Work Text:
The rain had created a pool of water at the curb where Ada stood. As the red stop sign flashed across the street, she held a lighter in her hand and a cigarette in the other, a rare comfort, and placed it between her lips. Her palm covered the flame to keep it from flickering over the tip. The smoke lifted into the night air as she exhaled. The traffic light above her head turned yellow as she stared down into the puddle, its light warped in the reflection.
The pool wavered as a car passed. She lifted the stick between her fingers. The comfort it usually provided wasn't coming. The ember at the tip of the offending stick reminded her of the way those flames danced along the small house's frame. The screams from inside reverberated inside her head.
Ada threw the cigarette into the pool of water and took a step off the curb as the little white man lit up at the other pedestrian light, giving her permission to cross. Her heels clicked along the concrete, and her hands were shoved in her coat pockets. Her feet stilled as she rounded the corner.
A gated park came into view. A couple kids played on the swings while a woman watched from a bench.
"Push me!" the young girl shouted to the older one.
"Not too high!" the woman called to them. "Be careful!" Ada's heart sped up the harder the girl pushed the younger one. She imagined the house again. Her big brown eyes staring out the window. Flames erupting behind her, consuming her tiny body before Ada could even—
Her heels clicked faster. She had a place in mind. If a smoke wasn't enough to calm her, she'd find another vice. She hoped Leon still had some to go around.
The apartment building wasn't far. Her pace quickened to the front door. She pressed the familiar button to ring his apartment. She fiddled with the pack of cigarettes in her pocket. The sky darkened as clouds covered the sun, and the air gave off the familiar scent of incoming rain. She rang the door again. Ada thought about leaving. There was a bar down the road somewhere. She remembered it from the last time she'd come knocking.
She tilted her head back to count the patios above her head. His was the only one without any furniture or plants. If she had her hook shot with her, she'd point it at his railing and zip up. But she'd left it in her hotel room. The one she'd need to fly back to tomorrow to start her next job.
The door buzz was long and loud before the usual click of the lock. She yanked it open and took the stairs. A gasp left her when a small head of brown hair nearly collided with her stomach.
"I'm sorry!" the small girl said, sidestepping around her. Ada stood still, clutching the railing with white knuckles. Her heart perched in her throat. The girl bounced down the rest of the stairs toward the front door. She reminded her so much of… The screaming ricocheted inside her mind so loudly that she was sure everyone in the apartment building could hear. She took the steps faster.
She stopped at his door with her hand raised to knock. Hesitation clutched her wrist in a cold grip. Her hand shook in a way Ada was unaccustomed to. She dropped her arm. The only light in the tiny hall was from the dusty window. Someone had attempted to plant flowers there at some point. They had left them in the dry planter, wilted and brown. The same color of wet timber. The door opened.
"Thought I heard someone out here," Leon's voice sounded gravely. His hair was long enough to tuck behind his ears. The back stuck up in a way that told her he'd napped. He wore a loose white shirt and black sweatpants. She felt as though she'd intruded, but it was too late to turn back. She eyed the stairs anyway. "Come in," he offered, stepping aside to give her space.
Ada stepped inside before she could convince herself to leave. The apartment was as empty of personal affects as ever. A half-empty bottle of water sat on the coffee table.
"Didn't expect to see you here." Leon stepped around her as she hovered in the entryway. He walked toward the gray couch; his white socks padded across the hard floor. Before he sat, he glanced at her over his shoulder. "Ada?" She knew there was something she should be doing there in the entry. "You alright?" he asked.
The intensity of the question forced her to drop her gaze. She needed something to do with her hands. She bent over to slowly unzip her heeled boots and placed them to the side. A pair of white slippers fell beside her feet. The swirling embroidered H gave away that they'd come from a hotel. She found his eyes on her, brows together in some deep thought or another.
"Thanks." The word came out soft but felt loud to her ears. When was the last time she had spoken to anyone? Leon nodded as if satisfied, though she wasn't sure. This time, she followed him to the couch. He gestured for her to sit first. She perched at the edge, pulled off her coat, and draped it over the arm rest beside her.
Leon sat across the coffee table from her on the floor. The table felt too tall for him to sit there like that, cross legged on the dark blue rug. She eyed the color. It was more like navy blue. The shade reminded her of his Raccoon City uniform. It reminded her of the darkest parts of the ocean, flying over in a helicopter. The color always looked darker when the sun went down. It appeared brighter under the light of flames.
"What brings you here?" Leon asked. Her attention on the rug faded.
"Do you have anything to drink?" Ada asked.
"Smoking wasn't enough?" he asked and stood from the floor.
"What?"
"I smelled it when you walked in." His broad shoulders moved beneath his shirt as he stretched on his way to the humble open kitchen. She thought about the cigarette she'd thrown in the puddle, kicking herself for not snubbing it out and throwing it in the trash. Leon opened some cabinets before returning."It must have been bad. You don't usually smoke." He lowered two glasses onto the coffee table next to his water and twisted the top off a bottle of Maker's Mark.
"Well, I didn't smoke it for long." Not that the cigarette tasted off or anything, but she didn't feel the need to explain to him the way it didn't make her feel like she wanted it to.
