Work Text:
It was serendipity that Robby had seen the flyer. Gloria's first meeting of the morning had been running over, so Robby went into the twelfth-floor break room in search of a coffee to keep him going. Righteous anger over budget cuts alone wasn't going to do it. He snorted on seeing that while bulk-buy instant coffee was considered fine for the peons down in the Pitt, the senior admin staff had much better quality stuff to hand. While Robby waited for the Keurig to do its thing, he idly scanned the various notices pinned to the cork board by the door, and spotted one for ADAPTIVE/AMPUTEE SOCCER — Ages 12 and up — Brookline Rec Center. He pulled out his phone, snapped a photo, and sent it to Jack.
In the months since he'd quit the TEMS unit, Jack had been making noises about needing another hobby ("Would we call the SWAT shit a hobby?" Robby had asked over breakfast) and not liking being without something to do ("You're making the jokes too easy," Robby had said, rolling closer to him in bed). But jokes aside, Jack was clearly restless, and there was only so much energy he could burn off through cleaning the bathroom or reorganising the hall closet. He needed a pastime; soccer was a pastime. Not that Robby knew much about it, and he couldn't remember ever hearing Jack talk about it, but it was worth a shot.
Robby didn't get a direct reply to his message, but a few days later, new entries appeared on the dry erase calendar that lived on the front of their fridge. Every Saturday now said 9 A.M. — SOCCER in the red marker that indicated it was an event of Jack's.
Robby knew Jack, so he very carefully said nothing about until after the first training session, and then over dinner said, "It go okay?"
Jack seemed to mull it over for a minute, and then shrugged and said, without looking up from his pasta. "Yeah, okay, I think."
But when Jack invited Robby to attend his first proper game ("Match, Robby, not game," Jack had said as imperiously as if he'd known what the offside rule was four weeks ago), it was so clear that it was okay. Better than that, even. Jack seemed to have found what he'd been looking for: exertion, challenge, brotherhood, and not a single firearm in sight. The realisation ratcheted down some little bit of tension that Robby hadn't been consciously aware he was carrying.
Robby cheered on from the sidelines as Jack chased down the ball with a look of focused exhilaration on his face. No one on either team was holding back. The huffs and shouts of the players as they called out to their teammates mingled with the clang and crash of crutches as they jostled for position and vied to be the first player to score. Robby applauded Jack's goal until his hands stung. Even though Jack's team drew, when he swung over to Robby afterwards, panting and sweaty, he was grinning just as hard as if they'd won in a landslide.
"Ugh, please go shower," Robby said, wrinkling his nose as Jack slung one arm around him and kissed him hard. "I love you but God almighty."
"That," Jack said, smug, "is the smell of victory."
"You didn't win!"
"Victory," Jack said, and his voice was as firm as his kiss.