Ghost Dad

[ignazwisdom.livejournal.com]

I forgot that I had even written this until just now. It's silly and unbeta-ed, for which I apologize -- comments (including concrit) are very welcome. I hope this works.

F/K, 1700 words of absurdity (but it's kind of an absurd show, isn't it?) for the "dreams" challenge:

Ghost Dad
Ignaz Wisdom

If Ray had known that the best way to get to know Fraser -- to really, really get to know the guy -- was to sleep with him ... well, he would have done it a lot sooner. Okay, call a spade a spade: he would have done it within ten minutes of meeting Fraser, only he wasn't so sure that Fraser was all that into him, what with the window putty sandwich and all.

But later, after they'd sorted everything out, he began to get these inklings. Fraser was weird, yeah, and sort of hard to get -- all honor and duty and politeness, to the point where you started wonder if there was even a real person underneath. But in between the honor and duty, Ray was sure he saw something else, something Fraser was only showing to him -– something he would come to call want.

He knew that look. He'd spent twenty years quietly hunting for it, and sometimes finding it -- the secret look, the maybe look, the I don't normally do this sort of thing look –- and sometimes, when he and Stella were on the outs, even acting on it. Fraser's was real subtle, though -- real subtle. And it wasn't always there. It came and went, like the other looks Fraser would occasionally let slip: hurt, anger, fear. Want was something even scarcer. It showed itself sometimes on stakeouts, when the tedium got so much that it was all they could do to just sit still and not go stir-crazy. It showed itself sometimes when Fraser thought Ray wasn't looking, like when he was driving or watching the game. But then Ray would turn and look Fraser right in the eye, and the look would be gone, just like that -– like nothing had ever been there. So Ray had to really search for it, which made him wonder if he wasn't maybe just seeing things because he wanted to see them, and not because they were actually there.

But still, he was Mr. Instinct, and so he thought -- what the hell. He picked his moment, and just before lunch on a Friday (he'd meant to wait until the end of the day, but he got antsy), he grabbed Fraser's arm, pulled him into the supply closet, firmly shut the door, pressed a startled Fraser up against it, and kissed the hell out of him.

After an agonizingly long moment, in which he watched Fraser's face as Fraser threw every brick and wall in his arsenal up, he smiled and watched as they all came crumbling down. Then Fraser was grabbing him, kissing him, and nearly babbling with relief. "Ray," he said. "I didn't -– you don’t know how –- oh, god, Ray."

And wouldn't you know that when you got Benton Fraser in the sack, he just cracked open -- all the walls down, the Mountie shell gone –- and Fraser? Had whole oceans underneath. So not only did Ray learn about Fraser's hurt, and anger, and fear, he also learned about his mom (died right in front of him when he was six) and Victoria (shot his dog, framed him for murder, fucked him up but good) and Canada (which Fraser could go on about for hours). It was good. It was greatness.

And then it got weird.

Because right on the tail of the mom and the psycho and the tundra, Fraser told Ray about Diefenbaker. And yeah, Ray knew that Fraser talked to the deaf half-wolf, but he didn't know that the wolf apparently understood by reading lips, and that not only did he understand, he also talked back. Except here was Fraser, loose-limbed and fucked-out in Ray's bed, bemoaning Dief's apparently constant criticism of his life.

"Uh," said Ray, continuing to rub long lines down Fraser's back in the dark.

"It's infuriating, really," Fraser was saying. "He's become quite the spoiled housepet since we came to Chicago. His current complaint is that the Consulate lacks appropriate sleeping accommodations for him. He seems to have seen an orthopedic canine bed in a catalogue and he now believes that possessing one is critical to his future health and happiness –"

"He said all that, huh?"

"I'm afraid his version was rather ruder."

And then Fraser was telling Ray all about his dad –- and not the usual "fine officer, legend in the north, I first came to Chicago" line of crap he fed everyone else. No, Ray got the bonafide in-bed-with-Benton version, which was apparently that Fraser's dad was a ghost who hung around him on a regular basis and with whom he carried on "the most exasperating, really, Ray" conversations.

"A ghost," said Ray, looking at Fraser's dark shape. He was sure he was being played.

"Yes, I suppose that would be the colloquial term. He tends to show up at the most inopportune moments. He is apparently under the mistaken impression that his input on my work and life is needed, despite my frequent assertions to the contrary –"

Ray frowned. "Fraser. You’re telling me -– you see ghosts?"

