Work Text:
Franz is blinking sleep and sick out of his eyes as he watches the shapes and colours of the people on American Duos blearily. It’s honestly one of the worst things he’s seen on television. He doesn’t even want to know why they’re watching an American TV show, or why an American TV show is coming to British Columbia, Canada. Is it North American Duos now?
He’s sitting on the floor, where it’s coolest, like he’s a dog, leaning onto Shawn’s leg.
He’s uncomfortable. He’s more than uncomfortable—he’s exhausted. Absolutely exhausted.
He’s cold, shivering, shaking, blanket pulled over his shoulders, feet kicked out, yet his body is hot enough to cook an egg on.
He wants to get Shawn to make him tea (which he probably won’t do) and then he wants to lay down, collapse in his bed. He can barely keep his eyes open and trained on that judge he thinks is evil as he spews nonsense.
Shawn strokes his head softly, running his hand through Franz’ hair. The only reason he—and by extension, Franz—is here is because Gus wanted to watch American Duos and the TV at Shawn and Franz’ home is set strictly to German—and whatever DVD Shawn throws into the old player.
Franz almost falls asleep, eyelids drooping, until Gus announces: “Rule one, Shawn, no talking during Duos,” and he remembers he’s in the Psych office and can’t sleep yet.
Shawn removes his hand from Franz’ hair as he presumably goes to talk with dramatic hand movements, and Franz, in the sick, humid daze he’s in, almost whines at the lack of soothing contact.
He presses his cheek close into Shawn’s leg.
“Gus, use the pause button once, please, for the love of Lori Loughlin. Why did we get TiVo if we don’t fast forward and I’m never allowed to stop for commentary?” Shawn wonders.
“Is it over yet?” Franz asks groggily from his seat on the floor, not actually expecting any response.
“It’s not over. What’s with all this Duos hate?” Gus remarks, at the same time as Shawn’s “do you want to sleep on the couch?”
Franz mumbles under his breath, and he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it until he’s wondering which one of them learned German without his knowledge.
“Okay. You’re going on the couch, c’mon,” Shawn says, he hauls Franz to his feet, grunting. Franz steadies himself against Shawn, against his warm body, and flops down onto the couch.
“I’m not that sick,” he protests, but he feels like a frieght train hit him head-on. He feels like he just did 50 training laps with multiple 100 pound weights strapped onto him.
“Ignore him,” Shawn repeats to Gus as he kisses the top of Franz’s head lovingly, and then makes his way back to Gus. “The NyQuill is taking him out. I should get some tea started. Do we have chamomile?”
Gus gives him a confused look, eyebrows furrowed. “Since when do you make tea?”
He starts rummaging through the cabinets nearest to the fridge. “I’ve always made tea, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Shawn has this air to his voice, higher pitched, the playful type of lying he does—not lying to the cops or his dad—but this fun, teasing sort of lying Franz can pick up in his tone easier than he can understand the words.
“When I offered you tea in Grade 10 you slapped it out of my hand!” Gus reminds, leaning subconsciously out of his chair and closer to Shawn. They’re like magnets, Franz thinks, stuck together.
Shawn scoffs. “That’s because nobody drinks tea in Grade 10. Besides, I don’t even remember that happening.”
“How do you not remember that happening? You had shards of glass imbedded in your shoe, Shawn! Imbedded.”
Shawn clicks on the kettle and pulls the SWAMP GIN mug that Franz thought the former had broken and turns around to face Gus, leaning back against the countertop, fingers drumming at a rapid, uncontrolled pace. “Yeah,” he says after a couple seconds of consideration, head tilted, almost puppy dog-like, “I don’t remember that either.”
The concept, the sheer, absolutely unbelievable concept of Shawn Spencer making him tea is so foreign to Franz he can only watch him fondly from tired eyes.
Franz does end up falling asleep, drifting between consciousness and unconsciousness, having dreams about Shawn and Gus’ conversations.
He couldn’t possible be asleep for more than five minutes before Shawn sitting down by his legs wakes him up. He props himself up using his elbows.
