Title: Photos and Favors
Summary: Morgan asks Sarah for a favor.
Rating: K (plus) . For: minor language (minor as in: blink and you might mistake it for another word).
Minor spoilers for 1x12, and 1x13.
Author's note: I don't think I'm the only one who missed Anna during the Chuck sandwich, so this was partly inspired by that. Funnily enough, she doesn't actually make an appearance.
Disclaimer: NBC owns Chuck. They're not letting him go. :)
Sarah drops a fresh batch of frozen fries into the vat when the bell on the door tinkles. She turns around, and can't help but smile a little when she catches a glimpse of a green polo.
"Hey, Morgan. What can I do for you?"
"Hello, Sarah. How are you?" he asks as he ambles up to the counter.
She lets a little laugh escape her lips. Morgan could be endearing sometimes. "My shift's almost over, so I'm fine. You?"
"I'm good. I'm good." He draws the last word out, as if he's afraid of continuing.
She narrows her eyes, studying him. "Is something wrong, Morgan?"
"Oh, no. No, no!" He pauses. "But actually, I do have something to ask you."
"Okay, shoot," she says, wiping off the counter.
He rubs his hands together a little nervously. "First, though, I think I will sample one of those delicious wieners."
"Smart move, Grimes. Very smart move," Sarah jokes and hands him a corndog fresh from the fryer.
He grins, taking a large bite.
"I guess I owe you one after the other night anyways," she continues more seriously. "Thanks again for taking care of Ellie. I'm sorry I ran out like that."
He waves her apology off. "Ah, no. We're all friends, right? Friends don't keep score."
It's funny how a few little words uttered by Morgan Grimes can hold so much meaning for her. She's so used to thinking in CIA terms, so used to bargaining, that she can't seem to shut that part of her brain off. It's difficult for her, sometimes, to be so painfully aware of everything – every move and every sound – when she's just spending a night with Chuck and Ellie and Morgan. She wishes she could just unwind and relax without having to worry about what secrets will slip from her loosened lips.
The timer beeps, pulls her from her thoughts. She lifts the basket from the fryer, and shakes the excess grease from the fries.
"Mmm . . . those look scrumptious."
She sends him a look of amusement. "I already said you can ask me anything."
"No, seriously – scrumptious. I'll take some of those, too."
She laughs and rings up the fries and corndog for him. She gives him the employee discount, but only because Chuck's not working today and she's not really in the mood for Weinerlicious food.
"So, Sarah, I was wondering if you could help me out with something. I wanted to get Anna a little gift, just to show her that I care about her. But I'm not quite sure what to get her, 'cause it's not any special day or anything."
Sarah's shocked. Shocked because Morgan's caring enough to get his girlfriend an unexpected gift. Shocked because he's thoughtful enough to ask for a woman's opinion. But mostly shocked because she feels so utterly inadequate. She fits very neatly into her life with the CIA, but this is strange, new territory for her.
"Wow, Morgan. I'd love to help you, but I actually don't know Anna that well. Wouldn't Ellie be the better choice?" She begs off with a slight smile, hoping he'll let her off the hook.
"No, Sarah. I'm sorry, but you saw Anna at Thanksgiving dinner. It was a disaster! If she knew Ellie helped pick out the gift, she'd freak!"
Sarah knew he was right.
Damn.
"So, what'd you have in mind, Morgan?" Sarah asks as they wander through the mall. They must look like an odd pair – he in his Buy More green, she in her Wienerlicious outfit. Seeing that he won't come within a foot of her, she smiles slightly. She attributes it to his respect – both for his best friend and for his girlfriend. And in turn, she discovers a newfound respect for him.
"Uh," he breathes out, "Now this is just brainstorming, but I was thinking maybe a sweater."
