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“Why doesn’t he get it?” Parker asks, frown lines appearing between her eyes. “The last one was really…loud.” She was hanging upside down in her harness, dangling above Hardison’s left shoulder.
Hardison reaches a hand up to pet Parker’s scalp. “People take time, baby mama. ‘Specially when it’s about something they don’t want to think about.”
“But it’s us,” Parker whines. “And Eliot’s always thinking about us, right?”
Hardison hmmms in response.
Parker shimmies out of her harness and plopps next to Hardison on the couch. “This is taking to long.”
Hardison’s fingers keep typing.
“Can’t we try something else?”
Hardison’s fingers still over the keyboard. A slow grin makes its way across his face.
“Oh, there’s something else we can try, alright.”
Something was off.
Eliot put his book down. The clock on his bedside table read 3:21 am, and the apartment was empty. The alarms hadn’t been triggered, and as far as he could tell, no one else was in any of the other rooms. So why –
Parker.
If she had decided to stop by, though it hadn’t happened in the past few weeks, and you’re not upset about it, he reminded himself firmly, she would be in the kitchen.
Always trust Parker to find the food.
But when Eliot reaches the kitchen, flicking the lights on and grasping a knife behind his back (just in case), he finds –
- nothing.
Parker’s not there.
He does, however, find a CD player and an envelope on the table.
Great. A game.
Eliot is used to Parker’s games. There’s “keep away” – Parker tries to poke Eliot after he’s been mildly injured, and Eliot, well, keeps away; then there’s “what normal people do”, courtesy of Sophie, and there’s cooking while Parker swings from her harness, trying to steal bits of food out from under him.
The last one is both their favorite.
This, though – Eliot tips a CD out of the envelope and pushes it into the CD player. He presses play.
Hey man,
Parker and I Hey Eliot! woah, shh baby mama, he can hear you – Parker and I have been trying to talk to you for a while, now, but, um, I guess we haven’t been that clear, or He just didn’t get it, Hardison ok, Parker, ok – what I mean, what we mean, is Treasure hunt! It’s a treasure hunt, and we’ll be waiting at the end, and then we’ll be good, right? yeah, what she said. Anyway man, the first clue is the easiest. Just start at the start, yeah? Don’t start till eight am, and you can’t contact us till it’s done. Scout’s honor. Bye Eliot!
Eliot stares at the CD player, a faint electrical hum filling the silence.
This. This is both Hardison and Parker, which worries him slightly. With a sigh, he puts the disc back down on the table and grabs his gym bag by the door. The message had said not to start until eight – it hadn’t said anything about not working out in the mean time.
Parker bounces around Hardison as he tries to follow Elliot through his binoculars.
“He found it!”
“He did.”
“Hardison?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I use your binoculars?"
“Sure, baby.”
Eliot finishes working out well before 8:00 am. He spends longer than he normally would on making breakfast, but even by then, it’s only 7:30. Start at the start, yeah? Hardison’s voice loops in his brain, and he finally gives up and walks out of the apartment.
Start at the start.
“Right on time,” Nate says as Eliot walks up to his table at McRory’s. “Figure it out yet?”
Eliot grunts.
“They got you in on this too?”
Nate raises his eyebrow and leans back in his chair. “Just helping.”
Eliot snorts and takes a swig from Nate’s coffee. “Helping, my ass.”
Nate shrugs and hands over a wrapped package. “What are friends for, if not the occasional favor?”
Eliot takes the package and makes to stand, nodding his goodbyes. Nate just waves a hand and resumes drinking his coffee. It’s when he’s almost at the door that Nate calls out, “let me know when it finally hits you, Eliot.”
Eliot keeps walking.
Outside, he finds a park bench where he can unwrap the package in peace. The work rush has quieted down, and it’s relatively quiet.
The paper is patterned with brightly colored snowmen and reindeer, and reeks of Christmas. It’s expertly wrapped, with ELIOT scrawled in big sharpie letters across the front. He smiles briefly despite himself, imagining Parker and Hardison carefully folding paper and cutting tape. He unwraps the paper and sets it aside, staring at the book in his lap.
“The New Intercourses: An Aphrodisiac Cookbook” is emblazoned in glossy red font across the cover, and a feminine figure is posed seductively with a pile of strawberries.
“What’s he doing?” Hardison asks, peering down through the window of a restaurant a few buildings away.
“He’s just sitting there,” Parker says, eyes glued to Hardison’s binoculars as she munches on her toast. “Hasn’t even opened it yet.”
“He hasn’t?” Hardison says, disappointed. “Let me see.”
“Oh, he’s opening it! Finally!” Parker bounces a little in her seat. “Here you go,” she says, passing the binoculars over in exchange for Hardison’s poached eggs.
Hardison looks through. “Man, he looks…”
“Mad?” Parker says softly, no longer eating her toast.
