SN WIP: Homophobic fic...
Apr. 15th, 2004 04:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
out_thereEstimated current word count: Approx 14,000.
***
["Do you remember the concepts of sharing and punishment?" Natalie had the innate ability of intimidation, a gift that seemed more suited to a seven foot quarterback.] It stood to reason that somewhere, there was a very physically impressive man with a very timid temper.
"I thought I was exempt from that?"
"You are, because I don't have an agreement with you. I have an agreement with Dan."
Casey was manly and brave, but he was primarily relieved. "Okay."
"But you remember?" Natalie asked, staring at him.
Casey nodded. "Sure."
"Could you remind Dan?"
"Why? What hasn't he shared?"
"Last night," she said peevishly. "He came in with a hickey this morning, but he refuses to share any details."
"He's going to get punished for this?" Casey briefly wondered when his workmates had crossed the line from charmingly eccentric to outright crazy. Maybe it had been on his last night off. "It was one date. Surely he's entitled to a little privacy?"
Natalie frowned. "He hasn't shared with you either?"
Casey shrugged. "Not yet."
"Huh." Natalie watched him closely for a long moment.
***
"Apparently, you haven't shared with Natalie," Casey said when Dan returned from editing.
Dan sat down on the couch, crossing his ankles over the arm of the chair. "Are you going to nag me about this, too?"
Casey shook his head, and turned back to his script. "Not nagging. Just stating a fact." Dan eyed him doubtfully and Casey clarified, "Natalie asked me to remind you."
Dan snorted. "She's enlisting your help to make me share. There's a really obvious joke in there somewhere."
"She said you had an agreement."
"We had an agreement about you and Dana." Casey shot Dan a look but Dan waved it off. "It helped Natalie scheme and it let us avoid excess heartbreak or jealousy."
"That worked really well," Casey said sarcastically.
"When you and Dana start flirting, the office goes haywire. The sharing arrangement is damage control."
"I don't think we're as bad as that," Casey said and Dan shrugged. "Is there a reason why you're not sharing?"
"A private life is supposed to be private," Dan said grudgingly. "And Natalie's got a big mouth."
Casey snickered. "Pot, meet kettle."
"What?"
"You and Natalie are the two biggest gossips in the office," Casey said with snide grin. "That's a pretty hefty boulder from a really glassy house."
Dan stared at him for a moment. "Have you got those cliches out of your system?"
"Make hay while the sun shines, Dan."
Dan groaned.
***
Casey tried asking Dan about last night gently, but Dan side-stepped the questions. He kept changing the conversation topic, making Casey forget about the mystery woman. He'd avoided Natalie's questions too.
Casey would have been impressed if he wasn't so frustratingly curious.
By the time they go on air, Casey devised a different mode of attack, a sneakier approach. If he couldn't get Dan talking about the mystery woman, he'd get Dan talking about his night out with Michael. Lull him into a false sense of security. Eventually, Dan would let something slip.
"So," Casey started after they threw to Kelly for a few minutes. "I can't shake this feeling of familiarity."
"Familiarity?" Dan asked, grinning at him.
"I feel that something is familiar."
"In your highly organised, habitual and, dare I say monotonous, lifestyle, you're experiencing a sense of familiarity? I'm shocked." Dan tried hard, but couldn't quite keep a straight face. "No, I'm serious, Casey. I'm shocked. Absolutely astounded."
Casey rolled his eyes. "There is a sense of familiarity and I think it's Michael."
Dan blinked. "Michael?"
"He seems familiar." Casey thought it was probably just because everyone went to school with someone like Michael; everyone knew at least one irritating, smug alumni who couldn't wait to show you up.
"Casey, why are we talking about this?"
"He seems familiar," Casey said. He didn't add that he wanted Dan to talk about his night out, but couldn't ask outright, because Dan would see through that ploy in a second.
Dan looked over his script. "Could be because you've met him before."
"Really?" Casey was bad with names. Actually, he was bad with faces, too. Well, he was bad with remembering people in general, but he really couldn't remember meeting Michael before. "You sure?"
