Living In Lucid Dreams - Part 2
Jul. 9th, 2009 10:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hildigunnurPart 2
Previous Part
Bright light played upon his eyelids, threatening to sting his eyes. There was a dull thrumming in his head and his forehead ached which was strange as he had hit the back of his head on the floor. Prying one eye open he felt harsh fluorescent lighting hit his eye so he closed it quickly again.
Someone was holding his hand, someone with small and soft hands and that someone spoke.
“Jensen, are you awake?”
His mother. What was his mother doing there?
The garage door, you idiot. Which would explain why his forehead was hurting?. Didn’t explain much else except for the presence of his mother.
“Yeah, I’m awake,” he said groggily. “Where am I?”
“At the hospital. Josh found you on the floor of the garage. The door must have knocked you out when you were putting away your car after church.”
“Wait, what day is it? What’s the time?”
“Sunday, the 7th of September. I think it’s just past four in the afternoon. I can ask a nurse … actually I should alert the doctor that you’re awake.” She rushed out and he was left there in the hospital bed. They hadn’t hooked him up with anything, thank god; he hated IVs and all that other crap. And it wasn’t like he didn’t have enough on his mind already. Nice, not having the frustration of being bound to a hospital bed as well.
Seriously, what had happened? Did I just have the most intense sex dream of all time while I was knocked out? It didn’t make any sense. He’s been knocked out before and he didn’t remember any super-realistic dreaming going on then. It didn’t feel like he’d come into the hospital sheets or anything. That would have been embarrassing to say the least.
As he was about to slip his hand under the covers to check whether there were any tell-tale signs, or if he had the bodily aches he’d felt before in the dream that might or mightn’t have been a dream, his mother and the doctor came into the room.
“I think we can discharge you, Mr. Ackles. Your head seems to be made of hard stuff, you didn’t even have a concussion. I advise you to take it easy for the next couple of days, call in sick at work and try not to have your garage door knock you out again.”
+++
“Dude, you could have called!”
Jensen looked up from the football game on TV. Chris was standing in the middle of the living room – he had obviously used some kind of über-stealth to get in. He did have a key hidden in a flower pot on the porch and Chris knew all about it, but that didn’t explain how he had managed to make himself unheard. Until now that was. Chris and dulcet tones shouldn’t be used in the same sentence.
“I … just … you know how it is.”
“Dude, we could have hung out today or something. You must have squeezed out a sick day.”
“Are you telling me you were up before five this afternoon?” Chris was a notorious night-owl, especially when he wasn’t working on something that needed his attention during the day.
“Hmm, you got me there. Who is playing?”
“The Packers and the Vikings.”
“For the love of football, Jen, turn it off. Did the garage door knock half your brain out?”
“Shit, Chris, no. And how come you know?”
“Your brother texted me earlier. Called you Knock Out Boy so I had to press for details.”
He couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the pun. Josh had been all too amused that he’d lost a fight with a garage door. His brother was a great guy but he was still careful to frequently remind Jensen who was the older brother.
Chris sat down on the sofa as Jensen turned off the game and shoved his hand right into the popcorn bowl on the table.
“So, tell me of this epic battle between you and your garage door. Was it heroic?” Chris asked through the mouthful of popcorn.
“It was stuck and it hit me on the forehead. I was knocked out. That’s it. And yeah, I’ve this huge bump on my head as you must see.” He couldn’t look straight at Chris. Despite his laidback attitude, Chris was always pretty good at reading people and seeing how he’d known Jensen since they were kids, he would know that there was something on his mind.
The entire day - actually every waking moment since he’d got home from the hospital - he had been thinking about that dream, or whatever the hell it had been he’d experienced while being knocked out. He kept reliving the sex over and over again, each time remembering a different sensation but above all, the dream man, Jared, appeared to have moved into his mind permanently. The tall frame, the long and sculpted muscles, the bright smile – everything about him was etched into Jensen’s memory.
“OK. You got knocked out. Big deal. Then why the hell are you staring down at your toes like you just smashed my favorite guitar by sitting on it? Don’t tell me you did it on purpose?”
“Of course not. If I wanted to kill myself, I would have found a more effective way.”
“Sheez, Jen, I know that. I was thinking more along the lines of insurance fraud.”
A dry sort of laughter escaped from Jensen’s throat.
“You think I’m that desperate? That strapped for cash? They do pay me.”
“It’s just … I know this isn’t what you want most.”
Chris had never liked the idea of Jensen buying the house. He had told him beforehand that it was the sort of house that someone who wanted a fixer-upper would want, not someone like Jensen who always managed to find his thumbs in a painful manner when he swung a hammer.
The whole thing with investing in real estate, the whole thing about no longer renting dank apartments and keeping most of his possessions in cardboard boxes had been his attempt to grow up. An attempt to find out who he really was. Chris had been right about the house not being the solution to that particular problem. Still, it appeased Jensen because he knew his parents felt like he was finally becoming an adult, at the ripe age of thirty, and taking some responsibility.
The thing was that he’d never known what he wanted most. It was the big reason why he’d dropped out of college – though flunking theoretical physics twice had also been a deciding factor. It was also the reason why he’d never settled down with anyone. In fact, one of his exes, Jessica, had dumped him on the grounds that he was too wishy-washy.
And now his mind was full of some ideal it had concocted and if he’d allow himself, he’d feel the want, but he couldn’t. It was so stupid and ridiculous to get hooked up on the delusions of one’s mind.
Still avoiding Chris’s eyes, he started fiddling with the TV remote, knowing all too well that Chris could turn up the heat on him and give him the third degree about the state of Jensen.
“Ok, what are you not telling me then?” Chris had planted himself on the couch.
“It’s nothing,” Jensen said, more to the remote than to Chris’s face.
“Please drop the act – tell me, even if you were trying to kill yourself just so you wouldn’t have to look at my ugly face again.”
“Chris, please, drop this.” He was bursting to tell someone but he knew what it would sound like and even if he would trust Chris with his life, Chris might think the best course of action to preserve that life would be to lock him up in a paddled cell.
“Jensen, no. Tell me. I know you are bursting to tell me something. It’s not like I met you yesterday. I know you.”
It was hard to keep up his resolve around Chris.
“Alright, I can try to tell you but you’re going to think I’m crazy.”
“Jen, just tell me. You’ve decided you’ll get a magical high via your garage door or something? Dude, it’s not that hard to score some weed.”
“The garage door hitting me on the head, that was an accident. The damn thing is breaking down, like every other thing in my house. You see, it’s more about me being knocked out.”
“You were knocked out, big deal. Don’t tell me that some punk violated you or something before anyone came around who could bring you to the hospital?”
He couldn’t help but chuckle. From a certain perspective, the dream or whatever could be interpreted that way.
“Not quite, Chris, not quite. It’s more like I had the most intense and vivid dream I’ve ever experienced.”
“While you were unconscious? I’ve been knocked out and it was all lights out for me. No dreaming of any sort.”
“That’s one of the things that are bugging me, but it's the contents of the dream or whatever the hell it was that’s eating me now.”
Telling Chris was hard. It was a lot harder than describing to him in detail what had gone down when he lost his virginity, and that had been painful and embarrassing enough, seeing how Lauren had been the girl who had kicked him out of bed after the deed, kick-starting his awkwardness about all things post-coital. Until the dream – or whatever it was. He did skimp on the details but managed to relay that it had been the best sex he’d ever had, awake, sleeping or in a coma. And of course, the fact that he couldn’t get the dream man out of his head.
Chris was silent for few minutes after Jensen had uttered, “yeah, and then I woke up in the hospital.” His face was unreadable and Jensen felt his stomach clench with uneasiness. It wasn’t that Chris was some homophobic close-minded guy or anything, but it probably wasn’t every day that his best friend told him about having vivid homoerotic fantasizes, especially when said friend had been presumably straight all the time they’d known each other.
“So you're all hung up on some guy who doesn’t exist except inside of your head?”
“Um, yeah. But … I kind of found him on Facebook.”
“Jensen, are you insane? I mean, don’t tell me you found some TV actor’s Facebook profile, someone I’ve never heard of and should actually only exist inside your head?”
“How many men named Jared Padalecki can there be in the world? And I actually don’t think he’s a TV actor. Well, there isn’t a lot on his Facebook profile except his friends keep throwing cows at him and giving him pictures of dogs and there are two pictures I could see of him and he looks a lot like the guy … the dream guy.”
“Ok, how about personal information? You know, his relationship status, his hometown, his job – that sort of thing?”
“I think it’s all set to friends only or something. I wish I knew how to hack a Facebook profile. Or just get more information on the guy.”
“I’m always the one to tell you to follow your dreams but you know I didn't mean to be taken so literally.”
Jensen just rolled his eyes.
+++
Despite looking like he had injected grape Jell-o into his forehead, Jensen braved work the next day. It was either to sit at home and stare at the computer screen, at a picture less than 300 pixels across of someone he believed to be Jared Padalecki, or try to pretend he wasn’t going insane and do his job which normally involved calming down the entitlement whores that made up the client base of Barnes-Wentworth Oil.
“No, Mr. Krebbs, I’m sorry but I can’t give you information about that. Yes, I know your company has been in business with this company for a long time. Yes. I’m aware of that. Have you looked at the information on the website? It’s right there, click where it says policy. Yes, I know.”
At the moment Jensen wished he could stab things with his computer mouse but instead he settled for moving it around very violently. It was a daily occurrence that some client or other inspired murderous rage in him, but at the moment he could do with all the murderous rage that was on offer. It kept his mind of others things and it kept him from opening up the browser on his computer.
