Chapter Text
Cody’s knees almost buckle under the weight of his general stumbling into him, throwing an arm around Cody’s shoulders, head titled back with laughter.
“Come on—” Cody breaks off, giggling as well, trying to urge Obi-Wan to keep walking,“Sir, we have to…it’s late.”
Rather than listen, Obi-Wan crumbles down to the ground, gesturing vaguely towards the sky. “But it’s so nice here Cod-commander, there’s so many lights.”
Suddenly, the ground looks like a great option, and before Cody’s even conscious of realizing this, he’s on his knees next to Obi-Wan, peering over the drop-off nearby, ships whizzing by, lights getting more faded as the levels descend.
Now they’re lying down, Obi-Wan on his back, Cody stretched on his stomach next to him, sides pressed together, wheezing with laughter even though neither of them has said anything particularly funny.
Obi-Wan’s commlink goes off; he fumbles to accept the message; Cody hopes vaguely that it’s not anyone important, who could get him in trouble.
“Obi-Wan? Where are you?” It’s General Skywalker, luckily.
“On the ground, Anakin,” Obi-Wan says through giggles, “I don’t…I don’t know why…”
“Are you drunk?” Skywalker asks, slightly exasperated, but with an undercurrent of…relief?
“Ah…well, you don’t have to worry about me being around, you can have your time with Padmé.”
Cody’s head snaps up to look at Obi-Wan, eyes wide with questioning, trying and failing to stifle more giggles.
“Master, I’m not—” Skywalker sputters, but is overpowered by Cody and Obi-Wan’s raucous laughter.
A few Twi’leks walking by glance down in concern, but apparently noticing that they’re a Jedi and solider, keep on their way.
Skywalker scoffs. “Okay, well, it’s just the same as you and—”
Obi-Wan snaps off the commlink with surprising reflexes, smoothing an anxious hand through his hair; Cody raises an eyebrow but decides not to pursue. If Obi-Wan has a secret lover too, well…he’d rather not hear anything about that.
“We should, we have to…” Obi-Wan starts, sitting up and waving a hand around, now not laughing anymore.
Cody just nods, picking himself off the ground and standing all the way up after only three tries; Obi-Wan needs to use Cody’s hand to pull himself up.
“I can’t…my men…I would not be a good example,” Cody says as they stumble down the street, knowing he’s too far gone to pretend like he hasn’t been drinking in front of his men, and knowing he’d be incredibly embarrassed to let them see him in this state. He has nowhere else to go, though, unless he finds some place open through the night to just camp out, get some caf, wait it out until he’s sober enough to go back—
“Sleep with me,” Obi-Wan replies, slightly too loudly, and then cringes knocking his shoulder into Cody’s again. “I mean, Cody, you can come with me, sleep where I am…sleep, there’s no men there at all…none brothers.”
Well, he’s not going to turn that down. A much better option.
Obi-Wan’s chambers in the Jedi Temple are unsurprisingly small, modest; although normally Cody would be drinking in any details about Obi-Wan as he could, in his current mental state, all Cody can think about is getting out of his clothes and lying down. After spending his life almost consistently surrounded by his brothers, with not an ounce of shame among them (honestly much helped by the fact that they all share the same body), he undresses without thinking, only dimly aware of Obi-Wan doing the same on the other side of the room. By the time Cody’s eyes have caught up with his mind, though, Obi-Wan is already stretched out in his bed, blankets covering everything but the top of his head.
Cody stands for a moment, blinking, realizing the gravity of the situation, having only one bed. But Obi-Wan brought him here, is definitely occupying only the right side of the bed. Had Cody’s head not been swimming with alcohol he likely would have made a different decision, but as it stands his impulsivity is through the roof, so he just tucks himself into bed next to his general.
“G’night, Cody,” Obi-Wan mumbles, turning slightly to smile over his shoulder, before passing out.
Suddenly, Cody feels wide awake.
He lies in darkness for what feels like hours, desperately trying to make his head stop spinning, thinking about everything but the sound of Obi-Wan’s heavy breathing so close to his ear.
“Sir? Are you awake?” he whispers. No response.
