Title: But That's A Minor Detail!
Author: Midst Ride
Summary: When you're Joseph Hardy, everything's a minor detail. Even when it can put your life in danger. Perhaps especially when it can put your life in danger… One-shot.
Line
"I can't believe you, Joe," Frank muttered from his chair. Once again, he was in a hospital bed. Why? Because Joe had made a rash decision and gotten hurt. "I swear, one of these days when I get my hands on you…"
Joe chuckled from his hospital bed. "Yeah, but you're going to have to walk first."
"I can walk, Joe! I'm sort-of waiting until you can!" Frank grinned, retorting to the fact that his brother almost broke his leg--mostly due to the damage from Zack.
"Relax, it's not like I'm paralyzed for life," Joe said, tossing his brother an irresistible grin, complete with puppy dog eyes. "Mom and Dad shouldn't kill you—too much."
"It's not my fault!" Frank protested. "Let me refresh your memory: You were the one who decided scalping the roof was a great idea!"
"They were going to get away if we didn't help," Joe countered. "You know that—and so do I."
"We could have let the police get them. But no. You just had to do it," Frank groaned. "Why do I listen to you?"
"You did it too," Joe protested, grinning again. "And you listen to me because you care."
"Too stop you," Frank countered, glaring back. "I know you wanted to catch Mitch after what he did to you, but…"
Joe grinned, then he grimaced. "It wasn't me, Frank," he said. "It was everyone he's ever hurt. Those thousands of people deserved to get their money back."
"We could have let the police handle it, and stopped you from getting hurt."
"Right. Like you would have done that. I'm surprised you didn't suggest it first," Joe said with a grin.
"Your suggestion landed you in the hospital. I wouldn't have done that."
"Actually," Joe countered, "You said what landed me in the hospital was my lack of memory."
Frank slowly smiled. "That is true," he said with a grin. "You're great at annoying people, you know that, right?"
"Yeah. But seriously, Frank, I don't see how my lack of memory affected anything."
"Affected anything? Joe, your lack of memory ended up getting you assaulted and almost kidnapped! If I hadn't been able to get his gun away, you would have been kidnapped!" Frank said. He'd been insisting this the whole time, but Joe either didn't notice--or, more likely, didn't care.
"How was I supposed to know he had a gun? Besides, that didn't make any difference," Joe shot back, "In fact, it's all the more reason we should've gone after him--we didn't want anyone else to get hurt, remember, Frank?"
Frank took a second to close his eyes before he replied. He silently counted to ten, reminding himself that if he punched Joe it would only get him kicked out of the hospital. "Look, Joe," he said, not sure exactly what he wanted to say.
"Don't look, Joe, me," Joe said with a smile. "It wasn't my fault." He grinned. "As a matter of fact, I think it was your fault."
"So naturally, it was my fault that you forgot Zack was there?" Frank said, slowly smiling. During their last case, Zack had been their main suspect from the get-go: and not just because he was nasty towards the brothers. The man knew everything that was going on, which had increased their suspicion. Finally, he'd ended up kicking Joe out of the art museum: which Joe had forgotten to tell Frank.
Why had Zack kicked Joe out of the art museum?
Because he knew Joe wasn't Joe Kirkland, he was Joe Hardy. When Frank had followed Joe to go after Zack, he'd had no idea that the man had known Joe's identity, and would have never agreed to allow Joe to follow the man!
Frank insisted that if Joe had told him that Zack had kicked him out, he wouldn't have gone after him, because that meant he knew who the brothers really were.
And just what, exactly, was Joe's response?
"But that's a minor detail!" and he hadn't said anything after that, which had infuriated Frank.
"You hush," Joe said with a grin. "Yes, it was totally your fault; it was all your fault, as a matter of fact."
"And how are you going to convince Dad that?" Frank retorted, his arms crossed against his chest. This was one battle he was going to win, because it wasn't his fault. If Joe had told him, he would've remembered.
"I'm going to tell him that you forgot that he'd kicked me out of the museum. You were there, remember?" Joe retorted.
"I was in the bathroom, Joe!" Frank said with a mock sigh. He was furious--how could Joe even pretend to blame him?
"But you can't deny you were there," Joe countered back with a grin. "So how do you plan to counter?"
"I was using the bathroom. That's exactly what I plan to say," Frank said, smiling. "And your exscuse for forgetting to tell me is...?"
"You're going to tell Dad you forgot to pee before talking to a major suspect?" Joe countered, slowly smiling.
Frank glared at him, wincing, knowing exactly what he would say. "Brat," he said, thinking of a few other names he could call Joe, but he decided not too.
Joe grinned back, returning Frank's smile. "Jerk," he said, then shut his mouth as the door opened.
As Fenton Hardy swung open the door, Joe began his sob story. "Dad, guess what happened thistime?" he said, a huge grin on his face, smiling evilly at Frank.