TEAM ROMANCE: Day 17, "Logic"
Title: Logic
Author: sisterofdream
Team: Romance
Prompt: “Not a plan, exactly - more like a strategy.”
Pairing(s): Fraser/Kowalski
Length: 4,600 words
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: None
Author's note: Thank you times eleventy billion to ignazwisdom for the lightning fast eleventh hour beta and to the team in general for being so awesome at life.
Summary: “Your strategy is to catch Fraser off guard and then use logic against him.”
Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Prompt and Team (Genre) information in the header above.
More details about the voting procedure can be found here.
**
Bob Fraser was mere moments away from telling the quiet Ukrainian gentleman the thrilling conclusion to the tale of Rusty O’Halloran and the Great Walrus Chase when he heard his son say something incredibly stupid.
“In point of fact I do believe you, Miss Cheburko, and must confess that I have on a number of occasions, seen a ghost myself.”
Bob looked up, startled, to find that Benton had somehow managed not to realize he’d said anything amiss, his face the same mask of polite, obligatory interest that it always was around people who were not his father as he listened to the young woman now eagerly explaining just what her dead grandfather had told her about the traveling acrobats and their recent string of liquor store robberies.
Bob looked past his son to see if the Yank had heard, but he still looked exactly as he did when Benton first began detailing the Inuit beliefs about life after death: arms and legs crossed, shoulders against the wall, eyes closed. Not sleeping though, simply not listening. Strange that a person so interested in his son could be so completely uninterested in anything he had to say.
Bob felt a tap on his arm and turned back to his companion, who appeared irritated at the interruption. Bob cheerfully returned to the story. He so rarely had an opportunity to talk with others these days; no sense in wasting that to talk to a son who’d only be ungrateful for the help anyway.
“So there Rusty was, one man against three walruses...”
--
Ray was fidgeting in the car on the way back to the station. Not an altogether unusual occurrence, of course, though it certainly seemed more frantic than usual. He’d turned the radio on and off twenty-seven times, the air conditioner six, and the heat twice for some reason. He also kept beginning to drink out of a coffee cup which had been empty for six aborted sips. Oh, seven now.
Fraser had just determined that the logical course of action was to find out if there was something on Ray’s mind and, if so, he might like to talk about it when Ray spoke up.
“So, Fraser…That thing you said in there to the woman. That wasn’t real, right?”
“What thing, Ray?” Fraser knew very well what thing but had decided to hold out hope that Ray was referring to something else altogether. Perhaps Ray was upset that he had complimented the woman’s blouse and if that was the case, he could quite truthfully explain to Ray that it was a simple social nicety and that he had actually found it to be in rather poor taste and far too revealing.
“Don’t do that, Fraser. You know what thing.” Ray turned off the radio again, unfortunately making conversation easier but at least turning off the music. Fraser wasn’t certain since the lyrics were terribly hard to make out amidst the din, but he rather thought they were being insincere when they sang “God save the Queen.”
“Really, Ray, I said many things and can hardly be expected to guess to which one you are referring.”
“The ghost thing. You told her you see ghosts.”
“Actually, I-”
“A ghost! You said you’d seen a ghost on ‘a number of occasions.’ Was that true?” Ray reached over to turn the air conditioning back on just as Fraser’s father poked his head in between the two front seats, causing Fraser to abruptly slam his head against the window and Ray to stare at him like he was insane.
“Lie, son. Best thing to do in a situation like this.”
How did the man get into the car? He’d been trying to talk Mr. Cheburko into some otherworldly bridge club when Ray and Fraser had left the apartment. You’d think if he was going to insist on tagging along everywhere he’d at least walk at the same pace as the living.
“Silence won’t work, you know. He’ll keep asking. Just lie and get it over with.”
“I can’t lie.” He muttered.
“Why would I want you to lie? Also, is your head okay?”
“Not you.”
“What? Okay, no.” Ray rather rashly, and judging by the horns and screeching tires, dangerously, crossed two lanes of traffic to make a right turn onto a side street and stopped the car a bit too far from the sidewalk for Fraser’s comfort. The engine was turned off, buttons for the radio, air conditioning, and heat unnecessarily hit, and seatbelt unbuckled before Ray turned to face him, jabbing his pinky and index fingers into Fraser’s chest. “Too many conversations go like this, Fraser. With the Inuit stories, or the talking to the dog.” Dief barked from the backseat. “Wolf. Or this thing. Where you just say random things until I get frustrated and can’t stand to be around you anymore.”
“I’m sorry my presence is so frustrating for you, Ray.” Fraser replied, trying to sound more hurt than he really felt.
“No! That is the stalling thing again! Just answer this question: do you seriously believe you’ve seen a ghost?”
“For God’s sake, Benton, lie!” his father hissed.
“All the time, Ray,” Fraser answered, carefully not glancing at the backseat.
“Fuck,” Ray said, collapsing back against his seat and staring blindly out the windshield.
“Mistake,” called out the voice from the back.
--
Four days later, when Lieutenant Welsh had tolerated all he could of Francesca’s moping and Vecchio’s hyperactivity and Dewey baiting, he called the detective into his office.
“Before you start talking, I want to make one thing clear: I don’t want to hear about whatever it was that happened. I just want to know if it’s possible that you could get the Mountie back here so he can shut you up and maybe help you solve a crime? Even just a small one would be fine. One not involving anything weird.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, that was too easy. You’re not going to test my patience with a little rant about licking things and Inuit stories?”
“No, sir,” he said and damn it if he didn’t look sincere. “I woulda done it sooner, it just took me a while to come up with a plan.”
“A plan?” Why was he asking? He didn’t want to know this.
“Yeah. I kind of pissed off Fraser and I had to figure out how to, you know, unpiss him off.”
