Chapter Text
Love is a sweet flower, but one must have the courage to pluck it on the edges of a terrible cliff.
~ Stendhal
*
“You want the last sip a whiskey, bud?”
Jack shook his head, not taking his eyes off the dying fire at their feet. “It’s all yours.”
Ennis knocked back the last mouthful of what had been a full bottle of Old Rose whiskey earlier that night, tossed the empty bottle away and stretched himself with a yawn, joints snapping audibly. He felt good, content even. The alcohol and the joint he and Jack had shared earlier had given him a pleasant buzz, enough to dim those thoughts of last night together, last night together to a faint nagging feeling at the back of his head, nothing that couldn’t be ignored for the time being. His mind was fuzzy and his dick rock hard in his pants, had been for the past thirty minutes or so. Not bad, for a guy almost in his forties.
Ennis glanced at Jack-- tall body folded up in that little camping chair, jean-clad legs spread wide as usual, flames licking at his boot heel. The collar of his quilted winter coat was pulled up against the mountain’s chill and the brim of his fancy black Resistol tipped low over his forehead, concealing most of his face. Still, Ennis did not need to see that face to know that Jack’s spirits had plummeted; after sixteen years of fishing trips, he knew the look by heart. Only one more night together before they parted ways again, before they headed back to Riverton and Childress respectively to continue living their separate and unsatisfactory lives and start counting down the days ‘till the next fishing trip. Ennis bore it with the resignation of a man who knows that what can’t be fixed must be endured, but Jack, never one to hide his feelings, always got real quiet and dejected those last few hours by the campfire.
Ennis worked his tongue in his mouth for a moment, turned to the side to spit on the ground. With his right foot he poked at the logs, causing sparks to fly. “Fire’s goin’ out, bud,” he said, speaking the words that had become a code phrase long ago. Time to hit the sack, fuck, spoon and sleep, in that order.
Still not looking up, Jack nodded slightly and brought his cigarette to his lips. “You go along. I’ll be right behind.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Ennis pushed himself out of his chair and stumbled to the tent, throwing one more glance back at Jack before he went in. The sight of Jack sitting there so forlorn, dark silhouette outlined by the fire, twisted his gut in an unpleasant way and he felt a familiar sting of guilt, because he knew all too well that Jack’s hunched shoulders were his doing entirely. After turning him away that fatal day, when Jack had driven fourteen hours straight for nothing, Ennis had seen Jack become a little sadder every year, the light in his eyes dying bit by bit in spite of the good times they still had together. To feel the old Jack slowly slipping away from him tore Ennis apart inside but he did not know what to do about it except to try and make their sparse time together as good for Jack as possible-- which was exactly what he had done this week and what he planned to do tonight.
But you still haven’t told him, a nasty little voice reminded him, not for the first time that night. He still doesn’t know about August.
He undressed quickly and made himself comfortable beneath the blankets, remembering to put the tube of KY at the ready for later. It was always Jack who remembered to bring along stuff like that, and although Ennis didn’t much like the idea of Jack going into a store and buying supplies of lube, he was glad that Jack had never asked him to do it.
Once everything in the tent was ready for some good old-fashioned screwing, Ennis lay down on his back and waited, with barely contained impatience, for Jack to join him. It was unusual that they came to the tent separately and it was not lost on Ennis that this was exactly how Jack had been waiting for him almost twenty years ago, that sultry night up on Brokeback that had changed the course of Ennis’s life for good. If he closed his eyes, he could still remember how the first touch of Jack’s lips had felt, still feel that thrill of first contact, lips and tongue and hands igniting a spark Ennis hadn’t known he carried inside himself. He knew he ought to feel sorry he ever set foot in that tent, sorry he’d failed to resist whatever it was that pulled him to Jack so strongly, but truth was-- he couldn’t, not really, although God knew he’d tried. The pitiful truth was that every single sin – and they had committed many that night – had felt like a piece of Heaven in itself, his heart falling wide open under Jack’s ministrations. It was one of his fondest memories, practically untainted by the ever-present feelings of guilt and shame that had cast their shadow over almost all of their moments together.
