Who: Veronica and Leon What: Last minute Christmas shopping; Leon mother hens. When: Recently Where: The mall Rating/Warnings: Low/non Status: Complete
Veronica hated shopping on most days. She wasn’t the type to spend her afternoons at the mall searching for the perfect outfit. So shopping during the holidays? That just made things even worse. Throw her pregnancy on top of it, with the swollen, sore feet? No fucking thank you. But still it had to be done. So here she was. At the mall. Only a few shopping bags in hand so far. Ugh she had quite the day ahead of her.
Veronica made her way through the mall to the next store on her list when someone walked out of a store and nearly ran he over. “Watch where you’re going!” the petite blonde snapped.
Leon had similar thoughts about shopping, especially during the holidays. There was nothing worse than being stuck in a mall, standing shoulder to shoulder with obnoxious strangers, all while listening to those god awful, and unfortunately catchy, Christmas songs playing ad naseum over the intercoms.
For most of his life, especially after the death of his parents, Leon had avoided doing the whole Christmas thing. Sometimes he’d get roped into the precincts Secret Santa draw, but he’d always made a point of working over Christmas and could therefore avoid the whole holiday obligation thing. But somehow over the last two years, he’d actually made lasting bonds with people, which meant that he had to actually buy Christmas presents. Some of them were easy to get, but he was currently stuck on what the hell to get Revy. His previous girlfriends had all enjoyed expensive jewelry, but he was sure that Revy wouldn’t appreciate that at all.
“No, you watch where you’re going!” a man screamed somewhere behind him. Leon turned, almost bored and certainly not intending to get involved until whatever was going on, until he saw the small blonde woman that the man was yelling at. He sighed, and fished his wallet out from his pocket, heading toward the two of them. “Is there a problem here?” he asked, flashing his badge at the man, who balked, quickly said there was no problem, and turned tail.
Veronica rolled her eyes when Leon flashed his badge. Although she was glad he got the guy to go away, he didn’t need to step in like that. “I can handle myself Orcot,” Veronica snapped at her friend. She was still in a grinchy mood. Holiday shopping did that to a pregnant woman.
That was gratitude for you. “I know you can,” Leon scowled. He adjusted the few bags of shopping he’d already picked up to one arm, and then reached to grab hold of Veronica’s as well. “Doesn’t mean you should. You should be taking it easy right now, you know. Why aren’t you making Logan do the Christmas shopping?”
“I actually have to get Logan a present.” Duh, Leon. “Plus if he picked out things for my friends they’d all end up with puka shells or something. Do you want a puka shell necklace for Christmas, Leon?” Okay so that was a dream gift and something he wore in the early 2000s but still. She raised a brow as he took her bags. What the hell? “What do you mean I should be taking it easy?” She was pregnant, not dying.
“Oh, what did you get me?” Leon asked, as he started to open one of the bags to glance through it. “And I mean just that. You should be sitting somewhere with your feet up, not trekking all over the place trying to buy presents.”
Veronica snatched the bags back from him. “You’ll have to wait till Christmas.” Couldn’t ruin the surprise there. “And why exactly is that?” Veronica questioned, eyes narrowed. She had a feeling she knew the answer and if he or Logan thought pregnancy was going to slow her down any, well they had another thing coming. “When have you ever known me to take it easy?”
“Why do you think?” Leon asked, reaching the snatch the bags back from her. She should know the answer. She was the one who had a tiny person growing inside her. “When you’re pregnant, you can’t just run around doing everything.”
“So what? You expect me to just sit around on my ass all day?” Clearly a rhetorical question but one that Veronica answered herself anyway. “I don’t think so.”
“Well,” Leon started, and then stopped. Sitting around on her ass all day probably wouldn’t be any better for the pregnancy. “Maybe not,” he conceded. “But you still shouldn’t going around exerting yourself. What if something happened?”
“Oh yeah. Carrying shopping bags is so straining,” Veronica replied sarcastically with a roll of her eyes. “I don’t know how I haven’t pulled a muscle yet. Good thing you came to rescue me from carrying my own bags.”
Sarcasm noted and ignored. “Yeah, good thing,” Leon said, without a trace of irony. “I’ll carry them at least to your car.”
“Thanks,” Veronica said though she snatched the bags back without missing a beat. “But no thanks.” No way in hell did she need some guy carrying her things for her. Not now, or ever. “I’m pregnant. Not dying.” And even if she was dying she’d still insist on handling things herself. It was just who she was. Veronica Mars was one tough cookie.
Leon opened his mouth to argue again - maternal deaths had been on the rise in the country - but even as he almost started talking he recognized his own defeat. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s see if I ever offer to help you again.” Not that he entirely meant that. Which was obvious when the next thing he said was “Are you sure you don’t need help with anything?”
Veronica almost burst into laughter. Leave it to Leon to contradict himself so quickly. As annoyed as she was at his insistence on helping her, she couldn’t stay mad at him long. “I’ll tell you what,” Veronica said with a small smile. “I’ll let you accompany me for the rest of my shopping.” It’d be nice to have someone to bitch with at the very least.
Just what Leon wanted. To spend even more time in this hellhole. But on the bright side, it did mean that he had someone there to complain to about the crowds while he finished his shopping. “Alright,” Leon said. “I’ll help you fight off all these crazed shoppers. Christmas shopping’s such a pain in the ass.”