Archive of Our Own ^beta

Birds chirp back and forth in the humid spring heat that has settled over Samwell during the last days of finals week, filling every frat house and library with it’s stifling haze that none, not even Shitty (who has stripped completely nude, not surprisingly), can escape. In his room, Jack lounges on his bed and stares at the ceiling. Finals had taken their toll on everyone in the Haus, even Bittle, who hadn’t so much as mentioned baking the past week. Suddenly, the heavy silence is shattered by the slamming of the front door and Lardo’s piercing voice, shouting, “ROADTRIP!

Commotion erupts, and Jack stumbles downstairs to judge the level of chaos. Bitty and Chowder are packing coolers, which in turn are being loaded in to the car by Ransom and Holster. Shitty seems to be on the phone with Dex and Nursey, and Lardo, in true manager form, is standing on the table giving directions from a clipboard. “Shitty! The frogs coming or nah?”

“Dex and Nursey say they’re en route to the murder Stop-and-Shop to pick up the shit you needed, and they said they got their bags as well, so I’d say we’re pretty much set for food.” Shitty says, pocketing his phone. 

“All we need now is a destination, and operation ‘Get the Fuck Outta the Heat,’ title courtesy of Holtzy, is go go go!”  Lardo spots Jack from her tabletop perch. “Jack! First place in North America that pops in to your head!"

“Uh…” North America. Good place in North America. A preferably not-hot place in North America. Jack ponders the question. He remembers summers spent in aquamarine water, surrounded by the smell of pine trees and the ocean, reveling in the natural serenity of the place. He blurts out, “How about Nova Scotia?”

Lardo meets his gaze as she hops off the table. “You heard the man! As proclaimed by our great leader, Jack Laurent Zimmerman, we are OFFICIALLY ROADTRIPPING TO NOVA SCOTIA!” She turns to Jack, grinning. “Pack yo’ bags, son! Let’s roll!”

Darling, nothing ever goes exactly how you planned it
I guess I've been here long enough to see
That time can be your dearest friend
Or time can be a bandit
When tomorrow changes into history

Shitty is driving, and Jack regrets every life choice he ever made. 90’s pop blasts over the car speakers, rattling Jack’s bones. Bitty, Ransom, and Holster belt out the lyrics in the backseat. (Bitty’s wearing just his hockey jersey and shorts, the shoulder of said jersey slipping down, down down, along with all the blood in Jack’s body and well doesn’t this completely nondescript piece of lint on the floor look interesting?) Lardo and the frogs are playing some card game that seems to involve an excessive amount of shouting and slapping, all crammed together in the way back. “Hey! You nerds wanna stop for some food?”

Shitty seemed to have turned down the music to address the passengers of the car. Up ahead, a tiny little store proclaiming to be, “Momma Larson’s Best and Only” pancake house is coming into view. Ecstatic cheers erupt from the backseat as the large billboard in front of the store is spotted.

“Momma Larson’s, here we come!” Shitty shouts, cranking the music back up.

“Shitty, it’s ten-thirty at night. There’s no way they’re going to be open!” Jack protests, grinning nonetheless.  Shitty just waves him off as they pull in to the parking lot of the pancake house. As they roll up to the front entrance, Ransom and Holster leap out of the car and peer inside the restaurant. A quick thumbs-up-good-to-go sign is flashed, and Shitty crows with triumph as the rest of the group scrambles out of the van. 

“Hah! You doubted Momma Larson’s best and only pancake house, Jack Zimmerman, and the pancake house pulled through!” Jack can only shake his head at Shitty’s words as they jog up to the door. The longhaired man scoops up a handful of gravel from one of the flowerbeds and begins to pelt Jack with the tiny rocks. “Stone the non-believer! Stone him!”

Lardo takes up the chant, followed by Ransom and Holster, until the entire group has chased Jack into the pancake house, laughing as they collapse around a table. And hey, if Jack sits next to Bitty because he wants to reach his arm around the blonde “in order to steal food from Lardo”, that’s his business, isn’t it?