Welsh stared at him for a moment and then realized that as much as he didn’t want to know, knowing would bother him less over the course of the day than wondering would.
“All right, I’ll ask. I’m certain I’ll regret it soon after, but I’ll ask. What’s your plan?”
“Logic.”
“That’s not a plan. It’s a word.”
“Not a plan, exactly - more like a strategy.” He seemed a little too pleased with this assessment, bouncing up on the balls of his feet and grinning widely.
“Your strategy is to use logic.” Welsh struggled to keep the disbelief out of his voice.
“First I’ll catch him off guard.”
“Your strategy is to catch Fraser off guard and then use logic against him.” This time he was certain he sounded disbelieving, not that it seemed to have any effect on Ray one way or another.
“Probably some emotional blackmail stuff, too. Trust me, if you knew the reason he was upset, it’d make perfect sense.”
“For the love of God, Vecchio, don’t tell me the reason. Just go strategize. Come back with the Mountie, and never tell me anything about it.”
“Of course, sir.” Vecchio saluted smartly, turned on his heel and walked out of the room and out of the station. Welsh pulled a piece of paper off the pad to his left and scribbled down “ask fewer questions.”
--
“Thanks for coming out and doing those interviews with me, Frase.” He glanced across the car to see Fraser smiling softly down at his hat.
“You know, you’ve already thanked me for that, Ray. Before and after each interview if I recall correctly.” He turned to meet Ray’s eyes, the smile on his face taking on a slight smirk, and Ray had to tear his eyes back to the road before he killed them both.
“Yeah, I know. It’s just, I’m sorry, you know, about last time. I shouldn’t have called you crazy and I shouldn’t have gone and left you at the consulate and not listened to you.”
“It’s all right, Ray.”
“Yeah? You’re not angry with me? I woulda been angry at me.”
“Not angry, Ray.”
“So, uh. Who is the ghost?”
Fraser was quiet for a long moment, staring calmly at Ray, as if waiting for something, only Ray didn’t know what.
“My father, Ray.” He finally said, very carefully.
“The one on whose killers the trail of whom…wait.”
Fraser laughed, still a strange sound to Ray, but all the more beautiful for its rarity.
“That sentence appears to have gotten away from you, Ray.”
“Well, now you know why I never use grammar.”
“Ah, now I understand. A fine effort though.”
Ray laughed with Fraser now and shook his head, trying to clear it. He turned and spent a long moment just staring back at Fraser and his bright eyes and wide smile.
“Come back with me to my place.” He found himself saying. “There’s baseball. I’ll get pizza.”
There was a bark from the backseat but Fraser didn’t take his eyes away from Ray.
“We’d love to.”
--
“It’s just, I don’t think you’re crazy.” Ray said at the start of the second commercial break and Fraser thought himself an idiot for thinking the subject closed for the evening. “Except in your own freaky, Canadian way, of course.” He added this as if it were a simple matter of fact, dropping the pizza on his plate and turning to face Fraser on the couch, arm stretched across the back so that his hand was right at Fraser’s shoulder. Fraser found himself focusing on it rather more than necessary. “So, yeah, crazy, but you’re still sane and rational and everything. So, if you’re telling people you’re seeing ghosts then I know you’re seeing something and if you’re seeing something, well, that’s not good.”
“I know, Ray.”
“Look, what would you say if I’d told you I’d seen a ghost?”
“I’d believe you,” Fraser said, knowing it probably wasn’t the truth but that there was a small chance it might be.
“No you wouldn’t, Fraser. No you would not! You would tell me an Inuit story whose moral was ‘it’s all in your head.’”
“Perhaps. But I would believe you, Ray. You don’t lie to me.”
“I lie to you all the time.”
Fraser was hurt by this revelation, apparently enough to let it show on his face because Ray rushed on to take it back.
“Well. Not lie. But I don’t tell you things.”
“Ah, but see, if you told me, you’d be telling me, Ray.”
Ray opened his mouth to speak, seemed to think better of it, and then turned his head and sighed.
“Ray? Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“Right now? Or more general like?”
“Both, I suppose. But let’s start with now.”
“Wait! This is the stalling thing again! We are off subject and this is you changing it to stall.”
That was only half true. There were two things Fraser wanted right now. One was to not talk about his dead father, one was to learn any and all of Ray’s secrets. That in this situation the two went together so well was just a fortunate coincidence.
“All right, and who are you anyway to ask me about things I haven’t told you? I mean, you didn’t tell me about any of this.”
“Of course I did, Ray. How else could we be talking about it?”
“No, you told her. I just overheard is all. You had this great big thing you weren’t telling anyone and then you went and told her. Known her five minutes but somehow you knew you could trust her more than you could trust me.”
“I do trust you, Ray.”
“Doesn’t feel like it.” Ray said softly, before getting up from the couch and walking across to the fridge.
“I made one comment to a witness to get information,” Fraser lept off the couch to follow Ray. “I’d never have told her that it was my father’s ghost or that he’s been following me for years now, or that sometimes I think that maybe he is nothing more than a hole in my bag of marbles except that frequently there are times that he knows things that I simply couldn’t have known on my own.”
“Like what?” Ray turned back to him now, beer in hand.
“He was with us on the Henry Allen, you know.”
“Think he’d have been more helpful.” Ray said with an ungentlemanly snort, putting the beer back down and crossing his arms across his chest.
“Actually, he was quite helpful. On the submarine, he was the one who told me to listen to you.”
“…He what?” Ray had suddenly gone quite still, and not the ‘contained motion’ still that Ray normally went, but the still of everyone else. It was unsettling.
“Do you remember? You were telling me to ‘go that way’ and I wasn’t going to but then he said…oh dear.”
