Immovable Object, Unstoppable Force (3) by Jamiesstories2

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A/N: Apologies, my dear readers, for the long wait. As it turns out, I lead quite a busy life, and it tends to get in the way of writing. I would promise that the wait for the next chapter won’t be quite as long, but that will most likely end up being a lie, so I won’t bother. Please, enjoy.

This is a continuation of Immovable Object, Unstoppable Force, please read the previous parts before reading this one.

Immovable Object, Unstoppable Force: Chapter 3

As the pair made their way to the Davis Center, Jackson questioned why the f*ck he was so anxious for something that was seemingly so banal. Maybe it was simply the prospect of spending more time with his personal sanity-thief that was making his palms sweat.

As the pair walked into the building, thankful for the warm refuge from the whipping winds outside, Ollie’s eyes were drawn away from Jackson to a group of people chatting near the front of the meeting room. He turned back to Jackson, smiling.

"Look, I have to go chat with the rest of exec before we start the meeting, okay?"

Jackson was about to ask what, exactly, he was supposed to do while Ollie talked to his fellow executive board members, but stopped himself, realizing that his question probably sounded embarrassingly similar to the whines of a lost child in a department store. He was supposed to socialize, of course, with a bunch of people who were much better and more involved than he was. The kind of people who actually fit in a place like this.

"Yeah, sounds good," he replied, attempting to put on an air of confidence he very much did not possess.

"Cool," Ollie said, already walking away, "We can meet back up when the meeting is done if you like!"

And just like that, he was off, hurrying towards his crew, while Jackson was left in his dust, trying to search for a single familiar face.

Like a light in the dark, he finally managed to spot someone he knew: Amira. He ran up to the girl, thankful for her presence in a sea of strangers, and she smiled when she saw him coming.

"Hey! Jackson, right?" She asked as he approached.

"Yeah, uh, hi," He replied, mulling over how exactly he was to explain his presence at this meeting.

"Did Ollie drag you along?" She asked with a smile, filling in the blank before even asking the question Jackson was anticipating.

"He… invited me?" Jackson muttered in response, not wanting to come across as homophobic.

"Don’t worry, I was invited too," Amira smirked, and then shook her head, "Although, I’m surprised he asked you to come along. That boy is really…something."

Jackson could only blush, feeling that there was more behind Amira’s declaration then she was letting on.

"Your instructions are simply to smile and participate," Amira explained, "I never come to these QSU things, but Ollie likes to have familiar faces in the crowd at the first meeting of the year. He gets nervous."

The idea of Ollie getting nervous baffled Jackson, he could not imagine this man, who would not stop talking during class, being scared of talking in front of a crowd. As Jackson was mulling over this new concept, however, the meeting was called to attention and the cliques of friends, including Amira and Jackson, were split into a large circle around the hall.

"Hi, everyone!" Ollie began, and Jackson couldn’t help but marvel at the confidence of his tone. Even though Jackson now knew it was an act, it wasn’t any less convincing. Ollie continued, "My name is Oliver, or Ollie, and I’m the president of the Queer Student Union. It’s nice to see you all, old faces and new."

President?

Jackson didn’t know Ollie was the president. Executive board made sense, yes, but something about the thought of knowing, being acquaintances with the president of one of the most important student organizations on campus still shocked Jackson to his core. And Ollie said the title as if it was no big deal. This was never the kind of person Jackson imagined he would know, and, well, this was never the kind of person Jackson imagined he would be.

Ollie proposed an icebreaker then, pulling Jackson out of his personal daydream: name, pronouns, class year, and favorite piece of queer media you’d consumed recently.

F*ck. Jackson was coming up incredibly blank on that last question. He’d consumed plenty of queer media, a lot of it alongside Ollie, but what queer media had he consumed recently that he’d actually liked?

Of course, because Amira was Amira, when Ollie asked for volunteers to go first, she immediately raised her hand. F*ck. Double f*cking f*ck. Now Jackson had even less time to think.

"Hi, my name is Amira, she/her pronouns--"

He would have to answer soon. Too soon.

"--I’m a senior--"

Think, dammit, think!

"--And my favorite piece of queer media I’ve consumed recently is… Heartstopper season two."

His turn. Time to make some sh*t up.

"Hey, I’m Jackson, uh, he/him pronouns, I’m a senior, and my favorite piece of queer media…The Price of Salt, which I recently read for class."

