| Subject: Odd Man Out |
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TT2
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Date Posted: 22:05:23 07/21/02 Sun
AN: Takes place right after Harm gives Mac the opportunity to guess his benefactor (in the Episode "Odd Man Out") This is my version of how things should've went.
Rated PG-13 mostly for language.
Feedback should be directed to thinktink2@yahoo.com
I think that's everything. Here we go...
**********
I ponder his offer for a moment. His eyes, always expressive, watch mine in amusement, the muscles at the corners of his mouth twitching. He has always been arrogant, but his smug demeanor seems sure I won’t guess correctly, and yet a little hopeful, as though he wouldn’t mind being proved wrong.
Hell, I wouldn’t mind either.
“Hmm…” I say, deciding to play his game.
Superbowl tickets, I mean, come on. Not to mention, the opportunity to attend the game with Harm. Just Harm and me. A nice day spent together, enjoying each other’s company, far removed from work. Oh, and the game of course. Too bad the stadium is a dome. Snuggling close together to stay warm in an open stadium, sharing a blanket, might be a…
Okay, marine. Focus.
I run through a list of possible contacts, Webb, Bobbi, Renee, though I knew that one wasn’t a possibility. Actually, I knew none of them were, but I couldn’t figure out where Harm would get such prime seats so close to the Superbowl.
“I thought you were supposed to be sucking up to me. This feels more like a slap in the face.”
“Well, whatever works,” I reply, grinning.
“Try the positive approach,” he advises.
He wants me to suck up to him.
Fine. Two can play that game. No way is he taking Sturgis. Sergei maybe I could concede, but I’m not about to give him quality time with Sturgis. Not after what happened with my stupid slip.
“Harm,” I begin sweetly. The mischievous glint has returned to his eye as he gives me his full attention. “If you take me, not only…” I spin some yarn about our friendship. It’s always good to remind one of the important matters in life, like spending quality time with your best friend.
“That’s a very good argument,” he says smiling. I can tell he liked the attention.
“Really?” I’m going to have to break out my number 28 Marshall Faulk jersey. Superbowl, here I c—
“But, Sturgis said the same thing this morning.” He grins innocently at the expression on my face.
Damn him.
Harm looks smug as he takes another sip of his coffee. Something competitive in me begins to wind up, and I find myself unable to concede that I’ve been one-upped by the Rabb charm. Or Sturgis.
“Did he?” I ask, my voice cool. An idea is taking root and I’m pretty damn sure if I don’t act on it, I’ll be stuck sitting next to the Admiral and Bud come game day, and Harm…well, Harm won’t even remember I exist come kickoff.
Harm nods, and flashes me a wide grin—a genuine flyboy smile, that I have every intention of knocking off his sweet face.
He turns his attention back to his coffee while I study his, okay, I admit, very handsome profile. He’s freshly shaven and I can smell the mix of his aftershave and cologne, and an image of us tucked away together under a black and red-checkered flannel blanket huddling for warmth flashes through my mind.
Okay, desperate times call for desperate measures, Colonel.
“Well, I don’t think Commander Turner is quite as persuasive as I am.”
I lean forward and place a soft kiss against his smooth cheek, inhaling the sweet, masculine scent of him. My lips linger on his cheek for just a moment longer than they should given the circumstances, before I pull away. We’re in the break room for Christ’s sake, and I’m kissing a fellow officer, Harm, and--to be honest--not really giving too much of a damn.
At least I wasn’t.
Now, I’m starting to doubt the wisdom of my battle plan.
Harm is frozen in place, looking much like one of the marble or granite monuments that dot the cityscape here in D.C. The Styrofoam cup containing his coffee is poised midair, and his eyes have lost their smug twinkle and have taken on a new expression—disbelieving shock.
I grab my own cup of coffee and hurry with as much dignity as I can out of the break room, leaving Harm to consider my…my…”argument.”
*******
I don’t break stride until I reach my office and the door and blinds are safely shut behind me.
What the hell was I thinking?!
I mean, do I really want to go to the Superbowl that bad, even if the seats are on the 50-yard line, or hell, even in the press box?
Who am I kidding? This was never really about the Superbowl. I mean, yeah, it was a little, but once my brain latched onto the idea of Harm and I alone together, rational thinking took an embarrassing dive.
What was I thinking?!
Did I actually believe that the two of us alone in the Big Easy would mean anything? I mean, he’s the one who said, “Location doesn’t change who we are.” The problem is who are we now?
Friends, Yes. Best friends. Something more? I don’t think either one of us have figured that out, yet.
Okay, so not entirely true, given what I let slip to Sturgis. I am in love with him. Some days it seems hopelessly so. Some days it just seems hopeless.
I’ve admitted, to Sturgis and myself anyway, that I’m in love with him. But now what? We’ve just managed to get ourselves somewhat squared away again, and back into familiar—and welcome—territory.