Finally Mr. Krebbs was satisfied and he could pull off the phone headset and turn his attention to a couple of emails.
“Hey, Ackles, that’s a colorful decoration you are sporting there on your head.”
Tom was craning his long neck over the cubicle wall.
“Thanks. Thought my face could do with some improvement.”
“I would have taken more days off if I were you,” said Tom and stepped into the cubicle. “But then again, I forget how much you like the abuse the clients throw your way.”
Tom had held Jensen’s job before him, but had been elevated to the ranks of a PR and had the pleasure of smooth-talking leggy TV reporters and convincing them that the environmental policy of Barnes-Wentworth Oil was progressive and daring. One look into Tom’s blue-green eyes and they all appeared to be putty in his hands.
“I was bored at home, plus I don’t have to look pretty, unlike you,” said Jensen and twirled his head-set around.
“True,” said Tom and winked at him. He couldn’t help but wonder whether Jared was the same height as Tom, or even taller. At least Jared had broader shoulders. And slimmer hips.
“You’re staring at me.” Tom raised an eyebrow. Jensen blinked and looked down, feeling his face heat up.
“You can look all you want,” Tom said in a sing-song voice as he turned on his heel. “See you at lunch.”
Not daring to watch him go, Jensen kept his eyes on the floor, looking at a frayed line in the carpet. It was one thing not being able to keep his mind off Jared but it was another thing to start leering at his co-workers because of it.
Why isn’t it five o’clock yet? I need a fucking drink.
+++
When his mother called on Friday and asked about his week, Jensen gave her the normal general crap he’d always done while he marveled internally at how bizarre his week had been. He truly had a hard time recalling anything physical he’d done but he could surely catalogue every thought and every mental image he’d had of Jared. It was pathetic, really but nothing seemed to be able divert his mind.
There was one show on in his head and it was the Jared Padalecki show with extended sex scenes. There was the whole thing with reliving the dream sex – or the sex hallucination – or the garage door induced acid trip like Chris had started calling it. Jensen had given up on trying to figure out what it had been – it didn’t change the fact he was stuck and was only now truly understanding the full meaning of the phrase ‘one-track mind’. If that wasn’t enough, his filthy mind had progressed into fantasies.
A favorite of his, which he wasn’t entirely sure would be physically possible, had him pinned to a wall by Jared where he would wrap his legs around Jared’s slim hips and be taken right there and then. Tom had even caught him staring into space at work and asked him what was on his mind.
Hi, Tom, I’m daydreaming about having emasculating sex with some phantom guy my brain has made up.
The whole week had been a struggle. A struggle to keep connected to the real world when his mind wanted to escape.
He had tried all kinds of distractions. His favorite video games, movies, going out for a run, even dinner at his parents’ place hadn’t kept his mind out of the gutter. There was even some good old heterosexual pornography involved in an attempt to derail his mind, but not even ‘In Diana Jones and the Temple Poon’ worked.
It had got so bad that he was starting to long for one of Chris’s famous ragers. There hadn’t been one for ages, maybe because Chris had managed to mellow out a little bit with age – plus it was no fun throwing a rager when all his friends were starting to yawn around midnight. These days it was more of a small gathering of close friends, Chris and Steve playing their guitars and sometimes people even brought food. Not just Doritos and Skittles but good, honest food they might actually have prepared in their own kitchen. Jensen had even displayed such maturity when he brought muffins he baked himself – not without burning his fingers but he’d made them himself.
Not that he was the poster child for maturity at the moment, daydreaming like a lovelorn teenager hopped up on a rush of hormones, disgustingly pathetic and yet a part of him didn’t care. It felt strangely satisfying to be this obsessed with something even if it was a mirage.
Salvation came in the form of his cell ringing.
“Jenny, still in dreamland?”
“Funny, Chris. What’s up?”
“I’m not your best friend for nothing, dude. ‘Cause you are coming over tonight and there will be booze and maybe some weed and girls. I might even find some guys if you want, seeing how your garage door knocked you out of the closet.”
“Haha, hilarious. I’ll come, but no boys, dude. I’m kicking your ass if you do.”
“Relax, Jen, it will just be the usual gang. My days of being cruel and unusual are long over.”
Chris was actually being honest here. Once his favorite sport had been Jensen-baiting, where he was set up with some girl or other, and Chris had usually filled their heads with some crap about him which he then had to correct and, along with it, kill any chance he’d ever had with them. But ever since Jensen had managed to stay in a relationship for more than a couple of weeks, Chris had got off his case. Not that any of his long-term relationships had been successful in the long run. There had been Jessica, who had dumped him because she felt he didn’t have any direction in his life and then there had been Joanna who had cheated on him.
“Sure, I’ll come. But I get to play the guitar if we play Rock Band.”
“You’re so needy.”
+++
Chris was true to his word and it was only the usual crowd gathered at his place. Chris and Steve and some of the others were deeply immersed in Rock Band and Steve was currently serenading everyone around him with the words “I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo.”
Jensen grabbed a beer and sat on a couch close to the guys. He wasn’t really in the mood to play; he was simply too distracted to be any good at the game.
The core of the group had been hanging out since high school – he and Chris had known each other for longer but Steve had come into the fold during high school and then the group had gathered friends like a stone gathers moss. Some had stuck around, others hadn’t.
Chris had ripped the game mic from Steve as Soundgarden’s ‘Black Hole Sun’ came up in the game. This was actually the reason why it was fun to play Rock Band with them: they always tried to compete over who was the bigger diva. Chris usually won, looking very pleased with himself, unless he ended up making mistakes and losing points.
As he was wondering whether he should join the playing he noticed Danneel sitting on the other side of the group, looking thoughtful. Danneel was the sort of girl you’d count as one of the boys if she weren’t as pretty and had as great a body as she did. That was probably the reason why she had very strict rules when it came to men. Dating was only for special occasions and she never dated her friends. She might sleep with them but only if they knew it was just sex. This had earned her a certain respect amongst the boys, not because she constantly put out but because she was straight forward.
Quite frankly, Jensen found her intimidating though he wasn’t entirely sure why. Maybe because she was sure in her sexuality – maybe because she defined her own boundaries.
“What’cha thinking, Jen?” Danneel had noticed him watching her. “You look so deep in thought.”
“I …” he stammered.
She smiled, rather knowingly in his opinion and then moved over to him.
“Stare all you want. I can handle it.”
He swallowed. It wasn’t like he’d been leering at her and his inner gentleman really wanted to protest but he wasn’t about to share his thoughts with her like that.
“I … just … you are very pretty,” he finished in a lame voice.
Her smile widened.
“Why, thank you, Jensen. I think you’re pretty hot yourself.”
A blush crept up his cheeks; he felt the heat and hoped that the lighting was dim enough for her not to notice. Looking down, he wondered how he could steer the conversation away from his lame attempts at flirting.
“You know, you could do with a little more confidence.”
If confidence was the only thing he needed, he’d be set for life. Glancing at her from the corner of his eye, he saw she was still smiling but her eyes were narrowing.
“Then again, you are kind of cute when you are being all coy.”
He blinked and turned his head towards her.
“You think I’m acting?”
“No, Jen. I’ve known you for years. You’re not being fake.”
“So you want me to be both coy and confident? I don’t get it.”
Her smile had turned into a thoughtful pout.
“Be yourself, Jensen.”
He huffed. What if being himself meant that everything was like a whirlpool of confusion? The urge to get up and just go home was strong. Not even a Friday night at Chris’s place offered him the distraction he longed for. Turning to Danneel again to say goodbye, he took a good look of her face. She was so pretty. All bedroom eyes and full lips curving in a pout.
It was something that stank of desperation but he looked her in the eyes and then dropped his gaze to her lips: the oldest move in the book but it worked. She tilted her head towards him as he leaned forward and kissed her. Her lips were just as soft as they had looked, like downy pillows, and it was nice.
Danneel wasn’t one to simply sit there and be kissed. She brought her hands to his face, deepening the kiss, opening her mouth as her hands smoothed over his jaw. Shifting closer, he held onto her shoulders: they felt so small, so fragile, which was strange because Danneel was anything but fragile. And he certainly felt that when she pushed him back, crawling over him, straddling his legs and moving her hands down to his chest. He still held her shoulders, unsure what to do next. As eager as she was in kissing him and as unabashed she was in touching him, it felt strange. Her weight was mostly resting on his thighs and he hardly felt it. His hands fell to her hips just to feel if she truly and physically was there. Under his hands he felt the swell of her hips, the curvature of her behind and it felt a lot softer than his sensory memory had led him to believe.
His sensory memory had been completely hi-jacked. What he wanted to feel under his hands, who he wanted to straddle him, whose lips he wanted to kiss, wasn’t Danneel, as beautiful and sexy as she was. He wanted hard muscles rippling under his hands, he wanted someone hard and heavy to straddle him, to tower over him, he wanted firm lips to crush his in a bruising kiss. He wanted it to feel like he was making out with Jared.
The realization made him turn his head away to break the kiss. Danneel froze, her hands resting on his stomach.
“I … can’t …” His voice was barely audible.
She straightened her back but stayed where she was.
“Why?”
“I … just … I can’t. You are so hot and … but I can’t.”
“Oh Jensen,” she said and lifted herself off him, moving to the arm of the couch and away from him. “It’s so cute how old fashioned you are.”
So she thought he was being a backward old fool who couldn’t handle making out with a girl, not to mention possibly sleeping with her. He looked at her, probably a bit wide-eyed.
