Work Text:
Jared had always been a good kid. Studied hard, paid attention in class, only ever had a few days off from school; so when he went off to college a fresh-faced, small-town Texas boy, he intended to carry on in much the same way as before. He wanted to concentrate on his law degree, wanted to do well and make his folks proud.
What he absolutely did not plan on doing was develop a hopeless, mortifying crush on the most popular fourth-year on campus. But, he had to admit, that’s kind of exactly what happened.
***
It totally wasn’t his fault. It’s not like he went looking for the guy or anything, hadn’t even given a thought to having any kind of relationship, and yet it started on the very first day he moved into his dorm. He’d insisted on making the journey alone – something to do with independence and making his own way in the world – so he was lumbered with the hefty task of carrying all his boxes from his beat-up car up the four flights of stairs to his room.
In an attempt to shorten the job, he was carrying three boxes at once, all stacked on top of each other as the muscles of his arms strained not to drop them. It was a pretty good plan, apart from the fact that he kinda couldn’t see where he was going at all, peeking over the very top of the boxes. As he came to the outside doors, he saw them begin to swing shut just as he was almost there. He cursed under his breath and made to budge it with his shoulder, when all of a sudden a pair of emerald green eyes appeared over the top of the uppermost box.
They were the prettiest eyes Jared had ever seen.
The owner of said prettiest eyes stood to the side, holding the door wide open for Jared. And damn, if the rest of him didn’t live up to them. Sandy, tousled hair, pouty lips, broad shoulders, a delicately golden tan sneaking down his arms from underneath the tight grey t-shirt he was wearing over worn jeans. He was perfectly proportioned where Jared was gangly, perfectly at ease where Jared was awkward.
Jared fumbled, mouth suddenly incapable of producing words. He just squeezed past awkwardly, trying not to brush up against the guy and hoping to hell he hadn’t noticed the scarlet tinge creeping into the tips of Jared’s ears.
Then, as quickly as he’d appeared and with nothing but another perfunctory smile he was gone, jogging ahead to catch up with his friends.
Jared stood shell-shocked as he watched him disappear, croaking out a belated, “Uh, thanks,” that went predictably unheard. Jared didn’t even know his name, and the guy barely spared half a second to look at him, but still he was left with sweaty palms and a dry mouth, heart thumping hopefully in his chest.
***
Of course, as these things always go, Jared saw him everywhere after that.
He learned that his name was Jensen pretty quickly – Jensen Ross Ackles, star of the football team, ridiculously talented drama student and all-round good guy. Everyone loved him, boys and girls alike, so much that Jared couldn’t understand why he never saw Jensen with anyone. He could have had his pick of anyone, but he was so independent of any kind of significant other that Jared couldn’t even guess if he was straight, gay or something in between.
What Jensen did seem to be, though, was in a million places all at once. And, painfully enough for Jared, he always seemed to show up at the precise same moment that Jared did something phenomenally embarrassing.
It was only about a week later that Jared saw him again. He’d been invited to a fresher’s party, but he only stayed long enough to get sufficiently wobbly on his feet. He wasn’t really into that kind of scene; but he was too polite to say no, so here he was, stumbling and veering a little from left to right and back again, trying to remember the way to his dorm.
He did find it eventually – although the concept of time was kind of melty just then, so he had no idea how long it took – and he tottered up the stairs to his room. Tried to, anyway; the toe of his shoe scuffed on the edge of a step, and he almost fell flat on his face, grabbing for the handrail in a panic and letting out a drunken yelp. He was mostly just concentrating on steadying himself, but a footstep or two from above made him look up through the middle of the square-spiralling stairs.
Jared was met with Jensen’s face – he was leaning on the rail about two floors up, pretty green eyes laughing down the stairwell at him, and as Jared watched dumbly, his lips quirked slowly, carefully, into a smile.
