musicalluna

Title: Shawn, You're No George Clooney
Fandom: Psych
Author: MusicalLuna
Rating: T
Characters/Pairings: Shawn, Gus
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Humor
Warnings:

SPOILER WARNING for High Top Fade Out as well as pretty much all of season four prior to that episode, just in case.

Set in the week following High Top Fade Out.

Complete: No
Summary: Shawn and Gus steal--pardon--borrow Henry's boat and soon discover the meager amount of boating experience between them just might land them at the bottom of the sea, sleeping with the fishes
A/N: All right kids, buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy ride. I'm breaking my own cardinal rule (what is it about October?) and posting a fic before I've finished it. I have a good feeling about this one though. I'm three chapters in and still steaming forward with excessive amounts of glee, and I haven't even gotten to the really good stuff yet.

So let's do this thing!

Disclaimer: Much as it pains me, I do not own Shawn or Gus, I only get to play with little dolls of them in the sandbox known as the internet. PLEASE DON'T PERSECUTE ME FOR LOVING THEM TOO MUCH.

“Are we really stealing your dad's boat again?” Gus asked from where he stood on the deck of Henry Spencer's fishing boat, watching as Shawn struggled to loose the mooring ropes.

At ten a.m., it was an unusually decent hour for Shawn to be already up and active. The early morning fog was still burning off at the Santa Barbara marina and gave the entire landscape (or seascape he supposed) a distinctly hazy feel which, frankly, kind of creeped Gus out. Especially considering the fact that the marina was almost silent but for the lapping of the waves, the occasional raised voice, and the faint, eerie sound of a bell ringing mournfully on a distant buoy. Mornings like this inspired thoughts of voluptuous sea-drenched sirens emerging from the depths to draw him in with beautiful song only to dash him to pieces on the rocks. He shivered.

“Borrowing, Gus,” Shawn panted at him, still yanking at the rope. “Borrowing.”

Gus rolled his eyes at Shawn's use of semantics. “Fine. Are we borrowing your dad's boat again?”

“Yes,” Shawn panted and then grit his teeth, making a noise that was probably supposed to sound like a manly heave-ho kind of noise, but mostly just made it sound like Shawn was about to have a hernia.

Flicking his eyes between the rope in Shawn's hand, the metal piling on the dock and the knot which he was completely failing to undo, Gus finally pursed his lips and snapped, “Let me do that!” before pushing Shawn aside. Shawn promptly sat down on his butt with his back against one of the wooden pylons. He tilted his head back, panting.

“I don't know—why that's so—hard,” he said.

It took Gus all of fifteen seconds to unwind the rope.

“Because you make it that way,” he retorted. He threw the loosened rope at Shawn, noting with satisfaction the thumping sound it made as it hit his friend in the chest, garnering a small grunt and a wince. “And you're supposed to turn the engine on before releasing the mooring lines. You're making us look like idiots.” A man on a nearby boat was eyeing them with a dubious expression and Gus tried to convey with a quick hand gesture that Shawn was the one the guy should really be worried about.

Oblivious, Shawn fluttered his hand, having miraculously recovered from the strain of his lost battle with the ropes. “This way works just as well.”

Quickly stepping over the widening gap between the boat and the dock, Gus just shook his head. If Shawn didn't feel like listening, he was hopeless.

“This is going to be a great day, Gus,” Shawn declared, scooping up the picnic basket he'd brought as he jumped on board, swinging the little door shut behind him. He'd actually made up and brought along a picnic basket (That basket had been one of the primary reasons Gus had agreed to come along.) “Nothing like two men spending time on the water. Heaving and hoing—”

Gus cut him off before he could get any further into in his grand delusions. “Explain to me again why we're 'borrowing' your dad's boat?”

Shawn shot him a wounded look as he deposited the basket on one of the seats beneath the awning. “I told you, Gus. I want to spend time with you. Alone time. Male-bonding time. No interruptions. Just me and my Brown Bear. The whole seeing-old-friends-from-college thing made me a little jealous and I want to reaffirm our BFF status.”

Gus put his hands on his hips. “First of all, if you're going to use nicknames on me make up your own, don't steal them from television shows. Second of all, you spent more time with those guys than I did, Shawn. If anyone should be jealous it should be me. Third of all—” He leaned forward to emphasize this particular point. “—you're a liar. I know you better than that.”

“That's debatable. You didn't know me better than that last week when I told you I wanted to take you to Ruth Chris so we could have a manly dinner together so I could get you to use your credit card.”

“What?! Shawn! That dinner cost me a hundred and twenty dollars! I paid for it because I thought you wanted to have a nice dinner, just the two of us!” Shawn danced out of reach as Gus lunged at him, trying to get a good chunk of flesh between his fingertips.

“We did have a nice dinner, Gus!” Shawn protested. “And the steaks were delicious, remember?”

“Still! You were using me!” He swiped again, missing Shawn's stomach by mere centimeters.

While he was recovering his balance, Shawn ducked behind the helm, calling, “I prefer to call it Getting Gus to Give Generously!”

Gus bristled. “I didn't give you anything! You manipulated me! If I had known better—”

Shawn's head poked around the side of the helm, his eyes going wide. “Are you saying you would refuse me your love, Gus?”

“Oi!” someone shouted over the water, “What the hell are you doing? Drive your damn boat, you hippies!”

Both Shawn and Gus straightened up, frowning in sync.

“Did he just call us hippies?” Shawn said, sounding mildly offended.

“I think he did,” Gus said, echoing his tone.

“Mind your own business, Grumpy McOldTimer!” Shawn shouted in the general direction of their criticizer.

“Yeah!” Gus added.

“Yuppie kids!” the man shouted back.