“I’m not going to be all offended or anything. I mean, I’d love to make out with you some more and even go somewhere else and take this further but I know you, Jensen. You just aren’t the one night stand type.”
A tiny little rebellious part of him wanted to prove her wrong, that he could handle sex with no strings attached, but it wouldn’t be fair to her because he knew his traitorous mind would replace her with someone else – he'd imagine someone else while having sex with her. In that respect he was a backward old fool.
“I’m sorry,” he said as he sat up. “I suppose you don’t get guys going all missies on you.”
“Hey, first time for everything,” she said and dangled at his shoulder. “Somewhere out there is someone who is very lucky but doesn’t know it. ‘Cause someday you’ll find someone who will appreciate you. Seriously, your exes were all touched in the head to break up with you.”
He laughed.
“I broke up with Joanna, remember? She cheated on me.”
“As I said, touched in the head.”
They both laughed and Jensen felt relieved. Danneel was simply that cool; she would never allow this to become an awkward thing between them. Not that he didn’t feel awkward but he was all awkward anyway.
+++
“Seriously, Jen, I saw you. You had your tongue down her throat and all. I mean, five minutes more and she’d have been offering to blow you.”
Jensen had left Chris’s place shortly after his interlude with Danneel and hoped he could just put it behind him there and then, but apparently Chris had noticed them and had to know everything. That’s why he was at Jensen’s place at half past one in the afternoon on a Saturday. In Chris time, that was like getting up at the crack of dawn.
“And she didn’t and that’s that.”
“Come on, Jen. Spill the beans. I’m not going to tell anyone, not even Steve. Danneel won’t know that you kiss and tell.”
This earned Chris an eye roll.
“What was it? Don’t tell me you’re such a bad kisser?” Chris wasn’t about to give up and Jensen kind of felt like he had a reputation to uphold.
“No, nothing like that. It was me who cut it short.”
“With Danneel, are you insane? It’s Danneel we are talking about, the world’s sexiest sex kitten.”
“Yeah. Really.” He gave Chris a suffering look, hoping against hope that he would drop the matter but he knew better.
“Dude, I’ve made out with her and slept with her and she’s like a force of nature. Don’t tell me you like them all meek and stuff? No, not with all the homoerotic fantasies. No, no, don’t tell me … Jen, seriously, was it because of them? Are you telling me that you can’t get some guy who does or doesn’t exist out of your head enough to get your fucking freak on with Danneel?”
The urge not to dignify that with an answer was quite strong but he knew Chris wasn’t judging him. Chris would just have to calibrate his world view a tiny bit and then he would be OK with it.
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Fuck, you need something like that brain eraser thing from Eternal Sunshine … you know, wipe your head clean of this. This is being dysfunctional, dude.”
The sad thing was that Chris was right. Jensen was hardly able to get through a normal day without spacing out and getting lost in thought about Jared. He felt frayed and he struggled to keep focused on whatever he was doing, whether it was helping a customer at work, watching TV at home or even having a conversation with his family and friends. It shouldn’t be this hard to put a lid on it.
Was the solution perhaps just to find the guy? In his head Jared had been a TV star but so had he been. So the question was to find this guy he’d possibly found on Facebook, but Facebook only went so far and looking through the telephone directories was even less helpful.
“Chris, I know you are going to tell me that I’m crazy and all but I think I should try to find Jared.”
“You’re crazy,” Chris said immediately but it was clear from the tone in his voice he wouldn’t try to stop him.
“The thing is that I need to find someone who can either hack Facebook profiles or just add the guy.”
“And then hire a PI to find out whether he has a criminal record or is a white supremacists or some other shit.” The tone in Chris’s voice wasn’t out-right mocking but he obviously felt that Jensen was being ridiculous.
But it was like someone had turned on a light switch in Jensen’s head. A PI would be his best bet. If Jared Padalecki turned out to a straight-laced guy with a wife and a couple of kids and therefore completely out of reach for him, a PI would find out fast and relatively painlessly.
“Chris, how much do you think it would cost to hire a PI?”
+++
The building wasn’t situated in the nicest part of town, so Jensen felt slightly uneasy leaving his car unattended even though it was just one step up from a piece of crap.
He had imagined a glass door with the name of the private detective painted on it, like in the Humphrey Bogart movies. But here he was, faced with a non-descript door with a sign that had been printed on a sheet of A4 paper with an ink jet printer that bled the ink a bit too much. The sign read ‘JDM Private Investigation, opening hours 3 PM-8PM Tues-Thurs.’ It was 4.50 PM on a Tuesday so someone should be in. He didn’t dare but to knock.
A gruff voice told him to come in and he walked into the untidiest office he’d seen in his life and that included Mike’s office when he was working a case. There were towering stacks of all kinds of things, not only paper and files but knick-knacks, miscellaneous paraphernalia and even weapons. There was something looking like a huge broadsword lying on the top of stacks of old copies of National Geographic. At the far end of the office was a desk with a computer and behind it sat a bearded fellow in a washed-out band t-shirt - Jensen was pretty sure it was a Skid Row t-shirt - typing something on a computer using only two fingers. There was another desk, almost hidden behind a stack of cardboard boxes and it appeared that someone was sitting there as well.
“Uhh, hello, I called earlier. My name is Ackles, Jensen Ackles. You told me to just swing by, I didn’t have to make an appointment.”
The guy in the band t-shirt looked up and without words beckoned him to come closer.
“Sit down,” he said and pointed out a chair which seemed to be clear from any debris.
Jensen sat down, kind of afraid that the reason the chair wasn’t stacked with an old cassette player and the all the volumes of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was because it would give way.
The chair didn’t give way and Jensen dared to sit a bit higher.
“Excuse my manners,” said the fellow and reached his hand towards him. “Jeffrey Dean Morgan, PI.”
He gave Jensen a hearty and strong handshake.
“So what brings you here? You said something about finding someone on the phone. Missing person? That sort of thing?”
“Erm, not exactly. I just have a name. I kind of need to know where this person lives and you know, the basic background stuff, like their jobs, family situation, things like that.”
Jeffrey laughed a belly-deep laugh.
“People use the internet for that sort of thing nowadays. You know, their Facebook accounts and blogs and photostreams and things like that. You are after something more, aren’t you?”
“OK, yeah. I kind of need to know more about their family situation than a Facebook relationship status has to offer.”
“Mmm, thought so.”
After a discussion about exactly the sort of information he wanted, Jeffrey asked him for the name. As Jensen spelled it out, Jeffrey didn’t write it down. He simply nodded and then Jensen heard someone typing something furiously behind him. Turning, he saw a dark-haired man hunched over a laptop.
“My Russian spy,” Jeffery grunted. “Doesn’t say very much but hella good at digging up the dirt.”
The guy didn’t seem to notice, just kept typing something and after a short while the printer on his desk started vomiting print-outs. Supposedly all those pages contained things about the real Jared Padalecki and supposedly he was dying to get that information but he just felt numb. Like every page would read, ‘Jensen Ross Ackles is a loser who thinks he can get into the pants of a hot guy.’
Finally the printer stopped and the Russian spy gathered the pages from the printer, put them in a folder and held it out to Jensen. He looked at the folder and felt like if he would take it, there would be no turning back.
“This is of course just basic information. Take a look and then you can decide if you want to take this further. Just drop Misha here an email or call. We have your credit card details in any case.”
It took a tiny shoulder jerk for him to ward off any money-related worries regarding this enterprise. So what if the roof wouldn’t get fixed for the next two years if he took this further?
He took the folder and almost stopped and waited for the earth to stop rotating on its axis.
It was actually a surprise to him that he made it all the way to the car but as soon as he was in the driver's seat, he flipped the folder open and started reading the information.
The first thing he saw was a huge picture of Jared, his Jared, the Jared in his head. If he looked closely he could see the tiniest difference. The Jared on the picture had shaggier hair – his bangs hung into his eyes more and his cheekbones stood out a little bit more, like he was slightly thinner.
So they had found a Jared Padalecki who looked very much like the one in his head. That was a start.
The next page contained the same information he would have found on the Facebook page if it hadn’t been locked. Born in July 1982 in San Antonio and to Jensen’s relief he appeared to still live there. This Jared was no TV star either, he was a carpenter, and Jensen felt relieved. He had feared that if Jared wasn’t a TV star, he would be some kind of a big shot somewhere. Maybe he was a big shot in the world of carpentry but that was less scary than if he had been a stockbroker or something like that.
Reading on, Jensen had to laugh when he read about his family – one older brother and one younger sister, though somehow he couldn’t imagine that Jared had the middle child syndrome as badly as he did.
There were more tidbits about him in the notes and nothing that told Jensen he should just forget about the whole thing. In fact, butterflies had started to flutter in his stomach. In San Antonio lived a carpenter named Jared Padalecki, looking exactly like the Jared in his head. And that was enough to set him up for days.
+++
He was munching on a chicken wrap in the canteen when his cell phone went off. Tom was on the other side of the table, eating a salad. He raised an eyebrow, since it was a rare occurrence for someone to call Jensen at work.
Seeing the number on the display, he was quick to put down his chicken wrap and stand up before answering the phone. There was no way that he was allowing Tom to overhear this phone call.
“Morgan here,” said the gruff voice on the other end of the line.
“OK, what’s up?” His hands were shaking and he had a hard time holding his cell to his ear.
“Well, we have a little more information on this person you are seeking. Misha is putting together a file for you. But I can tell you roughly what we found out.”