Ollie cocked a dark eyebrow in Jackson’s direction, knowing his true love, or lack thereof, for the novel in question. It almost looked as if…was he holding back a laugh?

Please don’t laugh, Jackson could only beg, silently. Yet Ollie seemed to control himself only a moment later, as the ice breaker moved to the next person in the circle.

Around they went, each member announcing their name, pronouns, etcetera.

Then it was time for the executive board to speak, and Jackson, admittedly, felt his eyes glaze over slightly at the announcements of the upcoming events, goals, hopes, and dreams for the semester to come. It all felt shockingly…normal. No one had looked at him sideways for being there or questioned whether he’d belonged; it was just assumed he did, and honestly, Jackson couldn’t really argue with that assumption. He would call himself an ally, after all.

After the meeting was over, Ollie found Amira and Jackson in the crowd of those lingering behind, packing up their things or waiting for their friends.

"Do you guys want to grab dinner?" He asked, seeming chipper at how the meeting had gone, "I’m absolutely starving."

Jackson thought for a moment and realized that he, too, was quite hungry.

"Dinner sounds great," Jackson replied, and both men looked over to Amira.

"I’ve got places to be, unfortunately," Amira responded, "There’s an ABC meeting tonight and you two are…not invited," she said, jokingly.

"Fair enough," Ollie replied, as Jackson nodded, "Good luck, see you at home."

Jackson pondered the idea of going from one club meeting to another, giving up a timely dinner for a busy schedule. This was something he’d seen Hyeon do before, but to watch it happen as if it was second nature was something new for him. The way Ollie and Amira spoke about these kinds of personal sacrifices, it was as if they happened often.

"Won’t you get hungry?" Jackson eventually blurted out, unable to stop himself.

"I’ll eat when I get home," Amira reassured him, "ABC is practically useless without me."

With that, she flipped her braids over her shoulder and walked off. Just a day ago, it might have seemed tasteless to Jackson, but he now knew the comment as what it was, a joke. A joke Amira had clearly earned the right to make, seeing as she was skipping her damn dinner to go to this meeting.

Ollie snorted and rolled his eyes in Amira’s general direction.

"I don’t feel like cooking," he announced, "How does Chinese sound?"

"Incredible," Jackson replied, and the two made their way to the restaurant a few blocks away from the main campus.

As the pair walked, Ollie looked over at Jackson, who was still a bit lost on his own train of thought.

"What did you think?" He asked.

"What did I think about what?"

"About the meeting," Ollie clarified.

Duh. The meeting. The meeting he had just attended.

"Oh, um, right," Jackson started, trying to gather his thoughts about said meeting, "I don’t know. It was…good, I guess…"

Ollie laughed.

"You can tell me if you hated it," He joked, "Amira makes no secret of the fact she’s only there for me, I won’t be hurt if you feel the same."

"No, no," Jackson started, "I liked it, I think I’m just still…digesting it. I was nervous I was going to feel out of place there, but I felt shockingly comfortable. I think that was just, um, surprising."

"I’m glad you felt comfortable," Ollie replied, "You know the point is kind of that we’re a safe space for everyone."

"I know, but I’m not the kind of person who needs a safe space," Jackson replied, "I mean, there’s a reason we’re not invited to the Association of Black Collegiates meeting."

"Give yourself more credit," Ollie offered, "You’re a straight guy who keeps getting mistakenly identified as queer at a school full of guys with fratcents, I’d say you need a safe space just as much as the rest of us weirdos."

Jackson could only grow warm then, not wanting to admit that some of those guys with fratcents were his friends.

"Yeah, well, sure," He could only manage to mumble.

Blessedly, they soon came to the Chinese restaurant, and Jackson could cover his embarrassed silence with a food menu. He already knew what he wanted, of course, both men did. You don’t go to university in a small town with one Chinese restaurant for four years and not memorize your order, but Jackson wanted something to hide behind more than anything.

Soon, however, the pair went to the counter and ordered, paying while they were at it, and they were left with an empty table and silence to fill.

"I have to ask," Ollie finally piped up, "And you can tell me to shut up if I’m out of line," he paused for a moment and Jackson wondered where the hell this line of questioning could be going, "Are you sure you’re not in the slightest bit gay?"

