Title: untenable positions
Fandom: Leverage
Rating: PG
Length: ~750 words
Spoilers: Set in the S1-S2 break, so vague ones for that time period.
Author note: Also written for the weekly writing prompt at gameofcards

Summary: Habits are breakable.



Walking away from his team is easier than Nate expected it to be.

He has all the money he needs – contrary to Hardison's opinion, he hadn't given it all to charity. He could live simply in his new condo for fifty years without running through it all. He doesn't need a job. He definitely doesn't need the high that comes from pulling a con, or helping people.

It's ridiculously easy to stop breaking the law. After all, Nate Ford is still an honest man. He just... stops.

It's kind of like his drinking that way. Now that he's had his revenge, he doesn't need his crutch any more. He can get through the day without the urge for a drink.

Okay, without the overwhelming urge for a drink. He's still an alcoholic, even if he's currently on the wagon.

The cons are the same thing. He doesn't need the crutch any more. He can get on with his life.

If he spends a while each morning reading the paper and thinking about how his team would take various high-profile monsters down, well. That's just keeping his mind sharp. Understanding where fraud can happen makes it easier to catch, as well as the reverse. He certainly isn't going to do anything about those thoughts.

If he reads the international news a little more carefully, wondering what deadly hellhole Eliot has gotten himself into (and almost certainly out of, by the time it makes the paper), there's nothing wrong with that. It's just wishing well for a friend. An old friend. An ex-acquaintance.

He does catch himself starting a few emails to Hardison. But that's just a habit, and habits are breakable.

He doesn't even consider calling Sophie. They never had anything in common but the con; he wouldn't know what to say.

He also buys two boxes of the sugary cereal that Parker liked to eat. They sit untouched in his kitchen cabinet, because Nate doesn't particularly like cereal. But the cartoon characters on this one make him smile in a way that has absolutely no connection to Parker herself. They're just funny, and he doesn't have to explain to anyone why he's smiling when he looks at them.

That's the hard part, though. Not the cereal; in his more candid moments, even Nate admits the cereal is kind of weird. The hard part is not having to explain anything, because there's no one there to explain to.

Nate kind of forgot, while he was ditching his team, that Nate Ford, ex-insurance agent, ex-husband, ex-father, and ex-drunk – that Nate Ford has no friends. Certainly no one who would be interested in catching up with the formerly criminal, formerly mastermind, formerly formidable Nate Ford from Leverage, Incorporated.

Some days, he wonders if he'll spend the rest of his life looking back at his glory days. It's only in the late hours of the night that he lets himself admit that he's not thinking of his heyday with IYS. All the stolen art he returned, all the fraudulent payouts he stopped – those aren't what he thinks of any more, when he thinks of the good he's done in the world.

He's thinking more and more about his team, and the lives they touched. The people they helped. The terrible burdens they lifted from people who had no place else to turn. Nate figures they did more good in a year than he had in his whole life before that.

Glory days. Except he can't talk about them with anyone.

When his job interviewers ask what he's been doing for the last year, Nate has nothing true to tell them. He makes it up, a little differently each time, with just a hint of truth mixed into the framework of lies. It's still going straight, even if he's having to leave out a lot. Lies of omission are still lies, but he can hardly confess to his crimes and expect to be trusted.

But it's still easier than he thought. The tables for one at the pub, the empty apartment, the lies. He can do this. He can stitch his life back together and come through it a stronger, saner human being.

But he's starting to think that this life isn't the one he wants. That he walked away from the life he really wanted, the people he really wanted. His friends. His team.

Leaving them was easier than he thought it would be. But getting them back? Nate has no idea where to start.