jackson healy/holland march, manicure. word count: 666.
The car sways when March gets in, because he's a jackass and drops his full weight into the seat. It's not early ā midday, in fact ā but March looks half asleep and smells like bourbon, sprawled in his seat and resting his head back like it aches. It doesn't take a detective to work that one out.
"Afternoon, March," he says, half to be an asshole and half out of genuine social convention. March doesn't seem to be in the mood for conversation, but Healy can't have a man climb into his car without greeting him. It's not proper.
March groans vaguely. Healy pulls off. He doesn't doubt March would still be in bed ā or, more realistically, wherever he landed when he passed out ā if he could, but they've got a case, people to interview, and March gets pissy when Healy does things without him. They've argued several times about how, in order to be included, March has to be conscious and at least half sober during Healy's working hours, and March has protested many times that he does his best work drunk and that surely they can work in the evenings.
March would probably still be late and hungover. Healy imagines moving their 'office hours' to late nights and having March wake up late at 6am, successfully shoved ass-backwards into being a functional human being.
"Jesus Christ," March whines, "What is this bullshit?"
His hand goes for the radio and yanks irritatedly at the dial, and Healy's classical music melts into static. A few seconds of pop, then rock, then a newscaster's voice, then pop again, all filter through the white noise intermittently, but March is turning the dial too fast to successfully land on any station. Healy lasts maybe a minute through him trying before one hand leaves the steering wheel to seize March's wrist.
"Stop that," he snaps, over March's high-pitched shriek of protest, and he goes to say something else ā perhaps tell March to keep his goddamn hands to himself while Healy turns his fucking music back on, but a glance downwards has every word he's ever known dying on his tongue. His gaze is stuck, despite the car still very much in motion, because March's bony wrist is still held in his palm and March's stupid pretty hand is there, and.
And his fingernails are painted.
Sparkly blue, maybe turquoise, shimmery and pretty and shifting slightly like the paint on a real nice car. March follows Healy's gaze down to them and blinks at them like he's seeing them for the first time. He holds up his other hand as if to see if it matches, and it does. He groans.
"Holly," he says. "She was doin' her nails last night, and asked if she could do mine."
"I was drunk," March adds quickly, defensively, clearly interpreting Healy's staring in his own way. "It's the only reason I let her."
The manicure's well done. The colour looks good with the suit March is wearing, surely the same one he was wearing last night when Holly did his nails.
A horn blares. Healy brakes hard to avoid flying through an intersection, gaze forced away from his fascination. March almost goes flying forwards into the dashboard with the force of their stop, but Healy braces him instinctively with a hand across his middle, resolutely not looking at him.
The lights change. Healy keeps driving, listening to the radio static. Eventually, he dares to take a hand from the steering wheel again, confident enough it won't go wandering off and find March's again. He turns the radio back to classical, and, as keys and strings flutter, manages to speak.
"Looks good," he says roughly. "She's good at that."
From the corner of his eye he sees pride overtake March, and he holds out his pretty hands ā long fingers, painted nails ā to admire them.
Healy thinks it's going to be a long fucking day.
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