Jeffrey then started giving him details about Jared’s workplace, his current address, the type of car he drove (unlike Jensen, he stuck to domestic cars and drove a Dodge truck) and the names of his roommates.
“There’s also a Milo Ventimiglia living at the apartment and it appears that he and Jared are lovers.”
This particular piece of information was dished out just like all the other things Jeffrey was rattling off but everything in Jensen’s head became fuzzy except for that particular piece of information. Almost as if in a trance he bid Jeffrey goodbye and then the cell slid out of his hands and fell to the floor with a clang. He was standing at one of end of the canteen where hardly anyone was sitting but the clang had people looking his way.
“Jensen, is everything alright?” Tom yelled over the hall.
He wanted to answer him but his voice was momentarily lost. His mind or his heart or whichever body part was in charge of his feelings had been prepared for the ‘Jared’s happily married and has two bouncy children’ thing but not for the ‘he’s gay but taken’ thing. His head was swimming with how Morgan had worded it, ‘lovers’. It sounded so untouchable – like Jared was destined to be with this guy forever. Yet somehow his hopes weren’t quelled completely.
“Earth to Jensen!” He hadn’t noticed Tom walking towards him. He looked up at him and saw some kind of amused concern on Tom’s face.
“Is everything alright? You dropped your phone.” Tom reached down and handed him the cell.
“Don’t worry,” he said as he pocketed the phone. He really couldn’t be there – he wanted to go somewhere… out there and have some sort of a melt-down. As he turned away, Tom caught his hand.
“Jensen, seriously. Is everything OK?”
“I’m fine. Please, let me go and … Tom, I have to go out for a bit.” He wrenched himself free from Tom and stormed out, having no idea where he was going and ending up in his car. There he sat, staring into the air while his mind and heart both felt like they were being put through the wringer.
First of all, his obsession was ridiculous. He had dreamt up the guy and then his mind had clung to the mental imprint like a drowning man to the last straw. Then he had actually done a crazy – and not to mention creepy – thing and tried to track down his fantasy man and now, even though he knew the guy was in serious relationship, his idiotic heart refused to give up because the sexual orientation was right. A sexual orientation that Jensen himself hadn’t really admitted to.
This is so fucked up beyond repair that I seriously should have myself committed.
But then there was the unshakable feeling that deep down drove him to finding Jared and to not giving up those shreds of hope. That it was right. That it was destiny. Maybe that was the creepiest part of it all.
+++
An hour later he went back to his office, hoping that things would be busy so at least a part of his mind wouldn’t be all caught up in the Jared Padalecki show.
Tom was waiting for him with couple of coffee containers but Jensen had the strong suspicion that Tom had gone up to Mike’s office and poured something a little more potent into the cups. He needed it, but he also knew that in return he had to give Tom some explanation.
“So what’s going on?” Tom asked when he handed Jensen the cup.
“Stuff,” Jensen answered noncommittally.
“Financial problems? Death in the family? Girlfriend woes? Come on, tell me.”
“None of the above,” said Jensen and sipped from the cup, feeling the burning taste of bourbon on his tongue.
Tom raised his right eyebrow and looked at Jensen like he was a curious specimen he was examining at a lab.
“Then what on earth is the matter with you?”
“I really, really don't want to tell you but I suppose I owe you some kind of explanation, seeing as how I've totally been out of it. Well, the gist of it is that I think I've fallen for someone who doesn't know I exist.”
“Seriously?”
Before continuing, Jensen took another sip of the whiskey.
“I know this seems so junior high, like I'm a love-struck pre-teen. But yeah, there is this person who knows nothing about my existence and I'm ... yeah. God, when I talk about this out loud, this sounds so lame I want to die.”
“Well, maybe it's lame but the matters of the heart are never rational,” Tom said sagely.
“Yeah. And ... I can't believe I'm saying this. It's a guy.”
Tom's eyes widened which gave him a curiously innocent look despite the fact he was a hardened PR shark who could convince the pope that selling the devil his grandmother was indeed the best course of action for all parties involved.
“I didn't know you were gay.”
“I didn't either.”
“Jensen, this sounds ... I'm sorry, this sounds weird.”
“How do you think I feel? I'm not planning my coming out party if that's what you think. I'm freaked out. I can't get the guy out of my head and he's never laid eyes on me.”
Now Tom's eyebrows shot up and Jensen realized he might have said too much.
“I'm going to go get the entire bottle," Tom said. "Meet me in my office in five. You've got to tell me what this is all about.”
As soon as he saw Tom disappear down the hall towards the elevators to go to the ninth to legal, Jensen felt like panicking. Why on earth had he told Tom about this? While Tom didn't have direct authority over his position, a well worded missive from him to human resources could have Jensen out of job. This had to be filed under reckless behavior. A visit to a shrink was sounding wiser by the minute.
The steps to Tom's corner office were heavy, he tried to cook up some story to feed Tom but draw a complete blank.
“Hey, Jen! My man. Tom says you are having an existential crisis.”
Wonderful. Why couldn't Tom just have brought the bottle? No, of course he had to drag Mike down with him.
Mike was actually his friend as much as Tom. Sure, there was the gap their status at the company had created but for guys who were much higher up the food chain than he was, Tom and Mike were downright egalitarian, so he tried not to panic.
“Kind of,” Jensen murmured when he put down his coffee cup to receive a hand-cut crystal tumbler containing bourbon on the rocks. Of course Mike kept ice cubes in his office. The legal deals of this company were probably all sealed by a glass of whiskey and under a cloud of cigar smoke.
“Spill, my friend,” Mike said jovially and patted at the seat beside him on the leather couch that Tom had in his office.
“It's just that I seem to be a thirteen year old girl who is in love with a guy who doesn't have a clue who I am. And I just can't get the guy out of my mind.”
Tom was still looking at him and Mike was blinking.
“So let's ignore the fact that you have suddenly started batting for the other team or the same team or whatever one says about these things. What do you mean? How did you fall for someone who doesn't know who you are?” Mike asked.
“'Cause I saw him in a dream,” Jensen mumbled.
“And you haven't had your head checked, why?” It was probably a small mercy that Mike didn't look as angelic as Tom when his eyes were wide with surprise.
“Because ... the guy exists.” The over-all lameness of the situation was getting a bit too much for Jensen and he downed his glass of whiskey in one gulp.
“So you aren't crazy but psychic?” Mike said and the sardonic tone in his voice did sting.
Jensen wanted to tell him to fuck himself and then run out of the office.
“Hey, play nice,” Tom said. “Maybe Jensen saw him for real but it didn’t register until in his dream.”
“OK, I don’t know what the fuck happened but I dreamt of some guy I’m pretty sure I’ve never laid my eyes on and he exists and I’m fucking hung up on him.” Jensen pulled himself up from the couch.
“Sorry, Jen. I mean – you’ve got to admit that it’s a bit crazy.” Mike was obviously attempting to talk in some kind of a soothing voice which aggravated Jensen even more.
“Thank you, Captain Obvious. Nice to know I can rely on your support.” He tried pushing past Tom but Tom put his hand on his shoulder so he stopped.
“Hey, it’s my 12 year old bourbon you are drinking.” The urge to punch Mike in the face was getting stronger and Tom seemed to sense that.
“Stop it. This is my office. Please try to be civilized. Mike, no matter how weird this thing might be, this is kind of serious for Jensen. And Jensen, you know Mike.” Tom had dropped his voice and was trying to sound soothing.
“OK, I’ll try,” Mike said in his most put-upon tone of voice. “Jen, so if we ignore the whole gay thing, we could ignore the crazy factor as well. Then the question is, why are you hanging around here all zombie-fied and out of it? Why aren’t you trying to meet up with this guy, or at least trying to find out if you have a chance?”
Jensen didn’t answer right away.
“’Cause it’s complicated.”
“Why is it complicated? You know that the guy exists so you should have some means of locating him.” Mike was insistent.
“I know where to find him and all. He lives in San Antonio.”
“So go there. Tom, the grunt workers can get time off, right?”
“You don’t think I haven’t been contemplating that? As I said, it’s complicated.”
“So explain.” Mike wasn’t going to give up.
“I may have hired a private detective and I may have found out that the guy is gay but taken.”
“Go Jen! It does smack of the whole creepy stalker thing but I’d say this counts for you being a go-getter.” Mike punched the air, making Tom roll his eyes.
“Jensen, what are you going to do?” Tom had put into words the question that had been swirling in Jensen’s mind for the last couple of hours.
“I don’t know. It’s not like the guy is married… this is Texas after all. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t committed and in love. Then there’s the small problem of him not knowing who I am and then another small problem of getting us together.” It felt bizarre to put it out there.
“Maybe you should hope that he’s the superficial sort ‘cause then you should be a shoe-in, Jen.” Mike was almost sniggering. “Pretty boy like you.”
He felt a blush creep up his cheeks and saw Tom shoot Mike a stern look.
“Yeah, ‘cause that’s the best basis for a relationship. Thanks but no thanks. Remember Joanna?”
Mike and Tom had been present for Joanna, as she was the daughter of the vice-chairman of Barnes-Wentworth. In fact, Tom had had a narrow escape from being given the royal Joanna treatment but he'd had the presence of mind not to date her.
“But you are just going to agonize over this forever if you don’t try to meet the guy. Show us you have balls, boy.”
“Classy, Mike,” said Tom sardonically.
“Tom, you know it’s true. And you know what, Jen, you are going to take time off. I’m sure you’ve got accumulated vacation time, but if not, Tom and I should be able to sort that out with human resources and maybe we’ll be lucky and get Kristin to cover for you.”
