Disclaimer:

Author's Notes: Thank you to Justacat and Lynnmonster for beta. Thank you to Lynnmonster for the perfect title. Thanks to the folks of #discourse for their cheerleading. Thanks and apologies to Tom Stoppard for the lines I lifted from Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead and dropped into various characters' mouths in this story.

Story Notes: This story was written for the year-end amnesty on ds_flashfiction and combines the Threesome, Voyeurism, Masturbation, Make-Up, Courtesy, Curtain, Knickers, Shakespeare (via Stoppard), Cliche #11 (Lookalike), and Door challenges.
Contains references to Dr Longball and Mountie Sings The Blues.
A 'triple-double' is "the achievement of a player who hits at least ten home runs, ten triples, and ten doubles in one season."

It freaked me out the first time he appeared in my fantasies. Really freaked me out. I almost brained myself on the headboard when the Mountie who had me tied up and at his mercy morphed from Fraser, who'd been buttering my muffin since day friggin' one, to Turnbull, who couldn't butter toast without help and detailed instructions with pictures.

Once my dick and brain got into the idea of the world's fussiest top ("Oh, those knots just aren't precise enough, are they, Ray?" "Oh dear, I can't decide whether to spank you or just fuck you... Perhaps I'll have to do both." "Oh dear, Ray, it seems your semen has stained my apron."), they got really into it. Night after night for a few weeks, polishing my wood, I soaked my sheets with spunk while in my mind he turned me into a red-faced, sweating, begging, puddle.

But he didn't stay Turnbull... not for long. And he didn't turn back into Fraser, either. He turned into the person I'm convinced caused Turnbull's arrival in my horny brain. So, I made this plan...

I'd been watching him lately. He's a total putz, but he's hot and I've been horny as fuck. And he'll do anything, I just know it, if I ask him to. He let me wear his uniform.

I caught him when he escaped from his "date" with Frannie, while he was packing dishes and silver and a friggin' tablecloth neatly back into an old-ladyish shopping bag with those big, clumsy hands of his.

"Yo, Turnbull, got a minute - or do you have to rush back to the Consulate and scrub the floors with a toothbrush?"

He turned, unlit taper candle in his hand, and beamed fatuously at me. "Why certainly I have a minute, Detective. Is there something I can help you with?"

I didn't say, "Yeah, be in my bedroom tonight and be ready to fuck until dawn." No, in the face of that Canadian politeness, Fraser's voice echoed in my brain - 'It only takes an extra second to be courteous, Ray' - and when I opened my mouth what came out was, "Yeah, you'd be doing me a huge favor if you'd join me for dinner on Saturday night... at my place."

I swear he snapped that candle, down at the thick end. Melted me, fuck yeah, and he blushed and looked down at his big feet. "You mean like a date?"

'Date' to me meant 'going out and doing stuff in public'. "Um... possibly... maybe... uh... yes." Didn't want to date him, but hell, if it got me what I wanted... I shrugged.

"A - a - a date, a date, wow - a date."

I turned on my grin. "Please?"

"I would... I would be honored, Detective."

"Great. Greatness. And call me Ray, wouldja?"

He nodded, the broken pieces of candle held loosely in his fist, staring at me. "Ray it is."

He was still staring when I turned back at the door, but his expression was less shell-shocked and more... hungry. Fuck yeah. "Oh, hey... Do you own any jeans, Turnbull? Wear 'em, okay?"

I had thought that Ray would, perhaps, be interested in joining me for dinner that Saturday, after Tracy Jenkins' bus had gone without me. I'd escaped the Consulate, where Turnbull was fluttering around like the world's largest crazed butterfly - if butterflies were given to flights of dusting and scrubbing floors with toothbrushes - and gone to the precinct house. Ray was not at his desk when I arrived, but he was expected back shortly according to Francesca, who proceeded to tell me she was thinking of buying a Japanese cheerleader's costume with the $50 she had won from detectives Huey and Dewey.

The image was so... startling, I nearly didn't notice her asking whether she could borrow Diefenbaker for the evening. She was satisfied by the non-committal noise I'm sure I made, and she continued on her current errand with a rather smug smile, Diefenbaker trailing her with a hopeful expression. I settled at Ray's desk to wait for him, resigned to a fatter, flatulent wolf on the morrow, turning my attention to the bullpen.

