AN: Just a light-hearted bit of fluff, not to be taken too seriously and most definitely a one-shot!
Not The End Of The World
Harmon Rabb had sat frozen, in stunned disbelief on his bar stool, his drink, forgotten and untouched in front of him.
What the hell just happened here? he had asked himself, as he watched her leave McMurphy's with an exaggerated sway of her hips, which drew the eyes of practically every man in the place to her butt. And he dimly recognised through his shock that, in those tight jeans, it was definitely worth a look, or two, or three.
But that wasn't the point, the still rational fragment of his brain pointed out.
But she had never seemed the type to wear jeans, he argued, especially not jeans that tight.
Get back on the point Rabb!
Yes, but with jeans that tight, there should have been VPL, but there wasn't, so that meant she must have been going commando, and that was so unlike her that...
Rabb! Point! Now!
Yeah, right, back on the point, two points really, he'd meant, that T-shirt didn't leave much to the imagination... OK, most of it had been hidden by her leather jacket - and that was another thing, leather jacket, T-shirt, Jeans and boots? Like a seventies' wet dream of a biker-chick or something out of a Mad Max movie...
Rabb, will you just get your mind out of the gutter and get back with the programme, please!
OK, let's just recap here, then, shall we? It had all gone horribly wrong this morning. Not that this morning had really been the start of it. No, that had happened when she, no, not her, the other she, had come into the office with that dumb ring on her hand. Yeah, OK, it had been her right hand - then, and then that stupid, arrogant Australian bastard had come back to DC, 'to be with the woman he loved' - oh, c'mon, how puke making was that? Then to cap it all, he'd nearly lost his hearing this morning when Harriett had squealed when she spotted the ring had been moved to her left hand. She had done it! She had agreed to marry the one man he'd ever met whom he really loathed! No. not Harriett, her, the one with the ring.
Oh, get over yourself! She's a beautiful woman; did you expect her to put her whole life on hold just because you didn't want her? Suck it up flyboy; you practically pushed her into his arms.
No, he protested, it wasn't like that, she'd been blowing hot and cold ever since he'd come back to JAG and shoving her promotion in his face every five minutes, then she suddenly springs a 'I want to get hot 'n' heavy' deal on him, without any warning. She'd sent him into a full-blown tail-spin, with both engines flamed-out and an ejection-seat misfire. He'd just needed a bit of time to process...
A bit of time? How much freaking time did you want? You'd known her for nearly five years; you'd been in love with her for practically all that time, what the hell was there to 'process'.
Well, what she said, it was like what happens in Aus stays in Aus. Yeah, right, he was - he had been - in love with her, but it sounded like she'd just wanted a one night stand, a fling that would end when they got home; he'd wanted more, so much more than that, but that deal wasn't even in the same boardroom, let alone on the table!
Why the hell do I even bother with you, you dumbass? She's a passionate woman, and she finally admits that she wanted you, and you turned her down - even you gotta admit that! If you'd had a pair and just said yes, it could have been your ring that she's wearing today! Sheesh! No wonder she turned to him after you rejected her!
He hadn't rejected her, he'd just needed a little more time, if she'd really loved him, she could have waited! And then to go straight from him to him! No, not him, the other him, the obnoxious Australian him.
What? After you hurt her that badly? Of course she went to him - she was trying to hurt you back!
Yeah? Well she damn well succeeded! And she wasn't the only one! Kate, his old partner and one-time lover, had been in town, she'd been in the bull-pen when Harriett's one-hundred-thousand decibel shriek had rousted out every pigeon in DC and the surrounding states! She'd seen through his cheerful, semi-congratulatory comments, she'd seen how much he was hurting, but then, when he'd called her that afternoon, inviting her to come for a drink, she'd said no, she wasn't going to fall into the same trap that he had; she wasn't going to become his fall-back girl, his second stringer. She'd enjoyed the time they'd had together all those years ago, but no, it was over a long time ago, and besides he didn't need a third woman in his life! What third woman he'd wanted to know, but she had just laughed and told him to get smart.
So, he'd ended up here. In McMurphy's. Alone. Except for a few shots of Tequila. And he hadn't had nearly enough of those when she came in. No, not her, the other she, the one with the tight jeans and the perky...
Hey! Watch your helm, sailor!
Yeah, alright, alright, already! So, she'd walked in, walked up to him, and asked if the bar-stool next his was free. Sure, go ahead, he'd told her; it's a free country, wondering what the hell she was doing there. She'd told the bartender to give her whatever he was drinking. No, not the bartender, but he, him. Then she'd commented on the news of the day; everybody at JAG was talking about it. She had finally said yes to the Australian. No, not her, the other one, the one who'd been in Australia with him, not the one next to him, the blonde one in that thin T-shirt and no bra...
Belay that, Commander!
Sheesh! Give me a break, will you! Anyway then she'd told him that she could guess how he felt. And that she was sorry for his pain, and she knew what he was going through. As if! But it wasn't the end of the world after all, she'd told him. It sure as hell felt like it had been his response. No, she'd assured him; she'd been in love once, and had had her heart broken, and she thought that it had been the end of the world, and then when she had least been expecting it, when she'd almost given up all hope, she'd fallen in love all over again. And he could too, if he only gave himself a chance.
And how had that worked out he'd wanted to know.
She'd answered that she'd let him know, when she found out. And then she'd stood on the rung of the bar-stool and had reached up and kissed him. And then when he hadn't responded, so shocked had he been, he'd felt the point of her tongue probing his lips and then he had responded. A lot. And then, when they'd run out of oxygen, she'd broken off the kiss to a chorus of cheers and approving whistles from the other bar patrons. Then she'd smiled at him and reminded him that it wasn't the end of the world, hopped down off the stool and had sashayed - that was the only word for it - out of the bar.
Leaving him frozen, in stunned disbelief on his bar stool, his drink, forgotten and untouched in front of him, and wondering what the hell had just happened.
Now sitting in his home office, with an open case-file in front of him, he could hear her in the nursery, singing little Matthew to sleep. And he remembered what the hell had just happened that evening in McMurphy's five years ago: He had just been very publicly, very thoroughly and very passionately kissed for the first time by Lieutenant Loren Singer, the Ice Queen of JAG. And she had been right; it had so not been the end of the world!