Chickenpox; Ranger's Turn (because I couldn't resist)

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"Ranger."

He looked up at me from the couch, frozen in that awkward position you end up in when you try to scratch the direct center of your back.

"Stop. Scratching."

Okay wow. That was probably the scariest glare I'd ever seen. I might even call that a glower. I might have just peed a little.

"I'm itchy." He told me shortly.

"No shit, really? You have the chickenpox of course you're itchy."

I rolled my eyes, I'd gotten over my chickenpox a day ago but Ranger was still completely broken out in spots.

"Yeah well if I'd known that exposing myself for a lengthy amount of time would make me have a worse case of it than you then I might have thought better of staying here!"

I narrowed my eyes at him.

"Okay, so I'm lying, I would have stayed anyways."

I relaxed and moved towards my room, snagging my purse on the way. He was driving me insane. Ranger sick is not something anyone in this world should ever have to deal with. It was hell trying to keep him from scratching the damn things and scarring his perfect body. Lula would kill me if she found out Ranger was scarred because of me.

I needed reinforcements.

"Hey girl what's up? How you feelin' over there?"

"I'm fine now Lula, but there's still a problem." I sighed into the phone.

"What you do this time?"

"Ranger has chickenpox."

"Shit! You got batman sick?! If that man has one scar on his mouth watering body I will never forgive you."

"He's driving me crazy Lula! I can't even think anymore! He won't stop scratching! And he's moping! It's unbearable!"

"What you want me to do about it?"

"Could you get Tank over here?"

"Sure, I'll call him right now but I don't want you getting' him no chickenpox! I need my man ready to perform!"

"Thanks."

I walked back out into my apartment and scowled at Ranger. He was scratching furiously at his chest.

"STOP SCRATCHING!" I shouted, stomping over and smacking his hand.

"I'M ITCHY LET ME SCRATCH MY GODDAMN ITCHES." He shouted back, looking miserable.

Apparently the anti itch lotion we'd used on mine wasn't working out too well for him.

There was a knock on the door.

Tank.

"I understand Ranger has a problem."

I nodded, hiding a smile. Tank was all decked out in RangeMan gear, gun securely on hip, dressed in all black, looking highly dangerous.

"What's the problem?" he asked walking into my apartment, stopping short when he saw Ranger sitting on the couch moodily scratching at his spotted arm.

"He's itchy."

Tank backed towards the door.

"Hell no. I aint sticking around when Ranger's sick. That man is a trial when he's sick. You're on your own with this Bombshell."

"Wait!" I called as he was walking back out the door. He glanced back at me over his shoulder.

"Don't you at least have any advice?"

"I don't suppose you'd run away, would you?"

I gave him the squinty eye.

"Didn't think so."

And he walked away. Bastard.

"Was that Tank?"

"Yes."

"Why did he leave?"

"Cause you're a bitch when you're sick."

"Oh. Will you scratch my back?"

"NO."

There was a knock on my door. Praying Tank had come back I flung it open.

"Cupcake?" Morelli looked confused as he glanced over my shoulder at the fidgeting, scratching, spotted Ranger.

"Ranger caught my chickenpox."

Morelli gave me dark look, "And how did he manage that when you came straight home and locked yourself away?"

Uh. How was I supposed to explain that he'd come over to take care of me and we'd sorta been sleeping in the same bed for the past week?

"Well… He came over to take care of me… But he'd never had the chickenpox…"

"Where's he been sleeping?"

We all looked at each other.

"The… uh… couch?"

"Great. I'll be back at five with my duffel."

Duffel?

"Excuse me?"

"I'm moving in."

"Are you forgetting the part where I'm extremely pissed at you for calling me every day and singing me Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer?"

"I figured you'd forget about it."

I glared angrily, "Not likely."

"I'll bring Pino's and a birthday cake?"

"What time did you say you were getting here?"

"Five. Bye."

I closed the door.

"I'm not sleeping on the couch."

I turned to look at Ranger.

"You are now."

"Babe!"

