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Jared should have known that Jensen would get right on that.
It had been one of the reasons that Jared hadn't mentioned the phone call before now. So long as it was something in his head, then it was just a nebulous something on a made up to-do list that wasn't real. It was something that he was just planning on getting around to. One day. In the future. When he felt like it.
But less than a week after Jared's night time confession, Jensen had the truck brought up from where it was, apparently, kept under a tarp in the work shed.
Jared hadn't even known the pride had a car. Or a work shed. Or tarps.
It was a big, old, beat up beast of a thing -- a 1946 Chevrolet pick up with a bubble shaped hood and beat up wood paneling along the side. Jared was amazed that it was somehow still in working order, rust growing on the edges of the metal, and tires a washed out grey. The truck had maybe been painted red once, but now it was pretty much just 'mud'.
Jared was sort of depending on the fact that he was carrying Jensen's children and that Jensen probably didn't want him to die, otherwise he would have labeled the thing a deathtrap and refused to get in on sight.
As it was, though, his own worries weren't the biggest problem.
"This isn't a good idea," Jeff announced, his arms crossed and jaw set, trying to stare down Jared over the hood of the truck.
"It'll be fine," Jensen dismissed, coming back from the main house with another box in his hands, which he set into the bed of the truck. "Just make sure to talk to the ranger once you get into town, and check with the sheriff about--"
"I wasn't talking about me going into town. I know my job. I was talking about him." Jeff gestured to Jared in a manner that Jared decided to take great offense to, and gawked at him. "He shouldn't be going down into town in his condition."
"In his condition--" Jared started, ready to get into a red-faced argument, when Jensen held out a hand.
"Well, getting into a fight is definitely not good for him, and he's made up his mind anyways--"
"You know, I am here," Jared reminded, giving both the dominants a dirty look.
"--all I need you to do is the regular run, and help Jared get to a phone he can use. He'll need 'long-distance'."
The way Jensen said 'long distance', like it was one word, made Jared snort a little, the alpha obviously not knowing the actual cadence of the term. It wasn't like Jensen wasn't educated. Hell, the dominant was far more well read than Jared, and in plenty of subjects. Jensen, it turned out, actually was a licensed electrician, and had read more books on physics and chemistry than Jared had ever even bothered to flip open, despite the fact that he'd been through institutionalized education. Jensen had also read what appeared to be ten school's worth of summer reading lists, and could quote great swathes of various texts that Jared didn't recognize. The alpha even knew most of the modern idioms and plenty of modern technology, even if the pride didn't have any tech that had been made after 1960.
All that Jensen lacked was that undefinable something that could only come from growing up in a culture -- that amorphous string of concepts that seemed to tie everything together, made it all sound natural and normal. All the little cultural quirks and cues that Jared had such a hard time explaining, because they were less like learning and more like instinct, something ingrained from a lifetime of growing up human that he couldn't really describe to someone else. Like trying to describe the color 'yellow' to a blind person.
That little missing link always made Jensen sound a little bit like a robot trying to imitate a human, but luckily, Jared just found it endearing.
Jeff's hands came down on the truck's hood with a little more force than necessary, leaning over it to look at the alpha.
"It's not the phone I'm worried about! I can make the call. Or someone else can. I don't see why it has to be him specifically -- he's carrying a litter."
"They're my parents, Jeff. I'm not going to have someone else call them." Jared rolled his eyes.
"Why not?"
"Because it's my decision. Christ, give it a rest." Jared glowered, irritation tinging his voice, and Jeff seemed to back off at that, lowering his hands from the truck's hood.
"...fine," the older dominant gave it, face still set in a grimace(more like a pout, Jared thought). "But I don't have to like it." With that he turned, finishing loading up supplies -- things to sell in town and other miscellanea.
The fertile let out a breath as the fight was diverted, and he turned to glance at Jensen, who was reaching out to put his hands on Jared's shoulders.
"You know how he is. He doesn't like the idea of you risking your health."
"I'm not risking my health, I'm going into town to make a phone call. And yeah, I do know how he is -- which begs the question, why'd you ask a pain in the ass to be my escort?"
"Because he doesn't like the idea of you risking your health and he'll be a pain in the ass about it," Jensen replied with too easy a smile. Jared scowled.
Freaking dominants. They were all a bunch of worry-worts.
"I'm sorry I couldn't come with you myself," Jensen continued, expression turning more serious.
"No, you have things to do, it's fine. I'm not going to get attacked by ninjas or anything." Jared raised a hand, placing it over one of Jensen's. "Go do alpha things. I'll be fine."
Jensen nodded, but Jared could see the dominant's eyes flick downward -- right to Jared's stomach. He moved his hand out to tip Jensen's chin back up.
