maskormenacelogs | It's hard to fight when the fight ain't fair

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It's hard to fight when the fight ain't fair

WHO: Kaidan and Shepard
WHERE: Apartment
WHEN: Wednesday Night
WHAT: Kaidan tried to kill the Commander under the influence of Harry Orr
WARNINGS: will advise if necessary

Ever since...the incident, things had been awkward for Kaidan. Not just at home, but everywhere. He'd attacked his friends, strangers, and people he looked up to -- like his roommate. Which was even more awkward, for a lot of reasons. Not just the fact that he'd strangled him, and Shepard had definitely been showing the signs of injury, and the longer the week went on, and then the second week, the worse he felt about it.

And then there was the fact that he'd smashed a giant hole in the wall between their bedrooms. Which was even more awkward, when you were actually trying to avoid someone. He'd tried to put a blanket up, to cover the space, and hope that it would do the necessary work to still give at least the illusion of space between their rooms, but it was still -- not right. And Kaidan had been going to bed earlier and earlier, in an effort to actually avoid seeing a person he'd practically choked to death. Or tried to. Well, it wasn't him, but it'd been him, and that was enough to make him fret and worry, and feel ashamed for the fact that he'd actively tried to kill someone like Shepard.

He'd made dinner, of course -- like some sort of twisted penance, but he normally ended up eating in his bedroom, asleep before Shepard got back, or just as he was going home, and he'd done a good job of avoiding him, up until the day that Shepard got home early enough that it just wasn't feasable that Kaidan would be going to bed quite so early. He looked up from the stove, where he'd just put something in the oven, before he fixed the other apartment's occupant with a tight, hesitant smile. "Hey, how're you feeling?"

Yes. Just rub in the fact that you had your hands around his troat, and tried to choke him to death. Great job, Alenko.

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Fortunately, Shepard healed fast -- though if he was holding himself a little gingerly for a few days, and avoided speaking too loudly, that was only to be expected, wasn't it? As much as he'd have liked to figure out where Kaidan's head was on the matter, between the remnants of his own injuries still on him (they didn't, he decided, merit another trip to the doctor or that girl who'd healed him) and the cleaning up the police had to do, the moment just didn't seem to be right to bring it up.

On the Normandy, he'd always had the opportunity to see his crew and give them privacy when need be, but with a badly-patched hole between their rooms (something else they weren't talking about) retreat wasn't exactly an option, so Shepard did the best he could and simply left Kaidan to himself. It wasn't that he held it against him -- though he knew Kaidan well enough to guess he'd be beating himself up for it for a long time -- but Kaidan was never one not to speak his mind. When he was ready, he'd come to Shepard with it, and they could put it behind them.

It wasn't until nearly two weeks of this that Shepard realized Kaidan was not, perhaps, going to bring this up after all, and was actively avoiding it. Something that sat poorly with him, and when he came home only to find his roommate looking almost guilty when he looked up and smiled at him, that just made that unpleasant feeling worse.

"I'm fine," he said instead, ignoring the awkwardness of the moment to fix Kaidan with a tight smile. "What are you making?"

"Dinner. Baked chicken," he said, and looked back down to the oven, opened it, and took a look inside. It was better than looking at Shepard, still noting the spaces on his neck -- not that he was looking -- where the skin was still bruised. He'd messed up with Shepard, a lot. He'd ripped him apart for allying himself with terrorists, he'd pointed a gun at him, he'd even questioned whether or not he was still human.

But that was, perhaps, unfair. A lot of what he'd done to Shepard was unfair. He should have trusted him a lot more than he did. He should have done something -- anything -- to make it up to him. He'd been planning to, back home, but that hadn't equated to taking action here, where it mattered. He'd done nothing more than give Shepard bits and pieces of information about what was going on at home, stumbling and making an idiot of himself more often than not. Telling Shepard he was a Spectre was one thing, but that hadn't proven much, had it? And then? Then he'd lost control -- and maybe it wasn't his fault. It wasn't his fault. But that didn't mean that he'd missed something. Some step, some thing had been the reason that Shepard had been hurt by him. Something he hadn't done maybe, but that didn't excuse him.

