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He thought the most awkward thing he'd have to endure was a rigid Roy Kent embrace in the Man City locker room months ago.
He was wrong. And he’s getting better at admitting when he’s wrong, so.
Turning up on Coach's doorstep at two thirty in the morning was infinitely, infinitely more awkward.
Ted answers the door like Jamie's never seen him before, in checkered pajama pants and a worn gray tee-shirt, and Jamie cringes inside. Only inside, because his face is a bit too fucked to do it on the outside, and, well. Isn't that why he's here?
Quiet hallway, soft light, it's fucking intimate in the worst way. Ted's face, cloudy with sleep, falls instantly when he sees Jamie.
"Hiya, Coach," Jamie says to the carpet in the hallway, wincing when his cheek twinges.
"Jamie," Ted breathes, and Jamie regrets everything. It's so fucking late, and he just woke Ted up. In the middle of the night, he just woke his coach up, he should have just slept in his fucking car, should have duct-taped the door to his house shut and called it a night.
"Jamie?"
He snaps out of it. What a stupid fucking idea. "Yeah, sorry. I--Ted, I--I'm really sorry. This was--"
"Jamie, please come in," and it's almost desperate the way Ted says it. Like he's worried sick, like he's just gone and watched some CCTV footage of Jamie getting his arse beat in his own fucking living room.
He doesn't want to. He really doesn't want to. He must've gotten clocked a bit too hard there to think this was even remotely something he wanted to do, for Ted to see him like this. After being fuck-all useless at every game so far, after taking the smallest backseat to God's fucking gift to Richmond. Can't imagine why he thought Ted would give a fuck. Why he would need to.
"Come on in. Come on."
Jamie takes an unsteady breath and steps into coach's flat. It's modest, but it looks like it's lived in, with a Richmond jacket draped over one of the kitchen chairs and a little army man perched near the microwave. Jamie blinks twice when he sees it, almost shakes his head because he's fucking dizzy. Wonders if there's still glass in his hair, doesn't bother to check because he doesn't want to get it on coach's floor. Remembers his temple, tacky with blood, his lip that throbs. He shouldn't have fucking driven, probably.
Ted looks fucking knackered, but he's standing in his socks in his kitchen and looking at Jamie like he's a dead cat on the side of the road. "Son, what happened?"
Jamie sucks on his bottom lip, and Ted already knows the answer, so he doesn't know why he bothers asking. His stomach turns. He doesn't expect his voice to wobble so much. "Do we 'ave to talk about it?"
Ted hesitates, mouth open in a little 'o'. After a moment, he exhales unsteady and runs a hand through his hair. "Okay. Okay, go ahead and have a seat on the couch, Jamie. We'll get you cleaned up."
Jamie swallows and searches the floor for a hint to what's going to happen next. Ted could call the police, Ted could call Roy, Ted could bench him for the rest of the fucking season, couldn't he--
Ted's persistent. So fucking gentle, too. "Son, come on and sit down with me for a minute."
Jamie nods and watches Ted make for the living room. Stays where he is, because he's not sure but moving seems like the last thing he wants to do, actually, and his legs won't listen and his breath gets caught in his throat.
Ted stops, and his eyebrows raise a little and then fall, even sadder than before. He takes a few steps closer, reaching out slow enough that Jamie could sprint away if he fucking wanted to. His hand is warm on Jamie's shoulder, light but still there, and Jamie's breath hitches, and he holds it as a tear rolls down his cheek.
Stupid. He's so stupid.
"Alright, you're alright," Ted says, so fucking patiently.
Jamie nods a little. Obviously. It's okay, he's not dying, and he's not pinned to the floor with his dad's hand on his neck anymore, he's just--
"We'll take it slow, Jamie. I want you to be comfortable, and I want to make sure you're okay." Ted puts a hand on his back, guides him to a tan couch.
Aside from being the worst fucking idea in the world, Jamie just feels so bad that he's here. In the middle of the fucking night, he woke his coach up, and Ted's got training to run tomorrow and meetings to go to and things to do, a whole fucking team to manage, things much more important than watching Jamie's pathetic arse shake apart on his sofa.
He's gotta learn that his actions affect other people. He needs to change, if he's ever gonna be a better person.
