#blaming my moms poor choices of boyfriends in my formative years fr 💪

[wherenymphsroam]

52 :3

And can I also kiss you?? 😭

52: “Can I kiss you?”

prompt game :^)

⟡ cw: mentions of withdrawals, struggles with alcoholism, depression, specifically soggy wet cat vendetta leon but can be read with damnation leon in mind :3

⟡ a/n: YES we are smooching, i am kissin u on the mouf rn 🤍

“Can I kiss you?”

What the hell was he saying.

One minute, he’s trembling over a plate of eggs and pancakes back at the hotel, and now he’s barely holding himself back from slumping against your shoulder like an old dog. You had insisted on dragging his miserable ass out of there, told him to get his shit together. That you were going for a ride, and he should hang on.

(Of course he was too stubborn to let you drive, no matter the fact that he had already put down half a bottle this morning.)

So despite his better judgement, he allowed you pull him away from those four walls that were his hotel room, all under the promise that it’d still be there when he got back.

Sure, he didn’t want to leave. If his hangover had anything to say about it, he’d be tucked back under the covers of that shitty, scratchy duvet in the fetal position. His head was pounding. But sat here on this stoop tucked away into the mountains, overlooking the small town he had sought out to lick his wounds within, the cool breeze sweeps away some of the tension in his facial features. The fresh air has coaxed that stress out of his shoulders, loosened him up in a way alcohol hadn’t managed to in years.

But maybe it was you.

You, tucked against his side, thumbing slow circles into the back of his palm. The scent of your shampoo drifting through the breeze that passes his nose that has his heart rate slowing. Honestly, he didn’t want to pull this apart. Whether it was the fresh air or you by his side that had him relaxing for the first time in months (years?), it didn’t matter. Because he asked a stupid question, and he doesn’t really feel like taking it back.

“Leon, you’re drunk,” you scoff, shaking your head. As if kissing your superior was such a far fetched idea. Or maybe you just didn’t want to kiss him. He couldn’t blame you, he’s not sure he even bothered to pack a toothbrush when he sought out a direct flight to Colorado.

“I’m the most sober I’ve been in weeks, right now.”

In his defense, he was telling the truth. After arriving at that run down mug, he had made it his mission to slug back as much as he could before he had to leave. Because he knew this was coming — whether in the form of a text message detailing his next deployment, or with the arrival of military personnel — and he had stuck it to himself to ignore it for as long as possible. Started digging that hole of sweet silence into his subconscious the second he got his room key.

And yet…. Here he was. Sobered up and wanting. Forced to face the sad reality that he was lonely, damn it.

Alright, universe, you win. He’ll admit it. Why else would you be playing with his head like this? Those eyes, deep as the ocean, bright as the stars. Pretty lips that fill out so delicately, cheeks that look softer than anything he’s felt in months. You were the embodiment of something a man like him didn’t deserve, and no withdrawal could create the guttural rawness of the wound this reality inflicted on him.

You weren’t a daydream, and you weren’t an illusion. You were tangible, distantly so. And after having been dragged back down to earth, he needed something stronger than what was in his flask.

Chancing a glance over at him, it’s clear you’re debating with yourself. Your teeth tucking that sweet bottom lip under them, plush in how it swells ever so slightly under the pressure. Lashes fluttering when you search his features. He was definitely in better shape than you had found him this morning, silverware clinking and wobbling in his unsteady grip.

The sight almost made you want to slip them from his hands, cut his food up for him like a doting mother. Maybe guide a few bites past his lips like some guilt ridden caregiver, anything to bring some color back to his cheeks.

But you’d never say that out loud.

“… I believe you,” you hum, gaze shifting back up from the dip of his cupids bow. A shitty cover to ignore how you had just wondered how that scruff over it would feel against your mouth. “Just don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Yeah?” He dryly laughs, short and null of any real humor. “Just like how joining this god forsaken organization wasn’t either, right?”

Silence. Thick, drawn out.

Few people knew just how Leon ended up in the DSO, landed himself in such a comfortable place with the higher ups. And fewer knew why he stayed. It’s hard to really respond to that when you’re not part of that statistic.

“I’m sorry,” you find yourself muttering softly, turning away again. Shifting your focus back out to gaze over the town below, the traffic flow of patrons returning home, shops turning off lights.

“Don’t be. I’m being a dick right now.”

Leon forgot how snippy he could be during withdrawals nowadays. Made him feel like an overgrown baby, still stuck in his oral phase. That flask in his pocket might as well have become a pacifier, anything to keep him from spinning off the handle.

“You’re acting like one, yeah. Doesn’t make you one.”

Pausing, Leon glances at you, follows the line of your side profile for a moment. Studies the line of your nose, the slope of your top lip. Down and over the jut of your chin, the retreat of your jaw. He wanted to follow that track with the bridge of his nose, maybe press his lips to the hollow of your throat.

Fuck. Maybe he wasn’t nearly as sober as he thought.

Clearing his throat, he shakes his head, glances out in the general direction you’re looking in. Can’t help how he finds similarities between the slopes of the mountains and your face.

“I’m glad you think so.”