Since that day three months ago, Nick hadn't paid her any more late night visits and surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly, that had only made her worry more. Judy gave another little huff of irritation as she peered over her steering wheel, looking for any signs of disturbances or crime. Before, she at least could be content with the fact that he made it to her apartment safely. Now she had no idea where he was until the next morning.
Damn you, Nicholas Wilde, and damn your stupid rules.
At the time, "the rules" had given her peace of mind since they gave her a lot of conditions under which she could use the recording: if Nick came over late at night two or more times, if he came to work drunk even once, if he was ever late to work three times or more, if he smelled of booze at work three times or more, etc. It was a very long list, and should any single one of them occur, Nick had promised to never resent her or be angry at her for using the recording.
However, there were also rules that prevented her from talking about the problem more and trying to fix it: she could only discuss it when Nick was completely sober and not hungover, she couldn't say anything about it in front of anyone else unless he had broken one of the other rules, she couldn't ask questions about it to try to wheedle him into quitting, etc. This was also a really long list.
No doubt Nick had done that on purpose in the hopes that she might forget what was a rule and what wasn't. Which is why she took quite a bit of satisfaction in the surprised look on his face when she produced a second carrot recorder pen from her desk and made him start the whole list of rules over, just so she could record every single one.
Of course, that had probably just made him come up with even more on the fly, just to cover his bases, but she had found it hard to hold it against him when he had arrived at his final two rules.
"Alright, alright, Carrots. Just two more, I promise," Nick said with a grin.
"Fine, but only two more," she warned. "Well, what are they?"
"No more threats like the one you made today," he said, a little defensively. "You can't quit being my partner over this, ever."
Before she could interrupt to tell him how unfair that was he continued, looking away with a bit of a blush, "And also you have to promise that you'll never give up... on me."
Another big smile broke over her face, "I promise."
#######
Judy couldn't help but beam at the memory, but it quickly turned back into a frown, because it made it abundantly clear that no matter how much Nick struggled against her ministrations or hid behind "the rules", he really was counting on her to keep pushing no matter what.
Before Judy could ruminate on the issue further Chief Bogo entered the bullpen amidst a cacophony of whooping, table smacking, and a single howl.
"Right, alright," he said, quickly quieting the officers present. "Assignments."
"Wolford. Snarlov. Undercover in Tundratown," the respective officers stood and walked forward to receive the red folders with their assignments.
Everything progressed as a typical morning until he neared the end of the list.
"Delgato. Wilde," he said, looking up from his list for just a moment before frowning and saying, "I'm sorry, my mistake. Delgato and Rhinavitz. Vandalism watch in Rainforest district. Hopps and Wilde, you've got patrol through Downtown today. We've heard of some gang activity so keep an ear and an eye out, respectively," Bogo finished with a short chuckle at his own joke.
Confused, Judy looked up at Nick. For a split second, she thought she had caught him glaring at Bogo but his smug grin quickly returned as he slipped off the chair and strolled out the door.
"What was that about?" Judy asked as she caught up to him in the hallway.
"Sorry, Carrots. I couldn't tell yah."
She would've pressed the issue further, but as she hopped into their patrol car she realized she had more important things to worry about, namely the fox getting into the passenger seat. She wasn't worried about hangovers affecting his duties, he always seemed to power through them with uncharacteristic discipline, but if Judy had her way, she would be discussing the "issue" right now, while Nick was at his most vulnerable.
But that would be against "the rules".
The surprisingly mocking tone of her thoughts would've made her chuckle to herself if she wasn't feeling so bitter.
Judy let out a little sigh as she buckled in and shifted the car into gear. It wouldn't be right to let this problem to impede her work any further than she had already allowed it, especially since Nick was doing such a good job of maintaining an air of professionalism.
An annoyingly good job of it.
It was annoying, since before this situation had become the norm, he had barely tiptoed the line of professionalism, with his constant air of smug slyness, his trading of witty barbs, and even his unnecessary physical contact. His actions had never reached the point of making Judy uncomfortable before and even served to endear him more to her. Now though, Nick remained silent during their patrols and kept physical contact to a minimum, sometimes even forgoing what some would deem necessary physical contact. Just last week, for example, when Judy asked to use his set of handcuffs. Instead of walking over and putting them in her paw with that damned grin on his face, he put them on the trunk of the patrol car and slid them to her.
In the logical part of Judy's brain, she knew why. He kept silent while on patrol to stop himself from saying anything that might make him sound drunk. He kept an air of professionalism to be absolutely sure he didn't do anything that might make him seem even slightly drunk. He kept his distance just in case he still smelled like booze. It was all extremely careful and well thought out, but…
"It's not sly at all," Judy thought aloud.
"What's that, Carrots?" Nick asked.
Judy knew he might hate her for this. She knew it was against "the rules". She knew that what she was thinking about doing was a stupid gamble that might ruin her friendship with Nick, let alone her chances at pulling him out of this habit, but...
Damn you, Nicholas Wilde, and damn your stupid rules.
She turned into an alley, threw the car into park, and flipped off the radio.
"It's not sly at all," she repeated.
"What's not sly at all?" Nick asked even more surprised by the sudden seriousness of the situation.
"This," she said, indicating Nick with open palms. "This whole act of yours lately. It has no guile, no artfulness, and it isn't sly at all."
Nick opened his mouth, no doubt still too confused to contribute anything meaningful to the discussion but Judy ignored him and continued.
"The silence, the professionalism, the physical distance between us... YOU... You're trying your hardest to be able to keep drinking as much as you want, which is admittedly a little upsetting, but I might've even been able to forgive you, if you weren't so... damn... obvious," she finished pointing a finger at him venomously.
"I thought we weren't going to talk about this when I'm hungover," he said, pulling his aviators down with a frown.
"We wouldn't be if you weren't so inept, so transparent, so… so…" Judy struggled to find a powerful and articulate insult, but instead settled for one that struck at the heart of his vanity. "So un-Nick."
Even behind his sunglasses, Judy could see both his eyebrows raise and the fur on his neck stand on end.
"And how un-Nick of me would it be to take away that precious recording because you broke the rules?" he asked threateningly.
#######
"Oh? You mean the one that I now have hidden away in my new apartment? The apartment that you haven't even seen the inside of, let alone where I hid the pen?"
Nick's eyes narrowed in anger, "You promised you'd follow the rules, I trusted you."
"To be fair, you also made me promise to never give up on you."
His expression softened into one of exhaustion, "I suppose I did."
The fox threw his arms into the air in frustrated resignation, "Alright, alright. I know when I'm beat. The con has been out-conned. Let's talk."
Judy sighed in relief and smiled, but her heartbeat picked up again soon after.
You've gotten this far, but you're not out of the woods yet. Don't mess it up now.
"I want you to give up drinking. Cold turkey," Judy said with fake confidence.
"No," he answered quickly, and Judy's face fell in despair.
"What? But I- What happened to being out-conned?" she said with indignation.
"That doesn't mean I'm going to just go along with any old idea, Carrots," he said calmly. "Consider this a negotiation. Negotiate."
"Fine, but how much you're drinking is my main issue, so I need a way to be absolutely sure you'll tone it down," she said with a pout.
"I think I may have a solution for that," he replied, now smirking. Judy didn't like the look of that smirk, not one bit.
Author's note:
That's Chapter 2 done. I might come back and edit some more later but for the most part I'll leave it alone. Thanks to everyone following the story. I actually didn't expect it to be this long. I was thinking I'd be done after 3000 words but now it's looking like I might have a much longer story here. Anyways, feel free to leave a review, and don't worry about being too harsh, I can take it.