author's note
characterization most likely a little skewed, based around preconceptions and headcanons of the characters i have from 3 years of roleplaying with the same gilbert.
not meant to be particularly fantastic.
They had known each other for years—since the Soviet era, since the war, and as a result of this they'd never been very fond of each other. Natalia hated Gilbert, actually, and was incredibly vocal about it; Gilbert loved to try and get a rise out of her at any chance. The time they'd spent with each other had lent itself to his favor. Gilbert was crafty and observant, and was able to see through most of the desperate attempts to keep herself guarded that Natalia put up. He knew how to get under her skin.
Well, that's how it came across to her, anyway.
They'd been the last two remaining after a sleazy bar run headed up by Alfred, insisting that everyone just needed a night to get the fuck over themselves and enjoying life. Natalia had agreed to go because her sister had asked her to accompany Ivan—Gilbert had gone because he wanted to get drunk, and he dragged Ludwig along with him.
For the majority of the night, Natalia camped out in the corner with her arms folded defensively over her chest, glaring at everyone from under her eyelashes and only responding to attempts of conversation with off-handed, dismissive grunts. She chided her brother for humoring such pointless, childish antics as everyone was indulging in, but he eventually moved away from her to join the rest of those who had once been the Allies. In her little nook, Natalia grumbled and settled down, occasionally drifting off to sleep between bouts of rejecting any form of alcohol.
She'd managed to fall into a legitimate bout of sleeping at some point in the night, and didn't wake up until she felt someone obnoxiously shaking her shoulder. She grumbles and opens her eyes, squinting down at the table, before turning her head over her shoulder to look at whoever had disturbed her.
"Shouldn't you be dead in a ditch somewhere by now?"
"Nat."
Gilbert is uncharacteristically stoic, his hand lingering on her shoulder, wrinkling the fabric of her dress. For a moment, the two are quiet and staring at each other, before Natalia utters a quiet 'right' and sits up, brushing Gilbert's hand away and looking around the building.
The bar is otherwise empty except for the bartender, who stands behind the counter cleaning glasses.
Natalia flicks her gaze back to Gilbert, mouth working into a small pout.
"Where is my brother?" she asks, a concerned lilt to her voice. Gilbert shrugs, pulls the other chair at her table out and sits down, propping his elbows up on the table top and resting his chin on his hands. Natalia's pout drips into a frown. "He is still here, yes?"
"Nah, he left with the others a while ago," Gilbert informed her matter-of-factly, yawning, and rocking his chair backwards. Natalia narrowed her eyes.
"He did not wake me up to take me with him." This solicits a snort from the other.
"Yeah, well, he was drunk when he left. Fuckin' plastered, actually," Gilbert grins, shifting his chin onto one hand and letting the other fall in front of him. "I've never seen him like that, even when I lived with the asshole. He was having trouble walking—had to hold onto somebody to even get out the door. Don't think he could've been much help getting you home." Natalia simply stares at him.
She doesn't really have much of a retort, because the realization reaches her that she doesn't have a way to get home. She rode with her brother.
"Oh."
"Don't be so disappointed," Gilbert scoffs, rolling his eyes and leaning back. "Hell, you've got me, don't you?" His voice gives way to the sarcasm as he throws his arms out beside him, before breaking into a bout of mocking laughter. Natalia scowls and stands, smoothing her skirt out.
"I am leaving," she announces, starting towards the door.
"Hey, wow, rude." Gilbert frowns and reaches for Natalia's wrist, grabbing it and tugging her back to the table. "I was in the middle of a conversation with you."
"It's only a conversation if both sides are participating."
"Participate, then."
"No, thank you."
"Where the hell would you go, anyway? You don't have a car."
"I will walk."
"Like hell."
"Why can't I?"
"Because you can't, Nat."
"Gilbert, I am a grown woman, I am perfectly capable of-" A quiet snort of laughter from Gilbert interrupts Natalia's train of thought. "What?"
"We're having a conversation."
At that, Natalia snatches her wrist away, and Gilbert tilts his head towards the other chair. Begrudgingly, she walks back over and sits down once more, heaving an exasperated sigh as Gilbert motions to the bartender to bring a round over.
"I do not drink," Natalia quickly reminds him, and Gilbert laughs.
"So I'll have what you don't."
"Take me home."
Gilbert quirks a brow.
