Title: Unsaid Words
Author: cinaed
Rating: PG-13
Prompt: 091. "Epiphany"
Disclaimer: Not mine. Unfortunately.
Warnings: ...Er, more angst
Pairings: David Hodges/Greg Sanders
Summary: This is some sort of jigsaw puzzle, and Greg will figure it out. He just has to collect all the pieces first.
Author's Notes: Second part of a trilogy. The first part can be found here - The Last One to Know.
Spoiler: None

***

(Do you hear it in the silence? A thousand unsaid words, all of which I should have said to you.)

Greg isn't sure how long he stands there, clutching the dictionary and staring in the direction that David's taxi has gone. During that entire time, however, the feeling that he's missed something doesn't wane -- in fact it does the exact opposite and increases, until Greg is almost dizzy.

He swallows and wonders at the panicky build-up of pressure in his chest. He takes a few deep breaths before he shakes his head, trying to clear it, and it's about that time Greg realizes he's been staring off into the distance for quite a few minutes, if his constant shivering and slightly numb hands are any indication.

He stows the dictionary away in the pocket of his jacket and then heads towards his car, turning over the night's events in his head. This is some sort of jigsaw puzzle, and Greg will figure it out. He just has to collect all the pieces first.

Even as he pulls out of the casino's parking lot, Greg sets out the pieces neatly. First, there was the fact that David came to the party at all. After all, he hadn't gone to David Phillips' bachelor party. Then there's the fact that David had gotten thoroughly smashed, and Greg has never seen David drink more than one or two glasses. There's also the fact that David had gotten him a present, and Greg wasn't sure if guys were supposed to give each other presents at bachelor parties (aside from strippers, that is). And the biggest puzzle piece of all has to be that look on David's face, the one that even just thinking about makes Greg's breath come short and an agitated feeling knot his stomach. 'Course, he's not sure if he's got that piece figured out yet, because he hasn't named that expression.

Well, Greg definitely has a lot (if not all) of the pieces of the jigsaw. It's too bad that he still doesn't know if he's trying to do a puzzle of the Eiffel Tower or a teddy bear.

After a moment, he nods to himself, absently noticing the red light and barely managing to come to a stop in time. He'll go ask Jacqui. She understands the inner workings of David Hodges better than anyone else does (which is to say, not that well, but hey, she knows him better than Greg, and that's something at least).

It's only after he rings her doorbell that he remembers it's almost four in the morning and that she's probably going to kill him for waking her up. He absently touches the dictionary in his pocket and tries to ready himself for his death (at least he didn't die a virgin).

He's caught off-guard by the expression on Jacqui's face when she opens the door -- rather than pissy, she looks expectant, like she knew he was going to come over or something, which he doesn't think she could possibly have known, unless she's suddenly become psychic. Greg's even more confused when the expectant look slides off her face and is replaced by an expression of confusion.

"Greg?" Jacqui blinks at him. "I thought you were…shouldn't you be in bed?" She checks her wristwatch. "Your wedding's in six hours. You should definitely be sleeping."

"Yeah, probably." He forces himself to smile. Obviously, Jacqui was expecting someone (the question is who, but since this isn't part of the David Hodges jigsaw, he ignores her confused look in favor of his own investigation). "Can I come in?"

She hesitates, still blinking bemusedly at him. Despite the fact that she's been expecting someone, she is wearing faded pajamas that used to have either ducks on them or bright yellow fish (he's gonna guess the former), and the gag gift bunny slippers that Archie had given her last Christmas.

"Fine," Jacqui says at last, stepping aside to let him inside, and he gratefully escapes the cool Nevada night. "Though if you're here because you've got cold feet, don't expect me to buy you a bus ticket to Miami or Seattle under an assumed name."

Greg makes a face. "I didn't get cold feet."

Jacqui just raises a skeptical eyebrow at that, and doesn't say a word, just closes her door and looks at him. After a moment of silence, during which Greg is trying to figure out how to ask, 'What the hell is up with David?' without sounding crazy, she says, "Well? I'm assuming this is something important if you're ringing my doorbell at four in the morning."

"I…." It's funny, Greg has never had trouble with words, in fact his tongue often wags a little too freely (as his accidentally letting slip to Sara how old he was when he lost his virginity can attest to), but even just thinking about the odd gleam in David's eyes makes him struggle for coherency. "David came to my bachelor party."

Some unknown emotion flickers across Jacqui's face at that, but before Greg can even start to try and define it, she rolls her eyes and declares, "While I realize that David being social is a sign of the Apocalypse, I have to remind you that we get seven years at the end of the world, so you'll get at least that much time with Becky."

"He gave me this," Greg says, and pulls out the dictionary.

The same emotion flickers across her face, but this time he recognizes it as wariness. What's Jacqui got to be cautious about? She just looks at the dictionary for a moment, and then shrugs, a forced smile on her lips. "What is with you boys and your gag gifts?"

"It wasn't a gag gift," he argues, thinking of that bittersweet smile and how tired David had looked. Flipping to the page with fountain on it, he thrusts it towards her.