And then I go and kiss him in the break room for a couple of seats in New Orleans.
Well, and a hotel room—separate from his, of course. Unless, they only have one available. I mean, with the Superbowl, I’m sure nearly all the rooms are booked if they’re not already. And if Harm has tickets then surely he has a hotel room already. How would the logistics of all this work? Assuming I’ve won. How could I not though? I’m pretty sure Sturgis isn’t going to kiss Harm.
Although I bet the expression on his face would be priceless. My grin fades as I recall Harm’s expression. He didn’t even seem…pleased by it. But, then again, I did get the element of surprise on him. I doubt he came into work today thinking he would receive a less-than-platonic kiss from his best friend in the break room all for some Superbowl seats.
I let my head flop down on my desk.
Way to go, Colonel.
********
Wow.
I stare into my coffee, and try to put together what exactly just happened here.
Wow.
I can still feel her warm lips against my cheek. And I thought today was going to be a bad day. First Mac sucking up to me, with her sweet smile and her soft voice, but Mac…Mac kissing me. Here. In the break room. At the office.
She must want to go to the Superbowl really bad.
I didn’t think she was that big of a football fan. I mean, yeah, sure she yells at the players on the TV, and sometimes she throws things--a box of Kleenex, a pillow, my Steelers cap I brought as a joke--at the screen, but …
Wow.
I wonder if she’ll be like this at the game. Damn. I wish New Orleans was an open stadium. Those seats would be hers in a second, no sucking up required. Not for the opportunity to snuggle together against the cold.
Assuming of course, if I actually had real seats to the game. Given Mac’s weak stomach for mach 1+ speed and pulling G’s, I’m not so sure she’d be quite so…’persuasive’ as she put it if she knew those two seats were in a tomcat.
Damn Sturgis warned me. “Don’t be swayed by emotional appeals.”
I underestimated Mac.
I suppose I should tell her the truth about the seats.
I stare into my coffee cup as though the answers lay hidden in its murky depths. Instead, the only idea that claws its way through the abyss is one that obviously has been fueled by the emotions Mac’s kiss stirred up.
Maybe, she has a few more “persuasions” up her sleeve.
Hmm.
Well, it might do to have her sweat it out a while.
********
1538 ZULU
Jag HQ
Falls Church, VA
I can’t believe I kissed Harm. I mean, we’ve kissed before. At Norfolk, but that doesn’t really count. Then on the Admiral’s porch. And then again at the Roberts’ Christmas party. Just a nice little mistletoe kiss between friends.
Right.
Just like that was a nice little office kiss between coworkers.
This is not helping MacKenzie. Think. You have to see Harm in court in a few minutes. Do you want to be blushing like some schoolgirl? Like the almighty aviator ego needs another woman swooning at his feet.
Besides, like Marines swoon anyway.
So. How to handle this?
I tap my pen against my legal pad as I try to think of anything other than the smooth curve of his cheek and his aftershave. Brut?
That isn’t helping either, Marine. Focus.
He is kind of a Brut man. A little rugged, a little dangerous. What am I saying?
I don’t even know why I’m worrying about any of this. Knowing Harm he’ll just clam up and pretend like nothing happened. We’ll avoid each other for a few days. Then we’ll just go back to the way things were before.
I’m tired of the way things are. I have no idea how to change them, though, where I don’t wind up getting the shaft.
Damage control, Colonel. You have court in fifteen minutes.
Locking lips with Harmon Rabb, Jr. isn’t really all that adverse to me. In fact, all three times it’s been a rather enjoyable experience.
Particularly the last two where it’s been a little clearer that I wasn’t just the only active participant. That kiss on the admiral’s porch—a Harmon Rabb a little passionate and needy. Out of control.
Perhaps that’s what I need to win this little bet, or game, or whatever it is. Keep Harm off his balance and a wonderful seat next to him will be mine.
Hmmm…don’t let him know the kiss affected me. And don’t let him know I have anything else in mind beyond winning a Superbowl seat off of him.
Unless he seems receptive to something else.
********
I saunter back to my office, unable to keep the smile off my face as I think about her leaning in so close to me, her perfume, in fact my favorite perfume—her Christmas present from me—lulling my senses to sleep. I glance at Mac’s door and note it’s closed, as well as the blinds.
My earlier resolve to let her sweat it out is faltering.
Perhaps she didn’t mean for the kiss to happen. I was goading her on, and Mac’s never one to back down from a challenge. Sometimes we both get carried away. I should just tell her the truth about the seats. She won’t want to fly with me anyway.
We have court in a few minutes. I don’t want her to think I—I—
What? Didn’t enjoy it?
Do I want her to think I did enjoy it?