Finally Ennis heard the outer tent flaps being pushed aside and zipped up, and other such familiar sounds as Jack took off his boots and came crawling into the small nylon space they had been sharing for the past seven nights. It was the irony of his life that of all the houses Ennis had ever lived in, nothing had come closer to being a home than this, a 7x7 shared with Jack somewhere on a mountain in the middle of nowhere.
“Hey,” Jack said when he saw that Ennis was in the nude. “It’s only been a few minutes, Ennis, and already you got started without me?”
“Just thought I’d save us the trouble, is all,” Ennis said, leaning up on one elbow and reaching out to pull Jack closer. “C’mere now, cowboy.”
The spark that was always there between them flared to life quickly, as it always did once Ennis felt comfortable enough to let his body run full-throttle. Their mouths came together easy, noses turning just the right way, tongues greeting each other like old friends. Unbuttoning Jack’s shirt-- Ennis could do that blindfolded too, although his hands started to shake a bit when Jack yanked the blankets aside and took him in a double-handed grip, spitting in his palm to create a smoother slide.
“Christ, Jack, slow down,” Ennis grated out as he pulled at Jack’s shirt hard, desperate to get to what was underneath. “Gonna go off in a moment you keep this up, and you still got yer pants on.”
Jack chuckled and moved his hands away, but not before he’d given one last, teasing pull. “What got you so worked up, Del Mar?” With one powerful sweep of the arms his t-shirt was up and away over his head, hands moving to unbuckle next.
Ennis watched as Jack got rid of his jeans, then seized him by the hips and pulled him on top of him. “Dunno. Everythin’, I guess. The booze, smokin’ that joint, your fine ass.” He leaned closer to lick a hot line across Jack’s chest. “Been watchin’ you all day, Jack.”
“That so, Ennis?”
“Yeah,” Ennis said breathless, sneaking a glance up at Jack. Still one hell of a fine-looking man at thirty-eight, despite the few extra pounds that had settled on his hips, the lines in his face that betrayed he wasn’t a young buck no more. Still had a head full of hair, and although grey was coming in at his temples it still fell across his forehead in that same boyish manner, the look of that making Ennis feel all soft inside for some reason.
“Been thinkin’ ‘bout what we would be doin’ tonight,” he added, writhing a bit so that his dick slid up against Jack’s thigh, leaving a tiny trail of wet on his skin.
“And what’s that?”
“Will show ya.” With a quick move born from practice, Ennis flipped Jack over on his back and, pulling up his hands over his head, pinned him to the ground as he leaned down to brush his lips over Jack’s nipple, swirl it with his tongue. Jack sucked in a breath, pushed up his hips against Ennis’s, seeking that first brush of cock that always had them panting.
“Want you to tell me,” he whispered. “C’mon. Wanna hear it from your mouth, Ennis.”
Ennis faltered ever so briefly. Talking dirty was not a strength of his, but this was a last night and Ennis was willing to do just about anything on them last nights; anything to take their minds off tomorrow, the long empty months stretching out before them, anything to soften the pain of yet another week come to an end too soon, much too soon.
So Ennis brought his mouth to Jack’s, ran his tongue over the lower lip, slid inside, kissed him deep and slow. “Gonna make you feel good, Jack,” he murmured. “Gonna fuck ya way you like to be fucked, do it slow ‘n nice. Gonna make ya cry my name ‘till you’re hoarse.”
“Shit.” Jack’s features were slack with lust and wanting. “More, tell me more.”
Ennis scooted down Jack’s body, keeping his eyes on the graceful curve of hard flesh against Jack’s belly. Of all the things Jack had taught him over the years, this had provided the greatest challenge. Took him a long time to work up the nerve to take Jack’s dick in his mouth, longer even to see it all the way through and swallow, the way Jack had done right from the beginning. Part of Ennis had been disgusted by the idea, because if sucking cock wasn’t queer then what was, but it didn’t seem fair to not put out when he knew how good it felt to be on the receiving end, so he had made a true effort to master the skill-- and actually started liking it. Talking about it, though, was another thing.
