☁︎ Check out @butyoudidthis4whatrecs for fics, art, gifs, edits, etc.!
Interact with the posts linked below to get on that character's tag list!
Each tag list is separate, so be sure to interact with each post for each character you'd like to be tagged for! Keep in mind that if you change your username you'll need to re-interact with each post if you'd still like to be tagged!
☁︎ Jack Abbot ☁︎ Andrew 'Pope' Cody
☁︎ Brett Richards ☁︎ Titus Danforth
☁︎ Grant Reilly ☁︎ Robby Robinavitch
☁︎ Rabbot (x Reader) ☁︎ Charlie Reid
Fics are also posted in each character's masterlist below!
☁︎ One Shots
╰━⚡︎ You're Okay
╰━꧞ mental health fic, hurt/comfort, angst
╰━⚡︎ Would You Believe Me If...
╰━꧞ mental health fic, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ It's planned.
╰━꧞ fluff
╰━⚡︎ Use Me
╰━꧞ smut, fluff
╰━⚡︎ Hour Thirteen
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ Carrier Pigeon
╰━꧞ mental health fic, hurt/comfort, angst
╰━⚡︎ Identify
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ Call Me
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort, will-they-won't-they
╰━⚡︎ I told you so.
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ The Sidewalk
╰━꧞ angsty-ish, friends to lovers, fluff
╰━⚡︎ I just wanted you to hear the words.
╰━꧞ hurt/comfort, Jack helps Reader with her SA trauma
╰━⚡︎ Dr. Abbot
╰━꧞ smut, hurt/comfort, angsty-ish
☁︎ Two shots
╰━⚡︎ Perfumer || Something Else
╰━꧞ smut, flirty, fluffy, softdom!jack
╰━⚡︎ Tepid || Lukewarm
╰━꧞ sick fics, hurt/comfort, fluff
╰━⚡︎ Your med school ex. || Your Jack.
╰━꧞ jealousy, angst, hurt/comfort, fluff
╰━⚡︎ You could do it with me. || We did it.
╰━꧞ idiots to lovers, angst, fluff, smut
☁︎ A nice bonus AU. Listed in chronological order, but after A nice bonus, they don't necessarily need to be read in that order!
╰━⚡︎ You and Jack meet when he sees you get hit by a car and rushes to take care of you. Your life together follows.
╰━⚡︎ A nice bonus.
╰━꧞ fluff, hurt/comfort, flirty
╰━⚡︎ Flustered
╰━꧞ angst, fluff, flirty
╰━⚡︎ 8:47 a.m.
╰━꧞ smut
╰━⚡︎ Where you belong.
╰━꧞ smut, fluff
╰━⚡︎ 3:47 a.m.
╰━꧞ pregnant!reader, fluff, smutty-ish
☁︎ Across the Hall AU. Neighbor!Jack x Neighbor!Reader.
╰━⚡︎ You and Jack are neighbors and easily become best friends. Best friends who both want more but are scared to admit it. Will you? Wont you?
╰━⚡︎ The Shower
╰━꧞ smut, flirty, just admit you're in love already
☁︎ Peep AU. Husband&Dad!Jack x Wife&Mom!Reader. Listed in chronological order but don't necessarily need to be read in that order!
╰━⚡︎ You and Jack are married and parents to a little girl who takes after her father in so many ways.
╰━⚡︎ Peep
╰━꧞ dad!Jack in action, fluffy, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ Six
╰━꧞ fluffy, maybe pregnant!reader
☁︎ No Man's Land: Series Complete. One shots ongoing. I highly recommend reading the series first for context and to avoid spoilers! The one shots will spoil things to varying degrees, so just keep that in mind when deciding the order you want to read! After the series, the one shots are listed in chronological order.
╰━⚡︎ Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4 || Part 5
╰━꧞ series has it all!
╰━⚡︎ Delayed Onset
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort, fluff, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ Your pen dies
╰━꧞ mental health fic, hurt/comfort, fluff, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ Dr. Abbot's wife. Here. Bloody.
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
☁︎ Quiet: Series In Progress. Widower!Jack x Widow&Singlemom!Reader
╰━⚡︎ Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4 || Part 5
╰━꧞ series has it all!
☁︎ The Next Three Things: Series In Progress. Ex!Jack and Ex!Reader
╰━⚡︎ Part 1
╰━꧞ series has it all!
☁︎ One shots
╰━⚡︎ Do you?
╰━꧞ fluff, flirty, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ It's snowing.
╰━꧞ fluffy, flirty
╰━⚡︎ You have me.
╰━꧞ hurt/comfort, fluffy, flirty, angsty-ish
╰━⚡︎ No touching.
╰━꧞ smut
╰━⚡︎ I just want you.
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ In... ever.
╰━꧞ smut
╰━⚡︎ It counts.
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort, fuff
☁︎ She's Here: Series Complete.
╰━⚡︎ Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4 || Part 5
╰━꧞ series has it all!
╰━⚡︎ The Alternate Ending.
╰━꧞ angst
☁︎ One Shots
╰━⚡︎ Take it for yourself.
╰━꧞ smut
╰━⚡︎ Ricochet
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort
╰━⚡︎ Have you ever stopped loving me?
╰━꧞ angst, hurt/comfort, fluff, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ And you stay.
╰━꧞ sick fic (Pope), hurt/comfort, fluff
╰━⚡︎ Both of You
╰━꧞ pregnant!reader, fluff
☁︎ Bartender!Reader AU. Listed in chronological order, but don't necessarily need to be read in that order!
╰━⚡︎ When Deran hires you as his new bartender you never expect to become best friends with his older brother Pope, much less fall in love with him. And Pope certainly never expects to become best friends, much less fall in love with his youngest brother's new bartender.
╰━⚡︎ Mine
╰━꧞ smut
╰━⚡︎ You said maybe.
╰━꧞ angst, jealousy, hurt/comfort, smutty-ish
╰━⚡︎ Safe
╰━꧞ mental health fic, hurt/comfort, fluff
╰━⚡︎ I hear you.
╰━꧞ hurt/comfort, fluff, smutty-ish
☁︎ One shots
╰━⚡︎ Remember that.
╰━꧞ mental health, hurt/comfort
☁︎ Coming Soon!
☁︎ Coming Soon!
☁︎ Coming Soon!
☁︎ Coming Soon!
Older ADCU writing from 2020-2021 can be found here.
i know it’s going to sound like i’m “just saying this” because of what you said, but i truly believe that your work has gotten even better over time!! i think you are too hard on yourself mich! everything you write is great and fantastic, and i’m so grateful you share this gift of yours with us! i’m sorry people are giving you a hard time about getting things out sooner. you just take your time and we will be here when you’re ready! it’s not worth you stressing and feeling bad over it. i love everything about your blog and i’m sure many others can relate to that sentiment!!!! we love you!!! 💗
Thank you so much friend. ♥️ I'm so sorry I've been super absent this week and that it took me this long to reply to this, it was just the actual longest seventy year week with days that felt like ten years each and I didn't have the energy to give a good reply. 😞 It means a lot that you think I've gotten better over time! And I'm really grateful that you take the time to read what I write and publish! I would never be someone to write for just myself and writing has become such an important escape and release for me, so I feel really lucky that people read and interact and give me the motivation to keep writing. ♥️ I try not to feel bad or stress about getting things out, but it's hard when I also just really want to. It makes me feel very restless. I keep hoping things will calm down and then looking at my work calendar and it feels never ending. 🫠 But hopefully I'll at least be able to set a new normal soon and get out everything that I want to! Thank you so much for your support and for taking the time to send this in. It truly means so so much to me! ♥️ I love you all too!! ♥️
I genuinely never thought I would write fanfic again and even when new characters and hyperfixations came I didn't, no matter how much the urge was there. I just could never go through with it. I write for a living currently and so the last thing I wanted to do when I got home from work was more writing, even if it was a different style and all my own. And then Jack Abbot entered my life at a time and I went on vacation where I had absolutely no access to work and was refreshed while also emotionally going through it and really had the urge to write and so here we are. A perfect storm.
In typical me fashion I decided I was so sad and anxious that I just wanted some happy fluffy stuff and wrote the exact opposite. I'm just an angst with a happy ending girl what can I say. But also I just really want someone to comfort me like this and it was cathartic to write. However, I'm not going to lie that I started feeling a bit better when writing this so it became a bit harder to write, weave together, and finish and I'm just rusty. Read the CWs please, it's rough stuff and potentially triggering, so protect yourself, and if I missed any please (nicely) let me know.
