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California Dreamin’

Part 2

Feeling like getting myself galvanized again by the experience of travelling to see a concert after these past years under “house arrest". Luckily, one character is at the right place and right time to take me just where I want to be, a concert that happened way before my time.

Heavy inspiration from Creedence and Tina, with Joaquin Phoenix as lead character in perpetuity. Starting to think I need rehab 🤦‍♀️😂

Pairing: Doc Sportello x Reader (as Penny Kimball, Deputy DA)

Summary: you are still contemplating Doc's crackpot invitation to move in with him, but he'd prepared an unexpected night that would solidify his closing argument.

Length: 3k words

Warnings: smoking pot, reckless driving, careless adolescent-like behavior by consenting adults 😂 totally shameless much needed comfort piece.

---

Bringing a pizza had been an excuse to drop by, but his fridge was emptier than the beach in mid winter. Sometimes you wondered if his only nourishment was that grass. How he wasn't constantly munching on something was beyond you, or perhaps it was merely the effect of years of daily exposure. Light smoker, hear that!

Munching on each other really wasn't a healthy substitute, so it wasn't long before the pizza became a thing of the past as he scrolled through channels while you laid over his chest. Somehow, you'd nuzzled closer and closer to him as the months went by, and it wasn't the joints speaking on your behalf. Now that he could feel how effortlessly it came to you, he'd learned you craved his kisses on your forehead and his fingertips stroking your scalp as if you were a kitten demanding all his attention. He didn't need a PHD to figure that out, yet his inexplicable success as a P.I. must have come from a natural talent of piecing together what others couldn't.

For months you'd tried to keep whatever this was in check, refusing to be distracted from your career. You'd built that with blood, sweat and tears, it defined you, made you walk with pride in your step and brought a fierceness to your expression that commanded respect. You weren't gonna let this hippie private detective living in a dump with seemingly no care in the world threaten that. How he'd snoop around in that worn out hat and sun glasses, his hair reflecting the state of his house, and yet here you were.

Secretly, you envied that live-and-let-live ease about him, wanting all of that for yourself with him in the center, but educated caution warned against the flimsiness of your inner dreamer. You were well aware he had that side chick he was chasing, but you'd never discussed exclusivity until now. You hoped she'd broken him so badly he'd just not want her back, but then again, perhaps you'd been the side chick all this time. Him asking you to consider moving in was more unexpected than his phone call earlier, yet his unpredictability was the chink in your armor. Somehow, he'd seeped right through it.

"I have a groovy thing I wanna go to tomorrow. I think you'd like it", he hummed as his toes wiggled to a tune in his head you couldn't possibly figure out.

"Cause we have so many common interests", you retorted in a haughty tone, promising to yourself to try and loosen that up around him. Cuddling closer to his chest, he chuckled at your sharpening claws.

"You might be surprised", he stubbed the bud in the ashtray and sat back down for your comfort. "Come with me. Take the day off tomorrow. We stay in bed, get some of that takeout you like, windows open, tube on full blast, we'll keep the neighbors entertained, mm?", despite your previous tone, his fingers kept stroking your hair.

"You're nuts, I have to be in court all day tomorrow!"

"Fine, Ms. Deputy DA", he must have rolled his eyes judging by his concession from quite an appealing plan. "I'll pick you up at 7. It's starting at 8 pm and we need to drive there pronto."

"For you and I to show face anywhere together, you need to wash that hair and trim those mutton chops, you hear me? Come tomorrow and you're looking like this, I'm back in the courthouse."

"What?" He seemed genuinely surprised as he run his fingers through his facial hair. "My mutton chops are neat."

"Not when you look like a fuzzy middle aged bear, they don't", you kissed the nook of his neck tenderly. "Where are you planning on taking me?"

"Nah-nah-nah. But your suit won't do for this. You can wear these shades and something less uptight", he slipped his sunglasses on your eyes and peppered your nose with kisses.

"I don't own hippie clothes, Doc."

"Of course you don't", he rolled his eyes once more at being reminded you belonged to a different class. "I'll figure something out. But tonight, you won't need any. Of. Those", the yen in his eyes driving his fingers to lift up your shirt enough to uncover your skin inch by inch.

There had been no time to drop back by your apartment in the morning and change clothes, thank god for the shirts in your trunk. Even so, your sudden disappearance the night before had been remarked on plenty. You played along and fought off the distraction of last night's multiple orgasms and tonight's surprise, the case would always take priority. Yet you checked your watch like a nervous tic, one more aspect your pals tauntingly quipped about.