Shawn runs his fingers through Franz’ hair, then rubs his cheek. “We got a call from the Chief. I can drive you home before we go,” he offers, softly, overly kind in a way Franz wasn’t aware Shawn could be. It seems as though Shawn is still surprising him.
(There’s a odd, vague thought in Franz’ head: if he were a cat, he wouldn’t be able to stop purring.)
“She said it was urgent, Shawn,” Gus reminds as he slips his shoes on.
Shawn rolls his eyes. “Gus, don’t be the graham cracker part of a s’more,” he says. “I’m not going to make him drive home— or sleep in the office because this couch destroyed my back.”
“I don’t want to keep you from a case,” Franz responds, trying to tilt his head into Shawn’s palm even more. At this rate, he’s going to give his boyfriend his cold.
There’s a flash of something in Shawn’s eyes, too quick for Franz to tell what it is. “Dude. No. I’m going to get you home.”
Shawn taking Franz over a case. How is he supposed to feel about this? The gravity of it, the importance of it, larger than life.
A day later, Franz is feeling better. Not better enough to go back to work, but good enough to accept Henry’s invitation to go to dinner.
Henry has been surprisingly accepting of Franz. Maybe it’s because he’s always been accepting of his son’s sexuality, and a boyfriend means nothing to him. Maybe it’s because he wants to get closer to Shawn. Maybe it’s because Henry thinks Franz is a good influence on his son.
Franz has never been thought of as a good influence. Franz has never been thought of as much as anything, actually.
Nigel St. Nigel is with Shawn and Gus, wearing Henry’s robe, sitting in his chair, insulting his food.
“Look at it, it’s still got marks where the jockey was hitting it,” Nigel says, looking down at the plate.
Franz is sharing a steak with his boyfriend, picking pieces off of Shawn’s plate and eating a small bowl of lauchsuppe—that Shawn is also eating.
“You are going to get sick,” he says, quietly, as to not be overheard by Nigel. He doesn’t want to become a target. Franz has gotten more confident as his English has gotten better, and a lot of this confidence is because of Shawn. Shawn, who’s never laughed at his accent and lets him have their TV set in German and who orders for him at restaurants when he gets a little too shy.
“I’ll be fine,” Shawn says dismissively, sipping from Franz’ spoon.
“Alright! That’s it!” declares Henry, standing up dramatically, as Nigel makes a distasteful comment at the table he made.
“Already? I’m just getting started. I’ve got a sonnet for each piece of fish paraphernalia and a soliloquy for the linoleum,” Nigel announces, smug. He reminds Franz of a coworker he had when he first name to Canada who had thought he was better than anybody else, especially Franz, a fresh-off the boat German immigrant.
Franz takes a piece of meat off Shawn’s plate. He watches as Henry gets more and more mad each time he looks at Nigel’s face.
“It’s diet whip-ass, actually,” Shawn quips, countering what his father said.
Shawn reaches for Gus’ plate, which holds three cobs of corn, just to get his hand slapped away.
“You must be out of your damn mind,” says Gus.
“Dude, you have three full cobs!” exclaims Shawn.
Franz nudges the bowl of soup closer to his boyfriend, a solution.
“See, Franz can share food. Why can’t you?” he says. He tries once more, and Gus’ palm comes down again.
“I will slap you Shawn,” he says.
Shawn springs his hand away, rubbing the top of it. “You just did.”
Henry and Nigel start arguing about the robe the latter stole, (why would anybody wear somebody else’s robe anyways? Franz isn’t a fan of robes, but if Shawn had a robe, he probably wouldn’t use it, and he certainly wouldn’t use Henry’s.) and the politeness dissolves from there.
Henry is right for not letting Nigel talk to him like that, Franz thinks, even though he knows that he would have let Nigel talk even worse to him if the roles were changed.
Shawn presses closer to Franz, like he’s trying to shelter him from Nigel and Henry.
Franz feels like it should be the other way around, like he should be protecting Shawn. Shawn usually needs protecting anyways, and Franz always tries to be there, faster than Lassiter or Juliet can get there—when Franz isn’t on shift.
Shawn’s thigh is warm against his, and Nigel can’t see where they’re touching, the pure intimacy of it.