I have a number of other ideas and thoughts for this man and am desperate to yell about him so feel free to send your thoughts in the ask box or DM me to yell about Jack.
Titles and summaries are unlikely to ever get better. Please be gentle with me as this is my first foray back into writing and posting in years. Please let me know if you like it. I thrive on positive feedback.
Again, please read the CWs: suicidal ideation; self harm ideation; extreme depression and anxiety discussed; discussion of anxious depressive attack; reference to rescue meds; self hate; reader is not okay; reader tries to push Jack away; abandonment issues and themes.
Summary: You have an anxious depressive attack for no readily apparent reason. Jack is the best and gets you through it. Happy ending. Established relationship. You and Jack live together. Age gap but not specified or referenced. No use of y/n or related. Absolutely zero proofreading, I mean none. No beta. This is also a bit open ended and could be conducive to a part two depending on reception and if anyone would be interested.
The sadness consumes you, sticks to you like the tegaderm you apply to patients. The most irritating part is how it just seemed to have come out of nowhere. Sure, you were feeling a bit more anxious and depressed than usual, but nothing horrific. And then it got a little worse towards the end of your first twelve hours. But then around hour sixteen it was like you just walked into a black hole and were totally consumed by it as you took a few minutes to yourself to use the bathroom.
It was the crying out of absolutely fucking nowhere for no apparent reason kind of sadness. The kind that left you perpetually teetering on a ledge and unable to breathe. The kind that makes you think this is it, you’re so broken now you’re past the point of fixable. Makes you think you will just be here forever, stuck in this sadness, unable to move or enjoy anything, condemned to a life of faking it. Makes you itch to hurt yourself. The kind that is so consuming and distorting it makes you ideate and think that ending it all might be an act of kindness to yourself and your closest; you no longer consumed by the sadness and them no longer burdened with you. The kind that is so frustrating for you because one sliver of logical, rational brain large enough to understand what is happening and that your brain is manipulating you escapes, so you know that you’re being unreasonable, that it’ll pass and yet you can’t seem to believe it. Or maybe it’s that you do believe it, it’s just that surviving until it does pass seems so hard and you are so tired.
Work keeps you busy. Busy enough to be able to push the thoughts to the side and just live with the feelings for now, both mentally and physically. You can focus on others, on fixing others, saving others, solving other people’s problems. It’s a good distraction, but just that. A distraction. It does nothing to fix anything and the second it’s gone you know it will all come crashing down.
Jack’s eyes are scanning for you the second he walks in the ED. Something was off with you when he finished his shift and left you for the second half of your double. You’d assured him you were just tired and would get some more caffeine and be good and he hadn’t pushed you. He’d told you to text or call him if you needed him, that he would probably get some sleep but would sleep with his phone on loud and near his head in case you needed him. He could just sense it on you.
You hear him make some sarcastic remark back to someone before you see that he’s here and it makes your heart race. There’s a little burst of happiness at seeing him of course, but then even that is overcome again by the sadness that rules your mind currently. You don’t want to ruin his mood, don’t want him to have to deal with you. It makes you more anxious, threatens to rip you in half in deciding what to do, tell him or try and pretend. You know that would be pointless though and you don’t really have a choice. Not when it comes to him. One look at your face and he’s going to read you like a chapter book. You thought the time getting home and ability to take some meds since you wouldn’t be working might help you calm down enough for it to not be quite as bad once you got home. You look back down at your tablet but chew hard on the inside of your cheek, taste the iron of your own blood, and when Mel walks up to you with a question you shift your tablet so that you can dig your nails into the skin of your hand. Just something to ground you. Just a little physical pain to match the internal.
Jack clocks it from where he is, finding you just as you look back down at your tablet. Your nails and cheek. There’s something else about the way you’re holding yourself that’s off too. His own anxiety ticks up. Were you hurt? Did something happen? He turns back to ask Santos if something happened this shift but she’s already gone. When he looks back over to where you were standing with Mel he finds you and Mel gone. He thinks you just went with her until he spots her alone with a patient.
You had to flee after answering her question and telling her you were off and to spread the word if anyone asked. You wouldn’t know how else to describe it other than giving into this urge to run and hide. Some sort of flight or fight thing undoubtedly, you’d just never had the feeling before. You had to get out of there before you lost it in front of everyone.
Jack being here isn’t good. It wasn’t the plan, the one you’ve been preparing and repeating to yourself all day to get through it without losing it. You’d get off, go home, he’d be there and you’d be okay and not feel like this because he’d be there. Or at least if you still were feeling like this he would be there and that would make it a little better, a bit less suffocating. It would make it all feel survivable.
But now he’s here and you can only assume that means he picked up a shift and you’ll have to go home to an empty place, something you’re not sure you trust yourself with right now. You try and tell yourself it’ll be fine, that you’ll take some meds at home and just sleep through it until he gets back and then sleep more with him and that the feelings will pass. And you know it’s true. Your logical brain knows that these feelings will pass. Your emotional brain that tells you you’re going to be stuck in this all-consuming sadness and anxiety wins, however, and the thoughts just won’t stop. The physical feeling of sadness and anxiety won’t leave. It’s enough to make you gag.
You don’t want to ruin his roof for him but you don’t know where else to go and think maybe you’ll find whatever it is Jack finds up here that seems to help him. And really you know you want him to find you. Need him to. Need him to take one look at your face and know how to help you, how to comfort you, like he always does. You hate putting that on him, though.
You don’t even consciously do it. You just look up and realize where you are. Right on the ledge. It’s so metaphoric it’s disgusting. It’s odd though, being on the other side of the guard rails. It feels like it should be scary or exhilarating in some kind of way but it’s just not. It’s nothing. Everything is nothing except that everything is also abhorrently and suffocatingly sad in a way you can’t explain. You let your hands come out a little and catch the wind. Some part of you hopes it’ll carry you away. It doesn’t and you’re so in your head you don’t hear the door or him as he walks over to you until he speaks.
“You’re in my spot, Doll.” His voice is gentle, feeling you out and giving you room. He’s desperate to see your eyes, to read your face in the way only he can.
You shrug. “I suppose I am.”
He walks a little closer, rests his arms on the bar. He doesn’t know yet, how bad things are, how bad you are right now. You’re just a little too good at hiding it with your back to him when he can’t see your eyes or face. “Bad shift?”
It takes you a minute to respond and when you do it’s a single word and an iciness starts to seep through him. “No.”
The way you say it is off. The way you sound, the way you’re standing, body leaning just slightly forward.
“What’s up? You don’t seem okay. What happened?” The genuine concern in his voice melts you but at the same time a large part of you feels bad for it, for making him concerned and worried about you. It’s unfair of you to do.
You shake your head a little in response. “Nothing.” As much as it sounds like a lie, it’s really the truth, at least to his last question. Nothing happened.
“Did you pick up a shift tonight?” You ask him quietly.
“No.”
“Why are you here then?”
He gives a soft laugh, almost a touch of disbelief to it. “I don’t know, the way you seemed when I left and we said goodbye. I thought you were just tired but it sat with me, stayed with me when I woke up. I just felt, I don’t know, drawn to come pick you up. Get my eyes on you as soon as I could.” There’s a pause. “I’m glad I came.”
You hum. You hate that he can pick it up off of you, that you can’t hide it better to protect him.
He’s never seen you go past the guard rail and combined with your demeanor and body language and the aura radiating off you it scares him, scares the fuck out of him right now. “Will you come here, please? Even if not to me, just to the other side.” There’s a pause as you consider. He leans back up off the rail to keep his hands free, ready to jump and grab you by the scrub top if he has to.
You don’t want to scare him, to hurt him. That’s the whole problem. And then you end up doing so anyway. He deserves so much better. You hate yourself.
“I’m afraid if you touch me I’ll shatter. Just totally fucking lose it. And you shouldn’t have to deal with that.” The way you say it tells him you want nothing more than to be in his arms. He’s right of course. He recognizes it for what it is beneath your words, an invitation for him to pull you back to him. Physically, mentally, and emotionally.
“Alright.” It’s his normal voice. Just Jack. He reaches and grabs your arm with his hand, gentle, but firm enough to keep you from going anywhere and show his seriousness. “You’re coming back on this side. Now.” It’s his Dr. Abbot voice, the one you know he must have developed in the service. “Please Doll.” And there’s your Jack, the tone he only uses with you, soft and sweet, empathetic, vulnerable in a strong way. Full of the love he has for you. You know if you pulled away he’d let you, but you don’t want to. You want him. Want to be close to him.
