Summary: Dani thinks that positive affirmations work better when someone else is saying them.
Dani is no stranger to self-loathing. She herself had habits from her teenage years that had followed her into adulthood. In high school she was hard on herself, in more ways than one. She was obsessively checking her weight, her GPA, and she always felt like she was inadequate. Once she had finally succeeded in her dream of becoming a cop, she felt like she could exhale, and she realized the error in her ways. When she finally got help, the entire world seemed brighter.
Malcolm has his demons, and this was just common knowledge, but Dani never really thought much about how Malcolm’s demons affected his own self-esteem. She didn’t really think about Malcolm’s self-esteem at all until the drug incident, when she noticed a neat stack of business-card sized writings next to his morning pills. She picked up the deck curiously, flipping through them. They were positive affirmations, and she could only assume that he read himself one, or a few, every morning while he took his meds.
From person experience, she knew that when you say positive affirmations to yourself then you’re less likely to believe them. She had tried it way back when, and it still took her until she had her Good Will Hunting-esque moment in therapy for her to actually believe any of them. Knowing Malcolm’s own stubbornness, she doubted that he believed any of what he told himself either.
Positive affirmations are more effective when someone else says them, she thought. She took this as her new little mission.
Malcolm had noticed something had changed five days into Dani’s new hobby. It took him a while, he won’t lie, but he certainly wasn’t known for being the most observant person ever when it came to the relationships around him, he tried to turn off his profiler switch when he could, and sometimes that meant missing information that he shouldn’t.
He never really knew how to act when Dani dotted on him, he wasn’t really great at taking praise in general, he usually made a morbid joke to counteract it, or said something jokingly full of himself.
When it came to Dani’s words, he just deflected completely, he usually just ignored her altogether, and acted as if he couldn’t hear her or she was talking to somebody else. By day five, Dani wasn’t having any of it.
“Being unable to let go of your trauma is not your fault,” Dani assured Malcolm, unprompted, after they had closed a case at the end of the day. It was just the two of them in the small briefing room, JT had left as soon as the case had closed, and Gil had exited to finish a few things up before he left for the day.
Malcolm just continued his humming like he had been before Dani had said anything, outright acting as if she hadn’t said anything. He kept going through the file in front of him, flipping aimlessly.
Dani reached out from where she was sitting, and poked Malcolm in his side to get his attention. What she didn’t expect, was for him to recoil quickly, bringing his hand down to catch her finger.
Dani perked up, looking at Malcolm as if she were studying him. “What was that?”
Malcolm shrugged, a sly smile on his face, “I don’t know, you just startled me I guess.”
Dani nodded, a smug smile on her face to match Bright’s, but he was still engrossed in his files. She continued to scroll through her phone, pretending to still be waiting for Malcolm like she had been before, but this time she was trying to investigate her hypothesis.
Once she was sure that Malcolm wasn’t suspecting anything, she reached out again, poking him in his upper ribs. Dani was definitely satisfied with her discovery, because this time Malcolm squealed, frantically trying to protect himself.
Dani stood up, standing next to Malcolm, who had placed his hands up in front of him as defence. She walked and walked until Malcolm’s back had met the corner, and he cursed under his breath.
Dani spared no time, shooting her fingers out to explore Malcolm’s seemingly sensitive body.
The reaction was instant, as he threw his head back and giggled, loud and uninhibited, as Dani’s fingers poked and prodded over and between Malcolm’s ribs. Dani wondered if he were this terribly ticklish everywhere of if this was just his worst spot, because Malcolm was absolutely howling after mere seconds of tickling. She would find out, only days later, that this was indeed his worst spot, but most others were not too far off.
“I’ll stop when you promise to listen to me when I compliment you, Bright,” She began, brushing over a spot towards the top of his ribs that got a really good reaction, “I’m a pretty tough girl, Bright, I can do this for as long as it takes.”
Malcolm shook his head, trying to curl up in spite of the fact that Dani’s body was preventing him from doing that.
Neither of them had heard the door open until it had closed again, and Gil was walking towards the table.
Dani stopped, embarrassed that she was being so childish in their place of work.
Gil put his hand up, trying to ease her. “It’s alright, that’s the best way to get to Bright’s stubborn ass anyways. Even I can’t help myself sometimes. Maybe try behind his ears?”
Dani’s fingers traced their way up until they cupped Malcolm’s face, coming to dip behind his ears. Malcolm’s laughter was high-pitched and lazy, almost like a baby’s, and Dani couldn’t help but audibly coo at the sheer adorableness of the sound.
Gil nodded, laughing to himself when he heard Dani’s response to Malcolm. “He’s a pretty adorable kid, despite the fact that he’s a total pain in the ass.” Gil gathered up the rest of his stuff, before saying a quick goodbye to the two of them.
Dani continued, moving one hand from behind Malcolm’s ear as the other remained, and bringing it back to his ribs. Instantly Malcolm was screaming, hiccuping lightly as he shook his head back and forth.
“Ahahahalright! Alright! I’m sohohorry!” Malcolm squealed, tears trickling out of his eyes.
“Ahahahand I’ll listen wh-whehehehen you tahalk!”
Dani came to a stop, and Malcolm’s head drooped forwards as he tried to calm down.
Dani held his chin with her hand, looking into his eyes as the wide smile on his face remained.
“You’re really amazing Malc,” Dani slipped out.
“Eugh- thanks Dani,” Malcolm replied, averting his eyes since he couldn’t move his head down.
Dani got up and got her phone from the table, walking towards the closed door, “C’mon Mr. Giggle Pants, I’m taking you home.”