"Me and the cubs will be fine," he amended, and Jensen finally nodded. Jared didn't complain(much) when Jensen's hands shifted, moving to pull Jared in and meld their mouths together. Some two months of sex and intimacy had almost inured him to the idea that he had a male lover, that he regularly surrendered control of his space and his body to that lover, that he enjoyed the sensation of surrender. Almost.
He still felt a little human piece of himself jolt in his spine, before everything went liquid and it was Jensen's lips on his, Jensen's hands on his face, and his body reminded him that this was how he liked it.
He just hoped his family would understand that.
He drew back when Jensen did, flicking a tongue out over spit slicked lips, huffing a laugh at the expression on his alpha's face -- some mixture of pride and want, and Jared shoved him playfully.
"Go, before you give me a good reason to give in and put this off even longer."
"As much as I love being a distraction..." Jensen murmured regretfully. "I want you to do this. It's something you need. Most likely, something they need too."
Jared's smile fell, firmed, and he nodded, knowing that intellectually, but nerves still fired up inside of him. The clearing had been easy, straight forward. This... This was life. Burning and shifting and moving and always, always unpredictable. Jared knew he had to take the bad, if he wanted to have the good.
He thought of Tristan, his dark spots and bright teal eyes, leaping on Jared and Jensen both in the morning, mindless of his claws or of his parents need for sleep. He thought of Tristan, and Jensen, and maybe even the cubs inside of him, and he wanted the good. He wanted it enough to turn and get in the truck cab, wincing at the groan and shriek of the old metal door, hearing it slam unevenly shut into its frame.
He leaned back in the stifling heat, looking up at the roof, hearing Jeff moving around the truck and feeling the occasional shift as another box was thrown into the back -- skulls from prey kills, marked with grooves from ailure teeth and claws, or figurines whittled from branches or fallen trees, all to be traded in town for money to buy more supplies, more books, more of whatever they needed from the humans to survive the winter.
For the first time in two years, Jared wasn't so afraid of the winter and the coming snow.
"Ready?" Jeff's voice came up over the open window of the driver's side door, before it swung open and the dominant pulled himself in with a grunt.
"As I'll ever be," Jared replied, and he listened as the engine turned over, groaned like an old man before firing to life, its rumble warm and deep, the sound of diesel. The cab nearly vibrated with it.
They pulled out, away from the garage and shed, moving down onto an unpaved road through the woods, and Jared took a deep breath.
He was leaving the woods.
-----
The pines lined either side of the road, blocking them in and walling the world off from them as they chugged along. The truck maxed out at fifty miles an hour, and there was no way they were going to hit that on the uneven dirt and gravel, the lack of shocks making everything grate and rattle as they made their way steadily downwards.
Jeff was silent, looking out at the road in front of them, and Jared was far too involved in his own thoughts to start up any kind of small talk. Now that he was actually in a moving vehicle, headed inexorably towards civilization, the thought of calling his parents was almost taking a backseat to the idea of actually being in town. Being surrounded by all the culture and technology that Jared had once been so very used to, until he'd forcibly removed himself from it.
It occurred to him that he hadn't even read a single newspaper in two years.
He'd never thought about it before, but there had been a whole world out there, moving without him. He'd been so involved in the drama of his own life that somehow the world outside had just stopped for him, had become this inert mass, frozen so long as Jared, it's central actor, was gone. But now he was coming back, and he realized just how stupid that was. People had lives and jobs and kids, governments passed laws and made amendments, and countries fought wars, negotiated trades. Not only had all the people of North Carolina gone on about their lives, so had all the people of Nigeria and Tunisia and Jordan. Somewhere out there, people were going to bed in Japan, just waking up in Alaska, and sitting down for tea in England.
And Jared had been divorced from all that. So separate that, for all he knew, there'd been a new world war, or government break down, or zombie outbreak. He'd never have heard.
It was a bizarre idea -- that the world he was returning to could be everything familiar that he'd missed, and yet still so unknown.
On one side of the cab the trees began to thin and fall away, getting lower and lower down a slope until that side opened up into a sprawling vista. It was unending wilderness, spread out before them, stretching out to the horizon and the mountains that ran the ridge to the west. The hunting grounds, Jared recalled from what Jensen had told him. All the land that the pride owned, kept and hunted. Jared hadn't been out to explore it yet, keeping mostly to pride ground and the cove. He hadn't experienced any morning sickness, ailure pregnancies not the same as human ones, but he'd still found himself plagued by a certain amount of tiredness, and not much inclined to go walking long distances.
He peered out at the long stretch of forest, the shape of clouds tattooed in shadow over the tops of the trees, moving so slowly that it was invisible to the eye, the wind reticent to blow in the lazy august sky and the air still.
