Disclaimer: I do not own Psych.
"My most brilliant achievement was my ability to be able to persuade my wife to marry me." ―Winston S. Churchill
"Tell him yes. Even if you are dying of fear, even if you are sorry later, because whatever you do, you will be sorry all the rest of your life if you say no." ―Gabriel Garcí a Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera
"So I'm thinking about asking Lassiter to marry me," Shawn says on a Sunday evening through a mouthful of buttery corn kernels, and Henry promptly manages to spray the tablecloth with gravy as he attempts to swallow back his bite of steak and spit it out simultaneously.
The hacking into the tablecloth continues for the next few moments while Shawn watches with his eyebrows knitted together. When his father finally rises from his near death experience of choking on a slice of beef, face sporting an offensive shade of red and eyes watery from the abuse on his throat, Shawn feels slightly indignant and drops his fork on the table.
"What?" He asks crossly while Henry chugs back his beer to clear his throat, "Why is that something worth choking over?"
"You're serious, kid?" Henry finally manages to rasp out, "Are you trying to tell me that this thing with you in Lassiter isn't just a romp around the station whenever you get bored?"
"Dad, I'm offended. Why would you use the word romp? Don't you know that we're in the twenty-first century? I would have accepted both monkey tango and sexy time," Shawn says casually around his second corncob. His father stares at him blankly, as if at a loss for words. It's nothing if not disconcerting for a man such as Henry Spencer, who is notorious for his constant need to express his negativity and personal opinion on any endeavor Shawn is intrigued in pursuing, to fall silent when Shawn's in need of a serious brainstorming session.
"You seriously want to marry Lassiter?" Henry parrots back at him slowly, as if slowing down his speech will help Shawn comprehend the ludicrousness of his idea, "Shawn, you do know that this isn't second grade. You don't just pick a couple dandelions, walk up someone's driveway, and put Gus in his father's dress shirt and make him marry you and the neighbor girl."
"You're right, I will need to divorce her first."
"Shawn, focus!" Henry says, balling up his napkin and throwing it onto the table next to his beer bottle. "This is for life! Now, have you and Lassiter even talked about this?"
"No," Shawn grumbles, setting down his half-eaten corncob and trying hard not to feel like his seventh year old self when he proclaimed his love for his algebra teacher around the house, scoured his bathroom for his two-year-old plastic purple cereal box prize ring, and Henry had to reel him back to reality with a firm lesson concerning marriage, divorce, and the mental instability of men who chase women.
"And you honestly think this is a good idea?"
"Yes," Shawn says firmly, and points his fork straight at Henry for emphasis, "Yes, I do. Why can't you believe that I'm serious about me and Lassiter?"
Henry huffs, as if merely considering the idea of taking his son seriously is cause for the basis of a hearty joke, Lassiter's addition to the situation only increasing how laughable it truly is, and Shawn furrows his eyebrows once more, "Oh, I don't know, Shawn, probably just because you've never been serious about a thing before in your life, and especially not Lassiter. Honestly, you can't even say his first name."
"Please," Shawn scoffs, and then wavers when the C lands on his tongue and has trouble plucking the rest of the letters from Lassiter's first name forth, "Carltonand I—no," Shawn wrinkles his nose and Henry smugly smiles, "No, I can't. I only call him that in the throes of passion."
Henry's smile is wiped from his lips as if washed instantly away, cheeks pallid, "Not funny, kid," he says gruffly, "Now listen to me. You're not going to marry Lassiter, run off into the sunset and adopt Argentinean children and make your own curtains."
He gets up from the table, empty bottles of beer slotted in between his fingers and gravy-dotted plates marred with leftover chewy pieces of steak stacked on top of each other in his hand, ready to load the dishwasher and take a nap on the couch while reruns of Copsplay in the background as white noise, and Shawn frowns as he feels his opportunity to have a rare, somber conversation with his father slip away. He's not one to frequently rehash his father's unsuccessful marriage, even less so his sticky divorce, but for once, Shawn needs fatherly advice that Gus can't provide him.
"Dad, listen to me," Shawn says, leaning over the table and holding his plate captive when Henry tries to snatch it from him and shovel it into the dishwasher with the rest of the pots and pans, "I'm not sixteen and trying to piss you off anymore. I'm head over heels—that doesn't sound right. How about head over tennis shoes?"
"Shawn."
"I'm head over tennis shoes for Lassiter and I know I want to spend the rest of my life with him and his salt and pepper chest hair. I know like—like you knew with mom," Shawn says, catching his father's eyes as they soften for a flicker of a moment before his lips turn up into a bitter, hardly amused smile.
"I'm sorry, son," he says with a shake of his head as he seizes Shawn's dirty utensils from the table, "but the day you and Lassiter get married is the day I become a vegetarian."
Shawn attempts to weigh the odds. According to Henry Spencer's haughty predictions, he and Lassiter's marriage is already doomed before it's begun.
O O O O O
It occurs to Shawn only after the words slip from his tactless mouth that maybe three minutes after mind-boggling sex while both of them are still riding a post-orgasmic high of arousal and bliss is not the best time to casually pipe up with the idea of marriage.
"Do you ever want to get married again?" Shawn questions into the sweaty expanse of Lassiter's chest, still rising and falling steadily as he attempts to regain his breath from when he mercilessly pinned Shawn onto the bed and pounded into him until he shook with a cry that was guaranteed to alarm the neighbors, attempting to channel an offhand nonchalance into his words that only comes out sounding uncertain and probingly inquisitive, like a young boy asking how babies are born when he knows he really doesn't need the answer.
Lassiter tenses, fingertips lazily crawling up and down Shawn's arm reaching a halt at his shoulder, "Marriage," he says, as if he testing out the word on his tongue after years of treating it like a particularly nasty swear word, "Why?"
"Just asking," Shawn says, and attempts to sway the conversation into comfortable grounds by letting the palm resting innocently on top of Lassiter's stomach slide down to rub circles onto his hips, "I mean, you can't expect a wandering, wild boy like me to stick around forever if you're not going to make an honest man out of me at one point. I'm like Marlon Brando in The Wild Oneexcept I'm not in a motorcycle gang that wears cool leather jackets."
Lassiter's hips twitch responsively up into Shawn's teasing touch, "Are you serious?" He asks incredulously.
"Well, you can't expect a stud like me to not want to be tamed eventually," Shawn explains, and feels his heartbeat pump against his ribcage until he feels as if it's swiveling on an axis inside his body. Lassiter shifts, sweaty legs knocking against Shawn's as he clears his throat and filters through his words for a response. Shawn can hear him filtering. He pokes him in the hip affectionately and then moves his slow rubbing to his inner thigh.
"I didn't know you were thinking about marriage," Lassiter admits, perhaps a bit nervously, and Shawn props himself up on his elbow to watch his face contort into blatant apprehension and maybe even a smidgen of curiosity at the idea of Shawn becoming the perfect cop's wife to make him cookies and milk every evening and rub his feet.
"I'm not thinking. It's more of a pondering. A musing. I would have to get an apron first, obviously, and Gus would have to get an orchiectomy online."
"You mean ordained, unless Guster is planning on being castrated anytime soon," Lassiter says, fingers picking up their gentle rhythm of stroking once more up and down the contours of Shawn's back, still damp from their rather vigorous tussle in bed.
"I've heard it both ways," Shawn says without missing a beat, smirking when he detects a smile on Lassiter's lips through the shadows. Beside the bed, neon green lights blink 1:24am at him and the gray light of the ghastly hours of the night slides through the window blinds. He stretches his legs, ankles brushing Lassiter's, and pillows his head on the soft skin of Lassiter's shoulder once more, his reward being the gentle rubbing of Lassiter's fingertips on his scalp as he combs through his hair.
"Shawn," Lassiter finally whispers after a few moments in which Shawn idly listens to the chirping of the outdoor critters and lets himself consider what Lassiter would look like in his grandmother's frilly abhorrence of lace she more fondly refers to as her wedding dress, "You know that for whatever reason, I actually like having you around. But after Victoria…" Lassiter trails off quietly into the night, feet readjusting under the sheets as Shawn curls himself around his side and kisses him languorously on the neck where his evening stubble begins to bristle on his lips.
