A Ghost in Your Garden Part 5
Jul. 25th, 2014 04:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dime_lioraDrained my blood at the mortuary
No more worry
Ice water in my veins
Took my bones to the cemetery
Where they still remain
When Jensen wakes up Adrianne is bandaging his leg. They’ve taken his pants off, and Jensen feels a slight sense of shame at the idea of being undressed in front of this strange woman.
This strange, dead woman.
Her smile is warm, voice soft, and her hands are cool but gentle.
“It’s ok. I was a nurse when I was alive. It’s gonna be ok Jensen.”
Jared is nowhere to be seen, but Aldis and Chris are hovering close with twin looks of concern and anger. Jensen wonders if they’ll be the head of the moving committee now, or if Matt will take that role when he sees what’s happened.
He wonders if he’ll be able to argue.
“I think you’re in a bit of shock honey, but it’s gonna be ok. They’re all too shallow for stitches.”
“Where’s Jared?”
Adrianne doesn’t look up from what she’s doing, her focus steady as she continues to wrap his leg tightly.
“Trying to figure out what happened I think. Don’t you worry about that. Let’s just get you better.”
“Was it a ghost like Jared?” Chris sounds put together, calm, and Jensen marvels yet again at how tightly controlled his friend can be when it’s necessary.
He jerks out of Adrianne’s grip, heart racing, when a new voice pipes up.
“A ghost like whom?”
It’s Matt, eyes wide and white again, fists clenched at his sides, and Jensen wonders if Matt could have walked in on anything worse.
“Matt. You need to calm down. Tensions are already pretty-“
His boyfriend cuts Chris off, face going stormy and rage-filled like the day in the kitchen.
“You need to shut the fuck up and mind your own business for once. Jensen? A ghost like Jared? The neighbor you’re always with?”
Jensen finds himself on the defensive in seconds, unwilling to back down and unable to be calm. He’s usually unwilling to be emotional in front of others, tightly controlled when it comes to making his private life pubic, and despite what he’s been willing to share with his friends he’s not gotten into how deeply and fundamentally damaged his relationship with Matt has become.
All these considerations go by the wayside as his blood boils.
“Always with? How the fuck would you know who I’m always with? You’re never here. You don’t want to be. You find out our house is fucking haunted and your response is to up your hours at the firm and disappear on me. You don’t want to deal with it, you don’t want to deal with me, and goddamn Matt I don’t want you to.”
Matt’s mouth trembles and then firms.
“After everything I’ve sacrificed for you this is what I get? You take off the second someone else shows up? Someone dead Jensen? A fucking dead man beat me out for your affections?”
Just like that it all flies away. The rage leaves him and Jensen has nothing left but a hollow fear that he’s about to make a mistake and won’t be able to take it back. Adrianne’s hand settles onto his knee, and Jensen takes a deep breath before meeting Matt’s eyes.
“I can never thank you enough for what you did for me. For how you’ve been there for me. But let’s face it Matt, we aren’t the same people anymore. We don’t love each other that way anymore. You can’t look at me without seeing everything you’ve been forced to do, and I can’t look at you without seeing everything I went through. We’re friends at best, patient and care provider at worst. You didn’t sign up for this. I don’t blame you. But staying with me out of guilt and nostalgia isn’t doing either of us any favors.”
Matt slumps back against the wall, one hand tugging at his already askew tie and the other pressing against the wall.
“Jensen. Jensen I. I’m sorry.”
It’s terrible. It’s welcome. When Matt agreed to be primary caregiver after the accident they’d been warned about the strain it could put on the relationship, they’d been given all the options, and they’d chosen this path. It ended here. He’d thought there would be bitterness or anger. Instead Jensen is relieved to have the burden of pretending, of clinging to nostalgia and complacency, lifted from his shoulders.
For the first time since the accident he is willing to let go of the familiar.
“It’s not your fault. It’s nobody’s fault Matt. It’s fine.”
Matt’s face scrunches up for a second before settling into determination.
“Alright, but Jensen you’re getting out of this house. Even if you don’t come with me. You can go with Chris and Aldis, or we’ll set you up with something alone.”
“I’m staying.”
Chris is already shaking his head, Aldis’s mouth is hanging open, and Adrianne’s hand squeezes his leg tightly.
“Then I’ll stay with you. I’ll sleep in another room.”
Jensen thinks of the rage in Matt’s face, of the corpse in the upstairs studio and how Jared never once blamed his wife for what happened. He thinks of the box cutter flying at him.
“No. This I have to do alone. You have to leave Matt.”
The face is so well known, and for a moment Jensen feels the pang he thought he would at ending the relationship. He knows Matt. Has known him for so long and shared so much with him. This is the young man he met in the library. This is the face he fell in love with so many years ago.
Even if he’d known then where they’d end. How they’d drift apart and lose each other, he’d do it all over again.
It’s a fight to get them all to go, and he has to promise to contact them regularly, but Jensen can’t leave. Not yet.
He has a ghost to talk to.
----
When the house is empty of everyone but him and the ghosts Jensen turns to Adrianne. She’s repacking his first aid kit, her face solemn and serious, and he takes a deep breath before he finds how he wants to phrase it.
“Where’s Jared?”
Adrianne closes the lid and then temples her fingers under her chin.
“Hiding like a coward.”
It’s the most honest and refreshing thing anyone has said to him in quite some time. It makes Jensen angry all over again.
“What the hell is he hiding from?”
“He feels guilty that you got hurt and is sure you’re going to leave. So instead of facing you and saying that he’s going to hide out and pretend it doesn’t matter until you go.”
“Well I’m not leaving.”
“Then he’ll be hiding for a while.”
She moves the kit out of the way before leaning over the counter.
“You realize that he can outlast you right? Unless you plan on dying here.”
Jensen has no good answer for that, no witty retort, so he watches Adrianne fade out of existence right in front of him.
---
The liquor is buried in the back of a cabinet, and Jensen lifts it out carefully and takes it to the bedroom with the hidden door. He should put furniture in here. He should rebuild the wall over the door.
He should bury Jared’s remains.
Instead he takes a position on the floor and starts to drink right from the bottle. He’s not driving anywhere. The thought brings out a bitter laugh, and the burn of the alcohol mixes perfectly with the level of rage he’s got burning just under his skin.
He stays and Jared disappears. He took the chance of throwing away everything he knew on a dead man that’s never shown anything but the same kind of doofy universal goodness he seems to give everyone around him.
About halfway to alcohol poisoning Jensen looks up to see Jared crouched in front of him, a look of concern on his stupid, dead, beautiful face.
“Jensen. Jensen can you give me the bottle?”
“You’re not my fucking mother.”
For a second Jensen thinks that’s he’s imagining this, because god that was a stupid thing to say and it isn’t even what he wanted to communicate and maybe the universe is being kind for once and he’s dreaming all the dumb shit that could come out of his mouth before Jared really does give up and appear.
“No. I am definitely not your mother. But you’ve had a lot of it and I’ve seen your medicine cabinet.”
“Fucking snoop.”
Jared snatches the bottle at that and then sinks onto the floor next to Jensen. They sit silently for a bit, thighs close enough to touch but not touching, and Jensen wonders if that’s his fault or Jared’s. If this sudden distance is only imagined, or if drunk and stripped of all his safety nets Jensen is finally realizing how much distance lies between himself and Jared.
“You need to catch up with Matt. I bet if you left right now he would-“
“Fuck you.”
“You’re a pretty angry drunk Jensen.”
And that is all he needs. All he requires to focus and pin down the source of his rage and despair.
“You’re a liar.”
Jared’s face twists in pain and shock, and then he pulls up a little and nods.
“I know. I’m sorry. I knew about the ghosts and I knew I was dead and I led you to believe-“
“You claimed death was peaceful. You told me all that bullshit about gaining enlightenment and distance and then it turns out death is just as shitty as life. That you’re just as angry and scared as I am. That’s what’s waiting for us. That’s what that kid-“
He cuts off at the last second, planting his conversational heels in the dirt so hard he can feel the grooves it digs, but it’s too late. He’s opened the door and Jared’s seen inside.
A big hand settles on his shoulder and then Jared is in his space, cool and steady.
“What kid?”
Jensen swallows, alcohol burning a path back up his throat and reminding him that he’s never had the best tolerance levels and now he’s seriously passed what little he did have.
“It’s nothing. Fucking nosy.”
“Yes I am. What kid Jensen?”
The room is dark, stupidly dark, because they don’t pay to put street lights out in the country. No all you have out there is the moon and stars, and headlights if you remember to put them on.
“Leave me alone.”
“Not a chance.”
But if you don’t. If you don’t remember to put them on then you have to take it on faith that everyone else on the road can make out the dim shape of your car hurtling through the darkness. And faith, Jensen learned that night, is something that teenagers have in abundance and that adults lose all too quickly.
