Head wounds were fucking frustrating. They were healed, enough so that Loki didn't need to keep bandages on it, but the healing skin itched in a way that was almost painful. Itched in a way that he had to be careful to not scratch at it so much that he had to worry about reopening. Itched in a way that made him wish that the guy he was watching would walk the hell out of the run down place Loki had watched him walk into a half hour before. Anything that wasn't stuck in a car by himself with only the phantom ache and itch he couldn't stop thinking about to focus on.
It was a new case. There wasn't any hesitation in his chief clearing him for another case, not after watching the way he hyperfixated on the last one, not after the chief figured they should take advantage of Loki's solve rate. He was a good detective. He didn't drink, he didn't smoke, and he worked hard. The Chief didn't see the in between parts, the way the hyperfixation consumed more of him than most traditional 'hard workers'. Work was the only thing that Loki had. It was the only thing he wanted.
Purpose.
Finally, the guy walks out with a duffle bag in hand. Loki breathes out hard in relief, more than tired of waiting. He'd been tagged as a possible suspect in a child trafficking ring, so the money (no doubt it was money, it was always money) didn't matter nearly as much as finding out where he lived. Where his friends lived. What kind of friends he had.
"Okay okay," he mutters to himself, thumb tapping idly on the wheel as he watches the guy get into a car. "Where are we going?"
The Honda starts up and pulls off. Loki follows, keeping his car several lengths back. It might have been unnecessary, but Loki wasn't going to take a chance and by the way the guy drove, he had no idea. Loki figured the guy would head to an apartment. A seedy hotel, maybe.
Instead, he was parking in a derelict lot, swapping cars. Loki made note of it and continued his pursuit, only to be rewarded with that seedy motel he'd been thinking of. The guy parks out front of a room and hustles out of his car, into a motel room where things were about to get ugly.
Whatever plan this is is probably a convoluted mess. It usually is, but the driver doesn't ask. That's on purpose: he waits in a very common car, watching the other car pull up and head to the hotel he'd been asked to stay at, and nothing else. The watch gets fixed on the wheel and Paul does what he's always done, staring at the door almost completely still.
Four minutes.
He's acutely aware of the car with the other man in it. Doesn't bother looking at who he is, only catches him in the rear view mirror. Trouble already.
Three minutes.
The man emerges again, and the blonde leans over to unlock the passenger seat door. By three and a half, the driver's not staring at the man making his way towards the car but instead that other car. This city's newer but he's still got the entire thing memorized, pouring over street maps. It's not LA but it's still a beating heart and all the veins are something the driver's already intimately familiar with.
Two minutes in and another stranger emerges from the same room, this time with a gun. Paul opens the passenger door entirely for his partner, who barely slides in before a bullet flies, and he's already peeling out if the parking lot before his five minutes are up at his partner's yelled insistence.
Paul maneuvers the familiar car with ease, calm and collected while the man he's with screams that he's been shot. He's fine enough that he's still screaming, and anyway, Paul's not focused on that: he's being tailed. That same car, probably a set up of some sort. His gloved hands grip the wheel tighter and he swerves into a lane and practically drifts around a corner with calm precision, snaking his way through traffic at a high rate before turning right and slowing down completely and finding his rhythm. He can tell the other car is still tailing him, but in a few more minutes he's confident he can lose him. It just takes patience.
Something was gonna go south. He didn't know what or when, but he could feel it in his bones. His phone weighed heavy in his inner jacket pocket, enough to bother him into taking it out, having it at the ready like he would the gun on his hip. If these guys were smart - nothing to suggest the guy he was following had been but some partners were sharp - they might have someone else watching the place. Security. And right now, it was just him stalking a guy.
Loki didn't move beyond the almost anxious shift in his seat as his guy comes back out. Shit. New car, and this time he's not driving. The only thing Loki could do was hope that stupid collected stupid. But the car wasn't pulling away.
"Why aren't you moving," he mutters out loud. "What are you waiting for."
Then, someone else. Someone armed. Bang Bang. The stillness being broken triggered several automatic things. The phone was dialed in - "10-71, at the following intersection, I'm in persuit-" The directions were rattled off as his car jumps to life and skids onto the road. It was an aggressive start - no way in hell was this was a stupid asshole. The way the car swerved was too smooth, too practiced. This was a professional.
"Shit."
Paul had always been and would always be the better driver, but Loki wasn't chump change. He'd been in police pursuits too many times before and, for a few seconds, looks like he might be able to keep up. It was the turns that really slowed him down, too scared to hit it too hard and flip his car, conscious of all the civilians around but he caught what he could on the straight aways.
"Come on, come on," he growls as he pushes his foot down harder on the pedal. This guy was good.
Most of his drives like this are long and careful, slow and smooth. It's not the matter of a singular car, it's the whole unit that's going to inevitably follow him, it's--
--a familiar voice cutting through the police scanner he has, 10-71, at the following intersection, I'm in persuit -- that he realizes his tail is a cop. The voice sounds familiar in a way that Paul doesn't care to think on: not now. He's focusing all of his concentration on the road.
The cop's good. Shabby with the turns but he's been in a speeding car before, maybe a few chases. Paul plies the car to push just a little faster, keeping an eye on it from his rearview. Honda. Old. Not shitty, but normal. This cop wasn't expecting something like this then.