"Should be done in about twenty minutes," he added, before he looked back down at the food, and then back up to Shepard, and then back down to the food again. "If you don't want to wait out here."

Guilty was one way to put it. He did feel guilty -- Shepard knew his crewmates a lot better than they knew themselves, sometimes.

Shepard frowned, looking at Kaidan like he was seeing him clearly for the first time. The worst of the damage had healed by now, sped by Shepard's own body and Cerberus' implants, and he didnt even have the hoarseness in his voice he'd had the first couple of days after the incident. He'd kept Kaidan under as long as he could, relieved to hear when someone had started working on a solution.

He could fight Saren and the Reapers, but he couldn't fight something that existed in his crew's heads, in their veins. Whatever they'd seen while they were under the influence of the Hornet's virus, it was as inaccessible to Shepard as the Prothean vision had been to his crew -- and he wanted to understand it just as badly.

Not for the same reasons they'd wanted to understand it then, of course. The scale he was working on was much smaller than that. Just no less imperative.

"It's fine, Kaidan," he said firmly, coming around the counter instead of sitting down like he normally would. Trying to keep his expression friendly, because whatever was making Kaidan on edge, he wanted to do what he could to ease that. "Twenty minutes isn't that long. We haven't had the chance to just hang out in a while."

"Yeah," he said, but his voice said very clearly that it had been designed like that. Kaidan normally didn't retreat so early, or leave so early to go running, or even spend most of his time out of the apartment. Of course he'd done it, because even if the crime hadn't really been his, and Kaidan knew that -- he remembered what it was like to tighten fingers around his neck, and feel Shepard's pulse there, feel it kick violently, like it'd missed a beat.

And feel happy about that. In a violent, prideful way that Kaidan had never thought he'd feel about hurting another human being. Not violent pleasure like that. His fingers drummed on the counter, a nervous energy needing a way out, but he didn't move. He could barely shift his feet to shuffle away from the oven.

"Been too busy," he lied. Terribly. He looked back down at the sink, but certainly didn't look at Shepard. Meeting his eyes was next to impossible, after watching them start to dim after he'd tried to --

"Anyway, I guess, I'll --" he'll what? He didn't know, but maybe it would be better if he left? Or should he just...start tapping away on his omnitool? No, none of those seemed right, but he didn't know how to just come out and say more than the "Sorry" he'd already given at least twenty times since he'd gotten back to normal. Not a single one seemed to alleviate his guilt.

Shepard had never been one to press someone for more information than they were willing to give, but two weeks of being outright evaded by his own roommate -- his friend -- was more than he was willing to stand for. He frowned, stepping forward until he was within arms range of the other biotic, trying to catch his eyes, and figure out why he kept looking away.

"Kaidan," he said his name softly, carefully, like he was an animal that might spook if Shepard spoke too loudly. Tempering himself had never been Shepard's forte, and maybe it showed in how carefully he had to move, when the temptation to take Kaidan by the shoulders and simply shake it out of him was almost overwhelming. He'd never thought of Kaidan Alenko as the type to keep beating himself up over a mistake, but it clearly wasn't something that was going away no matter how he'd tried to give him space and time to figure things out for himself, or how many times Shepard accepted his apologies.

So maybe it was time to confront the problem head-on instead. That was what Shepard always did best, wasn't it?

"You've been avoiding being in the same room alone with me for days," he began, advancing one step forward to close the distance, though he didn't lift his arm just yet. "And we both know you're not that busy." And they were still awake at the same times; the hole in the wall meant Shepard was aware of when Kaidan was up and about just as much as the reverse applied.

"Are we going to talk about this or not?"