“You’re an asshole. You know that right? An asshole. You sell me all this bullshit about happy afterlife families and flash that fucking smile of yours and next thing I know I’m dumping my boyfriend for you and staying in this goddamn horror movie.”
“I did do that.” Jared is soothing, understanding, and Jensen finds he hates that even more. “Is the kid attached to your car accident?”
His eyes narrow and he considers the possibility of getting up and wobbling his way out.
“How do you know about that?”
“I’m a snoop and there are a lot of papers all over the place. The kid hit you. And then he died right?”
“No, actually, he didn’t. He lived for an hour.”
Jensen finds himself pulled in tight, solid and stable arms wrapped around him and Jared’s face pressed against his hair as he responds.
“An hour? The report I read said he was dead when they got to you.”
“Yeah.” His voice is rough, and that’s what tips Jensen to the fact that he’s crying. When did he start crying? “It took them an hour and a half to get there. Mix of problems.”
Jared’s hands move up and down his back, rubbing and squeezing, and Jensen relaxes into it.
“Was he conscious?”
“Yeah. Kept. He kept apologizing and asking for his mommy. They said it was a miracle he survived coming through the windshield.”
“And he was pinned there in your car with you all that time dying?”
“Yes.”
Jared makes a little noise, and the arms around Jensen tighten a bit.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry Jensen. That’s so terrible.”
“It was so stupid. He was just having fun. He drank too much to remember to turn the goddamn lights on and just went out. Fucking, all they needed was daytime running lights. I would have seen him coming if he had them. I would have stopped and let him go. But I was tired, and I wasn’t looking for oncoming traffic and then-“
He cuts himself off at the last second. Jensen has never told a living soul that the boy that hit him was alive and conscious in the car with him. It was hard enough to describe to the court stenographers being pinned in the heap of metal that used to be his car with the body sprawled out over him.
“That wasn’t your fault.”
“People keep saying that but he was just a kid. He should have had a more responsible driver out there to give him a break. He shouldn’t have run into anyone in the first place. It was just a stupid mistake and he died for it. He died horribly. Is that a plan? Is that fucking destiny? And then what? I wanted to believe there was something- something better than this but what is there? Is he stuck out on that road looking at the place he suffered and died? Growing more bitter with every day? Is that what waits for us?”
Jared makes a little noise and continues to pet Jensen, hands steady and sure, and Jensen wants it. He wants the comfort, he wants the closeness, and damn if he doesn’t want Jared.
“This is not a normal afterlife.”
“What?”
“This is not a normal afterlife and what happened wasn’t an angry ghost. It’s the house.”
Jensen swallows thickly, and then pulls back just enough to really take Jared in.
“What’s the house?”
“The anger, the violence, all of it. That’s the house. It trapped us here on purpose. Anyone who dies on the property stays on the property. And what happened with my wife, what we thought was starting to happen with Matt, all of that is on the house. It twists people. Makes them turn on each other and hate each other. I thought I could protect you, but I’m starting to think I- Jensen, you should go back to Matt. Or go stay with Chris and Aldis. This place isn’t the answer to the questions you have about death and staying here won’t bring you peace or closure.”
“I thought you didn’t know what made her crazy."
Jared blushes again, and Jensen wonders about the blood flow in dead things.
“I lied again.”
Jensen licks his dry lips, suddenly unsure of whether or not he should go any further. He jumped into this thing half-blind, and now he has to feel his way through to the end or turn around and run the other way.
He decides to plunge ahead.
“I- originally, ok, maybe that was the plan but it’s changed.”
“What’s changed?” Jared’s head tilts, eyes wide, and Jensen knows then and there that he’s not making a mistake. It’s not the fear or the trauma, and it’s not the all-consuming need he had to know for certain that what was waiting for them, what the kid that hit him was experiencing, was something meaningful and positive after an arbitrary life of surprises and tragedy.
“I stayed for you.”
Jared’s eyes squint for a second like the words don’t make sense, like it’s a language he doesn’t know anymore, and then they go impossibly wide as his mouth drops open.
“Jensen, I’m dead. That’s not gonna change. I am totally, completely, utterly dead and have been so for a long time. You are not. Don’t you want to live your life?”
“Yeah. Yeah I do. That’s what I’m trying to do, and I want to try it with you.”
Disbelief morphs into something else, and then Jared reaches out tentatively and takes Jensen’s hand.
“I’d like to try that.”
-----
Jensen wakes up to a hideous hangover; terrible taste in his mouth and headache throbbing along with his overly loud pulse. Jared is sitting beside the bed with a glass of water and aspirin.
“I remember those. Nothing worse. Want us to make you breakfast?”
The thought of food turns his weak stomach over several times, but a long course of painkillers and other various pills have weakened Jensen’s stomach lining to the point that taking the aspirin without food isn’t the best of options either.
“Toast?” It’s hopeful, because he shouldn’t rely on the ghosts to be some sort of free in-house labor.
“Greasy food it is.”
Jensen ignores the new wave of queasiness in favor of weakly trying to return Jared’s smile. He follows the ghost through the house and down into the kitchen where apparently the breakfast decision was long since made. Chris is handling biscuit dough beside Samantha, whose face is set in a bright smile as she fries up bacon.
Aldis is hanging out on one of the stools, and he smiles at Jensen before speaking louder than would be necessary if they were across the house from each other.
“Jensen! My man! How are you feeling? Looking a little green!”
He needs to remember to hit Aldis once he’s sure there will be some force behind it.
Collapsing into the chair beside Aldis is the best decision he’s ever made, and he watches Chris and Samantha chat about techniques for biscuits while Aldis yammers on at Jared about something, still entirely too loud.
“Ah man we’re gonna have to play Call of Duty. You’re gonna love it. It’s-oh shit. You don’t even know what video games are do you?”
Jared’s smile is easy and understanding.
“Aldis, I’ve had fifteen families here in the last seven years and all of them had teenagers. I may be better at some of those games than you.”
The grin that splits Aldis’s face is blinding.
“We’ll see about that.”
And after the living people eat heartily they actually do. Jensen’s head and stomach have calmed down enough that the jumpy camera motions and loud explosions don’t affect him. As he watches the screen he begins to plan.
Maybe he jumped into this for the wrong reasons, or the right reasons not fully developed, but it’s time to take control. Jared’s right, his answer isn’t here. Or it isn’t yet. But if he wants to find it, and in the course of doing so become closer to Jared, then there are some things that need to change.
And every one of those things has to do with the house. When Jensen signed the closing papers he had the intention of fixing the place up, of bringing out the beauty he knew it must have once had, and now there’s just one more task that’s been added to the list.
Jensen has to purge it of the evil Jared swears it has. If he does then he’ll be safe, and the ghosts will be capable of leaving. Of course that might mean that Jared will decide to go, and if so Jensen’s burgeoning plans for his future will be radically changed, but he has to give the ghost that option. Otherwise Jared is just picking him because he has no other way.
Probably more importantly if he can successfully purge the house of evil he’ll be safe, and so will his friends when they visit and anyone who lives here in the future. Jensen is sure he wants this to be his life, but he’s not so certain about it being his death.
---
He starts out small. He calls the local parishes until he finds a priest willing to come out and bless the house despite Jensen not being one of the flock. He’s got two days to kill until the man has time, but that’s not so bad.
The first one is spent getting to know the ghosts better at large.
Samantha is sweet, a little meek, and Lauren hangs at her side on a regular basis, and Jensen doesn’t miss the way their fingers link together sometimes, or how her face lights up when the brunette turns her full attention on her.
Charles and Adrianne are perfect together. They share looks that Jensen can’t understand, laugh at the same time, and often she finishes his sentences. If they were any cuter together Jensen would probably hate them.
Jeffrey is a little more serious, but when he smiles his entire face crinkles. Jared tells Jensen that it’s harder for Jeffrey to keep in touch with the current time, but that he does better these days then he used to.
Sam and Chad stick closer together, their timelines a bit more in sync, and Jensen wonders if they would have been willing to be so close in life. Their personalities clash on a regular basis, Sam’s professional demeanor and Chad’s hair metal vibe, but they share at least a generational tie.
He finally meets D.J. and Jim, and he’s glad for it. D.J., Jared warns him, is still new to the whole thing. Because of that he has more bad days than good, but when he is in the current time he’s a sweet and funny geek. Jim on the other hand comes off gruff, but there’s a sense of humor underneath that Jensen really appreciates. Dry, but not too dry, and Jensen immediately takes to him.
They get together in the garden again, and move into the kitchen. They end the night sitting around the dining room table, swapping stories and laughing about families that made it out of the house unscathed but scared. Jensen wonders if he should be laughing. If he should tell them what he’s planning.
