Discovered at a Wedding -- Wedding Conversations
One Month Before:
It was another boring afternoon on stand-by, made worse by the fact that the windows to the rest room were open, providing constant confirmation that it was a wonderful warm May day. A perfect day to be riding a motorbike, or at the outdoor shooting range, or running errands, or just about anywhere other than stuck indoors, waiting. But wait they would, and indoors at that, because the Cow had something brewing, and had demanded that his top team be in the building that afternoon, rather than just available by R/T.
Ray Doyle sat on the battered couch, one ankle propped up on the other knee, his head buried in the day-before-yesterday’s Times. He’d already been through today’s issue and the half of yesterday’s that he could find. He didn’t bother to raise his head when he heard his partner’s distinctive footsteps as he walked back into the room after walking out not thirty seconds earlier, for the fifth time in the last hour.
The footsteps stopped right in front of him. “So, who are you taking, Ray?” Bodie’s voice asked from the other side of the newspaper.
“Taking where?” Ray turned a page, but still didn’t look up.
An odd sort of tapping noise came from Bodie’s direction. “McGee’s wedding. Who are you taking? The invitations are ‘and guest’.”
Ray lowered the paper and looked up to discover the tapping was Bodie holding a thick white envelope between his fingers and thumb, bouncing it off the knuckles of his other hand. He knit his brow at Bodie, and the tapping stopped. “No one,” he replied, returning to his reading.
“No one?” The tapping started up again.
Ray sighed, gave up on the paper, and dropped it into his lap. He looked back up at Bodie and braced himself for a ribbing. “Yeah, got no one I want to take. Not seeing anybody at the moment, am I? How ‘bout you, Sunshine?”
“Going solo myself,” Bodie pronounced somewhat smugly.
This sent Ray’s eyebrows toward his hairline. “Really? Should think you’d have a bird and a last-minute replacement, the way you carry on.”
Bodie patted Ray’s knee with the envelope and got the look on his face that Ray knew meant a patented ‘Bodie lecture on women’ was coming. “The trouble with weddings, my son, is that they make a woman think. She gets ideas, then there’s all sorts of trouble to talk your way out of. So - I’m going alone.” He crossed his arms and looked out the window before asking casually, “Drive up together?”
Ray studied his partner for a moment, a speculative look in his eyes. Then he picked the paper back up and went back to reading. “Yeah, alright,” he agreed just as casually.
One Week Before:
The multi-man op had gone badly - Anson was in hospital having a bullet cut out of his leg; in retaliation, Anson’s partner shot the gunman in a place much higher up, so there was no one to interrogate, which annoyed Cowley no end; and to put the top on it the fog rolled in, making the clean-up of the scene nearly impossible. It was very late when Doyle drove Bodie home. He invited Ray up for a drink when they reached his flat, and Ray had the key out of the ignition and was halfway up the path almost before Bodie’d finished his offer.
Now Bodie was stretched out on his couch with a half-filled glass in his hand. Ray slouched in the mismatched armchair, legs stretched out in front of him crossed at the ankles, elbows propped on the chair arms, fingers of both hands wrapped around his glass. He was staring down into the amber liquid like it was a crystal ball that would tell his future, or at least explain why things had gone to hell that day.
Trying to head off another dark Doyle mood at the pass, Bodie tossed back half his drink, studied his partner, and announced, “We’re off tomorrow, and the match’s on telly. Beer and take-away here?”
Ray shook his head back and forth slowly, never taking his eyes off his drink, almost as if he were puzzled by the failure of the contents of his glass to present the answers he sought, but he replied to the question. “Can’t, can I? Have to buy a wedding present.”
“You have fun with that, Ray.” One side of Bodie’s mouth lifted in a smirk.
Hooded green eyes shifted their focus from the drink to the man. Ray’s voice held a combination of dismay and disgust. “I suppose you’ve done it already. What did you get them?” He sat forward in anticipation. “Let’s see.”
“Can’t. I had it wrapped and delivered ahead, like you’re supposed to.”
Ray took umbrage at both Bodie’s put-on posh accent and the idea of Bodie handing over money for something extra, when Ray couldn’t even get a bag of crisps out of his partner at the pub. “You paid for delivery?” he asked dubiously.
