Author's Note: Hello! This is fluff, which I am new at, so please be kind.
Disclaimer: Inception is owned by Christopher Nolan. I wish I had his genius.
Ariadne suspects that Arthur likes her back. Here's the list of reasons why.
I. He commits a crime for her (but he isn't caught, thank God)
They were at a mini-mart to get a quick lunch.
Ariadne stares helplessly at the soda can stuck between the twisted metal rods of the Pepsi and the Mountain Dew columns. She gives the vending machine one furious kick before Arthur rushes to her side.
"Don't kick it," he says gently, restraining her with delicate hands. "Let me."
He gets on his knees and rolls up his sleeves neatly.
"Arthur, are you sure? I mean you might get stuck-"
"It's fine." He gives her a gentle smile. His gaze shifts to the security camera behind her head. "Cover me?"
She has a questioning look for a second, but then she catches on.
"Oh, right."
He clears his throat before he shoves his arm up the mouth of the machine.
"You're committing a crime for me."
Arthur laughs.
"I'm used to it anyway." He smiles.
Ariadne tenses up a little because she accidentally imagined what would happen if his arm got caught in the machine. Or if they got caught by the police.
Her thoughts are disrupted by a can of Mountain Dew being waved in front of her face.
"Here you go."
"Thanks." She hugs him with a turkey sandwich and a can of Mountain Dew in her hands, and he flinches (but just a little).
II. He looks through Eames' drawers for her
They were at a warehouse.
"Eames?" Ariadne looks around and finds no sign of Eames.
"Eames just went to get something in his hotel. What do you need?"
She sighs. "Do you have a copy of the mark's house?"
"Nope, it's all with Eames."
"Oh," She lets out a disappointed groan.
"But it's probably in Eames' desk."
"Oh, okay. I'll just get it-"
"NO!" She looks up at him with the startled eyes of a deer in headlights.
"...why not?"
"It's not an experience I would like for you to have."
She laughs at this.
"I think I can live through whatever it is."
"No, no you will not. Don't worry. I'll get it for you."
"Are you sure? You seem a little... repelled by his desk."
"No, no. This is just the face I get when we talk about Eames."
She smiles and he manages to smile too, so now they just look like fools smiling at each other.
Arthur gets on his feet, and Ariadne follows a few feet behind him, scared of what he might find.
"I think I saw him put it in that drawer." She points at the wide drawer in the middle of the desk.
Arthur nods, inhales, holds, and pulls on the desk handle.
There, a half-eaten cheeseburger greets them with a putrid smile, and a poorly wrapped apple core (the decaying apple's acids were burning through the thin layer of scratch paper Eames wrapped around it) sits in the corner of the drawer.
"Oh my God."
Arthur tries to lower the digested food climbing his throat with a heap of saliva.
He quickly digs through his files, carefully avoiding the discarded food, and finally encounters a picture of a man with his elbow on his mailbox in front of his house.
Arthur hurriedly hands this to her and shuts the drawer with a mighty thomp, and half-jogs to the bathroom.
Ariadne drops the photo onto her desk and follows him into the bathroom. She finds a flushed looking Arthur with his head over the toilet. She rubs his back and repeatedly says "I'm sorry!" as he heaves his food into the toilet.
It all feels better the next day because she gives him a box of dark chocolate for forgiveness (he wasn't even mad at her, but hey, box of chocolates from Ariadne! Yay!)
III. He loses a buttload of money (and patience) for her.
Ariadne accidentally lodges a rusty piece of cutter blade onto her thumb.
They panic when they find out that their First Aid Kit is all gone. (Yusuf stole it because his cat put a paw into his electric fan.) Arthur gives Yusuf a lot of bad looks when this happens.
They get into the car to get to the nearest clinic.
"Why can't you do anything about this? Aren't you a scientist or something?" Arthur snaps at Yusuf like he's a projection gone hostile.
"Jesus, I'm just a Chemist!" Yusuf answers flustered and embarassed. "Sorry, Ariadne." Yusuf rubs her shoulder and Ariadne holds his hand. "It's okay."
"Does it hurt?" Eames looks at her finger, disgusted (a face he rarely puts on).
Ariadne notices.
"It doesn't, see?" She shoves her finger into Eames' face. He barfs in his mouth while she laughs.
The situation gets even worse when they find out that the closest clinic is a veterinarian's clinic. They enter it anyway.
"Emergency! Emergency!" Eames grants himself a grand entrance, earning looks from all around the clinic, including the pets.
Arthur opens the door for Ariadne. Yusuf is waiting in the car.
She conceals her injury until they get to the receptionist's desk.
The receptionist looks up at them, uninterested.
"May I help you?" The receptionist speaks with a pang of her Brazilian accent.
"We were wondering if you could do something about this." Eames pulls Ariadne's hand up so that the receptionist sees. The receptionist's eyes widen.
"Doctor Vasquez! Doctor Vasquez!" she hurries into the doctor's office as she screams.
A few minutes later, a bandaged (and clueless) Ariadne comes out of the doctor's room. The doctor comes to them, ignoring his assistant.
"That'll be two hundred dollars."
Their jaws drop in surprise.
"Two hundred dollars for... a bandaged finger?"
"I used anesthesia since the blade cut until her muscle, and since we only have animal anesthesia, I injected a lot of doses."
Arthur gives him a condescending look.
"It would've been extremely painful if I didn't." He maintains a corporate tone.
