A/N: Minor Spoilers for 'There's something about Mira'
Chapter Eleven: A Moment of Side Notes
Four, Three, Two and Just Over One Month Ago. For Those Following Along At Home, Please Keep Your Arms and Legs Inside the Time Sequence At All Times. No Reading Ahead. No Giving Into Confusion. Failure To Comply With These Guidelines Will End In Severe…Badness. Like Hating Pineapple, Bad. Enjoy!…
"We had sex." Lassiter stated bluntly, standing in Shawn's doorway like he was afraid that crossing over the threshold would bring about a massive doom of some kind.
"Yeah," Shawn shrugged, not for the first time in his life he was unsure about how to approach a situation with a potential love interest. Or something. "We did."
"Did you…" Lassiter looked so unsure, so unguarded. Shawn decided in that moment that there was more to Carlton Lassiter than he'd ever believed he'd be able to see. And for the first time, he wanted to see it. "I mean, what…"
Shawn smiled. "It wasn't your first time with a guy." It wasn't a question.
Carlton shook his head, agreeing with Shawn's assessment. "I can't be gay."
"Huh," Shawn wasn't offended so much as amused. "Then I guess the butt-sex was a mistake."
"Spencer." Lassiter growled warningly before looking around suddenly, seemingly afraid that someone else might hear their words. He stepped into Shawn's apartment, but didn't moved away from the now closed front door.
Shawn wasn't complaining. He didn't really like people in his personal space until he'd had time to prepare. And Lassiter coming over that morning defiantly hadn't been expected.
"I'm serious." Lassiter didn't sound serious, though. He sounded scared.
"I know," Shawn said anyway, playing along. Because that felt right at the moment. And Shawn tried to base all his decisions on what felt right. Logic never lead anywhere good on the emotional side of life.
"So…" Lassiter didn't make eye-contact when he was nervous. He shifted from one foot to the other and he shoved his hands in his pockets.
Shawn was reminded of an elementary school boy with his first crush, standing on the playground, empty swings in the background, swaying in the breeze at dusk; long, poetic shadows cast off from those swings and the slide and the monkey bars, all leading up to this one person. This one man, boy, child; who was laying his heart on the line because he just didn't know what to do with it anymore.
Shawn shook his head, clearing it of that distinct image. Lassiter wasn't weak and unsure. He was strong, he knew who he was and what he was doing.
Or maybe not. Still, it wasn't up to Shawn to decide.
"So, what?" He asked, not angrily, but with no real defining emotion. "It happened. It doesn't have to mean anything."
Lassiter looked up, "It doesn't?" His face was a myriad of expressions. He'd left his poker face at home that day. Hope mixed with disappointment tinged with relief and…something else Shawn was too distracted to pick out.
"It can." He found himself saying. "It doesn't have to, but it can."
"Do you…want it to?" He was still rocking on the balls of his feet, hands shoved into his khaki pants. He still wasn't making eye contact.
Shawn wanted so badly to answer, to make things easier for himself and for Lassiter. But he knew he couldn't. Hard as it might be for him, the natural leader, he knew he couldn't take the reigns and steer right now.
So he just shrugged. "It's up to you, Lassie."
"Why?" Innocence and a pure desire to be lead shone through in that simple word and Shawn felt suddenly like he was that little boy on the playground, and he didn't like the emotions that crept up on him in that moment.
So he just shrugged again, suddenly uncomfortable. "I'll be around when you make up your mind."
o0oo0o
Lassiter had called.
"Spencer, it's me. I wanna talk to you about the Henning case. Follow up questions for court" - a long pause and suddenly it was less official and more nervous - "Meet me at my place tonight. I'll order pizza. Oh, and, Shawn…" - another long pause, some shuffling on the other end of the line- "Um…bring beer."
Then a click as his machine played the next message. But Shawn couldn't hear it. He was smiling and he couldn't deny how damn happy he was right at that moment.
o0oo0o
"Have you…ever…been with a guy before?" Shawn grinned. They were three and a half beers into the night and all of the Henning case stuff had been completed hours ago. Turns out 'follow up questions for court' was really just a couple signatures on some pieces of paper and an agreement that if he did - on some off chance - get called to court, it would be to testify as a witness. Nothing more.
He'd agreed easily and they'd been talking casually, civilly, ever since.
Lassiter, apparently, had a tendency to drop big questions out into random conversation. Shawn didn't know if this was because they'd circle around his mind and he'd spit them out the second he got the balls to, if they were just random thoughts, or if it was a method of trying to throw him off, get honest answers.
Maybe a mix of all three.
Shawn shrugged, which he seemed to do with Lassiter a lot. "Have you?"
"You already know I have." He pointed out.
Shawn bit his lip for a moment. "Three guys, five times." He paused. "Unless threesomes count."
Lassiter grinned so Shawn did, too. He liked seeing that grin.
"And out of those, how many times did you…" he stopped and blushed. Carlton Lassiter actually blushed.
Shawn thought it was adorable, and he got stuck on that for a moment before realizing what it was exactly his…friend, he guessed, was asking.
He thought about their night together several days before. He'd been on top. He was always on top. "I've never been the bottom." He half-smiled.