"Talk about --"

He couldn't even feign ignorance, could he? That wasn't fair to Shepard, which meant that he shouldn't even try. The fact that he'd been tempted said enough, and Kaidan closed his eyes, and took a breath. Shepard was...trying to talk to him like he'd flee, and that said enough, didn't it? He'd expected him to be angrier, at first, with him -- about this -- but he hadn't, which said enough. He looked at the food one more time, before he leaned against the fridge, his face screwed up slightly.

"Yeah, okay, sorry --" he released a soft, half-flabberghasted laugh. "I'm normally better about being up front with you, Commander. That's my fault. I just..." how did he even start this? It wasn't just that he'd tried to strangle the Commander, or that he enjoyed it, those were out of his control, it wasn't him.

"I'd say it was as much me being out of control as anything else, but that 's only a part of it, but a big one," he admitted, his voice pitched with a touch of disappointment. He really was disappointed in himself, for letting someone take him over, even if it wasn't something he could have ever fought. The fact of the matter was: he should have. He should have done something, but he didn't even know what.

"It was rough enough when you died the first time, I guess I..." this would be a lot easier, if he could just tell Shepard what it was bothering him, but... Shepard was so far behind him now, it felt almost... wrong? He'd had it all planned out, it was going to go just right, an afternoon at Apollo's, he'd tell him exactly how he felt, and then --

Well, he didn't know. Hopefully it'd be reciprocated? Maybe he'd say something about how much Kaidan meant to him? but he didn't hold his breath -- that was a bit much, wasn't it? And probably unlikely.

But even still, it was hard to think about killing someone you eventually wanted to...

"Honestly? I'm mad at myself, Shepard."

The more Kaidan spoke, the more Shepard had to struggle to keep his brows from constantly rising higher and his expression from turning into something incredulous. It wasn't like Kaidan to ramble either, or at least ramble without actually saying anything that made sense. He finished and looked at Shepard like the admission should mean anything, but the words only left Shepard feeling note confused than before.

After all, from everything Kaidan had said, his death was well behind him -- and there was nothing about the situation that should have reminded him of that. He exhaled, shaking his head and giving Kaidan a steady look.

"Mad at yourself for what? Almost killing me?" He prodded, softer than he normally would have, despite the harshness of the words. "We've been over this, Kaidan. Holding it against yourself would be like..." He trailed off, struggling for a metaphor. "Me being angry with myself about working with Cerberus."

Not the most elegant analogy, but hopefully it drove the point home. He cleared his throat, trying to meet Kaidan's eyes, reaching out to touch his fingers lightly against his shoulder. "Whatever it is, avoiding me isn't the answer."

It wasn't an elegant analogy, but he knew what Shepard meant by it. He didn't know, of course, that Kaidan had stared down the barrel of a gun at him afterward, that he'd had to bank on his trust to make sure the Commander didn't end up with a bullet in his brain. Of course, his loyalty to Shepard outweighed any doubts, but after that? The fact that he'd felt the surge of victory when he did it?

It made him sick to his stomach, honestly. And Shepard was right, of course, avoiding him wasn't the answer. It wasn't even close to the answer, but Kaidan needed to sort things out, even in his own head. And it wasn't like it'd been easy, what with the gaping maw between the bedrooms. They needed to patch it up --

But really, there weren't many ways to tell your roommate what he was trying to say, without saying it, was there? It wasn't like Kaidan could just leave and give him space, if... Well.

"I guess you're right. I mean, it's not that I -- " he scrubbed a hand through his hair. "It's harder to come to terms with, when it's someone you..." Admire? Look up to? Something else? Shouldn't he just come out and say it? Chilton had been suggesting he do more, be proactive, he'd said -- and maybe that was in terms of trusting the team, but...

That also meant in other places too. He'd been about to send Shepard an invitation, hadn't he? Still had the draft on his omni-tool, tooling through a few word choices before he sent it. Without the pressure of the reapers on their doorstep, it'd been harder to justify just jumping in, but... he didn't know if he could wait forever, either. Not with the way things went here. What if he lost the chance? What if something happened?