"I mean your job." He slid the glass, filled a third of the way with amber liquid, and sat back onto the floor in front of her. She took the glass in hand and sipped it. The liquor warmed her throat. Not as warm as the fire, the way it roared into the sky. Police and firefighters clamored to reach the people inside.
"It wasn't my job," she said. Leon took a drink as she spoke.
"Helping strays again?" He placed the glass back on the table. A smile came and went across his face.
"Something like that."
"What happened, Ada?" he asked. She finished her drink. The glass clinked against the surface of his coffee table. The burn had gone away so fast that she thought about drinking more. Though, if it wasn't going to work now, it wouldn't work with another. Like the cigarette, it didn't give her what she wanted. There was one other comfort she could try, but it would be unfair to him. Leon ran a hand through his messy hair in need of a wash. His biceps flexed as he lifted his arm. It was a familiar comfort, one they'd gotten lost in a few times already. No, it wouldn't feel right this time.
"Day off?" she asked.
"Yeah, I got the weekend."
"Must have been some job for them to force you into this much time off." Ada could admit she was a workaholic. Her body became restless when not given a task, a challenge of some sort. She had seen it too in Leon, that ever present need to focus on something outside of yourself. The work was grueling, but it filled that hole temporarily, a hole made of loss.
"My last one?" He leaned back on his palms and eyed her. "I guess."
"They don't usually give you this much unless requested."
"How do you know I didn't?"
"Because I wouldn't." They stared at each other in silence. The street outside was quiet. The rain had already begun to fall.
"You don't have anyone to force you," he said.
"I don't."
"You probably have something lined up." He took the glass in front of him and finished the drink.
"I do."
"Then why come here?" It wasn't an accusation or the sound of a scorned man—he'd left all that in Spain. Instead, she heard his curiosity that often got him into trouble. He used the tone that told her he'd spoken with his heart. No matter how hard he tried, he never got rid of that trait. Ada eyed the pristine white hotel slippers wrapped around her feet, unused until now as if he'd kept them just in case.
She had no right to seek him out. Yet, the same feet found their way here. Would it be too much to ask? For Leon to hold her? Would the world come crashing down if she felt enveloped by his warm arms, tucked against the expanse of his white shirt? Maybe not the world, but she would.
Ada hadn't realized he had moved until she felt him sink into the couch as he sat beside her. She found his eyes immediately, swimming in the care he could never mask. Not the way she could. They sat there for a long time in a comfortable silence. He made no show of moving, giving her space to think. She stared over his shoulder, out his sliding glass window to his patio. If she stood in front of it, she'd see the park from up here.
"I met her in May." When he didn't reply, she continued. She feared that if she didn't speak quickly, she'd never get it out. "I remember because she'd hid in a bush surrounded by flowers. She was so small and covered in dirt. I guessed that the war had taken her mother. I was just passing through but I couldn't leave her there." Leon nodded. She expected some surprise from him by her admission, but it never came. "I took her with me. She was so afraid of everything that she kept clinging to me. I didn't know what to do with her at first. On the train, she fell asleep on my lap. I stroked her hair while she slept." The vivid memory replaced the image of his window in her eyes.
"I found her a place to stay, a family who had just relocated, one that had lost their child. They took her immediately." Her fingers found his leg, pressed against hers. She leaned into him like an anchor. "I had finished my job but kept thinking about her. I kept thinking, what if I'd made a mistake bringing her there? So, I went back." Her fingers gripped the fabric of his pants into a fist. "I saw the smoke before the house. I saw the whole thing up in flames. She didn't—" Ada cut herself off. Leon's hand lay on top of her fist. His thumb lightly ran across the expanse of her knuckles.
She didn't want to talk anymore. She'd already said too much, revealed too much. At least she hadn't cried. Even as she thought it, she felt the tension in her chest and the way her throat tightened.
"It's not your fault," Leon said. "You didn't kill her." Ada stared into his eyes that searched her face. The realization struck her like the match to her cigarette. Her fingers loosened their grip, and he slid his beneath her hand to hold it. The feeling of that small embrace was better than the cigarette on the corner and the liquor in her glass.
"How do you know I didn't?"
"Because you wouldn't. Because you made the best decision you could with the information you had," he said. To Ada, he said it like a man who needed to hear it himself. Then maybe he needed what she needed. Ada slipped her hand from his and got on her knees beside him. The slippers slid onto the rug with two soft thumps. His hands surrounded her waist like muscle memory. She straddled his hips and wrapped her arms around him, burying her face into the place between his neck and shoulder.
The second his arms surrounded her, adjusting her so that she fit better against him, she allowed the door inside her to open. Her body shook, and his embrace tightened as if to take the burden of strength from her. Leon pressed his face into her shoulder and allowed Ada to quietly grieve.
She wasn't sure how long they remained that way. At some point, she turned her head toward the darkened windows and took a deep shaking breath. His grip had loosened enough for him to rhythmically run a hand up and down her back. Her body had fallen limp against him, and her sore lids were heavy with exhaustion. His lips brushed the top of her hair before the comforting caress of sleep took her under while the rain picked up, drizzling against the windows.