Work Text:
“Jamie wants to launch me off of a car at 70mph safely - or he wants to launch himself. But I was picturing myself being set into a mechanism that would launch me off a car at 70mph... and there’s pretty much only two people I would trust with the release pin, and one of them’s me and the other one’s Jamie. The fact is, is when push comes to shove, even though we drive each other nuts and we get really pissed off at each other every single day, whenever we leave things in other people’s hands it’s a variable we don’t know. But we know that when each other has control over the thing that we’re doing we know that it’s going to work the way that we think it is.” Adam Savage
Jamie
With Adam it was anything but love at first sight. In fact, if you’d asked him back then Jamie would have told you that there was no possible alternate universe of extraordinary circumstance where they could be in love. Jamie was a man of facts: he believed that things just were the way they were and you shouldn’t waste time dwelling on impossibilities. Adam is all about the possibilities. He’s a man of might-be and could-be and maybe. Adam rejects Jamie’s reality, and Jamie’s always taken that quite personally. There was no thunderbolt epiphany. Not either of the times he’d thought for sure he was about to watch Adam die, and then things miraculously worked out. Nor any of the many times he saw Adam bring his boys to set and completely transform into a dad. Looking back, it was in all the little moments that seemed trivial - so impersonal that many of them are even captured on camera for the world to see - when Adam wouldn’t stop asking “What if...” Jamie never thought this could happen; he blames Adam completely.
****
They knew all along that the car cling myth would be dangerous; the problem was that it wasn’t dangerous enough to justify building a human-finger-strength-calibrated, center-of-gravity-shifting, car-clinging robot. Watching Buster getting swung around like a pinata on the day of testing, Jamie reflected morosely on his odds of getting whiplash (for science!).
Jamie was down for the roof clings, mainly because those would be the most difficult and he’s stronger than Adam. He suited up in the body armor and they got the obligatory amusing shots of Adam testing his harness, then it was go-time, with Adam at the wheel. There had been talk of getting a professional driver, but the insurance company said they didn’t have to and Jamie was pretty sure they were both relieved. Crazy as it seems, he trusts Adam more than a stranger, even a professional.
The first test, the zig zags, wasn’t too bad. He got thrown off during the second one and Adam quickly stopped the car.
“Dude, tell me you’re okay?” Adam said as he rolled down the window.
“Oh, I’m fine. That was kind of thrilling,” he replied. And maybe he shouldn’t have been quite so encouraging, he thought, as Adam pulled through a long curve and slung him off again. This time his body snapped more and he struggled to get his feet under him against the car.
“How you doin’ there, brother?” Adam called out the window even before the car had stopped.
“I’m... doing okay. That’s kinda hard,” he said. Which brought them to the stage of the experiment that he was guaranteed to feel tomorrow - the sudden stop. Even at only 25mph the stop felt brutal. He flew forward and swung up short when the safety track ended. “I’m fine,” he heard himself say as he tried to clear his vision enough to find Adam behind the windshield.
He heard a car door open and Adam, a little panicked, “Are you okay?” Oh, he was facing the wrong way.
“I’m okay,” he repeated, and pushed himself around to settle on the hood so he could see Adam. “Well, I think that test is done.”
“I think so,” Adam laughed, relieved.
“I’m actually seeing some stars from that,” Jamie said.
Later, after the medic had checked him out, he got to exact a little revenge on Adam, who seemed to weather the force of the turns considerably better from his position on the hood. Jamie felt pretty good while he was driving the car, and after, while loading everything into the trucks. It wasn’t until he got out of the truck back at M5 that his back started to scream, loud and clear.
He inhaled sharply, which got Adam’s attention. Adam has the peculiar gift of looking like he is never paying attention while being the most observant person Jamie knows.
Adam frowned, “Your back?” Jamie nodded and walked into the shop before Adam could say anything else.
They were the last two in the shop that night. Jamie listened to the banks of lights shut down, one after another. “Night, Adam,” he said.
“Dude, let me help you with your back.” Adam said sincerely.
Jamie was already walking away and he didn’t stop. “Think I’d prefer a feminine touch. Night,” he was glad he was facing away so Adam couldn’t see his face. He’d just go home, take some Ibuprofen and chill with the dog on the couch and it would all be fine tomorrow. He walked out to his truck stiffly, leaving Adam to frown after him.
The next morning Jamie wasn’t sure how he got out of bed, much less into the shop. When he’d first rolled over he made a sound so pained that his dog leapt off the bed and hid underneath. Once in his office he sat carefully, trying to mitigate the white hot flares of pain every time he flexed his back. He heard Adam’s slightly spastic footsteps approach and pause at the door, then come in and shut it behind him.
“Dude, seriously,” Adam said, and Jamie didn’t have the wits or the inclination to complain as Adam helped him stand up (he counted to three under his breath and then lifted with his arms around Jamie and his hands clasped in the small of his back) and led him to the couch. Jamie unbuttoned his starched white shirt, wiggled out of his t-shirt and laid down while Adam disappeared briefly.
This position was better. It was painless enough for him to actually think, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Even though he trusted Adam implicitly he wasn’t sure how he felt about Adam touching him in a not-for-science sort of way. Adam has this problem with boundaries - once a line has been crossed once he never thinks twice about crossing it again and again. Jamie liked to keep his space from, well, everyone. The physical familiarity of friendship that Adam seemed to embody made him uncomfortable, so he purposefully kept a little distance from the crew. Unfortunately, Adam was about to blow through any remaining distance that had been between them, but at this point Jamie didn’t have a choice.
Adam returned, and Jamie heard the soft rumble of one of the low, rolling shop stools and as Adam pushed himself along. He always gripes at him for rolling around on them like that, it’s not good for the wheels. He shut the door and rolled himself up to the couch, one knee brushed Jamie’s ribs as he swiveled, snapped a cap open and drizzled something wet and cold onto Jamie’s back. Jamie resisted the urge to shrink away from the cold.