“So let me get this straight. I say ‘go that way.’ You say ‘no.’ The ghost says ‘go that way.’ You say ‘gee golly gosh, why not? You seem to be a reliable source of information!’”
“Well, it wasn’t quite like that.”
“Because that is not trusting me, Fraser. That is the opposite of trusting me. That is trusting someone not me.” Ray hadn’t moved forward a step, but he was gesturing wildly and had regained that tightly coiled element which made it appear as though he would at any moment explode. Fraser rather wished that wouldn’t happen.
“Well, in essence…” Fraser trailed off, and then scratched his brow, a nervous habit that had never helped him in any situation.
“No, Frase. No essence. That is not you trusting me. That is you waiting for the approval of a hallucination.”
“Ray, I…” He had to say something, anything. Most of the time he wasn’t able to shut up and now he couldn’t find any words at all? He stared silently at Ray and watched the resignation etch itself across his face before he turned away and placed his hands on the counter.
“Just. I don’t wanna talk anymore. I don’t care. I don’t care if he’s a ghost, or a schizo thing, or a piece of undigested beef.”
“Do you want to watch the ballgame?” Fraser found himself asking in a timid, hopeful voice he wasn’t aware he’d possessed, waiting for Ray to turn back to face him.
“No, Fraser.”
--
Five hours later, Fraser was in his forth hour of lying on his cot, staring up at the Consulate ceiling and what felt like the thousandth hour of listening to his father explain the many ways in which the situation had proved the elder right yet again.
“Told you not to tell him the truth. I told you to lie. But did you listen? Do you ever?”
“No, Dad.”
“Right! You did not and now you’ve gone and ruined your partnership forever.”
Fraser closed his eyes tightly and tried to block out the rest of what his father was saying, but something broke through at last.
“He looks at you funny.”
“Well, yes, Dad. My frequent conversations with you have convinced him that I’m insane.” Fraser wondered if he could submit his approaching migraine as proof of his father’s existence.
“Not that kind of funny, son. The way a man looks at other men if he’s been left on his own for too long.”
Fraser opened his eyes to look at his father, or, rather, the empty space where his father had just been.
“Dad?” He rolled off the cot and headed for the closet door and found only a closet behind it. He shut himself in anyway and when there was no change in his environment he asked the coats, “What did you mean by that?”
--
It was early Saturday morning, an hour Ray hadn’t known existed on Saturday mornings. He’d spent fifteen minutes trying to wait out the knocking but it had only gotten louder. Ray finally got up in an effort to stop the sound before his neighbors got together and planned the way in which they would murder him the next time he went to do his laundry.
“Hey, Fraser,” he said before he’d finished opening the door. Since he wasn’t really looking at the man, he was caught off guard when six feet of blue jeans and blue flannel shouldered past him and into the apartment. “What the hell?”
“I’m sorry to intrude, Ray. But we’re going to have to talk about this. Well, about two things, really.”
“Fraser, I told you I don’t want to talk.”
“Well, then, you’ll have to listen. Which means you’ll need to wake up. I brought coffee.” He shoved a cup into Ray’s hand, and what do you know, he had brought coffee, and good stuff. Ray glanced at the bag on the counter.
“Donuts, too?”
“Yes, Ray,” he said solemnly and Ray couldn’t help but smile because Fraser was here trying to make things better with talking and good coffee and donuts and apparently Ray was easy.
“Firstly, I do trust you, and I did trust you aboard the submarine. What my father said was that I had to trust my partner. He didn’t say you were right or wrong or to do as he said. It wasn’t about you, not really. It was about me. That I was being…that I am controlling and bullheaded and that I needed to listen to you. That right or wrong, death or victory, I had to listen to you, Ray.”
“All right.”
“All right?”
“You wanted me to argue?”
“Well, no, of course not.” He flicked his thumb across his eyebrow and messed it back up again when he furrowed his brow and stared at Ray. “I just rather expected it, I suppose. That was just the opening of the speech I practiced on the walk over.”
“Well, you brought coffee.”
“Ah.”
“So what was the other thing we had to talk about?”
“Well, I want to prove that my father is real.”
“Worth a shot.”
“He’s here now and he has reluctantly agreed to help me prove his existence. I would’ve been here sooner, but for quite some time he wouldn’t even show himself.”
“How’d you get him to do it?”
“I had to insult curling, Ray.”
“Don’t they take away your Mountie hat for that?” Ray asked with entirely too big of a smile on his face.
“Don’t make fun. It was quite difficult for me. And then he made a scene.” He turned to look just past Ray’s shoulder and said in the pissy tone he used when he stopped being passive-aggressive and started being an asshole, “yes, you did cause a scene. Just because Diefenbaker and myself were the only ones to see it made it no less a scene.”
“So, how are you going to prove the ghost is real?”
“Logic, Ray.”
“Damn, see, that was my plan.”
“Oh. Well.” Fraser suddenly seemed lost and Ray saved him out of habit.
“Fine, how many fingers?” Ray quickly put both his hands behind his back and looked at Fraser expectantly.
“Dad? Dad! Oh…fine…two?”
“Not even close! Wait. You were guessing. OK, stupid. Of course you were guessing.”
“Sorry, Ray, he’s gone into the bedroom.”
“Well, that seems convenient. Sorry, can’t prove the ghost is real, he’s taking a nap. Wait. Why is he in my room?”
“Please, Ray. Give me a moment.” He walked past Ray and into the bedroom, shouting a quick “Dad!” before he shut the door.
--
Fraser walked back out and looked at Ray, who had managed to eat all but one of the donuts in the six minutes Fraser had been in the bedroom, and he was now trying to polish off that one as well.
“Sorry,” Ray mumbled around the crumbling pastry.