Jackson laughed, but felt his cheeks grow hot again.

He was sure. He was so sure.

"Pretty sure," Jackson replied, "I grew up in San Fran-f*cking-cisco, I think I would’ve figured out by now if I was gay."

It wasn’t exactly true. He grew up outside of San Francisco, but the point still stood.

"You grew up in San Francisco?" Ollie asked in wonder, "Maybe that’s why you give off such gay vibes."

Jackson chuckled but felt bad now.

"Outside of San Francisco, but, yeah, maybe…"

Ollie still smiled, seemingly unphased by the comment.

"Look I was just curious because you have a real… queer energy to you," Ollie explained, "But it’s fine if you’re straight, I don’t actually care that much."

"Queer energy…" Jackson repeated back to the man, "I don’t think I’ve heard that before but you’re probably not wrong."

Ollie chuckled and looked up as their food made it to the table. The two dug in, both finding themselves absolutely famished.

Jackson was singularly focused on the orange chicken in front of him, eyes for the sweet morsels of meat only. He barely registered Ollie’s voice, cutting through his concentration.

"Woah, woah, Jackson your--"

A hand flashed forward, past Jackson’s face to the ends of his long, blonde hair. Jackson looked up then, chicken halfway between the plate and his mouth. His eyes flashed from the hand to Ollie’s face back to the hand, before leaning back (away) from the hand in question.

Ollie started to turn red.

"Sorry, uh, your hair, it was going to fall in your food," He explained.

Jackson took a moment to process. Hands in his hair. Ollie touching his hair.

Jackson felt anxious the same way he did when other people touched his hair, but-- wait, did he? Yes, he thought. But then this anxiety felt so different than normal? So…fluttery. He decided he hated this new, Ollie-only anxiety much, much more.

"Uh, yeah, you’re uh, good," Jackson tried to spit out.

"Sorry, I would offer a hair tie but…" Ollie trailed off and indicated to his buzzcut.

Well, that was it for Jackson. He was officially f*cking deceased.

"Oh, well, uh, don’t-don’t worry," Jackson sputtered, unsure if his face had turned incriminatingly white or red.

Although the thing he really wanted to do was hide far, far behind his personal curtain of hair he resisted the urge, instead finding his own hair tie on his wrist and pulling his mane into the quickest bun he could muster.

Ollie had remained silent, watching him carefully through the lenses of his glasses.

"I’m gonna, uh, I’m gonna eat," Jackson announced, to no one in particular, as he picked up his chopsticks again.

Ollie’s brows were furrowed.

"Jackson, did I make you uncomfortable?" He asked, concerned.

Now Jackson knew exactly what color his face was, if the heat on his cheeks was any indicator.

"No, no, it’s fine," Jackson mumbled directly through a bite of chicken.

"You can tell me if I did," Ollie reassured, "I feel bad. I usually don’t touch people without asking first, I just…didn’t want your hair to fall in your food."

Jackson sighed. He was going to have to cross this bridge sooner or later.

"It’s really okay, Ollie," Jackson finally said, after a long moment of pause, "I just get, um, weird about other people touching my hair."

Ollie’s face dawned with a look of understanding, and he leaned back, only just then realizing he’d been practically crawling over the table in his desperation to get Jackson to talk to him.

"Okay, that makes sense," He finally said, a light smile coming to his lips, "I’m sorry, again, I try to ask before I just reach out and touch people for this exact reason," He explained, "I’ll stay away from the hair."

"It’s really not that big a deal," Jackson reiterated, feeling that ever-present blush still lighting up his face, "It’s my thing, and people f*ck with my hair anyway all the time."

Oh. His quick tongue had let more words from his mouth than he intended, and suddenly Jackson sensed he had said too much. Well, sensed was one way to put it. The expression of concern that had made its way across Ollie’s face, however, hadn’t really made sensing a hard task.

"They f*ck with your hair anyway?" Ollie asked, "That’s…kind of messed up."

Oh god, Jackson had really said too much.

"No, uh, I mean- I-It’s fine, just, like, my friends and stuff," Jackson tried to clarify to little avail.

Ollie’s eyebrows did not return to their normal, relaxed state, and those glasses were doing nothing to soften his gaze. Jackson felt his teeth clatter on his lip ring before he even realized they’d made it there.