Jamie recognized the smell as baby oil as soon as Adam started spreading it around. They keep it in the shop because it’s incredibly useful, although Jamie wasn’t exactly anticipating this. Adam started to work steadily at Jamie’s lower back.
“Look, I know you guys broke up, okay?” Adam said abruptly. “Don’t suffer because you’re stubborn.” Jamie kept his face turned stoically into the crease of the couch back and Adam didn’t say anything else.
****
They wrapped “Unarmed and Unharmed,” a myth where they were both - literally - pulling the trigger on the other, a few months later at noon on a Friday. High on the satisfaction of a job well done, Jamie sent everyone home early after they cleaned up and he and Adam just had to return a few last items to their places in the famous wall of boxes before they’d get to leave the shop at five for the first time in a long time.
Adam stood on one tine of the forklift with the box of odds and ends while Jamie operated the machine like an elevator. He had it about six feet off the ground when Adam suddenly said, “Wait, wait, I forgot to get the gun,” and started to jump off the lift. Somehow he tripped - maybe his shoelace caught - and fell forward instead. He threw his arm up to protect his head from the other tine. Jamie saw it in slow motion as he hit both his head and his arm on the steel bar and something made a crunch. He fell the rest of the way to the floor limply and lay there.
Jamie was off the forklift as soon as he’d moved it away and turned it off and he had his phone out dialing 911 before he even got to Adam. For a second Adam was disturbingly still, but then he groaned and opened his eyes. Just as the operator picked up he screamed.
Jamie rode in the ambulance with him. He had tried to call Adam’s wife from the shop but he only had their home number and no one answered. Instead he had to call the other shop, where fortunately Tory was still working, and get him to find the file of photocopied emergency medical forms, hoping Adam had put her cell on there.
Adam was semi-conscious on the way to the hospital. The EMTs were trying to keep him awake since he obviously had a concussion, but his right arm was bent in a sickening way that indicated it was broken in at least two places and the pain seemed to be causing him to black out for almost a minute at a time. Every time they hit a pothole or made a hard turn he screamed, short and sharp. Jamie’s not the hand-holding type, but still he felt too far away, sitting in the passenger seat as they raced to the emergency room. He couldn’t reach Adam at all, he could barely see the top of the head if he leaned all the way around his seat. He saw a crack in the pavement coming and his stomach twisted even before they hit it and Adam screamed again.
“Hang in there, brother,” he called through the opening. “I can see the hospital, we’re almost there.”
Sometime in the wee hours of the morning Jamie’s watch beeped to let him know it was time to wake Adam again. The nurses had tasked him with waking Adam every two hours, he suspected, primarily, to give him something to do besides worry. Jamie hadn’t actually been able to sleep yet, he’d watched the heart rate monitor and the lump on Adam’s forehead instead. He imagined he could see the lump growing, but knew it wasn’t. He leaned toward the bed and shook Adam’s shoulder. It took a few tries but eventually Adam’s eyes opened, first clouded by sleepy confusion and then sharp with pain. “What happened?” he asked immediately, the same question he’d asked every time Jamie had woken him. “Am I going to be okay?” “How long do I have to stay here?”
Jamie’s answers were the same. Accident at the shop. Yes. They’re going to evaluate for surgery in the morning. Jamie decided it was time to ask his own question.
“Adam... why, uh- why am I your emergency contact?” Adam got a panicked look.
“Did you call my wife?” he asked immediately.
“No,” Jamie said, and Adam relaxed. The number had been there, on the sheet, with a couple of lines marked through it and Jamie’s number written above. He’d had Tory dictate it to him anyway and he’d put it in his cell, but decided not to make any more calls until Adam was awake. Jamie cleared his throat. “No one answered at home,” he said.
“Yeah... she and the boys are away this weekend.” He didn’t sound finished, Jamie waited. Adam studied his temporarily trussed up arm. “We split up a few weeks ago,” he said finally.
“Your boys?” Jamie asked.
“She’s taken them for now, till the court decides.” Jamie’s face must have shown confusion because he explained. “She legally adopted them, so they’re as much hers as mine.”
Jamie patted his good arm awkwardly in a way that he hoped projected sympathy and solidarity. “Get some sleep,” he said. “I’m waking you up again in two hours,” and he set his watch.
That moment in the early morning must have been a turning point for Adam because, although they never talked about it again, Adam clearly remembered telling him about his impending divorce. A couple of weeks later, before he’d even destroyed his first cast (he would eventually require three re-castings, in all) he threw himself into dating with the same recklessness and drive he applied to everything else. He returned to the shop day after day with new love bites. And while he seemed to have no problem finding a girl for every night, he didn’t seem to be able to keep any of them. Jamie thought maybe he didn’t want to.
****
It was soon after the cast finally came off that Adam entered the shop bright and early, whistling jauntily as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Jamie watched through the windows of his office as he pulled his hoodie over his head to hang it up. The friction rucked his shirt up in the back revealing dark bruises, some round and some long and thin, all of them large. That can’t be good, Jamie thought and went out to ask what the hell happened. When Adam saw him he waved and smiled, then turned on the band saw, drowning Jamie out. Jamie noticed thin purple bruises encircling his wrists, peeking out between his gloves and long shirt sleeves as he guided a sheet of wood.
He returned to his office determined not to ask questions he’d rather not know the answer to and, out of habit, ripped the next page off his day-by-day calendar. There, next to his Obscure Word of the Day (phrontistery (n) - a thinking place), was a pen sketch of Jamie with a lamp shade on his head and a note, decorated by highlighter-yellow stars.