"Don't worry, Lassie," Shawn murmurs, "Next time, you'll clearly get to be the wife."
O O O O O
Stealing Lassiter's address book, while Shawn had prepared a handful of both strategies of surefire thievery and watertight excuses should he be caught by Lassiter's neuroticism concerning his personal desk space, is simpler than expected with Juliet's help and Gus' spectacular diversion techniques. Gus manages a clean and only slightly awkward maneuver in which he unceremoniously bumps into McNab from behind to cause him to stumble, struggle to stay upright, and then proceed to drop Lassiter's carefully sugared coffee onto the police station floor in an ominous splatter. Lassiter's rage, fueled by his lack of caffeine and routine aggression for McNab's clumsy antics, stems into a one-sided argument that lasts a generous twenty minutes in which McNab promises to make another pot of coffee immediately and Lassiter roars out his temper bred from a morning in which Shawn's idea to share a sleepy blowjob made him ultimately late for work without even a morsel of breakfast.
While Gus covertly slides from the scene as McNab is thoroughly chewed out by Lassiter and shuffles about the brown puddle of creamy coffee on the station floor, Juliet makes the discreet trip over to Lassiter's desk to kneel out of sight and snatch his address book from his drawer and toss it to Shawn, who is casually concealed by the restrooms and vowing to make the ridicule McNab is enduring up to him later by delivering him a pineapple smoothie.
This time, Juliet manages to grab the right book, and instead of teeming with names of repeat offenders and petty crooks, it's full of random post-its adhered here and there holding scribbled phone numbers. He finds Lassiter's sister's number, his brother's e-mail address, and finally, near the end of the book, Shawn finds the name he was looking for and dials the number Lassiter scrawled beneath it in the safety of a bathroom cubicle at the station.
"Howdy," a familiar gravelly voice says through the phone, and Shawn springs into action.
"Howdy, Sheriff Hank! How's Miss Annie?" Shawn greets as the tinny feedback from the phone line stabilizing dissolves, "I had a quick question for you about your boy Lassie."
"Binky's all right, innit he?"
"No, he's fine," Shawn says, and makes a mental note to try out the nickname on Lassiter a few more times tonight before he puts it to bed, "I was actually calling because I know you're pretty much the closest thing Lassiter had to a father when he was growing up and so I wanted to ask you if… if you would mind if I married him."
There is a long, uncomfortable pregnant pause that has Shawn expecting either shock, instant disapproval, or a homophobic diatribe. He dances on the balls of his feet and hopes for none of the above, and when the phone remains eerily silent, Shawn's dancing feet still once more.
"Sheriff?" He pipes up hesitantly.
There's a gruff clearing of a throat across the line when Hank speaks up again, "I got two conditions," he grumbles, and Shawn hopes dearly one of them isn't a sex change or a suicide for the situation to be acceptable to Hank, "First, I get a front seat at the wedding. None of that in the back nonsense where everyone's big heads are in the way."
"Done," Shawn agrees instantly.
"And you promise to me that you won't break Binky's heart like Vicki did," Hank finishes, something quiet and unidentifiable in his voice until Shawn realizes it's the residue of leftover sadness after a divorce that clearly shook Lassiter up more than he was ever willing to convey when not inebriated and murmuring into a scotch-heavy beverage.
"I promise, Sheriff," Shawn says, and lets out a breath of relief he didn't know he was holding captive when he realizes he has Hank's acceptance of the idea of Lassiter being married to a young and scruffy hooligan, "The whole shebang, spleen in the eye and cross my heart."
"I think it's needle in the eye, son."
"Eh, I've heard it both ways," Shawn dismisses, and starts talking father-of-the-bride wedding traditions.
O O O O O
As much as Lassiter suffered through both what could only be a described a dull, humdrum marriage and an agonizing separation, Shawn knows that the man is surprisingly sentimental at heart and has kept the one memento Shawn needs in order to avoid asking suspicious inquiries about ring sizes or sneaking around after Lassiter's dozed off to discreetly take his finger's measurement in a variety of ways Google could teach him: his old wedding ring.
Sneaking into his own bathroom isn't nearly as intricate a feat as slipping Lassiter's address book from his desk was; finding the only remaining piece of Lassiter's old marriage amidst the clutter of hair products, toothpaste, and tie clips is the thorny part.
Shawn rifles through enough toiletries of shampoo to last his hair for months and a spectacular collection of lubricants that he had neglected to notice were tucked away in the bathroom and is one empty bottle of toothpaste away from accepting the fact that Lassiter has either discarded of the ring or no longer keeps it secure in a bathroom drawer. Should the former be true, no matter how relieved Shawn might be that Lassiter's found peace with the failure of his first marriage and managed to rid himself of his souvenir of a relationship better left alone after a grueling separation, he's still peeved that he now has to resort to not-so-subtle techniques of wrapping string around Lassiter's hand while he sleeps or coercing him into trying on his gargantuan ring-pop collection from the late eighties until he can determine which one fits best to accurately document Lassiter's ring size.
His hand is digging around in what Shawn can only presume is a dusty bag of hair curlers that used to belong to Lassiter's mother and somehow winded up in his possession when his finger happens to hit a smooth, cool band and his hand reaches the jackpot.
Shawn pulls it out from the pile of faded pink plastic rollers and blows the lint off the rim, holding it up in the light to examine it. He wonders if Lassiter and his wife picked their wedding ring together after he proposed, both of them heading to the jewelers to pick out a ring they believed symbolized their supposedly lifelong affection, and feels a twinge of envy in his gut as he turns the ring over in his palm. It's gold, simple, and somehow is still resplendently shiny after years spent hiding in a dusty bag of hair curlers.
He's in the middle of wondering how Lassiter's engagement transpired and if he proposed in a classy restaurant on one knee or during a ski vacation with her family watching when he remembers the task at hand and proceeds to hastily measure the circumference of the ring while ignoring the cliché engraving scratched on the inside. Shawn's still committing the numbers to memory when suddenly—
"What are you doing?" Lassiter's sharp voice, a bit squeaky and a lot indignant when he zeroes in on the ring perched in Shawn's fingers, undoubtedly his own, or rather, his horrifying trinket from his unsuccessful heterosexual years, breaks through Shawn's concentration.
"Lassie," Shawn says, and tries not to convey surprise in his expression since he knows perfectly well that wide eyes and a fumbling mouth equal guilt, and all he's guilty of is attempting to plan a romantic candlelit proposal with a ring that won't cut off the circulation in his boyfriend's hand after ten minutes. He tries fruitlessly to stash the ring behind his back or stuff his hand in his pocket, but the gleam of gold is easily detectable from even several feet away.
"Is that my wedding ring?" Lassiter grits out. Shawn can see him gnashing his teeth. "What are you doing with my wedding ring?"
"Ohhh, you know," Shawn says, and waves it about hither and thither, "I was actually looking for my watermelon-flavored ring-pop and found this, which I tried tasting and really only tastes like a hint of kiwi."
"Spencer," Lassiter thunders forward and snatches the ring from Shawn's hand, catching sight of the offending bag of decoy rollers sitting on the floor by Shawn's knee and stuffing it back inside. The outdated use of his surname should be a warning to Shawn, but he's too busy covering up his tracks after suspiciously snooping about Lassiter's wedding memorabilia to make sure Lassiter doesn't start sniffing wedding roses at the end of the day to be concerned with Lassiter's rage at Shawn's inability to value the sanctity of keeping personal objects personal.
"It's just a ring, Carly Davidson," Shawn says, attempting to soothe, patting Lassiter on the shoulder and promptly being knocked away, "I'm not rehashing ceremony details and bringing out the wedding album."
"Why do you even care so much about my wedding anyway?" Lassiter snaps, throwing the bag back into the bathroom cupboard under the sink and giving it one last agitated glance.
"I don't," Shawn defends, and it's true. The last thing he wants to see is grainy pictures of Lassiter and his ex-wife cutting into their wedding cake or swaying during their first dance as husband and wife, especially when he's certain that his wedding cake with Lassiter will be at least ten times taller and therefore, better. "I just care about my ring-pops. Like I said. But not the ones that are grape flavored. Why do they make those?"
