"Don't let anybody tell you what to do, kiddo," Mick answers, ignoring the way Leonard's counter to his sister sends his stomach into freefall. "And just because you're a guy don't mean you gotta go out and get a girl. There's no rule about it."
And when Mick was alone and honest with himself, he could admit that he didn't want any random woman. Or any woman at all. What he wanted he couldn't have. At least not the way he wanted.
"Same goes for you when you're older. Nobody says you gotta go and get a guy if you don't want to."
Leonard is often impressed at the ease with which Mick answers the weird, hard questions Lisa comes up with like this sometimes. He'd never known Mick with a family, so he supposes it's easy to forget he was probably somewhere in the middle of a giant family of siblings and he might have fielded more than one of the oddball questions before everything turned to ash. But he just doesn't even trip over this stuff and Leonard's always impressed by it.
"You mean I could marry a girl when I'm grown up if I wanted?" Lisa's eyes are wide with curiosity at the idea. It seemed strange, that's not what she always saw on the movies. It was always boys and girls together.
Suddenly, Leonard hates that he said a damn thing to her at all and got her started this line of questioning. He kind of would much rather the earth open and swallow him whole than talk about something this uncomfortable. Especially in public with a seven year old who doesn't know her own volume control.
Mick doesn't think about his family. He pushes it all aside as best he can and focuses on the family that he has. Leonard. Lisa. His whole damn world. Lisa is easy to answer because he's honest with her. No softballing things, no dumbing it down. She gets simple and direct answers because she's a smart kid and she deserves to be treated like one.
He shrugs. "Might even be legal then." A wink. "But keep talking about getting married and you're gonna make your brother go grey early." He drops to one knee as Leonard lets her down outside the restaurant. Lays a finger over her heart. "That right there? It's yours. Most important thing you got. So you don't go giving that to anyone, boy or girl, unless they went and earned it."
And if his eyes flick to Leonard for a moment, well. That's just coincidence. Right? Right. Totally not on purpose.
She giggles at the wink, even if she doesn't completely understand the comment he made before it.
Leonard lifts her over his shoulders and down onto the ground. Lisa is beaming at Mick, soaking up every word and Len is smiling a little at the sincerity of it.
It isn't until Mick's eyes dart over to him with those last couple of words that the world tilts a little. His eyes immediately cut away from Mick, busying himself with wrenching the pizza parlor door open and trying to ignore the way his stomach flips at the implication. It was nothing. Coincidence. A hasty, silent check-in that what he's telling his sister is okay. It definitely doesn't mean anything, least of all about Leonard.
"Let's get that pizza," he mumbles, tugging gently on Lisa's jacket to ease her inside.
That girl is gonna take over the damn world one day. Mick is sure of it. And if she doesn't? Him and Leonard would go and steal it for her.
Mick knows that he'd taken a risk saying something that stupid and sappy and it hurts to watch the way Leonard jerks his gaze away and opens the door, tugging his his sister in before him and looking at everywhere but him.
Then they're inside and the air smell warm and heavy with yeast and garlic and the happy chatter of Lisa's voice as she runs off to pick the perfect table. Mick wants to nudge him, to tell Leonard that it doesn't have to mean anything, that he would be there for him regardless, that it's okay if he doesn't want the same things Mick might. Because god help him Mick loves Leonard Snart with everything that he is and it's utterly terrifying.
The safer option is to check his wallet and order enough pizza, a lemonade for Lisa and two beers for them. If he doesn't call attention to what he just said, what he just implied then maybe they can pretend that it didn't happen. They can keep things just the way that they are.
The thing is, Leonard has never really thought about it that way. He's known for awhile now that Mick is important to him, and he's terrified of the idea of having him somehow taken from him. From losing the safety that he represents. But...he's never really thought about it beyond that.
"My heart is yours." That's what that look implied, attached to those words, thrown in Leonard's direction. That's what it meant and it was terrifying to consider. For so, so many reasons. Mick has given Leonard a power he never would have considered he could have over him by what he'd said without words. Holding someone else's heart in your hands meant you could unmake them, break them, ruin them completely. He's not sure he wants that power. But there it is. Right there, in one look.
