Noun: the part of a fielder's area where he is not expected to get to a batted ball and make a successful play.
He'd nearly been that boy.
The spoiled rich brat with the absentee parents and too much unsupervised time on his hands, with one friend he'd loved with all the little understanding he had in his heart of what love really was. Not that he'd ever gone so far as to get someone to tell Mark's girlfriend lies to get rid of her.
No, he'd just told Mark he liked him and that had been that.
Funny—he hadn't thought about Mark in years. Not that there were really that many parallels between Alex's miserable existence and his own less than warm childhood—and where'd all the orgies been when he was in high school?—but at a brief glance, the surface was far too similar.
He blinked as a hand waved in front of his face. "Earth to Martin."
"Hmmm?"
"Time to go home, space boy." Danny's amusement was tangible, as if Martin could touch the laughter that was nearly always present.
"Ok."
A quick hand grabbed his from where it was resting on the desk and raised it to Danny's eye level. Danny spread the fingers apart, then twisted them around to check both sides before letting his hand drop. Martin blinked again, staring in surprise at the man standing next to him.
"What was that for?"
"Just checking to see if any fingers were glowing in preparation for an interstellar phone call home."
Oh yes, he remembered this all too well—Mark had never let him remain serious for very long either. Like his mission in life was to keep Martin from turning out to be a controlling bastard like his father or frigid like his mother.
A finger snapping in front of his nose brought his attention back to the present and to Danny, who had a small frown of concern on his mobile face. "You okay, Martin?"
"Fine. Just—" he hesitated, wondering what Danny would say if he said what he was really thinking, "just tired."
"You need some rest. Wanna put your feet up and catch a game tonight?"
"It's November."
"You're very observant."
"The Series is over."
Danny hitched his hip on Martin's desk with a grin. "It's called ESPN Classic. God's gift to tired, Yankee-baiting FBI agents. 2002 Twins Yankees game tonight."
"Ah."
"So?"
"Sure, just let me run home and change. I'll meet you at your place."
"Borrow something of mine. Come on, let's go."
"Martin, wake up."
Danny's voice was hovering on the edge of his awareness, the melodic accent softly weaving its way into his escaping dream. "Tired."
"Yeah, I know. Time for bed."
Martin tried to bury his face in the solid presence under his cheek. "Mmmm, comfy."
"I know you are, but my arm's asleep. Let's move this somewhere more comfortable, ok?" Danny chuckled at Martin's grunt as he stumbled up and started blinking rapidly as the room tilted. A gentle hand caught his arm and stopped the room from moving.
"Bedroom's this way, Groggy Smurf."
Martin shook his head to clear it, then gave up and let Danny guide him into the bedroom. He quietly stripped off the borrowed sweats, then crawled under the covers on Danny's bed. A moment later, a cold draft hit his feet as Danny joined him, and he waited only until Danny stopped moving to curl around the other man and lay his head on Danny's shoulder.
"So who won?" Martin couldn't even remember seeing the first pitch of the game. He vaguely recalled settling in against Danny on the couch after changing clothes, but that was the last thing he remembered.
"Same team that won the first time around."
"Amazing how—" he yawned, "how that happens."
"Yeah, reruns are funny that way."
He snickered quietly at the not-quite-exasperated tone in Danny's voice. "What's the matter? Didn't you have fun taunting the Yankees without an audience?"
"Your snores said more about the game than my taunting ever could."
"Oh, very funny. You should take that on the road."
He felt more than heard the slight huff of laughter in Danny's chest as they lay there and listened to the building settle in for the night.
"What's the matter, Martin?"
It was—odd, how he sometimes forgot that Danny's sharp eyes rarely missed any details. Especially not the ones that had to do with Martin.
"Do you ever wonder what you'd be like if you'd had different parents?"
Danny's arm tightened briefly around his shoulders. "Did your dad call today?"
Martin closed his eyes tightly and pressed his face further into Danny's chest. "No."
"What happened?"
"I—" Quiet descended again as Martin tried to get his tired brain to form the words he wanted. "When I was a kid, my father was always in D.C., and the only time he seemed to bother to come back to Philadelphia was when Mother told him he had to appear for one of her receptions. He didn't really seem to care one way or another how my sister or I did in school, other than that we weren't causing trouble and were passing classes with flying colors.
"Mother had her clubs—you name it, she probably chaired or organized it." He snorted. "Usually with a glass in her hand."
Danny murmured something unintelligible under his breath and shifted, his other arm coming around Martin to wrap him in a warm cocoon.
"For all the attention they paid us, we might as well have raised ourselves." He took a deep breath, savoring the smell of Danny that was trapped by the blankets. "The only thing that stopped me from turning out exactly like Alex Durfee was my sister."
"You have a sister?"
Martin smiled. "Yeah."
"And?" He could hear an answering smile in Danny's voice.
"Caitlin is six years younger than me, and hated every nanny my mother ever hired, so I was always the one making sure she was taken care of, until we both were old enough to leave home for good."
"So what happened?"
"Nothing traumatic. I went to school at Saint Joseph's so I was still around to look out for her, and when I took a job in Seattle, she threatened to run away if she didn't get to live with me instead of our parents, so we worked it out."
"Where is she now?" Danny's hand was running slowly up and down his spine, stroking the soft cotton of his T-shirt.
"Still in Seattle. She went to U Dub, then decided she wanted to be a lawyer for Amnesty International."
Danny laughed. "That had to make your parents happy."
Martin smiled against Danny's chest. "Believe me, she loves the irony."
Danny snickered again as Martin shifted closer, enjoying the heat Danny radiated beneath the covers. A few minutes passed in silence before Danny spoke again. "That has to be hard."
"What?"
"Being so far apart from the one person in your family you love the most."
"Yeah," he replied softly. "Yeah, it is."
"So why did you—" Danny sighed, and shifted slightly to hug Martin tighter to his side. "Why did you decide to come back here?"
"I—" Martin swallowed quickly before continuing, "I wanted to do something that would really help people."
"What, getting their stolen identities back wasn't help enough?"
"It wasn't—satisfying, wasn't enough of a challenge. I rarely got to see the people we helped, got to really know that my work resulted in something good for the people we worked with. Not like—there was nothing like the feeling of telling a mother we found her kidnapped child alive and unharmed."
"Nothing like telling someone they'll never speak to their child again."
Martin sighed. "I didn't think about that part when I made the decision."
Danny hugged him closer. "It's not usually the first thing you'd think of."
"You—" Martin took a deep breath and pulled back so he could see Danny's face, "you've made it easier, you know, dealing with the cases that don't end the way we want them to."
Danny cleared his throat before answering. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. I don't think I could have made it through the last year—let alone my first two months—without you dragging me to the batting cage that first time."
Martin smiled at the look on Danny's face—slightly stunned, like no one had ever told him how much he was valued. He continued before Danny could take them further down that avenue of discussion than he felt up to dealing with tonight. "Of course, my arms may never forgive you, but I appreciated it."
Danny chuckled softly. "I know you did."
He grinned in return, then closed his eyes and put his head back on Danny's shoulder. "G'night, Danny."
Danny placed a soft kiss on the top of his head, then whispered, "You could never have been that kid, Martin. You learned how to tell someone you love them."
Nov. 13, 2003-Jan. 3, 2004
Dude, Veronica rocks. (I'm just sayin'. *vbg*) She's patient and helpful, doesn't roll her eyes at me when I say we have to rewind and watch that scene again, and she always knows when I need a swift kick in the behind to get me going again. *vbg* Plus she's an absolute sweetheart. Love ya, lady. :)
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