Title: "Terms of Endearment"
Author: monimala
Fandom: VM
Rating/Classification: AC, V/Lamb/Weevil, het and slash, adult language, sexual situations. 1200 words.
Disclaimer: I still don't own the characters.
Summary: These are missing (and AU) scenes for 2.22, "Not Pictured." This follows Notch and Double Exposure. The grip should be choking but isn't.
"Fuck you, Man. Fuck you. What is this?" he demands, the words running together like some meth freak from a COPS video as Lamb hustles him into the parking lot, one hand still curved around his neck. "What the fuck are you doing to me, huh?"
Lamb smirks, snapping his gum like a fifteen-year-old from the Valley. Except Eli hasn't known too many girls from the Valley. They don't slum so low as Neptune. They don't go past the ugly-ass Orange Curtain to get their kicks. "You know what this is."
"What? Payback?" he accuses, suddenly grinning despite the fact that abuela didn't get her wish and it's all this motherfucker's fault. Pendejo. "You still pissed off that V got with me but only did you 'cause you blackmailed her? 'Cause, man to man, I could actually understand that turning you into a prick who'd break my grandmother's heart."
"I already was that prick, Navarro." Lamb shoves him into the back of the cruiser, fingers against the back of his skull, curling into the scratchy collar of his green graduation gown. "This isn't payback."
"Then what is it? Slow day at the station? Not enough drunks in the tank?" He snorts, slumping against the warm vinyl, staring at the mesh barrier. This...this is what he's seeing instead of his diploma. Fuck, Man. Shit.
The sheriff is bent over the half-open door, one hand along the top of it. The hand on Weevil's neck hasn't moved and his thumb strokes over Weevil's pulse. The grip should be choking but isn't. It's kind. Like when you grab a cat by the scruff. It's *too* kind. It's too familiar.
He hears himself gasp, like one of those girly girls from the Valley. He hears it over the distant noise of the deputies peeling out of the lot and the sound of Lamb's grape gum. Snap. Snap. Fucking snap.
He remembers Veronica watching them…half-distracted, half-concerned, as Lamb practically paraded him in front of her like a trophy.
Oh. Oh, it's like that, huh?
The man's got some serious issues. Serious.
"What was five more minutes, Asshole? Till they got to the Os at least? You know they made me pay for this stupid gown."
"I’ll keep that in mind when I rip it off."
***
They take the long way back to the police station.
"You're going down for assault, Navarro," Lamb laughs in his ear, against his ink, against weak stitches made with dark green thread. "You hear me? You're *going down*."
He got a passing grade in English. He knows his damn metaphors.
The asphalt actually isn't that hard on his knees.
***
He's parked in Lamb's office -- a "processing error" keeping him out of the cell block -- when Veronica storms in, flinging off her hat and nearly dinging him in the face with the tassel. Of course, she doesn't even see him at first. She's too busy giving Lamb holy Hell, five foot two inches of valedictorial fury.
"If you wanted to watch me graduate, Deputy, Dad could've saved you a seat."
"Where would the fun in that be?"
"Oh, I forgot who you were again, didn't I? Did you kick some puppies today, too? Pull the wings off flies?"
"Naw...just unzipped one."
Bubblegum does wonders in getting the taste of cock out of your mouth, Weevil thinks, watching them go at it like prizefighters.
"You're disgusting."
"No, I'm practical. Your backdoor boy here beat up Thumper in plain view of witnesses. So, I figured I'd arrest him in plain view of some. Last month, you got him off. Today, he got me off. It has a nice kind of symmetry."
Symmetry, huh? Looks like somebody else got a passing grade in English, too. Weevil raises his hands, which Lamb thoughtfully cuffed in front of him after they got done with the long, strange trip through booking. "Hey...arrested person here. Anyone want to get me out of these things?"
He gets the whirlwind of wrath next. Veronica turns on him, a flash of cheap polyester and shampoo commercial hair. "No. No, you get to stay in those, Eli. I trusted you and I thought you trusted me. But, no, you went behind my back and decided to be a real macho muchacho and beat up Thumper. Do you know what I did for you? My God, I turned into a sexual deviant for you. You'd think you would show me the courtesy of staying out of trouble!"
He hates to have to bond with Lamb of all people -- never mind that he's going to be picking gravel out of his skin for weeks -- but there's no way around it. This requires basic male solidarity. They lock eyes, share a tiny nod, confirming what they both remember: that Miss Thing here initiated the sexual deviancy herself, with her tongue in the sheriff's mouth. There was some blackmail and shit, some definite strong-arming, but nobody held a gun to her head to make her pant their names in that sex kitten whisper. Nobody forced her to come.
The girl clearly aced revisionist history.
So, it's like that, is it?
She's matriculated and done her time and she's done with the likes of him now.
With the likes of *them*.
"Why don't you show me the courtesy of being straight with me, V?" he fires back, slouching in his chair. "Hell, even with Sheriff Lame-ass over there. Why're you even here?"
"I have to agree with my felonious amigo...shouldn't you be off celebrating graduating Summa Cum Loudly or something?"
"You spent all day thinking of that, didn't you?" Veronica rolls her eyes, looking so much like an 09-er that it's scary. Maybe she's already crawled into that Ivy League skin, into Logan's bed.
"Actually, I spent all day thinking of fucking you against a wall...with a few hours focusing on digging my department out of the embarrassing hole Aaron Echolls' acquittal dropped us into."
"I helped you save face? Aw, I'm touched. Really," Weevil drawls, still cracking up at the "cum loudly" thing as Lamb pushes off from his desk.
"There will be touching later, Navarro. Of the 'excessive force' variety."
He does his best to 'yay' clap. "You promise? I can hardly wait!"
"Should I leave you two alone?" Veronica interrupts, pulling them both back to her. Like always. Like forever.
"Should you? Yes. Will you? Doubtful."
And this, he figures, is where he gets the show. Where they kiss like they did that day...all jerky motions and hands going everywhere -- the three of them have a serious kink going, don't they? -- and desperation and wrongness. Where they pass A&P and Intro. to Psych and Go and they don't collect 200 dollars.
But Lamb yanks him up out of the chair and pulls *him* close. Weevil can hear Veronica swearing. He taught her some of those words, in fact. Lamb's lips are sugary. Snap. Snap. Fucking snap. Already Been Chewed.
"Motherfucker," he whispers. "Pendejo." And he adds, "Bitch," when slim, soft fingers slide down the front of his pants and Veronica gets him freed...for what's probably the last time.
--end--
May 12, 2006.