"Shawn, just," Lassiter breaks off and heaves a sigh, "I've left Victoria in the past, don't bring her back up into my present."
Shawn tries his hardest not to roll his eyes, grabbing onto Lassiter's face with his hands and shaking his cheeks until his head bobbles on his neck and his eyebrows furrow into a countenance of clear exasperation, as if trying to jiggle the illogical thinking out of his skull. Shawn grabs him by the tuft of hair on the nape of his neck and gently kisses his bottom lip.
"We can leave her in the past," Shawn agrees, pushing their noses together with a coy grin, "but if we somehow get trapped in a real life version of Back to the Future, we would technically be leaving her in the present, so if that happens, I won't be able to help you."
O O O O O
"Shawn, you do know that you passed the jerk chicken stand a few miles back, right?" Gus mentions from the passenger seat.
"Well, buddy, we're not stopping at the jerk chicken stand," Shawn says, and then adds, "First. Not first."
Gus furrows his eyebrows, clearly ready for the free meal of vendor's chicken he was dubiously promised earlier, and is two seconds away from starting a rant that accuses Shawn of his inability to charitably pick up the lunch bill when Shawn reaches across the console and opens the glove compartment, a furled pamphlet advertising pristinely cut diamonds and wedding bands sitting in its depths. Gus blinks, blinks again, and promptly snatches the pamphlet from its position in the glove compartment by the fortune cookies pilfered from the Chinese place down the street.
"Engagement rings?" He parrots dumbly from the catchy blurb printed on the inner flap of the pamphlet. He leafs through it furiously, as if looking for a hidden clue signaling to Shawn's true intentions with the jeweler's store across town. "What's going on, Shawn?"
"Well, I'm sorry I didn't run the idea by you first," Shawn attempts to ease into his big reveal, but a quick glimpse at Gus' far from amused expression as he accusatorily holds up the pamphlet as proof that Shawn's keeping secrets from his best friend urges Shawn to hurry along in his confession, "but I'm proposing to Lassiter."
Gus' eyes widen to the size of tree trunks before his expression slowly dissolves into one lacking all amusement and his mouth curves into a cool, displeased line, "Shawn, if you are driving my company car while you're drunk, I will not hesitate to remove your kneecaps while you're asleep."
"Gus!" Shawn cries, only mildly affronted, and leans over the car to exhale a huff of his breath, still tinged with the smell of fresh bacon and buttery waffles from breakfast, straight onto Gus' cheek, "I am not drunk! Are you seriously not going to take this seriously?"
Gus swats Shawn's face away and wrinkles his nose when he breathes in the waffle remnants on his face, "Does your dad know about this?"
"He's in the middle of delicately folding wedding invitations and getting chummy with Grandma Lassiter," Shawn deadpans while Gus stuffs the pamphlet back into the glove compartment, pointing out the window when the mall comes into view down the road, turning into the parking lot, "Ah, there it is! I'm gonna get me a ring."
He's in the middle of parking the car and unbuckling his seatbelt when he notices that Gus is still steadfastly sulking, arms crossed and jaw set when Shawn spares a glance to the passenger seat. "Oh, come on, Gus."
"Secrets don't make friends, Shawn."
"If it makes you feel any better," Shawn coaxes, pushing the button to release Gus' seatbelt and grinning at his cross friend across the car, "…my dad isn't actually at home folding wedding invitations. He doesn't think I'll go through with this whole proposal thing at all."
"Hmm," says Gus, rather passive-aggressively, and Shawn hopes he won't have to pull out bribery or other nefarious tools at his disposal to coerce Gus into joining him in the ring store, "Maybe I should go join him."
"But Gus, I brought you here because I wanted you to help me find a ring because your opinion matters to me, man," Shawn insists with a few manly punches to Gus' shoulder, "Don't be the guy who filmed all of Rick Perry's campaign commercials."
"Rick Perry is a homophobic bigot, Shawn, and I don't appreciate the implication, especially when I have been more than supportive during the entire time you decided to indulge in the death wish that is your and Lassiter's bizarre relationship," Gus reprimands, pouting resolutely at the dashboard to fume for an obligated number of seconds so Shawn can sit in the shame of his friend's disappointment before he sighs heavily in resignation and opens the passenger door. "Fine. I'll help. But I'm going to be best man if Lassiter is crazy enough to say yes."
Shawn grins and tries his hardest to refrain from commencing a dance of victory while Gus might still consider retracting his reluctant agreement to help Shawn find a ring that perfectly epitomizes his and Lassiter's inconceivable relationship that defies all laws of physics and romance alike.
"See, Gus, I knew you'd come around," Shawn claps Gus on the back and weaves his way through the cars in the parking lot toward the front door.
"Now that I'm in on this, no more secrets, Shawn. When did you even decide this?" Gus demands, "Where are you proposing? Do you know if he's even open into getting married again?"
"I'll tell you this now, Gus: I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing," Shawn admits, shrugging, pushing open the door to the jewelry store and squeezing inside after Gus, "I'm winging the whole thing on a whim. Lassiter will swoon."
"Lassiter doesn't even like surprises, Shawn," Gus points out, but Shawn conveniently forgets to listen to his advice as he walks through the doorway and waves at the nearest consultant.
"My good amigo!" Shawn calls out across the store jovially, a sales associate hastening over to the door to escort them inside and shush Shawn from shouting more greetings through the pristinely quiet shop, pierced with nothing but the murmuring of men bent over the displays and the soft sound of classical music wafting through the air. The entire store is tucked away in a corner lit by bright overhead lights and so free of dust, it's almost as if every surface has been sterilized. The glass cases of rings are clear and shiny, missing the smears of pudgy children's fingers on the glass.
"May I help you two gentlemen?" The salesman, swathed from head to toe in a wrinkle-free suit complete with a rich blue blazer that would fit seamlessly into the president's closet, asks with a tight-lipped smile that already indicates his skepticism that Shawn and Gus have wandered into the right store for whatever shopping needs they are fulfilling today.
"You tell me, Suits. I'm looking for the best ring you have in this entire store!" Shawn proclaims, peering over the salesman's shoulder to rake his gaze over the glass cases and begin evaluating the rings with Gus.
"What's the occasion?" the salesman persists, skirting around the counter and rapping his knuckles against the glass.
"I'm about to make an honest man out of a strapping manly police officer," Shawn says through a raunchy wink, Gus promptly elbowing him in the stomach, "and I need a ring with class. And color. And if we can somehow engrave our faces on the inside of the band, I'm willing to pay extra."
The salesman processes the information and takes a moment to pause, as if considering if he should ask the two men in his shop to stop the shenanigans and take their business somewhere they aren't pulling immature pranks on businessmen otherwise occupied in real work, and then returns to his default rigid smile.
"I'm sure I can find something that works for you," he says as he leads them down the aisle to where a case of shimmering golden bands with diamonds and stones colored to all hues of the rainbow sit glimmering in pride. "But I do feel the need to warn you that we… don't offer facial engravings on any of these rings."
"Damn," Shawn tells Gus with a shake of his head as he kneels by the case to take in the resplendent pieces of jewelry in front of him, "So what are we thinking, buddy?"
"Lassiter wouldn't wear any of these unless he was six feet under and pushing up daisies," Gus declares bluntly. Shawn pouts.
"Really? I'm digging the one in the back," Shawn wiggles his finger at the ring propped up in the back corner of the display case.
The salesman clears his throat and speaks up, "That's a yellow diamond set in a gold band."
"Sweet! Now, can we perhaps add a few more colors to the diamond?"
Gus stands up from the display, yanking Shawn to his feet by his elbow and sending the salesman a polite smile, "I think we're looking for something a bit more simplistic, sir. Can you show us any of your more popular choices?"
"Gus!" Shawn protests, "What about the purple one? It'll bring out Lassie's eyes!"
"Shawn, you know as well as I do that Lassiter isn't going to advertise any colors of the rainbow on his finger," Gus points out, grabbing Shawn by the forearm and bodily dragging him over to where the salesman is brandishing a case of basic silver bands and clear-cut diamonds shining in the light. "You need something pleasing to the eye. Something he won't try to accidentally flush down the toilet."