He stops thinking about that, too and gently loosens his foot on the gas, purposefully slowing down on a turn to let the car get a bit closer.
At that exact last moment he takes a hard, controlled turn and watches the old Honda try to course correct. There's a satisfaction he'll relish in later, when his job is done, about how that poor car skids to that side walk and immediately starts steaming up, narrowly avoiding someone.
The man next to him is laughing. The driver ignores him and spends the rest of the drive on the long game: avoiding the rest of the cars sure to follow.
--
He ditches the car, walks away and takes a taxi to his apartment where he winds up grabbing his actual car keys and going for a real drive. He listens to nothing but the quiet night, thinking about how much he misses palm trees and contemplating why that voice on the dispatcher sounded vaguely familiar, even though the crackle But quickly dismisses it as his imagination as goes to the 24 hour Diner he's managed to find. He treats himself with his hard earned money: a piece of pie and some coffee. He doesn't sleep, too amped on caffeine and adrenaline.
When he does show up for work--a shitty mechanic job a few minutes from where he lives--he's surprised to see a familiar car.
"Oh hey, kid--this came in last night. Bounced a curb."
The driver frowns, confused. It's the car from the chase, clear as day. That chase had been far away from him--did it end close to his neighborhood? Was this the only garage available?
"Cop car. We fix it fast and they leave just as quickly. Hey--he's coming back in a few minutes now that we've asessed the damage, and it's busted for at least a week until we get the parts in. You want to volunteer to tell him?"
Ha ha. Paul says nothing at the joke: he doesn't really say anything at all here. Suits him just fine. What bothers him is that there's not enough time to get the car down from it's position and look into the glovebox for information on the new curiosity. Until then?
The driver nods politely instead and gets to work, watching the car like a hawk for its owner.
The thing about car chases were that they could only really go a few ways. Loki might be able to catch up enough to hit the car, he might get lucky enough that the driver flips his own car with the pressure and everything else was a different kind of chaos. Loki wasn't stupid enough to pull out his gun, to try to fire out of the window to apprehend, but he could follow.
Or so he thought. The car turns too sharply and Loki knows he can't make it -"FUCK," he yells as it turns away from him, and the correction of his own speed and direction was too fast for him to recover. It was with screaming brakes and a hard bounce off of the curb that finally stops him.
"FUCK FUCK FUCK," he shouts, pounding three times in rapid succession on his steering wheel before sinking back into his seat and watching the smoke rise from his engine bay. Fuck was right. Repairs were going to have to come out of his pocket or come with an explanation as to why he felt the need to engage in a car chase all on his own.
-- Sleep wasn't going to happen. He was too amped, too focused, and too anxious about having lost his guy.
Loki calls a towing company, sets up his car to be taken to a shop by his apartment and walks back to the motel to meet up with responding police. The whole thing was a deal that went wrong, they figure and there's security footage of who the guy was meeting up with. Footage that wouldn't be available until the morning at the latest. So he pours over the motel room, walks around the property and chews over his next steps until the shop was open.
How bad the car was would determine how bad the rest of his day was going to be. Loki makes his way into the 'office', grabbing a cup of their 'coffee' - smelled and tastes like it was run through one of the oil filters, but shit it was better than nothing - before he's pointed out to the car bays.
"Your mechanic will get you up to date," he's told, and he nods his thanks before making his way out there. There was no mistaking his car, but its the mechanic in question that really surprises him. Loki stops dead a few feet away from the bay, staring with a quietly bewildered expression.
Was that Paul? It couldn't be. He had to be mistaken. Except the mechanic lowers his arms and lets Loki get a good look at his face.
"..Paul?" Maybe he was hallucinating. Not that he had any reason beyond no sleep to do so but - No way that Paul was in his area and he just didn't know.
He's wearing mechanics coveralls and a simple henley, toothpick inbetween his lips as he's working. He still doesn't have access to the glovebox--it's raised and lowering it means suspicion--but at the very least he can put his mind at ease and work, though not for very long: its' owner comes back and Paul lowers the wrench once his coworker whistles to let him know the other's arrived.
He freezes even if his body remains fairly languid in its usually semi-robotic stance. It's a good way to hide his surprise because this isn't what he expected whatsoever-this is beyond. He'd assumed Loki got himself killed doing something reckless, maybe, with his dogged pursuit of what he'd been able to justify, but not here and not the one shadowing him. Paul is not expecting the other to be so tall either, though the way Loki's brow furrows is exactly the same. Haircut, too.
And he's the voice over the police scanner.
It usually takes a few seconds for Paul to answer, a castoff of his younger days when all he'd do is shut down, something that's now seen as mysterious and brooding to most people because he keeps to himself, but there's a small tell in the way he blinks that pries his secret from him: he's genuinely surprised. Loki's still pale while Paul's traded the sleepy Washington rain for LA sun, but he looks good. Loki still has that spark in his eyes that Paul admires, even if it looks like he didn't get any sleep at all. It's endearing. It's worrying. Paul's mouth feels dry.
"Can't get the new parts for a week," he says, voice soft and quiet with a surprisingly strong commanding air to behind it. He leans against one of the work benches next to him and crosses his arms, watching the other carefully. He's still on guard.
He has to be. And he can't exactly ask what happened with Loki's car, not when they know. Not if Loki's still as whip-smart as he was when they grew up together.
