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Love, and a Series of Telephone Calls
for china_shop
Author's Notes: Ohmigod--so much thanks to Brynn for beta and hand-holding and general encouragement.
When the word got around that Kowalski was coming back to the two-seven, the rumor machine kicked into gear full throttle: Kowalski was a broken man, dumped by Fraser. He was a broken man, dumped by an Inuit beauty he lost his heart to while searching for the Hand of Franklin. He was a broken man, bested by the wind and the snow and the ice. He was a broken man--literally! He'd lost an arm, a leg--one of each and his nose to frostbite.
People had a lot of time on their hands, Ray figured.
Still, there was consensus on the "broken" part it seemed, which made it all the more surprising when Kowalski walked in looking about as healthy and happy as, well, a happy, healthy ox, smiling at Frannie and shaking hands and making bad jokes with Huey and Dewey.
He'd gotten broader--you could see the muscles that had built up in his arms and his shoulders and his thighs. Not that Ray was checking out another guy's thighs or anything; Ma Vecchio's little boy Raymond wasn't made that way, nuh-uh, no way. It was just hard not to notice the changes. Like his hair, for example--long and flopping around his ears, none of that Billy Idol wannabe shit going on. And he had a beard, for Christ's sake--maybe not Grizzly Adams caliber or anything but full enough to soften his jaw. He tended to play with it when he talked.
His eyes were the same though--clear and bright and blue--and Ray couldn't figure out why he remembered that so clearly, or kept noticing that so much.
"Aw, Lieu, c'mon--"
"Vecchio. You are the only detective currently without a partner. Except for Detective Kowalski here, who it so happens, needs a partner. This is what in the manual we call serendipity--a happy confluence of events."
"I'm housebroken, Vecchio, I swear." Those blue eyes twinkled--goddamn twinkled--and it bugged the shit out of Ray.
"Why are you so happy about this?" he demanded, turning on Kowalski. "You can't stand me any more than I can stand you. We'll kill each inside of three days, sir," he persisted, looking back at Welsh.
"At least I'll get three good days out of both of you in the meantime. Vecchio--" Welsh held up a hand as he got ready to argue some more. "I'm sure you and Detective Kowalski can reach some kind of amiable cease fire here. Get the hell out of my office and go do some detective work. And take your new partner with you," he called after Ray as he stormed out of the office.
He could feel Kowalski behind him all the way back through the squad room and he drew up short when he reached his desk. "This is my desk," he said. "You understand? Those are my files and these are my pens and that's my phone." He dropped into his chair. "We take my car, I drive, and you don't smoke or eat or breathe too hard while you're in it. You got all that or I gotta write it down?"
Kowalski settled into the side chair and grinned at him. "We doing ground rules here, Vecchio? Fine." He pointed over his shoulder at a desk already gathering paperwork like a pack rat. "I already got files and a phone, so I sure as shit don't need yours. And Frannie gave me my very own box of pencils." He leaned forward. "We'll take turns with the cars, I'll do the driving when it's my day, and you don't touch the radio ever."
"Listen, Kowalski--"
"And we don't ever eat lunch at Sal's--I don't care who's second cousin to your mother twice removed he is--the food's crap."
Ray dropped his head to his chest and shook it. "This isn't going to work."
"Sure it is." Kowalski smiled. "You're going to learn to love me."
"It's going well?"
"Who knows." Kowalski held the phone to his ear as he propped his feet up on his coffee table and tucked the cold beer between his legs, twisting off the cap with one hand. "I'm not dead yet--I guess you could call that a win."
"Patience, Ray. It's a virtue."
"Yeah, well--patience ain't high on my list of good qualities. For that matter, virtue don't interest me much either."
Ray got used to him. You do, when you gotta work with someone five days a week, sometimes seven--you got used to them or you went nuts. He learned to deal. He still didn't like Kowalski, he told himself, but he got used to him. Knew his tics, the way he took his coffee, the way he cocked his head when he was really listening. The beer he drank and the teams he liked. The stuff he ate on a hot dog.