Putting on his best ‘man of the world’ face, Bodie announced, “I see it as part of the cost, so I just spent a little less on what’s inside.”
“Cheap bastard.” Ray finally took a drink, returning to his slouch.
“Says him what’ll carry his gift to the wedding. Remember, silver’s always good! I’ll have a beer for you tomorrow.” Bodie raised his glass in a mock toast to Doyle and polished off the contents.
Ray returned the salute. “You do that.”
One Day Before:
Getting out of London was a nightmare, and the motorway north hadn’t been much better; it seemed half the population were determined to flee the city despite the weather. The rain was steady, heavy, and a little cold for June. The food at the transport caff where they’d stopped to eat had been greasy even by Bodie’s standards, and they both felt the worse for the experience, instead of rested. When they finally arrived at their hotel, the queue at the reception desk stretched nearly to the doors.
After fifteen minutes of slowly shuffling forward, the girl behind the desk didn’t even bother to look up when Bodie reached her. “Name please?” came her stoic inquiry.
“William Bodie,” he sighed, setting down his bag at his feet. They’d managed to get fairly wet just getting their bags out of the boot and walking across the car park, and he stifled the urge to shake off the excess moisture like a dog would.
She shuffled several papers in front of her and flipped over pages in a large ledger. Frowning slightly, she looked up at him. “I’m sorry, sir; we don’t have a reservation under that name.” It almost sounded like an accusation.
He glowered right back. “I rang a month ago! This is ridiculous.” Wiping off an errant raindrop that slid out of his hair and onto his forehead, he realized he was too cold and tired to put up much of a fight. “Fine, I’ll take whatever you have left.”
“Sorry, we’re full, sir. We’ve been sending those without reservations to Durham; there’s nothing left in town.” Her face was a stony mask that belied her apologetic words and announced there’d be no getting around her.
Bodie slammed a fist on the desk. “I had a bloody…” Turning behind him to his partner, he announced, “Dammit, Ray, they lost my reservation.”
Peering around Bodie to the girl at the desk, Doyle looked more than a little concerned. “Christ, I hope they still have mine. Raymond Doyle, miss?” His smile tried for charming, but only made it to wary.
She ran her finger down a page and looked up, relieved. “Yes sir, I have you here.” She started gathering his room key and various papers.
“Just bloody brilliant!” declared Bodie as he scrubbed his face with both hands.
“Shut it, Bodie.” Ray glared up at his partner as he stepped around him to move to the desk. “Miss, does that room sleep two?”
“Yes, sir.” She turned the register around and pushed it over to him.
Glancing back at Bodie, Ray grinned. “Looks like you’re with me, Sunshine. No pulling, though…” he announced as he turned back to sign in.
Bodie rolled his eyes. “There goes the wedding reception,” he muttered and picked up his bag.
During the Reception:
Bodie could feel the beat of the bass line through the soles of his shoes as he walked back to his table. The reception was in full swing - guests fed, traditions performed - and gyrating bodies moved on the dance floor while others sat around in groups, chatting and drinking. Pulling out the chair next to his partner, he looked down to find the bride’s bouquet on the table in front of him.
Ray looked up at him and glared, daring him to say something. Bodie found it impossible not to smirk, really. Besides, he knew Ray rarely could withstand his camping. “Nice posy, Petal,” he simpered as he sat down.
Instead of grinning, Ray lowered his head to his hands, elbows propped up on the table. “Shuddit. Not my idea. I’d just gone out for a slash; stepped back in the hall and wham! Got a face-full of roses. The new Mrs. McGee has quite an arm on her.” He looked out over the hall warily, as if the bride might suddenly appear with something else to toss in his direction.
“I’ll bet that didn’t exactly make you popular with the single women.” Bodie smiled into the half-full glass of beer he’d purloined from in front of Ray, and drained the contents. It was the only thing left on the table to drink, and since Ray seemed to be ignoring it, Bodie thought it fair game.