"I mean…" Ollie paused, "I don’t want to get in your business or anything, but unless you told them it was okay, they shouldn’t just cross your boundaries like that."

Jackson wanted to end this conversation, as soon as humanly f*cking possible.

"I know, I know," Jackson snapped back, with a little more venom in his voice than he anticipated, "Can we just stop talking about it?"

Ollie looked taken aback.

"Right. Yeah. Sorry."

"Thanks."

The only curt reply Jackson could muster.

The two ate the rest of their meal in relative silence, and as soon as Jackson managed to scarf down the last pieces of his chicken he was packed up and ready to go.

"I, uh, gotta get going…"

The sentence trailed off, the lie as obvious as Jackson felt it was, he was sure, but Ollie did not seem in any more of a mood to socialize than Jackson did.

"Cool, uh, see you on Monday," Ollie replied, smiling shortly and quickly turning his attention back to his own plate of food.

"You too," Jackson could only mutter as he left the restaurant.

As soon as he was outside, he reached up and pulled the hair tie out, letting his bun loose once again. He shook his head from side to side, letting his golden locks fan out behind him and to their resting place down his back. The place they were supposed to be, not trapped up in a stupid bun, in a stupid Chinese restaurant, talking to a stupid man.

He needed a beer.

XXXXX

Wednesday night bled into Thursday, bled into Friday. Ollie had made no use of Jackson’s phone number, and Jackson was happy for it, he needed some serious space away from the man, the longer that space lasted, the better.

Friday evening, Jackson sat in the dining hall with Hyeon, forcing dry chicken down his throat and reminiscing on the curry he’d eaten Tuesday night. The pair were both trying to save money and not eat out so much, but Jackson would just about kill for another home-cooked meal. He felt pent-up, and pensive, feelings with which he was getting uncomfortably familiar over the last few weeks. It was almost as if there was a ball of energy buried deep in his gut that he could not force out.

Hyeon knew him too well to let the energy sit unaddressed.

"What’s up with you?" She finally asked, after minutes of silence, "Usually when we have dinner, you’re getting on my nerves by now."

Jackson could only snort in response at first, but he was then left to ponder how he was supposed to answer the question at hand. The last Hyeon had heard of Ollie, he was the stuck-up brat with whom Jackson was being forced to do a group project. Any discussion of Tuesday or Wednesday had not yet taken place. Telling an outside figure made it feel so much more… real.

"I’m thinking about Ollie," Jackson eventually managed to mutter.

Hyeon raised a single, black eyebrow, twirling a lock of shiny hair around her finger.

"You know, for someone you hate, you sure think about that man quite a bit," Hyeon paused for a moment, but suddenly a light of realization dawned in her eyes, "And since when did you start calling him Ollie?"

Jackson could only blush at the observation.

"I don’t--" he finally tried, before cutting himself off, fully aware of just how stupid he was about to sound, "I don’t hate him."

"Oh, really?" Hyeon asked, incredulous, "You from Monday might disagree with that statement."

Jackson rolled his eyes.

"Alright, alright, thank you very much," Jackson replied, stopping the teasing girl before she could say more, "He still feels… I don’t know. He makes me feel weird, but I don’t hate him."

"Okay," Hyeon acquiesced slowly, "You don’t hate him, but he makes you feel weird. Weird how?"

Weird how? Jackson thought about how the hell he was supposed to answer that question.

Ollie made him feel… conscious? Of himself. Of his flaws. Of how he appeared under the man’s dark gaze. He thought of that fluttery feeling in his gut that appeared on Wednesday, that new kind of anxiety that he’d never felt before. The same anxiety he felt every time he looked at Ollie’s sinfully short haircut. An anxiety that pushed him away and pulled him back at the same time.

"I don’t know," Jackson finally mumbled back, "He makes me feel… self-conscious, anxious, just f*cking weird."

Hyeon’s brows furrowed.

"So, what happened?" She eventually asked.

"What do you mean what happened?" Jackson retorted, with more of a sharp edge in his voice than he intended.

Hyeon seemed to harden a bit in response, and Jackson was distinctly reminded of when the two of them were dating. He barely thought about their relationship anymore; thinking about it did nothing but make their friendship more awkward, but it had been coming to the front of his mind more often recently for reasons he could barely explain or understand.

