telecommute | (no subject)

(no subject)

Leo was late.

Not late enough to quite worry, to call their superiors, but long enough for Ivan to start worrying. Admittedly Ivan's threshold for worry was a low one indeed, especially seeing as it wasn't like he could exactly go look for Leo. The coffee table was laid out with an empty space for whatever research Leo brought back, empty notebooks and index cards to catalog and sticky notes and all color of pens to organize waited in neat stacks to break the research down into usable and referable bits.

The small kitchen table was set up ready to take tea at. Ivan clicked a few beads on his rosary together before getting up to put the kettle on just the same, even without Leo there. Busying himself with the work would ease his anxiety, he just needed something to do with his hands.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ivan stood, going over to his bookshelf to rifle through a few of his own tomes and bring over ones that were well-worn, edges of the paper soft with handling and sticky flags in all the colors of the original pride flag dotting along the edges.

"Then it was wisdom that paired us up, I would be useless if I had to do field work, which is where your talents shine best."

Leo tilted his head back, watching Ivan with heavy-lidded eyes as he did. He hummed thoughtfully again, which seemed to be his go-to for 'I'm falling asleep but trying to pretend that I'm not.'

"You callin' me dumb, Ivan? That hurts my feelings."

Ivan scoffed, muttering something unintelligible under his breath. It sounded like a curse though as he looked over to Leo and away from the book.

He adjusted his glasses, sliding them down his nose just a bit to look Leo in the eyes. It actually made Leo blurrier, but it often got the point across to people who did not wear glasses.

"I am saying that I have a particular skillset that you lack, just as you have a particular skillset that I lack. Neither are 'dumber' than the other, and as we are both deficient in the other's strengths it is a good match to have us working together."

Leo couldn't help it: he felt the corner of his lip curling into a grin when Ivan actually peered at him from over the rims of his glasses. "Okay, okay, thanks. You've successfully soothed my budding self-esteem problems."

He twisted to sit up then, rolling his shoulders back to try to wake himself up.

"Okay. Okay. I'm up. I'm good. I'm ready to go."

"Are you certain you will be able to make it out and back again safely? Text me when you make it to your apartment so I know you aren't dead in a ditch," Ivan said with a huff, turning back to the work before him once more.

He didn't like admitting that he worried, but he worried.

Leo gave his back a sleepy stare.

"Ivan... with what phone?"

Ivan paused, then cursed for certain.

"Pick up a burner phone at the 7-11 like a drug dealer, then. Until you can get a new one."

"You want anything while I'm out? You want a burger? I could pick up burgers."

He could definitely go for burgers. Or anything, just to wake himself up.

Ivan paused, tapping his pen against the coffee table before admitting - "A burger would be nice."

Leo ducked his head to mask a smile, even if he wasn't entirely sure why. "Yeah, okay. Write down what you like on 'em."

Ivan glanced at Leo out of the corner of his eye, averting his gaze just as quickly. Notepaper was easy to be found and soon enough Ivan's neat and legible handwriting that looked like it could have come off of a printer was holding out his aggressively plain burger order for Leo. Meat, cheese, lettuce, bun. Nothing else.

Under that the clarification of no sauces, no tomatoes or onions, no other meat except the one patty was underlined several times.

"French fries? Soda?" He skimmed the order, amused as he folded the paper up and slid it into his back pocket. "It's on me, you're the one busting your ass here while I run errands."

"Fries," Ivan said after a bit of thought. "Just a little one. No soda. I have soda here."

Strange Russian brands of soda, anyway. He liked it, it was what he grew up with, in spite of never visiting the country.

"Thank you, Leo. I should have something more by the time you get back. Be safe. Pick up another phone."

That was the most important thing, clearly.

Fries, he added to the mental checklist. Probably no ketchup, but he'd get some anyway, just in case. Little by little, he was doing his best to learn Ivan's idiosyncrasies.

"I'll pick one up if I see one," he promised, "but I'll just head to the store tomorrow if I can't. I'll be back in like, an hour tops."

Ivan snorted in displeasure at the dismissive concern about having a way to communicate. Utterly irresponsible.

"I am going to time you!" he said, which would have to function as a goodbye while he buried his nose in the scrolls and books.

It would be a solid hour and forty minutes before Leo would return. Not to be impolite, but he'd gotten a little lost and overwhelmed in all of his books before packing up the ones they needed, and then of course the all-night diner he'd decided to stop by was packed. He slipped in, two greasy paper sacks in hand. "Hey, sorry," he murmured. "Time got away."

"An hour and forty minutes!" Ivan yelled as soon as Leo returned, storming up to him with worry and anger alike crossing his features. His normally messy hair was in even more disarray than usual. He had given up on his paperwork around the hour and ten mark and had been working himself into a fit in the remaining time.

"This is why I say you need phone! An hour and forty minutes is not an hour!"

And Leo, for his part, was briefly stunned into silence. He'd been expecting a complaint, or a grumpy remark, or- well, for Ivan to have not noticed, because why should he care if he was gone one hour or three? Dumb. Dumb, dumb. They were partners, he had to... remember that.

"Hey. Hey, look, sorry- it's hard to keep track of time without a clock in your pocket. I'm fine, dude, there aren't any monsters between your place and mine. Calm down- eat with me?"

Ivan's hands clenched and unclenched into fists, trembling as the adrenaline-fueled anger faded into just worry, then to regret at his outburst.

"... I ... I apologize," He said finally, choking out the words and turning away quickly. "We do not yet know each other well. I worry. I should not have yelled. But please - get a phone as soon as possible or - or find someone else's you can use if you will be later than you say you will be."

Turning on his heel, Ivan went to the kitchen area as he frantically tried to smooth his hair back into some sense of order, setting out plates and cups and grabbing the kvass he kept in the fridge.

"No- no, it's fine. You're right. That's- that one's on me." Leo could feel his face flushing hot with something like embarrassment, as if he were a teenage boy breaking curfew. "That's how people in our job get into really stupid situations. I'll get one first thing in the morning."

He had been growing extra sleepy again, but now he could feel the blood pounding in his ears, and so he just took a seat at the table and began to silently unpack their food.

"Thank you," Ivan said quietly, the gratitude in his voice deep and genuine.

"... Have you had kvass before?" it was a shitty attempt to change the subject, but it was there. The argument had been resolved and passed, only thing to do was move on.

While grabbing the dark brown soda he also took a few more condiments and vegetables from his refrigerator, taking his aggressively plain burger and adding his own fixings himself.

Ivan liked his things in a very particular way. He didn't trust fast food places to get them right, even if it was a nice treat. UberEats had raised his variety significantly and yet he rarely branched out.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only