I've left this fic way too long, for which I offer this dose of fluff in apology. Also because there's only so much angst a fic can stand before it hides in a corner and cries.
Jack approached flat with a smile on his lips. He'd had places that he'd called 'home' several times in his long life, but it was a rarity for him to experience the feeling which went along with the word. All those years waiting for the Doctor had taught him to shy away from becoming too attached to any one place. Even during his brief marriage, Torchwood kept him away so often it felt cruel to expect Sarah to live in an empty house, waiting for him to come back, so they'd had rooms in her parents' home, instead.
With a wave of nostalgia, Jack concluded that the Tardis was probably his last real 'home'. He smiled at the memories, until reality crashed back down on him. The Tardis stopped being home the instant it labeled him 'wrong' and fled from his presence.
Still, now he had this place. An unpretentious two-bedroom flat on the third floor of an ordinary looking building in an equally unremarkable street. Testament to Ianto's ability to blend into the background. Not, one would think, the sort of setting for the determinedly larger-than-life leader of Torchwood. Yet, as Jack pushed the door open, he could almost feel the very walls extending a welcoming embrace. He shook his head at his own foolishness and ignored the way the faint screech of hinges seemed to whisper a greeting, too.
It was quiet inside, and dark. No sign of Ianto, and the sense of welcome diminished rapidly. It was just a place to live, after all, unless the one who made it home was safely inside the walls with him.
Jack checked his watch. He'd attended an alert before leaving the Hub, but it wasn't late enough that Ianto would have given up waiting for him and gone to bed already. Unless, Jack thought, with an accompanying upsurge of spirits, bed was where Ianto had chosen to wait.
But Ianto wasn't in bed. Ianto wasn't in the shower. Ianto wasn't home. Jack paced around the flat, unable to settle, forbidding himself to go looking for his lover. Reminding himself quite firmly that it was very unlikely that Ianto was in any danger, that even if something had gone wrong, Ianto was quite capable of looking after himself and that Ianto was, furthermore, with Mickey, who would likely take as good care of Ianto as Jack would himself. And Jack was grateful for that, not jealous.
Unfortunately, Jack didn't believe any of it.
Midway through his third restless circuit around the flat it finally occurred to Jack that a simple phone call would either settle his mind or give him an excuse to act. He'd hardly gotten the phone out of his pocket before he was smiling again, if somewhat wryly. Either Ianto knew him way too well or he was simply as efficient in his personal life as he was in everything else - there was a text message waiting.
-XXX-
Ianto padded along the hallway buzzing with a mixture of exhilaration and trepidation. He knew Jack wouldn't have approved of him accompanying Mickey on the alert Gwen called through, but the thought of staying behind hadn't even crossed his mind. He'd quieted his conscience with an uninformative Errand to run, be home soon text to Jack and accompanied Mickey with the sense of years rolling back. He'd felt like a teenager again, sending that text. A teenager pretending to do homework at a mate's place while they smoked stolen cigarettes under a bridge somewhere and scoffed a pack of peppermints before sneaking back home.
The hell with it, though. Ianto reminded himself that he'd done nothing wrong. He'd done his duty, in fact. He was a Torchwood agent, and he'd responded to an alert in the company of another agent. There hadn't even been any heavy lifting involved, which was Jack's latest excuse for keeping Ianto hub-bound. And the creatures they'd collected were probably the least dangerous in the universe. Unless they really were Tribbles, and there were Klingons about. Ianto wasn't even sure Klingons existed. Might have to ask Jack. Only then he'd have to tell Jack where he'd been.
Ianto hesitated at the doorway, twisting his key slowly in the lock, still feeling like that misbehaving teenager creeping home. This was ridiculous. It was Jack on the other side of the door. Jack, the leader of Torchwood, who would surely have frowned on Ianto leaving Mickey to attend an alert alone. All well and good, except that Jack wasn't only his boss anymore, even if they hadn't exactly defined the boundaries yet. Ianto sighed as he pushed the door open. He really didn't want another confrontation. They'd had more than enough of those, lately.
Ianto pushed the door open slowly. A scent far too appetizing to be takeaway wafted from the kitchen and into his nostrils. A smile crept across his face as the tension drained from his muscles. He was home and so was Jack. And Jack was cooking. That was nice. Unexpected, but nice.
Ianto stepped through the doorway and smirked at the sight before him. Jack was in front of the stove, stirring the source of the good smells with a wooden spoon. Quite the picture of domesticity. Ianto bit his tongue to prevent a laugh escaping. The only thing missing was the frilly apron.
"This might well be the sexiest sight I've ever seen," Ianto drawled.
Jack spun to face him. No apron, but there was a tea towel over his shoulder. Nearly as good.
"Wait until you see what I can do with an eggbeater," Jack responded.
Amid mutual laughter they met halfway across the kitchen for a leisurely greeting.