Jamie’s not one to wait around, he prefers to say what he means when he means it. So, instead of waiting till the end of the day to approach Adam he went out and motioned him to stop the band saw.
“Let’s hang out tonight. We can finally get drunk, for reasons besides science,” he said. Adam stared.
“Me and you? We never hang out after work. I have... other plans tonight anyway.”
“Do they involve women or 10-year-olds?” Jamie asked flatly. Adam’s expressions soured.
“Fuck you, Jamie. Fuck you and your prying, holier than thou, I’m-divorced-and-I’m-okay bull shit.” Adam said passionately. He didn’t shout, but he might as well have. He threw down his gloves and left the shop in a huff. Jamie heard his truck burn out of the parking lot.
He stood there for a minute before he went back into his office and ripped the top sheet off his calendar. “Twins’ Birthday. PAR-TAY!” it said in Adam’s handwriting. He put it in his second desk drawer with the others.
It had been nearly a year before, before either of them were single, when Jamie had grabbed the calendar and a handful of pens at the last minute on the way to a meeting. He always remembered to bring something to keep Adam busy, otherwise the meetings were torture for both of them. Adam had gone through and marked important days, from Thank-God-I-Didn’t-Die-When-I-Broke-My-Neck-That-One-Time Day to Day of Remembrance for the Cement Truck.
Jamie sighed, readjusted his beret and went to fire up the band saw and do some work.
Adam called him at 3 a.m., two hours before his alarm clock would have gone off.
“Jamie, I need help. I didn’t know who else to call.” Jamie thought, Of course you need help, but he didn’t say anything; he swung his legs out of bed and reached for his glasses and jeans. His dog, who’d been sharing the bed with him, rolled over and gave him a look that said ‘And just where the hell do you think you’re going?’
“What is it?”
“I had a wreck. I need you to come with a trailer and get me and the car before anyone comes by.”
“...You mean before any cops see you?”
“Fine, you caught me, now will you come get me?” Adam gave him his approximate location and Jamie hung up.
“Duty calls, buddy. Be back later,” he said. The dog laid her head on Jamie’s pillow and settled back in. Not for the first time, Jamie thought that a dog’s life wouldn’t be so bad after all.
He had to go by the shop to get his trailer and a winch, so it was just past 4 a.m. by the time his headlights glinted across a creased bumper at the edge of the trees that lined the highway. He slowed down in the shoulder and backed the trailer up toward the car. He saw Adam appear in his rearview mirror, illuminated by the red glow of tail lights, and direct him with waves of his hands. He had a bloody cut over one eye and mud on his arms and no jacket. He looked cold.
They got the trailer into position and Jamie got out to take a look at the car. It was totaled, completely. Adam had plowed over a ditch and gone head first into a couple of sturdy trees which had creased the hood and crumpled the sides. The airbag was hanging out of the driver’s door; it had blood on it.
Jamie unhooked the trailer and brought his truck around the back of the car. It was difficult to see with only the headlights to go by and their breath made clouds as they worked in silence to hook the rear axle to Jamie’s pickup so he could pull it away from the tree. Once the car was freed they attached the winch to the front axle and begin pulling it onto the trailer, using the bank of the ditch as a ramp. Watching him in the mirror, Jamie noticed that Adam was steady and accurate as he guided him back to the trailer hitch. He remembered the time he slapped Adam (for science!) to see if it would sober him up. A punch from an airbag would probably have a similar effect, he thought.
“Thanks,” Adam said finally when they were safely on the road back to San Francisco, with the sun just beginning to turn the sky pink ahead.
“What were you doing?” Jamie asked. Adam sighed heavily.
“I was with this... friend of mine and we were drinking - a lot, obviously - and I saw that my friend had pictures of their kids around and I- I wanted to see my boys.” There was a long pause, during which Jamie could feel himself getting worked up. “It was dumb, okay? I know,” Adam said.
“Stupid,” Jamie corrected. “Driving drunk is stupid... Fuck. Adam!” he exclaimed, exasperated to the point of incoherency. He felt more than a little angry and now that the task at hand was done, leaving only the long ride back home, the reality of the twisted metal and broken windows was starting to set in with a tidal wave of anxiety and concern. Adam once noted, a little too astutely, that when Jamie encounters strong emotions he’s reduced to the mentality of a 12-year-old. He feels that way now, he wants to curse and yell, to go slam the door to his room and play the music loud until the grown-ups get their act to together.
“You could have died, Adam. Not in a every-moment-could-be-your-last metaphorical sense, but literally, immediately. Someday you’ll get your day and court and this custody thing will be sorted out. It’d be a fucking shame for those boys to grow up without a dad.” Jamie glanced over at Adam, but he was looking away, out the window. He had his arms wrapped tight around himself, fresh bruises parallel to the one he’d had that morning. Jamie aimed his heat vents toward Adam.
“You should never have tried to go there drunk, but wanting to see your kids on their birthday? I was seriously concerned when I thought you didn’t care.” Adam gave him a faint smile and leaned his head against the window, Jamie wondered belatedly if he was very injured.
Adam was asleep in the truck when Jamie backed the trailer into a garage bay at M5 and unhooked it. He pulled the rolling door down and padlocked it so no one could get inside. Then he drove them to his house, because it was closer. It was 6:30 a.m. when he woke Adam and made him walk ahead of him up the stairs into the house. Adam wavered only a little.
“Sit down and let me look at that cut.” Jamie said and headed to the laundry room for a first aid kit. Adam touched his head and seemed surprised to find blood on his hand.
He sat obediently, and as still as Jamie had ever seen him, at the kitchen table while Jamie rinsed the cut, first with water and then hydrogen peroxide. He made butterfly band aids out of cloth tape and pulled the sides of the gash together.
