Title: Connections: The Virgin

Author/pseudonym: Caroline Crane

Fandom: JAG

Paring: Rabb/Webb

Rating: R for language

Status: new

Archive: yes to list archives

Series/Sequel: part 1 of ?

Disclaimers: All hail Bellasario for creating such a slashy show for me to twist into something unrecognizable. I do it out of insanity, not for money.

Notes: This is weird. I don't know what's wrong with me lately but the plot bunnies are getting stranger by the minute. The character Erik made his first appearance in my fic "Masquerade", which is completely unrelated and not required reading for this series. He's introduced a little more fully in that one though.

Summary: Just a couple of guys hanging out, surfing the web.

Warnings: Spoilers for "People vs. Gunny", that's about it

Connections: The Virgin
by Caroline Crane

Clay sighed softly as he pulled into his garage, turning the engine off and letting his eyes fall closed for a moment. It was the first moment of peace he’d had all day, problem after problem had come up at work and by the time 7:00 PM finally rolled around he was sure he’d never get out of the office. When he finally managed to tie up the last loose end he’d practically run for his car before anything else could get in his way. All he wanted to do was go home, take a long, hot shower and then relax in his living room with a glass of wine and his recording of La Boheme. Slowly he let himself out of the car and pulled his briefcase out of the back seat, making his way up the stairs to his front door. A small smile played over his lips as he caught sight of the door that would lead into the sanctity of his condo, imagining the calm hush that awaited him inside.

The sense of peace he felt on pulling into his garage lasted until he got his key in the lock and pushed his front door open, but the sound that greeted him when he opened the door brought all his hopes of a peaceful evening crashing down around him. The irritating strains of April March’s "Chick Habit" hit him first, loud enough to ensure at least one complaint from the neighbors. He groaned as the reality of his evening hit him – in his rush to escape his hectic workday he’d forgotten all about his houseguest. For a moment he contemplated turning around and driving back to the office, or maybe to some quiet bar downtown where he could find a dark corner to be alone with two fingers of Scotch and his thoughts. Before he had a chance to make his escape he heard a voice yelling for him from his office, though, and he knew it was too late.

He set his briefcase down and closed the door, closing his eyes and saying a quick prayer for patience as he slid off his jacket and carefully laid it over a chair in the kitchen. He ignored the sound of his longtime friend calling him from the back of the condo long enough to pour himself a glass of Cabernet, taking a healthy sip before he picked up the glass and marched to his doom. When he reached the entrance to his office there was his childhood best friend Erik, wrapped in a short silk robe and holding a glass full of something pink and fruity in one hand. He had his feet up on Clay’s desk and Clay’s laptop on his lap, his eyes glued to the screen even as he spoke to his friend. "Finally, I thought maybe the government had whisked you away on another top secret spy mission. You’ve gotta see this."

Clay’s eyes left the appalling sight of the man dressed in a kimono to play across his computer screen, his eyes rolling automatically as he realized what Erik was up to. "I don’t want to know, Erik. I had a horrible day, I just want to take a shower and go to bed. And would you turn that music down? The homeowners’ association is going to have me thrown out of here."

Erik sighed dramatically and glanced over at the stereo before deciding that it was much too far away to actually try to reach the volume. "Clay, you’ve gotta lighten up. No wonder you’re so tense all the time. Now come over here and check this out. I’ve got a virgin on my hands."

Clay’s eyes widened and he gasped, forgetting his mouthful of wine until it hit his shirt and the carpet. He groaned at the mess and reached for his handkerchief only to realize that he’d left it in the kitchen along with his jacket. "Oh, no. You are not having cybersex on my account," Clay snapped, forgetting the music and his relaxing evening as he finally crossed the room to grab a tissue off the desk.

"Somebody’s in a mood," Erik grumbled as Clay leaned over him, peering at the screen to see what exactly his friend had been doing while he was making the world safe for average citizens. "Don’t knock it till you try it, Clayton. But no, I’m not having cybersex. Yet. Right now I’ve got a total virgin on my hands, he’s never even been in a chat room before. And get this, I think he’s even telling me the truth about himself. It’s the cutest thing ever, I swear."

Finally Clay gave up on his shirt and began unbuttoning it, scowling as he tried to remember the best remedy for wine stains. "Honestly, Erik, what you see in lying to total strangers through the computer I’ll never know. How can you possibly enjoy it?"

"You, my friend, have no imagination, that’s your problem," Erik shot back without looking up. "Take my new friend, for example. He calls himself FlyBoy, isn’t that the cutest thing you’ve ever heard? He’s so painfully closeted too, poor thing. Wandered into the gay chat by accident, I think, or maybe he’s looking for a way out of the closet. Anyway I’m trying to lead him into the light."