She reads the words David had written on the page, and shakes her head. "This is obviously a gag gift, Greg. David--"

"It wasn't a gag gift, Jacqui," he repeats firmly, more certain of this than he has been of anything. When she just shakes her head again, he taps a finger against the pages of the open dictionary. "It wasn't. He had the weirdest look on his face--"

"Greg, why would David get you a gift? That's not the David we all know and lo…put up with," Jacqui says, equally firm, but the wariness is naked on her face now. "It's a gag gift. What else could it be?"

"I don't know," Greg says, frustration creeping into his voice. "That's what I came here to ask you. I mean, he had this look, like he--" And then all the pieces slide into the place, and in a burst of enlightenment that feels like a punch to the gut, Greg figures out what he's been missing.

"Oh," he says, ignoring the worried look Jacqui is directing his way. The inside of his head is suddenly buzzing, and he feels vaguely sick to his stomach. "Oh. He-- oh shit." And then he snatches the dictionary from her and makes a break for his car.

It's not until he's halfway to David's house that the buzzing quiets down enough for coherent thoughts to emerge, panicked ones like How the hell did I, the self-proclaimed master of subtext, miss that? and What the hell am I going to say to him?

Unfortunately, he is still grasping for an answer to the latter when he gets up to David's front door and rings the doorbell.

There is no answer, and Greg frowns at the dark house before he presses the doorbell again. Finally a light turns on, and a few moments later David is peering out at him blearily through a crack in the door and muttering, "What the hell? I was sleeping, Sanders. It's something sane people do--"

"Can I talk to you?" Those words tumble off his lips at least, albeit haphazardly, and David blinks and frowns before he opens the door wider and Greg steps inside.

"If you've got cold feet, I'm not the best one to help you out," David says, and rubs at his eyes as though trying not to fall back to sleep on his feet or perhaps he's just doubting his own sight. "Your best bet's Archie. He could probably get you a fake passport and everything."

"David," Greg says, and again he struggles for words, and he suspects that this is going to be a fight to the death for coherency, as David eyes him and looks about to say something scathing. "I just wanted to…I didn't realize…."

"Didn't realize what?" David says, tone sharp, when Greg falters. The tired, puzzled expression on his face has shifted to one that's hard and almost angry. "Didn't realize what, Greg?"

He swallows. "How you felt." The words feels like bullets aimed for David's chest as they propel from between his lips, and the bitter backlash and imagined taste of gunpowder makes him feel even more nauseous than before.

David is eyeing him, and wariness radiates from every pore, as though David is certain this is a trap and that he needs to be careful lest he get ensnared. When he speaks, his tone is guarded. "How I felt about what, precisely?"

The words catch at the back of his throat, but somehow Greg forces out, "How you felt about me."

The other man raises an eyebrow and is obviously trying for a smirk, but it comes out as a half-grimace instead. "What? That you're a poor speller? I would have thought that was obvious." When Greg just looks at him, he sighs and rolls his eyes. "Go to your apartment and sleep, Greg. You're obviously half-mad from panic at realizing that you've actually found someone willing to marry you--"

"You should have said something." Greg should probably be wording this more carefully, should probably be explaining that if David had kept quiet because he thought Greg was straight, he hadn't known about Greg's 'experimenting' in San Francisco, should probably be mentioning that when people joked that Greg flirted with everyone, they didn't realize he was actually flirting with everyone.

He should be doing all those things, but instead his words are coming out all helter-skelter, without his consent. "I mean, you could've said something, you know? I--"

Greg's not quite certain what happens next, but the next thing he knows he is being pinned to David's wall, and the other man's hand is twisting his shirt collar and cutting off his oxygen, and David is growling, something harsh and desperate in his voice, "Don't you dare tell me we had a chance, Greg -- don't you fucking dare."

Even if Greg wasn't breathless, he would be speechless, just looking at the hard, despondent look on David's face and hearing that harsh, desperate tone, and so he is silent even after David makes a sound of disgust and releases his death-grip on Greg's collar.

David takes a step back, running a trembling hand through his hair, and drops his gaze. "Go home and go to bed, Sanders," he advises quietly. "Think of your bride, whom I'm sure is lovely and delightful and perfect for you. Go. Get some sleep."

"David," Greg says again, this time knowing all-too-well why he feels suddenly panicked, and finally retreats from the house as David's face twists into an expression of grief and he snarls in a voice filled with despair, "Just go, damnit!"

And so Greg goes. He gets back into his car and drives home, peels off his socks and shoes and takes off his belt and crawls into bed. Try as he might, though, he can't sleep a wink, and spends the rest of the night staring up at the ceiling and remembering the despair in David's voice and the look on his face, and wishing that he hadn't been enlightened to the fact that David was in love with him.

When he gets to the church, Nick takes one look at him and chuckles. "Knew you'd get cold feet, G."

"Yeah," Greg says, and pastes a smile on his face that manages to stay on his lips all the way through the ceremony. He is aware that Jacqui is watching him with watchful, almost melancholy eyes, and that David is nowhere to be seen, and he cannot decide whether he has never been more relieved or rueful at that fact.

When he slides the ring onto Becky's finger, he is struck by how thick her fingers are compared to David's, or how her beaming smile seems overwhelming bright compared to David's more subtle smiles and smirks.

"You may now kiss the bride," the reverend announces, and Greg feels a wave of something akin to hopelessness and regret and a thousand unsaid words that will never be said aloud crash over him as he leans forward to gently kiss Becky's lips.

***