due South FIC - Not in my Job Description ~Kowalski/Fraser, Welsh ~R

[annieroo2]

Title: Winter Thaw
Writer: annieroo2
Universe: due South
Pairing: Kowalski/Fraser
Characters: Welsh (PoV), Kowalski, Fraser, Diefenbaker, Vecchio, Francesca
Genre: Gen/Romance
Rating: R for language
Spoilers: All three seasons are fair game
Warnings: None I can think of unless you want to kill me for my characterization
Word Count: 6743
Summary: Welsh travels to the end of the earth to visit his friends and comes to some interesting realizations


Gift Fic: This is for the lovely and incomparable akuni , because she does so much for everyone and deserves to get something in return. And also I was given the honor of writing for her as a part of Secret Santa gift exchange.

Notes: This is my first official due South fanfic, so make sure to bring lots of rotten vegetables and a couple of really sturdy red pens. :D

moshesque did a fantastic beta job for me and deserves oodles of commendations for holding my hand and smacking me in the back of the head, cause I was definitely in need of both. Any and all mistakes herein are mine and mine alone. She did the best she could whipping me into shape.

Disclaimer: I don’t own anything associated with due South, but Paul Gross said in an interview we were allowed to take the boys out and play with them…. Well, maybe not those exact words. ;)

***

Jesus. What the hell was I doing? Going all the way to the ass-end of the world? I liked these guys just fine. I’d say on a good day, they had been my friends as well as subordinates. They were both damn fine cops, despite the amount of crap they used to drag into my office on any given day.

When I was honest with myself, I admitted I damn well liked the weird shit they ended up in. Okay sure, I’d been well on my way to an ulcer and maybe even early retirement, but it sure as hell beat the day-in day-out drudgery that seemed to eat at my soul before the Mountie found his way into my station four years ago.

The rumors about a personal relationship between Kowalski and Fraser had never bothered me. Hell, who was I to begrudge any guy happiness, especially a Chicago cop… or, well… a former Chicago cop and his Mountie partner. Civilians never seemed to grasp what a man - or woman for that matter - gave up protecting a city like Chicago. No matter where you were stationed, be it the two- seven, the one-nine, anywhere in the city, that station may be your beat, but it was the whole fucking city that called to you.

Chicago was just one of those towns. There was no way you could hate her, even when she kicked you in the nuts every day. There was no way around it, Chicago was a bitch, but God did I love her. My guys seemed to get that. Maybe they got it even better after hanging around the Mountie for a few years.

Chicago cops weren’t known for being neighborly or considerate, but they worked fucking hard to protect even the lowliest citizens. Maybe it was the Midwest attitude layer on top of one of the most diverse cities in the country. Whatever it was, cops in Chicago were a fair bunch of bastards, even though no one ever seemed to see that. It took a Mountie in fire-engine-red running around like a lunatic to showcase what Chicago cops were all about. Weird but true.

Technically as their lieutenant I would have been required to split them up if they were involved, but in practice this was not a tactic employed unless the relationship put a crimp in solve rate or caused too much drama at the station. Since these guys had caused nothing but drama since the first day of their partnership and pretty much anyone paired with Fraser was allowed a few breakdowns, I figured unless they started kissing or feeling each other up in the john, I had nothing to worry about. Their solve rate was higher than all my other detectives and maybe even the whole of Chicago. Fraser just seemed to bring out the best in even the good cops like Kowalski and Vecchio.

Even a year after Fraser left and Kowalski took mostly desk duty, certain neighborhoods in Chicago had the best witnesses and most helpful citizens a cop could ask for. Kowalski’s lower middle class blocks, the consulate, Vecchio’s stomping ground, and even Fraser’s old gang ridden neighborhood. Sure, some days it was a damn drag to have so many citizens being “helpful”, but most days I could admit to just myself that those boys, including the real Vecchio of course, had done a service to Chicago.