(No one comments on the fact that Bitty practically glows whenever Jack touches him, although Dex does mutter angrily and then hands a twenty dollar bill over to Nursey.)

Maybe it'll find you lying peaceful under blankets
Or bleeding at the bottom of the stairs
Oh but it's not when or how you go
It's life and what you make it
It's the traveling, not the road that gets you there

It’s five-thirty in the morning when Jack takes the wheel from a very tired Holster at a truck rest stop in. Ransom struggles to turn in the shotgun seat, half-heartedly attempting to reach behind him to shake Bitty awake. Country music plays softly on the radio, and next to him, Bittle is slowly waking up, rubbing sleep from his eyes. Jack’s breath catches in his throat when he looks over to Bitty. In the light of the rising sun, his radiant, blonde hair is mussed and his sweatpants hang low on his hips. Bitty stretches, making little sleepy noises as he does so. Jack turns his eyes back to the wheel with a small cough. The blonde smiles at Jack, all sunshine and sugar, and gives him a bright, “Good morning!”  “Good morning.” Bittle is far too cheery for this hour.  There’s no one on the highway but them, and the road seemingly stretches for miles alongside cornfields and forests. There is not a house in sight.

          Jack steps on the gas.

He gradually pushes the car faster and faster, silhouetted against the watercolor sunrise, until the tall crops on either side of them are nothing but a blur. The van is flying along the road now, trees whizzing past the window. Something electronic and sparkly starts playing. Glancing over, Jack sees that Bitty’s plugged in his iPod in to the car speaker system.  The heavy bass is thumping along with Jack’s heart, hammering away with the added adrenaline from the speed of the car, and Jack feels like he could unfurl wings and fly.

So when those funeral drums are rumbling
Like some slow and steady thunder
I'll say my last goodbyes and walk away
I'll step into the river
Let the current pull me under
And just fall into that infinite embrace

Nova Scotia is just like he remembers it as a kid. Jack had gotten the same euphoric feeling when the beach had pulled into view, eyes lighting up at the sight of the ocean. The group had practically trampled one another to reach the water as soon as they had arrived, whooping and hollering all the way down to the shore.

Waves ripple over the sand, quiet and soothing. Jack’s not quite sure where the sky stops and the water ends, the ocean is so calm.  He is alone on the beach, breath matching the in-out swell of the sea that creeps steadily further towards him. His toes curl in the sand. Whatever Shitty and Lardo were smoking when Jack asked to take a drag has definitely kicked in. Here, Jack feels so real, nothing on his chest, nothing nagging in the back of his mind. Here, the only thing that matters is the stars that rotate slowly about the heavens, planets spinning to some ethereal melody, black holes and other galaxies in a space that keeps growing, expanding to accommodate the pure size of the universe.

            This is where I belong, Jack distantly acknowledges as his blue eyes reflect thousands of distant suns,

                                                            This is where I belong.

And oh my, my, honey, everybody dies

But you got, you got to see

That you can live your life walking in a straight line

But it’s more than just A to B

Jack wakes with Bitty curled up next to him. He lies in the tent, arms under his head, and sighs. This trip, however impromptu it had been, definitely was one for the record. The night before had been filled with bonfires and drinking shit beer Ransom and Holster had bought from a local convenience store, trading stories of previous trips and hockey, and later…

Later, Jack had finally fucking cornered Bitty and kissed him so damn hard Jack thought his lungs might have given out. Definitely the highlight of the evening. A blanket rustling beside him breaks his train of thought. Jack looks down to meet Bitty’s eyes. “Hey.”

“Oh my god, Jack, it is freezing come back down here this instant you massive heater!” Jack laughs (it feels nice to laugh like this) and snuggles back down in to the sleeping bag with Bittle. 

                                         Yes, he thinks, he is right where he belongs.

Oh my, my, honey, everybody dies,

But you got, you got to see

That you can live your life walking in a straight line

But it’s more than just A to B

Yeah, it’s more than just A to B.