Detectives Huey and Dewey had moved on from discussion of Country music and seemed utterly engrossed in flipping a coin repeatedly. "Okay, okay," Huey said loudly. "The law of averages, if I've got this right, means that if six monkeys were thrown up in the air long enough, they would land on their tails about as often as they would land on their --"

"Heads." Dewey glanced over at me, grinning at his partner's irritated glare, and yelled, "Hey, Constable, what's the weather like out there?"

"It's particularly windy, Detective, but otherwise quite pleasant. A southerly wind."

"The wind's coming up through the floor. That can't be south, can it?"

Huey eyed his partner with affectionate contempt. "That's not a direction. Lick your toe and wave it around a bit."

Dewey looked down at his bare feet. (I did not ask why his loafers were soaking in a trashcan beside his desk. I honestly did not want to know.) "No, I think you'd have to lick it for me."

"I'm prepared to let the whole matter drop," said Huey, after a long pause.

"Or I could lick yours, of course."

"No thank you."

"I'll even wave it around for you."

"What in God's name is wrong with you!?" Huey snatched his coffee cup off his desk, hightailing it for the break room.

"Just being friendly," Dewey called after him, going back to his coin-flipping with a smirk.

Ray entered the bustling room, his hair more experimental than ever, complaining about the wind. "That's rather ironic, Ray, since this is the 'Windy City'," I said by way of greeting.

He shot me a grin, tossing a few shopping bags on his desk. "Fraser, my friend, 'ironic' is a black fly in your Chardonnay. Bitching about the wind in Chicago is normal."

I did not rise to his bait. I knew Ray was expecting me to defend the inept lyrical choice of a fellow Canadian, but I could not do that in good conscience. "You've been shopping?" I inquired instead, gesturing to the bags. "For a... cowboy hat?"

He tucked the battered, obviously used, beige hat back into the bag it was falling out of. "Yeah." He smirked. "Got a date tonight."

"Ah." I rubbed my eyebrow, disappointed but intrigued. "It's unfortunate that Tracy Jenkins is no longer in town. It seems your date would have enjoyed attending her concert with you."

He laughed happily, sitting down and putting his feet up on his desk and ignoring my dropped bait altogether. "So, what's up?"

"Nothing in particular, Ray," I lied. Just the usual... my heart trying to absorb the knowledge that Ray wasn't interested in it beyond friendship and that it was facing another lonely night. Even Diefenbaker had a date. "I had a few thoughts about the theft at the lingerie store, however."

"Lay 'em on me, Frase. We looking for some pervert?"

"We've already got you, Vecchio!" Dewey sassed, padding by Ray's desk, still flipping his coin.

"Shouldn't you be doing something... constructive?" Ray asked, catching Dewey's quarter on its descent.

"What did you have in mind? A short, blunt human pyramid?"

"No, I think you should go f -"

"No, Ray, I don't believe we are." I spoke rather more sharply than I'd intended, but Ray's attention snapped back to me.

"Why else would someone steal 700 discontinued bras?"

"I think I can sum that up in one word. Well, not precisely a word, per se, in that it is an Internet address and the proper name of a business - a fairly successful one, which I anticipate will continue to grow in the future - " I cut myself off at his exasperated snort. "Ebay, Ray."

"I'm glad that Miss Vecchio won her bet with the detectives and that they didn't deny her the money on the basis of the song being about a mule, which while genetically different is quite metaphorically agreeable," Turnbull babbled as I watched him eat a roast beef sandwich the size of my head. "I was so... flustered by her attention that I'd completely forgotten about two Bluegrass songs and two Country songs!"

"Uh huh?" I stood and got the sugarless, caffeine-free, non-alcoholic pink lemonade out of the fridge.

"Well, yes, Ray. There's a Bluegrass song, by Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys, recorded in 1940, called Mule Skinner Blues which I suppose would have complicated matters anyway because I'd have had to explain what a mule skinner is to Miss Vecchio, and Wade Hill's Buckin' Donkey, recorded in 1973. However, she had specified a Country song, and while some people fail to distinguish between Country and Bluegrass, I do, which is why I am ashamed that I forgot about Homer and Jethro's 1947 recording of Donkey Serenade - "

I gestured to the pitcher and to his glass, starting toward the table again before he picked up his glass and swallowed the last mouthful in it.

