alliecat8 | The L Word

I don't know if this fic fulfills any of

ellel's requests or not, except maybe the one for crack!fic. But a few weeks ago we had this conversation re: Jack's "failure to hate" Sawyer in "Visibility."

Ellel: What a lovely and creative way to say "I love you!"

Me: Thank you! Yes, it's a "manly" way to say it! A way that wouldn't squick either one of them.

Ellel: Agreed!Though,something tells me that they both could use the 3 simple words as well;)

And so, my Queen, you inspired this most humble offering:

Title: The L Word
Characters: Jack/Sawyer
Word Count: 1,366
Rating: R
Spoilers: None
Summary: PWP, need I say more?
Disclaimer: Only mine in my dreams

The L Word

Sawyer was supremely relaxed. He sprawled over Jack, one arm and leg and hip pressing him into the sandpaper nap of the towel. He’d let his head drop to Jack’s chest and just lie there, little bits of warm, saltwater-stiff hair tickling Jack’s nose. Jack imagined Sawyer could hear his heartbeat, steady enough by now to serve as a lullaby. He hated to disturb him, but…something about this sweet tranquility was making Jack antsy. He’d feel better if things weren’t so uncomfortably peaceful. So he decided to ask an outrageous question.

“Hey Sawyer, do you love me?”

“Nmph.” Sawyer raised his head to give Jack a look that was a sleepy cross between cranky and amused. “No.” He went back to using Jack’s clavicle as a pillow.

“No, really,” Jack prodded, shifting around to try and make himself less comfortable to Sawyer and initiate some sort of discussion, damn it.

Sawyer just made himself heavier, unsympathetic to Jack’s struggle to move while lying in a dent in the sand with someone just as big and heavy as he was trying to sleep on top of him. “Fuck, Jack,” he muttered, “that’s a question you’re supposed ask a guy before, not after. When he’s got a vested interest in saying yes. Seems kind of pointless when the deal’s in the bag….”

Jack couldn’t see him smirk, but he knew he did it by the tone of his voice. Jack was feeling better already, back on familiar ground after the unnerving emotion of their latest encounter. He wanted to make Sawyer squirm again, and this time not in a good way. “Say it anyway.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. Seems like the right thing to do.”

“Christ,” Sawyer complained. Jack could almost feel the post-coital buzz dying for him.

“Well?”

“Well, what?”

“Quit stalling. Do you love me?”

“Okay,” he said, “fine. If I say yeah, will you just take the short answer and let me go back to sleep?”

“No. I want to hear you say the words.”

After a long uncomfortable minute Sawyer rolled off and raised up on one arm, surprising Jack by getting serious. “Doc,” he sighed, “there ain’t nothin’ magic about those words. Nothin’ sacred. I’ve said ‘em a hundred times. To a hundred women.” He shook his hair out of his eyes, a deliberately casual toss off. “And maybe some men, too. Always got me exactly what I wanted.”

“So….” Suddenly Jack wasn’t quite sure of himself. “Does that mean you don’t want anything from me?”

“Here? Naw. Anything I want from you here, I got already.” Arrogance, that’s what he wanted Jack to see. Vulnerability, he did not. Since Jack saw it anyway, in the set of his jaw and the slight tension in the corners of his eyes, he chose to hold his fire for the moment. He knew Sawyer wasn’t done, he just wanted to see if Jack would say something smart-ass so he could pretend he was. Change the subject. Pick a fight. Sidetrack this subject somehow.

The silence went on for a while, and Jack started to let his mind wander. He could feel the chill seeping up from the damp sand beneath him, and warmth seeping down from Sawyer’s heavy thigh still draped across his legs. He was aware of Sawyer’s breathing and the sound of his own heartbeat in the minute space between their bodies. He could smell saltwater and clean male sweat and the murkier smell of recent sex. He let his senses lull him, ease his strange jittery case of nerves. Sawyer’s soft murmur when it came seemed almost dreamlike. “I never asked you for anything, Doc.”

