Title: Almost perfect
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,609 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 462 - Rival
Summary: Jack never expected to come home to perfection.


‘Two guesses what you've been doing today,’ Jack muttered, taking in the front of their house as he rounded the car and headed towards the door, pausing to take it all in. Some of the neighbours claimed that the garden wasn't quite to their taste but what was Jack supposed to do about that? The garden had come with the house. They hadn't designed it, nor did Jack have any objections to it. Maybe it wasn't the perfectly coiffed topiary roses and bright white picket fences but he quite liked it. Like everything else about them it was different to the rest of the neighbourhood. Not enough to stand out, just enough to mark them as individuals.

There was only so much cookie cutter perfection Jack could stomach. To the right was Bob and Mary's Chelsea Gardens entry, and to the right was Vanessa's sprawling cottage patch. Vanessa’s garden certainly wasn't a contender for best lawn of the month, but it was at least confined within the bounds of the picket fence, echinacea doing its best to escape through a thicket of lavender. It had its charm as a slightly dishevelled version of country elegance, much like its owner. Jack couldn't picture Vanessa out pulling weeds. She was more likely to be lurking in her front verge attempting to pull young men. Her favourite prey were the newest next door neighbours of Serenity Plaza. Their relationship preferences didn’t put her off trying to lure the pair of them inside for some afternoon delight.

It was a far cry from the neatly pruned box hedges in their own patch. Not a traditional hedge, but a series of small square bushes alternating with colourful sedge grasses in between. There wasn't a rose in sight. Jack had never been a fan of roses. Too many thorns and too many romantic nuances attached. This modern look was much more his style, right down to the low drywall fence with its low, creeping plants spilling over the edges softening the edges with tiny mauve flowers, their front interrupted only by the square stepping stones that led from driveway to front door, each of crisp stone edges with not a single blade of grass encroaching on it. Even the driveway of pebble aggregate looked immaculate, a victim of the high pressure hose and probably a stiff bristled broom for good measure. He only hoped that the SUV didn’t choose tonight to leak oil all over their pristine driveway.

He stopped just before the doorstep, pausing to admire a large pot with bright yellow daffodils spilling out of its top. He fingered one with a little sigh of contentment. They were perfect, definitely not droopy as Ianto had claimed. He always took the comments of others as a personal indictment. Ianto was terribly house proud even if he denied it. A place for everything and everything in its place. They'd been well watered, as was the lawn, which looked so lush and green that Jack was tempted to toe off his boots and go walking across it, feeling the cool clipped grass between his toes, assuming there was enough left to get caught between us toes. It wasn't quite a golfing fairway but it wasn't far off. Maybe later though.

After a dull day at the hub, he was looking forward to seeing Ianto's face and hearing him tell stories of quirky neighbourhood gossip. Anything that might get them closer to identifying Cell 114. Ianto would be keen to hear about Jack’s day as well, removed for the moment from anything Torchwood related and unable to do more than check a few emails. Otherwise his mission was to ingratiate himself with the local community, getting to know them better than they knew themselves, and playing the role of dutiful husband and housekeeper. There was an alien sleeper, or maybe multiple sleepers, lurking somewhere around here. Living and breathing daily life in this tiny corner of suburbia was the only way to unearth them. And they would, even if it took months. The price of failure was far too high to do anything else.

When he came through the door, Ianto wasn't there to greet him. That was a little odd. Much like a puppy waited all day for its master to come home, so Ianto had developed the habit, desperately happy to see someone who wasn't stomach churningly nice. Jack found it amusingly quaint but he could see how living here could test even the most patient person. Not that Jack minded having someone there to welcome him in with a kiss and a smile. At least that much wasn't an act. He wondered if he could convince Ianto to continue the habit once they went back to their normal lives.