“It’s all right. Ray, if you would go into your room for a few moments and do anything you like and then come out here.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
Ray shrugged and walked into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him. Fraser began to pace. Then he threw out the empty donut bag and coffee cup and the pizza box and the three empty beer bottles before taking the plates and his glass to the sink. He had just finished drying them when Ray stepped back out.
“See, I knew this was just a trick to clean my apartment.”
Fraser ignored him and turned to look at his father, standing a few feet away.
“First, he muttered about what a ridiculous plan this was.” Bob said, tiredly and in a tone that said he rather agreed with Ray on this subject.
“First, you muttered about what a ridiculous plan this was.” Fraser repeated, turning back to Ray.
“Okay but that could just be your Mountie bat ears.”
“Then he flipped through a pile of CDs, sorting them into three stacks.”
“You sorted your CDs into three stacks.”
“Or a hidden camera. Did you set up a camera?”
“He’s never going to believe it.”
“Please, Dad, just try!” Fraser said, turning back to his father for a moment before facing Ray again.
“Then he tossed some clothing into a hamper.”
“You threw your clothes into the hamper.” Ray still didn’t look convinced, though he did look slightly terrified.
“He stared at that dream catcher you gave him.”
“You stared at your dream catcher.”
“Also, he’s in love with you.”
“Also, I’m in love with you.”
“What?” Ray asked, terror still plain across his face, but something else with it.
“What?” Fraser asked, spinning to face his father.
“No, son, you switched the pronouns. Simple mistake, go fix it.”
“You’re in love with me?” Fraser turned now he was able to place the other emotion on Ray’s face: hope.
“Frankly, I’m not sure how you got them switched like that in your mind.”
“I didn’t mean to say that.” he said quickly, stupidly.
“Oh.” And that was what hope looked like when it was destroyed in a moment, and Fraser had seen that expression too often to bear being the cause of it.
“No! I mean. I meant it. I did, I do. I just said it…accidentally.”
“Oh God, son. I think I’m going to leave the room now.”
“Right. Of course.” Ray didn’t look convinced, if anything, he looked even more hopeless. Perhaps this was a situation that couldn’t be solved with words. Perhaps it was time to trust instinct again.
So he move forward into Ray’s personal space and Ray’s eyes went wide and he began moving back, and Fraser with him, until his back was pressed against the wall and Fraser was against his front. Fraser slid one hand tight around Ray’s waist and the other along his neck until he could feel soft hair against his fingertips and a strong jaw against his thumb. He tilted his head and breathed “I love you” against Ray’s mouth before pressing his own firmly against it.
He’d expected a moment of hesitation and was thrilled to be wrong because Ray drove back against him seemingly without thought, one hand pressing hard on his back, the other gripping his hair hard and twisting Fraser’s head to better accommodate Ray’s hot, open mouth.
And then Ray ground his hips against Fraser’s and Fraser pulled Ray towards him even as he drove both of them further into the wall. Ray gasped into Fraser’s mouth before tearing his own away and taking deep, erratic breaths against Fraser’s ear. For his part, Fraser chose to attack Ray’s ear, running his tongue along the edge, which brought out a delightful moan from Ray, although it was no match for the one he gave when Fraser bit down on his ear. This moan was louder and accompanied with writhing and Ray’s head falling back, which provided Fraser with the now wide open expanse of Ray’s neck. Fraser fell to an elaborate combination of biting, sucking, and licking, enjoying the wild jerk of Ray’s hips against his own.
Quickly, he pulled his hands down to Ray’s fly, unbuttoning and unzipping with a deftness that rather surprised him. Fraser reached in and stroked the hot, silky length of him with one hand, using the other to try desperately to push Ray’s pants and boxers down further.
At another strangled sound from Ray, Fraser bit down hard and Ray came wildly in Fraser’s hand, pulling at the material of the flannel shirt until he finally collapsed against Fraser, face in his neck.
Fraser braced him against the wall, struggling a bit against the dead weight in his arms before Ray’s lips found his neck, placing soft, sleepy kisses on a path up to his jaw and claiming Fraser’s lips again.
He didn’t feel Ray’s hands slip away from his back, but they must have because now they were at the front of his pants, one trying clumsily to undo the button, the other sliding forward, and Fraser’s hips jerked once, twice, and Ray squeezed once, hard, and Fraser came with a cry and then it was his turn to fall against Ray.
A few deep breaths later and he was capable of lifting his head to look at Ray, feeling a blush spread across his cheeks.
“Sorry,” he muttered, trying not to look at Ray as he did so.
Ray just grinned dazedly and licked his lips.
“I was so close,” he said, his smile growing sharper.
Fraser dropped his head back down in an effort to hide.
Ray raised a hand up and stroked his fingers slowly through Fraser’s hair.
“Really, Fraser? You actually want me? You?”
Fraser lifted up his head and looked at Ray as if he’d never seen him.
“Ray, I may very well be insane and even if I’m not, then I’m a thirty-seven year old man who lives in his office and is haunted by his father.”
“Yeah well, I’m a thirty-seven year old former stalker with crippling self-esteem issues.”
“I still don’t think that’s any worse than mine.”
“Fraser? Do you think maybe we could stop trying to talk one another out of having sex with each other and instead go back to the sex? Cause I get the feeling this is gonna end up somewhere great. Possibly somewhere without pants.”
“Certainly, Ray.”
“Good,” he said, shoving Fraser across the apartment until he fell back across the armrest and onto the couch. He had just enough time to pull himself back so he was stretched out along its length before Ray slid on top of him. Fraser reached for Ray, but he stayed too far up for another moment, looking down seriously at Fraser before saying softly, “I love you, too.”
Dimly, Fraser heard what sounded like the door to Ray’s closet closing before Ray’s lips fell hard against his once more and everything else faded away.
**
THIS POLL IS NOW CLOSED. ANY FURTHER VOTES WILL NOT BE COUNTED.