"A sweater?" She's not very good at this, picking out personal gifts for people you're supposed to know very well, but even she can tell that this is a bad idea. "Morgan, I don't know." She takes a sip of cola, buying some time to arrange her thoughts. "A sweater is, you know, nice, but it's something your grandma always gave you for Christmas, right? It's not the best for an unexpected gift. Maybe for her birthday, if you had another gift to go along with it, but not for a special, out-of-the-blue kind of present."
He narrows his eyes, nodding his head. "Yeah, I got ya. Okay." They stop walking and he looks around at the glaring colors of the stores surrounding them. There's a video game store, which he is no doubt fighting the urge to go into right now. Next to it are a few more clothing stores, a book shop, a furniture store. His eyes fall on a jewelry shop. "What about a nice necklace or something? Earrings, maybe?"
Sarah considers this. "How long have you two been going out?"
"About two, three months."
She's really not sure. She would love a necklace, but Anna? Would Anna appreciate a gift like that? And isn't jewelry kind of a big gift after only a few months of dating? Sarah contorts her mouth a bit, thinking.
Morgan takes it as a sign to panic. "You don't like that idea? Too serious, right?"
"No!" she tries to calm him down. "No, it's not that. Well, maybe. I don't know. It's just that . . . I don't really know Anna that well, and I'm not sure what kind of jewelry she'd like." The explanation comes out slowly and uncertainly, confusing Sarah. What happened to her incredibly honed spy instincts? Instincts which, in a high-danger situation, would have allowed her to come up with a much better explanation in a much more convincing tone. She has to laugh at herself – a world-weary spy, falling apart in the face of a small problem like picking out a gift for her friend's girlfriend.
Morgan spots a soft pretzel kiosk a ways down the mall and she thinks she might have lost him. "Sarah," he says calmly, "Sarah, I'm gonna go get some brain food, because I'm starting to feel I'm in way over my head."
She's amazed that he has the stomach to eat a soft pretzel after downing a corndog and fries less than fifteen minutes ago, but recognizes that he is starting to freak out. "It's okay, Morgan. It's going to be okay. We'll figure this thing out," she says, following him down the walk.
He looks up at her gratefully, and she gives him a friendly smile. At the beginning of this assignment, she was worried that she'd get easily fed up with Morgan. But after getting to know him a bit better, she has to admit, he's got his good qualities. And she can definitely understand why he and Chuck are friends. She can only imagine what it was like for Chuck after Stanford, coming home after losing the future he had hoped for. But coming home to his sister and to his fiercely loyal best friend must have been a relief.
As Morgan pays for his cinnamon-sugar pretzel, Sarah swallows, wanting to ask but wondering if that's a boundary she should be crossing. They sit down at a small, two-person table near the kiosk.
"What?" Morgan asks self-consciously. "Do I have sugar on my beard?"
"What?" Sarah replies, confused. "No, no."
"Oh, 'cause you were . . . you were kinda starin' at me." He nods his head slightly, and takes another bite of his pretzel.
She dives into the opening. "I was just thinking how lucky Chuck was to have a friend like you after what happened at Stanford."
Morgan stops chewing for a few seconds, then resumes and swallows slowly. "Oh." He looks around the mall, not sure how to respond. "Well, thank you."
He takes another bite, and there's silence again, except for Morgan's chewing.
Sarah suddenly feels stupid. It's really none of her business, from his point of view. Chuck's ex asking about his past? That's just kind of stalker-ish, right?
"He took it pretty hard, you know," Morgan finally says, very quietly now, so that she can hardly hear him over the din of the mall crowd.
She looks up at him, silently asking for more, though she knows she doesn't deserve it.
"Well, it was rough for all of us, I guess. You know, he's like a brother to me. The more successful, older brother, of course, and I always knew he'd make something of himself. And then he came back, kicked out for something he didn't even do, and we were all just . . . devastated." He pauses to take a sip of his Coke. "He got through it, we all did actually, with each other. And slowly, he got his life back together, but it was never really at the caliber it could have been, would have been if he had graduated. He never fully recovered, though, not 100 percent. I would say, I would say maybe 98 percent, but not 100." He finally looks at her now. "But then he met you, and I thought he finally did."
