Ice Cubes
Summary: Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. Leo Buscaglia
Prompt from OP!Anon: Another touch starved Jack prompt but slightly different.
So apparently you need on average 8 positive touches every day to maintain emotional and physical health. It doesn't need to be something big, just a friendly touch on the shoulder counts. So missing 8 touches a day for 300 years - that would be about 876584 touches(don't trust my math but it's a lot) - makes for some very attention seeking behavior, conscious or not.
But when Jack starts to act less like 'his usual self', after spending a lot of time around the others, and more calm, the guardians get worried something is wrong. He's still very much himself but he doesn't feel the same need to freeze things/people, pull pranks and so forth to get people's attention. The other guardians voluntarily give him as much attention, touches or hugs as they can, feeling guilty about how long he was left alone.
Summerbreezeplease (Second reviewer of the tenth chapter): Something with jack hurt. I really don't care what everything you write is wonderful :D
Touch
Was it strange?
For him to crave touches more than an average person?
Is it weird?
If he sees a person hugging another and in reaction he hugs his staff closer to himself, pretending that the thin wood was a warm body, accepting and loving and kind and wanting?
Was he abnormal?
To hang upside down by the window and watch human beings interact, laugh, cry, yell, smile, touch?
Touch.
He wonders, he alwayswonders, lifting a hand up to his own face as he stares at the window into his pale reflection. What was it like to feel the touch of another? Of someone not cold, not invisible, not with thin hands like his own? Will their touch burn him as fire did? Or will it make him feel safe, warm…
…protected ?
He wonders and ponders, and stares and stands in front of humans as they walk, even though all they ever did was pass through him.
His eyes burns, his hands clenched into fists, white-knuckled in his desperation as his vision swims and the world goes hazy as another person runs through him.
It hurts and burns, being walked through and not seen and not believed in by others.
But when Jack sees these people punch each other on the shoulder, hug each other casually, or ruffle someone's head, he feels a little desperate and a little hopeful. He prays, he wishes, he shouts, he whispers…
But when no one answers him, when someone walks through him again and leaves him panting on the pavement… He curls unto himself and holds on, taking comfort in his too cold and thin arms, tired of always having to hold himself as he breakslittle by little in the course of the next few centuries.
He yearns and hopes and wishes and prays…
But no one sees him, no one hears him, no one believes in him…
So no one answers him.
And for the next three hundred years, the only company Jack will ever know is the Wind, and the only touch that he will ever receive… will be his own.
He defined trouble and danger, a trickster in the making-North would say- and a 'gumby' that froze water parts-would be Bunny's comment. He laughs as he free falls thousands of feet from the ground, he grins at angry yetis that try to throw him out, and freezes elves that get in the way.
The guardians had a new guardian, rambunctious, child-like with wonder, daredevil, and trickster debonair… They better get used to a life filled with pranks and jokes because Jack, the guardian of fun, was going to be death of their once uptight and boring lives.
Or so they thought.
Jack was normal in the first few days, grinning and laughing, freezing the elves, hopping down of high places and surprising a very short-tempered pooka. He replaced the yetis shampoo with pink hair dye and gave Santa sugar-free cookies for fun, he placed a bucket filled with confetti on the door just as Sandy walked in, and he led a concert for his number one fans- Tooth's mini fairies.
But the guardians never scolded him, not even Bunny-who may have grumbled here and then sometimes- as he went about his loud and zealous way of getting attention.
Instead of being shouted at or glared at, Jack gets a warm smile, a touch on the shoulder, an encouraging nod, an applause, a listening ear, a kind word, even a hug now and then.
He was frightened at first. He nearly did a judo move on Tooth when she patted him on the shoulder and he froze for about two minutes when North suddenly picked him up into a hug filled with laughter, when he saw the painted-elves running amok.
He didn't know what to feel, to be overwhelmed suddenly by these peoples who can see him and hear him. He didn't know what to do, when hands- noticeably warmer than his- reach out to touch him or hit him playfully.
Suddenly, people can see him, suddenly people can touch him.
And Jack feels the huge gaping hole where his heart was supposed to be, slowly mending from three hundred years of being walked-through.
He no longer felt that overwhelming loss in his gut, that need that tugged at his body to do mischievous things to get the attention of others. He no longer flew out of reach, choosing instead to hover near the ground in cases North or Bunny needed to hug him for reasons or hit him playfully on the ribs. His hold on his staff wasn't so tight anymore, and he no longer flinched when people got near him, frightened that they might go through him again.
Instead, he leans against a touch- any touch, be it on the shoulder or a hug- and silently answers question he had formulated so long ago, that yes…
The touch of others didmake him feel , safe, warm…
…and protected.
"Hey guys." Four sets of head look up automatically at the entrance of a certain Ice spirit. However instead of going through the window and bringing a pile of snow in the globe room to annoy Bunny, Jack walks into the globe room through the door calmly, acting like a civilized person. His hood was up, staff in hand, and his left hand was shoved into the pocket of his hoodie as he grinned. "Hey what's wrong? You look like you saw a ghost."
North closes his mouth and says in a deep voice, "Bunny." Jack's right eyebrow rose when the kangaroo hopped towards the window and opened it before closing it quickly.
