In An Instant
Chapter 5: At Odds
GENRES: Drama, Romance, Humor, Tragedy, Angst, ...pretty much everything. So...gen?
MILD CHARACTERIZATION SPOILERS for Chris Colfer's Struck By Lightning!
WARNINGS: lots of mentions of Sex and a shit ton of snark. Also, sexual tension. As if that wasn't already obvious.
PAIRING: Jesse St. James and Carson Phillips AKA Jarson AKA St. Phillips AKA Jarson St. Phillips. There may be mentions of other pairings down the line, especially ones from GLEE.
WORD COUNT: 4896
"You look worse than usual," Jesse greeted Carson, who simply grimaced at him.
"Coffee is needed."
"Got it babe."
"Not your babe," Carson grumbled irritably, falling into his chair at their usual table and immediately unzipping his backpack and unloading a big binder. This was promptly opened, a pen removed from his pocket, and a yellow journal flipped open.
Jesse watched him from the line as he did this, intrigued, and ordered their usual from the new barista as quickly as possible before swaggering back towards Carson, grabbing the yellow notebook from the table as he did so.
Carson let out an exclamation of annoyance.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"What is this?"
"It's a notebook," Carson retorted. "I'm sure you've seen them at least once before, though it's unsurprising if this is your first time having actual contact with one. However, I'd appreciate if you'd give it back to me, seeing as it's mine, and maybe if you're a good boy we can go get you one of your own later."
Jesse smirked, tossing it back in his direction.
"I'm sorry, but I'm just a bad, bad boy. Maybe if you took me over your knee…"
Carson leaned forward, features schooled into an expression of knowing intrigue.
"Is that what you want?"
Their eyes connected and stayed focused, intensely, on one another before Jesse broke away with a grin and Carson allowed himself a smirk, taking a sip of his coffee.
"No peppermint this time right?" he asked vaguely, and Jesse shot him an ambivalent look.
"Well…do you have the epi-pen on you now?"
Carson scowled.
"Yes, though I'm refusing to use it."
"That's fine. I'm always willing to shove it in you if you need me to."
Carson rolled his eyes, but his irritation seemed to have drained away entirely, and he just looked…content, in a strange way. Comfortable.
When had that happened?
"You know, the bet thing was just-"
"I honestly don't give a shit," Carson informed him, taking a deep gulp of coffee, and Jesse's lips quirked up, head tilting.
"You know, Casper- I still can't quite figure you out."
"I'm enigmatic, aren't I?"
"I don't know what that means."
Carson smirked.
"Vocabulary lesson of the day, then. Enigma means mystery. Enigmatic, then…"
"Sly bastard."
"Also good word usage, but not the definition of enigmatic," Carson laughed and Jesse leered at him, the wheels turning in his head, a measure of comprehension slowly dawning.
It was time.
If Jesse asked him out now…He wouldn't say yes, probably, since this was Carson…But he'd started liking Jesse enough, for sure, that there would be no genuine objection.
Jesse wasn't quite sure how that had happened, since he was pretty sure they'd just been fighting, but maybe that was it. They did say that absence made the heart grow fonder…
"You're working tomorrow, right?"
Carson ran his fingers over the bindings of books carefully as he restocked shelves, making sure that any bearing damage were either replaced in the box at his side or, if it was minute enough and more him being "finicky" (as his coworkers liked to complain), in the bottom of the stack of books, keeping the most pristine always at the forefront.
He occasionally allowed himself to read the summary of an unfamiliar novel, searching for things to add to his reading list for next month.
He always read four books a month, one per week, no matter how busy he was, just to keep his mind going. He'd found it was incredibly useful for keeping up and advancing his vocabulary and comprehension skills, in addition to knowing what was out there in the literary world at the moment.
Typically, one book had to be nonfiction, and one book had to be from that month's genre, next month's being science fiction, a welcome break after the horror of his reluctantly-added romance. The other two were whatever caught his attention, and tended to be the hardest slots to fill. Thankfully, though, filling them gave him something to do to whittle away hours at work when business ran slow but he needed to look preoccupied to the eyes of any and all potential customers.
He may, though, just have to make at least one of those slots a reread, because recently nothing good seemed to be coming in, and he honestly wasn't willing to give any of them a chance. The last time he'd done that was when the first Twilight book came out and he decided to ignore his instinct to run away instead of seeing what all the fuss was about.
