Darien

Darien

Rating: soft R for language and male-male interaction

Pairing: Robert Hobbes/Darien Fawkes

Disclaimer: "The Invisible Man" does not belong to me. I make no money from this venture.

Dedication: This slashfic is for Ewan McGregor, Ralph Nader fans, and Annie even though she doesn't know me.

Wherein it's sort of cool working with an invisible guy; sometimes political correctness is right after all; and Darien Fawkes is hell-bent on setting Bobby Hobbes's table.

Notice: I saw a girl talking to herself seconds before I walked past a sign that read, "Do Bush and Gore make you want to Ralph?" Then I thought of this...

Bobby Hobbes was well aware of his own shortcomings. With everyone being nice enough to point them out all of the time, how could he help but be aware? So he knew that, strictly speaking, he wasn't playing with a full deck. He'd stopped laying blame for it and learned to accept it.

Accept it within boundaries. He was not going to see a therapist every week to talk about his feelings. No way no how; Bobby Hobbes had better places to be. So he didn't see the therapist, but he educated himself. He knew what was wrong with him; he took the pills; he saw his psychiatrist for regular check-ups on how his dosages were treating him.

He didn't like being a little psycho. He didn't want everyone else knowing about it. That "everyone else" included Darien Fawkes. He hated that Fawkes knew about it. A comment from an ex-coworker here, a run-in with the...say it, Bobby...ex-wife there - - yeah, Fawkes knew all about Bobby's psychoses.

It wasn't good for him and his paranoia that his partner could turn invisible at will. He was leery at first, always wondering whether there were other invisible people around, whether they might just be watching him right now. He found himself spinning around suddenly as though to surprise them.

Then he got to know Fawkes better. It was sort of cool working with an invisible guy. He actually sort of liked Fawkes. They could be friends.

Were they friends?

Maybe Fawkes was his friend, but he wasn't Fawkes's. Or was that the other way around? However it went, he got the distinct impression that Fawkes was more important to him, to his life, than he was to Fawkes and Fawkes' life. But he wasn't unused to that situation.

So invisible people might not be too bad. Invisible Fawkes was okay. So when Bobby got nervous one night, alone in his apartment, wondering whether there really might be other invisible people and whether they might be watching him, he decided, so what? What if there were? They might be just as okay as Fawkes was.

So he talked to them.

And after a day or two, he realized that he wasn't just talking to "them," he was talking to Fawkes. Talking to the thin air as if Fawkes were right in the room with him, just in invisible mode. Alone in his apartment, a lonely middle-aged nutcase, he carried on conversations with his very own invisible friend.

After a while, it felt downright cosy.

He was nuts, but he could be honest about it. He called his invisible friend "Darien." Instead of muttering to himself about almost getting his ass shot off trying to save Fawkes in just another day at the office, he actually talked to Darien about it. Instead of yelling at the idiots on TV, he talked to Darien about them. Instead of arguing with the editorialists in the newspaper, he told Darien why they were misguided fools.

It wasn't a constant stream of conversation. It was just...he felt good, having someone to talk to if he felt like talking.

Like many psychotics, he heard voices sometimes. Just sometimes. On rare occasions. They were called auditory hallucinations; usually it was just someone calling his name. "Bobby." It wasn't like "Kill the Official" or anything. (Although, if he heard a voice telling him to kill Eberts, he might consider it. He could get off for being nuts, right?) And when he heard his name, he pretended that it was Darien.

For the first time, being insane wasn't entirely terrifying.

Bobby stormed into his apartment. "That motherfucker!" He whirled around and kicked the door shut, an unsatisfying burst of violence. "And don't tell me he's not one, I know he is, this is my house and I can call him whatever the hell I want to call him." He turned the deadbolts. "Trying to get me killed. I know he's trying to get me killed. It's never enough with him. I am not his baby-sitter and I am not his annoying pest and I - - I am trying to do my job! This is my job, this is my life, I've lived and worked and trained for this, I'm good at this, it's the only thing I'm good at and I'm damned good at it! If he'd just work with me instead of ditching me and working around me and pretending he's the only one who matters. Who does he think is the one who keeps saving his ass? Right, that's my job, keeping Gland Boy out of trouble. All I'm good for." He was barefoot by now, jacket on the sofa, shirtsleeves rolled up past his elbows. He grabbed a pot from beneath the sink and slammed it onto the stove just to hear the crash. "Thinks he's so special because he's tall and handsome and oh-so-special with his glandular problems. We're all just living in Fawkes' world, now." He made himself stop yelling while he filled the pot. When the pot was on the burner, he pulled himself up to sit on the counter to wait, clapping on a lid. "Little bastard." He glanced at the pot. "Don't boil over; I'll be right back." He jumped down and walked to the bedroom, closed the door, stripped, and pulled on sweatpants and a T-shirt. Then he went back to sit on the counter to wait for the pot to boil.