But he doesn’t. Whether it’s because he’s afraid Jared and the others will be upset, or if he doesn’t want the house to get a full scope of his plan, Jensen isn’t sure. He just knows he doesn’t want to chance it.
The next day is only Jared, and Jensen learns a fair amount. Jensen clicks with him on a very basic level. It’s almost seamless really how they get along. There’s a quality to Jared that Jensen can appreciate now that he knows everything. Even dead Jared is more alive than Jensen has possibly ever been.
Jared knows everything about the house, can tell Jensen crazy tidbits about the town that wouldn’t be in the historical records, and has a million stories from his brief stint in mob era Chicago. It’s fascinating, and Jensen loves listening to him.
More than the aspect of living history though is the way Jared lights up. He’s physical, there’s no question of that, but his skin practically glows as he talks about the art scene in Chicago, the early days here in Texas, and putting his studio together when he got here.
Better than that is the fact that Jared, as Jensen quickly learns, has no hang-ups at all about casual touching. It puts Jensen at ease somehow, even though he’s never been terribly touchy, to have that reminder that despite Jared’s pulse handicap he is real and there with Jensen.
Despite the need for public secrecy, and his deal with Sandy, Jared talks warmly about his family’s acceptance of his sexual preferences and life style. He tells Jensen all about his little sister and big brother, about how close they all were to each other. Jared talks in great detail about how he grew up watching how much his parents loved each other and longing for the same sort of bond with someone else.
It’s easy to laugh with Jared, to listen to him, and then to open up to him. They don’t talk about the accident again, or Jensen’s issues stemming from it, but they do talk about his family and his business. Jensen talks about meeting Chris and Aldis, he tells Jared about the gulf that slowly opened up between him and Matt. The way their relationship shifted and morphed until it became a shadow of its former self.
Jensen tells Jared about how his own family reacted to his coming out. About his dad baking him a cake and his mom mocking the terrible icing job his dad did. He talks about his sister and brother, about the life choices they made, and how often he sees them. He basically talks about anything, and finds that all of it is rewarded with that big dimpled grin.
Without a second thought it seems they become more physical as the day progresses. What was already a fairly handsy Jared becomes a constant barrage of touching. Jensen’s shoulder, his thigh, his knee, and casual pats become hugs become hand holding. Jared is physical, and that should amaze Jensen all things considered, but it just comes the same way the emotional connectivity did. They just get along and Jensen loves it. There’s no awkwardness between them.
He’s always believed that to fully understand a person you have to know them the way you know a house. The heart of the structure, what ties it all together and makes it a solid and single unit. He knows that about Jared, and in turn Jared knows it about him.
And then, as if on some kind of timer, Jared pulls the rug out from under him again and throws Jensen’s entire scripted and romantic day off track.
“I want you to help me bury the body.”
It could be a joke in any other situation. Or a misunderstanding. But Jensen knows exactly what Jared means.
“Are you kidding?”
“No. It’s been rotting in there forever. I can touch things Jensen. The house gives me corporeal form. I want to paint again but it’s goddamn depressing to stare at the thing when I try.”
Jensen has to swallow back a thousand replies it seems before he finds the one that seems the least insulting or confusing.
“You mean you?”
Jared tilts his head, squints his eyes, and then shakes his head. It’s an entire conversation Jensen doesn’t get to hear.
“Not anymore. That’s a corpse Jensen. It deserves its respects I guess, but it’s not me. This is me.” Jared’s fingers link with Jensen’s, and he feels the cool skin solid and sure. “This is who I am. I left that behind a long time ago.”
And Jensen doesn’t have a rebuttal for that. Not a good one anyway.
“Fine. But you’re helping dig, and this is officially the worst first date in history.”
Jared’s grin is bright and overwhelming, dimples carved deep into his cheeks.
“Who says this is our first date?”
He can’t make himself touch the body, but he spreads out a sheet and Jared lowers the corpse into it carefully and wraps it. They tie the whole thing up in a gruesome bundle, and then together they carry Jared’s big body down the stairs and out the back door. Jensen wonders what his neighbors see if they’re looking at all. If he’ll have an awkward conversation with a police officer about this, and Matt’s whereabouts.
And there’s the question of Jared’s family. There’s little chance any of them are still alive, but would their descendants like to know what happened to Jared? Would they prefer to have a ceremony for him? To bury him in their plots and to know there’s a marker to visit.
Jensen will have to order a marker for Jared.
“You want any spot in particular?”
Jared eyes the ground speculatively, and then points to an empty spot near Jeff’s headstone.
“There’s fine. I always liked Jeff and it’s far enough from the tree line we won’t be fighting tree roots every inch.”
It’s practical, logical, and Jensen feels himself balking.
“Shouldn’t we get the other ghosts? Or Chris and Aldis? Don’t you want mourners?”
Hazel eyes, predominantly green in the now waning sunlight, turn on him fully.
“Do you feel like mourning?”
“You were a good man.”
“I would like to think I am a good man, but what does that matter?”
“Good people should be remembered. They should be mourned. It should matter that you died. That you were lost. There should be a monument and people crying. There should be meaning.”
Instead of responding Jared picks up the shovel and starts to dig. Jensen waits for something, anything, but when Jared just keeps working he finally picks his own shovel up and gets to work. It’s hard, and his leg isn’t enjoying it, but after a sweaty and intense period of digging they have a shallow grave. Jared puts his own body into the grave and then looks up and wipes his forehead. There’s no sweat, but there is dirt.
“Will you give me a eulogy?”
He blinks several times, unsure if he’s heard that correctly, and then Jensen swallows once before stepping to the graveside.
“His name was-“
“Is.”
Jensen jerks, and then nods in agreement.
“His name is Jared Padalecki and he was-“
“Is.”
“Do you want me to do this or do you?”
“I’m the son of an English teacher. Tense is important Jensen.”
He makes a sour face and picks up where he left off.
“He is an artist, a good friend, and a good man. He loved-loves to laugh and to talk. He talks too much. Way too much.”
“This doesn’t seem very mournful or respectful.”
Jared’s lips are curling up, and he scoops up a shovelful of dirt and drops it over the bundle.
“It’s hard to be a proper mourner when you’re standing right there mocking me.”
“That would be the point.”
Jensen drops his shovel and looks at Jared in the dimming light.
“You’re teaching me a lesson.”
Jared nods, crosses the space, and cups Jensen’s chin in his dirty hands. They’re still cool, texture unchanged from the digging but gritty sand particles rubbing against his skin.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because you think I need it.”
“Do you?” Jared’s thumb rubs against Jensen’s lower lip, gentle and sweet, and Jensen swallows.
A first kiss in a graveyard is not exactly movie material.
“No. I don’t need you to remind me that you’re not gone. I can feel you, Jared. I know you’re here.”
The lips curl fully now, pink tongue slipping out and wetting Jared’s lips before he leans in. Jensen can’t feel breath against his mouth, but he only notices because he’s looking for it. Instead he feels the barest bit of pressure from Jared’s lips as they brush gently against his.
“And I always will be. No one needs to cry over this hole, or the shell in it, or the man you think is being put into it. I’m not there. I’m right here in front of you. My name is Jared Padalecki. I’m an artist, I’m a ghost, and I’m yours if you want me. I can touch you, I can listen to you, and I can annoy the shit out of you with my constant talking. If my death has to have meaning then make it that dying here gave me the ability to stick around until you came. It brought me to you. So stop looking at death as the end. It’s just an intermission in the play.”
Jensen reaches up, threads his fingers into Jared’s hair and pulls him down into a kiss. There’s dirt on Jared’s lips, but his mouth tastes oddly sweet, and is just as cool as the rest of him. Jared pauses for only a second, lips stuttering against Jensen’s, and then he opens his mouth and deepens the contact. Jared’s fingers spread out, consume Jensen’s face, and the encasement brings him fully into the moment. He forgets that they are in a graveyard, that Jared is dead, that this whole thing is some sort of crazy diversion from normalcy that anyone else would probably commit Jensen for.
His left hand slips down, slides along the length of Jared’s torso and to edge of the button up shirt, and then Jensen is touching the cool and taut flesh of Jared’s stomach. He feels the muscles ripple underneath his fingers, reacting to his presence, and it’s better than he could have ever imagined. His hand settles there and helps him memorize every contraction, every hitch as Jared kisses him dizzy and stupid.
Jensen should have guessed that this would be the way Jared kissed. The man takes up entire rooms with his personality, eclipses light and reason with his smiles, so why wouldn’t he be able to take every thought and fear out of Jensen’s head with his kissing? It’s so cheesy, the whole idea of it, but he can’t help it. He wants more.
Except the kiss breaks, Jared’s forehead rests against his, hair tickling Jensen, and one thumb slips down to rasp against Jensen’s stubble.
