He’s a lot like a wild animal, you think—showing up at strange hours of the night, skulking around your front porch just out of sight while you laze about in your home with a book in hand and classical music softly playing from a worn down speaker you never got around to replacing, blood dripping from the leg he nearly bit off himself to escape the trap he found himself ensnared in.

(When it really comes down to it, he's hardwired to sacrifice.)

He thinks you don't know he’s there, thinks you can't smell iron and gun oil and gasoline drifting in through open windows. You’ll let him believe it, so long as it keeps him from running off.

It's a sort of routine you've fallen into.

Leon S. Kennedy, ornery and stubborn and an enigma you long stopped trying to make sense of, never goes home after grueling missions. He comes to you—battered and bruised, with stitches coming out and blood dripping from his wounds, seeking… something. You still haven't figured out what; whether it's comfort, a small handful of little deaths before the morning light, or a gentler hand than his own to rub antiseptic into his cuts.

Whatever it is, you know he finds something in you that he cannot get anywhere else. Something unspoken, too big for him to say aloud.

(You find something in him too, however little of it he has to give.)

Tonight, it's raining when he comes to you.

He's soaked—drenched down to the bone—and shivering. His hair is plastered to his forehead, rainwater dripping down his prominent cheekbones and even farther down his neck, disappearing at his shirt collar. His skin is smooth, though beginning to crease under the weight of time and stress. You notice another fine line or two, a new gray hair since you last saw him. His clothes are sopping wet as well, dripping onto your welcome mat, showing off the hard lines of lithe muscle wound tightly through his arms, clinging to a defined abdomen and inhumanly strong legs. You forget how strong he is, in the times that he's gone—he's never seemed to feel the need to show you his strength either, only ever touching you as though you were holy, but Leon carries himself in such a way that he cannot hide it.

He looks haunted, more so than usual.

You don't know much—you can't know much, but he was gone for a long time, and his eyes look heavy.

And he’s bleeding.

It's not bad. Far from the worst you've seen, but there's still blood beading up from a laceration on his forehead and dripping down to his eyebrow.

His hair is oily too, evident even with the rainwater clinging to the strands and dripping down his face. 

You know he doesn't have the chance to care for himself on his missions (hardwired to sacrifice, when it comes down to it), nor would he think to, even with the time.

“That bad?” You ask, opening your door to let him in.

You watch as he takes in his surroundings, like he expected something to be different from the last time. What you don’t tell him is that you always keep your home the same so he always has something consistent to come back to. You just let him observe, watch the calculated movements of his eyes, like he still isn't sure whether this is safe—like he's expecting to need to flee at any moment. The scent of petrichor and pine trees waft in through open windows, mixing with his cologne and rusty iron. Rain beats against your roof, mixing with the music still playing in the living room.

You picked a song you know he likes, picked it as soon as you heard his bike blazing down the road—something soft, one of the rare few classical pieces he enjoys.

Something familiar. Soothing.

“You could say that.” His voice is hoarse, like he's using it for the first time again. “Never going to Spain again.”

You say nothing—you don't need to. You just give him a small laugh and usher him to the bathroom. He knows the routine by now, knows how you fret over him at the smallest drop of blood. He used to fight you over it, batting your hands away when you inspected the cuts and scrapes, but you wore him down over time; kept your hand stuck out and eyes turned down long enough for him to come to you himself.

You sit him down on the edge of your bathtub and push his soaked bangs away from his eyes.

He looks so tired.

(He always does, these days.)

You closely inspect the cut—four butterfly strips struggle to hold the lacerated skin in place, but held up poorly against the rain and Leon’s speeding. You know he has a habit of picking at his skin too, but exchanges flesh for bandages when available. He doesn't realize he's doing it, you know that, so you change the dressings instead of reprimanding him.

As you gather your first aid kit, the one you never kept until he started coming around, you feel Leon’s eyes burning into the back of your skull.

“Do you need to talk?” You ask, ignoring the feeling of being watched.

It's an olive branch you always extend.

“Not really.”

One that is never accepted.

“I guess I can cross off Spain as a vacation spot, then?”

He smiles at that—charming and boyish, a small glimpse into the man he used to be, the one you met all those years ago in a shitty dive bar before the world had its way with him.