He swallowed, but ploughed on ahead. "When it's someone you care about."

The silence hung in the air for a while after that, Shepard's lips slightly parted as his brain worked on processing exactly what Kaidan had just said, blinking slowly.

Intuition came to Shepard easily in fights, anticipating the empty spaces his enemies left behind, where their attention flagged, and insinuating himself into them to gain the upper hand. Conversations, though, felt like a minefield, and he'd learned it was wiser to keep his mouth shut and listen to what other people had to say. There were any number of ways to take what Kaidan had said, and Shepard watched him, frowning slightly, before his expression shifted.

Minutely, but it was there, from concerned confusion to tentative realization, his expression becoming something more curious, and if one didn't know the Commander, you could almost call it shy. It was hard not to pick up on the nervousness in Kaidan's body language, and Shepard found himself mirroring it unconsciously, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

"You care about a lot of people, Major." It was a half-hearted attempt at deflecting the tension even he could feel starting to snap through the air, and he cleared his throat. "Maybe you should care about yourself more."

Kaidan paused, and shifted. Watching Shepard carefully. He didn't know what he was trying to get at, with those words. Was he trying to say anything at all? What did he mean? Was there --

He swallowed, and shifted from foot to foot, starting to examine, and take in his expression, before he made any snap-judgments. Not that Kaidan wasn't the sort to make those, but for once in his damn life, he slowed down, and kept his mouth shut, and thought before he spoke. Kaidan always thought. A lot, but more often than not, the thinking was after he ran his mouth, like they were totally separate parts of him.

But he couldn't think this through all night, could he? That was just going to keep him going in exactly the same direction he'd been going, which was nowhere, like he was spinning his wheels, and he was damn sick of it. He'd been wallowing in something close to self-pity for near on two weeks, and Shepard was right, he needed to care about himself. That at least, they could agree on.

He stepped closer, just one step, but in the small kitchen, it was enough. "That's..." he ducked his head. "Probably a good point, but I'm not talking about anyone else right now," he broached it carefully, like Shepard was a spooked animal. And fairly enough, he had no idea what that indiscernible look meant on his face. What Shepard was thinking. "I was talking about you."

Really, Shepard wasn't any more sure of what Shepard was thinking than Kaidan was. Which should have been embarrassing, how a mind that stayed razor sharp even when geth destroyers were sending missiles at it was balking so easily.

There was something terribly awkward and familiar about this situation, although it took Shepard a moment to place it, but then he remembered what it reminded him of. Tali fumbling with her words in front of the engine, Jack's eyes drilling into his own with searing intensity in the dim light of engineering.

Then again, neither of those encounters had made his gut clench hard enough to leave him breathless. He shifted uncomfortably when Kaidan stepped closer, but he didnt move away, meeting his eyes.

"That ... Almost sounds like a compliment." He tried for humor to lighten the mood, though it fell a bit flat. Not for the first time, he had ample reason to curse having spent most of his life on a ship, as he could feel the flush crawl up the back of his neck and onto too-pale skin.

His voice, at least, managed to stay level. "But I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to say."

He had a feeling that Shepard understood it a lot more than he let on. Kaidan watched carefully, watched for the small details, especially the flush on his skin, that was good right? It had to be good, or at least not terrible. He wasn't exactly saying no, was he? Or at least... well, Kaidan didn't know whether playing it off with a joke was an attempt at a subtle no, or if he simply...didn't know how to say yes, but Kaidan shifted his weight, before he bit the inside of his cheek, thinking.

He really did need it spelled out, and hearing that was...encouraging, at the very least. He wasn't walking away, and he hadn't been turned down. That had to mean something, right?

Right?

"Yeah, I guess I'm doing a bad job of spelling it out," he admitted, his voice touched with shame at the sound of it. He smiled, hesitantly, and rubbed at the back of his neck, like he was trying to think of the right way to say it. Or at least to approach it. He wasn't doing it right, he knew that. He was failing miserably, and...