“Gonna make ya come, Jack,” he said, trying to sound confident even though he was blushing. “Gonna suck ya real good.”
“Jesus.” Jack bit his lip. “Gonna come just from hearin’ ya talk like that, Ennis.” He sucked in a breath when Ennis’s work-roughened hand closed around him, then exhaled when Ennis started taking him into his mouth, and propped himself up to watch. Lust crackled between them like lightning when Ennis twisted his neck in a near impossible angle to meet Jack’s eyes, holding his gaze as he moved up and down slow, deliberate, wanting Jack to see it all, to imprint this image in his mind, savor it in the long months to come.
“Christ, Ennis,” Jack said, trembling. “Got any idea how fuckin’ hot that is?”
“Mmm,” Ennis replied, letting almost all of Jack slip out of his mouth. He rubbed the crown with his tongue, sucking hard until Jack’s hips were jerking wildly, head thrashing as cries of “ohgodohgodennisjesusfuck!” and other such profanities spilled from his mouth, Jack never one to hold back in that respect. Hell, Jack never one to keep his mouth shut.
Ennis sat up, scrabbling for the tube-o-lube while Jack whimpered with frustration. Ennis was back on him quick, fingers slicked up good, nudging between Jack’s thighs, pushing in slow, probing, twisting and rubbing until Jack was thrashing on the bedroll, pushing himself into Ennis’s mouth in sync with the strokes of Ennis’s fingers, breath coming in fast, short pants.
“Oh... yeah... Ennis... God... fuck... that’s good... so... fucking... good...”
Words eventually became unintelligible moans, pushing became frantic thrusting, Jack fucking Ennis’s mouth in hard, full strokes. Ennis grunted with the pleasure and the torture of it, Jack in his mouth and in his lungs and in his every fiber, this here connection between them so strong that even twenty years of shame and fear could not break it. What two nineteen-year-olds had started up on Brokeback two decades ago was still here, flame still burning bright and strong despite the years of hurt, anger and disappointment so bitter that all the whiskey in the world could not wash the taste off his tongue.
“Ennis! Oh God...”
Jack bucked like a bronco, Ennis sucking him off with closed eyes, not moving away until he was truly and completely done.
“Fuckin’ hell,” Jack panted. “Ennis...”
Ennis sat up, hands shaking bad as he prepared himself for entry, his dick feeling like a locked and loaded rifle ready to go off. Reached out to stop Jack when he started to turn around, preparing to get up on hands and knees. “No, Jack. Wanna see yer face.”
Jack bit his lip when Ennis started that familiar, languorous push-and-pull motion that was the essence of their relationship, a constant factor throughout all of their sparse moments together. This was the rhythm to which their hearts had started beating one cold, moonlit night some twenty years ago - frost in the ground but their bodies in that grimy tent creating a heat neither of them had known or even dreamed of before then - on that mountain that had since become an icon to them, the alpha and the omega, the symbol of everything they held dear; and whose name they rarely spoke aloud these days.
They kissed deep, with lots of tongue, and Ennis tried his damnedest to go slow, make the moment last, but found it damn near impossible with Jack moaning like that, surging up to him like that. He was even hard again, like when they were nineteen and going at it all the time like bucks in rut. And damn if that chatterbox Twist wasn’t flapping his mouth again, chanting Ennis’s name like some fucking mantra, begging him to go harder, faster, that foul-mouthed sonofabitch. And fact was, no one did begging better than Jack Twist, with that dirty mouth and those fuck me eyes.