You wonder what could've come of him had it been a bit kinder.

No matter.

You focus instead on the way his eyes crease at the corners and his eyebrows minutely rise, making him look happier for that moment in time. 

“You’ll have to check that one off your bucket list without me.”

“It’s not worth it if you're not there.” You don't mean to say it and you know he doesn't mean to freeze when you do.

You both ignore it.

(There's a lot you ignore. Like the way he watches you when he thinks you don't notice and the way you do the same to him; the way you cried yourself to sleep the first night he showed up at your door with a black eye, split knuckles and a limp after going MIA for over a year. The way he always, always comes here instead of home after missions and what that might mean to him and the way you hope this feels more like home.

The way you know you're hopelessly, helplessly in love with Leon Kennedy, who is hopelessly and helplessly stuck behind a wall built from government contracts and emotional detachment—a fact that reigns true no matter how hard you fight to ignore it.)

“Let me see,” you say, brushing away the slip like it meant nothing.

For a moment, the only sound is that of rain pattering on your roof and your intermixed breaths, the music long forgotten. You brush back Leon’s hair again, threading your fingers through the damp strands with your non-dominant hand while your other works an alcohol soaked q-tip under the butterfly strips to loosen the adhesive.

“You can just rip them off,” he offers impassively, noticeable bracing himself like he expects you to accept.

“That’ll hurt.”

“I'm used to it.”

“That's exactly why I’m not doing it.” You continue soaking the q-tip, wiggling it under the adhesive and repeating until the first strip pulls away without resistance. Leon watches you the whole time, eyes flicking back and forth across your face, down the expanse of your chest, even further to the curve of your hips and waist. There's something more than lust, deeper than hunger in his eyes and your stomach twists at what it may be.

“You're too good to me sometimes.” He doesn't look away from you when he says it. His hands, previously balled up into loose fists on his legs, come up and gently skim the back of your thighs, his touch leaving gooseflesh behind.

“I'm only as good as you deserve,” you mutter. You remove the second strip, the laceration now in better view.

It's not too deep, but probably called for stitches over steri-strips. You know Leon well enough at this point to know he refused, and likely put up enough fight to make the medical examiner compromise on the dressing.

He winces when a drop of alcohol makes its way into the cut as you go for the third strip. “Sorry,” you whisper.

“It's okay.”

His fingertips trace small patterns on the back of your thighs, so subtly you think he may not realize he's doing it. Leon never seems to show physical affection consciously—not when you're outside of the bedroom and your clothes are on. Even then, he's distant. Never lays himself bare in any way other than physical.

“How long do you get to stay this time?” You ask as you peel away the third strip. Another drop of alcohol trickles into the cut, but he hides his reaction this time.

“Not sure.” He tilts his head, chasing the sensation of your other hand still laced through his bangs, holding them out of your way. He nuzzles his head into your hand, so subtly you almost missed it. You run your fingers through his hair in response, gently scratching at his scalp and you see gooseflesh break out across his skin, concentrated on his neck and feel a deep groan reverberating through his body more than you hear it.

“Thinking about going on leave. Staying here for a bit. I have a few strings I can pull after this.”

This must have been a bad one.

You want to ask. “You deserve a break,” is what you settle on. The last butterfly strip is stubborn to peel away, the adhesive unaffected by Leon’s picking habits and the rain beating on his face. He flinches when you tug at it.

“I wouldn't go that far.”

“I would.”

“You worry too much.”

“Somebody has to.” He shakes his head, but leaves it at that. You ready an alcohol soaked pad and apologize for how it’ll burn.

He claims he's used to it and it's fine, but you both know he hates it.

His fingertips dig lightly into the backs of your thighs at the first sting of disinfectant, then disappear altogether when he finally seems to realize they sought your skin for comfort in the first place. In an uncharacteristically bold move, you grab his hands on their retreat and place them back where they were.

He looks at you like you're some kind of goddess—awestruck, reverent, baptized in rubbing alcohol atop linoleum flooring and yellow lighting.

Under the weight of that stare, you work a q-tip around the remaining adhesive stuck to his skin, thoroughly cleansing him before reapplying the dressings.

“You need a shower,” you say absentmindedly, readying the strips beside you. “Your hair is dirty.”