It's easy enough for Leonard to get through lunch like it was nothing, and even ice cream afterwards. But the problem with words--spoken or not--that powerful is that they're sticky and messy and they kind of get all over everything in their wake.
Lisa's passed out after what was probably one of the best days she's had in awhile, tuckered out from playing so hard. Without her to field anything between them, Leonard is sitting on the opposite end of the couch that Mick's on, flicking through the channels to try and find a movie to watch, stuck with this thing that's reverberated through his brain all day and colored every thought in his head, every action Mick has made all day. What did it mean? Did it change things? Did it have to? Did he want it to?
Risky. Stupid. But that didn't make the look or the meaning behind that look any less true.
Mick soldiers on through lunch, enjoying the moments for what they are. Spending time with the people who matter to him. Pizza and ice cream and Lisa is already drowsing by the time Leonard gets her into the car, spoiled rotten by a full day of playing and a belly full of good food.
But once she's napping in the little room Mick had set up for her in his apartment, they're sitting in an uneasy and uncomfortable silence. No talking about a movie they want to see, or setting up some kind of job just to keep the money flowing. All because he had to go and open his damn mouth.
He breathes out. Picks at the threadbare couch. Doesn't look up. "It don't gotta mean anything," he finally offers, no matter how desperately he wishes that it could mean something.
His eyes dart over toward the source of the sudden silence-breaker, lingering for a second before falling back to the tv. He really hates how Mick can do that, almost like he can see inside his head and pick out the exact thoughts inside of it. It's weird and a little unnerving sometimes. More useful than he realizes, yet.
"It does, though." he says finally. Whether they own it or not, it's out there. It's been said. Or not-said. But close enough. It exists and Leonard's aware of it now and there's no taking it back. "Ha- How do you just pretend it doesn't exist?"
To be fair, Mick just puts two and two together. He'd all but told Leonard that he was completely and irrevocably his. That his heart belonged to only him. What else could he be thinking about?
"It means something to me," he clarifies with a half roll of a shoulder, still unable to look up at him. "It don't gotta mean the same thing to you." Because maybe Leonard doesn't think about him that way. Maybe he only likes girls. A thousand different maybes. "It's okay if it doesn't."
Leonard doesn't really think about girls. Or boys. Or what he would or wouldn't like with either one, if he's completely honest. But he does like Mick. He just isn't sure if it's like that. Or how to know if it is in the first place because, honestly, he's never feltlike that about anyone before.
"I....don't know if it does." It sounds dumb to his own ears and he can only imagine how stupid it sounds to someone else. He's uncomfortable with this conversation, but it's not really because of Mick, more than it is because he doesn't really understand his own thoughts about it anyway.
Mick has. Thought about both girls and boys and had his brothers and old man kick the shit out of him when he didn't show enough interest in girls. Hell, the day his old man dragged the boys off to a brothel had been an utter nightmare for Mick. So since then, he didn't really do much when it came to sex. Maybe let off some steam here and there but it never meant anything because he didn't want it to. At least not until Lenny had come into his life.
His admission isn't a rejection. Not really.
"'s okay Lenny." A quiet reassurance. "I just.. I mean.. " Christ he's bad at this and Mick drags a hand across his face. "It doesn't have to change things."
"I don't mean... I just--" His heart stutters in his chest. He's never really explained this to anyone, put the thoughts and feelings and the actual lack of them to words before. He shifts and turns sideways on the couch, draws his legs up to sit criss-cross and tryies to figure out how explain what he actually meant. As opposed to what it sounded like, and how Mick obviously took it.
"It's not that I don't...feel the same way. Or that I don't. It's just-- I don't know." That didn't feel any clearer, even to him. Great. This is going so well. Can the ground hurry up on that swallowing him whole thing, already? "It's like..." Like what? It's like nothing, and that's the problem. How does he even make this make sense to Mick when he doesn't get it himself? "You've liked people before, right? Had crushes or whatever before?"