Hardison puts the binoculars down and fiddles with them. “I think he’s just processing.”
Eliot was not mad.
He was confused. And slightly irritated. And maybe slightly, but just slightly, amused.Taking a deep breath, he opens the cookbook again. This time, he notices a photograph tucked into the spine along the first page.
It’s a picture of him and Parker, passed out on the long plane flight back from their case in Kiev. Parker is curled tight against his side, and his head is resting at an awkward angle on top of her hoodie. They look disgustingly adorable. Stop it, he tells himself firmly.
Just to be thorough, he flips it over, and sees a note written on the back.
Clue 2: Follow the ducklings to find the missing pages
Frowning, Eliot flips through the book more carefully, noticing that several pages are indeed missing. Grimacing at some of the more outlandish recipes, he turns to the index, where several recipes have been marked. None of them have anything to do with ducks, or fowl in general.
Eliot flips the card back over. Ducklings. What –
It clicks.
Checking his watch, Eliot sees he has just enough time to catch the bus four blocks down.
The bus drops him off along Arlington St., and he wanders around for a while, not heading in any particular direction. He stops to sit on a bench while he considers his next move. Looking around, he remembers running through the park on some case or another. He thinks he even recognizes one particular flowerbed into which he flung a rather irritable, if persistent, bodyguard.
The ducklings statue is just across the way, but he doesn’t move. He likes this, despite himself, likes the care and attention and the lighthearted fun of it all, and he doesn’t want it to end. As to why Parker and Hardison decided this was a worthwhile endeavor, well – bored people pull all sorts of pranks on their friends.
Eliot crushes the edge of his jacket in his fist.
When he gets to the ducklings, there are the usual groups of harried parents and over-excited children, but no signs of any other clues. He sticks his hands in his pockets and walks over to an old woman knitting on a bench.
“You got anything for me?” He asks, sitting down next to her.
“What a strange question,” she says, continuing to clack her needles together. “I don’t believe I know you, young man.”
“You don’t,” Eliot says calmly. “But your aging makeup is missing on the back of your neck, and that knitting is the worst I’ve ever seen.”
She laughs, and sets the yarn aside. “He said you'd be perceptive,” she says chuckling, and pulls a wrapped parcel out of her carpetbag. “Have fun.”
Eliot waits till the woman’s gone before examining the latest clue. It’s smaller than the first one, but bulkier, and makes a wooden sound when he taps it. He’s just as careful unwrapping the paper as the first time, setting it aside on the bench. He’s left with a child’s wooden puzzle box.
A post-it note taped to the top just says quack quack ;)
Grinning, Eliot pulls the cookbook out of his backpack, flipping to the circled recipes in the back. On closer inspection, it’s not just the missing page numbers that are circled - key words from the ingredients are marked as well.
p. 5/ 1 bag green frosting
p. 16/ 3 cups blueberries
p. 74/ 2 cups brown sugar
p. 199/ 4 teaspoons turmeric
Holding up the puzzle, Eliot checks: there are indeed green, blue, brown, and yellow slats of wood that slide around. He tries a few, then slides them back to their original positions, listening to the clicks of tiny locks inside.
Looking at the placement of the pages numbers on the index again, he hazards a guess. Pages listed on the left of the index, turn left. Pages on the right of the index, turn right.
Green slat, 1 turn to the left.
Blue slat, 3 turns to the left.
Brown slat, 2 turns to the right.
Yellow slat, 4 turns to the right.
Click.
“Yeah,” he says in quiet celebration, pulling the contents out of the box. There are some of the missing pages, which he tucks back into the cookbook, snorting at the recipe titles. He pauses when he sees another photograph.
This one is of him and Hardison; Hardison is slightly drunk and sliding into Eliot’s lap, Eliot looks bemused and…happy? He shakes his head. As with the first one, he flips the photo over for more information. There’s an address scribbled in barely legible handwriting, but Eliot recognizes it as the name of a restaurant that he had offhandedly mentioned to Parker months ago.
This…This is suspiciously looking like a date. A weird, remotely controlled, three person date, but still.
“You decided to go along with this,” Eliot mutters to himself. “So go along with it.”
The restaurant is a blend of stylish and comfortable – gilt letters on the windows, faded plush booths, and homey ceramic dishes. He picks a table in the back and orders the French onion soup.
Halfway through, Sophie breezes in, shopping bags swirling around her legs. The waiter rushes to pull out her chair, nearly toppling over when Sophie smiles at him.
“I’ll have the salmon,” she says, and the waiter scurries off.
“Nice day?” Sophie asks, sipping her water delicately.
Eliot stares back blank faced. “Wonderful.”
She huffs, exasperated. “Well, at least you admit it. It took Nate ages.”
Eliot puts down his spoon with a sinking feeling in his gut. “What took Nate ages?”