"I don't like these," Shawn whines, tugging on Gus' sleeve while he and the salesman mirror eye rolls off of each other.
"Give them a chance!" Gus demands, "Can we look at one up close?"
The salesman unlocks the case and pulls the one in the front delicately out of the case, handing it to Shawn and placing it carefully on his palm, as if concerned that Shawn will manhandle the pricy piece of jewelry, and waits for a response. Gus nudges Shawn in the ribs until he plucks the ring from his palm and looks at it, the silver band and princess-cut diamond stunner sparkling up at him.
"I don't—you're actually right, Gus, this is quite exquisite," Shawn admits, examining the ring from its sides and tossing it deftly into the air to catch in his left hand, the salesman watching in horror all the while. "I think you just made a sale, Suits!"
O O O O O
It only takes three hours after purchasing his engagement ring for said fresh, newly bought ring to be immersed in havoc.
Shawn looks at Gus' finger, adorned with a familiar diamond ring stuck on his left hand that he was by no means authorized to wear, and tries to remember that these are the sorts of blunders and mishaps that best friends are supposed to get him into and that disposing of Gus' body in the bathtub would surely lead a suspicious trail back to him.
"Gus, you didn't!"
"I did!" Gus wails, hand already flailing as he tries to send the ring flying off his finger to no avail, Shawn grabbing Gus' hand and attempting to forcibly pull the piece of priceless jewelry off of Gus' ring finger. "I didn't think it would get stuck!"
"Why did you put it on in the first place?" Shawn asks, still trying to wrench the ring off of Gus' finger with all of the strength in both of his arms combined. "Did you learn nothing from A Christmas Story? Never put your body parts anywhere when you don't know if they'll be coming back!"
"Flick gets his tongue stuck to a pole, Shawn!" Gus says sharply, finally yanking his hand out of Shawn's reach when his knuckle starts swelling, "This is nothing like that!"
Shawn groans as Gus starts panicking, hand flapping helplessly by his side as he tries to shake off the jewelry and dig his fingernails underneath it. Shawn pushes him bodily toward the sink and seizes the dishwashing soap.
"Stop freaking out!" Shawn tells him, pouring generous globs of green dishwashing liquid over Gus' hand and into the sink, furiously working the soap up to a lather around his knuckles to loosen the hold the ring has on his friend's finger. He sees the image of Gus howling in the emergency room while the doctor gravely tells Shawn that he has to cut through Lassiter's costly, brand new engagement ring before he ever had the chance to gift it to Lassiter and tries not to start panicking himself. Gus continues flailing his hand hysterically when the ring stays put.
"Shawn! Shawn, it's cutting off my circulation! Shawn, I'm going to lose this finger!"
Shawn's one second away from joining the freak out session Gus has successfully begun as he starts reciting reasons as to why he desperately needs to keep his ring finger for future endeavors when the sink echoes with a resounding metallic clinkand the ring slips through the suds on Gus' knuckle and lands directly into the sink.
And then into the drain.
The scrambling continues, two pairs of hands simultaneously attempting to stuff themselves down the sink drain to catch the ring before it lands out of reach and starts drifting into the sewage canal. Their wrists bump, the drain too miniscule to accommodate twenty fingers, and they both pull away from the drain to exchange mortified glances. Shawn whimpers, aghast, and is about to dive into the drain once more when Gus firmly wrenches his hand out.
"What did you just tell me, Shawn? Never put your body parts anywhere when you don't know if they'll be coming back. Didn't you see the plumber lose his arm by sticking his hand down the sink in Supernatural?"
"Gus, are you seriously trying to tell me you watch Supernatural for the plot, and not for Jensen Cankles' face? Because I might not believe you if you do."
"It's Jensen Ackles, Shawn."
"I've heard it—"
"No, you haven't, Shawn!" Gus snaps, nursing his abused finger and massaging at his knuckle through the soap suds, "Now open the pipes under the sink before you lose that ring for good!"
O O O O O
It takes one hour to find tools lying about the Psych office that are sufficient in unhinging sink pipes, two failed attempts at pulling the ring from the pipes with their bare hands, one plan to wade into the nearest gutter and locate the ring, and one Henry-recommended plumber before the Shawn once more sees his future with Lassiter twinkle in front of his face in the form of a wet, sudsy piece of jewelry that had quite the adventure amid the pipes.
O O O O O
Three hours past his reservation and two plates of undersized appetizers later at the elegant restaurant a few miles down from the station that will serve as the location for Lassiter and Shawn's epic engagement, Shawn realizes that nerves are not his biggest concern when it comes to performing memorably during this proposal.
Shawn's munching on his third delivery of complimentary Italian slices of bread and readjusting the bowtie that he artfully stole from his father's closet when he ignores the pit of consternation bubbling in his stomach and chances a look at the clock. Lassiter, a man who functions on punctuality and order, is more than three hours late.
It's more than a bit unsettling, especially during what is supposed to be the most important evening of Shawn's collective life, including the time Gus was sloshed enough to throw up on the prom queen during senior homecoming because Shawn had innocently spiked his punch, and Lassiter is not here. His palms are damp with an accumulation of sweat that started when he was first shimmying into his ironed dress pants, there's a bulge in his dress jacket from the protrusion of a ring box Shawn's fingers keep compulsively grabbing and tracing to assure himself of its existence in his pocket, and across the table and the frilly tablecloth and the fancy wicker basket of bread crumbs next to the shimmering candles, Lassiter's chair sits empty.
Shawn tries not to feel betrayed above all else. It was not the first time Lassiter had been stuck with dull paperwork he hadn't been able to relegate down to McNab or a rookie and didn't clock out and come home until well past midnight so Shawn and him could do little but exchange sleepy kisses and the occasional rambunctious late-night blowjob if either of them weren't too enamored with thoughts of slumber. However, it was the first time that Lassiter had conveniently forgotten to call his boyfriend and inform him of his tardiness, and as Shawn watches the minute hand on the wall clock tick incessantly by and stare at him in what can only be described as the cosmic universe being reduced to peals of laughter at the sight of Shawn Spencer attempting honest to goodness romance, he feels slightly hoodwinked.
He wonders if what truly happened was not an absent mind overlooking the need to give Shawn a ring and inform him of a delay in dinner plans, but rather an early rejection by result of Gus or Henry leaking information by accident—or potentially on purpose if Henry is still convinced that the entire idea of Shawn marrying someone as irate as Detective Carlton Lassiter is grounds for mental institutionalizing and decided to blow the whole operation by blabbing. Shawn imagines Lassiter, sitting at his desk at the station or holed up in the bathroom at home and staring wide-eyed at the wall while trying to process the horror of attempting another marriage, not with a dainty, run of the mill girl with pretty brown eyes, but with none other than Shawn Spencer. Shawn plays with the prongs of his fork, finishes the last slice of the loaf of bread left in the basket, and avoids the imploring gaze from the maître d' expectantly awaiting the rest of Shawn's party.
To lower his own inhibitions and calm his nerves, Shawn downs the glass of exorbitant wine that Gus encouraged him to purchase for the evening to impress Lassiter with faux classiness. He dabs at the gathering of sweat dotted on the back of his neck with the delicately folded napkin on the table as his mind begins imagining the worst and creating a storm of pessimism that does nothing to decrease his nerves as he starts to factor in a variable he hadn't considered before outside of losing the ring or securing Henry's approval—Lassiter not wantingto give marriage another try with Shawn.
The wine doesn't dull the sting of that thought nearly enough as a shot of tequila might, and suddenly, Shawn resents the fancy restaurant with its linen napkins and customers all dressed as if in company of royalty. He attempts to drown out the sound of prudish laughter and the clinking of silverware, and when unsuccessful in reaching his inner peace and channeling the Zen qualities of yoga instructors, Shawn is about to call the waiter forth to order a drink heavier on the alcohol when his phone buzzes in his pocket. Lassiter's name blinks up at him from the screen.
"Shawn," Lassiter's voice grinds out before Shawn can squeeze in a greeting, "Where are you."