Poll Vote for this story
Author: sisterofdream
Team: Romance
Prompt: “Not a plan, exactly - more like a strategy.”
Pairing(s): Fraser/Kowalski
Length: 4,600 words
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: None
Author's note: Thank you times eleventy billion to ignazwisdom for the lightning fast eleventh hour beta and to the team in general for being so awesome at life.
Summary: “Your strategy is to catch Fraser off guard and then use logic against him.”
Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Prompt and Team (Genre) information in the header above.
More details about the voting procedure can be found here.
**
Bob Fraser was mere moments away from telling the quiet Ukrainian gentleman the thrilling conclusion to the tale of Rusty O’Halloran and the Great Walrus Chase when he heard his son say something incredibly stupid.
“In point of fact I do believe you, Miss Cheburko, and must confess that I have on a number of occasions, seen a ghost myself.”
Bob looked up, startled, to find that Benton had somehow managed not to realize he’d said anything amiss, his face the same mask of polite, obligatory interest that it always was around people who were not his father as he listened to the young woman now eagerly explaining just what her dead grandfather had told her about the traveling acrobats and their recent string of liquor store robberies.
Bob looked past his son to see if the Yank had heard, but he still looked exactly as he did when Benton first began detailing the Inuit beliefs about life after death: arms and legs crossed, shoulders against the wall, eyes closed. Not sleeping though, simply not listening. Strange that a person so interested in his son could be so completely uninterested in anything he had to say.
Bob felt a tap on his arm and turned back to his companion, who appeared irritated at the interruption. Bob cheerfully returned to the story. He so rarely had an opportunity to talk with others these days; no sense in wasting that to talk to a son who’d only be ungrateful for the help anyway.
“So there Rusty was, one man against three walruses...”
--
Ray was fidgeting in the car on the way back to the station. Not an altogether unusual occurrence, of course, though it certainly seemed more frantic than usual. He’d turned the radio on and off twenty-seven times, the air conditioner six, and the heat twice for some reason. He also kept beginning to drink out of a coffee cup which had been empty for six aborted sips. Oh, seven now.
Fraser had just determined that the logical course of action was to find out if there was something on Ray’s mind and, if so, he might like to talk about it when Ray spoke up.
“So, Fraser…That thing you said in there to the woman. That wasn’t real, right?”
“What thing, Ray?” Fraser knew very well what thing but had decided to hold out hope that Ray was referring to something else altogether. Perhaps Ray was upset that he had complimented the woman’s blouse and if that was the case, he could quite truthfully explain to Ray that it was a simple social nicety and that he had actually found it to be in rather poor taste and far too revealing.
“Don’t do that, Fraser. You know what thing.” Ray turned off the radio again, unfortunately making conversation easier but at least turning off the music. Fraser wasn’t certain since the lyrics were terribly hard to make out amidst the din, but he rather thought they were being insincere when they sang “God save the Queen.”
“Really, Ray, I said many things and can hardly be expected to guess to which one you are referring.”
“The ghost thing. You told her you see ghosts.”
“Actually, I-”
“A ghost! You said you’d seen a ghost on ‘a number of occasions.’ Was that true?” Ray reached over to turn the air conditioning back on just as Fraser’s father poked his head in between the two front seats, causing Fraser to abruptly slam his head against the window and Ray to stare at him like he was insane.
“Lie, son. Best thing to do in a situation like this.”
How did the man get into the car? He’d been trying to talk Mr. Cheburko into some otherworldly bridge club when Ray and Fraser had left the apartment. You’d think if he was going to insist on tagging along everywhere he’d at least walk at the same pace as the living.
“Silence won’t work, you know. He’ll keep asking. Just lie and get it over with.”
“I can’t lie.” He muttered.
“Why would I want you to lie? Also, is your head okay?”
“Not you.”
“What? Okay, no.” Ray rather rashly, and judging by the horns and screeching tires, dangerously, crossed two lanes of traffic to make a right turn onto a side street and stopped the car a bit too far from the sidewalk for Fraser’s comfort. The engine was turned off, buttons for the radio, air conditioning, and heat unnecessarily hit, and seatbelt unbuckled before Ray turned to face him, jabbing his pinky and index fingers into Fraser’s chest. “Too many conversations go like this, Fraser. With the Inuit stories, or the talking to the dog.” Dief barked from the backseat. “Wolf. Or this thing. Where you just say random things until I get frustrated and can’t stand to be around you anymore.”
“I’m sorry my presence is so frustrating for you, Ray.” Fraser replied, trying to sound more hurt than he really felt.
“No! That is the stalling thing again! Just answer this question: do you seriously believe you’ve seen a ghost?”
“For God’s sake, Benton, lie!” his father hissed.
“All the time, Ray,” Fraser answered, carefully not glancing at the backseat.
“Fuck,” Ray said, collapsing back against his seat and staring blindly out the windshield.
“Mistake,” called out the voice from the back.
--
Four days later, when Lieutenant Welsh had tolerated all he could of Francesca’s moping and Vecchio’s hyperactivity and Dewey baiting, he called the detective into his office.
“Before you start talking, I want to make one thing clear: I don’t want to hear about whatever it was that happened. I just want to know if it’s possible that you could get the Mountie back here so he can shut you up and maybe help you solve a crime? Even just a small one would be fine. One not involving anything weird.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, that was too easy. You’re not going to test my patience with a little rant about licking things and Inuit stories?”
“No, sir,” he said and damn it if he didn’t look sincere. “I woulda done it sooner, it just took me a while to come up with a plan.”
“A plan?” Why was he asking? He didn’t want to know this.
“Yeah. I kind of pissed off Fraser and I had to figure out how to, you know, unpiss him off.”