"Well," Hyeon started, before stopping herself and taking a deep breath. Jackson couldn’t help but wonder what was on her mind, "Whether you want to admit it or not, something about the way you think about Ollie has changed from Monday. So, what gives?"

Jackson sighed, preparing himself for the deep embarrassment of admitting he might have, maybe, been slightly incorrect about Ollie, but before he could, his phone started buzzing, almost uncontrollably, on the table. The device was facedown, and Jackson retrieved it to look at what, or rather who, the f*ck was causing his phone to have a downright seizure.

It was a group chat, the name of which he both very much wanted and did not want to see. Pregame tonight, before an Alpha Gamma Rho party, before a late-night. Free beer and forgetting, Jackson’s two favorite things.

"Don’t even tell me who’s texting you right now, I’m sure I don’t want to know," Hyeon scoffed when Jackson looked up with an apologetic expression.

"Look, I know they can be a little annoying, but they’re not bad people," Jackson protested.

"I think your definition of ‘bad’ and mine are different," Hyeon retorted icily, before pausing.

The pair sat in silence for a moment and Jackson shoved another piece of bone-dry chicken down his throat, refusing to be the one to break the tension. Hyeon acquiesced.

"Sorry, I’m being a c**t," She started, quietly, "They’re your friends and you already know how I feel about them. There’s no use in beating a dead horse."

"It’s cool," Jackson muttered quietly, unused to these rare moments of apology from Hyeon, the only person nearly as stubborn as him.

"No, it’s not. You’re allowed to live your life without me being sh*tty about it. Have fun tonight, don’t do anything stupid."

Jackson gave Hyeon an incredulous look as he ate his last bite of dinner, and the girl snorted.

"Don’t do anything super-duper stupid?" She suggested.

Jackson chuckled.

"You know me so well."

XXXXX

Jackson stood in front of his mirror, inspecting his outfit for the evening. The smell of nail polish remover was almost overpowering, only added to by the distinct scent of the vodka Jackson had taken a shot of a few minutes earlier. Pregaming the pregame. Nothing but healthy.

His cuticles still felt dry from the rubbing, but he always removed his nail polish before these things, ensuring he dressed in exactly the right way. Pregames with The Boys always demanded a very specific style of dress, halfway between a typical frat bro and a cool, San Francisco boy. Tonight, that meant black jeans that were slightly too big, a T-shirt from the least political punk band he enjoyed, and his denim jacket. A uniform, mandatory for attendance.

He didn’t usually think like this, and decided the musings were an indicator of too little alcohol. He coughed down another shot of vodka as he walked out the door, the lack of chaser leaving the burn sitting in his throat.

He walked through the cold night air until he found the dirt driveway with a few pickup trucks parked around the entrance, behind the trees was Alpha Gamma Rho, the site of many of his best blackout stories. He took a deep breath and in he went.

The lights were already off. Music, already bumping.

Jackson did not pretend to know much about rap, but even he, in his limited knowledge, could be sure of the fact that whatever AGR played was the worst and Whitest of an art form far beyond their understanding. As his eyes adjusted to the lack of light, he focused on his friends, grouped in one of the house’s many living rooms, passing around bottles and laughing at each other’s jokes.

As he came over, one placed a beer in his hand as another dapped him up. Here he was--a part of this group for the night.

The main three men he stuck to were Luke, Bryce, and Owen, Luke usually being the one who invited him to these kinds of events. Tonight, his crowd seemed to be no different.

Jackson took a swig of his drink and found it to be a particularly disgusting strand of beer. He grimaced and made a face in the other mens’ direction.

"Is this sh*t beer or pond water? Jesus."

"It’s PBR," Owen replied with a scowl, "I don’t like it any more than you do, but we can’t buy Bud Light anymore."

"Remind me why we can’t buy Bud Light?" Jackson asked with a scowl.

"Because it’s so f*cking political," Bryce explained, "I mean, I have no problem with trans… whatever, but do they really need to put that sh*t in a beer commercial? I just want to drink in peace."

Jackson nearly retorted that basic human rights weren’t exactly a revolutionary political statement, but then remembered where he was and who he was talking to. Tonight wasn’t a night for that, it was a night for alcohol. But even after another swig of his beer he couldn’t unhear Hyeon in his head. Why the f*ck did he have to feel guilty just for trying to have a single night with the friends he’d had since his freshman year?