7:10 on a Friday and you were still in the courtroom, the prosecutor sure loved to prolong his closing statements to put on a show. Pompous prick! 7:20 found you grabbing your bag and almost smashing through the front door, once again ditching your group and scanning the parking lot for his grey 64 Dodge Dart. Thankfully, he'd listened to you and parked all the way across the block. You bit your lip to stifle a giggle, hoping you'd not be seen fleeing with him. You could easily foretell your colleague's remarks even to your face - "this fucking guy, Penny, really?", but they didn't know him like you did.

Approaching the car in your high heels and suit, he threw the cigarette bud out the window as he started the engine to meet you half way, opening the car door for you to jump in mid drive. Foolish, downright preposterous, but your heartbeat accelerating had nothing to do with your sprint to the car. The instant you'd laid eyes on his fine kempt hair and scar on his stubbled lip, you knew just how smitten you really were. Of course he hadn't trimmed his signature mutton chops, but you relished the palette of color on his face, from the darkest eyebrows crowning the biggest green eyes to the tiniest white hair in his beard.

"Howdy, stranger", he furtively smirked at you as he drove onto 6th Street.

"I asked you to park there so we can keep this out of sight, Doc, what the hell?"

"Take a chill pill, baby girl," he chuckled with characteristic nonchalance. "Your friends were too preoccupied kissing each others' asses to care whose car you're jumping into. Here, puff this up for me."

His frankness and lack of censorship regarding his admiration towards your profession was infuriating, yet so refreshing you craved it. He'd just handed you a joint, how surprising.

"You shouldn't be smoking this in the car, Larry...", you almost choked on the puff you'd just taken.

Stopping at the red light, he took off his shades and eyed your suit in disapproval. The electric feel of his meadow green eyes up and down your body without even a single touch had only amplified after all these months.

"Alright, ma'! Can you just chill and let me take care of you for one evening in my own way? Who knows, maybe you'll get off that high horse and even enjoy it."

"You know what? Fuck you, ok?"

"Hey, right on", he chuckled at having scratched your itch. "Later, if you insist. But you need to get outta those threads. Check the bag on the backseat, put on what's in there. And yes, before you state the obvious, you will be changing clothes in the car."

Pesky bastard and his damned charisma, he was right to call you on your bullshit. How could you be mad when the wind flew freely through his fresh locks weathered by the sun as he snuck a few peeks at you, awaiting an acid comeback. You had none, so you kissed his fuzzy cheek and reached for the bag.

"What am I gonna do with your linen green shirt and a garland, Doc?"

"What do you think? Here," spliff between his lips, he took both hands off the wheel to untie his belt and hand it to you. "Tie this around and you're all set."

Regardless of your bickering, you undressed on the passenger seat while chastising him to keep his eyes on the road. Ripping the price tag on the cowboy boots and slipping into them, you felt uncomfortably comfortable.

"That wasn't so hard now, was it? Look at you, outtasight, girl! We're almost there. Do me a favor - let down your hair, and put this on", he handed you a summer scarf the color of his eyes and the sea at midday.

"That's two favors", you quibbled as you unbraided your hair to let it wild over your shoulders. "Where are you taking me, anyway?"

"Somewhere hip, you'll find out soon enough."

"Are we going to some hippie retreat? You know that's just how I want to spend my evenings", the sarcasm in your tone was pointless as you heard it out loud.

"Well... judging by last night, and last week, and the week before and so on, I'd say you dig that. Put the scarf on already, we're almost there."

The taste of his lips at the red light was enough to convince you to follow his lead, the effect of the spliff loosening your tension and traversing your muscles to a much needed state of Friday evening chill. You couldn't see, but you clearly heard the rumble outside as he looked for a parking space, casually pointing out how all spots were taken cause you couldn't meet him on time. Engine off, he opened your door and helped you out in a hurry towards a noisy entrance.

Holding your hand wasn't enough to get you through the crowd safely, so he wrapped his arm around you, clarifying to someone how you were blindfolded as a surprise. No further questions asked after you confirmed you had no idea where he'd brought you, so he rushed you through what smelled and sounded like a stadium. Within short minutes of making room through a sea of people, he stopped and your heart galloped at the excitement.