Welsh stared at him for a moment and then realized that as much as he didn’t want to know, knowing would bother him less over the course of the day than wondering would.
“All right, I’ll ask. I’m certain I’ll regret it soon after, but I’ll ask. What’s your plan?”
“Logic.”
“That’s not a plan. It’s a word.”
“Not a plan, exactly - more like a strategy.” He seemed a little too pleased with this assessment, bouncing up on the balls of his feet and grinning widely.
“Your strategy is to use logic.” Welsh struggled to keep the disbelief out of his voice.
“First I’ll catch him off guard.”
“Your strategy is to catch Fraser off guard and then use logic against him.” This time he was certain he sounded disbelieving, not that it seemed to have any effect on Ray one way or another.
“Probably some emotional blackmail stuff, too. Trust me, if you knew the reason he was upset, it’d make perfect sense.”
“For the love of God, Vecchio, don’t tell me the reason. Just go strategize. Come back with the Mountie, and never tell me anything about it.”
“Of course, sir.” Vecchio saluted smartly, turned on his heel and walked out of the room and out of the station. Welsh pulled a piece of paper off the pad to his left and scribbled down “ask fewer questions.”
--
“Thanks for coming out and doing those interviews with me, Frase.” He glanced across the car to see Fraser smiling softly down at his hat.
“You know, you’ve already thanked me for that, Ray. Before and after each interview if I recall correctly.” He turned to meet Ray’s eyes, the smile on his face taking on a slight smirk, and Ray had to tear his eyes back to the road before he killed them both.
“Yeah, I know. It’s just, I’m sorry, you know, about last time. I shouldn’t have called you crazy and I shouldn’t have gone and left you at the consulate and not listened to you.”
“It’s all right, Ray.”
“Yeah? You’re not angry with me? I woulda been angry at me.”
“Not angry, Ray.”
“So, uh. Who is the ghost?”
Fraser was quiet for a long moment, staring calmly at Ray, as if waiting for something, only Ray didn’t know what.
“My father, Ray.” He finally said, very carefully.
“The one on whose killers the trail of whom…wait.”
Fraser laughed, still a strange sound to Ray, but all the more beautiful for its rarity.
“That sentence appears to have gotten away from you, Ray.”
“Well, now you know why I never use grammar.”
“Ah, now I understand. A fine effort though.”
Ray laughed with Fraser now and shook his head, trying to clear it. He turned and spent a long moment just staring back at Fraser and his bright eyes and wide smile.
“Come back with me to my place.” He found himself saying. “There’s baseball. I’ll get pizza.”
There was a bark from the backseat but Fraser didn’t take his eyes away from Ray.
“We’d love to.”
--
“It’s just, I don’t think you’re crazy.” Ray said at the start of the second commercial break and Fraser thought himself an idiot for thinking the subject closed for the evening. “Except in your own freaky, Canadian way, of course.” He added this as if it were a simple matter of fact, dropping the pizza on his plate and turning to face Fraser on the couch, arm stretched across the back so that his hand was right at Fraser’s shoulder. Fraser found himself focusing on it rather more than necessary. “So, yeah, crazy, but you’re still sane and rational and everything. So, if you’re telling people you’re seeing ghosts then I know you’re seeing something and if you’re seeing something, well, that’s not good.”
“I know, Ray.”
“Look, what would you say if I’d told you I’d seen a ghost?”
“I’d believe you,” Fraser said, knowing it probably wasn’t the truth but that there was a small chance it might be.
“No you wouldn’t, Fraser. No you would not! You would tell me an Inuit story whose moral was ‘it’s all in your head.’”
“Perhaps. But I would believe you, Ray. You don’t lie to me.”
“I lie to you all the time.”
Fraser was hurt by this revelation, apparently enough to let it show on his face because Ray rushed on to take it back.
“Well. Not lie. But I don’t tell you things.”
“Ah, but see, if you told me, you’d be telling me, Ray.”
Ray opened his mouth to speak, seemed to think better of it, and then turned his head and sighed.
“Ray? Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“Right now? Or more general like?”
“Both, I suppose. But let’s start with now.”
“Wait! This is the stalling thing again! We are off subject and this is you changing it to stall.”
That was only half true. There were two things Fraser wanted right now. One was to not talk about his dead father, one was to learn any and all of Ray’s secrets. That in this situation the two went together so well was just a fortunate coincidence.
“All right, and who are you anyway to ask me about things I haven’t told you? I mean, you didn’t tell me about any of this.”
“Of course I did, Ray. How else could we be talking about it?”
“No, you told her. I just overheard is all. You had this great big thing you weren’t telling anyone and then you went and told her. Known her five minutes but somehow you knew you could trust her more than you could trust me.”
“I do trust you, Ray.”
“Doesn’t feel like it.” Ray said softly, before getting up from the couch and walking across to the fridge.
“I made one comment to a witness to get information,” Fraser lept off the couch to follow Ray. “I’d never have told her that it was my father’s ghost or that he’s been following me for years now, or that sometimes I think that maybe he is nothing more than a hole in my bag of marbles except that frequently there are times that he knows things that I simply couldn’t have known on my own.”
“Like what?” Ray turned back to him now, beer in hand.
“He was with us on the Henry Allen, you know.”
“Think he’d have been more helpful.” Ray said with an ungentlemanly snort, putting the beer back down and crossing his arms across his chest.
“Actually, he was quite helpful. On the submarine, he was the one who told me to listen to you.”
“…He what?” Ray had suddenly gone quite still, and not the ‘contained motion’ still that Ray normally went, but the still of everyone else. It was unsettling.
“Do you remember? You were telling me to ‘go that way’ and I wasn’t going to but then he said…oh dear.”
“So let me get this straight. I say ‘go that way.’ You say ‘no.’ The ghost says ‘go that way.’ You say ‘gee golly gosh, why not? You seem to be a reliable source of information!’”