Kowalski had his good points--Ray was man enough to admit it. At least when it came to work. When they were working together everything seemed to fall into place, like well oiled cogs. Ray saw the things Kowalski didn't, and Kowalski picked up on the clues he missed. Ray started finishing Kowalski's sentences, and Kowalski finished his.
Like two part harmony, Welsh said dryly one day, when they were in his office talking through what they had for a search warrant. "Like a frigging duet or something."
Kowalski grinned.
"So we were grilling this guy, you see, and I'm thinking all we need to do is just kick him in the head and see how the pieces fall, right? But then Vecchio steps in smooth as silk, see, with this whole Michael Corleone 'I'm gonna make you an offer you can't refuse' thing and I swear to God, the guy damn near tripped over himself spilling everything he knew. It was priceless, Fraser. I think he thought Vecchio was gonna take him out back and plug him right then."
"Plug him?"
"Y'know, shoot him. Bang, bang."
"I see."
"Yeah. See, Vecchio's got that down, that whole cool as a cucumber thing. He says he learned it in Vegas, which I get. When you're hanging out with the Mob you can't afford to lose your temper."
"No indeed."
"But he doesn't make a big deal of it, y'know? I mean, Dewey plays a counter clerk for all of two hours while we're staking out a convenience store, and you'd think he was Laurence fucking Olivier or something."
"A fine actor."
"Yeah. So you get my point about Dewey. But Vecchio, he's like--it's like he knows he's good so he don't gotta brag about it."
"It sounds like you and Ray are getting along very well."
"Oh, well, y'know, he's still a pain in the ass. Still freaks out when the crease in his trousers gets messed up. That kind of thing."
"But you are enjoying working with him."
"Well, I don't know I'd go so far as to say enjoy--"
"You've developed a certain regard for his abilities."
"Certain regard? Who talks like that, Fraser?"
"Perhaps even a certain fondness?"
"Fondness? Whoa, whoa, Fraser you are not suggesting--"
"Of course not, Ray. Not if you say so."
Ray was running out of patience. It'd been a long, frustrating week, what with Kowalski suddenly in his face at every turn it seemed, but now it was Friday, goddamn it, and Friday night meant Eddie's, where the only thing on the agenda was supposed to be beer and steak and cheese sandwiches, and maybe a couple of games of pool. Nice slow wind down at the end of the week.
What it was not supposed to be was more Kowalski, who'd dogged his steps all week and was now tagging along behind Ray like they were new best friends or something, walking so damn close to Ray as they went into the bar that he was bumping shoulders with him every other step. About the fourth time it happened Ray turned to him and snapped, "What, you forget how to walk?" but Kowalski just smiled at him and shrugged "Sorry."
Ray didn't like this new Kowalski, this weird, happy, smirking, Zen-Jedi-Mountie Kowalski. He made Ray nervous. Not that he'd ever liked the old Kowalski either, but at least the old Kowalski was predictable. Screwy and volatile as dynamite, but predictable, in a comfortable kind of way. Put your nickel in and get a smartassed remark; poke him and watch him explode. Predictable. But this new Kowalski? Sure, he was still prickly, no question. He was still smartassed, too, come to think of it, still as likely as not to go off on a dime but--
Okay so maybe Ray wasn't quite sure what was different. Maybe he hadn't figured it all out yet. But he knew one thing--this Kowalski smiled too goddamn much and that couldn't be good. It just wasn't normal.
"I'm going to play pool," Ray said to him, as soon as they were through the door. "You get off my ass--you've been stuck to it like you were super glued all week. I'll pretend I don't know you and you pretend you don't know me, and with any luck we won't have to talk to each other again tonight." And he walked off without waiting for an answer, waving briefly at Huey and Dewey as he passed their table.
There were a couple of regulars looking for game and they played for quarters. Ray lost the first game but won the second two. He looked up about halfway through the second game and saw Kowalski sitting at a table nearby, watching. Kowalski lifted his glass and saluted him, and Ray grimaced and turned away.
After the third game the two guys took off, and Ray racked up the balls for another game. He was halfway through it when he felt someone at his side, and turned to see Kowalski setting down a beer. "Your brand, right?" he said.
