Author's website: http://www.trickster.org/kass/

Disclaimer: Boys are theirs, words are mine.

Author's Notes: In response to the canoe challenge at the lj community ds_flashfiction. Thanks to Sihaya Black for beta.

Story Notes:

They'd paddled pretty far, waves lapping at the taut green metal and the sounds of the street receding, when Fraser stopped and held his oar across his knees. Ray stopped, too, mirroring him.

Quickly, and surprisingly gracefully, Fraser turned on the bench seat to face him.

"So," he said.

"So." Ray felt like a weird echo.

"This seems a suitable distance."

"For...?"

"For whatever you wanted to talk to me about." As if it were obvious that Ray wanted to talk.

Which maybe, come to think of it, it was. Ray fumbled for the way to start.

"You just seemed...homesick," he hazarded, after a while. "I figured maybe this," gesturing at the water and the gulls, "would cheer you up."

Fraser's smile was real; it reached all the way to his eyes. Ray felt his heart do a little dance, and ignored it.

"Ray, I...thank you. Kindly."

There was a 'but' coming, he could feel it. Damn: had he done something wrong?

"But there's nothing like this where I come from." Fraser's voice was earnest. "To be able to be on water like this, but surrounded by one of the great cities of the continent...? It's a marvel, really."

"Huh." Had a point there, actually.

"And I've grown quite fond of Chicago. Not to say, of course, that I don't miss home; but the city has its own particular delights."

Diefenbaker, lying on the bottom of the canoe with his head pillowed on a paw, barked once as if in response.

"That's absolutely not what I mean, and you know it."

Was Fraser's face a little pink? Ray decided to ignore it. "I'm glad you're not homesick," he offered. "You've seemed kinda sad lately."

Fraser took a deep breath. "I've been missing Ray Vecchio."

"Oh." There was a long pause. Like Fraser was holding something back. Maybe Ray wasn't imagining things. "You two were close," he said slowly.

"Very."

"More than just partners." Mentally crossing his fingers, hoping he hadn't just stepped over some kind of line...

"Well, Ray, one feels a sense of bereavement when sundered from a longtime work companion," Fraser started, then cut himself off. He turned to look over his shoulder, apparently at the sparkle of sunlight on the water, and muttered something that sounded oddly like "Leave us alone," which Ray also chose to ignore when Fraser turned back and said, "but yes, we were more than partners."

Water lapped at the sides of the boat again. Diefenbaker let out a long, slow huff of breath and closed his eyes. Ray tried to figure out how to answer.

"Were you still..." he made a vague gesture which he wasn't really sure what it was supposed to look like, "when he went to do the mob thing?"

"Oh! No, no. We had ended that phase of our relationship some time before his departure." Fraser rubbed at an eyebrow. "Sometimes, even when you love each other, you just can't make that kind of thing work."

Ray thought, for a fleeting instant, of Stella packing her suitcase and walking out. "Don't I know it."

The air smelled like lakewater and a little bit like gasoline from one of the huge boats going by, maybe a hundred yards away.

"So whose idea was it to split up?"

"The decision was mutual, but it was Ray who first broached the subject of what wasn't working."

"Jeez, if I was him," Ray started, then caught himself. Way to let the mouth get ahead of the brain, he thought, disgusted. He looked down at his feet, at the bottom of the canoe, at the wolf.

"Yes?"

"I wouldn't'a done that." Determined to finish the sentence, no matter how red his face got. Which was probably pretty red by now.

If Fraser noticed the blush, he didn't say. "I'm not an easy man to be with."

Ray snorted. "Like I don't know that?"

Diefenbaker gave a short half-howl, as if in agreement.

"Oh, you shut up," Fraser snapped.

Ray hid the temptation to snicker. What the hell: in for a penny, in for a pound. "I'm just saying, I wouldn't throw you out of bed for eating crackers."

Fraser cocked his head slightly and seemed to be appraising him. "Nor would I, you, Ray."

Holy shit. Was that just Canadian politeness, like saying "no, it is a greater pleasure for me," or did Fraser actually mean that? Ray's heart was suddenly rocking and tipping far more wildly than their craft.

"Ray, you're not wearing sunscreen."

Another left-turn into Fraserland. "No, Fraser, actually I'm not."

Fraser made a tsk'ing sound. "You're going to burn. Your face is quite pink."

That's from me thinking of what I might be eating in your bed instead of crackers...

This time Ray had the sense not to open his mouth until the thought had passed.

"Here, take this," Fraser said, briskly. Handing his Stetson over the sleeping wolf, into Ray's hand.

"I'm fine, Fraser, I--"

"We should head back. I'd hate to see anything happen to your skin." Fraser turned back around and had his paddle in the water before Ray could tell whether that was flirting or not.

Sure as fuck felt like flirting. How about that.

He put the hat on. It was slightly too large for his head, and it smelled like Fraser.

It made him smile the whole way back to shore.

(899 words)

End Canoe Conversations by Kass: kass@trickster.org

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