Chapter Text
1.
“I just don’t see why you couldn’t have picked up your goddamn phone!” Leorio shouts, for perhaps the eighth time in this conversation. “Gon needed you!”
“Gon had you. He had Killua. What was I going to do that you two couldn’t?” Kurapika’s tone is cool and clipped and it drives Leorio crazy, how he can remain so infuriatingly calm in the midst of an argument.
“What about me then, huh?” Leorio asks, softer this time. “It wasn’t just Gon who needed you. I needed you, Kurapika.”
For just a moment, Kurapika looks disarmed and strangely vulnerable. But the look passes as quickly as it came.
“Believe it or not, I have obligations in my life besides attending to your every emotional need.”
Leorio laughs, but there isn’t any humor in it.
“Oh, right, your noble crusade. When are you going to admit to yourself that it’s not even about the revenge anymore? When are you going to finally own up to the fact that it’s just you refusing to actually sit with your grief?”
Kurapika’s eyes go wide.
“I beg your pardon?” he demands, voice just beginning to rise. Finally, a bit of anger. Leorio knows it shouldn’t feel like such a victory, but it does.
“You’re not righting some great injustice, Kurapika! You’re not really avenging anyone. You’re just unable to find any other way to cope with what you went through! And it was awful—I know that. Or maybe I don’t. How could I know, really? But the point is you’ve gotta figure out a way to work through it, because I am done watching you destroy yourself and the people who love you over this.”
Kurapika flushes bright red and strides up to Leorio until they’re only inches apart. It doesn’t carry quite the intimidation Kurapika wants it to, given that Leorio has quite a bit of height on him, and Kurapika has to crane his neck to look Leorio in the eye, but the sheer force of Kurapika’s glare gives him pause.
“Where do you get to thinking you have any say in the choices I make?” he demands, jabbing a finger into Leorio’s chest. “What right do you have to that?”
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because I’m your friend? Maybe because I care about you, and I lie awake at night worrying about you, and I’m sick and tired of watching you self-destruct?”
“I am not ‘self-destructing.’” Kurapika snaps. “I’m doing what needs to be done.”
“Sure, sweetheart,” Leorio says. “Keep telling yourself that.”
“Don’t take that tone with me!”
“Yeah?” Leorio challenges. “Make me.”
It’s an extremely childish response and Leorio really should be above it. But as soon as he says it, a strange look comes over Kurapika’s face. It’s the look before a person jumps into a cold lake on a winter’s day. Or the look before someone throws the first punch. It’s the look of setting aside all reservations. Of abandoning all better judgment. Of taking an enormous risk.
Kurapika reaches up and grabs Leorio’s shirt tight in his fists. For a moment, Leorio worries Kurapika is going to hit him, but all at once Kurapika yanks him down and kisses him.
It should be a violent sort of kiss, one of those desperate, demanding ones that’s more teeth than anything else. But Kurapika is insistent and gentle all at once, kissing Leorio not like he’s angry, but like he simply couldn’t hold back anymore. His mouth is so warm and his hands are so tight in Leorio’s shirt and it’s incredible, it’s years worth of affection and frustration and yearning all at once. Leorio’s just really beginning to enjoy it, just about to thread his hands through Kurapika’s hair and pull him closer, when Kurapika pulls back.
“I’m… I’m sorry,” he begins, but Leorio doesn’t let him get any farther than that. He takes Kurapika’s face in his hands and kisses him. Hard.
“Don’t even think about apologizing,” he murmurs between kisses. “Can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted you to do that.”
When at last he pulls back for just a moment, Kurapika looks up at him, and Leorio can’t remember the last time his eyes were so deeply scarlet.
2.
Leorio’s whole body aches. It’s been a long shift at the hospital, one of those really hectic ones in which every time he turns around, there’s somehow another crisis demanding his attention. He’s leaving two hours later than he was supposed to, but he didn’t want to go home until his last patient, the father with the three young children all fighting to curl up with him in his hospital bed, emerged from surgery.
The sun has long since set and the drive seems twice as long as usual, but knowing he’ll be going home to Kurapika eases some of the weariness. The kiss those two months ago had led to a discussion, which had led to a shy, inarticulate confession, which had led to this, Kurapika and Leorio sharing a studio apartment while Leorio finishes his residency.