“Too right. Been staring daggers at me ever since. You’d think I’d done it on purpose.” Ray leaned his head in the direction of a gaggle of bridesmaids, who were glaring at him en masse but looked away and pulled their heads closer to each other to talk when they noticed he was watching.
Bodie shook his head sympathetically. “I told you birds get ideas at a wedding. They come with a bloke, and use the bouquet as a final nudge.” Setting down the now-empty glass, he laid a hand on his partners shoulder to get Ray’s attention and went for his best fatherly look and tone of voice. “So, do tell, Raymond -- who’s the lucky man?”
Ray rolled his eyes and shoved Bodie at the shoulder hard enough to nearly push him out of his chair. “Enough, Bodie. It’s your round.”
The End of the Evening:
The bride and groom were away; a majority of the guests had gone, as well. The dance floor held the die-hards - wedding party and escorts, mostly - and only the parents of the couple and a few of their closest relatives remained at the tables. Ray pushed back his chair and stood, placing a hand on Bodie’s shoulder. “C’mon, Sunshine - time to go.”
“There’s still booze and birds left, Ray.” It came out as more of a whinge than a grumble. Bodie was a genial social drunk. It was only when he set out to handle bad memories with alcohol that he became belligerent.
Shaking his head and smiling, Ray slid Bodie’s chair back and put his hands under Bodie’s arms to urge him to his feet. “We’ve had enough of the first, and you can’t pull anyway, got nowhere to take her, remember?”
Bodie shook off Ray as he stood. “Most of them are local, the bride’s friends.”
“And still living with Mum, by the look of ‘em.” Ray had managed to dance with a few of them despite the incident with the bouquet. They were secretaries and shop assistants, most of them less than five years out of school and few of them earning enough to be sharing a flat with friends. He thought a couple of them had even eyed him up as marriage material, since he’d caught the bouquet and he worked with the bride’s new husband.
“Now mate, you wouldn’t mind staying in the lounge while I entertained for an hour or so, would you?” Turning on that smile of his that few people could resist and that Ray rarely did, Bodie put all of his persuasive, ‘mates do for each other’ force into his voice.
Not only did Ray resist, he glared at his partner, almost bristling. “More than you know, mate. Besides, these aren’t that sort of girl. These get those ideas you’re so anxious to avoid. Let’s just leave, Bodie.” He grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair and pulled it on, not even bothering to unroll his shirtsleeves from where he’d pushed them up, too warm from dancing.
Bodie aped Ray’s actions. “Killjoy,” he muttered, starting toward the door.
“Takes one to know one.”
Stopping in mid-stride, Bodie looked back over his shoulder at Ray. “You what?”
Ray stared at a point somewhere between Bodie’s shoulder blades. “Just… go, Bodie,” he nearly snarled, and pushed with both hands in the place he’d been staring at. Bodie shook his head and continued walking out of the hall.
A Bit Later:
The atmosphere in the car on the drive back from the hall started out feeling strained. Bodie’s clever quips about the reception met with stony silence, and he was just a little too drunk to work out what he could have done to upset Ray, much less find the right words to force his partner to admit the reason. So he just sat staring forward while Ray drove, the occasional befuddled or puzzled look crossing his face.
Ray, watching Bodie out of the corner of his eye, finally shook his head with a quiet snort and a slight smile on his face that Bodie knew usually meant something like ‘my partner is quite dense but there’s no use explaining, so I give up.’ The tension between them seemed to ease with that. Bodie relaxed for the rest of the trip to the hotel.
Turning back to his partner after hanging his jacket in the wardrobe in their room, Bodie realized Ray had been carrying something he hadn’t noticed before. “You never brought the bouquet?” he asked as Ray set it down on the low, wide chest of drawers.
“Seemed rude to leave it, like it wasn’t appreciated.” Ray shrugged, not looking at Bodie. He started emptying his trouser pockets.
Bodie toed off his shoes and flopped down on the bed on his back. “You’re a sentimental sod, Raymond,” he pronounced fondly, tucking his hands behind his head on the pillow and looking over to his partner’s reflection in the mirror on the wall behind the chest of drawers.