“This is going to scar unless you get stitches.”
“That’s okay, I need to remember it.”
As soon as Jamie moved back Adam stood up. “Why don’t you, uh, get some rest?” Jamie asked, indicating the bedroom with a nod.
“Actually, I’d really like a shower.”
Jamie laid out clean briefs, pajama pants, and a t-shirt and retreated to the kitchen, suddenly starving. He poked around the fridge and pantry for a while, these days there were more takeout boxes than anything, though. Finally he settled on grilled cheese sandwiches - bread, butter and processed cheese product being three of the only staple food items on hand. He was just polishing off his second sandwich when he heard a loud bump followed by Adam’s curse.
He knocked twice, “Adam?”
“Yeah?”
Jamie pushed the door open, “You okay?”
Adam was under the covers already, sprawled on his back with his hands curled in loose fists lying on either side of his head. He looked like a child, except for the line of bandages on his head and the purple marks on his wrists. “Just a stubbed toe,” he said and yawned.
Jamie cleared his throat, “Adam, your friend, what does she do to you?”
Adam’s reply was muffled because he’d turned his head into the pillow and seemed about to drop off any moment.
“What?” Jamie asked.
“He,” Adam enunciated. “I sleep with dudes. And he doesn’t do anything I don’t want.” Even though Adam was falling-down tired, and his inhibitions were lowered due to the alcohol and trauma, Jamie knew that he wasn’t nearly as nonchalant as he seemed. For one thing, the pulse point at his neck was twitching visibly and quickly. Much like Jamie’s.
“Sleep well, Adam,” Jamie said. “I’m going to go ahead and wake you up every couple hours, just in case.” He closed the curtains - floral drapes his wife left behind - and paused by the bed to clasp Adam on the shoulder before closing the door.
He stuck his hand into his pocket and felt the key to the padlock that guarded Adam’s smashed car. He was Adam’s secret keeper, and, although more by keen observation than his own disclosure, Adam was his. He put the key under the empty fruit bowl and took a mug of coffee down to his basement shop to tinker and think.
****
Adam
It was mid afternoon when Adam woke up feeling like he’d been run over by a truck. Every muscle protested when he rolled over and sat up and his head was stale and achy. He limped through the house leaning on furniture and found Jamie on the back deck taking a staple gun to some canvas. Jamie looked up at the sound of the sliding door. He was wearing those dark sunglasses that, along with the beret and mustache, make him look like a steampunk pirate.
“Mending some sails, Matey?”
“It’s for you, actually.” Jamie said. He stood up and held the contraption out so Adam could see. “How do you feel?”
“Sore. I’ll live. What is it?”
“It’s a... a weighted poncho, basically. My wife’s sister had boys with ADD and she swore by weighted vests and stuff so I just thought, you know-”
“Aw, Jamie,” Adam immediately began trying pulling it over his head. “You made me a lead Snuggie!” Adam managed to get it onto his head but couldn’t get it any farther because he couldn’t lift his arms past his shoulders.
“Well, you know it’s not literally lead, it’s poly pellets-” Jamie grumbled and Adam felt his hands reaching through the sleeve to find his own hand and gently guide it through. When his face finally came into view Adam could tell he was pleased, and a little embarrassed.
“Jamie, don’t ruin my fun. I’m going to wear it all time!” He did shimmy to settle it and then grimaced. He turned to look at himself in the glass doors. It certainly wasn’t the most visually appealing thing Jamie had ever made. “I look a bit like a mad scientist. Did you ever see ‘Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along-Blog’?”
“Maybe we should make a weighted track suit or something instead; that was meant to be a prototype.”
“I like it. Hey, do you have any food?” Adam asked, and headed into the kitchen to rummage.
They ordered take out and ate it sitting in the living room.
“You know, M5 is probably the easiest place in the state to launder a crashed vehicle without raising suspicion,” Jamie said seriously.
Adam laughed so suddenly he almost got fried rice in his nose. He quickly subsided into giggles, clutching his burning abs. They didn’t talk about the other things, which confirmed Adam’s suspicion that everything was okay; Jamie didn’t think they needed to.
***
Adam wasn’t sure exactly when the anniversary of Jamie’s breakup was. He had it narrowed down to about a week, but that was his best guess. He brought a 750mL of Makers Mark to the shop at the beginning of the week and hid it in his desk in case of emergencies. He’d been primarily wearing the weighted coat at home because it would look funny on TV, but it really was soothing. So, in honor of Jamie’s potentially frayed nerves he brought it to work, too, and wore it in the shop the entire week, trying to be on his very best behavior. All he could do was keep his eyes and ears open and wait.
On Friday morning he was in the kitchen talking to an intern when he heard Jamie swearing, uncharacteristically loud. He poked his head into the shop just in time to see him storm into his office red faced after throwing a multi tool to the floor.
He retrieved the booze and followed Jamie into his office, setting the bottle down heavily on the edge of Jamie’s desk.
“Wanna call it a day and go get drunk?” Adam asked.
“That sounds like the best idea you’ve had all month,” Jamie replied.
Adam let the crew know they were getting a day off while Jamie waited in his new truck.
“My place or yours?” Adam asked. Jamie chose Adam’s, which was farther away, but under the circumstances Adam wasn’t surprised.
By noon they were planted on the floor of Adam’s house, already pretty trashed. Jamie leaned his head back against Adam’s new futon and stared at the blank walls.
“So, you sleep with men? How did I not know that about you? I thought I knew everything about you. You have, like, too-much-information Tourette’s or something.”
Adam chuckled. Past a certain level of drunkenness it was like all the words Jamie normally kept inside started coming out at once. He also lost his slight stutter and frequent ‘um’s. “I don’t know. It just wasn’t a big deal because I was married and it didn’t matter. And then, after... at first I just neglected to tell you and then it became like I was making some kind of statement by keeping it a secret or something. I don’t know.” They sat in silence for a moment; he focused on the muted episode of “How I Met Your Mother” on the TV. Someone had a marathon on.