"Yes, please. And how could I have possibly forgotten Marty Robbins' remarkable 1987 recording of Nestor The Long-Eared Christmas Donkeeeeeeeeeeee! Oh, cold! Cold!" He erupted out of his chair, as ice-cubes hit the floor and whatever lemonade didn't soak immediately into his entirely-too-friggin'-loose jeans ran down his shins.

"Sorry! Sorry! Oh, fuck..." I grabbed the roll of paper towels off the middle of the table with my free hand. "Fuck!" Setting the pitcher on the floor, I started blotting at the cold, wet spot at his crotch, trying to hide my glee under a shower of apologies. I hadn't planned to trip and spill on him, but man, I hadn't expected his jeans to be so loose either. My buckling linoleum was working in my favor tonight - in a big way. A very big way, I realized, now that I was virtually face-to-package with him. Oh yeah. Big hands, big feet, big...

"Ray..." The sea monster he had tucked in that denim stirred under the Bounty, and he grabbed my wrist gently. "Ray, it's okay. It'll dry." The pressure on my wrist increased and he tugged me to my feet. He wasn't blushing, yet.

He didn't even blush when I let go of the paper towel and started feeling him up with my other hand, just closed his eyes, gasping a little, his hips swaying forward and his dick swelling in my hand. "Oh, Ray..." And his grip on my wrist loosened, his hand sliding down my forearm and up over my biceps and he leaned down, his eyes opening, and brushed his lips lightly over mine.

Fuck yeah. That heat wasn't from the horseradish. That heat was him and it shot straight to my dick. I wasn't expecting it, but oh... fuck yeah.

I didn't even have to say please, but I'd have to stop now or we'd be done before I got what I wanted.

I tugged on his waistband and licked my lips. "Take 'em off. I'll wash 'em."

There it went, the blush creeping over his cheekbones. "What?"

"There's towels in the john. Go put one on if you're feeling modest. I know I don't own any clothes that would fit you. I'll clean up this mess."

"Oh... okay," he said, looking a little dazed, wandering slowly toward the bathroom.

"And when you get back? We can make out on the couch."

Turnbull had departed in a gust of over-applied cologne for - amazingly - his third date in a week (if one took Tracy Jenkins' concert into account), and I couldn't fight a feeling of restlessness. I'd thought I'd resigned myself to a quiet evening; had in fact settled with a hot cup of lemony tea and Hamlet.

"Truth is the currency of living, son."

I glanced up from the ghost of Hamlet Sr. to the ghost of Robert Fraser. "Hello, Dad."

"There may be nothing behind it, but it doesn't make any difference so long as it is honored."

"Even for you, Dad, that was opaque."

"One acts on assumptions. What do you assume?"

I sighed. "What do I assume about what, Dad? What truth?"

"Who's the moron on a date with?" My father sniffed at my tea.

"Well..."

His eyebrow blended with the fur of his hat.

"I assume he's on a date with Ms. Vecchio." He didn't reply, just watched as I determinedly gathered my jacket and Stetson. It couldn't be... and the walk would do me good.

"Where are you going?"

"To challenge an assumption."

He groaned when I stopped this time, trying to pull me back down onto his lap.

"Just a second... got to go get your jeans out of the dryer." And get the bag I had all ready...

I dropped his still-hot jeans on his lap, leaning down to kiss him again as he raised his eyebrow at the bag. "What's that, Ray?"

I licked along his jaw, skirting the tiny razor wound there, and whispered in his ear what I wanted.

"But... isn't that rather, you know, kinky?" he answered eventually.

I let out the breath it felt like I'd been holding for about an hour. "Nah. It's just, ya know, role-playing. Dressing up, like Halloween. Nobody's tricked and we both get a treat."

Beneath his scandalized exterior, there beat the heart of a true pervert, because after another long pause, he took the shopping bag from my hand with a mischievous grin, pulled out the cowboy hat and perched it rakishly on his head. "I'll be right back, Ray."

