Date Night, The Blues, and Stupid Weakened Immune Systems - a fanfic - Chapter 1/7
Title: Date Night, The Blues and Stupid Weakened Immune Systems
Author: nancygrew
Disclaimer: characters belong to atwt
Rating: pg-13 for a few swears in an upcoming chapter
Characters: Luke/Reid, Lucinda, Half of Oakdale. A small percentage of Malta.
Warning: The title probably gives away the fact that there’s hurt/comfort ahead.
Notes: Futurefic. Takes place June 2015. Takes place between my story Luke and Casey Have a Chat and my story Amnesia and Realizations. And Maple-Glazed Turkey. The latter story mentioned that Luke had been seriously ill about six months prior to that story and there was a request to see that story so I thought I’d give it a shot. You don’t have to read my other fic in order to understand this one. AU after Reid drives off to Bay City on some long-forgotten errand.
Summary: Reid hangs out with Lucinda and Luke’s been working too hard.
Chapter One - Reid picks up his smoking hot date
Reid parked his car and headed towards his grandmother-in-law’s house. He didn’t even have a chance to ring the Fur Elise-playing doorbell before a young red-haired woman in a black suit opened the front door to the expansive Walsh Estate.
"Good evening, Dr. Oliver," greeted the woman. "Ms. Walsh will be down shortly. You may await her in the Blue Parlor. Please follow me."
"Where’s Mr. Belvedere?" asked Reid.
"If you’re referring to my predecessor, Stevens, he retired," explained the woman as she led him to the Blue Parlor. "I’m his replacement, Crichton."
"Strange that he retired," muttered Reid. "He couldn’t have been more than a hundred and ten."
"Dr. Dixon and his children are in the Blue Parlor and are having a lovely wine but it’s my understanding that you prefer not to drink at all when you’re going to be driving. Is there a particular non-alcoholic beverage that you would like while you’re waiting for Ms. Walsh?"
"Oooh, yeah," exclaimed Reid. "Is there any of that sweet mint tea that Kenton makes? That stuff is like drinking pure bliss. I think she puts meth and rainbows in it."
As the reached the door to the Blue Parlor, Crichton excused herself to go get Reid the "meth and rainbows" beverage that he had requested.
Reid entered the room and saw that Dr. John Dixon and his "children" must have been chugging the lovely wine that Crichton had mentioned. The retired cardiologist and his middle-aged children yelled out greetings to Reid. Loud greetings. Reid winced at the volume.
John practically leapt to his feet when Reid entered the room. "Reid, you know my sons, Duke and MJ, and my daughter, Margo, but I don’t think you’ve ever met my son Andy. You were called in for that emergency surgery when he was back for my wedding to Lucinda. He’s back home in Oakdale for good after living in San Francisco for years. We’re all so excited to have him and his daughter, Hope, back home."
Andy Dixon stood up from where he had been sitting next to his half-sister, Margo Hughes, on one of the elegant sofas in the parlor. He and Reid shook hands.
"It’s very nice to meet you," said Andy politely in the slow measured tones of someone pretending that they weren’t tipsy. "I’ve heard a lot about you."
"Did you hear that I eat babies and watch reality television?" asked Reid.
"Yep. But I didn’t believe my brother Duke," assured Andy.
Reid shot Dr. Duke Kramer, Chief of Pediatrics at Oakdale Memorial, a mild glare. "I knew that you were the one who started that rumor."
Duke grinned. "I just started the rumor about you eating babies. I’m not enough of a jerk to start the rumor about you watching reality television."
MJ, who was sitting beside Duke, raised his hand. "Actually, I am a big enough jerk to start the rumor that you watch reality television. I told Gossip Orderly that you were a big fan of Archery with the Stars. I told him that you cried when Justin Bieber was eliminated."
Reid sighed.
MJ shrugged. "Hey, it was after you told me that my girlfriend was making eyes at Hunter McDermott. You hurt my feelings by thinking that my girlfriend had feelings for someone else."
"How are Hunter and Liberty and their little love child, Artemis?" asked Reid solicitously.
"Okay, in hindsight I can see you made the right call," admitted MJ. "But at the time I thought you were just being a jerk instead of being someone who cared about me."
"I haven’t yet decided if I care about you," sniffed Reid. He turned back towards Andy. "Your daughter Hope has been by our house a few times over the last few weeks with her new best friend, Faith. Hope doesn’t seem like a moron."
Andy frowned in confusion.
"That’s Reid-speak for ‘Hope is a smart and engaging young woman who I greatly enjoy,’" explained John for Andy’s edification.
