Title: not a zero sum game
Author: helsinkibaby
Fandom: Unstoppable
Pairing: Frank Barnes/Connie Hooper
Rating: PG
Notes: for the fan-flashworks choices challenge
Summary : They've had this conversation before , but Frank's still not sure if it's the right choice for Connie


"So, are you going to tell me why you're brooding or are you going to make me guess?"

Frank turned with some surprise to see Connie standing in front of the refrigerator, a bottle of beer in each hand, a quizzical smile on her face to soften the blow of her question. "Brooding?" he asked, extracting the bottle opener and closing the drawer, extending a hand for one of the beers. "Who's brooding?"

Connie chuckled. "Frank, if there's one thing I've learned over the last eighteen months, it's when you're being quiet because you're being quiet and when you're being quiet because you're brooding." He opened the first beer, handed it back to her and took the second. She took a sip from the bottle, placed it down on the kitchen counter, resting her hand beside it like she was bracing herself for a blow. "So..."

He took a sip of his beer before putting it down beside hers. Stepping closer to her, he laid his hand on top of hers, didn't miss the smile that came to her face at his touch. He loved that smile, had loved it for eighteen months now. "You look amazing, you know that?" he asked, his free hand sliding down her side, from the thin shoulder strap of the little summer dress she was wearing, down her side, down to the hem of her dress and underneath. He moved his hand up her thigh, just a little, delighting in the noise she made at the back of her throat.

"I actually do know that," she told him, tilting her head so that her long hair fell to the side, making his fingers itch to run through it. "And usually when I look this amazing, you don't look so serious." She was teasing, but with an edge of steel to it and he knew that she wasn't going to let this go. 

"I was watching you today, at the party," he told her, the image recalled easily to his mind. "You had the kids, you were giving Darcy a break, you had the baby on your hip, little four footer there holding your hand, talking away to you a mile a minute..." Will had been standing beside him at the time and he could hear the younger man's voice in his head, clear as if he was there in the kitchen with them now. 

"I think Connie's getting broody," he'd quipped and when Frank had given him a look - head cocked, eyebrow raised - he'd continued, "Look at her, man - she's a natural."

Frank had looked, and he had seen. 

"You looked like you belonged there," he told Connie. "With them."

Connie closed her eyes, took a deep breath and let it out slowly. When she opened her eyes again, there was a soft, sad smile playing around her lips. "We've talked about this," she reminded him. "We agreed..."

"I know that, I know that." His hand had moved under her skirt to the back of her dress and he made absent minded circles on the small of her back, thinking back to what he'd said not long after things had become serious between them. 

"I'm too old to change nappies and do two a.m. feeds." It took a second for him to realise that Connie was doing an impression of him, quoting his exact words to him. The smile on her face had lost most of its sadness, was now just gently teasing. "That's what you said." 

"I know what I said." Her fingers played with the buttons on his shirt, he watched them as they moved because it was easier than looking her in the eye. "And I know I'm right. For me. It's the right call for me. But for you..." He sighed, moved his hand from her back to her stomach, imagining it big and round with new life. "You should have kids, Connie... you should be a mom."

Much to his surprise, Connie didn't answer him, not in words anyway. Instead, she leaned in, brushed her lips across his and, when he responsed, she deepened the kiss, pressing her body against his, winding her arms around his neck. Breaking the kiss, she didn't break her hold as she said, "Frank... I'd like a baby. You know that. But if I was going to have one... I'd want it to be with you. And if that's not on the table..." She pressed her lips together, shrugged. "I love you.  I don't want anyone else."

It was music to his ears, but he still couldn't shake the feeling she was selling herself short. "And what happens," he wondered, "in five years time, ten years time, you trade me in for a younger model and you realise you've missed your chance?"

Connie leaned her head back, lifted two eyebrows which was when he knew she had a comeback that would wipe the floor with him. "And what happens," she countered, "in five years, ten years time when you can't keep up with me and trade me in for an older model?"

The words surprised a laugh out of him, which got one from her too. "Sweetheart, you know that's not gonna happen," he told her and she shrugged again. 

"Frank, I've made my choice," she told him quietly. "You. Us." She looked around the kitchen of what used to be just her house, the one that he'd moved into almost a year ago, leaving his place to the tender mercies of Maya and Nicole. "This." Her hands moved up his neck, one resting on the back of his head. "I'm happy, Frank."

"Yeah." He nodded. "I'm happy too." Which was a big deal for him, because for a long time, after losing Alice, relations with the girls being strained, he'd thought he'd never be happy again. "You make me happy, Connie."

This time, her smile was the one she'd been wearing the first time he'd actually seen her, at a hastily contrived press conference in a freezing cold Pennslyvania field. It was the kind of smile that could warm a man from the inside out when it was directed at him, the kind of smile that made him want to smile right back. 

So he did. 

"You know what would make me happier?" she asked him, and from the sway of her body, he had an idea, but he waited to hear the words from her. "If you took me to bed. Now."

"Well, never let it be said I refused a lady's request..." He surprised her though, by scooping her up in his arms, carrying her into the bedroom, her laughter music to his ears.