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Your feelings for him grew, before you could even recognize them as love, and by the time you did, you didn't think you ever wanted to go back to before. Okay, now, what the hell is this? Let's backtrack a little! You had known Leon for years. He saved you in Raccoon City. You owed him your life. He would cringe at that, but it was the truth, to you. Maybe you were a little bit obsessive (there was something undiagnosed about you, but you didn't really care for that right now). Anyways! Point is, after that… incident, and after the US government decided to, after researching your background, coerce you into working for them, as a technical analyst, you and Leon grew closer. You were both human disasters, but could anyone blame either of you, after what you survived that night? No!
You remember, even back then, when Ada (or whatever her actual name was) kissed him, whilst you were standing awkwardly off to the side, your heart was lurching in your chest, and that familiar, awful, horrible, feeling was taking root in there (never to leave). You hadn't trusted her from the moment she showed up. I mean, who the hell goes to an active warzone in high heels and a dress?! You were in boots, and even then you were struggling immensely! Maybe that's a skill issue on your part, but like, come on! An FBI agent in a flaming red dress, in the middle of a zombie outbreak, appearing conveniently whenever you both were in trouble? It seemed suspicious. But apparently, it came as a big surprise (to Leon) when it was revealed that she was not, in fact, who she said she was. You could see his heart break in real time, and even though at that point, you had known him for a few mere hours, you could tell.
Sigh.
And then when he was sent to Spain to save Ashley, and they sent you along with him, to support him if technical difficulties arose, as well as to get samples of the virus for the lab rats and photo evidence (thank god they had trained you to handle guns, so you weren't dead weight, at least), and Ada showed her face again, you had wanted to tear your hair out, when Leon immediately started to rely on her. And here you were thinking you never learned! You desperately wanted to chainsmoke every time he radio-ed her to ask for intel, as if you hadn't given him the best you could, especially after your gear had been stolen and promptly destroyed by the ganados. You remember you had genuinely wanted to scream at him, until he got it. But, seeing as you prided yourself in being a good friend (the word itself tasted bitter on your tongue) you couldn't say much. You didn't say much.
It wasn't your place, you see. Even though, in your head, it absolutely was, because what kind of best friend allows their best friend to make that mistake TWICE?! And you also couldn't afford to clue him in on just how intensely you loved him, you knew he would never see you that same way. Why ruin the only good thing in your miserable life? After the whole Spain fiasco had been resolved, and Ashley was home safe, the first thing you did when you yourself got back to your apartment, was drink until you passed out. One of the days following that grueling mission, you and Leon were hanging out together after work, and were both quite tipsy, as things went when two people who coped with their shitty lives by drinking got together, he had admitted to you how he thought she was a part of him he would never be able to get rid of.
That had torn you apart on the spot. You don't even know how you kept your shit together long enough to get him to his bed, going to his couch to cry yourself to sleep.
All she was doing was using him to her own benefit, then disappearing as if she was never there. How was this fair? You were always there for him, even when you were too depressed and isolating yourself for days on end, you put your shit aside, for his sake, and you didn't even deserve a thank you? An acknowledgment? He hadn't spent a collective of more than 10 hours around her, for gods sake! That resentment kept building up over the years, starting from a small sprout, and growing alongside the deep, all consuming love you felt for him. Every time you were drunk, alone and spiralling, it was either about that, or the sheer amount of horrors you had lived through.
You two even lived near each other, as codependent as that sounded. He knew you had a bad habit of isolating yourself and stewing in your own misery and self hatred, leaving your apartment only to go to work, and if you absolutely had to, outside of that, when things got especially bad. You knew he drunk himself stupid, his own need to forget the horrors he'd seen burning brighter than anything else.
It was okay. At least you had each other, right? Wrong. He was your everything, but you were his silly, really clumsy, constantly cracking jokes to cope with the horrors, best friend. God, you were so fucked, you couldnt even find a good joke to try to make yourself feel better about this mess. Everything was meaningless. (Leon would argue with your statement, for hours if he had to.)
You sighed again. Checked the time. 1am. You'd spend the rest of the night alone, no boyfriend, no family that spoke to you, and hopelessly in love with your best friend, who would never feel the same. What a joke. You actually huffed a humorless laugh at that, you probably looked insane to the rest of the quiet bars patrons. You motioned at the bartender for a refill. God bless his soul, he had seen you stumbling out of the bar, drunk, more times than you could count, but this was the most social interaction you've had this month, so, baby steps, right?