“Can't—shoulders took a beating from the recoil. Can barely get my arms above my head.” He demonstrates his range of motion for you. True to his word, his arms barely clear his chest before visible pain spreads across his face.

You scoff. “And you say you don't need a break.”

He says nothing.

“I’ll help you when we're done with this.”

Leon looks mildly distressed at your offer. “You don't have to do that.”

“I know,” is all you have to say, because that's what this—whatever this is—boils down to, isn't it? Small acts of care and compassion that are never owed, never expected, but still freely given without the promise of repayment. A little reality the two of you have built in your home, separate from the rest of the world; something only the two of you know about. You tend to his wounds and make him dinner when he shows up unannounced in the small hours of the night, he cleans up the mess he tracks in and washes the dishes when you're done cooking and traces patterns into the small of your back until you fall asleep.

A routine that you both have fallen into without ever having to write it out.

You're both silent while you dress his wound, rain and distant melodies filling the air around you. The strips apply easily, the skin not so separated that it's a fruitless task but enough that you can't engage in small talk for the sake of focusing. Leon stares straight ahead, no longer watching you; you find that you miss his eyes being on you, but he still touches the backs of your legs. 

You're fine settling with that.

When you finish, Leon picks up the bloody cotton balls and q-tips and bandages, carefully disposing of them while you clean your hands.

“Can you take your shirt off?” You ask, beginning to run a bath for him.

You know he is feeling worse than he lets on because there's no ridiculous joke, no knowing look. Just quiet. Just compliance. 

You watch pain flash across his face as he lifts his arms. “Let me help,” you offer. He accepts without complaint, and the two of you begin stripping off his shirt while the tub fills. It takes longer than what might be necessary, but you refuse to move him in a way that will cause him more pain. You’d rather cut the shirt off of him than do that.

But, eventually, Leon’s shirt is stripped away and the tub fills with warm water and heat sits heavy in the air, damp on your skin. You try to stop your wandering eyes, but the bruises and cuts littering his tanned skin steal your attention. He looks like he's been through hell and back. You add a healthy scoop of epsom salt and eucalyptus scented soap to the bathwater at the sight of him—the salts to soothe his aching muscles, the soap to preserve his modesty in the water, should he desire it.

Leon tends to be protective of his body. You suspect the scars have something to do with it.

(You tell him they're beautiful, he tells you you're lying.)

“Let me know when you're ready,” you say, leaving him to finish undressing in private. You grab a plastic cup while you wait.

It's only a handful of moments before he calls you back into the bathroom. His clothes are neatly folded on the counter, belt coiled on top and boots on the floor, caked in mud. He sits in the tub with his back hunched and hands clasped together around his curled legs.

He looks small—afraid, like he’s ready to flee from this moment of vulnerability.

You've never helped Leon wash himself before.

You've bought his favorite soap for him to use. You’ve asked him what detergent he prefers (all he would say is yours) and keep it stocked so you can wash his clothes. You have spare clothes for him. You've cleaned and bandaged his wounds more times than you can count—you even took a couple volunteer classes to better learn how to care for him like this. You learned how to cook his favorite meals. You learned what textures he gravitates towards for his bedding and made sure his favorites are always clean.

But never this—this, somehow, is far more intimate than anything you have done for him. 

(More intimate than even sex.)

You sit on the edge of the tub, paying no mind to the water splashes soaking your thin shorts. 

“Is this okay?” You ask, giving him the opportunity to stop this, to tell you he doesn't want your help and he’ll just properly wash himself when the soreness has subsided. While you wait for his reply, your eyes trace along more bruises. You see a large bruise along his right shoulder and peck, likely from the recoil of his rifle; you see another one, deep purple and green and angry, blossoming on his back amidst a nasty scrape as though he were thrown. His torso is covered in other smaller cuts and scrapes, and there are stitches along his upper left bicep.

(Who did he sacrifice his body for this time?)

“Yeah,” he whispers. “Thank you.”

You fill your cup with water, gently tilt his head back and slowly pour it along his hair line. Leon’s eyes are squeezed shut, brows knitted together like he still hasn't actually decided that this is okay. The only sounds between you are Leon’s deep breaths and trickling water.

It's peaceful.

On the fourth cup of water, Leon’s shoulder visibly loosen, seeming to disappear with every stream of water down his back, but it's replaced with small tremors—like he is holding something back.