Maybe I was taking three different planes, a jeep, and a snowmobile up here to pay some sort of debt, but that didn’t seem right either. I owed these guys… sure. But I think it was more than that. They taught me something about not only myself but my guys - not just cops and detectives, but people. All my people. And maybe I wanted to know if there was anything else I could learn. By visiting the ass-end of the world.

***

Okay so it wasn’t the ass-end of the world. I was politely informed upon my arrival, it was the top of the world, or very nearly as Fraser so eloquently put it. Really, once you’re this far north picking nits seems a little ridiculous, but then that’s Fraser. And I don’t suppose there was ever telling him otherwise.

To be completely truthful, I wasn’t even exactly sure where the hell I was. Something-or-other Tuk. Fraser had tried to tell me, but between the history of the Northwest Territories and the very recent creation of Nunavut I wasn’t even sure what state… uh, province I was in anymore. Whenever I was required to comment I’d usually just mumble a couple of sounds and stick ‘Tuk’ on the end of it. Fraser just gave me one of his enigmatic smiles, knowing exactly what I was doing, and Kowalski would laugh his ass off at me. Hell, even the damn wolf seemed to be laughing at me. Glad someone was having fun, cause all I’d been doing since I arrived was freezing my nuts off.

It was obvious right off that the rumors back home about Fraser and Kowalski could have been true, but they weren’t. Even a lowly civilian could have seen how these guys worked and flowed together as a unit. Sure the partner thing back in Chicago probably gave them a damn good start, but it sure as hell didn’t take an old-as-the-hills Lieutenant to see there was a lot going on under the surface these guys weren’t talking about. Not out loud and not to each other. It was a study in pain actually, and not just theirs but mine as well.

Hey, I’ve had my share of deviant thoughts… scratch that - what these guys shared wasn’t the least bit deviant. It was so fucking obvious they loved each other it was breaking my damn heart and I’m a rotten cold bastard when it comes to love. Just ask my ex-wife.

Off and on for a year they’d been up here making a home for themselves, carving out a living in wilderness so desolate it made my eyes hurt from lack of features. But they clearly weren’t fucking each other. Not that I was wanting them too because, yeah. But just watching them was agonizing. And not in the ‘oh my god those guys are fucking each other, that must hurt’ way, but in the ‘what the fuck is wrong with you two idiots - painful’ way.

They seemed to still communicate fine. Well, as fine as two alpha males ever communicate. They had their routine, they had the dogs. Ray was unofficially Fraser’s partner, not as if that was anything new. Seemed like it worked for them.

Technically Ray had applied for his citizenship based on his pilot and mechanic licenses’. But in the two months he’d been up here full time, he still didn’t own a plane or a repair shop and his citizenship process was being slowed down because of that.

Ray had spent the past year working like a dog, training my new detectives, so that his case load was minimal. On top of that he’d been earning his small plane pilot’s license and an official mechanic’s license from Universal Institute of Technology. Turns out he knew a guy who knew a guy that could expedite the training and get Ray up to speed on snow mobile engines. When Ray’s motivated, he’s not too shabby in the testing department. He got his snow mobile repair license in less than nine months. The bastard was definitely motivated.

Bush pilot. It was the first thing he said to me the day he walked back into my office after the Muldoon case. Personally I thought he was fucking nuts when he came back from his four week trek to the frozen north saying how beautiful it was up there. I figured it was all starry-eyed bullshit. He’d settle down in a few weeks and realize Chicago was in his blood. When the frantic search for flying lessons went unabated for two weeks, I figured maybe the rumors about him and Fraser had been true.

They had to be, because Kowalski had it going, he was a great cop in the sense that he knew how to get what he needed by walking that line. The one between being a great cop and having internal affairs all over your ass for going too far. I figure Fraser helped with that, but Kowalski had the building blocks all along. And if Ray was really leaving then it was obvious to me that Fraser was more important to him than being a cop, and that sort of blew my mind.