You don’t shatter from his touch. Not yet anyway. You let out a long breath but nod, let him help you back to the safe side. His hands are on your face, one thumb brushing over a cheekbone as he searches your eyes. You try to look away but he follows you. He hates what he sees, how sad and small you look and must feel, the nondescript anxiety coursing through you.
“Doll,” he says a little breathless, aching to make it all better. “I need you to talk to me, please.” It’s desperate, on the cusp of begging. “Let me help. Let me in.” If anything the dialogue is normally reversed, but it’s been a good while since you’ve had to ask him to talk to you or let you in. You’ve been together so long now that it’s automatic for him. The only things he tries to keep you out of sometimes are his PTSD and flashbacks and phantom limb pain, but even then. He’s an easy lock for you to pick.
You scrunch your shoulders up hard for a few seconds as you take a deep breath and let them fall back down as you let it out through your nose. “And if I say I’m fine?” You give him a hint of a smile.
He gives a little scoff of a laugh. “Then I’ll be hurt by how much of a blind idiot you think I am.” It’s a little reassuring though. That you still have it in you to joke. It tells him you’re still in there.
You give him the smallest smile before your face fades back into a heartbreaking sadness. “I don’t know Jack,” you say softly. “I… Nothing is even wrong. Nothing has happened. I just…” You trail off and he lets you, gives you the space to gather your thoughts even as he watches you with concern etched into his features. You look away from him, out at the city. He can still see your eyes get glassy though, the slightest tremble of your chin before you recover. “I’m too mentally ill for you. You deserve better.”
He has to give another laugh at that. “Have you met me?”
You look at him, and while he sees sadness and hurt he also sees terror.
“I’m just… sad. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s all consuming and feels never ending even when I can sit and rationally tell myself I have nothing to be sad or anxious about. It just doesn’t fucking matter. It still feels like I can’t breathe except I am and I’m aware of it because I’m still alive and still thinking, still sad and spiraling. I’m almost like, fucking lightheaded it’s so bad, I shake, I can’t get that pit in my stomach and burn at my diaphragm to go away and over what? There’s nothing. There’s absolutely fucking nothing for me to be this sad or anxious or upset over.” You close your eyes and bring a shaky hand to your lips. “I’m just a huge mess for no god damn reason and I fucking hate it, Jack. And you deserve better, so, so much better, even if you don’t think so or want to admit it. You deserve not to be stuck with this, with whatever it is I am.”
He opens his mouth to speak but then shuts it. There’s so much he wants to say he doesn’t know where to start. He just wants to hold you. To hug you until all the pieces of you fit back together the way you’ve done for him so many times. He wishes he had a way to let you into his mind so that you could see how much he loves you, how much he needs you.
“I feel so fucking melodramatic. The shift was fine. Nobody died. It was a good shift if anything. Life is good. I have friends who love and care about me. I’ve got you for christ’s sake, I’m the luckiest woman in the fucking world.” You shake your head a little. “And yet here I am. Like this. Feeling like the world is falling out from under me and so sad I almost want to jump for no reason. No fucking reason. And now I’m making you deal with it, with me. I hate it. I hate myself. You would be better off without me, you really would.”
“That simply is not fucking true,” he almost gasps out, just needing to get something out to you. “Jesus fucking christ I don’t know that there would still be me without you.” You shrug. “No. Don’t shrug, please do not shrug. This is not whatever. You are not whatever. It’s true, I don’t know if I’d still be here without you. I don’t know if I could go on without you. That’s just the truth. You’re not too mentally ill for me. You’re not too sad for me, or too anxious or too whatever. I can’t deserve better when I already have the best, regardless of whether you don’t think that’s true or want to admit it.” He sees you shaking a little. “I need you.”
His voice cracks a little on ‘need.’ “Your brain is lying to you, no matter how real it seems in this moment, I promise. It’s okay to feel this way and to need to lean on me, to need my support. It won’t push me or make me go anywhere. I want to be here for you. I want to help you, help you feel better and not so sad. The depression and anxiety don’t care if the shift was good and nobody dies and you have friends and me. That doesn’t mean you can’t feel as deeply and as badly as you do right now. It doesn’t mean it’s melodramatic. It doesn’t mean you don’t deserve your life or me. You’re struggling. That’s okay.” His thumbs wipe some tears away from your face and his heart cracks. He feels so helpless, this is one of the only things he can’t just fix for you, can’t protect you from. He wants to cry himself. “I’ve got you. This is an anxious depressive attack,” he reminds you. “You are so strong and you will come out of it. It will pass.”
“It’s just been happening more and more, Jack! I’ve been having this happen more and more. And one day you’re going to wake up and realize you’re exhausted by it. And I,” a few tears slip out as you take a shuddery breath, “I feel so fucking guilty making you deal with me and watching you deal with it, with me. How much it scares you and makes you sad. I just want the best for you, happiness and easiness and a calm, steady, good life. You deserve that. After everything you’ve been through you deserve that and more and I don’t think I’m that. I’m just more stress, more exhaustion, more to deal with. And that’s not fair and you deserve better.” The tears flow more freely now and your voice shakes with every word but you haven’t totally fallen apart somehow.
“I get this exact same way too. I struggle too. I feel the darkness consume me just like you are now. I lean on you, ask for your help, or accept it when you have to offer because I can’t ask for myself. Why should or would I not do the same for you? Why would I give up on and abandon you when you’d never dream of doing it to me?” He asks, hands a bit firmer where they’re still holding your face.
“It’s different,” you mutter.
“How? How is it any different?”
You shrug. “I don’t know. It just is. You’re different. It’s okay when it’s you.”
“Well that’s bullshit, Doll, and I know you know that,” he says with loving sternness. He softens again. “It’s okay when it’s you too, I promise. The way you feel about me when it’s me is the way I feel about you right now. It’s okay if you don’t know why you’re feeling like this and it’s okay if the reason is buried deep inside and it’s okay if there is no reason and you’re just feeling like this. It’s okay. We’re okay. I’m not dealing with you, even though your mind is telling you that. You’re not a burden. You’re not pushing me away by being like this. Your brain is lying to you right now. I’m not going anywhere. For better or worse you got yourself stuck with me when you agreed to that first date. Because I knew it was you then. And I won’t lose you and certainly not to this.” His thumbs brush over your cheeks again, one going to brush over your thumb. His eyes are so earnest it almost hurts.
You look at him for a moment and then he’s pulling you into his chest and arms as you’re falling into them. He lowers you both to the ground with you in his lap as you do finally shatter in his arms.
You sob into him. Not soft tears that are silent or even heavy tears with some sniffing and stuttered words. It’s ugly, chest heaving. You almost seem to scream into his chest at times in between the huge breaths you try to take in. There are times where you choke, cry so hard you dry heave. But Jack doesn’t flinch, doesn’t try to get away or pull away with any kind of disgust at any of it. He just holds you, his arms warm and steady and solid around you, keeping you grounded, even if just. He rocks softly at times, shushes you softly but not to get you to be quiet, just to reassure. There are whispered words, “I know,” “It’s okay, you’re okay,” “I’ve got you,” “I’m not letting go,” “Let it out Doll, I’m here, I’ll always be here,” “I love you.” He kisses the top of your head and rubs your back, squeezes you tight to try and help you regulate, desperate to do anything he can to help.
Eventually you cry yourself out and are reduced to small sniffles and hiccups. You go so still a couple of times he thinks you may have fallen asleep in his arms, knows how tired crying can make you, but then you let out a sigh. You pull your head from his chest a little, look up at him with sheepish eyes. It’s heartbreaking, how swollen and red your face and eyes are, how beautiful you look even this sad.
“You don’t need to apologize,” he whispers when you go to speak. He knows you too well, better than he knows himself sometimes, you both swear.
“I just hate it. Feeling like this. And having the rational part of my brain know at the same time that it’s ridiculous and unnecessary and all wrong but it losing to that emotional part of my brain that drags me into panic and all consuming sadness. I hate it.” You sniffle hard, try to wipe your face with your hand but it does nothing. Jack pulls his shirt up a little so that he can use it to wipe your face for you.