"You’re a true Samaritan, Erik," Clay muttered as he crossed back to the door. "I use that computer for official business, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t surf gay porn while you’re staying here."

"God, Clay, live a little," Erik called after him as he crossed the hall to try to rinse the stains out of his shirt in the bathroom. "And it’s just a chat room, there’s not a naked man in sight. Unfortunately."

Clay let out a long-suffering sigh and mentally calculated the number of days left until the roof of Erik’s apartment building would be repaired. He knew it was a bad idea to agree to let his friend stay with him, but Erik was between relationships, at least what passed for relationships in his life. Clay didn’t have the heart to go make him stay with his parents, their country house wasn’t far from his own family’s property but it was the definition of stuffy. Even Clay didn’t feel comfortable there, so there was no way Erik would have survived a whole week with his parents.

Once he’d succeeded in making the wine stains bleed a little more he gave up and tossed the shirt in the hamper, making a mental note to stop by the dry cleaner’s on the way to work in the morning. He changed into a thin sweater and wandered back across the hall, turning down the stereo and ignoring the glare Erik shot him. "This one’s right up your alley," Erik told him as he settled in the leather arm chair next to the desk and picked up his wine glass.

"Is that so?" Clay muttered distractedly, his mind already wandering to the mountain of red tape he’d have to wade through tomorrow. Some days it just didn’t pay to get out of bed.

"Uh huh," Erik murmured as his fingers flew across the keyboard. Once he stopped typing he looked over at Clay and grinned, his expression telling the other man that whatever Erik was about to say he probably didn’t want to hear. "He’s a military man."

"Oh wow, a closet case in the military. How shocking," Clay said, rolling his eyes.

Erik laughed as he watched Clay frown into his wine glass. "Please, you’re surrounded by men in uniform at least 40 hours a week. How you manage to get through the day without a constant hard-on I’ll never understand."

"Don’t be disgusting," Clay muttered, taking another sip of wine to hide the flush creeping into his cheeks. He’d regretted letting his uniform fetish slip the second it escaped his lips, and that had to be fifteen years ago now. Once Erik had a piece of information he considered juicy, though, he never let it go. It was one of his friend’s most annoying traits. "How do you even know he’s telling the truth? It could be some fifteen year old kid in Missouri. Hell, it could be your grandmother for all you know."

Erik snorted appreciatively at the image of his stately grandmother lurking in gay chat rooms, playing mind games with lonely gay men on the prowl. "If it weren’t for your sense of humor I’d have dropped you years ago," he said as he turned back to the computer screen to read the response to whatever he’d typed last. "You can just tell when someone’s telling the truth. Sure, 90% of it is bullshit, but that’s part of the fun. You can be anyone you want to in these rooms, it’s very freeing. You should try it, Clay."

"You’re right, pretending to be someone I’m not during my free time is exactly what I need to relax."

His sarcasm was rewarded by a sneer from Erik, then a surprised laugh as his friend read something on the screen. "Oh good Lord. This is too much. I think I’m in love."

"What?" Clay asked before he could stop himself, suddenly forgetting that he wasn’t supposed to be interested in Erik’s online adventures.

"He’s lamenting the fact that some woman he’s been friends with forever went and fell in love with him. God, I’m such a sucker for the closet cases. What is it about me? He’ll only break my heart, I just know it."

"Please, Erik," Clay muttered, more out of habit than because he thought his friend was actually listening to a word he was saying. "You’re a sucker for any man that looks at you twice."

An indignant snort escaped Erik’s throat as he shot Clay another look. "Thank God we never dated. You’re so bitter, Clay. Honestly, I don’t know how you can stand to be so serious all the time. Have a little fun. Come over here and talk to my new friend. You’re perfect for each other anyway."

"A closeted military man with a habit of stringing women along? No thank you," Clay answered, swallowing the rest of his wine before he stood up and crossed the room again. He shook his head and left Erik to his conversation, clutching his wine glass in one hand as he headed back toward the kitchen. As soon as he said the words his thoughts instantly flew to a man he didn’t need to be thinking about, not after the day he’d had. No one knew about that particular crush, not even Erik, and he planned to keep it that way. The last thing he needed was his friend teasing him about having a crush on a hopelessly unavailable lawyer, or worse yet, pitying him for being such a fool.

Besides, he wasn’t really interested in Rabb. He was just a pretty face, and they enjoyed pushing one another’s buttons. Getting under the man’s skin was one of Clay’s primary joys, he didn’t get to do it nearly enough but there was nothing quite like the fire in Harm’s eyes when Clay forced him to loosen his grip on his polarized view of the world just a little. It was a mutually antagonistic relationship, just a mental challenge that he rarely found in his dealings with government employees. Rabb was an enigma, at once the stalwart soldier for the cause but at the same time a lone wolf type. Clay didn’t waste a lot of time thinking about him, just because he happened to find the man attractive didn’t mean he was pining for him or anything.

