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Ada had never once thought that she could have something like this.
From the moment she learned to think for herself, life has always had a way of teaching her that it did not matter who you were or where you came from, it would be just as unfair to you as it was to everyone else. There were no victors in a world full of cruelty and despair. Only survivors.
She has never considered herself anything but that, decades of running away from things she didn’t entirely understand and even longer of charging into those that she did leaving her molten and scarred. There was never any room for anything else. No time. No cares. Nothing but an inexplicable ideal that nothing really mattered even if she wanted it to.
Eventually, surviving just kind of became the norm.
Until it wasn’t anymore.
Never in her life had Ada ever considered it a worthwhile thing to let herself rely on another human being for long. Humans were just too wild. Too unpredictable. Too often burdened with a sense of duality that left them indecisive and unable to do what was necessary to survive. She had spent years molding herself into someone capable, someone unable to consider whether there was a wrong choice because choices meant that something mattered in the end. And for a long time, she lived like nothing did.
Then Raccoon City happened, and she met him.
And she finally got to see what it looked like when everything mattered.
“You gonna stay in bed all day or what,” Leon’s voice calls out to her from just beyond the sliding glass doors, sun-kissed skin and muscular arms finding rest on the edge of the pool some feet away. There’s a comfortable and amused smile on his lips, bright in a way it hasn’t been in ages, and for a brief moment Ada considers that there is nothing she would do to go back and change any of it. Not if it meant she wouldn’t end up here.
She smiles back at him, feeling the way her heart expands in her chest. “It’s called beauty rest. Not that you would know.”
Leon laughs at that, shaking his head. “You’re beautiful enough. Come get your ass in the pool before I put you in it.”
She’s known him long enough now to know that his threat holds much promise. But the sky is clear and the sun is warmer than it has felt in months and the air does not smell like death and ashes, so some crazed part of her actually feels like testing her luck. It’s hard to resist him, much harder than she could’ve ever imagined, but she forces herself to remain steady. Valiantly stubborn in a way she knows drives him crazy.
It’s easy when it’s like this. She wishes it could stay this way all the time.
Instead of making good on his threat, Leon rolls his eyes and shoves away from the wall, swimming backwards until he is certain she can see the way his entire body contracts with the motion. Teasingly perfect. Playing the game. Knowing full well that she will inevitably give in first.
Ada shakes her head in amusement when he splashes a little, tilting her head back to close her eyes as she breathes in the fresh morning air. She lets her arms relax from beneath her, laying herself down onto the mattress before she stretches as far as she can and releases any unresolved tension in her bones. The stretch expands all the way down to her toes, unraveling every part of her. Making her softer. Easier. Malleable to whatever the day prepares to throw at her.
For a long while, she just lays there, staring up at the ceiling until she can start to make out the imperfections in the white paint. In the gentle breeze that passes through the open room, the crisp scent of saltwater kisses her skin gently, washing away all the things that might not care to matter. Not as long as she is here, in this place. Far away from the rest of the world and tucked in a quiet corner alongside the only person who makes sense.
Who always has, when nothing else did.
There’s a dip in the mattress then, a large shadow sliding in to block out the light beyond her closed eyelids, dripping wet and uncaring about what that might mean for the bedsheets. Ada lets a slow smile stretch across her lips, refusing to open her eyes. Knowing what comes next.
“Ada,” Leon murmurs, a tease in his voice.
Strong hands plant themselves on either side of her head, even stronger legs finding rest on either side of her body. Warm lips find their way to the top of her nose, working their way down until they travel home atop hers.
She lets him kiss her, slow and gentle until they have to come up for air, and only opens her eyes when the distance returns. What she finds, she thinks, and not for the first time, is something entirely perfect.
“Come swim,” he beckons.
Gentle fingertips trace a familiar line along his jaw, feeling the stubble there. Unable to help herself. “There’s a reservation in an hour.”
“So,” Leon shrugs, sitting back on his knees as his hands slide along her arms to find her own. He pulls her up to sit, sliding backwards until he’s on his feet again. “It’s still an hour.”
Ada laughs under her breath, begrudgingly allowing him to drag her out of bed. Her heart isn’t entirely in it to fight him. It never is these days.
As soon as she’s upright, he snatches her into his grip without warning, lifting her from the floor far enough that she has no choice but to wrap herself around his body. She holds on for dear life as he bolts towards the awaiting water, laughter spilling from her lips when he topples over and sends them crashing into it. It’s nowhere near as cold as she imagined it would be, gentle warmth enveloping her easily, drawing her in until she’s entirely submerged and without a single thought other than how good it feels to be alive.
To be able to experience this.
To be able to find happiness and not have to worry about what might come after it when it’s gone.
When they finally surface for air, Leon grins. He closes the distance between them and allows his body to reach for her a second time, pulling her close enough that she can see the specks of gray in his blue eyes, replacing the colorfulness of what they had once been before. It serves as a stark reminder that they are getting older, time beginning to pass by more quickly than it once had and yet more slowly all the same.
Ada has learned, though the quiet moments like this one, that there is nothing wrong with slowing down to enjoy it for a while. Life does not have to be as chaotic as it once was. She can afford to stop and consider the things that might matter to her without the fear of losing them completely. And if she does lose them, well…
At least she took care to enjoy them for a while.
“Hey,” Leon whispers into the space between them, looking lighter than he has in months.
“Hi,” Ada whispers in return, pushing some unruly, wet strands away from his face. Slicking his hair back. Taking note of the way it has darkened over time, leaving room for occasional threads of shining silver to appear.
She finds it unfair that despite all of his stress, it has not managed to gray faster than hers, discolored strands taking root all along the edges of her skull. It’s like the world is punishing her for something she doesn’t yet understand, but avoiding him altogether.
Leon leans forward, letting their foreheads touch. Closing his eyes when she moves to carefully caress his face. Breathing through it. Letting it heal him.
Ada still doesn’t understand why it is that she seems to have such an effect on him. It’s one thing for Leon to make her feel like there isn’t anything she can’t do in this world, but to have him feel the exact same way? She has no idea.
Maybe she doesn’t have to.
Maybe this can just be another one of those things that just is.
She folds her arms around his neck then, feeling the strength of his shoulders beneath her palms. Appreciating the evidence of how hard he has fought to get where he is. The rawness of it.
The two of them have spent so long fighting that there is not a patch of skin on either of their bodies that is not littered with scarred tissue. Even if it cannot be seen, there are changes in the physical plane which harbor memories upon memories of violence and ruin, molding their vessels inside and out until they are left unrecognizable to what they were before.
But Ada knows, better than anyone, that regardless of outward appearances there is a place somewhere deep within the both of them where their old self still resides. Watching. Waiting. Observing.
Finally being allowed to heal.
No longer surviving, but living.