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It was a quiet affair; most of their relationship was.
Just a simple “do you want to get married?” whispered between them in bed one morning as they held each other, simply enjoying the rare moment of closeness.
The question wasn’t out of nowhere – the two had been dating for a number of years, since a little while after Claire had introduced them following the city. Now, with Chris fresh off yet another hospital stay in which only his sister had been able to visit and a long history of Leon… not having anyone, really, who fit the ‘family only’ rule the labs employed, it was only a matter of time.
An equally quiet “of course” was only a formality to follow the kiss that was answer enough for both of them.
So they did: a month and a half later, just after Leon got back from Spain and was put on his mandatory probation week, and Chris took leave to stay with him.
They got married at the courthouse – no big ceremony, no fancy getups, no guest list to sort out, not really anything even that would count as formal vows. All they needed was the two of them in their, uh, objectively nice clothes, a set of plain tungsten rings, and Sherry and Claire to act as their witnesses.
The two girls were miffed that they hadn’t gotten to embarrass them with fussy bachelor parties and even more so with overdramatic, slightly intoxicated speeches; but the tears in their eyes when they watched the two sign their names on the certificate belied how little they actually cared.
The envelope sealed with a lipstick kiss that gifted them a set of photos of the ring exchange and the private, laughter-filled kiss they shared behind one of the building’s stone columns as they were leaving made them tear up again. The little date and “congratulations, boys :)” written on the backs in loopy, thin sharpie made them laugh, though – they should have known to plan for a fifth member.
The thing was – it never really got old either.
Not after Chris moved out of the apartment he and Claire had shared to stay in Leon’s, even though it was smaller and they were ‘forced’ to squish themselves onto his double bed until they thought to invest in a new one for the sake of not ending up on the hardwood every other time they had sex.
Not when they had their bad days, when their minds and bodies were held down by grief and memories and they hid it behind defensive anger until the other could bring them down to pick up the pieces.
Not when the apartment sat empty for weeks at a time and gathered dust, and the only physical tether between them was a ring weighing down Chris’s dog tags under his armor and hidden beneath the glove steadying Leon’s support hand.
Not when they got their certificate renewed along with all their other ten-thousand pieces of government paperwork for their fifth anniversary after Leon legally became Leon, and it felt like the first time all over again, but even better this time around.
Not when Claire dragged both of them into her bridal party so that not only would her maid of honor have to give a speech and dance with her at her wedding, but so would both of her hopeless romantic brothers. Or even when they embarrassed her by slow dancing to every single song with the excuse that if they did anything else, their knees cracking would be audible over her music, even though she found them making out with all the enthusiasm of horny college students in the corner not an hour later.
Not after days, weeks, months, even years of holding hands underneath tables and stealing away into storage closets at HQ and expensive international calls from motel payphones and obliging kisses in the middle of the terminal when they picked each other up from overcrowded airports.
Not after even greater lengths of time of trying and failing to suppress truly idiotic grins and bright blushes every time they got to say ‘my husband’, as they did every single instance that they could just to make al their coworkers fake gag at their happiness.