It’s far from perfect. The two of them still bicker incessantly, and of course there’s the nagging anxiety in the back of Leorio’s mind that Kurapika’s just going to up and disappear again, and the apartment really wasn’t made to accommodate two people. So it’s not perfect. But it doesn’t have to be. This is enough, Leorio pulling into the parking space and seeing the light on through the blinds and knowing Kurapika is waiting for him.
But when Leorio makes it up the stairs and opens the door to the apartment, Kurapika doesn’t rush to greet him like he usually does. He’s sitting at the table reading a book, and doesn’t so much as lift his head when Leorio opens the door.
“Hey,” Leorio says, kicking off his shoes by the door. He heads over to where Kurapika’s sitting and drapes himself over the back of his chair, wrapping his arms around Kurapika from behind and going to kiss his cheek. Kurapika sets his book facedown on the table, but makes no move to return Leorio’s affection.
“You’re two hours late,” he says.
“Yeah, I’m really sorry,” Leorio replies, not moving from where he’s draped himself over Kurapika. “Maybe it was a full moon today, but things were just bonkers for the whole shift.”
“You didn’t text me to let me know. You didn’t reply when I asked where you were.”
A strange mix of fondness and exasperation clenches in Leorio’s chest. Beneath Kurapika’s cool, competent exterior, he can be surprisingly petulant and demanding, and Leorio can’t help but find it cute.
“I know,” Leorio murmurs, kissing Kurapika’s cheek again. “I’m sorry. I hardly had a chance to check my phone for the whole shift. I’ll do better next time.”
“I was worried,” he says flatly.
“Aww, really? You were worried about me?”
“Shut up,” Kurapika says, shoving Leorio off of himself and standing up from the table. Given the size of the apartment, he can’t really storm off, but he at least walks the few feet into the kitchen, gets a glass, and begins to fill it in the sink.
Leorio sighs.
“Come on, baby,” he pleads, “don’t be like that.”
Kurapika abruptly looks up from the sink. His eyes are wide and his cheeks are flushed and he stands stock still for several long moments.
“Hey, your cup is overflowing,” Leorio says, gesturing to where the still-running water spills over the edge and down the outside of the glass.
Kurapika blinks. He looks down at his hands with a slightly puzzled expression, as if surprised to be finding the glass there. He stares at it for a moment too long before turning off the water, then lifts the glass to his lips and drains half of it in one go.
“Wait,” Leorio says slowly, the realization dawning on him. “Are you really that flustered that I called you ‘baby?’”
Kurapika’s face only goes redder and he shoots Leorio a withering glare.
“No.”
Leorio can’t help but grin. Kurapika’s never been good at lying to him.
“You are so cute I can hardly stand it.”
“I am not cute, ” Kurapika snaps.
Leorio joins Kurapika at the sink and wraps his arms around his waist from behind.
“You’re right, you’re right. I’m sorry. You’re not cute.” Leorio pauses for a moment, then grins in spite of himself. “You’re absolutely adorable .”
“Leorio, you’re seriously--hey!”
Whatever protest Kurapika was about to make is cut off when Leorio reaches down an arm beneath his knees, braces the other beneath his shoulders, and scoops him up into his arms. He’s so quick and smooth about it that Kurapika doesn’t spill any of the water from the glass he’s still holding.
It’s probably unfair to use his strength to his advantage like this, but Kurapika’s now blushing all the way down his throat and his pupils have blown impossibly, breathtakingly wide, and that’s not exactly negative reinforcement.
“Put me down.” Kurapika most likely means for it to come out as low and commanding, but his voice has gone far too breathy for it to have the desired effect.
“Hmm, I don’t think I will,” Leorio says, reaching down to kiss Kurapika’s forehead. Kurapika shoves him away and clears his throat.
“Put me down. Now.”
His voice is steadier this time, but the blush has only grown darker.
“How about you give me one good reason I should?”
Something bright and sudden flashes in Kurapika’s eyes, like a lightning strike, and then in one swift motion, he takes the half-full glass of water he’d been holding and dumps it directly onto Leorio’s head.
The water is actually oddly refreshing after what a long day Leorio’s had, dripping in slow, cool rivulets down his face and neck, and the grin Kurapika is so clearly failing to hold back makes his heart clench in his chest.
“Is that a good enough reason for you?”
Leorio just throws his head back and laughs, loud and full-bodied and delighted. And although he’s doing his best to be quiet about it, he can feel Kurapika’s body shaking in his arms enough to tell that he’s laughing too.