He dropped the car keys on the sideboard and removed his shoes before padding though the house looking for his undercover husband. He eventually found Ianto collapsed on the sofa, one leg hanging over the side. There was a brief moment of panic that maybe Cell 114 had found out who they were and had come to deal with them, but then he saw the slow rise and fall of Ianto's chest. Just napping, Jack realised, gently picking up the hand that dangled over the edge and placing it back across his stomach. He watched Ianto snooze for a moment, feeling a fuzzy sensation settle in his chest. He smelled of freshly mown grass and had a smudge of dirt across his forehead and more under his fingernails, clearly not having showered yet. It was so unlike Ianto not to be groomed to perfection. The dirty dishevelled look was kinda sexy, Jack thought. He rested a hand on Ianto’s shoulder and then paused looking over his shoulder for a moment. ‘Honey?’

Two eyes slowly opened and blinked, looking up at him. ‘Jack?’ Jack frowned at him and then he realised his error, face scrunching up a little as reality snapped back into place. ‘Sorry.’ In here they were meant to be Ken and Ifan, not Jack and Ianto. They probably weren't being bugged but it never hurt to be too careful.

Jack grinned down at him. ‘Tough day?’

‘Mmm.’ Ianto let his eyes close again, raising a hand to rest over the one on his arm, keeping Jack’s touch where it was. ‘Out in the yard all day.’

‘I could tell. One wonders if you're not taking this whole best lawn of the month thing a little too seriously.’

Ianto’s eyes reopened and his expression turned serious. ‘I wouldn't bother except Bob is on my case about it on a daily basis. Every time I go out there he's watering or clipping. Can't even fetch the mail without some comment about the hedges needing tidying or the grass being a fraction too too long. Besides, it’s not like his garden is always perfect.’

‘Oh?’ Jack’s face broke into a grin. ‘Is that a little bit of rivalry I'm detecting there?’

‘Oh, come on,’ Ianto said, sitting up. ‘You know what he's like. Don't tell me you wouldn’t like to wipe that smug grin from his face, touting yet another bloody certificate.’ Ianto paused, turning thoughtful. ‘Maybe he's bribing the judges…’

‘Maybe we should start seeing if they'll take a bribe from us,’ Jack teased. It amused him that Ianto hadn’t flat out denied being jealous of Bob and Mary’s front garden.

Ianto shook his head. ‘Nope. I want to win this thing fair and square.’

‘Even if it means running yourself into the ground?’

‘I only sat down for a few minutes! I didn't mean to drop off.’ He looked around. ‘What time is it?’

‘Half five,’ Jack said. ‘Thought I'd knock off early and be a good husband, see my lovely man as soon as I could.’

Ianot missed the suggestive undertones of Jack’s reply. ‘Half five? Blimey. I should have had dinner started an hour ago.’

Jack moved to rest his hand on Ianto’s leg. ‘Relax. We’ll order in. Even the most perfect couple are allowed takeaway after a long day's work.’

Ianto frowned. ‘I bet you Bob and Mary never order in. She'll be round with a batch of cupcakes later that just so happened to be too much for them to eat all on their own. “Sorry, we made fifty cupcakes and spent all day decorating them and didn’t stop to think that we couldn't eat more than a dozen ourselves.” he mocked. ‘Like they don’t plan right from the start on handing them out all over the street like some kind of weird cupcake baking whores.’

Jack laughed and ruffled Ianto's hair. ‘I'll bet you they've secretly got a fridge stashed full to the brim with ready meals.’ No one was as perfect as Ianto made them out to be. Everyone had their secrets and their own way of covering up the blemishes, putting on an air of perfection. They were doing it themselves, and Jack knew better than anyone that he and Ianto were as far from perfect as they could be.

‘Wouldn't that be something?’ Ianto said. ‘I'd take photos and leak them all around the plaza. Show everyone that they're massive cheats.’

Jack shook his own head. ‘Now I know you've gone native. C’mon, I've changed my mind. You get showered and then I'm taking you out for dinner. A reward for the best kept lawn in Serenity Plaza, no matter what any stuffy judges happen to think.’

‘A night off from being the perfect couple?’ Ianto asked. Jack nodded. ‘Count me in. I could do with not being perfect.’

‘You’re pretty perfect to me,’ Jack said.