"When I was in college," Dan added, not looking up. "He used to be blond."
"I don't remember him at all."
"He was the guy who supported the Red Wings because his brother-in-law did."
"Oh." Casey frowned, suddenly remembering the somewhat smarmy business major. There was something extremely annoying about people who said they supported a team, but actually had no personal interest in, or knowledge of, said team. If you didn't follow the sport, you should be honest enough to say so. "And you're still friends with him?"
Dan jerked his head around and shot Casey a wary look. "We were… close friends in college."
"What?" Casey was more confused by Dan's reaction than Dan's reasonable answer. Dan shook his head sharply and then gestured at the clock.
Dave's voice came over the P.A. "And we're back in three, two..."
Casey waited until the next C-break and then tried again. "So, despite Michael's superficial loyalty, you had a good time last night?"
"Casey, just drop it," Dan said tersely.
"Why?" Casey asked, and gave up on subtlety altogether. "Did something interesting happen?"
Dan glanced at him briefly. Dan's eyes were surprisingly blank, which was highly unusual and probably not a good sign. "We went out. We had a couple of drinks. That was it, okay?"
"Okay," Casey said, holding his hands up in surrender. Dan cleared his throat and turned back to his script. Casey read over the next few features and watched Dan carefully ignore him. "I just don't get what the big deal is."
"I was good friends with him in college. Can you drop it now?"
Casey sighed and waited for the red light to glow on the cameras. The next two sections of the show passed quickly enough and Dan seemed fine. The trick was knowing the difference between really-annoyed-Dan and just-a-little-thrown-Dan. Bothering one was a bad thing, bothering the other was a lot of fun.
When Dan didn't initiate conversation during the first ten seconds of their next break, Casey decided to push a little more. "I thought I was your only friend at college," he said with a cheeky grin.
"I had plenty of friends at college," Dan replied with a quick smile. "Unlike you, I wasn't burdened by the dork-factor of being on the gymnastics team."
Dan was right; he'd had plenty of friends at college compared to Casey. That had more to do with Casey's awkward shyness during those early college years, than with being a member of the gymnastics team.
Casey snorted. "Well, I was your only *good* friend at least." Dan had a crowd of people he called friends, but… those friendships seemed to be very superficial. Everyone knew of Dan, everyone laughed at Dan's jokes or admired Dan's grades, but they barely *knew* Dan.
Casey had been surprised at the number of people who said Dan was 'a great friend', but didn't know the little details. They didn't know Dan had technically grown up in Connecticut, but considered New York his home. They didn't know that Dan could roller-skate with an impressive amount of skill, but was inexplicably hopeless on a bike. They didn't know that Dan watched figure skating, even though he didn't understand the scoring system at all.
They seemed to think that Dan actually suffered from home-sickness. They saw Dan's bright (and to Casey, almost brittle) cheer after speaking with his Dad, but didn't see it was Dan's way of hiding the strain in his family relationships. And none of Dan's 'friends' understood why Dan always drove at the speed limit, and never drove under the influence.
"You weren't the only person who knew me," Dan responded, looking at the timer.
Casey noticed that Dan didn't deny that a lot of his so-called friends hadn't really known him. "Really?"
"Really."
"Really?" Casey asked again and Dan glared. "How many of your college friends knew you wanted to be a ballerina when you were a kid?"
Dana laughed through their earpieces, and Casey wondered when he'd grown used to semi-private conversations being suddenly interrupted. "A ballerina?"
Dan looked up at the camera in defiance. "Is there something wrong with that?"
"There are a lot of things wrong with that," Dana replied. "But picturing you in a pink tutu is on the top of that list." Casey blinked and wished that mental image hadn't just been inflicted on him.
"I was four, okay?"
"He liked the sound of the word," Casey added with a grin.
"You did?" Dana sounded sceptical.
"Yeah," Dan replied. "I didn't actually know what it meant."
