Never Lost a War

Alex tries to keep the kiss chaste, even though Jack is kissing him hungrily, and it's perfect, better than Jack could have imagined (which he did, maybe a lot), and Alex tastes like toothpaste and a hint of coffee, and they wind up horizontal on Alex's bed while Jack makes a mental note to send Keller a thank-you note card and flowers and chocolates and all of the money in his bank account, because this- this is worth it.

It's worth all of it, the drinking and the flitting around each other and the confusion and the cluelessness, because through it all-- this is where he was heading; Alex's fingertips underneath his t-shirt to skim across his hipbones, his teeth scraping Jack's neck. It's heady and exhilarating and it's nothing like he's ever experienced and he never wants it to end.

"You're so skinny," Alex says, mumbles into Jack's neck, and he sounds kind of amazed by it, like he somehow finds Jack's gangly limbs attractive, which would be laughable in almost any other situation, but now it just makes Jack smile stupidly big, his face flushing.

"Love your collarbones," he continues. "You know I love you, right?" Alex says, and Jack nods, pulling Alex back up to kiss him again, biting at his bottom lip.

"Yeah, I-- had kind of hoped, what with the kissing," Jack says, and Alex laughs; half-disbelieving and half-thrilled, before he kisses him again, like he can't help himself.

"Me too, obviously, actually rather a lot," Alex mumbles into the spot where Jack's neck meets his shoulder, and Jack feels his cheeks heat up even though it's dumb, it's so dumb, but no one's ever paid attention to him like this before; kissed him like they needed it to breathe, and it's all-consuming and wonderful and he can feel himself flushing from his forehead to his chest.

'You're gorgeous,' Jack wants to say when Alex hovers over him, all strong arms and chest, but what comes out is, "I really like to look at you," because of course he never says anything right, and he'd be stupid to think that he could come out of this with all of his (remaining) dignity still in tact.

"Yeah?" Alex says, mutters, really, laughing quietly and ducking his head down until his laughing against Jack's collarbone and Jack can feel his breath on his skin. He's laughing, and then he's kissing the edge of Jack's clavicle, and sucking, and biting-

"Are you giving me a hickey?" Jack asks incredulously, biting back a laugh of his own, because somehow it seems so high school, but also so Alex and something warm flutters in his chest. In any other situation, he'd probably gag at the cliche, but for now? He has no complaints at all.

Alex seems to be blushing slightly when he looks up at Jack, biting his lip in a way that is definitely playing dirty before he shrugs casually, placing a quick, chaste kiss on Jack's lips. His eyes are unfair, too. No one as endearing as Alex should be allowed to have eyes that big and expressive. He should have to wear an eye patch at the very least.

"Maybe I was," he says, smiling in a way that suggests there's no maybe about it, before he leans back down to Jack's neck, much above where his collar would cover, starting to suck there. "But you're right, I was in the wrong place," he says smugly, and Jack just laughs again, disbelieving.

"I... I want people to know, that's dumb, sorry," Alex says, hiding his face against the side of Jack's neck like some sort of small animal.

"Know what," Jack blurts.

Alex chuckles, almost self-conscious sounding, before he looks at Jack in a way that's so stupidly sincere and adoring that Jack almost forgets Alex has something to tell him in the first place in favor of pulling him down for another kiss. "I want this to be like, a thing. That people know about. That you chose me, that you're mine... That's why the hickey," he mumbles.

Jack's brain kind of short-circuits.

"If that's okay," Alex adds quickly, seeming to take Jack's silence for disagreement.

"Jesus Christ," Jack breathes, pulling Alex down to him by the back of his neck, kissing him with much more heat and intensity before. It goes on for a few minutes, or hours, or something, Jack's not thinking anything except a constant stream of Alex, Alex, Alex, and he's never been particularly inclined to do things based on clocks. While that may be a problem when it comes to deadlines for term papers, he can't find anything negative about applying it to making out with Alex.

Eventually, Alex pulls back shyly, trying to sit upright but not finding enough space to do so and sort of awkwardly lying on top of Jack. "I was just. I mean. If you. We don't have to like- do everything. Or I mean, anything, we don't have to do anything-"

Jack fixes him with a look. "Really, Lex? You think I'm going to chicken out or something? Of course we're going to fucking do something, we've been kissing for like days-"

"It's been 40 minutes," Alex corrects.

"Days," Jack maintains, "and I've thought you were hot as hell since like, freshman orientation, I've just been too much of a fucking idiot to realize that maybe I actually liked you, and now you're thinking I'm going to chicken out of sex with you."

Alex is silent.

Jack blanches. "Shit, are you saying that you're not ready? Am I making a complete ass of myself right now? Shit, Lex, I swear to god, I'm not- I'm not just trying to get rid of that pesky virginity thing, we don't have to do this if you're not ready, as long as I have some sort of unwritten promise that like, it'll still be you whenever you want, kind of like an I.O.U, but for my virginity-"

Alex laughs again, and Jack physically feels his chest decompress as Alex kisses his cheeks, his nose, his lips, his forehead. "I didn't think you were using me for sex, jack ass, I don't think someone who was just trying to get in my pants would tell me, you know, that they loved me. And just so you know, we've basically been dating without sex since freshman orientation. I'm pretty sure our entire fucking building thinks we're fucking already, and when I heard that you'd never- you know-"

"Had sex," Jack fills in.