"Pumpkin-flavored Jack, one of my very favorite kinds," Ianto approved, leaning back in for another taste.
Jack detached himself reluctantly and returned to his stirring. "Pumpkin risotto," he corrected. "In the spirit of the ever more futile 'eat more vegetables' campaign." He dipped the spoon into the pot and offered it to Ianto. "Have a taste from the source," he directed.
Ianto tasted, swallowed and went for a rummage in the pantry.
"Pine nuts," he announced, waving a container.
Jack assumed a pose of mock offence. "My efforts not good enough, then?"
"Constructive criticism should be welcomed," Ianto lectured. "And as they say, if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."
Both men were smiling hard enough to crack their faces by now. Childish banter, just what they both needed. Deep and meaningful discussions hovered in both their minds, where they could wait while more important, or at least more pleasant, matters were dealt with.
"If you want nuts in your risotto, pine or otherwise," Jack announced, "you can put 'em in yourself."
Ianto frowned deeply, but his eyes sparkled. The gauntlet had been thrown, and he was more than ready to take on the challenge. "But you're in the way," he complained.
"Ever heard of tackling?" Jack asked throatily.
Ianto pounced. His preferred method of tackling, however, would have seen him sidelined for an entire season.
Ianto pulled away after less than a minute, ending the embrace all too soon, in Jack's opinion. A situation he tried valiantly to address.
"We should eat first," Ianto suggested, somewhat breathlessly. "Or it'll be ruined."
"Let it simmer," Jack growled.
"It's risotto, Jack, not stew," Ianto reminded him. "It'll get gluggy."
"Why'd you start something you weren't gonna finish?" Jack asked, pout much in evidence.
Ianto grinned triumphantly and pointed to the neglected pot on the stove. Pine nuts dotted the surface.
"You might have won that battle," Jack conceded, "but the war isn't over."
Skirmishing continued throughout the meal. Both men were grinning and breathless by the time Ianto began collecting the plates.
"Wash or dry?" he asked.
"Haven't we got a dishwasher?" Jack demanded.
"I'm not going to run it for two plates and one pot, Jack," Ianto said, sounding so scandalized Jack couldn't help but smile.
Ianto dodged a pair of reaching arms and began running water into the sink. Jack watched fondly, wasted a moment wishing they could have more evenings like this, then stepped close enough to wrap himself around the scullery boy. He felt more than saw the slight wince at the pressure against newly-healed ribs, and slid one arm upwards, stopping when he could feel the steady thud beneath his palm.
"You don't have to keep checking," Ianto teased. "I'm sure there'd be other signs if it actually stops beating."
"Avoids the ribs," Jack explained, resting his chin on the younger man's shoulder, which was comfortable – for him at least, and didn't seem to hamper the washing up. "And…"
"And?" Ianto prompted.
"Something I can't remember," Jack admitted, the frustration evident both in his tone and the sudden tension of the body plastered against Ianto's back. "It means something, and I can't remember what. It's driving me crazier than I already am."
Ianto tensed too. This was dangerous territory. A century-and-a-half made for more memories than the human mind could reasonably be expected to retain. Add – or subtract – the two years the Time Agency stole, who-knew-how-much Retcon, not to mention the effect of centuries underground, and gaps in Jack's memory seemed inevitable. Which didn't help Jack in the least, so he'd stopped saying it. And however wistful Ianto felt about the fact that Jack's memories of him would one day go the same way, he'd promised himself never to mention it.
"Don't worry at it," Ianto suggested instead. "It'll come back if it's important."
Jack huffed his annoyance into Ianto's ear, and then found much more interesting things to do with both the ear and his mouth.
"Leave the dishes," he mumbled.
"I was always a fan of air-drying," Ianto agreed, tossing the tea-towel towards the rack, and not caring in the least that it missed.
-XXX-
"Jack?" Ianto asked, in a completely different tone to the one he normally used at this stage of breathlessness.
Jack looked up with glazed eyes. "You've got a question now?"
"Just one," Ianto promised. "Then I swear I'll…ah….concentrate fully on the matter in hand."
Jack dropped back against the pillows. He hadn't imagined it. Ianto's mind wasn't where it should be, which was kind of reassuring. No need to worry that his technique was slipping, after all.
"This evening," Ianto said, gathering the wits scattered by Jack's recent ministrations. "All the playing about…was it because you were trying not to tell me something?"
The scariest thing about that sentence was Jack understood it completely.
"Yep," Jack admitted. Damn the man, could he read minds now? Jack mentally waved farewell to an evening that had begun with so much promise.
Ianto smiled broadly and surprised him again. "Me too."
Jack contemplated it for all of five seconds before deciding that whatever the hell it was Ianto wanted to tell him, it could wait. "Nice to know we're on the same page," Jack said placidly. "Now you said something about concentrating?"
Ianto nodded. "Later then?"
"Later," Jack agreed. "Now where were we?"
Ianto slid back into his arms. "Right here, I think."