Casey waited for Dana's reply, but she must have been distracted by something more urgent. Their earpieces remained silent, and after a moment, Casey turned his attention back to Dan. "So."
"Yeah?"
Casey leaned back in his chair. "How many people know?"
"Everyone standing in the control room, and probably half of the people in the studio," Dan replied with a grimace.
"From college," Casey insisted. "How many college friends knew about that?"
"You." Dan looked up at the ceiling in thought.
Casey grinned. "And?"
"And..." Dan's brows lowered as he thought. Casey was just waiting for him to admit that Casey was right. "Michael. And Alex."
"Two friends," Casey hooted, holding up two fingers. "Two friends. Two is not plenty, Dan."
Dan looked at him out of the corner of his eye and shrugged. "It's plenty enough."
"It's a pretty small number. Just two. Just Alex and Michael." Casey frowned for a split-second, trying to work out why that seemed familiar.
"I don't get close to a lot of people," Dan replied glibly.
Glancing up at the clock, Casey started mentally counting himself back from the commercials. "Apart from dear Alex and Michael," Casey said and then realised. Realised where he knew those names from and remembered Dan's casual grin. Realised that the Jeopardy answer to clueless was 'Who is Casey McCall?'.
"Apart from them."
"Alex and Michael?" Casey asked, but his own words were echoing in his skull. 'You were sleeping with them.' For a moment he thought he'd said it out loud, but Dan was still smiling, so he knew he hadn't."
"Yeah," Dan replied, sounding bemused. "Michael and Alex."
"Alex and Michael," Casey said slowly, staring at Dan and wanting his mind to stop whirling *now*. He wanted the thoughts to stop now, because he might be oblivious but he wasn't stupid. Michael was *Michael*-Michael. He was college-Michael, none-of-Casey's-business-Michael. He was Dan's-slept-with-guys-Michael. Suddenly, Casey didn't need any more information to work out where Dan's hickey had come from. "Alex and Michael from *college*?"
Dan half-nodded, and Casey knew that Dan knew that Casey knew. Or that Casey had just remembered that he knew. Shaking his head, he tried to dislodge the fog of sudden understanding from his mind.
"We're back in ten, Casey." Dan just watched him, his face perfectly calm. Ridiculously calm, considering that Casey had just clicked that Michael was actually Dan-*still*-sleeps-with-guys-Michael.
Casey swallowed and glanced at the timer again. "Yeah."
"You cool with the intro?" Dan asked quietly.
Casey nodded and blinked at the teleprompter until the words 'Alex and Michael' and 'Michael and Dan' blurred back into their script. Taking a deep breath, he got his game face back on. "I'm good."
***
Casey was furious. He'd spent the rest of the show slowly fuming, and by the time the end credits had rolled, he'd stewed in his own juices long enough to become a very cranky casserole.
He was furious at himself: for letting this get to him; for misspeaking three times during the last twenty minutes on air; for not realising sooner. He had all the information at his fingertips, and he just hadn't realised, he hadn't understood the connection until it was right in front of his face.
If he was angry at himself, he was positively livid at Dan. Dan, who hadn't warned him that Michael was *that* Michael. Dan, who hadn't told him *why* Casey shouldn't have kept asking about last night while they were on air. Dan, who had told Casey very clearly that he didn't do that, didn't sleep with guys, anymore.
Casey had dragged himself through the show, and kept his smile firmly pasted on, but the second they were out, he was gone. He yanked the earpiece out, shoved it onto the desk and stormed over to wardrobe. He'd almost lost a button pulling the shirt off, but he'd managed to return the clothes undamaged, handing the rumpled pile to Monica without a word.
Striding back to the office, he ignored Jeremy's raised brows and Natalie's hushed, "What's up with him?"
He also ignored Elliot's reply. "I don't know, but I don't want to stick around to find out."
He closed the office door behind him, and stood with his back to it, staring at the dark sky. Dan's jacket is still on the coat rack and Casey clenched his fist as he waited for Dan to return.