Ted sits in front of him on the coffee table with a wet flannel in his hand and a gentle smile. "I'm glad you came here, Jamie. I want you to come on over, if you ever need to. My door's always open, glad somebody finally took me up on it, though I--though I wish the circumstances were better."
And apart from it all, Ted's being so fucking nice.
"Sorry," Jamie says again, on autopilot. He is anywhere but here. "I'm sorry, Ted."
"No need to apologize, now." Ted notices his shaking hands. His face lights up, ever so slightly. "Do you want some tea?"
It's PG Tips, and Jamie thinks about Ted, wandering the Tesco aisles. Looking for something he knows he's not going to drink, something to keep in his cupboard for company, despite the slander he's cast on it before. He thinks about Ted, thinking about other people and caring, so unconditionally, and it's enough to stop his heart in his chest.
He wishes his father could be a fraction of the man Ted is.
Wishes he, himself, could be.
"Jamie?"
The mug has a little chip on the edge and a faded Waffle House logo--whatever the fuck that is. It's warm in a distant way, like the sun in the pale winter sky, and he is floating, miles above Ted's flat, spinning in the air. He lets his eyes slip closed.
"Can I try to help?" Jamie blinks open to Ted gesturing at his face, which must look a right state.
Right. This.
He nods.
Ted is careful as he wipes away crusted blood from Jamie's cheek where his dad's ring bit into him, away from his nose and behind his ear, where his dad had cuffed him.
The flannel is warm. Ted must've held it under warm water.
Soft stories of football and America, little bits and pieces, murmurs of Kansas, of burgers and milkshakes and farms and shit. Ted traces the little cuts on his face where his dad had pushed his face into the floor with the bits of broken glass, when he'd slipped on the spilled bourbon and taken them both down, hard.
It's the most he's said to him in weeks. Makes him miss the way things used to be.
Jamie flinches a few times, and Ted stops every time and asks if he's okay, says he'll stop if Jamie needs him to. Jamie sets his jaw and shakes his head. He doesn't get to be a prick about this.
He ends up with a clean face and plasters on the cuts that are still sluggishly bleeding. Ted applies antiseptic like a fucking dad on TV would, fingers light and gentle on his cheeks and his nose, and Jamie closes his eyes so the tears can't come.
Ted informs him that he should stay in his spare room. Says he's just washed the sheets and that there's nice pillows, says he might find a Lego or two if he looks hard enough.
Jamie stares at his mug, half-empty and going lukewarm. He feels like he needs to puke and settles on drifting again, floating--
"Or I could get you a ride back," Ted offers when he doesn't respond. "I don't love the idea of leavin' you alone right now, but if that's what you need…"
He feels himself grin, sick and unsteady, a smile that quirks the corners of his mouth and wrinkles the plasters in ways that hurt his skin. He thinks of the glass on the floor, liquor slick on the tile, thinks of the door that's probably flapping in the wind. And it's not funny, especially the look on Ted's face when he says, "Me dad's there."
Ted's smile is strained. "I'll get you some clothes to borrow."
He should feel fucking ashamed when coach hands him a tee-shirt with some Uni on it, he should feel out of place and wrong. He's a fucking intrusion.
Miles away, his dad snores on his two thousand pound couch, drooling and bleeding, with Jamie's own pillow tucked under his head and a blanket pulled up to his ears.
Jamie changes in the bathroom and gets a look at himself for the first time. The rings of red around his eyes, his neck, the scratch marks, angry little lines. The already purplish bruise in the curves of his eye socket. It looks like his head was just pulled from a pot of boiling water. He does look a right fucking state. Came in looking even worse.
This is the worst it's been in ten years, and he should've just drove to the club and slept in the parking lot.
What the fuck is he doing here?
The clothes are soft and Jamie is numb and he leaves his reflection in the mirror, because there's nothing else he can do tonight.
"If you could just make sure the door's shut, I wouldn't want anyone--"
Ted is hovering in the entryway to the living room and speaking softly into his phone.
"He's kinda spaced out right now, he's gonna stay here."
Ted notices him hovering in the hallway and ends the call hushed and quickly. He's looking more concerned by the minute. He hesitates before he speaks, pinched brows and downturned mustache.
"Hey, it was just Roy. I wanted to tell him not to bother coming over tomorrow morning for your daily runs or whatever y'all are always… you… you okay? Feeling dizzy or anything? You seem a little…"
Jamie doesn't know what to say. Ears ringing, he leans heavily against the wall and tries to decide if he's going to faint or puke.