“When I lived in New York, not long after high school, I hung out with all these film school kids that I met before I dropped out of the drama program at NYU. I built sets for them in between other jobs. They comprised, like, the entirety of my social circle. You can imagine what it was like... all these artistic, visionary, passionate, beautiful people hanging out and living together. And of course, we were primarily gay and bi-sexuals, we failed to buck that stereotype. I’d never really thought about it before - what I was or who I wanted to be with - but it just made sense that it didn’t matter if it was a girl or a guy or whatever. ...And we had a blast, let me tell you.” He couldn’t help smiling just thinking about those days of weed, and sex, and art. He turned his head toward Jamie, “And then I got married and grew up. Believe it or not, I’ve matured a lot.”
“I do,” Jamie said. “Was that why your marriage ended? Something about you and men?” Apparently Jamie had lost his filter, too. This was way drunker than they had ever gotten on the show.
“No,” Adam felt himself frown. “It was my fault though. I was never there, you know? Never consistent enough or patient enough or whatever-enough.” Jamie straightened up and leaned so that his face came into Adam’s field of view. His eyebrows were pinched down: concerned. “She said it was like being married to a super ball. Always exciting, but never the same. Never going in the same direction for more than a moment.” Adam watched Jamie’s face as he talked. Jamie’s expression changed subtly to one Adam couldn’t quite pin down and he handed him a shot.
“Weren’t you always like that?” He asked.
“Yeah.” Adam downed the shot and made a face. They needed more variety of booze. “I just don’t know how you handle it, man. How you keep going on like nothing happened. No one at the shop even knows you two split up. I don’t think there’s anyone in California who’s missed my divorce.”
Jamie shook his head and laughed. His laugh trailed off with a funny little hitch at the end. “I am so not okay,” he chuckled again, interrupted by a less-than-manly hiccup. “I’m just not quite as expressive about it as you are. I’ve drank more in the past year than in my entire life previously, including college. And I was a liberal arts student, so I practically majored in alcohol consumption.”
“I’ve started paying people to tie me down and do things to me,” Adam began and paused to fortify himself with a stuttering inhale. “Sometimes they knock me around, sometimes they fuck me. I spend more time with them then I do my friends.” Adam’s heart beat fast as he confessed. He knew the only reason he was able to admit to it was the enormous amount of booze supplementing his courage.
Jamie looked him in the eye, which under the circumstances was a little unnerving. “Why do you do that?”
“I don’t know.” Adam searched, and then began haltingly to explain, “I- There was some experimentation back in New York, but nothing like this. I just feel so responsible for what happened with my wife, and now my boys are gone, and I just- I think it feels good not to be in control. I feel so much better after. For a while, anyway.”
“You know, we have a straight jacket at the shop. I could tie you up. In fact I’d be happy to; it would be safer.”
It hadn’t occurred to Adam that Jamie might not question his needs, only his methods. He was taken aback. “I- That might work. You’d do that for me? It’s all so mixed up now, I don’t know. I think there’s something to be said for-” he hesitated.
“For taking it up the ass while you’re tied up?” Jamie said dryly and perfectly seriously, and Adam just had to laugh. He burst out cackling, because he could never in a million years have pictured Jamie saying that sentence. Jamie, for his part, blushed bright red and almost cracked a smile, as if he’d just realized what he said.
Adam was getting a little twitchy from thinking about - talking about - his proclivities. He hadn’t been out at all this week because he’d been so focused on observing Jamie and not upsetting him. He also felt distinctly too sober as the adrenaline cleansed his system. He hoisted himself, unsteadily and went to the kitchen to fetch the rum. He did two shots before he went back to the living room.
“What’s the matter?” Jamie asked when he returned and slid down to the floor in front of the futon.
“Nothing, just got the itch a little.” He rolled his neck, “Been a long week waiting for you to crack and show some emotion.” Jamie watched him steadily.
Adam drummed his fingers on the table, cracked his knuckles and looked around the room for help. He really regretted right now that he’d left his snuggie at work, and it didn’t help that he was with Jamie, who he’d had more than a couple of fantasies about, and his inhibitions were lowered. He pulled a couple of heavy blankets off the futon and draped them over himself, but it didn’t do much to curb the itch that was getting worse at an alarming rate.
“God, Jamie,” he said desperately, “I wish you’d punch me or something.” He avoided looking at Jamie.
Jamie didn’t punch him. Instead he made a few very economical movements and tackled Adam to the floor, pinning him flat on his back. Adam found that being restrained under Jamie’s compact, muscular form was surprisingly effective. And more than a little comforting. He exhaled and relaxed, dropping his head back to the floor.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Adam.” Jamie said seriously, raising his head off Adam’s chest to look at him. “I’m not that guy.”
Adam struggled futilely twice, just a token effort of resistance, and then subsided, content. They lay like that for so long that Adam was beginning to think Jamie had passed out. Fine by him, he had no desire to move.
“I just hate seeing her stuff everywhere, you know?” Jamie said suddenly. Adam opened his eyes but could only see the top of Jamie’s bald head, resting on his chest. He’d lost his beret somehow. “The couch, the drapes, the fucking salad bowls. But it would be impractical to throw it all out.”
Adam snickered. Because of course Jamie would be practical about it. Adam had the opposite problem, himself. He got to keep the house but his wife took everything that was in it. He had a futon, a bed, a TV and a dish set from Goodwill. His hundreds of movie prop replicas and oddities were scattered around on the floor with no coffee tables or floating shelves to display them on.
