FIC: Not Quite A Valentine's Day Massacre (But Close)
Title: Not Quite A Valentine’s Day Massacre (But Close)
Summary: David’s so oblivious that it takes the obviousness of the garish holiday known as Valentine’s Day to knock some sense into him.
Pairing: Greg/David
Word Count: 1893
Rating: PG
Author’s Notes: It’s been awhile since I’ve written David-fic, so I decided it was time to get back into the swing of things. This also conveniently helped me take out my aggressions toward Valentine’s Day. Thanks for the beta, Starr.
It was Valentine’s Day.
Or, as David preferred to call it, The Day On Which Every Possible Existing Deity Joined The Universe In Conspiring To Torture David Hodges.
So the nickname needed a little work. D-Day had already been taken.
That wasn’t the point, anyway. The point was that it was Valentine’s Day and he was sure to be assaulted by cards bearing pictures of fat babies with arrows, candy so sweet it could rot your teeth if you just looked at it, and an absolutely ungodly, unholy, un-everything-good, illegal-in-seven-countries-because-it-broke-the-Geneva-conventions amount of pink. It was enough to drive a man to drink.
Thankfully, he had an ally; Jacqui was single at this point in time and therefore she was currently agreeing with him on the subject of Valentine’s Day. Not having anyone to make snide comments with would’ve only made the day even more unbearable.
Of course, the fact that Greg had whole-heartedly embraced the holiday made it bad enough on its own.
Little known fact: it could be maybe construed that it was minutely possible that David Hodges didn’t completely despise Greg Sanders. It could even be said-in a dead language to a dead person in the dead of night-that he sort of didn’t hate conversing with the man. Maybe. He might even admit-under the total duress associated with being faced with certain death-that he had grown kind of, sort of, a little, tiny bit fond of him. Not that you’d hear him say it anytime soon. But it was true nonetheless.
So when Greg bounded into his lab looking especially bright and shiny on a day when David Hodges would gladly kill someone if it would erase the color pink from the universe, he groaned. Why, for the love of God, did he have to kind of not-hate someone who was so damn perky?
“What’s the matter, Dave?” Greg asked cheerfully, and Hodges rolled his eyes at the nickname.
“David. David. Say it with me now-David. I realize speaking isn’t one of your strong suits, but I’m pretty sure an extra syllable won’t kill you,” Hodges returned.
“Yikes. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today.”
“No, I just woke up today,” Hodges answered, trying to concentrate on the trace he was currently running.
“What’s wrong with today?”
“Besides the fact that we could kill someone with the amount of candy that’s being consumed and the fact that I made the discovery this morning that the color pink is actually an instrument of torture, nothing at all,” David replied, rolling his eyes again.
“Aw, come on, Dave. You hate Valentine’s Day?”
“I hate any day that reduces grown, intelligent-okay, well, grown, anyway-adults to gibbering heaps of idiocy,” Hodges told him. “And for the last time, my name is David.”
“You let Archie, Bobby, and Jacqui call you Dave.”
“If I didn’t let Archie, he’d bore me to tears with story after story about Star Trek; if I didn’t let Bobby, he’d probably shoot me; and if I didn’t let Jacqui... actually, I don’t want to contemplate what Jacqui might do to me,” he responded. “You, however, pose no threat whatsoever.”
“Right,” Greg replied, rolling his eyes. “C’mon. All your friends call you Dave. Why can’t I?”
“Don’t go spreading around the rumor that those lunatics and I are friends. I’ll never be able to get rid of them.”
“You don’t fool me, Dave.”
Hodges nearly threw up his arms in frustration. “Is there something you needed, Gre? Or are you just in here annoying me for sport?”
“You love me. Don’t deny it.”
“I have to deny false accusations.”
“Fine. Here. I need you to run this.” He handed him a small envelope.
Hodges gave him a look when he didn’t leave. “We still haven’t invented the magical-instant-results machine. It’ll be awhile. I have backlog from day shift to go through first.”
“Fine. Page me,” Greg told him. Before leaving, he added, “And give Valentine’s Day a chance.”
“As soon as you give both sanity and normality a chance,” Hodges answered, going back to concentrating on his work.