Clayton Webb pine for a man – that would be the day, he told himself with a harsh laugh. He filled his wine glass again and wandered into the living room, running a hand over his CD collection before he decided against putting in an opera and losing himself in the music. Against his better judgement he wandered back into his office, smiling in spite of himself at the picture Erik presented as he held his drink in one hand and typed with the other. "Doesn’t it work better with both hands?"

Erik glanced over his shoulder and grinned at Clay, his bright eyes sparkling. "You’d be amazed how quickly you learn to type with one hand in these rooms."

Clay groaned and shook his head, wishing he’d just kept his mouth shut. Or better yet stayed in the living room where he was safe from any knowledge of Erik’s online habits. Clay himself only used the internet connection when he needed information from the Agency database while he was working at home, cyberspace didn’t particularly appeal to him and he only knew how to use his e-mail because it was a necessity in his line of work. Still, he knew from experience that the internet was a powerful tool. A person could find out almost anything about anyone if they knew the right channels to follow, and that included finding out who was on the other end of those chat rooms Erik enjoyed so much.

"Oh Lord," Erik moaned, oblivious to the fact that his friend had fallen into a contemplative mood. "He’s starting to pontificate about the choices he’s made in his life. I bet you season tickets to the National Theatre that I can talk him into quitting his job and coming out by the end of the night."

Clay felt a twinge of pity for the poor sucker at the other end of that chat room. Once Erik set his mind to something he could be fairly persuasive, and if the guy was already confused there was no telling what Erik could talk him into. Still, he was never one to pass up a challenge, especially when it came to a subject he knew well. The uniform had a much stronger hold on those boys than Erik probably realized, and it would take a lot to talk a man into resigning his commission. Not even Erik could pull that off, Clay was willing to bet the price of season tickets on that. "You’re on."

"I’ve been dying to see "Rent" again, I hear it’s coming back."

"Well if I don’t have a date maybe I’ll take you," Clay shot back, matching Erik’s grin as he lifted his wine glass and relaxed a little further into his chair. "There’s no way in hell you’re talking a man you don’t even know into resigning his commission, Erik."

"Have you no faith in my powers of persuasiveness? I can be very convincing, you know." Erik took a sip of his drink and set it on the desk, focusing on the screen again as his hands flew across the keyboard. "He’s desperate for a way out of his life, I can tell. Poor bastard’s actually thinking about getting involved with this woman that’s gone and fallen in love with him and he’s scared out of his mind. All I have to do is convince him that there’s a way out."

Clay frowned as he listened to Erik talk, his thoughts stalled on the poor guy stuck living a lie. In a way he knew how it felt, he kept his personal life separate from his work as a matter of discretion and sometimes it got more than a little distracting. For him it wasn’t a matter of do or die, though, not the way it was for the military. His mind wandered to Petty Officer Tiner and the furor over him when everyone thought he was in the closet a few years back. Privately Clay wasn’t entirely convinced that Tiner wasn’t actually hiding something, but for the kid’s sake he was glad everyone at JAG was so easily snowed. It couldn’t be easy to walk that line, he knew he wouldn’t choose to do it.

The thought that it could very easily be Tiner at the other end of the chat room made him sit up a little straighter, leaning forward as he focused on Erik again. "Erik, don’t fuck with this kid if he’s just spinning his wheels. It’s hard enough for those kids to get through the day without some bored queen messing with their heads in a chat room."

Erik let out a huff of breath and pouted at the computer screen as he listened to his friend lecture him. "Give me a little credit, Clayton. I’m not trying to ruin his life, I’m just helping him see there are options. Besides, who says he’s a kid? I’ll have you know he’s our age."

Clay shrugged and leaned back in his chair, turning this latest piece of information over in his mind. For some reason he’d just assumed conflicted and hiding behind the uniform meant Erik was dealing with a scared kid. It had never really occurred to him that it might be an officer thinking about giving up his stripes and coming out, that would mean giving up years of work building a service record. It was one thing to walk away from six months out of the year floating around on a carrier, but walking away from a commission was a much bigger deal. He sighed and leaned back again, telling himself it wasn’t any of his business anyway. If the guy was in a chat room talking to strangers about his personal life that was his problem for lacking the good sense to be discreet in the first place. Anyway, the fact that Erik was dealing with an officer pretty much guaranteed that Clay would win the bet, and he wasn’t about to point that out to his friend. Let him have his fun, chances were if the guy he was talking to was even on the level he’d forget all about the conversation by morning.

The End