The office door opened quietly, and Casey waited for the soft snick of it closing behind Dan before he turned around. "What sort of a stupid stunt...?" Casey growled, walking over to Dan in quick, sharp steps.
"I wasn't the one forcing the issue during the breaks," Dan replied, setting his shoulders firmly.
Casey's jaw was so tense it hurt. "No, you were the one..." He didn't say the rest of the sentence because it's all too clear why Dan was at fault. Although Dan didn’t seem to see it.
Dan should have apologised, but instead, he just glared back at Casey. "I was the one who *what*?"
"I'm not an idiot, Dan."
Dan's smirk became decidedly mean. "Could have fooled me."
It was enough to make Casey take the few steps between them, to make him use that extra inch of height to fiercely stare down at Dan. He grabbed Dan's wrist, digging his fingers into the bare skin and hissed, "You were the one who let some guy fuck you, and then wore the hickey to work."
Dan's face paled and his lips compressed into a tight, angry line. "Are you in love with me?"
Casey blinked, thrown by the non sequitur. "What?"
"Are you screwing me?"
"No."
"Then what the hell does my sex life have to do with you?" Dan demanded heatedly, pulling his wrist back and giving Casey a firm shove backwards.
Casey stumbled, more from the unexpectedness of physical violence than from the actual force behind it. "Because it's my show, too. And I don't want to see it go down in flames," he said as he regained his footing and put a few more feet between them.
Dan closed his eyes for a long second, and said tightly, "I'm ignoring that bad pun."
"Dan, it's my career. I don't want it ruined because you can't control your hormones."
Dan glared at him as if he'd been punched. "That's rich, coming from you."
Casey leaned back against the desk, trying to make himself look far more relaxed than he felt. "Meaning?"
"Meaning the amount of restraint you showed around the moll gunning for Dana's job was truly impressive," Dan spat back at him.
"Sally wasn't-"
"Sally was and is, and you don't care as long as you get your rocks off," Dan said quickly. "And as long as it doesn't affect *your* career."
"Sally wouldn't have affected your career either." Casey stood up. His hands were fisted, and he could feel his nails biting into his palms. "*Michael* would."
Dan's eyes narrowed to dark slits. "Just for your piece of mind, Casey, I was discreet. You don't need to worry about your career just yet."
"Not until next time," Casey sneered spitefully.
"There won't be a next time."
"Somehow, I find that hard to believe."
"Yeah?" Everything about Dan's posture screamed challenge, and Casey wasn't about to back down.
"I seem to recall you promising me that before." Dan hissed and broke eye contact, turning his head towards the sinister skyline. Casey felt a vicious thrill. "Or it could be that you proved that your word can't be trusted."
After a moment of tense of silence, Dan breathed in loudly. "I didn't lie to you."
"You didn't?" Casey snorted. "So the part about you not doing that anymore was true?"
"It was."
Casey couldn't believe Dan's nerve. "Are you going to stand there and tell me that you didn't let Michael fuck you?"
"Casey-"
"That just insults my intelligence."
"Casey, what I did or did not do with Michael is none of yo-"
Casey took half a step towards Dan before he realised it. "Don't even try that line." He walked over to the couch, keeping the invisible boundary between them. "Frankly, it's wearing thin."
"It *isn't* your business," Dan growled.
"Yes, it is," Casey said, uncurling his fingers and noting the bruised crescents imprinted on his palms.
"How?"
"Maybe I don't want to work with a partner who's going to screw me over by fucking around!" Casey exploded and then realised what he said. He certainly hadn’t been thinking that. Now, he wasn't sure whether or not he wanted to take those words back.
"You know what, Casey? Fuck you," Dan barked and thundered out.
It wasn’t until a good ten minutes later that Casey calmed down enough to notice that Dan had left without ever collecting his jacket. Casey left it there for Dan to collect the next morning.
***
***
["Do you remember the concepts of sharing and punishment?" Natalie had the innate ability of intimidation, a gift that seemed more suited to a seven foot quarterback.] It stood to reason that somewhere, there was a very physically impressive man with a very timid temper.