"It's not locked, mate." Bunny said and North looked at Jack questioningly making the guardian of Fun laugh.
"What? Can't I walk in like a normal person?" He said with a mischievous smile as he pulled a chair and sat down. Tooth and Sandy exchanged a look, usually Jack would sit on top of his staff to make sure everyone would notice him or maybe just impress them with his balance and mobility… but this time Jack was actually just sitting down on one of North's chairs.
The old Santa cleared his throat, "I'm not saying you can't, Jack. It is just… it is notlike you to walk into workshop like civilized person! Ah, no offense."
None taken." Jack said casually as an elf walked towards him with a platter of cookies. The guardians faces were expectant as Jack leaned down, waiting for him to freeze the elf like always, but instead of doing that the youngest guardian smiled. "Thanks." He said as he patted –patted!- the elf on the head gently. A few frost ferns decorated the elf's tiny red outfit, as the elf gaped at Jack.
Even the elf- Kringle- was shell-shocked!
"Jack, my boy, are you alright?" North asked seriously as his blue eyes gazed at Jack who laughed, the familiar sound eased the four guardians immediately.
"Of course I'm alright! What makes you say otherwise?" He winked and the guardians all exchanged looks but said nothing.
"It's nothing Jack, it's just-" Tooth began but then she sighed as she decided not to explain anything in cases it upset Jack. "It's nothing. North, why don't we start the meeting?" Tooth stated to the other man who nodded.
The youngest guardian didn't fail to notice the four sets of eyes that followed him as he pushed his chair towards the table.
"And that is why Christmas is better than Easter!" North said proudly as Bunny jumped up in his seat.
"I can't believe you called us all here to gloat about Christmas for the next two hours! Are you trying to pick a fight with me North?" Bunny said as his fur bristled.
"Ah, but I did not point fingers!"
"You just said 'Easter'!" The guardian of Hope accused.
"Why you so uptight? Who are you to be so mad? The guardian of Easter?" North scoffed.
"Why, yes! YES I AM!" The pooka shouted as North let out a booming laugh. Sandy sighed quietly while beside him Tooth was talking in whispers with her fairies.
"-a bicuspid? On a sidewalk? Did you see who-?" The queen of fairies interrogated and Sandy sipped his eggnog before he turned to Jack. What he saw almost made him drop his small wooden goblet.
Jack was still sitting at his seat, yes, but he had his legs and his hood up, eyes so very, very dark blue, his arms slightly shaking as he grabbed at his sleeves as though trying to seek comfort from his own touch.
The sight alarmed the sandman, making him create a giant flag made of sand as he grabbed the elf and shook him as hard as he could.
The noise coupled with the giant dream sand flag, alerted his companions except Jack, to the little man who was waving the poor elf in his hand.
"Sandy? What is it? Can you not see us arguing?" North said as he pointed to himself and Bunny. Tooth was looking at the guardian of Dreams as well.
Sandy gave them all a disapproving look before pointing at Jack urgently. The three guardians did so, and what they saw made them crinkle their eyebrows in worry.
"Jack?" Tooth called out but the boy did not move. Tooth and North exchanged worried glances but it was Bunny who hopped towards the frost spirit first.
"Frostbite?" Bunny called out but Jack wasn't looking at him. "Jack?" It was only when Bunny placed a hand on his shoulder that Jack looked up stunned, blue eyes clearing immediately at the touch.
"Bunny?" Jack whispered and then he turned and looked at North, Tooth, and Sandy. "Uh, did I miss anything? Why are you guys looking at me like that?" He chuckled awkwardly.
Bunny's eyebrows crinkled in confusion as he stared at his companions, prompting North to speak on their behalf, "Jack, are you sure you are alright?"
The guardian of fun blinked and then smiled. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Why?" He tilted his head, blue eyes curious.
"You- You've been acting strange lately." Tooth spoke up as she flitted forward and Bunny stepped back just as she placed a hand on his shoulder.
The young teen leaned against the touch unconsciously. The fairy pursed he lips at the feel of fragile shoulders under her small hands. "You haven't pranked anyone lately, and you've been so quiet, it worried us."
Sandy nodded as he made sand figures of Jack popping out of nowhere laughing.
"Not that it's a bad thing." Bunny immediately interrupted when he saw the sand figure of Jack scaring Bunny from high up. "I mean, it's almost like, before you were always on sugar high, but now you've calmed down a bit, and we ain't sure if that's a good or a bad thing mate."
Everyone nodded at Bunny's statement.
"But then you suddenly act like this, as if we weren't worried enough to be-" Bunny shut his mouth expecting Jack to retort it with a mischievous statement but instead the frost sprite gave him a soft smile and the pooka's ears flop down in his version of a blush.
Jack chuckled as he gazed at the guardians, blue eyes slightly distant.
"Yeah. I don't know either. It's just that lately I don't have that sudden urge to freeze people you know?"
No we don't. The guardians thought to themselves. Seeing their confusion, the winter spirit elaborated further.