I watched his terry-covered ass and his bare calves as he walked to the bathroom to change, then shook myself like Dief coming in out of the rain, feeling loose and tight all at once. Oh fuck, yeah, the plan was goin' smooth as Teflon so far. I stretched, and then flopped down on the couch to wait. I groaned. Still warm - no, hot. The guy was a friggin' furnace, just like Fraser. Sandwich me between 'em and serve me up with kraut...

Whoa, Kowalski, one fantasy fulfillment at a time.

"Ray?" Turnbull's voice was both plaintive and chiding. "I believe you shrank my jeans."

I hoped he couldn't hear the smirk in my voice. "Oh yeah? You sure? Need some help?"

"No... Um... maybe," he grunted. "I'm having some trouble zipping them with, urgh, my boxers -"

"Take the boxers off." Mmmm, naked ass in painted-on jeans.

"Ray?"

"You heard me. No boxers. Just the jock."

"The...? Oh!"

Francesca was quite pleased to see me, despite coming to the door with the fireplace poker. Diefenbaker was not - most likely because he knew I'd justifiably chide him for letting Francesca paint his toenails. I made my escape after only one cup of sickeningly sweet, pastel marshmallow-infested cocoa, and stood for a minute on the Vecchio front porch, wondering just what I was doing.

I took a deep breath of the crisp air once I'd made up my mind, and started off in the direction of Ray's apartment. There was no guarantee that he'd be there; in fact the odds were against it. I needed to know, however, to find out if yet another of my assumptions was based on an untruth.

My father fell into step beside me after a few blocks. "The weather's changed, son. Wind's blowing north-northwest."

"Frankly, Dad, I think I deserve to go a little mad."

He nodded, and I walked on alone.

"Ray, honestly, I don't think the sunglasses are practical in this dimly lit room. May I please take them off?"

I looked over the back of the couch. "Nuh uh..." Guh. Whoa.

The man standing in the bathroom doorway wasn't Turnbull anymore. Okay, yeah, he was, but only on the inside. On the outside, the guy I was looking at could have been Bubba Dean - except he was standing at a close approximation of attention. And, yeah, that was the whole plan...

"Ray? Is this all right?" Couldn't see his big blue eyes behind those shades, but I didn't have to to know he was worried.

"Oh, yeah... yeah." Hard to talk when you're almost swallowing your tongue and your dick's boring a hole through your zipper. "Almost perfect. Something, huh." He tensed a bit as I walked over to him, his hands clenching into nervous fists. Damn, his arms were even better than Fraser's... Jesus, look at those biceps! It hit me what was missing and I laughed. Of course Turnbull wouldn't have a tattoo, but we could fix that. "Hey, relax. Slouch a bit. You're supposed to be a bad boy."

"I am?" He was amused by the idea, if the little curl of his lips was any indication.

I pushed past him into the bathroom, opening the medicine cabinet and digging through the crap on the top shelf. "Yeah, the kind of guy who plays minor-league ball, the kind of guy who's got a - " Ha, there it was. I waved the eyeliner in front of his face. " - tattoo."

"Ah, I believe I understand. Like you, Ray?"

"Yeah, like me, I guess." I shrugged.

I ain't an artist, so what I drew on his right arm didn't look anything like Bubba's tattoo, but you've got to admit that a big, goofy smiley face fit Turnbull. He looked down at his arm and laughed. It wasn't the cynical laugh you'd hear from Bubba himself, but I bristled anyway.

He took off the sunglasses, which, yeah, stupid idea for me to have him wear them anyway, and dropped them on the sink, and met my eyes all sincere and smiling. "I like it very much, Ray."

And right then? That moment? Right that second, I realized that this was more than just getting laid to him.

Damn.

He took the eyeliner from me, then turned to the mirror, and I watched him carefully smudge it in two thick lines under his eyes with his thumb, just in the right spots. He glanced at me, raising his right eyebrow.

"Oh yeah. Perfect."

This whole plan thing was about me getting my fantasy... so, why shouldn't he get his, too?

He grinned, wiping his thumb on his really-friggin'-tight (I had shrunk them a lot) jeans. "I did play some baseball when I was younger, Ray. Shall we?" He gestured out the door to the couch, looking a lot more relaxed and slouchy, and there was a downright wicked glint in his eyes when I pushed past him again.

"Oh, yeah? What did you do? Pitch, catch...?" I looked over my shoulder at him, winking broadly.