Well, that was true. Jack closed his eyes and let him go on, “Back in the world, if I’d wanted you, it would’ve been for your money. Now all that money of yours, it’s gone up in smoke. Might as well be a pile of ashes like everything we left behind on that plane. It don’t count for shit here.”

“Wouldn’t’ve mattered anyway,” Jack said without opening his eyes. “If you’d taken my money back then, I wouldn’t have been on that plane. I’d be living in an alley in Sydney, with a bottle in one hand and a deck of cards in the other. I’d still be lost, either way.”

“Well, now ain’t that ironic. Wonder where we’d both be now, if I’d been more of an asshole back then. Not stuck in the middle of the goddamn Pacific, I bet.” Jack recognized a hint of bitterness in his voice; Sawyer might’ve come a long way since he'd begun whatever this was with Jack, but he was still Sawyer. “Anyhow, what’ve you got to offer me anymore?”

And being Sawyer, he was still a shit. Jack threw a hand up behind his head, scrabbling around in the sand for Sawyer’s shirt. “Stop that,” Sawyer said irritably, trapping Jack’s hand beneath his just as he hooked a finger under the gritty wet bit of cloth.

Jack wanted Sawyer to put his shirt on. He was being a little bit too abrasive and it made Jack aware of Sawyer's scars, aware of being chest-to-chest with him, heart-to-heart with nothing but vulnerable skin between them. It made him remember how he’d felt when he thought Sawyer was dying. Sawyer’s grip on his hand was hard enough to force his fingers open, and before he could recover Sawyer flicked the worn-out bit of fabric out of reach. Deliberately, he raked his gaze over Jack’s body, then back to his face. “You got anything tangible to offer me now, that I ain’t already had?”

“Are you serious?” Jack looked at him in disbelief. “You want me to barter for your love?”

Sawyer snorted softly. “Nah,” he said. “Just for the words.”

Jack swallowed back the uncomfortable feeling that he’d gotten in over his head somehow in this conversation. “I could’ve sworn…” he muttered softly, and sighed. Sawyer raised an eyebrow and grunted in what could have been encouragement for him to continue, so he did. “Could’ve sworn you loved me back when you were yelling it ten minutes ago. Never mind, now. Asshole.”

Jack sensed a sudden tension in Sawyer’s body and he almost felt satisfied, until Sawyer spoke and Jack realized that he was doing his damnedest not to laugh. “Doc,” he said, “you are the only person I’ve ever known who’s got more – as my granny called it – spit and vinegar, than I do.” He reached over and took hold of Jack’s chin, pulling his mouth up against Sawyer’s but not kissing him, speaking instead with a grin against his lips. “That’s gotta be why I love you.”

Startled, no, stunned that he’d actually said it, all Jack could think to do was give him a good hard shove and then smack the crap out of him. “I said, never mind! It’s too late now, you son of a bitch –“

Sawyer rolled flat over on top of him, pinning him down and rendering him helpless, which as Jack knew he knew, only made Jack madder. “See, the way I look at it,” Sawyer said, sounding totally unruffled, “since we’ve already established there’s nothin’ in it for me, you gotta know I’m tellin' the truth.” He paused, and his voice took on an edge of concern. “Don’t you dare try to bite me.”

Jack lay there under him, in the dark because Sawyer’s chest was on top of his head, and considered two things. One, Sawyer’s logic, which Jack finally decided was surprisingly sound, maybe even believable. And two, whether or not Jack ought to bite him. Maybe later, he decided, and brought his knee up between Sawyer’s legs instead. Not hard, just enough to make him think about what he could’ve done if he’d had a mind to. And just enough to remind him that he was lying on top of Jack, and they were both naked, and maybe they could find something better to do with their time now that they’d gotten that tricky subject out of the way.

And later, when Jack was sure that Sawyer had gotten everything he really wanted from Jack, Jack said the L word, too.

End

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

eponine119.livejournal.com

This captures their stubborn dynamic so perfectly. Of course Sawyer would find the words meaningless, but then he says them anyway.

“Don’t you dare try to bite me.”

For some reason, I just adored that line. And the "spit and vinegar" one too.

From:

Thru with accepting limits 'cause someone says they're so

The L Word

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