Jared opens his mouth, then abruptly closes it again, flushing a bright red on top of the already-tipsy pink of his cheeks as he unsteadily ducked out of sight under the stairs, alcohol-addled brain belatedly realising that Jensen had most probably already seen him. Jared stumbled the rest of the way to his room, flopping against the door when he closed it behind him.
“Goddamn it.”
***
“Hey, Jared, you want this?” Chad, a guy from Jared’s course, called over to him, even though the room was filled with a studious silence.
Sitting alone on a table in the corner, where he’d been waiting patiently for computer access in the crowded library, Jared looked up from the thick, leather-bound book his nose had previously been buried in. He nodded and thanked Chad in a hushed tone, closing the book and carrying it over to the station where Chad was logging off.
Suddenly, Jared stopped in his tracks, his heart shooting up to his throat and his fingers almost fumbling the book completely. Sitting at the computer directly next to the newly-free space was, of course, Jensen fucking Ackles, wearing yet another tight-fitting t-shirt and staring intently at the webpage he was scrolling through. Fuckfuckfuck, he looked so good and Jared was dressed in his slouchiest jeans and an old, soft hoodie too baggy to look anything except horrific.
He wished it was a little bigger so he could crawl inside it and hide.
Jensen’s books and pens were kind of strewn across the shared desk bearing the two computers, just intruding on the free space. Right on cue, Jensen turned and smiled, eyes almost lighting up with it as he reached over and immediately moved his belongings over to make space. “Sorry,” he laughed, “I got a habit of spreadin’ everything out. Feel free to sit yourself down there, I won’t bite,” and oh, Jesus, there was a refined but blatant Texan twang to his voice that made Jared’s heart pulse with warmly vibrant thoughts of home; it was so unexpected that he just stared at him, unable to form any words.
As the look on Jensen’s face slowly faded from interested to slightly weirded out, Jared forced himself to blurt out, “Uh,” and then, “No. I’m fine,” and he was panicking so much he felt like his throat was actually about to close up so the words came out clipped and harsh, and Jensen’s smile dimmed a little, and Jared wanted to die.
Needing to escape before he actually melted into a puddle of embarrassment, Jared turned and stalked over to the door with his long legs, Chad looking after him in confusion. He couldn’t help glancing back over his shoulder just before he left, though, and Jensen’s attention was back on his screen, his jaw pulled a little tighter than it was before, his mouth a straight, thin line. Almost as if he was disappointed.
But that was probably just Jared’s imagination.
***
A couple of weeks passed after that particularly embarrassing day – a couple of perfect, Jensen-free weeks where Jared actually managed to trip up or walk into doorframes without him magically appearing – and so he was finally starting to think that his luck was beginning to turn.
He should’ve known better than that, really.
Walking out of the lecture theatre and into an oncoming stream of student traffic, Jared found himself bumping straight into a painfully familiar face, losing his balance and almost toppling him right over.
“Whoa, careful,” a deep, gravelly voice said, and then there was a hand on Jared’s arm, steadying him with a strong, sure grip that sent a shiver down his spine. Jensen kept his hand there for a moment or too longer than Jared could take without slowly going insane, palm just resting on the bare, tanned skin of Jared’s arm.
Like a deer caught in the headlights, Jared stared at him wide-eyed and panicky, stuttered an apology and pushed away into the milling crowds of students before Jensen could get a word in, and before he could embarrass himself any further.
***
Jared was in a state of pure despair. Every time he looked into Jensen’s ridiculously green eyes, he got so tongue-tied and red-faced and two-left-footed that he just wanted to run away; and it seemed that every time he turned around, there Jensen was, ready to make Jared embarrass himself one more time.
He was sitting in a window seat in a coffee shop not far from the college, but off-campus enough that it at least put Jared at ease that he wouldn’t be subjected to any chance encounters. A waitress gave him his mocha latte along with her number, but he only smiled politely and left the scrap of paper where she’d dropped it. There was only one person he wanted to call, and he was a thousand per cent certain that that person would never think twice about talking to him.