“We should finish this and go inside.”
Jensen pictures Jared sprawled out underneath him on the couch, big hands touching more of him and lips slipping against his as their bodies work their way into the cushions. He imagines how good it will be to feel all of Jared pressed against him.
And all he has to do is help Jared bury the past.
“Yeah. Let’s do that.”
-----
Jensen wakes up on the couch to the doorbell ringing. He at least showered after the grave digging, sadly alone, but he’s in the rumpled clothes he changed into before joining Jared in the living room. On the couch. Where they didn’t watch a minute of whatever background noise was playing on the TV.
He makes his way to the door with a smile on his face. A little bounce in his step, and it never occurs to him until the sunlight is pouring in and revealing his visitor that maybe he should have gone to bed at a decent hour last night so he wouldn’t be greeting the priest blessing his home looking like he spent the night making out with someone.
If he’s expecting the awkwardness to go both ways he’s severely disappointed, because the blue-eyed priest squints at him for a moment before a big smile breaks out on his face and he holds out one hand. Jensen takes it carefully and shakes before stepping back to welcome him in.
“Father Pellegrino?”
The priest smiles some more as he looks around.
“Oh no. He ended up too busy I’m afraid. I’m Deacon Collins, but you can call me Misha.”
Jensen has to work to wrap his foggy brain around that, but when it becomes clear he feels a little more bitterness towards the church than he did before.
“A Deacon? Can a Deacon do this?”
The clergyman looks at him with amusement, and Jensen wonders if that’s his default face.
“I assure you I finished the same seminary training as Father Mark. In fact I got better grades. But in the end I was in love with a woman, and he was in love with the priesthood. Not that I don’t love my calling, I just love my Vicki too.”
Deacon Misha breaks off, takes a deep breath, and looks around again. Jensen feels the need to fill the silence, but he’s not entirely sure what he’s supposed to say here. Good for you or Sounds logical? His own choice in partner would probably send the Deacon into apoplexy.
Or maybe not considering with every vibe Deacon Misha is giving off he lives against the strict code Jensen has learned from his minimal interactions with Catholicism and his exposure in movies. Maybe he should ask a normal question, something he’d ask anybody else.
Deacon Misha takes the need out of his hand by seamlessly picking up the conversation as if there isn’t a strained and confused look on Jensen’s face.
“You know, I’ve wanted to search this place since I was a kid. Vicki, my wife, and I were high school sweethearts and all the kids used to dare each other to come up on the porch and touch the front door. It was a ritual. I guess even then ritual was important to me. We actually did it once on our second date. Finished dinner and then drove up here and psyched ourselves up in the car for fifteen minutes before just rushing it. Thought I’d piss myself. You mind if I get something to drink?”
Jensen nods dumbly and leads Deacon Misha through the house into the kitchen. He’s pouring the tea when the man speaks again.
“So how many ghosts are there really?”
The tea splashes and Jensen reminds himself that this is exactly what he asked for, or not exactly but close, and he should be handling it better. Except now that the clergyman is here Jensen is starting to consider all the ramifications.
“What?”
Misha’s eyes sparkle as he pulls paper towels and mops up the spill. His mouth is quirked funny, like he and Jensen are sharing an old joke.
“Ghosts. There’s multiple, I know that at least, but they must be doing something awful if you’re this desperate to get rid of them.”
“Why do you think I’m desperate to get rid of them?”
His head tilts, one eyebrow cocked at a crazy angle, and Jensen wonders if maybe the real priest will show up in a few minutes and this guy will turn out to be some kind of lunatic who just wanted access to the local haunted house. Or who just really likes dressing up in clergy outfits and walking through people’s houses.
“There’s not a single religious symbol in your house, not even a Pier One decoration. You can barely meet my eye, you called every church in the area until you got the one that’s most lax on the rules, and you don’t seem to know what exactly it is I’m going to be doing today.”
“Blessing the house?”
The Deacon laughs, head tilting back and chest heaving, until he finally gets himself back under control. Barely.
“Yes. That. So, let’s get some things out of the way. I don’t have a problem with homosexuality, I don’t mind that you’re not Catholic, and I’m going to do the blessing for you free of charge but I’ll also peek into cabinets because I’m nosy. You don’t have to believe in the Holy Trinity or the Sacrament for it to work because I’m going to take care of that, and when I’m done you’ll be a hundred percent ghost free.”
“And that’s a good thing.” The voice comes from behind him, the doorway out to the yard, and Jensen spins around on one foot to see Jared standing in the kitchen doorway with a look on his face that is jovial, pleasant, and totally devoid of any honest emotion.
“Jared. Wait not that’s not-“
But Jared just smiles, shakes his head, and then crosses the room to shake Deacon Misha’s hand.
“Jared Padalecki.”
“Deacon Misha Collins. Are you guys life partners? You’re a tall one.”
“They grow ‘em bigger in Texas.” Jared still has that frozen smile on his face, and it’s so obvious that even Misha who’s just met him is shifting uncomfortably. “How long do you think this is gonna take?”
“With a place this big probably about an hour or two. Although a good bit of that is just me walking around and looking in everything. Do you guys want to come with, or would you prefer to stay down here? You don’t have to be with me; I won’t steal anything.” It’s a weak joke to combat the way Jared and Jensen didn’t answer his question, the frozen look still on Jared’s face.
Jensen tries to figure out what he’s supposed to do, who he’s supposed to talk to, but there’s no time because Jared cuts in first.
“Jensen will go with you. He’s the one so eager to get rid of the ghosts. Good luck to you both.”
And with that Jared disappears and leaves Jensen alone with the Deacon. Literally disappears. There’s a short silence, the two of them simply looking at the place Jared just was, and then Misha lets out a bright and loud noise.
“Cool!”
----
“So let me get this straight, you befriended the ghosts?”
“Well when you put it that way it sounds stupid.”
“I’m not judging you I’m just trying to clarify. If you’re friends with them, or from the look of hurt on his face and despair on yours more than friends with the ghosts why would you bring me out here to banish them?”
Jensen has to wonder if his answer will get him locked in an asylum. Although considering what he’s already seen of the Deacon, and how quickly Misha accepted everything, probably not. Jared’s disappearance may have hurt their burgeoning relationship, but it only helped validate everything Jensen is about to have to say.
“I’m not trying to banish them. But they’re…they’re stuck here. At least that’s how it was described to me. Trapped by the house. And I don’t think they all want to be here. And the house took a swing at us.”
“Us as in you and Jared?”
“Us as in me and my ex-boyfriend. It was making him crazy and it- God this all sounds insane. It made Jared’s wife kill him. It made Matt angry at me. Like ‘was gonna hit me’ angry. And then Jared stopped him.”
“Well good on Jared. So you don’t necessarily want all of the ghosts gone. Just the ones that want to leave. And whatever evil is inside the house.”
“Yeah. That. Except now he thinks I want to get rid of him. Which is the opposite of what I want.”
Misha’s hands fold under his chin and his face takes on a look of glee. Jensen finds himself slightly disturbed by it.
“Jensen. Are you in love with your haunting?”
He scoffs, once, but it feels forced and Misha’s laughter suggests it didn’t come out any more believable than it sounded to him.
“We just met.”
“I knew about Vicki roughly five minutes after I first spoke to her. Just met is no excuse. Plus, you guys already live together.”
“That hardly counts. He doesn’t live anywhere.”
Misha’s grin grows Cheshire Cat huge, and he leans forward before tapping Jensen lightly with one finger on the nose.
“That, is nothing but semantics. He’s real to you isn’t he? You can touch him, you can see him, and he has a personality and a spirit separate from your own that you find attractive. A pulse seems like such a little thing to worry about compared to those qualifications.”
Jensen swallows once and then rubs his face.
“Are you supposed to be condoning this?”
“There’s a reason we’re the only church who would send someone out to your house without you paying your weekly tithe and proving you’re one of the good, God-fearing sheeple. As far as I and Father Pellegrino are concerned God is love, and love is something he treasures. Everything happens for a reason. Nothing is chance. I believe that. I think your stumbling block right now is that you can’t see the reason for it. That’s understandable. But keep an open mind and give God a chance to show you His plan.”
“I don’t believe in God.”
Misha stood then, opened the case he’d brought in with him and began to remove his ritual tools.
“Well, then the only thing that waits for us beyond the flesh is apparently your house.”
“Do you really think this will work?”
The Deacon smiles, eyes bright and friendly, and Jensen wonders if he should call the whole thing off. If this was a bad idea.
“To be honest? I don’t know Jensen. I’m pretty sure someone has tried this before. If you’re right though, and it’s the house and not the ghosts, then perhaps it’s because no one’s ever gotten to the heart of the matter before. Treated the symptoms and not the disease.”