Ray bristled. "I don't need you to buy my beer, Kowalski."
Kowalski shrugged. "So you can get the next round." He wandered around the table, leaning over once or twice to sight a shot. "You looking for a game?"
"You any good?" Ray challenged.
Kowalski grinned and leaned a hip against the table. "You sure you want to find out?"
Ray looked away and started racking up the balls again. He realized his hands were shaking, slightly, and he tried to convince himself that Kowalski was only talking about pool.
"Who won?"
"What's that matter?"
"So Ray won."
"Why are you assuming--look, maybe I won. D'you ever think of that?"
"Did you win?"
"Jesus, that doesn't matter, Fraser. What matters is that Vecchio and me, we, y'know--how do you say it? We bonded."
"You bonded."
"Yeah. Or, y'know, whatever. We did the guy thing over a game of pool."
"Very effective strategy, Ray. Competitive sports often serve as a traditional male bonding ritual. As do war, drinking to excess, and visiting prostitutes. In fact, activities that give a man a sense of control and domination over his environment can often serve to allay tensions due to underlying homoerotic anxieties--"
"We played pool, Fraser! We didn't measure our dicks in the bathroom."
"Perhaps not literally but in a metaphorical sense--"
"You gonna lecture or you gonna congratulate me? 'Cause if it's the lecture then there's a game on I could watch."
"Forgive me, Ray. Congratulations. I'm sure it's was an important step forward."
"Yeah, that's what I thought."
"Of course, it probably helped that Ray won."
Once a week Ray played a pick-up game with the guys from the neighborhood over at the Y near St. Francis. A few hoops, some cold beer, some reminiscing mixed in with a little good-natured lying, and Ray was home by eleven, feeling good and loose and ready for a nice, long, hot shower and bed.
Tonight hadn't been any different, except maybe Ray needed it more, what with dealing with his increasingly weird partner and all. Three months now and they hadn't killed each other, but Ray still didn't like it. Kowalski just rubbed him the wrong way, for reasons Ray still couldn't figure out. There was this tension between them all the time now that never seemed to go away, no matter what they were doing. Like static electricity almost--Ray could feel the hair on his arms stand on end and he could practically see the sparks flying whenever they got too close.
Not that Kowalski was being a deliberate pain in the ass--at least, not much--but he was like still like a sore tooth, always there and just uncomfortable enough not to let a guy forget it. Ray couldn't help but poke at it all the time.
Kowalski refused to rise to the bait though. Oh, sure--he still came in pissy in the mornings, answering in grunts until he'd had a cup or two of coffee. When he got mad, there was still the danger of flying objects. But sometimes he'd get this funny little smile on his face when they were going at it and Ray was sure he was just arguing for the sake of arguing, like he just liked to see Ray get all het up and ranting. Which just made him even madder, the way Kowalski seemed to know all his buttons, and how to push them.
So after the game, when Eddie announced Carrie was pregnant again, Ray had the perfect excuse for an extra round or two, or maybe five--just something to get him out of his head and help him stop thinking for a couple of hours about how much Kowalski got under his skin these days. It was a good plan, as far as it went, but it didn't go far enough, and it fell apart about the time he walked into his house and found Kowalski there, sitting on the sofa and sipping Uncle Manny's homemade wine with Ma and Frannie and a half dozen assorted members of the Vecchio clan, just like he was family. He was wearing his well-worn leather jacket and his glasses, and he looked like a cross between a hood and a geek, and Ray didn't like the way that thought twisted something in his belly.
"Raymond." Ma was out of her chair, taking hold of his arm and pulling him into the room. "Finally, you come home. Come sit with us and have some wine. Ray was just visiting with us, telling us all about his adventures in Canada."
Ray glared at him. "What are you doing here, Kowalski?"
"Raymond! Mind your manners." She shook her head and turned to Kowalski. "Don't listen to him--lately, he seems to come home more tired and irritable with every day that goes by. Make room for him next to you--you boys can squeeze in together. Both too skinny by half," she said, shaking her head. Kowalski obligingly moved and patted the cushion next to him, smiling at Ray when he frowned.