“Well, it wasn’t quite like that.”
“Because that is not trusting me, Fraser. That is the opposite of trusting me. That is trusting someone not me.” Ray hadn’t moved forward a step, but he was gesturing wildly and had regained that tightly coiled element which made it appear as though he would at any moment explode. Fraser rather wished that wouldn’t happen.
“Well, in essence…” Fraser trailed off, and then scratched his brow, a nervous habit that had never helped him in any situation.
“No, Frase. No essence. That is not you trusting me. That is you waiting for the approval of a hallucination.”
“Ray, I…” He had to say something, anything. Most of the time he wasn’t able to shut up and now he couldn’t find any words at all? He stared silently at Ray and watched the resignation etch itself across his face before he turned away and placed his hands on the counter.
“Just. I don’t wanna talk anymore. I don’t care. I don’t care if he’s a ghost, or a schizo thing, or a piece of undigested beef.”
“Do you want to watch the ballgame?” Fraser found himself asking in a timid, hopeful voice he wasn’t aware he’d possessed, waiting for Ray to turn back to face him.
“No, Fraser.”
--
Five hours later, Fraser was in his forth hour of lying on his cot, staring up at the Consulate ceiling and what felt like the thousandth hour of listening to his father explain the many ways in which the situation had proved the elder right yet again.
“Told you not to tell him the truth. I told you to lie. But did you listen? Do you ever?”
“No, Dad.”
“Right! You did not and now you’ve gone and ruined your partnership forever.”
Fraser closed his eyes tightly and tried to block out the rest of what his father was saying, but something broke through at last.
“He looks at you funny.”
“Well, yes, Dad. My frequent conversations with you have convinced him that I’m insane.” Fraser wondered if he could submit his approaching migraine as proof of his father’s existence.
“Not that kind of funny, son. The way a man looks at other men if he’s been left on his own for too long.”
Fraser opened his eyes to look at his father, or, rather, the empty space where his father had just been.
“Dad?” He rolled off the cot and headed for the closet door and found only a closet behind it. He shut himself in anyway and when there was no change in his environment he asked the coats, “What did you mean by that?”
--
It was early Saturday morning, an hour Ray hadn’t known existed on Saturday mornings. He’d spent fifteen minutes trying to wait out the knocking but it had only gotten louder. Ray finally got up in an effort to stop the sound before his neighbors got together and planned the way in which they would murder him the next time he went to do his laundry.
“Hey, Fraser,” he said before he’d finished opening the door. Since he wasn’t really looking at the man, he was caught off guard when six feet of blue jeans and blue flannel shouldered past him and into the apartment. “What the hell?”
“I’m sorry to intrude, Ray. But we’re going to have to talk about this. Well, about two things, really.”
“Fraser, I told you I don’t want to talk.”
“Well, then, you’ll have to listen. Which means you’ll need to wake up. I brought coffee.” He shoved a cup into Ray’s hand, and what do you know, he had brought coffee, and good stuff. Ray glanced at the bag on the counter.
“Donuts, too?”
“Yes, Ray,” he said solemnly and Ray couldn’t help but smile because Fraser was here trying to make things better with talking and good coffee and donuts and apparently Ray was easy.
“Firstly, I do trust you, and I did trust you aboard the submarine. What my father said was that I had to trust my partner. He didn’t say you were right or wrong or to do as he said. It wasn’t about you, not really. It was about me. That I was being…that I am controlling and bullheaded and that I needed to listen to you. That right or wrong, death or victory, I had to listen to you, Ray.”
“All right.”
“All right?”
“You wanted me to argue?”
“Well, no, of course not.” He flicked his thumb across his eyebrow and messed it back up again when he furrowed his brow and stared at Ray. “I just rather expected it, I suppose. That was just the opening of the speech I practiced on the walk over.”
“Well, you brought coffee.”
“Ah.”
“So what was the other thing we had to talk about?”
“Well, I want to prove that my father is real.”
“Worth a shot.”
“He’s here now and he has reluctantly agreed to help me prove his existence. I would’ve been here sooner, but for quite some time he wouldn’t even show himself.”
“How’d you get him to do it?”
“I had to insult curling, Ray.”
“Don’t they take away your Mountie hat for that?” Ray asked with entirely too big of a smile on his face.
“Don’t make fun. It was quite difficult for me. And then he made a scene.” He turned to look just past Ray’s shoulder and said in the pissy tone he used when he stopped being passive-aggressive and started being an asshole, “yes, you did cause a scene. Just because Diefenbaker and myself were the only ones to see it made it no less a scene.”
“So, how are you going to prove the ghost is real?”
“Logic, Ray.”
“Damn, see, that was my plan.”
“Oh. Well.” Fraser suddenly seemed lost and Ray saved him out of habit.
“Fine, how many fingers?” Ray quickly put both his hands behind his back and looked at Fraser expectantly.
“Dad? Dad! Oh…fine…two?”
“Not even close! Wait. You were guessing. OK, stupid. Of course you were guessing.”
“Sorry, Ray, he’s gone into the bedroom.”
“Well, that seems convenient. Sorry, can’t prove the ghost is real, he’s taking a nap. Wait. Why is he in my room?”
“Please, Ray. Give me a moment.” He walked past Ray and into the bedroom, shouting a quick “Dad!” before he shut the door.
--
Fraser walked back out and looked at Ray, who had managed to eat all but one of the donuts in the six minutes Fraser had been in the bedroom, and he was now trying to polish off that one as well.
“Sorry,” Ray mumbled around the crumbling pastry.
“It’s all right. Ray, if you would go into your room for a few moments and do anything you like and then come out here.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
Ray shrugged and walked into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him. Fraser began to pace. Then he threw out the empty donut bag and coffee cup and the pizza box and the three empty beer bottles before taking the plates and his glass to the sink. He had just finished drying them when Ray stepped back out.
