Work Text:
As soon as it’s over, she knows it was a mistake.
Shepard is looking at Garrus, her best friend, illuminated only by the light of her fish tank, lying in her bed and she knows this was a mistake. She also knows she is gonna make it again and again again. There is one thing she can do however.
“Garrus?”
“Yeah?”
“You have to promise me something.”
He shifts around to look at her. “If you think I am about to run around bragging…”
“No that’s….that’s not it”, she takes a deep breath “Promise me that you won’t fall in love with me.”
Garrus blinks “Uhm...okay. I promise. Why?”
“I can’t”, she pushes out the air “I can’t have someone love me. I need to be in a position where I can make the decisions I have to make without knowing I might hurt someone who loves me.”
Garrus tilts his head. “I get that. But please remember that, even if I don’t fall in love with you, I’m still your friend and I care about you.”
Shepard smiles. “I know.”
-
They keep up their friends with benefits...thing after the Suicide Mission and Shepard begins to wonder. If she is having sex with her best friend, someone she would readily die for, isn’t it already a relationship? She keeps pushing the feeling away but Shepard is all too aware that she loves Garrus. She keeps wondering what could happen if they both survived the war. If being the operative word. Because in the likely scenario that one of them dies, an admission of love would leave the other heartbroken. She suspects Garrus feels the same.
Shepard doesn’t talk to him about it of course, doesn’t even try to think about it. She can not afford to be in love, she can not let Garrus be in love with her. There’s just too much potential for pain.
-
Garrus gets injured in the run to the beacon and as Shepard pushes him onto the Normandy to be evacuated she sees the look in his eyes and knows he broke his promise.
“Shep…”
“I told you”, her voice is almost breaking “You promised.”
“I know. I’m sorry, but I…”
“Don’t”
“I love you”
Shepard closes her eyes and presses her lips together. She doesn’t know if the sound she is trying to hold in is a sob or a scream.
“I’m sorry”, Garrus sounds so sad, so broken and she knows the damage is done.
Shepard looks into Garrus eyes, her vision is going blurry with tears. “I love you too.”, she whispers “I always will.”
She gives him one last kiss before the Normandy leaves. Silently, tears rolling down her face, Shepard turns and walks towards her death.