"...Fine." Arthur pays him as Ariadne walks around with an amazed face at everything she sees. Eames rushes to restrain her.
They walk back to the car.
"OH, A CAR! Can I drive?"
"NO!" Arthur and Eames answer simultaneously while Ariadne boisterously laughs.
She catches sight of Eames' hair.
"What do you think he gave her?"
She twirls at his hair, and tiptoes (and almost falls over) to do it.
"Your hair looks like spaghetti!"
Eames blinks at a very high Ariadne.
"I don't know, but I don't like it."
She offers to pay Arthur the next day (Eames told and teased her of how he took the bill), but of course, he declines. A lot.
IV. He doesn't poison Eames when he had the chance to because she said he shouldn't.
It's April fools' day and Eames is a hundred times more annoying than he ever was.
He starts the day with exchanging all their desk things with one another.
Ariadne finds Yusuf's vial of weird somnacin in the middle of her bagel.
Yusuf finds Arthur's planner taped under his desk.
Arthur finds Ariadne's "grooming kit" in his desk drawer. He examines it with a curious eye, opens it and sees a bottle of feminine wash, a pack of sanitary napkins and... extra underwear. Flustered Arthur zips the bag hurriedly and briskly walks to Ariadne's desk, unconsciously slamming the bag onto her sketch. "Sorry." He stiffly walks to the bathroom. Ariadne's eyes widen and she snaps her head to Eames' direction while he laughs soundlessly onto his desk.
She calmly walks to Eames and pinches him really hard on his arm. He lets out a girly "Ow!" before she lets go.
Arthur and Yusuf stare at Eames, asleep on his desk.
"What should we do?" Yusuf whispers.
"I have a bottle of laxatives."
Yusuf quietly laughs menacingly while giving Arthur an approving look.
Ariadne comes out from the bathroom when she sees three men: one asleep and the other two fiddling with a medicine bottle.
"What are you guys doing?" She leans into them while they speak softly.
"We're going to poison Eames with laxatives." Arthur says uncharacteristically.
Ariadne soundlessly gasps at them and slaps both their arms.
They both let out a muffled shout of pain while Ariadne gives them a stern look.
"Don't."
Yusuf ignores her and continues to fiddle with the bottle like a child.
Arthur continues to stare at her eyes (they look extra-round, not to mention cute, when she's mad) and slowly pulls the bottle away from Yusuf's grasp.
"HEY!"
"Shhhh!" They both shush Yusuf when Eames stirs a little on his desk.
"Disperse! Disperse!" Yusuf pulls his chair to his desk while Arthur rolls to his. Ariadne follows Arthur.
"Give it to me." She holds a hand out.
Arthur looks at Yusuf mouthing "no", but he gives it to her anyway.
Ariadne smiles in triumph.
"Don't worry. We'll get our revenge soon."
Arthur smiles like a five-year old.
V. He actually makes a move.
They all ended up working late. Eames was getting cranky, Yusuf was drinking much more coffee than the recommended number of cups, and Ariadne was falling asleep at her desk. Arthur, however, just seemed nervous.
"Arthur, you have the keys, right?." he doesn't look up.
"Arthur." he still doesn't look up.
"ARTHUR, DARLING. PLEASE ANSWER ME!"
"Huh? What?" He snaps his head to Eames, who just grunts in response.
"Just lock the damn place up." Yusuf and Eames walk lazily to the door.
"...oh, okay." Arthur shifted his gaze from Eames to Ariadne, who was already going towards the door.
He starts packing too. He gets up and wears his jacket. He catches up with Ariadne and pulls her a little bit too forcefully.
"Whoa, whoa, what's happening?" Ariadne's head snaps towards Arthur with a concerned look.
"Ariadne," he catches his breath.
"ARIADNE HURRY UP IT'S MY TURN TO DRIVE YOU HOME TONIGHT" Eames shouts from outside. Arthur and Eames have been taking turns (Yusuf doesn't have a car) to drive Ariadne home because she lived several miles away from the warehouse, and getting a taxi at night was near impossible and incredibly dangerous.
They both shoot a look at Eames who was standing, impatient, beside his car.
"Ariadne, I-uh,"
"ARIADNE, COME ON!"
Arthur (unconsciously) kneels.
"Would you like to go to dinner with me?"
"Good God, Yes." She realizes that she said the "Good God" part aloud and blushes. He smiles.
"Why are you kneeling?"
"What?" He looks down. "Oh, right." She laughs, he gets up. "Shut up, I was nervous." he flashes a little childish smile (that makes her melt on the inside) and dusts his knees.
Ariadne was heading towards the door when Arthur pulled her again, with the right amount of force this time.
Arthur filled the space between them, smiled and put his forehead against his, and kissed her. She released to take a breather.
"See you tomorrow night?
"I mean, we would see each other in the morning but-"
She cut him off by giving him a peck on the cheek.
"See you tomorrow, Arthur!" then she ran towards annoyed Eames.
Ariadne is smiling like a freak when they pull off of the driveway.
"You really think I didn't see that?"
"Huh?" Ariadne looks at him, still smiling.
"You think I didn't see you kiss?"
"Oh, that. I-uh-I-"
"He loves you, Ariadne. That ol' stick in the mud loves you." He gives a nod of approval before he turns back to the driveway.
She only whispers. "I know."
Author's Note: Sorry if they're a bit OOC. bleeeech :( Review for improvement? :D