Thinking back on the summer of 1963, first thing Ennis saw was those eyes. Bright blue eyes watching him, body clad in equally blue denim draped all nonchalant over that black CMC. Under such open scrutiny, Ennis’d felt his insides crawl up tight. He’d never liked being gaped at, and was thankful for his hat, hiding his eyes underneath the brim. He felt discomfited by the stranger with the black Stetson, wasn’t too sure about being teamed up with him at first, but later on, sharing a few beers and a lighter in the bar, Ennis had been reassured some. That Twist fella seemed cordial enough; yapped a whole lot more than Ennis would have liked, so Ennis figured he was going to have to do a whole lot of listening in the months to come, but that was okay. Hell, listening to others talk was what Ennis del Mar did best.
They’d had a bit of a slow start. Wasn’t like Ennis to lay down his life’s story for any guy who happened to share his campfire, and he spent those first days setting up the routine in camp, tending to his chores and trying to figure out the phenomenon that was Jack Twist. The guy was a mystery; claimed to have been raised in a hellhole called Lightning Flat, the only child of a loving, but helpless mother and a father who made sure Jack was hardly ever without the bruises that were meant to remind him of exactly how big a disappointment he was to his daddy. After only a few days on the mountain, Ennis had been shown all the old scars left behind by the belt buckle old man Twist had wielded with such ardor, had been told all the stories too. But the years of oppression and abuse at his father’s hands had done nothing to diminish Jack’s ambition of achieving something, that boy’s head and mouth full of the plans he had for the future, the prizes he hoped to win riding those bulls, the acres of land he intended to own one day and the ranch he would call home, with a shitload of cattle and chickens and a goddamn dog called Murphy.
“Murphy?” Ennis’d said, frowning at his coffee cup.
“Yeah,” Jack’d said softly. “We useta have a dog a that name when I was little.”
No more information had been offered, but the melancholy tone of Jack’s voice had told Ennis enough-- this dog Murphy had been dear to Jack, possibly the only friend he’d ever had.
Wasn’t often Jack got downhearted, though. Shit-eating grin plastered to his face almost all the time, except when he got to bitching about whatever happened to get his dander up-- Joe Aguirre, pup tents, the cold, the humidity, that feisty mare, their monotonous diet of beans and spuds, the list went on and on. Ennis learned to accept it as a part of Jack’s character, to be ready for the complaining to start the moment Jack came riding into camp in the mornings. It seemed to be Jack’s way of getting his grievances out of his system and he usually cheered up soon enough, helped by a few cups of the fresh coffee Ennis made sure was waiting for him every morning.
“Friend, that’s some kick-ass coffee you make,” Jack’d said one of the first days, rewarding Ennis with a pearly-white smile of gratitude, to which Ennis had responded with a shrug and a noncommittal grunt, wondering what the big deal was. Anybody could make coffee, couldn’t they?
The brew he found in the coffeepot a few weeks later, reporting for breakfast after his first night with the sheep, proved him wrong. Jack’s coffee was disgusting, but Ennis did not want to hurt Jack’s feelings and gulped it all down without complaint. No, the gift of cooking wasn’t something the good Lord had bestowed on Jack Twist, in fact there was a whole bunch of things Jack wasn’t particularly good at, but that didn’t stop him from trying anyway. That was Jack. Couldn’t carry a tune to save his life, but damn if he didn’t play that harmonica every fucking day, the sound of it getting on Ennis’s nerves like nails on a blackboard. Jack. Lousiest shot Ennis had ever seen, but carried that rifle around like he was God’s greatest gift to cowboykind since canned beef. Jack. Had gotten it into his head to become some hot-shot bull rider, but got thrown at three seconds more often than not. Was actually proud of the scars some of those bulls had left on him, the damn fool. And that belt buckle he had won on what had probably been one of his better days was cherished like a memento, a fucking crown jewel.