You were truly pathetic. Not even as pretty as Ada, not skilled enough, just awkwardly stumbling through life with more grief and self hatred than a person your age should have to bear. Though, you suppose, Leon was the same, minus the fact that he was the prettiest person you'd ever laid your eyes upon, and so perfect at everything he did. You wanted to cry. About anything and everything.
You downed your (fresh) drink in one gulp, paid your tab, and (very, very shakily) got up to walk back home. As soon as the cold outside air hit your face, you shivered, maybe the walk home in the chilly streets would help sober you up a little? Here's hoping you don't pass out along the way. You wrapped your coat tighter around you and pulled a cigarette to smoke as you walked. You continued to mope about your shitty life all the way back to your apartment, but you stopped dead in your tracks when you saw Leon running a hand through his hair outside your door. He looked stressed. And exhausted.
As soon as he saw you approaching, he breathed a sigh of relief, and ran his hand through his hair again. “Oh thank god, where the hell have you been!?” he said, pulling you into his arms in a tight hug.
“Bar,” was all you said, breathing his (unfairly) intoxicating scent in, hands fumbling around in your pockets for the keys to your place. “Did something happen?”
He lets go of you (much to your displeasure) and shakes his head. “You didn't pick up any of my calls, I was worried.”
You nod in understanding, as you unlock the door and let both of you inside. The warmth hit you, and you breathed a sigh of relief. You took your coat and shoes off, placing them in their respective places, with Leon doing the same after you, and went straight for more alcohol. You were still in a very shitty mood.
“Jesus, you're going to drink more?” Leon huffs, making you shrug.
“So what if I do? What are you, a cop?”
That makes him give you a very disapproving look, and you scrunch your face in displeasure. Despite that, you pour a drink for yourself, hands still shaky, and brain way too fuzzy and full of nasty thoughts you desperately wished to drown out.
“Were you crying…?” Leon asks, taking a seat next to you on the couch, his head tilted in question.
You hadn't even realized you might have actually been crying on the walk over. Fuck. “Dunno, I’m too drunk to give a fuck right now.”
Leon shook his head again. You stared off at the TV blankly, before reaching for the remote lazily and turn it on, maybe the background noise would help. “Did you have shitty dreams again?”
Your question makes Leon tense up, and pause mid sip from your drink, thief. He nods. You nod. He takes the darned sip and puts your drink back on the table. “Wanna talk about it?”
“Fuck no.”
You sighed. Once, you'd have done everything you could to coax it out of him, reassure him with words that he could, and should tell you about it, how it would ease the gnawing feeling in his chest. But somewhere along this year, you just… stopped pushing. He didnt wanna tell you? Fine. Whatever.
(It never was ‘whatever’, but god, you were so exhausted with carrying all these heavy feelings around, love and jealousy a very horrid mix. You would always care, too much for your own good, but you never fucking learned.)
Whilst you were stewing in your little internal dialogue and staring at the TV with unfocused eyes, Leon was going through it himself. Because lately, his dreams, or, well, nightmares, involved you. Tonight's one? It wasn't even one of the usual ones, where you ended up dying in his arms. Oh, no, tonight's one was much, much worse. It had started out as a normal dream, you two were hanging out, but somehow, a fight broke out between him and you, and by the end of it, dream ‘you’, had ended up leaving him. The fight itself didn't even matter, but watching you leave, finally resigning with putting up with his shit? That had torn him up from the inside. He had even woken up softly crying. And then when he called you, as we know, you hadn't picked up. So he showed up at your apartment, which was a common occurrence between you two. Nothing out of the ordinary, but his worry only grew when you didn't answer the door. We know how this ends, but Leon was halfway out of his mind with worry, brain still too overwhelmed with panic from what he had seen in his dream to think calmly about the situation by the time you showed up.
Leon sighs to himself, subconsciously inching closer to you on the couch. You, too hopelessly dense (and drunk!) don't even notice as you throw your head back, resting it against the back of the couch, groaning loudly. “I feel like garbage,” you whine.
Leon smiles. “Shouldnt have drunk so much if you didn't want to feel like this, then.”
“Oh you're such a smartass, aren't you?” you snap back and glare at him from the corner of your eyes, before you close them and press the backs of your hands against them until you see stars. “Im so fucking miserable, Leon."
“I know,” is all he says. He knows that sober you would never, in the history of ever, admit to such a thing, but the booze always made you loose lipped and more emotional. He preferred this over you constantly masking how you truly felt with jokes. Which is kind of ironic, since he did so too. Not to the extent you did, because you never took anything seriously, but still. “We're both a mess.”