Andy nodded. "Yep, my daughter’s not a moron. I’m thinking about getting that on a bumper sticker. She spoke highly of you. And she’s become insanely fond of Luke in a very short time. I’m a little concerned that she might have a crush on him. Damn. If she does have a crush, she probably wouldn’t want me spilling her girlish secrets. Forget I said anything. I’m begging you. She once didn’t speak to me for an entire week because I embarrassed her by wearing a Partridge Family T-shirt when I picked her up at school. I was wearing it ironically but she didn’t care."
Reid was in a generous mood. He decided to take pity on the guy. "I don’t think it’s a romantic crush. Luke views her as, and treats her as, a long lost little sister. She can’t help but respond to that. It’s nothing to worry about."
"He remembers her as a baby from when she and Faith were switched at birth?" asked Andy.
"Not really something that a big brother would forget," said Reid while managing not to roll his eyes. Barely managing.
Margo subtly tried to change the emotionally charged topic. She waved from her position from the sofa and sang to Reid. "Reid, Reid, Bo-Beid, Banana, Fanana, Fo-Feid, Reid, Reid, Bo-Beid, Re-id."
"Mayor Hughes," Reid greeted dryly. "Good wine?"
"It’s fabulous," sighed Margo. "Of course I was a little giddy before I even started drinking. It’s so nice to spend some time with just my amazing brothers and my dad. Even if he did only invite us over because he’s trying to drown his sorrows about you and his wife dating."
That was when Reid noticed that Crichton had unobtrusively returned with a tall glass of sweet mint tea and a plateful of his favorite delicacies. "Oooh, those are my favorite."
"Kenton prepared them earlier with you in mind," replied Crichton. "Is there anything else that you require?"
"For Kenton to run away and elope with me," answered Reid before he sat down and started shoveling the food into his mouth as if someone was going to take it away from him and use it to destroy all the goodness in the world.
"I believe her bags are already packed for this eventuality," Crichton informed Reid. "I’ll get a ladder out so the elopement can be done old school."
Reid awarded Crichton an impressed nod. There were interns at the Oakdale Memorial who routinely worked themselves into a frenzy in hopes of being awarded with an impressed nod from their Chief of Staff.
Crichton left the room after filling up various wine glasses.
"Am I drunker than I thought or did Margo say that you’re dating my step-mother?" asked a puzzled Andy. He had plopped back down onto the sofa beside his big sister and was allowing her to braid his hair. His hair wasn’t particularly long so she was creating many very short braids that stuck up at crazy angles.
"Wednesday nights are a date night for me and Luke so I don’t schedule work for Wednesday nights. When Luke’s out of town on business, Lucinda has dibs on me and we go out to The Juke Joint to listen to people sing about being miserable and to stuff our faces with barbecue. Your father gets all cranky because he’s not allowed to come with us to our barbecue nights. Lucinda and I don’t have sex or anything. Luke’s all fussy about me having sex with other people."
Andy nodded knowingly.
The elegant and refined Lucinda Walsh swept into the room. Reid was always amused that Lucinda never attempted to ‘dress down’ in order to fit in with the rest of the clientele of The Juke Joint. She was just as buff and polished and exquisitely dressed as if she was headed out to a place which had fine linen and real silverware as opposed to rolls of paper towels atop wooden, scarred tables. "Reid, darling, I’m so sorry I made you wait. I was tied up with a conference call with Tokyo."
"All of Toyko?" asked Reid after he stood and kissed Lucinda on the cheek.
"Just the important parts," responded Lucinda. "Sit down and finish your pre-dinner snack. We have plenty of time to get to The Juke Joint before Morose Milton Miller goes on stage at 8:00." Reid sat back down and Lucinda perched herself on the arm of his chair.
"Cool," said Reid. "Hey, Margo, how are your plans to get the City Council to approve funding for the proposed subway going?"
Margo appeared perplexed. "You’re suddenly interested in city politics?"
‘Not even a little bit," confessed Reid cheerfully as John snorted. "But Luke likes it when I manage to successfully make small talk with people."
Duke smirked at Reid. "Luke’s not even here to give you any brownie points for your successful effort at interacting with your fellow human beings without using the words ‘idiot’ or ‘incompetent’."
"No, but I can always make use of it later. ‘Margo Hughes and I were discussing the proposed subway system the other day and she said blah-di-blah blah.’"
"Fine," said Margo. "It looks like the proposal is going to pass. It’s going to be expensive but it’s going to be worth it. There. Now you can tell Luke that you and I discussed it. I’ll totally have your back if he questions whether you really tried out small talk."
"Appreciate it," said Reid. "You know, there’s a new nephrologist at Memorial who’s pretty hot for a straight guy. I can introduce you if you want."