Maybe I felt I owed these guys, even if they fucking walked out on me. I’d tried to talk Ray into convincing the Mountie I could get him a permanent job at the two-seven as a visiting police officer. Gun license and all included now that he wasn’t officially working at the consulate. Nothing doing there, though. Ray refused to even discuss it. Said ‘Benton’ was at home on the ice and wouldn’t be coming back. Shit.

So what was I gonna do, hamper Kowalski’s chances at making a go of it up north because I was a selfish bastard? Well of course I was… wasn’t. I was about ready to lose my best detective and be foolish enough to help him along. I tried to tell myself it didn’t matter. If Kowalski was determined enough to go, he’d find a way. I didn’t need to be helping the process along. He was going whether I gave him a leg up or not.

I may have thought he was a crazy bastard, but when he went the snowmobile repair route after striking out repeatedly on the flying lessons, I knew it wasn’t gonna be all that long before he deserted me. So I relented. I gave him the cushy but unenviable job of breaking in all the new detectives they were shoving my way after Huey, Dewey and the original Vecchio bailed on me.

Turns out it was the best decision I ever made. Ray Kowalski was a natural at cutting through the bullshit and teaching the plebes exactly what they needed to know in a very short time. One case with Kowalski and the shine of the badge was knocked right off and replaced with the very necessary reality of life as a Chicago detective. Though, I still feel bad for Mathews. That undercover work Kowalski had him doing with the dog fighting ring had him finding fleas for months.

Those first few weeks of class Kowalski was barely sleeping as it was, but he still hadn’t given up on trying to find someone to teach him to fly. I wanted to tell him to forget it. Even the bonus he’d gotten for working undercover couldn’t possibly pay for the lessons he needed.

I am not a soft touch, and anyone who insinuates such a stain on my character would be wise to be two states away before I hear it. But this thing for Ray was real, and I felt the need to ‘help’. It had to be because I liked the guy and wished him the best, because I was still pissed as hell to be losing him.

Besides… I knew a guy. It’d been a long fucking time since Vietnam, but I knew he still worked over at Migs field and I also knew he’d be happy to repay me. Hell, even if we never spoke a word about it after that day, I knew the free flight lessons he was gonna give Kowalski would probably only partly assuage his need to repay me, anyway.

I’m still not sure the idiot slept that whole year. With maybe the exception of the week or so Kowalski would spend with Fraser every couple months as his “down time”, which he was actually allotted quite a bit of over the year due to how long he’d spent under cover as Vecchio. Turns out the shrinks are pretty good for something every once in a while. Seeing as how Kowalski not only covered Vecchio’s ass for a year, but also lost his ex-wife to the moron, got Ray enough leave time to fly up to see Fraser often enough to keep the shakes away.

It was close a couple of times. I could tell when his training exercises for one of the stupid newbies got too hazardous, it was time to quietly suggest another “cool down period”, which was code for - “Go see Fraser before you kill one of your idiot partners.”

It was a bitch of a year for all of us, but in the end I got four new detectives that worked together like seasoned pros. Especially after I took Kowalski’s “advice” in pairing them up. He did the whole song and dance routine about knowing how to read body language. I think it had less to do with that and more to do with understanding what makes two people good partners, but I decided not to burst his bubble. Besides he owed me one for this new humiliation to my division.

It was still embarrassing after all those years of having the Duck Boys around, that I now had a detective team by the name of Tom and Jerry and another of Fred and Daphne. It was like a cartoon shop instead of cop shop and it was fucking mortifying at the One-liner. Everyone but me seemed to love it. I believe Kowalski called me an old fuddy-duddy. Jesus, the shit I put up with.

***

Fraser and Vecchio had always been like brothers. First case with Fraser’s dad and Vecchio takes him home to the family for dinner. Maybe Vecchio missed having a brother; maybe they just clicked that way from the start. They were good partners, but they really were a lot like brother’s following each other into trouble without thought, just because that’s what you did with your brother.

