PRETENCE
By
Nikki Harrington
Set during The Pilot.
As Fraser walks away from Ray's desk, his thoughts are about more than the scene he has just witnessed.
A pre-slash story.
Written: February 2007. Word count: 500.
"It would seem that like you, he was pretending to be someone he was not."
As I spoke the words and walked away from you, so many thoughts were going through my mind. And not all, I am ashamed to say, were to do with my father's case. Indeed, most were not. Most of them centered on the scene I had witnessed.
'Pretence'.
Essentially it is such a short word. It might even be considered to be a harmless word, until one considers what it really implies. It can mean:
A false or unsupportable quality.
An artful or simulated semblance.
Pretending with intention to deceive.
Imaginative intellectual play.
The act of giving a false appearance.
You see now, do you not, how many of its meanings are not harmless? Nor is its practice. And yet, to a greater or lesser extent, we are all, at some time in our lives, guilty of it.
Yes, even me. A member of the RCMP. A Mountie. A man who lives by truth, honesty, openness, and all the things that are depicted as good. A man for whom lying, which essentially is what pretence is, does not come easily.
And yet, I do it.
Just as you do.
When you were in the holding cell attempting to entrap that man, you were 'guilty' of definitions two, for indeed your cover could be called 'artful'; three, as your intention was to deceive the man into believing you were someone you were not; and five, as you were indeed giving a false appearance.
But there was more to your pretence than that.
There was the pretence that is part of your daily persona. The one you put on each morning, just as you put on your clothes. The one that is now so habitual, you do not need to think about it. The one that you fear, but cannot, indeed will not, let go of. The one that you wish you could share with someone special, but you fear you never will.
How do I know this?
Because it is my pretence too.
Despite what I witnessed in the holding cell, despite your sarcasm over the 'dead Mountie', I saw that there is a great deal of good in you. An honesty and worth and fineness that is in danger of being sullied by the world that you are forced to inhabit.
You are a good man, Ray Vecchio. You see I took the time to find out your true name before I left your station. You are a worthy man. You are a man I believe that I would be honored to call 'friend'. And maybe so much more. But I shall not, I will not, I must not, let myself think of that, think of the 'more', at least for now.
For now we must work on friendship and mutual trust. Then maybe, one day, we will be able to stop the pretence, at least around one another.
One day, Ray Vecchio.
One day.
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