“God, you are such a horndog, Mike.” Tom shook his head.
Part 3 - Master Post
Previous Part
Bright light played upon his eyelids, threatening to sting his eyes. There was a dull thrumming in his head and his forehead ached which was strange as he had hit the back of his head on the floor. Prying one eye open he felt harsh fluorescent lighting hit his eye so he closed it quickly again.
Someone was holding his hand, someone with small and soft hands and that someone spoke.
“Jensen, are you awake?”
His mother. What was his mother doing there?
The garage door, you idiot. Which would explain why his forehead was hurting?. Didn’t explain much else except for the presence of his mother.
“Yeah, I’m awake,” he said groggily. “Where am I?”
“At the hospital. Josh found you on the floor of the garage. The door must have knocked you out when you were putting away your car after church.”
“Wait, what day is it? What’s the time?”
“Sunday, the 7th of September. I think it’s just past four in the afternoon. I can ask a nurse … actually I should alert the doctor that you’re awake.” She rushed out and he was left there in the hospital bed. They hadn’t hooked him up with anything, thank god; he hated IVs and all that other crap. And it wasn’t like he didn’t have enough on his mind already. Nice, not having the frustration of being bound to a hospital bed as well.
Seriously, what had happened? Did I just have the most intense sex dream of all time while I was knocked out? It didn’t make any sense. He’s been knocked out before and he didn’t remember any super-realistic dreaming going on then. It didn’t feel like he’d come into the hospital sheets or anything. That would have been embarrassing to say the least.
As he was about to slip his hand under the covers to check whether there were any tell-tale signs, or if he had the bodily aches he’d felt before in the dream that might or mightn’t have been a dream, his mother and the doctor came into the room.
“I think we can discharge you, Mr. Ackles. Your head seems to be made of hard stuff, you didn’t even have a concussion. I advise you to take it easy for the next couple of days, call in sick at work and try not to have your garage door knock you out again.”
“Dude, you could have called!”
Jensen looked up from the football game on TV. Chris was standing in the middle of the living room – he had obviously used some kind of über-stealth to get in. He did have a key hidden in a flower pot on the porch and Chris knew all about it, but that didn’t explain how he had managed to make himself unheard. Until now that was. Chris and dulcet tones shouldn’t be used in the same sentence.
“I … just … you know how it is.”
“Dude, we could have hung out today or something. You must have squeezed out a sick day.”
“Are you telling me you were up before five this afternoon?” Chris was a notorious night-owl, especially when he wasn’t working on something that needed his attention during the day.
“Hmm, you got me there. Who is playing?”
“The Packers and the Vikings.”
“For the love of football, Jen, turn it off. Did the garage door knock half your brain out?”
“Shit, Chris, no. And how come you know?”
“Your brother texted me earlier. Called you Knock Out Boy so I had to press for details.”
He couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the pun. Josh had been all too amused that he’d lost a fight with a garage door. His brother was a great guy but he was still careful to frequently remind Jensen who was the older brother.
Chris sat down on the sofa as Jensen turned off the game and shoved his hand right into the popcorn bowl on the table.
“So, tell me of this epic battle between you and your garage door. Was it heroic?” Chris asked through the mouthful of popcorn.
“It was stuck and it hit me on the forehead. I was knocked out. That’s it. And yeah, I’ve this huge bump on my head as you must see.” He couldn’t look straight at Chris. Despite his laidback attitude, Chris was always pretty good at reading people and seeing how he’d known Jensen since they were kids, he would know that there was something on his mind.
The entire day - actually every waking moment since he’d got home from the hospital - he had been thinking about that dream, or whatever the hell it had been he’d experienced while being knocked out. He kept reliving the sex over and over again, each time remembering a different sensation but above all, the dream man, Jared, appeared to have moved into his mind permanently. The tall frame, the long and sculpted muscles, the bright smile – everything about him was etched into Jensen’s memory.
“OK. You got knocked out. Big deal. Then why the hell are you staring down at your toes like you just smashed my favorite guitar by sitting on it? Don’t tell me you did it on purpose?”
“Of course not. If I wanted to kill myself, I would have found a more effective way.”
“Sheez, Jen, I know that. I was thinking more along the lines of insurance fraud.”
A dry sort of laughter escaped from Jensen’s throat.
“You think I’m that desperate? That strapped for cash? They do pay me.”
“It’s just … I know this isn’t what you want most.”
Chris had never liked the idea of Jensen buying the house. He had told him beforehand that it was the sort of house that someone who wanted a fixer-upper would want, not someone like Jensen who always managed to find his thumbs in a painful manner when he swung a hammer.
The whole thing with investing in real estate, the whole thing about no longer renting dank apartments and keeping most of his possessions in cardboard boxes had been his attempt to grow up. An attempt to find out who he really was. Chris had been right about the house not being the solution to that particular problem. Still, it appeased Jensen because he knew his parents felt like he was finally becoming an adult, at the ripe age of thirty, and taking some responsibility.
The thing was that he’d never known what he wanted most. It was the big reason why he’d dropped out of college – though flunking theoretical physics twice had also been a deciding factor. It was also the reason why he’d never settled down with anyone. In fact, one of his exes, Jessica, had dumped him on the grounds that he was too wishy-washy.
And now his mind was full of some ideal it had concocted and if he’d allow himself, he’d feel the want, but he couldn’t. It was so stupid and ridiculous to get hooked up on the delusions of one’s mind.
Still avoiding Chris’s eyes, he started fiddling with the TV remote, knowing all too well that Chris could turn up the heat on him and give him the third degree about the state of Jensen.
“Ok, what are you not telling me then?” Chris had planted himself on the couch.
“It’s nothing,” Jensen said, more to the remote than to Chris’s face.
“Please drop the act – tell me, even if you were trying to kill yourself just so you wouldn’t have to look at my ugly face again.”
“Chris, please, drop this.” He was bursting to tell someone but he knew what it would sound like and even if he would trust Chris with his life, Chris might think the best course of action to preserve that life would be to lock him up in a paddled cell.
“Jensen, no. Tell me. I know you are bursting to tell me something. It’s not like I met you yesterday. I know you.”
It was hard to keep up his resolve around Chris.
“Alright, I can try to tell you but you’re going to think I’m crazy.”
“Jen, just tell me. You’ve decided you’ll get a magical high via your garage door or something? Dude, it’s not that hard to score some weed.”
“The garage door hitting me on the head, that was an accident. The damn thing is breaking down, like every other thing in my house. You see, it’s more about me being knocked out.”
“You were knocked out, big deal. Don’t tell me that some punk violated you or something before anyone came around who could bring you to the hospital?”
He couldn’t help but chuckle. From a certain perspective, the dream or whatever could be interpreted that way.
“Not quite, Chris, not quite. It’s more like I had the most intense and vivid dream I’ve ever experienced.”
“While you were unconscious? I’ve been knocked out and it was all lights out for me. No dreaming of any sort.”
“That’s one of the things that are bugging me, but it's the contents of the dream or whatever the hell it was that’s eating me now.”
Telling Chris was hard. It was a lot harder than describing to him in detail what had gone down when he lost his virginity, and that had been painful and embarrassing enough, seeing how Lauren had been the girl who had kicked him out of bed after the deed, kick-starting his awkwardness about all things post-coital. Until the dream – or whatever it was. He did skimp on the details but managed to relay that it had been the best sex he’d ever had, awake, sleeping or in a coma. And of course, the fact that he couldn’t get the dream man out of his head.
Chris was silent for few minutes after Jensen had uttered, “yeah, and then I woke up in the hospital.” His face was unreadable and Jensen felt his stomach clench with uneasiness. It wasn’t that Chris was some homophobic close-minded guy or anything, but it probably wasn’t every day that his best friend told him about having vivid homoerotic fantasizes, especially when said friend had been presumably straight all the time they’d known each other.
“So you're all hung up on some guy who doesn’t exist except inside of your head?”
“Um, yeah. But … I kind of found him on Facebook.”
“Jensen, are you insane? I mean, don’t tell me you found some TV actor’s Facebook profile, someone I’ve never heard of and should actually only exist inside your head?”
“How many men named Jared Padalecki can there be in the world? And I actually don’t think he’s a TV actor. Well, there isn’t a lot on his Facebook profile except his friends keep throwing cows at him and giving him pictures of dogs and there are two pictures I could see of him and he looks a lot like the guy … the dream guy.”
“Ok, how about personal information? You know, his relationship status, his hometown, his job – that sort of thing?”
“I think it’s all set to friends only or something. I wish I knew how to hack a Facebook profile. Or just get more information on the guy.”
“I’m always the one to tell you to follow your dreams but you know I didn't mean to be taken so literally.”
Jensen just rolled his eyes.
Despite looking like he had injected grape Jell-o into his forehead, Jensen braved work the next day. It was either to sit at home and stare at the computer screen, at a picture less than 300 pixels across of someone he believed to be Jared Padalecki, or try to pretend he wasn’t going insane and do his job which normally involved calming down the entitlement whores that made up the client base of Barnes-Wentworth Oil.
“No, Mr. Krebbs, I’m sorry but I can’t give you information about that. Yes, I know your company has been in business with this company for a long time. Yes. I’m aware of that. Have you looked at the information on the website? It’s right there, click where it says policy. Yes, I know.”
At the moment Jensen wished he could stab things with his computer mouse but instead he settled for moving it around very violently. It was a daily occurrence that some client or other inspired murderous rage in him, but at the moment he could do with all the murderous rage that was on offer. It kept his mind of others things and it kept him from opening up the browser on his computer.
