With Time
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Disclaimer: I don't own 'em, they don't like me. The people who do own 'em probably don't like me, either.
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Summary: "You know we trust you, Elena. But there're some things you don't talk about to the little blonde you met three months ago." Mildly Rude/Elena-ish
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"Hey, Rude?"
A weary sigh, and the sound of skin on bed linens.
"What, Elena?"
A pause. Then, tentatively from the middle of the room's three small cots, across the gap between it and the far left,
"Are you okay?"
"…Fine."
"You sounded like you were in pain a minute ago."
"A nightmare. I'm fine."
The sound of threadbare white cotton twisting in long, slim fingers.
"…Do you want to tell me about it?"
"No," emphatically. Another pause. "Thank-you."
Hardly daring to breathe, she considers her next words carefully.
"It sounded like you were dreaming about your father."
A sharp intake of breath, and she can almost hear him tense in the darkness. She reaches a few inches into the gap between their cots, then pulls her hand back quickly.
"Drop it, Elena."
"Well, then, at least promise that you'll talk to Reno when he comes back, if you're still upset."
"I'm not—why would I talk to Reno about it?"
An annoyed huff.
"It's obvious, Rude; you two talk about everything." His soft chuckle emboldens her, and she continues, partly in jest, but a far larger part entirely serious. "You know, one of these days, you'll have to get used to me being here. Like it or not, I'm going to be around a while, and it makes a lot more sense to give me a chance to prove you can trust me than to try and pretend I'm not here."
"Elena. You know we trust you. But there're some things you don't talk about to the little blonde you met three months ago." He pauses for a moment when he catches a contemptuous little sniff. "Just because she turns into someone else in a fight and you feel sorry for the poor shit fighting her. Just because she's probably saved your ass more times than you want to think about."
"Rude?" Elena breaks in timidly once she overcomes her shock at that many full sentences, all in a row, from the normally silent man stretched out one cot away. "Did…did you have something to drink?"
A soft, deep chuckle.
"Another thing, Elena: don't ask people if they're drunk when you finally get them to tell you things."
He can nearly hear her blush, can nearly see her cheeks glow through the darkness.
"S-sorry," she chokes, and with a soft noise of flannel on cotton, she turns over.
"Elena." He takes a soft murmur as a reply, and goes on. "Give it time, alright?"
Her smile is far brighter than her blush of seconds before; or maybe it's only that he's seeing it up close – even though he can't see anything in this windowless hole that someone passed off as a three-person hotel room – because she's just landed half on his chest and half on the mattress with a force that sets the springs and rusted iron bed frame and his ribs alike creaking.
"Thanks, Rude," she whispers against his shoulder before giving him a childish, exuberant kiss on the cheek.
His laugh this time is more in astonishment than amusement, but it still stirs her hair and makes her shiver.
"Sure," he says softly, and she shivers again as she feels his words rumble against her hand where it rests at his chest. "Goodnight."
"Goodnight."
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And several hours later, when Reno finds his way back to the hotel room that he feels no real desire to see again, to find his colleagues curled up together one of these damn cots that are too small for one guy Rude's size, let alone the fluffy, kittenish little blonde clinging to him, he doesn't know whether to smirk or grimace, so he just pushes the other two cots together without a word, and goes to bed.
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End Notes: Y'know, one of these days, I'm going to have to figure out how to write Elena properly instead of turning her into a cute, hyperactive six-year old. XD