It’s not like it was some deep, passionate, kiss. It wasn’t just a kiss between friends either. Why do things always have to be so complicated between us? Why can’t Mac just kiss me—or I kiss her—without all this emotional baggage we’ve been lugging around for the past three years. Why can’t we go forward from here?
Is Mac willing to go to this step of our relationship? Using her feminine wiles to sucker me into doing or giving her what she wants. Taking our friendship to a more personal, romantic level. God, I hope so. I’ve been wanting this for a long time.
Maybe I can use this Superbowl thing to my advantage. I highly doubt, given how sick she gets when she’s up in the air in a tomcat that she’ll want to ride with me on my mission. Besides, that position belongs to Skates—she is my RIO after all—and in the off chance that something does happen that needs my aviation services, it might be best to have Skates with me.
Not that Mac was a bad RIO when we were in Russia.
So, the nice Superbowl game snuggled under a blanket for warmth, her warm moist breath against my ear as she comments on how great the Rams offense is, is out. I suppose since I’ll be flying back to Pensacola that the nice romantic walks and dinners in the Big Easy are out as well. So that leaves me with…? Not much, by my count.
In FantasyWorld, Mac would be waiting for me in Pensacola when I finished providing cover for the game. We’d go out, maybe to a nice little fish grotto in the area, maybe further south to the warmth of the Keys, and take a walk along the boardwalk. She’d tease me about how she was right about the Rams kicking the Steelers’ sixes, and that I owed her…a nice massage which I would be only too happy to oblige her with. She would murmur a sound of approval as I began to knead her shoulders. I would bend my head close to her ear and whisper something, like “you enjoy that marine?” and she would nod her head. Then I would place one, then two, then three kisses along her neck, traveling from her shoulder to her jaw and ask, “how ‘bout that?” And she would nod again, and sigh contentedly and somehow from there to five years in the future we’d be married and already fulfilled our baby deal, a son, with another one, a daughter, on the way.
Alas reality has a nasty way of intruding on this life. I’m late for court.
I bump into Mac as she’s charging out the door. She’s late, too?
“Whoops! Excuse me, Commander.”
“Sorry, Mac. Internal clock off, Marine?” I can’t help ask.
“Not at all, Squid. I wouldn’t miss the chance of a little pre-trial sparring with you. Can’t get that if I’m actually on time, you know.”
“You mean a little pre-trial sucking up,” I correct, albeit a little arrogantly. I wouldn’t really be all that surprised if she kicked my six.
“Doesn’t hurt with the Superbowl at stake.” She flashes me another one of her beautiful smiles, and I swear she’s brushing up against me on purpose as we walk to the courtroom. She’s definitely wearing the perfume I bought her. Does that mean something for me, for us, or just that she likes the scent of ‘Beautiful’, too? We’re halfway to court before I realize I don’t have any of my files for the case.
“Uh…” I begin, not quite sure how I can save face here.
She stops walking and looks at me and I swear a see a little doubt cloud her face, but it’s gone when she looks down at my hands and realizes I’m not carrying my briefcase. Something more like glee has replaced it.
“I forgot my files. I just need…” I gesture back towards the bullpen and my office. She nods in sympathetic understanding.
I swear I hear a snort of laughter as I walk away.
********
She shoots, she scores. Well, with torturing Harm, anyway. It was a nice feeling to get one up on Harm. The look on his face when he realized he had followed me down the hall without even thinking of grabbing his notes was worth the half hour I spent in my office working on an ulcer trying to figure out what to do about that kiss and us.
He, of course, did win the case, though how he won this one, I don’t know. Actually, I do know.
Aggravation, thy name is Bud Roberts.
A murderer has been allowed to walk, and now I’m looking through Virginia Code to see what I can do about having the D.A. take the case. Hell if I’m going to let a murderer go free.
Really it’s not much of a victory for Harm when I know he wants the bastard put away as much as I do.
I take a sip of my latte, and glance at the other one sitting on my desk. I hope Harm gets here to perform his customary gloat-after-a-win session before his latte gets cold. I went through all the trouble of ordering it for him. I can’t help but smile at my thoughtfulness. Soymilk for my health-conscious partner. Yet another score for the marine. I practically own that seat next to him.
“Hey,” he says wandering in. He doesn’t look happy. Time to schmooze and for Sturgis to lose.
“Hey,” I greet him warmly. Gloating or not, he brightens my office as much as he darkens it. “I got you something.” I hand him the latte.
“What is it?” He takes it from me carefully, as though it might just start oozing some sort of bubbly, green chemical at any moment.
“It’s a soy latte. I thought you might like it.” I smile as he takes a sip. His face screws up into an unattractive grimace and he practically gags.
“Ugh. Oh, God, that’s nasty.”
I manage to suppress the sigh I’m about to heave.
“Are you always this cranky after a win?”