"How are you feeling?" Jeff's voice finally broke the silence, after an hour of uninterrupted travel, and Jared's gaze ticked over to the beta across the front bench.
"...alright," he answered after a pause, trying to size this conversation up before it happened.
Jeff sighed.
"Look, I didn't mean anything by all that, alright?" The dominant's eyes flicked to him, before returning to the road in front of them. "It's just...this is your first litter. I don't like taking chances."
"Chances like what? I'm going to make a phone call, not hold up a bank."
"Chances like chances. I know I'm...being a pain, but. I just worry, is all. I don't know why Jensen'hrao wasn't more concerned, to be honest."
"He was." Jared shrugged. He saw Jeff throw him a questioningly raised eyebrow and continued. "He's just learned there's not a lot of good in fighting me, when I make up my mind. Besides, he really wants me to do this. The whole...contacting my family thing. And he knows I'll put it off forever, if given half a chance, so..."
The grit of the road passed under them, grumbling as the tires stirred the rocks against each other. Jared felt every bump and hitch, jittering in the seat as they made their way down through the forest. Jeff was silent for awhile, eyes fixed on the road ahead of them, hands firm at ten and two on the wheel.
His tone was lower, softer, when he spoke again, a sound so like the rumble of the car, stones tumbling over one another in his throat.
"It's been my job to care for the fertiles since... Well. It just always has been. And less of a job, as well. More like...a calling. I see when they suffer, and when they rejoice, and nothing hurts more than seeing a fertile in pain. You walk like you have a hole in your belly, some days, little one. It's been better, since Jensen brought you back, brought you home, but it's still something that dogs your steps. I don't think that the others can't see it, but even if they can't, I can."
Jared let out a breath, turning his head to stare out the passenger's side window at the pine trees drifting past, his side of the car facing the mountainside, heavy green branches lay over each other and creating a criss-cross wild wall of foliage, holding back the order of the road. It wasn't like he'd just magically forgotten his time alone in the woods. As much as each day had faded into the next, and as much as that sameness had grown over him like a haze, it had still been two years. Two long years.
Readjusting to living in society, to being around people, was a slow process. It had been easier, somehow, when he'd been expecting to leave again, when none of his actions had consequences. When it didn't matter if these people cared for him or not.
Now pride ground was home, and he had a family -- a mate and a son, neither of which he wanted to lose. And he suddenly had so much at stake there. He was aware that his social skills weren't really up to snuff anymore. And even if they had been, he wasn't really aware of ailure etiquette. Sure, everyone had been kind and cutting him slack, but how long before that got old? He was already becoming some kind of crazy person, waking Jensen up in the night practically begging the alpha to fuck him, only to turn around and tell him how wrong it was.
If this went on much longer, he was pretty certain that Jensen would be eligible for sainthood.
Jared bit at his thumb nail.
"I'm," he started with no particular destination, cutting the sentence off at the root. He let out a puff of breath, but Jeff said nothing, didn't jump in, and Jared didn't look over at him, always finding it easier to talk about the hard things when he didn't have to see someone else's face. Like he was alone again and just talking to the forest, to the trees that couldn't judge him and the river that couldn't think anything at all. "...Sorry. Sorry about... you know. Being a brat."
"You're a kid. It's part of growing up," Jeff replied, too easy and flippant, forgiving without a problem. "Besides, I was being controlling. I knew it, too. It's your place to make the calls. I just... Well. As I said, I worry."
"But me specifically, right?" Jared turned away from the window, releasing his thumb nail from his teeth, his curiosity overcoming his desire to hide. "Why me specifically?"
"Because... you are still just a kid, and you're also carrying your first litter," he repeated, as if that were the answer to everything. "You've been hurt, and you still hurt, and we're all protective of you, if you haven't noticed yet. And because you were raised by humans. Everyone just wants to... help. I suppose that has to be a bit stifling."
Jared swallowed and leaned back against the seat, looking out at the road.
"I think that's the weird thing. It should be stifling. And...okay, it is, sometimes. But a lot of the time... it's kind of nice. Is that weird?"
"No, little one...that isn't weird."
Jared huffed and shook his head.
"You guys and your nicknames. I'm not little. I'm as tall as you are!"
"Yes," Jeff replied. "But not in your true form, and besides, it's what I call many of the fertiles. It's a gesture of affection."
"Yeah, I get that much," Jared grumped.
"Do you want me to stop?"
"I dunno..." Jared shrugged a little. "I feel like kind of an asshole, telling people they can't call me affectionate pet names. Seems like kind of an asshole thing to do, doesn't it?"
