definitely maybe i will live to love || Five x Reader/OC ||

everyday, it's a-gettin closer

Everyday

There is something jarring about watching you remove your makeup, Five realizes. It's not that he likes you more with makeup—he couldn't care less, and you literally have ageless skin anyway, and why is he even thinking about it for so long—but after the chaos of the gala, reuniting with the dysfunctional family, and planning on how to avert the day of the apocalypse (which is technically today, Five thinks, but it's still a few hours from dawn and so it can't count yet), the simple act of you cleaning your face is so mundane in the face of doomsday and the utter destruction of the family that Five can't help but laugh.

"Hm?"

You don't glance at him from your seat at your vanity. You drag the warm washcloth down your left eye, leaving a streak of smudgy black in its wake. You've unpinned your hair from its gala updo by now, and it's messy and pushed back from your face with one of Allison's headbands. Product still keeps it stiff in awkward places, but you don't seem to mind right now.

"Nothing," Five says. When he hears how croaky his voice is, he frowns at it. He'd done too much talking, and his throat certainly suffered from all the times he bit back outright shouts because everyone just had to get on his nerves. But he refrained simply because of the fact that they couldn't afford the time to derail everything with pointless arguments.

God, he'd gotten so soft in case management.

"What," you say as you continue your routine. Your feet, free of heels, are bare and arch against the legs of the chair you sit in. You haven't put socks on yet. Why haven't you put socks on yet? You're back in the academy uniform, sans blazer and tie. The pleated skirt drapes off your bent knees. Five needs to change. Shower, too, but he's far too tired and too miserly with his time to waste it on a shower right now. Besides, he has a feeling that it'll be pointless—the Commission isn't going to let the day of the apocalypse pass quietly by with birds singing and rainbows shining, which means Five will get too much of a workout and leave him in the same state he's currently in.

"It really is nothing. Stupid."

Why is he even here with you in the bathroom, uncomfortably perched on the bathtub edge with his back against the cold wall and a half-drank glass of whiskey in his hand? The worst thing is, the whiskey doesn't even taste that good—Five blames it on Dot and Herb, who got him way too much into fruity, nauseatingly sweet frozen margaritas.

He goes to loosen his tie and finds that it's long gone. The first button of his shirt has been undone as well.

"I doubt it," you say. You work away the smudge with the washcloth. It just creates more of a distinct raccoon circle around your eye.

Why is Five here? He can't come up with an answer, and he's very good at coming up with answers. Irritation prickles in the back of his head.

He takes another drink of whiskey, then says, "It's just—this." He uses the glass to gesture to the bathroom, to them, for emphasis.

"Feels odd, doesn't it? But the wind-down always does. Hard to imagine calm after the chaos until you're actually in it."

You move to the other eye before you fully wipe away the makeup reside from the left one. You repeat the process. More makeup smears.

Five continues to watch the inane ritual. Why is it taking you so long to take your makeup off? Why are you even taking it off in the first place? It's a waste of time, and the two of you have far more important things to do than sit in the bathroom. He has more important things to do than watch your reflection in the bulb-lit vanity mirror.