*
It was a couple hours later when Jacqui stormed into his lab, looking a cross between annoyed and furious. In laymen’s terms: pretty damn terrifying.
“David Hodges,” she started in a low tone that David recognized as deadly, “what’s the meaning of this?” She held up a card. It was pink with hearts of varying shades all over the front, and when she opened it, it started singing.
David looked aghast. “Call the pentagon. It has to be the terrorists’ new plan of attack,” he replied.
“Don’t even joke about this, David. You know I hate this holiday as much as you do.”
Now Hodges was just confused. “Do you have a point, or were you just planning on rambling nonsensically for the entirety of this conversation?”
“Look at who it’s signed from!” she answered, glaring. “How could you?”
David looked. Sure enough, the words ‘From David’ were printed clearly.
She though he sent the card? “Jacqueline Ann Franco!” he exclaimed, offended. “You can’t possibly think I had anything to do with this monstrosity!”
Jacqui visibly faltered, though David wasn’t sure if it was due to her realizing the absurdity of her accusation or her being startled that he’d used her full name. “It’s not one of your cruel jokes?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.
“No. If you think I’d even touch, let alone sign, something as horribly tacky as that, you’re insane. That’s the type of thing Greg would-” He cut off, realization dawning. “Oh, he’s dead,” he said. “Greg was in here earlier telling me to ‘give Valentine’s Day a chance.’ He probably sent it.”
Jacqui appeared thoughtful. “That does sound like something Greg would do.”
Just then, Nick and Sara walked into the lab as well. Nick was smiling and holding a card similar to Jacqui’s. Sara just looked perplexed-she had one too. “Hey, man,” Nick greeted. “I have to say, I didn’t think you’d be into Valentine’s Day at all. But thanks for the card.”
“Yeah, Hodges. What prompted the sudden change of heart? Last week I heard you muttering about the holiday,” Sara added, smirking.
“I am going to kill him,” Hodges said through gritted teeth.
“Kill who?” Sara asked.
“Greg. He’s the one who sent these ridiculous cards. Not me.”
Nick winked. “Sure, Hodges. We believe you. Don’t we, Sara?”
Sara grinned. “Sure we do.” She handed him an envelope. “We have trace. Thanks for the card.”
And before Hodges could retort, they were gone. “Greg is dead. He’s so dead he’s actually a step beyond dead,” he told Jacqui. She nodded solemnly.
*
When Hodges paged Greg a couple hours later, he was seething.
It seemed that the fact that the cards “he” sent had prompted the others to send him cards in “return” and currently David’s lab was overrun by tacky, singing cards that made the idea of stabbing himself in the heart with the shard of a broken beaker very tempting.
“Aw, Dave! It’s good to see you finally got into the Valentine’s Day spirit!” Greg said, beaming as he walked into the lab and looked at all the cards.
Hodges glared. “You did this.”
Greg gave him an innocent look that Hodges didn’t believe for a second. “I didn’t do this. I got you a card, not this many,” he answered.
“No, you-” David faltered. “You got me a card? What the hell for?”
“It’s Valentine’s Day. Here you go,” Greg said, handing him the card. With that, he took the results out of the momentarily-stunned trace tech’s hands and left.
David stared at the card in his hands, slightly dumbfounded. Why had Greg given him a card? Moreover, why had he gone to the trouble of getting everyone else to send him cards? David sighed, opening the card and expecting to have his ears mutilated by some electronic-sounding-song-murdering melody. When none came, he really looked at the card.
It wasn’t pink. It didn’t sing. It was actually, dare he say it, tasteful. David blinked, reading what Greg had written inside:
I’ll explain at breakfast. Meet me at the diner after shift. Happy Valentine’s Day, David.
Hodges blinked again. Okay, what the hell was going on? Who had stolen Greg Sanders’ mind and body and what clone or pod person had replaced him?
He supposed he’d find out at breakfast.
*
When Hodges arrived at the diner, Greg was already seated in a booth looking... the man looked nervous, which was just weird.
“All right, Sanders. Spill,” he said, sliding into the seat across from him. “What compelled you to have everyone send me annoying Valentine’s Day cards? Do you hate me that much?”
“Can’t we order first?” Greg asked, looking at his menu.
David sighed. “Just tell me what the hell is going on.”