He looked.. the same. Okay, not quite the same, age had only refined them but seeing Paul again felt like seeing a saint. Seeing a kindred spirit that the Gods had sent him. After Paul left, after Paul ghosted him like he had, Loki was sure he was never going to see him again. Torn between wanting to punch him and yell at him, wanting to hug him, shake him, Loki blinks that hard, full face blink and stays where he is.
Safer that way.
The information about the car barely registers. A week was too long. Meant he was already in the shit and he hadn't even gone in yet. It was the 'I can drive you home if you want' that sent everything in him further up into the internal flurry of emotion.
"Gotta go to work." Short, to the point. Blunt but not cutting. Stunned. Careful. If he got even half a hope up, he was pretty sure he would implode. "You-" He blinks again and glances back at the office. "Just passing through or are you working here for real?"
[ It's 2am and he's just ditched a car on a Saturday night, but he can't sleep. He can never sleep after this, after the anticipation and adrenaline wears off but the nerve remains.
So he drives.
He drives and he thinks about everything, decompressing. He thinks about why he's here now. Thinks about Loki. He thinks a lot about Loki.
He's got his old friend's number form work, and he's already memorized it. He calls without a single ounce of hesitation, and instead of answering 'hey,' he just speaks. ]
I can't stop thinking about you.
[ there's the sound of the car humming, but it's a quiet sort of background noise. Paul feels like he can be vulnerable like this. ]
[ It's 2 am and Loki is at work, sitting at his desk with headphones on, watching CCTV of the nearby shipyard, waiting for something to give him a break in this case. Someone taking one of the cargo boxes food and water. Any kind of proof that the trafficking ring is moving through the port. He felt like he was throwing himself against a brick wall.
The call was almost a welcome distraction and it was only because it was 2 am that he answered an unknown number, Paul's opening flattening him in one breath. He glances around the otherwise empty office and pushes to his feet, heading towards the stairs and eventually, the roof.]
I'm going to take that as a good thing. [Fuck he wanted it to be a good thing. He could hear the car engine in the background and could see Paul perfectly in his minds eye.] Especially if you're calling me to say so.
[ He lapses into silence again, turning onto an empty street, losing himself in sleepy rain and neon lights. Loki picked up immediately, still up at 2am. He wonders if he should take Loki out for a spin, but decides that that's not what he actually wants.
Feeling lonely like this, it's second nature to him. Something out of it would he completely out of his comfort zone. He takes a while to respond. ]
[Loki doesn't mind the silence, taking that time to get upstairs. The roof door is propped open and he steps out, just under the awning. The rain was something of a comfort, and the smell of it made him quiet in a way no other weather or situation did. Even in the worst circumstances, there was something about it that set it apart.
He doesn't answer right away, rolling the question over in his mind.]
I suppose that depends on who you ask. [Keller yelling at him for letting Alex go came to mind, but that case was still painfully fresh in a way he couldn't shake. Was he good with this much blood on his hands? With the number of children he doesn't find or finds too late.]
I try to be. When I can. Might make up for all the times I wasn't. Means making choices though. [Hard ones.]
[ Paul's not so sure he did himself. He's not so sure he ever makes the right choice, not without Loki, not without his Loki, the guy that started a fight over some chode putting a hand up a girl's skirt in high school on his first day. Loki knows how it works. Paul...
Paul thought he knew how it worked. That's why he's here. Mostly now, he just wants to hear Loki's voice. ]
[Which time? Deciding to get into a car chase with an unknown with no backup? The last time he shot and killed someone? The last time he held his temper in check for the sake of a life?]
I do. You can guess what the alternative to my making the wrong choice is now. The only thing that eats me is time. How quick I figure something out. Or how long it takes me. [The people who die because he's not quicker or sharper or smarter-
Which is why he needed to know what happened the other night. What Paul was there for. What Paul knew.]
I'm going to need you to answer a couple of questions. The sooner the better. [But it didn't have to be this exact moment.]
Loki didn't go to Church regularly. He didn't go at all. Between his job, his tattoos, his deviancy, his guilt, to say nothing of everything under that, it didn't feel right. It didn't feel deserved, to take in the refilling of his proverbial cup. But Christmas was different. Loki didn't celebrate as such, not any holiday, putting on a polite smile and hummed along when he was forced to, and otherwise avoided anything resembling 'cheer'.
What he did allow himself was one Mass a year. Christmas Eve, Midnight Mass.
He told Paul, told him he didn't have to come along - he knew how much easier it was to just stay away from their past then look at it, than sit in it's pews and listen to the rhythmic repetition of words that were pressed in Loki's soul and some that were pressed into his skin. But he was dressed in his best suit and tie, shiny black shoes unfit for the snowy weather outside, and pulling on his jacket and hat.
"It'll only be about an hour. They keep it shorter here, past couple of years. Weather and all."
It's colder in Washington than it is Arizona or LA, but the driver's never felt more warm. Loki's nervous--no, not nervous, but apologetic in a way that Paul doesn't quite understand. It means a lot to Loki. Why wouldn't he go?
"'The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told,'" he says, voice steady and clear. He's borrowing one of Loki's dress shirts, top button undone, white scorpion jacket absent with just his denim jacket, hair neat and parted on the side.
He stops Loki at the door, one hand on the frame.
"It can take all night and I wouldn't mind. You're there."