"Asking for what you need is never an 'asshole thing to do'." Jeff looked over at him, brown eyes too knowing, and Jared jolted a little, never having thought of himself as someone who was shy about asking for things. Hell, he barely ever shut up about the things that he wanted. For gum at the store in the check-out line when he was kid, for that stupid basketball hoop that he'd begged his parents for months for only to never use it, for his mom to make his favorite food for dinner, for Daniel to change the goddamned channel, for a car, when he was old enough. Jared could talk anyone's ear off about what he wanted.
It only occurred to him, just then, that Jeff hadn't used the word 'want' at all.
Jared looked down at the floorboards.
"How about just 'Jared', then?" the dominant asked. Jared huffed and quirked his lips.
"...Jared's good."
"Good then." A large hand clapped down on Jared's back, rubbing once before withdrawing. He continued with the same easy tone, carrying the conversation without effort. "So, tell me, how has it been, so far?"
"Been?" Jared blinked, turning his head up again.
"Your pregnancy."
Jared flushed, feeling aware, once again, of his stomach, and he tried for words, but before he could find any Jeff continued right on.
"Growing up with humans, you must not know much of ailure pregnancies... I'm sure you've had plenty of questions. Jensen'hrao has been taking care of you?"
"Yeah... I mean, of course."
"Of course," Jeff nodded along, turning the wheel as they rounded a bend, tracing the line of the mountain. "He's a devoted alpha, there's no reason he wouldn't... But I can't help but wonder if you've been asking him the things you want to."
"What do you mean?" Jared's brow furrowed, Jeff always managing to confuse him. He valued the dominant's friendship, and in the nearly five months he'd been living with the Blue Ridge Pride he'd found solace in Jeff's advice and calm presence more than once, but the black cougar's ability to stay unrattled also meant that he was plenty good at rattling others. Their conversations could sometimes be exhausting, and trapped in a moving car as they were, this one was shaping up to be a doozy.
"I mean that every time I mention your litter, you blush or turn your head away, or shutter your eyes. You aren't as stealthy as you think you are." The truck slowed, taking another, sharper bend, and out the driver's window Jared could see the valley flash behind a few trees before reappearing, mountains running over the horizon, great and rolling. "And I can't help but wonder... if you've just tucked all your curiosities away, thinking that perhaps that will make things easier. But no matter what you pretend, you are pregnant, and I figure, so long as you're stuck here with me, I might as well use the time to my advantage."
Jared reached a hand up, rubbing the back of his neck, knowing that he'd just been pinned like a bug under a microscope. Jeff acted like a big stupid lump most of the time, just lazing around and laughing at his own stupid jokes -- and it was easy to forget that the dominant was not only a skilled and dangerous warrior, but also not half as much an idiot as he pretended to be.
Jeff watched, observed. He took everything in, and when he was quiet enough, sometimes Jared even forgot he was there.
He wondered, at least, if maybe he shouldn't take the opportunity though. Driving down a road, halfway between the world of the ailure and the world of the humans and no where else to be, this was perhaps the perfect place for Jared to let out all his crazy, all the absent wonderings and musings that ran between his ears day in and day out.
"Well, it's just-- It's not like I don't trust Jensen, okay?" was the first thing he found himself saying, as ready to defend his lover as he had been his parents. He didn't like anyone thinking poorly of the people he loved, especially when all the mistakes made were on Jared's shoulders. "It's just that, you know... He lost most of Tristan's litter. And you saw how badly that fucked him up-- messed him up."
Cursing in front of Jeff always felt a little bit like cursing in front of his parents.
"Anyways," Jared continued. "I just don't want to say anything to worry him or freak him out. This is a big deal to him. I mean, he puts his hands on my belly like, every day. And he gets this...big, mushy look on his face, like he's looking at the Madonna and Child, and not, you know, my stomach. I don't know how to tell him that some days I wonder if it's just the side effects from having a regular amounts of food again. Just putting on some pudge or something. It doesn't feel like I'm pregnant. Like I can't possibly be pregnant, because it just doesn't make sense. That there can't be some kind of...uterus in there, doing its thing. I don't feel pregnant. I just feel kind of...flabby and weird. It's not like there's any kicking or anything. And is it a male fertile thing? Like...do we have worse litters? Cause we're... I dunno. Guys. I mean, Cosette was a chick. What if the cubs aren't the same as Tristan? What if they're messed up? I was raised as a human, with human food and human schools and fluoride in my water -- what if my cubs are...all weird and freaky? What if a steady diet of Kraft Mac and Cheese makes your...eggs or ovaries or man-uterus all wrong and bizarre? What if they're completely mangled in there? Like...conjoined twins or they have two heads, or... I don't even know! And, I mean, does it hurt? Giving birth. We're like, what, fifteen thousand miles away from a hospital, so I'm not betting on an epidural, or...boiling water, and what is the boiling water even for? Do they pour it on the baby once it's out? To make it...sterile? A sterile baby. I mean, they're always saying to boil the water in the movies, but then they just have it sitting there steaming. Is it for ambiance?" He rubbed a frustrated hand through his hair. "See? I'm not going to have any boiling water and I don't even know what the boiling water is for and I am pregnant with a litter of kittens, how does no one think that this is insane?!"