He sure knew how to ride that horse though, no doubt about that. Sat in the saddle like he belonged there, never letting that mare get the better of him. He was pretty good with the lariat too, and had a sharp eye for the sheep, always the first to single out the sick and injured individuals. And when they embraced, that night they had shared the tent a second time, it no longer mattered that Jack was a second-rate bull rider at best, or that he served half-raw spuds and motor oil for coffee, or that he got silly like a school boy when he was drunk and could whine like one, too. The importance of all that quickly shrank to zero when Ennis found himself being cradled against the warm solidity that was Jack’s chest. Ennis, who hadn’t known a whole lot of love in his life, couldn’t remember the last time someone had held him like this, embraced him with such warmth and made him feel like he was worth it. At that moment, it didn’t even bother him that the body beneath his hands was that of a man, thoughts of sin and abomination far from his mind. That night, Ennis felt like he was being offered the world, a chance to breathe after a lifetime of choking. God help him, he took it. He took it, and even twenty years of living in constant fear could not make him regret that choice.
Jack’s mouth now open and panting, fingers tangled in Ennis’s hair, body rocking back and forth with the force of Ennis’s thrusts. The eye contact between them gave Ennis the final push, and he shoved deep with a long, low grunt that had Jack’s name in the center of it, the two of them climaxing almost simultaneously as, for one brief moment, all pieces fell into their rightful place.
Crazy, foolish, dear Jack. Cocky bastard. Ministering angel. High-voltage smile that could’ve turned fucking Casanova queer. Eyes the color of the sky over Brokeback and just as turbulent.
They may not have gotten anywhere, they may never have moved forward from when they were twenty-three and rekindling the flame with postcards and fishing trips-- but at least they had achieved this, a perfect physical understanding of each other, every touch knowing, giving pleasure, building up to that elusive moment of oblivion, where they could lose themselves in each other in a few blessed moments of guiltless, untainted ecstasy.
It wasn’t enough, not by a long shot, but Ennis had learned long ago to settle for what life threw his way and not ask for more. It was hard though; got a little harder every time, the weeks becoming shorter, the time in between stretching out longer and longer. Ennis knew that next time they saw each other, they would be thirty-nine, Jack’s hair would probably be a bit greyer at the temples, and Ennis would have to work a little harder still for Jack’s smiles. The routine with which they settled into their weeks together always stayed the same, though; they’d start out awkwardly those first few hours, reacquainting themselves with each other’s presence as they set up camp and talked about this and that. But sooner or later one of them would cross the invisible threshold that Jack had first crossed when he had taken Ennis’s hand and pulled it to his crotch twenty years ago. After that the gloves were off; clothes would tear, buttons fly, the two men usually not even making it into the tent but rolling around in the soil in a frantic attempt to slake months’ worth of hunger. That first coupling always fast and furious, Jack on hands and knees in front of Ennis in an almost exact re-enactment of their first time. Sometimes they didn’t even get around to eating that first day, wearing each other’s bodies out until they fell asleep, only to wake up the following morning hungry for more. Once that first lust was slaked they were able to enjoy other things besides the sex, but the bruises they sported by the time they parted ways had nothing to do with fishing. Jack had once said jokingly that he had to wear turtlenecks for at least a week so as not to arouse Lureen’s suspicion.
Much later, long after Jack had fallen asleep, Ennis lay awake on his back, staring into the dark and listening to the sounds of the forest outside, the soft creak of pine and the murmuring of the nearby stream. Jack lay on his side next to him, facing away, for the moment unaware of the minutes that were ticking away relentlessly on that expensive silver watch of his, the rapidly shrinking time between now and the inevitable farewell that awaited them tomorrow. Blissfully unaware also of the bad news Ennis had been choking back all this time, afraid to see the disappointment on Jack’s face. Tomorrow was his last chance, and he had to take it or he might as well cut off his balls and flush them down the drain.
He turned over, toward Jack who looked like a sleeping kid with one hand open next to his face. Moving in closer, he pulled Jack against his chest and kissed the nape of his neck, something he reserved for moments like this, never uninhibited enough to show that kind of tenderness when Jack was awake.
It’ll be okay, he told himself. Jack’ll understand. Doesn’t he always? He won’t take it too bad. He closed his eyes, attempting – and failing – to push away the sense of doom that crept up on him. Please, please don’t let him take it too bad.
Finally he fell into a light and restless sleep fraught with flashes of troubled dreams, while outside, in that dark and silent world, snow started drifting down.