"Morelli will pitch a fit if he knows you were sleeping in the bed!"

"I'm sick!" he cried, looking at me plaintively.

I felt myself weakening as he looked at me pathetically itching his cheek.

"Please?"

"Fine! Okay! But you're sleeping in it with Morelli cause he sure as hell isn't going to let me sleep in there with you and there's only room for one on my couch."

"Can't you call him and tell him not to come?"

I gave him a blank stare, "He's bringing Birthday Cake. Didn't you hear him?"

"Babe. I'm better than birthday cake."

"Not when you're sick you aren't!"

Ranger turned and trudged back to the couch with his own personal emo cloud following him the whole time. I wouldn't be surprised if I caught him wearing a studded belt and cutting his hair into an emo fringe tomorrow. I half expected the goddamn Emo Song to start playing every time he walked into the room.

A couple hours later, I walked over to the couch and sat next to him. He slumped over so his head was in my lap.

"I hate being sick." he mumbled.

I gently stroked his hair, "I know, it'll be over soon. And don't think I don't know you're discreetly scratching your cheek on my fly."

He looked up at me in amusement, "I can't help it, this is terrible!"

"Well let me give you some incentive to stop scratching."

"I'm all ears."

"If you don't stop I'm going to tell Lula exactly where she can find your apartment after I toss your fob out the window to her, don't bother looking for it I've hidden it already, and then I'm going to tell her exactly where your underwear drawer is and she's going to figure out that you only have one pair of silk black boxers and that you must go commando a lot of the time. And then you know who she's going to tell? Tank. And then your entire team will know you forgo undergarments most of the time, is that really something you want spreading around town?"

He was staring at me in surprise.

"You wouldn't do that."

"I most certainly would."

He got up and walked over to his jacket, peering into the pocket.

"Where's my key fob?"

"Like I'm going to tell you!"

He stalked over and leaned into me on the couch, "Oh you'll tell me alright, I just have to apply pressure to the right places."

We both jumped and stared towards the door. It was unlocking.

"Oh did I say five? I meant three!" Morelli said smoothly, shutting the door behind him with his foot and setting a pizza and a cake down on the table.

"What were you guys doing?"

"Stephanie here was just about to tell me what she did with the keys to my apartment."

Morelli rounded on me, "What are you doing with keys to his apartment?!"

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

"Blackmailing him."

"Into doing what?" He asked, clearly confused with my answer. I guess it's not every day you meet someone crazy enough to try and blackmail Ranger.

"She wants me to stop scratchi-" Ranger trailed off staring over my shoulder.

"Stephanie. Is your hamster gnawing on my key?"

I swiveled my gaze to Rex's cage where he did in fact seem to be chewing on a little black remote.

"He might be…"

"Cupcake, you know that hamster will devour anything! He probably thought the damn thing was all you could afford for lunch today!"

"Shut up Morelli! I had it hidden under his food dish, I didn't think he'd find it!"

Ranger had slowly walked aver to the aquarium and was lifting the lid carefully.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you." I told him warily.

He glanced back at me, hand poised over the cage, "Why not?"

Morelli laughed, "I've seen that hamster bite. Trust me it is not pretty. Damn thing'll take your finger off!"

Ranger looked from me to Morelli and back again, "You're joking."

I stared at him in annoyance, "Fine go ahead but if you get bit I don't want you shooting my hamster in a fit of rage."

Ranger scoffed at me and inched his hand into the cage stealthily. Rex had crawled back into his can, leaving the remote in plain sight. Ranger's finger had just touched the remote when Rex made his move and sank his fangs into Ranger's finger.

He yanked his hand out of the cage and shook it. Rex held on with a grip of death.

"Get it off me! Get it off me! You have a fucking vampire hamster!"

Morelli and I watched him in morbid amusement for a while before I walked over to him and grabbed his wrist, slowly lowering it back into the cage. Once Rex's feet were safely back on the woodchips he let go, grabbed the remote in his red fangs, and scurried back into the soup can.

Ranger stuck his finger in his mouth and glared at me.