"What, you want me to fuck you?" The corners of his mouth tug into a smirk. Natalia goes red in the cheeks.
"No. I meant for you to drive me back to my own house, since you will not let me walk." Gilbert only grins wider at this as he lets his chair fall forward and thanks the bartender as he sets their drinks down.
"Last time I checked, you don't ever listen to me. I'm not 'not letting you' do shit, Nat," Gilbert points out, bringing the glass to his lips and sipping at it casually. He winces. "Tastes awful. Don't bother." He pauses. "You're blushing."
"It's hot in here," Natalia dismisses him with a wave of her hand, settling back into her chair and folding her arms across her chest. Gilbert laughs again.
The two fall silent, Natalia folded in on herself, Gilbert subjecting himself to terrible beer. Finally, the latter stands and stretches.
"C'mon," he says, slipping a tip onto the table and walking towards the door. Natalia stares at him, confused. He looks back over his shoulder. "Nat."
"Where are you going?" Natalia whines, but obliges and stands, following after him. He pushes the door open with his hip and shakes his head, ushering her out of the building and towards his car.
"You told me to take you home. I'm taking you home."
"I don't trust you to drive after you've been drinking."
But she gets in the car and buckles up, and he turns the key in the ignition after assuring her he knows what he's doing.
"This isn't my house."
Gilbert grins as she ogles the front of the building. He pulls the key and unlocks his door, stepping out of the car into the driveway. Natalia remains in the car before clambering out through the driver's side, kicking the door shut with her heel. By this point, Gilbert is at the front door, unlocking it, and wiping his foot off on the rug.
"Lights are off, Ludwig's asleep—shh," he advises, holding his finger to his lips as he starts down the hall to what Natalia assumes is the door to his basement. She shuts the front door behind her and turns the lock as quietly as she can, gathering her skirts and following after him. She steps gingerly down the stairs into the excessively dark basement, shuts the door behind her and starts feeling around the wall for the lights witch.
"Gilbert, where-"
In that second, one hand is over her mouth and the other is on her hip, Natalia nearly jumps out of her fucking skin and the only thing keeping her from screaming is the laughter that ensues as the hands disappear, the lights come on, and she sees Gilbert in front of her with his hands on his waist.
"You're an easy scare," he chortles, strolling over to his bed and flopping down onto it. Natalia simply stares at him from across the room.
"I want to go home," she stresses, narrowing her eyes.
"Tomorrow. S'too late to drive that far. Spend the night here."
"You could have gotten me there in time if you'd have driven there in the first place."
"Yeah, well, I didn't. Suck it up, princess."
"I'm not sleeping here."
Gilbert rolls his eyes and sits up again, this time stooping over his knees to untie his shoes, kicking them haphazardly across his room and shrugging his shirt off. He looks up at Natalia, and she finds herself lost as to what his expression means.
"Are you just going to stand there and bitch at me? If you're going, then go. Call a taxi if you want to leave. I'm not keeping you here," he says bluntly, standing and taking a few steps towards her, thumbs hooked in his jean pockets.
"You keep saying things like that," she mutters, eyes flicking to the floor, her stance shifting from defensive to defeated. Gilbert chuckles and she sees him move his weight to his left leg, planting his hands on his waist.
"It's true, though. You're an independent-ass woman and hell if you've ever let me forget it. If you're going to complain about being in my place, then I'm not gonna keep you here." He's smiling. She can hear it. She doesn't like that. She stiffens up and frowns, a childish, almost overdone kind of frown.
"Where is your guest room?"
He laughs boisterously and, without a trace of mocking, informs her that there is no guest room.
He'd let her borrow a spare toothbrush and comb and watched her from afar as she combed the tangles out of her hair. He called her Rapunzel a few times jokingly, and every time she snapped at him. She'd rooted through his drawers and eventually found a pair of boxers that were dubbed clean enough for her to steal for the night. Content enough with the situation she disappeared into the hall outside the basement and reappeared five minutes later with her hair pulled back into a low, loose ponytail, in his boxers and a sports bra, with a stack of the dress and blouse she'd worn earlier that day folded in her arms.
"You're fucking bony," Gilbert marvels, whistling to punctuate his point as she bumps the door shut with her hip behind her. She shrugs dismissively, almost like it should be obvious, and makes her way down the stairs to set her clothes down next to his dresser.
