Jack was not exactly a homebody by any stretch of the imagination. He was, as actually, he'd told Destiny, entirely capable of having fun that didn't involve parties, illegal drugs and girls but Repose wasn't filled with the bloom of fun. Everyone it appeared had known him was making clear the inevitability of an ignoble slide down to the bottom. He had plans for adulthood. They involved vague, great success and seeing all the countries in his geography book from school, and none of them really centered around the small town, even if he did actually like the people.
And he liked Louis. School had been a bit much, everyone obsessed with how many girls you'd slept with or been wanked off by, when all the while at least half of them were doing it under the bedcovers. Pretty bloody silly really, to give a shit except they had and Louis, who Jack half thought would murder somebody someday and who was admirable for his acid politeness, had taken the brunt of it. He hadn't seen him in years. University instead and the love-affair that had got him sent down, and Jack dug both hands into the pockets of his woollen, dark-blue peacoat, and leaned into the door of the little antiques shop which was apparently Louis's haunt.
It made him think of home. His mother's room, to be precise. China and delicate things made of silver and tablecloths and heavy curtains. It was relentlessly old and therefore familiar and Jack grinned in the direction of the bent shape by the cabinets, a sweep of reddish-dark hair over clear blue eyes in a much-softened face since the last time Louis had probably seen him.
"I would like to buy this... very old thing, that doesn't appear to have an obvious purpose but probably costs the earth," he declared with more cheer than Jack actually felt, and a flittingly shy look as he glanced from Louis to the display cabinet and back again. Jack didn't mind eye-contact but he'd mind very badly if someone else took him to task for not being whoever it was he was now, and was meant to be.