Masterpost
Next Part
Previous Part
No more worry
Ice water in my veins
Took my bones to the cemetery
Where they still remain
When Jensen wakes up Adrianne is bandaging his leg. They’ve taken his pants off, and Jensen feels a slight sense of shame at the idea of being undressed in front of this strange woman.
This strange, dead woman.
Her smile is warm, voice soft, and her hands are cool but gentle.
“It’s ok. I was a nurse when I was alive. It’s gonna be ok Jensen.”
Jared is nowhere to be seen, but Aldis and Chris are hovering close with twin looks of concern and anger. Jensen wonders if they’ll be the head of the moving committee now, or if Matt will take that role when he sees what’s happened.
He wonders if he’ll be able to argue.
“I think you’re in a bit of shock honey, but it’s gonna be ok. They’re all too shallow for stitches.”
“Where’s Jared?”
Adrianne doesn’t look up from what she’s doing, her focus steady as she continues to wrap his leg tightly.
“Trying to figure out what happened I think. Don’t you worry about that. Let’s just get you better.”
“Was it a ghost like Jared?” Chris sounds put together, calm, and Jensen marvels yet again at how tightly controlled his friend can be when it’s necessary.
He jerks out of Adrianne’s grip, heart racing, when a new voice pipes up.
“A ghost like whom?”
It’s Matt, eyes wide and white again, fists clenched at his sides, and Jensen wonders if Matt could have walked in on anything worse.
“Matt. You need to calm down. Tensions are already pretty-“
His boyfriend cuts Chris off, face going stormy and rage-filled like the day in the kitchen.
“You need to shut the fuck up and mind your own business for once. Jensen? A ghost like Jared? The neighbor you’re always with?”
Jensen finds himself on the defensive in seconds, unwilling to back down and unable to be calm. He’s usually unwilling to be emotional in front of others, tightly controlled when it comes to making his private life pubic, and despite what he’s been willing to share with his friends he’s not gotten into how deeply and fundamentally damaged his relationship with Matt has become.
All these considerations go by the wayside as his blood boils.
“Always with? How the fuck would you know who I’m always with? You’re never here. You don’t want to be. You find out our house is fucking haunted and your response is to up your hours at the firm and disappear on me. You don’t want to deal with it, you don’t want to deal with me, and goddamn Matt I don’t want you to.”
Matt’s mouth trembles and then firms.
“After everything I’ve sacrificed for you this is what I get? You take off the second someone else shows up? Someone dead Jensen? A fucking dead man beat me out for your affections?”
Just like that it all flies away. The rage leaves him and Jensen has nothing left but a hollow fear that he’s about to make a mistake and won’t be able to take it back. Adrianne’s hand settles onto his knee, and Jensen takes a deep breath before meeting Matt’s eyes.
“I can never thank you enough for what you did for me. For how you’ve been there for me. But let’s face it Matt, we aren’t the same people anymore. We don’t love each other that way anymore. You can’t look at me without seeing everything you’ve been forced to do, and I can’t look at you without seeing everything I went through. We’re friends at best, patient and care provider at worst. You didn’t sign up for this. I don’t blame you. But staying with me out of guilt and nostalgia isn’t doing either of us any favors.”
Matt slumps back against the wall, one hand tugging at his already askew tie and the other pressing against the wall.
“Jensen. Jensen I. I’m sorry.”
It’s terrible. It’s welcome. When Matt agreed to be primary caregiver after the accident they’d been warned about the strain it could put on the relationship, they’d been given all the options, and they’d chosen this path. It ended here. He’d thought there would be bitterness or anger. Instead Jensen is relieved to have the burden of pretending, of clinging to nostalgia and complacency, lifted from his shoulders.
For the first time since the accident he is willing to let go of the familiar.
“It’s not your fault. It’s nobody’s fault Matt. It’s fine.”
Matt’s face scrunches up for a second before settling into determination.
“Alright, but Jensen you’re getting out of this house. Even if you don’t come with me. You can go with Chris and Aldis, or we’ll set you up with something alone.”
“I’m staying.”
Chris is already shaking his head, Aldis’s mouth is hanging open, and Adrianne’s hand squeezes his leg tightly.
“Then I’ll stay with you. I’ll sleep in another room.”
Jensen thinks of the rage in Matt’s face, of the corpse in the upstairs studio and how Jared never once blamed his wife for what happened. He thinks of the box cutter flying at him.
“No. This I have to do alone. You have to leave Matt.”
The face is so well known, and for a moment Jensen feels the pang he thought he would at ending the relationship. He knows Matt. Has known him for so long and shared so much with him. This is the young man he met in the library. This is the face he fell in love with so many years ago.
Even if he’d known then where they’d end. How they’d drift apart and lose each other, he’d do it all over again.
It’s a fight to get them all to go, and he has to promise to contact them regularly, but Jensen can’t leave. Not yet.
He has a ghost to talk to.
----
When the house is empty of everyone but him and the ghosts Jensen turns to Adrianne. She’s repacking his first aid kit, her face solemn and serious, and he takes a deep breath before he finds how he wants to phrase it.
“Where’s Jared?”
Adrianne closes the lid and then temples her fingers under her chin.
“Hiding like a coward.”
It’s the most honest and refreshing thing anyone has said to him in quite some time. It makes Jensen angry all over again.
“What the hell is he hiding from?”
“He feels guilty that you got hurt and is sure you’re going to leave. So instead of facing you and saying that he’s going to hide out and pretend it doesn’t matter until you go.”
“Well I’m not leaving.”
“Then he’ll be hiding for a while.”
She moves the kit out of the way before leaning over the counter.
“You realize that he can outlast you right? Unless you plan on dying here.”
Jensen has no good answer for that, no witty retort, so he watches Adrianne fade out of existence right in front of him.
---
The liquor is buried in the back of a cabinet, and Jensen lifts it out carefully and takes it to the bedroom with the hidden door. He should put furniture in here. He should rebuild the wall over the door.
He should bury Jared’s remains.
Instead he takes a position on the floor and starts to drink right from the bottle. He’s not driving anywhere. The thought brings out a bitter laugh, and the burn of the alcohol mixes perfectly with the level of rage he’s got burning just under his skin.
He stays and Jared disappears. He took the chance of throwing away everything he knew on a dead man that’s never shown anything but the same kind of doofy universal goodness he seems to give everyone around him.
About halfway to alcohol poisoning Jensen looks up to see Jared crouched in front of him, a look of concern on his stupid, dead, beautiful face.
“Jensen. Jensen can you give me the bottle?”
“You’re not my fucking mother.”
For a second Jensen thinks that’s he’s imagining this, because god that was a stupid thing to say and it isn’t even what he wanted to communicate and maybe the universe is being kind for once and he’s dreaming all the dumb shit that could come out of his mouth before Jared really does give up and appear.
“No. I am definitely not your mother. But you’ve had a lot of it and I’ve seen your medicine cabinet.”
“Fucking snoop.”
Jared snatches the bottle at that and then sinks onto the floor next to Jensen. They sit silently for a bit, thighs close enough to touch but not touching, and Jensen wonders if that’s his fault or Jared’s. If this sudden distance is only imagined, or if drunk and stripped of all his safety nets Jensen is finally realizing how much distance lies between himself and Jared.
“You need to catch up with Matt. I bet if you left right now he would-“
“Fuck you.”
“You’re a pretty angry drunk Jensen.”
And that is all he needs. All he requires to focus and pin down the source of his rage and despair.
“You’re a liar.”
Jared’s face twists in pain and shock, and then he pulls up a little and nods.
“I know. I’m sorry. I knew about the ghosts and I knew I was dead and I led you to believe-“
“You claimed death was peaceful. You told me all that bullshit about gaining enlightenment and distance and then it turns out death is just as shitty as life. That you’re just as angry and scared as I am. That’s what’s waiting for us. That’s what that kid-“
He cuts off at the last second, planting his conversational heels in the dirt so hard he can feel the grooves it digs, but it’s too late. He’s opened the door and Jared’s seen inside.
A big hand settles on his shoulder and then Jared is in his space, cool and steady.
“What kid?”
Jensen swallows, alcohol burning a path back up his throat and reminding him that he’s never had the best tolerance levels and now he’s seriously passed what little he did have.
“It’s nothing. Fucking nosy.”
“Yes I am. What kid Jensen?”
The room is dark, stupidly dark, because they don’t pay to put street lights out in the country. No all you have out there is the moon and stars, and headlights if you remember to put them on.
“Leave me alone.”
“Not a chance.”
But if you don’t. If you don’t remember to put them on then you have to take it on faith that everyone else on the road can make out the dim shape of your car hurtling through the darkness. And faith, Jensen learned that night, is something that teenagers have in abundance and that adults lose all too quickly.
