Work Text:
Ava Coleman is not a touchy person.
She knows this.
At work, she notices when people enter her space. Hands on arms, lingering shoulders, bodies standing too close for too long. She has always been clear on who is allowed to do that. Abbott has its own ecosystem, which means proximity is unavoidable. Familiarity creeps in whether you invite it or not and Ava has learned how to manage that without letting it get out of hand.
The list of people she tolerates comfortably is short. Curated. Melissa Schemmenti operates well within Ava’s space. She does it with purpose, usually to say something illegal-adjacent, and then leave just as quickly. Ava finds that efficient. Comforting, even. Barbara Howard is similar. She’s allowed because she’s careful. She enters Ava’s space the way she does everything else: deliberately, with restraint, and only when necessary. Ava appreciates that. There’s reassurance in knowing someone won’t take advantage of access once it’s given.
Janine Teagues is newer. Ava has stopped bracing when Janine hugs her, which is saying something, because Janine commits fully and without warning. It’s not that Ava invites it. She has simply learned to tolerate it. The way one tolerates loud colours. Janine never half-commits to anything, Ava notices that. Jacob Hill is jumpy. He startles easily and tends to involve whoever is nearest. Which oftentimes is her. Ava learned this during movie night. Saltburn was involved. So were her arms. She sits a little farther away now. As for Gregory Eddie, a few years back there was strategic proximity. A performance. Ava has always known how to use space when it benefits her. That didn’t mean she wanted anyone staying there.
Outside of work is different. Ava’s life has never lacked people. She’s social. Desired. But physical affection has never been something she has relied on. Not in some dramatic way. It simply wasn’t offered growing up, and Ava learned early that you could live very well without it.
So she did. She became very good at it.
Which is why she notices it immediately when someone touches her, and she doesn’t move away.
It starts small with O’shon. It always has.
Early on, it was the careful stuff. A hand at her lower back when he moved past her chair. Fingers brushing her wrist when he passed her something, like he was mindful of where he ended and she began. Considerate and more than easy to ignore.
If she wanted to.
She remembers noticing it then, registering the consistency without giving it any meaning. That was manageable.
Now, it’s different. Not louder. Just closer.
His hand settles at her waist when they’re standing side by side, thumb moving once. Absentminded. He touches her curls when she leans into him on the couch, slow and idle, like he’s thinking through something else entirely. When they sit together, his hand finds her leg without looking, resting there like it has always known the way.
There’s nothing proprietary about it. Nothing claimed. If she shifted, he’d move. If she pulled away, he’d follow her lead without question. Ava knows this instinctively. That’s part of what keeps the touch from feeling like something she needs to address.
It’s just… him. Warm and present. Unthinking, in the way people get when they’re comfortable exactly where they are.
And that’s the part that gets under her skin.
Because Ava is aware of it now, not in a way that distracts, but in the way her body has adjusted around it. The way the contact feels inevitable, not because he insists but because she lets it happen.
They’re on the couch when it finally registers.
Her legs are stretched across O’Shon’s lap, ankle resting against his thigh. She’s on her phone, half-paying attention to something she stopped reading minutes ago. He’s watching TV, something dumb, by the sound of it. That, too, feels incidental.
His hand is already on her leg.
It’s heavy, settled, fingers moving in slow, carefree paths over her skin. Not deliberate enough to be anything. Just there. Tracing, drifting, pausing, like his body is doing it without consulting the rest of him.
Then he laughs.
It’s quick and surprised, like something caught him off guard, and when he does it his hand tightens around her leg. Just a brief squeeze, unconscious and easy, before loosening again.
Ava’s thumb stills mid scroll.
The squeeze shouldn’t mean anything. It’s the kind of reflex people have when they’re comfortable, when they’re sharing space without thinking about it. But it lands anyway right under her skin, because it feels like inclusion. Like he reached for her without looking, without checking, without needing to make it obvious.
He doesn’t turn to her. Doesn’t comment. His attention stays on the screen, smile lingering, hand resuming its idle movement like nothing happened.
Ava doesn’t look up either.
She shifts instead, just slightly. Letting her calf settle more fully into his palm. The adjustment is subtle, the kind of movement no one would question if they were paying attention. Which he isn’t.
His hand follows without hesitation.
She lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding and returns to her phone, posture unchanged, pulse steady.
Well. Steady the way a hamster on a wheel is technically staying in one place.
Manageable.
Ava doesn’t comment on it.
She lets the contact exist as it is. Easy, warm, unannounced, and folds it into herself like something she’s decided to keep.
She’s lived without it before. She knows she could again.
The fact that she hasn’t…
well.
Ava Coleman is not a touchy person.
(That assessment may require revision.)