Author's Note: First foray into Leverage. Written as part of the 14Valentines project on Livejournal. Today's Topic: Body Image.
|Sophie | Eliot | Hardison | Parker | Nate |
Sophie knows that she's not the most attractive eye candy in the room at most of the upper-class events she slips into and out of at the drop of a hat. The shiniest, when the occasion calls for it, but not the most stunningly gorgeous (and certainly not without a fair amount of work on her part). It's something she's come to terms with, and not without its advantages. The stunningly gorgeous stand out wherever they go, a fact that is more hindrance than help in her line of work. They also put people on edge, make them wary and nervous. Sophie can make a man sweat at twenty paces, but she can also make him trust with a whisper and a song, a talent that requires subtlety and flaws.
If she'd been born a beauty, a real beauty, she'd never have made it in the world she now knows. She'd have gone one of two ways, and neither of them suits the woman she's become. She could have been lucky, stepping from the shadows onto the arm of a powerful man and becoming the arm candy she so effortlessly imitates when the need arises. Or she might not have been so fortunate, loved a little too hard just a little too young, carrying secrets and scars even darker than those she already bears.
Sophie knows that she's not the prettiest, never will be, but that's all right with her. Because what she lacks in god-given aesthetics, she makes up for in brains. She'll take that trade any day.
Eliot knows the difference between sex and relationships. He also knows the difference between energetic pity sex and hot angry hate sex. He even knows the difference between sex and "making love" (although you'd lose teeth if you ever brought it up without some serious tactical groundwork beforehand). He understands losing yourself in a stranger and using them as a stand-in, and has played both roles over the years. In short, Eliot Spencer has had a lot of sex, in a lot of different circumstances, and he likes to consider himself something of a casual expert on the subject.
That being said, he's not sure what to do when Hardison shows up on his doorstep with a bottle of wine and a bag of takeout with PF Chang's stamped on the side of it. It's been a hell of a day, and all Eliot wants to do is sleep, but the food smells really good, so he lets Hardison in and tries not to think about why he's there. It's one thing for there to have been (sort-of) accidental sex between teammates because Hardison couldn't hold his sake and Eliot wasn't one to turn down an offer. It would be one thing if that was even what had happened. After all, they were both still getting used to the idea that the crew was going to last longer than the next job, and as long as it didn't happen twice it was no harm, no foul. That was something Eliot knew how to deal with, no problem. Hardison showing up on his doorstep with disgustingly good food and a half-stuttered explanation of being in the neighborhood was something else, and Eliot wants to kick himself for not realizing Hardison was so fucking normal, even as he acknowledges the real problem.
Because the bad sign isn't that Hardison's there, although that's fucked up in its own regard. It's that Eliot can't bring himself to care, even though he damn well knows the difference between what's going on and what's going on in Hardison's head.
Probably.
Hardison knows his limits. It's a strange thing for a hacker like him to know, because he's never met a system he couldn't con in his own unique way, but he knows them nonetheless. No matter how many early morning hours Eliot spends with him (and that will be the bare minimum that Nate stipulates so that Hardison doesn't end up unexpectedly dead on a routine job, because Eliot has the anger management skills of a pissed off rhino when he hasn't had his coffee), Hardison's never going to forget what it felt like to have his hand slammed in a car door and that sickening moment when he thought his fingers were toast. He gets why Nate wants him able to defend himself more effectively, it's just that some things are never going to change.
Back when he first got into the game, hacking was all about the con just as much as one of Parker's jewel heists. Access numbers and IP addresses, back when everything was still hard wires and human error. In short order, he could bullshit on the phone just as well as the next guy, or if he was honest, a whole lot better. But not everything in life is at a distance, where it can be controlled and manipulated without consequence or risk. Hardison learned that the hard way, and pain has a way of making lessons stick. He might have been sixteen when the accident happened, but that doesn't mean it's ever going to stop haunting him.
Working with the crew is good for him, because it does force him to stop lurking in the distance. He's expanding his skill set (just ask Eliot. Or, on second thought, don't), trying new things and picking up tricks left and right. He's seen more of the country in a year than he had in the first two and a half decades of his life, never mind Europe. He's nearly been killed a dozen times, and had to lie his way into (and out of) more situations than he can count (187, give or take a near-decapitation), and he's pretty sure that Parker's going to murder him in his sleep one of these days. But he still knows his limits, and he's not afraid to yell and scream when he reaches them. He likes being alive a lot more than he likes new experiences, and there's nothing that makes him feel alive like the feel of a keyboard under his fingertips.
Parker knows how to read people, and how to manipulate them, at least in theory. With a few notable exceptions, she's always gotten what she needed out of a situation, so she can't be too bad at the whole people thing. It's just that she's also very, very good at looking at the cost/benefit ratio of a thing. Before she joined the crew, she never put in enough face time to make it worth bothering to dust off her conversation skills (such as they are). Even after six months and some really bizarre B&E (which is saying something, coming from her), she's still not sure it's worth the effort. There are benefits to not being a people person, and it's not like they don't already have their fair share of straight-faced liars in the crew. People are less likely to argue if you stick to the point, and there's a limit to how friendly it pays to be in a crew, because they're only going to last so long before going their separate ways.
She's learning, despite what the others think. Every time Sophie opens her mouth, Parker pays attention. It's just that people aren't like an alarm system, there are too many variables for every action and reaction, and the trial and error involved in managing them is way more effort than it's worth on a day-to-day basis. Except, sometimes, life decides to kick her in the face and remind her that theory and reality aren't the same thing. It happens enough after they form the crew that she decides to do something about it - that's why Alice White doesn't just disappear when her jury duty ends. If there's one thing that Parker's vocation has taught her, it's that practice really does make you better at things. She's smart, that's something else she knows, which means that if she practices enough this will come, too. So while Peggy might be kind of strange, and disgustingly apple pie, she's also free practice without anyone looking over Parker's shoulder. And while she can tolerate it from Nate, Parker's been a thief long enough that she instinctively hates the idea of anyone looking over her shoulder.
Nate knows that he's never going to stop hurting over the death of his son. That all the platitudes and well wishes, and even the fresh, sharp tang of vengeance, won't make that hole in his chest disappear anymore than the whiskey on his tongue.
If he thought it would help, he'd crawl into a box somewhere and let the world pass him by. Experience has proven that approach to be null and void. Even worse, since he started running a crew there's a distinct probability that someone would reach into that box and toss his ass back out into the daylight whether he wanted it or not. Nate's not foolish enough to think he can fall off the grid well enough to lose all four of his personal band of merry men. He's also not foolish enough to think that Sophie would hesitate to browbeat the rest of them into hunting him down, not without some serious and unpleasant work on his part.
The thing is, there's something comforting about having that pain gnawing away at him, because at least it means that he hasn't forgotten. A big part of him doesn't want to stop hurting, because there's always going to have been something he should have done differently, could have done differently - there has to be. No matter how small that part of him gets, it's never going to disappear completely, not matter how many other things he fills his life with, and that's okay. He'd hate to lose the only piece of his son that he has left.
~ Finis ~