Erwin Smith (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
solutioning) wrote2013-11-28 03:39 am
solutioning) wrote2013-11-28 03:39 am
Entry tags:
How To Be A Good Sport
Regrettably, it was morning. Pale sunlight filtered through the blinds. Erwin tossed the file on his desk, set his mug (Number One Dad, though he was nobody's father) next to it, and sank heavily into his chair. The station coffee managed to be both watery and bitter-burnt, so it was really only bearable when it was still steaming. He had developed the trick of distracting himself while he drank so that he would notice as little of the scalding or the taste as possible. Today's reading was the report Lieutenant Levi had put together after the nasty situation at the chemical plant a few weeks back. He leafed through the pages. A straightforward homicide case, disgruntled worker, two bodies, a co-worker and a supervisor, dumped into a vat of solvent in an attempt to hide the evidence. The suspect had been spotted on site and Levi had run him down on foot, apparently sprinting over a walkway and hauling his ass up a 15-meter scaffold to do so. The thought of it sent a familiar chill down Erwin's spine, not unpleasantly.
He'd see Levi soon enough. Probably he was cleaning up last night's paperwork, and waiting, in his cunning way, for Captain Smith to be awake enough to fully appreciate what was coming to him. And Captain Smith did wonder what it was going to be - ugly sweater? Silly hat? Levi's sense of humor was very strange and Erwin didn't put it past him to show up with some instrument of minor torture, like shoes in the wrong size.
But then, if he didn't want to be a good sport about losing a bet, he shouldn't have been betting with Levi in the first place.
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Discretion was, after all, the name of the game.
He wondered if Erwin suspected anything; probably not. It had been the kind of joke that developed in a seedy bar at a late hour -- sloppy, crude. Levi hated sloppy and so it had never been an option, but that didn't change the fact that his answer to the bet was somewhat... inordinately... delicate.
That was fine, as far as he was concerned. It was, after all, his choice to make, and Erwin knew well the general perils of losing to Levi. Still; he had never come up with something like this, and he had to admit that he was curious as to the Captain's reaction.
He didn't knock before entering the office, stepping inside, and pushing the door closed behind himself. For a moment, he observed Captain Smith, meticulously categorizing the little tells of morning fatigue: the drawn blinds, his nearly empty cup, the faint dark smudges under his eyes. There was an odd sort of pleasure in seeing these things -- perhaps because the rest of him was so immaculate, smooth and clean-shaven, tall, impressive. On anyone else, these little weaknesses would have been off-putting, but Erwin was simply too competent for that to be the case.
"Good morning." The little box was light and aerodynamic, which was why it had no trouble at all reaching Erwin's desk. It landed atop the report just as Levi advanced towards it. He didn't smile. He didn't have to.
"Your forfeit."
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Levi looked like he was in an unusually good mood, to tell by the sharpness in his eyes and his brisk, precise movements. Unlike Levi, Erwin allowed himself a smile - one which widened a little when he took in the entire matter of Levi's presence and the box sure to be full of Levi's joke, whatever it was. Light, though, wasn't it? Rules out the shoes. Small mercies. Too small for the ugly sweater, as well...
He lifted the lid and looked inside.
His piercing blue gaze lifted to Levi once again.
Back down to the box. He placed the lid on top.
A long moment of silence as he looked at his lieutenant. He was not smiling now.
Erwin stood, scootched back his chair, and strode to the windows which looked out upon the main floor of Homicide. One by one he began to draw the blinds down and shut. A bet was a bet. He felt a strange sensation in the small of his back, a tight hyperawareness, not unlike being tickled, but nobody was touching him.
"I'll see you at the 8:15." He said calmly. This was by way of dismissing Levi. He didn't mean to be watched when he put on his new garment.
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The day would be interesting.
His fingers found the handle of the door; he was still looking at Erwin, intently.
"Captain," he said, by way of acknowledgement. It was uncommonly soft. Erwin might have recognized it as the sort of tone Levi took when he intended to be dangerous.
Then he pulled open the door and stepped through it again, letting it click quietly shut behind him. 8:15 was a ways away, still; he'd have time to get some of the shitty coffee and start on his own pile of paperwork.
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The 8:15 standup was when the team touched base about the day's work. Where they'd be, what they'd be doing, state of the case, that sort of thing. The detectives and paper-pushers and Hange, the forensics dork, and her little tribe - everyone came to the open aisle between the desks on the main floor and the door of Erwin's office, clutching file folders or styrofoam cups of brown coffeelike substance, nursing hangovers or chortling at rude jokes. Not a lot of banter in homicide. Something about Erwin's implacable face, and, maybe worse, Lieutenant Levi's total immunity to humor in any form.