"I don't know, I guess..." it wasn't working. He had this whole speech mapped out, but it didn't really matter anymore, did it? Not here. Not without... everything that was happening at home. It just didn't seem right. Now they had time, why should he talk about what they could've missed? He stepped forward, and reached out, to rest his fingers against Shepard's cheek.

"I think you do."

Shepard remembered hearing, once, that inertia was the most dangerous thing in space. That you had to be conscious of what you put into motion, because there was no telling when or how it would stop -- or what it would crash into. In space, all it took was the smallest touch to set off a cascade of reactions you couldn't stop.

Maybe it was the warmth of Kaidan's fingers against his face, or the soft, serious tone of his voice, or even just the way he closed the distance between them, but left that little bit more as uncharted territory, no man's land. Unless Shepard chose to claim it.

He could turn on a time with biotics pushing him forward, but the step he now took was slow and clumsy, but purposeful, pushing past the fingers on his face so he could reach up and cup Kaidan's with his own, his touch sure in a way that didn't match the sharp tattoo of his heart in his chest. Of course, Shepard was used to presenting a better face on things than he actually felt, and it felt like the most obvious thing in the world to lean in and press his mouth neatly to the Major's.

The kiss -- if one could call it that -- was dry and chaste, but firm, lasting for all of a second before Shepard began to draw back, tense wariness snapping through his body as he tried to gauge Kaidan's reaction. If he'd judged wrong, if he'd misunderstood the implication,being less than an inch from a grown L2 was not the place to be.

Kaidan's brain worked constantly, always twisting and thinking things through. Constantly working through every avenue he could've thought of, antagonizing over every mistake and misstep until it was so overworked it had evolved from something small into something large. Right now? His brain skidded to a full-on stop, and he didn't think much of anything for as long as the kiss, if one could call it that, lasted.

When Shepard finally pulled away, straightened, his brain had to take a few moments to kickstart itself, like he was sputtering and stumbling over thoughts that he couldn't quite form. Things were working in his head, but he couldn't get them to solidify. He kept getting into a loop of Shepard, lips, kiss -- and then everything stopped working again.

His mouth open, he tried to work it open, but he kept stopping, what could he even actually say? 'That's exactly what I had in mind' sounded too stupid to actually work, and that's all his brain could come up with, before he opened his mouth, the first thing coming to mind about all he could think of.

But nothing came out. He was still too stunned to say anything, before he choked out a somewhat dazed sounding: "Well --" before he leaned forward again, to mirror the motion, but this time it was a touch less chaste, a little less about trying to feel out whether or not he was going to get punched for this, and with a touch more confidence.

Shepard had been fully prepared to take a step back and apologize -- Kaidan's tone of voice didn't seem to suggest he'd been on the right track -- but when he leaned in again, that firmly pushed any thoughts of retreat out of his head. Shepard's breath hissed sharply out of his nose, and he tipped his head to accommodate the press of Kaidan's mouth against his own.

It had been a while, but it was hardly like it was Shepard's first kiss. Maybe a first time for kissing someone who'd been under his command at one point, but that was the furthest thing from his mind right now, forgotten in favor of trying to find the right way to make this work. When he turned his head too sharply and bumped his nose against the other man's, he broke away, gasping softly. Strange, how winded something so small could make you.

"Wait--" It wasn't what he'd meant to say, and the fact that his arms had found their way to Looping around Kaidan's neck wasn't the most persuasive argument on that point, but he needed to clear his head. But the pause gave him the opportunity to sniff the air, realizing it was filled with the distinct scent of charred meat.

"I think that's the chicken." He was surprised his own voice managed to stay so steady, even when he felt too warm and disoriented.

That was... new. Kissing Shepard wasn't anything like he'd imagined -- not that he'd spent much time thinking about it -- but it was better. Up until the moment that Shepard bumped against his, and he paused, trying not to accidentally bite anything, which would just leave marks that he didn't think either of them were going to want to explain. To anybody.