It had been a lot of years. Loki had learned to be quiet about his faith, about the filters it was beamed through, the theology and dedication and thought it all went through. It was between him and God. And the Freemasons, but that was a topic they never touched on. The fact that Paul was coming steadies him in a way and he stares into Paul's painful perfect face, with I love you written all over his face, the sense that he might lunge forward and kiss Paul held back by Something. Finally, Loki smiles a little, crookedly.
"Least I won't be chantin' latin this time." He idly fidgets with his hat instead of reaching out. "You look nice." Thank you.. "Let's go, otherwise we're gonna be late," he says, pulling his beanie on and tugging it down into place.
"How much of all that stuff do you remember? The scripture, songs and shit."
They are going to be late if Paul keeps this up. Especially since Loki's so close and he looks so good.
He'd hate to dismantle something Loki's looking forward to just because of how good the other looks in a pair of shiny shoes. He does, however, put a hand on Loki's lower back as he passes the other to get into the car, talking openly. Unusual, but Loki inspires it.
"Most of it," he confesses. Pauses, too, and looks over at Loki in the rearview as he slides in.
His heart skips a beat at Paul's passing touch, eyes following until he sinks into the car and closes the door behind him. If he had his way, once they got back home, Loki was going to octopus around Paul and just soak in how fucking solid a guy Paul was. They were lucky, stupidly lucky, even if everything were to go to shit tomorrow. He hoped it didn't; Christmas was already shakey enough.
"You always impress me," he says honestly, smile slipping into the stupid kind of stunned. Loki wouldn't have blamed Paul if he didn't remember, or didn't bother to learn, or shoved it all to the side to get through his life without living back there.
He was staring again. He pinches the end of his nose in a half assed scratch and glances out the window before looking back.
"Uh, we're heading to Saint Josephine, over on Carvell street. You know where it is?"
"I know it," Paul confirms. He'd long since memorized the town, taking special care to the roots towards where he figured Loki would like to go. The churches had come after he noticed the other's tattoos.
Both of them would do anything for the other. Stay in line, step out of line, anticipate needs. They're beyond friends, beyond whatever this has turned into. They're soul mates. He starts driving, hand on the stick shift. Smiling softly as he reminds himself that Loki had just said he impressed him. It feels good.
Paul spends most of the week worried about Loki in the vaguest of senses, a low hum constantly reverberating through him with each twist of a wrench during his 10 hour work days at the Garage. Little things: is Loki's headwound fully healed? Is he drinking enough water? Has he slept for more than three hours a night?
There's big things, too of course. Those are less of a hum and more of a focused point, things that give Paul a mild headache when he mulls them over too much in his mind. Is Loki blaming himself every second there's a kid missing? How hard can he push himself before he tears himself inside out? Is Paul compromising him?
(That last one is selfish, Paul knows, but it's a worry that sets his teeth on edge.)
But Paul knows Loki as well as Loki knows Paul. Hell, maybe Paul knows Loki better than Loki himself. Loki sure as hell can see through Paul when he can't. And the fact of the matter is this: Loki needs a fucking break and Paul needs some goddamn Mexican food and it's more than just a date, because Paul had been on maybe four of those in his life total. It's also rare time with Loki.
That's more important to him than anything. It's an event. It's a celebration. Sometimes Paul thinks it's a miracle both of them are alive at all.
Paul arrives at Loki's house at exactly the designated time, knocking at 6 o'clock sharp, scorpion jacket and gloves on, toothpick in lieu of cigarette. He likes Loki's little place. It’s small, efficient. Practical. He likes staying over, too, when he can. Most times he doesn't want to leave.
The door opens. Paul's leaning against the door frame and can't help but smile as he nods his hello.
He doesn't think he'll ever get tired of seeing Loki's face when that door opens.
Loki has been on the grind all week. As much as he loved Paul, a fact that Loki had to figure out how to quantify over the handful of days, his work came first. He knew Paul understood, knew Paul got how valuable these lives he was fighting for were, how full of possibility and hope, despite the situation that they're in. Loki can't help but think about him and Paul specifically now, when he's working, and it's only served to drive him harder.
Every life they saved meant someone else getting a shot at finding someone they loved as much as he loved Paul. Paul would understand that, he was positive. So it wasn't something he questioned at all, wasn't something he talked about in the context of whatever case information he would let slip in his almost obsessed rambles to his lover in the few hours they got together before falling in, exhausted from their various days. But Loki was looking forward to the date they'd agreed on, the night falling in such a way that he didn't have any new leads to follow for work, much to the thanks of how hard he'd been running in the days prior. Looking forward to them pretending that they were normal, that they were just a couple having dinner with each other.
They agreed on 6 and there Paul was, knocking at his door and looking fucking devastatingly perfect. There was never any stopping the way Loki's eyes lit up when Paul came around, their intensity adoring, even in it's sharp mindfulness. He didn't even feel the stupid crooked smile that slides onto his face. He never does.
"Hey." He was already ready to go, prompt as a clock when he had a goal. "You ready to get so full of fajitas and chips that they gotta roll us outta there with heavy machinery?"
His hair was slicked back with gel, and he was dressed as casual as he got - black cargo pants and a form fitting longjohn type knit dark navy offsetting the well used winter jacket he wore. Thankfully, it wasn't cold enough that he needed a beanie to fuck up his hair.