Greg shot him an annoyed look. “You want to know what’s going on? You’re the single most oblivious person I’ve ever met.”
He blinked. “What are you talking about? If I’d known you were going to spout nonsense, I’d have skipped this conversation.”
“I’m talking about the fact that I’ve been trying to ask you out for the past two months!” he exclaimed, looking deeply embarrassed not a moment later.
Hodges stared. “Very funny,” he snapped. “What’s the real reason?”
“Dammit, David, that is the real reason. You blew me off the last three times I asked you out, so I figured at least this way I could get your attention.”
“...when did you ask me out?” David asked, confused.
Greg rolled his eyes. “Last month, the concert invitation? Three weeks ago, the movie. Last week, the breakfast.”
“You were asking me out?” David asked. “I thought you were just being annoyingly sociable and offering to be polite.” It was a testament to how shocked he was that he admitted that out loud.
“Nope,” Greg replied.
“Huh.” He’d been being chased and he hadn’t even realized it. He supposed that spoke to how long it’d been since he was last on a date. “Is this a good idea? I mean, we work together. And we have nothing in common. And we’re nothing alike.” He was babbling now-it happened when he was nervous and didn’t know what else to do. “And-”
“David, for once in your life, just shut up,” Greg responded. And that was when he leaned in and kissed him.
David almost instinctively shut his eyes and kissed him back. It was a nice kiss-someone had certainly taught Greg how to do this the right way. He was sort of losing himself in it until he realized that he was sitting in the middle of a diner he frequented regularly, kissing, of all people, Greg Sanders.
He pulled away, startled. “I-” he started, at a loss for words.
“Is the infamous David Hodges actually speechless?” Greg grinned.
David shot him a glare. “I really hate you.”
“Don’t lie, Dave. It’s unbecoming.”
“My name is-oh, forget it.”
Greg smirked triumphantly.
David allowed himself a small smile. Maybe Valentine’s Day wasn’t so bad-okay, no. It really was. It was torture wrapped up in evil surrounded by malevolence. But at least it was sort of bearable now. Maybe. Kind of. But only in the minutest of ways.
Whatever the case, David just smirked back at Greg and kissed him again.
-End
Summary: David’s so oblivious that it takes the obviousness of the garish holiday known as Valentine’s Day to knock some sense into him.
Pairing: Greg/David
Word Count: 1893
Rating: PG
Author’s Notes: It’s been awhile since I’ve written David-fic, so I decided it was time to get back into the swing of things. This also conveniently helped me take out my aggressions toward Valentine’s Day. Thanks for the beta, Starr.
It was Valentine’s Day.
Or, as David preferred to call it, The Day On Which Every Possible Existing Deity Joined The Universe In Conspiring To Torture David Hodges.
So the nickname needed a little work. D-Day had already been taken.
That wasn’t the point, anyway. The point was that it was Valentine’s Day and he was sure to be assaulted by cards bearing pictures of fat babies with arrows, candy so sweet it could rot your teeth if you just looked at it, and an absolutely ungodly, unholy, un-everything-good, illegal-in-seven-countries-because-it-broke-the-Geneva-conventions amount of pink. It was enough to drive a man to drink.
Thankfully, he had an ally; Jacqui was single at this point in time and therefore she was currently agreeing with him on the subject of Valentine’s Day. Not having anyone to make snide comments with would’ve only made the day even more unbearable.
Of course, the fact that Greg had whole-heartedly embraced the holiday made it bad enough on its own.
Little known fact: it could be maybe construed that it was minutely possible that David Hodges didn’t completely despise Greg Sanders. It could even be said-in a dead language to a dead person in the dead of night-that he sort of didn’t hate conversing with the man. Maybe. He might even admit-under the total duress associated with being faced with certain death-that he had grown kind of, sort of, a little, tiny bit fond of him. Not that you’d hear him say it anytime soon. But it was true nonetheless.
So when Greg bounded into his lab looking especially bright and shiny on a day when David Hodges would gladly kill someone if it would erase the color pink from the universe, he groaned. Why, for the love of God, did he have to kind of not-hate someone who was so damn perky?
“What’s the matter, Dave?” Greg asked cheerfully, and Hodges rolled his eyes at the nickname.