Finally Mr. Krebbs was satisfied and he could pull off the phone headset and turn his attention to a couple of emails.
“Hey, Ackles, that’s a colorful decoration you are sporting there on your head.”
Tom was craning his long neck over the cubicle wall.
“Thanks. Thought my face could do with some improvement.”
“I would have taken more days off if I were you,” said Tom and stepped into the cubicle. “But then again, I forget how much you like the abuse the clients throw your way.”
Tom had held Jensen’s job before him, but had been elevated to the ranks of a PR and had the pleasure of smooth-talking leggy TV reporters and convincing them that the environmental policy of Barnes-Wentworth Oil was progressive and daring. One look into Tom’s blue-green eyes and they all appeared to be putty in his hands.
“I was bored at home, plus I don’t have to look pretty, unlike you,” said Jensen and twirled his head-set around.
“True,” said Tom and winked at him. He couldn’t help but wonder whether Jared was the same height as Tom, or even taller. At least Jared had broader shoulders. And slimmer hips.
“You’re staring at me.” Tom raised an eyebrow. Jensen blinked and looked down, feeling his face heat up.
“You can look all you want,” Tom said in a sing-song voice as he turned on his heel. “See you at lunch.”
Not daring to watch him go, Jensen kept his eyes on the floor, looking at a frayed line in the carpet. It was one thing not being able to keep his mind off Jared but it was another thing to start leering at his co-workers because of it.
Why isn’t it five o’clock yet? I need a fucking drink.
When his mother called on Friday and asked about his week, Jensen gave her the normal general crap he’d always done while he marveled internally at how bizarre his week had been. He truly had a hard time recalling anything physical he’d done but he could surely catalogue every thought and every mental image he’d had of Jared. It was pathetic, really but nothing seemed to be able divert his mind.
There was one show on in his head and it was the Jared Padalecki show with extended sex scenes. There was the whole thing with reliving the dream sex – or the sex hallucination – or the garage door induced acid trip like Chris had started calling it. Jensen had given up on trying to figure out what it had been – it didn’t change the fact he was stuck and was only now truly understanding the full meaning of the phrase ‘one-track mind’. If that wasn’t enough, his filthy mind had progressed into fantasies.
A favorite of his, which he wasn’t entirely sure would be physically possible, had him pinned to a wall by Jared where he would wrap his legs around Jared’s slim hips and be taken right there and then. Tom had even caught him staring into space at work and asked him what was on his mind.
Hi, Tom, I’m daydreaming about having emasculating sex with some phantom guy my brain has made up.
The whole week had been a struggle. A struggle to keep connected to the real world when his mind wanted to escape.
He had tried all kinds of distractions. His favorite video games, movies, going out for a run, even dinner at his parents’ place hadn’t kept his mind out of the gutter. There was even some good old heterosexual pornography involved in an attempt to derail his mind, but not even ‘In Diana Jones and the Temple Poon’ worked.
It had got so bad that he was starting to long for one of Chris’s famous ragers. There hadn’t been one for ages, maybe because Chris had managed to mellow out a little bit with age – plus it was no fun throwing a rager when all his friends were starting to yawn around midnight. These days it was more of a small gathering of close friends, Chris and Steve playing their guitars and sometimes people even brought food. Not just Doritos and Skittles but good, honest food they might actually have prepared in their own kitchen. Jensen had even displayed such maturity when he brought muffins he baked himself – not without burning his fingers but he’d made them himself.
Not that he was the poster child for maturity at the moment, daydreaming like a lovelorn teenager hopped up on a rush of hormones, disgustingly pathetic and yet a part of him didn’t care. It felt strangely satisfying to be this obsessed with something even if it was a mirage.
Salvation came in the form of his cell ringing.
“Jenny, still in dreamland?”
“Funny, Chris. What’s up?”
“I’m not your best friend for nothing, dude. ‘Cause you are coming over tonight and there will be booze and maybe some weed and girls. I might even find some guys if you want, seeing how your garage door knocked you out of the closet.”
“Haha, hilarious. I’ll come, but no boys, dude. I’m kicking your ass if you do.”
“Relax, Jen, it will just be the usual gang. My days of being cruel and unusual are long over.”
Chris was actually being honest here. Once his favorite sport had been Jensen-baiting, where he was set up with some girl or other, and Chris had usually filled their heads with some crap about him which he then had to correct and, along with it, kill any chance he’d ever had with them. But ever since Jensen had managed to stay in a relationship for more than a couple of weeks, Chris had got off his case. Not that any of his long-term relationships had been successful in the long run. There had been Jessica, who had dumped him because she felt he didn’t have any direction in his life and then there had been Joanna who had cheated on him.
“Sure, I’ll come. But I get to play the guitar if we play Rock Band.”
“You’re so needy.”
Chris was true to his word and it was only the usual crowd gathered at his place. Chris and Steve and some of the others were deeply immersed in Rock Band and Steve was currently serenading everyone around him with the words “I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo.”
Jensen grabbed a beer and sat on a couch close to the guys. He wasn’t really in the mood to play; he was simply too distracted to be any good at the game.
The core of the group had been hanging out since high school – he and Chris had known each other for longer but Steve had come into the fold during high school and then the group had gathered friends like a stone gathers moss. Some had stuck around, others hadn’t.
Chris had ripped the game mic from Steve as Soundgarden’s ‘Black Hole Sun’ came up in the game. This was actually the reason why it was fun to play Rock Band with them: they always tried to compete over who was the bigger diva. Chris usually won, looking very pleased with himself, unless he ended up making mistakes and losing points.
As he was wondering whether he should join the playing he noticed Danneel sitting on the other side of the group, looking thoughtful. Danneel was the sort of girl you’d count as one of the boys if she weren’t as pretty and had as great a body as she did. That was probably the reason why she had very strict rules when it came to men. Dating was only for special occasions and she never dated her friends. She might sleep with them but only if they knew it was just sex. This had earned her a certain respect amongst the boys, not because she constantly put out but because she was straight forward.
Quite frankly, Jensen found her intimidating though he wasn’t entirely sure why. Maybe because she was sure in her sexuality – maybe because she defined her own boundaries.
“What’cha thinking, Jen?” Danneel had noticed him watching her. “You look so deep in thought.”
“I …” he stammered.
She smiled, rather knowingly in his opinion and then moved over to him.
“Stare all you want. I can handle it.”
He swallowed. It wasn’t like he’d been leering at her and his inner gentleman really wanted to protest but he wasn’t about to share his thoughts with her like that.
“I … just … you are very pretty,” he finished in a lame voice.
Her smile widened.
“Why, thank you, Jensen. I think you’re pretty hot yourself.”
A blush crept up his cheeks; he felt the heat and hoped that the lighting was dim enough for her not to notice. Looking down, he wondered how he could steer the conversation away from his lame attempts at flirting.
“You know, you could do with a little more confidence.”
If confidence was the only thing he needed, he’d be set for life. Glancing at her from the corner of his eye, he saw she was still smiling but her eyes were narrowing.
“Then again, you are kind of cute when you are being all coy.”
He blinked and turned his head towards her.
“You think I’m acting?”
“No, Jen. I’ve known you for years. You’re not being fake.”
“So you want me to be both coy and confident? I don’t get it.”
Her smile had turned into a thoughtful pout.
“Be yourself, Jensen.”
He huffed. What if being himself meant that everything was like a whirlpool of confusion? The urge to get up and just go home was strong. Not even a Friday night at Chris’s place offered him the distraction he longed for. Turning to Danneel again to say goodbye, he took a good look of her face. She was so pretty. All bedroom eyes and full lips curving in a pout.
It was something that stank of desperation but he looked her in the eyes and then dropped his gaze to her lips: the oldest move in the book but it worked. She tilted her head towards him as he leaned forward and kissed her. Her lips were just as soft as they had looked, like downy pillows, and it was nice.
Danneel wasn’t one to simply sit there and be kissed. She brought her hands to his face, deepening the kiss, opening her mouth as her hands smoothed over his jaw. Shifting closer, he held onto her shoulders: they felt so small, so fragile, which was strange because Danneel was anything but fragile. And he certainly felt that when she pushed him back, crawling over him, straddling his legs and moving her hands down to his chest. He still held her shoulders, unsure what to do next. As eager as she was in kissing him and as unabashed she was in touching him, it felt strange. Her weight was mostly resting on his thighs and he hardly felt it. His hands fell to her hips just to feel if she truly and physically was there. Under his hands he felt the swell of her hips, the curvature of her behind and it felt a lot softer than his sensory memory had led him to believe.
His sensory memory had been completely hi-jacked. What he wanted to feel under his hands, who he wanted to straddle him, whose lips he wanted to kiss, wasn’t Danneel, as beautiful and sexy as she was. He wanted hard muscles rippling under his hands, he wanted someone hard and heavy to straddle him, to tower over him, he wanted firm lips to crush his in a bruising kiss. He wanted it to feel like he was making out with Jared.
The realization made him turn his head away to break the kiss. Danneel froze, her hands resting on his stomach.
“I … can’t …” His voice was barely audible.
She straightened her back but stayed where she was.
“Why?”
“I … just … I can’t. You are so hot and … but I can’t.”
“Oh Jensen,” she said and lifted herself off him, moving to the arm of the couch and away from him. “It’s so cute how old fashioned you are.”
So she thought he was being a backward old fool who couldn’t handle making out with a girl, not to mention possibly sleeping with her. He looked at her, probably a bit wide-eyed.