"He's such a jerk. I know, I know, I wouldn't be this upset if I didn't care so much. That's what they say, right? If what he does bothers you so much, it has to be because you care. If it comes down to that, I've gotta be in love with him, he drives me so crazy. But if I don't look out for him, who will? No one else is there with him. I have to look out for him. He sure doesn't look out for himself. Being invisible does not make you indestructible. Sure doesn't make you smart. I know, I know, that's not fair, he's smart anyway. Smart kid. Smart mouth. Always got something to say. Even in other people's words. Always acts like he has it all figured out, when we all know he's really running off half-cocked with half the information and a lot of wrong assumptions. Still manages to come out all right in the end. Wish I could take credit for that."

"Bobby."

He picked at a cuticle.

"Hobbes."

That was new. Normally it was his first name.

"Hobbes." He heard that little shivery tinkling sound. That sounded way too real; he looked up and holy shit Fawkes was standing in his kitchen.

"I can get to a gun faster than you can blink, Fawkes. What are you doing here?"

"Who are you talking to?"

"Never saw somebody talking to himself before?"

"The first two times I said your name you barely reacted. It was a big non-reaction. I know you heard me."

"If I didn't react, how do you know that I heard you?"

"Okay, that proves you heard me, or you'd be asking 'What first two times?' I know you heard me the second time anyway, Hobbes; your eyes flickered."

"They're my eyes, they can do whatever they want. What're you doing here?"

"Who are you talking to?"

"You're not supposed to be going invisible for non-Agency-related reasons. The Official sent you here? Asked you to check up on me?"

"I felt bad. About earlier. When you left you were so mad at me, I thought..."

"You decided to go see-through and follow me?"

"Something like that."

"Something like that," he muttered.

"Hobbes-"

"You wanna stay?"

"What?"

"Stay. Eat. You're here, I'm cooking, might as well join me."

"Okay."

"Okay." He slid down from the counter.

"You really have a gun that close?"

"I'm Bobby Hobbes, Fawkes. I can kill you in seconds. Inside or outside of my apartment. Visible or not."

"Really?"

"Don't ask me to prove it."

"How come I've never been here before?"

"Because you haven't."

"You never invited me."

"You never invited me to your place."

"You've been there anyway. We're reduced to sneaking into each other's apartments? We can't just get together like normal people?"

"Which of us is normal?"

"You know, I hate that. That whole politically correct notion that there's no such thing as 'normal,' that-"

"Fawkes. Look at me and look at you. Which one of the two of us is normal?"

Fawkes fell silent. "Okay." He grinned. "I'll give you that much."

"Good."

"So what are we having?"

"Heaven in a box."

"Macaroni and cheese?"

"You have any better ideas? I didn't think so. Sit down, Fawkes, you're in my way. You sit, I serve - - it'll be just like we're at work."

"That is not fair."

"So help. Set the table."

"Where are the plates?"

"See? That's what I'm saying. My kitchen, Fawkes, my game. You're not prepared to play."

Fawkes's face went grim. "You've made your point, Hobbes."

"What happened to Bobby?"

"What?"

"You said Bobby first."

"When?"

"When you were saying my name and I wasn't reacting, according to you."

"I didn't."

"I heard you, Fawkes."

"I thought you didn't hear me."

"Just sit down, then, and be quiet."

"I'm not here to look decorative."

"Could've fooled me. Go on, sit down. You're the guest here."

"Hobbes-"

"You're so hell-bent on setting my table, you can come over again another night and do it."

"Another night?"

"What, we're working together, we're partners, you're never setting foot in my home again?"

Darien smiled, pulled out a chair, and sat. "Okay," he said, still smiling.

Bobby set the table, finished getting the food ready, and they started to talk about things. They started out talking about work, a few hesitant comments on today's job, then their bosses/co-workers, and moved to Fawkes's professional past, the NHL, the NIH, Bud Light, fabric softeners, and Sam Donaldson. By that point, they'd cleaned up in the kitchen, washing dishes together like they'd been doing it for weeks, moving into the living room, sitting on the sofa and talking, and Bobby was relaxed, actually relaxed, for the first time in how long?

And then he got tense. Because Fawkes was kissing him. Kissing him. On the mouth.

"Fawkes?"

"Call me Darien."

Right. It was only customary to call someone by his first name when he was sucking on your tongue. "Darien?" Which was weird. That's what he'd gotten used to calling his invisible friend. But this was his invisible friend. This one just happened to be 3-D, which made this one much, much better. Bobby was feeling much, much better, too, which might have had something to do with how his cock was hard in his pants and Fawkes's - - Darien's - - hand was, yeah, right there...

"You want this?" Darien asked. And Darien was still kissing him, still touching him, but Darien's voice really had asked the question, really wanted to know. Like he might say no. Like he might say that he didn't want this at all.

He had a choice. He could say no.

"Yeah," he said, and curled his fingers in the front of Darien's shirt, pulling Darien closer. "Are we going to make out on the sofa like kids or do you want more?"

"More?"

"You want more?"

"I want more," Darien said, and Darien's kiss was hot and wet and very deep, like their mouths were doing all the mating that their bodies could want. But Bobby's body wanted more anyway, and, according to the hard, hot bulge under Bobby's hand, Darien's body wanted more, too.

"It was you."

"What was me?"

"I was talking to you."

"You didn't know I was here."

"I wanted you to be here."

"I'm here now."

matthew@matthewtime.com
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