By the end of his mini-meltdown, Jared was panting, gesturing with both hands out, palm up and shoulders raised, because this crap just didn't make sense. It couldn't be real.
And he had no idea that when Jeff had asked him if he had any questions about his pregnancy that it would turn into this, that he was so clearly crazier than a trash can full of rabid squirrels, and why had no one told him that? Was he this crazy all the time and he just didn't notice, because holy crap, he was a crazy hormonal pregnant person.
"...sorry," he managed, glancing over at the older ailure, sheepish. "I...didn't really know I was going to do that."
Jeff just shook his head, slight smile on his lips, relaxed like Jared hadn't just flipped out on him.
"It's natural to have questions on your first litter -- even more so when you were unaware you could have a litter at all until recently. It's not as if there's a guide for this. In our people, you would have been raised surrounded by other fertiles, learning with them, from them, about them. And even then, a first litter is still a first litter. No matter how much you hear about it, it's a personal experience for every fertile I've ever sat with."
"Sat with? Do you--...Are you there for the births?"
"Sometimes," Jeff nodded. "Most fertiles give birth in...well, not public, but surrounded by friends and family. It eases them. And I'm often called to lay beside them."
Jared couldn't miss the warmth that suffused Jeff's expression then, and Jared smiled a little as well at the mental image: Jeff, the giant stuffed teddy cat. He could understand though. Jeff, when not being infuriating, was an incredibly soothing presence.
"As for what you asked..." the dominant continued. "There is pain. But it isn't like a human birth. The cubs are half the size of a human child, at most, and even then their heads are much smaller. It's still trying, but a fertile in labor doesn't take as long to deliver as a human does. At least, if the medical book is to be believed -- I've never witnessed a human birth. And as for being male, no, it won't effect your litter. You are as given to birthing as a female fertile. I don't know what most of those human things you listed are but...humans give birth without problems don't they?"
"Most of the time, yeah," Jared mumbled, scratching at his arm.
"Then I doubt it will hurt any of your cubs." Jeff looked over at him briefly, gaze warm. "And you are pregnant, Jared. I can smell it, the way your scent has shifted."
"Yeah, and that and a million other pieces of evidence are telling me that, but it's still not-- It's like it's not connecting. I know it logically. It's like I can't know it in...every other way."
Jared reached up, using a hand to rub his forehead, finding even more sudden and unknown words building up behind his lips, just waiting for their chance to get out, and now that Jeff had broken the dam they were just going to keep coming.
"I guess it's just that...you know," Jared continued. "I went my whole life thinking I couldn't get pregnant. Hell, it wasn't even that. It was so out of the realm of possibility that I didn't even think that I couldn't get pregnant. The idea was just a given. Just like I don't think about the fact that I can't draw sounds or sing colors." Jared sighed, leaning his head against his hand, elbow on the passenger side door. "So I guess now I'm just dealing with the idea that I could become pregnant, except I'm dealing with it while actually pregnant. And I'm not...It's not like I'm not kind of excited about it. Well, not excited but... I'm gonna have kids, you know? And that's...actually not that scary. I have Tristan. I know that I'm good with him. I know that I can be good at this. It's just..."
He paused then, trying to find the words to express that neither-here-nor-there feeling inside him. It reminded him, weirdly, of his heat, feeling nowhere and strange. It wasn't as intense, and it wasn't quite the same, but it produced a similar ache in him -- the sensation of being lost and without direction. Like he was feeling something so ephemeral and intangible that he couldn't describe it, couldn't define it enough to even begin to know how to fix it. Like until he could cage it with words he couldn't see it enough to know if it was real.
"I feel like I'm going to become someone else. I feel like...I'm not the person I was before. I have a husband, for all intents and purposes, and I'm going to give birth in three months -- Christ, three months -- and then this is going to be my life. This isn't a phase or something I've just got to get through. There are going to be kids on the other side of this. Kids. Like, actual living, thinking creatures that are going to depend on me to raise them. And I can look after kids, I'm a great babysitter, but this isn't babysitting. This is..." He shook his head, not having the words for it. The idea that he was going to be a mother. The idea that he already was. "I guess it just kind of hit me that...this is my life. This isn't just tomorrow or the next day but...the decisions I'm making right now are going to define the rest of my life. I just...Am I equipped for that? Am I old enough to make that kind of decision? I thought that when I was nineteen I was going to be at college, getting drunk the night before an exam or something. Not...planning my future with my spouse, out in the middle of the woods."