The way Lassiter grits out the words erases all question marks and instead makes it into a commanding order the Shawn feels almost obligated to answer. For a moment, he remembers that he's the one who's supposed to be feeling dejected and rather upset after being stood up by Lassiter to the most important date either of them have ever had, including all dates involving tandem sky-diving, but leaves that fact to be addressed after he quells Lassiter's sudden distress.
"What do you mean, where am I? I'm at the restaurant! You were supposed to be here three hours ago! And unless the Winchesters showed up to ghostbust everyone at the station, you have no excuse."
"No, youwere supposed to be here three hours ago," Lassiter grumbles, and even across the phone Shawn can make out the unmistakable sound of gnashing of teeth, "I've been at this damn restaurant for hours. You could've called me!"
Shawn whirls around in his seat, scanning the restaurant. He sees a clan of elders undoubtedly celebrating another ancient birthday, a fashionable pair cozying up as they feed each other bites of cheesecake at the table in the corner, and a prissy group of gentlemen in tailored suits talking business near the front of the restaurant. Lassiter remains seemingly invisible from the throng of customers.
"I don't see you anywhere!" Shawn says into the phone, dialing his voice down to a whisper when the neighboring tables send him reproachful glowers at his lack of decorum regarding noisiness in an upscale restaurant, "I told you to come to the fancy European restaurant with the bushes shaped like dolphins two miles north of the station."
"Spencer, you said two miles east of the station."
"Are you seriously trying to tell me that there's another restaurant two miles from the station with shrubs shaped like dolphins that isn't the one I'm at?"
"I don't know! I wasn't exactly paying attention to the bushes, Shawn!"
"You should have, they were my key descriptor in getting you to the right place!"
Lassiter growls in exasperation on the other end of the line, a sound that on any other occasion would spark a hint of arousal in Shawn's chest and lace up his spine. Right now, he feels nothing but a nervous tick in his foot as the remainder of his nerves slowly untwist themselves from his muscles and the disheartening realization that tonight is not the night Lassiter agrees to become Mrs. Shawn Spencer.
O O O O O
"So Shawn," Gus says coolly over a pancake breakfast the following morning while he pours the last of the syrup onto his baked good, all the while avoiding Shawn's desperate swipes to steal the last few drops of syrupy goodness for his own pancake, both of their stacks perfectly golden in color after several charred attempts landed in the trash, "Perhaps you'd like to explain why when I checked my bank account balance last night, two hundred dollars were mysteriously missing."
Shawn promptly stuffs his mouth full of three bites worth of pancake slabs, taking his time chewing through the fluffy delicacy while Gus stares him down across the table, "Well, buddy," he burbles through a mouth of pancake bits, "I have a good explanation."
"Mmhmm," Gus waits for said explanation. Shawn swallows back his mouthful of pancake.
"Turns out, the little old ladies get mad when you try to steal flowers from their gardens," Shawn elaborates, stealing a generous glob of syrup from the peak of Gus' heap of pancakes to drizzle over his own, "So I had to fork out the dough for a few dozen bouquets to be sent to Lassie with the ring sitting on the only plastic one in the bunch. Sweet, isn't it?"
"Adorable. Read that on some teenage girl's blog?" Gus simpers.
"Gus, I'm affronted," Shawn huffs, stealing another spoonful of syrup from Gus' plate, "I already have the mind of a teenage girl, why would I have to borrow the ideas from someone else's—ow!"
Gus smacks Shawn's hand as it reaches over for a third helping of syrup, leaving an angry red handprint in the wake of his slap as Shawn pulls his palm back and rubs soothingly at his knuckles, "Stop stealing my syrup, Shawn! There's some more in the cupboard. Stop being lazy and get up to get it."
Shawn ignores him, choosing instead to lick his syrupy sticky thumb clean until the sugary mess is gone from his fingertip and manage with the amount of syrup he's managed to thieve from Gus' syrup-laden plate, "Anyway, there's been a dip in my savings since I've decided to buy an engagement ring that didn't come from the bottom of a cereal box, so I had to borrow some cash from you."
"Wait," Gus garbles mid-chew, "so you're not actually going to be there during the proposal? Lassiter's just going the find the ring on the flower and assume you're implying you want to be his wife?"
"That way, when he finds the ring, it'll be a delightful surprise for him that I'll be watching from behind the plastic plant by the Chief's office," Shawn grins, imagining the scene as Lassiter arrives at work, gasps in glee at the sight of blooming flowers enshrouding his desk, and then musters up a manly squeal for the discovery of the ring wedged onto the edge of a thorny stem.
"This sounds like a terrible idea," Gus mentions slowly, as if Shawn needs to hear the words carefully enunciated to come to the realization that his plan is in desperate need of tweaks and that his proposal will soon be laughed at by millions on YouTube if it's not reformed, "Do you know how many things could go wrong?"
"Gus, don't be the little train that couldn't," Shawn advises with the aura of wisdom normally reserved for old, crippled Asian emperors, eliciting a wrinkle in the nose out of Gus that clearly indicates he's still doubting the entire operation, "You'll ruin little kid's books everywhere."
Oh, Gus, Shawn thinks miserably as he stares in horror at the explosion of flowers surrounding McNab's desk, occupying his chair, and sitting on his paper tray, why do you always have to be right.
McNab stares at his desk in equal astonishment, several officers giggling and buzzing with talk over inappropriate lovesick behavior at the office. Dobson wrangles his way through the bouquets spilling over to his desk, delicate vases crowding around his chair as they leak out of the close-knit circle the flowers have made around McNab's working area.
"I told them to deliver it to the strapping Irish lad with hair like a salt and pepper cake mold," Shawn murmurs feebly to the ceiling where he hopes it will pierce the building and somehow make it up to the cosmos, where the universal overlords overlooking his fate are surely in doubling over in laughter, "How did this happen?"
"Someone has a secret admirer!" A young officer coos from her desk a few feet away from the indoor garden that has become McNab's work space, and several more officers start up in whispers of adultery and infidelity in marriage.
"Um," McNab says, clearly too befuddled to articulate much more, mouth hanging open as he takes in the sight of the virtual greenhouse presented in front of him, keyboard and computer monitor crowded with tulips and chair laden with lilies. Gus, standing a few feet behind Shawn as if to distance himself from his mess, pats McNab on the shoulder in consolation.
"I'm sure this was all just a misunderstanding," Gus tells him, and McNab nods dumbly. It only takes two more seconds of dumbfounded staring from both McNab and Shawn while Gus shakes his head in wordless disapproval at Shawn's inability to propose to the right officer and create breeding grounds for bees and insects of all families within the Santa Barbara police station until the Chief traipses from her office, Lassiter and Juliet trailing after her. All three stop dead in their tracks.
"Wow," Juliet breathes out at the sight of the colorful jungle growing in front of her, "Is it you and your wife's anniversary, McNab?"
McNab turns around at Juliet's voice, face paling at the sight of the Chief's flabbergasted expression and Lassiter's wide eyes. Gus leans discreetly over to Shawn, mumbling by his ear, "Shawn, you might want to get your ring back in your pocket before someone else finds it and thinks McNab has a mistress."
Shawn lets out a string of hushed swear words, postponing the inevitable bang of his forehead against the nearest wall to a situation harboring less pressure than the one he's been cruelly forced into. He takes in the sight of the flowers, a myriad of bouquets littered among the floor and the desktop.
"Dude," Shawn whispers to Gus, "this may not be the best time to bring this up considering I don't remember which vase the ring is in, but I think they totally undercharged us for all of these flowers."
Gus spews a slew of unidentifiable words and syllables at the horrifying knowledge that a priceless ring that could easily pay off a mortgage on a beachfront property house is lost amid the sea of floral bouquets blinking up at them innocently. Shawn claps him on the back until his hissing stops.
"How can you not know, Shawn?" He demands, lowering his voice to a hush as the Chief begins circling the mass of flowers as if she hardly believes her own eyesight, "Didn't they tell you which vase it was in?"