His big right hand caught me off-guard as he slapped my ass firmly and winked back at me. "Switch hitter. Welcome to the fun house."

The lights were on in Ray's apartment, but I didn't go to the door. The madness gripping me sent me to the roof of the building across the street, where I could see both his living room and his bedroom and not be seen myself.

The television was off, the lights low. The remains of a meal - hardly a romantic one - littered his table and, strangely, his floor. An entirely innocent scene, despite the closed bedroom curtains and the absence of Ray and his date. I leaned back against a conveniently placed air conditioning unit and looked up at the clouds scudding across the moon. Ray was probably in the shower or something... and I was letting my imagination get the best of me.

I thought I should go back to the Consulate; I thought I should, possibly, climb down from my lofty perch and go to Ray's apartment. I did neither.

Because when I looked across the street again, Ray was there, pushing a man onto his couch and straddling his lap, and I couldn't move.

At first glance, the man he was with was not Turnbull. I'd last seen this man in Williston, playing minor league baseball - and not very well, I might add - for the Hawkeyes. However, from my correspondence with Wilson Welsh I knew that the gentleman in Ray's apartment could not be Bubba Dean; it had to be Turnbull shifting to lie down and kissing Ray's neck.

I couldn't, try as I might, assume there was anything even remotely innocent about their actions, nor, as I kept watching, my own.

"Just one more thing." I snaked out my arm and knocked a roll of duct tape off the coffee table as I grabbed the pack of Carefree, tearing it open and pulling out a stick. "Open wide."

He turned into Turnbull again at me. "But, Ray, chewing gum has such a deleterious effect on one's dental enamel! The sugar alone -"

"It's sugarless." I folded the gum in half, sticking it in his mouth before he could say another word. I kept my fingers there, feeling his tongue. "Wouldn't fuck up your teeth... guh..." The teeth in question held my fingers in place, and his tongue rippled against my fingertips before he let me go and started to chew. I rocked on his hips, his dick a firm pressure on my balls, not caring that my knee was wedged between the back of the couch and one cushion, and his hands tightened on my hips as he ground up into me with a groan.

"Ray... oh..."

"Call me 'Ace'..." I held the next stick of gum in my teeth, leaning down just far enough that he had to crane his neck up to take it from me one bite at a time until we were lip-locked and swapping spit and passing the gum back and forth, and it was wet and hot and dirty and so not Turnbull.

Bubba chewed a wad of gum the size of a baby's fist, but I could come in my pants from the way Turnbull was chewing my tongue and those two measly pieces of sugarless. He must have had the same idea, because he let go of my ass, tossed the hat across the room, and grunted, "Bedroom, now..."

Their sexual activity was becoming decidedly more serious, and I could not deny that it was affecting me. My jeans, normally comfortable, were so no longer. Despite what I had to admit to myself was deep jealousy, the unbridled eroticism of the two of them writhing on Ray's dilapidated sofa would have aroused me if I were dead. I wished I could hear their groans, moans, and the other accompanying sounds they must be making, my eyes locked on the dumb show before me.

Until Turnbull bodily lifted Ray off him, stood, and they adjourned rapidly toward the bedroom... where the curtains would utterly obstruct my view.

I lowered my telescope with a curse, yet did not remove my other hand from its tight confinement in my jeans where it cradled my erection. My imagination would have to suffice, it seemed.

Turnbull took an unfortunate doorknob-to-the-back when I twisted so he couldn't slam me up against the bedroom door in his enthusiasm, but he fumbled it open and we stumbled in, tearing at each other's shirts and tripping over each other's feet. I narrowly avoided a dresser-to-the-kidney with a smooth little shimmy that got us almost to the window, where his hand caught in the drapes. He lurched backwards in surprise, and with a rattle of rings, the curtains tore free of the rod.

"I'm sorry, Ra - Ace," he panted, his cheeks flushed with more than just heat.

I spun him to face the window, saying, "Fuck it! I don't care." I yanked up the back of his shirt, slurping at the bruise that was already forming beside his spine while I reached around to unzip his jeans. "Oh, yeah... way to take one for the team..." His fingers pushed mine out of the way, not clumsy at all on the zipper - at least until I ran my tongue along his waistband.