“I almost died over there.”

You pause. Frozen for just a second, living in a moment that feels like a lifetime, in a reality where Leon isn't here with you.

You don't want to be there.

You want to be here, in this bubble you've created for yourselves, where he's decided it's safe enough to tell you this.

“Don't think I've ever been that close to it. I…” He hesitates, shoulders locking again as you pour more water. “I was afraid. I thought I wouldn't get to—” You don't get to know what he wants to say. He cuts himself off with a sharp inhale and minusculely turns his head from you.

“Is it over now?”

“I think so.”

“Good.” You pause. “You don't get to skip out that easy.” His laugh is softer than you wanted, but at least it's there.

He’s there.

Hair properly saturated, you reach for the bottle of two-in-one shampoo (which you repeatedly tried getting him to change, but to no avail—he’s nothing if not stuck in his ways) you keep in the bathroom for him, always ready for when he may show.

You squeeze a generous amount in your palms. “Why do you always do this?” He asks quietly as you begin lathering his hair.

You hesitate to answer for a moment, but continue to scrub at his scalp and admire the way his eyes drift closed at the sensation.

“Why do I do what?”

“This,” he emphasizes, gesturing to the room. “Let me show up out of the blue, beaten half to death, and just… take care of me? Why do you care?”

It's a good question. One you ponder while you lather and scrub his hair, watching how, despite himself, Leon sinks a little deeper into the water, relaxing more with each passing moment.

Why do you care so much?

You met Leon a small handful of times before Raccoon City, no more than thrice—back when his cheeks were rounder, his hopes were higher, and he always wore that charmingly sly grin. Nothing serious, nothing romantic even, just a budding friendship that was ripped out root and stem far too soon. You thought he was dead until he turned up at your front door (you're still not even sure how he found you) beaten and battered, saying he had nowhere else to stay that night. He never stopped coming back after. You don't really know why, and you aren't sure he does either, but there seems to be something for him here he can't find anywhere else. 

Against your better judgement, it blossomed into something you had no control over.

It was impossible not to.

So, why do you care?

Because it’s as natural to you as breathing, molded by hand from the space he fills in your kitchen at midnight and your lips slotted against his. 

“Probably for the same reason you keep letting me.”

And it seems there's nothing else to say as you rinse the shampoo from his hair, he just gives you that look again—the one that stops your heart and tricks you into thinking there's more he's able to give you.

You leave Leon to dry himself off, deciding he doesn't need your help with that part.

When he meets you in the living room, his hair is sopping wet, dripping down his bare torso and sweatpants are draped low across his hips.

You go to chastise him, tell him he's not sitting on your couch when he's still wet as a dog, but he makes himself as small as he can manage and lays his head in your lap—how could you stop him? How could you ruin a moment so vulnerable, so human from a man who has been conditioned to be anything but? He lays next to you, beaten down and exhausted beyond comprehension, and he looks content, more than you've ever seen from him so you think a bit of water is more than worth the trade.

“I thought I wasn't coming back,” he says softly as you card your fingers through his dripping hair.

Your heart stops. You suspected that was the case. “I'm happy you did.”

“I don't want to leave again.”

“Do you have to?”

“I will.” He's shaking like a leaf, like it's causing him physical pain to say his next words “But I want to stay. I don't want to go back. Not yet.”

You don't want him to either.

You tell him as much.

He sits up, moving awkwardly around his pain and looks at you with terrifying intensity. “If– if I do take a break… can I stay with you?”

You don't have to think about your answer. “Always.”

Leon’s eyes flick back and forth between your own. His are glassy, threatening to spill over with unspoken emotion, and lined with a bright red that shows the exhaustion he’s fighting with himself to hide.

“I don't know what I would do without you.”

You feel overcome with your own emotion. Leon doesn't talk like this. Ever. Your heart swells, chills break out across your skin despite the scorching heat his body sears into you.

“You don’t have to figure that out. I'm here with you—always.”

He leans forward gently, slow like he's scared you'll run away from him, or maybe scared that he’ll be the one to run. Large, calloused hands come up and cradle the sides of your face, thumbs brushing back and forth along your jaw, at the place it meets your neck—a spot he's kissed and bitten and nipped more times than you can recall, now the subject of divine devotion. And softly, like it was a declaration of so many years of unspoken feelings, he kisses you. It's not heated, it's not passionate, nothing like the fire you normally burn up in; it's raw—vulnerable and tender and so fragile, the only sound it could survive is rainwater and violin.