I’d done it with mine before our family went to complete shit. Dad had caught the end of World War Two and all he saw was cleanup in the Western campaign. I’d never understood how you could look at the desiccated remains of so many bodies and still treat your family like dirt. Maybe the booze made it better for him, but it made it hell for the rest of us. Mom always wanted to defend him, but by the end even her heart wasn’t in it and it finally gave out. I suppose it was my last reason to ever try and forgive my old man, so I just stopped trying.

Wilson never did stop trying. Maybe he’s just more optimistic than me. Or more stubborn. Or… well I suppose it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I recognized the brother syndrome with Fraser and Vecchio and it knew it was going to be a never ending string of headaches.

I’d picked Kowalski for the Vecchio gig. Not many people knew that. I doubt even Kowalski knew. He was about as far from Italian as you could get, but I’d seen him a few times undercover back when I worked vice and under pressure Kowalski always managed to pull out the seeming impossible. Yeah, he was that good. And I needed someone who was fast on their feet and quick wits to cover for Vecchio.

I liked Vecchio. I couldn’t give a shit about the feds and their stupid Vegas case, but Vecchio was mine, and no one messed with someone who was mine. Even if Vecchio had an over developed sense responsibility after working with The Mountie. I knew he needed as much real protection as we could give him, regardless of how cavalier the feds were treating this replacement gig.

I figured dragging Kowalski in to play Vecchio would shake it up just right and get at least one or the other of them acting like adults. Jesus, God, did I screw the pooch on that one. Two weeks in and Kowalski and Fraser were acting like an old married couple determined to fight it out to their last breath. I was so shocked when they didn’t split after the Henry Allen case. I thought for sure we were looking at the big D on after that one. It was better afterwards though, less antagonism, but no less complicated.

Despite all the shit, I was sad to see him go that day in early March when he’d finally gotten his little slip of paper saying he could fly planes. He was surprisingly good too. Took me out over Lake Michigan one day and landed this little two-seater, pretty as you please, right on the water. Even showed me how to climb down and fish off one of the pontoons. Didn’t catch shit, but then it was a pretty short trip. Even cheap gas costs a bundle when you’re in an airplane, and this was a personal rental. So, Ray was forking over the dough by the hour to show me what my favor had gotten him.

By then he’d felt like more friend than employee, so I guess it didn’t seem too weird to ask a personal question. At least I hoped not. He actually seemed pleased when I asked why he didn’t have the jitters in the middle of all that water, since I knew Kowalski’s idea of swimming was a really poor imitation of a dog paddle. After the schooling for the mechanics license and the wild-eyed drive to get his pilot’s license I really shouldn’t have been shocked. But when he told me one of the old guys Fraser used to hang out with had been giving him swimming lessons at the YMCA, I was floored. Oh yeah, I definitely saw it as the real thing.

Watching Ray sit there on the pontoon relaxed and at ease, I knew it had been the best favor I ever called in. Kowalski looked about ten years younger and happier than I’d ever seen him. I figured after all the shit he’d dealt with being Vecchio on my recommendation, and all the crap he’d had to deal with training four new detectives in less than a year, he deserved it more than most.

Still, I was sorry to see him go, even though it was obvious he’d never be happy in Chicago again. It was just no longer in his blood. For the first time in history, Canada had invaded and apparently taken at least one prisoner as well.

***

I gave Ray a Saint Jude medal as a going away gift. Well, Vecchio and I did, but I’m forbidden to tell Kowalski that. Vecchio and me we still talked occasionally, but I’m not even sure how we got on the subject of Kowalski’s going away gift. Vecchio said right out though, that Kowalski needed a Saint Jude medal like the one I’d given him before his stint in Vegas. Told me that medal saved his soul more than a dozen times and was still working every day. I’d never tell Vecchio, because I don’t talk about that part of my life, but I knew exactly what he was saying… and what he wasn’t. That medallion was something that connected Vecchio to the cop he used to be, and some days might be all that stood between him and The Bookman.

