Title: The Pastry Promise
Rating: K+
Genre: General, Humor, Fluff
Pairings: Bobby/Alex Friendship, UST if you read it that way (which I totally dooo.)
Spoilers: It occurs right after the most recent Goren/Eames episode "Self-Made", but the only real spoiler is a mention of a name. And a really super-obscure reference to a comment Eames made in a past episode, which was the premise of this fic, but also entirely unimportant.
A/N: My first LOCI fic, possibly wretchedly out of character, likely a waste of your time, but given to you anyway, because I really miss the way Bobby and Alex used to get along, and I kinda want it back. This fic is sort of an experiment for me: an attempt to get the character's dialogues and some of Bobby's more trademark gestures down onto paper, and see if it translated with any accuracy at all.
Summary: "The Danish Fairy and I are on very good terms." He leaned forward conspiratorially, hands splayed in the air at chest level in an abstract gesture. "I helped her find the Muffin Man when he went missing a few years ago. It turns out Cherry Lane is not the upscale suburb it pretends to be." Bobby and Alex begin repairing their battered partnership. Post Self-Made.
When Eames arrived at 1PP at 7:15 on the nose, there was no one and nothing else in the bullpen but for a lone Danish sitting on her desk. An Orange Danish, she clarified mentally, draping her jacket on the back of her seat. And coffee. Hot, fresh nothing-at-all-like-the-stuff-from-MCS coffee, if the sight and smell was anything to go by. How strange.
After glancing around, she sat down, absently setting the final reports on the TJ Hawkins case down in the center of her desk, and rested her elbow atop them, chin perched jauntily in hand to properly tilt her head and ponder the Orange Danish and coffee. 'I really would like to drink that coffee,' she mused, the fingers of her other hand drumming mindlessly against her thigh. 'And that is so my favorite kind of Danish. But-'
"You're allowed to eat it, you know." At the sudden voice from her left, she swiveled her chin to see none other than Bobby Goren coming towards her from the copier room, looking simultaneously scruffy and impeccable as usual. He wore a peculiar expression on his face, and it took her a moment to realize he was actually…smiling. 'Oh yes,' her mind said. 'I used to see that a lot. A long time ago. Hmm.' Before all the silence and the irritation.
She must've digested the rather mundane fact a moment too long, for he took another two steps forward, his head ducked to the side in that curiously shy manner he had when he was actually being self-aware enough to consider the people around him. "It uh, i-it is yours. " He looked at her askance, as if peering over the tops of invisible glasses: chin tucked down, eyes lifted hesitantly. And that vague, soft smile still lurked around the stubble-covered corners of his mouth. He looked rather like a puppy who'd just brought his owner the paper, tail wagging behind him, and Eames was quite startled, in the ensuing pause, to feel no awkwardness nor ill-will floating in the air between them for the first time in months. Years, maybe.
"Oh, so you saw the Danish Fairy bring it, then? I hope she left a calling card, I want to set up a daily delivery," She answered loftily after a moment, but her hand finally left its aimless tapping on her leg to steal across the desk and slide the coffee towards her.
At her words, Bobby's entire face burst into sunbeams, his eyes crinkling in delight at her snark. 'He looks like a twelve year old boy.'
She rethought.
'A six foot four, two hundred thirty pound, graying twelve year old boy. But still.'
"That could probably be arranged," he said, cutting across her vision to sit down in his chair in an easy, fluid movement. Nearer a level height, his gaze caught hers head on for an instant before flicking awkwardly to the left again. She shifted, dreading the disappearance of this strange and sudden truce, but he went on. "The, the daily delivery, I mean." The sunbeams actually brightened another notch. "The Danish Fairy and I are on very good terms." He leaned forward conspiratorially, hands splayed in the air at chest level in an abstract gesture. "I helped her find the Muffin Man when he went missing a few years ago. It turns out Cherry Lane is not the, the upscale suburb it pretends to be."
Absolutely startled, Alex Eames burst into a peal of delighted laughter.
Hearing Bobby join in with quiet chuckles a moment later, she opened her mouth. "I'll spare you the joke about a torrid affair with Little Debbie," she huffed, and reached languidly with her other hand across the desk to grab the Danish and take a warm, flaky bite of heaven.
Whatever further jibe might have been in her head disappeared completely, and she let out a contented sigh. "God, Bobby, this is perfect," she hummed around her mouthful, eyes closed in near-obscene enjoyment. She could almost hear his smile then.
"It's from that little bakery on uh, on Seventh?" His voice lifted in a question, asking if she remembered it, and she nodded, and made an inarticulate sound, taking a deep sip of the coffee. "We went there a few years ago a-after a case." Again she nodded. "I remember how much you liked the pastries…"
She opened her eyes again, hearing an 'and' he never said, to find him looking down fixedly at his hands clasped together on top of his desk. "So what's the occasion?" She asked casually, licking a drip of icing off her finger. "Or did you lose a bet I forgot about?" He smiled again, but she noticed the tips of his ears turning faintly red. 'Something I never would've noticed about anyone eight years ago.'
