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What’s the etiquette here? He wondered.
On the one hand, she’s his Commanding Officer. She writes his performance reviews. She has his career in her hands, a career he’s worked very hard for.
On the other hand, he’s on shore leave. This is his apartment. His bed. His expensive, white, bed sheets.
On the other other hand, she’s just given him hands-down the best orgasm of his life, and she looked damn good doing it. And still does: wearing only a sheet tucked loosely under her arms, her hair perfectly disheveled, lips still rosy from the use he’d just made of her mouth.
Ultimately, whatever the complicated overall social context, he can’t stop himself. He has to say it, come what may.
“Shepard, could you-”
“Not my name,” she says, shaking the soy sauce bottle over her lap. Each spurt of dark fluid that hurtles toward the small plastic tray on her lap threatens to stop his heart, lest it splash onto his luxury bedding.
“Allie!” He says, snatching the bottle from her mid-shake. She looks up at him mystified, reaching for the bedside sake without taking her eyes off him.
Oh my god, now she’s going to spill that.
“Kaidan,” she says, pouring the cloudy rice wine into a little ceramic cup, “first of all, bottoms up. You’re too sober.” She pours her own cup and raises it to his, downing it as he takes a drink.
“And the rest?” she says, glancing down at his cup with her eyebrows raised expectantly, “Go on, I’ll wait.”
He finishes the cup, and she pours another round.
“Drink this one at your leisure,” she says, setting the bottle back on the bedside table, “Now. That was first of all. Second of all: you have a lot of fucking nerve, you know that?”
He laughs. “Sorry, Al. These sheets are expensive.”
She looks at him agape.
“What?” he asks uneasily.
“Kaidan… I…” she blinks at him, looks down at her cup and takes a long drink, pouring herself another cup. “Okay, now you,” she says gesturing at his cup, “down the hatch, it seems you still have a ways to go.”
He knocks his cup back, holds it out for a refill which she promptly provides.
“Hopefully that helps with what I’m about to say,” she says, setting her cup to the side so she can steeple her fingers in front of her mouth, “Kaidan… you’re a great guy, honestly. You’re a sweetheart, excellent Lieutenant, well-hung-”
“Wait,” he says, “are you breaking up with me?”
“We aren’t dating,” she says, smiling, “…are we?”
“What were you going to say?”
“Are we?”
“I felt a ‘but’ coming…”
“Kaidan, you’re a great guy,” she says, laughing, “but sometimes you can be unbelievably dense.”
He scoffs as she picks up her sake cup again to take a sip.
“Here I am, Hero of the Citadel, naked in your bed,” she says, “having just done some truly filthy things to you, things we both could only have dreamed of a month ago. Hell, a week ago. And now, having just worked my ass off, I want to enjoy a relaxing dinner in bed. And your priority, the only thing on your mind, is your bed sheets?”
“Okay, sure. I see your point,” he says, “but-”
“Oh my god. Kaidan! I’ll fucking buy you new sheets. I’ll buy you a new bed! Here, you’re still too sober,” she says, refilling her cup to give to him, then emptying the bottle into his cup, “drink both of those, and then hand me that bottle behind you. This one’s out.”
He does as instructed, and she arranges the elegant takeaway sushi boxes on the bed, opening them carefully.
“Wow,” she says, her expression suddenly childlike, “this looks exactly like it does in old vids!”
In the day and a half she’d been on Earth, there had already been a few instances like this. Something would happen that, to him, was totally mundane, and she would light up with wonder and ask him all about it.
He found it incredibly endearing, especially the way it instantly shattered any hardass pretenses she was still inexplicably working to preserve.
“Oh, it’s so slimy,” she says, running her finger along a piece of salmon nigiri and pulling a face. He laughs, handing her a pair of chopsticks before snapping his own.
“What’s this for?” She asks, before noticing the way he’s just split his in half. “Am I supposed to break it?”
“They’re chopsticks,” he says, “You’ve never used chopsticks?”
“I don’t know what chopsticks are,” she says, “What are they used for?”
“It’s what you’d traditionally eat sushi with. Here, like this,” he says, picking up a roll and bringing it to his mouth.
She snaps her chopsticks apart, looking back and forth from his hand to hers, trying to approximate his grip.
“Wait, not like that,” he says, scooting closer to her, “hm, this might be a little harder to teach you, since you’re left-handed…”
She holds the sticks awkwardly, never able to keep both sticks in hand for more than a few seconds before one suddenly goes spiraling out of her grasp.
“Tell me you’re fucking with me,” she says, absolutely incredulous, “tell me this is a prank you’ve been working on for months. Did you lift that piece with a tiny biotic field or something? Do it again.”
Something about the sincerity of her accusation has him laughing harder than he has in ages, laughing almost to tears. The thought that he would concoct a prank where the end goal is to try to convince her to eat with two small wooden sticks. Not with an audience, just the two of them. And the thought that the prank hinged on using a tiny biotic field to bring the sushi to his mouth and make it look like it was the chopsticks.
She must be thinking the same thing, because now she’s laughing just as hard as he is.
“What would be the point??” he gasps.
“I don’t know! I don’t know,” she says, tears of laughter starting to fall down her cheeks, lightly flushed with drunkenness.
He’s never heard her laugh like this, so totally unrestrained. He’s not sure he’s ever laughed like this, either.
He kisses her, overcome with joy, his hand resting behind her neck as she reaches up to grab his face with both hands, laughing against his mouth.
“Fucking ridiculous,” she says, shaking her head and kissing him, “fucking ridiculous lie to tell a person.”
“They’re real!” he laughs, kissing her again, “I swear. I’ll teach you how to use them tomorrow.”