Chapter Two: Of Fishing and Bars

Seven Days Ago…

Shawn Spencer didn't have issues with his father so much as he had…facets of irritation. His childhood, that was one facet. His dad's need to control everything that he did, that was a facet. Henry's built-in belief that – because he taught his son everything he knew, trained him – he was the better detective, that was another facet. There were millions more, but Shawn wasn't in the mood to be depressed right now.

Instead, he decided to share his new metaphor.

"We have different facets," he began, eyeing his father critically over his bottle of Budweiser. "There's like…all these different facets, and you just…keep adding to them."

Henry glared at his son in a roundabout way. "What are you talking about?" He asked, almost carelessly.

"You're stalking me." Shawn burst out, giving up on the metaphor all together and waving his hand in the air for good measure. "This, this right here-" he gestured some more, rather vaguely, "-this is not normal."

"It's a bar," his father scoffed, signaling to the man behind the counter and getting irritated when he was ignored. "A public establishment. I have just as much of a right to be here as you do." He lowered his hand and all but huffed in anger. "Get over yourself, kid."

"Since when do you go to bars, anyway?" Shawn gave up his outraged annoyance-tinged-ever-so-slightly-with-distain and crashed right into comfortably buzzed thus he didn't give a shit.

"Since I was twenty," Henry snapped, "What about you? That fake ID you got when you were fifteen ever work out for you?"

Shawn wanted to act shocked and feel a sense of personal invasion because his father knew that. And hey, why the hell not?

"How did you…I knew it! You snooped through my room when I was a kid, didn't you?" He'd figured that out long ago, in truth – that's why he'd started hiding all his incriminating items at Gus' house in his mid-teens - there was just something about bringing up old issues with his father that was supremely satisfying to the younger Spencer.

"I was a cop," Henry all but shouted the last bit, in hope that the seemingly deaf bartender would hear and serve him already.

Shawn waited silently for a few seconds with his dad…and…wait for it…so close…oh, bust. The younger man wanted to grin but restrained himself because…okay, maybe that was a smile on his face.

"What are you smirking at?" Henry barked.

"I…" Shawn trailed off mid-sarcastic quip to glance over his father's shoulder. Friggin' perfect. "Lassie!" He shouted all the same, restraining a real grin as the detective looked over at him and almost – almost, mind you – smiled.

"Spencer," Lassiter called lightly, walking over to him. The older man was wearing his almost always present perfectly pressed shirt and pants. He was sans jacket, which Shawn knew was his version of 'casual.'

The current head detective saw the retired cop and a look of regret flashed over his features for such a brief moment that the only person in the entire world who would have noticed was Shawn himself.

Even his father seemed to think that Lassiter's, "Mr. Spencer, nice to see you again," and the following manly handshake were sincere. The Irishman took a seat next to Shawn's father at the bar, leaning back casually and gesturing to the bartender.

The short man behind the counter walked up immediately and Shawn took in his father's flabbergasted expression while pretending to glance at the front door.

"What can I do you for?" The man said in a thick, and horribly out of place on someone so docile looking – in Shawn's opinion – Bronx accent.

"Scotch," Lassiter said lightly, the man nodded and looked at the fake psychic, nodding slightly down at the beer Shawn still had in his grasp. Shawn nodded, indicating that he would indeed like another.

Henry had just opened his mouth to finally place his order, but the nice bartender man walked away. "Son of a-"

"So, Mr. Spencer," Lassiter broke through the quiet curse quickly and the two younger men were both barely containing grins. "You been out fishing lately?"

This topic, as expected, distracted Henry from his upset slightly, and as he grudgingly answered the politely phrased question, Shawn let his vision wander.

He hadn't been expecting to run into his father at a bar near the outskirts of Santa Barbara. He and Lassie had planned on meeting here specifically because it was fairly far away from where they lived, worked and normally socialized.

The relationship that Shawn had with Detective Lassiter was…a complicated mess, to put it lightly, and he didn't feel like dwelling on it right now. Instead, he let his roaming eyes take in the surrounding bar and its occupants.

He'd never been here before, but after only a few minutes of eyeballing, he could tell that it was a family owned place (A back wall was covered with pictures from throughout the years, judging on how faded the Polaroid's looked. And the Corky's employees – they all had aprons or hats with the bar's named displayed visibly – had the same short stature, facial similarities and a birthmark near the hairline.)

Just like the one the man handing him his third beer bottle had almost directly above his left eyebrow. Shawn nodded at him after receiving his drink and tuned back into Lassie and his dad for just long enough to realize that they'd begun a riveting conversation about fishing poles.

Shawn rolled his eyes, sipped his beer and kept scanning. There was a couple in the corner of the room by the front window that was in the midst of a break-up (she was crying, he was fingering an obviously female claddagh ring - plus there was a tan line on her middle left finger. He looked on the brink of tears, too.) Shawn felt bad for them, but knew there was nothing he could do – she was moving to Boston to go to college (brochure sticking out of her bag) and he had to stay in California to take over a family business, trade or care for a close relative in some way or another (Shawn knew what resentment looked like) so he just politely glanced away, frowning absently.