Needless to say: Never again.
"Carson!"
Carson drew his lips into an impassive line, immediately dropping the book he'd been flipping through into a stack at the sound of his supervisor's voice.
"What do you need?"
"Can you see me in my office?"
Across the way, Claire Mathews raised an eyebrow at him and he rolled his eyes away, fighting the urge to throw out some snark in favor of really wanting to keep his job.
He followed his supervisor, Ellen, into her office warily, hands jamming into his pockets, and sat down at her request, nerves jumping just a little as she closed the door.
He may be belligerent with classmates and the occasional infuriating teacher, but he never once did so here, and wasn't really one to get into issues with anyone at work, though most of his coworkers weren't extraordinarily fond of him, given his often anti-social disposition. If anything, he definitely had a perhaps-grudging respect and alliance with the rest of the company (excluding Claire, although even she most laid off of him here) due to his efficiency and book-knowledge. Being called into the office like this was more than putting him on edge.
"We need to talk."
Carson nodded, sitting a little further up and choking down the desire to say something snippy about a break up, especially because a break up of sorts was always a possibility here, and one he definitely wanted to avoid.
"I haven't hidden any of the books I thought were poorly written since you talked to me about it," he said slowly, and Ellen looked a little amused at the memory of their one prior meeting where she'd had to close the door.
"Which is very good," she replied. "I just wanted to discuss some customer complaints with you before we open. I may ask you to stay after we close for a bit as well if we don't manage to finish this meeting in time, in fact. They're a bit…disturbing, to be frank. At first I thought they were just jokes," Ellen continued, opening a file of papers and pulling out a pile that had been separated from the rest by a paperclip. His file.
"Now, though, I'm becoming…concerned."
She handed him the sheaf silently, expression grave, and he took it reluctantly, immediately beginning to rifle through the alarmingly large stack.
This was very not good.
He almost groaned aloud when he saw the content, though restrained it, settling for a grimace.
"I would never do this stuff. These complaints are completely nonsensical. Book-molester? How can I get in trouble for something that blatantly ludicrous, let alone fired? And I'd never do anything even remotely sexual in a public venue, let alone masturbate."
"I believe you," Ellen assured him. "The problem is with this many complaints I'm not in charge of this one-hundred-percent as I'd like, and management wants to at least do something. Now, they'd prefer I fired you…"
Carson winced. This was so ridiculous. If the goddamn kids at his school got him fired…
"However, you're very good at what you do, something I know for a fact. So, I told them hell no. Without the hell, of course…" She paused to smile a little at him, then her expression hardened once more. "But they would only relent under the condition that I did do something, which is why you're working Halloween, for no pay, and we're letting everyone who wants that night off, have it. You'll have two other people working counters and floor with you, and I expect you to cover the reference center work, as well as write up reports on any incidents that may happen. We're not typically very busy, but I'm warning you now that the customers we do have tend to be up to no good, which is why it's a shift very few want."
She paused again to sigh, looking sympathetic.
"I'm going to take a wild leap and say that you're not very liked by some of your classmates at school."
Carson's gaze darkened more, if possible, his arms tightening in their position over his chest.
"Not really."
She looked truly sorry, and he knew she'd done some major good for him here. And he was definitely grateful. But he was also no less furious.
"I'm sorry," she repeated. "I know what that's like. Believe me, you're not the only person who was ever outcasted in this town. I just didn't get out, like I'd wanted. It's not so bad now, of course, and it actually hasn't been since I started my senior year. Things got far better with the perspective twelfth grade gave everyone. But I still know, and I wish I could do more. I'll tell you what though… Halloween shift will be even harder for you, because you're a target. If you want to have someone come in and stick around with you through it, I'll look the other way."
Carson slumped.
"Thanks," he retorted, forcing the anger from his voice as much as he could manage. "Is there anything else?"
"We're also going through the security tapes," she informed him, her face smoothing back to only slightly sympathetic professional.
Carson nodded.
That was expected.
"After Halloween, if we're not done, you'll be asked to take leave from work until it's all finished up."
"Fantastic," he gritted out. "Is my pay docked too?"