Ray met his gaze for a split second then bent over to take off his shoes. “Yeah, too soft-hearted for me own good. It gets me in all sorts of trouble.” He picked up his pair of shoes and Bodie’s, and set them in the floor of the wardrobe.
“And I get you out.” Bodie’s gaze followed Ray around the room. He was a bit puzzled that Ray wouldn’t turn and look at him while they talked, but too mellow to be really worried.
“Not this time, Sunshine.” Ray shook his head.
Rolling over on his side to watch Ray, Bodie propped himself up on one elbow, resting his head in his hand. “Love life, is it? Tell Uncle Bodie all about it,” he coaxed, letting just a bit of a leer into his voice.
Ray’s shoulders stiffened then sagged. “Let it go, Bodie. I’m going to clean my teeth.” He grabbed his toilet bag and headed for the en-suite.
“Fine, just trying to help. Oh, Ray?” Bodie asked, his voice suddenly changing to all sweetness-and-light.
Pausing with his hand on the en-suite door, Ray replied wearily, “What?”
“The posy? You never told me who the lucky bloke was, Petal.”
Turning to look back over his shoulder at the bed, Ray gave his partner a knowing glance. “Nobody here but you, is there? Back in a tick,” he announced.
Bodie lay there for a moment, mouth slightly open, and then his eyes went wide. The odd stares, the quick offer to share a hotel room, the rush to leave when Bodie started seriously eyeing up the girls at the reception - all explained in one long gaze from his partner’s green eyes. “Oh,” he said breathlessly. “That’s a bit of alright, then.” He rolled off the bed, yanked back the bedclothes, and headed to the en-suite himself to make damned sure Ray didn’t change his mind.
Later Still:
“That was good, Bodie.” Ray didn’t have enough energy to open his eyes, much less lift his head from where it rested on his partner’s shoulder. His voice was a low murmur, his breath tickling at Bodie’s throat as he spoke.
Rolling onto his back while making certain not to shift Ray’s head too much, Bodie’s smile was beyond smug, well into cat-that-got-the-cream territory. “Was, wasn’t I? And you said I couldn’t pull.” He glanced sideways to see the results of his latest needling.
Ray’s snort ghosted across Bodie’s skin. “I said you couldn’t pull a bird, because you were sleeping with me. Besides, seems to me I did the pulling.” Arching his back, Ray stretched along his entire length. Bodie took the opportunity to admire the view. Again. He’d made his appreciation of it well known ever since he’d started peeling Ray out of his clothes.
“You just keep thinking that, Angelfish. Whatever makes you happy.” Bodie reached across his chest with his free hand to rumple his partner’s already well-mussed hair.
Propping himself up on one elbow, Ray smiled at Bodie and answered in a serious tone, “You make me happy, mate.” Suddenly there was a wicked glint in his eyes. “So, you going to make an honest man of me, then?” With one finger, he traced the path of a bead of sweat from the hollow of Bodie’s throat down his sternum.
Bodie pressed back into the pillows, as if the little distance that gave him would change what he thought he just heard. “What?”
The finger moved slowly to Bodie’s far shoulder, then slid across his clavicle and down the other arm. Ray appeared to be very absorbed in following its travels. “You were right. Going to a wedding with a bloke does give you ideas, and I did catch the bouquet.” He peeked up at Bodie from under his eyelashes, smiling shyly. “We could put in for a two-bedroom flat. Saw some curtains at Harrods…”
“Now, Raymond - “ Bodie’s eyes widened until they were tiny circles of blue and black lost in a sea of white. He tried backing away further, only to discover there was nowhere left to go.
Suddenly Ray let out a thoroughly filthy guffaw and flopped down on his back, laughing. When he caught his breath, he looked over at his very confused partner and announced, “Gotcha, Sunshine.”
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Title: Wedding Conversations
Author: GRITS in Misery
Characters: Bodie/Doyle
Disclaimer: All things Professionals belong to Brian Clemens et. al. Borrowed for the gratis amusement of myself and others.
Notes: My personal prompts were "bouquet" and "presents". Originally seven dialogue-only drabbles, but I had time to fill 'em out. I owe it all to my beta draycevixen , who left the land of roses and lavender to suffer the vagaries of America for love (and pomegranate margaritas.)