Jackson tried to force down more of his beer as the boys ran through the typical topics: sports, girls, crazy drug-induced stories, but at a moment when the conversation died down, Owen piped up with a new prompt.

"Guess who I saw in the library a few days ago?"

"Who?" Luke replied excitedly.

"Jackson motherf*cking Young," Owen delivered.

Jackson sighed, this conversation at his expense was only going to go downhill, he sensed it already.

"What? Jackson in the library? No way!" Bryce replied, reaching over and ruffling Jackson’s hair.

It took a not insignificant amount of self-control not to punch Bryce in the face, especially after what might have been one too many sips of beer.

"F*ck off," he muttered to the crowd at large, but the men only snickered.

"What business could you possibly have had in a library?" Luke further teased, and Owen grinned, pleased at his work.

"I had a group project," Jackson replied flatly.

"Oof. Rough buddy," one of the three men replied, although Jackson couldn’t quite be sure which.

"What class?" Luke asked again.

Oh boy, here we f*cking go, Jackson could only sigh to himself.

"Queer Lit." The reply was so clipped, Jackson was surprised the other men heard it over the pounding music.

"Queer Lit?" Bryce piped up, and Jackson braced himself for whatever was about to come out of the man’s mouth, "What was the project? How to get f*cked up the ass?"

That elicited raucous laughter from the other three, and Jackson simply stood, unsure how to respond.

"Although you’d already know all about that, wouldn’t you?" Owen joked.

Jackson couldn’t help it; he felt himself bristling at the comment. Being seen as queer by Ollie was one thing, but by these boys, it was something else entirely. It felt distinctly like danger.

"What the f*ck do you mean by that?" He snapped back with more vitriol than he had intended.

"You know," Owen waggled his eyebrows, and Jackson was filled with another deep impulse to punch someone, "San Francisco…"

Owen didn’t need to finish the sentence for the others to fill in the blank, and the space around Jackson was filled with a bunch of laughter and the ooh’s that come after a quip the crowd considers to be a ‘good burn.’ Jackson was at his f*cking limit.

"Well, not like you all know how to read, but it is a f*cking English class, so the project was about a book," Jackson snapped back, trying to keep an air of playful joking while feeling his blood boil right underneath his skin.

Bryce scowled at the comment, the one out of the three men who was the recipient of the most teasing about his subpar GPA.

"You know Jackson, I was curious why you even chose that class in the first place," He retorted, "Girls not working out for ya? Wanted to try out some men?"

Jackson knew at this point it was bait, but he was somewhere between too drunk and too fed up not to take it.

"Girls are working out just fine for me, thanks," He snapped back icily, "And what’s with all the sh*t anyway? Luke, isn’t your girlfriend queer?"

Luke flushed at the question but replied as quickly to the snub as Jackson had to his own.

"Yeah, she’s bi, but she’s not that kind of queer."

"What do you mean, ‘that kind of queer’? Last I checked she’s a f*cked a couple women in her time, I think that makes her pretty damn queer."

"You know," Bryce prompted, but Jackson purposefully did not take the hint, "The kind of queer that isn’t loud about it."

Oh, that made Jackson feel all kinds of uncomfortable. Maybe he’d always been too drunk or not listening close enough to care before, but he could swear this was the first time his less…progressive friends had been so damn blatant about it. He hated it when Hyeon was right, mostly because she always f*cking was, even when he didn’t admit it.

Luke wasn’t done though, chiming back in to add onto whatever inane words had just fallen from Bryce’s mouth.

"Right, exactly!" He exclaimed as if Bryce had just proposed a philosophical truth on the level of Renee Descartes, "She’d never take a class like Queer Lit. Last I heard all the people in that class are loud dykes and men who like it up the ass."

"And Jackson, apparently," Owen chimed in.

Jackson decided to lay off, he wasn’t going to change these men’s minds, and he didn’t feel like putting in the effort to try.

"Yes, I’m a loud lesbian and proud," He instead joked.

"Certainly got the hair to be one," Luke snapped back, reaching out and grabbing a handful of Jackson’s dirty blonde hair and tugging on it.

Jackson could give Bryce the benefit of the doubt, the man had enough of a sloth brain for Jackson to legitimately believe it was through a lapse in memory that he’d violated that boundary, but Luke was not nearly that dense. That action was on purpose, and Jackson knew it as well as Luke did.

