Work Text:
Cooper believes in many things; in the ritual of breakfast; in the mundane miracle of coffee, eggs, and toast; in driving through the Philadelphia fog during a lunch break to try out a “wonderful, little Italian spot,”; in bringing back cannoli for the rest of the Blue Rose team.
It’s not that Albert has anything against breakfast. It’s a perfectly respectable meal, all things considered. The problem, as most things are vexingly becoming clear these days, is Cooper.
Cooper could probably navigate the city based on his proximity to coffee shops alone. In fact, it’s become a bit of a running gag in their working relationship: Cooper calls from some hole-in-the-wall eatery, Albert comes running half an hour later with paperwork. That’s how it works.
Admittedly, Albert would rather buy a bagel with cream cheese and eat it in his office. Except, more often than not, Diane drags him outside for a smoke break so they can both ruin what hope they have of being healthy when they retire. If they retire. Blue Rose agents don’t exactly have an excellent track record when it comes to settling down after a long and distinguished career.
Gordon’s taste for agents has remained consistent across the years: a sense of righteousness, utter assurance of their capabilities, and a predilection towards vanishing in the line of duty. Dale Cooper is a simulacrum of Phillip Jeffries, Chet Desmond, and every other good-looking fella Albert’s ever eyed in a bar.
Blue Rose agents don’t break curses, so Albert files the notion—rendered in triplicate and redacted in heavy black ink—away into the back of his brain. He should know better. Really, he should.
And yet.
Albert is at his desk writing up a report, back aching from the long early hours spent removing several sets of incisors from the belly of the latest Jane Doe to cross his slab, when a hand carefully sets a white pastry box on his desk.
An acerbic remark is already whetting its edge on his tongue when he finds himself staring into the face of Dale Cooper.
Cooper’s cheeks are flushed from the cold, his perfectly shellacked hair dusted with quickly melting February snow. A checked scarf is looped haphazardly around his neck,
Cooper gives him a boyish grin. “Tempt you to breakfast?”
“You got the maxim wrong. Flattery, not bribery, is the one that’s supposed to get you everywhere.”
“Diane thought you might say that.” Cooper takes an unopened pack of Marlboro’s out of his coat pocket and slides it across the wood. “This is the bribe.”
Albert’s gaze darts from Cooper’s face to the sliver of throat above Cooper’s shirt collar, and back again. He should know better. And yet—.
Soon enough, Albert’s coat is on his shoulders and his shoulders are following Cooper down several flights of stairs and out to the spot he and Diane usually occupy in the small courtyard outside the FBI building.
They’d picked it initially for two reasons. Firstly, it provided a maximum view of the bewilderingly ugly fountain the Bureau had decided upon as appropriate decoration for the Philly outpost. And secondly, it had the discrete advantage of being canopied by a large black walnut tree, muffling conversation and braining potential eavesdroppers with falling fruit.
There are no leaves now, and the fountain has long since been shut off for winter. Cooper seems almost to drift in and out of focus as they make their way to the bench.
“I’m not against dining al fresco,” says Albert, opening his bribe and lighting up. “But couldn’t you have picked a slightly warmer place to haul our asses out to in the middle of the morning?”
“Why go to all the trouble to find a perfect place when you’d already discovered it long before I did?”
Maybe it’s the nicotine on an empty stomach, but the sentiment makes Albert feel like he’s being raked over a bed of hot coals. “Never figured you for a lazy, ne’er-do-well,” he says, taking a long drag to distract himself from the sensation and ashing out onto a pile of gray slush.
Cooper opens the box to reveal a dense, twisted loaf topped with cinnamon streusel.
“Babka?” says Albert incredulously, because of course it would be babka. “Really?”
“I like to think I’m full of surprises.” Cooper takes out a plastic knife and cuts thin, crumbling slices.
“More like cheap theatrics.”
Cooper’s face falls slightly. “Should I have gotten the chocolate instead? I know you don’t share my fascination with yeasted breads, but the woman at the bakery insisted this was the superior version.
“Cinnamon is fine, Cooper.”
Cooper passes him a mostly even slice atop a napkin. The wind whistles around them as they eat in silence. It’s a perfectly ordinary moment until Cooper places the flat of his palm against Albert’s lapel and lets it linger there.
“Coop?”
“Yes, Albert?”
“What are you doing?”
For a flicker of a second, Cooper generally looks uncertain. “My apologies,” he says, withdrawing his hand. “I had the strangest feeling come over me, like the sudden awareness you get when you’re dreaming.”
Albert has enough of his wits to know that Cooper relies on his instincts to move through the world, but this feels a little unmoored even for him.
“That’s a hell of an overture.”
“I’m sorry—.”
“And not entirely unwelcome,” amends Albert. “Only, I’d rather have you here and not…wherever it is you go.”
Cooper is about to reply until a shout in the distance pulls the two of them apart, and Gordon and Diane descend upon them like a pack of ravenous tropical birds. Cooper dutifully slices the rest of the loaf and is soon pulled into a spirited conversation with Gordon about the differences between babkas and alpacas.
Diane arches a single, interrogatory eyebrow at him.
Albert scowls. “I have no idea what on earth you hoped to achieve.”
“Peace on earth, goodwill to man.” Diane grabs the open pack from the bench and withdraws a cigarette with slender fingers. “Or maybe you saying what you mean for once.”
Albert passes her his lighter, and she lets out a plume of smoke into the bare branches of the walnut tree. “I’ll keep that in mind for the next time.”
As Albert turns to make an undignified escape, he catches Cooper’s gaze. The other man’s lips quirk as if to say something before straightening into a line, head bobbing forward once. Albert recognizes the expression: it’s the one Cooper usually gives him in the middle of cases when they both know the other person in the room is lying. It’s as much of a “see you later” as Albert’s going to get.
He doesn’t see Cooper for the rest of the day, or indeed the rest of the week. The next time Albert hears from him is when he phones long distance from a podunk town with a ridiculously suggestive name all the way on the other coast.
“They’ve got a cherry pie there that’ll kill ya.”
Cooper calls, and Albert comes running. That’s how it works.