He heard the sound of the front door and closed the laptop, getting up to meet Jack. He found him in the hall, shrugging off his jacket. The motion seemed a little rusty.
"Hey," Boone said.
Jack looked up at him and gave him a weary smile. He hung up his coat and moved towards Boone. "Hey," he responded.
He pulled Boone into a hug which Boone was more than happy to go with. But then Jack didn't pull away. Which was strange because Jack was usually, no, probably, actually, always the one to pull away. Not that he didn't like hugs, he just didn't get soppy all that often and he seemed to view hugs as a little girly when you weren't horizontal. And still he wasn't pulling away. In fact, he leaned his head on Boone's shoulder and sighed deeply.
"You tired?" Boone asked.
"I guess," Jack replied, a little ambiguously.
"I made dinner," Boone said.
Jack pulled away and looked at him. "I'm sorry," he said.
Boone looked confused. "That I made dinner?"
Jack smiled but it was that weary smile again. "That I'm late," he explained. "I was... I guess I got held up."
Boone shrugged. "No problem. You want it now?"
"Sure."
They went through to the kitchen and Boone portioned out the spaghetti bolognese he'd made. He put a plate in front of Jack and then sat opposite him.
"So, did work kinda suck today?" Boone asked.
"I dunno, it was okay," he replied, sounding downbeat. "What have you been up to?"
"Nursery stuff. I've finished the window panes in there and I've been thinking about the floor. I think it might be best just to go with the floorboards. Probably easier for spillage than a rug, right? When they get older we can think about changing it but now I think floorboards would work best. Means I'll have to go rent that floor sander again. I can go check it out tomorrow."
He looked at Jack who was absently twirling spaghetti around his fork, apparently with no intention of actually picking it up.
"And then I'll have to go visit Victor, my lover," Boone continued. "I always see him on a Thursday so I'll have to fit that into my schedule somewhere."
Jack continued twirling his spaghetti, clearly not listening to a word Boone was saying. He did ask, the least he could do was listen.
"Jack," Boone said.
Jack looked up at him blankly. "Sorry, what did you say?"
"You're not listening to a word I'm saying," Boone pointed out. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing. Nothing's wrong. I guess I'm just tired. Drained. I don't know, I'm just out of it," Jack rambled on.
"You feel ill?" Boone asked, getting concerned.
"No. I'm not ill, I'm fine," Jack assured him.
"So what's going on?" Boone asked again.
"Nothing. I'm sorry. I've got some stuff on my mind," Jack explained. "Tell me again, I'll listen."
Boone shook his head. "It doesn't matter. It wasn't important."
Jack sighed. He looked annoyed but he also looked like he was giving up. Which was, again, unusual. Jack wasn't one to back down so easily and he was always willing to argue the toss with Boone. Which was kind of immature, yes, but also expected.
Jack went back to twirling his pasta around but still showed no particular interest in getting it off the plate. Boone watched him, not quite sure what to do anymore.
"You don't have to eat that if you don't want it," he pointed out.
Jack looked up at him again. "No, I want it," he said. "It looks good."
"It's just that you don't seem all that interested in it," Boone continued.
Jack sighed again, breathing apparently some big chore right now, and put down the fork pushing the plate away slightly. He let one hand fall heavily on the table while he brought his other up to rub his forehead.
"I'm sorry," he said. "It does look good. I think I just need an early night."
"Okay," Boone replied.
But Jack made no attempt to leave, he just sat there rubbing his forehead, his action hiding his eyes from Boone. So Boone just sat there and waited for him to do something or say something. Eventually let his other hand drop down and looked at Boone. His eyes were a little wet.
"What's wrong, Jack?" Boone asked, finding himself getting a little frustrated. His kept his voice gentle though.
Jack looked back down at the table cloth. God he was being hard work tonight.
"It doesn't matter, you don't wanna talk about it, it's cool," Boone said, hoping he sounded like at least part of that was true.
"I want to talk about it..." Jack said, and then kind of trailed off.
Boone guessed the rest of the sentence was 'but I'm not ready quite yet', which Boone could certainly relate to. So he gave Jack a little smile to let him know he understood. Well, he hoped that's what the little smile conveyed.
"You should go to bed," he told Jack.
Jack nodded. He then looked at Boone again. "Will you come with me?"
Boone looked at him. "You wanna have sex?" he asked. That certainly came out of left field. Not that Boone would really have any objections but it didn't look like Jack was really in the mood.
Jack gave him an amused little smile. "No," he said, and shook his head a little. "I just..." His face evened out and he became more serious again. "I just don't really wanna be on my own."
That must have been pretty hard for Jack to admit, Boone thought. Jack wasn't exactly free and easy with the emotions and he certainly didn't like to let anyone know that he needed them, not even Boone, not really.
Boone nodded. "Yeah. I'll come with you."
Jack gave him a thankful little smile that he guessed was as much to do with the fact that Boone wasn't making a big deal out of it than the fact that he'd agreed.
So he took Jack up to bed and he wrapped his arms around him and he held him tight. Jack rested his head on Boone's chest and Boone had the feeling he had started to cry at one point. But he knew Jack didn't want to talk about it right now, he just wanted Boone to be there for him. So Boone rubbed Jack's back and held him close until he fell asleep, his breathing evening out and his muscles relaxing.