"No," she said automatically. "Your leave will be unpaid, but when you are working, with the exception of Halloween, your pay will be left completely intact. Trust me, Carson. I'm working with corporate to get a rush on this. I raved about you to them to get this much."
"I do appreciate that."
"I know. Now, we open in fifteen minutes, and I need you out there getting everything you were working on before finished up. Do we need to discuss this farther before the end of your shift?"
"Can I work overtime?"
"No."
"Then I've got nothing," Carson replied, shrugging jerkily. "I'll get back to work, then?"
"Thank you for cooperating," Ellen sighed. "Yes, you can go. Please don't make my vote of confidence look bad. The pressure's on both of us now."
Carson nodded, standing.
"Don't worry about it."
He moved quickly back to his previous station, unsurprised when Claire popped up moments later as he was quickly shelving the sorted books and neatening the boxes he'd have to carry back to the stockroom.
"What'd you do?"
"I didn't do anything," he retorted tersely. "And remember three years ago when you swore that you'd never again talk to me? When exactly is that coming into effect?"
Claire ignored him, shuffling a few of the books in the historical section that bridged with the literature section he'd immersed himself in organizing.
"If you didn't do anything then what'd you have to talk to Ellen for? Oh, they finally got a new biography for Mary Queen of Scots in," she interrupted herself, looking delighted.
Carson snorted despite himself.
"You're still addicted to biographies. Do your followers know?"
Claire ignored the gibe.
She was always her nicest and most relaxed before they opened. It was the time of least risk.
"So what was it? Did she catch you with the books?"
Carson shot her a look of abrupt fury.
"You knew?"
"That you eye-fuck books? Um…duh? You don't exactly hide that. Well…you don't hide it well, at least."
Carson slammed a book onto the shelf.
"Did you make any of those complaints?"
Claire frowned at him, the hand still holding the biography she'd been leafing through bringing the volume to her chest.
"Complaints."
"There were roughly twenty customer complaints against me," Carson informed her dully, after noting her expression and the clear implication that she had no real idea what he was talking about. "Most of them along the lines of being a sexual deviant with a book fetish. I was almost fired."
Claire winced, no longer even remotely meeting his eye, instead dragging a finger and her gaze along the ridge of a row of biographies
"Huh. Are you sure you're not?"
Carson scowled at her, shoving a book a little more roughly than what was technically necessary into its place.
"Once again, why are you talking to me?"
Claire hmphed, hand dropping.
"Wow, so sorry for trying to be nice."
"Yeah, you tried really hard on that one," he said quietly with a hollow laugh. "I can see how you've achieved so much, Madame President."
Claire narrowed her eyes.
"If you only knew how much I've helped you-"
"Don't," Carson cut her off, hefting a box. "Leave me the hell alone."
"I was right, wasn't I, though? I was always right. Things have only gotten better for me with every year."
Carson's only response was to walk away.
It was a brilliant beginning to what he suspected would be a completely shit day.
Jesse St. James was pretty sure today would be amazing.
Though he was also pretty sure it'd be better if Lucas hadn't locked him out of the room again, when he was only wearing a towel…
Not that he couldn't rock the look, because he was sexy as hell, and he'd already had six separate incidents of flirting since he'd emerged from the shower and gone to the room to find it locked.
One of these days he really did need to make a copy of that key…Or at least find where Lucas kept the spare Jesse knew he'd made when they'd first gotten their dorm.
He would love to see Carson's face if he turned up at his work to ask him out in a towel though…
It was just that the issue of being arrested for public indecency might put a bit of a damper on things… And he really didn't think Carson would be willing to bail him out.
"Lucas, I have to go," he informed the door.
"Lucas isn't in there," Seth informed him from behind, and Jesse turned quickly on his heel to face the other boy.
"You're fucking with me right?"
Seth paused, head cocking, then: "Do you…want me to be?"
Jesse groaned, letting his head fall back into his door with a thud, the towel hanging loosely on his hips.
"I have to leave soon and I have no way of getting in to get dressed."
Seth gave him a look of bemusement.
"You could easily just get the spare."
"Trust me, if I knew where I could find it, I'd have it by now."
Seth went to the wall next to the door and leaned his head back, automatically mimicking Jesse's stance as he rolled his head up then to the side to stare at Jesse.
"I assumed Lucas would have told you by now."
Jesse arched a brow.
"Told me what?"