“I’m not going to be all offended or anything. I mean, I’d love to make out with you some more and even go somewhere else and take this further but I know you, Jensen. You just aren’t the one night stand type.”
A tiny little rebellious part of him wanted to prove her wrong, that he could handle sex with no strings attached, but it wouldn’t be fair to her because he knew his traitorous mind would replace her with someone else – he'd imagine someone else while having sex with her. In that respect he was a backward old fool.
“I’m sorry,” he said as he sat up. “I suppose you don’t get guys going all missies on you.”
“Hey, first time for everything,” she said and dangled at his shoulder. “Somewhere out there is someone who is very lucky but doesn’t know it. ‘Cause someday you’ll find someone who will appreciate you. Seriously, your exes were all touched in the head to break up with you.”
He laughed.
“I broke up with Joanna, remember? She cheated on me.”
“As I said, touched in the head.”
They both laughed and Jensen felt relieved. Danneel was simply that cool; she would never allow this to become an awkward thing between them. Not that he didn’t feel awkward but he was all awkward anyway.
“Seriously, Jen, I saw you. You had your tongue down her throat and all. I mean, five minutes more and she’d have been offering to blow you.”
Jensen had left Chris’s place shortly after his interlude with Danneel and hoped he could just put it behind him there and then, but apparently Chris had noticed them and had to know everything. That’s why he was at Jensen’s place at half past one in the afternoon on a Saturday. In Chris time, that was like getting up at the crack of dawn.
“And she didn’t and that’s that.”
“Come on, Jen. Spill the beans. I’m not going to tell anyone, not even Steve. Danneel won’t know that you kiss and tell.”
This earned Chris an eye roll.
“What was it? Don’t tell me you’re such a bad kisser?” Chris wasn’t about to give up and Jensen kind of felt like he had a reputation to uphold.
“No, nothing like that. It was me who cut it short.”
“With Danneel, are you insane? It’s Danneel we are talking about, the world’s sexiest sex kitten.”
“Yeah. Really.” He gave Chris a suffering look, hoping against hope that he would drop the matter but he knew better.
“Dude, I’ve made out with her and slept with her and she’s like a force of nature. Don’t tell me you like them all meek and stuff? No, not with all the homoerotic fantasies. No, no, don’t tell me … Jen, seriously, was it because of them? Are you telling me that you can’t get some guy who does or doesn’t exist out of your head enough to get your fucking freak on with Danneel?”
The urge not to dignify that with an answer was quite strong but he knew Chris wasn’t judging him. Chris would just have to calibrate his world view a tiny bit and then he would be OK with it.
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Fuck, you need something like that brain eraser thing from Eternal Sunshine … you know, wipe your head clean of this. This is being dysfunctional, dude.”
The sad thing was that Chris was right. Jensen was hardly able to get through a normal day without spacing out and getting lost in thought about Jared. He felt frayed and he struggled to keep focused on whatever he was doing, whether it was helping a customer at work, watching TV at home or even having a conversation with his family and friends. It shouldn’t be this hard to put a lid on it.
Was the solution perhaps just to find the guy? In his head Jared had been a TV star but so had he been. So the question was to find this guy he’d possibly found on Facebook, but Facebook only went so far and looking through the telephone directories was even less helpful.
“Chris, I know you are going to tell me that I’m crazy and all but I think I should try to find Jared.”
“You’re crazy,” Chris said immediately but it was clear from the tone in his voice he wouldn’t try to stop him.
“The thing is that I need to find someone who can either hack Facebook profiles or just add the guy.”
“And then hire a PI to find out whether he has a criminal record or is a white supremacists or some other shit.” The tone in Chris’s voice wasn’t out-right mocking but he obviously felt that Jensen was being ridiculous.
But it was like someone had turned on a light switch in Jensen’s head. A PI would be his best bet. If Jared Padalecki turned out to a straight-laced guy with a wife and a couple of kids and therefore completely out of reach for him, a PI would find out fast and relatively painlessly.
“Chris, how much do you think it would cost to hire a PI?”
The building wasn’t situated in the nicest part of town, so Jensen felt slightly uneasy leaving his car unattended even though it was just one step up from a piece of crap.
He had imagined a glass door with the name of the private detective painted on it, like in the Humphrey Bogart movies. But here he was, faced with a non-descript door with a sign that had been printed on a sheet of A4 paper with an ink jet printer that bled the ink a bit too much. The sign read ‘JDM Private Investigation, opening hours 3 PM-8PM Tues-Thurs.’ It was 4.50 PM on a Tuesday so someone should be in. He didn’t dare but to knock.
A gruff voice told him to come in and he walked into the untidiest office he’d seen in his life and that included Mike’s office when he was working a case. There were towering stacks of all kinds of things, not only paper and files but knick-knacks, miscellaneous paraphernalia and even weapons. There was something looking like a huge broadsword lying on the top of stacks of old copies of National Geographic. At the far end of the office was a desk with a computer and behind it sat a bearded fellow in a washed-out band t-shirt - Jensen was pretty sure it was a Skid Row t-shirt - typing something on a computer using only two fingers. There was another desk, almost hidden behind a stack of cardboard boxes and it appeared that someone was sitting there as well.
“Uhh, hello, I called earlier. My name is Ackles, Jensen Ackles. You told me to just swing by, I didn’t have to make an appointment.”
The guy in the band t-shirt looked up and without words beckoned him to come closer.
“Sit down,” he said and pointed out a chair which seemed to be clear from any debris.
Jensen sat down, kind of afraid that the reason the chair wasn’t stacked with an old cassette player and the all the volumes of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was because it would give way.
The chair didn’t give way and Jensen dared to sit a bit higher.
“Excuse my manners,” said the fellow and reached his hand towards him. “Jeffrey Dean Morgan, PI.”
He gave Jensen a hearty and strong handshake.
“So what brings you here? You said something about finding someone on the phone. Missing person? That sort of thing?”
“Erm, not exactly. I just have a name. I kind of need to know where this person lives and you know, the basic background stuff, like their jobs, family situation, things like that.”
Jeffrey laughed a belly-deep laugh.
“People use the internet for that sort of thing nowadays. You know, their Facebook accounts and blogs and photostreams and things like that. You are after something more, aren’t you?”
“OK, yeah. I kind of need to know more about their family situation than a Facebook relationship status has to offer.”
“Mmm, thought so.”
After a discussion about exactly the sort of information he wanted, Jeffrey asked him for the name. As Jensen spelled it out, Jeffrey didn’t write it down. He simply nodded and then Jensen heard someone typing something furiously behind him. Turning, he saw a dark-haired man hunched over a laptop.
“My Russian spy,” Jeffery grunted. “Doesn’t say very much but hella good at digging up the dirt.”
The guy didn’t seem to notice, just kept typing something and after a short while the printer on his desk started vomiting print-outs. Supposedly all those pages contained things about the real Jared Padalecki and supposedly he was dying to get that information but he just felt numb. Like every page would read, ‘Jensen Ross Ackles is a loser who thinks he can get into the pants of a hot guy.’
Finally the printer stopped and the Russian spy gathered the pages from the printer, put them in a folder and held it out to Jensen. He looked at the folder and felt like if he would take it, there would be no turning back.
“This is of course just basic information. Take a look and then you can decide if you want to take this further. Just drop Misha here an email or call. We have your credit card details in any case.”
It took a tiny shoulder jerk for him to ward off any money-related worries regarding this enterprise. So what if the roof wouldn’t get fixed for the next two years if he took this further?
He took the folder and almost stopped and waited for the earth to stop rotating on its axis.
It was actually a surprise to him that he made it all the way to the car but as soon as he was in the driver's seat, he flipped the folder open and started reading the information.
The first thing he saw was a huge picture of Jared, his Jared, the Jared in his head. If he looked closely he could see the tiniest difference. The Jared on the picture had shaggier hair – his bangs hung into his eyes more and his cheekbones stood out a little bit more, like he was slightly thinner.
So they had found a Jared Padalecki who looked very much like the one in his head. That was a start.
The next page contained the same information he would have found on the Facebook page if it hadn’t been locked. Born in July 1982 in San Antonio and to Jensen’s relief he appeared to still live there. This Jared was no TV star either, he was a carpenter, and Jensen felt relieved. He had feared that if Jared wasn’t a TV star, he would be some kind of a big shot somewhere. Maybe he was a big shot in the world of carpentry but that was less scary than if he had been a stockbroker or something like that.
Reading on, Jensen had to laugh when he read about his family – one older brother and one younger sister, though somehow he couldn’t imagine that Jared had the middle child syndrome as badly as he did.
There were more tidbits about him in the notes and nothing that told Jensen he should just forget about the whole thing. In fact, butterflies had started to flutter in his stomach. In San Antonio lived a carpenter named Jared Padalecki, looking exactly like the Jared in his head. And that was enough to set him up for days.
He was munching on a chicken wrap in the canteen when his cell phone went off. Tom was on the other side of the table, eating a salad. He raised an eyebrow, since it was a rare occurrence for someone to call Jensen at work.
Seeing the number on the display, he was quick to put down his chicken wrap and stand up before answering the phone. There was no way that he was allowing Tom to overhear this phone call.
“Morgan here,” said the gruff voice on the other end of the line.
“OK, what’s up?” His hands were shaking and he had a hard time holding his cell to his ear.
“Well, we have a little more information on this person you are seeking. Misha is putting together a file for you. But I can tell you roughly what we found out.”
Jeffrey then started giving him details about Jared’s workplace, his current address, the type of car he drove (unlike Jensen, he stuck to domestic cars and drove a Dodge truck) and the names of his roommates.
