ds_flashfiction | Whitehorse Holiday, by Isis (isiscolo)

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Whitehorse Holiday, by Isis (

isiscolo)
Fraser/RayK, PG, 970 words
Thanks to

riverlight for beta-reading. This is based on Chicago Holiday, which you can probably tell from the title, huh?

The first set had gone well, Christina thought. She had to give her agent credit; when he'd first suggested a tour of western Canada, she'd thought he was nuts, but the people there were gratifyingly polite and actually listened to her singing and David's piano playing, instead of just talking louder so they could hear each other over the music. And they bought more CDs than the people in Ottawa and Toronto, too. Maybe they just didn't get a lot of good jazz singers out here in the sticks. Whatever it was, they treated her like she was something special, and she liked it.

She drank her first glass of water quickly, but as the bartender handed her another, she noticed a man approaching. She set down the water and gave him a practiced smile, calibrated to be just friendly enough without being overly encouraging.

"Miss Nichols," the man said warmly. "I never expected you'd become an entertainer, but you're quite talented. I'm impressed."

"I'm sorry, do I know you?" He didn't look familiar, and as far as she knew she didn't know anybody in Whitehorse. But he was older than her, probably forty or so - maybe he was one of her father's friends, someone from the government.

He put out a hand, and she shook it automatically. "Benton Fraser. Although you might remember me as…Chicago."

Her hand flew to her mouth. "Oh my God! Chicago!" The Mountie who'd been assigned to look after her - God, it seemed so long ago. Seven years ago? Eight? "I can't believe you remember. In fact, I'm kind of embarrassed you remember. I was just a kid."

"Wise for your years."

"Or trying to pretend I was, anyway." She shook her head. "I really put you through hell, didn't I?"

"Part of the job," he said. "But it all turned out all right in the end."

"I guess," she said, taking a gulp of water. "I still can't believe you're here." Then she gave him a side-long glance. He wasn't wearing that ridiculous red uniform, but he still looked immaculate, straight-backed and solid in jeans and a pale blue dress shirt. There was a ring on his left hand; he must have gotten married, then. Probably had the regulation two-point-five kids and a doting stay-at-home wife. And he was wearing a tie. Nobody wore a tie to a nightclub. "Not just that it's been so long. It's just hard to believe that you're here," she said, gesturing to take in the room.

"I'd never intended Chicago to be a permanent home. I've been stationed here in Whitehorse for some years."

"I don't just mean Whitehorse. I mean, here here. The 'Lizard Lounge'." She made little quotes in the air with her fingers; it was a silly name. "I remember how you were in that club in Chicago. Nightclubs just don't seem like your kind of scene."

"True, they're not," he said, nodding toward her in acknowledgment. Yeah, it wasn't too hard to figure that Fraser wasn't a nightclub sort of guy. She remembered him as stiff and strait-laced, all prim and proper. Straight as an arrow. Like a knight out of a fairy tale, or at least, that was what he had been for her. Hopefully she hadn't done him too much damage, making him chase her all around the seamiest parts of Chicago. She had to suppress a giggle, remembering him in the fetish bar. Lord, that had been something.

"But I saw your name in the newspaper, and I wanted to see if Christina Nichols of the Christina Nichols Band was the same girl who had given me such an - interesting time in Chicago," Fraser continued. "And of course, Ray was delighted to have the opportunity to go out."

"Ray?"

He gestured toward one of the tables lining the edges of the dance floor, catching the eye of a blond man who rose and walked over toward them with an easy grace. He was about Fraser's age, she guessed, but had a wilder look about him. Yeah, he probably went to nightclubs a lot.

Ray nodded to her as he approached. "Nice voice you got there," he said. He sounded American.

"My partner, Ray," said Fraser.

"Oh, you're a Mountie, too?" Huh, guess he was Canadian after all. She'd heard so many accents as a child, traveling around with her father. She thought she was pretty good at identifying them, but sometimes she got them wrong.

But Fraser was shaking his head. "My partner," he repeated meaningfully; and it was then that she noticed that Ray wore a ring, too, a simple silver band that looked identical to the one Fraser wore.

"Oh," she said dumbly. "Yeah, I get it." And it was obvious, the way they looked at each other. Like there wasn't anybody else in the room that mattered. She looked Ray in the eyes and grinned. "Listen, I got my next set coming up," she said. "You take care of Chicago here, okay?"

There was no reason Ray would have known what she meant, but it looked like he did, anyway, because he nodded. "I always do."

"Nice seeing you again," she said to Fraser, and he and Ray went back to their table.

She tossed back the rest of the water in her glass and headed back out to the microphone. At the piano, David caught her eye, and she nodded, and he started the next number. She looked out into the smoky bar, looking for Fraser's table. There he sat, he and Ray, and as the first notes of the piano went spiraling into the room she could see the two of them, looking into each other's eyes and smiling.

You're not so much of a straight arrow after all, Chicago, she thought, as she started to sing.