“It just feels like it’ll never get better. Like I’ll be stuck in this darkness and sadness and anxiety forever.” Your words are muffled against him and make him hold you a little tighter.
“I know. But I promise these feelings, especially at this intensity, will pass. I’m not dismissing them or saying they aren’t real, at all, but they will pass.” He kisses your hair a few more times, continues rubbing your back. He knows there’s not much he can say right now and doesn’t want to overwhelm you with words, just reassure you.
“Yeah,” you murmur. He doesn’t push you to accept it.
“Did it help? The cry?” He asks gently.
You shrug in his arms. “I don’t know, probably.” You let the steady thump of his heart in your ear regulate yours. After a few moments you amend your answer. “It wasn’t the cry. It was you.”
The corners of his lips turn up just slightly. He likes hearing he helped. “I’m glad.”
“Thank you,” you whisper. He gives you a squeeze in response. A couple more minutes pass as you sit there just trying to recover.
“I got your shirt all gross.”
He shrugs. “It’s okay. I’ve had worse on me from people I don’t love more than anything.” He kisses the side of your head. “Plus it’s the one you like to steal anyway,” he whispers in your ear.
That makes you laugh, laugh enough that you start crying and let your head fall back into the side of his neck and shoulder again. “I’m sorry,” you almost squeak out.
“Oh baby,” he gives a sad little laugh. “It’s okay. You’re okay. I’ve got you, I promise. I’m not going anywhere.”
This round doesn’t last anywhere near as long, largely because you’re just too fucking tired. A bit because he was right, it was an acute anxious depressive attack that’s starting to lift. You sigh into him. “I think I’m done.”
“Let’s get up and go home. Get some food in you, maybe some of your rescue meds if you want, and some sleep. It’ll help even though I know everything feels kind of helpless right now.” He kisses the top of your head, your forehead and then your lips. Nibbles on your nose just to pull a smile from you. He goes to pull away so that you can get up but you make a little whine of protest and just hold onto him tighter, nuzzle your nose against his neck.
“I’m already home.” You murmur. “You’re home.” You’ve both said it to each other before and he knows how fucking true it is for him but it still makes him smile, knowing he’s that safe place for you.
He gives a fake exasperated sigh just to see if it’ll pull anything from you. “Let’s get up and go to our house, then, little miss pedantic. Get in our bed.”
You smile against his neck and it makes him relax a little, makes him feel good knowing he’s the only one who could pull you out of this and make you smile. “I’m not pedantic, it’s just the truth. And even if I am pedantic I’m your little miss pedantic.”
You don’t say it as a question but he knows it is one, a subtle way of asking for reassurance when being direct is too hard.
“Yes you are. All mine.” He squeezes you a bit tighter to drive home the point. “I happen to find pedantism so hot. Gets me all bothered when you get so concerned about all the little details.” He mouths at your neck, rubs his scruff against you lightly because he knows it tickles you and wants to draw a little laugh.
It’s just barely successful, you give him a little huff of a laugh, but with how you were, he’ll take it. You finally let yourself fall out of his arms and stand up with him. He can tell by your face that while you might be feeling the slightest bit better in the moment, you’re not really. You’re still deep in that hole and struggling. You see the recognition of it flicker in his eyes. “I’m sorry.” You whisper. “That I made you think I wanted to… end myself and for scaring you. And that I’m not better. That I might never be better.”
He shakes his head. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I understand. I really do, Doll. And I don’t expect it to be better with one conversation or two or three. And I’m not going to get tired of it, of you, as much as your brain wants you to believe that. I’ll be here and helping you through it just like you will with me until we’re in the ground together, okay?” You nod at him.
He winds his fingers through yours and squeezes. “Let’s go home,” he says again, “to our house, the physical building where we reside together, where our bed is.” You go to open your mouth. “Yes, I still want you in my bed,” he cuts you off. “I could shower you first if you wanted.”
“Shower me? First?”
He holds the door of the roof open for you and you step in and hit the elevator button. “I know me washing your hair and body calms and grounds you,” he murmurs. He drops his voice a little lower, in volume and pitch and moves his face closer to yours so that his lips brush yours when he speaks. “And I say the shower is first because the second thing I could do for you, well, hopefully it would give you some oxytocin, dopamine and serotonin,” he smirks, gives you a teasingly light kiss on the lips. “Or if that’s all too much right now then we’ll just go home and get in bed and I’ll hold you while you sleep. Whatever you want. Whatever you need.”
You grin at him as he pulls away. It actually meets your eyes, even if it’s not the biggest smile he’s ever pulled from you. “I’m not sure what I did to deserve you Jack Abbot.”
“You were born.”
You start laughing. Like can’t breathe laughing, tears streaming, laughing. A smile pulls onto his face and he has to start laughing because yours is so contagious. “What?”
“I don’t fucking know,” you get out in between laughs, “just the way you said ‘you were born’ so seriously was so fucking funny. It was so… you.” You look up at him, eyes sparkling from tears but also love. “I’m so lucky,” you whisper, words a bit shaky. “I love you.” The laughing so hard you cried has brought you back to the precipice of tears.
“I love you more,” Jack tells you as he wraps you back in his arms. The elevator opens though and you’re able to take in a deep breath and keep it together.
“You wanna go out the side and I’ll meet you outside the ambo bay? I’ll swing back to the ED and grab your stuff.” He wipes a few tears from your face. It’s an offer to save some face and not look like a mess in front of everyone.
“That bad?”
“You never look anything less than gorgeous, but the crying is obvious, yeah. It’ll draw questions.” He says it so matter of fact, that you’re never anything less than gorgeous in his eyes and that the crying is so obvious and people will gossip and it’s just another thing that feels so him that it helps tether you to reality.
You nod. “Thank you,” you whisper.
When you reach the door he squeezes your hand. You can see a little fear in his eyes. “You’ll be waiting, yeah? On the sidewalk?”
You give him a soft laugh and smile. “Yeah, on the sidewalk.”
“Good.” He leans in to give you a quick kiss. “I need you, you know? Just as much as you need me.”
“I know. I do, I promise.” As he walks away you call his name and he’s back by your side in a second. “I am sorry, you know. I would never actually do anything and leave you, and I’m sorry for hurting you by insinuating otherwise.”
He shakes his head slightly. “You don’t need to feel guilty for saying how you feel or felt. You don’t need to apologize. I want you to talk to me, even if it is painful for me to hear. It’s the only way I can help.”
“It’s just hard to say, especially when I worry so much that it’ll make you go away. And I promise that’s not a reflection on you, or that I think you would-” He silences you with a kiss. It’s uncharacteristic for him at work, even if you’re not in the ED. That makes the fact of it happening a little better in some way, you think.
“I know. I understand, I promise.” He pulls back and looks at you. “I would tell you if it was becoming a problem or something I couldn’t handle. But I’m never going to have to tell you that. Now go wait for me.” He flicks his chin at the side door and gives you a little tap on the ass, flashes you one of his smiles that’s almost a smirk and makes you melt. You nod, do as instructed. And Jack watches you walk away until you disappear out the door, a whole piece of his heart out there existing outside of him. He knows you’ll be okay, that you’ll get through this. But it still scares him, still kills him to see you struggle like this. He wants to protect you from everything, does everything he can to, but always ends up trying to grapple with and accept the fact that he can’t really protect you from yourself.
Outside, you wait for him on the sidewalk like you promised. Things are a bit lighter now that you’ve been able to speak to Jack, to just let yourself fall apart and cry. The guilt still eats at you even though you try not to let it. You watch him walk up to you, see the way he smiles when he spots you. It makes your heart ache. “I really love you, you know?” You murmur to him when he’s back at your side.
“I do,” he nods. His lips pull up in a teasing smile as he starts up his favorite ‘argument’ you guys are always having. “I also know I love you more.”
7.9k || All my content is 18+ MDNI || CW: neighbor AU; will-they-won't-they tension; another famous rabbit nickname because it's me; self-doubt/self-consciousness; hand job; oral sex; PIV sex; masturbation; pretty much just fluffy and smutty!
Summary: When your hot water heater breaks Jack lets you grab a shower at his place. After you leave he finds himself enveloped by warm steam that smells like you. What's a man to do?
