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You’re not allowed to fly at night but all that seems to mean to Grace is that she’ll be itching to leave as soon as the sun rises, already waiting for you when you roll out of bed to a message on your datapad at 5am, that just tells you to come as soon as you can. On those occasions you don’t bother to take anyone else, and it’s just the two of you watching the world wake up, trees rustling in the breeze and unfamiliar creatures starting their day. Sometimes if you’re already up when the message comes through you can be first out of the hangar, chasing the rising sun across the sky. It’s rather gratifying to see the relief on her face when she sees you, even though that face is blue and distinctly feline.
The first time you see her in her own human skin is a rare occasion when you pass her in the corridors, her looking distinctly like she’s about to slam someone’s head into something. You wish you could say that it was a heart-changing occurrence, but you’re pretty sure your heart had already been flipped over during her tense and uncommunicative rides in your back seat, her face set. She never spoke to you more than she needed to, which was almost not at all, but sometimes your questions could get a small smile out of her.
She seemed to approve of your flying, anyway.
You’re more than a stranger and less than an acquaintance by the time Jake turns up, and when you spend an entire day with Grace in the back looking like she was genuinely upset that they’d lost him you almost want to give her a hug, or ignore the no fly rule so she can carry on looking, so she doesn’t have to carry that weight on her chest through the night. Somehow instead it leads to you following her and Norm back to the lab, and you spend the evening and some of the night making jokes and sarcastic comments with the others, occasionally (okay so quite often) looking over at Grace to see if she was okay, as she studied samples and smoked an entire pack. You’re not sure you’ve actually managed to help, but when Jake wakes up to Grace being the first thing he sees you’re glad you waited around; you could happily take the image of her relieved smile and etch it onto your eyelids so you never forget. You find her grumpiness endearing but her smiles are really something, enough to overwhelm you, anyway. You slink out as Jake starts crowing about everything he’s seen, and you miss her watch you walk away, smile still stubbornly clinging to her lips.
Three months isn’t so long, you reason as you consider what spending all of that time cooped up with her is going to be like. It was fine when you were just ferrying blue people around, when that was the only Grace you got to see, but there’s something about human Grace that’s different - you think it might be because while she’s still tall, she’s not literally a giant (it’s that or the lack of tail, anyway).
She makes you nervous like you haven’t been around girls since about ninth grade, and you try to keep your clumsy hands and red cheeks in check around her as much as you can. She spends so much time looking at samples, writing things down - and you’d be lying if you said you weren’t interested in the science - but you know your level, that you’re just the muscle and that she hates the fact that you’re necessary. She also hated Jake a few weeks ago but now she’s making sure he eats, scolding him for not looking after himself, but it’s pretty unlikely you’ll pull off anything anywhere near as impressive as what he has any time soon. It’s cute, almost painfully so, the way that she covers up how much she cares by being so mean.
You don’t sleep well, never have done and in the first week when you get up to get some water you’re surprised to find Grace sitting in the almost dark, staring out the window with a frown on her face and you’re surprised that she’s sans cigarette, and she doesn’t have any kind of sample in front of her, which is strange because she’s always doing something. She looks up as you come in and her frown maybe lessens a bit, or you like to think it does.
You get some water and sit down opposite her, smiling a little then looking out the window too, and you wonder if she’s going to say anything or if she’s just going to keep on frowning at you.
“Couldn’t sleep?” she manages, an awkward two minutes later, and when you glance at her she’s not looking at you but she has produced a pack of cigarettes from somewhere about her person.
“I’ve never been much good at sleeping through the night,” you reply quietly, letting a smile tug at your lips so that she sees you don’t mind her asking. “Any chance I can bum one of those?”
She looks at you for a moment, like she still doesn’t know what to make of you, then shrugs. “Knock yourself out.” She throws them across the table, and then the lighter follows as she takes her first drag. “I didn’t know you smoked.” You’re not sure whether it’s a question or a statement but you seize on it anyway.
“I quit when I was about 18, but someone keeps on smoking in close proximity to me and honestly I’m lucky I held out the week.” You make sure to smile as you say it, so she knows you’re teasing.