"Jamie?"
PG Tips isn't nearly as good the second time around.
Ted hovers in the bathroom doorway now, and Jamie thinks his head might be a balloon, he thinks he's going to float away--
"Okay. Wipe your mouth, son, it's okay," and Ted's kneeling beside him, handing him a different flannel, and Jamie doesn't realize till now that he's curled himself into the corner by the tub, and his eyes feel heavy.
Fucking hell. He wipes his mouth with an unsteady hand that doesn't feel like his own and Ted takes the cloth and comes back to help him up. The room lists to the side, and there are hands on his shoulders, grabbing--
"Can I lie down?"
Ted frowns. "Of course you can. Guest room's just over here."
Ted's hand lingers on his back, warm and solid through the worn t-shirt, the other loose around Jamie's bicep. He could shake them off if he wanted to. He could bolt, he could sprint into the night and call an Uber, shiver on a corner until he's carted back to his busted flat, left to lick his wounds and face his dad by himself.
He could do it. He could do it right now.
Jamie hesitates in the doorway to the spare room. Sees the drawings from Henry, the spaceships and firetrucks, thinks of a faded Roy Kent poster and thin blankets, scuffed linoleum and cracked plaster walls. He presses a hand to his face as he feels the tears prick his eyes. The floor spins slowly.
"It's okay, son. You're okay."
He buries his face in Ted's shoulder. Ted rubs his back, puts a gentle hand on his neck and shushes, and Jamie tries to gather the sobs and hold them in his chest until they disappear, but it doesn't work.
"I've gotcha, Jamie."
He cries harder. It hurts, and he knows he doesn't deserve it. Any of it, the kindness, the gentle flannel on his face, the way Ted looks at him when he's on the pitch, the second chance and the ridiculous faith he's had Jamie all along--
For a long time he stands there, waiting for Ted to pull away. Waiting for the hand to leave his hair, waiting for the unmistakable hardening after such a tender moment.
Nothing ever comes. Jamie's the one to end it.
Ted's face is so open. So kind. "Go ahead and lie down, son. I'm gonna get you some water."
Jamie scrubs at sore eyes and curls up underneath blankets that are almost too soft, on a mattress that is pillowy and cold.
He could run, still. He could go.
Ted comes in and sets a cloudy glass of water on the bedside table, crouches in front of him, orange-y in the lamplight. He taps Jamie's leg lightly, and Jamie turns his face out from the pillow. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
"Two."
"What team do you play for?"
Zava. Man City. "Richmond."
"Where are we?"
"Your flat."
"Follow my finger."
Jamie wonders if he was ever really meant for good things sometimes. He knows that Ted is one of those good things. He knows Colin and Issac and Sam are those good things. He knows Richmond is one of those good things.
He thinks about his dad. Thinks about cold locker rooms. Thinks about Roy.
"Alright. I'll be back in a while with some better questions, you got a theme preference?" he asks with a smile that betrays his utter fucking concern. "Favorite show--"
"Bake-off," Jamie finds himself murmuring, only because it's the last thing he remembers watching.
Ted places a gentle hand on his knee and makes like he's going to say something, but he doesn't.
Jamie's face throbs. He could still leave.
"Lie back now, get some rest, Jamie."
The pillow is cold on his cheek.
(Three-fourty comes and Jamie might throw up again.
"No one likes a…?"
"Soggy bottom.")
One of the times Ted comes in, he sits on the edge of the bed and doesn't say anything. Jamie's curled up, and he cracks one eye open to see before he goes back to sleep. He feels a weight on his forehead, and a finger smooths over the plaster on his temple.
The soft touch lingers, and he drifts.
Morning is quiet.
He wakes up to silence for the first time in a while, and it takes him a minute to remember why everything hurts, where he is. His phone lies dead on the bedside table.
There's a note on the kitchen table in Ted's handwriting.
Jamie,
Ran to the office quick, be back soon. Feel free to hang around! There's breakfast food in the cabinets, go on and find it. But don't eat the peanut butter.
-Ted
His head pounds. He finds a glass for water and drinks like he hasn't had a drop of liquid in days.
He throws it all up in the kitchen sink and makes sure to rinse it with soap before he leaves.