“I can imagine,” Adam said to Jamie after what he realized was an awfully long lapse. Jamie didn’t seem to notice, just settled in further. “Hey, you should move in here. You can restrain me when I get crazy and we could combine our stuff. Anything we have duplicates of we could donate yours to that new intern who just moved here. Kari was saying she doesn’t have any furniture and she eats off paper towels.” Adam said. He talked so quickly he out-ran his brain, he began to regret saying anything as soon as it caught up to his mouth. Of course sensible Jamie wouldn’t want to agree to that. They’d never even really hung out before tonight.
“My place is nicer and closer to work, but if you moved in we’d need some ground rules. Like, no clutter in the shared living space. And wash your fucking dishes.” Jamie said. Adam leaned up suddenly and dislodged Jamie from his chest.
“Seriously?” he said. Jamie looked up at him, the remains of the bottle of Makers Mark was just beside his ear.
“If you make my house look like you’re corner of the shop at work, I will kick you to the curb so fast-“
“I promise, I promise. I can be clean. It’s harder to be neat, but I can do it.”
“Okay then, let’s do it,” Jamie said and smiled his off-camera smile, and when Adam lay back down he settled onto his chest again and they fell asleep that way.
****
They’d been living together for just over a month and Adam’s court date had come and gone. He would get to see the boys every other weekend and for the summer months, which wasn’t the same as always, but better than never. The arrangement with Jamie had worked out almost surprisingly well. He found that just having another person in the house at the end of the day kept him from going as crazy. Before he would rattle around in that empty house - like a bouncy ball, he thought - with no one to talk to, no one to see. Jamie was, naturally, a stabilizing influence.
As his first visiting weekend approached he’d been surprised to hear Jamie offer to go somewhere else for a couple days.
“Dude, it was your place first,” Adam responded.
“I know, but I don’t- I don’t mind. I know you’ve missed them a lot.”
“Yeah, but... No.” Adam said, he was still a little taken aback that Jamie had even offered. “Actually I was planning to take them to the beach Sunday anyway, to get out of the house.”
“Oh yeah. Yeah, great idea,” Jamie interrupted, as if it wasn’t March and still too cold to swim.
“I was hoping you’d come with us,” Adam continued. He bit his lip and waited for Jamie to answer.
“You think that’d be okay? I mean, you want me to go?”
“Yeah, I mean, you know... You’re a part of my life, and the boys have always liked you. I though you could help us design some bad-ass kites on Saturday to take out there.”
“okay,” Jamie said, “That actually sounds like a lot of fun.” He smiled wide, and Adam smiled, too.
And it was. Fun, that is. The boys loved Jamie as much as ever and they were only mildly thrown off by the new house. They were quickly won over when Jamie showed them the attic loft where they’d get to sleep. They thought it was a clubhouse. They did make some pretty killer kites, which only lasted until about lunch when both were lost during an airborne battle to the death. Then the boys thought it’d be a great idea to bury Adam up to his neck in the sand and Jamie was the man with a shovel in his truck.
They’d just finished tamping down the sand around Adam’s neck when the ex-wife pulled up to take them home - the beach was a more convenient exchange point than taking them back to the house. She was in a rush to go, so Jamie left Adam and carried the boys’ bags from his truck to her car. The kids were sad to go and made Jamie promise they’d come to the beach again next time. Adam had to wave goodbye by bobbing his head a little awkwardly and all too quickly they were gone and it was just he and Jamie on the beach in the fading light.
Adam sighed happily as he strained his neck to watch Jamie walking back toward him over the sand. “I never knew you were so great with kids!” he said. “I can’t imagine this weekend having gone better.”
“I do like kids, I just never really got the opportunity to have them around much,” Jamie said, and Adam wanted to remember to ask him later why that was. But right now, there was something he thought he had to say.
“You know, I have kind of a huge crush of you, and you’re really not helping me out much.” It was the perfect moment, and somehow it was easier to say it to Jamie’s shoe and shin, which were the only parts of him within his field of vision. Jamie didn’t say anything for a while - too long. “Can you dig me up now so we can go,” Adam asked uncomfortably, feeling disappointed even though he shouldn’t be surprised. What did he expect, after all?
“I promised your boys I’d leave you there for a while,” Jamie said. He sighed and sat down hard in the sand beside Adam. If he squinted Adam could make out his profile from the corner of his eye.
“Well...” Adam said after a minute passed. He was bad with uncomfortable silences, just had to fill them. He was about two seconds away from telling a dirty joke or breaking into song when Jamie spoke.
“I thought that you think that I’m boring, and stiff?” Adam just looked at him. “And weird. You use the Attenborough voice and talk about me like I’m some bizarre animal.”
“Wait, does that mean you’re actually considering this? I thought you were straight?” Adam said, shocked.
“A few of my relationships before my wife were with men,” he said dismissively. “Once, when we filmed ‘Brandy vs. Hypothermia’ you said that the little alien that operates the Jamie robot was going to crawl out of my mouth and go looking for a warmer host. And they aired it. And you always make fun of my mustache.”
It took Adam a few seconds to recall that time in the freezer, “Dude, I can’t believe you remember that!”
“It hurt my feelings,” Jamie said simply. He was drawing meandering lines in the sand with his finger.
“Well, I’m sorry,” Adam felt like his was flailing. All his assumptions about Jamie were quickly unraveling. “Geez, I never meant to be mean, I was trying to have fun. I think you’re awesome. You know that, right?”
Jamie made a noncommittal ‘mmph’ sound.
“Seriously, you’re a genius. And you make fun of us all the time, you’re just so smart about it that we can’t tell. I lo- I like it that you’re so different and you don’t give a damn what anyone else thinks. I wish I could be that way, I’ve done some really stupid stuff to get attention. I’m sorry if you didn’t know, I’m just not very good at being sincere.”