“I’m bad at this,” he begins with a shaking breath. “I don't know if I can give you more than this—but I… I don't want you to go anywhere. And I don't want to show up to another man’s car in your driveway.”

As if you could ever accept another man’s touch.

“God, I'd probably kill the son of a bitch,” he says with a wry laugh. “When I collapsed, you were all I saw—the only thing I could think about was not getting to see you again and it felt more terrifying than death.”

You can't stop yourself from asking. “Collapsed?”

The idea of Leon in such a miserable state is enough to nearly choke you. To think, while you were curled up in bed or bored and miserable at work, Leon almost died.

You've never heard him make such a claim before.

You watch as he parses through what he can and cannot tell you. “There was some kind of disease– a parasite. It nearly took me over. I collapsed right in the damn lab that held the cure—if it weren't for Ash–” he cuts himself off. “Baby Eagle, I wouldn't be here.”

“Leon…”

“Getting back here was the only thing that kept me going– back to you.”

You cup his face, your hands so much smaller than his, barely covering half the area of his own.

“You can stay as long as you want, as long as you keep coming back to me.” He smiles, yet another glimpse of that fresh-faced rookie sneaking between fine lines and creased brows.

Leon captures you in a crushing hug, head tucked beneath yours and body scrunched in on itself.

“I don't know what I did to deserve you.”

“You didn't have to do anything, Leon,” you say, as you card your hands through his hair again. “You being here is enough.”

He grumbles something into your skin as his head slowly drifts toward your stomach and his arms loosen. It's well past one in the morning by now—he must have been exhausted. You are as well, you realize, as Leon’s soft snores (that he claims don't exist) intermingle in the soft sounds of your living room. Music still drifts in the air, mixing with petrichor and eucalyptus as you drift off to sleep.

You know your neck and hips will be sore in the morning.

You know Leon will be closed off again—despite his confession. Not because he's been disingenuous but because he knows nothing else.

You know the air will feel damp and coffee won’t be made until he wakes.

you take another bite. the watermelon’s from a street vendor down the block who sells it in hacked-up wedges, ice cold from a blue cooler. you’d walked back barefoot, because your sandals snapped and sho offered to carry them, but ended up forgetting them halfway through a story about some new blocking form he’s trying. the apology came in sugary form.

he grunts when the screw won’t budge, that tendon running down the side of his throat pulling taut. the new mole you didn’t notice until two nights ago, when he’d passed out on your chest after a beach run and a long shower, dances around on his chin.

“fan’s a lost cause,” he mutters, pulling the tool from between his teeth. “might throw it off the balcony.”

“you won’t,” you pop a seedless piece of watermelon into your mouth. “you love that stupid fan.”

“‘s not stupid,” he pouts, “it’s from kageyama.”

you blink. of course it is. a gift from his old partner, lugged across an ocean because it reminded them of a joke only the four of you would still remember.

(them including tsukishima kei, another old teammate, who somehow got dragged into both the trip to brazil, and the mess, completely against his will.)

you swallow your laughter, nudging a sweaty curl off his forehead with your pinky. “you know we’re gonna die in this kitchen, right?”

the cracked plastic base even has a sharpie doodle on it: a lopsided smiley and a thumbs up drawn onto the compartment you open to replace the batteries.

“ever the romantic,” he deadpans, but he leans into your touch anyway, eyes fluttering closed for a second. “at least you’ll be wearing my clothes.”

you grin. “buried in them, actually. put it in my will.”

he snorts, tossing the screwdriver onto the counter beside you and stretching out his arms. big baby. “maybe we should go swimming.”

“after you fix the fan.”

“fan’s dead too, baby.”

you suck the juice off your thumb and look at him, really look at him, bare feet blackened a little at the soles from the tile, right hand smudged with grease from the inside of the motor. there’s a healing blister on his palm. a faint shadow under his eye from waking up too early for runs on the beach.

you lean forward and kiss the corner of his jaw, slow and quiet. “then let’s go die in the ocean instead.”