State of Grace,
by Olivia/LaPlacesDemon
Warnings: None
1. A kid on the way back from the bathroom walks through North and Jack laughs. North sends him a look, carefully placing the last present under the tree before turning and placing his hands on his hips. "What do you mean by that?" he says. "'Is sad. Child no longer believes."
"Oh, i definitely agree, that's sad," Jack affirms. His staff knocks into the tree and a few ornaments freeze up. "But how could you not laugh? The sensation of someone walking through you tickles!"
North's frown gets deeper. "It does not bother you?"
"Uh, not really," Jack says, frowning. "Now come on, don't you have more presents to deliver? Hey, can I pass out the coal?"
"Strange child," North mutters as Jack whoops and leaps up the chimney.
2. Bunny finds Jack in Burgess (of course), lying next to a group of girls making snow angels. Jack's looking at them fondly, smiling while they giggle and whisper secrets into the snow. One girl's hand passes through him and he huffs out a laugh, Bunny notices with a blink.
"Frostbite," Bunny says in way of greeting. Jack sits up, shaking some stray snow off of his shoulders.
"'Sup, bunny?" Jack says. He shoots up, barely disrupting the snow piled around his feet.
"The meetin' started fifteen minutes ago, mate," Bunny says warily. "North sent me ta fetch ya."Hhis eyes keep drifting back to the girl who's reaching through Jack's ankle to grasp her friend's hand.
"oh, that was today?" Jack runs a hand through his hair. Shit, sorry. Sorta caught up bringing joy around here. Y'know, Guardian of Fun and all that." He wrinkles his nose at the title, like he can't believe what he's saying.
Bunny stares at him. "Are ya sure you're okay?"
Jack, nonplussed, says, "...Yeah? I'll see you in five, okay?"
As bunny opens a tunnel to Santoff Claussen, the last thing he sees is Jack waving goodbye to the group. They don't notice.
3. Sandy thinks that Jack being fine and dandy after 300 years of solitude is really freaking creepy. He'll never say anything, of course (he doesn't say much at all), but he always grimaces whenever he sees Jack interacting with someone who has no idea he exists. As arguably the second-least popular Guardian (and the least judgemental one), he knows he can't really say anything. He's caught himself making signs at unbelieving children before.
"Hey Sandy, y'alright?," Jack calls. He's in a snow-castle-building contest with North ("It's way more fun than sand castles, and it's not like i could actually go to a beach that wasn't in, y'know, Antarctica"), but he's stopped temporarily to glance, confused, at the Guardian of Dreams.
The irony is not lost on Sandy, but he just shrugs and signs to Jack, 'Are you alright?'
Jack nods, his hand patting down some loose clumps absentmindedly. North notices Sandy and bursts into a huge grin. "Привет, Sandy. Come to compete?"
Sandy shrugs, pushing away the thoughts of Jack for a later time. He might as well.
+1. "So it doesn't bother you that not many kids can see you?" Tooth asks quickly, sipping her tea and directing her fairies with her fingers. She's sitting in her garden near the waterfall, the mural bright and shockingly pink in the midday sun. Jack is floating around on a chunk of ice in the river near Tooth's feet.
The winter spirit, surprised at the question, flails off his makeshift raft and sinks into the water. He resurfaces a few seconds later, coughing up water that tastes subtly of fluoride and feeling a terrible sense of deja vu. "What?"
tooth frowns in surprise. "We- I mean all of us guardians- were sort of wondering about that. Yes, yes, bogota, I've said this three times already." The fairy near her elbow chirps and zooms off. "Well anyways, it doesn't bother you?"
Jack shrugs. "I guess at first, but now not so much. You get used to people not seeing you or knowing you're there. I just made the best of it."
Tooth's harried expression softens. "They notice you now, Jack." The fairies by her shoulder twitter in agreement.
He flashes her his crooked smile, bubblegum-toothpaste-sweet, and backstrokes over to them. "Yeah, I know." Then suddenly he's frozen her river solid, and he's pelting her and her fairies with snowballs, and Tooth loses her train of thought in exasperation and the sound of his sunny laugh. Maybe being unknown isn't so bad, anyways.
A/N: Hellloooooo. This has been sitting on MyDrive for like, ever and ever, back from the time I used to peruse the rotg-kink meme. It's a response to a prompt in round 2 (I'm not going to even attempt to link here bc hates me). I think in this piece I captured a very mellow Jack, which is good because I can blame his OOC personality on his contentedness when it comes to being ignored. Oooh yes, joys of AU (also see: sassafras!Sandy). I didn't really capture the hyper being suggested in the prompt either; is that okay, you think? Also three-plus-one! It's like a five-plus-one, but it's more hipster because it's not exactly what all the cool kids are doing.
Привет means"hello" in Russian. I think I was inspired by another fanfic for the beach thing. On another note, I'd like to thank you for your response to Hold Your Breath. You guys/gals/etc. are awesome! If you feel like it, please think about reviewing/favoriting/flaming/etc. Thanks all C: