Ch. 8
Eric rolled over, sighing. Jack had fallen asleep ages ago, babbling away about how great it was to be home with Eric. To be away from the smell of the hospital and the freakishly white walls and the sounds of beeping machines. Eric just nodded along and held Jack close, relishing the feel of his skin and the sound of his voice that had finally returned to its somber tones. He held Jack and smiled, trying to keep the sadness out of his voice as he agreed half-heartedly. He didn't think he'd be able to sleep tonight. He stared out the window at the orange sky. If he had to guess, he'd say it was about two in the morning.
He lay awake thinking about the coming weeks and how he could possibly keep Jack from repeating everything all over again. He'd pushed himself to finish his coursework in a day and a half. Eric had come home from the grocery store two weeks ago to find him on the phone with Feeny requesting extra credit 'just in case'.
Eric sighed again, his weariness fully taking over. He was staring at the night sky until, gradually, it turned into a dark, almost black canvas, bordered by large, reaching evergreens…
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Eric stared at the point of Jack's chin as he stared up at the dark sky, stars appearing with the absence of the city lights. He spread his arms out wide and leaned as far as possible forward, appearing like a giant shirtless bird posed to take flight.
"Jack." Eric's voice was quickly becoming sharp and biting. He was lashing out over the fear turning his stomach like a blender on 'whip'. "Jack! I don't know what the fuck I'm supposed to… tell me what I'm supposed to do for you!"
Jack kept talking, as if Eric had never spoken. "But everythin's gonna be okay now, Eric. So,… so, so you don't have to worry anymore. You don't have to worry," he choked and coughed a few times. "You don't have to worry about if I'm eating or if I'm… or if I'm sleeping enough. And you don't," he shrugged apologetically, watching Eric from above. "You don't have to, to love a fucking basketcase who just can't seem to love you back. Can't love you back the way you want; like they should."
"Jack—"
"Because they should. They fucking should. You deserve better than me." Jack shook his head, and Eric imagined he could see Jack's hand wiping absently at his cheek.
Eric began to shiver and he saw Jack's foot falter above. He had to do something but he was frozen to that spot. "Jack, please. I love you so much. I don't… I'm not going to stop. Not now, not ever." But Jack carried on again.
"And you don't have to be afraid anymore. Because… everythin's going to be okay now, Eric. Everythin's gonna be okay in a minute. Everythin's going to be…" And then Jack was, almost gracefully and fluidly, falling falling falling to the inharmonious soundtrack of Eric's grating screaming.
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Eric jerked awake, feeling a weight falling off of his chest. He reached out in the dark, the back of his hand brushing against warm skin. "Jack?"
"Eric? What's going on?" Jack asked drowsily. "Bad dream?"
Eric nodded, lying back slowly, trying to ignore his sweat-soaked t-shirt chilling his warm skin. Jack settled back on top of him and seemed to fall asleep again instantly.
Eric tried to sleep again but every time his lids closed, he was bombarded with the vision of Jack' speeding to the forest floor. The sickening thud jerking him awake hour by hour.
Jack stumbled out of bed, silently making his way to the bathroom. It was around four a.m and he was trying hard to keep his steps quiet. He had to crawl carefully over Eric's slumbering form to get out of bed. He could tell that Eric hadn't quite gotten over his nightmare. He had a vague idea of what it was about.
He turned the light on in the bathroom and studied his reflection. His eyes were weary but the bruising had faded away and so had the bruises on the rest of his body; his back, shoulders and abdomen. His hair could use a trim and he hadn't shaved in a while. He looked better and he felt better. At least partially. He still felt guilty at hearing Eric talk in his sleep.
He hadn't noticed how tired he'd seemed lately. He didn't make jokes as often as he used to, he stopped pestering Jack to eat and he'd stopped trying to keep Jack from working so hard. Now that he thought about it, Jack was sure Eric had been eating even less than he had. He seemed to have given up trying. Now, whenever Jack made an excuse to keep working or skipped a meal, Eric closed off and kept silent. Before, Jack would've given anything to get Eric to stop caring. Now that he finally had, Jack was more scared than he cared to admit. And after what Eric had told him, about life before the accident, he couldn't stop feeling like Eric would've been so much better off if he'd just given up on Jack a long time ago.
"I told you when this started… someday I'll fuck this up." The reflection whispered.
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Jack couldn't put it into words. He'd find himself staring at the subtle curve of Eric's hips when he should've been studying theorems. Eying the way he bit his lip when he received exam results. The way his face seemed devoid of any worries while he slept. He told himself it was only because he had started living with Eric and was still discovering things about him. He could tell himself anything, anything at all. But he wasn't an idiot and he'd been raised to face facts, however unpleasant, at an early age.
So far, Jack thought he'd been getting away with it until he noticed that more often than not, Eric caught him staring. He'd play it off with a shy smile and a shrug and that was fine until the second week of exams.
