The Easiest Choice

Fraser/Kowalski Fanfiction
Title:	The Easiest Choice
Author(s):	C.L. Finn
Date(s):	2000
Length:
Genre:	slash
Fandom:	due South
External Links:	online here online at AO3
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The Easiest Choice is a Fraser/Kowalski story by C.L. Finn.

Reactions and Reviews

I've been meaning to rec this story for a while now. It's not a new one, I just kept forgetting to rec the damn thing. Thought I had rec'd it, because it's one of my favorites. It falls under the category of, 'why haven't I rec'd this yet?' I have a bad problem of remembering the plot to a story, but not the author or title. I actually, did one of those 'looking for a story' messages regarding this one a while back on a list. Meant to rec it then, but that was when everyone thought the due south archive was closing and trying to save their favorite stuff. (I was trying to make sure I had this one.) So I wasn't sure there would be a link to it for very much longer. Well, it's finally been archived at the due slash site so I found a link for it that I don't think is going to change any time soon. Moving on to the rec. This one is a post COTW (ep Call of the Wild) story. It is set over a decade or so into the future. In it Ray and Fraser have been together for a long time, old married couple in a way. They are still totally hot for each other though. The dance of their relationship, how well they know one another. The others likes and dislikes, what gets them turned on that only the other knows about. That level of comfort together and still so much heat. That is where the true charm of the piece is. It just has a quiet calm to it, of two people settled together, they know no one is going anywhere. Their sure in their love and yet thankful for having it everyday. The piece is just beautiful and I love Ben in this one. He's wonderful in this story, sortof how I see him, in a way. Guard let down and totally gone in love with RayK.

... here's a don't-miss dS fic with a very different tone - a long-term RayK/Fraser relationship fic, by which I mean a story that takes place a decade or more post-Call of the Wild, when the guys have been together for long enough to be an "old married couple." I have two favorites in this genre; The Easiest Choice is one of them.*

The story is told from Fraser's first person POV - one of the best, most appealing Fraser voices I've read. Ray and Fraser have spent the past eleven years in Chicago, during which Ray replaced Welsh as Lieutenant for the 2-7 and Fraser became the Seargent in charge of the consulate. Now they are a few months away from a major life transition - Ray is preparing to take early retirement so they can move to Canada.

The entire story takes place during the course of a single evening, a standard day-in-the-life for the two of them: Fraser picks up Ray from the station and waits while Ray is interrogating a suspect, they drive home and make dinner, Fraser goes running and then cleans his leather accoutrements, Ray reads, they go to bed together. It's a snapshot of their daily life together. Not much really "happens" - but Fraser, anticipating the forthcoming change in their lives, is in a particularly contemplative mood, and throughout the evening he reflects extensively on their years in Chicago and his feelings about the change.

These reflections are seamlessly and masterfully interwoven with the day-to-day details of their evening, and together these comprise the real story. Fraser's memories of the major events in their lives over their time in Chicago and how they dealt with them together are wonderfully evocative, sometimes funny, sometimes touching - the passage about Dief is particularly lovely, perhaps the most moving such passage I've ever read in any dS fic. But more important, these memories - as well as Fraser's recounting of the normal events of their evening - paint a remarkably complete and nuanced portrait of their relationship and illustrate how it has anchored them through the years. And the relationship thus revealed is such an endearingly beautiful, tender, solid one - it's just the kind of future I want to imagine for my favorite pairing.

The writing is absolutely gorgeous; beautifully cadenced, with a quiet, nostalgic, almost wistful tone. The characterization is wonderful - Ray and Fraser are older, changed, but still unmistakably the characters we know and love. It's almost achingly sweet and tender, and yet manages to be not at all sappy, which is quite an achievement. And even better, it has a bit of heat - a wonderful sex scene that's totally consistent with the feel of the fic.

One reviewer has described The Easiest Choice as "the fic equivalent of hot chocolate and a smooshy quilt on a cold, rainy night," and I couldn't have said it better myself. It's one of the most lovely and moving fics I know.

It's gentle and tender and warm and happy. It's the fic equivalent of hot chocolate and a smooshy quilt on a cold, rainy night. Comfort reading of the nicest sort. Slash.