All those hard edges, the tattoo, the severity--it melts when Loki smiles, and it makes Paul's heart skip a beat every time. It's just for him, too, and that's somehow even better. There's always been bit of possessiveness he can't shake.
"I am," he says, two syllables filled with an amount of warmth that feels like it should be wrong. He falls in synch with Loki almost immediately, trailing a fraction of a second behind him until they get out of the apartment. It's two long strides to get ahead of him and to open the door, looking expectant for Loki to slide in.
It felt right, having Paul walking next to him and the stupid little crook of a smile stays on his lips as they trot down the stairs, and he can't help huffing a little laugh at the Gentlemanly gesture. If it had been anyone else, it would have been an insult, a mockery, a taunt - but of course Paul had different rules. So very different from everyone else; Loki could only be charmed. He slides in the car, looking over to watch Paul join him in the driver's seat - god those gloves - and his stomach grumbles as if on cue.
"I'm guessing you've already scoped out the restaurant we're going to?" Did he need to provide directions? He very much doubted it. Even if Paul hadn't gone into the place himself to eat, it served plenty well as a landmark and those were priceless.
Of course he did. From the very moment Loki had mentioned it offhand--just the vaguest hint of a location even remotely nearby here--Paul had committed everything to memory and found it on a map later in the day. He'd driven there a couple of times when he couldn't sleep, though that's rarer when he spends the night at Loki's, which is often. It's not his fault the days and nights bleed together when he's with his childhood sweetheart.
He looks into the mirror as he pulls out and begins the journey.
"Tell me how to get there?"
Paul knows exactly how. He just wants to hear Loki's voice.
It was only a handful of turns away, and Loki relayed them neatly, succinct - the quickest path. The rest of the five minutes it took them, he tried to keep himself from smiling too stupidly and being too outwardly enthused. They were just roommates (soulmates) getting Mexican food. He loved this feeling, this tight, sweetly anxious coil in the bottom of his stomach.
They pull up and it's everything every hole in the wall Mexican place could ask for - tiled Spanish roof, wafting Chicano music and festive lights that have likely been up for a decade strung around the inside. Loki glances at Paul to get a gauge of how he's taking the borderline gaudy decorations and continues leading them towards an empty booth.
"I'll let you face the door. Be a gentleman about it, you know." He grins as he shoulders off his jacket and folds it into the seat next to him as he slips in to sit down. Their waiter is prompt, bringing them menus and asking what they want to drink.
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timeasmymeasure
Not everything that is lost stays that way
Date: 2023-08-22 08:51 pm (UTC)It was a new case. There wasn't any hesitation in his chief clearing him for another case, not after watching the way he hyperfixated on the last one, not after the chief figured they should take advantage of Loki's solve rate. He was a good detective. He didn't drink, he didn't smoke, and he worked hard. The Chief didn't see the in between parts, the way the hyperfixation consumed more of him than most traditional 'hard workers'. Work was the only thing that Loki had. It was the only thing he wanted.
Purpose.
Finally, the guy walks out with a duffle bag in hand. Loki breathes out hard in relief, more than tired of waiting. He'd been tagged as a possible suspect in a child trafficking ring, so the money (no doubt it was money, it was always money) didn't matter nearly as much as finding out where he lived. Where his friends lived. What kind of friends he had.
"Okay okay," he mutters to himself, thumb tapping idly on the wheel as he watches the guy get into a car. "Where are we going?"
The Honda starts up and pulls off. Loki follows, keeping his car several lengths back. It might have been unnecessary, but Loki wasn't going to take a chance and by the way the guy drove, he had no idea. Loki figured the guy would head to an apartment. A seedy hotel, maybe.
Instead, he was parking in a derelict lot, swapping cars. Loki made note of it and continued his pursuit, only to be rewarded with that seedy motel he'd been thinking of. The guy parks out front of a room and hustles out of his car, into a motel room where things were about to get ugly.
no subject
Date: 2023-08-22 11:49 pm (UTC)Four minutes.
He's acutely aware of the car with the other man in it. Doesn't bother looking at who he is, only catches him in the rear view mirror. Trouble already.
Three minutes.
The man emerges again, and the blonde leans over to unlock the passenger seat door. By three and a half, the driver's not staring at the man making his way towards the car but instead that other car. This city's newer but he's still got the entire thing memorized, pouring over street maps. It's not LA but it's still a beating heart and all the veins are something the driver's already intimately familiar with.
Two minutes in and another stranger emerges from the same room, this time with a gun. Paul opens the passenger door entirely for his partner, who barely slides in before a bullet flies, and he's already peeling out if the parking lot before his five minutes are up at his partner's yelled insistence.
Paul maneuvers the familiar car with ease, calm and collected while the man he's with screams that he's been shot. He's fine enough that he's still screaming, and anyway, Paul's not focused on that: he's being tailed. That same car, probably a set up of some sort. His gloved hands grip the wheel tighter and he swerves into a lane and practically drifts around a corner with calm precision, snaking his way through traffic at a high rate before turning right and slowing down completely and finding his rhythm. He can tell the other car is still tailing him, but in a few more minutes he's confident he can lose him. It just takes patience.
no subject
Date: 2023-08-23 02:21 am (UTC)Loki didn't move beyond the almost anxious shift in his seat as his guy comes back out. Shit. New car, and this time he's not driving. The only thing Loki could do was hope that stupid collected stupid. But the car wasn't pulling away.