“Yeah... so I noticed.” Jamie said. Adam looked toward him, he was squinting up at the sky like he was thinking. Adam focused on the cool confines of the sand and how nice it felt so that he wouldn’t be tempted to interrupt.
“You really don’t think I’m boring? You addressed me as Oh Boring One once on camera. I know that I can come across as kind of dry.”
Adam sputtered. “Jamie! You have a degree in Russian linguistics, you’ve worked as a diver and boat captain, concrete inspector, pet shop owner, prop builder, and god-knows what else. How could you be boring? You’re the most interesting person I know.” Adam thought Jamie might be blushing, but it was hard to tell in silhouette and it was getting darker. Adam studied the sand clinging to the toe of Jamie’s boot.
“Don’t you think I’m reckless and infuriating?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Jamie said. “And brilliant.”
Calmly, Jamie removed his beret and then Adam’s glasses which he placed inside. Adam closed his eyes reflexively as Jamie’s fingers grazed his temples. He heard him shifting and then Jamie leaned over and kissed him, gently, kneeling on the sand. He’d removed his own glasses, too, Adam noticed, right before he got distracted by the prickle of Jamie’s mustache and warmth of his lips. The kiss was passionate but chaste. Jamie didn’t try to take it any further, but Adam did. He licked Jamie’s mouth and tried to turn his head sideways for better access, which Jamie somewhat hesitantly granted. Then he wrapped one broad hand around the back of Adam’s head, and that felt really good.
Shortly they broke apart and Jamie leaned back on his heels, too far away for Adam to see. Without his glasses Jamie can still see fairly well, but without his glasses Adam sees only colors and light, which is why he prefers not to wear them when he does funny personas for myth introductions. Only one thing embarrasses Adam, and it’s scripted acting. There’s a reason he’s always been a behind the scenes guy before. Jamie knows that, Adam thought as he panted slightly and waited. Jamie knows a lot of things about Adam that no one else does.
“Could you dig me up now, I’d really like to be able to use my hands.” Adam said toward the anomalous color blob a few feet away. Jamie chuckled and the blob moved a little.
“I can think of a few things to do with you right there. And you’d probably enjoy it too,” Jamie said, and Adam swore he could hear it in his voice that Jamie was blushing. He had to be.
Adam felt himself blush all the way up to his hair, skin suddenly flushed hot against the cold sand.
“Seriously though,” Jamie said and he swooped in to give Adam a quick peck that he didn’t see coming, “okay.”
He returned Adam’s glasses and replaced his beret before grabbing the shovel and starting to dig.
Jamie found a towel for Adam to sit on in the truck on the ride back and once they arrived ordered him to strip off his sandy clothes, which was all of them, on the porch and not track sand in the house. Adam did and wrapped the towel around his waist on the way to the shower.
“Aren’t you going to come with me?” He asked Jamie with a grin as he passed him in the kitchen. Jamie blushed.
“Where I come from we do this right. Get cleaned up and I’ll take you out to dinner. Candles and, uh, conversation and everything.”
“Seriously?” Adam laughed, “Don’t you feel like we’ve been dating for like ten years? ‘Cause I do. And when have you ever been one for casual conversation?”
Jamie frowned. “I know I have a problem with... revealing things about myself. When I’m in a relationship with someone I have to make an effort to share information. I was going to make an effort.”
Adam stepped closer to Jamie and clasped him on one shoulder, the other hand still holding up his towel. “I know, Jamie. But I don’t think it’d be good for us to try and force it. You just tell me stuff when you want to. I can figure out most of the important things on my own, and besides, I think it’s kind of cool and mysterious. You never cease to surprise me.” He moved his other hand to Jamie’s shoulder and his towel started to slip, he turned to the side to pin it against Jamie’s hip. “Better to let it happen naturally, don’t you think?”
Jamie was still red, and from this close Adam could feel his heart beating a fast pace and hear him breathe. He wasn’t just embarrassed, he was turned on. “I- I guess so,” he replied and let Adam lead him to the bathroom.
Adam had seen Jamie in his underwear before on a slightly disturbing number of occasions. He’d painted him with gold latex, even smeared him with tomato juice in a memorable pair of black briefs. The high incidence of semi-nudity might cause one to wonder what sort of a TV show they’re making.
Still, he felt nervous as he started the water running and waited for Jamie to get undressed in the bedroom. Normally Adam didn’t wear his glasses in the shower, he used a bar soap that was bright teal and always made sure his shampoo had a brightly colored cap so he wouldn’t have to. For that reason, he was leaning against the counter, dressed only in his black-framed glasses and wreathed in shower steam when Jamie opened the bathroom door.
Jamie still had his briefs on and he colored at the sight of Adam without his. He halted just inside the door and it was up to Adam to walk toward him. He turned Jamie around by his shoulder, looked at him from all side - really looked, the way he hadn’t been able to when they were filming. Jamie remained tense but passive, watching Adam’s eyes.
“Will you get more aggressive if we keep doing this?” Adam asked as he slid his thumbs under the elastic of Jamie’s briefs and pushed them off.
“Yes,” Jamie said thickly, and brushed Adam’s hip as he walked past him into the shower. Adam took his glasses off and left them on the counter, then followed Jamie and shut the door.
Without his glasses it was easy for Adam to get bolder, he hoped Jamie would speak up if he did anything he objected to. He located the bar of soap easily enough and started lathering Jamie’s chest which was thick with hair. He would get brief glimpses of Jamie’s expression whenever he got within about 6 inches of his face, every time he did Jamie was staring back at him. Adam thought his vital signs were better indicators at the moment, anyway. He could feel Jamie’s heart pounding and, when he ran one hand down to check, his cock was definitely getting interested. Jamie gasped when Adam touched him. It had been a long time for both of them.
