The fact that they lived together came through because of convenience. Rent was significantly cheaper, the company was anything but horrid, and they could avoid the constant invasion of their personal lives in the shelter of what they called home.
However, with the territory of them being roommates came a road much more less traveled.
So maybe they've sat way too close during a movie, maybe they've fallen asleep in each others arms, maybe they've shared their deepest insecurities, and maybe they've exchanged sly glances and slightly too flirty words during their daily morning routines.
Maybe.
But maybe it was also normal to feel this way about your friend, your rival, your roommate, right?
It was a question Gladion asked himself far too often since he moved in with Moon. No, they weren't dating per say, or at all. They were friends.Just friends. And her previous home just happened to be where he seeked refuge from the daily stresses from work, from his sister, from Hau.
The agreement was quick, the move was simple. He was sleeping over constantly anyways (she lived closer to work) and with Moon finding herself constantly pestered by the aforementioned duo, it just made sense.
Neither Gladion or Moon ever admitted to what they were being questioned about; both keeping the secret under lock and key about how the couple was asking when they would get together.
A preposterous idea under any circumstances.
But still an idea that had crossed both of their minds far too many times; neither able to bring the thought into actual feasible action.
Ever since they moved in together (secretly, of course) they had found the excessive prying to stop all together. Gladion obviously wasn't going to Moon's anymore, and Moon never stopped by Aether.
It was almost as if they stopped being friends.
Almost.
Because it was just a charade that Gladion and Moon would both win to an outsiders view, but to the players? The game was getting harder to play.
To the world they were still President Gladion and Champion Moon, but to each other it was harder to discern.
Because their hands would brush and interlock during said movies. Because sleep could only be found when wrapped in each others arms. Because Gladion got to see Moon drop her smile for once and she got to actually see him laugh so hard he cried. And because sometimes their quips would go too far; Moon backed into a wall under a scrutinizing emerald stare as his eyes flickered back and forth between her eyes and her lips.
Their whole home, their whole situation, was filled with a strange balance of uncertainty and complete comfort.
And Moon knew it. Moon had known for a while. Moon had been very aware of her feelings for the blonde and somehow thought that them living together wouldn't make this thing between them worse.
(It did.)
But as they kept tiptoeing around the tension Moon had found herself in quite the situation.
She didn't know that when Ilima came up to Mount Lanakila asking her to " hang out " that the friendly outing she agreed to was actually a date; a date that Gladion was quick to point out, a date that he was about to protest, until he suddenly didn't, his mouth closing into a tightly sealed line.
Who was he to stop Moon from dating?
And who was he to wipe the smile off her face?
His disapproval however, didn't go unnoticed by Moon; because as she was sitting in their room, fixing her hair, her makeup, her clothes, she could feel Gladion watching her silently from the doorway. His facial expression cold, his arms crossed in silent objection, until he finally asks, 30 minutes before she's due to leave, "do you have to go out?"
And Moon, whose heart had been pounding due to weird mix of excitement and disappointment, just giggles.
"Why? You jealous?"
Her carefree smile reflecting back at him through the mirror she was using. His stomach twisting, lurching due to the idea of finally admitting was had been bugging him about the whole ordeal.
He didn't have a problem with Ilima, no, not at all. He had a problem with Moon going out with someone who wasn't him.
"So what if I am?"
The sincerity in the words hit Moon hard and fast, but she finds her mind to slow to react, a growing silence filling the space between them. Moon's hands stopping their preening as she slowly drops them into her lap, her head turning to Gladion half expecting a smirk or a quick brush off of his comment.
It never happens.
And instead she's met with the most serious expression she had seen under their roof. An expression she had only seen on the battlefield and in this conference rooms, an expression that told her that maybe, just maybe, she had been right all along.
That maybe her feelings weren't just one-sided.
"What are you going to do about it then?"
Although it was a mere whisper, the playfulness in her voice was undoubtable, the smile on her face was unavoidable, and the clamoring in his chest was unignorable.
What he was going to do?
And as Moon stared at him with gleam in her eye Gladion knew all at once that he had said too much. All that he could do was to actually act.
To actually tell Moon that she was more than just a friend, a roommate, a rival, or any other excuse he had made up over the years.
But with his silence Moon's eyes grew wary, seeking for an proper answer out of him, an answer he would only struggle to put into words. So instead he silently walks forward to cross the 2 feet that felt like 2 miles.
The distance growing increasingly and increasingly smaller as he finally stops in front of Moon and leans down to her level.
Moon had never felt so exposed under his stare and never so vulnerable under his touch; his hand now gently holding her chin as he finally breaks the silence,
"If you'd let me, I'll kiss you."
Moon couldn't help the gasp that escaped her lips, the flush that reached her cheeks. It was a request, a plea, to make her stay; to make her consider someone else entirely, to consider him.
The "okay," Moon whispered was all Gladion needed to hear as his lips close in on the last remaining space between them. He tenderly kisses her like he had been wanting to for years, Moon reciprocating with the same desperation, both eventually pulling away just slightly with rising chest and revealed emotions.
"I should probably cancel with Ilima," Moon whispers against his lips, Gladion merely chuckling in response, murmuring "you probably should," before taking her in again