"I danced with a company for a very long time," she explains, stretching her arms over her head, a quiet yawn working its way from her mouth. "They were strict with what we could and could not eat, and how much we weighed. I suppose the habits stuck with me." Gilbert nods. Makes enough sense.
"I've never seen you with your hair back before, Nat," he mentions, and Natalia notices that he's wearing Christmas pajama pants. In February. "It looks good like that."
That jostles her.
She furrows her brow and stares at him, pursing her lips. Gilbert just laughs, pulling the sheets and blanket on his side of the bed down, and climbing in.
"You don't take compliments very well, do you?" Natalia shakes her head slowly and continues to stand there at the edge of the bed, even after Gilbert turns out the light. It's quiet for a good while, and Natalia almost assumes that he's asleep, before she sees his shape moving in the dark and he sits up. She can almost feel him staring into her. "Are you just gonna stand there?"
She rolls her eyes and in a show of internal defiance she stoops over and turns what she assumes to be her side of the bed down, crawling in as slowly and quietly as she can.
The silence in the room is awkward and thick, and it makes Natalia regret even going to the bar with her brother. There is a nervous, gnawing feeling in her stomach, because she feels very at home in the basement with Gilbert, and she is lost as to why.
Well, no, not really, but it makes her uncomfortable to think about it.
"You don't take up much space," Gilbert comments, for what Natalia perceives to be no reason. She looks over her shoulder at him, and she can make out the curves of his spine and shoulder blades, and the back of his head facing her. "It's not like you have to hug the edge."
"I'm not."
The quiet is usually her friend—it is her domain and her comfort, because in the quiet, Natalia almost always worked the most effectively when she had to. Gilbert is just as acquainted with the night and the silence that comes with it as she is, though, and she finds it to be almost suffocating her.
It feels like an hour has passed, but she knows it's only been a few minutes, and she can't get to sleep. She's tired. Is she even tired? She didn't do anything to make her tired today. Fuck, this is so weird.
She hears Gilbert turn over next to her and she holds her breath. He's asleep. Why is she doing that? His arms are around her waist. Why is he doing that?
"Stop touching me," she warns in a low tone, and she hears him chuckle softly behind her, his thumbs brushing over her stomach as he links his fingers atop her.
"You're cold, Nat."
"Mm."
"Why is that?"
"I told you to stop touching me."
"Natalia."
A chill goes up her spine and she closes her eyes. One of her hands migrates to lay atop his. She's daunted by the comfort that this situation presents. She wants to hit him. She doesn't want to hit him. Please don't let go, she thinks, fingers half linking into his. She feels his breath on her neck as he pulls her closer. Her head hurts. Her heart hurts. She can hear a clock ticking, slamming into her mind, keeping her awake as she curls against him, and he curls into her. She doesn't want this.
"Gilbert."
She's wanted it forever; she's wanted it since the first time she ever saw him, since the first time he ever deflected one of her threats, since the first time he ever mocked her, belittled her, since the first time she realized that she had an even match who knew his way around the slimiest alleyways across Europe just as well as she did—since the first time she realized that he would never let her control him like she controlled everyone else.
By the time the clocks all read 2am, Gilbert had enough scratches to rightfully call himself a pincushion, Natalia had bruises and bitemarks over every inch of her neck and hips, and her hair had been pulled out of its ponytail. She fell asleep curled up against him with her head on his chest, his arm around her, and before they'd fallen out of it he'd been tracing circles along her shoulder blades and counting the vertebrae in her spine, dragging his fingers up and down each bony bump.
She would wake up again at dawn, groggy and sore, and she would redress herself, think over what she would say to anyone who ask where she ended up that night—sleeping off the liquor in a hotel downtown, she would lie—and sneak out the front door with an apple swiped off the counter. She would not let Ludwig see her, nor would she let Gilbert have any trace of a "goodbye", save for the note she left on her pillow with a slew of expletives she didn't even know she knew, and somewhere hidden between the lines a "thank you".
And the next time they saw each other, Gilbert would come up behind her and pull his hands over the front of her hair, running his fingers through it, before producing the rubber band she'd left behind and pulling her hair into a loose, low ponytail, and would squeeze her fondly around the waist before disappearing off to bother someone else.
She wore her hair pulled back a lot more often after that.