Jeff was nodding along, listening, one finger tapping absently on the worn and cracked leather of the wheel. It was bizarre, like some out of body experience, Jared thought, listening to himself talk about all these things that he hadn't even been aware that he was thinking. It was like Jeff had poked an abscess and all the pus was running out, getting everywhere.
Jared winced at that mental image.
"Is that a bad thing?" Jeff asked, after a moment, and Jared glanced at him askance. "Is it bad that you're becoming someone different? I think you're right about one thing, by the by: that you're young, and that these are big choices but... you said you were becoming someone different. Did you like who you were before?"
Jared hadn't thought about it like that, and he leaned back against the creaky seat, hands flopped between his thighs. He thought about who he'd been before he'd found Tristan, before he'd been accepted into a pride. He'd damned near gone 'round the bend -- become a crazy bastard talking to himself in the woods to keep himself company, reading the four books he had over and over again, just to hear the voices of the characters in his head. He'd tucked himself away in the stupid belief that somehow he'd be better off, when in reality he'd just been flagellating himself, punishing himself for a crime he'd never wanted to commit.
He'd been someone so lost and confused and miserable that he'd just turned everything off, because somehow feeling nothing was better than feeling everything.
And even Jared recognized that that was a nowhere future. Living each day only to survive to tomorrow, no purpose or meaning to anything besides base survival.
Then, he'd had no future. Now, he had too much of one.
"...no, it's not a bad thing," he replied, finally. It was obvious that he'd needed to change. He just didn't know how to make himself fit into this whole new life and whole new family.
Especially not on a ride down the mountain to make a call to his past.
-----
He had no idea what kind of reception he'd get.
But he supposed that he could thank Jeff for the fact that the call wasn't the first thing on his mind anymore.
The dirt track eventually met up with the main road, truck bumping along as it moved over the lip and onto the paved highway. Jared instinctively lowered a hand to his stomach, feeling an innate apprehension come over him, making him suddenly aware of why Jeff didn't want him to come along.
He was going to be pregnant and surrounded by humans.
It wasn't like anyone would know. He didn't look like anything except maybe a guy who'd had a couple too many cheeseburgers. But that didn't change the fact that, for the first time in two years, he was going to be in civilization again. Surrounded by asphalt and buildings and hot dog stands and electrical poles and humans. A strange and sudden juxtaposition to the fact that Jensen's tiny cubs were growing inside of him.
He felt a little queasy, and suddenly powerfully protective, wrapping his arms around his middle, like the tadpoles in there were going to somehow be safer because of a few inches more muscle and bone. Most days he still had trouble believing that he was really pregnant, that it still seemed impossible that his body was enough to grow, to nurture and protect new life, but then, every so often, there were moments like these: where he couldn't feel more maternal if he tried. Where he felt that irrefutable need to protect the children everyone believed he was carrying. The need to one day see their faces.
The rest of the trip was faster, Jeff able to accelerate more on the paved roads, and the ride less bumpy as they drove down into town. Bryson was pretty much as Jared had left it when he'd walked through two years ago on his way up into the mountains. A low little town, nothing over three stories, brick work and flat streets, a railway line running up from the south. Not tiny but not large, a piece of turn of the century America painted over with something more modern, everything scrubbed clean and bright.
A town that lived and breathed by the tourist.
Jeff navigated the streets with familiar ease, even though Jared knew that the pride didn't send people down here often. He pulled in to a parking space in front of the postal office, throwing the stick into park and turning the engine off. Jared sat forward, waiting for instructions, but those weren't the first words out of Jeff's mouth.
"You know Jensen would let you go, if you asked," the dominant said, and looking down at the steering wheel. "I don't want you to, but it has to be said: you are young, and this doesn't have to be the rest of your life, if you don't want it to be."
Jared pursed his lips, and it wasn't like he didn't want Jensen. He could admit that he was pretty rapidly falling for the guy, despite all the self-imposed road blocks he kept throwing up. He was happy with Jensen.
It was just that he didn't feel prepared to decide the rest of his life right now.
"I know," he finally replied, swallowing dryly. "That's what freaks me out so much. It's like...all the decisions are in my hands. No matter what call I make, if it turns out bad, it's my fault."
"But why does it have to turn out bad?"
"Because it always does and I just... I just want someone to tell me what to do."
Jeff just sighed and turned to look at him.
"I can't tell you what to do, Jared. No one can. All I can say is...You're handling it. Better than anyone could ask for."
And Jared blinked, because him having an extended freak out about life the universe and everything was not what he'd call handling it. Especially not when the option of breaking the heart of Jeff's alpha had been thrown down on the table. Not that Jared was going to take it, but he'd fully expected Jeff to want him to just shut up and not question a good thing when he was given it.