"Yes," came the exasperated reply. "Well, one ghost. Fortunately, my father seems to be the only one who has seen fit to grace me with his presence so far," and okay, sarcastic was another one of those things Fraser generally kept under wraps, except with Ray.

Ray gnawed on his bottom lip, pulled the sheet over his exposed groin, and scanned the dark room quickly. "Uh, Frase. Is he ... is he here right now?"

Fraser shook his head. "My father," he said, "is a man of habit, even in the afterlife. At this time of evening, he’ll have settled down to sleep on the cot in his office. Which," he added, sounding kind of pissed, "is inconveniently located inside the closet of my office."

Ray nodded in a manner that he hoped conveyed sympathy rather than panic, not that Fraser was even looking at him. "Your dad –- your, um, ghost dad. He ever say anything about –-" Ray gestured at the space between them in his bed. "-- you know, about this?"

"Not as of yet," Fraser replied. "I'm not sure if he's even aware of the -- changed nature of our relationship," and here Fraser's hand found his in the dark, which was weirdly comforting, in a my-partner's-insane-but-at-least-he-likes-me kind of way. "Although he is quite fond of you, Ray. He believes you to be a good man and a fine officer of the law."

"Well, hey, that’s nice," Ray mused. "The dead ghost dad of the guy I'm sleeping with thinks I'm okay. Thanks, Frase."

"You're welcome, Ray."

Later, after Fraser had fallen asleep, Ray lay on his back, staring at the ceiling and worrying. For all that he talked about Fraser being crazy, he'd never actually thought that Fraser might be crazy. He wondered if Mounties had to have regular psych evaluations. And Fraser was a smart guy, one of the smartest guys he'd ever known –- wouldn’t he know if there was something hinky with his head?

Ray slept, and dreamed of ghosts and wolves.

* * *

When he woke up, it was still dark, Fraser was still asleep, and there was a third person in the bedroom, watching him from the doorway.

Ray bolted upright, eyes wide, grappling for a gun that wasn't there. The man in the doorway stood upright, removing his fedora. "Oh, you’re awake!" he remarked –- and dear God, Ray thought in bewildered horror, is that Bill Cosby?

"What," he spat, breathlessly, "the fuck?"

"Hey, you remember me, dontcha? I just happened to be in the neighborhood, and I thought I'd drop by. I brought along a few friends -– I hope you don’t mind!"

Ray yanked the sheet up to his neck and watched, horrified, as a fat green blob, an old guy wearing period clothes and chains, and Patrick Swayze entered his bedroom. All were in various states of semi-transparency. The green blob hovered mid-air, dripping and drooling all over itself.

Fraser slept on.

Immediately behind them, a cherubic-faced white sheet flew directly to the foot of Ray's bed and floated there.

"Hi, Ray!" it cried in a child’s voice. "Remember me? From television? I'm Casper!"

His lungs petrified, Ray turned to look out the bedroom window, where the enormously fat, white face of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man beamed at him.

Ray yelped. He leapt out of bed, ran to the window, and yanked the curtain shut over the smiling, sugary face. He turned around, panting, a cold sweat breaking on his face. "FRASER!" Fraser hadn't moved. The assembled throng of ghostly guests hadn't moved.

"DIEF!" he shouted, and then stamped on the floor for emphasis. Fraser might be one up on him as far as ghosts went, but he didn’t believe for a minute that the dog was really deaf.

The noise or the vibration roused Diefenbaker, who trotted into the bedroom from his spot on the living room couch, nails clicking on the hard floor. He walked through the crowd of apparitions –- not between them, but directly through their translucent bodies. His nose emerged from Patrick Swayze’s knee. He shook a spot of green slime off of his tail, then sat down in front of Ray and barked.

"Dief," Ray hissed, pointing at the figures in the doorway. "Sic."

The half-wolf stared at him blankly, then turned to glance at the apparitions. He turned back towards Ray and gave the canine equivalent of a shrug.

Ray dropped to Dief's eye level and grabbed his face. "Dief," he said, swallowing. "Fraser says you can understand him and you can talk back. Can you understand me?" Dief blinked mutely. "Say something!"

Dief raised one white paw and placed it, companionably, on Ray's shoulder.

"Yo quiero Taco Bell," he said, in a low, Mexican accent.

Ray's scream echoed into the night.

* * *

The next morning, he dug through his dresser until he found the dream catcher Fraser had made for Vecchio, and nailed it to the wall directly over what had become his side of the bed.