Endeavour Strawberry and Pistachio

It's mid-afternoon on a Saturday in September, and it's unseasonably warm outside. He hasn't slept for the past 36 hours, but it's been worth it — they solved two murders and saved a young woman from being the third — though, in the end, it had been a close thing.

Morse can feel himself becoming increasingly uncomfortable in his suit and overcoat as he drives DI Thursday home. Sparing his mentor a glance, he wonders how the older man can stand the heat. A good deal taller and broader than Morse, Thursday is flushed and already sweating profusely.

As Morse pulls the car up to the house, the two men say their farewells, and confirm what time Morse should arrive on the following Monday morning. When Thursday gets out of the car to go inside, Morse takes the opportunity to get out and remove his overcoat.

After folding his coat and suit jacket and placing them on the back seat, Morse stands up and turns toward the driver's seat, only to see quite another Thursday walking out of the house. He freezes, wondering for a brief, ludicrous moment if he ought to quickly grab his jacket and put it back on. He doesn't.

Joan Thursday looks like a picture from a fashion magazine in red cigarette pants and a sleeveless top, with a silk scarf moonlighting as a make-shift hair band. As she makes her way over to where he's standing with the Jag, her eyes watch him watching her, almost-but-not-quite-smiling, as though she knows something that he doesn't.

"Miss Thursday," he greets her automatically, with a nod in his usual way, before remembering the countless times she's told him to call her Joan. He knows he's about to get a scolding and nearly smiles at the thought, but catches himself so that it appears as more of a wince.

"Morse, really, why do you insist on greeting me like a grammar school tutor?" she says, in that direct, half-laughing way of hers.

"Beg your pardon," he replies sheepishly, pausing to consider his answer. "Habit, I suppose?"

"You coppers do love your habits," she agrees, with a glance back at the house in reference to her father. "But I intend to break you of this one."

"You'll have a rather grim task ahead of you, I'm afraid," he says, in sympathy.

"Oh, I think I can manage," she assures him with a smile, as she comes to a stop at the passenger side door. "Are you running the car back now?"

"I am."

"Would you mind terribly giving me a lift?" she asks. "I'm going to the cinema, so I'd only have to walk around the corner from the station. If it's no trouble…"

"Not at all — I mean, of course," he says a little too quickly, gesturing vaguely at the Jag and silently cursing his verbal clumsiness as he gets in the driver's side. He starts the engine, and they set off in pleasant silence.

When they turn onto the main road, her brow furrows briefly as her mind catches hold of something. This makes him nervous.

"Well, I'm an appalling sort of friend, aren't I? Almost two years I've been scolding you about saying my name and I don't even know yours."

Morse can feel himself coloring slightly at her revelation, dreading the inevitable embarrassment that comes with sharing his given name — but at the word emfriend/em his eyes widen slightly in surprise and a sort of childlike wonder. He never would have dared to name her as a friend, but her matter-of-fact acknowledgement makes his heart feel full.

Having no notion of his internal flux, Joan takes his silence for reluctance and decides to charm it out of him.

"Seeing as my father believes we've been on at least one date, and we went on another quite by accident, do you think I might finally have the honor of an introduction?" she asks with a pleasant smile, extending a hand awkwardly from the passenger side. It's all he can do to keep his eyes on the road.

"Joan Thursday. It's a pleasure to meet you, mister…"

"Morse." He takes a deep breath and meets her gaze with a glance, scarcely believing that he could give in so easily. "_Endeavour_ Morse," he clarifies, eyes back on the road, but not before he returns the awkward handshake.

"Goodness," she replies kindly, sounding appalled and endeared all at once. "What on earth did you do to deserve _that_?" And he chuckles softly, looking again in her direction.

"I haven't a clue, but it must have been something very dreadful indeed," he ventures, his joke earning him a very satisfying laugh. "My father was a Quaker and they tend toward virtuous nouns when it comes to naming children," he explains.

"Well, I promise not to tell anyone," she says, conspiratorially. "But, as your friend, I reserve the right to call you by your name when no one's around. It's not as if you don't live up to it, you know. It isn't false advertising."

He hardly knows what to say to that, and does the only thing he can: he coughs nervously and puts both hands back on the wheel. Recognizing his discomfort with compliments, Joan changes the subject.

"What's your favorite ice cream?" she asks him casually. He inadvertently turns and glances at her when he answers.

"Strawberry," he says before realizing what he's doing. She smiles at his response, and Morse can feel himself blush slightly as he wonders whether she has figured out that her spontaneous questions are the easiest way to get an honest answer out of him.

When they are a few blocks from the station, she asks him to pull over and he parks the car near a small common, across the street from a row of shops. When she gets out of the car, he stays in the driver's seat, once again unsure what to do. After a few steps she seems to realize that he's not following her, so she turns around and catches his gaze.