Lassiter surprised him by admitting, "I hadn't either. Until you."
Shawn wasn't sure what that meant. "We were drunk."
They were kind of drunk now, actually. The fake-psychic couldn't think of a situation where they would be having this conversation and not be drunk.
"That," Lassiter chuckled, "And…I trust you."
Shawn might have fallen in love right then.
o0oo0o
"An interpretive dance group in Buffalo?" Carlton laughed outright at that. "And was that before or after the candy emporium in Texas?"
"Dude…" Shawn dragged out. "After, but if you ever really wanna know what eternal torment is, try cleaning up an entire store of melted candy for eight hours after the air conditioning breaks."
The older man barked a laugh and Shawn couldn't hold back, "I'm talking chocolate, skittles, suckers, marshmallows, sour belts, gummy bears, gummy snakes, gummy sharks, gummy army guys - we basically could have made a little world out of all the gummy stuff we had. It was right before Easter, too so we had about eight pounds of Peeps. Ten thousand different colors. And flavors. Did you know Peeps could come in different flavors? And, God, the Heresy Kisses. Carmel - which is good - but then there's coconut, strawberry, vanilla. Raspberry Three Musketeers. It's wrong and disturbing, how they violate the integrity of candy sometimes. " He was in full on rant mode now. "Because, seriously? Coconut Marshmallows? I mean, I can get on board with the chocolate ones, even the strawberry ones weren't that bad, but coconut? And mint chocolate? How wrong is that?"
Lassiter crinkled his nose in disgust, "I'm with you there."
"Marshmallow, candy coated, Hello Kitty suckers," Shawn went on, "Chocolate covered Peeps. I mean, we had chocolate I couldn't even pronounce in flavors like 'Up town, raspberry mint, dark chocolate truffle' Whatever happened to plain chocolate candy bars that cost a dollar at the grocery store? Oh, and, out of all our nasty flavors, no one, not even once, thought to make anything remotely Pineapple flavored."
"Did you write an angry letter?" Lassiter was only semi-mocking him. Mostly, he was enjoying seeing Shawn in his element.
"Nah," The younger man laughed some more, "But I did get so fired after that."
"Why? Wasn't your fault the air conditioning broke."
"No, but I did kinda decide after a few hours of cleaning that all thatcandy - clearly several experiments at the candy factory gone wrong - wasn't really worth saving, so I gathered together all the melted crap and made a oversized statute of penis on the middle of the counter." They were laughing so hard now their faces were bright red.
"And I haven't even told you the stories from the pet store, the snowboarding place, the Hallmark, the tour guiding, used car salesman, fortune cookie fortune writer, assistant to the assistant of the assistant at that record label, the Weiner mobile, the acne puncture..ist, the birthing coach, hot air balloon inspector…"
"You're making this up," Carlton accused, laughing all the while.
"I'm really not," Shawn insisted, before going into the detailed stories of how exactly he found out that experience - which he didn't have -was indeed necessary for so many of those jobs.
They laughed until the sun came up.
o0oo0o
Lassiter had never seen him truly worried before. Nor angry. But that night on their way to Mira's parents winery changed a lot of things for Head Detective Carlton Lassiter. Until that night, it'd been easy for him to forget that they were both human beings, both caring and feeling and wanting.
Especially Shawn, who put up a false front even when he was trying not to put up a false front. And it wasn't like Lassiter had been completely innocent of that crime himself.
But that day, that long, long day had changed everything.
O'Hara had scored better than him on his detective's exam. And Shawn had aced the damn thing at age fifteen - which really didn't surprise him at that point, but come on.
He'd gotten totally carried away with a suspect, mocked Shawn's 'Jan doesn't exist theory' which was fun. (He got to clasp him on the shoulder without raising suspicions)
But then everything changed. Shawn had changed. In the split second that it took him to realize that his best friend was in danger, he'd gone from willy-nilly psychic wonder boy, to…
Just a really worried Shawn Spencer.
And Lassiter had seen him in a different light.
Of course he still had to be right about everything. "Remember when I said Jan didn't exist? Well, technically, I was right. Ya know what? Forget that, I was totally right."
But the way he was speaking…he repeated words, he wasn't having a 'vision'…he just…
"Somebody give me a gun!"
Even a cop who was that distraught or that personally involved in a case wouldn't have been carrying a weapon, if they'd been at the scene at all. But Shawn didn't follow protocol or procedure. He was Shawn.
And as he explained the what's and how's of the case, he'd calmed down a bit, which in turn calmed Lassiter down, but the second the story was out…
"But why's Guster in trouble?" He couldn't help but inquire.
And when Shawn said impatiently, "Because it's Thursday night, Lassie." He'd felt like a bonehead for not figuring it out sooner. Because as soon as Shawn said it, it seemed so obvious.
"Somebody give me a gun!"
Two chorused no's.
"Then drive faster, that's my best friend in there!"
And that changed everything.
Shawn wasn't jus worried or angry.
He was frantic. And pissed.
He was so protective of his best friend, so willing to run right into danger to get the other man out safe. Lassiter had had to pull him back, physically pull him away so he wouldn't bust down the door himself.
