fandom: Scrubs isn't mine. Touchstone, Buena Vista and Bill Lawrence own everything. I'm not making any money.
warnings: Barely PG JD/Cox slash. Yeah.
notes: Written for the fanfic100 challenge on LJ. Prompt 061: Winter.
"Wow, I'm sorry. I must have slipped into an alternative reality while you were talking. What did you just say!" Dr. Cox's voice boomed down the hallway, around the corner and woke up a coma patient one floor down. JD kept on smiling, fingers clutching at Mrs. Alley's chart. Nervous Guy whimpered just the messenger, just the messenger from behind JD's manly back.
"I said that Dr. Kelso wants us all to attend an ice skating thingy later this evening." JD repeated and stepped aside to reveal Nervous Guy to Dr. Cox's narrowing eyes.
"And what, pray tell me Louise, made you think I would be even moderately interested in your girly pastime of twirling on the ice in a tiny, tiny skirt?" Dr. Cox asked, picking up a chart from the pile on the nurses' station and thwacking Nervous Guy across the back of the head with it. Nervous Guy squealed and ran for it. JD snorted, but flinched back when Dr. Cox shook the chart in his direction.
"Just thought you'd like to come and... laugh at everybody's lousy attempts at skating?" JD kept backing up while he talked, eyeing warily the chart still clutched in Dr. Cox's hand. He ended up with his back pressed to a pillar, but wasn't that worried because Laverne was still sitting in her chair behind the nurses' station, her ear glued to a phone, eyes sharp. She would at least tell the world what had happened if Dr. Cox did end up killing him.
Dr. Cox stopped a few inches from JD's face, his nostrils flaring. "But Linda, you must recall how much I am not the type to attend any sort of gathering that involves most of the people I work with, because that would be just wro-ho-hong. I have no desire to see their simpering little monkey faces after work, and by God, Newbie, why the hell are you asking me along, anyway?"
JD smiled in a (hopefully) placating way, Mrs. Alley's chart still clutched to his chest for protection. "Because it's a sort of couple thingy? You can't go without a partner." Dr. Cox's face performed many advanced calisthenics moves while he mulled this over. JD stared at the flexing muscles in awe because how cool was a pair of eyebrows doing the macarena?
"A couple thingy? A couple thingy? Dear Lord, Newbie! What did you eat for breakfast this morning? Was it a snack from the nice homeless crack-mongering whore of a man that lives in the little alleyway behind your apartment building? Because if you ate that, then you are in a lo-ho-hot of trouble, little girl. Didn't your parents ever tell you never to accept anything from strangers?" Dr. Cox paused to breathe and JD pounced at the opportunity.
"Dr. Cox! I didn't mean it like that!" JD exclaimed, the tips of his ears pink because yeah, he did, only in a very hush hush, doomed-crush-on-an-older-man-that-could-snap-his-neck-with-his-pinky kind of way. "It's just that Carla and Turk are going as a couple and Elliot's taking Molly." (And just about here JD took a brief detour into fantasyland with hot girl kissing.)
Dr. Cox pulled back from JD's face and crossed his arms. He tapped the deadly chart he'd used to brain Nervous Guy against his bulging arm. JD kept flinching at every tap. They stood there for a small eternity, garnering strange looks from passing personnel and the rapt attention of Laverne, who hadn't blinked in five minutes. Finally Dr. Cox sighed, bringing his hand up to pinch at the bridge of his nose. JD grinned like it was Christmas.
"Okay then, Clarabelle, but only because I'd hate for you to miss out on the perfect opportunity to find the love of your beautifully pink life. However," and Dr. Cox held up a hand, "when we get there, we split up. I am not going to hobble along on a pair of moth-eaten ice skates, Lola, and I'm sure as hell not going to skate arm in arm with you to the syrupy tunes of My Heart Will Go On, no matter how much you'd love to."
JD rolled his eyes but he still couldn't stop smiling even after Dr. Cox strode off muttering about insane people and their stupid ideas. Laverne lifted an eyebrow. JD made vague hahahahahaa expressions her way and held out a hand to collect his twenty bucks. Laverne paid up, her lips pursed.
---
It was dark when JD, Turk and Carla pulled into the parking lot of an old, run-down building. Carla rubbed her mittened hands together, frowning at the solitary lamp burning brightly over a small entrance.
"Is this really the place?" she asked while Turk parked the car and they got out into the chilly night. JD pulled his bright red, fuzzy scarf up to cover the lower half of his face and muttered through the warm fabric. "Has to be. Dr. Kelso was very specific when he gave me the instructions."
(Dr. Kelso had been scowling throughout the conversation. "Now, if I find out who the hell suggested ice skating as a way to improve the morale around here, I am going to grab at their crotch area and twist until they turn blue.")
Carla's brows climbed into her fuzzy pink knit cap. "Well, he didn't spend a lot of money on this thing," she said, slipping her arm around a scowling Turk's back. "Aww, what's wrong, baby?" Carla asked, smooching Turk's cheek loudly. Turk narrowed his eyes.
"I do not like skating, woman," he said, nevertheless wrapping an arm around Carla's shoulders and trudging reluctantly towards the forbidding building. Carla grinned wickedly, poking at Turk's side. "Then I'll teach you, baby. No big deal!" Turk still wasn't convinced and turned to make save-me-brotha' eyes at JD. It always warmed his heart when Turk did that.
"Dude, why are you grinning like an escaped loon when we're slowly but surely being led to our very unmanly deaths?" Turk's voice climbed two octaves. Carla snorted and poked at her boyfriend's side again. JD bit at his lip until he stopped smiling.