He's patient. He can wait. For Lenny, he can wait while he does his damndest to put the words together in the right order and that's probably the clearest sign to Mick that he's somehow managed to rattle him. Normally Leonard is the one good with words, the one who can put things together in ways that elude Mick.
"Yeah. Yeah I guess so." Nothing lasting. A fleeting fancy here or there but nothing that ever meant anything. Not like how he feels about Leonard.
"You don't have to know. This isn't something you gotta figure out okay?" It was more important that at least Leonard knows how he feels. About him. "As long as you're okay.. with me. Being different."
The point isn't whether it's ever been a last thing, just that it's existed, which... as expected, of course it has. Because even if he likes boys, or both, or whatever, Mick has still experienced it. Isn't broken somehow like Leonard seems to be-- because that's how it feels. Like there's something wrong with him, that he's not wired the way other kids his age are.
"Okay, well....I haven't." How's that for blunt and to the point? "I don't know what it looks like. What it feels like. How do you know the difference? I just..." He takes a deep, shaky breath. "I know that I like you, and being around you." He fidgets a little, tapping his finger against his knee.
"But I want to," he blurts out, all but talking over Mick as he says he doesn't have to figure anything out. He feels awkward about it as soon as it's out of his mouth, and hates that he can feel the heat that rushes to his cheeks and he ducks his head in a vain attempt to hide it. He looks back up a moment later, though, almost incredulous at the implication that he wouldn't be okay with anything about Mick, ever. "'Course I am. That stuff doesn't matter." Not to him. Not the way it did to Lewis.
"Oh." A simple response. Because he didn't realize it, didn't know that Lenny didn't think about relationships that way. Mick's brow knits as he reaches out, fingertips tentatively touching Leonard's hand. "I like being around you too Lenny."
They can take it slow. They can take it as slow as Leonard might need it because Mick wasn't going anywhere. Ever. God he was so gone on him already and they'd never even touched. Not really. "You don't have to figure this out tonight. Or tomorrow. We got time okay?"
A hesitant brush of his fingers along his. "I'm not goin anywhere Lenny. Not ever."
Leonard's fingers twitch as Mick reaches for his hand, but he doesn't pull away, mostly just watches curiously until he looks back up at Mick. "Yeah?" His lips twitch in the smallest of smiles at that comment.
He nods a little, "Okay..." His eyes trail back to their hands again when he feels Mick's fingers brush across his again. His stomach does a weird flip and he looks back up again. "Promise?"
"Yeah Lenny." Mick dares to reach out a little more, tangling their fingers together. His pulse is thundering in his ears, a mix of nerves and something that feels suspiciously like happiness for something as mundane as simple as holding hands and watching a movie together.
He feels like the floor might drop out from under him suddenly when Mick tangles their fingers together and he wonders if that's normal.
He squeezes his fingers a little in Mick's grip and smiles a little at the promise. "Good," he nods a little and shifts to sit with his back against the couch again, refusing to let go of Mick's hand yet.
He still isn't sure what this means, but he intends to explore it some more eventually. Mick will have to guide this a little more because Leonard is completely out of his depths, but at least he knows he can trust Mick to be okay with whatever happens in the end.
Mick will wait. He will wait as long as he has to. The feeling of something as simple and stupid as holding hands sends his pulse skittering and he offers him a small smile as he sits back, their hands still tangled together.
He wants to touch. To taste. To show Leonard in every way how important he is to him. How much he loves him. But because it's Leonard Mick will wait. It'll be okay. He can wait. They can figure this out together.
"Go ahead and pick a movie," he offers, voice quiet and fond.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 07:00 pm (UTC)And when Mick was alone and honest with himself, he could admit that he didn't want any random woman. Or any woman at all.
What he wanted he couldn't have.
At least not the way he wanted.
"Same goes for you when you're older. Nobody says you gotta go and get a guy if you don't want to."
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 07:09 pm (UTC)"You mean I could marry a girl when I'm grown up if I wanted?" Lisa's eyes are wide with curiosity at the idea. It seemed strange, that's not what she always saw on the movies. It was always boys and girls together.
