Daniel sways a little where he's standing in front of the Keurig, listening to the noise of coffee brewing. Like his body realized caffeine was coming, and now it's giving in, Jesus take the wheel style.
Across the grid of grey metal desks, Verstappen is hunched over, his face only a few inches away from the files spread out in front of him. The back of his neck's pale and smooth looking in the harsh florescent lights they keep having to wave their arms to keep lit this late at night.
This keeps happening. Daniel staying later than he ever used to before Michael left and he got assigned Verstappen as his new partner. Even though their current case like, isn't even that intense, compared to some of the shit Daniel and Michael had last year. He's been getting softball cases ever since Michael left, but Verstappen treats them all like they're, like, life and death, and Daniel kind of hasn't figured out how to say no to the way him, to the ways he's just–so intent on everything. Chasing down every lead themselves, talking through their notes over and over again in the car, staying late. It just, like, kind of gets to him, the way Verstappen acts like such a rookie, but in this way that kind of makes Daniel want to be more like him instead of less. How he'd answered when Daniel'd asked him why he'd wanted to be a detective, To keep people safe, sincere and simple and obvious, like there were no complications to that. The way he'll blink up at Daniel when Daniel says, Call it a night? his face all lost looking like he can't imagine just going out into the regular world after hours and hours of looking at pictures of horrible things.
The coffee finishes, and Daniel grabs his Bills mug and Verstappen's World's best uncle one and trudges back over to their desks, drinking a gulp of his while it's still scalding.
He has to stop himself from pressing the warmth of the cup to the back of Verstappen's neck, another, like, body-on-autopilot thing that keeps happening late at night, just the two of them in the office, the whole building quiet except for their voices and the hum of the lights and whatever playlist Daniel has on to keep the vibe from getting too dark.
When Michael used to sit across from Daniel, he'd complain all the time about how the air conditioning blew right onto him, so Daniel knows Verstappen must be cold. He imagines it all the time for some reason, what it would be like to just–not even touch him there skin to skin, but to come up behind him and press the ceramic curve of his mug against him, a little moment of warmth to make him pull his face out of his awful files for a second.
He knows it's weird. He puts the mug right by Verstappen's hand on his desk, tells him no worries even though he doesn't say thank you, just smiles and immediately brings his coffee to his mouth, his top lip pursing as he blows softly across the surface of it.
–
"I think we should go back to talk to the dad again," Verstappen tells him in the car a week later, gesturing sharp with his hands.
Apparently every KA for this whole case lives in like the middle of nowhere, so they're driving a back road again, Daniel's window down so he can smell the forest, thick and bright, mid-summer green; the warmth of smoke from where someone must be open burning nearby. Underneath, there's Verstappen's cologne, or his deodorant, Daniel hasn't figured it out.
"Mate, come on," Daniel says, and he sounds more annoyed than he really means to, but whatever. Verstappen's been on this ever since they first met the guy, even though he was totally normal, had an alibi and everything.
And Daniel's just. Fucking tired. He'd left the office before midnight for the first time in two weeks last night, Verstappen blinking betrayed up at him like Daniel was, like, a puppy who was abandoning him.
His face got worse when Daniel told him, Sorry bud, got a date. You know looking at corpses and eating shitty takeout with you is hard to beat, but she puts out, so.
He'd been thinking about it all day. All of the last three days, really, ever since a girl at the Dunkin he went to on the way in to work asked him out. Rewording what he was going to say over and over, to figure out a way to brush up against all the things he kept thinking and swallowing down.
And Verstappen's reaction was like, exactly what he'd kept thinking he wanted, his eyes getting all big for a second before jerking away, back to his files where he splayed a hand over his page of his notes, like all the sudden Daniel was, like, some guy trying to copy his homework.
But then the date had been, like, shitty. Daniel distracted, having to ask her "Sorry, what were you saying?" like six times. He ate her out and barely got half hard, told her he came rubbing against the mattress, dropped her back home and went through Starbucks on the way to work in the morning, brought Verstappen a coffee he acted like was the worst thing he'd ever tasted.
"You only don't want to because you thought he was nice but of course nice people can also be bad," Verstappen says, his voice high and hoarse, his face turned toward Daniel.
Daniel keeps his eyes on the road, slides his hands along the smooth leather of the steering wheel to take them around a sharp curve.
Verstappen has to grab at his notebook and pen to keep them from sliding off his thighs.
"I don't want to talk to him because he has an alibi," Daniel tells him flatly, "and I'm lead, so: we're not talking to him again."