You hum in acknowledgement, and bring your hands back down, resting them on your thighs. You turned your head to look at him, and if a third party was observing you, they'd surely point out how in love you looked. Thank god he never noticed. Or maybe he did, but just didn't care. But you knew, deep down, he would never be so cruel. Leon, at his core, was a give a fuck-er, that would never change, just like the sun rising every morning. You sighed again and reached for your drink, taking a small sip from it, just so he would be able to sip too.
Meanwhile, Leon was lost in thought. Why were his dreams centered around you? Why had this one dream done such a number on him? Maybe because you were one of the only constants in his life, his rock, the person he relied to to cheer him up, or was it because of… something else? He thinks he's not ready to tackle that beast yet. He takes the glass from your hands and throws the drink back, making you whine again, before he puts it back on the table and slumps against the couch.
How could he be better at handling bio-organic fucking weapons better than his own feelings? He’d spent so many years thinking Ada was the one, despite all the fucked up shit she had done to him over the years, that he never had even considered the possibility that he could be in love with his best friend.
In love?
What??? Where did that thought come from? Oh. my. God. He had a lot to think about, huh?
Simultaneously, there you sat, unaware and next to him. He was so fucked. He started to think about all the times you had told him about going on a date with another person, how peculiar he had felt at the news, and. Christ. He runs a hand through his hair. Or the time Chris had jokingly flirted with you, in front of him, no less (the audacity!), had made him act so pissy and bitter he hadn't spoken to you in two days. (Chris had shot him a look, knowing perhaps? How did the bastard know before Leon ever did? hello!?)
Leon groans out loud, making you look at him in curiosity. “Whats got your panties in a twist, Leon?"
He tiredly rubs his eyes and looks at you, really looks at you, in all your drunken, exhausted glory, the way the TV illuminates your features, the way your hair frames your face, the way you look at him with a small smile on your face, features soft and gentle, despite everything you're probably feeling right now. He thinks about how you've always been there for him, never complaining and quietly taking care of him, in all the small ways that matter, always having his back when he needs it the most, and something in his brain clicks. He's thankful you're too buzzed to notice the way he's currently looking at you, like you hung the stars in the sky.
He doesn't speak for a while, the words caught between his heart and his throat, which feels suddenly too tight. It's like his feelings have slammed into him like a truck, all these years of his idiotic thinking he was in love with the wrong person, whilst the right one had been next to him all this time, making his miserable days of endless training a little more bearable. “Uh, nothing,” he clears his throat and shakes his head, as if that would shake away the thoughts currently overwhelming him. “I don't think I ever was in love with Ada," he says after a while, which makes you do a double take, blinking at him like you can't quite process his words, and he can't blame you at all for that. Not after he spent so many nights telling you otherwise, with you comforting him about the whole thing. God, hes been so stupid, so, so fucking stupid, and now that hes thinking about it all, actually thinking, he wants to slam his head on a flat surface.
“What makes you say that?”
The sound that leaves his throat is quite undignified, but he doesn't care. He shrugs. “I just- I’ve been thinking…”
“That's new,” you chime and snicker at your jab.
He shoots you a glare before he continues, “about things, and I guess you were right all along. Maybe I've been in love with the idea of her instead of her. Hell, I've never actually met the ‘real’ her.”
You hum again, in thought, the feeling of vindication drowning out the dizziness of the alcohol you have consumed. The feeling is short lived, because, what. What if he falls in love with someone else now, and forgets about you and gets in a happy relationship with them and you're not allowed to see him again because the person he's dating can sniff out from miles away that you're hopelessly in love with him!? You wouldn't even blame them for it, but still. Oh my god you think you might throw up. “And, ah, what made things click for you?” you squeak out, taking in nice and slow deep breaths to prevent yourself from throwing up.
“The dream I had earlier,” he huffs a laugh, because how insane does that sound? A dream, of all things, making it click in his head that he doesn't just love you as a friend, instead of all your actions?! “Proved to be enlightening.”
“Ohhh,” you nod, “still don't wanna talk about it?”
He scrubs a hand down his face, tearing his gaze away from you and fixing it on the TV. “I don't know, it's… complicated.”
His tone is clipped, that much you can tell. You've started to sober up by now, thanks to the metaphorical bomb leon dropped on you. And the fact that you were spiralling over it. “Ookay, what happened in it?”