Erwin, as usual, had a couple new cases to hand out. Neither was anything special. A straightforward domestic violence-related murder, which he handed to the freshfaced Sasha and her partner Connie; and what looked like a mugging gone wrong in the northwest part of the city, near the river docks, which went to Jean. He had yet to settle on a new partner, but he was, in Erwin's estimation, capable of handling this on his own, and not ready to be pressed.
He listened to everyone's report-out, and spoke, plainly and directly as usual, about the day to come. And from time to time he would shift his weight from one foot to the other. Lots of the team had bad posture and lazy leg muscles from sitting too long. On anyone else it would have been completely innocuous. Someone attentive would even have seen him look overlong at the corner of a nearby desk. Somewhere to sit. He was immaculate in his tan suit and green tie; not a hair out of place, not a wrinkle, but there was a difference in his posture which was too subtle to be noticed.
Towards the end of the meeting he shot Levi a look. But that was even more innocuous than the shifting thing.
"Okay, that's it." He said to the team, which had already begun to disperse. "I'm in a budget meeting for the next two hours so take any problems to Levi."
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But of course he would. Erwin was too... honourable wasn't the right word, not quite; neither was honest. They just didn't lie to each other. Couldn't.
So he was wearing it.
He watched it -- the shifting, the glances, Erwin's face as he talked. This wasn't unusual, either: Lieutenant Levi was known for cracking down on any show of disrespect towards the Captain, and so it was only natural that he was attentive when Erwin spoke. There was something slightly off about it today, though. Hange had remarked he looked tense, leaning against a desk with his arms crossed. He'd ignored her, but Hange had always had a good eye for details.
He was having trouble not thinking about it.
His cold grey eyes followed Erwin silently until the closing, when his own name was mentioned. At this point he'd straightened and jabbed a gentle elbow into the ribs of the person to his right, who just so happened to be Jean. Jean yelped, and, for a moment, stopped looking at once constipated and grief-stricken in order to look startled.
"Work hard," Levi cautioned him, by way of encouragement. Then he peeled his eyes off Erwin, but not before returning the pointed look. It was not aimed at Erwin's face.
The rest of the morning brought with it more paperwork, some interviews, and Hange hanging around to fangirl over bodily fluids and Eren, who was a non-secretor. When Levi barged into Erwin's office with a fresh cup of coffee, it was early afternoon, and he was purely looking to escape a discussion over the fine points of blood splatter analysis.
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All the same he'd been unusually unsettled with a loaded hotdog in one hand on the street corner. He felt as if someone would take it as an invitation. Though to all third parties there was nothing unusual at all about the tall blond man, hotdog or not. The drama was entirely in his head.
A private joke that tainted everything else it came into contact with.
That afternoon, Erwin was diligently flipping through a heap of printed-out spreadsheets, pausing now and again to annotate with a cheap ballpoint.At first he looked up with the basic Captain Erwin nod of recognition, immediately returning to his work - then Levi registered, and he looked up again, and this time a frisson of unreadable emotion crossed his face. He settled back politely.
"Good afternoon, lieutenant. What can I do for you?"
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"How was the meeting."
Did you squirm all the way through that, too, was what he didn't say, though Erwin might have been able to read it from the careful, unblinking way Levi was watching him now. Just like he had at the morning standup.
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You know how it went, or you can guess.
His lieutenant was a little above eye level like this. Erwin had to look up, which made him lean back in his seat, which ground his ass against delicate fabric, and, as with each time this had happened today, he felt fresh pressure, new heat. The feeling of exposure. Sharper because he knew how sharp Levi's awareness was.
"No news, otherwise. Are you training this afternoon?"
The best shot in the station and quite possibly in the force, Levi would occasionally lead a class for new recruits and those interested in improving their skills.
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Erwin was so calm it was a little annoying, even though he hadn't expected anything else, not really. Hard to read anything off of him. And yet, Levi thought he'd seen something when his captain shifted in his seat--
Ordinarily, he would have kept his distance, but Erwin's clear gaze and still-immaculate, well-tailored suit were provocative. They'd been dancing around this thing for weeks; he no longer felt like being delicate. Usually, he'd stay just like this: arms folded across his chest, back ramrod straight.
Today, he perched on the table instead, twisting enough so he could still look at Erwin, as well as reach for his cup. "Still shitty?"
why haven't you run out to fetch me a bunch of actual erwin icons, chibi
It was a non-starter.
That was the kind of calm which informed Erwin's daily life. Discard impossibilities and concentrate on what can be done. Be a good boss for the guy. Sign off on paperwork for the guy. Go drinking with the guy. Make bets and be a good sport about losing. Wear the thing he picked out and look at him, level, when he sits on the desk, bone-chillingly elegant, capable, and good-looking, and takes your cup.
Erwin relinquished it without argument, his warm fingers touching Levi's in the handoff.