“You’re an asshole. You know that right? An asshole. You sell me all this bullshit about happy afterlife families and flash that fucking smile of yours and next thing I know I’m dumping my boyfriend for you and staying in this goddamn horror movie.”
“I did do that.” Jared is soothing, understanding, and Jensen finds he hates that even more. “Is the kid attached to your car accident?”
His eyes narrow and he considers the possibility of getting up and wobbling his way out.
“How do you know about that?”
“I’m a snoop and there are a lot of papers all over the place. The kid hit you. And then he died right?”
“No, actually, he didn’t. He lived for an hour.”
Jensen finds himself pulled in tight, solid and stable arms wrapped around him and Jared’s face pressed against his hair as he responds.
“An hour? The report I read said he was dead when they got to you.”
“Yeah.” His voice is rough, and that’s what tips Jensen to the fact that he’s crying. When did he start crying? “It took them an hour and a half to get there. Mix of problems.”
Jared’s hands move up and down his back, rubbing and squeezing, and Jensen relaxes into it.
“Was he conscious?”
“Yeah. Kept. He kept apologizing and asking for his mommy. They said it was a miracle he survived coming through the windshield.”
“And he was pinned there in your car with you all that time dying?”
“Yes.”
Jared makes a little noise, and the arms around Jensen tighten a bit.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry Jensen. That’s so terrible.”
“It was so stupid. He was just having fun. He drank too much to remember to turn the goddamn lights on and just went out. Fucking, all they needed was daytime running lights. I would have seen him coming if he had them. I would have stopped and let him go. But I was tired, and I wasn’t looking for oncoming traffic and then-“
He cuts himself off at the last second. Jensen has never told a living soul that the boy that hit him was alive and conscious in the car with him. It was hard enough to describe to the court stenographers being pinned in the heap of metal that used to be his car with the body sprawled out over him.
“That wasn’t your fault.”
“People keep saying that but he was just a kid. He should have had a more responsible driver out there to give him a break. He shouldn’t have run into anyone in the first place. It was just a stupid mistake and he died for it. He died horribly. Is that a plan? Is that fucking destiny? And then what? I wanted to believe there was something- something better than this but what is there? Is he stuck out on that road looking at the place he suffered and died? Growing more bitter with every day? Is that what waits for us?”
Jared makes a little noise and continues to pet Jensen, hands steady and sure, and Jensen wants it. He wants the comfort, he wants the closeness, and damn if he doesn’t want Jared.
“This is not a normal afterlife.”
“What?”
“This is not a normal afterlife and what happened wasn’t an angry ghost. It’s the house.”
Jensen swallows thickly, and then pulls back just enough to really take Jared in.
“What’s the house?”
“The anger, the violence, all of it. That’s the house. It trapped us here on purpose. Anyone who dies on the property stays on the property. And what happened with my wife, what we thought was starting to happen with Matt, all of that is on the house. It twists people. Makes them turn on each other and hate each other. I thought I could protect you, but I’m starting to think I- Jensen, you should go back to Matt. Or go stay with Chris and Aldis. This place isn’t the answer to the questions you have about death and staying here won’t bring you peace or closure.”
“I thought you didn’t know what made her crazy."
Jared blushes again, and Jensen wonders about the blood flow in dead things.
“I lied again.”
Jensen licks his dry lips, suddenly unsure of whether or not he should go any further. He jumped into this thing half-blind, and now he has to feel his way through to the end or turn around and run the other way.
He decides to plunge ahead.
“I- originally, ok, maybe that was the plan but it’s changed.”
“What’s changed?” Jared’s head tilts, eyes wide, and Jensen knows then and there that he’s not making a mistake. It’s not the fear or the trauma, and it’s not the all-consuming need he had to know for certain that what was waiting for them, what the kid that hit him was experiencing, was something meaningful and positive after an arbitrary life of surprises and tragedy.
“I stayed for you.”
Jared’s eyes squint for a second like the words don’t make sense, like it’s a language he doesn’t know anymore, and then they go impossibly wide as his mouth drops open.
“Jensen, I’m dead. That’s not gonna change. I am totally, completely, utterly dead and have been so for a long time. You are not. Don’t you want to live your life?”
“Yeah. Yeah I do. That’s what I’m trying to do, and I want to try it with you.”
Disbelief morphs into something else, and then Jared reaches out tentatively and takes Jensen’s hand.
“I’d like to try that.”
-----
Jensen wakes up to a hideous hangover; terrible taste in his mouth and headache throbbing along with his overly loud pulse. Jared is sitting beside the bed with a glass of water and aspirin.
“I remember those. Nothing worse. Want us to make you breakfast?”
The thought of food turns his weak stomach over several times, but a long course of painkillers and other various pills have weakened Jensen’s stomach lining to the point that taking the aspirin without food isn’t the best of options either.
“Toast?” It’s hopeful, because he shouldn’t rely on the ghosts to be some sort of free in-house labor.
“Greasy food it is.”
Jensen ignores the new wave of queasiness in favor of weakly trying to return Jared’s smile. He follows the ghost through the house and down into the kitchen where apparently the breakfast decision was long since made. Chris is handling biscuit dough beside Samantha, whose face is set in a bright smile as she fries up bacon.
Aldis is hanging out on one of the stools, and he smiles at Jensen before speaking louder than would be necessary if they were across the house from each other.
“Jensen! My man! How are you feeling? Looking a little green!”
He needs to remember to hit Aldis once he’s sure there will be some force behind it.
Collapsing into the chair beside Aldis is the best decision he’s ever made, and he watches Chris and Samantha chat about techniques for biscuits while Aldis yammers on at Jared about something, still entirely too loud.
“Ah man we’re gonna have to play Call of Duty. You’re gonna love it. It’s-oh shit. You don’t even know what video games are do you?”
Jared’s smile is easy and understanding.
“Aldis, I’ve had fifteen families here in the last seven years and all of them had teenagers. I may be better at some of those games than you.”
The grin that splits Aldis’s face is blinding.
“We’ll see about that.”
And after the living people eat heartily they actually do. Jensen’s head and stomach have calmed down enough that the jumpy camera motions and loud explosions don’t affect him. As he watches the screen he begins to plan.
Maybe he jumped into this for the wrong reasons, or the right reasons not fully developed, but it’s time to take control. Jared’s right, his answer isn’t here. Or it isn’t yet. But if he wants to find it, and in the course of doing so become closer to Jared, then there are some things that need to change.
And every one of those things has to do with the house. When Jensen signed the closing papers he had the intention of fixing the place up, of bringing out the beauty he knew it must have once had, and now there’s just one more task that’s been added to the list.
Jensen has to purge it of the evil Jared swears it has. If he does then he’ll be safe, and the ghosts will be capable of leaving. Of course that might mean that Jared will decide to go, and if so Jensen’s burgeoning plans for his future will be radically changed, but he has to give the ghost that option. Otherwise Jared is just picking him because he has no other way.
Probably more importantly if he can successfully purge the house of evil he’ll be safe, and so will his friends when they visit and anyone who lives here in the future. Jensen is sure he wants this to be his life, but he’s not so certain about it being his death.
---
He starts out small. He calls the local parishes until he finds a priest willing to come out and bless the house despite Jensen not being one of the flock. He’s got two days to kill until the man has time, but that’s not so bad.
The first one is spent getting to know the ghosts better at large.
Samantha is sweet, a little meek, and Lauren hangs at her side on a regular basis, and Jensen doesn’t miss the way their fingers link together sometimes, or how her face lights up when the brunette turns her full attention on her.
Charles and Adrianne are perfect together. They share looks that Jensen can’t understand, laugh at the same time, and often she finishes his sentences. If they were any cuter together Jensen would probably hate them.
Jeffrey is a little more serious, but when he smiles his entire face crinkles. Jared tells Jensen that it’s harder for Jeffrey to keep in touch with the current time, but that he does better these days then he used to.
Sam and Chad stick closer together, their timelines a bit more in sync, and Jensen wonders if they would have been willing to be so close in life. Their personalities clash on a regular basis, Sam’s professional demeanor and Chad’s hair metal vibe, but they share at least a generational tie.
He finally meets D.J. and Jim, and he’s glad for it. D.J., Jared warns him, is still new to the whole thing. Because of that he has more bad days than good, but when he is in the current time he’s a sweet and funny geek. Jim on the other hand comes off gruff, but there’s a sense of humor underneath that Jensen really appreciates. Dry, but not too dry, and Jensen immediately takes to him.
They get together in the garden again, and move into the kitchen. They end the night sitting around the dining room table, swapping stories and laughing about families that made it out of the house unscathed but scared. Jensen wonders if he should be laughing. If he should tell them what he’s planning.
