Title: Packing Up
By: amuly
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Word Count: 2,071
Rating: soft PG-13
Summary: Before it was Ianto’s flat. Then it was their flat. Now it is just a flat.
Warnings: Angst angst angst. Sorry, going through some shit right now.
A/N: I don’t actually think this scene happens in cannon. Like, I don’t think Jack went back to the flat: I think he just left Gwen to it all. However, if it did happen, this is how I think it would have gone down. Does that make sense?

Companion fic to Not Coming Back.

            Jack stepped into their flat. His flat. The flat…he turned around and started to walk away.

            “Jack! Jack! No, no no no no no. Turn around. You are not leaving me to do this on my own!”

            Jack took a breath, blinking tears out of his eyes. He turned back to look at Gwen, who was staring him down. Tears glistened in her eyes, and Jack had to quell his instinct to turn and run. He just wanted to get as far away as he could: from the memories of him, and the smells, and the sights…

            Jack clenched and unclenched his hands. “Okay. Okay.”

            He walked past Gwen, back into…a flat. It wasn’t their flat anymore, or his flat, or even the flat. Just a flat. As Jack’s eyes roamed over everything inside, memories bubbled to the surface. Jack could tell himself it was just a flat, but it still felt like their flat. It still felt like Ianto was going to walk through the door any minute, make him coffee, grumble about the new Bond movie, or entice him into the bedroom. Shit. The bedroom.

            “Gwen, why don’t…” Jack swallowed and opened his eyes wide, as if that would stop the tears. “Why don’t you start working on the living room? I’ll…” Jack’s eyes lingered on the bedroom door. “I’ll do the bedroom.”

            “Sure, Jack.” Gwen handed over a stack of cardboard boxes. He took them, his hand lingering on the Torchwood logo emblazoned on the side of each one. He looked up when he heard Gwen walk away into their living room. His living room. The living room. Jack wiped a hand over his face, sniffling loudly. Then he turned and went into the bedroom, boxes in hand. 

            Once he stepped into their…Ianto’s…the bedroom, Jack shut the door behind him. He slumped against it, the hard wood supporting him: a firmament desperately needed right now. He looked around. It was just as they left it, that last morning. Before he…before the world went to shit. Before he, Jack, went to shit.

            “Jack, come on. Get dressed.”

            “But Ianto…”

            “No, we have to go.”

            “What time is it?”

            “7:30. Jack, get your arse out of bed.”

            “7:30? Why are you getting up so early? Ianto, come back to bed and screw me into the mattress before we go to work.”

            “Williams collapsed. We have to get to the hospital and get that hitchhiker out of him, before the medical staff discover it.”

            “Damn it. Where’s my…”

            “Clothes on the chair, coffee and pastry on the counter, boots and coat in the hall. Now get up so I can make the bed.”

            “You’re going to make the bed? We have to go.”

            “Blowjob says I can make it before you’re out the door.”

            “You’re on.”

            Pushing himself off the door, Jack walked over to the bed. He smoothed his hands over the perfectly tucked away sheets. Ianto had won the bet, of course. Didn’t have time to claim his prize before…before everything else. Jack’s hands pressed into the bed, supporting his weight. Vaguely, some small part of his mind noted that he was rumpling the sheets, and Ianto would be upset with him for that. Fuck.

            Jack straightened up and wiped the back of his hand across his eyes. It came away wet. He had always known this day would come, that one day he would have to pack away Ianto’s life. And really, he had always known that the day would come sooner rather than later. But some small part of him had ignored facts, statistics, reason - he had fooled himself into thinking that Ianto would be around with him for years to come.

            Setting to work, Jack opened a box and assembled it, folding the cardboard tabs into each other. He cleaned out their special box first. No need for Gwen to walk in and see that. Briefly Jack toyed with the idea of keeping some of it. But, all this stuff had been his-and-Ianto’s. Now that there was no him-and-Ianto, it didn’t seem right. It wasn’t just his, and so it wasn’t his.

            Jack sealed the box up with packing tape and slid it in the corner. Next box: assemble, fill, slide to the corner. That one was filled with their special costumes. The open closet door stared at Jack, who stared back. His own clothes filled half the closet. And to think a year and a half ago Ianto had been hesitant about Jack stepping foot in his flat. Now it was their flat. Except now it wasn’t.

            Coming to a decision, Jack packed away almost all of his clothes with Ianto’s, keeping just a few for himself. Couple trousers, couple shirts, a pair of braces. He shoved those into the backpack he had brought, then taped shut the box and slid it across the floor. More clothes, novels, linens, office supplies, files, filled the next several boxes.

            Jack paused when he reached Ianto’s PDA and laptop. He would have to turn them over to Gwen: probably had some Torchwood information on it. Jack opened it and started going through Ianto’s picture and video files. There were some things he needed to delete before Gwen saw them. Methodically trashing all the intimate photos Ianto had stored on his hard drive, Jack paused. On the screen was a picture Tosh had taken around two years ago. She had come in early one morning and discovered the two men sleeping on the couch: Ianto half on top of Jack, Jack with his arms wrapped tightly around him. Tosh had snapped the photo before waking the two men and yelling at them for using her displays for watching James Bond movies. Jack smiled at the picture, and his fingers drifted up to trace Ianto’s face on the screen. He looked so peaceful and relaxed, so…so young. So, so young. His face was turned half into Jack’s neck, and it looked almost like he was trying to hide in Jack’s arms.