Sophie just smiles, but not the same one she gave to the waiter. This one is all sharks’ teeth. Eliot gulps.
The waiter chooses that moment to arrive with the salmon. They spend the remainder of the meal focusing on their food, occasionally making quips about the other customers and what upcoming cons Nate might have in mind.
Sophie makes a contented sound and pats her mouth with her napkin, and the waiter springs from the shadows to bring the cheque. Eliot reaches for it to pay his share, but Sophie just waves him away with her hand.
“My treat,” she says. “You can get the next one.”
“Thanks.”
Sophie looks up at him, her features softening slightly. “I know it’s frustrating darling, but they have been trying to clue you in for months, now.”
Eliot stays silent, mouth closed in a thin line. “It’s not what you think it is.”
Sophie throws her hands in the air. “Men. I swear, it’s a miracle you get anything done.” She shakes her head fondly, and pulls an envelope out of one of the shopping bags. “This is for you.”
Eliot takes the envelope, sliding it open as Sophie walks away.
He pulls out the final missing page, and places it back in the cookbook. He sees the photo at the bottom of the envelope and reaches to pull it out, then stops, hesitating.
This could be the last one.
He frowns, irritated with himself, and snatches the image, flipping it over before he can stop himself. It flutters out of his fingers onto the table.
It’s Hardison and Parker in their bed, sleep-rumpled and tangled up in each other. Hardison is taking a selfie of the two of them, his forearm taking up most of the frame. Parker is squinting, still half-asleep next to him, but she’s smiling fondly into the camera just the same.
Eliot’s scared to touch it.
Eventually, he turns it over, looking for the final clue. It says:
Come home?
When Eliot walks into Hardison and Parker’s apartment, they’re waiting for him. Hardison is standing by the counter, Parker seated on a stool next to him.
Eliot crosses his arms.
“We tried telling you,” Hardison says amiably. Parker nods.
Eliot quirks an eyebrow. “Really.”
Parker huffs, and begins counting the instances off on her fingers. “Movie nights –”
“I thought those were two person dates –”
“ – making you food – ”
“a misguided gesture –"
Hardison breaks in. “That we left on your bed!”
“ – that was why it was misguided,” Eliot mumbles. “I had to reset all my security alarms.”
“ – inviting you to sleep over,” Parker was still going.
Eliot throws his hands in the air. “You think I’d want to sleep over with my two friends who are dating –”
“ – and we kissed! In our kitchen! In front of you!”
Eliot stops ranting. “That was an invitation?” he says hoarsely.
“Well, yeah,” Hardison says, watching Elliot carefully. “Why wouldn’t we want to invite you?”
Eliot stands speechless. “I thought I would get in the way,” he says quietly.
Parker has steadily been moving closer during her speech. Now she wraps her arms around Eliot, pulling him over to Hardison. “Do you think we get in your way?” Parker asks, looking at him.
“What? No, Parker. I would never think that about you.”
Hardison speaks up from where he’s still standing by the counter, looking at Eliot like he’s going to fall apart. “Then why would you think that about yourself?”
Eliot shudders, and Parker clings to him tighter. “Was the treasure hunt really necessary?” Eliot’s question is muffled, trying to get a decent look at Hardison from around Parker’s hair.
“Just be grateful we didn’t actually put you on a plane, man,” Hardison says, coming up to untangle Parker from Eliot with minimal success.
“I wanted us to go to Canada!” Parker says, somehow managing to wedge herself between her two boys. “They have geese.”
“Geese bite, Parker,” Hardison and Eliot say in unison
There is a moment of silence as Eliot and Hardison configure the best way to keep Parker off the ground and still stay standing themselves. Girl could wriggle.
“What happened to not pulling one on your team?” Eliot grumbles half-heartedly. Parker stills, then clings even tighter, pulling her head up from where it had been nuzzling against his neck.
“You’re not really mad, are you?” she asks, brow creasing. “I told Hardison you might be, but I didn’t really think – ”
Eliot bumps her nose with his forehead. “I’m not mad, Parker.”
Hardison’s voice is a little strained. “In that case, could we move to the couch? Parker’s feet keep hitting my sensitive bits.”
Eliot lets go of Parker, who promptly glomms on to Hardison with all the determination of a limpet. Hardison gives a long-suffering sigh, but continues to move to the couch, neatly depositing Parker in one fell swoop. She giggles, then pulls Hardison down after her, creating a tangled sprawl of limbs.
“Well, you coming?” Hardison asks, looking over at where Eliot is still standing.
Eliot smiles. “Coming.”
Later, after they’ve all molded themselves into the couch, Eliot raises his head to ask, “How did you choose the recipes for the box?”
Hardison nudges his foot. “They were all the recipes we wanted you to do first.”
Parker pipes up from somewhere below Elliot’s elbow: “I want the fondue!”