“There’s also a Milo Ventimiglia living at the apartment and it appears that he and Jared are lovers.”
This particular piece of information was dished out just like all the other things Jeffrey was rattling off but everything in Jensen’s head became fuzzy except for that particular piece of information. Almost as if in a trance he bid Jeffrey goodbye and then the cell slid out of his hands and fell to the floor with a clang. He was standing at one of end of the canteen where hardly anyone was sitting but the clang had people looking his way.
“Jensen, is everything alright?” Tom yelled over the hall.
He wanted to answer him but his voice was momentarily lost. His mind or his heart or whichever body part was in charge of his feelings had been prepared for the ‘Jared’s happily married and has two bouncy children’ thing but not for the ‘he’s gay but taken’ thing. His head was swimming with how Morgan had worded it, ‘lovers’. It sounded so untouchable – like Jared was destined to be with this guy forever. Yet somehow his hopes weren’t quelled completely.
“Earth to Jensen!” He hadn’t noticed Tom walking towards him. He looked up at him and saw some kind of amused concern on Tom’s face.
“Is everything alright? You dropped your phone.” Tom reached down and handed him the cell.
“Don’t worry,” he said as he pocketed the phone. He really couldn’t be there – he wanted to go somewhere… out there and have some sort of a melt-down. As he turned away, Tom caught his hand.
“Jensen, seriously. Is everything OK?”
“I’m fine. Please, let me go and … Tom, I have to go out for a bit.” He wrenched himself free from Tom and stormed out, having no idea where he was going and ending up in his car. There he sat, staring into the air while his mind and heart both felt like they were being put through the wringer.
First of all, his obsession was ridiculous. He had dreamt up the guy and then his mind had clung to the mental imprint like a drowning man to the last straw. Then he had actually done a crazy – and not to mention creepy – thing and tried to track down his fantasy man and now, even though he knew the guy was in serious relationship, his idiotic heart refused to give up because the sexual orientation was right. A sexual orientation that Jensen himself hadn’t really admitted to.
This is so fucked up beyond repair that I seriously should have myself committed.
But then there was the unshakable feeling that deep down drove him to finding Jared and to not giving up those shreds of hope. That it was right. That it was destiny. Maybe that was the creepiest part of it all.
An hour later he went back to his office, hoping that things would be busy so at least a part of his mind wouldn’t be all caught up in the Jared Padalecki show.
Tom was waiting for him with couple of coffee containers but Jensen had the strong suspicion that Tom had gone up to Mike’s office and poured something a little more potent into the cups. He needed it, but he also knew that in return he had to give Tom some explanation.
“So what’s going on?” Tom asked when he handed Jensen the cup.
“Stuff,” Jensen answered noncommittally.
“Financial problems? Death in the family? Girlfriend woes? Come on, tell me.”
“None of the above,” said Jensen and sipped from the cup, feeling the burning taste of bourbon on his tongue.
Tom raised his right eyebrow and looked at Jensen like he was a curious specimen he was examining at a lab.
“Then what on earth is the matter with you?”
“I really, really don't want to tell you but I suppose I owe you some kind of explanation, seeing as how I've totally been out of it. Well, the gist of it is that I think I've fallen for someone who doesn't know I exist.”
“Seriously?”
Before continuing, Jensen took another sip of the whiskey.
“I know this seems so junior high, like I'm a love-struck pre-teen. But yeah, there is this person who knows nothing about my existence and I'm ... yeah. God, when I talk about this out loud, this sounds so lame I want to die.”
“Well, maybe it's lame but the matters of the heart are never rational,” Tom said sagely.
“Yeah. And ... I can't believe I'm saying this. It's a guy.”
Tom's eyes widened which gave him a curiously innocent look despite the fact he was a hardened PR shark who could convince the pope that selling the devil his grandmother was indeed the best course of action for all parties involved.
“I didn't know you were gay.”
“I didn't either.”
“Jensen, this sounds ... I'm sorry, this sounds weird.”
“How do you think I feel? I'm not planning my coming out party if that's what you think. I'm freaked out. I can't get the guy out of my head and he's never laid eyes on me.”
Now Tom's eyebrows shot up and Jensen realized he might have said too much.
“I'm going to go get the entire bottle," Tom said. "Meet me in my office in five. You've got to tell me what this is all about.”
As soon as he saw Tom disappear down the hall towards the elevators to go to the ninth to legal, Jensen felt like panicking. Why on earth had he told Tom about this? While Tom didn't have direct authority over his position, a well worded missive from him to human resources could have Jensen out of job. This had to be filed under reckless behavior. A visit to a shrink was sounding wiser by the minute.
The steps to Tom's corner office were heavy, he tried to cook up some story to feed Tom but draw a complete blank.
“Hey, Jen! My man. Tom says you are having an existential crisis.”
Wonderful. Why couldn't Tom just have brought the bottle? No, of course he had to drag Mike down with him.
Mike was actually his friend as much as Tom. Sure, there was the gap their status at the company had created but for guys who were much higher up the food chain than he was, Tom and Mike were downright egalitarian, so he tried not to panic.
“Kind of,” Jensen murmured when he put down his coffee cup to receive a hand-cut crystal tumbler containing bourbon on the rocks. Of course Mike kept ice cubes in his office. The legal deals of this company were probably all sealed by a glass of whiskey and under a cloud of cigar smoke.
“Spill, my friend,” Mike said jovially and patted at the seat beside him on the leather couch that Tom had in his office.
“It's just that I seem to be a thirteen year old girl who is in love with a guy who doesn't have a clue who I am. And I just can't get the guy out of my mind.”
Tom was still looking at him and Mike was blinking.
“So let's ignore the fact that you have suddenly started batting for the other team or the same team or whatever one says about these things. What do you mean? How did you fall for someone who doesn't know who you are?” Mike asked.
“'Cause I saw him in a dream,” Jensen mumbled.
“And you haven't had your head checked, why?” It was probably a small mercy that Mike didn't look as angelic as Tom when his eyes were wide with surprise.
“Because ... the guy exists.” The over-all lameness of the situation was getting a bit too much for Jensen and he downed his glass of whiskey in one gulp.
“So you aren't crazy but psychic?” Mike said and the sardonic tone in his voice did sting.
Jensen wanted to tell him to fuck himself and then run out of the office.
“Hey, play nice,” Tom said. “Maybe Jensen saw him for real but it didn’t register until in his dream.”
“OK, I don’t know what the fuck happened but I dreamt of some guy I’m pretty sure I’ve never laid my eyes on and he exists and I’m fucking hung up on him.” Jensen pulled himself up from the couch.
“Sorry, Jen. I mean – you’ve got to admit that it’s a bit crazy.” Mike was obviously attempting to talk in some kind of a soothing voice which aggravated Jensen even more.
“Thank you, Captain Obvious. Nice to know I can rely on your support.” He tried pushing past Tom but Tom put his hand on his shoulder so he stopped.
“Hey, it’s my 12 year old bourbon you are drinking.” The urge to punch Mike in the face was getting stronger and Tom seemed to sense that.
“Stop it. This is my office. Please try to be civilized. Mike, no matter how weird this thing might be, this is kind of serious for Jensen. And Jensen, you know Mike.” Tom had dropped his voice and was trying to sound soothing.
“OK, I’ll try,” Mike said in his most put-upon tone of voice. “Jen, so if we ignore the whole gay thing, we could ignore the crazy factor as well. Then the question is, why are you hanging around here all zombie-fied and out of it? Why aren’t you trying to meet up with this guy, or at least trying to find out if you have a chance?”
Jensen didn’t answer right away.
“’Cause it’s complicated.”
“Why is it complicated? You know that the guy exists so you should have some means of locating him.” Mike was insistent.
“I know where to find him and all. He lives in San Antonio.”
“So go there. Tom, the grunt workers can get time off, right?”
“You don’t think I haven’t been contemplating that? As I said, it’s complicated.”
“So explain.” Mike wasn’t going to give up.
“I may have hired a private detective and I may have found out that the guy is gay but taken.”
“Go Jen! It does smack of the whole creepy stalker thing but I’d say this counts for you being a go-getter.” Mike punched the air, making Tom roll his eyes.
“Jensen, what are you going to do?” Tom had put into words the question that had been swirling in Jensen’s mind for the last couple of hours.
“I don’t know. It’s not like the guy is married… this is Texas after all. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t committed and in love. Then there’s the small problem of him not knowing who I am and then another small problem of getting us together.” It felt bizarre to put it out there.
“Maybe you should hope that he’s the superficial sort ‘cause then you should be a shoe-in, Jen.” Mike was almost sniggering. “Pretty boy like you.”
He felt a blush creep up his cheeks and saw Tom shoot Mike a stern look.
“Yeah, ‘cause that’s the best basis for a relationship. Thanks but no thanks. Remember Joanna?”
Mike and Tom had been present for Joanna, as she was the daughter of the vice-chairman of Barnes-Wentworth. In fact, Tom had had a narrow escape from being given the royal Joanna treatment but he'd had the presence of mind not to date her.
“But you are just going to agonize over this forever if you don’t try to meet the guy. Show us you have balls, boy.”
“Classy, Mike,” said Tom sardonically.
“Tom, you know it’s true. And you know what, Jen, you are going to take time off. I’m sure you’ve got accumulated vacation time, but if not, Tom and I should be able to sort that out with human resources and maybe we’ll be lucky and get Kristin to cover for you.”
“God, you are such a horndog, Mike.” Tom shook his head.
Part 3 - Master Post