"Ray... Oh... " His hips canted back toward me as he finally got the button undone and the zipper down. "Ace... oh, god..."

"Off. Off, take them off!" I yanked my t-shirt over my head, dropping to my knees to watch as he stripped and I got to see his ass framed by the thick white elastic of the jock. "Oh, fuck yeah..." He had to brace himself against the windowsill, 'cause I didn't let him get his jeans off his right ankle before I grabbed that ass, spread it, and dove in tonguefirst.

"Fuuuuuuck," he groaned.

As they fought to unzip Turnbull's jeans, I tore at the fastenings of my own, taking myself more firmly in hand, thankful for the serendipity that had caused the curtains' demise. I groaned aloud, as Turnbull evidently did, watching Ray's fingers tighten on Turnbull's hips while Turnbull bit his lower lip, his head thrown back. Oh, Ray was...

I closed my eyes tightly, lowering the telescope to rest carefully on the tar and gravel of the roof. I licked two of my fingers and, imagining myself in Turnbull's place with Ray's agile tongue exploring between my buttocks, slid my hand into the back of my jeans. I brushed my fingertips against my anus lightly and then with more pressure. I had to squeeze the tip of my penis quite hard to stave off the orgasm that threatened to overcome me.

Still gasping, unwilling to allow myself release until the unsuspecting subjects of my surveillance had reached theirs, I reluctantly removed my fingers. I picked up my telescope again, refocusing it on the window.

The light glinted off Ray's bracelet as he masturbated Turnbull with his right hand. The jockstrap no longer obscured Turnbull's prodigious erection; Ray apparently had simply shoved it aside in his eagerness. Turnbull seemed frozen in place; his chest, framed by his unbuttoned shirt, heaving and mottled red with arousal. His fingers were white-knuckled from holding the windowsill so tightly; sweat from his hair and forehead trickled down the glass. I watched as if hypnotized as he lifted his head from against the window, his eyes opening, and looked directly at me as I knelt there, my hand's motion synched to Ray's.

I knew he saw me; my breath caught in my chest and my pulse outraced the now-frantic pace of my hand on my penis. A flash of shock and recognition crossed his face, then his eyes slammed shut and his face turned to the side. The tendons in his neck were taut and straining and his teeth were bared. Ray's hand moved faster, nearly a blur, and Turnbull's semen spattered against the glass and covered Ray's fist.

With a cry, I joined him in orgasm, incapable of preventing it any longer. Breathing hard, my cheeks hot and the rest of me chilled in the aftermath, I waited for the inevitable outcome of my deplorable behavior.

I waited as the now-southerly wind dried the sweat on my forehead...

But the expected exposure did not come.

Instead, Turnbull turned slowly, his right arm leaving a large smudge of some dark substance on the glass, and treated me to an impressive view of his backside, his buttocks reddened from the pressure of Ray's hands. I hastily changed the focus in time to catch a glimpse of Ray wiping his mouth and jaw on his arm and grinning at Turnbull before Turnbull tugged him up off the floor and shoved him, not roughly, onto the bed. Ray bounced once, clearly laughing, and hurriedly removed his black jeans and boxer briefs in one sensuous but graceless movement.

"Didn't swallow your gum, didja? Thought for a second there you were chokin', but you seem okay now."

The bed rocked as he climbed onto it. "I very nearly did, but I managed to keep it in my cheek. No one has ever done that for me before, Ray," he husked, his eyes still fierce and dazed.

He'd been forgetting to call me 'Ace' for a while, but, heck, that was okay, 'cause I couldn't remember to think of him as Bubba anymore. Hell, I can't imagine anybody yelling, "Bubba!" when they came, anyway, not without laughing. Can't imagine yelling, "Renfield!" either, but...

But his big, urgent hand on my dick and his tongue fucking my navel derailed my train of thought. "Do you have any condoms, Ray? I want... may I please...?"

"Just hurry up before I die here!" I didn't give a shit whether he wanted to suck my dick or plow my ass, because his hands sure as hell weren't clumsy at what they were doing now. I squirmed toward the edge of the bed and yanked the top drawer of the nightstand out so damn fast it almost ended up on the floor, but he caught it, chuckling a little.

The condom wrapper crinkled in his fingers as he tore it open with his teeth.