He feels you shift around on the couch, angling your body to face him better, but he keeps stubbornly staring at the TV, a shitty movie playing. “Stuff.”
“Oh you're such a joy right now,” you deadpan. “Stop being cryptic, dumbass.”
Leon bristles at your words, finally turning to look at you again. His breath catches when he sees the way you're looking at him. He normally prides himself on his amazing impulse control, but right now, he wants, no, needs, to kiss that look off your face. Okay, maybe the alcohol he drank from your glass is also adding to his fraying self control, but hey, that is besides the point!
“Am not!” he protests, but it sounds unconvincing. “It’s just, I don't know, we had a fight and you walked out on me, and watching you do that felt like you took my heart with you and I don't think I'd be able to live with myself if that actually ever happened. Or if you found someone else…”
He hadn't meant to say that much. Oh fuck. Your shocked expression, mouth slightly parted open, blinking slowly at him, would normally crack him up, but he looks just as shocked as you do, because he was absolutely not supposed to say all that.
Your mouth opens and closes again, multiple times, as if trying to find the right words instead of blurting out something stupid. But you are you, so obviously, you blurt out something stupid. “Good to know you value me as a friend, eh?”
Leon facepalms. He fucking facepalms. He always had found your obliviousness endearing (except for the times other people flirted with you but you assumed they were being nice to you so you never shot them down, he was seething on those occasions, now he knows why) but right now it was irritating him. “You’re such a moron sometimes,” he groans after he mentally recovers.
“What, why?”
This time it's his turn to gape at you. “Because I am in love with you, I have just been too stupid to see that. I'm practically confessing here sweetheart, work with me.”
“YOU’RE WHAT”
He flinches at your outburst, but despite himself, laughs. “I know, it's hard to believe me, but I'm serious.”
“No way.”
“Way.”
You stare at him. He stares at you. He's dead serious. Even now, slightly tipsy, with most of your mental faculties recovered, you can tell he is not messing with you. He would never do that. He's way too nice to ever do such a thing. You feel the familiar feeling of bile rising up your mouth, and before either of you can comprehend, you sprint off to the bathroom and kneel down in front of the toilet and throw up.
Leon, being the saint he is, follows closely behind you, holding your hair and rubbing your back soothingly as you finish throwing up. You take a moment to compose yourself, spitting out and flushing the toilet, then standing up to rinse your mouth.
“That went well.”
You whip around to stare at him in disbelief, making yourself nauseous again. He snickers at your reaction and continues, “I mean, I just told you I love you and you,” he makes a vague motion towards the toilet, “should I take that as a rejection?”
“NO!” you say too quickly, shaking your head vehemently and clearing your throat. “I mean, no! Ahem.”
Leon looks entirely amused (and hopeful?) as he waits for you to continue. You lean back against the bathroom counter and try to compose yourself before you make a fool out of yourself some more.
“I, ah, just. You know,” you make vague gestures with your hands and nod, as if that explains anything. “I can't even think of something to say, you broke my brain.”
He laughs and steps closer to you, and you take a step back, needing some space to process, which was the wrong move because he looks a little crestfallen. You blink a few more times to clear your head, get your thoughts in order and try to come up with an actual sentence.
“I’ve spent all these years convincing myself you would never feel the same, swallowing my feelings, and you just. Say all that, and now I don't know how to react, like, what do you mean you are in love with me, why?? Why would you do this to-”
Leon presses his hand against your mouth to get you to stop spiralling and fixes you with a way too serious look.
“Your feelings?” he asks and slowly moves his hand from your mouth, resting it on your waist.
“Um. Yeah.”
“Wanna elaborate?”
“...No?” you shrug, suddenly feeling too shy and put on the spot.
He looks exasperated as he mutters your name and fixes you with another serious look.
“Okay, I might've been deeply, irreversibly, madly in love with you since we met? Borderline obsessive even?”
“You have? Why didn't you say anything?”
You look at him like he just said the most dumb thing on planet earth and it dawns on him why.
“Oh. Okay, that's-ah-fair.”
You nod awkwardly, tentatively bringing your hands up to rest against his chest. “You’re awfully close,” you mutter.
“You don't seem to mind, sweetheart.”
“Psh, what would you know, nerd,” you grumble.
He huffs a laugh and shakes his head. He moves down to kiss you, but you press your hand against his mouth, making him look at you like you kicked his nonexistent puppy.
“I just threw up, for god's sake, you are not kissing me right now!”
“So, I get to kiss you later?”