"No!" Shawn hisses back, and promptly quells his onslaught of anxiety at the thought of losing a ring during his attempted proposal, forcing his mind to slow down to focus on his observational skills. He scans the bouquets, noting each petal and the length of each stem before he finally notices a pristine batch of flowers sitting atop McNab's desk, differing from the rest with a small white card hanging from the neck of the vase. Shawn remembers it as the slightly raunchy proposal limerick he had rhymed on the spot and asked the florists to print on a tag to loop around the crown bouquet, snatching forward to snag the card, pull the flowers from their vase, and grab the ring lodged securely onto the bottom of two stems, stuffing it into his pocket and swiveling around to face the crowd.
"McNab, would you happen to know who would send you something like this to your workplace—"
"Oh nooooo!" Shawn cries, thumping the roses onto his nose and shrugging at the audience of officers, "Our fault, you guys. This wasn't Buzz over here trying to make up for forgetting to buy everyone chocolates on Valentine's Day."
"This is your doing, Mr. Spencer?" Chief Vick asks, her voice laced with an undeniable tone of irritation as she addresses him, as if speaking specifically to a bothersome crick in her neck. Juliet raises her eyebrows and Lassiter fixes him with a stare that tells Shawn he may or may not be enjoying sex with his boyfriend tonight after unnecessarily disturbing the police department with something as inane as a storm of floral arrangements.
"Well," Shawn says, slowly handing out individual roses from the bouquet still in his fist as peace offerings, "They were meantfor the churro guy down the street. I mean, the health department might call his sanitation level inadequate, but that perfect sprinkling of cinnamon just needs to be commended."
For a second, the officers shuffle as they watch the scene and Chief Vick fixes Shawn with a hard stare as he fists the ring in his pocket before she sighs heavily. "Fine," she mumbles, snatching the remaining rose from Shawn's hand and heading for her office, "Just get them out of here, please, Mr. Spencer, and apologize to Officer McNab."
"Sorry, Nabby," Shawn says with a sincere pat to McNab's shoulder as he and Gus start piling vases in their arms to clean up the disaster, Lassiter's hand on his elbow pulling him away a second later.
"You're not trying to ask McNab out, are you?" He asks, rather quietly, eyeing the collection of flowers as if suspicious of their intentions, and Shawn unclenches the ring in his pocket to affectionately pat Lassiter's cheek.
"Please, Lassie," Shawn admonishes, "if I wanted a married man, I'd turn you into one myself."
O O O O O
It doesn't take too long for Shawn to shake off the unmitigated disaster his first and second proposal attempts were. He realizes that if there is anything that encapsulates Shawn Spencer, a posh and elegant restaurant in which he has to lick back his hair and wear a necktie in order to make it through the door without being mistaken for a No Good ruffian or delivering bouquets arranged in a floral waterfall is not it. If Lassiter loves him—a fact that Shawn isn't willing to test but accepts wordlessly as a universal truth, like the sun being hot or the earth turning in an orbit—he'll be willing to endure a proposal that isn't borrowed from a prim and prissy executive with a fondness for miniscule appetizers, but rather derived from boyish imagination and original Spencer charm.
"So after work, don't come home," Shawn tells Lassiter from the sleepy comfort of their bed as he squirms to monopolize the entire mattress with his limbs as Lassiter shimmies out from underneath the sheets to locate his clothing and prepare for another early day at work, sliding over to Lassiter's side of the bed to burrow into the warm patch Lassiter's body heat left on the mattress and breathe in the faint scent of his shampoo on the pillow. Shawn closes his eyes against the light of the sunrise filtering through the blinds as he detects the sounds of a clinking belt buckle being fastened and the rustle of fabric as Lassiter buttons up his shirt.
"You do know this is my place, right? You can't exactly kick me out."
Shawn pries open one eye, vision still blurred from vestiges of sleep and groggy morning slumber, and grins, "I have plans for us. We're going to the beach for a rendezvous in the sunset to prance and frolic in the sand and whatever else they might do on Laguna Beachminus the teenage drama."
"Shawn, I already said no to sex on the beach," Lassiter says curtly, tucking in his shirt, and then repeats for emphasis, "No. You can get all sorts of diseases—"
"As much as the idea of diseases on the beach turns me on, we're not going there for sex. I told you, I've got plans," Shawn reaches out to seize Lassiter's wrist and yank him unceremoniously back onto the wrinkled sheets, looping his arms around his waist and dragging him closer as Shawn lets his eyes flutter closed again. He undoes any progress Lassiter made dressing himself by impatiently tugging at the buttons and nuzzling his stomach. Lassiter's breath hitches and Shawn grins against his bare belly, using Lassiter's ephemeral lapse into pleasure to let his fingers flirt with his zipper and successfully unbutton his pants. He worms his hand into his boxers and wraps his fingers around Lassiter's length, smirking as his erection steadily takes interest.
"Shawn," Lassiter murmurs as a warning, swaying on the bed as if contemplating getting up and removing the option of early morning handjobs from his schedule or risking a late entrance to the meeting the Chief had planned for the morning by succumbing to Shawn's wandering fingers, now picking up a rhythmic stroke on his cock and gently squeezing, "Spencer," he says when Shawn's left hand continues to roam and his right hand picks up his pace, "I've got work."
"And I've got a pineapple waiting for me in the kitchen, we've all got plans," Shawn murmurs, sinking his teeth into Lassiter's hip in a teasing nip and rubbing at his inner thigh through the fabric of his pants with his free hand, "Prioritize, Lassie."
Lassiter groans, a sign Shawn has learned to mean that he's submitted himself to Shawn's antics and games despite his better judgment, and firmly pushes Shawn until he's supine and willing on the bed, straddling his hips and pushing their lips together in a dry, warm kiss that tastes like minty toothpaste.
"Fine, I'll come to the beach after I get done in the station," Lassiter acquiesces on Shawn's lips, "this time let's just make sure it's the same beach."
"And no sex, right?" Shawn says, grinning and bucking up against Lassiter's clothed hips, "Could I perhaps interest you in some dry humping?"
"We'll see," Lassiter mumbles on the crook of Shawn's neck, nose dragging over the bristles of his stubble and tongue darting out to flit over his pulse while his hand wanders southward to palm Shawn's length, neglected before now, and Shawn wraps his legs around Lassiter's hips with a fervor he was too groggy to possess a mere few minutes before.
So far, this whole proposal thing was working out splendidly.
O O O O O
It takes Shawn two and a half hours to properly prepare a picnic basket appropriate for a soothing dinner at the beach and slightly suggestive dessert that leads to Shawn kneeling in the sand and pulling the ring from his swim shorts to propose in the radiance of the sunset while the waves crash picturesquely behind his figure. Calling Henry for tips in searing lobster offers Shawn more frustration than it does help when the phone call morphs from cooking advice into a pro-con list establishing reasons for why Shawn believes he's mature enough to handle something as significant as marriage, and so, when Gus ditches Shawn and his cuisine dilemma in favor of finishing his pharmaceutical route at work, Shawn has to turn to his last resort and turn on the cooking channel for a step-by-step instruction manual on how to cook lobster.
He ends up being coached by Paula Deen for the better part of an hour until he's succeeded in preparing a succulent yet slightly over-buttered lobster and an easily packaged pineapple upside-down cake that Shawn knows, as his specialty, he can't go wrong with. He changes into his swim trunks, makes the effort to shave until his jaw is silky smooth, and hauls out the Tupperware to stack his snacks into before he heads out to the beach and lays out the enormous beach towel he and Gus used to use as Captain-America-goes-to-Malibu capes.
Shawn's only sprawled out in the dimming sun forming sandcastles for fifteen minutes before he makes out Lassiter's form in the distance stalking through the sand, and the fact that he is neither late nor is he across town is a sign that Shawn views as serious good luck in comparison to his last proposal attempt. He grins and waves in Lassiter's direction until he's safeguarded his attention.
"Lassie!" Shawn calls out as Lassiter approaches the towel and unknots his tie as it flutters in the breeze. "Why aren't you in your swim trunks?" He wiggles his hips, clad in nothing but swim shorts adorned with patterned sea shells, and Lassiter frowns.
"You didn't say anything about swim shorts."
