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It's been nearly two years since Fraser watched Ray stalk his (ex) wife, and Ray is dating a lovely woman by the name of Jessica. Fraser finds her easy and delightful to be around, pleasant and witty and as kind as any American he's known.
He hates her.
He hates himself for it.
She seems to like him, though, not at all resenting him as competition for Ray's time (though he is) or affections (though he wishes she would). Ray is more relaxed these days, and Fraser does not let him think about why (or about the two of them together, sliding against each other in bed, his pale skin setting off the dark gleam of hers).
He doesn't let himself think about it much.
One day she pulls Fraser aside and asks, "Look, you've known him forever," and it feels like truth, but she continues, "What can I get him for his birthday? What does he really like?"
Fraser thinks about the carving he's been working on ("For the cabin," he answers, when Ray sees the wood shavings and asks), which he'll never give Ray. He thinks about the song he's not writing but pieces of which come to him sometime when he's running or in the shower and definitely not thinking about Ray. He opens his mouth, and tells her, "Well, he likes Smarties."
She grins so brightly, and his heart breaks a little more.
*****
Ray stares at the stupid rolls of candy, a giant bag of them, then up at Jess's face, smiling, lips curled up like she's waiting for him to get in on the joke, and he's half smiling back, wanting to get it.
She sees his hesitation, says, "Oh, but Benton said you liked them…"
Ray mouths Benton, but she's moving on, saying "Oh well, here's a better treat…" and mouths down his body, and he has much better things to think about.
It comes back to him for a moment later, while his face is slick and open and pressed against her, thinks about the strangeness of it, but she clutches his hair tighter when he pulls back to breathe, and he presses lips and tongue and nose into her and forgets all about it.
*****
They're at the consulate, after a case that’s kept them up ugly late but Ray has to be in court even uglier early and Fraser brings him coffee, real coffee, dark and rich and sweet and chocolatey, and he moans like the last time he was with Jess.
(Week ago Saturday. It’s becoming a problem, not because she’s nagging him, but just because it IS, it’s hard when two people can’t make their times line up right. Relationships thrive on quantity, not just quality, and no amount of roses can make up for the lack. He has the divorce papers to prove it.)
Fraser blushes, and Ray, who has to tease him when he does that, he just has to -- hell, he got the guy downright giggling on Tuesday (or was it Wednesday? nah, Monday, that’s right, the Dirkson stakeout, not the night they got take out and worked on the Sheraton thing) -- anyway, he says something about sinfully good chocolate (eyes never leave Fraser’s face, as he looks up from the cup under his lashes, and Fraser only blushes harder, heh), asks what’s in it, and Fraser says, "It’s just Smarties, Ray."
"What, this isn’t smarties, that’d be tart and chalky and--" His face puckers, tongue out, remembering the one and only time, back in his first bachelorhood, when he'd run out of sugar and thought crushing some of the pastel discs would help his coffee.
"No, chocolate Smarties," and Fraser shows him the box.
Ray snorts. "Those are just M&Ms. Freakish, Canadian M&Ms maybe, but they're not Smarties."
Fraser shrugs and puts them away, and Ray asks, "What do you have those for anyway? You don’t even like chocolate," and Fraser isn’t even blushing anymore, he just sets his jaw and damn, that is the Mountie in full mask and they’re out the door and on the way to court and Ray thinks: huh.
*****
End of the week, and he's home early enough to do more than just fall into bed; finally a day when work didn’t bleed into the evening (it was actual bleeding yesterday, and he rubs the stitches under his jeans).
Fraser seemed fine going back to the consulate, so Ray’s at home, by himself, Friday night, plans to take Fraser and Dief to that weird wood store in the morning. It’s on the edge of town, and Fraser says he’s happy to walk the three hours, but Dief whined and Ray yelled a lot and said he’d see them at nine and Fraser’d get to sleep in or whatever and STILL get there earlier than walking and Fraser did that not smiling thing and said understood, so that was cool.