It was another boring afternoon on stand-by, made worse by the fact that the windows to the rest room were open, providing constant confirmation that it was a wonderful warm May day. A perfect day to be riding a motorbike, or at the outdoor shooting range, or running errands, or just about anywhere other than stuck indoors, waiting. But wait they would, and indoors at that, because the Cow had something brewing, and had demanded that his top team be in the building that afternoon, rather than just available by R/T.
Ray Doyle sat on the battered couch, one ankle propped up on the other knee, his head buried in the day-before-yesterday’s Times. He’d already been through today’s issue and the half of yesterday’s that he could find. He didn’t bother to raise his head when he heard his partner’s distinctive footsteps as he walked back into the room after walking out not thirty seconds earlier, for the fifth time in the last hour.
The footsteps stopped right in front of him. “So, who are you taking, Ray?” Bodie’s voice asked from the other side of the newspaper.
“Taking where?” Ray turned a page, but still didn’t look up.
An odd sort of tapping noise came from Bodie’s direction. “McGee’s wedding. Who are you taking? The invitations are ‘and guest’.”
Ray lowered the paper and looked up to discover the tapping was Bodie holding a thick white envelope between his fingers and thumb, bouncing it off the knuckles of his other hand. He knit his brow at Bodie, and the tapping stopped. “No one,” he replied, returning to his reading.
“No one?” The tapping started up again.
Ray sighed, gave up on the paper, and dropped it into his lap. He looked back up at Bodie and braced himself for a ribbing. “Yeah, got no one I want to take. Not seeing anybody at the moment, am I? How ‘bout you, Sunshine?”
“Going solo myself,” Bodie pronounced somewhat smugly.
This sent Ray’s eyebrows toward his hairline. “Really? Should think you’d have a bird and a last-minute replacement, the way you carry on.”
Bodie patted Ray’s knee with the envelope and got the look on his face that Ray knew meant a patented ‘Bodie lecture on women’ was coming. “The trouble with weddings, my son, is that they make a woman think. She gets ideas, then there’s all sorts of trouble to talk your way out of. So - I’m going alone.” He crossed his arms and looked out the window before asking casually, “Drive up together?”
Ray studied his partner for a moment, a speculative look in his eyes. Then he picked the paper back up and went back to reading. “Yeah, alright,” he agreed just as casually.
One Week Before:
The multi-man op had gone badly - Anson was in hospital having a bullet cut out of his leg; in retaliation, Anson’s partner shot the gunman in a place much higher up, so there was no one to interrogate, which annoyed Cowley no end; and to put the top on it the fog rolled in, making the clean-up of the scene nearly impossible. It was very late when Doyle drove Bodie home. He invited Ray up for a drink when they reached his flat, and Ray had the key out of the ignition and was halfway up the path almost before Bodie’d finished his offer.
Now Bodie was stretched out on his couch with a half-filled glass in his hand. Ray slouched in the mismatched armchair, legs stretched out in front of him crossed at the ankles, elbows propped on the chair arms, fingers of both hands wrapped around his glass. He was staring down into the amber liquid like it was a crystal ball that would tell his future, or at least explain why things had gone to hell that day.
Trying to head off another dark Doyle mood at the pass, Bodie tossed back half his drink, studied his partner, and announced, “We’re off tomorrow, and the match’s on telly. Beer and take-away here?”
Ray shook his head back and forth slowly, never taking his eyes off his drink, almost as if he were puzzled by the failure of the contents of his glass to present the answers he sought, but he replied to the question. “Can’t, can I? Have to buy a wedding present.”
“You have fun with that, Ray.” One side of Bodie’s mouth lifted in a smirk.
Hooded green eyes shifted their focus from the drink to the man. Ray’s voice held a combination of dismay and disgust. “I suppose you’ve done it already. What did you get them?” He sat forward in anticipation. “Let’s see.”
“Can’t. I had it wrapped and delivered ahead, like you’re supposed to.”
Ray took umbrage at both Bodie’s put-on posh accent and the idea of Bodie handing over money for something extra, when Ray couldn’t even get a bag of crisps out of his partner at the pub. “You paid for delivery?” he asked dubiously.