"Your fucking hamster just tried to eat my fucking finger. And it stole my fucking remote."

"We warned you." I reminded him.

He stalked over to my bedroom and flung open the door, stripping his shirt off.

We stared at him as he flopped down onto the bed.

"What are you doing?" Morelli finally asked.

"I'm taking a nap."

Morelli looked at me.

"His clothes are on your bedroom floor."

"Uh… yeah… I can explain that…"

He waited.

"Well you see… by couch I really meant… we'd been sharing my bed in a friendly nonsexual way… ever since I got sick… because Ranger doesn't exactly do couches and I was too sick to sleep on the couch. Now he's too sick to sleep on the couch so we're still sharing."

"Friendly nonsexual way." he repeated, looking like he was about to bust a vein in his forehead.

"Maybe it was friendly and nonsexual to her but I was having the time of my life curled up with her in here." Ranger called out from the bedroom, a smirk in his voice. I glared at the bedroom.

"I'm going to kill him." Morelli managed to get out through clenched teeth.

"You can't kill him! He's pathetically ill and the merry men will rip you to shreds! Why do you think I haven't shot him yet?! Because of his charming disposition?! He's a bitch when he's sick!" I hissed, slightly panicking.

Morelli took several deep breaths and I could almost see him counting to ten in his head.

"Oh, hey babe? I just found these in the sheets."

A black lacy thong was tossed out of the bedroom, landing on Morelli's head. I reached out and plucked the tiny scrap of lace off of his face. I peered at them, then turned and looked incredulously at the bedroom. I hadn't worn this pair in at least a month! He'd gotten them out of my drawer!

"So let me get this straight. You wore a black lacy thong to go have some friendly nonsexual… sleep… and then somehow in the middle of this friendly nonsexual… sleep…. They got removed?"

Morelli's face was inventing new shades of red the world has never before seen and never wants to see again.

"He's just trying to piss you off, he must have gotten them out of my drawer!"

Morelli looked at me in disbelief, "I didn't hear any of your drawers open."

I gave him a look, "He's Ranger. Do you honestly think anything he touches makes noise?!"

"I know plenty of… things… that make noise when I touch them." Ranger said from where he was leaning against the doorway, smirking for all he was worth.

I glared at him, "You'll have to excuse him Joe. He gets a bit childish when he's sick."

Ranger's eyes widened fractionally, "Did you just call me childish?!"

I narrowed my eyes even more at him, "Did you just take a black lacy thong out of my drawer?"

"Sorry should I have tossed the lime green one that was actually on the floor?"

I winced. I was pretty sure there really was a green thong on the ground, I'd been wearing it last night and had probably chucked it there after my shower this morning.

Morelli was pretty much glowing from anger at this point. Ranger was scratching his stomach again. I huffed angrily and shoved past him into my room, slamming my door which effectively knocked him away from where he'd been leaning.

"Go eat some goddamn pizza. Morelli, you have my permission to shoot him if he continues to scratch himself."

I heard Morelli unholster his gun and prayed he wouldn't actually shoot Ranger. That would be complicated.

"Babe, your cop is pointing a gun at me, praying I'm going to scratch something and it's making me really itchy here."

"Fine!" I shouted, "Ranger, you go take a cold shower to numb the itch and Morelli you go start eating pizza and calm down."

It was quiet after that and I heard the shower start to run. I sighed, how the hell do I get myself into these situations. I just hoped Morelli had had the chickenpox.

I leaned my head out the door and looked at Morelli who was broodingly scarfing down a piece of pizza.

"What?"

Gee, wasn't he Mr. Friendly.

"You've had the chickenpox right?"

"When I was five."

"Good."

I shut the door again and set myself to pick up all the clothes lying around on the floor. I even made the bed. Once it looked normal again and walked over to the kitchen table and sat down just as the shower shut off.

I was about to dig into my first piece of what would hopefully be many pieces of birthday cake when the door opened and Ranger strolled out in nothing but one of my towels, water dripping from his hair onto his chest and running in rivulets down until it disappeared into the towel.