"I thought I was exempt from that?"
"You are, because I don't have an agreement with you. I have an agreement with Dan."
Casey was manly and brave, but he was primarily relieved. "Okay."
"But you remember?" Natalie asked, staring at him.
Casey nodded. "Sure."
"Could you remind Dan?"
"Why? What hasn't he shared?"
"Last night," she said peevishly. "He came in with a hickey this morning, but he refuses to share any details."
"He's going to get punished for this?" Casey briefly wondered when his workmates had crossed the line from charmingly eccentric to outright crazy. Maybe it had been on his last night off. "It was one date. Surely he's entitled to a little privacy?"
Natalie frowned. "He hasn't shared with you either?"
Casey shrugged. "Not yet."
"Huh." Natalie watched him closely for a long moment.
***
"Apparently, you haven't shared with Natalie," Casey said when Dan returned from editing.
Dan sat down on the couch, crossing his ankles over the arm of the chair. "Are you going to nag me about this, too?"
Casey shook his head, and turned back to his script. "Not nagging. Just stating a fact." Dan eyed him doubtfully and Casey clarified, "Natalie asked me to remind you."
Dan snorted. "She's enlisting your help to make me share. There's a really obvious joke in there somewhere."
"She said you had an agreement."
"We had an agreement about you and Dana." Casey shot Dan a look but Dan waved it off. "It helped Natalie scheme and it let us avoid excess heartbreak or jealousy."
"That worked really well," Casey said sarcastically.
"When you and Dana start flirting, the office goes haywire. The sharing arrangement is damage control."
"I don't think we're as bad as that," Casey said and Dan shrugged. "Is there a reason why you're not sharing?"
"A private life is supposed to be private," Dan said grudgingly. "And Natalie's got a big mouth."
Casey snickered. "Pot, meet kettle."
"What?"
"You and Natalie are the two biggest gossips in the office," Casey said with snide grin. "That's a pretty hefty boulder from a really glassy house."
Dan stared at him for a moment. "Have you got those cliches out of your system?"
"Make hay while the sun shines, Dan."
Dan groaned.
***
Casey tried asking Dan about last night gently, but Dan side-stepped the questions. He kept changing the conversation topic, making Casey forget about the mystery woman. He'd avoided Natalie's questions too.
Casey would have been impressed if he wasn't so frustratingly curious.
By the time they go on air, Casey devised a different mode of attack, a sneakier approach. If he couldn't get Dan talking about the mystery woman, he'd get Dan talking about his night out with Michael. Lull him into a false sense of security. Eventually, Dan would let something slip.
"So," Casey started after they threw to Kelly for a few minutes. "I can't shake this feeling of familiarity."
"Familiarity?" Dan asked, grinning at him.
"I feel that something is familiar."
"In your highly organised, habitual and, dare I say monotonous, lifestyle, you're experiencing a sense of familiarity? I'm shocked." Dan tried hard, but couldn't quite keep a straight face. "No, I'm serious, Casey. I'm shocked. Absolutely astounded."
Casey rolled his eyes. "There is a sense of familiarity and I think it's Michael."
Dan blinked. "Michael?"
"He seems familiar." Casey thought it was probably just because everyone went to school with someone like Michael; everyone knew at least one irritating, smug alumni who couldn't wait to show you up.
"Casey, why are we talking about this?"
"He seems familiar," Casey said. He didn't add that he wanted Dan to talk about his night out, but couldn't ask outright, because Dan would see through that ploy in a second.
Dan looked over his script. "Could be because you've met him before."
"Really?" Casey was bad with names. Actually, he was bad with faces, too. Well, he was bad with remembering people in general, but he really couldn't remember meeting Michael before. "You sure?"
"When I was in college," Dan added, not looking up. "He used to be blond."
"I don't remember him at all."
"He was the guy who supported the Red Wings because his brother-in-law did."