Suddenly, Leonard hates that he said a damn thing to her at all and got her started this line of questioning. He kind of would much rather the earth open and swallow him whole than talk about something this uncomfortable. Especially in public with a seven year old who doesn't know her own volume control.
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Date: 2018-01-03 07:16 pm (UTC)He shrugs. "Might even be legal then." A wink. "But keep talking about getting married and you're gonna make your brother go grey early." He drops to one knee as Leonard lets her down outside the restaurant. Lays a finger over her heart. "That right there? It's yours. Most important thing you got. So you don't go giving that to anyone, boy or girl, unless they went and earned it."
And if his eyes flick to Leonard for a moment, well. That's just coincidence. Right? Right. Totally not on purpose.
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Date: 2018-01-03 07:24 pm (UTC)Leonard lifts her over his shoulders and down onto the ground. Lisa is beaming at Mick, soaking up every word and Len is smiling a little at the sincerity of it.
It isn't until Mick's eyes dart over to him with those last couple of words that the world tilts a little. His eyes immediately cut away from Mick, busying himself with wrenching the pizza parlor door open and trying to ignore the way his stomach flips at the implication. It was nothing. Coincidence. A hasty, silent check-in that what he's telling his sister is okay. It definitely doesn't mean anything, least of all about Leonard.
"Let's get that pizza," he mumbles, tugging gently on Lisa's jacket to ease her inside.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 07:37 pm (UTC)And if she doesn't? Him and Leonard would go and steal it for her.
Mick knows that he'd taken a risk saying something that stupid and sappy and it hurts to watch the way Leonard jerks his gaze away and opens the door, tugging his his sister in before him and looking at everywhere but him.
Then they're inside and the air smell warm and heavy with yeast and garlic and the happy chatter of Lisa's voice as she runs off to pick the perfect table. Mick wants to nudge him, to tell Leonard that it doesn't have to mean anything, that he would be there for him regardless, that it's okay if he doesn't want the same things Mick might. Because god help him Mick loves Leonard Snart with everything that he is and it's utterly terrifying.
The safer option is to check his wallet and order enough pizza, a lemonade for Lisa and two beers for them. If he doesn't call attention to what he just said, what he just implied then maybe they can pretend that it didn't happen. They can keep things just the way that they are.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 07:58 pm (UTC)"My heart is yours." That's what that look implied, attached to those words, thrown in Leonard's direction.
That's what it meant and it was terrifying to consider. For so, so many reasons.
Mick has given Leonard a power he never would have considered he could have over him by what he'd said without words. Holding someone else's heart in your hands meant you could unmake them, break them, ruin them completely. He's not sure he wants that power. But there it is. Right there, in one look.
It's easy enough for Leonard to get through lunch like it was nothing, and even ice cream afterwards. But the problem with words--spoken or not--that powerful is that they're sticky and messy and they kind of get all over everything in their wake.
Lisa's passed out after what was probably one of the best days she's had in awhile, tuckered out from playing so hard. Without her to field anything between them, Leonard is sitting on the opposite end of the couch that Mick's on, flicking through the channels to try and find a movie to watch, stuck with this thing that's reverberated through his brain all day and colored every thought in his head, every action Mick has made all day. What did it mean? Did it change things? Did it have to? Did he want it to?
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 08:20 pm (UTC)Stupid.
But that didn't make the look or the meaning behind that look any less true.
Mick soldiers on through lunch, enjoying the moments for what they are. Spending time with the people who matter to him. Pizza and ice cream and Lisa is already drowsing by the time Leonard gets her into the car, spoiled rotten by a full day of playing and a belly full of good food.
But once she's napping in the little room Mick had set up for her in his apartment, they're sitting in an uneasy and uncomfortable silence. No talking about a movie they want to see, or setting up some kind of job just to keep the money flowing. All because he had to go and open his damn mouth.
He breathes out. Picks at the threadbare couch. Doesn't look up.
"It don't gotta mean anything," he finally offers, no matter how desperately he wishes that it could mean something.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 08:51 pm (UTC)"It does, though." he says finally. Whether they own it or not, it's out there. It's been said. Or not-said. But close enough. It exists and Leonard's aware of it now and there's no taking it back. "Ha- How do you just pretend it doesn't exist?"