"Why aren't you moving," he mutters out loud. "What are you waiting for."
Then, someone else. Someone armed. Bang Bang. The stillness being broken triggered several automatic things. The phone was dialed in - "10-71, at the following intersection, I'm in persuit-" The directions were rattled off as his car jumps to life and skids onto the road. It was an aggressive start - no way in hell was this was a stupid asshole. The way the car swerved was too smooth, too practiced. This was a professional.
"Shit."
Paul had always been and would always be the better driver, but Loki wasn't chump change. He'd been in police pursuits too many times before and, for a few seconds, looks like he might be able to keep up. It was the turns that really slowed him down, too scared to hit it too hard and flip his car, conscious of all the civilians around but he caught what he could on the straight aways.
"Come on, come on," he growls as he pushes his foot down harder on the pedal. This guy was good.
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Date: 2023-08-23 05:42 am (UTC)--a familiar voice cutting through the police scanner he has, 10-71, at the following intersection, I'm in persuit -- that he realizes his tail is a cop. The voice sounds familiar in a way that Paul doesn't care to think on: not now. He's focusing all of his concentration on the road.
The cop's good. Shabby with the turns but he's been in a speeding car before, maybe a few chases. Paul plies the car to push just a little faster, keeping an eye on it from his rearview. Honda. Old. Not shitty, but normal. This cop wasn't expecting something like this then.
He stops thinking about that, too and gently loosens his foot on the gas, purposefully slowing down on a turn to let the car get a bit closer.
At that exact last moment he takes a hard, controlled turn and watches the old Honda try to course correct. There's a satisfaction he'll relish in later, when his job is done, about how that poor car skids to that side walk and immediately starts steaming up, narrowly avoiding someone.
The man next to him is laughing. The driver ignores him and spends the rest of the drive on the long game: avoiding the rest of the cars sure to follow.
--
He ditches the car, walks away and takes a taxi to his apartment where he winds up grabbing his actual car keys and going for a real drive. He listens to nothing but the quiet night, thinking about how much he misses palm trees and contemplating why that voice on the dispatcher sounded vaguely familiar, even though the crackle But quickly dismisses it as his imagination as goes to the 24 hour Diner he's managed to find. He treats himself with his hard earned money: a piece of pie and some coffee. He doesn't sleep, too amped on caffeine and adrenaline.
When he does show up for work--a shitty mechanic job a few minutes from where he lives--he's surprised to see a familiar car.
"Oh hey, kid--this came in last night. Bounced a curb."
The driver frowns, confused. It's the car from the chase, clear as day. That chase had been far away from him--did it end close to his neighborhood? Was this the only garage available?
"Cop car. We fix it fast and they leave just as quickly. Hey--he's coming back in a few minutes now that we've asessed the damage, and it's busted for at least a week until we get the parts in. You want to volunteer to tell him?"
Ha ha. Paul says nothing at the joke: he doesn't really say anything at all here. Suits him just fine. What bothers him is that there's not enough time to get the car down from it's position and look into the glovebox for information on the new curiosity. Until then?
The driver nods politely instead and gets to work, watching the car like a hawk for its owner.
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Date: 2023-08-23 05:06 pm (UTC)Or so he thought. The car turns too sharply and Loki knows he can't make it -"FUCK," he yells as it turns away from him, and the correction of his own speed and direction was too fast for him to recover. It was with screaming brakes and a hard bounce off of the curb that finally stops him.
"FUCK FUCK FUCK," he shouts, pounding three times in rapid succession on his steering wheel before sinking back into his seat and watching the smoke rise from his engine bay. Fuck was right. Repairs were going to have to come out of his pocket or come with an explanation as to why he felt the need to engage in a car chase all on his own.
--
Sleep wasn't going to happen. He was too amped, too focused, and too anxious about having lost his guy.
Loki calls a towing company, sets up his car to be taken to a shop by his apartment and walks back to the motel to meet up with responding police. The whole thing was a deal that went wrong, they figure and there's security footage of who the guy was meeting up with. Footage that wouldn't be available until the morning at the latest. So he pours over the motel room, walks around the property and chews over his next steps until the shop was open.
How bad the car was would determine how bad the rest of his day was going to be. Loki makes his way into the 'office', grabbing a cup of their 'coffee' - smelled and tastes like it was run through one of the oil filters, but shit it was better than nothing - before he's pointed out to the car bays.
"Your mechanic will get you up to date," he's told, and he nods his thanks before making his way out there. There was no mistaking his car, but its the mechanic in question that really surprises him. Loki stops dead a few feet away from the bay, staring with a quietly bewildered expression.
Was that Paul? It couldn't be. He had to be mistaken. Except the mechanic lowers his arms and lets Loki get a good look at his face.
"..Paul?" Maybe he was hallucinating. Not that he had any reason beyond no sleep to do so but - No way that Paul was in his area and he just didn't know.
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Date: 2023-08-23 09:02 pm (UTC)He freezes even if his body remains fairly languid in its usually semi-robotic stance. It's a good way to hide his surprise because this isn't what he expected whatsoever-this is beyond. He'd assumed Loki got himself killed doing something reckless, maybe, with his dogged pursuit of what he'd been able to justify, but not here and not the one shadowing him. Paul is not expecting the other to be so tall either, though the way Loki's brow furrows is exactly the same. Haircut, too.