"That if you need in, I have the spare."
"You have a key to our dorm," Jesse said dumbly, eyes falling closed. "Because that's not asking for trouble. Can I use it then?"
Seth grinned.
"Of course. Follow me."
Jesse sighed, readjusting his towel, and followed Seth back to his own dorm begrudgingly, humming as he went to fill the awkward silence.
He and Seth were very rarely alone these days. Well, the past week or so, but still...
It was weird.
Seth gestured him in and shut the door behind him.
"When do you have to be out by, anyway? What's with the rush?"
Jesse watched Seth rifle through a drawer, scanning the dorm vaguely as he did.
"I'm going to Barnes and Noble."
Seth paused in his search to look up, brow crinkled with disconcertion.
"You don't read."
"Of course I do."
"…Like what?"
"Scripts and magazines."
Seth laughed loudly, returning to his hunt through the drawer, and finally pulling out a small book, which he threw Jesse's way.
Jesse frowned, picking it up from where it had landed in his lap and laying back.
"What's this?"
"Read it."
Jesse eyed the thing suspiciously.
"Is the key in here?"
"Nope."
"Then… What is it?"
"Lucas likes to keep a log…"
Jesse laughed loudly, swinging his calves against the bed.
"Please, oh please, tell me you're not serious."
"Of course I am," Seth replied, voice still soft and a little distracted, though soaked in a strange sentimentality.
Jesse shook his head.
"You guys are lucky you have Naomi to redeem you. Can I have the key now?"
Seth held it up and smiled.
"First, sign in."
Jesse rolled his eyes but did so, and caught the key thrown his way with self-satisfied ease.
"I can walk you back?"
"That's fine," Jesse refuted him. "I've got to hurry to keep up my plan."
He was beaming just thinking about it and Seth's brow crinkled.
"Why are you going to Barnes and Noble anyway?"
Jesse winked at him, letting his towel slip down past the point of even semi-decency as he went to open the door, exposing himself gleefully, and a little teasingly as he responded.
"It's where Carson works. See ya."
He left Seth gaping, though didn't bother turning to see if it was with astonishment or with anger.
He was Jesse St. James, after all. Of course it was the former.
Jesse wasn't much of a reader, but he'd always had a bit of a thing for bookstores and libraries, though he honestly thought Barnes and Noble was the one who should have been closed down instead of Borders.
They'd had Starbucks, after all.
But Barnes and Noble got bonus points since Carson worked there, so Jesse was willing to forgive it the lack of coffee and general sugary goodness.
Especially since, he observed with a manic grin and glinting eye as he pulled in, there was a Starbucks perched conveniently right next to it. Bet Carson loved the fuck out of that coincidence. If it was a coincidence that was, Jesse mused, clambering from his car and setting off towards the shop. He wouldn't put it past Carson to have made absolutely sure that wherever he worked was next to some sort of coffee venue.
It would be just like him, in fact, Jesse thought with a small smirk.
He ordered himself and Carson each a coffee, already mentally staking out which would be his and Carson's spot.
It wasn't hard to find, and Jesse strolled out quickly, entering Barnes and Noble moments later.
Carson was kneeling at a shelf in the romance section, a group of girls at his side, the one at the forefront tapping her foot in Carson's line of vision, while another girl snapped her gum every fifteen seconds, making his eyes narrow.
He stood up, brushing hard at the legs of his jeans, and arched his brow at the girl, countenance cool, with the exclusion of his hands' jerky movements against his thighs.
"You're sure you don't remember the title, author, anything?" he asked, and Jesse smirked from his place in the aisle behind them like a fucking ninja, or the cat who got the canary.
Gum snap.
Tap.
Tap.
Pop.
"No," the girl with the gum said finally, drawing it back into her mouth after yet another loudly bursted bubble had completely deflated to her lip.
Carson nodded.
"Is there any way you can get that information? Much as I'd like my name to be google… We have computers. If you want to just enter the keywords, maybe…"
"I know it's here," one of the girls interrupted. "Can't you just check the shelf again?"
"…Sure," Carson strained out, and Jesse was unable to hold back a snort at the expression on his face.
"What was that?" gum-girl asked dully, and Jesse popped out from behind the behind the shelf, grinning.
Carson didn't look up, though his hand faltered over a row of books before moving on again.
