whitetwoguns | But I ain't no madman.

Half? Only?

[It is a minor reversal from the norm and it feels just as natural. Now he picks up a partially dismantled semi-automatic. Freddy works the piece open like it's nothing more than an extension of his own freckled hands.]

Naw, nothing else. I'm just gonna help you make it the whole fucking lot.

[Even when he takes his eyes off the gun to look at Larry while he speaks his fingers brush and rub in all the right places. Of the weapon that is.]

Well, I got about...I'd say a third done.

[Swift, freckled fingers. Damn.]

The help would be appreciated though.

[No doubt Freddy can tell. Working side by side will get the job done in a snap or click, click, snap.]

...I like having something to do about it.

[As he states the obvious. Being on edge about a few other things only makes this serious matter oh so important.]

I ain't gonna bill you. [Freddy quips and shrugs like it's no thing.] I know you do.

[That's no thing either and he passes it off casually but it does mean something to him and he knows it means a heck of a lot to Larry too. Click click snap. This gun's ready to go. He puts it aside for the next piece in their not so little set up.]

[Another sip of beer and he grabs one for himself and then another to Freddy.]

You know who he's bunking with?

[Right to it, he may not have had the government funded training that the kid beside him had but he knows his way around firearms.]

[Hey hey is that some sort of accusation that the kid wouldn't know his way around guns if it weren't for the LAPD? ...He'd only be half right. Freddy raises the next piece like it's a drink for a toast before he starts working at it with all the professionalism of a man who's been trained by law enforcement only to have that training evolve into an artform.]

Dr. McCoy. That McCoy.

[If Larry catches his drift. The TV show's only a year younger than himself. Surely someone as old as Lawrence Dimick remembers when it first premiered, right??]

[Speculation, not accusation. He would love to know that he's half wrong.]

What? Small fuckin' world this is. Jesus.

[Say, weren't they attended to by some sort of a doctor named that? Well, nevermind.]

Anybody ever ask him where Scottie is?

[He thinks that's pretty fucking funny. Enough to chuckle about it to himself after. Another one added to the pile.]

The two of em can be neurotic together.

[Wow he got that reference after all. The delighted surprise probably shows on the kid's face but it's not like a man can hear another man's heart making curious knocking sounds or anything.]

No. He's kind of a different McCoy.

[Freddy will refrain from making a real mccoy joke here. As for the doctor, that's the one, the one who helped to erase a scar from his belly. It wasn't able to remove the older one though.]

You mean like he's the real McCoy?

[This is why they are in a committed relationship with one another. Larry about slaps his own knee at the coincidence. Nope. Won't do it though, they're trying to gt a job done here.]

Maybe that would keep the heat off of Pink, he's gotta play nice with Mr. Civilian. ...it'd be smart to keep a doctor friend.

[Oh well if the old man is going to go there the kid here just can't help but laugh. It's a ridiculous sounding straight out of Fresno laugh too.]

Yeah. Yeah I mean it like that.

[Freddy somehow manages to speak through his laughter though at the price of having to put this piece's deconstruction on hold. Whew, steady Newendyke, don't keel over from hilarity. This is why he loves you, Lawrence Dimick.]

He's a good doctor, maybe he's got questionable taste. [In friends. Some people would say that about them too.]

[Even when the joke is over with though the old man is smiling ear to fucking ear. Even laughing a little more because Freddy's is so infectious. That's his baby.]

I'll say.

[When things have settled.]

Pink isn't anybody's best pal.

[Not at first. Who did White go to a strip club with when things got sour? Who did he invite to chum along with that time they got drunk as skunks at the Blue Light?]

Pink's Pink's best pal.

[That and diamonds. Freddy shrugs like he's not going to judge a weasel for looking out for number one...in most circumstances anyway. He wouldn't have done what Pink did, Larry knows this first hand. Would White have gone down a similar road had he and Orange not forged a connection so strong and early in the game? There's a reason why he's never asked him that, to each their own, and anyway it doesn't matter because that's not their history together.]

He sure is.

[Click. Click.]

Though he knew what he was doing going off on me about Joe and Eddie.

[Sure did hit where it was supposed to. Larry's still working. Not a tearful man or one to mope openly. That one has been floating on his mind. Those are his dead friends.]