Guess Vecchio figured Kowalski might need the same type of reminder way up there in the frozen north. I just figured it might be a nice reminder of Chicago occasionally. Kowalski might not be a Chicago cop anymore, but he’d been a dedicated one long enough to have our patron saint keep an eye on him and keep him from freezing to death or being eaten by a bear.

The going away party was at the One-liner. Most of the two-seven stuff was these days. It was a damn good party. Fraser even came down one last time to hang out with everyone. The jokes were still lame, but Huey and Dewey gave us all beer at cost and Ray had the Deli on Halstead cater a damn good spread.

Francesca, God Bless her, even showed up with her little boy. He certainly is a little angel, heaven knows how, being from that bizarre family, but I still think naming him Angelo is gonna give the poor guy some serious grief when he’s older. Though, it’s obvious being a mom is exactly what Francesca needed. She’s been happy and more stable than any other Vecchio I’ve ever known. I used to think I should be breaking someone’s head for knocking her up and not marrying her, but being a mom’s such a good fit for her I’ll give the asshole a pass this time.

Angelo wasn’t sure what to make of Fraser. He didn’t cry, but he got this odd look on his face like he was trying to solve a puzzle. Weird look for a four month old baby. But Ray… oh yeah, Ray he loved. The little guy giggled and jabbered and I could almost swear Ray understood Angelo cause he talked to that baby just like he did Diefenbaker. Francesca laughed with them and treated him just like the brother he’d pretended to be for so long. She even called him Uncle Stan, which made the entire group fall silent, probably wondering, like I was, if she’d lost her mind. “Have him call me Uncle K, okay Frannie. At least Tommy Lee Jones is cool. I can live with that.” She threw her arms around him and agreed and the rest of us breathed a sigh of relief. Normally no one called Kowalski by his first name and lived, so either he was mellowing, or Francesca was allotted a lot more leeway than most. I was betting on the last, but hoping for the first cause I was pretty sure Kowalski was gonna need it where he was going.

The whole party, not one clue, though, that Ray’s permanent relocation had any kind of romantic overtones. Fraser and Kowalski were still just as alternately biting and respectful of each other. I figured it was just really good camouflage on Ray’s part. The guy could do under cover when the occasion called for it. But Fraser, I wasn’t so sure. The Mountie couldn’t lie for shit. But maybe this was more self preservation. I didn’t know how Canada handled gay cops, but Chicago was still working out the kinks.

It was better after all that sensitivity training that went on back in ‘90. And Chicago’d been queer happy for almost as long as San Francisco. Boys Town and Girls Town were prime examples of fairly well to do stable neighborhoods populated by predominately gays. And hey, Chicago’s Gay Pride Parade had been an annual event since ‘70.

But the cop thing was still a sticky issue. Being gay was one thing. Being a gay cop… that was something totally different. Not that you’d get stiffed on an officer down call, cause that just didn’t happen in Chicago, no matter what rumors guys liked to spout off. But being a gay cop was still its own version of hell a lot of times. It was kinda like being the skinny, geeky kid that the football players liked to pick on. You never ended up dead from their pranks, jokes and bad mouthing, but some days you sure as hell wished you were.

So yeah, that March when Kowalski was saying good-bye I was still convinced the rumors were probably true, no matter what it looked like on the surface. Took that trip to the ass-end of nowhere and found out I was dead wrong. Shame that.

***

No plane, and no repair shop, meant so far, Ray’s citizenship was still iffy, even with his newly minted little papers. So in the mean time Kowalski tagged along with Fraser on the long haul patrols in the frozen waste. Normal days he spent at Fraser’s cabin trying to fix up shit so it would be livable by next winter. Until then, they were living in this two bedroom condo unit painted pink. Which would have been funny and downright bizarre, except every fucking unit in the place was some weird-ass color. It was like a rainbow threw up all over the place. But given that there were places like that pretty much scattered all over the town I guess it was normal for Canadians. I’m still not sure if it was comforting to find out that Fraser wasn’t a one of a kind nut job.