“See, I knew this was just a trick to clean my apartment.”
Fraser ignored him and turned to look at his father, standing a few feet away.
“First, he muttered about what a ridiculous plan this was.” Bob said, tiredly and in a tone that said he rather agreed with Ray on this subject.
“First, you muttered about what a ridiculous plan this was.” Fraser repeated, turning back to Ray.
“Okay but that could just be your Mountie bat ears.”
“Then he flipped through a pile of CDs, sorting them into three stacks.”
“You sorted your CDs into three stacks.”
“Or a hidden camera. Did you set up a camera?”
“He’s never going to believe it.”
“Please, Dad, just try!” Fraser said, turning back to his father for a moment before facing Ray again.
“Then he tossed some clothing into a hamper.”
“You threw your clothes into the hamper.” Ray still didn’t look convinced, though he did look slightly terrified.
“He stared at that dream catcher you gave him.”
“You stared at your dream catcher.”
“Also, he’s in love with you.”
“Also, I’m in love with you.”
“What?” Ray asked, terror still plain across his face, but something else with it.
“What?” Fraser asked, spinning to face his father.
“No, son, you switched the pronouns. Simple mistake, go fix it.”
“You’re in love with me?” Fraser turned now he was able to place the other emotion on Ray’s face: hope.
“Frankly, I’m not sure how you got them switched like that in your mind.”
“I didn’t mean to say that.” he said quickly, stupidly.
“Oh.” And that was what hope looked like when it was destroyed in a moment, and Fraser had seen that expression too often to bear being the cause of it.
“No! I mean. I meant it. I did, I do. I just said it…accidentally.”
“Oh God, son. I think I’m going to leave the room now.”
“Right. Of course.” Ray didn’t look convinced, if anything, he looked even more hopeless. Perhaps this was a situation that couldn’t be solved with words. Perhaps it was time to trust instinct again.
So he move forward into Ray’s personal space and Ray’s eyes went wide and he began moving back, and Fraser with him, until his back was pressed against the wall and Fraser was against his front. Fraser slid one hand tight around Ray’s waist and the other along his neck until he could feel soft hair against his fingertips and a strong jaw against his thumb. He tilted his head and breathed “I love you” against Ray’s mouth before pressing his own firmly against it.
He’d expected a moment of hesitation and was thrilled to be wrong because Ray drove back against him seemingly without thought, one hand pressing hard on his back, the other gripping his hair hard and twisting Fraser’s head to better accommodate Ray’s hot, open mouth.
And then Ray ground his hips against Fraser’s and Fraser pulled Ray towards him even as he drove both of them further into the wall. Ray gasped into Fraser’s mouth before tearing his own away and taking deep, erratic breaths against Fraser’s ear. For his part, Fraser chose to attack Ray’s ear, running his tongue along the edge, which brought out a delightful moan from Ray, although it was no match for the one he gave when Fraser bit down on his ear. This moan was louder and accompanied with writhing and Ray’s head falling back, which provided Fraser with the now wide open expanse of Ray’s neck. Fraser fell to an elaborate combination of biting, sucking, and licking, enjoying the wild jerk of Ray’s hips against his own.
Quickly, he pulled his hands down to Ray’s fly, unbuttoning and unzipping with a deftness that rather surprised him. Fraser reached in and stroked the hot, silky length of him with one hand, using the other to try desperately to push Ray’s pants and boxers down further.
At another strangled sound from Ray, Fraser bit down hard and Ray came wildly in Fraser’s hand, pulling at the material of the flannel shirt until he finally collapsed against Fraser, face in his neck.
Fraser braced him against the wall, struggling a bit against the dead weight in his arms before Ray’s lips found his neck, placing soft, sleepy kisses on a path up to his jaw and claiming Fraser’s lips again.
He didn’t feel Ray’s hands slip away from his back, but they must have because now they were at the front of his pants, one trying clumsily to undo the button, the other sliding forward, and Fraser’s hips jerked once, twice, and Ray squeezed once, hard, and Fraser came with a cry and then it was his turn to fall against Ray.
A few deep breaths later and he was capable of lifting his head to look at Ray, feeling a blush spread across his cheeks.
“Sorry,” he muttered, trying not to look at Ray as he did so.
Ray just grinned dazedly and licked his lips.
“I was so close,” he said, his smile growing sharper.
Fraser dropped his head back down in an effort to hide.
Ray raised a hand up and stroked his fingers slowly through Fraser’s hair.
“Really, Fraser? You actually want me? You?”
Fraser lifted up his head and looked at Ray as if he’d never seen him.
“Ray, I may very well be insane and even if I’m not, then I’m a thirty-seven year old man who lives in his office and is haunted by his father.”
“Yeah well, I’m a thirty-seven year old former stalker with crippling self-esteem issues.”
“I still don’t think that’s any worse than mine.”
“Fraser? Do you think maybe we could stop trying to talk one another out of having sex with each other and instead go back to the sex? Cause I get the feeling this is gonna end up somewhere great. Possibly somewhere without pants.”
“Certainly, Ray.”
“Good,” he said, shoving Fraser across the apartment until he fell back across the armrest and onto the couch. He had just enough time to pull himself back so he was stretched out along its length before Ray slid on top of him. Fraser reached for Ray, but he stayed too far up for another moment, looking down seriously at Fraser before saying softly, “I love you, too.”
Dimly, Fraser heard what sounded like the door to Ray’s closet closing before Ray’s lips fell hard against his once more and everything else faded away.
**
THIS POLL IS NOW CLOSED. ANY FURTHER VOTES WILL NOT BE COUNTED.
Poll Vote for this story