#like it’s touch with purpose AND Inej is basically an athlete

[brekkerbybrekker]

Let Me Help

(Just some Kanej fluff involving a sore leg and sad Kaz confessions)

His tell is obvious as Inej hears him climbing up the stairs. His pace is slow and he’s leaning heavily on his cane. It was a bad day.

Inej is sitting in the window sill when Kaz enters the room, damp from the rain. He crosses the room wordlessly and sits down at his desk in a huff.

“Why are you wet?” Inej asks, innocently enough.

“I’ve been all over this damn city gathering supplies for the next job,” he struggles out of his wet jacket and vest, “apparently no one around here wants to work anymore but me.” He considers, then adds, “and you, of course. Then again, if I noticed you doing your job, you wouldn’t be doing a very good one.”

She ignores the compliment, “what new job? I wasn’t aware.”

He turns his face slightly away from hers to avoid her eyes. Another tell that most would ignore. “Well, there’s nothing specific yet, just being prepared.”

Kaz stands to hang up his wet coat and gloves, and winces slightly every time he takes a step, “And this weather is not helping,” he adds, begrudgingly. Obviously hating for anyone to see him struggle. A small part of him resenting her for her presence in his space.

“Why are you working, then?” She moves closer to him, perching on the edge of his desk as he sits back down. His head falls back against the chair back. His eyes are red rimmed and shadowed underneath. His skin looks sallow and pale. “You look exhausted,” she concludes.

“Too much to do, too little time,” he replies. Deflecting.

“What needs to be done?” She pushes him. He is exceptionally dodgy tonight, his nerves on edge. He sighs and closes his eyes. “Tell me, maybe I can help?”

“There’s nothing you can help me with.”

“Try me.”

“Jordie’s birthday is this week,” he answers instead.

Inej doesn’t speak, so caught off guard by this sudden admission. Instead of responding, she gives him time to continue.

“I spent an hour standing at the harbor like a sentimental fool because I have no grave to visit.” He opens his eyes and stares blankly at the wall behind her.

“I don’t even remember the day, that’s the worst part. I just know it’s this week. A 20-something-th day. And I’ve tried to remember, and I’ve looked into records, but there’s nothing. There’s no trace of him.”

“You’re not a sentimental fool for paying respects to your brother,” Inej says. His face is hardened, no trace of the softness that should come along with his words, not in his face or his tone.

“No, but I’m a sentimental fool for missing him.” Again, the candidness of his speech is shocking. And last year, would’ve been something she’d have never expected him to admit. After Kaz finally told her about Jordie and everything that happened, it’s like he is relieved to have someone else in the know. Someone to be honest with. He doesn’t look sad, he looks angry. At himself, she supposes, but also everyone else. Everyone that took so much from him, everyone that has those things that he doesn’t have. He kneaded his bad leg absently.

“Let me,” she says instead of replying. He looked like he was going far away, and she didn’t think before she said it, didn’t consider the impact of her words. The intimacy of the gesture. She just wanted to distract him. It’s just so difficult to give comfort to a person who doesn’t know how, or can’t, accept comfort.

“Let you what?”

“Your leg. I know how,” The offer felt awkward coming out of her mouth, but there was no taking it back now, so she just barreled on, “Everyone in my troop did, since injuries and knotted muscles were common.”

“I’m fine,” he responded, automatically, too quickly.

“No, you aren’t,” she sighs, “it’s worse tonight. It’s actually a little insulting that you think you could get away with lying about that to me.”

“It’s the rain,” he mumbles, then gets up to limp over to his bed.

“No matter what the reason is,” she tries, softer, hoping he picks up on her meaning. “I can help.” Please, let me help somehow.

He meets her eyes for the first time since she offered. Underneath the grimace that’s permanently plastered on his face is something like fear.

“I don’t have to touch your skin,” she adds, quietly.

“I know, I’m familiar with the process,” he snaps, then sighs. He reclines back against his pillows and headboard, swinging his legs onto the bed. He nods, curtly, and says, “Okay, then. Do your worst. I expect you’re going to add this to your timesheet?”

She rolls her eyes at his weak attempt at comic relief and walks over to the edge of his bed, plopping down on the mattress cross-legged, next to him.

“This might hurt more at first, but eventually, it will hurt less,” she tells him.

“Sounds promising,” he grumbles, and throws an exaggerated arm over his face indignantly. (Embarrassedly, she thinks, though he’d hate to realize that.)

She reaches toward his leg and she stops when he grabs her sleeve. “It’s particularly sore today,” he admits, uncomfortably. And I have never let anyone do this and I don’t know what to expect, goes unspoken.

“I’ll be careful,” she says, and he releases her arm.

She begins to work out the tension in his leg, gently at first, since he immediately hisses at her first application of pressure, cursing and muttering “that doesn’t feel careful” under his breath. She smiles in response.

His leg is knotted with tension from the day and also from the tension that’s been building up in him from the moment she touched him since he is apparently using every ounce of willpower in his body not to recoil from her touch.

Eventually, after the awkwardness and pain subsides some, they both relax into a more comfortable rhythm. Her, applying more pressure than before, him wincing occasionally but refusing to say anything or really even breathe differently to give her any indication of pain or relief.

The only sign she got that he wasn’t completely regretting his decision to allow her to do this was a forceful exhale when she changed what she was doing to target a different muscle that was almost a sigh.

“See? It helps,” she boasted.

He didn’t reply, and she continued.

Bit by bit, he relaxed into her touch. She didn’t look at his face, her cheeks hot at the suddenly reality of the situation now that they weren’t picking at each other. She was touching him and he was okay with it. At least, okay enough. And she was sitting on his bed. With him in this compromising position. In this room that only she is entrusted with being in. Doing something only she is entrusted with doing, whatever that means. Instead of dwelling on any of those facts, she just went through the motions of massaging, just like she would for another member of her troop. She was so lost in this process that she didn’t notice his breathing change at first.

His body had gone slack next to her, his breathing deeper. She looked up at his face which was still covered from the nose up by his arm. His free hand crossing his stomach, fingers occasionally twitching. He’s asleep, she realizes, (and much more quickly than a normal, not sleep deprived person would be, she adds mentally.) Her heart tightens a bit at the sight. His face was softer in sleep, jaw unclenched and mouth not pulled into some sort of frown. She feels like she’s seeing something she shouldn’t, that Kaz wouldn’t want anyone else to. She wonders if she’s still included in that “anyone else.” He trusts her with his life and his secrets, but does he trust her with this?

Moving unnoticed is second nature to her, so getting up without waking him isn’t difficult. She considers tossing a blanket over him if it weren’t for the surety of that both waking him up and mortifying him.

She cuts the light and leaves out the window, unnoticed, only looking back at him once... or twice. Kaz doesn’t stir.