Sarah's flabbergasted. This is definitely dangerous territory. But before she can figure out a way to extract herself from the conversation, he speaks again.
"I'm sorry, you know, about the whole proposal thing."
She shakes her head slightly, questioning him.
"Oh, Chuck didn't tell you?"
"Tell me what?"
"Well, I kind of thought the ring was for you. And I freaked out a bit because Chuck didn't include me or Ellie in this huge, gigantic decision."
Unfortunately, she chooses the moment he says that to take a sip of her drink. And she chokes, the cool liquid sliding down the wrong pipe.
Worried, he half-rises from his chair and reaches a hand to slap her on the back, but she waves him off, coughing loudly.
Her face is bright red, for a number of reasons, when she finally coughs out, "You think Chuck would propose to me?"
He settles back into his seat, and clears his throat. "Yeah, yeah, I mean, you're the best thing to happen to him since Stanford. And you know, you guys are great together. You're like this super couple."
She smiles at the image of her and Chuck as a super couple. One thing nags at her mind, though. "But, Morgan, Chuck and I aren't even together." And she can't resist the urge to add, "Right now."
"Yeah, I know that," he protests, "but that's just a minor hiccup. You guys'll get over that soon enough."
She's amazed at how sure he is. Then she remembers that she and Chuck are just a pretend couple, or were (even worse), and her heart plummets. She stares at the table long enough for her eyes to lose focus. As she realizes she's completely neglecting Morgan, he lets out a little yelp and jumps up from his seat.
"Sarah! I've found the perfect store!"
To Sarah's surprise, it actually is the perfect store. She was expecting – okay, she's not exactly sure what she was expecting (it's Morgan, after all) – but whatever she was expecting, she can truthfully say that it was not Things Remembered. Luckily, his eyes find the photo frames within a few minutes, and she doesn't have to spend an hour sorting through the saccharine items to find the perfect gift. They spend a few minutes deciding on a frame, and settle on a simple silver one with the word LOVE written on the left-hand side. It's very . . . understated. Not something Sarah, or anyone, would expect from Morgan. She had a feeling Anna would love it. Now for the engraving . . .
Once again, Morgan surprises Sarah. She should be getting used to that by now. He needs very little help deciding on the engraving:
Anna and Morgan
2008
Simple and sweet.
It's enough to make Sarah's heart melt and yearn for a normal life, a normal relationship. One thing that doesn't surprise Sarah is the man those dreams revolve around.
When Chuck asks later, like she knows he will, she won't be able to explain how it happened. Somehow, someway, she ends up at Morgan's house. Technically, at his mom's house. But still, here she is, walking through his bedroom, trying futilely to avoid the piles of dirty laundry and discarded food wrappers. Thankfully, his mom isn't home. She has a mental image of what she'd be like, kind of like an older, more feminine version of Morgan, and shudders to think of how their meeting would have gone.
She suppresses a smile as Morgan pulls up a second chair next to his and pats the cushion. They settle down at the computer and get to work. He digs into his digital photo folders, and she sees that he's got tons of pictures. Sighing, she prepares herself for a few hours of slogging through his photos to find just the right one for the frame.
Twenty minutes later, it appears that they've got a few candidates for the winning photograph, but Morgan's not quite convinced. Wanting to go through a few more folders before deciding for certain, he clicks on one entitled "Picnic." As he opens the folder, Sarah can see that it contains pictures from the day she, Chuck, Morgan, and Anna went on a picnic in the park just a month or so ago, right after she and Chuck had reached their 'just friends' status and had gotten over the awkwardness that was Bryce's unexpected return.
