FAKE Ficlet: Versatile

[badly_knitted]

 


Title: Versatile
Fandom: FAKE
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Dee, Ryo.
Rating: PG
Setting: After Vol. 7.
Summary: Thanks to Ryo, Dee gains a greater appreciation of handkerchiefs. They’re not as useless and outdated as he thought.
Word Count: 500
Written For: Challenge 215: Square at anythingdrabble.
Disclaimer: I don’t own FAKE, or the characters.
 
 


Shopping with Ryo was always more fun than going alone, especially when it came to buying clothes. There was a special kind of pleasure in picking things out for each other to try on, turning to ask, “How does this look?” and knowing he’d get an honest answer from the only person whose opinion really mattered. Dee and his lover had spent a happy couple of hours doing just that, choosing some new shirts and pants for work, t-shirts for casual wear, looking at winter coats but not finding anything they liked, which was a shame since there was a sale on.

 
Heading for the checkout with their final choices, Ryo stopped dead beside a display.

 
“Oops, almost forgot I need some new handkerchiefs.” Juggling what he was carrying in order to free one hand, he snagged a couple of packs of plain white cotton squares and continued towards the front of the store.

 
Dee shook his head, baffled. “Why d’you bother buyin’ them? It’s not like ya use them.” Like any sensible guy, if Ryo needed to blow his nose, he used a nice hygienic disposable tissue.
 

Ryo frowned at his partner. “What are you talking about? I use them all the time. Handkerchiefs are one of the most useful things ever invented. Everybody should carry one; you never know when you might need it.”

 
That just confused Dee even more. “Yeah? For what?” As far as Dee was concerned, those little cotton squares were an outdated commodity, and yet they were still being made.

 
“A couple of weeks ago, when you cut your hand on that pineapple,” Ryo pointed out. “I bandaged it with my handkerchief.”

 
“Right. I’d forgotten about that.”
 

“And three or four months ago when I needed an icepack on my eye and all that was available was ice-cubes, I wrapped some in my handkerchief.”

 
They’d been making an arrest and Ryo had been elbowed in the eye. Getting ice on it right away, from the dispenser at the motel where the guy they were after was hiding out, had helped keep it from swelling too badly.

 
“I remember that. It was a clever idea.”
 

“Sometimes you just have to use what you have to hand. A handkerchief is like a piece of multi-purpose first-aid equipment. It’s good for police work too; I’ve used one to avoid leaving prints on dropped weapons when I haven’t had a latex glove handy, and we’ve both used mine to… uh… clean ourselves up when necessary. Ryo blushed faintly as Dee grinned, remembering fun times in the file room at the precinct, and one time in an elevator when the power went out.
 

“Okay, I guess you’re right, handkerchiefs are a useful accessory.” Dee was never going to look at them in quite the same way. Who knew they could be so versatile? Maybe he should start carrying one himself.
 

“All that’s a bonus though,” Ryo admitted. “Most of the time I just use mine to clean my glasses.”
 

 
The End