Work Text:
Never A Concern
“Are you sure about this love?”
Inej hummed back an affirmative, never looking up as she sorted through her dorm. She’d already packed the majority of her things, but now Nina and her were going through the last of it. Matthias was waiting downstairs in his truck, an assortment of boxes shoved in the back of his truck.
Inej folded another of her sweaters, tucking it into a box next to the rest of her wardrobe. She sealed it, then took a step back to give the space a once over. Bare beige walls looked back at her, devoid of their usual coverings. It had been her home for two years now at Ketterdam University. Two wonderfully chaotic years of rooming with Nina and managing general classes and talking to her every night. Two years of going back and forth on her next steps and what she wanted to be in life, and her own advice to Nina bouncing around the walls.
Now she was leaving it behind her.
“Yeah.” She said, bending down and hoisting up the last box. Nina gave her a look, some special mixture of curious and concerned.
“It’s Kaz.” Nina reminded as they descended the staircase. “As in Kaz Brekker, the man who has dirt on everyone that dares to breathe in Ketterdam.”
“He is more than a myth.”
Nina rolled her eyes. “Not my point. You’re electing to willing- willing- take up residence with Kaz in his two bedroom two bathroom apartment. I’m just doing my due diligence as your friend to ensure that you know you’ll be rooming with a mob boss that can kill you.”
Inej smiled, “He’s our friend you know.”
Nina shrugged. “Doesn’t change the fact that he scares me.”
“You speak so cruelly and yet you love him too in your own special way.”
“I would indeed be devastated if Kaz died or skipped town before I could cash out all the favors he’s asked of me.”
Inej rolled her eyes again, pushing the door open with her back and heading down the sidewalk. Matthias leaned out the window of his truck, lips twisted into a tight smile.
“‘Nej.” He nodded to the back of the cabin. “If it’s light, throw it in with you. I know we aren’t going far but…” He trailed off, lips quirking into a half smile.
Honestly it baffled Inej how Matthias managed to be so much of a standard stereotypical jock, and yet so much not like them at all. He was quiet and kind and polite, and the first time they met he offered her a handshake and asked if she knew where he could find a record shop that had Choppin.
He was an enigma and yet not.
He fit all the stereotypes and yet none of them at the same time.
“Box of clothes?” She asked with a grin.
“Put it in the back with you. Could go either way.”
Inej climbed in, and a moment later Nina jumped into the front seat. Matthias shifted the truck into reverse backing out of the space and heading down the road. It truthfully wasn’t that far from her dorm to Kaz’s apartment, perhaps a handful of blocks totaling a ten minute walk or a three minute drive.
Matthias’s truck arrived before Inej had time to muster the courage to assure Nina everything was fine. So she bailed. She sprung out of the truck and fully committed to the act of moving her belongings into Kaz’s so graciously offered space.
He met them at the door, tall, lanky and imposing. He’d dressed casually today, or as casually as the man seemed to know how to dress. It’s still black slacks and black socks, but his white button up had two buttons undone and the sleeves were rolled up an entire cuff length before his pale skin disappeared beneath his gloves.
“Daring amount of skin showing.” She teased, and in response he’d simply smirked.
There were no misunderstandings between them. She knew he could not stand the brush of skin against skin. He knew she could not bear the touch of a man, the intrusive breath of someone so close to her. She could not- would not-
She took a deep breath.
“Your room is the one at the end of the hall.” Kaz explained, his gait uneven as he moved from the front door to lead the way. His cane clicks against the hardwoods of the apartment. “You know the space.” He added, gesturing at the kitchen and then the bathroom with an off hand. “You can have the first bathroom. I’ll take the second.”
The second bathroom was smaller and did not have a tub.
Inej wasn’t sure if that was a conscious decision or not, she only knows that Kaz hated being wet almost as much as he hated being touched. She supposed that was why he had all of those damn water bottles.
She should ask him about those. He seems to alternate, but she’s never seen any given one for more than a week. Jesper has mentioned that he likes to get Kaz obnoxiously coloured ones every now and then, but the worst she’s seen the man carry was a dark purple one.
He didn’t seem to mind, but Inej didn’t see it the following week.
Water bottles aside he was allowing her to stay in his apartment for a manageable rent and there was no chance that this room would suddenly become ‘unavailable’ due to ‘unforeseen additional retention for freshman.’ It was bullshit, and Kaz had confirmed it, but there wasn’t anything he could technically do about it.
Inej wasn’t sure she wanted to know what ‘technically’ meant in that context.
Regardless, he’d offered the extra bedroom and bathroom he had in his apartment. An offer that caused more than a little controversy.
