Work Text:
(88) - (F/RV)
"It's not the same."
Ray glared at the shack. "It is the same. It's exactly the same, Benny. We worked from pictures."
"Yes. Yes, we did." Fraser very carefully looked at the snow.
"For two weeks, we worked from pictures. Was there a single moment when I wasn't doing exactly what you told me to do? No! There was not. And do you know why?"
"Sixteen days, to be precise."
Ray sighed. "Yeah. I don't know why, either."
"Ray, I'm not complaining. I'm simply stating a fact. There are subtle differences that affect the overall presentation. And of course there's the age and grain of the wood, which couldn't have been helped in any case. Even Diefenbaker sees it."
Ray leaned down into Dief's line of sight. "Dief, you see any difference between this cabin where I fed you pancakes not three hours
ago and the cabin where you nearly died of mountie-inflicted wounds three years ago? What's that, boy? You want me to throw Fraser down a well?"
"The windows used to be higher, I think."
"There's something wrong with you. You need help. You got a head mountie in Inuvik? Somebody I can call to come out here with a straitjacket?"
"And perhaps a level." Fraser squinted up at the roof. "Something in the angle of the light..."
"Oh, for--you can't tell that just by looking."
Fraser looked at Ray, smiling faintly. "I can, actually."
Ray tried to see it. It looked like the same damn roof to him. He sat down on the steps and looked at Fraser. "I don't see a difference."
"Perhaps I have a different perspective."
"Yeah. The perspective of a lunatic."
"There's no call to be snippy, Ray." Fraser settled comfortably on the step beside him. That close, Fraser smelled like work and pine trees. "I like the light from here."
"I guess there's no way to get it back just like it was, huh." Ray shook his head. "Shoulda known."
"A lot has happened since it was built. If Victoria hadn't burned it down, it would still be different, I think. I've come back to
it a different man."
"I liked this place the way it was." Ray let out a long breath, staring at his hands. "I never should've left, Benny."
"I'm not so sure." Fraser looked up at the door. "The original was good workmanship, for the time and the materials, but rebuilding made it stronger. We were able to avoid most of the defects of the prototype."
Ray looked up at Fraser sharply. "Why do I think we just stopped talking architecture?"
Fraser smiled, soft and warm, and Ray's stomach turned to water. That was Fraser distilled down to his most basic elements in that smile, and Ray-- Ah, hell. Ray was blushing, he could feel it.
"I stopped talking architecture three days ago. You're a very literal man, Ray."
Ray closed his eyes and laughed hoarsely. "Benny--"
"We are who we always were, Ray. Just--older. Re-modeled, perhaps, on the inside, but essentially the same."
"You, maybe. Me, my grain is wrong, and my windows used to be higher. Not exactly a deft touch with the metaphor there, Benny."
Fraser put an ice-cold hand on the back of Ray's neck. Ray, who knew a moment when he landed in one, took it like a man. "I like your windows, Ray. Your windows make me very happy. They always have." Gentle fingers stroked over Ray's face; he shook under them.
"That's-- Yeah." Ray swallowed hard and shifted closer. "I got nice floorboards, too."
Fraser smiled. "Show me."