Work Text:
Patrick is on his way back from the tax seminar when his phone vibrates with so many texts it slides off the seat onto the floorboard. He pulls over to the side of the road to check, just in case there’s an actual emergency, and then sends back a quick message letting David know he’ll be home soon.
It doesn’t take long to make a quick stop at a liquor store and their favorite burger place. He figures having something to help David’s mood will be worth it, given that his day has included not just the discovery that Wendy’s new business venture is a rip-off of Rose Apothecary but also that Alexis and Ted have wreaked havoc on the store’s newly renovated bathroom. In contrast, Patrick’s day of listening to moderately boring talks about small business tax issues was completely drama-free.
David swans up to Patrick as soon as he enters the apartment, launching into a detailed description of Alexis’ atrocious conduct and how this even tops the incident with the Tamagotchis. Patrick deposits his bags on the counter and turns to David, placing a finger on his lips.
David’s eyes go wide, but he stops talking.
“Give me five minutes,” Patrick says. “Go sit down on the couch, and let me get our dinner ready.”
“But-” David starts, his lips brushing Patrick’s fingertip.
“Nope. I’ll listen to all of it in five minutes. Go.”
David’s face is a combination of astonished and amused, with perhaps a bit of arousal as well. He gives Patrick a smile that twists up one corner of his mouth, and sits himself down on the couch as instructed, crossing one leg gracefully over the other and lacing his fingers together on top of his knee.
Patrick turns away from him and focuses on the task at hand. It’s harder to do than he anticipated - David is such a sight for sore eyes, and he’s tempted to throw his plans away and himself into David’s arms – but he thinks it will be worth it.
He puts the burgers and fries into the oven to keep them warm. It’s not ideal, but it turns out that a good burger is a good burger, even reheated. He takes the two chocolate milkshakes and pours them into a blender, and adding generous doses of his purchases from the liquor store – Bailey’s Irish Cream and vodka. He adds a few ice cubes and pulses the blender a few times, then pours it into tall glasses, with plenty left over for seconds.
Patrick drops the straws in and takes a long sip. His creation still tastes mostly like ice cream, so Patrick adds more vodka on top of each milkshake. It’s not a precise recipe by any means.
Satisfied, he checks his watch, sets the timer on the oven for a few more minutes, and brings the drinks over to David.
David takes one of the milkshakes and ponders it curiously.
“Taste it,” Patrick says, and David does, his lips pursing around the straw. “What do you think?”
“Oh, may I speak now?” David asks coyly.
“Please.”
David blinks his eyelashes at Patrick and wiggles a little bit. “Well, I applaud your efforts. Especially the vodka floater. Genius.”
“You don’t think there’s too much alcohol in there?”
David snorts. “You realize that my drink of choice is a vaguely chocolate and peppermint flavored shot?”
“I do. I thought this might appeal to you too, what with the chocolate and all.”
“There is definitely something appealing here,” David drawls, leaning in close. “And it’s not just this delicious boozy dessert.” David kisses Patrick, his lips cold from the milkshake, and then pulls back. “But today was insane, and that’s before Alexis and Ted lied to my face. Ted! You have to let me tell you about it.”
“I will. I just thought it would be more fun this way.”
“If I was drunk?”
“If you were happily enjoying a sweet adult beverage.”
“Mmm.” David takes a long sip of his milkshake. “You are correct.”
David proceeds to tell the story of the vaguely David-like man who conned Wendy into selling rip-offs of luxury goods, and how they discovered the ruse and saved Wendy from certain disaster in business and love, and then he launches into the Alexis debacle. In between dramatic sweeps of his free hand he slurps at the milkshake, his face growing ever more expressive.
When David finally takes a breath Patrick leans in and kisses him, hot and determined, with plenty of tongue for good measure. David abandons his rant and returns the kiss with enthusiasm, climbing into Patrick’s lap. Patrick is about to let his brain completely derail when the timer on the oven goes off.
“What now?” David exclaims, as if the evening has been a series of cockblocks.
“Our burgers,” Patrick says, reluctantly shoving David off his lap.
“Let them burn, I don’t care,” David grabs at Patrick as he moves away. Patrick is tempted, but the timer won’t stop buzzing and he doesn’t want to piss off the neighbors.
