Ice challenge

[katallison.livejournal.com]

Just a little piece of ephemeral fluff (well, 2027 words' worth). This can be blamed entirely on my long-standing desire to write Fraser shovelling snow. *g*

By four, it was clear that the first great snow of the season had come to Chicago, and Inspector Thatcher gave Fraser the welcome order that freed him to trade his paperwork for a shovel. He had saluted with genuine enthusiasm, donned jacket and gloves, and, once outside, stood on the front step for a moment, watching the thick swirl of snow and breathing deeply of the clean cold air.

The city had been rasping his spirits rather more than usual lately, with its clamor and crowds, and there was pure pleasure in seeing it slowly submerged under snow, edges softened, glare dimmed, litter buried. The streets were almost empty, and even the unrelenting city noise was muffled to a low buzz and hum. It felt almost homelike, and for a moment, as he stood there, squinting into the snow-whirl, he allowed himself the rare luxury of nostalgia for his home--the silence, the pure sweep of snow, the empty horizons, the solitude.

After a minute he shook out his arms with a sigh, unshouldered the shovel, and bent to his task, briskly clearing the steps and front walk. He was about to begin on the main sidewalk itself, when an unfamiliar and disreputable-looking car, driven rather too fast for the prevailing road conditions, skidded recklessly into the reserved parking space right in front of the Consulate, and slid to a halt, sending up a fine splattering arc of snow.

Fraser watched as Ray got out, slammed the door, glared at it (the latch had apparently failed to engage), and gave it a resounding kick in the side panel, knocking loose a shower of rust. Seeming satisfied, he waded through the snow with wide clomping steps to where Fraser stood, holding his shovel. For once, Fraser noted, the heavy black motorcycle boots actually constituted sensible urban footwear.

"What the hell are you doing out here?"

"Well, I'm shovelling, Ray." Fraser's gesture took in the expanse of sidewalk that lay still blanketed in snow.

Ray flung his arms out, a gesture usually signalling exasperation, but Fraser suspected that he wasn't really irked. There was a hint of manic glee, rather, in his demeanor, the air of a child with energy to burn let out of school early.

"OK, this? This is stupid, Fraser, this is illogical, because, in case you haven't noticed, it's still snowing. You shovel now, two-three hours later, you gotta come back out and do it all over again. What you do is, you wait until it quits, then you do the whole thing once, then you go collapse and have a beer."

"I trust the beer is optional," Fraser said. "And not to disparage the logic of your argument, Ray, but the fact is that soon pedestrians on their way home from work will be using this sidewalk, and it behooves me to clear it for their passage." The glare that Ray gave him was fine recompense for that sentence, and he went on without allowing time for interruption. "By the way, if I may ask--I haven't seen that car before, have I? Is the GTO being repaired?"

Ray transferred his glare to the rusty Bonneville and then turned back. "Nah. In storage. See, the way it works in Chicago, being as how we don't have dogsleds here, what happens is when it snows, first the snowplows come. And after them--" Ray was holding his hands out before him, in a minatory way, as though conveying deep secrets. "After that ... they salt." He took a couple of steps closer to Fraser, dropping his voice. "And salt. Eats. Cars."

"Indeed." It was too much to resist. "And yet, as I understand, salt also eats ice, and ice, left unchecked, leads to accidents, which also can in their own way damage cars, so--it's a conundrum, isn't it?"

"Conundrum." Ray grinned suddenly, raised a hand to brush off the fine dusting of snow that had collected on his hair, and the glitter as the flakes scattered was no brighter than the glitter in Ray's eyes. "That's exactly what it is, my friend, and that is why this beater is what I'll be driving until March."

Beater. Fraser savored the word inwardly, stored it away in his brain, but had no time to formulate a response before Ray banged his gloved hands together and said, "OK, so, where do you guys keep your shovels?"

"Well, there's another one in the front hall closet, but really, Ray, you needn't--" Ray was already jogging up the front walk, flinging the great door open--leaving it wide to the wintry air, Fraser noted--and a moment later he emerged, bearing the scoop shovel in triumph. Bounding after him came Dief, whom Fraser had last seen napping behind the reception desk.

"OK!" Ray sprinted halfway down the walk, then abruptly planted his boots and slid, waving the shovel for balance and skidding to a stop a few feet short of where Fraser stood. "So, you do that side--" A quick jerk of his head. "I do this side, last one done buys dinner. Deal?"

Fraser nodded his acceptance, and set back to his work with energy. He heard Ray's boots clomping off, and then--not the rhythmic scrape-pause scrape-pause of shovelling, but rather a long sustained screech. He turned to see Ray barrelling down the sidewalk, shovel planted straight before him like a plow, with the snow flying away wildly on either side, Dief following and barking.

When Ray reached the spot that Fraser had already cleared, he made a sideways heave and dumped the great heap of snow he'd accumulated haphazardly into the street. "There." He grinned, wiped his face, and gestured toward the wavering blade's-width path that stretched back toward the corner. "Done. So, move it and finish up yours, Fraser, there's a pizza out there with my name on it."

