.
They both make it home somehow, their Manhattan dorm keys beeping as they let themselves into the lobby. When they reach the elevator and step inside, David leans on Jack a little, tired from stress and papers and everything, and Jack stands there and doesn't move away until the elevator dings open and they walk down the hall.
David stumbles a little over the doorway, and Jack catches his elbow, easy as you please, and he's about to let go when David turns around and looks at him, and someone somewhere is going to strike him down for thinking that David is the sexiest thing on earth (the most beautiful thing on earth).
"You – you didn't ever say why, really." Jack's brain is running way too fast, and he's thinking too much except for not at all really, as it all goes back to David I'm touching David David David.
(You could say Jack has a bit of a one-track mind. He'd agree with you, and tell you that currently that track was on a collision course into some blue eyes that were roughly around shoulder-level.)
"Because," he starts, and pauses, licking his lips; he can still feel the rush of caffeine from Tibby's, and his mind whirls, and then he just doesn't care anymore.
It's almost like his hand is moving of it's own accord, traveling up David's arm to rest on his neck, finding a pulse beneath his thumb; almost like his feet are unattached, simply bringing the rest of Jack with them as he steps forward and is practically chest-to-chest with (your roommate, says some small part of his brain, this is your roommate, your best friend, how can you do this when this is) David.
He hears David's breath catch a little, a sharp intake, the jaw working to say something like Jack, what are you doing, what is this, Jack? That's when he brings his other hand up, running his thumb around David's temple and cheek and under his eyes, and he doesn't know if David knows that his hands are grabbing onto Jack's shirt in the back, fingernails digging into Jack's shoulder blades and Jack could stay here forever, he really could.
He kisses David, and it's so, so easy, even though he doesn't know what comes next –
David kisses him back.