Ray was actually using his knowledge of snowmobiles though. Twice while I was there I went out with him on an emergency. Turns out when it’s thirty below on a warm day, if your snowmobile doesn’t work it’s an emergency. I went with Kowalski and watched him work. It was interesting to watch him channel all that energy into something besides police work or chopping wood. I still couldn’t figure out how he could stand working without gloves. I got frostbite on mine just watching him.

The strangest thing though, about Kowalski’s new life, is that he was the local substitute teacher. Seriously. No joke. Weirded me right out the first time I figured out what Ray and Fraser were talking about. Turns out the territories are always so hard up for teachers that all you need is any degree from any university to play backup teacher. So Ray’s certificate from UIT meant, voila, instant teacher.

I’d never trust Ray to teach Canadian history, but then again I seriously doubt I’d trust him to teach American history. Even though English was his first language, the way he butchered it on a daily basis I’m not sure I’d trust him to teach that either. But the basics, yeah, I already knew Ray was good with that stuff, and I’d bet the hat that kept my ears from falling off, that the kids loved him.

So I’m learning all this shit sitting around a fucking hole in the ice and I have no clue what to do with it. Not that I need to do anything, but it felt like I should. Jesus Fucking Christ, Lieutenant Harding Welsh, match maker. I was definitely going to hell for this one.

It was almost hypnotizing watching them work together. They’d pitch tent in 10 minutes flat or we’d break camp in less than twenty and be off to another fishing hole or just plain stomping around checking out the game trails. Fraser still liked to talk, as if that would ever change. But up here it was so easy to listen to. Inuit stories, caribou stories, and family stories that broke my heart and Kowalski’s from the look of it. It all seemed so matter of fact to Fraser, these stories, as if there was no difference in the telling, and maybe to him there wasn’t and didn’t that just make an old cynic like me want to cry.

Ray still had the weird touch thing going on with Fraser and even me occasionally. I didn’t hold it against him; he was just wired that way. But Fraser wasn’t, though it was obvious he wanted to be. Fraser still held himself so composed and dignified despite never having once put on the red serge since he and Kowalski had picked me up. It was damn hard to watch. Damn hard. I kept wondering when a couple of those tiny fissures he had going on were gonna crack wide open. And then what would be left of the Benton Fraser we all knew? And apparently the one Kowalski loved.

So, yeah, not in my job title, but like I said, I liked these guys and found I still had a great deal of respect for them both despite how they ran out on me. I could see now it had been necessary for Fraser’s sanity to return to the one place he could live like himself.

I wondered how these very bright, very capable detectives could miss something I found so obvious at nearly first glance. They needed a hand, and for once I was capable of giving. Not my idea of fun. Just my idea of fair play for what they’d both given up for me and my city.

Match-maker… sheesh.

***

Polar bears are not sweet and cuddly. Contrary to what I’ve seen in the Brookfield Zoo they do not play with beach balls. They are big, hairy and fucking scary as shit. Their idea of playing was tormenting and eating the seals that popped up out of the ice.

I’d been closer to them at the zoo, but I gotta say they were imminently more frightening when there was nothing but a domesticated wolf between me and them. Fraser assured me that people were not generally on a polar bears diet. Maybe people don’t taste like chicken like I’d always heard, or maybe polar bears just weren’t much for chicken. Either way made me pretty happy.

I’m not sure how close I would have gotten before I noticed him. That polar bear blended so seamlessly into the all the frozen white. So, I’m pretty sure Diefenbaker saved my life. But I don’t ever plan on telling him that. That wolf already has an ego the size of Alaska, one the sized of Canada would probably be more torture than even Fraser could handle.

Took me a minute or two of trying to push past Diefenbaker to realize what he wanted me to do and why. Maybe slipping him my dinner plate every night to clean up paid off, or maybe he just felt that responsible to all his humans that way. Whatever it was, I was damn fucking grateful not to be bear dinner.