As he took the blindfold off, the place was bustling but your eyes had frozen stiff on his own even in the late August heat and stuffy atmosphere at The Forum in Inglewood. His goddamn eyes were the luster in your darkness. He'd kept your back turned to the stage, his fingers running through your hair delicately despite the crowd already cheering and whistling. Bringing you closer so you'd hear him, he whispered "Why don't we make this our anniversary, baby doll?" and stole a peck off your lips as the crowd lost their minds in unison to the first riffs of Run Through The Jungle.

Turning to the stage faster than one two three, your heart poured out of your chest, your face contorted and your mouth fell agape at the sight and swamp blues sound of your favorite band. You hadn't yet seen them live cause of your shit schedule, which meant you'd had to put in the extra time whenever they had played close to home. Creedence Clearwater Revival on stage before you, their sound soothing your soul with every disc you'd bought religiously, now sinking through your bones from head to toe like ravenous thunder. You could easily cry yet you let out the loudest of groupie shrieks as you jumped to Doc's arms.

"Oh my god, Doc!!! How did you know?!", you practically screamed your lungs out at him, the radiant smile on his face at your euphoria had dispersed any desires to ever return to your life without him. Looking mighty fine himself with fresh wavy hair locks over his forehead, his linen shirt and the sandals, but his naturally contoured emerald eyes stole your breath away withour fault.

"That night at your place", he shouted back, "I found your collection of discs. I wouldn't have taken you for a Creedence fan, Ms. Executive DA, but look at you, so beautiful tonight, you're glowing!"

His lips kissed you one last time before he turned you towards the stage, urging you to go with the flow as your exaltation reached new heights hearing the riffs to I Heard It Through The Grapevine.

There you were, wearing his shabby hippie long shirt smelling of cologne, tobacco and him, his soft arms around you, mutton chops brushing your flushed cheeks, your limbs mellowed and fervent at the same time. Whomever she was, you wanted her to stay. You laughed and danced in his arms remembering how your heart had fell on a Creedence line when you'd first seen him, hello Doc, goodbye heart, and how wild horses couldn't make you stay away. For once in a dreadfully long time, you finally felt free and wild, finally allowing yourself to enter his devil-may-care world and exult in every step you took closer to him.

He'd been there for months, and even if you'd thrown him to the feds just yesterday, the glimmer in his eyes spoke of how little that had mattered. Surprising was an understatement, underneath that adorable fuzziness lay that attentiveness your previous partners would have found threatening of their masculinity, and you were done ignoring and hiding it away from prying eyes. This had somehow become serious somewhere along the way, and even if you couldn't put your finger on when it happened, him tapping his foot to Keep On Chooglin' and humming John Fogerty's lyrics into your ear had leveled all your walls.

The best hour of your life had wrapped up, yet you were far from coming down from the cloud, each step you took guided by his hand felt like floating on air. In a sea of satisfied faces heading towards the exit, you radiated with an feverish ardor for more, and you'd just realized you couldn't give two shits if anyone saw you together. There was nowhere you'd rather be tonight than here, holding his hand and running towards the car in a warm summer night shower.

"Doc!!! Oh my god!!! You rascal, I can't believe you did this!", you bristled with euphoria in a smile he'd not been privy to before tonight.

"Rascal, huh?", the smirk in the corner of his lips gave away how he'd noticed it and already bottled it up.

"Yesss", you blurted giddily.

"But that's why you like me, baby doll", he lit another spliff and handed it to you as he headed out of the parking lot and into the first drive-through.

"That's what keeps you coming back, isn't it? If we're being honest now, I didn't need to put in the effort for tonight, but I wanna see you radiating like this more often." Waiting in queue for the order he'd just given, you ran your hand through his damp hair and nuzzled to his chest realizing how badly you got a kick out of his wit, and just how right he was.

"If you mean that, then you'd better stop by a pharmacy so I buy a new toothbrush for tonight", your fingers running through his chest hairs down his shirt's v-line sensing a faster heartbeat.

"Are you serious?" his voice faltered as his hand removed your locks of hair off your forehead to catch a glimpse of your face.

"If you are." You looked at him and hoped you'd not be following white rabbits in your quest for his heart that might have belonged to another. "I wasn't expecting tonight. I'm just... really happy..."

"2 menus, $4.20", the cashier repeated rather obfuscated at Doc's absentmindedness.

You handed a 10 and asked her to keep the change as he tried to put some words together through a smile from ear to ear.

"I'll bring some stuff over, but you'll drop your side chick. You know, the one you don't have." His forehead furrowed, but he laughed as if caught red-handed. He, of course, denied all charges nonchalantly, attributing them to your paranoia.