And he's the voice over the police scanner.
It usually takes a few seconds for Paul to answer, a castoff of his younger days when all he'd do is shut down, something that's now seen as mysterious and brooding to most people because he keeps to himself, but there's a small tell in the way he blinks that pries his secret from him: he's genuinely surprised. Loki's still pale while Paul's traded the sleepy Washington rain for LA sun, but he looks good. Loki still has that spark in his eyes that Paul admires, even if it looks like he didn't get any sleep at all. It's endearing. It's worrying. Paul's mouth feels dry.
"Can't get the new parts for a week," he says, voice soft and quiet with a surprisingly strong commanding air to behind it. He leans against one of the work benches next to him and crosses his arms, watching the other carefully. He's still on guard.
He has to be. And he can't exactly ask what happened with Loki's car, not when they know. Not if Loki's still as whip-smart as he was when they grew up together.
"I can drive you home if you want."
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Date: 2023-08-23 10:55 pm (UTC)Safer that way.
The information about the car barely registers. A week was too long. Meant he was already in the shit and he hadn't even gone in yet. It was the 'I can drive you home if you want' that sent everything in him further up into the internal flurry of emotion.
"Gotta go to work." Short, to the point. Blunt but not cutting. Stunned. Careful. If he got even half a hope up, he was pretty sure he would implode. "You-" He blinks again and glances back at the office. "Just passing through or are you working here for real?"
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From:I'm giving you a night call to tell you how I feel;
Date: 2023-08-26 02:43 am (UTC)So he drives.
He drives and he thinks about everything, decompressing. He thinks about why he's here now. Thinks about Loki. He thinks a lot about Loki.
He's got his old friend's number form work, and he's already memorized it. He calls without a single ounce of hesitation, and instead of answering 'hey,' he just speaks. ]
I can't stop thinking about you.
[ there's the sound of the car humming, but it's a quiet sort of background noise. Paul feels like he can be vulnerable like this. ]
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Date: 2023-08-26 03:03 am (UTC)The call was almost a welcome distraction and it was only because it was 2 am that he answered an unknown number, Paul's opening flattening him in one breath. He glances around the otherwise empty office and pushes to his feet, heading towards the stairs and eventually, the roof.]
I'm going to take that as a good thing. [Fuck he wanted it to be a good thing. He could hear the car engine in the background and could see Paul perfectly in his minds eye.] Especially if you're calling me to say so.
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Date: 2023-08-26 03:12 am (UTC)Feeling lonely like this, it's second nature to him. Something out of it would he completely out of his comfort zone. He takes a while to respond. ]
Are you a good person?
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Date: 2023-08-26 03:34 am (UTC)He doesn't answer right away, rolling the question over in his mind.]
I suppose that depends on who you ask. [Keller yelling at him for letting Alex go came to mind, but that case was still painfully fresh in a way he couldn't shake. Was he good with this much blood on his hands? With the number of children he doesn't find or finds too late.]
I try to be. When I can. Might make up for all the times I wasn't. Means making choices though. [Hard ones.]
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Date: 2023-08-26 05:35 am (UTC)[ Paul's not so sure he did himself. He's not so sure he ever makes the right choice, not without Loki, not without his Loki, the guy that started a fight over some chode putting a hand up a girl's skirt in high school on his first day. Loki knows how it works. Paul...
Paul thought he knew how it worked. That's why he's here. Mostly now, he just wants to hear Loki's voice. ]
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Date: 2023-08-26 04:19 pm (UTC)I do. You can guess what the alternative to my making the wrong choice is now. The only thing that eats me is time. How quick I figure something out. Or how long it takes me. [The people who die because he's not quicker or sharper or smarter-
Which is why he needed to know what happened the other night. What Paul was there for. What Paul knew.]
I'm going to need you to answer a couple of questions. The sooner the better. [But it didn't have to be this exact moment.]
I want to see you again.
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From:Midnight Mass
Date: 2023-12-25 01:17 am (UTC)What he did allow himself was one Mass a year. Christmas Eve, Midnight Mass.
He told Paul, told him he didn't have to come along - he knew how much easier it was to just stay away from their past then look at it, than sit in it's pews and listen to the rhythmic repetition of words that were pressed in Loki's soul and some that were pressed into his skin. But he was dressed in his best suit and tie, shiny black shoes unfit for the snowy weather outside, and pulling on his jacket and hat.
"It'll only be about an hour. They keep it shorter here, past couple of years. Weather and all."
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Date: 2023-12-25 01:53 am (UTC)"'The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told,'" he says, voice steady and clear. He's borrowing one of Loki's dress shirts, top button undone, white scorpion jacket absent with just his denim jacket, hair neat and parted on the side.
He stops Loki at the door, one hand on the frame.
"It can take all night and I wouldn't mind. You're there."
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Date: 2023-12-25 02:24 am (UTC)"Least I won't be chantin' latin this time." He idly fidgets with his hat instead of reaching out. "You look nice." Thank you.. "Let's go, otherwise we're gonna be late," he says, pulling his beanie on and tugging it down into place.
"How much of all that stuff do you remember? The scripture, songs and shit."