I’m pretty sure though that was the day I started talking to the damn wolf myself. Which I guess was okay, as long as I didn’t get to the point of thinking Dief was talking back like the other two crazy bastards I was out here with.

I’d thought Fraser was uptight and rigid in Chicago. In the arctic he definitely wasn’t uptight. I’d never seen him more at home or at ease with his surroundings despite the barren desolate landscape. What really got me though was how commanding he was. Not like I was, gruff and over bearing, but he held a knowledge and purpose that was impossible not to follow. It was… surprising. I think I could finally see what Kowalski was so interested in. Weird… very, very weird.

Under Fraser’s direction we quietly packed up camp and sort of slunk outta there. Even the dogs were pretty quiet which I thought was kinda odd, but Ray explained that they were well trained and only if the bear encroached on the camp or made threatening moves would the dogs go berserk. Polar bears don’t really like dogs, he told me, and unless food was extremely scarce polar bears would avoid people and dogs both. Good to know. Also good to know… I’d never be traipsing around Canada without someone who really knew what the fuck they were doing. I was pretty sure I had a better chance of coming out alive unarmed, in a blind alley with a gang banger than on the tundra with a polar bear. I didn’t know how the guys could take the uncertainty and stress of all the weird shit that cropped up every day in the frozen north, but they both seemed to thrive on it. I suppose, though, the circumstances were completely different; it wasn’t all that dissimilar than having to tackle weird shit as a cop.

The arrival of the polar bears was the end of our ice fishing, which was fine by me. Because apparently I’d never been ice fishing before. What I used to call ice fishing was just fishing when it was really cold. Ice fishing in Canada was like everything else in Canada - extreme. Frozen rivers that if I’d come sooner in the season we could have used to drive a car on. Holes in the ice feet deep to get to water rather than inches, and setting up tent in our holes over the ice to fish, then moving them off the ice for the night to sleep in. Fraser even tried to teach me some technique of stringing baited lines from one hole to the next, but I told him it wasn’t fishing without a pole. I got another shit-eating grin Kowalski and I could swear Fraser giggled, but I’d never admit that to anyone, or they’d know I’d lost my mind. It made me wonder how many of these same conversations Ray and Fraser had already had between themselves. Regardless, I was happy that the “ice” fishing was over for this trip.

Sadly, the bugs were not far behind as the weather started warming up as we headed back to Fraser and Kowalski’s condo. The mosquitoes up here are like small airplanes with the appetite of vampires that aren’t controlled by the light of day. I’d put it off a couple of days because I’d smelled that shit of Fraser’s and it was not something I wanted near me, until I was almost carried away by mosquitoes and eaten by black flies. How the blood sucking fuckers managed to live up here for the few weeks it was actually warm defied logic. From previous conversation with Kowalski I knew even in the summer heat there were places with ice and snow.

Turns out you get used to the smell on yourself pretty quickly up here, too. Not just the, ‘please Fraser don’t tell me what it’s made of’, ointment, but the minimal hygiene as well. It was obvious Fraser thrived here cause he knew all the tricks, snow baths included. And Ray seemed comfortable in his skin like I’d never seen him in Chicago. He still fidgeted, but it all seemed to hold a purpose rather than just frustrated nervous energy.

The first time I saw Ray field dress a rabbit I thought the poor fucker was gonna puke. He looked like pea soup he was so green. Fraser kept his distance and only asked once to take over, but it was so obvious Ray was determined. I knew what this guy had been like with regular dead bodies back in the morgue. Seeing him gut and skin that rabbit, while Fraser looked on with pride and affection. Yeah I knew right there it was true love. Weird way to show it I guess, but when it’s two guys who live out in the back of beyond together, dinner and the movies looks a little different.

The hats, holy crap. What kind of man wears a white and red striped hat with a red fluffy ball on the end? Kowalski obviously. The man looked deranged, but weirdly happy. Like the hat was some sort of rite of passage. I didn’t ask cause I was pretty sure I didn’t want to know.