            Jack’s chest constricted, but he fumbled around and grabbed a USB drive they had lying around. Quickly Jack downloaded all the photos left on the computer to it, then erased them from the laptop’s hard drive. He tucked the USB into his pocket as he stood, grabbed the laptop and PDA, and headed out to Gwen.

            He found her in thei- the living room. He tried his best to ignore the empty space on the counter which his coffee maker used to occupy. He almost broke down, trying. Ridiculous.

            Gwen was sitting on the floor in front of the tv, packing DVDs into a box. Her eyes were red and face streaked with tears. She looked up at Jack as he walked in, smiling tightly. “Has all the Bond movies. He loved them. Never understood why.”

            Jack shrugged, one hand in his pocket clutching the USB drive tightly. “Handsome, suave, man of mystery. Who wouldn’t?”

            “Sounds like you.”

            Jack shook his head. “Sounds like Ianto. Especially with those suits.”

            Standing over Gwen, he peered down into the box she was filling, ignoring her glances at the computer stuck under his arm. “What are you…”

            Jack dropped to his knees, hands scrambling at the DVDs. “You…you’re…” Gwen. Damn Gwen. She had put the DVDs in wrong. He had gotten hell from Ianto when he had brought a stack of novels to his flat. Need to pack them upside down and in reverse order, so that when you pull them out they’re in order, ready to be shelved. Gasping around his tears, Jack tried to explain this to Gwen. “The…the order…Ianto…”

            Gwen reached for Jack, trying to comfort him. He shrugged off her hands, clutching the DVDs in shaking hands.

            “Jack, do you…”

            Abruptly Jack stood, dropping the movies on the floor. “I…I can’t…” Jack ran into the bedroom, grabbing his backpack. As he passed Gwen on his way to the door she shouted after him.

            “Jack! Jack, you can’t just leave me here! Jack!”

            He paused, turning. “I’ll…I’ll come back. I just can’t,” his voice cracked and he paused, struggling to maintain some control. “I can’t. Not now. I need to…wander. For a bit. Just…I can’t be this close.” Jack stepped forward and kissed Gwen on a tear-streaked cheek. “I’ll come back,” he whispered in her ear, and then he left, pushing through the door and ignoring her shouts and pleas.

**

            That night, Jack checked himself into a hotel. He had a bag in his hand, which he tossed on the bed as he took off his backpack and boots. Sufficiently settled, Jack pulled his purchase out of the bag: a digital picture frame. Reaching into his pocket Jack removed the little USB drive. He plugged it in and waited. A little screen popped up with a percent to completion bar. As he waited for the photos to download, Jack brushed his teeth, turned off the lights, and crawled into bed with his backpack. Screen still only at 80%, Jack slowly opened his backpack. He paused for a moment, hand shaking and hovering in the air in front of the bag. Inside was something he had discovered midday, when he was searching for a clean pair of socks. He shoved his hand in, hand clenching around the item inside.

            Out came a maroon, silk tie. It had been on the same hook as his red braces: Jack hadn’t noticed it when he grabbed them earlier today. Thumb rubbing up and down over the tie, Jack let the tears that had been threatening all day fall. Oh God, he missed him. He missed him so much. He just needed to see him again, talk to him, laugh with him, have sex with him, feel him smell him hold him…

            Through blurry eyes, Jack saw the screen blink complete. An image appeared: a photo Jack had taken of Ianto as he stepped out of the shower. He looked so pissed off…Jack gasped out a cross between a sob and a laugh. Abruptly the photo changed, and Jack scrambled at the frame. Shit, how did you make the damn thing go back…Now Ianto stared out from the screen, stopwatch in hand and eyebrow arched. Jack remembered that day. Ianto had wanted to play with the stopwatch, but Jack had to deal with UNIT chiefs all day. By the end of the day Ianto had been so horny and pissed off that Jack had to take a picture of him. He looked too adorable not to.

            A new picture now: Ianto sitting on their…his…the couch at home. He had nodded off during a James Bond-athon. He had on nothing but pants, and his head was on the armrest, body contorted uncomfortably. After Jack took the photo, he had woken Ianto with a blowjob, and Ianto had climbed on top of Jack, screwing him senseless on the couch. That had completed their quest to have sex in every room of their flat. His flat. The flat.

            New photo: Ianto on a rare day off. They had spent it on the beach. In the picture Ianto was squinting at the camera, hand over his eyes in an attempt to see what Jack had called his name for. Jack had bought him those red swim trunks. They rented a hotel room on the beach. Made love as the waves crashed outside the window.

            Jack breathed in shakily, turning to his side. He clutched the picture frame and watched as picture after picture flickered over its surface. The silk tie was still wrapped around his fingers. He struggled to keep his eyes open as he watched a procession of Ianto’s march in front of his eyes, but it was too much. The weight of grief and the day pressed down on him, causing his eyelids to grow heavy and mind to slow.

The last one he saw before his eyes drifted closed was one of the two of them on Christmas Eve, last year. It was after Tosh and Owen had died, and the festivities were muted. Still, Gwen had insisted on decorating the Hub, mistletoe and all. Jack had stolen a sprig, and in the picture him and a flush Ianto were kissing under it. Ianto had too much to drink, his breath reeked of liquor, and the kiss was sloppy and uncoordinated. But it was perfect. Because Ianto was perfect. And Jack loved him.