“I would apologise but it’s rather obvious that I’m not going to stop.”
“That’s fine, so long as you can live with me stealing one occasionally.” It’s been a long time - you have to fight the urge to cough, and you almost flick ash everywhere like you’re about fourteen years old. “I guess you couldn’t sleep either, huh?” You say into the following silence, after she’s rolled her eyes at you in what you’re pretty sure was agreement.
“I wanted to go for a walk but obviously I can’t because of the security regulations and deadly animals.”
You’re surprised by her candor, expecting some sort of brush off, and you smile. “If it wasn’t for my chopper I would be going stir crazy,” you say sympathetically, and she still looks like you aren’t annoying her.
“I can imagine this all isn’t particularly fun for you, being stuck with two scientists and wonderboy.”
“It’s been… Interesting.” You both laugh, and you’re just struck, again, with how pretty she is in this lighting, how much you want to make her smile more. You want to punch yourself for being so sappy, and you’re glad the others back at base aren’t going to see you in this state. “No but it has actually been really interesting. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that the high-ups don’t tell us anything about this stuff - we’re just expected to shoot at anything that gets too close.”
“I suppose the less you know the easier it is to shoot without hesitation,” she muttered grimly, frowning at the plate both of you were using as an ashtray.
“That does seem to be what the Colonel is counting on,” you chuckle hollowly, frowning at Grace. “I may not understand a lot of stuff, but you can tell me about it anyway.”
She raised an eyebrow sceptically. “You wouldn’t mind if I told you all about alien plant life?”
“Just because I’m the muscle doesn’t mean that I don’t find weird plants interesting.”
She looks like she doesn’t know whether to believe you but you try to smile encouragingly, and she eventually launches into a long spiel about the most recent samples they’ve found. You’re instantly gripped by what she’s saying - she’s so passionate about her topic that you can’t not be. You both don’t go to bed until much later, and you’re pleased to think that she maybe looks a bit more relaxed than she had when you happened upon her.
You try to help around the place as much as you can, and often that means you end up trying to help Norm teach Jake Na’vi, which actually means Norm ends up trying to teach both of you while you try not to mess around too much - Grace has been known to split the two of you up when you get too excitable. Occasionally she interjects when Norm can’t work something out, seeming exasperated that you’re better at it than Jake, but you also don’t miss the proud look on her face when she overhears the three of you bickering in an odd mash-up of Na’vi and English. When she catches you looking her facial expression immediately goes back to grumpy, but before she can distract herself with lighting a cigarette you’re already grinning at her.
You catch her trying to go for a walk very early one morning a week or so later, slipping on an exopack quieter than you would have expected of a scientist. You let her leave and then slip out of bed after her, unable to let her go wondering off by herself. She doesn’t look surprised to see you when you join her sat on the weirdly soft moss, looking in the direction of a sunrise that somehow looks better when it wasn’t being viewed through a pane of glass.
“I suppose you couldn’t leave me to traipse around by myself, colonel’s orders, right?” she sounds surprisingly calm, and her face is purposefully neutral.
“Yes, though I personally would be rather upset if you got eaten by a thanator,” you manage carefully, steadily looking forwards at the sunrise unfolding in front of you, not letting yourself glance over at Grace. She doesn’t respond for long enough that you start to worry you’ve said the wrong thing.
“So you’re here because you like me,” she asks, voice liberally laced with cynicism, and you want to laugh because yes that is why you’re here, but you can’t tell her how much.
“Something like that,” you chuckle softly and finally look at her, meeting her eyes for the first time since you sat down. You worry that your feelings are written all over your face.
“I suppose it helps you’re not one of my lab team - you get to escape most of my terrible moods.”
“Your grumpiness is almost endearing,” you laugh, and she does too, surprised. You hadn’t considered that she wouldn’t even guess that you were interested in her, that she saw it as an impossibility, that she was unused to things in her personal life going her way, that she was so busy acting natural that she didn’t notice that you were doing the same thing.
“We’ll see if you still think that in a few weeks,” she snorts, and you just shake your head, smiling at her. The two of you watch the sunrise in silence, comfortably sat together. By the time you get back inside Norm and Jake are staggering around blearily, and they both look confused but don’t ask because Grace doesn’t give them a chance to, already talking about the plans for the day.
Living somewhere with such little space meant that awkward brushing past people was basically inevitable, and Norm’s awkward apologising and Jake’s laughing are two things that you can deal with. Having to edge by Grace, on the other hand, is something that you both look forward to and dread, especially at night when you’re both in pyjamas and there’s just two thin tshirts between the two of you.
You feel like you’re in a movie, clumsily bumping into your crush to get them to notice you, and you hope that the lighting is bad enough that she doesn’t notice the dark blush that covers your cheeks as you edge past her and apologise.
“Couldn’t sleep again?” she asks softly once you’ve got past, her just going to bed after having stared at samples for hours, and you getting up to get a glass of water once again, planning on sitting up for a bit because you know it doesn’t matter how long you spend laying down; you’re just not tired.
“Yeah, sometimes there’s nothing for it; I’m just not tired enough to sleep.” You’re both whispering, almost in the doorway of where Jake and Norm are sleeping, and it’s dark so you can barely see her face.
“Want company?” she offers and you’re surprised because you would have thought that her sleep was more important than the pilot’s insomnia.
“I would, but don’t you have things you need to do tomorrow?” you reply carefully, trying not to show how much you would appreciate it.
“The samples will still be there even if I have a lie-in,” she says simply, and follows you into the other half of the tin can, settling at the table with a small smile, and you’re nervous like it’s your first date or something, but she just pulls out a pack of cigarettes (you still don’t understand where she keeps those), offering you one, which you take, even though you had internally promised that you weren’t going to take up smoking again just because you find it insanely difficult to say no to her.
After a long quiet moment that she spends gazing out the window, you decide it’s time to attempt conversation - and you realise that you somehow know approximately nothing about her.
“Somehow we’ve spent weeks stuck in a tin can together without having learnt anything about each other, apart from our preferences in disgusting space food.”
She laughs quietly and looks at you again, eyebrow raised in question. “What do you want to know?”
“I don’t know,” you shrugged. “Family? Tea or coffee? Favourite colour?”
She looks at you for a moment, like she doesn’t know whether to indulge you or not, and you can see the moment where she decides “fuck it” cross her face. “No children, no spouse, an older brother I haven’t had contact with in a long time, parents that I haven’t seen in even longer. Coffee, obviously, and forest green.” She reels off, ticking them off on her fingers with a weird smile on her face, like she can’t believe she’s having this conversation. “You?”
“No children, no spouse, a brother and a sister I still get messages from occasionally, my parents still send me care packages,” you admitted with a small smile; you just couldn’t stop your mum from fussing. “Coffee, and red.”
“I feel like I know you so much better already,” she says sarcastically and you roll your eyes with a smile.
“Isn’t there anything you want to know about people when you meet them?”
“Mostly I want to know whether or not they’re interested in botany and if not I tend to just walk away.”
“You’re still talking to me,” you couldn’t help but point out, however much it may be tempting fate.
“Well I can leave now -” she pretends to go to stand up with a smile, laughing when you quickly shake your head.
“You offered, remember?”
“So you’re saying I brought this upon myself?”
“Exactly,” you’re still smiling, unable to help yourself, just pleased that she’s being so unlike how she can be back at base, when Quaritch and such are there to annoy her. She looks more relaxed sat here now than you think she must have been in years.
“But, really, isn’t there anything you want to know?”
“If there was anything I wanted to know I would have asked; I’m not exactly known for observing social niceties.” Her tone is as dry as ever, but she’s still smiling.
“I’m sure there are plenty of things even you wouldn’t ask without invitation.”
“Alright, how about the obvious one - why did you agree to be posted on a distant moon?” she says after a moment, and you feel like she’s actually wanted to ask for a while, like she doesn’t understand how the hell you could want to be here if it wasn’t for the science.
“I didn’t have any children or a girlfriend to keep me on Earth, the pay was good, and I was told I wouldn’t have to shoot any people, because of course I didn’t realise that actually the Na’vi are people, at that time. I was eager for adventure.”
“Do you regret it?”
You mull that over in your head for a prolonged moment, then you shrug. “I don’t think so. Opportunities on Earth are pretty scarce these days.”
“They dried up right around the time the last of the rainforest got chopped down,” she said bitterly, and you almost laugh.
“Of course you’re an environmentalist.”
“How can you not be, considering the state of things?”
“I’m not saying I’m not, I’m just saying that I should have known. Whenever I finally go home I sure am going to miss the colour green, even if they do produce noxious gas here.” you paused and then grinned, quick and sharp. “Is this when you start to tell me all about how important trees are?”
She laughed, a short sharp burst like she’d surprised herself, shaking her head at you. “I could, although that would potentially be even less interesting for you than alien botany.”
“At least the alien plants glow,” you agree and she laughs again, still shaking her head at you.
“If you’re not careful I’ll explain the science behind that,” she warns and it’s your turn to laugh, grinning across the table at her, surprised and pleased with where the conversation had gone.
“I could think of much worse things,” you shrug and she eyes you suspiciously, like she doesn’t understand why you seem to be happy to hear about something that you have no previous interest in.
“It must feel like sitting through a very confusing biology lesson whenever I lecture you.”
“I happened to really like biology when I last took it in tenth grade,” you laughed and she rolled her eyes again, as though she couldn’t believe that anyone would choose subjects other than biology. “Did you forget that there are people who don’t care about biology again?”
“No, I’m constantly aware of it while being baffled by it as an idea,” she said dryly, but she was still smiling, and you find yourself having to duck your head, looking at your hands, something that you couldn’t help but do when slightly overwhelmed. Grace practically grinning at you across a small table in the half dark is more than enough to qualify for that, and you’re scrambling for a response when she speaks again. “Now, we should both go back to bed soon, so what do you want me to bore you to death about first?”
“Why don’t you explain the glowing? That seems intricate enough?” you laugh and so does she, softly, smiling in the dark, then she launches into an explanation, and you listen to her voice instead of the words. When you both stumble into your separate beds much later you’re still smiling, like you can’t help yourself, and you hope that she doesn’t regret offering to stay up with you.
A few days later you get back from running Norm in his avatar form somewhere in the chopper to be faced with Grace sitting in her usual seat, eye jammed to her telescope, writing something down without looking away. You smile at the sight of her and can’t help the thought that crosses your mind - the boys are both out today, Jake teaching Norm something or other far enough away from the Na’vi’s home that they wouldn’t get in trouble, and it’s just the two of you stuck in the tin can together all day, something which has yet to happen - usually Grace always has samples of some kind to collect. Your brain is out of your control as it considers everything that could happen, but you settle on being lucky if you squeeze a conversation out of her.
"No samples to collect today?" you ask carefully as you sit down at the table, far enough away that you're not in danger of harming any of her research with your continuous fidgeting.
"No, not today. I would have liked to have gone to see the kids but Jake's not there, he's with Norm, and I wouldn't be allowed anywhere near the Na'vi by myself."
"It's a shame that they don't trust you," you sigh, knowing that what happened weighed heavily on Grace, that she still carried that guilt around with her everyday. "You've only ever wanted to help."
"Unlucky them," she muttered bitterly, staring out the window, her near constant frown wrinkling her brow.
"Grace -" you started and she sighed, shaking her head.
"I know what you're going to say and I appreciate it. I do, I just don't want to hear it," she smiled grimly and you want to hug her.
"So long as you know," you respond, softly, and then let a small smile cross your features, letting her know you're prepared to drop it. "So, what are you doing?” you lean forward a little, eager beside yourself, and she faces you with a quirked eyebrow.
“You don’t want to know about this plant, even I’m leaning towards saying it’s not interesting,” she says with frustration and you grin, because you know that she doesn’t mean that, that she’s just annoyed.
“You don’t believe that at all, you’re just frustrated with the plant for some reason.”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” she admits, and then looks at you as though to confirm that you don’t mind if she goes into it. “It’s just completely different to everything else we’ve found,” she says simply, surprising you.
“Well that was going to happen eventually, right? I mean this must have happened all of the time when you first got out here?”
“Of course, but it’s different -” she sighed in frustration and lit a cigarette, dragging a hand through her hair. “Can we talk about something else?”
You almost have to shake yourself into paying attention, rather than being overwhelmed by seeing another side of her that you had yet to witness - frustrated but not taking it out on you, which you decide is a compliment - and try to come up with something to say. “We could go back to twenty questions?” you suggest, somewhat lamely in your opinion but she nods.
“Alright, seeing as I got the last question, it’s your turn.”
You decide you go straight in with the big guns, and ask something you’ve been thinking about since that night. “Why no spouse?”
She looks surprised but not upset, and shrugs with a weird, small smile on her face. “I always let the science come first, and people don’t like that in a partner,” she paused, considering. “I actually had been in a relationship when I took this job, and she told me that if I went and lived on a distant moon where she had no hope of seeing me for twenty years then she wouldn’t wait for me to come back, and I didn’t even have to think,” she laughed sharply, quickly, and then she leaned back in her chair, sighing. “She knew what the answer would be.”
The mood is tense but you can’t help yourself. “So a girl, huh?” you say in your most teasing voice and she instantly rolls her eyes, but she almost looks relieved that you broke the tension.
“Yes, a girl,” she has that slightly begrudging smile on her face again, like every conversation with you is amusing but against her better judgement, like she still isn’t sure how she got herself into this situation. “What about you, is there a girl?”
“No, like you said, no one likes it when their partner literally leaves the planet. And there wasn’t a girl anyway, not one I was serious about.”
“You’ll have time for all of that when you get back to Earth anyway.”
“Can’t wait to impress the girls with my facts about glowing alien plants,” you said with a grin. “You’ll have time for all of that too, when you get back.”
She shrugged. “I’m old, and I don’t have much intention of getting back. If it’s up to me I’ll still be staring at glowing alien plants when I’m dead.”
“Isn’t there anyone on base that you think is cute?”
“Well, erm, no, of course not,” she managed, and was that a blush gracing her cheeks, and she’s looking down, and you’re startled by this change from the usually brash and unapologetic scientist. “I, erm,” she coughed. “I need to get back to work,” and she just turns back to her samples, leaving you sat there with your mouth hanging open, trying to work out what on earth would make her react in such a way. Then you work it out; she obviously does think someone is cute, but is absolutely mortified and will definitely refuse to tell you about it, even as a slow smirk crosses your face and you resolve to work it out.
“Okay, what’s wrong with Grace?” Jake questions two days later, the three of you holding an impromptu meeting huddled at one end of the tin can while the woman in question is distracted by science.
"She's barely said a word that wasn't "move" in like two days," he adds, and you sigh.
"I was warned about this, by the other technicians. This just happens sometimes, apparently. She just gets into a mood and then doesn't speak and then when she's over it she pretends like it never happened," Norm answers.
"She let me go to bed without eating dinner or doing my video log last night, something is definitely wrong." You keep quiet because you think you know what happened - ever since your conversation where she accidentally revealed what was definite interest in someone at the base she's been angry at all three of you, yourself especially. Like she's dealing with being embarrassed by being mean to you all, something which doesn't surprise you in the least; she seemed like the type to lash out at others when she's unsure, or when she felt like she’d revealed too much. Which made you question, what had she actually revealed? Because it didn’t seem like much but she was acting like it was make or break.
“I think I know what happened,” you say, cutting over Norm theorising, and the two look at you in surprise.
“That was the day where the two of you were here alone, wasn’t it?” Jake grinned. “Something happen with the boss, huh?”
You roll your eyes; he can be such a typical Marine at times. “Get your mind out the gutter, Jake. Nothing “happened”. She just,” you sighed. “She basically admitted that she might have a crush on someone at base. She didn’t say who and she told me she didn’t, but judging by her reaction it’s pretty obvious that she does.”
“Well it’s obviously me,” Jake says and you roll your eyes again.
“Oh yeah I’m sure she finds your inability to look after yourself incredibly alluring.”
“Somebody’s sensitive,” he responds and you try to keep your cool but you know he’s already called it, you can tell by the smirk that he’s trying to keep off his face but is steadily creeping through, and he starts to laugh, and the two of you shush him because you don’t want Grace to end up interested in what all of the commotion is and find the three of you gossiping.
“Regardless of my feelings towards our esteemed leader we need to get her to stop being like this,” you try, but he’s unable to resist another dig.
“You know she’s not technically your boss so you could go for it, I’m sure there aren’t any rules against that.”
“Jake. Focus.”
“Well what did she actually say to you?” Norm interrupts, trying to get the conversation back on track.
“We were just talking about whether we had girlfriends or not and then she said she wasn’t counting on dating ever again basically and then I was like “isn’t there anyone at base that you find attractive” and she was like “what no” but she was also blushing and she immediately said she had to get back to work and hasn’t spoken to anyone since, which is actually kind of admirable considering we’re all stuck in a tin can together.”
“You were talking about girlfriends? Looks like you’re in with a chance, Chacon.”
“Jake shut up. This really really isn’t about my feelings, this is about hers.”
Norm looked at you both for a moment, tapping his lip in silence, like he had some kind of idea, and you looked back at him hopefully, not just because you couldn’t wait for this conversation to end so you could get away from Jake’s constant teasing.
“So you need to make her feel like she’s back in control, basically? Which means you need to find a way to make her not embarrassed about her slip. I don’t know how to suggest you do that.”
“You could fall over dramatically while she’s in the room? Hey, I know, you could fall over onto her lap, that would totally work.” Jake’s still laughing at you, grinning like a ten year old as you try not to freak out just at the thought of accidentally doing that. “You could tell her you have a huge crush on her and that she shouldn’t worry about her crush on whoever because at least they don’t know,” he paused. “Actually why would she be freaking out this much unless the person she was talking about was you?”
“What? No, I - no!” you spluttered in response, while both Norm and Jake looked like this answered all of their questions. “No way!”
“He’s right,” Norm shrugged. “If she just liked someone at base well that’s… A lot of potential people. Way too many for her to be this stressed out about it.”
“Maybe she just hates people knowing things,” you tried weakly, while they both just looked at you, and Jake was still grinning.
“You should just walk over there and plant one on her,” he suggests and you groan in response because he’s been so purposefully unhelpful the whole time.
“We can’t really do anything, if one of us brings it up or she finds out that you two know she’ll probably ignore it for even longer. Give her a couple more days and if she hasn’t come around then I’ll have to say something to her.”
“I’m glad you’re prepared to take one for the team,” Jake laughs, like he can’t believe you’re actually considering confronting her at all.
“Just a warning; Max told me she once was like this for two months, so it’s not looking likely.”
“Does anyone know what happened that time?”
“Nope. Max asked around at the time and no one knew anything. Good luck.” You sighed in response, dropping your head into your hands, and then the three of you attempt to disperse as covertly as possible - so not really very covertly at all, and she doesn’t even look up when you wander back over to the table, ignoring you as the three of you spread out across the room.
It’s been three days. Grace has not said a single unnecessary word to any of you, even though you’ve made several jokes within her hearing about how terrible Quaritch is, which you know full well she would have laughed at otherwise, or at least cracked a smile. Jake has been making kissy faces at you whenever she’s not looking, so pretty much all of the time, and Norm is so nervous whenever she’s in the room you swear he’s close to cracking under the pressure and just running into the forest. It has to end, and neither of those two idiots are going to do anything about it, so once they’ve gone to bed and Grace is sat up on her own you decide it’s now or never.
“Grace,” you start and she doesn’t even look up from what she’s doing, diligently jotting something down and pretending like you don’t exist. “Grace, you can’t keep on ignoring everyone.” You move closer, standing next to where she’s sat at the table, leaning one hip against it. The sides of her mouth tighten, a clear sign she’s heard you, and she stops writing even though she keeps her head bowed, concentrating on the half empty page. “Look I don’t really know what I did but this has been the most frustrating five days of my life and you can’t take it out on the other two,” you say quickly, keeping your voice down because the others are asleep, but your frustration is audible.
“I’m not “taking it out on” anyone.” She says tightly after a long moment, looking forwards through the window instead of at you, and you have to restrain the urge to scream.
“What would you call ignoring everyone for five days, then? Because I would call that taking it out on us,” you sighed. “Norm found out that apparently you did this for two months once. Plus do not let this be a repeat of that.”
“I’m retaining a professional distance,” she said stiffly, and she looks like she literally has her entire body tensed. You wish that she could deal with this differently.
“We’re literally stuck in a tin can together, professional distance wasn’t going to be maintained.”
“It should have been. So I’m reintroducing it.”
“Grace you hate professionalism. You swear at your boss on a regular basis. You literally left the base so that you could continue to work without having to put up with his professionalism,” you sighed. “Please just talk to me, tell me what’s going on,” you murmur as softly as you can manage, but she doesn’t break.
“Nothing’s going on.”
“I really thought we’d made a connection here, that I’d finally have someone to talk to on this damn moon.”
“You and Jake seem to be getting on well, talk to him,” she rebuffs, bitterly, and you can feel the urge to scream getting much stronger.
“Have you spoken to him recently, he’s nice but he’s an idiot. And he doesn’t know anything about glowing plants,” you try, and you swear she almost relaxes a tiny bit, but she also doesn’t respond.
“Grace, please,” you say, softly, and pull up a chair next to her, looking at her with wide eyes. You sit so close that your knees are almost touching her leg, and you try not to think about that as it would just derail your thoughts from your attempt at conversation. She finally turns to face you, and when she realises how close your face is she immediately leans back, in a move that makes you feel like she maybe doesn’t trust herself around you, that she doesn’t know how to cope with you that close.
“Just tell me what’s wrong.”
She looks away at that, looks away from your beseeching eyes and downturned mouth.
“I’m really not sure that’s a good idea.”
“Do you want me to bear my soul to you, to restore the power balance? Because I will, if that’s what you need me to do.”
“Trudy, that’s not -” she murmurs, and you catch it when her gaze flicks down to your lips, and she looks back up quickly, and you swear there’s red gracing her cheekbones, and you can’t help the smile that flashes across your face. She takes that the wrong way and tries to leave, but you take one of her hands, standing up with her, trying to let her give you time to explain.
“Please, I wasn’t laughing, I promise. I was smiling because it’s good, because I’m glad,” you sighed as she glared at you, and you let go of her hand, ignoring the way that your skin tingles, the way you want to hold onto that moment of contact forever. “If the last few days have been because of what I hope they have, then I feel like we’ve wasted a lot of time stressed out when we could have been doing this,” and you take her hand again, softly this time, linking your fingers through hers, and you pull her closer, smiling as softly as you can, looking up at this frustrating woman you’ve been wanting to kiss for years. She looks uncertain, confused, like she can’t believe this is happening, like she’s waiting for you to laugh as you pull away and leave her stood there. You don’t do that, not even close, instead you take a tiny step closer and you lean up, sliding your other hand around the back of her neck and pulling her into a kiss, still softly and slowly, and when you pull away she follows you, wrapping her arms around you and tilting her head, kissing you slowly. When you both pull away you keep your arms around each other, and she’s smiling.
“Guess I’ve been pretty stupid, huh?”
“For a scientist you sure aren’t that smart when it comes to noticing when people have a huge crush on you,” you laugh, grinning so much you swear your face is about to fall off, and you kiss her again just because you can, feeling her smile against your mouth. “So you’re gonna stop being moody now, right?”
“Hmm I don’t know, convince me into it,” she teases with a mischievous glint in her eye and a smirk you’ve never seen, and you almost faint right there.