Jake insists on taking you home, regardless of how many times you insist that you're fine. By the time you walk out of the hospital, garish purple cast strapped to your leg and decorated with metallic stickers, he's already babbling about his adventures and you admit that for once, not having to talk is kind of nice. You're fine with hearing Jake talk about his five month long camping trips along the Adirondack trail, or him fighting off a brown bear that had tried to steal his beef jerky or something, not quite catching the details. It's a break from the constant talking about how you were feeling, rating your pain when you came in and talking over insurance and stay length and it wore you out, which was a damn hard thing to do, considering most of your nights were spent staying up until one at the earliest, and though you weren't exactly talkative, your phone buzzed once every half hour or so, with some news or offer or message from Roxy waiting at the other end. Once in a while, your bro remembers that you're alive and invites you to some party that's halfway across the country. You can never go to them.
"So it was pouring buckets outside, and-"he fumbles for his car keys, and you quietly note that his car is in the same spot as it was when he took you there. "and I get a message from Jane talking about baking or something," he finds the keys, snapping open his door with a swish and leaning over to open the passenger side one, and turning the key in the ignition as you slide in, avoiding the dangerously low doorframe. "and with what I swear was a pop, my phone died! I spent an extra night in the woods because I couldn't call her to pick me up!" Jake begins to drive off. "Anyway, enough about me, how are you feeling, Mr. Fragile?" "Oh, my, I'm just going to faint! Goodness knows I'm on the edge of death!" you reply, allowing your Texan drawl to come out as you collapse into the seat with a drawn out sigh. "Oh, ye elder gods, why must you subject me to this fate!" he answers, lifting both his hands from the steering wheel before realizing what he was doing and quickly grabbing it again. "Don't want to get into another car crash, eh?" he says, laughing a bit but keeping his eyes on the road. "Shall I pull over and curse at the sky for killing one so innocent and devoid of fault?" he continues, and you respond with "I can't believe you would be so cold! Where is the frantic sobbing, the checking my pulse, the desperate attempts to revive my body, which grows colder in your arms? Honestly, and I thought you loved me! You didn't even try to kiss me awake!" you join in, smiling as he continues to laugh away, seeming genuinely happy. The jealously in you flickers on for a moment before you shove it away again. "Of course! How could I have been so neglectful! No chivalrous adventurer would leave such a helpless being die without a fight! You are the damsel in distress, it's you." You keep smiling as his giggles die down. "But yeah, I'd prefer to stay as uninjured as possible for now. If at all possible." Jake looks mischievous as he says "No guarantees," and speeds up enough to toss you back into your seat. As he slows down to the limit a second later, he glances over at you, half expectant, and you remember that you haven't told him where you live. You consider just asking him to take you back to the coffee shop, but that somehow seems rude, considering that he has driven you both to and from the hospital at this point. "I'll give you directions, don't worry. Your aura of chivalry has totally overpowered me, good sir." Why are you getting so awkward all of a sudden? Seriously, this is not how you're supposed to act. You're a Strider, for god's sake. "Alright," he relies casually, and you drive onto the large avenue which goes towards your house.
You pull up about 20 terrifying minutes later, as Jake slams the brakes to "keep you on your toes" whole you hope that your sutures don't pop, wondering if driving yourself home, although it would be dangerous, would be more comfortable than this. As you pull up to your apartment (with another jolting shock and laugh from English), you make a snap decision to let him in. You kind of owe him that, at this point. "Wanna come up?" You say. "I mean, there's a huge mess, but I can get you a soda- and that isn't coffee, eh?" It occurs to you around this time that you're asking a guy who you've only just met to come upstairs to your house. Oh well. To your relief, he doesn't freak out or anything and just says "Sounds cool!"
Fuck. Your house is worse off than you thought.
Jake hesitates for a second in the doorway, and you know why- it looks like you should be on Hoarders. There's at least ten different ventriloquist puppets within sight of the doorway, Lil' Cal is staring at him in the creepiest way, and there are no less than three vinyl records that Dave, the asshat that he is, fucking gave you when you moved out, saying that they were tokens of his undying affection or some bullshit like that. "Wow, you have a lot of records!" he says, and you inwardly bless him for not bringing up the puppets. "Yeah, my brother gave me loads, and I just kinda picked up on the habit of grabbing ones I liked…" He digs around for a second, then pulls out a Snoop Dogg record that you found in some dark corner of ebay, one eyebrow cocked and a smirk plastered on his face. Before he decides to poke Cal or find what you affectionately call "the ramen cupboard," you reach for a random record and play it. It's slow, and so, being the kinda guy you are, you refuse Jake's half laughing, four-octaves-lower-than-normal-how-does-he-even-do -that-with-his-voice offer of "Would you like to dance, good sir?", and start to twerk. Within thirty seconds of the piano music and 1920's vocals backing your intentionally shitty twerking, Jake has fallen on your couch, laughing hysterically and looking away, then glancing back and laughing even more loudly. You start laughing too, fucking giggling at yourself and his constant laughing and you're just standing there with your hand on the arm of the couch with your shoulders shaking, not able to make any more sounds and grinning with this huge, dumb smile on your face.
Within a five seconds, Jake grabs your hand off the armrest and spins you around, stepping into the clear part of your living room and grabbing your other hand in one move like the classy motherfucker he is, and before you know it you're dancing, fox-trotting while still laughing and spinning around in circles like you're in third grade, switching between swing dancing to waltzing to an extremely old fashioned dance that causes both of you to trip as you try to remember its name, and eventually return to the foxtrot, rocking back and forth to avoid the shot on your floor and somehow, throughout the whole thing, keeping to the beat despite your incredibly unwieldy cast . Very suddenly, he pulls you into a close tango, and you contemplate cracking a joke about how forward he's being before you're literally flung onto a pile of puppets, Jake cackling with mischief as he flings your fridge open with the same force that he threw you with, disregarding you totally and stealing an orange soda before flopping down next to you and splashing it over your hair, making you look absolutely ridiculous. "You owe me a drink, remember?" Your expression had already fallen into its usual poker face, but you smile a little as you say "You're such a douche, English."