He paused, waiting. This wasn't -- that wasn't a bad wait, was it? Hands on Shepard's hips, his fingers twitched slightly, a faint reminder that he was there, and he wondered if Shepard was asking him to remove them, but... he was there too, wasn't he? He hadn't moved, just backed off, and --

"Shit!" he finally said, a slight delay, his brain still operating on a start and stop bootup sequence that didn't seem to actually finish, like he simply couldn't get it to work, but action often did, and in that moment, he finally jerked slightly, pulling out of Shepard's arms completely, if only to try and salvage the chicken, which honestly -- it wasn't too bad. He looked at it sourly, once he pulled it out, before leaning against the counter again, before looking back at Shepard, his face a touch red.

"Ah, sorry, I guess -- well, it might not be too ruined..." he looked it over, with crossed arms, before finally sliding his gaze back over to Shepard, trying to make light of the situation. Or at least attempting to. "Sorry, I guess I was a little distracted."

Kaidan pulling away entirely left Shepard at a bit of an awkward loss, arms still shaped around another body left gripping empty air instead. For a brief, crazy moment, he was seized with the urge to reach out and tug Kaidan back, but he clamped down on the irrational impulse and folded his arms across his chest instead, glancing away.

Until Kaidan called for his attention, and his eyes dropped to the food. Which wasn't that bad, just crisped to the point of charring at the edges, but they'd both had much worse than that and lived, hadn't they? He chuckled, because it felt like he was supposed to, and ran a hand over his hair, then shook his head.

"That makes two of us. Seems like we're regular fire hazards, aren't we?" That sounded better in his head than it did out loud, and he let his gaze drop to the floor, which had become immensely interesting.

There'd been a moment there, or something like it, and now no amount of smartass remarks Shepard could think of was going to get them back there, where it had finally felt like they were getting somewhere at last. He coughed to clear his throat, then glanced up.

"So ... been holding on to that for a while?"

"Ah --" He didn't flush, but there it was again, the slight frown. A touch on the constipated side, before he wiped it from his face, and gave Shepard a slight grin. He didn't need to know that Kaidan still had a message on his omnitool, that he'd never sent. It'd been here since he arrived, almost a year ago. He didn't need to open his mouth and talk about how he hadn't dated anyone in years, that he'd been... waiting for the right person, and then it was almost too late by the time he'd realized it.

No, that was probably...not the right way to start this off, was it? He just bit the inside of his cheek, and thought about it for a moment, before he let his arms fall back down, a nervous habit, crossing and uncrossing his arms. "Yeah, I guess... I've been thinking about it for a while."

He actually smiled, a bit wider this time. "You didn't think... I mean, we've been going out to dinner for months..." he winced. That was probably...not the right way to approach it. Then again, did he really want to tell Shepard that he'd actually intended to take him out on a date when he bought him, before he lost his nerve? That seemed... probably dumb.

"I might've...considered it."

There'd been a glimmer of... not hope, per say, but definitely something. But going out to dinner was just something you did with people you lived with, wasn't it? Shepard has dismissed it out of hand as anything significant, deciding that unless the matter was ever actually addressed, it was better not to read too much into it.

Except now, apparently, he was being asked to, and he looked caught in the headlights for a moment before he winced and rubbed at the nape of his neck. Months sounded bad. Months of Shepard apparently completely missing cues he was supposed to have picked up on.

"Oh." That ... wasn't as surprising as it should have been. It certainly explained the extra awkwardness after his attempt at strangling Shepard to death. The realization also left him feeling a touch foolish, like he should have picked up on it sooner. He brought a hand up to his mouth, tracing his lower lip in thought, before he caught himself and stopped, letting his hand drop.

"Were you ever going to say anything?" It was better than asking why he hadn't said anything at all.