Putting on his best ‘man of the world’ face, Bodie announced, “I see it as part of the cost, so I just spent a little less on what’s inside.”
“Cheap bastard.” Ray finally took a drink, returning to his slouch.
“Says him what’ll carry his gift to the wedding. Remember, silver’s always good! I’ll have a beer for you tomorrow.” Bodie raised his glass in a mock toast to Doyle and polished off the contents.
Ray returned the salute. “You do that.”
One Day Before:
Getting out of London was a nightmare, and the motorway north hadn’t been much better; it seemed half the population were determined to flee the city despite the weather. The rain was steady, heavy, and a little cold for June. The food at the transport caff where they’d stopped to eat had been greasy even by Bodie’s standards, and they both felt the worse for the experience, instead of rested. When they finally arrived at their hotel, the queue at the reception desk stretched nearly to the doors.
After fifteen minutes of slowly shuffling forward, the girl behind the desk didn’t even bother to look up when Bodie reached her. “Name please?” came her stoic inquiry.
“William Bodie,” he sighed, setting down his bag at his feet. They’d managed to get fairly wet just getting their bags out of the boot and walking across the car park, and he stifled the urge to shake off the excess moisture like a dog would.
She shuffled several papers in front of her and flipped over pages in a large ledger. Frowning slightly, she looked up at him. “I’m sorry, sir; we don’t have a reservation under that name.” It almost sounded like an accusation.
He glowered right back. “I rang a month ago! This is ridiculous.” Wiping off an errant raindrop that slid out of his hair and onto his forehead, he realized he was too cold and tired to put up much of a fight. “Fine, I’ll take whatever you have left.”
“Sorry, we’re full, sir. We’ve been sending those without reservations to Durham; there’s nothing left in town.” Her face was a stony mask that belied her apologetic words and announced there’d be no getting around her.
Bodie slammed a fist on the desk. “I had a bloody…” Turning behind him to his partner, he announced, “Dammit, Ray, they lost my reservation.”
Peering around Bodie to the girl at the desk, Doyle looked more than a little concerned. “Christ, I hope they still have mine. Raymond Doyle, miss?” His smile tried for charming, but only made it to wary.
She ran her finger down a page and looked up, relieved. “Yes sir, I have you here.” She started gathering his room key and various papers.
“Just bloody brilliant!” declared Bodie as he scrubbed his face with both hands.
“Shut it, Bodie.” Ray glared up at his partner as he stepped around him to move to the desk. “Miss, does that room sleep two?”
“Yes, sir.” She turned the register around and pushed it over to him.
Glancing back at Bodie, Ray grinned. “Looks like you’re with me, Sunshine. No pulling, though…” he announced as he turned back to sign in.
Bodie rolled his eyes. “There goes the wedding reception,” he muttered and picked up his bag.
During the Reception:
Bodie could feel the beat of the bass line through the soles of his shoes as he walked back to his table. The reception was in full swing - guests fed, traditions performed - and gyrating bodies moved on the dance floor while others sat around in groups, chatting and drinking. Pulling out the chair next to his partner, he looked down to find the bride’s bouquet on the table in front of him.
Ray looked up at him and glared, daring him to say something. Bodie found it impossible not to smirk, really. Besides, he knew Ray rarely could withstand his camping. “Nice posy, Petal,” he simpered as he sat down.
Instead of grinning, Ray lowered his head to his hands, elbows propped up on the table. “Shuddit. Not my idea. I’d just gone out for a slash; stepped back in the hall and wham! Got a face-full of roses. The new Mrs. McGee has quite an arm on her.” He looked out over the hall warily, as if the bride might suddenly appear with something else to toss in his direction.
“I’ll bet that didn’t exactly make you popular with the single women.” Bodie smiled into the half-full glass of beer he’d purloined from in front of Ray, and drained the contents. It was the only thing left on the table to drink, and since Ray seemed to be ignoring it, Bodie thought it fair game.
“Too right. Been staring daggers at me ever since. You’d think I’d done it on purpose.” Ray leaned his head in the direction of a gaggle of bridesmaids, who were glaring at him en masse but looked away and pulled their heads closer to each other to talk when they noticed he was watching.
