Work Text:
“I trust you to finish this job yourself,” Reigen sternly slaps a paper into the waiting palms of Serizawa, who stares at her with glassy eyes, “the client only wants you to exorcise his home, and he already paid in advance. Just clear the place out and come back when you’re done.”
“Right,” Serizawa nods faintly. Really, her eyes are so glassy. Like the rippling of Mob’s psychic powers that Reigen sometimes glimpses in between blinks, or the surface of the lake near her childhood home that froze over every winter just in time for the hockey players and stray ice skaters.
She looks almost out of it. Serizawa’s been spacing out a bit these past few days. Reigen squints at her face. What’s she thinking of? She can never tell. Serizawa blinks back at her like an owl, and Reigen smiles up at her with the force of a thousand suns (hopefully).
”How about I give you a little something when you get back, hm?” Serizawa suddenly perks up, as if the life has suddenly been sucked back into her. Reigen pats the paper which, essentially, is her palms. “It’s a reward for doing so well lately.”
She glows instantaneously at the praise, a wavering smile curling the corners of her lips up, and Reigen swears she can see a tail wagging behind her. “A-Alright! I’ll do my best!” And then, with that, she clutches the paper tighter and sprints out of the office.
Reigen smiles tiredly to herself when she hears the door slam shut—the taller woman hadn’t even asked her what her prize would be before she was flying out the door. It’s not hard to motivate Serizawa, though she isn’t quite sure why she reacts so positively to Reigen doing… whatever it is she’s doing. As long as it works, she supposes, but it’s a little peculiar for reasons she can’t put her finger on…
”Um… shishou?”
She startles a bit. Ah, right. Mob is still here. The middle schooler is staring at her, eyes boring through bone, and Reigen forces out an awkward laugh.
”Aha… Mob! Is something wrong?”
She’s still staring at her like she wants to burn holes into her skin—and frankly, she very well could. “Why do you treat Serizawa-san like that?”
…Eh?
She blinks slowly. “Like a dog.”
Ah.
Why does she? Maybe it’s her face. She stares like a sad dog, eyes big and glimmering, with her lips lined neutral and a hint of that lip balm Reigen had handed her after seeing how easily chapped she got. Or her mannerisms. She trails after Reigen meekly, brightens when Reigen addresses her, follows her orders to a T. She’s a good employee. Reigen really can’t understand why she treats Serizawa like the dog she had fostered at fifteen years old—like if she throws a bone, Serizawa will bound after it and bring it back with a shy smile.
Hey, why does Serizawa go along with it, though? Reigen furrows her brow. She gets that she’s still partially new to forming sturdy relationships with others, but still… wouldn’t she at least notice when Reigen would instinctively reach up to pet her head? Ah, well. She can discuss that with her when she gets back, after her reward.
Speaking of. She had said all that with such gusto, but in truth, she has nothing planned. Maybe she could buy some hot pork buns… no, that seems a little lackluster. A little extra cash? How much?
”Shishou?”
Oops. She got carried away. Reigen quickly collects herself with a choked clearing of her throat. “Right… ah… It’s just to… boost her morale!” Mob doesn’t blink, though there seems to be a tinge of surprise coloring her blank expression. “Haven’t you noticed her improved work ethic lately? This… uh… special kind of encouragement… think of it like accommodations. Besides, doesn’t Serizawa remind you of those big, gentle dogs that get scared of everything?”
Mob tilts her head.
Reigen coughs lightly. “Ah, never mind! Forget that. I’m… going to go to the bathroom! I need to fix my hair.”
Her hair is fine. She just doesn’t know how to face her student with such an unfamiliar uncertainty settling in her bones. She strides briskly to the restroom across the hall, brow still creased and thoughts racing.
Serizawa. She’s a wonderful employee, a bit of a bumbling mess of nerves, but she gets the job done. She’s a comfortable new addition to the office: she’s starting to get the hang of brewing tea, she occasionally provides helpful insight on advertising, she has the muscles that Reigen and Mob lack, a good and firm build, tall with sculpted calves, a handsome face…
Reigen sputters in shock, blinking wildly at her reflection. The other woman in the bathroom gives her a strange look.