Jensen was popular. He was charming, he was funny, he had a perfect smile and perfect eyes and a jaw line that could cut a goddamn diamond – he was the only drama major anyone bought tickets to college plays to see, the football player who made all the cheerleaders fall over themselves, the fourth-year whose name everyone knew.
There were about two people who knew Jared’s name, and Jensen certainly wasn’t one of them.
Because Jared was clumsy with big feet and big arms and big shoulders and big everything – he was too big for any doorway, too uncoordinated to squeeze past a group of people without treading on at least four sets of toes. He preferred all-nighters starring thick books over tall pints, and he couldn’t even begin to compete with Jensen in terms of looks with his too-wide grin and his pointy-tipped nose and his unruly, floppy hair.
Jared sighed into his latte, blowing his bangs out of his eyes with a puff of frustrated breath.
Just at that moment, the bell above the door tinkled. Jared looked up and promptly muttered, “Aw, fuck,” grabbing for the menu standing on his table and opening it hurriedly in front of his face, shrinking behind it and hoping to hell that Jensen didn’t see him.
A minute later, thick fingers curled over the top of the menu and gently pulled it down, leaving Jared staring helplessly into Jensen’s eyes.
His eyes.
“You really gotta stop followin’ me, kiddo,” Jensen murmured light-heartedly, his voice pitched low enough to make Jared’s stomach flip over – and that goddamn smile didn’t help. Jared had never seen it this close before, and he noticed that Jensen’s eyes crinkled up at the corners, tiny freckles tucked into thin, happy creases.
“Um. Well, I, uh... I promise I’m not,” Jared mumbled quickly, ducking his head to avoid eye contact, the tips of his ears burning. Jensen sounded like he was joking, but he probably thought Jared was totally weird too – what if he really did think he was stalking him or something, oh God—
“Are you okay?” Jensen asked slowly, leaning closer to peer into Jared’s face, and Jared swallowed thickly and scrambled out of his seat, slipping past Jensen and almost tripping over the hem of his jeans.
“I have to go,” Jared answered, already making for the door, “I’m sorry,” and he at least managed to wait until he was safely back in his dorm room before hopelessly banging his head against the wall.
***
“C’mon, Jay. You gotta have some fun, what the fuck did you even come to college for?” Chad demanded brashly, slapping Jared square between the shoulder blades as his voice bounced off the college restroom tiles. “Party. Tonight. Be there. Lots’a girls,” he added with a wink.
Jared raised an eyebrow. “I thought we’d been over this.”
“Fine, fine, lots’a guys, too,” Chad shrugged. “Same diff. Seein’ you there?”
“I don’t think so,” Jared mumbled.
“Everyone’s going!”
“Not everyone,” Jared corrected, “not who I’d like to be going.”
Chad rolled his eyes. “Whatever, dude. When I’m getting laid twenty-plus times tonight, I’ll make sure to call an’ tell you exactly what you’re missing out on.”
Jared grimaced. “Please don’t,” he replied with a laugh, but Chad was already disappearing out the door, leaving Jared alone with a bunch of empty stalls. He sighed, and went over to the nearest sink to wash his hands.
“You again.”
Jared whirled round, splashing water all down the front of his clothes and cursing inwardly when he saw Jensen silhouetted in the doorway. This particular bathroom was situated just off the main foyer, the closest one to the playing fields, and Jensen must have come from exactly there because he was kitted out in his full football uniform, fucking socks and all. Christ, he looked gorgeous. His face was streaked with mud and there was grass in his hair, but he smiled at Jared as he walked closer. Jared inadvertently backed himself right up against the sink as he choked out, “Uh, yeah. I guess so.”
Jensen peered into the mirror next to the one Jared was blocking and ran a careless hand through his already-tousled hair. “Good game,” Jensen commented, even though Jared didn’t ask. “Kinda look like I’ve been dragged through a forest now, though. S’why I come in here before headin’ back, to at least try to look a little decent,” he explains with a quiet laugh, running the water and scrubbing at a smear of mud on his cheek.