"Oh." Casey frowned, suddenly remembering the somewhat smarmy business major. There was something extremely annoying about people who said they supported a team, but actually had no personal interest in, or knowledge of, said team. If you didn't follow the sport, you should be honest enough to say so. "And you're still friends with him?"
Dan jerked his head around and shot Casey a wary look. "We were… close friends in college."
"What?" Casey was more confused by Dan's reaction than Dan's reasonable answer. Dan shook his head sharply and then gestured at the clock.
Dave's voice came over the P.A. "And we're back in three, two..."
Casey waited until the next C-break and then tried again. "So, despite Michael's superficial loyalty, you had a good time last night?"
"Casey, just drop it," Dan said tersely.
"Why?" Casey asked, and gave up on subtlety altogether. "Did something interesting happen?"
Dan glanced at him briefly. Dan's eyes were surprisingly blank, which was highly unusual and probably not a good sign. "We went out. We had a couple of drinks. That was it, okay?"
"Okay," Casey said, holding his hands up in surrender. Dan cleared his throat and turned back to his script. Casey read over the next few features and watched Dan carefully ignore him. "I just don't get what the big deal is."
"I was good friends with him in college. Can you drop it now?"
Casey sighed and waited for the red light to glow on the cameras. The next two sections of the show passed quickly enough and Dan seemed fine. The trick was knowing the difference between really-annoyed-Dan and just-a-little-thrown-Dan. Bothering one was a bad thing, bothering the other was a lot of fun.
When Dan didn't initiate conversation during the first ten seconds of their next break, Casey decided to push a little more. "I thought I was your only friend at college," he said with a cheeky grin.
"I had plenty of friends at college," Dan replied with a quick smile. "Unlike you, I wasn't burdened by the dork-factor of being on the gymnastics team."
Dan was right; he'd had plenty of friends at college compared to Casey. That had more to do with Casey's awkward shyness during those early college years, than with being a member of the gymnastics team.
Casey snorted. "Well, I was your only *good* friend at least." Dan had a crowd of people he called friends, but… those friendships seemed to be very superficial. Everyone knew of Dan, everyone laughed at Dan's jokes or admired Dan's grades, but they barely *knew* Dan.
Casey had been surprised at the number of people who said Dan was 'a great friend', but didn't know the little details. They didn't know Dan had technically grown up in Connecticut, but considered New York his home. They didn't know that Dan could roller-skate with an impressive amount of skill, but was inexplicably hopeless on a bike. They didn't know that Dan watched figure skating, even though he didn't understand the scoring system at all.
They seemed to think that Dan actually suffered from home-sickness. They saw Dan's bright (and to Casey, almost brittle) cheer after speaking with his Dad, but didn't see it was Dan's way of hiding the strain in his family relationships. And none of Dan's 'friends' understood why Dan always drove at the speed limit, and never drove under the influence.
"You weren't the only person who knew me," Dan responded, looking at the timer.
Casey noticed that Dan didn't deny that a lot of his so-called friends hadn't really known him. "Really?"
"Really."
"Really?" Casey asked again and Dan glared. "How many of your college friends knew you wanted to be a ballerina when you were a kid?"
Dana laughed through their earpieces, and Casey wondered when he'd grown used to semi-private conversations being suddenly interrupted. "A ballerina?"
Dan looked up at the camera in defiance. "Is there something wrong with that?"
"There are a lot of things wrong with that," Dana replied. "But picturing you in a pink tutu is on the top of that list." Casey blinked and wished that mental image hadn't just been inflicted on him.
"I was four, okay?"
"He liked the sound of the word," Casey added with a grin.
"You did?" Dana sounded sceptical.
"Yeah," Dan replied. "I didn't actually know what it meant."
Casey waited for Dana's reply, but she must have been distracted by something more urgent. Their earpieces remained silent, and after a moment, Casey turned his attention back to Dan. "So."
"Yeah?"
Casey leaned back in his chair. "How many people know?"
"Everyone standing in the control room, and probably half of the people in the studio," Dan replied with a grimace.