"Because ice skating is a real man's sport and I think you're overreacting." JD said, tilting his head to the side and scanning the parking lot for Dr. Cox's car. There was the beat-up Ford Elliot had bought together with Molly (and another brief detour into the whoa yeah territory with the girl sexin'). No sign of Dr. Cox anywhere. JD pouted in a very manly, chest-beating way.
Turk wrenched open the metal door of the ramshackle building. They peered inside at the crowd of happily smiling people dressed in thick winter gear, their multicolored hats zooming along the ice. JD spotted Elliot and Molly tittering to each other near the small refreshments table manned by a furiously scowling Dr. Kelso who'd apparently had to bring Ted as his partner. The Janitor was dancing on the ice, for lack of a better word. JD followed his twirling, leaping, thwacking-people-in-the-face-with-his-outflung-arms way across the ice for a while.
Carla pulled Turk through the narrow doorway into the hall, and they made their way over to the table where a grumpy Laverne was sitting with a box of pretty bows in many colors. "Evenin', Laverne!" JD said cheerily, pulling his gloves off and picking up a dark blue bow. "What are these for?"
Laverne smacked his hand and ignored his yelp in a most cold-hearted way. "Those are to mark the couples, Q-tip. I'm not seein' your partner anywhere." JD pouted at her and inched his fingers towards the box again. Laverne cocked her head to the side and glared at him over the top of her glasses. JD pulled his hand back and slipped on his glove. "You just wait outside for your partner. Come inside when he shows up." Laverne said, handing over a pair of pink bows to Turk and Carla.
JD whimpered miserably when Carla and Turk made apologetic faces at him and left for a nearby bench where they could tie their ice skates on. He didn't have any other choice but to slip outside into the terrifying cold because he just wasn't built to take on Laverne (and win).
So there JD huddled in the light of the entrance, his hands clenched into fists under his armpits. He wasn't sure that Dr. Cox would actually show up, since he really wasn't a big fan of social gatherings. JD bit at his lips and followed the billowing clouds of his breath up into the darkness of the night. JD felt frozen solid by the time Dr. Cox finally strode around the corner, his curly hair in a wild disarray.
"Dr. Cox! Th-th-this way!" JD hollered, his teeth chattering. His arms were pretty much stuck the way they were and he doubted there was any circulation left in his delicates. Dr. Cox made his way over to JD. When he reached the small circle of light from the lamp overhead, JD couldn't help but titter very nervously at Dr. Cox's fluffy black earmuffs.
"I swear to a very large number of higher powers, Kelly, that if you don't stop laughing right this very instant, I will turn around and leave you here to freeze your little girl-balls off." Dr. Cox groused, stopping close to to peer into JD's (probably cheery blue) face. "And my God, Newbie. Have you been standing out here long enough to have whatever tiny amount of common sense you used to have solidify into a minuscule mass inside your empty skull?"
JD tried to say something but all words flew right out of his ears when Dr. Cox pulled off his gloves and slapped his huge, warm hands onto JD's cheeks. Blissful warmth! cried out JD's skin and made him lean into Dr. Cox's fingers.
"Um, hi?" JD mumbled at the silently staring Dr. Cox when his lips felt like moving again. Dr. Cox slipped his hands lower, fingers pushing under JD's scarf and tickling at the skin of his neck. JD swallowed, eyes closing halfway in the unreal silence of the dark night. He felt himself leaning closer to Dr. Cox's parted lips, hands unraveling from beneath his arms to come up and clutch at Dr. Cox's shoulders.
Unfortunately that was the moment when Turk shoved open the metal door and poked his head out. "Yo, JD! Is Dr. Cox..." he managed to get out before his eyes nearly bulged out of his skull. "Dude. Just no. Nuh-uh." Turk retreated inside, shaking his head violently from side to side. JD could hear him squeak out Carlaaaa and then there were running and stumbling noises.
"Um, oops?" JD grinned guiltily into Dr. Cox's face and slowly pulled his hands away from the man's shoulders. Dr. Cox frowned at him and extracted his own hands from the folds of JD's scarf. For a moment they stood smoothing rumpled clothing in an awkward silence.
"So, uh, should we go inside?" JD asked after he'd straightened the folds of his coat for the fifth time. Dr. Cox sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose once more. JD thought it was sort of cute in a homicidal way. "Yeah, Jenny, let's go inside and let everybody stare at the new freakshow of a gay couple our blessed hospital has just acquired." Dr. Cox said, his voice and eyes tired. JD felt something twist a little in his chest.
"Hey, I'll talk to Turk and maybe after he's stopped hyperventilating into a paper bag, he'll tell Laverne that it was all just one big misunderstanding." JD said, trying for encouraging. His skin still tingled where Dr. Cox had touched it. His fingers still itched for another chance to smooth over Dr. Cox's strong shoulders.
Dr. Cox frowned at his twitching fingers and finally snorted. "Look, Carol. This thing wouldn't work anyway, and who ever even said that there was a thing between the two of us?" JD opened his mouth, but Dr. Cox held up a finger to silence him. "Seriously, Newbie. There's no way for this to work out."
JD made his seriously-thinking-about-this face, which required a lot of squinting and eyebrow twitching. "Okay then. But I still want to go ice skating. I haven't been since Dan took me once back when I was ten." (JD decided leave out all the screaming and blood that had ensued. He still had scars.) Dr. Cox gave his head a short shake, eyes going squinty in return.
"And hey. I really think you should just give us a chance." JD said, turning on his heel to wrestle with the door. His fingers were still numb from the cold, but eventually he managed to fumble the creaky piece of metal open. He turned to look at Dr. Cox over his shoulder, a wicked glint in his eye. "Maybe you just need to experience da JD ride. I can guarantee that you ain't nevah seen anything like it."
Dr. Cox snorted loudly and disbelievingly, but followed the wriggling ends of JD's bright red scarf inside anyway.