"Why would I ask that if I had plans of keeping a side chick, you little daffy?"

Assuring him you'd cash in on that check tonight, you asked to find a spot to eat and turned up Rock Vault Radio. Driving far up the hill on an adjacent quiet road, you'd fed him almost the whole bag of fries as you both sang to the music, but he turned the car around facing the night city lights and pulled the hand brake.

Those burgers weren't the most delicious treat in his car. The same concurrent thought through your minds as he hummed at the nightlights and starry sky, but turned his attention to you languidly yet with clear intent. His fingertips gently to your chin, his eyes devoured your lip as he unconsciously bit his own, and you were already smoldering the moment he beckoned you closer.

Tugging at his shirt with greedy fingers, the fire in his eyes enhanced their color to glisten with the same gluttony as yours, an educated guess confirmed by the taste of his lips on yours in a heart beat. As you gasped for air, his fingers had already undone your belt and his palms had found their way underneath the shirt-dress. Mouth gobbling at your neck, all senses on overload as the windows steamed up from the heat of your bodies, his gravelly voice demanding that you get your bodacious ass on the backseat. You followed without hesitation, yet you were surprised when he went round the car to the same backdoor.

"Come here", he snuggled next to you, yet his fingers effortlessly slid your undies to the floor, his hands groping your feet and dragging you almost halfway out the door.

An empty dark road, a car with dripping foggy windows and his knees in the damp grass, he lodged your feet on the headrests and sunk his face between your thighs as he watched you let him unplug you from your world. You may have shrieked yourself to exhaustion at the concert, but you'd saved your acoustic symphonies for him albeit unaware his tongue would demand them on the backseat of his car on a quiet road overlooking the city lights. The thrill of the night had already penetrated your bones, but the things he'd do to you had no equivalent outside his bed. Or his car, for that matter, so you let him have his crafty ways; the better he'd do, the more you'd encourage until you had no breath left to scream out his name no more.

Dazed and confused at the rejuvenating effects his mouth had on you, your fingers grabbed his shirt and pulled him on the backseat next to you. Straddling him between your thighs and quickly undoing his pants, sinking him inside of you ripped the grunt from his throat you relished in as your personal savory. The crescendo of your wails were his exclusively, quickly throwing you both into that state you hungered off each other but no amount of kissing would satiate.

You'd forgotten who you really were, hiding behind a mound of paperwork, late hours and expensive courtroom suits, yet the thrill of feeling like an 18 year old you'd secretly chased ever since. Who would have thought you'd find it in his arms at a concert and on the backseat of his car as he brought you closer and closer to shivers and tremors once more. As greedy as he was, tonight the glint in his eyes spoke that he'd be taking you home for the weekend, and you wouldn't want to leave by the end of it. He could be right, yet you'd let him keep on giving his best nonetheless, and his palms on your waist as he disheveled into you had just induced one more session of intense muscle spasms traversing your whole body to confirm the veracity of his educated guess.

Zero visibility, but there hadn't been any headlights passing by since he'd parked here. Your fingers entangled deep in his hair, you pinned him on the headrest when all the poor man wanted was to breathe, but he cuddled you so close to his chest, you could easily swoon in his arms. It had been a damn decade since you last felt this way, a naive thrill inside screaming the words at the top of your lungs. You just giggled instead, your thumbs tracing circles over his mutton chops as he blinked sluggishly, revealing galaxies more stunning than you'd ever seen on the night sky.

"Let's motor the fuck outta here", he tucked himself back into his briefs as you tried to get yourself back to a decent state of dress.

"Aren't we gonna eat?!"

"We did what we came here for, doll, we can eat on the drive back home". He winked at you with a satisfied grin plastered all over his face, and as he stole one last kiss, it had just dawned on you that home could very well be with him.

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Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed it! ❤

Tagging a few of the lovely people around here:

@sweet-nothings04 @ajokeformur-ray @wuika @iartsometimes @fleckcmscott @jokerownsmysoul @bananabreaddough @arthurflecksgirl @cruuelty @hhandley80 @shaw-2000 @fruitjuicebasket @imaginarytowel @flowerglitterwoman @nothingclown @j05eph @justafleck @the-one-who-is-chaoz @darknessisafriend @fly-like-a-phoenix @beatlebabe1996 @harleyq80 @chalkicharli @deathlthallow @delicatecroissantprofessorthing @readingafterdarkness @nendouism @gutted-goth @ihoneywaffle

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