"Jesus..." I arched into his loose fist as he used his tongue to stick his damned gum to the empty wrapper.

"Soon, Ray..." He tossed the wrapper in the direction of the nightstand and grinned impishly. "I'm fairly certain you'll enjoy this." He stuck the condom in his mouth, exclaiming, "Oh, how pleasant! Mint!"

He dove onto my dick like it was Christmas morning and he'd not had a candy cane in years. It was a good thing he'd got that rubber on me, 'cause I was riding the edge and if he hadn't I'd have come already. "Holy...! Jesus, Rennie!"

He paused, and before I could bitch about it, his eyes met mine with such... god, with such a look of... tenderness, and he started again.

I exploded.

He kept my dick in his mouth until it almost got uncomfortable, while I lay there doing my best impression of a puddle, then got the rubber off me. I hadn't regained the power of speech yet, but my arms worked, sorta. Enough to let him know that I wanted him to lie down next to me anyway, and he did. After a few more minutes, I flopped over on my side to face him. "Wow..."

He nodded, and I closed the gap and kissed him. Real soft and real sweet, like that look he gave me. We made out slow and gentle until my brain coasted back from fucked-out to tired-but-functional. He rolled me over onto my other side, getting us both comfortable.

"That was... It was wonderful, Ray. Tonight was wonderful." He snuggled closer to me, murmuring drowsily against my shoulder. "Didn't even mind being... just wish..."

"Huh?"

"Wish you'd asked..." He yawned. "Only takes a second to be -"

"Asked? Being what?" I rolled over to face him, and his eyes opened. He looked as young as he was, a little scared and a little resigned. "Rennie?"

"Watched. It's all right, Ray. I know that you and Const - "

"Wait, wait, wait! Fraser was watching?"

I've never been so pissed off in my whole entire life. My fucking best friend and partner fucking spying on me? No fucking way! I don't even know how I got out of bed without maiming Turnbull. I damn near broke the window getting it open, and I didn't care what my neighbors would think when I yelled, "Fraser!"

No answer.

"Dammit, Fraser, I know you're there."

"Yes, Ray?"

"You... you... Get over here right this minute."

"I'm not sure that would be wise, Ray."

"Do not do this to me, Fraser. Do not make me come over there and kick you in the head."

I found my jeans on the floor and started putting them on so he'd know I was damned serious, 'cause I knew he was still watching, but he still didn't answer for a long time. "I'll be there in five minutes, Ray."

I slammed the window and paced a bit, unable to see anything but the red haze in my brain or hear anything but my muttered cursing and the pounding of my heart, until a whisper from the bed finally registered.

"Ray? I... I should probably... go..."

"No, no you should not go," I insisted, crossing to the bed and poking him in the chest. "Because he owes you an apology, and he owes me an apology, and..."

I looked at where my hand was and turned the poke into a caress, because, fuck, I may be damaged but I ain't stupid, and he may be weird but he's sweet and hot and he don't deserve to be treated like a... a fucking toy. And, fuck, he thought he'd been set up, but he stayed and kept going because... because he thought it was a date 'cause I told him it was one.

"...I owe you an apology, Rennie, 'cause I suck." I sat down on the bed, my hand still on his chest. His fingers crept slowly up my arm and he started playing with my bracelet a little. "I don't want you to go, 'cause I... And I didn't know, okay, that Fraser was watching. And we ain't a couple - not that I don't want to be, you know, part of a couple with him, but he's Fraser - but this thing? This you and me thing? This ain't pity, Rennie. Never was. Dunno what it was when it started, but that wasn't it at all, you got that? I like you."

"I... I'm glad. I like you, too, Ray," he whispered. "You don't suck." His hand tightened on my wrist, and he pulled me a closer, smiling just a little even though his eyes were kind of teary. "If you'll recall, I was the one doing the sucking."

I laughed; couldn't help it. "You're a nut, Rennie." His smile got a little bigger, then disappeared as I kissed him. "So," I asked when I pulled back, "when did you see him?"

"Right before I... achieved orgasm, Ray." He blushed a little, but kept meeting my eyes. "It, well, to be honest..."

"Got you hot, huh?" Oh, yeah, it did. That stirring under the blanket sure as hell wasn't a snake. And, come to think of it, it turned my crank, too, but before he could say anything, Fraser knocked on the door.