"What do you think?"
there seem to be heartbreakingly few :(
Rejection would have been easy; it would have made sense, from a man like Erwin -- always rational, always keeping it together, always thinking about the future of Homicide and little else.
This was something else. Something that didn't make sense. The glances, the casual touching -- he held back an exhale when their fingers brushed -- letting Levi walk all over him with, frankly, deeply inappropriate shit. For months he'd been aware exactly when Captain Smith had entered a room, how his shirt stretched over his shoulders when he took off his jacket, the precise shade of his eyes under the fluorescent lights. Even so, nothing had ever happened. Sometimes he wondered if it was, maybe, because Erwin himself wasn't sure what he wanted.
In the end, it didn't matter. Levi knew what he wanted, and, now that the question had been definitively established, he was unafraid to force Erwin's hand into providing an answer.
He raised the cup to his lips, keeping eye contact. Careful, so careful to turn it, so that he would sip from the exact same spot Erwin had touched.
"Nasty," was his clinical assessment. "Tell Bolton to shove it next time."
:| even your failures are tiny
Inasmuch as this was as far as things could or would go, Erwin meant to hang on to the moment for a while. Serious, unguarded, he watched Levi's deliberate movement, listened to his dry, dispassionate words, well aware that a separate conversation was being had beneath these pleasantries. He wasn't afraid of it, as there was only one outcome. Everything before that was permissible playtime, everything after meant playtime was over.
Surely Levi knew this too. He liked to push the envelope. Like with the forfeit, he liked to ride the line. Because it would bring an end to these incursions, Erwin was that much more reticent to have to make the boundary clear. He'd be slow to do it.
"If you want better, bring it yourself. Can I have my cup back, please?"
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His next action belied his agreement -- Levi had slipped off the desk, cup held at the rim by his fingertips, undeterred by the steam hitting his palm. There was something calculating in the look he gave Erwin then -- a cat waiting to see whether the bird had gotten spooked yet.
He rounded the table slowly, almost ceremonial in his steady, silent advance. Miraculously, the coffee level remained even, even as Levi reached his goal -- Erwin's chair -- paused for a moment, and then deposited himself neatly into his captain's lap.
The height difference almost went away like this, especially when he slung his free arm over Erwin's shoulders an leaned in, close enough to feel Erwin exhale.
"Here it is," he announced, drily. The coffee floated somewhere at about Erwin's chest-level, its contents still preternaturally still.
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A warm, perfectly firm ass snuggled into his lap. Levi was heavier than he looked, wonderfully so, and his dick didn't miss it. Levi's lean body crushed up next to his. Even in this he was martial and precise, his legs dangling easily, his wrist steady, no less in control of himself now than he was at the firing range. He smelled clean and virile. His fine skin, which showed so little trace of age, smooth over his small, sharp, serious features, looked as good up close as it ever had in any of Erwin's covert moments of watching Levi from afar. A perilous thrill ran down all his limbs.
He frowned at Levi's cool, smug expression. When he reached, it was to gently tug the cup free of Levi's grasp. He set it on the desk, and, mindfully, not directly in front of him but off to the side, towards the corner.
"This is a bad idea."
He said it in a factual sort of way. Clearly it was meant that this was factually a bad idea, and not a matter of opinion. Or desire. There was no unsteadiness in his blue eyes, no laughter or hope crumpling thick blond brows. For all intents and purposes he looked unmoved.
Against the crook of his arm Levi could no doubt feel all the things which Erwin couldn't control: the sudden lifting heat of his skin, the thump of his pulse - much too fast for someone just sitting around doing paperwork. Against his ass he'd feel other signs, too, just as helpless, and just as unlikely to provoke any open admission from Erwin.
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It was difficult to stay collected, now, with the object of his hunger so close. Hard to keep so still, with Erwin's lace-covered dick against his ass; deliberately, Levi shifted against it, not quite holding in his shiver. His free hand had come up to trace the strong, masculine line of Erwin's jaw, then dipped beneath to sneak steam-hot fingers under his collar, splayed over his collar bone.
"I want it," he demanded, so quietly the words would have gotten lost had they not been sharing breaths. "My forfeit."
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However cool he looked externally inside a lust so powerful he felt sick with it pounded in his throat and thickened his dick. Almost enough to make him forget to breathe. Levi's mouth so close to his own, Levi's body against his own, this thing that he'd cheerfully shoved aside looming over him now, horribly possible. He wanted it so much that the vastness of wanting was a caution in itself and dragged him irretrievably back to his responsibilities. A stoic, silent pain, like swallowing something too big that sticks in the gullet.
His whisper was low and bare. "I'm going to give you," He swallowed, and this little motion brought his lips so close to Levi's that he felt their warmth. His other hand curled around the back of Levi's head and felt with relish the short, soft prickling of his black undercut. "A few hours to cool down, lieutenant. If you still feel this way tonight..."