Jack had been eying the sliver of skin present above Eric's ratty, old Levi's for the better part of half an hour. He was supposed to be revising but the scattered notes on his spiral had long since faded into a jumbled mass. The sketched picture of Eric's face in the corner the only clear image in the collage of pencil marks. He was lost somewhere in his head where he was a braver, more confident Jack. This Jack stood up from his chair, grabbed Eric and pushed him up against the counter and then proceeded to have his way with him. This Jack had Eric's shirt on the ground in thirty seconds.
Real Jack had been imagining this scenario over and over in his head, not noticing the eyes on his face. Eric had been washing the same glass for about fifteen minutes now. He was pretty sure he'd rubbed off the insignia by now. His eyes kept coming back to the gentle curve of Jack's neck as he bent over his notebook. He wondered whether the skin was as soft, warm and inviting as it looked. He couldn't stop wanting to run his tongue over that small area where Jack's jaw met his neck. He could see himself dropping the glass on the floor and pulling Jack out of his chair. He'd pull the smaller man against him, kiss him feverishly, drag him into Eric's room, force him onto the bed and…
Unaware, Eric let out a small groan, shaking Jack out of his reverie. He stared at Eric bemused. "What'd you say?"
"Nothing." He finally set down the glass and set it down on the towel on the counter. He dried his hands and turned around, leaning back against the counter. Jack was still silently studying him, his pen slipping from his fingers. He continued to stare and eventually Eric noticed Jack's eyes were settled somewhere beneath his waist. He quickly glanced down, he was wearing baggy jeans so the effects of his wandering thoughts weren't obvious. He met Jack's eyes, confused.
"What?" He asked, a grin on his face. Jack's face reddened a bit and he returned his eyes to the large textbook on the table in front of him. Eric, bored, shuffled over to the table. He sat lightly against its edge. He sat there, eyes fixated on Jack's slender hands, his fingers, his nails. His mind began wandering again and he saw himself kneeling over Jack on his bed, Jack's carefully maintained nails scratching the soft skin of his back. He could almost hear the smaller man calling out his name and…
Jack couldn't concentrate. Eric's long-standing stares were making it harder for him to stay on task. He kept picturing running his tongue over the curve of Eric's hip, biting the tempting skin below his navel, making Eric beg for him to… no! He had to focus, he had a test over five chapters that Friday. He had to concentrate. He stared at the blurring words of the text for a few more minutes before letting his head fall onto the table.
Eric sighed, shaking himself out of more thoughts. He stood and stretched, hearing his back pop. Jack's carefully averted his eyes. "Shower." He skipped up the stairs and into the bathroom. Jack kept his head down, trying to will his body to behave.
When Eric emerged from the shower, he quickly grabbed a towel before hurrying into his room for his shaving kit. He found Jack sitting on his bed, an odd look on his face. "Jack?" The younger man was sitting with his hands in his lap, head down studying them. "Jack?"
Jack stood, took a few calculating steps toward Eric, the tension between them growing thicker as Eric started to tremble slightly. He opened his mouth as if deciding to speak before closing it again. Eric had seen Jack determined before but this was different. He appeared as if he was trying not to do something. Finally, he was so close Eric could see every line, however slight, on Jack's face. Jack exhaled and Eric inhaled. He ducked his head for a moment, shaking his head. He started to back away but Eric, unsure of what had come over him, reached out for his arm. The touch sent a shock through his body, making his quiet shaking worsen. Jack lifted his head, dark, almost black eyes started back at him, drenched in a feeling Eric had never seen on Jack's face before. He pulled Jack tight to his body, feeling the towel fall away in the space it took for Jack's body to meet his.
"Eric," The rest of his words swallowed as Eric's mouth met his. The small sound Jack made in the back of his throat was almost pained. He started to push Eric away, trying to do so with as little contact as possible. As if Eric's skin burned, and maybe it had. Eric let himself be pushed, standing there in his bedroom, bare and exposed. Jack stared as Eric ducked his head. Jack's eyes never straying away from his face. "I can't… I'm- but you're so…" Silence and the room seemed to blur as Eric found himself being shoved into the doorjamb behind him, Jack's lips locked on his. Jack held Eric's hips tight in his hand, pressed himself harder into Eric's naked body. As if he was trying to something mold himself into Eric. As if he was somehow trying to force, to push himself inside of him to somehow become whole again.
After, Eric tried to talk to Jack about what exactly they'd just done. Jack refused to answer, choosing to instead lay his head across Eric's chest, hands playing idly with his skin. He sighed, laying his ear to Eric's heart, breathing in time with Eric's breaths. "Someday I'll fuck this up." He sat up, looking Eric in the eye. "And then you have my permission to leave. You can run as far as you can."
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Eric woke abruptly. He wasn't sure what it was that woke him. He listened, motionless. He heard absolute silence. It was completely silent. It was too quiet. Eric threw himself out of bed as quickly as possible, he sprinted into the bathroom. It was empty.
He hurried down the stairs, his steps echoing in the empty apartment. He hurried to check Jack's old room. Empty. "Jack?" he whispered feebly. Eric shrank weakly onto the dusty hardwood floor. No one had really been in this room since Jack had developed the cleaning obsession months ago. Eric's chest ached; even empty rooms reminded him of Jack.