There was nothing about this situation that was good. Ray was dirty and sticky, and maybe a little drunk--okay, maybe a lot drunk--and Kowalski's eyes were smiling up at him in that way he had that just set Ray on edge, like he knew something Ray didn't. Kowalski put a hand on Ray's arm, and then on his wrist, pulling him down. "C'mon, Vecchio--stop thinking so much," Kowalski said, whispering in his ear, and it tickled, sending an involuntary shiver down his spine.
Frannie passed a glass of wine to Kowalski, and he put it in Ray's hands, their fingertips brushing as he took it. He emptied half of it in two swallows, too aware of the heat of Kowalski's arm settling against his own, warm, with the rough brush of hair against his skin.
He didn't understand this. He should move. He should get up and go to bed. He should tell Kowalski he wasn't interested in hearing any of his stories. He most certainly shouldn't be sitting here, so close to Kowalski he could feel it every time he breathed.
"So where was I?" Kowalski asked, looking around with a smile.
"Easy."
The voice was quiet, curling inside his ear. It was dark, the shadowy shapes of his bedroom painted in shades of grey and charcoal. He leaned against Kowalski, who was laughing softly and trying to steer him to his bed, and looked around. He couldn't remember how he got here. "What are you doing?"
"You fell asleep on the couch. I told your Ma I'd put you to bed." Kowalski pushed him down to sit on the mattress and grabbed the edge of his sweatshirt, pulling it up over his head. Ray forgot to lift his arms and Kowalski had to do it for him, and then one arm got caught in his sleeve and the other got twisted behind his neck until he felt like one big clumsy knot, blind and awkward. Kowalski tugged again and the collar snagged on his ear, and he batted Kowalski's hands away, trying to push him back.
"Okay, okay. Jesus, Vecchio." Kowalski whapped the top of his head through the sweatshirt. "Calm down, will you?"
"Pain in the ass," he said, subsiding, wondering why his tongue felt so thick.
"Hmm?" Kowalski had finally untangled him from his sweatshirt and was kneeling down, untying his shoes.
"You. Pain in my ass. Since the day you got here."
"Yeah?" Cocky, smartass grin. "You're no picnic yourself, Vecchio. Lay back."
"Huh?"
Kowalski put a hand in the middle of his forehead and pushed. Ray fell back on the bed, which only helped a little with the way things were spinning all around him. He felt hands at his waist, tugging.
"What're you doing?" He tried to lift his head to see but he couldn't keep it up, and he dropped back on the bed again. "What are you doing?" he asked again suspiciously.
"Taking off your pants, Vecchio. Just lie back and think of Canada."
"Very funny. Leave me alone."
"What, and miss out on the chance to remind you of this when you're sober? No chance. Can you--here, never mind. Just shift up," and Kowalski put his hand under his shoulders and tugged him up and around, so that his head was resting on his pillows. "God, you're going to be miserable tomorrow."
"Miserable already. Goddamn pain in my ass."
"Yeah?"
"Stop looking at me. Tired of you always looking at me," he whispered. Kowalski was leaning over him, smiling gently. "You look at me, all the time. All the goddamn time." He lifted his hand, pressed a finger into the bridge of Kowalski's glasses, pushing them up on his nose. "Why are you always looking at me?"
"Maybe--"
"Maybe?" His words were slurring.
But Kowalski's voice was fading as he slipped into sleep.
"--maybe I just like what I see."
"He drives me crazy, Fraser."
"Crazy good or crazy bad?"
"Crazy I don't know. I just want to--he makes me want--"
"He makes you want?"
"Everything."
The bartender was laughing and giggling, looking up at Kowalski from under her lashes as she twisted a straw around her finger. Ray knew the look, and the way women moved when they were interested, the way they tried to let you know with eyes and a smile, and the roll of their hips that they were open for negotiations.
Kowalski knew it, too--Ray could tell from the way he smiled back, the way he perched lazily on his bar stool and surrendered his hand when she offered to read his future.