Jamie retrieved his own soap, some kind of antibacterial liquid, and rubbed it between both hands. He started exploring Adam’s chest without even a pretence of cleaning, running his fingers gently over Adam’s ribs and around his sides. Adam giggled, “That tickles!” This seemed to only encourage Jamie, who proceeded to mercilessly discover all his most ticklish ribs - and Adam has several. When he relented Adam was sprawled on the shower’s floor more or less between Jamie’s legs.
Adam got to his knees and brought his face close enough to Jamie’s groin to actually see him. He heard Jamie’s breath catch above him and, yeah, this was only going one place. He wondered briefly if giving head was one of those things like riding a bicycle (you never forget), as he stroked Jamie a few times. Jamie leaned back heavily against the shower wall but didn’t make a sound. Adam decided he was going to make getting sounds out of Jamie a personal goal. Toward that end, he leaned up and took him in as deeply as he could without warning.
Jamie did something that might have been a groan but, even if it was, was too quiet to be satisfying. Adam laved his tongue around Jamie’s cock and tried experimentally to push past his gag reflex. Guess there are some thing you never forget, he thought, and, thank god I learned something in college.
Jamie continued to breathe heavily while Adam bobbed up and down enthusiastically and did everything he could think of to get him to break. Adam happened to know that he is (or had been, at least) really good at giving head. Jamie’s iron will was hurting his pride a little bit. Before he was ready to give up he felt Jamie tugging on his hair urgently. He chose to ignore him and kept going, swallowing around Jamie’s cock. There was no way Jamie would be able to stay silent much longer.
The tugging got more insistently and finally Jamie pleaded with a stuttered “Adam...” God, Jamie sounded like his was right on the edge. The sound of Jamie’s voice, so uncharacteristically out of control, saying Adam’s name like that, had Adam abruptly more interested in getting them both there, together, than anything else.
He stood up and pressed close to Jamie, close enough to see his flushed cheek and his mouth hanging slightly open. “Help a brother out?” he said, and Jamie brought his trembling hand - conveniently he had gotten more soap - to Adam’s and stroked them both. Adam shuddered and thrust erratically into the soap slick inside Jamie’s hip. Jamie did make a soft “Oh,” at that and grabbed Adam’s shoulders. Adam tugged Jamie’s hips closer and kept thrusting, with Jamie’s cock rubbing hard against his stomach they both quickly reached their climax. They shuddered and clung together, Adam knew he groaned loudly but Jamie didn’t make a sound.
Adam leaned against Jamie and kissed him, Jamie kissed back languidly. Adam was enjoying the feeling of Jamie under him and the water hitting his back, planning his next assault on Jamie’s iron resolve, until Jamie separated them by pushing Adam back.
“Okay, now we definitely need the soap,” he said, referring the sticky mess between their bellies.
“We’re in a shower, it’ll just wash off,” Adam said and stepped back into the water stream. “See? Done.”
“Uh-uh,” Jamie said. “Wash, with soap.”
Adam was all set to launch into an argument about the relative merits of cum and soap when Jamie reached out and started to spread soap on his stomach.
Come to think of it, he had no objection at all.
****
Jamie
“Dance with me,” Adam said. They were out on the porch eating grilled fish and rice, the first meal Jamie had cooked in this house since before his wife left.
“I don’t dance,” Jamie replied, but he could feel himself smiling.
“What? Sure you do, I’ve seen it.”
Jamie had been known to dance - he did a pathetically white-boy combination of the robot and the club dancing he saw on TV. It looked funny, but it came from the heart. Truth be told it felt good to try expressing emotions physically, something he normally never did, but he was only able to do it from within the insulating confines of a fire suit, or the red man suit or a shark cage underwater.
“I know you normally only do it when you feel like no one can see you,” apparently Adam was adding mind reading to his list of talents, Jamie thought. Adam continued, “But it’s just you and me here, no one else can see us.”
“I know, but I just don’t. I don’t dance.”
“Try,” Adam said and went to turn up the radio that was sitting on the porch rail. A slow song was on. “You trust me?”
“Of course,” Jamie said as he reluctantly allowed Adam to pull him to his feet. “I don’t think I can though, Adam. I’m not like you, I’m not,” he searched for the right word, “exuberant. I don’t let my emotions go on display.”
Adam pulled him into a hug, arms around his shoulders, and started swaying his hips. Jamie buried his face in Adam’s neck, hands clasped loosely around his waist and stood stiffly.
“Try, Jamie,” Adam whispered in his ear. “We’ll start out with only slow songs. No one believes that you can’t but you.” He used his momentum to start Jamie swaying, too, and took a few small steps.
Jamie stumbled after Adam and tried to sway but he just couldn’t get the timing right.
Adam said, “Stop thinking so damn much.”
Jamie couldn’t stop, he felt hyper-focused on the moment and everything that he was doing wrong. He felt clumsy and embarrassed, two things which would normally guarantee he’d stop whatever he was doing and never try again. He was good at enough things not to pursue the stuff he was bad at.
Adam placed one hand in Jamie’s and held it at shoulder height, steering him, and the other on his hip; he kept moving, slowly. “The world is full of possibilities, Jamie. Why deprive yourself of any of them?”
“There are things that can’t be done,” he said stubbornly, now he was feeling petulant. He momentarily forgot to concentrate on his feet and was surprised seconds later to feel Adam guide him through a smooth turn past the tiki lantern, swaying magically in time.
Adam leaned back enough to look in his face and smirked at him, and now Jamie was reading minds, too. He knew exactly what Adam was about to say.
“Jamie Hyneman, I reject your reality and substitute my own.” Adam kept them going in a lazy circle until the song finished and Jamie tripped only once.