AN: I've wanted to do a neighbor AU with Jack for soooooo long and finally gave in! I'm calling it the Across the Hall AU (there will eventually be a fic titled Across the Hall 😂). I don't really love this but I'm doing my best to ignore that because I do love the AU so much and have a lot of other ideas for it, so I hope it's enjoyable enough to want more. We're not starting with them meeting because this is what inspired me the most and what my brain wanted to write for some reason and I needed to run with whatever it would give me right now lol. Thank you so much for all of your support and for reading and I hope it's okay and you enjoy! ♥️
The ding of the elevator draws your attention.
Jack must be getting home. Your apartments are the only ones on this floor, your doors directly across the hall from each other. As you go to lock your door you do your best to try not to think about where Jack has been and why he's getting home at 10 p.m. on a Thursday. You know from chatting last week that he got off this morning and is off the next few days.
Your entire body freezes when the realization hits you, preemptive jealousy and rejection flooding your system. What if he walks off the elevator with someone?
It's been over nine months of this… thing between you and Jack. You're neighbors, yes, but you're clearly so much more. And while it's clear that you're more than neighbors, it's unclear what you actually are, together and to each other.
The two of you flirt, sometimes subtly and with an intimate gentleness that almost makes your hearts ache, and sometimes intensely, both of you lit on fire by the other's words and body movements and facial expressions. There have been so many what you're both 99% sure were almost-kisses that you've lost count.
You have nicknames for each other. One day you'd called him Bugs, it had just slipped out without you even realizing. It took Jack about twenty seconds to put it together and figure out where it came from. You were going to apologize and assure him you'd never call him it again but he spoke first, responding to whatever you said and calling you Tweety.
Jack has invited you over and cooked you dinner and the two of you have eaten at his table sharing a bottle of wine or a six pack of whatever before you chill on his couch until you start to fall asleep, sometimes watching something on TV, but most of the time just facing each other and chatting. You've invited Jack over and the two of you have eaten takeout on your couch while showing each other your favorite movies and watching new ones together, trying to find movies that are so bad they're good and leave you both crying with laughter on your couch.
You’ve met his friends and the people who he’s closest with and who mean the most to him, some from the Pitt, some from his army unit, some from his SWAT unit. He’s met a couple of your more casual friends, knows that your closest and who mean the most to you don’t live in or particularly close to the city.
Jack has hugged you so tightly and for so long on some of your worst days, until enough pieces of you have been put back together that you feel like you can function again, made you your favorite or ordered it in if you could stomach it, made you something light if you couldn't so that you had some food in your system. He always seems to know just what to do and just what you need.
You've made Jack breakfast and eaten with him while he sat silently on your couch trying to process some of his worst shifts, ones that were hell or where there was more death than life or patients that particularly got to him, been with him however he needed on some of his worst days, never expect or ask him to talk or explain what's going on. You always seem to know just what to do and just what he needs.
He knows all the gossip from your job. You know all of the Pitt gossip that Jack knows, which is pretty much all of it because people just tell him things without him asking or even hinting that he'd like to know.
You tease each other in every sense. You've both been obviously jealous when there have been the occasional dates the other has gone on, have both acted out a little bit over said jealousy.
You text each other every day, some days more than others. It's not uncommon for you to go four or five days without seeing each other in person or hearing the other's voice, you're not spending every night at each other's house or constantly going over for dinners or just to hang or whatever. While there's less pressure to have a reason, much less a legitimate sounding one, to invite the other over, you both still frequently try to offer one, no matter how lame it ends up sounding.
You know each other's secrets, things neither of you have admitted to anyone else except maybe your therapists. You know each other's past, each other's present and each other's dreams for the future. You've become best friends in the most unique way despite how little time you actually spend together. You can't imagine life without each other.
Jack knows he's falling in love with you.
You know you're falling in love with Jack.
But Jack can't understand for a single second why you'd ever be interested in him, convinces himself that he’s making up all the evidence that you are.
And you can't understand for a single second why Jack would ever be interested in you, convince yourself you’re making up all the evidence that he is.
You're both scared. Neither of you want to lose the other.
So you just continue on in this perpetual state of limbo that's so far beyond better than nothing at the same time as it's absolutely fucking nowhere near enough.
You're fumbling with your key when you hear Jack step off the elevator. There's no footsteps behind or next to him. He's alone. A sense of relief you know you have no business having washes over you.
"Hey, Tweety." Jack watches you turn your key the opposite direction than he expects. His eyebrows raise slightly. "Heading out this late on a Thursday?"
As he makes his way closer and stops walking he realizes you have a duffel bag with you, though it doesn't look like there's a ton in it. That observation has his eyebrows furrowing. He didn't realize you were going somewhere and wouldn't be around the next few days. He does his best to keep his voice light, curious but not intrusive. "Ah," he drawls, nodding at your duffel. "Escaping somewhere this weekend?"
He won't lie, he'll be disappointed if you are. He was kind of hoping to invite you over this weekend just to hang out at his place and make you dinner.
"Not quite," you laugh softly. "My, um, my hot water heater broke. I was planning on just dealing since they're either fixing it or replacing it tomorrow, but I don't know." You shrug at him. "I just need to wash the day off me." You let out a breath and smile at him. "A coworker sent me a pass to her gym so I'm going to go use the shower there. What about you? 10 p.m. on a Thursday." You force a smirk and raise your eyebrows. "Hot date?"
Jack snorts. "Hardly. A group of us from work went out to a bar to decompress."
You hold your smirk and tilt your head at him despite the way you want to cry and your heart sinks at the potential for what you say next to be true. "Could still be someone special there you haven't told me about who made you want to go."
He rolls his eyes at you playfully, but he can feel the butterflies in his stomach and fluttering of his heart caused by you seeming to care and maybe even being jealous at just the thought that there could be someone else. "I can assure you there's nobody special at work. You know there's absolutely nobody at work I'm remotely interested in and that I don't shit where I eat," he smirks back at you. "Why don't you just use my shower? Save yourself the time of getting to the gym and back."
"Oh, I, I," you titter, lick your lips and force yourself to pull it together. "I couldn't impose like that. It's getting late and it'll take up your time and, and… you know. It's very sweet of you to offer though, truly."
"You using my shower is so fucking far away from being an imposition. And it is getting late, yeah. Which is all the more reason for you to do the much safer thing and use my shower that's just across the hall." He cocks his head at you and raises his eyebrows. "You know if you go to the gym I'm going to stay up until you text me that you're home safe."
You let out a breathy laugh. He's right. You know he will. And you know there's something so protective with almost a possessive edge to it that makes your heart race and warmth bloom in your lower abdomen. "You don't have to do that, Bugs."
"I know," he nods once, "but I will anyway." Jack's voice drops to a murmur, his eyes dark and piercing yours as he holds your gaze. "I won’t be able to help it."
You're not sure how or when it happened exactly, but there's something in the air and the look in Jack's eyes that makes you think it might finally happen, that the two of you might finally kiss and give into this thing between you. When Jack's eyes leave yours and drop down to look at your lips you swear the tension in the hallway becomes so great that it's physically harder to breathe from the weight of it. Suddenly all you can really think about is Jack dragging you into his place and having his way with you until he's sated and ready to take a shower with you and scrub the day and his cum and sweat off you.
Jack's eyes drag back up to yours just in time for him to watch yours drop down and look at his lips. When you bring your eyes back to his the look you give him is so doe eyed and wanting and almost fucking demure Jack can feel the blood start to rush to his cock as he thinks about how you'd wear that look with your mouth full of his cock.
"I know… You’re silly like that aren't you?" you breathe, take a small step toward him.
"Yeah." The word is almost all air as Jack mirrors you and takes a small step toward you. "Only for you, though." And then the tension shatters.
But not how either of you want it to. It's the loud thud of someone dropping something in the elevator on the floor below you that does it. Both you and Jack look away from each other, annoyed at the noise and regretting not having acted quicker on the moment you were clearly having. He clears his throat as you look at each other again. "I wasn't like that for the guy that lived there before you," he smirks. He takes the few steps to his door. "Come on."
You give him a small smile and shift on your feet. "You're sure?"
"100%." Jack winks at you and opens his door, holds his one arm up and out to invite you in.
You feel lightheaded at his wink. So lightheaded you have to bite your lip hard to ground yourself with the pain. You shake your head at him and laugh softly as you walk into his place. "Thank you."
"Of course," Jack hums as he steps in behind you and shuts and locks the door.
As he sets his keys down and gets his shoes off he realizes he's been saying my shower this whole time. But it can't really be his shower. He has to show you to his guest bathroom's shower. Right? It would be weird to take you to his shower in the en suite bathroom off his bedroom because then you'd have to walk through his bedroom and that feels weird and what if it was somehow pressuring? Or felt like he was trying to say something?
