Title: The penny jar theory

Fandom: due South
Pairing: Fraser/Kowalski
Categories: slash, established relationship, post-canon
Length: medium, ~13,000 words
Warnings: none really

Author on Livejournal: deputychairman
Author Website: Deputychairman on AO3

Summary: “How - ” Fraser cleared his throat. “How long is the contract?”
“Six months,” Ray told the stew.
“And will you,” he stopped. Ray heard the deep breath he took. Taking it on the chin, attaboy, Ben. “Are you planning to come back here, afterwards?”

Review: The last two weeks I've read nothing but due South, so with due permission--it's someone else's reccing fandom--I'm sneaking in a rec of my favourite so far of the fics that seem to have appeared since last I read dS.

The question that seems to have the strongest pull on me post-series is What does Kowalski do in Canada? and this fic is centred around the practicalities of him trying to find an answer to exactly that, and the ways Fraser and Ray's relationship has to shift around it. The fic exists in a world where the answers aren't perfect and the characters have to make compromises. It's not an unhappy fic, not really, but oddly bittersweet.

I love to bits the central images of the dubious gift of the Penny Jar -- and the time limit/death-knell of a relationship that it starts off by proclaiming -- and Ray Kowalski heading off to work on the isolation of an oil rig without Fraser's approval.

The penny jar theory