Kaz stopped at that door at the end of the hall, producing a set of keys from a pocket, he tallied them off before handing Inej a set of three. SHe frowned, and he gesutred to the door to her bedroom in explanation.
There was a lock.
“Why is there a lock?”
“It’s a keyed lock on both sides.” Kaz explained simply.
Inej stared at it, then looked at him again.
“I don’t have a key.” He added.
“Why?”
Only now does his stoicism falter and the hard look in his eyes shift to what Inej would almost call uncertainty if she didn’t know that Kaz knew exactly what he was doing all of the time. “Do you want me to?”
It’s a simple question, but it’s one that Inej isn’t sure she knows the answer of.
“You’re moving into my spare bedroom. I thought it might be…” Kaz hesitated, stalling for a moment in his own thoughts. “I thought it might be good for you to know there is always a place that only you have access to.”
She smiled at him. “How long would it take you to pick that lock?”
“Less than a minute. But,” Leather clad fingers ghost over the lock, seams catching on the lip of it. “I promise you that this is a lock I will never touch, never pick, never rekey, for so long as you tell me to.”
“So it’s my room?” She asked.
He nodded.
And for just a moment she felt like she saw him without his usual visage. There were no gloves, no calculated glares or smug smirks. There was no scheme behind this offer, no underhanded tactic to gain her trust, only a genuine effort to make her feel comfortable in the only way Kaz Brekker knew how.
“For as long as you wish it.”
Inej smiled at him.
And then the moment was broken as she heard Matthias’s boots thud against the front door and the faint grumblings of an argument between him and Nina echoing down the hall.
“I’ll direct them to your room.” Kaz huffed, “figure out where you want to put everything.”
He left.
Leaving three keys in her hand, each imprinted with a little letter. Two marked ‘A’ which she assumed meant ‘Apartment’ and one ‘D’ for Door.
It was her own space.
Kaz might own the apartment, but he had given her a room and a key. And a promise.
“Any preference?” Matthias asked, stepping into the room carrying one of the boxes they’d loaded into his truck.
“Anywhere.” Inej replied with a smile. “I’ll sort it out later. Thanks for helping.”
“Anytime ‘Nej.” Matthias stalled at the door. “Are you…” He gestured out the door, where Kaz and Nina were talking. “Okay with…?”
Matthias didn’t know all the details. But he was observant and maybe a little naive. He knew she didn’t like being alone with men. He knew she didn’t like being in situations she couldn’t control. He knew she didn’t like parties, and she didn’t hang around frat houses or near jocks.
He didn’t know all of it though. Just enough. Just what she was willing to let him pick up on.
“Kaz was never a concern.” She assured him.
“Just making sure. You going to help me move your bed frame in?”
Oh right. She doubted Nina would help with that.
Then again, she doubted Matthias needed the help to begin with.
~*~*~*~*~
“So…” Jesper lounges on the couch, eyes flicking from Kaz to Inej.
“Yes?” Inej doesn’t shift, doesn’t humor Jesper by giving the sudden change up in the living room lay out any attention at all.
She’d talked with Kaz about it, and told him they should let in some more natural light. He’d shrugged his shoulders, and then the next day the black out drapes were gone, there was a set of I-bolts secured in one of the exposed beams. Inej had hung up her hammock, and a swing rope, and Kaz hadn’t said a word.
“The stain did nicely on the beams.” Kaz commented, the clack of his cane on the kitchen tile accompanied by a soft slurp as he took his morning sip of coffee.
Inej had been living with him for two weeks now, and still couldn’t fathom how he drank it, scalding hot and disgustingly black.
“We goin’ to talk about how your landlord feels about you and those exposed beams I swear were not here last Wednesday?” Jesper asked softly.
“No.”
“How about you and Inej living together?”
“No.”
Inej shifted, twisting in the lining of her hammock to peer down. Kaz took a seat below her. The hammock would graze the top of his head if he were standing, but positioned nearly right beside his recliner, it worked quite well for the space.
“How about…”
“No.” Kaz gritted out.
Jesper shut his mouth.
“We could talk about your date with Wylan instead.” Inej proposed with a smile.
Jesper’s dark skin flushed, and he shifted on the couch. “Oh… Oh no it wasn’t… I mean I guess it kinda was but… No I don’t…” He swallowed. “How did you know about that?”
Inej smirked as Kaz held up a tumblr, the lid secured tight and the coffee inside a soft brown instead of black. “None of your concern.” She took the tumblr and slid back into her hammock, calm and content in the knowledge that those in the room were her closest friends and that the man below her would respect her space without question.