Cody isn’t really sure why he starts talking at all; it’s like something comes over him, even more than the alcohol, compelling him to spill what he’d been saving up in his heart for the past several long months.
“Sir, I…I could never say so if you were awake, if you were listening, but,” Cody whispers to the ceiling, and his next words come out in a rush, “I…mirdi gar’mesh’la. Ni vercopaani ni reta’tayli, aala yaim’la ti gar. Ni copaani gar cuyir ner…cyar’ika…ni kar’tayl gar darasuum.” For a few long moments, Cody lies in silence, not really able to believe that he said it aloud. Then his brain catches up with his mouth and he snaps his eyes over to Obi-Wan’s dark form, trying to assess whether he’s actually asleep. Surely, if not, he would give some indication? Say something?
“General? Sir?” Cody says as quietly as possible, making sure he doesn’t wake Obi-Wan; he had after all checked in before saying anything, so the chances of him having been heard are slim-to-none. Also, Cody has no idea what his grasp of Mando’a is; even if Obi-Wan had been awake, he isn’t sure how much would have even been comprehensible.
Obi-Wan stays silent, chest rising and falling slowly and steadily, nothing to indicate he’s anything but in an alcohol-induced sound sleep.
— — —
When Cody wakes the next morning, squinting at the harsh light pouring through the windows, head pounding, he remembers nothing.
Obi-Wan remembers everything.
— — —
“I know I say this every time but…I’m never getting drunk again,” Cody grumbles to himself, expecting to hear some razzing, and the the general clamor of his brothers around the barracks. Instead, he’s hit with silence, and a heartbeat later he realizes that this is not his bed and the barracks do not normally smell like breakfast.
He lurches up, which makes his head spin, taking in the room and trying to assess where the hell he is, when someone in an incredibly fluffy robe walks in the doorway.
“Good morning, Cody,” Obi-Wan says simply, “How are you feeling?”
Cody chokes on his own breath, blinking rapidly as if the man standing before him is going to disappear one of the times that Cody opens his eyes, trying to process the situation as best he can when his brain is just…screaming.
“This is where you live? Why am I here?” Cody manages to ask, gesturing vaguely.
Several emotions flash over Obi-Wan’s face, too quick for Cody to discern; Obi-Wan finally settles on confusion.
“I lose my memory very easily when I drink,” Cody explains, guessing the questions, “but I’m glad I ended up somewhere safe, at least.”
Obi-Wan smiles, and then points to the floor next to Cody’s side of the bed.
“I collected and folded your clothes there; breakfast is through here when you’re dressed.” With that, he turns and heads back through the door, in the direction of the wonderful smells.
My clothes? Cody thinks, suddenly becoming aware of the fact that he’s naked under the blankets.
Mind racing with anxieties about what he may have done last night, Cody quickly slips on his clothes and checks his reflection in the mirror hanging across from Obi-Wan’s bed. He’s not sure why; it’s not like he expects to look any different, and his hair isn’t long enough to get messed up by sleep. Other than sightly bloodshot eyes framed by a couple new dark circles, he looks exactly the same as he always has; seeing himself in the mirror, seeing the same, boring face that currently runs around under millions of helmets, Cody reminds himself that nothing about him is special, and the chances are slim-to-none that anything…happened with his general last night. And even if Obi-Wan decided he wanted to experiment with fucking one of his soldiers, it’s not like he would pick Cody.
Besides, waking up naked means nothing, isn’t unusual; Cody’s slept naked plenty of times surround by brothers in the barracks, and he certainly hasn’t fucked any of them.
Shaking his head to clear it, Cody follows the way Obi-Wan went, stepping into a kitchen area, modest like the bedroom, where Obi-Wan is sitting at a small round table which is set for a meal.
Obi-Wan smiles mildly when he sees Cody, gesturing to sit. He almost groans aloud at seeing the rich spread of eggs, sausage, and fresh waffles, still steaming, set before him.
