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"What the heck is aromantic?" Fusco grumbled from behind his computer screen.
Root paused, mid-bite of her apple, to lean in and read over his shoulder. The web page in front of him featured a scrolling rainbow and a lot of bright graphics.
"Reading up on your LGBTQ+ terms, Lionel? That's sweet."
"Yeah well my kid's into theatre. He could end up gay one day. Gotta be prepared."
Root chuckled, "Not positive that's how it works..."
"Huh, we'll see. Can't figure out what all these mean though. I know the basics, but some of these are just... jibber jabber. Like what's a Poly? or an Ace? Or this one, here?"
He pointed again at "Aromantic"
Root paused her apple-worship; "aromantic is when a person wants to do all the between the sheets fun stuff with someone but none of the romantic feelingsy things."
"Hooking up?"
"Mmmm, not really hooking up. More like, not prone to romantic attachment or behavior or relationships, but not necessarily against sex or friendship or other... interactions." Root frowned into her apple, unsure if her explanation made sense.
"Oh. Ok, figures you'd know that."
Root wrinkled her nose, "oh, Lionel, come on now, my letter's not even in that anagram."
"It's not?" Fusco mouthed the label associated with each letter, trying to figure out why Root wouldn't just cop to being an "L," or maybe a "B."
"My letter's an 'N'"
"That's not on here."
"N... as in Not picky."
In his head, Fusco called BS on that one... BS as in Banging Shaw.
He chuckled, "Well, Fruit Loops, if you're an N, Short Dark and Stormy is obviously one of these aromantics."
"Mmm mm," Root crunched into her apple and shook her head, "You can be aromantic along with any of the other labels. It's like an an auxiliary function. But no, Shaw's not aromantic."
"Yeah, right. I can just see her buying you flowers or letting you take her on a date."
Fusco grinned at the image of Shaw, all dressed up and letting Root drag her on a picnic, or showing up somewhere with roses for her perky psycho partner.
"Shawwwwww!" Root called.
Shaw and Bear came trundling down the subway platform. Bear had a mouthful of some kind of bone. Shaw, shoeless and wrapped in a grey hoodie (which, judging by the length of the sleeves, was probably Root's) was busy rubbing sleep out of her eyes.
"This'd better be good. You interrupted my first nap in 36 hours."
"Shaw, what's the most romantic thing we've ever done as a couple?"
Shaw stopped in her tracks and looked away quickly. Fusco's eyes darted between the two women.
"Seriously?" She rubbed the back of her neck, "You woke me up for this?"
"Fusco has been casting aspersions regarding our ability to be deeply and powerfully romantic,"
Root shot an exaggerated pout at Shaw. "Tell him he's wrong."
"Fine. Root."
Shaw tilted her proud chin at them. She glared. Fusco found it hard to take her seriously when her ponytail was all mussed up and her oversized clothes gave her the appearance of a tiny, irate elf.
"The most romantic thing you and I ever did as a couple was that time you broke into my loft but I was expecting you so I had candles out and those special handcuffs we-"
"Second most romantic!" Root interrupted, "he doesn't need to know about that one."
Shaw shrugged and yawned.
"Ugh. Whatever. I guess it was on the anniversary of our second date when you ordered that cake and had it decorated to look like a freshly used taser. And then we watched footage of our best recorded interrogations. And we got called in because Reese had finally caught up to Greer and you shot him in the foot and then you tied him to a chair and you said, 'this is for the hell you put my girlfriend through,' and poured acid on his leg, That was pretty romantic. Even if John, stupid square, wouldn't let us torture him to death."
Shaw regarded Root for a moment, clearly not finished with her list:
"Then there was that time when I got really sick from exposure when I had to work as an ER doctor to get close to that number, and when I was finally able to stay awake for more than four minutes, you randomly showed up with that amazing rifle. It wasn't even declassified yet so I don't know how you got it.... with the state of the art scope and the bayonet-footed tripod. That was seriously the most romantic shit anyone's ever pulled on me."
"You look so hot firing that rifle," Root breathed.
"I know, you showed me pictures."
"That's weird," Fusco said, "romantic, I guess, but kind of stalker-y and definitely weird."
He turned to Root, "so Grumpy lets you do nice stuff for her, fine. But has she ever done something like that for you?"
"You mean besides running into certain death and/or capture by Samaritan at the stock exchange that one time?" Shaw asked.
Fusco said nothing. That hadn't exactly been a romantic gesture. And Root had been batshit for months afterwards, until Shaw's escape, and even a bit after that.
Root stroked Shaw's bicep soothingly. She munched loudly on her apple and chewed thoughtfully for a moment before answering Fusco.
"Shaw does a lot of romantic things. She turned down Tomas in favor of me. That was incredibly sweet of her."
"Yeah. He was REALLY hot," Shaw added. Root nodded.
"Then there was the time I hurt my foot running from that gang and I didn't say anything about it, but Shaw noticed, and hauled me back to her apartment and rubbed my feet."
Shaw coughed awkwardly, "yeah, I don't remember that."
Root smiled her most condescending / disbelieving smile at Shaw and patted her shoulder; "that wasn't all you rubbed that night."
Shaw swatted her hand away and Root continued:
"Then there was the time you made me a key to your apartment, and basically forced me to move in. And bought a pillow for me. And let me decorate. And every day you pretend to like the curtains and throw pillows and matching dishes and the cute little sharks shower curtain, even though I know you could care less about that stuff.
And you let me steal your food, which is probably the nicest thing you do on a daily basis. Oh and you kneecap anyone who so much as looks the wrong way at me. And at night sometimes you do that thing that you don't particularly enjoy but that I love. I don't even ask you to and you do it. Oh! And you stole that processor for me, from the Pentagon! oh, Sameen, that was definitely the most romantic."
Fusco watched them in a sort of muted horror. Shaw stared unblinkingly at Root and Root dropped her mauled apple core into Fusco's bin.
Shaw cleared her throat, "we should go into the train car... and talk about that thing, that we need to, um, talk about."
She turned to Fusco, "Bear needs a walk."
Root nodded at Lionel, all wide-eyed and innocent.
Fusco tried to stay away for at least half an hour, but Bear soon tired of chasing pigeons. When he got back, they were still making out in the subway car.
Reese was cleaning his pistol on one of the plastic work tables. He gave Fusco a friendly nod.
Fusco plopped back down in front of his computer, "I wonder what it is that Shaw hates to do but does for Root..." he wondered aloud after a few moments.
"Spooning," Reese said in a stage-whisper. "What? I heard them talking about it when we were camping."
He lowered his voice and inched closer to Fusco, "Shaw won't even do it unless she gets to be the big spoon."
"How is that possible? She's so tiny!"
"I can hear you," Shaw's annoyed voice floated out from the subway car, "one more word about our sleeping habits and I'll let perky psycho come taser the shit out of you."
"Sameen!" Root chastised, clearly trying to keep her voice down but failing, "I can't tase anybody until you give me back my bra!"