Kowalski had worn his glasses occasionally while we’d been out camping and fishing and even with the freaking kiddie hat, I couldn’t place who he reminded me of. It wasn’t until it warmed up enough for Fraser to put his Stetson on again, that I figured it out. I swore I was looking at Carmen Sandiego and Where’s Waldo. It was like some Canadian version of the display I’d seen for the Museum last time I drove down Lake Shore Drive. So Fraser didn’t really look like a woman, but with his hair longer and curling up a bit at the back of the hat, he and Kowalski could have posed for the Outback version of that same display.

Maybe it was time for me to go home. Losing my mind hadn’t been on the agenda for my visit.

Weird, weird, weird. I needed someone else to tackle this job; I was simply not up for it. I didn’t believe in love even when it stared me right in the face. I couldn’t make this work. Guys did NOT talk about feelings, especially and most determinedly not with guys who used to be their hardass boss.

Why the hell couldn’t they both just get their heads outta their asses and see? They were never particularly careful around each other. You really couldn’t be in the close quarters of camping and fishing together. But every so often Kowalski would get this love sick sadness to his face when he and Fraser touched, but it was always carefully hidden from Fraser himself. Fraser was much better schooled at hiding. But I’d been up here for almost three weeks now and I’d seen the look of longing Fraser would cast Kowalski’s way often enough to know it was no fluke.

Stupid bastards were in love and had no idea how to bridge the gap. I’d given up on the subtle hints and the mixing their belongings to put them in closer contact. I’d decided I simply couldn’t do this. It wasn’t in my nature to screw with someone’s love life, or lack thereof. When I found myself talking to Diefenbaker about the problem I was concerned for my sanity. After a few “conversations” I was convinced Dief was actually giving me pointers, but it wasn’t until I thought I understood his little growls, grumbles and head shakes that I knew I’d completely lost my mind. Definitely time to go home and kick some teeth in to recover my sanity.

By the time I left it was finally too warm for a snow mobile or dog sled, even this far north. The trip had definitely been an adventure and a trip of extremes. Nearly twenty degrees below at my arrival and eighty now at my departure. Canada was one fucking weird place. It was perfect for Fraser and maybe even Kowalski if they could ever dig deep and show some balls.

We did the manly hug thing as I was leaving. They’d brought me all the way to the airplane this time, since the roads were finally solid enough for Fraser’s four wheel drive. I looked at them and almost let it go. Almost. But I knew if I did, Kowalski was going to be back in six months asking for a job again, and… it would be wrong. I could be making this a whole helluva lot worse, but I was a gambling man. I shook Ray’s hand and held on to it. He gave me a questioning look as I pulled him to me and whispered in his ear, “He’s in love with you. Make it work, or this time next year I’m coming back to kick you both in the ass all the way back to Chicago.” I let go of a very stunned Kowalski and took Benton’s hand and simply said, “You’re a smart man, Fraser. Start acting like it.” Diefenbaker followed me to the airplane and I patted his head. “Will this insanity of mine go away now that I’m leaving?” Dief just snorted and shook his head. “Yeah… I was afraid of that. Well, at least look after them both. Okay?” All I got for my trouble was a raised tail and sneeze as he walked back to Ray and Fraser. “I was not being condescending -“At the strange look from the pilot, I decided now might be a really good time to shut up.

As we taxied away in the little prop plane that made my stomach spin, all I could see of them were two small dots. But I could swear one small dot tackled the other to the ground. But maybe, that was just wishful thinking.

***

It’d only been three weeks before I received my first postcard from the top of the world. I still thought of it as the ass end, but who was I to judge? Fraser’s section of the card was short and neat and simply thanked me for the pleasant and illuminating visit, and asked me to return next year. It wasn’t until I deciphered Kowalski’s scrawl that I figured I done good. His was something like, “I owe you one, LT. Anything you want, any time, you name it. Cause you are the rockingest boss ever.”
***The End?