Bodie shook his head sympathetically. “I told you birds get ideas at a wedding. They come with a bloke, and use the bouquet as a final nudge.” Setting down the now-empty glass, he laid a hand on his partners shoulder to get Ray’s attention and went for his best fatherly look and tone of voice. “So, do tell, Raymond -- who’s the lucky man?”
Ray rolled his eyes and shoved Bodie at the shoulder hard enough to nearly push him out of his chair. “Enough, Bodie. It’s your round.”
The End of the Evening:
The bride and groom were away; a majority of the guests had gone, as well. The dance floor held the die-hards - wedding party and escorts, mostly - and only the parents of the couple and a few of their closest relatives remained at the tables. Ray pushed back his chair and stood, placing a hand on Bodie’s shoulder. “C’mon, Sunshine - time to go.”
“There’s still booze and birds left, Ray.” It came out as more of a whinge than a grumble. Bodie was a genial social drunk. It was only when he set out to handle bad memories with alcohol that he became belligerent.
Shaking his head and smiling, Ray slid Bodie’s chair back and put his hands under Bodie’s arms to urge him to his feet. “We’ve had enough of the first, and you can’t pull anyway, got nowhere to take her, remember?”
Bodie shook off Ray as he stood. “Most of them are local, the bride’s friends.”
“And still living with Mum, by the look of ‘em.” Ray had managed to dance with a few of them despite the incident with the bouquet. They were secretaries and shop assistants, most of them less than five years out of school and few of them earning enough to be sharing a flat with friends. He thought a couple of them had even eyed him up as marriage material, since he’d caught the bouquet and he worked with the bride’s new husband.
“Now mate, you wouldn’t mind staying in the lounge while I entertained for an hour or so, would you?” Turning on that smile of his that few people could resist and that Ray rarely did, Bodie put all of his persuasive, ‘mates do for each other’ force into his voice.
Not only did Ray resist, he glared at his partner, almost bristling. “More than you know, mate. Besides, these aren’t that sort of girl. These get those ideas you’re so anxious to avoid. Let’s just leave, Bodie.” He grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair and pulled it on, not even bothering to unroll his shirtsleeves from where he’d pushed them up, too warm from dancing.
Bodie aped Ray’s actions. “Killjoy,” he muttered, starting toward the door.
“Takes one to know one.”
Stopping in mid-stride, Bodie looked back over his shoulder at Ray. “You what?”
Ray stared at a point somewhere between Bodie’s shoulder blades. “Just… go, Bodie,” he nearly snarled, and pushed with both hands in the place he’d been staring at. Bodie shook his head and continued walking out of the hall.
A Bit Later:
The atmosphere in the car on the drive back from the hall started out feeling strained. Bodie’s clever quips about the reception met with stony silence, and he was just a little too drunk to work out what he could have done to upset Ray, much less find the right words to force his partner to admit the reason. So he just sat staring forward while Ray drove, the occasional befuddled or puzzled look crossing his face.
Ray, watching Bodie out of the corner of his eye, finally shook his head with a quiet snort and a slight smile on his face that Bodie knew usually meant something like ‘my partner is quite dense but there’s no use explaining, so I give up.’ The tension between them seemed to ease with that. Bodie relaxed for the rest of the trip to the hotel.
Turning back to his partner after hanging his jacket in the wardrobe in their room, Bodie realized Ray had been carrying something he hadn’t noticed before. “You never brought the bouquet?” he asked as Ray set it down on the low, wide chest of drawers.
“Seemed rude to leave it, like it wasn’t appreciated.” Ray shrugged, not looking at Bodie. He started emptying his trouser pockets.
Bodie toed off his shoes and flopped down on the bed on his back. “You’re a sentimental sod, Raymond,” he pronounced fondly, tucking his hands behind his head on the pillow and looking over to his partner’s reflection in the mirror on the wall behind the chest of drawers.
Ray met his gaze for a split second then bent over to take off his shoes. “Yeah, too soft-hearted for me own good. It gets me in all sorts of trouble.” He picked up his pair of shoes and Bodie’s, and set them in the floor of the wardrobe.