"You're still just a kid," the dominant continued. "Jensen knows that. We all do. And you're confused. That's to be expected. That's what being nineteen is like. You're confused and you're trying to figure out which way to go, and you're so damn fixated on staring at yourself, trying to figure yourself out, that you miss all the things that happen around you. All I can tell you is that life goes on, and it gets easier. And the endless navel-gazing lightens up, too." He smirked slightly, for just a second, before sobering. "All you gotta do is weather the storm, kiddo. Everyone manages to grow up, eventually. And yeah, you got a few more obstacles than most, but you're stronger than most, too. And if you stumble," he reached out, clapping a hand over Jared's shoulder. "You got folks to catch you. So try not to worry for a bit, alright? You're doing what you can with what you got, and you gotta allow for the fact that what you decide on might actually lead to something good."
Jared swallowed, and he didn't really trust his voice right then, so he just nodded instead. Once, short and firm.
It was frightening: confronting the idea that he could actually be happy here. That he could be happy here and just not stop.
That he was so used to seeing himself as a fuck up, as someone who could never seem to do anything right -- pitying himself as someone that fate and the world seemed so eager to kick when he was down -- that the idea of waking up to a person, to people, who valued him, liked him, loved him, hurt like pins and needles, like blood rushing into a limb that had been too long numb.
And he'd never thought of himself as that kind of person. The kind of person that was so deep in their own well that they turned away from a rope out just because they couldn't handle the idea of being outside of those brick walls.
He let out a breath, and Jeff's hand squeezed his shoulder, a firm grip -- meant to be reassuring, but hiding the physical support there, holding Jared upright when he felt like he might just tip forward.
"Y'alright?" the dominant asked, gruff voice somewhat hushed.
"Yeah, I'm--" He wasn't sure he had a word for it. He wasn't alright. But the possibility that he might be, in time, was only just occurring to him. And that Jensen was prepared to wait for it, and to field all the crazy crap he was going to come up with in the meantime, pregnant and hormonal and dealing with so much more besides, was a startling reality, and not just a hypothetical.
"You need a minute?"
"No," Jared shook his head, certain, at least, of that much. He took a deep breath, and pushed himself upright against the seat back. "Thanks. For listening. And...everything else."
Jeff just shrugged, as if it were meaningless.
"Now, you go on into the office here -- tell them you're one of ours and you need to use the phone. They'll recognize the car. When you're done, you wait there until I come get you. Everyone here's nice, but the tourists can get a bit pushy, and I don't think you want a crowd snapping pictures at you, well meaning as they might be."
The thought was a little stomach churning, and Jared shook his head in agreement, the idea of being under so much scrutiny pushing against that place in his brain that whispered 'Freak.' Even though he felt some temptation to get out and explore, to see what had happened, what had changed in the world since his seclusion, he was willing to wait until he was less pregnant. Possibly, also, until he was better in the head. He was pretty certain that now wasn't the time to be dealing with anything like that.
He didn't have anything else to say, and was about to get out of the car and head to the post office when Jeff's hand held firm and hauled him back, and between Jeff's strength and Jared's complete surprise, there wasn't much to it. One second he was over by the door and the next he was pressed up against Jeff's chest, his face smooshed in against the dominant's neck, and this? This was familiar.
Jeff being a big uncomprehending lump who thought that everyone ended a conversation with a good long grooming session(and hell, Jared was just grateful that he wasn't getting his hair licked -- that'd give the tourists a pretty picture).
Jared just sighed and gave up, leaning into it, because he'd learned that in Jeff's world there was no problem that couldn't be fixed with snuggles, and nothing anyone did could convince Jeff otherwise. It was easier just to give in.
Jeff began to purr lowly, and Jared rolled his eyes, even if he was smiling slightly.
-----
Not that there had been any problems getting into the post office, or getting people to believe he was one of the ailure from up the mountain. No, Jeff had gotten him through the front doors, given him one last worried look, then moved back to take care of his town business while Jared found a postal worker to cautiously interrupt.
And yes, there had been the staring and the big eyes, but everyone had been pretty professional, over all, taking him back into an office and shutting the door, even if there'd been a few folks glancing in with curiosity as the door was shut.
But at the end of the day, Jared had gotten to a phone.
And now he was sitting on the edge of an office chair, just staring at it.
It was big and clunky and black, not new by any stretch of the imagination, with a rotary dial on the front and the handset resting on top on the hook. It was smudged and motionless, utterly unthreatening, but Jared still regarded it like some kind of devilish predator, waiting for just the right moment to strike.
He could remember his parents' phone number, remembered them making him recite it five times on the morning of his first day of school, hands clasping the straps of his little backpack('Five-Oh-Two-Six-Nine-Eight...'), and it had never changed in all the years of his life. They'd never moved, never changed service providers, the house having belonged his dad's dad, a man he'd never had a chance to meet, and a house that he and his brothers always used to argue over who got to inherit.