"I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you always trying to fix me up with men," Margo answered drily. "However, I’m still happily married to Tom."
Reid shrugged. He just did not "get" how Margo Hughes didn’t realize that she could aim higher than Humorless Tom Hughes. Sure, she hadn’t been the most successful police detective in the world. But that could have been partially explained by the fact that Oakdalians tended to be completely averse to letting the police investigate and handle crimes. If there was a kidnapping, embezzling, or murder, a typical Oakdalian response was to start their own independent investigation. And some Oakdalians typically made sure to include undercover work whenever they investigated criminal malfeasance. And if you were Hank Coleman, you made sure to include undercover work in women’s clothing whenever you investigated wrong-doing. Or if it was the first Tuesday of the month. Reid blamed it on the fact that Starsky and Hutch re-runs played perpetually on the local Oakdale television stations. When he and Luke had first started dating, Reid had once ended up babysitting Luke’s little brother. Ethan had cajoled Reid into playing Starsky and Hutch with him. Reid had never before seen an episode of the Spelling-Goldberg production so Ethan had given Reid a crash course on how to pretend to be a 1970s southern Californian cop. From what Reid had gathered, this involved calling people ‘Turkey’ a lot. Margo had turned out to be much more successful as Mayor of Oakdale than she had been as Chief of Police.
"Where has Luke’s current business trip taken him?" Duke asked his boss.
"He spent a few days in New York on Grimaldi Shipping business and then flew into Malta yesterday on Kingsley Malta business," answered Reid.
"The two of you are always so busy," mentioned MJ. "You’re serious workaholics."
"Hmmph. I’m merely the Milky Way’s most important neurosurgeon and Chief of Staff of a hospital, Luke’s the one who schedules himself like a maniac. President of Grimaldi Shipping. On the boards of Oakdale Memorial and Kingsley Malta. Co-owner of multiple businesses. Developer of luxury condos. And oh yeah, he takes night classes too. Otherwise he might actually have a free ten minutes a week."
"You sound a little annoyed," said Lucinda in a worried tone.
"Not at Luke," reassured Reid. "Although I wish he’d schedule a little more down time, I’m proud of what he’s accomplished. I am annoyed at your daughter for not taking his hectic schedule into consideration when she’s having her weekly nervous breakdown. I don’t mind sharing him with the Snyder Sibs but I resent that she doesn’t feel any compunction about interrupting our always heavily-anticipated date nights because she wants Luke to reassure her about being pretty or whatever the hell she’s upset about that particularly day."
"I’ll talk to Lily," assured Lucinda. "It’s important for you and Luke to have some time alone to be intimate."
"We’re both men," said Reid. "No matter how busy we are, there’s always time for mutual blow jobs."
Andy started choking on his wine; he flailed his arms.
Reid squinted at John. ‘I can’t believe that The Pimp Daddy of Oakdale has a prude for a son."
"Not a prude," assured a red-faced Andy. "I was just . . . surprised."
Margo patted Andy’s arm. "There’s nothing wrong with the fact that you’re . . . old-fashioned."
"I am not!" huffed Andy indignantly.
"It’s okay, Andy," Duke assured his brother. "No one’s judging you. Hey, there’s a piano in the music room. Do you want to go in and cover up its legs?"
"Suck my elbow," replied Andy.
"I’m sure that my lovely wife meant emotional intimacy as opposed to physical intimacy," John informed Reid. Reid looked doubtful. Lucinda looked smugly amused.
"Okay, it’s time for me and Luce to hit the road," announced Reid after licking his fingers clean. "Don’t wait up. We’ll call if we need bail."
Reid held out his arm for Lucinda to take and she airily waved goodbye to her husband and his children. Margo blew kisses to them as they left. Duke shot them the "Peace" sign.
By the time Reid and Lucinda had reached the front door of the estate, Crichton had seemingly transported there in order to open the door for them.
"You move like a ninja," Reid told Lucinda’s butler.
"Well, I’m half-ninja on my mother’s side," replied Crichton politely.
Reid eyeballed Cricthon’s red hair and blue eyes.
He and Lucinda exited the mansion. The luxurious Walsh Estate was Lucinda’s version of Xanadu. But without the sled. Or maybe it was her version of Tara. But without the unforgivable glossing over of the horror of the history of slavery in the United States.
Reid led Lucinda over to his car and opened the passenger seat door for her. After she settled herself in, he walked around the car to the driver’s side door and let himself into the car. He buckled his seat belt and then unbuckled it just to verify that it was working. He did it three times in a row. Lucinda sighed happily as she and Reid headed out for the evening. She always looked forward to date night with her acerbic son-in-law. Even if he did have that strange little quirk with triple-checking his seatbelt.