Shawn shrugs and pats the sandy spot on the towel next to him, reaching behind his back to seize the picnic basket handle, "Wait for iiiiiiiit," he whips the basket in front of Lassiter's face and beams in pride, "Handmade dinner. Cue the applause."
Lassiter opens the basket and peers inside as he settles himself on the towel, expression slightly impressed as he rummages through the various boxes of Tupperware stacked with sundry snacks all chopped, gathered, and prepared by hand. He's about to offer some laudatory praise for Shawn's gourmet skills when horror washes over his face.
"Oh god, I forgot an anniversary, didn't I," Lassiter mutters, forefinger and thumb rubbing at the bridge of his nose in an attempt to mollify his own withering memory when Shawn pulls his hand down from his nose and slots their fingers together.
"Unless you count National Pancake Day, you missed nothing," Shawn paused, wavering in his thought process, "Maybe it shouldcount, considering how important pancakes are."
"Then what's this all about?" Lassiter inquires, his disappointment in himself in allowing his memory to lapse regarding benchmarks in his and Shawn's relationship giving way to suspicion as Shawn pulls two tall wine glasses, albeit plastic glasses, from the basket and then proceeds to reveal a wine bottle from the caverns of the basket a moment later.
"What, just because you're not a girl I can't treat you like a princess?" Shawn asks innocently, pulling the bottle of wine from Lassiter's fingers to smugly display the label, "I found your favorite, Monsieur."
"All of this for… no reason?" Lassiter narrows his eyes as Shawn uncorks the bottle and pours a generous helping of wine into Lassiter's glass, "Do you want something? There's only so many parking tickets of yours I can take care of before the Chief gets suspicious, Shawn."
Shawn puts down the wine and rolls his eyes at Lassiter's poorly concealed qualms for tonight's true intents and purposes, "Oh, Carly, you were a skeptic years ago and you're a skeptic now."
"Years ago you tried to tell me you're a psychic," Lassiter points out, "I was right to be skeptical."
Shawn lets the disagreement pass by in favor of maintaining a serene atmosphere for a proposal free of lover's spats, reaching out to grip Lassiter's chin with his thumb and push their lips softly together. Lassiter stills, the tension knitting his eyebrows together dissolving as Shawn angles their mouths together and licks over the seam of Lassiter's lips. A crashing wave tickles at Shawn's feet, frothy seawater startling his toes and breaking their brief kiss.
"It is time, Lassieface, to start doubting your doubts," Shawn tells him, thumb running over the pad of his bottom lip, "I am as romantic as Prince Charming, but with better hair and without a foot fetish," he tips Lassiter's wine glass up to his lips while he reaches into the picnic basket and pulls out his packaged lobster meat, pulling out a handful and nudging at Lassiter's lips. "Open up!"
Lassiter puts the wine glass atop the basket after a few sips and obediently opens his mouth. Shawn takes a moment to feel pleased at the fact that Lassiter didn't feel the need to examine the meat or question Shawn's cooking abilities before opening his mouth and sampling a bite of buttery lobster.
"Hmmm," Lassiter murmurs as he chews, "You made this yourself?"
"I admit, some credit should go to Paula Deen's country cooking recipes," Shawn shrugs, unloading the rest of the Tupperware onto the towel for broad display. He pops a piece of lobster meat in his own mouth, mmming appreciatively upon discovering his newfound skill for creating culinary masterpieces. "Damn, Carly Horse! I'm the next Alton Brown."
He eases another bite of lobster into Lassiter's mouth and catches sight of the sun, dipping under the horizon line and leaving in its wake puffs of golden clouds. The vanishing daylight serves as a cue for Shawn to start brandishing the ring and work his magic. He reaches for the ring box hidden discreetly in the pocket of his swim trunks, and is promptly horrified to find his pocket to be lacking a certain square-shaped bump.
"Holy shit, I lost it," Shawn mutters, hands scrambling to rummage through the mounds of sand under the towel and search for the jewelry amid the architectural masterpiece his sand castle was before Shawn's hands delivered irreparable destruction to its delicate walls in his frantic search.
"What kind of spices did you use on this?" Lassiter asks, a hint of skepticism crawling back into his voice as he rubs idly at his own lower lip and continues chewing into the lobster, "It burns a bit."
"Burns?" Shawn parrots back incredulously, but he's not truly processing the words Lassiter's speaking, mind too busy urgently rifling through all of the potential locations his ring could now reside and hands too occupied digging hysterically through the sand.
"Yeah, it stings my tongue just a bit," Lassiter mentions, continuing to rub at his mouth as he swallows back the lobster. Shawn hums absent-mindedly at his comment, continuing to pat himself down until he comes across the box sitting innocently in the other, unsearched pocket of his swimming trunks. He breathes a sigh of relief, about to brandish the ring in triumph under Lassiter's nose, when he turns around and notices an angry line of red welts swelling to furious sizes around Lassiter's mouth. Lassiter continues scratching with his fingernail, the flesh surrounding his lips only continuing to balloon to puffier heights.
"Holy shit!" Shawn shouts at the sight of Lassiter's face.
"Spencer, what the hell did you feed me?" Lassiter demands as his fingers begin prodding around his cheeks and jaw, skin enlarging and tinged a cantankerous shade of scarlet.
"It was just lobster, I swear! This didn't happen to Paula Deen!" Shawn scrambles to pull the Tupperware of lobster bits away from Lassiter's grip, staring in horror as the redness spreads.
"I'm allergic to lobster! How do you not know that?" Lassiter roars, and as if the labeling of the food he just ingested caps off the allergic reaction, he promptly grabs his stomach and focuses on breathing as he staggers off the towel, heading straight for the ocean even as the waves splash and lick around his ankles, seawater seeping into his polished shoes.
"You're not going to die, are you? I mean, you can still breathe, right, Carly? Oh, I'm the worst boyfriend ever," Shawn groans, refraining from the temptation of burying his head in the sand and refusing to come up for air. He watches as Lassiter stumbles and wades through the waves up to his knees and after several coughing fits in which he almost hacks up a few internal organs, begins retching into the teal waves. Shawn imagines his boyfriend's throat, slowly swelling and denying entry to all oxygen, lobster-chunked bile trapped in his stomach and left hand still free of the ring sitting limp in Shawn's hand, now forgotten in favor of more pressing matters of potentially lethal allergies.
This, Shawn thinks, as Lassiter heaves another string of stomach acid and chewed bits of lobster meat into the sea, is not the proposal he had planned.
O O O O O
After the repercussions of two utterly failed proposals that were beyond repair despite their initial brilliance and their supposed lack of troublesome loopholes, Shawn starts needing the counseling and encouragement that only fresh banana splits and a fluffed cotton bathrobe can provide.
He's lounging on the couch, wallowing in his inadequacy as a husband-to-be while nursing his bowl of thawing ice cream scoops and starting to question what fate and the universe and karma might have to do with all of this, and if never calling back his ninth grade crush after an awkward date at the bowling alley is now coming back as revenge to keep him from successfully proposing to Lassiter with a hint of romance and grace. Shawn thinks about his plans—beachside engagements complete with picnic baskets of semi-edible snacks and reservations at an elegant, five-star restaurant so expensive even the napkins were out of Shawn's price range—and wonders woefully if this is a sign from the omniscient deities warning him to give a rest to his tragically beautiful proposal dreams before Lassiter accidentally dislocates his shoulder the next time Shawn whips out his ring and his well-rehearsed speech of everlasting love.
"So maybe it's taking a little longer than you thought it would to get this whole engagement thing right," Gus dares to pipe up as he notices Shawn burrowing into the couch cushions, snatching his bowl of ice cream away, "Is this my banana ice cream? You did noteat the rest of my banana ice cream, Shawn!"
Shawn makes futile swipes for the bowl from his slothful position on the couch. Gus holds it out of his reach and promptly spoons up the remainder of the scoops that aren't melted in a yellow pool at the bottom of the bowl. Shawn whines and writhes on the cushions in his plush robe until Gus huffs at him.
"What I was trying to say was that so what if it's taking a while? It took a while for Lassiter to even agree to date you in the first place."
"That's only because he was blinded by love and the power of his feelings scared him, Gus," Shawn insists, "I'm a frightening prospect to take in and process."