"Lucky in love," she giggled again, pointing to a scar Kowalski had on his palm from a knife fight with a perp back in 1992, and Kowalski chuffed out a laugh and slanted his eyebrows at Ray before he said, "That so?" to the girl.
Ray downed his shot--he didn't need to hang around here and watch Kowalski talk some barely legal bartender with the IQ of a gnat into going home with him. "I'm out of here," he said as he slid off his stool and he was shrugging into his jacket before he was halfway across the bar.
The door banged back against the wall as he left--he might have shoved it open with a little more force than was necessary--and he dug in his pocket for his keys.
"Drop me back at my place?" The voice was right in his ear and there was Kowalski at his shoulder, where he always seemed to be these days.
Ray turned and raised an eyebrow, surprised. "You're not going home with Madame Palm Reader?"
"Are you serious?" Kowalski laughed and knocked his shoulder into Ray's. "I got cell phones older than her."
Ray leaned back into the touch. "Getting old, Kowalski?" he asked and he knew, if called on it, he wouldn't be able to explain why he was grinning like an idiot.
"So how are things going?"
"They're not going, not really. That's the problem."
"I thought you and Ray were getting along better."
"We are. We are. It's just that--okay, we're working together really well and all but it's just--we partners, okay? And maybe friends. Maybe. But that's as far as it goes. It's like he won't let me in any closer."
"Perhaps he just needs time. To adjust to the idea of being in a relationship with another man."
"Yeah, and maybe he's just not into guys. I mean, how would I know. Vecchio ain't talking and you said you guys never--you guys never, right, Fraser?"
"I assure you, Ray, my relationship with Ray Vecchio is strictly platonic."
"Is?"
"Is and was. If there's an impediment here, Ray, it isn't me."
"Right. Yeah, right, I know. But--so I mean--what if he isn't gay? What if this whole thing is doomed to failure because Vecchio isn't queer? I mean, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink the Kool-aid, if you know what I mean--"
"Actually, Ray, I haven't the slightest idea--"
"Wait."
"What?"
"Well, what if--I mean, what if he doesn't think I'm--I mean, does he know?"
"Know what?"
"Does he know I'm queer?"
Kowalski was queer. Kowalski was fucking queer. Kowalski had a goddamn fucking boyfriend.
It wasn't something Vecchio picked up on right away but then he started to notice--the phone calls that Kowalski excused himself to take, the way he'd laugh into the phone, all low and quiet. The way Kowalski started saying he wanted to be done by a certain time because he had plans. At first Ray figured he'd hitched himself to something blonde and soft, and as much as Kowalski still irritated the shit out of him sometimes, you couldn't really resent your partner finding someone nice to spend his time with off-duty. Or if you did, you didn't spend too much time thinking about it.
At least, not until you met the someone nice.
The blond part was right. But it turned out the blond's name was Tom.
"Tom?"
"He's a guy from the gym. I knew him back in high school and he's between boyfriends."
"When you say 'knew'--"
"Not like that. Back then it was just Stella, you know that."
"I see. And Ray?"
"Vecchio? Heh. Don't think he likes Tom at all."
"Ah. You know, Ray, I'm not sure I understand your strategy. Forgive me if I'm being dense, but if Ray thinks you're involved with another man, isn't he less likely to contemplate any kind of relationship with you?"
"No, no, Fraser. I'm working the jealousy angle. I'm making Vecchio jealous."
"Ah."
"...You don't sound very convinced."
Pretty soon it was "Tom this" and "Tom that" and "Tom and I"--and Ray couldn't figure out what bothered him more--fucking Tom or Kowalski being all "out and proud" in his face. Seemed Kowalski should have been a bit more nervous that he was gonna go all straight Thin Blue Line on him and since when did he give off vibes like he was comfortable with the whole guy on guy thing anyway? They were cops, for Christ's sake. Not that he was that kind of asshole or anything but still--seemed Kowalski should have at least bothered to get a little nervous about it.
But Kowalski didn't seem to care that he might go all homophobic asshole on his head--he just smiled and shared until Ray thought his ears would go numb.