Ray thinks maybe he should call Jess, it’s been a couple weeks. Couple weeks since they went out, even longer since she's been over. Not since his birthday, now that he thinks about it, and there are the Smarties, still sitting unopened on the table, half buried by mail (also unopened). The chocolate he puts in his coffee every morning is on top of the pile, and he stares at it and thinks: Oh. She said he told her I like Smarties.
He grabs up the chocolate and promises himself he’ll send Jess the nicest breakup bouquet she’s ever seen, and he runs out the door, to Fraser, to weird Canadian candies, to the future he didn’t know he could have.
*****
It’s Friday night, and Fraser got back to the consulate even before Inspector Thatcher left – precisely at 5:30, just like every Friday, and he’s never wondered what makes that evening require such precision when every other might vary, depending on workload or social obligations – so Ray is almost certainly at home (showering), making plans with Jessica. He is… alone.
Or maybe not.
“Never could see the point in those things. Give me a chunk of maple any day.”
“That’s not even – nevermind. Hi, Dad.” He glances up from the box he bought on impulse three months ago (it was before Ray met Jessica, before he himself regained what little sanity he can claim and put away the carving and the guitar and his hopes for anything but Ray’s happy, heterosexual future). His dad’s in uniform again; his own tunic is hung in the closet, and maybe a better poet than he could make something of that.
Robert is chattering something about a maple syrup heist, and Fraser is refraining – mostly – from replying that he was the one who found the tern that ultimately foiled the $13M syrup theft in ‘89, when, thank God, there’s a knock on the consulate door. He says goodbye, vaguely – he’s never sure whether his dad notices, whether the ghost remains when he isn’t in the room (whether his father or any part of him other than memories is, in fact, there at all) – and goes to the foyer. He realizes it’s Ray before getting to the door (that particular shuffle of feet, not to mention the faint scent of stale cigarettes), and pauses. Ray knocks again, louder, calls out “Fraser, come on, olly olly open me”, and he does, because he can’t not (it wouldn’t be courteous, but that’s not why, of course).
Ray is there, Ray is smiling, that sweet smile, the one that says there's good news and he can't wait to share it, and Fraser’s heart sinks: it’s far too early for anything with Jessica to be settled, that can’t be –
“Gonna invite me in, Fraser?” Ray’s voice is unusually soft, though his hand is jittering. Ray is nervous, hopeful. But why?
“Why are you – yeah, sorry, come in. Um.”
“Why am I here? That’s the question isn’t it.” Ray’s going past him, down the hall, to the – kitchen? “Nah, wait, wrong question. Maybe why are you here?”
He’s rummaging in the drawers, and Fraser is just standing there, in the doorway, wishing he’d thought to put away the evidence, but maybe Ray won’t –
“Ah hah! …huh.” But of course he does. He does, he sees the box at the table, and he looks at Fraser, and damn those eyes, that lightening-strange mind, and Ray is pulling something out of his jacket, dropping it on the table, and Fraser can’t pull his eyes from Ray’s, but he does, looks down and sees –
“Coupla smarties, huh? We’re a coupla dummies, is what.”
The American box of chocolates opened on impact, bumping against the Canadian and scattering sweets across the table.
“Ray,” and Fraser doesn’t know what he’d follow that with, he really doesn’t, so it’s just as well Ray is there, in his space, in his face, blocking the chocolates and the table and the kitchen and all the parts of Canada Fraser is currently responsible for, and Fraser takes in Ray’s eyelashes – so much darker than his hair – the crinkles around his eyes, deep crevasses of his smile, and his heart is pounding, this can’t be what it seems, this can’t -- and then he remembers why it can't, and names the reason:
“Jessica.”
“Sweet girl. Never made me coffee. Fraser, just shut up, okay?” and then Ray is kissing him, they are kissing, Ray’s mouth is glorious, and Fraser is opening, open, falling out into Ray, and Ray catches him, arms tight around him, and yes, this is what he wanted, this, the taste of chocolate and coffee and Ray and home.