Two years.
Two years of being completely out of the loop, of not having seen that house or dialed that number, and he wondered if they'd moved. Maybe after everything that had happened, they'd needed a change. He wondered what he'd do if a stranger picked up. If some strange voice came down the line and asked who this was and if it was a wrong number. If he'd return to Jensen with a lazy shrug and a 'I tried' and leave it at that.
But as pleasantly simple as that seemed, he'd just struggled through an epiphany in the truck, had to deal with all the fallout of that, and the determination to not let himself become the kind of person who just took the easy way out because he was young and scared and pregnant.
Pregnant. Shit.
He took a deep breath and picked up the phone before he could second guess himself. Or forty-second guess himself, as the case may be.
"Okay, babies," he murmured to the room, to the cubs who most definitely did not have ears yet, and swallowed. "Wish me luck."
He put his finger in the dial('Nine to get an outside line, sugar. Then one and the area code'), and stiffly moved it, listening to it tick slowly forward, his other hand gripping the handset so tight he thought he'd snap the plastic. But then he got to the end, felt it stop, and removed his finger, watching the dial sling back, and he let out a breath. One down. Eleven to go.
Each one was a battle, and he hung up at five, had to fight and talk himself into picking it up again, trying again, everything stiff and tense in him, afraid of the call but more afraid of the coward he'd know himself to be if he ran out of here with his tail between his legs.
He wasn't going to live hand to mouth anymore, and that meant making the hard calls.
Calls just like this one.
When he pressed the speaker to his ear, he heard only his heartbeat, thudding over the static of the line. And then the first ring.
Jared jumped at it, heart picking up and he bit his lower lip, putting his hand over his stomach, half to quell his nausea, half to remind himself that there was more than just him in this room in a postal office in Bryson. There were tiny pieces of Jensen here, with him.
The ringing continued, one after another, and Jared's hope waned, not sure he had the strength to leave a message('Hey! Your estranged son here! Just thought I'd check in and see how everyone's doing. Wanted to let everyone know I'm pregnant -- yes, pregnant! -- with a litter of kittens, and my mate, Jensen, did I mention him? Well, he thought I should just check in. Anyways, we don't really have a phone cause we live in the middle of nowhere like crazy mountain people, but maybe I'll try you again later. Kisses!') when suddenly there was a click, plastic clattering on plastic, and the ring cut off, the tap and whine of a corded phone stretching too tight, and then, out of nowhere, the voice that used to sing him to sleep when he was a child, and Jared stopped breathing.
"Hello! Padalecki residence."
She sounded good. She sounded happy.
It had been two years -- he didn't know why he had expected the morose tone of someone in mourning. But the doubt threatened, crowded in like festering rot around a wound, because maybe they were doing okay. Maybe he was just going to disrupt things by doing this. Maybe he was just being selfish again, and he pressed his eyes tight shut.
"Hello?" her voice echoed down the line, sweet and curious. "Is anyone there? If you're saying anything, I can't hear you. We've been having some trouble with the line..."
His voice was there, somewhere. He was certain that he'd had a voice when he'd come in here -- he'd been talking and everything. Now it seemed like it was too much to ask to breathe, and he thought of Jensen curled up against his back, telling him that he deserved peace, thought of Jeff telling him he was strong, but he didn't feel strong. He didn't feel like the kind of person worthy of their faith, because he didn't feel like he could do this.
"Okay, well... I suppose just try calling back? I'm going to hang up now..." her voice drifted off, uncertain, a reticent end to a conversation that never started.
Jared's nails bit into the desk, and he had to do this. He couldn't keep turning his back to every problem and running away, like that would solve anything. He'd run from his heat, from his family, and from the pride, and it had never worked, never made anything better. He had to do this, and he knew if he ran out of this office, ran like he always did, he'd regret it. He'd regret it, and he'd never be strong enough to try again.
He had to do this. He had to--
"Mom," he said, coming out on all the breath he'd held, sudden and stilted, like he regretted it half way through the syllable.
There was a long silence, and he wondered if maybe she thought he was Brandon or Daniel, or maybe she'd realized it was him and just hung up and he hadn't heard it, but then he heard a breath, heard her breathing. He tried again.
"Mom." It was stronger, this time, but more ground up, ravaged in a throat growing too tight to speak, and there was a sound over the other end of the line, through the crackle of the static, a sound halfway between a laugh and a sob.
"Jared," she said, something barely whispered, something full of hope, and pain, and something else: all the emotions Jared had never been able to understand until Tristan had looked up at him and called him 'mother.'
And he smiled, even as the tears broke loose, because he knew without a doubt that she wasn't going to hang up.