My father appeared as I stood at the base of the stairs that led to Ray's apartment. "Any pithy words of advice on how I can get out of this, Dad?"

My sarcasm failed to affect him. "Relax. Respond. That's what people do. You can't go through life questioning your situation at every turn, son."

"Huh. That's almost coherent, Dad. I'm impressed." But when I glanced over at him again, he was gone.

I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and climbed the stairs to what I felt sure was the end of the most fulfilling relationship of my life. Ray's door was closed, and I paused before knocking to rest my forehead against it. It was quiet inside his apartment, which surprised me given Ray's unmistakable - and fully justified - anger. Then I heard Ray laugh, which surprised me even more than the calm. What would happen to me on the other side of that door? I raised my hand and knocked.

Shirtless, disheveled, and smelling strongly of sex, Ray opened it after several very long seconds. His expression gave very little away, and he turned and walked to his bedroom without saying a word. I closed the door, locked it, and followed him slowly, my mind replaying the events that had brought about his physical condition. Watching Turnbull, who possessed evident skill I'd never imagined, fellate him so ardently had, despite my shame and guilt, inspired me to lick my semen off my fingers rather than leaving. Ray had experienced such pleasure from Turnbull, that I honestly could no longer judge which of them I envied more - the one giving or the one receiving.

It was with that thought in mind that I crossed the threshold of Ray's bedroom, trying to relax, to respond, and to not question my situation.

Ray was settled on the bed beside Turnbull, who was looking at me warily. "Okay, Fraser, talk," Ray said, crossing his arms over his chest.

I ran my knuckle over my eyebrow and cleared my throat. "I really don't know what to say to you besides 'I'm sorry' - and to you as well, Constable Turnbull. I have no rational explanation for my deplorable behavior."

"That's it? No rational explanation?"

"No, Ray."

"You were spying on us. What about an irrational explanation, Fraser? We got something you've never seen before or what? You sat up there on that roof watching us through a friggin' telescope why?"

I shifted uncomfortably. "No, Ray, I assure you that you both possess perfectly normal genitalia - and in Constable Turnbull's case quite exceptional, to tell the truth - for human males, and being one myself, I have certainly seen the like before. I... I had initiated my... surveillance simply to determine whether you and Constable Turnbull were in fact on a date. With each other."

"So once you figured out we were together, you just, being unhinged and all, decided to spend your Saturday night on the roof across the street to check out our perfectly normal genitals? And, by the way, Fraser, his name is Renfield. You've seen him at a very awkward moment - lots of 'em even - and you should at least be callin' him by his name."

"Ray..." Turnbull interjected softly.

Ray turned to look at him, then leaned closer to him so Turnbull could whisper in his ear. Ray chuckled a little in response to what he heard, and I waited.

"So, you liked what you saw, Fraser? That it? It get you off?"

"Yes, Ray," I admitted finally, looking down at my shoes, a furious heat rushing to my cheeks. "But..."

"But, what, sir?" Turnbull's voice brought my shamed attention back to the bed. "But you'd rather have been participating?"

I nodded, meeting his eyes mutely for a moment, sure that his were seeing all my heartbreak and envy.

"You like him, Fraser?" Ray asked quietly, no anger in his voice anymore, just what sounded vaguely like... hope.

"Like... Renfield, Ray?"

"Yes, Fraser. Do you like him? Like looking at him? Want to touch him like this?"

I just nodded, feeling it the better part of valor in the face of Ray's renewed testiness and the provocation of Ray's hand, which was now caressing the broad expanse of Turnbull's chest.

"And do you like me, Fraser?"

"Of course, Ray." I was on firmer ground here, familiar despite the awkwardness of the situation. "You know that. I lov - like you very much."

"And I lov - like you very much, too, Fraser. Even though you're a total pervert freak that I didn't think I had a chance with who likes to watch but would rather participate."

All your life you live so close to the truth it becomes a permanent blur in the corner of your eye. And when something nudges it into outline, it's like being ambushed by a grotesque. I felt that now; my assumptions overturned with a few simple words.

"So, what are you doing standing over there? I got this sorta Polish Sausage fantasy thing..."

End Triple-Double by Heuradys: heuradys_fox@comcast.net

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