Obviously there's this thing between the two of you that you haven't defined or given into, this thing you both know is there and want but just haven't let happen because there's no way the other can truly feel the same. With the attraction, physical and sexual and emotional, between you a permanent undercurrent whenever the two of you are together now, the last thing Jack wants to do is make you feel like he's using that, or trying to, or being weird or creepy or like he's doing anything other than just trying to help you out. Because that's all he's doing, trying to help you out.
As you stand by Jack and get your shoes off and move them out of the way near a pair of Jack's while he does the same you're struck by how familiar and comfortable Jack's apartment has become. If you're honest with yourself you wish you never had to leave.
"I'm guessing you don't need anything other than towels?" he asks as you both walk further into his place. He loves seeing you in his space. If he's honest with himself he wishes you never had to leave.
"I don't even need towels. I packed some." You smile at him, a hint of a smirk to it. "I can use them, save you the laundry."
"Yeah, okay." He rolls his eyes at you playfully. "Or I can just give you proper towels so you don't have to use the thin pool towels I know you packed."
You scoff at him with mock offense and a wide smile. "I resent that."
"But noticeably didn't deny it." You can hear the smirk in his voice as he turns and starts walking down to his hall closet. "Where's the gym anyway?" Jack calls to you as he pulls out a couple towels of various sizes.
"Squirrel Hill South."
"Squirrel Hill South?!" Jack repeats with teasing incredulousness, huffing. He starts walking back toward you, holding your eye contact how he loves to do. "You were seriously going to trek to fucking Squirrel Hill South for a shower instead of just asking me?"
"Well, I don't know," you shrug, voice a little higher pitched with mock defensiveness. "I don't like to be a burden or impose and I didn't know if that was appropriate or would be awkward or weird or what!" you laugh. "I didn't want to put you in an awkward position."
"You could never be a burden or an imposition and it's not inappropriate or awkward or weird." Jack offers you the towels and you take them. He stays standing in front of you, raises his brows and gives you a small smile. "Would it feel that way if I asked you if I could use your shower?"
"Well, no. But, but that's-"
He shakes his head and interrupts you gently, sets his hands on your shoulders, fingers a little too far in toward your neck to be strictly platonic, his thumbs against your collarbones. There's an intimacy to it that makes you breathe a little harder. You have half a mind to drop the towels and your bag and grab his face, pull it down to yours as you step even closer to him. "No buts." He flicks his eyebrows up at you and nods in a silent yeah? "And no it's not different. Anytime you need, yeah? Anything. A shower, a bed, someone to listen, stitches, a distraction." He smirks deeply at you. "A cup of sugar or whatever it is they say."
You try to match his smirk but it's a little too soft and smiled. Jack's words warm you from your core. You want whatever this is between you so badly. Those are things you say to a close friend, sure, but they're things you say to your partner too. Your girlfriend or boyfriend. And the way Jack said it, his tone of voice and his facial expressions, there was something so boyfriend reassuring his girlfriend about it all that drives you insane and makes your heart flutter and makes you want and need him and makes you a little sad almost. Because he's not your boyfriend.
"The same goes for you with me at my place, you know?" You click your tongue and bob your head to the side. "Minus the stitches, of course."
"I know," Jack chuckles. He gives your shoulders a little squeeze and then releases them and takes a step away from you.
"Good." You don't know why you do it or where the move comes from or where the confidence to comes from but you reach out and squeeze his upper arm. "Thank you, Jack."
The way you say his name there isn't special. It isn't whispered or breathy or giggled or moaned or anything special. It's normal. Like you always say it. And it rips through him in the best way, like hearing you say his name always does. It makes him want to kiss you and hold you and never let you go, makes him want to take you to bed and hear you moan it over and over again underneath him as he makes you feel better than you've ever been made to feel before, makes him want to cry with how much care you always say it with, how much warmth. It makes him want to get on his knees in front of you and ask you to be his, to go on a date with him, give him one chance.
As though all the times you've shared takeout on your couch or he's cooked you dinner and you've eaten at his place weren't, in reality, dates, even if you didn't label them as such.
"Did something happen today?" You furrow your brows and tilt your head at him, confused. "To make you need to wash the day off. You don't have to say, just I'm… here, like I said. To listen or distract or talk or whatever. Help how I can."
"Oh." You shake your head and shrug. "No, nothing happened. It was just a long day and sometimes showering helps me let it all go. I like my long, hot showers, you know," you laugh softly, your words a throw back to you telling Jack while you were both a little tipsy on his couch one night how much you love taking long, hot showers.
"Okay, good." Jack gives you one of those small, closed lip smiles that's all in his eyes and you melt.
"Thanks for checking." You give him a similar smile back and then start to walk toward the guest bathroom.
"Oh," Jack calls after you. "The fan in there doesn't work by the way, sorry. I've been meaning to get it fixed but never really had a reason so I just haven't."
"That's okay." You turn and look at him when you get to the door. "I like the extra steam."
"Perfect then. Take your time. They're good hot water heaters when they're not broken. Perfect for long, hot showers," Jack teases you with a smile.
You fake glare at him. "You better not have spoken them replacing mine with some shitty one into the universe."
Jack laughs and the sound makes you weak. You want to hear that sound always, every day, you want to be the one to pull it from him, the one to make him laugh and smile and be happy. "If they do, I promise I'll give you a key to my place so that you can come take your long, hot showers as frequently as your heart desires."
You swallow hard at the thought of Jack giving you a key to his place so that you could come shower. Your mind can't help but think about whether he'd ever join you eventually, whether that would be the start of something more, of you both just finally saying how you feel and exploring what's so obviously between you.
"Guess we'll have to see." You give him a lopsided smile and open the door.
"Guess so," he nods. "Enjoy."
"Thanks, Jack." You hold his gaze for a moment and then step inside the bathroom.
Jack knows he's going to think about the way you just said his name and the smile you gave him for the rest of his life.
Being in Jack's shower, even just his guest bathroom's shower, is a fucking trip.
You're pretty sure you spend the first five minutes just standing there thinking about it. Nothing actually specific. Just the fact of it, of where you are. It's almost like you're frozen in a way, mind present and thinking about how you're in Jack's fucking shower, but also so spaced out.
It's only once you unfreeze and come back to yourself that specific thoughts start to hit you as just below scalding water rains down on you. And all of those thoughts, of course, involve you in Jack's shower, but in Jack's shower, in the en suite off his bedroom. With Jack in the shower with you.
You know he has a nice built in bench in his shower, you guys talked about it once, how they let him build it in. You don't remember why or how it came up, but it doesn't matter.
You wonder if he'd let you kneel between his legs and suck him off. Your mouth feels so empty at the thought that you're pretty sure you pout to yourself a little. You think Jack might fight it a little at first, not want you to hurt or bruise your knees. But as you convinced him it's what you really want, what you need, you think he'd let you.
Maybe he'd let you take control and set the pace. Maybe sometimes he'd take control, hold your head with one hand, maybe both, and move you up and down just how he wants.
You're sure he's too seasoned of an emergency room doctor to be super into shower sex, has probably seen some gnarly injuries from it, but maybe your mouth on his cock would help convince him otherwise.
Maybe Jack would say your name lowly, voice even more gravelly than it usually is, dripping in need and lust and affection. Maybe he'd get you positioned perfectly standing between his legs and then tell you to turn around so that your back is facing him. Maybe he'd reach forward and run his fingers through you planning on rubbing your clit to get you nice and wet for him, huff a groaned laugh when he realizes you're already beyond ready for him. Maybe he'd guide you back further with his hand on your hips, get you in the right position and himself notched right at your entrance and then pull you down onto his cock before letting you fuck yourself on him.
Maybe… Maybe you need to get a fucking grip, you chastise yourself when you realize how deep into that day dream you are and how wet you know you must be with how prominent your heartbeat feels between your legs.
You force yourself to actually start showering. You know Jack said to take your time but you should still be considerate. It's late enough.
But as you shower the thoughts don't really stop. All you can think about when you finally turn the shower off and wrap one of Jack's towels around you are his hands all over your body and soft words of adoration and appreciation and maybe even love being whispered into your ear as he helps dry you off.
