Note on this and all of my D&J Drake/Mindy stories—I'm not sure how much updating I'm going to be doing over the next month or so. I signed up back in the fall to write a Warehouse 13/Eureka crossover for the LJ Small Fandom Big Bang and deadlines are approaching so I'm going to be trying to focus as much as I can on that.

Reviews are love!

Close, But Not Touching

((Post-series future fic - part of the OYE universe; pre-Open Your Eyes - pre-Drake/Mindy - Rating: K+; Words: 833))

Drake ducks into the backyard for a little peace and quiet. It's Josh's birthday party but people keep shifting their focus to him, continually asking him when he's going to release another album. He hasn't told anyone that Spin City is leaning towards dropping him from the label since his last album barely made it onto the charts.

Drake's not the only person taking a break from the party. It takes him a few seconds to recognize that the young woman sitting by the pool is Mindy Crenshaw; he can't recall having seen her at the party before now.

"You do know that the party's inside?"

She'd been lost in her own little world and his voice causes her to jump, her hair whipping around as she looks over her shoulder. She regards him with curiosity for a moment before she responds, "I do know that the party's inside. I just needed a little fresh air. What about you? You have plenty of adoring fans in there; how did you manage to tear yourself away?"

She's not being mean, not really, but she is poking fun at him.

Drake's not sure why but he gives Mindy an answer that he thinks she'll get a kick out of. "I used the phrase 'itching and burning sensation.'"

She snorts. "I've had the displeasure of meeting legions of your fans; I'm sure someone would have offered to help you apply ointment."

He shudders, "Eww." He sits in a chair next to her. "Where's What's His Face?"

"Luke and I broke up a couple weeks ago," she admits. Mindy waits for Drake to make a scathing remark about how Luke is probably better off, that he came to his senses. It was more of a mutual, somewhat amicable break-up—not too terribly unlike her break-ups with Josh.

"Here's to being single," he says flippantly.

He doesn't quite seem like himself so she has to ask, "Are you okay?"

Drake doesn't know why but he feels like he can talk her so he spills his guts to her about his troubles with the record company, how much more he's been trying to focus on his music as a craft and not as a tool to get dates.

"Drake, you've been a musician for as long as I've known you; surely you're not going to let something like not having a record contract stop you from doing what you love, especially something that makes you so happy."

He squirms a little. "I don't know how I feel about this."

She looks at him funny, "Feel about what?"

"You being supportive and nice."

She sighs. "Yeah, well, I was never the horrible girl you tried to make me out to be. Well, aside from that time I framed you and tried to get you suspended."

"You mean the time you went bonkers?" It slips out so easily.

Her lips form a thin line. "Yes, that time I went 'bonkers' as you so eloquently put it."

"Sorry," he says with a shrug.

"It's not your fault that I lacked an adequate outlet for the mental stress and strain that I put on myself back then." Her tone is as biting as it is teasing, "Just like it's not your fault that you were horn-dog that chased everything in a skirt."

"Not everything," he says pointedly. He doesn't have to elaborate.

"That's because you hated me."

"Only because you hated me first."

Mindy cocks her head to the side. "I never really hated you, Drake. Initially, I resented you because you squandered your intellectual potential. There was no reason for you to be placed in the same classes as Josh and I instead of remedial classes if you didn't have the smarts. You just chose not to use them; that's what I hated about you. That and your cavalier attitude about how you treated the girls you used and dated."

"I—" Drake stops, frowning a little, thinking better of whatever he was about to say; her assessments aren't too far off the mark. But now he's tired of talking about himself and his problems so he steers the conversation back to her. "We all have our own ways of dealing with stress, even if it's ignoring it."

"Indeed we do." Their eyes meet and there are thoughts formulating in her head, connecting dots between outlets for stress to being on the rebound. Rebound. She'll chalk her actions up to being on the rebound and this odd tension that seems to be building between them as she rocks forward and gives Drake a quick kiss on the lips.

Drake opens his mouth then closes it again. He really doesn't know how to process what just happened. "Did you just—"

"Let's not speak of this ever again. I didn't mean—" she's cut off by his lips on hers.

When he pulls back, Drake looks just as surprised as she does. He clears his throat, "We should probably get back inside."

*** Finis ***