“And I get you out.” Bodie’s gaze followed Ray around the room. He was a bit puzzled that Ray wouldn’t turn and look at him while they talked, but too mellow to be really worried.
“Not this time, Sunshine.” Ray shook his head.
Rolling over on his side to watch Ray, Bodie propped himself up on one elbow, resting his head in his hand. “Love life, is it? Tell Uncle Bodie all about it,” he coaxed, letting just a bit of a leer into his voice.
Ray’s shoulders stiffened then sagged. “Let it go, Bodie. I’m going to clean my teeth.” He grabbed his toilet bag and headed for the en-suite.
“Fine, just trying to help. Oh, Ray?” Bodie asked, his voice suddenly changing to all sweetness-and-light.
Pausing with his hand on the en-suite door, Ray replied wearily, “What?”
“The posy? You never told me who the lucky bloke was, Petal.”
Turning to look back over his shoulder at the bed, Ray gave his partner a knowing glance. “Nobody here but you, is there? Back in a tick,” he announced.
Bodie lay there for a moment, mouth slightly open, and then his eyes went wide. The odd stares, the quick offer to share a hotel room, the rush to leave when Bodie started seriously eyeing up the girls at the reception - all explained in one long gaze from his partner’s green eyes. “Oh,” he said breathlessly. “That’s a bit of alright, then.” He rolled off the bed, yanked back the bedclothes, and headed to the en-suite himself to make damned sure Ray didn’t change his mind.
Later Still:
“That was good, Bodie.” Ray didn’t have enough energy to open his eyes, much less lift his head from where it rested on his partner’s shoulder. His voice was a low murmur, his breath tickling at Bodie’s throat as he spoke.
Rolling onto his back while making certain not to shift Ray’s head too much, Bodie’s smile was beyond smug, well into cat-that-got-the-cream territory. “Was, wasn’t I? And you said I couldn’t pull.” He glanced sideways to see the results of his latest needling.
Ray’s snort ghosted across Bodie’s skin. “I said you couldn’t pull a bird, because you were sleeping with me. Besides, seems to me I did the pulling.” Arching his back, Ray stretched along his entire length. Bodie took the opportunity to admire the view. Again. He’d made his appreciation of it well known ever since he’d started peeling Ray out of his clothes.
“You just keep thinking that, Angelfish. Whatever makes you happy.” Bodie reached across his chest with his free hand to rumple his partner’s already well-mussed hair.
Propping himself up on one elbow, Ray smiled at Bodie and answered in a serious tone, “You make me happy, mate.” Suddenly there was a wicked glint in his eyes. “So, you going to make an honest man of me, then?” With one finger, he traced the path of a bead of sweat from the hollow of Bodie’s throat down his sternum.
Bodie pressed back into the pillows, as if the little distance that gave him would change what he thought he just heard. “What?”
The finger moved slowly to Bodie’s far shoulder, then slid across his clavicle and down the other arm. Ray appeared to be very absorbed in following its travels. “You were right. Going to a wedding with a bloke does give you ideas, and I did catch the bouquet.” He peeked up at Bodie from under his eyelashes, smiling shyly. “We could put in for a two-bedroom flat. Saw some curtains at Harrods…”
“Now, Raymond - “ Bodie’s eyes widened until they were tiny circles of blue and black lost in a sea of white. He tried backing away further, only to discover there was nowhere left to go.
Suddenly Ray let out a thoroughly filthy guffaw and flopped down on his back, laughing. When he caught his breath, he looked over at his very confused partner and announced, “Gotcha, Sunshine.”
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Title: Wedding Conversations
Author: GRITS in Misery
Characters: Bodie/Doyle
Disclaimer: All things Professionals belong to Brian Clemens et. al. Borrowed for the gratis amusement of myself and others.
Notes: My personal prompts were "bouquet" and "presents". Originally seven dialogue-only drabbles, but I had time to fill 'em out. I owe it all to my beta draycevixen , who left the land of roses and lavender to suffer the vagaries of America for love (and pomegranate margaritas.)