Once you disappear into the bathroom and he hears the shower start Jack realizes he's going to have to do everything possible to keep himself busy so that he doesn't just sit on his couch and think about showering with you. He makes himself act like it's just any other night, do what he would normally do and what he would've done if he'd gotten home tonight without seeing you. Or at least he makes himself try to act like it's just any other night.
Jack heads into his room and changes his shirt, grabs a pair of sweatpants and sits on the side of his bed and takes his prosthetic off, checks over his leg and cleans it and his prosthetic, pulls his sweats on and knots the one leg to keep it from getting caught under his crutches. From his room he goes to his kitchen to grab a drink and then crutches to his couch and sits in his usual seat, grabs the medical journal and opens it to the page he left off on and starts to read. Or at least he tries to read.
By the time you get out of the shower and walk out of his bathroom Jack's read a single paragraph about twenty times and has absorbed approximately none of it, his head far too full of thoughts of you. It's a miracle he hears you leave the bathroom and shut the door behind you and that you don't just walk out to him staring at a page of the journal completely spaced out and lost in his own little world. And hard.
Very obviously hard in his gray sweatpants.
You smile at him almost a little bashfully as you get closer. "Thank you for that."
Jack sets the journal in his lap and returns your smile with an easy one of his own. "Anytime. Feel better?"
"Yeah," you nod, "I do. I really appreciate it. It was very nice not having to trek across the city."
"I'm sure it was," he chuckles.
There's a beat of comfortable silence between you. There's no awkwardness to it at all. Something about it is almost poignant and expectant. You and Jack find yourselves where you always seem to. Both of you desperately wanting the other to make a move to confirm this thing between you is real and reciprocal and wanted and needed, followed by neither of you making it, you unconvinced that Jack could feel for you how you do for him and Jack unconvinced that you could feel for him how he does for you.
"Well." You let out a long breath and then walk over to his front door, Jack sitting up a bit to keep a better view of you. "I'll let you get back to your night." You pause with your hand on the door handle and look over at Jack.
The words are on the tip of his tongue. You can stay if you want.
Words that would be an unspoken ‘please want to stay.’
But he can't get them out. Not quick enough at least.
"Thank you again, Bugs." The smile you give him this time is absolutely unquestionably bashful and Jack wants to make you his, needs to. "I really appreciate it. And you. I really appreciate you. I hope you know that."
"I mean it. Anytime." Jack's smile is a little flustered and there's something so adorable about it that you bite your bottom lip which just makes him more flustered and his cock throb. "And I know. You make sure I know. I hope you know I really appreciate you too."
"I know," you nod, "you make sure I know." You shift your duffel and give Jack one last smile for the evening. "Goodnight, Bugs. Make sure you lock up." You wink at him, teasing him playfully about the way he always reminds you. You mean it though, you care about him just as much as Jack does about you.
Jack is floored the wink doesn't stop his heart or make him come untouched.
"Goodnight, Tweety." He gives you one last teasing smile for the night as you walk out, already knowing what he's going to call to you as you do. "Make sure you lock up too!"
Jack can hear your soft giggles as you pull his front door shut behind you. He's still for a moment, his brain trying to process everything that's happened tonight.
Jack has absolutely no idea what compels him to do it, but something in his subconscious does. He tells himself he's going to get the towels you used to throw them in the washer. He tosses the medical journal aside and gets up and crutches to the guest bathroom.
When he opens the door he's greeted with warm steam that smells like you, like your body wash mixed with your shampoo and conditioner. Jack immediately realizes his subconscious knew that's what would happen. He's frozen by it for a second before he quickly crutches into the bathroom and shuts the door so that no more steam can escape.
As he stands there, Jack's cock throbs even harder, the racing beat of his heart quickly the only thing he can hear. The thought crosses his mind as he breathes in deeply through his nose.
No. Absolutely not. No. He can't. It's wrong.
Before he fully realizes what he's doing Jack crutches over and puts the lid down on the toilet and sits, rests his crutches against the wall. It's not particularly comfortable but it doesn't matter. He's not going to be here long, he tells himself. Just another thirty seconds or so. He'll let himself sit in the steamy warmth that smells like you for just another thirty seconds or so.
Jack's hand brushes over his cock and his breath catches at the feeling. He didn't really mean to do that. He just didn't pay enough attention to where his hand was as he was bringing it up to run through his hair.
But it felt good. God, it felt so fucking good.
The way he brings his hand back down and starts to palm at his cock over his sweatpants is undeniably deliberate. This is wrong. He shouldn't. He can't.
Jack palms himself a little harder, bites his lip and groans. Does he seriously have this little self-control when it comes to you? So little that he can't just get up and go back to his couch or to bed and let his erection fade away?
Apparently he seriously has this little self-control when it comes to you because instead of getting up Jack shifts and pulls his sweatpants and boxer briefs down enough to free his cock and then nearly tears his shirt off. He lets out a heavy breath as he takes in another deep breath of your scent through his nose and rubs the bead of precum that leaks from his slit into his head.
This is so, so wrong. Getting off to the scent of you. This is so fucking dirty and probably a little creepy and, god what would you think of him if you knew what he was doing?
The thoughts fade quickly as he lets his eyes flutter closed and starts stroking himself properly as he continues breathing you in. You're all he's been thinking when getting himself off for a good while now, but this, this is different. The warmth of the air around him and the way it smells like you and the way the scent clings to him because of the steam makes it so different, makes it feel more real.
Maybe you'd like it, if you knew. Like that he was touching himself to the smell and thought of you. If the situations were reversed, though, he wouldn't mind. If he'd showered in your guest bathroom and you walked in once he left to warm steam that still smelled of him he wouldn't mind at all if you sat somewhere and touched yourself while you breathed him in and thought of him. He'd fucking want you to.
Jack doesn't know why, doesn't truly have a single fucking thing to draw the conclusion from, but he thinks you'd like it too. He thinks you'd find it hot.
If you knew he was doing this would you ask to watch? Ask him to show you what he likes? Would you slowly get closer to him so you could study every movement? Would you ask him what he was thinking about? Ask him to tell you all the things he thinks about when he touches himself? All the things he wants to do to you? Would you tell him all the things you want to do to him? Would you drag him to bed so you could both be more comfortable? Would you ask to take over? With your hand? With your mouth? Would you want to watch him come? Would you take your pants and underwear off and position yourself so he could come all over your cunt? Would you sink yourself down on him just as he started to come?
A million questions and possibilities run through Jack's mind, a million scenarios, ones he's imagined before and new ones. But his mind eventually settles.
"Jack?"
You and Jack are in his bed together, naked. You're tangled together on your sides, both of you breathless from making out. You press a couple of kisses to his jaw and scratch your nails at the v of his hips and whine slightly at the way you can feel his cock throb.
"Show me, please. Show me what you like," you whisper. "How you touch yourself. Please."
He swallows hard but nods. In addition to how fucking hot it is, there's something incredibly intimate about the ask, about the idea of touching himself with you watching. "Okay, Baby." Both of you shift and sit up against the headboard, Jack’s back propped up against it with some pillows comfortably and you pressed into his side, the position easier for you to bring your dominant hand across his body. Jack brings a hand that he has to focus way too hard on keeping steady to his cock.
"No, Jack," you interrupt before he can truly start, shaking your head at him. You hold your hand out to him. "Show me. Teach me. I want to be able to make you feel good."
"Fuck," Jack breathes, a heavy jolt of pleasure running up his spine. "I don't need to show you, Sweetheart. Just you touching me will make me feel good. Shit, just you watching makes it even better."
"But I want to know what makes you feel the best. I want to make you feel good, the best you've ever felt." You hit him with a pout that has him squeezing the base of his cock hard so he doesn't lose it just from that. "Please."
"Yeah, of course," Jack pants, reaches out and grabs your hand. "Anything you want, Baby. Anything and everything."
The groan Jack lets out as he imagines your hand wrapping around his cock at the guidance of his is ripped from deep in his chest. He knows that the feeling he's imagining would be nothing compared to the real thing, to how small your hand would feel in his and wrapped around him and how soft your skin would be against his cock.
Jack starts moving your hand up and down his cock slowly at first, picking up the pace with each pass until you're at a steady rhythm. He twists when he gets to his head and as Jack watches you watch your hand he can almost see you noting in your brain exactly where to start the twist to give him the most pleasure. He can't believe anybody, let alone you, would care for him enough to pay such close attention just so you can make him feel good.
"You're so big Jack," you moan softly as you work his cock. "I don't know how you're going to fit." Jack's hips buck at your words and your eyes meet as you look up at him. "You will fuck me tonight, right Jack? I need it. Need you."