"Well, Ray, that's a decent beginning." Fraser removed his hat, shook off the snow that had settled on it, put it back on. "Now all you need to do is go back and clear each side, all the way to the edge."

"No way." Though the protest sounded heartfelt, Ray did not, Fraser noted, seem entirely surprised. "You said people gotta have a place to walk, so OK, they got it, they need more room than that, they shouldn't be out on the street."

"The correct procedure for clearing a sidewalk, Ray, is edge to edge, and down to the pavement. Like this." Fraser aligned the edge of his blade at a precise 90 degrees, slid it until it met the grass verge, lifted a clean rectangular block of snow, and deposited it tidily to the side. He straightened and turned to face Ray. "You see?"

"Edge to edge." But there was some affection underlying the mockery in Ray's voice. "That in your, uh, Canadian regulations book or something?"

"Of course not, though I believe there is something of the sort in the Chicago Code of Ordinances, specifying that all public sidewalks shall be cleared to a width of at least five feet." Fraser scooped and dumped another shovelful, for emphasis. "I must say I'm a bit surprised that, as an officer of the law, you aren't aware of that."

"Yeah, like I do sidewalk patrol. Jeez." Fraser had actually expected rather more in the way of argument, but Ray merely growled, turned away, and banged his shovel on the sidewalk to clear off the clumps of snow clinging to it.

Fraser bent back to his own work, moving methodically down the sidewalk and pausing at intervals to stretch his shoulders. He noted that Ray chose to continue using his high-speed snowplow technique, with considerable obstruction from Dief and a certain amount of messy overspill, but he was at least widening his path.

By the time Fraser had finished, and had done a final pass to square up his edges, the snow had stopped, and the darkening sky, streaked with purple and russet, had begun to clear, showing a few stars. Ray had abandoned his shovel and was throwing snowballs for Dief, who leapt to snatch them out of the air, both seeming amused at the way they exploded in his jaws.

Ray tossed a final ball, and turned. "You finally done? Can we get some food, maybe? I'm starving."

Fraser walked over, examining Ray's work, noting with an inward sigh the scalloped margins, the loose snow scattered across the pavement. "While I don't mean to be a nag, Ray, I can't help but point out that this is still a bit of a mess. Note, for example, these places where the pressure of a foot has compacted the snow to the pavement, and--" He began chipping at a packed-down spot, when Ray reached over and took a grip on the handle, stopping him.

"Look." Ray sounded serious, all of a sudden. "I get it that you don't understand about sidewalks, Fraser, cause I'm guessing they didn't have any where you grew up, right?"

"Well, there are wooden walkways along some streets in Inuvik, but--" Ray shook the shovel, warningly, and Fraser subsided.

"So what you don't get is--" Ray let go of the shovel and moved to stand side by side with Fraser, shoulder almost touching his. "See, you notice how the sidewalk's slanted a little?" He held a hand out, flat, tilting it slightly. "That's so when it warms up and stuff melts, the water runs off instead of making puddles. But the problem with that is, when it freezes again at night, you get sheet ice. And if you do the down-to-the-pavement thing, then you got cement with sheet ice on it, and then sure as hell some little old lady comes along, hits the ice, which like I already pointed out is slanty, and vwwwooop--" He made an abrupt sideways gesture. "Down she goes, broken hip. Which if you left some snow and crud on the sidewalk wouldn't happen, cause her feet'd have something to grab onto. Y'see? Sometimes rough is better than smooth."

Fraser listened attentively, pondered. "So what you're arguing is--"

"I'm not arguing, Fraser, that'd be you. I'm just saying--you put the salt down, you rust out your car, you go for down to the pavement, you kill the old ladies. It's like--like this thing I heard a guy say one time, Perfect is the enemy of good enough." He produced the quotation with a flourish, looking smug.

"Voltaire," Fraser said automatically. "And it's actually--"

Ray frowned. "Nah, I think it was Harry Carey. Whatever. Let's get out of here."

Fraser put away the shovels, ignoring Ray's "Just shove 'em in the bushes, they'll be fine," and made his way back down the front walk, pondering. Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien. What was it Ray had said? Sometimes rough is better than smooth. Yes. Perhaps. Perhaps, he thought, looking at the spiky-haired rough-voiced man who stood waiting for him, unselfconsciously wiping his nose on the wristband of his leather jacket.

Fraser's thoughts were interrupted by Dief, who, apparently wishing a resumption of their game, came lolloping up to Ray and planted two snowy forepaws in his chest. "Cut it out!" Ray yelled, laughing and shoving. "Mutt! Offa me and into the car!" And then to Fraser, "C'mon. You gotta jerk the door up when you open it, it sticks sometimes."

Fraser watched as his half-breed mutt leapt into the backseat, slopping snow on the upholstery, as Ray yanked the driver's door open, with a creak and a curse. Then he pulled his own rusty door open, settled on the torn seatcushion (which reeked abominably of old cigarette smoke), winced at the cacophonous music Ray punched in on the radio, and they sped off into the night, skidding and rattling over the snowdrifts and the potholes.