"From college," Casey insisted. "How many college friends knew about that?"
"You." Dan looked up at the ceiling in thought.
Casey grinned. "And?"
"And..." Dan's brows lowered as he thought. Casey was just waiting for him to admit that Casey was right. "Michael. And Alex."
"Two friends," Casey hooted, holding up two fingers. "Two friends. Two is not plenty, Dan."
Dan looked at him out of the corner of his eye and shrugged. "It's plenty enough."
"It's a pretty small number. Just two. Just Alex and Michael." Casey frowned for a split-second, trying to work out why that seemed familiar.
"I don't get close to a lot of people," Dan replied glibly.
Glancing up at the clock, Casey started mentally counting himself back from the commercials. "Apart from dear Alex and Michael," Casey said and then realised. Realised where he knew those names from and remembered Dan's casual grin. Realised that the Jeopardy answer to clueless was 'Who is Casey McCall?'.
"Apart from them."
"Alex and Michael?" Casey asked, but his own words were echoing in his skull. 'You were sleeping with them.' For a moment he thought he'd said it out loud, but Dan was still smiling, so he knew he hadn't."
"Yeah," Dan replied, sounding bemused. "Michael and Alex."
"Alex and Michael," Casey said slowly, staring at Dan and wanting his mind to stop whirling *now*. He wanted the thoughts to stop now, because he might be oblivious but he wasn't stupid. Michael was *Michael*-Michael. He was college-Michael, none-of-Casey's-business-Michael. He was Dan's-slept-with-guys-Michael. Suddenly, Casey didn't need any more information to work out where Dan's hickey had come from. "Alex and Michael from *college*?"
Dan half-nodded, and Casey knew that Dan knew that Casey knew. Or that Casey had just remembered that he knew. Shaking his head, he tried to dislodge the fog of sudden understanding from his mind.
"We're back in ten, Casey." Dan just watched him, his face perfectly calm. Ridiculously calm, considering that Casey had just clicked that Michael was actually Dan-*still*-sleeps-with-guys-Michael.
Casey swallowed and glanced at the timer again. "Yeah."
"You cool with the intro?" Dan asked quietly.
Casey nodded and blinked at the teleprompter until the words 'Alex and Michael' and 'Michael and Dan' blurred back into their script. Taking a deep breath, he got his game face back on. "I'm good."
***
Casey was furious. He'd spent the rest of the show slowly fuming, and by the time the end credits had rolled, he'd stewed in his own juices long enough to become a very cranky casserole.
He was furious at himself: for letting this get to him; for misspeaking three times during the last twenty minutes on air; for not realising sooner. He had all the information at his fingertips, and he just hadn't realised, he hadn't understood the connection until it was right in front of his face.
If he was angry at himself, he was positively livid at Dan. Dan, who hadn't warned him that Michael was *that* Michael. Dan, who hadn't told him *why* Casey shouldn't have kept asking about last night while they were on air. Dan, who had told Casey very clearly that he didn't do that, didn't sleep with guys, anymore.
Casey had dragged himself through the show, and kept his smile firmly pasted on, but the second they were out, he was gone. He yanked the earpiece out, shoved it onto the desk and stormed over to wardrobe. He'd almost lost a button pulling the shirt off, but he'd managed to return the clothes undamaged, handing the rumpled pile to Monica without a word.
Striding back to the office, he ignored Jeremy's raised brows and Natalie's hushed, "What's up with him?"
He also ignored Elliot's reply. "I don't know, but I don't want to stick around to find out."
He closed the office door behind him, and stood with his back to it, staring at the dark sky. Dan's jacket is still on the coat rack and Casey clenched his fist as he waited for Dan to return.
The office door opened quietly, and Casey waited for the soft snick of it closing behind Dan before he turned around. "What sort of a stupid stunt...?" Casey growled, walking over to Dan in quick, sharp steps.
"I wasn't the one forcing the issue during the breaks," Dan replied, setting his shoulders firmly.