Sculpted calves… for the heavy-lifting, of course! Reigen scowls half-heartedly at her reddening face in the mirror, slapping her hands to her cheeks and blushing even further at how her skin burns against her palms. Exorcism is a difficult task! Having muscles helps with warding off the spirits! And when Reigen wants to move the furniture a bit, Serizawa offers to help, and she leans down to lift the drawer and Reigen can see the faint outline of her muscles through her sleeves even though Serizawa could’ve just used her psychic powers and… and…
Damn! Reigen squeezes her eyes closed, but that only burdens her with a more well-imagined memory of Serizawa’s little smile as she obediently shifted the drawer from side to side until Reigen was satisfied with its placement, and she exhales sharply to try and hastily erase it.
No use ruminating over this now. She scrubs her hands and pivots on her heel, hard, before she stalks back to the office. She should figure out what to give Serizawa when she gets back. Yes. That’s the most important task on her long mental list right now.
Mob looks up when Reigen swings the door open with too much force, and she looks as if she’s about to ask why she was in the bathroom for that long before she stares at Reigen’s face for a dragging couple seconds and then kindly forces her gaze back down to her math homework.
Wonderful. Lovely, even. Reigen throws herself into her chair, flips her laptop open, and pores intently over the very professional selection of apps sitting on her home screen.
Maybe an expensive tea? No, that would seem like Reigen is trying to subtly urge her to do more work. Well, not that it would be a bad thing, but she doesn’t want a gift to seem like a shitty boss’ pestering after Serizawa’s blatant eagerness. A book? Reigen isn’t sure what Serizawa would like to read, much less if she has the time to spare for books in between her work and classes. She scratches idly at her nail polish, digging at the cracks with a newly determined vigor. Mob’s hesitant scritching fills the room, along with the tapping of Reigen’s nails against her keys and the incessant clicking of her mouse as she switches uselessly between tabs.
It stays like that for a while, until Mob starts standing up and announcing she has to go home with Reigen humming distractedly in affirmation, and then the Sun is starting to set as Reigen stares mindlessly at her floral wallpaper. Should she change it? Maybe to something bluer. She thinks of Serizawa’s well-ironed suit and accidentally digs her nail into her skin. She hisses, rubs over the sore spot, and then sighs sharply.
Really, there isn’t much to think about concerning Serizawa. What is she fretting over, anyway? She feels like a high school girl all over again, flustered and fawning over someone she would forget the face of after graduation. But this is Serizawa. Serizawa, with her soft smiles when Mob converses with her; Serizawa, how she hunches over to make herself smaller when Reigen speaks with clients; Serizawa, staring at Reigen when she talks about boring work things like she just pinned the stars in the sky with her own hands…
And there’s Serizawa, walking in through the door with the most enthusiasm Reigen has seen out of her yet, and she almost thinks it’s just her mind playing tricks on her until Serizawa opens her mouth.
”I finished.” She says, almost a little winded, like she was rushing to get here. Rushing. Because of Reigen’s promise. To gift her something. “Exorcising the spirits. There were two. I… I exorcised them.”
Reigen blinks stupidly at her, and she seems to grow a bit anxious, shrinking in on herself and fiddling with the hem of her jacket. Are her pants wrinkled? “U-Um… I’m sorry it took so long… the client wanted me to have a complementary meal first, and I couldn’t decline…” so she was sitting for a while? Kneeling, presumably, since she’s so deathly afraid of coming off as impolite. That explains the wrinkled pants. “But… I did it. There are no spirits in his house anymore.”
Reigen gazes up at Serizawa’s flushed face; her warm and dog-like eyes shining with the setting sun, her instinctively hunched shoulders bearing the weight of her entire world. How could Reigen not treat her like a dog? She’s loyal, trustworthy, and cute. Just like the dog Reigen had fostered at fifteen, the one that would sit by her heels waiting patiently for her to throw the toy bone again. She gazes up at her and suddenly understands why people wax poetic about their partners, understands how someone can feel a love so deep in their core it molds with the flesh. Liking Serizawa, she just now finds, is much too different from loving Mob. Mob is a friend; Serizawa is an enigma. Reigen is a high school girl all over again, flustered and fawning over someone who she doesn’t think she can forget the face of, even if she tried.