"We've got guns." He heard O'Hara mumble to him, and he'd lagged back.
A minute later and it was as if none of it had ever happened. Shawn and Guster were reunited, Shawn told some impressive cover story to hide whatever had actually happened in that wine cellar, placing Gus in a more impressive light.
Then they'd left, gone about their routine as normal, and it was as if nothing had changed.
Only everything had.
Nothing would ever be the same. Because for a fleeting moment when Shawn had been frantic and pissed - under his worry and professionalism, Carlton Lassiter had been jealous.
It'd only been for a fraction of a second, but it'd been enough. He'd wanted to be the one to provoke that kind of reaction out of Shawn. He'd wanted to be that important. He wanted to be the one with whom Shawn reenacted the 'fight.' He wanted Shawn to fall into his arms just so the younger man would be able to know, to feel, for sure that he was alive and well.
He'd wanted to be that important…to Shawn.
And in that moment, he knew without doubt that he was in over his head.
o0oo0o
"I just don't get the point of online dating," Shawn stressed his point, scratching the back of his head in that way he had that meant he wasn't saying something that he wanted to say.
Lassiter just shrugged. "It's easier sometimes." He studied the younger man. "Why? Are you jealous?"
Shawn snorted, "No."
"Then why won't you look me in the eye?"
Shawn didn't look up, but was silent for several long moments before, "Fine! Ya know what? Go head, go online and find your desperate over-the-hill bimbos and let me know how that works out for you!"
He got up from the kitchen table, storming out of Lassiter's apartment angrily. The Head Detective himself just leaned back and raised a single eyebrow.
"And another thing," Shawn swung back around suddenly and pointed a finger at his lover, "There are crazy, crazy people on the internet! It's like…a homing beacon for every two-bit wanna be psycho stalker slash rapist slash killer slash…porn freak, midget fetish… person ever! And if you wanna lower yourself to those standards, then fine! Go head! I won't stop you."
"So…" Lassiter bit back a smile as the younger man caught his breath, "You're jealous, huh?"
o0oo0o
Lassiter looked up from the book he was reading, spread out comfortably on his couch, he'd been taking a rare early evening at home to relax; until a tentive knock sounded on his front door. Shortly followed by a head of dirty blonde hair poking its way through his threshold.
He didn't even chastise himself for leaving the door unlocked until much, much later. Because he'd recognized the knock and he'd known right away who was at the door.
"Shawn?" Soon the younger man was fully visible and closing the door behind himself. "What are you doing here?"
The fake psychic shrugged. It was odd how quiet he was being. Very odd.
"Is everything okay?" Lassiter prayed that it was because he wasn't that good at anything emotionally complicated.
Shawn shrugged again, bit his lip and eventually asked, "Can I spend the night here?"
Lassiter thought that it was a supremely unusual request, delivered in a undeniably uncharacteristic way, but it was either question it and risk Shawn scampering off, or just do what he did; nod.
"Sure, of course." Because it wasn't like he didn't want the younger man in his bed. They hadn't even come close to defining their relationship. At this point, it was just a series of one-night stands strung together, if that.
But yet here Shawn was, kicking off his shoes and lying down next to Carlton on the couch.
"Um, we could go to the bedroom," the detective offered.
He felt Shawn shake his head against his chest as one of his arms wrapped around his torso. Shawn was so small that there was still plenty of leftover room on the luscious couch.
"Keep reading," his lover insisted, "I just wanna sleep for a little while."
And that was the position they stayed in for the better part of that evening; Shawn asleep on his stomach, Carlton alternating between reading the words of his book and dragging his hand lovingly through Shawn's hair.
Carlton never did ask his lover why he'd come over that night, but he would never forget it.
That night was another one of those moments that changed everything.
o0oo0o
Four And a Half Days Ago…
Shawn took a deep breath, "The end?"
"More like the beginning," the woman in front of him was older, with flowing, dirty blonde hair - the same color as Shawn's - petite, thin and dressed casually in a white T-shirt and jeans. She was barefoot, as she'd been lounging around her house comfortably before Shawn had knocked on the door.
"That, too." The fake psychic chuckled. "Oh, and there's this whole thing with a gang and this guy I used to know and he was framed, but nobody will believe me until I can prove it. Oh, and this other convicted criminal might be trying to kill me." Shawn shrugged again. "Got any coffee?"
"I always have coffee." The older woman took all this information in stride and simply opened her door wider, and Shawn stepped across the threshold gratefully.
"Thanks, Aunt Jamie."
End Chapter.
A/N: I know, I didn't answer any questions about the crime part of the plot and I didn't include Gus - which was hard for me, by the way - but this is the most Shassie packed chapter thus far and I'd Loooooove to know what you thought?
Oh, and that candy rant? I work at a big store that stocks a lot of the Easter inspired stuff AND I used to work at a really small candy store. So I'm very well versed in candy. There really were that many different kind of Gummy things and all those flavors? They really do exist. Go check out the 'Seasonal' section of a Rite Aid, Target, Walgreen's or something sometime. It's Friggin' crazy. And gross.