Where would he go? Did I say something, did I do something wrong? The last thing Eric remembered was getting back into bed and finding Jack fast asleep. Eric weakly slid up the wall to a standing position. He left the room, stumbled down the stairs to the table Jack often used as a desk. It was covered in papers and textbooks and pens. Eric noted that the pile of Jack's unfinished work was largely greater than the pile of Jacks finished work. Eric shook his head slowly, disbelieving.
He practically floated over to the fridge. The groceries he'd bought weeks ago appeared untouched. With the exception of the alcohol he'd bought on a whim. Three pint-sized bottles were missing.
"No." Eric mumbled, shaking his head. With newfound strength, he hurried over to the empty cordless phone cradle. He smashed the 'call' button, the force knocking the machine to the floor. He heard the three repeated tones coming from underneath the couch cushions. As he reached them, he kicked the coffee table out of his way, threw the standing lamp to the ground, hearing a satisfying sound of the lightbulb breaking. He frantically pulled the cushions from the couch, tossing them over his shoulder. The zipper on the back of one of them created a thin cut five inches long on the inside of his arm but he didn't feel it.
"No, no, no… no, there's no way…" Eric picked up the cordless phone in an almost dreamlike state. His hands were shaking as he checked the missed calls list. "No, no, no…" He scrolled and scrolled until he got to missed calls from yesterday. 'Toller and Dale Developers' blinked back at him… the very symbol of his failure. "Fuck."
He threw the phone as hard as he could against the wall, but the crack wasn't loud enough for him. He picked up the coffee table and threw it into the wall, a couple of picture frames on the counter following soon after. He was incapable of feeling anything and he hated it. He rammed his body into anything close, trying to break wood, glass or even bone. He wanted Jack, he wanted pain, he wanted the friend he'd had before, and he wanted the love he wasn't even sure he'd had. He punched the wall over and over as hard as he could, his bloodied knuckles leaving red stains on the walls next the stains Jack had left there so many weeks ago. It wasn't like anything mattered anymore. He couldn't take care of Jack. He'd been given another chance and he'd failed all over again.
He'd failed again. He'd ruined everything. Everything they'd gone through… and it'd all just happened again. Eric screamed and threw his wrecked body up the stairs. There were still a few things he could break.
Jack rubbed his eyes, tired from walking all night. He needed to clear his mind and rather than throwing himself into work, he decided to take a walk. It made him feel less guilty and it took him away from Eric. Far enough for him to get some rest without worrying about Jack sitting wide awake next to him.
He had just pulled out his keys when Mrs. Henry, their neighbor down the hall called his name. She was a quiet lady who smiled as often as Eric used to. "Oh, hello dear. Well, you appear very well this morning." She observed, a small frown on her face. Great, it seems I make everyone unhappy these days.
"Should I not be?"
"Well, I heard shouting and scraping furniture and just… you two made quite the ruckus last night. I thought you were having some sort of argument."
Confused, Jack shook his head. "No, we didn't argue. Maybe it was Mr. and Mrs. Young."
"Maybe." She agreed, her smile smaller than usual. She bustled down the hall, patting Jack on the back as she passed.
When the elevator doors closed, Jack hurried to open the front door and stepped into what used to be his living room. The furniture was all displaced and the majority of it seemed to be crushed. The coffee table was almost unrecognizable. Pieces of it lay everywhere. The stuffing in some of the couch's pillows littered the floor. Some of it appearing in the kitchen sink.
Worried, Jack called out. "Eric?" No response. He rushed up the stairs, tripping a bit in his drowsy state, checked his old room and noticed more broken furniture. Though a picture of him and Shawn lay unbroken on the dusty floor. He checked their room, which had remained practically untouched by Eric's rage. He hurried to the bathroom.
The tile floor was covered in shining, reflecting glass, the sound of it crunching underneath Jack's shoes. The shower was running cold water and judging by Eric's pale pink skin, it had been running cold water for a while. "Eric!" Jack dropped to his knees and crawled to the tub, quickly turning the water off. Eric was barely breathing and, though he was ice cold to the touch, he wasn't shivering. Jack shook his wet body. "Eric! Wake up!" He shook harder, throwing the last of his energy into it. "Eric! Please!"
He shook him over and over for what felt like an hour. And still Eric showed no sign of movement. Jack gave up and he crawled into their bedroom and reached for the cell phone on the table nearest to him. He could barely push the numbers to dial the Matthew's number. Cory picked up on the third ring, sounding really cheery.
"Hey Eric, good morning." He greeted and Jack could hear the sounds of breakfast at the Matthew's in the background. "Eric?"
Jack sighed. "Cory. Something's wrong with Eric. He won't wake up an' he's ice cold. I didn't know what to do so… so I called you."
He thought he got the words out but he was just so tired. All he wanted to do was just sleep. He wanted to climb into their bed and lie down and pull the covers up. He wanted to lie close to Eric and fall asleep in his warmth. And really, why was it so important that he finish talking to Cory right now. And Eric was gong to be so upset when he found out how long he'd been awake this time. Jack's head fell back against the mattress, the phone falling from his loose grip. Cory's muffled voice shouting from the other end.
"Jack? Jack! You said something's wrong with Eric? Jack!"