Random patrons crowded the establishment. Two gay men were sitting to the far left of the bar flirting, very obviously. Shawn wondered if Lassiter had seen them, wondered if it made him uncomfortable. Then he wondered if it would make his dad uncomfortable, if his father the ex-cop would make some kind of joke at their expense. When he started wondering about how he felt about it – what would it be like to be labeled as gay? - he decided that he wasn't quite drunk enough yet, took another swig of beer and averted his eyes yet again.

That's when he noticed it – noticed them. He shook his head to clear it, knowing that intoxication might skew his observations, and then he looked again. He wasn't wrong.

Crap.

Shawn bit his lip to keep from smiling ironically. Gus hadn't been out of town half a day yet and he was already disobeying the rules his worrisome friend had laid down. Though, in Shawn's defense, Gus had just said not to take any cases, he'd mentioned nothing about cases – or in this instance, particular situations – coming to him.

Hell, if nothing else, it would make the fishing talk stop.

"Hey, guys," Shawn broke up a riveting conversation about trout or some such boringness. "I hate to interrupt-"

"Yeah, right," Henry snapped, interrupting his interruption. Both his son and Lassiter were a little taken aback by the harshness of his words. "Shawn, are you completely incapable of being quiet for more than ten minutes?"

"I-"

"I know you could care less about fishing, but could you stop and think for maybe just a second that the world doesn't revolve around you and keeping you entertained?"

"Wow," Shawn licked his lips and debated on whether or not to actually take offence, "Someone's crabby."

"Shawn-"

This time it was the younger man interrupting, "Hey, in my personal opinion, the only thing more boring than actually fishing, is talking about fishing," he saw an almost hurt look ghost over Lassiter's face and wanted to roll his eyes. "But that's just me, you two can spend all the time you want chatting about bait and hooks and lines and reels,"

"Shawn-"

"I just thought you might like to know," he spoke over his father once more and gestured to two tall white guys with red hair sitting at the very back of the bar, "Fred and George over there are about to rob this place."

o0oo0o

Now…

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Gus interrupted loudly, causing Shawn to stop mid breath and focus again on his current surroundings.

"What?" The other man said, "You asked me to start at the beginning."

"You cannot go, 'Hey, Gus, guess what? After years of having sex with any woman who looked at me, I discovered that I'm actually gay.'" He took a deep breath, "And then start talking about two guys holding up a bar."

"Technically," Shawn said in a purposely annoying whiny voice, "All I said was that I thought they were going to hold up the place. And that was just based on their nervous expressions and behavior, untypical baggy clothing – because, Hi, we're in California, no one really needs to own a black sweatshirt that big - the gun sticking out from the one guy's pants and the car with no license plate I remembered seeing in the parking lot."

"It's called foreshadowing and logical deduction." Gus snapped. "What does any of this have to do with you and Lassiter…"

When the other man didn't go on, Shawn lowered the phone from his ear and squinted at it, trying to deduce if he'd been cut off. When he figured out that he hadn't been, he placed the receiver back where it belonged and tried not to let his nervousness become audible when he asked, "Gus?"

"Damn, that sounds weird just saying," Shawn knew that his friend wouldn't judge or think any less of him because of his newly discovered sexual orientation. The worst thing that would come of it was Gus acting uncomfortable around him for a while or in certain situations – which Shawn planned on taking full advantage of, as he always did with his best friend's discomfort, because, hello, fun.

It was his choice in partners that he was actually at least semi-seriously worried about being judged on. "Yeah," he said now, "I know-"

"How long has that been going on?" Gus demanded suddenly and in a voice that left no room for argument.

"What? Me and Lassie?"

"No, your dad and Lassiter," Gus' sarcasm always made him sound extra 'tough black guy who could take you in a street fight even if I'm five inches shorter than you' and Shawn wasn't sure why - but it always impressed him. "Yes, you and Lassiter."

"Oh," Shawn thought about it, "Ah…remember the Henning's kidnapping case a few months ago?"

"Yeah," Gus snapped, waited, and then got it, "Since then?"

"Technically, yeah," No, that was not a sigh he just released. It was a…long exhale. "It's been on and off with a few freak outs thrown in for good measure."

"Was Lassiter…I mean…was he already...?"

Shawn smiled. There wasn't really a polite way to phrase that question.

"He's been experimenting with his sexual preferences since right before he and his wife separated." Shawn thought about leaving this next part out since it was kind of personal, but really – at least when it came to Gus – when had that ever stopped him? "It's actually what broke up the marriage."

"Damn…" Gus exhaled breathily.

"Yup," Shawn continued on in his typical, careless tone, "That pretty much sums it up."

"Does your dad know?" He sounded normal enough, but Shawn knew he'd be insulted and hurt if he found out that Henry had known about this before him.

"Dude," he said lightly, "You're totally interrupting story time."

And yes, Shawn could hear the eye roll. "Fine," Gus huffed.

"Great, now where were we?" He asked rhetorically, shifting in his seat a little bit for comfort purposes.

"Bar. Robbery. Guy's with guns." He answered in a clipped tone.

"Right," Shawn took a deep breath, "Guy's with guns."

End Chapter.

A/N: As always, your reviews are encouraged!