“You don’t,” Jared protested quickly, without thinking, and Jensen side-eyed him, quirked his eyebrows. “I mean,” Jared fumbled, “you don’t look like... you look fine.”
Jensen’s eyes slowly slid over Jared’s face, then darted down to his feet to race all the way back up his body. “Thanks,” he said at length, and Jared thinks he’s smiling, but he’s probably just laughing at him.
“I mean, like. I’m sure the cheerleaders would agree. They practically swoon when you run out onto the field,” Jared rambles, dimly recognising that he should have stopped talking ages ago now, shit, why can’t he stop talking?
Straightening up from where he’d been splashing water onto his face, Jensen pins him with a look so intense it makes Jared shift on his oversized feet. Then, he laughs, a low chuckle bubbling up in his throat. “Cheerleaders aren’t exactly what I’m into, Jared.”
Jared blinked, his entire mind fuzzing out to a pure white blank. “You...” he trailed off, feeling his cheeks flush hotly. He knew he should be focusing on the first part of that statement, but – “You know my name.”
Jensen stepped closer and shrugged. “Why wouldn’t I?” A pink tongue darted out to wet his lips, and gosh was he close to Jared now, their faces practically inches apart.
“Because you’re... you,” Jared spluttered incredulously, and Jensen tipped his head back to let out a loud, ringing laugh.
“Good observation,” he said, “I can see how you got in here.” Jared laughed weakly, and promptly stopped when Jensen reached up and brushed a stray lock of hair out of Jared’s eyes, all matter-of-fact, like it’s something completely normal, like it didn’t make Jared want to kiss him about a million percent more than before. “Jared Padalecki, I’ve been takin’ special measures to ensure I bump into you as much as possible. What kinda guy would I be if I didn’t at least find out your name before that?”
Jared giggled, honest to God giggled, a high-pitched, almost hysterical noise that made him clap a huge hand over his mouth. Through the gap between two fingers, he commented, “Special measures aren’t usually necessary. I kinda bump into everything very naturally.”
“I noticed.” Jensen’s eyes were doing that crinkly thing again. “And it’s very adorable. Unfortunately, that just kinda made me wanna stalk you even more, so.”
Jared laughed unexpectedly, a genuinely happy, no-holds-barred sound. “That’s kinda creepy of you.”
Jensen grinned. “Others might call it charming.”
Jared laughed again, feeling giddy and most definitely like he was dreaming.
This was Jensen goddamn Ackles, the most popular guy by miles on a campus of thousands, standing in front of him and touching his arm, leaning into his space, biting his lip as he looked at his mouth and Jared knew he had to stop thinking about all of this too much or he might actually start hyperventilating.
“So, uh,” Jared said hesitantly. “Not into cheerleaders, huh?”
Jensen smiled. “Never met one who blushes as pretty as you,” he replied quietly, and he leaned in further, one hand sliding up to Jared’s neck and tugging him down to normal-person level and then, holy shit, their mouths were meeting and the tip of Jensen’s tongue was flicking at the seam of Jared’s lips and Jared’s eyes were slipping closed and his arms were hanging uselessly by his sides because all his coordination was being spent on keeping his goddamn knees from buckling beneath him.
When they pulled apart, Jared knew he’d been frozen in place the whole time, hadn’t even laid a finger on Jensen, and he coloured darker as he stuttered out, “I-I’m sorry, uh, we can... try again and I’ll try to be less, uh, less me—“
“I like you when you’re you,” Jensen interrupted, winding his arms around Jared’s waist and roughly tugging him closer. Jared almost loses his balance and tips forward into Jensen, both hands landing on Jensen’s shoulders and his mouth ending up a breath away from Jensen’s own.
As if to prove his point, Jensen simply chuckled, shook his head, and kissed him again.