[Now that's something Freddy won't make a joke about. He waits until he's finished with cleaning out the chamber on this one and popping it back into place.]

He was pissed off being in the dark.

[In other words it was the best way for Pink to shank White without an actual shank. That counts for something, doesn't it?]

Yeah.

[Dark hair sorta sways with his nod.]

I dunno if he even mourned em or anything. ...Never asked.

[Because he didn't want to know. All the better to not think about it anymore. The old man can tell Freddy's shifted mood. Good man.]

[Dark, huh? Has it been dyed recently? Nothing wrong with it, of course, just curiosity on the kid's side.]

Don't bother, he wouldn't have brought it up if he didn't want to hit below the belt.

[Again, better than a bullet, but this is about Joe and Freddy can't deny they were more than just associates. He told Jim his observations himself; not a foot soldier, they go way back.]

[Maybe just a little. He didn't go all over this time. Touch up the back, the top...he's a little silvery at the temples.]

And below the belt.

[Double whammy.]

They were sorta friends, I think. I dunno how much. I didn't meet Pink formally until the heist.

[Busy still. Because they wanted to get through the pile.]

[Click click. New gun. The 'to do' side is getting smaller while the 'done' side is getting bigger. Not that the guns are being rearranged, there's a certain knack to just knowing what's been touched and what hasn't when they're all laid out this way. It's one more thing they share in common regardless of who's a cop and who's a crook.]

I didn't know that.

[About Pink and Joe, despite hearing something like Pink saying he's known Joe since he was a little weasel.] Long Beach Mike set me up.

[Freddy says this part casually because it seems relevant. He doesn't think about how he's just ratted out the guy to someone who might want to take revenge one day. It's not like he outright said Mike was snitching to them, right?]

Yeah? I heard about that guy. Think I met him at least once. Seemed on the level.

[Except he set up acquaintances with cops so...]

You really knew your shit.

[Back then. Right now. Still moving along the assembly line. Man, it is quicker with two other sets of hands.]

It's all starting to feel like a fucking long time ago.

[Except for when there is a rehash of those feelings when they gotta tell someone or...something.]

I had a lot of help.

[He'll mention Mike because Mike's a link in the chain between them. Who he won't mention is Holdaway or even McCluskey. They're cops through and through, he won't bring his own out to the table so easily. Nothing personal, Lawrence Dimick. Is that another thing they have in common? Able to tell stories but without the specificity that could hurt their acquaintances. It's a curious relationship. Click and snap. This piece is finished.]

I don't think it was a long time ago...you and me just came a real long way.

[He looks at Larry, caramel green eyes to brown ones.]

You're right about that, baby.

[Still more distance and hurdles. Except glancing back to see how much is covered does boost his ego now and then. It's a rather important thing to this bear.

Click. Click.]

...I thought you were the best company outta all of em.

[No lie or fluff.]

Brown was a fucking cartoon. Pink...you know him.

[He doesn't really need to go on.]

[Aw shucks, really Lawrence Dimick? Look at the softest shade of red slowly creep up into his cheeks. It's not like Larry hasn't complimented him before, but somehow saying that in this moment has a different effect entirely.]

Thanks...

[They were attracted to each other in some capacity from day fucking one.] Right back at you, I turned a blind eye to the Brewers thing.

[Freddy smiles.]

[Because he means it? Or because he saw a diamond in the scum? Whichever reason, the old man means what he says. Simple or not. Out of the corner of his eye he swears he can see something of the color. That sort of shit he privately cherishes.]

I won money out of that. What'd your Dodgers ever get you?

[Another gun down. There's only two or so to go. He is whipping his hands because that talk means Freddy needs a lesson.]

[Heh heh heh. It doesn't take much for that shy smile to turn into something a bit more cocky as he puts this gun back together.]

A blowjob.

[From Lawrence Dimick himself. Does it count that it happened in the City with a Dodgers team on TV that may or may not even reflect the current one in Los Angeles? Ah well, details details.]

Is that what you're fixing to get with that sort of talk?

[...It may actually work. Brown eyes are on him completely, in fact one squints a little bit.]

I ain't the Dodgers.

I'm just saying. You know, facts are facts.

[And all that. The kid keeps on trucking, last gun down it seems, or is it standing? Freckled hands get to work with ease like he didn't just start talking about mouths on dicks.]

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