"Well, uhm before- you know, before I met you guys- something inside of me always sorta ached whenever I see other people." Jack explained awkwardly as he waved his hands in a meaningful way. "No one could see me, or hear me, or even touchme." He says and laughs as though that statement didn't carry an age old ache. "And I sorta became a bit desperate for someone, anyoneto s-see me." His voice breaks just a bit at the last two words.
There was a heavy silence as Jack breathed in deeply to continue. "So, that's why I began starting snowball fights between kids and blizzards during spring," He gave Bunny a meaningful look and the pooka flinched like he had been slapped. The winter spirit looked down at his pale hands and fingers, they looked as young as they ever were but if only Jack's body could reflect the tiredness he felt in his heart, his hands would probably be old and wrinkled, aged and frostbitten. "I wanted to catch someone's attention. I wanted to be seen or heard, I wanted to know what it felt like when someone nudged you or patted you on the back…"
Jack clenched his hands closed as he smiled up at his fellow guardians. "But now I have you guys." He said breathlessly. "You can see me, hear me, touch me… You don't go through me like I'm not there, like I don't exist…" He said the last in a quiet voice but his smiled brightened as he laughed.
"That's probably why I began acting 'calmer'," He did the air quotes with finesse. "I don't feel the need to catch your attention anymore because you're there and you smile at me and listen to me and pat me on the back even when I-"
But Jack was suddenly cut off when Tooth threw herself into his arms. He could feel something wet drip onto his cold hoodie as he held the fairy uncertainly. "Tooth?" He asked worriedly but then his eyes widened when he felt a furry arm go around his shoulder and a certain guardian of hope leaned against him. Jack could see the sad flop of the long ears. "Bunny? Sandy?" Jack said when he saw someone golden nuzzle onto his shoulder.
He looked up at North who was the only one not hugging him, and he could see sad blue eyes looking at him. "North?"
But the old Santa said nothing, and instead he opened his arms wide and enveloped all of the guardians into a silent hug that conveyed so many messages.
We're sorry.
For judging you so quickly, I'm sorry. Bunny thought as his arm tightened around the guardian of fun.
For not being there, I'm sorry.Tooth sobbed quietly into the blue hoodie.
For not coming for you sooner, I'm sorry.Sandy's small hands tightened on the cold fabric.
For not saving you from loneliness, I'm sorry.North's eyes closed sadly.
We're sorry.
And Jack's eyes widened as he felt everyone clung to him, like-like they couldn't get enough of his company, as though- as though his existence was important, like…
…like they wanted nothing more than for him to be there, withthem.
"It's alright." Someone, Tooth, said softly onto his shoulder. "We're here. We'll always be here. You don't have to be alone anymore."
And Jack trembled, not from the heat surrounding him completely, not because of the uncomfortably closed space he was in… No.
He was shaking because of the meaningful words and warmth the others' touch gave him.
"We love you."
He was shaking because he had never been touched as long as this before. He was shaking because no one has ever told him these words before. He was shaking not from sadness or anger or grief…
He was shaking from happiness, trying to suppress the burning in his eyes as he felt the need to shed tears, not because of loneliness this time but because he realized… he no longer had to hold himself alone during cold lonely nights when he felt abandoned by the world, he no longer had to rely on his own cold hands to keep himself together and to pick up the shattered remains of a three hundred year-old heart that was tired of beating…
And Jack realized, that not only was he safe, warm, and protected…
…he was loved too.
Author's notes: So, this is for OP!Anon and summerbreezeplease. I know some of you have read this, I just decided to post this here since it is a family fic XD
I also edited it to make it more hurty-feely (no that's not a word XD).
Summerbreezeplease didn't specify what type of hurt so I'm going with 'feels' hurt. ENJOY!
Review Replies:
Jesters of the Moon: Oh man, you read Frosted Perfection? I haven't even edited it yet, there were a lot of errors too XD Well, I'm happy you enjoyed it as well as the other fics though!
Dragowolf: THANKS! Hahaha, headcanons are awesome, I think I wanna hear other people's headcannons too :P
JayaEmera: Oh, no need to be embarrassed! I'm happy you enjoyed! Thank you for always commenting! (And it's not perfect *covers face in embarrassment*)
Lovepuppy316: YOU NOTICED! *hugs you* I'm so happy you noticed the endings, I work hard to make them sound so good! THANK YOU!
Emeraldbuttercup: XD I'll try, but you have to wait for it though O. O
Dark Inu Fan: Thanks Dark, school is so boring but I will try my best! THANK YOU for always commenting!
Book girl fan: It's really embarrassing, to keep you waiting. I've deleted the fic over and over again because it doesn't come out as good as I wanted to D: But thanks for always reviewing T^T
THANKS TO EVERYONE ELSE TOO, I'm sorry I can't reply to all but I'm really busy T^T
OH AND BY THE WAY! For those who keep requesting on reviews (sweatdrops) guys, one at a time okay? I'll do my best to get to you soon. But I won't take up everything but I'll do my best! XD
Thanks for understanding and hopefully, I'll update soon!
Oh, and shout out to my friend, KEVIN, who has (somewhat) started reading my fanfics! HEY KEVIN! Hope you keep reading this! XD
See you!