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Date: 2023-12-25 02:41 am (UTC)He'd hate to dismantle something Loki's looking forward to just because of how good the other looks in a pair of shiny shoes. He does, however, put a hand on Loki's lower back as he passes the other to get into the car, talking openly. Unusual, but Loki inspires it.
"Most of it," he confesses. Pauses, too, and looks over at Loki in the rearview as he slides in.
"I wanted to impress you."
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Date: 2023-12-25 03:24 am (UTC)"You always impress me," he says honestly, smile slipping into the stupid kind of stunned. Loki wouldn't have blamed Paul if he didn't remember, or didn't bother to learn, or shoved it all to the side to get through his life without living back there.
He was staring again. He pinches the end of his nose in a half assed scratch and glances out the window before looking back.
"Uh, we're heading to Saint Josephine, over on Carvell street. You know where it is?"
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Date: 2023-12-25 04:06 am (UTC)Both of them would do anything for the other. Stay in line, step out of line, anticipate needs. They're beyond friends, beyond whatever this has turned into. They're soul mates. He starts driving, hand on the stick shift. Smiling softly as he reminds himself that Loki had just said he impressed him. It feels good.
"Do I gotta sing?"
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From:an actual date;
Date: 2024-02-11 05:26 pm (UTC)There's big things, too of course. Those are less of a hum and more of a focused point, things that give Paul a mild headache when he mulls them over too much in his mind. Is Loki blaming himself every second there's a kid missing? How hard can he push himself before he tears himself inside out? Is Paul compromising him?
(That last one is selfish, Paul knows, but it's a worry that sets his teeth on edge.)
But Paul knows Loki as well as Loki knows Paul. Hell, maybe Paul knows Loki better than Loki himself. Loki sure as hell can see through Paul when he can't. And the fact of the matter is this: Loki needs a fucking break and Paul needs some goddamn Mexican food and it's more than just a date, because Paul had been on maybe four of those in his life total. It's also rare time with Loki.
That's more important to him than anything. It's an event. It's a celebration. Sometimes Paul thinks it's a miracle both of them are alive at all.
Paul arrives at Loki's house at exactly the designated time, knocking at 6 o'clock sharp, scorpion jacket and gloves on, toothpick in lieu of cigarette. He likes Loki's little place. It’s small, efficient. Practical. He likes staying over, too, when he can. Most times he doesn't want to leave.
The door opens. Paul's leaning against the door frame and can't help but smile as he nods his hello.
He doesn't think he'll ever get tired of seeing Loki's face when that door opens.
Re: an actual date;
Date: 2024-02-17 03:14 am (UTC)Every life they saved meant someone else getting a shot at finding someone they loved as much as he loved Paul. Paul would understand that, he was positive. So it wasn't something he questioned at all, wasn't something he talked about in the context of whatever case information he would let slip in his almost obsessed rambles to his lover in the few hours they got together before falling in, exhausted from their various days. But Loki was looking forward to the date they'd agreed on, the night falling in such a way that he didn't have any new leads to follow for work, much to the thanks of how hard he'd been running in the days prior. Looking forward to them pretending that they were normal, that they were just a couple having dinner with each other.
They agreed on 6 and there Paul was, knocking at his door and looking fucking devastatingly perfect. There was never any stopping the way Loki's eyes lit up when Paul came around, their intensity adoring, even in it's sharp mindfulness. He didn't even feel the stupid crooked smile that slides onto his face. He never does.
"Hey." He was already ready to go, prompt as a clock when he had a goal. "You ready to get so full of fajitas and chips that they gotta roll us outta there with heavy machinery?"
His hair was slicked back with gel, and he was dressed as casual as he got - black cargo pants and a form fitting longjohn type knit dark navy offsetting the well used winter jacket he wore. Thankfully, it wasn't cold enough that he needed a beanie to fuck up his hair.
Re: an actual date;
Date: 2024-02-20 09:36 pm (UTC)"I am," he says, two syllables filled with an amount of warmth that feels like it should be wrong. He falls in synch with Loki almost immediately, trailing a fraction of a second behind him until they get out of the apartment. It's two long strides to get ahead of him and to open the door, looking expectant for Loki to slide in.
Re: an actual date;
Date: 2024-02-22 08:38 pm (UTC)"I'm guessing you've already scoped out the restaurant we're going to?" Did he need to provide directions? He very much doubted it. Even if Paul hadn't gone into the place himself to eat, it served plenty well as a landmark and those were priceless.
Re: an actual date;
Date: 2024-02-25 12:55 am (UTC)He looks into the mirror as he pulls out and begins the journey.
"Tell me how to get there?"
Paul knows exactly how. He just wants to hear Loki's voice.
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Date: 2024-03-05 01:05 am (UTC)soulmates) getting Mexican food. He loved this feeling, this tight, sweetly anxious coil in the bottom of his stomach.They pull up and it's everything every hole in the wall Mexican place could ask for - tiled Spanish roof, wafting Chicano music and festive lights that have likely been up for a decade strung around the inside. Loki glances at Paul to get a gauge of how he's taking the borderline gaudy decorations and continues leading them towards an empty booth.
"I'll let you face the door. Be a gentleman about it, you know." He grins as he shoulders off his jacket and folds it into the seat next to him as he slips in to sit down. Their waiter is prompt, bringing them menus and asking what they want to drink.
"Coke for me, please."
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