Title: Horizons
By: Jessica Harris

Fandom: Due South
Pairing: RayK/Fraser

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Some nights I like to leave the lights on, watch my hand around his 
cock. I like to see the way he moves at the touch, the way his pale 
skin blushes, the way, when I look up at his face, his eyes go wide 
and wondering, a little uncertain, like he knows there's something 
going on here that he doesn't understand.

I try to keep that picture in my head during the day. It helps, a 
little. Helps keep me from making an ass of myself, from being *at* 
him all the time - stealing his hat, ruffling his hair, yanking at 
his sleeve, his coat, his belt, anything to disturb that perfect 
uniform. Not that anything I do seems to have much impact - I don't 
think the damn thing can *be* disturbed, and I just end up looking 
like an idiot, fidgeting and picking at him like a small annoying 
monkey.

It's stupid. This is supposed to be what I wanted. This *is* what I 
wanted. So why is it such a struggle to keep from doing things that 
drive him crazy?

It's just - just that everything seems so *easy* for him sometimes. 
When none of it's been easy for me.

It started with one of those moments that I didn't think happened 
outside of movies. I was dropping him off outside the consulate, 
and he turned and smiled at me before getting out, and Bam! Slo-mo, 
violins, the whole nine yards, and I realised that I didn't want him 
to get out of the car, I wanted to lock the doors and strap him in 
and just take off, drive us away to some safe and secret place where 
I could keep him with me forever, where he could shed that damn 
monkey-suit and  . . .

And *that* thought made a wave of heat roll from the soles of my 
feet to the top of my head, and I could feel my jaw hanging open as 
I stared at him.

"Ray?" he was saying, as if at a distance, "Ray? Ray? Ray?" Then he 
put his hand on my shoulder and gently shook me.

I reacted like the idiot I am. Slapped his hand away, shouted 
"Don't! Don't *do* that! Don't *shake* me! No *shaking*, OK?"

He flinched away and started backing out of the car, saying 
soothingly "I'm sorry, Ray, I understand, no shaking. But you 
appeared to have fallen into some sort of a fugue state, and often 
the application of physical stimulus can be helpful. But if you're 
all right, I'll just - "

"I'm *fine*," I said, "just fine. You can go." He nodded, and 
retreated into the consulate, leaving me there, clutching the 
steering wheel so tight my fingers were numb.

I wasn't fine. I wasn't fine for weeks. I mean, what I had felt 
there in the car, that wasn't who I thought I was, you know? I 
didn't think I was the kind of guy who wanted ... well, it wasn't 
just the thought of having sex with another guy that freaked me the 
most over those weeks. When you get right down to it, sex is sex, 
right? Pick your tab A and  slot B of choice and hopefully everyone 
ends up happy. But I had never thought I was the kind of guy who 
wanted another guy to, you know, put his arms around him, and tell 
him that everything was going to be OK. Which more and more I *did* 
want. And if I was wrong about that, what else was I wrong about? 
Working with Fraser had already made me someone else on paper, but 
at least I had always thought that *I* knew who I was. But if 
Stanley Kowalski wasn't the guy I had thought, then who was I?

Fraser, of course, noticed that something was wrong. One night I was 
dropping him off again, but instead of getting out of the car, he 
looked at me and said, "Have I offended you in some way, Ray? You've 
been acting very erratically lately, and I can't help but notice 
that your attitude towards me seems rather - skittish."

And just like that it burst out of me. "I think I'm queer for you, 
Fraser."

He just looked confused, so I rushed on before I could come to my 
senses and take the words back. "I mean, I have, I have these 
*feelings* towards you, and they're not, like, manly, partner-type 
feelings. They're more . . .  more . . ."

His forehead furrowed in a tiny frown, and I couldn't go on. "Ray?" 
he finally said, "are you saying that you're . . . attracted to me?"

I looked away. "Yeah," I said, "I mean, it's like I - yeah. Yes. I 
am. Attracted to you, that is. And maybe - maybe more."

"Oh," he said, "you should have told me before." And then he leaned 
right over and put his arms around me, and his eyes were all shy and 
happy and so goddam *kind* I could have cried. And then I couldn't 
see them at all anymore, because he was kissing me, right there in 
my car in front of the consulate, and I had to close my eyes.

And so you're probably wondering what the problem is, why I'm still 
acting like an asshole. And I don't know how to tell you exactly, 
it's just that I get this feeling sometimes, like, you can take the 
boy out of the north, but you can't take the north out . . . you 
know where I'm going with this.

He talks about the tundra a lot, and it's like there's that 
landscape inside of him, all ice and snow and sky for hundreds of 
miles, stretching right to horizon. A land where days and nights 
last for months at a time. It's not that he's cold, or distant, 
exactly - in fact he's a cuddler, like you might have guessed. It's 
just that it's such a *big* landscape inside him that all the normal 
human worries seem small to him, hardly a blip on that wide horizon. 
It seems to make things simpler for him - like, if you see wrong 
being done, of *course* you try to right it. And if someone loves 
you, of *course* you give them back whatever you can. And if you do 
love someone, and someone loves you, then the little stuff doesn't 
matter - you follow your heart.

So he can't understand why I'm like this still, why I can't look 
Stella in the eye anymore, or Franny either for that matter. Why I 
get edgy and restless and crazy, why some nights I can't sleep, and 
flinch away if he touches me. Why I hate him sometimes for being the 
only thing left I can be sure of, since I can't be sure of myself. 
I *do* love him. But he's turned me upside-down and inside-out and 
backwards, he's turned me into someone I never knew I could be, and 
I can't even wrinkle his damn uniform. He says that he loves me, and 
I know that it's true, but this love is so big that it feels like a 
glacier, or an avalanche, something grinding me to powder, sweeping 
me away. And I don't think that anyone will ever find me again.

Somehow those nights with the lights on make me feel less lost. I 
can see myself reflected in his eyes, the same bony face and spiky 
hair as ever. I can see the ways that I sweep *him* away, make him 
shudder and gasp and scream my name, make him moan low and desperate 
like he'll die without me. And I try to hold that picture in my mind 
- his cock, my hand, his wide, wondering eyes.

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