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Author's Notes: This was my response to the livejournal ds_flashfiction Curtainfic Challenge, which was: "I'd love to see forty-odd tiny curtainfic stories. Buying curtains, hanging curtains, climbing them, pulling them down, getting them all dirty -- curtains of hair, th-th-that's all folks curtains, iron curtain metaphors -- let's beat this hoary old cliche into the ground, shall we?

Story Notes:

Ray slowly turned around in the aisle, a look of a man mightily wronged firmly on his face. "So Frase," he said grimly, "what fresh hell is this?"

Fraser quite visibly bit his tongue, let out a breath and said, "As I have already told you-- four separate times, I might add-we are picking up something for Mrs. Vecchio at the store."

Ray waved a hand. "Yeah, yeah, I got that already. But I thought you meant something like, I don't know, special oregano or sausage or something. Not," Ray paused to look skeptically at the aisles of Home Depot, "not hardware."

"Well, technically Ray, since we will be buying curtains, I don't know if that can be classified as hardware."

"Whoa, whoa!" Ray stopped dead and put his hands out on front of him, warding off the specter of curtains. "Do you mean we're picking up some curtains that Ma already ordered, or are we going to have to pick then out ourselves?"

"Does it really make a difference, Ray?"

"Ah, jeez, Frase! Of course it does! If we're just picking them up, okay, we're whipped, but that's okay 'cause Ma's old. But if we have to actually pick them out. . ." Ray trailed off and raised an eyebrow significantly.

Fraser raised his own eyebrow and made a 'continue' gesture with his hand.

Ray leaned in and lowered his voice. "If we have to pick them out? Two guys, choosing curtains? It's kind of fruity there, Frase."

Fraser nodded. "Ah, I see. Well, prepare to embrace your inner woman, Ray, because we will be choosing the curtains ourselves."

Ray covered his face with his hands. "Fraser, Fraser, Fraser. You see, this right here is why I don't like you talking to people by yourself." He dropped his hands and glared. "What else did you sign us up for, huh? Interior decorating classes? Picking up Frannie's tampons? What?"

Fraser rolled his eyes. "For god's sake, Ray, we're buying curtains, not a matching set of cock rings!"

Ray's mouth dropped open. He snapped it shut, and shot nervous looks at the other customers, who were all quite studiously not looking at them. He grabbed Frase by the arm and pulled him over into the next aisle. "Shit, Frase, you do not say things like that in a family store!" He narrowed his eyes. "Do you even know what those are?"

Fraser pulled his arm from Ray's grasp. "Of course I do! I am a member of the RCMP, which is an acronym for 'Royal Canadian Mounted Police', in case you've forgotten. Or do you somehow assume there's no vice in Canada?"

Ray snorted. "Oh, yeah, those penguin pimps, how could I forget them?"

"Actually, Ray, penguins are indigenous to the-" Fraser stopped himself. "That's irrelevant at the moment. What is relevant: Toronto, Montreal, Winnipeg, Vancouver, Edmonton, Banff, Regina. Large cities, Ray, with their full complement of large city crime."

"But, but," Ray waved his arms about, "but when those chicks hit on you, when Frannie's all oozing up against you, you don't know what they're talking about!"

"Really, Ray, I'm not mentally deficient! I merely act oblivious to spare them the pain of outright rejection. It's a form a chivalry."

Ray stared at Fraser intently, and then suddenly pointed two fingers at him. "You! You're all Wizard of Oz-y!"

"I beg your pardon?"

"You know what I mean! 'Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!' And yeah, I knew you did it with other people, but now, well, you're doing it with me, too, Frase, and that just ain't buddies!"

Fraser began to nod slowly, and then stopped and shook his head. "I'm sorry, Ray, but I really have no idea of what you're saying."

"You do, too! You show the world that flaming wizard head Mountie Mask, but really you're the Professor behind the curtain pulling all the levers. And the lever-pulling guy, I thought that was the real you, the you you showed only me, but now, now I find out you're some cock ring-knowing Mountie behind another curtain, and I don't even know you anymore. Jeez, how do I know you're even my friend?"

Fraser sighed. "You know, Ray, perhaps you wouldn't worry so much about appearing 'fruity' to complete strangers in Home Depot if you weren't such the drama queen."

Once again, Ray was speechless, but then suddenly, mercurially, he began to laugh. He canted out his hip, made the z-snap, and said, "Oh, do not go there, girlfriend!"

After a shocked, startled moment, Fraser joined him, both of them laughing so hard they stumbled into, and knocked over, the display for Ralph Lauren Fire Fox Red paint.

". . .and that, Sir, is how Ray and I came to be arrested for public drunkenness and lewd behavior." Fraser frowned. "Although in actuality, we were neither drunk nor lewd, so I feel confident that the charges will be dropped."

Lieutenant Welsh just shook his head. "I was at home, watching the Cubs. I had beer." He sighed sadly, shaking his head again, opening the door to the holding cell. "Go forth, gentlemen, and sin no more." He watched with a jaundiced eye as Ray and Fraser sidled out of the cell, not meeting his eyes. "Your predictions were correct, Constable. You and the Boy Wonder there are free to go."

Ray raised his head. "Lieu, I got to say-"

Welsh shook his head, and put his hand in front of Ray's face. "Talk to the hand, boys. Talk to the hand."

Fraser and Ray sniggered, walking out of the jail in tandem, their shoulders bumping every other step. Welsh watched them leave, and then rolled his eyes. "Oh, yeah, they're not gay." He snorted, and went back home to his ball game.

End Curtains? Well. . . by Doll: space___monkey___@hotmail.com

Author and story notes above.