"Fraser, let me ask you a question. Do you find me attractive?"
"Haven't we covered this ground before, Ray?"
"Yeah. I mean, no, right, it's just--well, I mean, if you were Vecchio, would you find me attractive?"
"I'm afraid I have very little experience upon which to base an opinion of what characteristics Ray would find attractive in a man."
"So pretend! Play make-believe! Pretend you're Vecchio, okay? Do you find me attractive?"
"Ray, if Ray falls in love with you it will be for your many good qualities, not just for your physical attributes--"
"Fraser, would you answer the goddamn question?!"
"I'm sorry. Of course. Ray, you are a very handsome man."
"Yeah?"
"Absolutely. You have a certain--if I may be permitted to say--a certain je nais se quois that is very attractive."
"Je nais se what? Nah, never mind--I figure that's good."
"It's very good, Ray."
"Yeah, well, my je nais se whatever is getting me no place with Vecchio. I figure maybe I need to jazz it up a bit."
"Jazz it up?"
"Yeah, y'know, go for the bad boy thing. I bet Vecchio's got a secret hard-on for the whole bad boy thing."
...
"Fraser? Fraser, you still there?"
Ray did a one-eighty when Kowalski walked in the following Monday morning, clean shaven, cropped and gelled, and looking--well, looking damn fine was what he would've thought, if he'd have let himself think that, which he wouldn't because he was straight, goddamn it, he was straight, straight, straight, straight as a fucking ruler and--
Jesus. He needed to get laid.
"Fucking Vecchio."
"Ray? Ray, have you been drinking?"
"He's seeing someone."
"He's seeing someone?"
"Yeah. Nurse he met when I was getting patched up last week."
"Ray, you didn't mention getting injured--"
"She's perfect."
"I see."
"Small. Brunette. She's smart and funny and she's Italian, for fuck's sake--she'll probably give him six kids, all boys. Plus she's got tits, which I got a noticeable lack of, and no dick, which I got too much of, and-- Fuck."
"I'm sorry, Ray."
"Yeah."
It was March when Kowalski got shot. A routine hostage situation gone bad, zero to massacre in sixty seconds.
Ray saw Kowalski get hit. He was up in front, trying to get the fleeing hostages to safety behind the police vans while avoiding getting hit by the bullets that were flying everywhere. Ray was crouched behind one of the cop cars, trying to return fire without taking his eyes off of Kowalski, muttering, "come on, come on, move it," as he watched him try to get a pale-faced, fat assed business man to hurry. He saw Kowalski spin around from the impact of the bullet and the way he dropped like a dead weight to the ground. Later, Frannie told Ray she heard from Edwards that they had to restrain him, hold him down on the sidewalk to keep him from flying across the street to where Kowalski was laying, not moving.
Ray charged across the wide, hospital hallway and fisted his hands in Kowalski's t-shirt, holding on tight and walking him backwards until he was flush against the wall.
"You couldn't mention you were wearing a goddamn vest?"
Kowalski brought his hands up and grabbed Ray's wrists. "Vecchio--"
"I thought you were dead." He emphasized his words by shoving Kowalski against the wall again, ignoring his wince. "I thought--I saw you get hit and you went down and I thought--"
"Look, Vecchio--" And there it was. That goddamn smile. That goddamn look. Those goddamn clear blue eyes.
"Shut up. Just shut up, Kowalski." And that's when Ray kissed him.
"So everything worked out in the end?"
"Yeah. Yeah, everything worked out just--in a minute!"
"Excuse me?"
"It's just Vecchio, yelling. He's good at that. He's--I said just a minute! I'm doing something here!"
"So everything is fine."
"Yeah, everything's fine, Fraser. Everything's real good."
"You're happy?"
"I'm--give me back the phone, Vecchio. Goddamn it, I said give me back--"
"Benny."
"Ray."
"Benny, I am taking Kowalski back to bed. He'll call you back in the morning."
"Yes, Ray."
"Wait, don't I get--"
"No, you don't. Goodnight, Benny."
"Understood, Ray. Understood."
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