“David. David. Say it with me now-David. I realize speaking isn’t one of your strong suits, but I’m pretty sure an extra syllable won’t kill you,” Hodges returned.
“Yikes. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today.”
“No, I just woke up today,” Hodges answered, trying to concentrate on the trace he was currently running.
“What’s wrong with today?”
“Besides the fact that we could kill someone with the amount of candy that’s being consumed and the fact that I made the discovery this morning that the color pink is actually an instrument of torture, nothing at all,” David replied, rolling his eyes again.
“Aw, come on, Dave. You hate Valentine’s Day?”
“I hate any day that reduces grown, intelligent-okay, well, grown, anyway-adults to gibbering heaps of idiocy,” Hodges told him. “And for the last time, my name is David.”
“You let Archie, Bobby, and Jacqui call you Dave.”
“If I didn’t let Archie, he’d bore me to tears with story after story about Star Trek; if I didn’t let Bobby, he’d probably shoot me; and if I didn’t let Jacqui... actually, I don’t want to contemplate what Jacqui might do to me,” he responded. “You, however, pose no threat whatsoever.”
“Right,” Greg replied, rolling his eyes. “C’mon. All your friends call you Dave. Why can’t I?”
“Don’t go spreading around the rumor that those lunatics and I are friends. I’ll never be able to get rid of them.”
“You don’t fool me, Dave.”
Hodges nearly threw up his arms in frustration. “Is there something you needed, Gre? Or are you just in here annoying me for sport?”
“You love me. Don’t deny it.”
“I have to deny false accusations.”
“Fine. Here. I need you to run this.” He handed him a small envelope.
Hodges gave him a look when he didn’t leave. “We still haven’t invented the magical-instant-results machine. It’ll be awhile. I have backlog from day shift to go through first.”
“Fine. Page me,” Greg told him. Before leaving, he added, “And give Valentine’s Day a chance.”
“As soon as you give both sanity and normality a chance,” Hodges answered, going back to concentrating on his work.
*
It was a couple hours later when Jacqui stormed into his lab, looking a cross between annoyed and furious. In laymen’s terms: pretty damn terrifying.
“David Hodges,” she started in a low tone that David recognized as deadly, “what’s the meaning of this?” She held up a card. It was pink with hearts of varying shades all over the front, and when she opened it, it started singing.
David looked aghast. “Call the pentagon. It has to be the terrorists’ new plan of attack,” he replied.
“Don’t even joke about this, David. You know I hate this holiday as much as you do.”
Now Hodges was just confused. “Do you have a point, or were you just planning on rambling nonsensically for the entirety of this conversation?”
“Look at who it’s signed from!” she answered, glaring. “How could you?”
David looked. Sure enough, the words ‘From David’ were printed clearly.
She though he sent the card? “Jacqueline Ann Franco!” he exclaimed, offended. “You can’t possibly think I had anything to do with this monstrosity!”
Jacqui visibly faltered, though David wasn’t sure if it was due to her realizing the absurdity of her accusation or her being startled that he’d used her full name. “It’s not one of your cruel jokes?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.
“No. If you think I’d even touch, let alone sign, something as horribly tacky as that, you’re insane. That’s the type of thing Greg would-” He cut off, realization dawning. “Oh, he’s dead,” he said. “Greg was in here earlier telling me to ‘give Valentine’s Day a chance.’ He probably sent it.”
Jacqui appeared thoughtful. “That does sound like something Greg would do.”
Just then, Nick and Sara walked into the lab as well. Nick was smiling and holding a card similar to Jacqui’s. Sara just looked perplexed-she had one too. “Hey, man,” Nick greeted. “I have to say, I didn’t think you’d be into Valentine’s Day at all. But thanks for the card.”
“Yeah, Hodges. What prompted the sudden change of heart? Last week I heard you muttering about the holiday,” Sara added, smirking.
“I am going to kill him,” Hodges said through gritted teeth.
“Kill who?” Sara asked.
“Greg. He’s the one who sent these ridiculous cards. Not me.”
Nick winked. “Sure, Hodges. We believe you. Don’t we, Sara?”
Sara grinned. “Sure we do.” She handed him an envelope. “We have trace. Thanks for the card.”