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Date: 2018-01-03 08:59 pm (UTC)"It means something to me," he clarifies with a half roll of a shoulder, still unable to look up at him. "It don't gotta mean the same thing to you." Because maybe Leonard doesn't think about him that way. Maybe he only likes girls. A thousand different maybes. "It's okay if it doesn't."
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Date: 2018-01-03 09:27 pm (UTC)"I....don't know if it does." It sounds dumb to his own ears and he can only imagine how stupid it sounds to someone else. He's uncomfortable with this conversation, but it's not really because of Mick, more than it is because he doesn't really understand his own thoughts about it anyway.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 09:35 pm (UTC)So since then, he didn't really do much when it came to sex. Maybe let off some steam here and there but it never meant anything because he didn't want it to. At least not until Lenny had come into his life.
His admission isn't a rejection. Not really.
"'s okay Lenny." A quiet reassurance. "I just.. I mean.. " Christ he's bad at this and Mick drags a hand across his face. "It doesn't have to change things."
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 09:59 pm (UTC)"It's not that I don't...feel the same way. Or that I don't. It's just-- I don't know." That didn't feel any clearer, even to him. Great. This is going so well. Can the ground hurry up on that swallowing him whole thing, already? "It's like..." Like what? It's like nothing, and that's the problem. How does he even make this make sense to Mick when he doesn't get it himself? "You've liked people before, right? Had crushes or whatever before?"
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 10:14 pm (UTC)"Yeah. Yeah I guess so." Nothing lasting. A fleeting fancy here or there but nothing that ever meant anything. Not like how he feels about Leonard.
"You don't have to know. This isn't something you gotta figure out okay?" It was more important that at least Leonard knows how he feels. About him. "As long as you're okay.. with me. Being different."
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 10:46 pm (UTC)"Okay, well....I haven't." How's that for blunt and to the point? "I don't know what it looks like. What it feels like. How do you know the difference? I just..." He takes a deep, shaky breath. "I know that I like you, and being around you." He fidgets a little, tapping his finger against his knee.
"But I want to," he blurts out, all but talking over Mick as he says he doesn't have to figure anything out. He feels awkward about it as soon as it's out of his mouth, and hates that he can feel the heat that rushes to his cheeks and he ducks his head in a vain attempt to hide it. He looks back up a moment later, though, almost incredulous at the implication that he wouldn't be okay with anything about Mick, ever. "'Course I am. That stuff doesn't matter." Not to him. Not the way it did to Lewis.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 10:56 pm (UTC)They can take it slow. They can take it as slow as Leonard might need it because Mick wasn't going anywhere. Ever. God he was so gone on him already and they'd never even touched. Not really. "You don't have to figure this out tonight. Or tomorrow. We got time okay?"
A hesitant brush of his fingers along his. "I'm not goin anywhere Lenny. Not ever."
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Date: 2018-01-03 11:19 pm (UTC)He nods a little, "Okay..." His eyes trail back to their hands again when he feels Mick's fingers brush across his again. His stomach does a weird flip and he looks back up again. "Promise?"
no subject
Date: 2018-01-03 11:40 pm (UTC)"I promise. Not going anywhere."
no subject
Date: 2018-01-04 12:22 am (UTC)He squeezes his fingers a little in Mick's grip and smiles a little at the promise. "Good," he nods a little and shifts to sit with his back against the couch again, refusing to let go of Mick's hand yet.
He still isn't sure what this means, but he intends to explore it some more eventually. Mick will have to guide this a little more because Leonard is completely out of his depths, but at least he knows he can trust Mick to be okay with whatever happens in the end.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-04 12:30 am (UTC)The feeling of something as simple and stupid as holding hands sends his pulse skittering and he offers him a small smile as he sits back, their hands still tangled together.
He wants to touch. To taste. To show Leonard in every way how important he is to him. How much he loves him. But because it's Leonard Mick will wait.
It'll be okay. He can wait.
They can figure this out together.
"Go ahead and pick a movie," he offers, voice quiet and fond.