"Shawn, would you listen to me?" Gus persists, "Nothing with Lassiter is ever going to be easy. It took the man a good few years before he could even stand the sight of your face."
Shawn idly brings a hand to his face, stroking his jaw and the bristles of his untamed stubble after days of leaving shaving to the wayside in preference of moping on the sofa. He thinks of Lassiter, hunched over the moist sand while he retches helplessly into the waves, his face highlighted by a radiant glow from the sunset that would have been wretchedly romantic in any other situation that didn't include rabid vomiting into the ocean, and tries not to groan out loud. Gus smacks him over the head.
"Ow!"
"Stop thinking about Lassiter throwing up!" Gus orders, "This isn't the hard part, Shawn. After this is wedding planning and dealing with in-laws and what I can predict without the help of fake psychic premonitions might be a seriously nasty divorce when Lassiter finds out you have a habit of eating all the peanut butter without having the courtesy to leave some for other people's peanut butter and jelly sandwiches!"
Shawn plays with the frayed hem of his robe's sleeve and considers the difficulty to come after the engagement actually commences, from finding a caterer willing to incorporate pineapple garnishes into every course to dealing with Henry's nitpicking over the font used on the invitation and the visibility of his vantage point from his seat during the ceremony.
"You're right, Gus," Shawn admits, "You're going to be an absolute nightmare to deal with as my best man."
Gus pauses his nuptials lecture to frown at Shawn before continuing, "Shawn, I know you don't mean that, because I am an absolute pleasure to be around during upscale events. You know I'm an organization guru. You know I have a spatial eye that'll come in handy when you're looking for venues. I'll be the best man to ever best."
Shawn spares his friend a glance before returning to his previous task of addressing the ceiling. He stares at the splat of faint pink on the ceiling from when he attempted to make Lassiter a strawberry smoothie when he visited the Psych office for lunch and Shawn failed to remember to screw on the blender lid.
"I don't know, Gus," Shawn says uneasily, eyes moving from the stain to an unblemished portion of the ceiling and mind riveting back to the memory of Lassiter barfing over a romantic picnic that Shawn has no hope of ever successfully repressing from his memory, "Maybe this whole proposal thing is just doomed."
"Shawn, I will pull you off that couch myself," Gus warns in a no-nonsense tone that Shawn knows well enough to mark as a turn in Gus' mood that implies he's no longer amused with Shawn's lack of cooperation, "The only way that this is a bad proposal is if he says no."
Shawn gropes helplessly under the couch, fingernails scraping the floorboards until he finds the jewelry box he had hidden under the sofa in shame, pulling it out of the shadows and wads of dust under the couch to open the box and examine the shiny ring, unworn and in mint condition, the money he had saved for his clone of Val Kilmer deposited instead in the benchmark for his and Lassiter's life together. He lets the light bounce off the crystal and ruminates, ruminates about how his father doubted the validity of Shawn's proposal idea from the start, about how over a dozen bouquets of tulips had invaded McNab's desk instead of Lassiter's, about how many times the ring Shawn chose for Lassiter was nearly flushed, trashed, or lost in the sand. He looks up at Gus, hands on his hips and face set crossly with sass Shawn only ever witnesses on his friend when he's pulling out the strongest motivation tactics he has in his disposal, and snaps the ring box shut.
"You know what, Gus?" Shawn says, swinging his legs over the couch and hands reaching to undo the knot on his robe after he slips the ring into his pants pocket, "You're right, buddy. You're definitely right. And Lassie saying no? Is the onething I don't have to be worried about!"
Gus beams and claps Shawn on the back as he discards of the robe and throws it onto the lampshade, "You know that's right. You got your ego back?"
"Please, Gus, it never left me. It just went for a coffee break," Shawn grins, familiar light of mischief dotting his eyes, the same light that's present when they're scheming against Henry during April Fool's Day or when they're reminiscing the pranks they pulled on their sixth grade gym coach, "Now, can you drive me to the police station?"
Gus blinks, "Are you going to do it now?"
"Yes, Gus! Now! I'm on a roll. I feel it in my blood. It's ringing wedding bells," Shawn slips on his shoes, pausing to catch a glimpse of himself in the mirror and analyze his general appearance, "Hmm. Before I make it to the altar, I might need to put on some deodorant."
O O O O O
Shawn fixedly ignores the pumping of his heart against his ribcage as he walks through the station, palpitations surely about to pulverize his ribs and leave nothing but whistling air protecting his heart while he vomits his heart out to Lassiter and channels Leonardo DiCaprio's irresistible charm that always makes the ladies swoon in the movies. He skids to a sudden stop at Lassiter's desk and wipes his sweaty palms off on his jeans.
Lassiter notices the extra presence around his desk two seconds after Shawn arrives, wavering dumbly on the spot and attempting to find the right words to accurately articulate his emotion—how he rooted through the grimy pipes under his sink to find Lassiter's ring, how he watched Paula Deen make lobster for an entire hour so he could create the perfect meal for their proposal, how he wanted nothing more than to make this proposal the most memorable thing his children and grandchildren and the entire police station would ever chatter about, how he went through all of this because he's in love with Lassiter despite all of the signs steering him away from commitment and trying to throw him back into bachelorhood. The words lodge themselves into his throat.
"Shawn," Lassiter says as if pleasantly surprised by the unexpected visit when he looks up from his desk. His eyes are blue, very blue, and Shawn tries not to get distracted by them. He thinks about how many times he's stared into Lassiter's eyes, the startling color of a summer pool before the children start turning it into a murky yellow by ignoring the no urination in the pool, please sign.
"I love you, you big Irish penguin," Shawn spews helplessly, as if opening his mouth caused a torrent of nonsense to freefall out.
"Uh, that doesn't make any sense," Gus adds unnecessarily from a few feet behind Shawn, who Shawn eloquently ignores.
"I can't even tell you why. If I tried to write a list of reasons why, I'd get a big fat F on my paper because I would have no idea where to start," Shawn rambles, and is about to continue ranting with his eighth grade assignment analogy when Gus helpfully nudges him in the small of his back. "And I already see your face in my bed every morning, which is nice, and now I just want to make sure I'll keeping it for a while. Forever, if that's not as long and scary as everyone says it is. It's like—you know the feeling when you're hungry and you go to the fridge and it's full of food and you can't find anything you want, but you keep coming back every five minutes waiting for something you want? Well, you're that thing I want, Lassie. I don't have to go back to the fridge."
"Shawn, what's going on?" Lassiter mumbles, eyes zipping left and right to where a few officers have stopped working to watch the scene play out in front of them, as if expecting hundreds of floral bouquets to once more walk into the station and monopolize the working space.
Shawn pulls the ring out from his pocket and holds it out. A second later he feels the firm push of Gus' hand on his shoulder and promptly remembers that he should be kneeling for this. Juliet, approaching Lassiter's desk with evidence for their latest case, swiftly drops her file and gasps at the sight.
"I kept trying to complicate this and make this special and cook lobster and screw everything up—but dude, this already is special! All I have to do is tell you that I don't even mind if you'll stop shaving when you hit sixty and that I am totally meant to be with you because I'm the only one who'll tolerate your annoying little habits all day long and still want to kiss you at the end of the day! So," Shawn takes a deep breath and takes in the stunning, resonant silence in the police station as not even a phone begins trilling with a disruptive ring, "Will you marry me, Lassie?"
For another few petrifying seconds that pass by as if being lugged through molasses, there is deafening silence. Then, after a slow exhale, Lassiter says, "I can't believe I'm about to say yes," and the cheers begin. Gus applauds, Juliet squeals, and a good handful of police officers clap both Lassiter and Shawn on the back in lieu of congratulations as the applause wracks the station for a good minute before Shawn grabs onto Lassiter's lapels for support and plants a sound kiss on his mouth to ring in the deal.
"So now that we can discuss this," Shawn says after a kiss that leaves him feeling slightly disoriented comes to a breathless end, "How do you feel about lace on your wedding dress? Yay or nay?"
Lassiter grabs the ring from Shawn's hand, jams it onto his finger, and shuts Shawn up with his mouth once more instead of answering.