And before Hodges could retort, they were gone. “Greg is dead. He’s so dead he’s actually a step beyond dead,” he told Jacqui. She nodded solemnly.
*
When Hodges paged Greg a couple hours later, he was seething.
It seemed that the fact that the cards “he” sent had prompted the others to send him cards in “return” and currently David’s lab was overrun by tacky, singing cards that made the idea of stabbing himself in the heart with the shard of a broken beaker very tempting.
“Aw, Dave! It’s good to see you finally got into the Valentine’s Day spirit!” Greg said, beaming as he walked into the lab and looked at all the cards.
Hodges glared. “You did this.”
Greg gave him an innocent look that Hodges didn’t believe for a second. “I didn’t do this. I got you a card, not this many,” he answered.
“No, you-” David faltered. “You got me a card? What the hell for?”
“It’s Valentine’s Day. Here you go,” Greg said, handing him the card. With that, he took the results out of the momentarily-stunned trace tech’s hands and left.
David stared at the card in his hands, slightly dumbfounded. Why had Greg given him a card? Moreover, why had he gone to the trouble of getting everyone else to send him cards? David sighed, opening the card and expecting to have his ears mutilated by some electronic-sounding-song-murdering melody. When none came, he really looked at the card.
It wasn’t pink. It didn’t sing. It was actually, dare he say it, tasteful. David blinked, reading what Greg had written inside:
I’ll explain at breakfast. Meet me at the diner after shift. Happy Valentine’s Day, David.
Hodges blinked again. Okay, what the hell was going on? Who had stolen Greg Sanders’ mind and body and what clone or pod person had replaced him?
He supposed he’d find out at breakfast.
*
When Hodges arrived at the diner, Greg was already seated in a booth looking... the man looked nervous, which was just weird.
“All right, Sanders. Spill,” he said, sliding into the seat across from him. “What compelled you to have everyone send me annoying Valentine’s Day cards? Do you hate me that much?”
“Can’t we order first?” Greg asked, looking at his menu.
David sighed. “Just tell me what the hell is going on.”
Greg shot him an annoyed look. “You want to know what’s going on? You’re the single most oblivious person I’ve ever met.”
He blinked. “What are you talking about? If I’d known you were going to spout nonsense, I’d have skipped this conversation.”
“I’m talking about the fact that I’ve been trying to ask you out for the past two months!” he exclaimed, looking deeply embarrassed not a moment later.
Hodges stared. “Very funny,” he snapped. “What’s the real reason?”
“Dammit, David, that is the real reason. You blew me off the last three times I asked you out, so I figured at least this way I could get your attention.”
“...when did you ask me out?” David asked, confused.
Greg rolled his eyes. “Last month, the concert invitation? Three weeks ago, the movie. Last week, the breakfast.”
“You were asking me out?” David asked. “I thought you were just being annoyingly sociable and offering to be polite.” It was a testament to how shocked he was that he admitted that out loud.
“Nope,” Greg replied.
“Huh.” He’d been being chased and he hadn’t even realized it. He supposed that spoke to how long it’d been since he was last on a date. “Is this a good idea? I mean, we work together. And we have nothing in common. And we’re nothing alike.” He was babbling now-it happened when he was nervous and didn’t know what else to do. “And-”
“David, for once in your life, just shut up,” Greg responded. And that was when he leaned in and kissed him.
David almost instinctively shut his eyes and kissed him back. It was a nice kiss-someone had certainly taught Greg how to do this the right way. He was sort of losing himself in it until he realized that he was sitting in the middle of a diner he frequented regularly, kissing, of all people, Greg Sanders.
He pulled away, startled. “I-” he started, at a loss for words.
“Is the infamous David Hodges actually speechless?” Greg grinned.
David shot him a glare. “I really hate you.”
“Don’t lie, Dave. It’s unbecoming.”
“My name is-oh, forget it.”
Greg smirked triumphantly.
David allowed himself a small smile. Maybe Valentine’s Day wasn’t so bad-okay, no. It really was. It was torture wrapped up in evil surrounded by malevolence. But at least it was sort of bearable now. Maybe. Kind of. But only in the minutest of ways.
Whatever the case, David just smirked back at Greg and kissed him again.
-End