Then what. He didn't do this kind of thing. There weren't any plans for this eventuality. With difficulty, he continued. "...My place."
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What he was listening to was the quick sound of Erwin's breathing, his voice rumbling low in his throat -- the movement in his throat when he swallowed, felt just barely through the fingertips Levi splayed over his throat -- something large and hot pressing against his ass, even through both of their clothing. He wanted nothing more than to strip Erwin of his, to feel more of his steady hands, to hear that smooth voice heavy with desire...
But Erwin wanted him to wait.
And, even in this, Levi would obey. Not without making a point, however.
Both his hands swept up, now, to cup Erwin's face and hold him carefully still. For a moment, Levi only watched him, composed if it had not been for the faint flush of arousal on his impassive face.
"A tithe," he barely warned, before leaning in to take the kiss. It was neither long nor deep: just the firm, warm pressure of his mouth against Erwin's, the barest hint of Levi's tongue swiping across Erwin's lower lip -- then he was gone. Entirely, as he was slipping off his captain's lap and heading towards the door.
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He got up and slid open the blinds on an outside window and watched the parking lot until he felt like he could focus again. Then it was back to the paperwork which he failed to finish during the morning meeting, also due to failure to focus.
At 8:37 pm, in his comfortable, well-kept two-bedroom house in a quiet residential part of town, Erwin was preparing dinner. He had not yet changed from his work clothes; he'd only shed the jacket and tie. The TV was on in the other room and tuned to the news. He was in the kitchen with all the lights on, turning over a single chicken breast in a pan, and had all of the other accouterments of a responsible bachelor meal at hand: broccoli, salt and pepper, a dish of reheated rice pilaf, a tumbler of scotch. The last part was not customary.
A manageable anticipation leapt in his heart. Every now and then he looked to the back door, which opened onto the deck and yard. Whether or not Levi came, whether or not it was a bad idea, whether or not anything would happen, that was not something he could plan for. Whatever happened there was an inevitability; he couldn't seriously turn Levi away any more than he could demand that he come. However: he could plan for a good outcome and for a bad one, which he did, impartially, as the grandfather clock in the foyer ticked the minutes.
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He hadn't allowed himself to think about it again until he was leaving work. Even then, these were only vague thoughts about Erwin's house and the most efficient route there.
He hadn't taken said route, instead stopping in a bar -- not the same one they'd gone to last time -- for a moment with a beer. It was necessary, this time; because he didn't feel like rushing to Erwin's door like an overeager puppy, and because, more importantly, it would have felt wrong to invade Erwin's home with the crises and worries of the day freshly clinging to him, with his mercenary edges still so sharp.
At least tonight, this had to be distinct from their work.
It did not take long to find Erwin's house after that. He'd stared at the front door for a few seconds, and then, out of some unnamed instinct, jumped the low fence to pad silently towards the back deck instead. He could see Erwin through the glass door, tall and golden even in the artificial kitchen light. For another long moment, he just watched from the shadows -- the way his hands moved as he worked, his military-straight posture, the attractively open collar of his shirt.
The notion of still feeling this way had never seemed more laughable.
Levi's knock on the glass was sharp and brief. Then he waited, hands stuck inside his bomber jacket to ward off the late-autumn chill.
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He turned off the burner instead and moved the pan off the heat, and reached for a kitchen towel to wipe his hands down. Nothing changed in his expression; there was no hitch in his step, no haste or reticence, as he came to the door and opened it.
An old saying crossed his mind: only lovers come to the back door. The front door might have been anything. The back door was an intentional trespass, an avoidance of prying neighbors and spies.
Levi's perfect lithe figure straddled the line between soldier and thug. Like this, with his hands concealed and the darkness slouching at his back, young-looking and dangerous, it was a little more thug. Erwin thought about touching him right away, lifting his chin and examining him, stripping off his coat and leaving it on the floor, having sex with him, maybe right up against the wall. A piercing hunger hid in his eyes. He didn't have to think about tomorrow anymore; it had already been planned for.
"Hello," he said, pleasant and neutral. That was the end of his cool act. One hand curled around the back of Levi's head and Erwin bent to him, serious, hungry, to give back the kiss he'd been teased with that afternoon.
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Erwin's open hunger sent a sharp thrill down his spine; Levi tilted his body upwards, pressed into him, kissing back open-mouthed and filthy, like he could convey weeks' worth of fantasies and stolen glances with this gesture alone. His free hand had slipped down Erwin's side to find his perfectly muscular ass. His fingers skittered over it like he could feel the lace beneath, before squeezing with a slightly menacing, greedy glee.
Captain Erwin's ass had also featured prominently in his frame of mind, earlier in the day.