"Yeah," Jack pants, "yeah, I'll fuck you tonight. I'll do whatever you want to you tonight."
"I want you to take whatever you want, want you to use me however you want." You look so truly desperate for it that Jack's hips buck just as desperately again. "I want you to do everything you've ever wanted to me, Jack."
He lets out a shuddery breath with a hint of a laugh to it. "That list is way the fuck too long for one night, Baby."
You giggle and bite your lip, twist your hand on your own just to surprise him and pull a loud groan of your name from his chest. It's like you can tell he's getting close despite this being the first time you guys have ever given in and done this, seen each other and kissed each other and touched each other like this. Jack can feel the way he's about to come, starts to draw in air to try to form the words to tell you, but instead his brows furrow in confusion when you slow your hand and then pull it away. He just barely swallows down most of a whine.
You hum soothingly, roll your head a little to kiss his skin wherever you can as his orgasm ebbs and then look up at him with an eager need in your eyes. "I want you to show me something else now."
"Oh yeah?" Jack has a feeling he knows what you mean, his heart somehow thundering harder at just the thought.
"Yeah." You move so that you're between his legs and facing him. And then you start to lower yourself and get comfortable laying between his legs on your stomach.
"Oh, Baby, you don't, you don't have to do this." He brings a hand down to your face where you rest it on his thigh and look up at him. "Your hand is more than enough."
"I know I don't have to, Jack." You smile at the precum he leaks when you say his name. You lift your head up and kiss his inner thigh up to his cock. "I want to, I promise" you murmur. "Show me how you like it, Baby, please."
You take his head in your mouth and swirl your tongue around it as you suck and moan. "Fuck!" Jack rasps, voice strained with pleasure. "Oh god, Baby, fuck. Fuck your mouth is so good, oh fuck."
As you slowly start to bob your head up and down one of your hands grabs one of his and brings it to your head as you look at him pleadingly. Jack knows it's a silent request for him to take control and show you how he likes it. He lets out a shuddery breath as he does what you asked.
Jack's hand speeds up, tightens around himself even more. He's close. He's so fucking close and it hasn't even been that long and he should be embarrassed but he's not. He's just fucking not. That's what you do to him. This is what you do to him.
And you’re not even fucking here.
He thinks he might be drunk off your scent. Jack never wants this to end, never wants the steam that smells like you and envelops him to dissipate. Not unless he can have the real thing. Not unless he can be fucking you with his nose pressed up against your neck or hauling you into the shower with him to make more steam that smells like you. Not unless you're his and he's yours.
"Jack." The way you say his name is almost moaned, your lips fluttering against his tip so you can take him back in your mouth as soon as you finish speaking. "Come for me."
Jack does with a breathy groan of your name, body almost trembling at how fucking good it feels as he watches his cum paint his chest and abdomen, a little hitting his collarbones and lower neck. His head drops back and he lets his eyes close as he keeps working himself through it, your name falling off his tongue over and over.
He works himself to a little painful overstimulation and then lets go of his cock as he pants and tries to come back down, aftershocks of pleasure ripping through his body as he basks in the post-orgasm haze and the smell of you. Jack can't remember the last time he came that hard. He's not sure if he ever has before. And all it took was the scent of you.
He's so astronomically fucked.
He's falling in love with you. With your beauty and smile and laugh and your personality and wit and how vibrant you are. With the light you bring into his life just by being his neighbor.
He craves you, wants you like he's never wanted someone before. He wants all of you, the good and the bad and the parts you haven't shown him yet and the parts of you that you haven't even discovered yet, in every possible way, sexual and otherwise. Jack wants you. All of you. All the time.
You guys have your thing, but it's probably harmless flirting to you, not something that would ever go anywhere. He told himself you'd probably find this hot, but would you? Would you really? Or would you find it sad? A man his age touching himself.
Jack finally comes back around to where he always seems to land. Why would you ever want him?
He grabs some toilet paper and cleans his chest off. He stands up and opens the lid, tosses it in the toilet and flushes. It's as he pulls his shirt back on that his hearing apparently fucking comes back.
There's a knock on his door. "Bugs?" His unlocked door. He never locked it after you left, and he knows you, he knows you'll be concerned that he hasn't answered and you'll try it and he's in the fucking bathroom you were just in, that he has no reason to be in, that he never uses, always just goes to his, and you're too smart for your own fucking good and you'll put together why. You'll know.
So he needs to get out of here.
"Jack?" He hears the door start to open. "I'm coming in."
He just gets the lights off and makes it out of the bathroom and into the hallway a little bit, hopefully enough that it doesn't seem like he was coming out of there. "Hey, sorry," he calls to you as he crutches closer as you walk in. "I didn't hear at first…" He tries to think of some sort of excuse about why he didn't hear when he's always heard every other time, but he decides to let it go. You'll see right through him and the lie.
"That's okay." You smile at him, cocking your head just slightly with a subtly suspicious smile. Jack looks different than you've ever seen him before. He looks… caught, almost.
As you move closer to each other and you get a better look at him you realize he's flushed from the neck up, skin red and pink and a little blotchy, sweat making some of his curls stick to his forehead and his temple and neck a bit shiny. He looks hot. Literally and metaphorically.
You're so transfixed by him and thinking about what it would be like to have him on top of you while looking like he does right now that you don't even stop to think about why he looks like that right now, about what he could've been doing.
"You didn't lock your door." You raise your eyebrows at him and give him a teasing smile. "You need to."
Jack smirks at you. "Worried about me?"
"Yeah, actually," you laugh, the teasing sliding out of your smile and replaced by something so genuine Jack has to cover the way his breath hitches. "You'd be so mad if you discovered my door unlocked."
"Not mad," he shakes his head, "concerned and worried."
You shoot him an oh please look, but you know he's telling the truth. You know it would be that kind of anger that's really just a mask for intense and deep worry and concern. You lick your lips and take a breath. "I came back because I think I left my body wash."
Jack nods. "Ah, well we couldn’t possibly have that sitting in my guest bathroom until the next time you came over and grabbed it at your convenience. Absolutely required you getting out of bed and coming back over," he teases, crutching toward the bathroom with you.
"Nope," you pop the 'p.' "You might use it when you miss me," you smirk at him as you step by him to walk into the guest bathroom, your chests nearly brushing, something that isn't completely unusual, it's happened before and you guys hug. But there's something much more keyed up to the way your chests almost touch when combined with your words.
Your words that make Jack glitch for a moment. Do you know? Could you have figured out what he was doing before you came back in? No. There's no way you could've. You're just fucking around. He needs to fucking relax and be normal before he gives it away.
"Oh," Jack drawls with teasing amusement as you grab the bottle from the shower and then turn back to him and walk toward him, "is that your way of asking for a bottle of my body wash for when you miss me?"
The beat before you reply is just a few seconds too long for it to mean nothing, and fuck, Jack realizes, you might actually want that. But why? How? He has to be wrong. He's projecting.
You're undeniably a little flustered though, that much is obvious to Jack, but not flustered in a he made you uncomfortable way, more in a you've been caught kind of way. It makes his head spin.
Where the fuck everything that happens next comes from, where the confidence to do any of it comes from, you have no idea. It just seems to happen.
You stop in front of Jack, chests less than a centimeter from brushing. "You know one time you had me over you'd left a bottle of your body wash on the kitchen table for you to take into your bathroom the next time you went back there," you murmur, eye contact with him direct and unbelievably heady, a small ghost of a self-satisfied smile on your face. "So for all you know I already have a bottle in my shower just for that purpose."
Your smile pulls up a little wider on your face when Jack's breath catches in his throat and he swallows heavily. His brain tries to come up with something to say but just fucking can't because you just said that. You just said that and it’s how you said it and that smile and your murmured voice and the look in your eyes and fuck.
You really just said that.
And Jack has no idea whether you do or don't but is now so beyond desperate to know.
"Thank you again, Bugs." You lean into him and up and press a soft kiss to his cheek, something you've never done before. "Have a good rest of your night."
You step back and smile at him before turning and walking to his front door, Jack almost frozen to his spot because you just said that and then kissed his cheek. Your lips had contact with his skin. Your lips.
You pause at his door again and turn back to him. "Make sure you really lock up this time, Bugs, yeah?" You flick your eyebrows up at him for a second in emphasis. "And have sweet dreams, Jack."
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