cicatrize | Duplicity IC Inbox [ un: jbenjamin ]

❰ steve is going to call as many times as it takes you to pick the fuck up, jack, so you might as well do it on the first ring. ❱

Where are you?

❰ the sounds in the background are the authoritative stomps of steve walking through the down, heading toward the elevator building. ❱

[ looks like you'll be calling for a while, stevie.

up until jack just turns his phone off, and it sends good ol' mama steve straight to voicemail. ]

❰ oh fuuuuuck you. steve very nearly throws his phone at the wall when he realizes what jack must have done, but he's absolutely not giving up on his search, beginning with jack's apartment, moving on to every other place he can possibly think jack might be, including the apartments of his friends and every bar he can possibly find. ❱

[ surprise, homie, he's not anywhere in the Up. ]

❰ and when realizes THAT he's going to repeat the same search downside. you think you can hide from him, jack benjamin? steve's not stopping until jack's found. he'll put out the call on the network if he has to, try him. ❱

[ in the dankest, darkest, skeeviest club deep in the Down, Steve will finally spot Jack coming out of a private back room with some stranger, jeans still half open, looking like a train wreck of a human being with no interest in amending it.

and then he catches sight of steve across the building, and alarms go off in his head.

and then his hand reaches for the very physical fire alarm on the wall next to him.

and then real alarms go off all through the club. sprinklers on the ceiling turn on and rain water down. club goers scream and panic and run around making choas in the building.

meanwhile, jack makes for the back door into the alley. ]

❰ you little shit. steve pushes through the crowd running for the exit, and it slows him down enough that the door's been closed behind jack for almost a minute before steve can make his way over to it. the alley's long, at least, and closed in, so jack is still in view when steve slams outside, pausing only long enough to catch sight of him before sprinting after him. it was a good idea, trying to give himself time to get a head start, but steve's faster than jack could ever hope to be, and he catches up to him in seconds, grabbing the back of jack's coat and using it to pull him back and against the alley wall.

he's not even breathing heavily, the jerk. ❱

Really? The fire alarm?

[ he was really hoping he could round that corner before steve made it through the door, but no such luck, and jack's back hits the wall hard, punching the air out of his lungs. he knows steve's here being bucky sent him, but mostly because he cares, and somehow that just stokes the anger in him, and jack shoves steve's hands away from him like they burn. ]

Get the hell off me, Steve, I swear to fucking God—

[ well, he doesn't really know what he's swearing, because it's not like he can fight steve, and that helplessness is salt to every open wound in him right now. ]

I'm not your goddamn child, and I didn't come here looking for another ancient war hero to tell me how to live, alright?

❰ yeah, steve wasn't expecting jack to take this particularly well. if the running at the sight of him didn't tip him off, the fact that bucky basically tossed him out would definitely do it, and steve's certain that he and bucky are linked in jack's head in some amorphous way. if he's mad at bucky, he's mad at steve, and while that's unfair, steve can't say he doesn't understand it.

what he can say he doesn't understand is that second comment. ❱

What'd Bucky tell you?

❰ because there is no way jack got that from what steve said, and he has no interest in arguing about whether he is or isn't trying to tell jack how to live, when that very clearly is not the issue. ❱

[ it isn't from this conversation, or from anything bucky'd said to him. it's this - steve running after him, bucky and his 'make sure you eat, kid'. their doting and checking on him and taking responsibility for him like steve and his house arrest or bucky and his 'steve's, now'.

jack shakes his head - bucky didn't tell him anything. it isn't that. ]

The both of you. You hover around me like I'm some kind of pet project to paste back together.

[ this cruel little monster of a boy, maybe they can brush the soot off him and make him a shiny and healthy member of society, but that's not something jack is, or has ever been, or ever had the hope to be. ] If I want to get wasted in some dirty hole in the wall, you don't have the right to tell me it's not what I need.

❰ if steve were bucky, he might have something to say back to that. some kind of insightful, constructive remark that would put the lie to jack's accusation and convince him to just calm the fuck down and listen.

but steve is not bucky, and he's been enough of a hypocrite, as far as jack's concerned. ❱

You look whole to me, ❰ is all he says, pushing off the wall and stepping back from jack. and he is, which is what steve was checking on — not the complete and total wreck he'd been earlier in the month, though the redness in his eyes is starting to become uncomfortably familiar. ❱

Turn your phone on, text me in the morning so I know you're not dead.

❰ house arrest had been instated out of genuine fear for jack's safety if he left. getting drunk and having a bunch of ill-advised sex isn't going to kill him. although — ❱

And use protection.

❰ may your dadsband telling you to wrap it kill your boner for a while, you menace. ❱

[ honestly? he's grateful for steve and not bucky right now. he isn't interested in hearing anything insightful or constructive. jack doesn't want progress on whatever his issues are, he doesn't want to think about the best angle to attack them from, he just wants an empty mind.

steve's allowing him that. so, he'll compromise. ]

Fine.

[ tugging his phone out, jack makes a show of turning it back on, showing Steve the screen so he knows it's on. see? he'll text. stop losing your mind, you nerd.

but speaking of nerd, oh my god, steven. ]

God, you're so old.

[ okay, well, he always uses protection because he's paranoid as hell, but that was so mom-like it hurt. but it did get a little smirk out of him. ]

❰ hey, look at that, you give jack some freedom and he turns into a moderately tolerable human being. steve nods in appreciation at jack's phone, and even smiles a little when he calls him old. ❱

You're the one who fucked a 95 year-old.

❰ what is worse, jackathan, to be old or to be turned on by the old? think about it.

and with that, steve crooks his finger under jack's chin, tilting jack's head up and his own head down to kiss him. it's a soft, lingering kiss, more permission than anything else, and there's one more peck as he pulls back before steve steps back and gestures down the alley. go on, you little monster, get your drink on. just please don't get alcohol poisoning or an std. ❱

[ jack's mid-eyeroll when steve tips his chin up, and while there's a fraction of a second's hesitation, remembering he's angry at the singular unit that is steve-and-bucky, but his will is a weak thing right now. and steve's lips are so, so soft and inviting.

it's over too quickly, and jack murmurs against his lips before they part: ]

Oral isn't fucking, you're still a virgin.

[ and now he is free to frolic in debauchery and horrible decisions, as he does best. he will use protection, he will text his mother every morning. with a mock salute, jack pushes off the way, and saunters his way down the alley, off he goes, into the wild blue slutty yonder.

and, for good measure: whistling the Kill Bill tune. ]

Duplicity IC Inbox [ un: jbenjamin ]

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