Author: Desiree Armfeldt
Title: Attractive
Fandoms: due South
Characters: Benton Fraser, Ray Kowalski (pre-slash)
Rating: Gen
Length: 410 words
Angst-to-hope ratio: Low
Disclaimer: I didn't create these characters, I don't own them, I derive no profit from their use.
A/N: It's an actual flashwork for once, though I don't think it quite makes the written-in-under-an-hour bar.
Summary: Fraser is aware that he’s considered good-looking.



Fraser is aware that he’s considered good-looking.  To be unaware of the fact, he would have to be not merely naïve and a poor reader of social cues, but actually deaf to boot, because various people over the years expressed their sexual attraction to him in so many words.   He can see their point, theoretically, but it’s difficult to make aesthetic judgments about the face he shaves in the mirror each day.

Do you find me attractive? he remembers his new partner asking him.  A somewhat odd question to ask on such slight acquaintance, but not unprecedented in Fraser’s experience.  He’s still not entirely sure what motivated Ray Kowalski to ask, or why he thought Fraser was qualified to judge, but having no reason to equivocate, Fraser had given his honest opinion.  Yes, very much so.

He pauses with the razor against his jaw, examining his reflection with Ray’s question echoing in his mind’s ear.  Neat, dark hair; soft cheeks and square jaw (currently white with shaving cream); slightly lopsided smile; deep-set blue eyes; strong brows; broad shoulders.  Yes, that’s himself, all right.  He’d know that face anywhere.

Do you find me attractive?  It’s a question Fraser has never had occasion to ask anyone.  It’s never occurred to him to ask.

He’d like to think that that’s because he doesn’t care about something so superficial as other people’s opinion of his physical appearance.  But—considering the matter for the first time—he suspects that it may simply be that because most people make their opinion abundantly clear almost immediately, Fraser has never needed to ask.

And then, too, there have been few enough people in his life whose opinion on the point has ever mattered to him.

Suddenly, that strikes him as sad.

He pictures this new Ray, with his sharp, mobile features and his trick of looking weathered one moment and boyish the next, electric razor in hand, interrogating his own reflection, hoping for. . .Fraser can’t quite imagine what Ray thinks or hopes.

Not yet.  But he will understand, sooner or later.  Probably sooner: Fraser is intrigued, and Ray, for all his defensiveness and self-identification as a ‘con job’. . .doesn’t seem to want to hide from Fraser.  That, in itself, is an interesting piece of data.

Do you find me attractive? The man in the mirror mouths the words back at him.  But Fraser has no answer to give.  He’s the wrong person to ask, anyway.