David follows him to the kitchen, pouring the remainder of the milkshakes from the blender into their glasses. He checks out the burgers and fries and nods. “Diner night with bonus alcohol. I like it.”
“Thought you would.”
They stand at the counter and feed each other bites of the deliciously salty fries, but soon enough they’re just kissing again, David looping his hands around Patrick’s neck and Patrick tugging at David’s hips. Patrick shifts them so that David is leaning up against the counter, and David slouches a little so that their hips are aligned. Patrick slots a thigh between David’s legs and David lets out a low moan. “Mmm, yes, come here,” David murmurs, reaching around to grab Patrick’s ass, but his arm must hit something behind him on the way because there’s a clatter and then-
“Oh god, I can’t. I just can’t,” David says, his face red and his eyes wide.
“What?” Patrick’s brain is mostly offline at this point.
“The – the sink,” David says, gasping out a laugh. “You’ve got me – up against the sink.”
Patrick glances at the sink, where the bottle of dish soap has fallen down. It doesn’t seem particularly funny. Then he remembers the story about Alexis.
“Your sister has done it on a lot of sinks,” he says. “Maybe we should try it.”
David glares at him. “Mkay, that is not happening.”
“It almost did.” Of course, getting David up on the counter would do nothing to help out their height difference, but Patrick is tempted to try it anyway. It would put certain of his body parts at a convenient height for Patrick to reach.
“It most certainly did not.” David takes Patrick by the arm and pulls him away from the kitchen. “And I’ll thank you not to bring images of my sister into this.” David waves his hand between them. “Just, ew.”
“You started it.”
“No, you did.” David flops down on the couch, and Patrick sits next to him. “Ugh. Now I can’t stop thinking of Alexis’s naked…skin… on sinks. Could anything be more unhygienic? Do you thinks she cleans it off first? Or afterward?” David looks horrified.
“Kind of killed the mood, huh?” Patrick asks, as David slumps next to him. Patrick tugs until David is curled up with his head in Patrick’s lap, and starts threading his fingers through David’s hair.
David presses into his touch and lets out a little hum of approval. Patrick had assumed, when they first started dating, that David wouldn’t let him anywhere near his hair. Turns out he was wrong. David doesn’t let most people near it, but Patrick is not most people.
“I’m sorry you had such a crappy day,” Patrick says. “I wish I could have been with you.”
“Ugh, no, I’m glad you weren’t. You would have been furious.”
“About Alexis?” Patrick rather thinks he would have been amused – although come to think of it, a broken sink means he’ll have to deal with Ronnie again, which is not going to go well.
“I was thinking about Wendy ripping off our store, actually.” David twists in Patrick’s lap, looking up at him. “She says everyone’s doing general stores just like ours.”
“I doubt that.”
“I guess it wasn’t as good an idea you thought.”
Patrick knows that the insecurity he hears in David’s voice is real. He wishes it wasn’t the case, but he knows David Rose, and self-doubt comes with the territory. He just needs to do his job and balance him out. It’s why they work so well together. “Come on, who are you going to believe, Wendy or me?”
“I suppose.”
“I’m the one that’s going to all these conferences, and I can tell you that no one else is doing what we do. Bringing locally sourced products together under a common brand, with such a high degree of quality control? With exclusive vendor arrangements? Your idea was unique, David. Our store is one of a kind, and nothing Wendy does to mimic it is going to change it.”
“Do you really think so?” David sits up and waves his hands in frustration as he speaks. “What if Wendy had kept going with her inferior products? Where would that leave us?”
Patrick takes David’s hands and catches his gaze. “We would be right where we are – with a successful store that reflects your creative brilliance and my unerring business sense.”
David blushes and gives Patrick a sideways smile. “Would we call it ‘unerring’? Then how do you explain the fact that our sink collapsed today?”
“Hey, I’m not the one that left Alexis there unsupervised.”
“Perhaps that was part of my creative brilliance,” David says, his smile growing.
“You’re right, I’m sure deconstructed bathrooms are all the rage. Great plan.”
“It’s probably better that Alexis broke the sink. What if it had been a customer? They could sue. This was an accident waiting to happen.”
“Your sister, or the sink?”
David grins and leans forward to capture Patrick’s lips in a kiss, pressing him back against the couch. “How about we stop talking about my sister now?” David says in a low voice that sends sparks down Patrick’s spine.
“Now that’s the creative brilliance I was talking about.”