Various gratitudes tumbling out — all of which Obi-Wan waves off — Cody digs into the food, torn between wanting to hoarf it all down, and wanting to go slow and savor it; this is probably the last time he’ll have a fresh Jedi-cooked breakfast, especially one made by Obi-Wan, and the memory needs to get him through the hundreds of military meals stretching into the foreseeable future.
“How much exactly do you remember from last night?” Obi-Wan asks, attempting to appear casual by keeping his eyes down on the waffle he’s cutting, but his slightly shaky tone, and the way his voice goes unnaturally high at the end, betray him.
A slight sinking sensation in Cody’s stomach. “Nothing after about the eighth drink, when that Zabrak was trying to seduce you. What…um, did I do anything embarrassing? Untoward?” Please don’t say I said anything to you…tried anything…did anything that would jeopardize our friendship, or working relationship…or my position as a commander.
Obi-Wan is silent for several long moments, the flush on Cody’s face deepening in direct correlation with his anxiety rising higher each second. “Sir, I have been known to act very strange while drunk, say and do things I don’t mean at all, and if I—”
“No, no, don’t worry,” Obi-Wan finally answers, doing nothing to quell Cody’s worries. Seemingly realizing how weak his denial is, Obi-Wan continues: “We both made slight fools of ourselves, in the normal way anybody does while incredibly inebriated. Nothing to worry about, though, nothing more than that.”
Cody lets out a breath he hadn’t been conscious of holding, shoulders dropping down with relief. That was too close of call; he can’t ever get drunk around Obi-Wan again, at least until he squashes out the feelings he has for the general. He’d been trying, of course, from the moment he realized he thought of Obi-Wan as more than his commanding officer, and then as more than his friend; the closer the two became, the worse his feelings developed. This morning is…certainly not helping the plight, not with how adorable Obi-Wan looks with his head framed by the fluffs of his robe, back of his hair sticking up from sleep, eyelids still a bit droopy, and his guard down in a way Cody hasn’t seen before. Unsurprisingly; of course Obi-Wan is relaxed at his home versus on the battlefield. It doesn’t mean it’s any less lovely to Cody, though. Oh, to be able to see comfortable sleepy Obi-Wan every morning for the rest of his life.
“All good?” Obi-Wan asks, and Cody realizes he’s been staring vaguely into the space over Obi-Wan’s shoulder, fork paused halfway to his mouth.
“Yes, sir, just, uh, not quite awake,” Cody says quickly, stuffing a large bite into his mouth so he doesn’t have to speak further for a moment.
“I’m glad you like it all.” Obi-Wan sighs, looking down at his hands, which are squeezed together in an uncharacteristic way. “You really don’t remember anything after that?”
Something happened. Something definitely happened.
“Sir, if I did anything, if anything happened, no I don’t remember but please…” Cody says, cupping his face in his hands and rubbing his temples.
Obi-Wan laughs; it sounds natural but oddly insincere. “Don’t worry, Cody, it’s me who was the fool.”
In all of his worrying, and mind running through possibilities, somehow Cody had missed the idea that Obi-Wan did something embarrassing he’s glad Cody doesn’t remember.
With that finally out of the way, Cody satisfied that he didn’t try to seduce his general or confess his feelings or anything of the sort, and Obi-Wan apparently satisfied that Cody truly lost his memory, they pass the rest of the meal slowly talking about anything that comes to mind, but both consciously (difficulty) trying to avoid any conversation around war.
“This was the best meal I’ve had in a long time,” Obi-Wan confesses, as he walks Cody to the door after the commander had finally insisted he should be getting back to his men. “I don’t really get the chance to cook for anyone else. You’re welcome to come back any time you want.”
Cody knows it’s sincere.
“I would certainly enjoy that, general. I’ll see you later. Hopefully under equally pleasant circumstances.” They both know that won’t be the case, that the next time their paths cross it will be on a ship headed to wherever they’re risking their lives next.
When Obi-Wan pauses at the door, Cody wishes he could give Obi-Wan a hug, feel the warmth of their bodies pressed together, bury his face in the side of his generals neck.
Instead, he settles for a nod and an awkward wave which he knows he’ll beat himself up for later, using all of his willpower not to look back at Obi-Wan as he heads down the temple hallway.