He really was trying to think. Trying to calculate and find the right words to say that would get him back to where they'd been before Shepard realized the chicken was burning. There had to be a way, right? There had to be some way that he could get Shepard back to where they'd been. He breathed out, and then Shepard did that... thing with his fingers, and that's all he could concentrate on for the longest time.

It was hard to look at anything else, until he dropped his hand, and Kaidan... well, he followed it for a moment, and he was concentrating so hard on it, that he almost didn't hear Shepard's question, until his brain caught back up to him, and he frowned, almost like he was hurt, before he winced. No, he shouldn't be hurt, he deserved that, actually. It wasn't fair to harbor these kinds of things, and leave Shepard in the dark, was it?

"I guess that's...fair," he admitted, and rubbed at his pants, like he was trying to get read of the sweatiness on his palms. "I...meant to? You just didn't -- I wasn't sure if you had someone back...home, and I guess I figured we had time, so --" so it didn't seem like it was that pressing. For once. "I don't know, with you being back, before..."

All he had were excuses. "I guess I didn't want to push things, but right now that sounds like a pretty bad excuse."

It was a pretty bad excuse -- he'd heard better from stammering recruits trying to explain why they were out of their bunks after hours, and had come up with better excuses too. But Kaidan seemed so damn chagrined by the whole thing that Shepard couldn't do more than chuckle, scratching at the stubble on his chin. Of all the things he'd expected to have to deal with coming off-shift, this ... hadn't been one of them.

"Come on, Kaidan," he shook his head, exhaling softly and ducking his head. "It wasn't exactly a ... priority." Really, the way things went down on the first Normandy should have been a clue, shouldn't it? When Shepard had a mission on his mind, that was what he focused on, first and foremost. His crew's well-being mattered, but that was about as far as interpersonal relationships ever got. There were always more important things that needed his attention, and he couldn't afford to slow down when lives depended on him moving forward.

Things were different here, though, weren't they? There wasn't that urgency hanging over their heads, the sense of impending destruction that still haunted Kaidan, sometimes, when he spoke about home. It was one thing to know the Reapers were going to invade Earth, another to actually see it, and Shepard wondered if he'd ever get sent back home to live through it himself.

Thoughts like that weren't helping with the present situation, though, and he pushed them aside, leaning his hip against the counter instead. "So... what now?"

That was the question, wasn't it? Where did they go from here? Where did Shepard want to go from here? It wasn't like they'd actually said anything about the nature of their relationship. They'd kissed, but that was...just kissing. It could have meant nothing at all, just like the dinners hadn't registered --

But Kaidan wasn't stupid. He'd said what he wanted, or at least made it clear so Shepard was at the right page now, maybe at the top of it while he was on the bottom, but he could wait until he reached the bottom of the page, so they were at the same spot. He looked at Shepard, and then the chicken, and then he smiled. He admitted he didn't have anyone, so another of Kaidan's fears were stripped away. It wasn't that he thought Shepard did, but... what if he wasn't from the same world Kaidan was. There could always be small changes, right? But maybe this wasn't one of them.

"I guess, we could eat," he nodded at the chicken. They were biotics, after all, and while they might have something more important than food on their minds, food still often came first. "And we could...talk about...this --" he gestured, somewhat vaguely, between the two of them. "I mean, I know what I want, but..." but...

"I guess I'm still wondering what it is you want."

What he wanted was a question Shepard had no idea how to answer. It wasn't as if the thought of -- this hadn't crossed his mind before, but it had been fleeting and pushed aside as quickly as it had been contemplated, dismissed as complications he didn't need to have in his rekindled friendship with the Major.

Then again, that had been before he'd blown a hole through his wall, proceeded to attempt to strangle him, then awkwardly alternated between avoiding him and apologizing to him for two weeks. Maybe it was time to reevaluate that position. He looked at the chicken, and then back at Kaidan. If one didn't know the savior of the Citadel better, one might say he actually squirmed. It took a lot for a biotic to turn down food, but somehow, he didn't think a full stomach was going to be the solution to this.