"Well, come on, then," she says playfully, encouraging him to follow her. So he does.

She leads the way to an ice cream parlor and orders two ice cream cones — one strawberry and one pistachio. When he goes to pay for them, she shoots him a look that makes him put his money back in his pocket. She hands him the strawberry cone, and then pays for them herself.

"Thank you," he blurts out accidentally, as if the words were a sneeze.

"The pleasure is all mine," she says amiably, taking the pistachio cone and turning to exit the shop. He follows her outside and they walk toward the small park, eating their ice cream. Once they reach the grassy common, she turns to him, halting their progress.

"Hold this," she demands kindly, handing him her cone without waiting for a response. He takes it, both perplexed and amused by her audacity.

"You can't possibly be comfortable in long sleeves," she says, and he silently concedes that she's not wrong as she proceeds to unbutton his cuffs and fold them up to his elbows.

He is alternately embarrassed, enthralled, and endeared by her ability to use his own manners against him — she knows that he would never drop their ice cream cones, so he has no way of preventing her from attending to his sleeves in such a familiar way.

A light breeze moves her hair and he catches the faint scent of her perfume while she works. She is quick but careful, her folding neat and efficient, as though she wants him to understand that she, too, likes things to be _just so_.

Somehow she has managed to trick him into being more comfortable, and he suddenly finds himself almost overwhelmed by the urge to kiss her. But the manners and the ice cream cones in his hands prevent him from acting on it, and he silently thanks divine providence for both. It isn't the first time his mind has entertained the idea of snogging Joan Thursday to within an inch of her life, but it _is_ the first time he's been in danger of actually having a go at it.

Instead he directs a small, disbelieving smile in her direction as she finishes with his sleeves, straightens his collar, and tugs lightly on his windsor knot to loosen the tie from his neck.

"There," she says with evident satisfaction. "Isn't that better?" The question is probably rhetorical, but he finds himself answering anyway.

"Yes, it is," he replies with appreciation, only half surprised to find that it's true. She takes back the pistachio cone and immediately attends to the sides that have begun to drip. He does the same to his strawberry cone, and they resume their stroll in the park without a word.

He glances at Joan every now and then, considering her as they finish their ice cream. She is kind in a way that reminds him of his sister Joyce — she respects him and treats him like an equal; she is honest; and somehow her teasing always manages to make him feel noticed and appreciated rather than awkward and inadequate.

But where Joycie has always tended toward meekness when it comes to her own wants and needs — no doubt a result of living in a house with Gwen for so long — Joan simply asks for what she wants. And, more often than not, she gets it.

Morse's problem is that he finds her frankness as disconcerting as it is exhilarating.

When she speaks to him she always seems to be looking directly at him, and she is not at all discouraged by his almost painful reserve. He's only slightly embarrassed to admit how much he likes the fearless, unselfconscious way she looks at him, as if he is the only person in the universe she wants to talk to.

Those big brown eyes of hers are dangerous. They make him consider saying and doing things he would never say or do normally. Of course he never says or does them; but for someone as thoughtful and reserved as Morse, mere consideration is enough to drive him to distraction.

"Endeavour?"

"Hmm?" he responds distractedly, taking a bite out of his sugar cone. He doesn't see her smile at his failure to notice that she's addressed him by his given name.

"If we're going to be friends, we ought to know more about each other, don't you think?" What he thinks is that his heart might have stopped, just for a moment, and it's a minor miracle that he manages to swallow the bit of cone he's chewing without choking on it.

"I suppose so," he replies, unsure of what she's asking. He is surprised to find her looking uncharacteristically hesitant.

"I like talking to you. I like that you notice things that other people don't, and you have good manners, and you're the sort of copper that sees young ladies safely home. You aren't patronizing, and you can even be funny when you make an effort," she teases. He smiles. "But I don't know what kinds of films you like, or what makes you laugh, or why you like… opera." He chuckles at the last comment, acknowledging that his taste in music is far from the mainstream.

"I like talking to you, too," he admits before he can change his mind. She smiles and her posture relaxes a little, and he feels like his heart might burst out of his chest. "Lawrence of Arabia, the Sound of Music, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Mary Poppins," he offers.

"Okay, _now_ you're having me on," she says, skeptically. "_Mary Poppins?_"

"Yes, Joanie. _Mary Poppins_," he confirms, with a chuckle of feigned exasperation. "Why would I lie about that?"

"You wouldn't, I suppose," she admits. Then the smile returns, bigger than before, and she directs it at him. "You called me _Joanie_."

"Did I." He is suddenly uncomfortable because he truly hadn't realized that he'd said it. But she seems very pleased by it for some reason, so his embarrassment quickly starts to ebb.

"You did. See?" she nudges him with her shoulder playfully, as she eats her ice cream. "I told you I could wear you down."


End file.