It was in that moment that Ollie barged into Jackson’s mind for the millionth time over the past two days, uninvited as he always was. Jackson had always brushed off the boys playing with his hair as an annoyance he would have to forgive, something to tolerate to be friends with them, but was it really as simple as Ollie made it seem? Was there really a possible world where Jackson didn’t feel like he was constantly on his toes?

Jackson pushed the doubts far, far out of his mind as soon as they came barging in. He’d come to this f*cking pregame to forget about Ollie, not to let him invade his mind once again. His friends, however, didn’t seem to get the memo.

"You know," Owen started, "If you got a normal f*cking haircut, it would probably be a lot easier for you to pull girls who are actually hot."

Another chorus of ooh’s ran through the men, and Jackson decided he was done playing nice.

"Well it would be a lot easier for you to pull girls who are hot if you stopped watching so much rape porn and yet, here we are," He snapped back, letting his words do the punching instead of his fists, his drunk mind uncaring of what exactly what fell from his lips, "And you can keep Hyeon’s name out of your mouth."

The self-satisfied grin dropped from Owen’s face.

"I didn’t say her name," He snapped back.

"Yeah, because you can’t f*cking pronounce it," Jackson replied, just as quickly, before turning to Luke, "You got some vodka? I need a real drink."

Luke nodded towards the other end of the room, where a table was full of liquor. Jackson did not bother to say thank you, turning on his heel and simply walking away. He dared one of the men to touch his hair then, but they seemed to sense that he was not in the mood and, for once, they respected the boundary.

As Jackson approached the table with liquor, he saw a younger man he didn’t recognize standing by a generous dusting of white powder. As he grabbed a handle of cheap vodka from the table and busied himself searching for a glass, he couldn’t help but cock a single eyebrow at the kid.

"Do I even wanna know?" He asked.

"It’s only Adderall," The kid replied, "I’m like… seventy-five percent sure."

Oh, great. Seventy-five percent.

The kid held a rolled-up dollar bill and stuck the thing up his nose, and Jackson, in an effort not to be an accomplice to whatever laundry list of crimes was about to take place, turned his back. The aggressive sniffing noises were enough to let him know what had just happened.

F*ck it. Tonight was not a cup night; tonight was a drink-straight-from-the-bottle night. Jackson wanted to forget. Forget the guilt. Forget Hyeon. And especially, especially forget Ollie.

Down the hatch. The liquor burned like fire, but f*ck did it feel good to burn away whatever annoying thoughts remained in his brain. From what sounded like a far distance, he heard a few people chanting for him to continue chugging. He’d gotten pretty good at that over the years and opened his throat. The boys wanted a show? He’d give them a f*cking show.

Eventually however, even an experienced drinker like himself needed a break. As soon as he took the rim of the bottle from his lips, he already felt the effects of however much alcohol he’d guzzled making its way through his veins. His body feeling somehow heavy and light at the same time, feet slightly unstable below him.

He slammed the handle back down on the table, and slowly made his way back to the boys he’d run away from just a few minutes earlier.

However, just as Luke’s eyes met his own, slightly glassy gaze, everything he’d just drank to flood out of his mind came back with a vengeance. Ollie’s face swimming in front of his vision, a mix of sadness and disappointment that Jackson hated to see in his dark eyes, not even slightly softened by those glasses.

F*ck it. More.

He returned and picked up the PBR he’d handed to Owen, downing the rest of the swill in one swallow.

"Damn, Jackson," Bryce said, but while Jackson could hear Hyeon saying the same words in a disapproving tone, the men seemed to be plenty impressed with the amount of alcohol he could down in a matter of minutes.

"Time to get f*cked up!" Jackson exclaimed, wanting to put on a fun air in the hopes that after enough pretending it would start being real.

Someone clapped him on the back and someone else exclaimed, "F*ck yeah!" Although Jackson wasn’t quite sure from where these stimuli were coming.

It turns out, as Jackson learned that night and not for the first time, that when one announces their intention to get f*cked up in a frat house, the brothers will shove drinks into their hands until that goal is thoroughly met.

Red solo cups, shot glasses, and mystery cans, Jackson downed them faster than he registered exactly what they were. After a while, the burn of the alcohol seemed to fade as he craved more of the floaty feeling the magical liquid was giving him.