She can’t contain the quiet laugh that slips past her defenses. She can tell Serizawa is worried she didn’t do well enough with how her eyes dart from Reigen’s face to the wall behind her, and she finds this worry to be nonsense. Of course, she wouldn’t say that to Serizawa’s face, but it feels a bit absurd to her. Serizawa is much more capable than she makes herself out to be.
Reigen motions for her to come closer. Serizawa shuffles forward timidly until she’s standing in front of Reigen with Reigen’s back against the table. She shakes her hand of the remnants of her picked off nail polish and then reaches her hand up to the back of Serizawa’s neck. She rests her hand there, curls the baby strands around her finger, smiles up at her with a particular fondness she hasn’t felt in years.
Serizawa stares back at her, eyes wide and bewildered, completely stock-still at her touch. She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t have to.
”Good job,” Reigen murmurs, feeling a bit breathless, as she gently pulls Serizawa’s frazzled face closer—the baby strands hug her fingers tenderly, and Serizawa grows impossibly redder, “consider this a bonus for your hard work.”
And then she closes her eyes to kiss her, a gentle and steady thing, and she can’t help but smile when she feels Serizawa physically fumble against her. Reigen brings her hands up to her face, cradles her in her palms like she’s the Moon, and Serizawa melts against her as if her legs can no longer keep themselves anchored to the floor.
Her hands flail helplessly until one lands on Reigen’s waist and the other clings to one of her arms—leeway for escape, Reigen presumes, something Serizawa can lean against so she isn’t swept away by her fear, and Reigen only caresses her thumb over Serizawa’s cheekbone to tell her that it’s okay. To reassure her that she’ll always have that exit door to escape from. To try to ground her, at least a little, before the current crashes over the both of them.
Serizawa seems to appreciate this because she, in turn, kisses her harder. Her grip on her arm tightens, she presses her body closer, and Reigen feels like she’s floating. Her heartbeat thrums through her veins; down, down her fingertips until it prints itself along Serizawa’s jawline. Reigen tilts her head further, drags one hand to the back of Serizawa’s head, prods lightly at her lips, and—
“—Urk.”
Reigen hits her head.
She pulls herself away reluctantly, purposefully avoiding Serizawa’s pleading eyes, and looks up to see the top of her head resting against the ceiling.
”Oh.” Serizawa blurts. “…’M sorry.”
Did she get too excited and lose control of her powers? Reigen glances back at her, and she has this guilty expression plastered all over her scarlet-drowned face that forces an unprofessional snort out of her. Serizawa looks up when she hears the undignified sound, something akin to a dopey smile tugging at her lips, and Reigen chokes it out to be an awkward laugh.
”It’s fine, of course!” It’s not really fine because Serizawa now has her arm curled protectively around Reigen’s waist and she doesn’t really remember when she wrapped her legs around the other’s torso, nor does she remember looping her arms around Serizawa’s neck so tightly and clinging to her like a koala, and now she’s definitely creasing the pencil skirt she was going to wear again tomorrow… “It’s… fine.”
Almost everything else in the office is floating too. The desk, the chairs, the pens; they’re all at least an inch above the ground, from what Reigen can see, anyway. She peers around, then flicks her gaze back to Serizawa. She thinks to start ad-libbing about the kiss, how she’s only just joking, she doesn’t actually want to kiss Serizawa, and she definitely doesn’t think her employee is a dog that needs to get her hair ruffled now, but she makes eye contact and the words die in her throat.
Serizawa blinks at her, eyes wide, Reigen’s (just slightly) desperate fingerprints a fading red on her skin and the hand holding her arm entirely tender and affectionate.
…She really is like those big, gentle dogs.
”…Hey, watch the laptop, okay? The printer, too. If you break it, you pay for it.”
“A-Ah… Yes, ma’am…”