But he doesn’t. Whether it’s because he’s afraid Jared and the others will be upset, or if he doesn’t want the house to get a full scope of his plan, Jensen isn’t sure. He just knows he doesn’t want to chance it.
The next day is only Jared, and Jensen learns a fair amount. Jensen clicks with him on a very basic level. It’s almost seamless really how they get along. There’s a quality to Jared that Jensen can appreciate now that he knows everything. Even dead Jared is more alive than Jensen has possibly ever been.
Jared knows everything about the house, can tell Jensen crazy tidbits about the town that wouldn’t be in the historical records, and has a million stories from his brief stint in mob era Chicago. It’s fascinating, and Jensen loves listening to him.
More than the aspect of living history though is the way Jared lights up. He’s physical, there’s no question of that, but his skin practically glows as he talks about the art scene in Chicago, the early days here in Texas, and putting his studio together when he got here.
Better than that is the fact that Jared, as Jensen quickly learns, has no hang-ups at all about casual touching. It puts Jensen at ease somehow, even though he’s never been terribly touchy, to have that reminder that despite Jared’s pulse handicap he is real and there with Jensen.
Despite the need for public secrecy, and his deal with Sandy, Jared talks warmly about his family’s acceptance of his sexual preferences and life style. He tells Jensen all about his little sister and big brother, about how close they all were to each other. Jared talks in great detail about how he grew up watching how much his parents loved each other and longing for the same sort of bond with someone else.
It’s easy to laugh with Jared, to listen to him, and then to open up to him. They don’t talk about the accident again, or Jensen’s issues stemming from it, but they do talk about his family and his business. Jensen talks about meeting Chris and Aldis, he tells Jared about the gulf that slowly opened up between him and Matt. The way their relationship shifted and morphed until it became a shadow of its former self.
Jensen tells Jared about how his own family reacted to his coming out. About his dad baking him a cake and his mom mocking the terrible icing job his dad did. He talks about his sister and brother, about the life choices they made, and how often he sees them. He basically talks about anything, and finds that all of it is rewarded with that big dimpled grin.
Without a second thought it seems they become more physical as the day progresses. What was already a fairly handsy Jared becomes a constant barrage of touching. Jensen’s shoulder, his thigh, his knee, and casual pats become hugs become hand holding. Jared is physical, and that should amaze Jensen all things considered, but it just comes the same way the emotional connectivity did. They just get along and Jensen loves it. There’s no awkwardness between them.
He’s always believed that to fully understand a person you have to know them the way you know a house. The heart of the structure, what ties it all together and makes it a solid and single unit. He knows that about Jared, and in turn Jared knows it about him.
And then, as if on some kind of timer, Jared pulls the rug out from under him again and throws Jensen’s entire scripted and romantic day off track.
“I want you to help me bury the body.”
It could be a joke in any other situation. Or a misunderstanding. But Jensen knows exactly what Jared means.
“Are you kidding?”
“No. It’s been rotting in there forever. I can touch things Jensen. The house gives me corporeal form. I want to paint again but it’s goddamn depressing to stare at the thing when I try.”
Jensen has to swallow back a thousand replies it seems before he finds the one that seems the least insulting or confusing.
“You mean you?”
Jared tilts his head, squints his eyes, and then shakes his head. It’s an entire conversation Jensen doesn’t get to hear.
“Not anymore. That’s a corpse Jensen. It deserves its respects I guess, but it’s not me. This is me.” Jared’s fingers link with Jensen’s, and he feels the cool skin solid and sure. “This is who I am. I left that behind a long time ago.”
And Jensen doesn’t have a rebuttal for that. Not a good one anyway.
“Fine. But you’re helping dig, and this is officially the worst first date in history.”
Jared’s grin is bright and overwhelming, dimples carved deep into his cheeks.
“Who says this is our first date?”
He can’t make himself touch the body, but he spreads out a sheet and Jared lowers the corpse into it carefully and wraps it. They tie the whole thing up in a gruesome bundle, and then together they carry Jared’s big body down the stairs and out the back door. Jensen wonders what his neighbors see if they’re looking at all. If he’ll have an awkward conversation with a police officer about this, and Matt’s whereabouts.
And there’s the question of Jared’s family. There’s little chance any of them are still alive, but would their descendants like to know what happened to Jared? Would they prefer to have a ceremony for him? To bury him in their plots and to know there’s a marker to visit.
Jensen will have to order a marker for Jared.
“You want any spot in particular?”
Jared eyes the ground speculatively, and then points to an empty spot near Jeff’s headstone.
“There’s fine. I always liked Jeff and it’s far enough from the tree line we won’t be fighting tree roots every inch.”
It’s practical, logical, and Jensen feels himself balking.
“Shouldn’t we get the other ghosts? Or Chris and Aldis? Don’t you want mourners?”
Hazel eyes, predominantly green in the now waning sunlight, turn on him fully.
“Do you feel like mourning?”
“You were a good man.”
“I would like to think I am a good man, but what does that matter?”
“Good people should be remembered. They should be mourned. It should matter that you died. That you were lost. There should be a monument and people crying. There should be meaning.”
Instead of responding Jared picks up the shovel and starts to dig. Jensen waits for something, anything, but when Jared just keeps working he finally picks his own shovel up and gets to work. It’s hard, and his leg isn’t enjoying it, but after a sweaty and intense period of digging they have a shallow grave. Jared puts his own body into the grave and then looks up and wipes his forehead. There’s no sweat, but there is dirt.
“Will you give me a eulogy?”
He blinks several times, unsure if he’s heard that correctly, and then Jensen swallows once before stepping to the graveside.
“His name was-“
“Is.”
Jensen jerks, and then nods in agreement.
“His name is Jared Padalecki and he was-“
“Is.”
“Do you want me to do this or do you?”
“I’m the son of an English teacher. Tense is important Jensen.”
He makes a sour face and picks up where he left off.
“He is an artist, a good friend, and a good man. He loved-loves to laugh and to talk. He talks too much. Way too much.”
“This doesn’t seem very mournful or respectful.”
Jared’s lips are curling up, and he scoops up a shovelful of dirt and drops it over the bundle.
“It’s hard to be a proper mourner when you’re standing right there mocking me.”
“That would be the point.”
Jensen drops his shovel and looks at Jared in the dimming light.
“You’re teaching me a lesson.”
Jared nods, crosses the space, and cups Jensen’s chin in his dirty hands. They’re still cool, texture unchanged from the digging but gritty sand particles rubbing against his skin.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because you think I need it.”
“Do you?” Jared’s thumb rubs against Jensen’s lower lip, gentle and sweet, and Jensen swallows.
A first kiss in a graveyard is not exactly movie material.
“No. I don’t need you to remind me that you’re not gone. I can feel you, Jared. I know you’re here.”
The lips curl fully now, pink tongue slipping out and wetting Jared’s lips before he leans in. Jensen can’t feel breath against his mouth, but he only notices because he’s looking for it. Instead he feels the barest bit of pressure from Jared’s lips as they brush gently against his.
“And I always will be. No one needs to cry over this hole, or the shell in it, or the man you think is being put into it. I’m not there. I’m right here in front of you. My name is Jared Padalecki. I’m an artist, I’m a ghost, and I’m yours if you want me. I can touch you, I can listen to you, and I can annoy the shit out of you with my constant talking. If my death has to have meaning then make it that dying here gave me the ability to stick around until you came. It brought me to you. So stop looking at death as the end. It’s just an intermission in the play.”
Jensen reaches up, threads his fingers into Jared’s hair and pulls him down into a kiss. There’s dirt on Jared’s lips, but his mouth tastes oddly sweet, and is just as cool as the rest of him. Jared pauses for only a second, lips stuttering against Jensen’s, and then he opens his mouth and deepens the contact. Jared’s fingers spread out, consume Jensen’s face, and the encasement brings him fully into the moment. He forgets that they are in a graveyard, that Jared is dead, that this whole thing is some sort of crazy diversion from normalcy that anyone else would probably commit Jensen for.
His left hand slips down, slides along the length of Jared’s torso and to edge of the button up shirt, and then Jensen is touching the cool and taut flesh of Jared’s stomach. He feels the muscles ripple underneath his fingers, reacting to his presence, and it’s better than he could have ever imagined. His hand settles there and helps him memorize every contraction, every hitch as Jared kisses him dizzy and stupid.
Jensen should have guessed that this would be the way Jared kissed. The man takes up entire rooms with his personality, eclipses light and reason with his smiles, so why wouldn’t he be able to take every thought and fear out of Jensen’s head with his kissing? It’s so cheesy, the whole idea of it, but he can’t help it. He wants more.
Except the kiss breaks, Jared’s forehead rests against his, hair tickling Jensen, and one thumb slips down to rasp against Jensen’s stubble.
“We should finish this and go inside.”