At some point though, even the floaty feeling turned a bit sour, and the room started to spin. Jackson decided he was, in fact, thoroughly f*cked up and if he wanted to actually make it through the rest of the night, it might be a good idea to take a break.

He sat down on a couch in a living room, lights and noise and people flashing all around him. It was at that moment, with the world rotating around him, that his thoroughly intoxicated brain decided to conjure the exact person he was trying so hard to forget.

He heard as the bass beats of the music pounding turned into Ollie’s voice in his ears, felt Ollie’s knee brushing along Jackson’s own, saw Ollie’s guilty expression, watched as the man’s pale hand swam in front of his vision, reaching out and grabbing dirty blonde hair, watched as the other pale hand came to the nape of his neck, watched that buzzcut, that buzzcut, that buzzcut.

Ollie would be sad to know he was here.

Ollie would be sad to know Jackson was the exact kind of person he despised.

Jackson had to get out.

At this point, the party was in full motion and Jackson was sure he could slip out without being particularly missed. Luke had his location, if he really wanted to see where Jackson was, but if their brief spat earlier tonight was any indication, Jackson doubted Luke would much care where he was at the moment.

He pushed himself up from the couch, stumbling slightly as lights and figures blurred and twisted in his vision. The heat of the room was not helping anything, and Jackson craved the cold of the outdoors. He pushed through bodies, feet stumbling and sorrys slurred, over and under the throngs and escaped out the front door.

As soon as the cold air touched his skin, he felt relief. He realized he’d been sweating, his palms damp and a few strands of hair plastering themselves to his forehead. Ollie’s voice, Ollie’s face, Ollie’s touch blared more loudly and obviously than ever, but at least he didn’t have to experience the man and the damn party at the same time.

Jackson still couldn’t help but feel guilty, however.

At first, his slow-moving mind couldn’t figure out why. He’d tried to stuff that guilt back in the AGR house and shut the door on it, but it crept out anyway, seeping under the doorframe and through the cracks in the windows. Finally, though, his brain found it. Wednesday. Those damn hands and his damn hair and those words that made him want to crawl out of his skin and into an interdimensional wormhole.

He hadn’t just been feeling guilty because of tonight, he’d been feeling guilty because of the uncomfortable silence that had sat between him and Ollie for the last two days. The silence he suddenly felt an intense impulse to break.

F*ck it, he decided for the millionth time that night. If he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Ollie, he ought to at least text him something, anything.

He pulled his phone from his pocket and tapped out a message with stuttering fingers and questionable accuracy.

J: Sorrry abour Wednesday. I wad kind of a dickkkkk

Sent. There. Clear conscience.

Jackson looked around and decided that his focus right now should be getting home, in an effort not to freeze in the Vermont winter. F*ck he missed California, the place where you could pass out after a party and all you had to worry about cops, not hypothermia. Jackson had practiced this route, however, while drunk, high off any number of drugs, and often crossed. He knew how to get back home on muscle memory alone.

Soon enough, his trusty feet, working fully on autopilot, brought him to his dorm, into his room, and he collapsed into his bed.

It was the sunlight that woke Jackson, eventually. He opened his eyes to the blinding light of midday sun and an equally blinding headache. This was the worst hangover he’d had in a while. The last night came to him in scraps. A vague argument with the AGR boys, too much to drink, and…f*ck. He hadn’t actually texted Ollie, had he?

He scrambled for his phone, desperate to know if his brain had been nearly as stupid as he remembered it being, a repetitive chorus of please no running through his mind as he unlocked his phone.

One text. From Ollie. Sent at 9:01 am.

O: No problem. I’m sorry, too. I was pushy.

Jackson wanted to fall back asleep. Jackson wanted to get blackout drunk for the rest of his life to forget what he had done. He read back the text he’d sent, full of typos and delivered at 1:30 am. If that didn’t scream drunk text, he didn’t know what did.

In some strange way, however, Jackson had to be thankful for his dumb, drunk self. When sober, he would run to the hills rather than ever be vulnerable or, worst of all, admit wrongdoing, yet his vodka-pickled brain seemed to have no problem doing what sober him could never do--apologize.

All was forgiven. All could be forgotten. And Monday could come without returning to the state of silence and hatred Ollie and Jackson had been in a week ago.

Thank God, his brain supplied, before he could stop it.

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