Morgan clicks through the pictures fairly quickly, because he wants one of just him and Anna, but Sarah can't stop a gasp from escaping her throat when he clicks through a photo of her and Chuck. It's a candid, and she's a bit ashamed that she didn't even realize at the time that Morgan was taking it. Toward the left side of the picture, Chuck, wearing one of her favorite shirts, a dark red, tightly-fitting t-shirt that shows off his body quite nicely, is leaning back on the picnic blanket on his elbows, staring up at the sky with a small smile on his face. She's on the other side of the frame, legs folded underneath her, leaning on one hand, looking at him intently. She's astonished that she had let her guard down so completely, and that Morgan had managed to capture her at such a vulnerable moment without her even noticing.
Her gasp is enough to catch Morgan's attention, and, though he skips over the picture quickly, he goes back to it right away. He looks at her curiously; she's still staring at the screen.
"You like that picture?"
Yes!, she wants to scream at him. She likes it so much that can't tear her eyes from it.
Apparently, her non-reaction is enough of a reaction for him. He simply smiles and says, "Yeah, me, too. I was so surprised when you didn't even notice I took it. Usually, you're so aware of things like that." He chuckles slightly.
She reddens. If the agency ever got a hold of this photo, it'd practically be proof that she's in desperate need of a reassignment. They might even take it as evidence that she's lost judgment completely, because no worthy agent would ever let herself be caught with her guard down like that. She clears her throat.
Morgan seems to sense her embarrassment, so he clicks to the next photo, and acts like nothing happened. She's grateful to him, and they're able to find the perfect photo for his gift to Anna just a few minutes later.
A few days later, Sarah's back in the Weinerlicious, handing a customer his order when Morgan comes through the door, sending the bell tinkling. He walks in nonchalantly, but she's already noticed the small, wrapped package he's hidden behind his back.
She greets him with a grin, "Hey, Morgan! How are you?"
He smiles back. "I'm doing well, Sarah. How's your day?"
Since she helped him with his gift, they've settled into an easy, friendly routine that's mystified everyone, Chuck especially. She couldn't stop the urge to laugh out loud at Chuck's incredulous face the other day when he saw her voluntarily and civilly interacting with Morgan.
"It's good." She stands at the counter, waiting for him to order.
"Well, that's fine and all, but I've got something that'll make your day great." She raises an eyebrow at him, and he pulls the package out from behind his back. "For you," he says as he presents the gift with a flourish. "It's a thank-you for helping me with Anna's present. She loved it, by the way. I gave it to her last night."
"That's great, Morgan! But you didn't have to get me anything." He waves that off, but she continues, "What happened to friends don't keep score?"
"This isn't score-keeping. This is me, happening to notice something you really liked, I hope. And since it was very easily within my power to get it for you, it's my way of thanking you for being a great friend. To both myself, and to Chuck."
Her eyes are beginning to sting, but no tears rise to her eyes as she slowly unwraps the paper.
"Come on, girl! Just rip it off!"
She laughs, and obliges, but her laughter immediately subsides as she catches sight of the gift. It's in a plain black frame, but it's beautiful. Just the right thing she could use to personalize her apartment. Probably the only personal touch she'll allow herself. She already knows that it belongs on her bed stand, so it'll be the last thing she looks at before she goes to sleep and the first thing she sees when she wakes up.
"Sorry the frame's kind of simple," Morgan interrupts, "I didn't have time to get you an engraved one."
She laughs again, but it's a different laugh this time, one that acknowledges just how touched she is by his thoughtfulness. She reaches over the counter to give him a spontaneous hug. He hugs her back, but it's awkward with the counter separating them.
"Thank you, Morgan. Thank you so much." She's so overwhelmed that she barely knows what to say. "It's perfect," she whispers in his ear before finally releasing him.
He smiles, and is sensible enough to leave the moment exactly as it is.
As he makes his way back to the Buy More, she stares down at the photo in her hands, and traces Chuck's face with a finger. She's used to short-lived assignments, but if this one were to end tomorrow, at least she'd have one picture by which to remember him, one picture which she'd never let the agency get their hands on.