“Some cases you don’t wanna win,” He says, his face still somewhat scrunched up. Honestly I didn’t think he’d find it that bad. Especially after gut-wrenching fare like his meatless meatloaf. I shudder at the thought, but fortunately Bud’s entrance has attracted Harm’s attention so he doesn’t notice.
I’m somewhat surprised at Bud. He seems genuinely confused why Harm wasn’t more thrilled with the verdict. I know Bud thinks he did a great service to the jury panel, helping them reason out the evidence. I think Harm is a little frustrated with Bud.
Harm answers Bud’s questions coolly, hands the coffee back to me and disappears into the bullpen.
Bud looks at me questioningly. This time I do sigh. Neither one of us gets the vindication we want.
*******
Harm’s slouched over in his office, working on some paperwork from what I can see from here by the copier. He hasn’t said much since he accompanied Bud and I out to see the Lieutenant. I hope that excursion hasn’t made me lose Favored Superbowl Companion status.
I should make sure he’s okay.
“Hey squid,” I say. He gives me a small smile as he looks up. I get the impression he knows why I’m here.
“Hey Mac,” he answers easily. He continues to scribble some notes on the document on his desk.
“You feel like dinner?” Dinner’s a good way to see what’s up and work my charms for the Superbowl.
“I don’t feel like beltway burgers, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“No, we could go to that healthy place you always go to on the weekends. Tofu Frenzy.”
He stops writing and looks up at me with a raised eyebrow.
“Really?” He remarks with casual disbelief. I nod with as much enthusiasm as I can muster. “You’re really going all out for these Superbowl tickets.”
“It’s not for the Superbowl.” He gives me a Look. “Okay, not just for the Superbowl. You’re my best friend. I care about you.” He gives me another Look.
“What? I do,” I reply defensively. Does he really believe I’m that shallow? “So what’s up with the frown, flyboy?”
“Nothing.” He picks up the pen he laid down and starts scribbling again.
“Come on, Harm, with your win—okay, maybe not the win necessarily—“I amend upon a flicker of long black eyelashes and green eyes flashed at me. “But, killer seats to the Superbowl—the Superbowl, Harm—and everyone sucking up to you, it has to be a pretty good week for you and it’s only Wednesday.”
“It’s had its highlights and downsides,” he replies, a smile playing at his lips. He stares at me with an unreadable expression. I wonder what he’s thinking and where the kiss in the break room falls in those two categories.
“So, marine, are you going to wager a guess as to where the tickets came from, or are you going to watch your chance at Superbowl madness slip by.”
“You mean to say my efforts at convincing you I’m your number one Superbowl fan have all been for naught?”
“The latte set you back.”
“It’s the thought that counts,” I counter. He grins one of his killer flyboy grins. “Besides, what has Sturgis done to convince you to take him?”
“Well, Sturgis had some very convincing arguments,” he says matter-of-factly.
“So you’re taking Sturgis?” I ask, feeling a little crestfallen. I thought that little scene in the break room would’ve counted for something.
“I didn’t say that.”
“So you’re taking me?”
“I didn’t say that, either.”
“So, who are you taking?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Take me.” I try to keep the pleading note out of my voice but I don’t think I succeed.
He gets up from his desk and marches over to one of his file cabinets. I stand up also and follow, and lean against the file cabinet as he searches for whatever file he needs.
“Come on, Harm, think about it. The lights. The crowd. You. Me. Football,” I add quickly, afraid of how what I just said might be construed. He leans down very close to me, so close I am engulfed by that wonderful aftershave. If it’s not Brut it has to be a stolen scent of heaven. I seize up at his proximity, and can only stare helplessly into his beautiful green eyes. They really are quite beautiful. I’ve always loved them. They say so much about him when the rest of him isn’t talking. Or refusing to talk.
“Aren’t you worried that if you and I go,” he whispers softly, and I stiffen up a little at what’s coming next—I knew we couldn’t avoid all of our relationship baggage—“the Steelers may kick the Rams’ six and you may not enjoy the Superbowl at all.” He stands up straight again, putting a little distance between us, that damn smug grin ever present on his face. “Because if you think I’m going to let the opportunity to rub it in pass me by, you’d better think again.” He takes a seat behind his desk again and waits for my response.
That arrogant bastard.
I saunter over to his chair and lean down very close to his ear, maintaining my balance with one hand on the arm of his chair, and the other on the back of his chair.
“If you actually think the Rams are going to lose this one, flyboy, maybe you should consider going home early. You’re obviously not feeling very well. You’d better take care or you might not be able to attend the game. Sturgis and I may have to go in your stead.” So close to his ear I’m having a hard time not taking advantage of the opportunity here. Oh, hell.
I place a light kiss on his temple and sashay out of his office.
I don’t look back, but I’m pretty sure that supercilious smile is no longer on his face.
TBC in Part 2
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