I forced my gaze back to my cake and began resolutely shoveling it in, feeling like my dad. I heard a chair scrape and looked over. Ranger was sitting next to me. Still in his towel. Holy shit. Even with the spots this was making my mouth begin to water.

I pretended it was the cake and kept eating, trying not to stare at him.

"Go put some clothes on."

Ranger glanced at Morelli.

"No."

"Excuse me?" Morelli spluttered a little.

"I'm not putting clothes on yet. They make me itch."

I rolled my eyes and mentally slapped my forehead. Ranger was worse than a child when it came to provoking people.

"Stephanie. Make him put some clothes on."

"Ranger go put some clothes on." I said quietly, still shoveling cake into my mouth.

"Fine."

Seconds later he was back at the table.

I still didn't see a shirt from what I could see out of the corner of my eye. I glanced over. He was wearing his one pair of silk black boxers.

"Those do not count as clothes." Morelli growled.

"They're my pajamas!" Ranger exclaimed, looking at him innocently.

Morelli's glare rounded on me, "You've been friendly nonsexually sleeping in the same bed as him while he was in those boxers?!"

I glared at him around my last forkful of my third piece of cake, "Yes. Nothing happened. It was all PG."

Well… PG-13 borderline R more like but Morelli didn't need to know that.

"I can't believe you!" He growled.

I shoved away from the table and stormed to my room.

"I'm going to bed!" I shouted and flopped myself down in the middle of the mattress.

There was a quick scuffle outside the room and they both burst in at the same time.

"Me too!" They announced.

"You're on the couch bud." Morelli said tightly.

"Nope, Steph promised me the bed because I'm sick, didn't you Stephanie?"

Morelli looked at me.

"Yes. I did."

"For the love of God." Morelli sighed plopping down on the mattress on my right, "Why do I have to be in love with the woman who let's other men sleep in her bed just because they're sick?!"

Ranger settled in on my left without saying anything.

This was about the most uncomfortable I'd ever felt in my own bed. I was exhausted though, dealing with Ranger and keeping Morelli from killing him was a tiring thing, and I feel asleep pretty soon despite the tension.

I woke up sprawled across the two of them, my legs tangled with Morelli's and my head on Ranger's chest.

So it was a sucky way to go to sleep but it was a pretty damn good way to wake up.

I glanced over Ranger and a grin spread over my face. His spots were beginning to fade a little, there were less than yesterday.

I glanced over at Morelli and my heart nearly stopped at the sight of one small red dot on his cheek.

I nudged him awake, horror racing through my head.

"Nnngh?"

He cracked one eye open at me.

"How bad did you have the chicken pox when you were younger?"

"I was the lucky one in my family, I had a real mild case. Why?"

"No reason. Go back to sleep."

Within seconds he seemed to have dropped back off.

Fuck. I'd read online the other day that people who had a really mild case the first time can sometimes get it again later in life.

Morelli was going to kill me.

I crawled out of bed and took a shower.

When I got out Morelli was making scrambled eggs and bacon and Ranger was sitting at the table drinking coffee.

I sat down at the table.

"I have good news and bad news."

Both men looked over at me.

"Ranger, you're spots seem to be fading. I think you're getting better."

"Yeah. I'm less itchy today." he agreed.

"Morelli… You might want to go look in the mirror and pray that's a zit."

"I don't get zits… zit?! Pray what's a zit?!"

Morelli raced to the bathroom. The was the sound of loud cursing from the bathroom.

Ranger was smiling.

"Ranger. It isn't funny."

"Morelli has the chickenpox. It's funny as hell."

I smiled a little too. It was a little funny. Besides I was still a little sore over the Rudolph joke.

He stormed out of the bathroom and roughly slammed the bacon and eggs on the table, sitting down so hard I was afraid the legs were going to break.

He looked up and gave Ranger the look of death.

"I hate you."

A/N::.. Hope you guys liked it, I couldn't help myself it pretty much wrote itself lol Review me and maybe a few more stories will write themselves?