"-yeah, that, it was all I could think about, and I hope that doesn't sound creepy, jesus fuck this is not what I meant to say, but, yeah, Christ, Jack- it was all I could think about, making it good for you, taking care of you like this... So. I'm just saying, if you don't want to right now. It'll still be me. If you still want to, it'll still be me."

"No, I definitely think now's good," Jack says, and his voice sounds wrecked when he pulls Alex back on top of him.

Now ends up being very, very good.

--
The next morning, they (which has come to include Keller and Cass, now, apparently, who, conveniently, get along wonderfully) all eat breakfast in Rian's room for whatever reason. Mostly because they all just follow each other around, and partly because they all really like to trash Rian's room more than the others, mostly because he values cleanliness the most.

Jack is making his way through his fourth hashbrown when Alex finally stumbles in, his hair still a mess and one of Jack's too-small shirts as the matching component to his probably five year old sweatpants. "G'morning," he mumbles, rubbing at his eyes as he flops down on Rian's bed.

Rian and Zack roll their eyes while Cass blushes, and Keller whistles lewdly and smirks at the matching bruises on their necks.

"Hell yes, pay the fuck up, Merrick," Keller says, putting out her hand expectantly.

Alex glares at her half-heartedly, looking more like a sleepy kitten than anything threatening. "Wha'sgoin'on?" he says through a yawn, and Jack can't even fight the smile that makes his way onto his face, even if Rian looks a little bit like he's going to be sick.

"You guys are precious," Cass sighs happily. No one else seems to hear her (or rather, they choose to ignore her), but Jack appreciates the sentiment. That doesn't mean he doesn't have to take control of the situation, though.

"What money?" he says, fixing Keller with his most intimidating look. He's been told it makes him look slightly constipated, but it's all he has.

"I- okay, don't be mad, you still owe me lots of friendship points, so, I think this is fair enough," Keller starts. Jack doesn't even bother to argue that friendship points do not exist at all in any universe. "Zack and I may or may not have bet that Alex'd be the one you'd lose it to. I said yes, he said no, he owes me fifty bucks, easy as that," she said, grinning contentedly.

"You bet against me, Zack?" Alex says, pulling an exaggerated puppy-dog face.

"Fuck you, Gaskarth, we all thought you were gonna pine forever, and Keller totally cheated, anyway, so whatever-"

"I did not cheat!" Keller interrupts, crossing her arms. "I was just like- like, one of the mentors in a romantic comedy! I was the quirky best friend who gives great advice-"

"Yeah, great advice like, 'hey Jack, maybe you should fuck Gaskarth' "-

"I just told him to follow his heart!"

Jack drops his head onto his knees, because it is still 9:30 in the morning, and he is not ready for this conversation, now, or like, ever.

"Either way, I guess it's nice you two idiots finally pulled your heads out of your asses and got together-"

"Such a romantic," Keller says sarcastically, placing the back of her head to her forehead in a overly dramatized form of swooning.

"-but that doesn't mean I'm paying Keller anything."

Rian snorts. "Keller, this is me telling you to never bother with Zack Merrick because he's not worth your time and he will never pay you for anything. Now you can never say I didn't warn you."

"Yeah, well, he's got... nice arms," Keller teases, shrugging as she pulls Zack in for a quick kiss, like she's done it a million times. Zack pulls her onto his lap and wraps his arms around her waist, and Jack splutters.

"What the fuck, Kel?" he says, near disgusted, but also kind of confused at the way they seem to fit together so nicely. Now that Jack thinks about it, he doesn't know why he didn't introduce the two of them sooner, because they both like to talk about violent movies and reasons why Jack's an idiot, which is essentially a match made in heaven.

And then he remembers. "Keller, the first time we met you said that you wouldn't sleep with a guy if he didn't put in the work, and that no girl is really past a bit of flattery. You meant that, yes?"

"Yes, I did," Keller says slowly, as if she's not quite sure what she's agreeing to.

Jack grins wolfishly, batting his eyelashes ridiculously at Zack. "Merrick, you romantic, you wooed her," he says, thrilled. Alex looks caught between being horrified and laughing, Rian and Cass don't seem to be caught at all between anything (they've clearly chosen laughing), and Keller is blushing for the first time in possibly ever while Zack grumbles something under his breath about idiots.

"Whatever, I'm classy," Zack says, flipping him off. "I could do Old Spice commercials."

"Right, we keep forgetting you're a nice Christian boy," Alex pipes up, grinning.

"I have finally got the upper hand over Keller Maitland, I'm not a virgin, and I, well- I'm assuming, we haven't really gone over the labels, not that I think that's important?- have a really, um, fantastic boyfriend." Jack ducks his face down to hide his blush. "I don't think anything's ever gone this well for me before."

"Yeah, definitely," Alex says, smiling bright. "Definitely boyfriend."

"And I'm the romantic," Zack mumbles.

Jack doesn't pay much attention to him, though, because Alex is leaning into kiss him, and suddenly making fun of his friends seems worlds away.