"I just, uhm…I-I just thought that I uh, probably o-owed you a Danish." He blinked owlishly at his hands. "Or ten. A-and, uh, and an…apology."
Coffee half-way to her lips, Eames froze. Somehow, instinctively, she knew he didn't mean he was saying sorry for being late last week. Somehow, instinctively, she knew, somewhere between the sticky orange icing and the sugar in the coffee, that this wasn't just an apology. This was the apology. For all the crap between them, all the distance and the total nonpartnership that had dominated their relationship recently. For the disappearance of their friendship. The Apology, stuck amid a mundane treat from the bakery and Bobby's darting gaze.
But he was speaking again, and she almost missed it in her dazed shock. "Or maybe more like one Danish a-and uh, and ten apologies."
'Try twenty. Dozen. And is this a Danish-flavored cop-out?' She eyed him coolly, and set the coffee back down. "And you figure a Danish and a cuppa joe'll just about cover it?"
He looked back up at her again, and she was startled to find herself thinking how much older he looked. How much he'd aged in the past year. And how little she knew about any of it. 'Maybe the 'sorry' thing's not a one way deal…entirely.' His dark eyes were meeting hers head on again, and they looked very tired, but also very clear, for the first time in her recent memory. He shook his head. "No…no, not at all. Not even close." His left hand came up to cover the lower half of his face, his pointer finger draped introspectively across his lips. His eyes fell back down to his desk. "But, uh, th-the, the Danish" His right hand made a vague gesture toward said pastry. "Is uhm…a start?" It was another question, hesitant and hopeful, but he didn't give her time to answer. "And even if it's not, I owed you one. You told me so."
Eames prided herself on stoicism, but was suddenly struck by the urge to cry. Or hit him. Both? She settled on an eye roll. "Yeah, Bobby, once. Years ago."
He smiled, but it was shadowed again, and that bothered her more than she wanted it to. "Well…better late than never." He didn't phrase it as a question this time, but she still heard it.
She made a non-committal noise, and took a calm drink of the coffee, before finally straightening her gaze to find his eyes again. She offered him a thin smile. "Well, it's not my style to knock a guy down when he's trying." Her eyes drifted over to the pastry. "And that's a damn good Danish, Bobby, I have to tell you." She let her smile widen into a friendly one.
And just like that, the tips of his ears returned to near-normal color, and he un-slumped a little in front of her, the relief coming off him in a wave so strong it almost knocked her over. "Good," he said, his voice a little rushed, like he'd been winded. He said again, softer, "Good." His head tilted to the other side, playful again, instead of nervous and beleaguered. "You should eat that before it, uh, before it gets cold." He jabbed his chin at the Danish still held in her right hand.
Eames smiled again, and obligingly lifted the pastry to her mouth for another sweet, doughy mouthful. "Why didn't you get yourself one, Bobby? I know how much you like anything that'll clog your arteries faster."
Instantly, his eyes dropped away again, and she worriedly wondered what she'd done, until she noticed him staring, squint-eyed, at his too-visible stomach, as though it had somehow offended him. "I'm doing a permanent pass on the sweets for awhile, Eames," he sighed. "And the Pastrami." He sounded utterly injured then, and she couldn't help but grin, reveling in the simple enjoyment of this exchange.
"Poor thing. What'll you do without your grease-on-a-roll for lunch? I guess you'll be joining the Salad Brigade with me for a while, huh?"
He frowned in a decidedly pouty manner. "Don't make fun, Eames." The frown deepened, and a hand came up to cover his stomach protectively. "I don't even like salad."
She outright laughed then, chortling through another bite. "It's not like it's a baby, Bobby, you don't have to be so protective of it." He looked for a moment as if he was going to take issue with her referring to his recently formed tummy as an 'it', and she positively cackled, smiling wickedly. "You haven't named it, have you? Because if you name it, you'll want to keep it, and that's so not the way to go."
He leveled her with a dark look, but his mouth was quivering with laughter. "Just eat your Danish, Eames, would ya? You're buying my lunch." He sunk down a little in his chair, scowling, and grumbled, "Not like it'll cost much. Rabbit food's always been cheap."
She grinned at him, and tossed one of the Hawkins reports over to his desk, opening one for herself to get down to work. "Whatever you say, Bobby."
He smiled back and took a breath as he flipped open the folder and grabbed a pen between his slender fingers. A pause, then: "A-and maybe over lunch we'll, uh…w-we can talk?"
Her smile was content this time as she bent her head over the papers before her. "You bet, Partner." Their eyes met for a contented moment before settling back to the work before them. "You bet."
So. Loved it? Liked it? Hated it with a burning passion? Please drop me a review, you have no idea what it would mean.
Either way though, Thanks for Reading!