Jensen pictures Jared sprawled out underneath him on the couch, big hands touching more of him and lips slipping against his as their bodies work their way into the cushions. He imagines how good it will be to feel all of Jared pressed against him.
And all he has to do is help Jared bury the past.
“Yeah. Let’s do that.”
-----
Jensen wakes up on the couch to the doorbell ringing. He at least showered after the grave digging, sadly alone, but he’s in the rumpled clothes he changed into before joining Jared in the living room. On the couch. Where they didn’t watch a minute of whatever background noise was playing on the TV.
He makes his way to the door with a smile on his face. A little bounce in his step, and it never occurs to him until the sunlight is pouring in and revealing his visitor that maybe he should have gone to bed at a decent hour last night so he wouldn’t be greeting the priest blessing his home looking like he spent the night making out with someone.
If he’s expecting the awkwardness to go both ways he’s severely disappointed, because the blue-eyed priest squints at him for a moment before a big smile breaks out on his face and he holds out one hand. Jensen takes it carefully and shakes before stepping back to welcome him in.
“Father Pellegrino?”
The priest smiles some more as he looks around.
“Oh no. He ended up too busy I’m afraid. I’m Deacon Collins, but you can call me Misha.”
Jensen has to work to wrap his foggy brain around that, but when it becomes clear he feels a little more bitterness towards the church than he did before.
“A Deacon? Can a Deacon do this?”
The clergyman looks at him with amusement, and Jensen wonders if that’s his default face.
“I assure you I finished the same seminary training as Father Mark. In fact I got better grades. But in the end I was in love with a woman, and he was in love with the priesthood. Not that I don’t love my calling, I just love my Vicki too.”
Deacon Misha breaks off, takes a deep breath, and looks around again. Jensen feels the need to fill the silence, but he’s not entirely sure what he’s supposed to say here. Good for you or Sounds logical? His own choice in partner would probably send the Deacon into apoplexy.
Or maybe not considering with every vibe Deacon Misha is giving off he lives against the strict code Jensen has learned from his minimal interactions with Catholicism and his exposure in movies. Maybe he should ask a normal question, something he’d ask anybody else.
Deacon Misha takes the need out of his hand by seamlessly picking up the conversation as if there isn’t a strained and confused look on Jensen’s face.
“You know, I’ve wanted to search this place since I was a kid. Vicki, my wife, and I were high school sweethearts and all the kids used to dare each other to come up on the porch and touch the front door. It was a ritual. I guess even then ritual was important to me. We actually did it once on our second date. Finished dinner and then drove up here and psyched ourselves up in the car for fifteen minutes before just rushing it. Thought I’d piss myself. You mind if I get something to drink?”
Jensen nods dumbly and leads Deacon Misha through the house into the kitchen. He’s pouring the tea when the man speaks again.
“So how many ghosts are there really?”
The tea splashes and Jensen reminds himself that this is exactly what he asked for, or not exactly but close, and he should be handling it better. Except now that the clergyman is here Jensen is starting to consider all the ramifications.
“What?”
Misha’s eyes sparkle as he pulls paper towels and mops up the spill. His mouth is quirked funny, like he and Jensen are sharing an old joke.
“Ghosts. There’s multiple, I know that at least, but they must be doing something awful if you’re this desperate to get rid of them.”
“Why do you think I’m desperate to get rid of them?”
His head tilts, one eyebrow cocked at a crazy angle, and Jensen wonders if maybe the real priest will show up in a few minutes and this guy will turn out to be some kind of lunatic who just wanted access to the local haunted house. Or who just really likes dressing up in clergy outfits and walking through people’s houses.
“There’s not a single religious symbol in your house, not even a Pier One decoration. You can barely meet my eye, you called every church in the area until you got the one that’s most lax on the rules, and you don’t seem to know what exactly it is I’m going to be doing today.”
“Blessing the house?”
The Deacon laughs, head tilting back and chest heaving, until he finally gets himself back under control. Barely.
“Yes. That. So, let’s get some things out of the way. I don’t have a problem with homosexuality, I don’t mind that you’re not Catholic, and I’m going to do the blessing for you free of charge but I’ll also peek into cabinets because I’m nosy. You don’t have to believe in the Holy Trinity or the Sacrament for it to work because I’m going to take care of that, and when I’m done you’ll be a hundred percent ghost free.”
“And that’s a good thing.” The voice comes from behind him, the doorway out to the yard, and Jensen spins around on one foot to see Jared standing in the kitchen doorway with a look on his face that is jovial, pleasant, and totally devoid of any honest emotion.
“Jared. Wait not that’s not-“
But Jared just smiles, shakes his head, and then crosses the room to shake Deacon Misha’s hand.
“Jared Padalecki.”
“Deacon Misha Collins. Are you guys life partners? You’re a tall one.”
“They grow ‘em bigger in Texas.” Jared still has that frozen smile on his face, and it’s so obvious that even Misha who’s just met him is shifting uncomfortably. “How long do you think this is gonna take?”
“With a place this big probably about an hour or two. Although a good bit of that is just me walking around and looking in everything. Do you guys want to come with, or would you prefer to stay down here? You don’t have to be with me; I won’t steal anything.” It’s a weak joke to combat the way Jared and Jensen didn’t answer his question, the frozen look still on Jared’s face.
Jensen tries to figure out what he’s supposed to do, who he’s supposed to talk to, but there’s no time because Jared cuts in first.
“Jensen will go with you. He’s the one so eager to get rid of the ghosts. Good luck to you both.”
And with that Jared disappears and leaves Jensen alone with the Deacon. Literally disappears. There’s a short silence, the two of them simply looking at the place Jared just was, and then Misha lets out a bright and loud noise.
“Cool!”
----
“So let me get this straight, you befriended the ghosts?”
“Well when you put it that way it sounds stupid.”
“I’m not judging you I’m just trying to clarify. If you’re friends with them, or from the look of hurt on his face and despair on yours more than friends with the ghosts why would you bring me out here to banish them?”
Jensen has to wonder if his answer will get him locked in an asylum. Although considering what he’s already seen of the Deacon, and how quickly Misha accepted everything, probably not. Jared’s disappearance may have hurt their burgeoning relationship, but it only helped validate everything Jensen is about to have to say.
“I’m not trying to banish them. But they’re…they’re stuck here. At least that’s how it was described to me. Trapped by the house. And I don’t think they all want to be here. And the house took a swing at us.”
“Us as in you and Jared?”
“Us as in me and my ex-boyfriend. It was making him crazy and it- God this all sounds insane. It made Jared’s wife kill him. It made Matt angry at me. Like ‘was gonna hit me’ angry. And then Jared stopped him.”
“Well good on Jared. So you don’t necessarily want all of the ghosts gone. Just the ones that want to leave. And whatever evil is inside the house.”
“Yeah. That. Except now he thinks I want to get rid of him. Which is the opposite of what I want.”
Misha’s hands fold under his chin and his face takes on a look of glee. Jensen finds himself slightly disturbed by it.
“Jensen. Are you in love with your haunting?”
He scoffs, once, but it feels forced and Misha’s laughter suggests it didn’t come out any more believable than it sounded to him.
“We just met.”
“I knew about Vicki roughly five minutes after I first spoke to her. Just met is no excuse. Plus, you guys already live together.”
“That hardly counts. He doesn’t live anywhere.”
Misha’s grin grows Cheshire Cat huge, and he leans forward before tapping Jensen lightly with one finger on the nose.
“That, is nothing but semantics. He’s real to you isn’t he? You can touch him, you can see him, and he has a personality and a spirit separate from your own that you find attractive. A pulse seems like such a little thing to worry about compared to those qualifications.”
Jensen swallows once and then rubs his face.
“Are you supposed to be condoning this?”
“There’s a reason we’re the only church who would send someone out to your house without you paying your weekly tithe and proving you’re one of the good, God-fearing sheeple. As far as I and Father Pellegrino are concerned God is love, and love is something he treasures. Everything happens for a reason. Nothing is chance. I believe that. I think your stumbling block right now is that you can’t see the reason for it. That’s understandable. But keep an open mind and give God a chance to show you His plan.”
“I don’t believe in God.”
Misha stood then, opened the case he’d brought in with him and began to remove his ritual tools.
“Well, then the only thing that waits for us beyond the flesh is apparently your house.”
“Do you really think this will work?”
The Deacon smiles, eyes bright and friendly, and Jensen wonders if he should call the whole thing off. If this was a bad idea.
“To be honest? I don’t know Jensen. I’m pretty sure someone has tried this before. If you’re right though, and it’s the house and not the ghosts, then perhaps it’s because no one’s ever gotten to the heart of the matter before. Treated the symptoms and not the disease.”
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Date: 2014-08-03 04:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-07-16 05:13 pm (UTC)