Glancing out over the railing, Gus noted that they were drifting perilously close to some of the other boats. He leaned in toward Shawn, lowering his voice. “Maybe you should just drive the boat, Shawn.”

Shawn wrinkled his nose, nodding. “Yeah, I think that might be a good plan.”

They broke off, again in sync, Shawn moving to the helm and turning the key as Gus checked the side of the boat one more time just to make sure they hadn't missed a mooring line or the anchor or something with equal potential for destruction and/or abject humiliation. The motor rumbled to life and the deck began vibrating steadily beneath his feet. Shawn eased forward on the throttle and they started toward the mouth of the bay, wind streaming over the deck in a cool stream.

Gus smiled, despite himself. He had to admit, being on a boat was pretty cool.

The sky was more of a slate blue now that they had pushed past the fog lingering around the bay. Beneath it the water was a dark blue-gray, the waves capped with shreds of white. Out here the only sound was the motor and the slap of the boat against the waves.

He could see why Henry might enjoy this part.

And then he remembered the conversation he'd been trying to have with Shawn. He scowled. Shawn had managed to distract him, again! Stalking over to the helm where Shawn was watching the water stretched out in front of them, he punched him in the arm hard enough to elicit a hiss of pain. “Stop trying to distract me, Shawn, and tell me why we really stole your dad's boat!”

“Ow!” Shawn whined, one hand coming up to gently cover the injury. “Dude, you really gotta learn to pull your punches. My entire shoulder is gonna turn purple!”

“Stop making me need to hit you and you won't have to worry about it! Now tell me where we're going.” He crossed his arms, pinning Shawn with a glare.

“Okay, okay!” Shawn exclaimed, throwing up his hands defensively. “But I think you should know that's the mentality of a chronic abuser.”

Gus just glared at him.

Obviously they weren't going out just for the bonding experience because Shawn waffled a little longer, pursing his lips.

Finally, Gus sighed. “It's a case, isn't it?”

“Not necessarily!” Shawn said his chin jutting forward and his head waggling back and forth in such a way that it merely confirmed Gus' suspicions. Sometimes Shawn was a really terrible liar.

“Is there a dead guy?” he asked.

Shawn still wouldn't look at him. “Technically, it's a dead girl, but—”

Gus' lips pinched together, eyes rolling toward the sky. “It's a case. Where are we going?”

Shawn pouted. “You take all of the excitement out of these impulsive trips, Gus.”

“I know better than to let you drag me off without making you tell me where we're going first.” He began making a list on his fingers, lifting a finger for each point. “I learned it in third grade when you took me out on Halloween and insisted that we were just going on a nice autumn hayride, conveniently forgetting to mention that it was a haunted hayride. I learned it in tenth grade when you told me we were going to see a Boston Pops concert and you took me to see Nine Inch Nails instead, even though you know I hate them. I learned it in twelfth grade when you lured me into the backyard under the pretenses that we were going to stargaze, and then locked me out of the house. Out of my house. I learned it in Mexico—”

“Those were all fun times, Gus!”

“Maybe for you,” he muttered in response.

Glancing at him for a moment, Shawn poked a finger at him. “Fine, Mr. Fun-Sucker. Mr. Sucker-of-Fun. Mr. Vampire-That-Eats-Fun-For-Breakfast—”

“Where are we going, Shawn?” Gus asked, raising his voice.

Shawn heaved a put-upon sigh and then said, “We're going to the Chanel Islands.”

Honestly, Shawn just did these things on purpose, trying to drive him insane. “It's Channel Islands, Shawn,” he told him peevishly. “Chanel is a French designer. A dead French designer.”

A careless shrug rolled off of Shawn's shoulders. “I've heard it both ways.”

“Maybe in the last five seconds, from yourself,” Gus shot back.

Shawn's expression brightened. “Ooh, nice, Gus! Very snappy retort.”

Gus preened. “You're not the only one with great comedic timing. I know a few things.” Sufficiently mollified by Shawn's ego-stroking, he tipped his chin out toward the open sea. “So really, which island are we going to?”

“I just told you, Gus, the Channel Islands,” Shawn replied absently, leaning over the helm to peer at some of the instrumentation. He poked at one of the dials.

You have got to be kidding me, Gus thought. “Shawn, can you tell me what the key word in that phrase is?”

“Not Chanel?” Shawn guessed, straightening up.

Gus' mouth turned downward. “No, Shawn, the key word in that phrase is islands. Plural. As in, more than one.”

Shawn blinked at him, uncomprehending. Or at least faking it pretty well.

“There are five Channel Islands, Shawn!” Gus burst, unable to contain his disbelief. And once again he went into list mode, though this time it was more like an assault-by-list as he thrust each new raised finger into Shawn's face. “San Miguel, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, Anacapa, and Santa Barbara Islands! Which one is it?”

Shawn's head wobbled back and forth, a high-pitched little, “Ehhh,” sliding from his throat. “We'll figure it out when we get there.”

Gus put his hands on his hips and started focusing very hard on the Lamaze breathing techniques he'd learned ages ago. Shawn was his best friend. He liked Shawn. He did not want to wrap his hands around Shawn's scrawny neck and strangle him to death so he could throw his body overboard and commit the perfect murder. Even if he were sloppy, Lassiter would probably miscatalogue the evidence out of gratitude.

“We'll be fine, Gus,” Shawn said, waving off his concern. “It's only like, twenty-five miles. How hard can this be?”

Gus began reciting the mantra aloud. “I do not want to kill him, I do not want to kill him, I do not want to kill him.”

“Gus, buddy,” Shawn called, voice satisfyingly nervous, “Remember what the therapist said about homicide. It's bad for me and you.”

“I do not have a therapist, Shawn!”

He was absolutely going to kill him.

Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI