Work Text:
"I need a father,
I need a mother,
I need some older, wiser being to cry to.
I talk to God, but the sky is empty."
- Sylvia Plath
"Ashcroft, my office."
Grace jumped up from her desk in a panic, not even realising that she had managed to doze off at work, again. Making eye contact with her superior, she adjusted her glasses and fixed her hair franticly before hurrying to the office close behind him.
She knew what was coming, yet she still couldn't admit it to herself. Ever since she got back from the care centre and managed to bring herself to go to work again, she hadn't exactly been the star employee, not that she ever was in the first place, but this was bad. She couldn't stop herself from falling asleep at her desk, not being able to sleep in her bed despite being exhausted. Her panic attacks had gotten worse and more frequent, disrupting her entire work days, and her work itself had become sloppy and unfinished, and with every verbal warning she got she knew that this job wouldn't last, yet something in her mind still thought that she could somehow convince Nathan to let her stay, that she was fine
Nathan sat down at his desk while Grace stood near the door, not bothering to take a seat.
"Grace, you know I hate these meetings as much as you do, but I think you know what I'm going to say."
Grace shut her eyes for a brief moment, not wanting to cry in front of her boss. "Y-Yeah, I know..."
Nathan sighed and took his glasses off, leaving them on the table. "Listen, Grace, there's talks of you being put on extended leave again. I'm letting you know now just so you don't walk into that meeting with HR not knowing anything."
Grace didn't respond, because she knew that if she did, it would just be a babble of tears and stuttered words. In a way, she appreciated him just getting straight to the point instead of beating around the bush. Any thought of her convincing him that she was well enough to still work went out the window
'You'll have a more formal meeting with HR later today for any paperwork you need to sign." Nathan stood up from his desk. "Grace, I really don't know what to say, you were a good employee, albeit a bit late on reports at times. but even when they were late they were good. It's as if an entirely different person walked through these doors after you came back from leave."
Grace grimaced at his words. Due to the sensitive nature of, well, everything that had happened, she knew she couldn't exactly tell them the exact reason why she had went MIA for three days and then had to be put on leave, nor the reason why she had come back a "completely different person" in his words. This was the second time she had been forced to take leave for mental health reasons, and her entire office was running out of sympathy for her loud panic attacks and flashbacks. She didn't want to take leave, work was the only thing that kept her mind somewhat busy, and now she was on the brink of losing that.
Grace still stood there, trying hard to hold back her sniffles. Nathan continued. "I don't know whats going on with you, but you can't keep bringing it into the office. I know you have what it takes to do well in the FBI, but if you can't control your mental state, then I'll be honest, I'm not sure if you'll be able to come back."
Grace froze, she probably should have known that this was an option for her superiors. "B-But I can't lose my job, this is all I have!"
Nathan was slightly taken aback at how animated Grace had became in that split second. He sighed. "I know, Grace, I know, but you have to understand that we need everyone here to be completely mentally well. We've offered all the help that we can give here in the office, but you need to take more time off and figure this out before we have to let you go."
Grace didn't fight back. How could she? they were completely in the right.
She snapped back to reality once Nathan started to put his glasses back on. "Your leave starts tomorrow." Nathan said as he walked towards her. He put a hand on her shoulder, Grace not having the energy to shrug him off. "You're an excellent analyst, Grace, I'd hate to lose you from our team."
With nothing else to say, he walked out of the office to attend to other matters. Grace silently followed and went back to her desk, defeated.
Her meeting with the HR ladies was a blur. She sat there in silence while they did out the paperwork for her leave and had her sign it. Through the haze and ringing in her ears, she made out the words "liability".
For the rest of the day, she sat at her messy desk, staring into nothing.
thats it. ive lost everything. nobody trusts me anymore, i dont even trust myself.
why did this all have to happen to me?
why?
why?
why?
She snapped out of her trance once she heard her ringtone. She took her phone out of her pocket.
Leon Kennedy
She sat there for a moment, contemplating answering, but before she could make a decision the call rang out. She let out a shaky breath.
Ever since the pair had gotten rescued by Chris Redfield's team, Leon had been texting and calling her every once in a while to check in. He gave her his phone number while she was sitting in the helicopter waiting to be brought to the hospital. She remembered what he had said to her.
"If you're ever in trouble, call me, I'll be there."
It was a nice gesture, but Grace didn't take it seriously. She barely knew him, and she was sure that he had bigger fish to fry than helping a 22 year old mess deal with anxiety spells and seeing things that weren't there. He had to deal with real problems. She mainly replied to his calls and texts out of politeness, but she had never reached out fully for help.
His texts were mainly asking how she was holding up, and if she needed anything. He was always offering to give her food that his wife Claire had made, who's name Grace had only learned recently from talking with Leon over the phone. She appreciated him taking time out of his day to contact her, but in her mind it was surface level. Still, she did feel bad about not having the mental energy to respond to him, and as the weeks went by she had been ignoring him more and more.
He's only doing this because he has to, he's DSO, its probably a part of his job...
The clock on the wall had struck 5:00, but Grace didn't want to go. She didn't want to go back to her apartment. Her apartment was where her mind was at its worst. Nothing she did could cease the violent memories in her mind or the thoughts of how to even go on living after something like this. She had tried working out, meditating, picking up a new hobby, all things that were suggested to deal with PTSD, but nothing she did worked. Going to normal therapy wasn't exactly an option either since she could not tell the full truth to the therapist. She was specifically instructed to keep everything she knew under wraps except to the people of the DSO and the BSAA. She had no friends, no family.
She was alone.
She usually stayed back after hours before she was assigned the case at Wrenwood Hotel, but upon seeing Nathan's stern expression straight at her desk from across the office, she mustered the strength to get up, grab her bag and leave. Before she did, she grabbed the picture of herself and her mother from her desk, tucking it away in her bag.
The car journey home was silent. Grace used to love cranking up the radio to sing along to her favourite CDs, but things like that couldn't raise her spirits anymore. Her knuckles were white from gripping the steering wheel. She looked at herself in the rearview mirror. Her eyebags were pretty much purple at this stage, and acne that hadn't appeared since she was a teenager was starting to make an appearance again. She looked pale, like she had seen a ghost.
And that was the funny thing, she had seen ghosts. Ghosts of the past and ghosts of a biological warfare conspiracy that turned out to be true. After everything, she often thought of the people who had turned into infected throughout the care centre. Who were they before they turned? did they have friends? family? were they happy?
She drove over a long bridge as part of her commute home, and she often wondered what would happen if she just flung her car into the river below. She thought about this a little too often.
I shouldn't do that, I don't want a team of people to have to get my car out of the river, I don't deserve that much effort.
As she saw the sign for the liqour store in the distance, and pulled into the parking spot right next to the door. She walked in and as if on autopilot, grabbed a shoulder of whatever cheap vodka was on the shelf, and a shoulder of whiskey. She took it to the counter and paid after being ID'd, and silently went back to the car. She overheard the guy at the counter say something along the lines of "someone's having a party tonight" but ignored it. It was getting to the point that other workers in the store had started to recognise her and didn't have to ID her every time she came in, which Grace three months ago would've thought was ridiculous, but current Grace couldn't bring herself to care anymore.
She silently placed the alcohol in the passenger seat and continued on her way home.
Alcohol was the only way Grace could sleep nowadays. She had never been a drinker, even in college and even after she turned 21. She didn't exactly have many friends to go out and party with. She hated the taste, but getting drunk meant falling asleep for a while and not thinking back to the previous month. Without drinking heavily, every time she closed her eyes she saw them. Her mother, Emily, Victor, Zeno, and the countless infected she had come across.
She pulled into the driveway of her apartment as it had just started to rain. She grabbed the bottles from the passenger seat and locked the car. She fumbled for her keys before realising that she had left her apartment unlocked. She must've been too hungover this morning to remember to lock it behind her.
There was one constant in Grace's life right now, and that was the TV. She used to never use her TV, opting for watching things on her laptop instead, but the TV kept her company. It provided background noise while she wasted away in her messy, cold apartment. She had stopped paying the heating bill a while ago. She had the money to pay for it, she just kept forgetting until they eventually just shut it off. She didn't care if she froze, the alcohol kept her warm anyway. She had also become extremely afraid of the dark, and kept lights on at all times.
She could already feel the familiar tightness in her chest starting to brew, the main symptom of her anxiety. She constantly felt like she was suffocating, like there was a massive ball in her throat that was closing up, not allowing her to swallow. Even though she had been to the doctor plently of times, they told her that there was nothing wrong with her physically, and that every symptom she felt was just anxiety. Learning all of this made her hate herself even more. She hated being so weak that even just one anxious thought would send her mind and body into a spiral, a spiral that was impossible to unwind.
She unscrewed the cap from the vodka and took a swig, her face scrunching up at the taste. Despite this becoming a regular routine, she still hadn't gotten used to the genuine paint thinner that was the taste of vodka. She took another gulp before taking the picture of her mother out of her bag, and sitting on the couch.
The TV was on, but she wasn't watching. She stared at the picture of her and her mother, her hands beginning to shake and her eyes welling up with tears. She didn't cry much nowadays, unless she was waking up from a nightmare or having a particularly bad panic attack, these tears were a long time coming.
She clutched the picture to her chest, silently sobbing.
i'm sorry mom
it was my fault, if you hadn't adopted me, none of this would have happened. that man wouldn't have come for you.
i'm sorry that i turned out this way
The laughing track that was blaring from whatever sitcom was on the TV was a complete juxtaposition to what was occuring on the couch opposite to it. Grace took drink after drink from the bottle of vodka until the room started to spin and her head felt too heavy to hold up anymore. She continued to sob and let her body flop onto the couch, dropping the empty bottle and it shattering on the floor next to the coffee table.
She didn't react to the bottle breaking. She felt paralysed with anxiety yet loose from the alcohol, she felt like her head was going to float off her body. She wanted her mom, she wanted a father, she wanted someone who was older and wiser to tell her what to do next, how to break out of this cycle of obsessive memories haunting her, but her apartment was a silent as ever other than the TV.
It was getting later and later, and eventually the TV broadcast had ended, leaving no sound in Grace's apartment other than the broadcast end screen and her laboured breathing.
Having one more swig of whiskey, she collapsed back down on the couch, her mother's picture on the floor beside her. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes was the open medicine cabinet, bottles of sleeping pills and painkillers staring back at her.
She contemplated for a moment in silence.
i'm sorry, mom, i don't think i can go on for much longer.
i'm tired.
It had been two weeks since Grace had last responded to Leon's texts or calls.
Leon sat in the apartment that him and Claire had been renting. Leon had been asked to stay around Wrenwood for a little longer by the DSO to wrap up the investigation officially. He didn't mind. Chris was around investigating on behalf of his wolves, and Claire had moved with Leon to be closer to him and her brother, while also working with TerraSave in order to help any people who had been affected by the Rhodes Hill incident. So it wasn't all bad. He got to be close to his wife and best friend, and he got to put another Umbrella chapter behind him.
Leon saw so much of his younger self in Grace that it made him feel sick. Ever since she had insisted that she come with him to destroy Elpis after he told her to stay, all he could think of was how alone and scared he felt when he was her age and how all he wanted was to do the right thing. Granted, he was a bit younger than her when he first arrived at RPD, but she was still only 22 years old, and this was her first run in with something as mind-boggling as Umbrella, let alone standard FBI fieldwork.
Therefore, he had made a distinct effort to check in on her over the phone. He was never able to ask her where she lived and swing by her apartment in person due to being so busy with wrapping up the case, but after getting to know her and seeing how anxious she naturally was, he grew concerned. She was a normal citizen who hadn't experienced the horrors of Umbrella before. In a way, he was glad that the DSO had asked for him to stay behind, that meant that he was in Grace's general location. He made a mental note to physically meet up with her before he, Claire and Chris left again, but ever since she stopped responding to him, that meetup would have to be earlier than expected.
He sat there, looking through some of the text messages he had sent her and the missed phone calls.
- Hey Grace, Leon here
- Claire and I are gonna be in town for longer than expected. We'd love to have you over for dinner
- 👍
- (4) Missed Calls
- Grace?
- (2) Missed Calls
- I hope work isn't too busy, call me back when you get the chance 👍
Claire had noticed Leon sitting in the armchair of the living room, looking a little antsy, staring at his phone. "Is Grace still not answering you?"
Leon looked up. "No. No she's not..."
The messages weren't left on read, they were delivered and had never been opened.
Claire frowned. While she hadn't officially met Grace, Leon had told Claire about her, and if she was honest, she owed Grace for saving her husband's life, as well as Sherry's and anybody else affected by the Raccoon City Syndrome. "Is there anyone you can call to check up on her? Any family?"
Leon shook his head. "No, as far as I know she has nobody. Her only relative was her mother, Alyssa."
He stood up from the armchair, grabbing his jacket that had been drapped over the back of it. "I have a really bad feeling about all this..."
Claire handed him his phone and pistol from the countertop. "Go, see if she's alright. From what you've told me about her she doesn't have much support options except for us."
From Sherry to Rani, if there was one thing Claire Redfield had a soft spot for, it was girls that reminded her of herself. Despite Claire being older, and much wiser now, she would never forget the feeling of being so alone after her parents had passed away, and the loneliness of having this career. Of course, Chris had gone above and beyond for her from childhood to adulthood, and for that she would never be able to repay him, but despite his presence in her life there was something about losing her parents that made her feel so helplessly alone. She didn't want Grace to have absolutely nobody to turn to, especially after this huge case.
Leon gave her a quick peck on the cheek before putting his jacket and gloves on. Despite being free of the T-Virus, he still liked to wear his gloves from time to time. "I'm gonna ask Sherry to see if she can find out where she lives, I'll see if she's doing alright."
"And if she's not there?"
Leon paused at the door. "...I don't know. I'll figure something out."
Claire shot him a warm smile. "Go."
Leon gently closed the front door and made his way to his car, phone in hand dialling Sherry.
She picked up quickly, much to his relief. "Hey Leon! How are you doing?"
Leon smiled. "I'm doing good Sherry, I hope you're taking care of yourself."
"Always am, ever since the Elpis injection it's like I have a new lease on life again. Why are you calling so late?"
Leon got into his car and turned on the ignition. "Are you at the office right now?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Do you think you'd be able to find Grace Ashcroft's address for me?"
Sherry paused for a moment. "Yeah, of course, but why? Everything with Elpis has been wrapped up now, right?"
Leon also paused, backing the car out of the driveway. "I just need to make sure she's okay. I've been trying to contact her to see how she's holding up after everything with Gideon and she stopped responding."
He heard Sherry hum in agreement on the other side. "She's stopped responding completely?"
"Yeah, she's completely gone dark."
"I'll find her address, just give me a few minutes to sift through the files, I can't imagine it'll be hard to find considering Gideon knew where she lived for years."
Leon shuddered, remembering going through some of the files that Victor had on Grace. It didn't take a lot to scare him, but seeing how much information Victor had on her without her knowledge was downright creepy. It was even creepier that Victor had waited to kidnap her when he did. She was a tiny girl with virtually no experience outside of her computer, and he waited until she was all alone on a job without the safety of her car or apartment to take her.
"Thanks, Sher, Claire and I are due to go visit you."
Sherry scoffed on the other end. "With what free time?"
"True."
He could hear Sherry typing quickly over the phone. "There. Sending you the address now. Looks like it's about an hour away from your current location."
That was all he needed to hear. Thanking Sherry, he sped off in the direction of Grace's apartment.
"Leon?"
Leon turned up the phone speaker. "Yeah?"
"Do me a favour, don't go in all guns blazing on Grace."
Leon raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, Grace is super anxious, right? and bombarding her might make her feel worse. You gotta be chilled out."
"Chilled out is my middle name, Sherry. I'll report back later."
He could visualize Sherry rolling her eyes at his cheesy statement. "See you later, Leon"
He hung up the phone and sped off onto the highway, mind racing.
While Leon was able to stay quite calm in most situations, he couldn't help but let his mind race when it came to people he worried about. If Claire ever came home late, he would be worried sick and about to go looking for her himself. If Chris wasn't responding while on missions, he could feel his stomach getting sick with worry until Chris responded over the comms again. He was well aware that the people who surrounded him were more than capable of looking after themselves, especially Claire and Chris, but after losing so much, Leon couldn't help but viciously cling on to the people who were still here with him.
And as far as he was concerned, and whether she knew it or not, Grace was one of those people now.
After an hour of driving, Leon finally arrived at her apartment block. Sherry had told him the room number before he arrived. It was on the bottom floor to the very right.
He glanced at the window to what he assumed was her living room and saw a faint glow of a lamp and a TV. He also took note of her car being in her apartment's parking spot in the front. He sighed a breath of relief.
That's a good sign. Maybe I was just overreacting.
He opened the front door to the complex and turned down the right corridor. Thoughts of how easy it would have been for Victor to break in and take her filled his head. He shakes away those thoughts, focused on the task at hand.
He gets to the house number that Sherry had provided to him. Apartment 5. Leon clears his throat and knocks gently.
"Grace?"
He knocks again, a little louder this time. "Grace, It's Leon, open up."
Chancing his luck, he grabbed the handle of the door and turned it, and to his surprise, her apartment was unlocked. This was getting strange. Just from Grace's demeanor alone, and the fact that she was a young woman living alone, he knew that she probably wouldn't have left her apartment unlocked of her own accord. On guard, Leon quietly opened the front door and kept his hand on his pistol, just in case.
Her apartment was pretty small, and for that Leon was grateful. He slowly made his way towards the soft glow of the lamp coming out of her living room. "Grace? Are you in here?"
Nothing could have prepared him for the carnage that he saw in her living room.
His eyes first locked onto Grace. She was passed out on the floor, in what looked like broken glass. She looked horrible. Her hair was matted, her face was stained in tears and it looked like she hadn't showered or changed her clothes in weeks. Then, his eyes wandered to the copious amount of alcohol bottles littering the entire room, and finally, his eyes widened as he saw the bottles of pills on the coffee table next to her.
Oh no
On autopilot, he ran towards her, falling down to his knees next to her body. "Grace? Grace?!"
He then noticed the small pool of vomit next to her. His heart stopped for a moment.
He pressed his fingers to her neck and lowered his ear next to her nose and mouth to feel if she was still breathing. She was. He felt her faint breath tickling his ear. "Fuck fuck fuck..."
He picked her up off the glass and placed her on the couch, propping her head and shoulders up with the pillows to prevent her from choking on any more vomit. She cried out in her sleep, Leon making out the words "mom" and "I'm sorry" throughout her cries. Kicking away the larger shards of glass, he knelt beside the blonde, cradling her face. "Gracie, Grace? Can you hear me?"
She wailed for her mother again, and the sound broke Leon's heart. Suddenly, she gasped awake and shot up from the couch. Leon wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders, and settled his other hand on her knee. Then, she shrieked.
"Leon?!"
She started to cough and shuffled away from him like a scared animal, hissing at the cuts on her arm from falling off the couch and landing in the broken glass in her drunken state. "O-Oh my god, Leon..."
"Grace..."
She shrieked again, clearly confused. "H-How the fuck did you get in here?!" Her face scrunched up and she clutched her arm again in pain, and felt Leon's calloused hands on her shoulders, trying to calm her.
"Your front door was unlocked, Grace." He replied seriously, trying hard to look into her eyes directly. That statement made her cheeks flush red. She wanted the ground to open up and swallow her whole, taking her away from this. "Oh..."
"Grace, I need to know what you took." He picked up the bottle of sleeping pills that were on the coffee table and saw that it had been opened, the seal had been undone. His blood ran cold. He looked to the small pool of vomit next to her and saw little while shards of pills still in it. it didn't look like enough to do any damage.
I don't think this was planned, if she had planned it thoroughly, she would've...
Upon seeing the pill bottle in his hand, she began to hyperventilate. Leon locked eyes with her, seeing nothing but despair in hers. "Hey, Hey..."
why didn't it work
why didn't it work
why am i still here
He gently started smoothing her hair down with his hands, crouching down in front of her and leaving the bottle of pills at his side. "Leon, I...I can't breathe" She croaked. He cupped her face with his hands and started stroking his thumbs down her cheeks. Her breath reeked of alcohol. "Grace, I need you to look at me, can you do that for me?"
Her breathing rugged, she managed to lock eyes with him. He remembered what Sherry had said about not bombarding her. He could get answers later. Right now, he needed to focus on calming her down.
"You can breathe, Gracie, it's just a panic attack, just like your other ones, yeah? C'mon, take some deep breaths with me..."
Gracie
Despite her drunken state, hearing her mom's old nickname for the first time in years made her start hyperventilating even more. Leon didn't waver. Keeping eye contact, he took deep breaths with her. Inhaling for four, holding for five, exhaling for eight. They didn't stop until Leon was sure that her breathing was more regulated. "There you go, nice and easy..."
He pulled away from her once she had calmed, moving to sit on the couch next to her. With the light from the TV he was able to get a better look at her. She looked sickly. She was gaunt, her eyes were bloodshot from not sleeping, and her lips were cracked and clearly had been bitten to shreds from the slight remain of blood on them. She sat next to him in silence, her breathing still a little rugged and her body swaying back and forth. She stared down into her hands, picking the skin on her thumb like it owed her money. Leon continued. "Grace, what happened here? I came because you haven't been answering your phone. Did something happe-"
Grace felt her mouth salivate. "I-I think I need to throw up again..."
She stood up and clumsily dragged herself to the bathroom as quickly as she could, Leon following close behind. She swung the door open and fell to her knees, head in the toilet bowl. She felt Leon awkwardly patting her back and trying his best to hold back her short hair as she managed to churn up nothing but alcohol and bile. Once she was done, she let her head rest on the toilet seat. Leon looked at the clear liquid in the toilet.
Fuck, when was the last time she ate anything?
Leon kept quiet, the severity of the situation having settled in the moment he saw her unconcious in the living room. "You're okay now, kiddo, I'm here..." He soothed, helping her up off the floor and bringing her to the sink. "Can you wash your mouth out for me?" She half heartedly washed her mouth out with water, the smell and taste of vomit still lingering in her mouth when she was done. He noticed her hair brush sitting on the shelf next to the sink. He took it and quickly combed through the tangled mess as gently as he could while Grace turned off the tap. Exhausted, Grace fell onto the floor.
Leon scooped her up off the bathroom floor with ease, settling her down on the couch before rummaging through the open medicine cabinet, searching for a first aid kit. Her injuries from the glass were nothing major, just some cuts, they wouldn't need stitches or anything. He brought the first aid kit to her and sat down on her right hand side. He rolled up her stained shirt to reveal more of her upper arm and shoulder. Opening the kit, he took out bandages and alcohol wipes. He glanced at her. She was barely able to hold herself up.
"I need to clean your cuts, Grace, okay? this is gonna sting..."
He began cleaning her cuts, the stinging pain sobering her up ever so slightly. Once he was sure they were cleaned he began wrapping them, securing the bandages with a knot. He wasn't the best when it came to first aid, but he knew enough to make sure her cuts wouldn't risk infection. "That's better..."
"L-Leon I'm so s-sorry" Grace cried out. "I didn't m-mean to-" He quickly gathered her in his arms, rocking her slowly and petting her hair, her arms loosely wrapping around his midsection. She didn't even try to hold herself up anymore, opting to rest her heavy, aching body against the older man. Leon stayed silent, he couldn't think of anything else to do. Despite her vomiting, she still wasn't sober, not by a long shot. He couldn't talk to her properly and get to the bottom of this in the state she was in now.
He let her cry against his chest, not able to make out her incoherent babbling inbetween cries and hiccups. He let her hold onto him for as long as she needed. It was the least he could do. He didn't let go until she let go herself.
After Grace had calmed down again, he put the first aid kit back in the cabinet, along with all the pills that were on the table. He would question her about that another time, but for now he had to make sure she was settled. He glanced over at the open door to her bedroom. "I'm gonna take you to your room now, okay?"
Grace's tearful eyes widened and she shuffled further into the couch once more. "N-No!, please..."
She looked genuinely startled by the thought of having to sleep in her own bedroom. Leon ignored the confusion he felt and just focused on her. "That's okay, you don't have to if you don't want to. I'll get you some blankets."
He got up and went into her bedroom, taking the duvet and pillow off her bed. It was only then that he realised how chilly her apartment was. He brought them back out and set up the pillow and duvet, being careful not to step in the broken glass. He made a mental note to clean that up once he got Grace to bed.
He helped Grace get tucked in under the blanket. Still not fully there, she didn't understand why he was helping her. "L-Leon?"
"Yeah?"
"Why...Why are you being so n-nice to me?"
Leon's mouth formed a small smile. "Because I want to, kiddo."
He made sure her entire body was under the blanket before kneeling down next to her again. "Are you tired?"
Grace looked small underneath the duvet, almost like a kid. "Yeah"
"Good. You should get some rest."
He stood up, but Grace reached out and weakly grabbed his fingers. "P-Please don't leave..." She said, her voice barely above a whisper. Leon knelt down beside her again, hand on her face and his thumb gently caressing her cheek. "I'm not going anywhere, yeah? I'll be here when you wake up. We'll figure this out together, okay?"
She nodded meekly, settling back down underneath the duvet, Leon didn't move immedietly. Instead, he stayed beside her, shushing her and smoothing her hair, he only stood up again once her sniffles had stopped and he was sure she was fully asleep. Despite her circumstances, she looked somewhat peaceful.
Leon finally allowed himself to take a deep breath and really take in what had just happened.
I should have known
I should have known something was wrong the minute she didn't respond to me
I shouldn't have waited this long, she could have died.
After all he had been through, Leon knew better than to dwell on the past, he couldn't help it, but right now, all that mattered was the girl sleeping in front of him, and making sure she was okay. He got to work on cleaning up the glass and vomit as quietly as he could, as well as grabbing some of the bottles that were surrounding the couch and coffee table like they were a fortress. He left two lamps on but turned off the TV, the sound was beginning to irritate him.
He sat at the bottom end of the couch, Grace's feet resting against his thigh. He couldn't help but let out a short chuckle at Grace's cactus socks. He took out his phone and dialled Claire's number, not even thinking about it.
She picked up right away. "Is everything okay?"
Leon smirked. "Nice to see you too, sweetheart."
He could hear Claire scoff. "Yes Leon you are the love of my life, my north star etcetera etcetera. Did you check up on Grace?"
Claire could hear his tone become serious again, his voice low. "Yeah, I did...It's bad, Claire."
"Is she alright?"
She could hear Leon clear his throat. "N-No, I...I think I walked in on her attempting suicide."
Claire stopped pacing around the hallway of their apartment. "Oh my god, fuck..."
Leon continued, keeping his voice low. "I should've known something was wrong the minute she wasn't answering me. I think I got here just in time..."
He leaned over to look at Grace again, her face illuminated by the soft orange glow of the lamp. He couldn't stop himself cursing in his head over and over. He of all people should know the mental toll seeing these things takes on a normal person.
"She's stable for now, but I don't want to leave her here overnight by herself."
Claire nodded, still standing in the hallway. "Of course, bring her here tomorrow morning. We're only an hour away. We can look after her until we can figure out what to do. W-We can bring her to a doctor, or..."
"She has seen things, Claire, just like us. We can't bring her to any old doctor or therapist. Do you think any of your people in TerraSave would be qualified?"
"I can see. It depends on how long we have left here, and what she's allowed and not allowed to say, did they make her sign anything?"
"Not sure, she had to give her statement alone, I wasn't in the room. I can ask Sherry and see if she had to sign an NDA. I have a feeling she won't be able to talk about the specifics..." By specifics, he meant losing Emily, everything that Victor had said and done to her, anything about her mother's murder or Spencer, essentially the main things that he could imagine were eating her up from the inside out. The guilt he was feeling for not checking up on her sooner was starting to eat him up, too.
Claire let out a harsh exhale. She couldn't believe that Grace's condition had escalated this quickly. It only seemed like yesterday that she was suggesting that Leon bring Grace some groceries to help her get back on her feet. "Okay, you stay with her, try and see if she'll come stay with us for a day or two. We can make sure she's safe and that she won't do anything reckless. We'll get her the help she needs before we have to leave again."
Leon sighed. "Yeah, yeah we will. I love you."
"I love you too, Leon."
Grace awoke to the smell of toast and the sun peeking out from the slit in her curtains.
what?
For a split second, she forgot where she was, until her vague memories of the night before came flooding back to her.
leon...
fuck
Accepting the embarrasment she was about to feel, she let her eyes flutter open, her head pounding and her mouth dry. Standing in her kitchen was Leon, hunched over her countertop reading a newspaper. He had kept his promise. He didn't leave her.
He looked up from the newspaper and his eyes met hers. "Hey, you.."
She didn't respond, trying to ignore the tightness in her chest and feeling like she was frozen in place. He grabbed a plate of toast and a tall glass of water that had been next to him and brought them to her, placing them on the coffee table. "You still feelin' rough?"
"Y-Yeah." Grace whispered, not having the courage to look up at him. Leon was secretly relieved that she looked better than last night. Grace thought it was so strange, seeing him in normal clothing and not covered in dirt and blood. She didn't notice at the time, but Elpis really turned him around. He looked taller now, less hunched, and he looked less tired than before.
After placing the toast and water on the table, he sat down on the couch next to her, pushing the duvet closer to her. "I made you breakfast, it's not much but you should be able to keep it down."
Grace really didn't feel like eating, but she wasn't going to be a dickhead. She grabbed the water first and chugged it down, the dryness in her mouth subsiding. She shakily grabbed the plate of toast and took a decent bite. Leon seemed satisfied. The glass of water was already making her headache feel a little better.
She looked around the room, noticing that it was a lot cleaner than how she had left it. Her eyes widened and she looked towards Leon. "Did you-"
"Yeah, the place was a mess so a did a little tidy. I'm sorry if that was invasive."
Grace shook her head. "N-No, it's not invasive...thank you, Leon." She couldn't believe that last night was actually real. She really thought that last night was her last, yet she was here, sitting on her couch with the DSO agent that helped her survive the care centre. The only thing she really remembered was vomiting, being picked up off the bathroom floor and hearing Leon's voice as she drifted off to sleep.
Leon waited patiently for Grace to finish the toast. Grace could tell by the silence that he was trying to hold back from questioning her.
There was no running away from this. Leon's presence in the room was large. It was confident and commanding. She knew he would not leave until he got the truth out of her. The whole truth.
man, i really should've answered the phone more...
Leon started the conversation, fiddling with his wedding ring on his left hand. "Grace. I need you to be totally honest with me here. I'm not gonna lie, you scared me half to death. You can't do that to an old man like me."
Grace gave him a weak smile, appreciating his gentleness. "I know, Leon. I-I don't think I can even come up with the words to say how sorry I am." Her voice was quiet, shaky, as if she was trying to contain every last fibre of her anxiety.
"Hey, kiddo, you don't need to apologise for anything." He replied gently, not wanting to aggrivate her anxiety. "I've been exactly where you are, trust me."
Grace was taken aback by that information. She couldn't fathom someone as confident and capable as Leon Kennedy drunk crying in a ball on the couch. "R-Really?"
"Really."
She let out a shaky breath, another attempt to control her swirling thoughts. "H-How long did it take you to forget?"
Leon's suspicions of Grace suffering from post traumatic stress were now proven correct. His hand made its way to her shoulder. "Can you tell me exactly what led up to this?"
Grace sat there for a moment, not having to question what he meant by "this". Using the feeling of Leon's hand on her shoulder to ground herself, she cleared her throat. "I-I haven't been right since we got back from Rhodes. It feels like I'm...I'm..."
"Still there?" Leon finished for her, listening intently to every word she was saying.
"Yeah, exactly."
"Been there." Leon muttured to himself.
The older man stayed quiet, letting Grace continue. "...Work had put me on leave ever since I managed to go back. I kept having really bad...really bad panic attacks in the office, the ones where I'm screaming and hiding under my desk. I couldn't control them. I kept seeing their faces whereever I went."
"Their faces?"
"M-Mainly Emily's and Victor Gideon's. And my mom's too, but she was always there."
Leon hummed in agreement, letting her know he was listening.
"Being put on leave made me worse. Work gave me a distraction throughout the day. The first time I was put on leave was when...when the drinking started."
"When were you first put on leave?"
"Around two months ago"
Leon felt his free hand ball up into a fist. She had been suffering for this long and he didn't even know. "Was the drinking always this bad?"
"N-No..." Grace insisted. "It only started off as beer, or a little bit of whiskey, just to help get me to sleep and stay asleep. Last night was probably the worst I've ever been."
"Nightmares?"
Grace nodded. "...Y-Yeah. That's why I haven't been sleeping in my bedroom. I always see him in there."
"Victor?"
She nodded again. "I'd usually just sleep out here with the TV on to try block out the nightmares. It helped a little, but...but it just kept getting worse."
Leon could see her start to get shaky again, her chest rising and falling quicker. He preemptively put his free hand on her knee and kept his other hand around her shoulders, his thumb once again gently rubbing her shoulder. "I'm here, Grace." He reminded her softly. "You don't have to keep going if you don't want to."
Grace let out a little sniffle. "N-No, it's okay. I need to tell s-someone."
She took a deep breath and steadied herself. "...I got p-put on leave again two weeks ago, and my supervisor basically threatened to let me go if I didn't get my shit together. I kinda took that as a sign that...that things weren't going to get any better."
"Is that why you..." Leon found his eyes glancing towards the medicine cabinet.
"Yeah, but...but I didn't really plan it out, per say. I lost my gun in the care centre, and I think I just got so drunk last night that I-I just decided...fuck it."
She refrained from telling him about driving over the bridge every day, not wanting to concern him further. While Leon looked calm, there was a sense of tension surrounding him that was hard to ignore. He was deep in thought.
"And then...then you found me."
"And then I found you..." Leon said quietly, seemingly to himself.
Grace sighed, relieved that she had gotten through telling Leon everything without having a full blown meltdown. Leon felt her shoulders relax a little once she had finished, although she was still internally cringing at the thought of Leon seeing her drunk, and having to clean up her vomit and the broken glass that she had left on the floor.
"Thank you for telling me all this, Grace. Believe me, I know it's not easy."
Leon adjusted his sitting position so that she could see him better. He looked into her eyes, this time Grace not trying so hard to avoid them.
He cleared his throat. "I won't lie to you. I can't promise that you'll forget. You went through something that most people couldn't even dream about. And you're still here, but you feel like you shouldn't be. Trust me when I say that I know exactly how you feel."
Grace didn't interrupt him. Despite the hangover, she was locked into what the older man was saying, studying the wrinkles around his eyes.
"Y'know, I never told you, but you remind me so much of myself when I first came to Raccoon City. Hell, I was even late and hungover on the first day of me being there, my girlfriend had just dumped me."
Leon chuckled, which in turn made Grace giggle too. She couldn't imagine this machine of a human being acting all lovesick and sappy over an ex. He continued. "I didn't know how to deal with everything that had happened to me. I had gotten hired by Stratcom pretty much immediately after that, and I've been all over the world since. I never had time to...sit with it all, you know? all that information. I turned to drinking plenty of times, and I'm sure as you've figured out, it's not a nice habit."
Grace nodded.
"But the difference is that I had a community. If it weren't for Claire, or Chris, or Sherry, or anyone else in my circle, I think I would have been long gone by now." He expressed, a somber tone in his voice. "I'm here to tell you now that whatever you're thinking of doing, it's not worth it. There are people out there who want to see you survive, even if you think you haven't found them yet."
His words sunk into Grace like a knife. He noticed and kept the momentum going. "We can't bring back Emily, or...or your mother. But what we can do is fight. You mourn the dead, and you fight like hell for the living. In this business, that's what kept me from sinking."
For as long as he lived, he would never forget the death and destruction that had surrounded him from a young age, but right here, right now? He needed to be brave Leon, he needed to be DSO Leon, not 21 year old police rookie Leon, even though that Leon was still alive and well inside him. He knew himself he had never been amazing with his words, but whatever he was saying to Grace seemed to go through.
Without warning, Grace quickly pulled him into a tight hug, an "oof" sound coming from the man. He froze up for a second before wrapping his arms around her in return, her head tucked underneath his chin and her small body disappearing into the hug. He was never really one for hugs, but he would gladly oblige for anyone who needed one. "I'm...I'm sorry, Leon. If you hadn't been here...you...you saved my life."
"That makes us even now, Gracie." He chuckled, his deep voice vibrating in his chest and into Grace's ear. She wasn't sure how she felt about Leon suddenly picking up her mother's old nickname for her, but for now, it was comforting.
thank you mom
thank you for sending someone to help me
Grace wasn't sure if she believed in a god, or an afterlife, but in this moment she truly believed that her mother was looking out for her, somehow.
Leon let go of her so he could speak to her properly. "Claire and I really want you to come be with us for a couple of days at least. We're going to try to get you some professional advice before we have to leave again."
Grace felt her cheeks grow a little hot, embarassed that Claire also knew of her situation. "Um...I-I'm not sure..."
She could see Leon develop a serious look on his face. "Grace, trauma is a hell of a thing. It doesn't go away overnight, and I can't promise that me, or anyone else will be around here all the time. We need to make sure you're safe, and that you have the support you need to tackle this on your own, too."
Leon could feel a sarcastic smirk coming on. "Which also means answering the phone for your elders."
Grace sighed, her face growing even more red. "Yeah yeah, I'm still sorry about that..."
"It's okay, kiddo, really." Leon stood up and grabbed his jacket, offering his hand to Grace. "You can ask my wife, I'm a do not disturb king when I'm off the clock."
And for the first time in a long time, Grace laughed.