Casey's jaw was so tense it hurt. "No, you were the one..." He didn't say the rest of the sentence because it's all too clear why Dan was at fault. Although Dan didn’t seem to see it.
Dan should have apologised, but instead, he just glared back at Casey. "I was the one who *what*?"
"I'm not an idiot, Dan."
Dan's smirk became decidedly mean. "Could have fooled me."
It was enough to make Casey take the few steps between them, to make him use that extra inch of height to fiercely stare down at Dan. He grabbed Dan's wrist, digging his fingers into the bare skin and hissed, "You were the one who let some guy fuck you, and then wore the hickey to work."
Dan's face paled and his lips compressed into a tight, angry line. "Are you in love with me?"
Casey blinked, thrown by the non sequitur. "What?"
"Are you screwing me?"
"No."
"Then what the hell does my sex life have to do with you?" Dan demanded heatedly, pulling his wrist back and giving Casey a firm shove backwards.
Casey stumbled, more from the unexpectedness of physical violence than from the actual force behind it. "Because it's my show, too. And I don't want to see it go down in flames," he said as he regained his footing and put a few more feet between them.
Dan closed his eyes for a long second, and said tightly, "I'm ignoring that bad pun."
"Dan, it's my career. I don't want it ruined because you can't control your hormones."
Dan glared at him as if he'd been punched. "That's rich, coming from you."
Casey leaned back against the desk, trying to make himself look far more relaxed than he felt. "Meaning?"
"Meaning the amount of restraint you showed around the moll gunning for Dana's job was truly impressive," Dan spat back at him.
"Sally wasn't-"
"Sally was and is, and you don't care as long as you get your rocks off," Dan said quickly. "And as long as it doesn't affect *your* career."
"Sally wouldn't have affected your career either." Casey stood up. His hands were fisted, and he could feel his nails biting into his palms. "*Michael* would."
Dan's eyes narrowed to dark slits. "Just for your piece of mind, Casey, I was discreet. You don't need to worry about your career just yet."
"Not until next time," Casey sneered spitefully.
"There won't be a next time."
"Somehow, I find that hard to believe."
"Yeah?" Everything about Dan's posture screamed challenge, and Casey wasn't about to back down.
"I seem to recall you promising me that before." Dan hissed and broke eye contact, turning his head towards the sinister skyline. Casey felt a vicious thrill. "Or it could be that you proved that your word can't be trusted."
After a moment of tense of silence, Dan breathed in loudly. "I didn't lie to you."
"You didn't?" Casey snorted. "So the part about you not doing that anymore was true?"
"It was."
Casey couldn't believe Dan's nerve. "Are you going to stand there and tell me that you didn't let Michael fuck you?"
"Casey-"
"That just insults my intelligence."
"Casey, what I did or did not do with Michael is none of yo-"
Casey took half a step towards Dan before he realised it. "Don't even try that line." He walked over to the couch, keeping the invisible boundary between them. "Frankly, it's wearing thin."
"It *isn't* your business," Dan growled.
"Yes, it is," Casey said, uncurling his fingers and noting the bruised crescents imprinted on his palms.
"How?"
"Maybe I don't want to work with a partner who's going to screw me over by fucking around!" Casey exploded and then realised what he said. He certainly hadn’t been thinking that. Now, he wasn't sure whether or not he wanted to take those words back.
"You know what, Casey? Fuck you," Dan barked and thundered out.
It wasn’t until a good ten minutes later that Casey calmed down enough to notice that Dan had left without ever collecting his jacket. Casey left it there for Dan to collect the next morning.
***
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Date: 2004-04-15 08:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-15 09:16 pm (UTC)Not all of the fic is online. There is the start (http://www.livejournal.com/users/out_there/332663.html), and then a while later (http://www.livejournal.com/users/out_there/414416.html), then this bit (*points to post above*), and then the bit right after this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/out_there/422311.html).
When I started, the fic wouldn't come smoothly but I'm going to try to post all of what I have over the weekend, so it makes more sense.