"Jesse St. James, at your service," Jesse informed them, leaning against the side of the shelf. "Well, his actually, but don't feel too bad. I know guy on guy action is hot among your age group, so to lessen your pain, I'll give you this little tidbit:…" at this Jesse looked at Carson who was giving him a passive look in return, though with an edge of concern. The girls seemed bewildered and, disturbingly, a little entranced. "I like him, and I know he likes me too, though he won't admit it. Still, I do want to ask him out, so I'd appreciate if we could have a moment."
"Um…Sure… Come on. Let's go ask that girl if she has any recommendations," one of the girls between the gum-popper and foot-tapper said, and all of the others immediately assented.
Carson's head was already shaking, but his eyes had returned to the books, and he wasn't saying a single snarky word, which Jesse took as a pretty good sign.
"So, my dorm tomorrow, say five-ish?"
Carson rolled his eyes.
"Sure, Jesse."
"It's a date, then."
"A study date," Carson affirmed, picking out one of the books and giving it a once-over.
"Studying anatomy," Jesse replied with a smile, dipping down next to Carson, who looked at him in amusement.
"Big word."
"Thanks… It's a pretty hard one too."
Carson rolled his eyes, reorganizing a few books abruptly with a look of annoyance.
"People need to learn to put things back where they belong…" he muttered. "So, what exactly do you want me to work on tomorrow? Can I get a few specifics?"
Jesse watched Carson a moment, before automatically throwing out: "Shakespeare."
Carson perked up immediately.
"What's the subject?"
Jesse laughed, sliding a coffee cup over to him, which he took promptly, not even bothering with his usual suspicion.
"You want to start writing it right when you get off work don't you?"
Carson nodded, unabashed, and stood to face him squarely.
"Of course I do. That's how good work is done, St. James. Have I taught you nothing?"
Jesse grinned.
"Absolutely nothing. You should be working harder at that."
He winked and reached forward, pulling a pen from Carson's pocket and then grabbing his hand in a firm grip as Carson raised an eyebrow at him. Carson scowled at the pen against his skin, but didn't bother to object until Jesse was done, and he had his hand to himself.
"You didn't put that it was a study date. Just date. And it's not our first. And two is a better time. We can get more work done."
Jesse shrugged, grabbing his hand again, curling their fingers together as he changed five to two and added "study" above the word date in quotation marks.
"Happy Casper?"
Carson's eyes narrowed.
"Not particularly, but I suppose it's the best I'll get out of you, isn't it?"
Jesse smirked.
"It's good we have an understanding. I'll see you at two. The address of my dorm is already on your phone."
Carson nodded distractedly, eyes on a few more customers.
"That's fine. Can I get back to work now? ...And thanks for the coffee. I'm skipping my break today, so that was needed."
Jesse's voice was genuine, if condescending and smarmy as ever, as he replied: "Anytime."
A/N-
1. Just so everyone knows, you can find your daily fill of Jarson at JarsonStPhillips dot tumblr dot com. We have a "Song of the Day" special every other week, and with all of these "extras" for the story are also posted.
2. The answer to our anon reviewer, Matt, can be found in Thusday's SotD. We made sure to make a list of every character that has a focus's sexuality, with that list being added to as the story goes on. But, for anyone who doesn't have the time/patience/etc. to do that, I'll also tell you here that Carson is what's called Pansexual. I'll make sure some links with extra info on this are put up on our tumblr tonight, but that's the general "label" we'd use. This will be coming up soon in the story as well, but because the point of this story is not the character's sexualities, it likely won't have a *HUGE* focus. We do appreciate the question, and knew it was coming up, so we only hope no-one has issues with this story based on this answer. Thanks for that. :) And we appreciate the feedback we've gotten. All readers in general mean the world to us, but special thanks go to ItsMetaphorFool, KurtFabulous, AND, so much, Allie and Mary, whom we love and are amazing and we hope they enjoy this Jarson, too. Also: Matt, without whom this ramble would not have occured. Lol.
3. Reviews make duct-tape magically appear over the characters who stuffed the complaint box's mouths, and have the capability of getting Claire to shove off. Also, we all know Jesse is like Rachel Berry and needs applause to live. And if he doesn't live, then who will kiss Carson-... Oh, no, have I said too much? STAY TUNED! :)