"Ah." An awkward pause, eyes finding the floor again, before they stubbornly lifted up, jaw set in determination. "Actually, I was kind of hoping to figure out what you wanted, first." This was just taking them in circles, he knew, but if Kaidan had admitted to knowing what he wanted, Shepard might have a better idea of how to phrase his.

That? That wasn't encouraging. It wasn't that he thought Shepard was trying to hide his own feelings -- no, there was... something there, for certain. There was something lurking beneath the intense gaze he'd set on him, and Kaidan very nearly squirmed himself, before he relaxed -- forced himself to relax -- against the counter. He looked more like a creature folding himself up, like he was ready to bolt at anytime.

Laying himself out like this, putting himself forward when he had no idea how Shepard felt like this... it was a little like being in the line of fire, but he was used to that, wasn't he? And Shepard had kissed him, he'd kissed first, so it had to mean something? Maybe it wasn't so much that he didn't want to put himself forward as he didn't want to do it too much.

That was the only thing that allowed Kaidan to open his mouth, while he worked through the answer carefully. "Well," he started, hands moving to lace together, and then unlace, he started to nervously rub them together, a calming gesture. "It's hard to say, we know things are temporary here, but I guess you could say I'm looking for someone --" he paused, and shook his head. No, it wasn't just someone. "-- you? -- to share things with. Date? I'm not exactly the expert on these sorts of things, or how to ask someone out, you know. I haven't exactly been going out of my way to find a partner back home."

That was as close as he could come, to the actual truth. The fact that he'd sometimes caught Shepard looking at him, and the fact that he'd spare him a smile, or stumble over his words. It wasn't exactly as if he'd been very...subtle.

That was enough to startle a laugh out of Shepard, however unwitting, and he paused like he'd caught himself by surprise before he gave him a wry smile.

"Not my area of expertise either," he pointed out, before his expression gentled, catching sight of the nervous worrying of Kaidan's fingers. He supposed he'd put the man on the spot, and he cleared his throat slightly.

"I think that be nice." That sounded terrible, and he tried again. "I mean, we already live out of each other's pockets..." He trailed off. "Maybe I should just stop talking."

But that'd leave them in the same bind before, so he pushed himself off the counter and back into Kaidan's personal space, putting on a grin that was more confident than he felt. "What I'm saying is, I'd like that, too. Maybe we can figure it out as we go."

Edited 2015-03-22 10:25 (UTC)

"I'd..." he trailed off a little, when Shepard got a little closer, and while the smile was confident, he could see the signs that Shepard was just as lost as he was. The way his hands didn't know where to go, the way the smile reached his eyes, but didn't quite make it as relaxed and confident as it should.

"I'd like that, Shepard," he admitted. Probably a lot more than he was letting on, and with him back in his personal space, the food... was entirely forgotten again. Maybe it was because the prospect was so close, he could practically reach out and touch it.

Well, he could.

He actually did, well, he reached out close enough to let his fingertips rest against his cheek again, trying to figure out what the next move should be. "Do you mind if I --" he paused, obviously he didn't mind. "Is this okay?"

Shepard wasn't used to questioning every action and instinct -- but then again, that was what people like Kaidan were around for, weren't they? To take the care Shepard wouldn't, or at least show him how it was done. Against the fingers resting on his cheek, Shepard laughed, feeling lightness take hold even as he lifted a hand to grasp Kaidan's wrist, as if to keep it firmly where it was.

"I think I can live with it," he assured Kaidan dryly, but his tone suggested he was happy to do more than just live with it, and he smiled at Kaidan, looking younger than his age, for once. And the words weren't just empty platitudes meant to soothe his roommates worries. Things weren't exactly resolved, he knew, but as he leaned in towards Kaidan of his own volition, with purpose that was just a little surer, that if they worked on it together, they would be.

A fighting chance to make things work. That was all that anyone could ask for, wasn't it?

Edited 2015-03-22 23:04 (UTC)

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It's hard to fight when the fight ain't fair

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