Din was thrilled from the moment you announced your pregnancy, he would sit down with Grogu explaining the responsibilities of a big brother.
When you give birth, he helps you. It was his fault that you were on a deserted planet after all. He feared the worst, but you were strong and so was your child.
When he first held his daughter, she was still covered in blood, but in his eyes, she was the definition of perfection.
Jack Daniels
This wasn’t the first time he was about to become a father, but this was the time he was super cautious. Making sure you were safe at every second, he doesn’t want to go through the same pain as before.
When you gave birth, he was on a mission. He was called by Ginger and he immediately dropped everything. But he was late.
By the time he arrived to the hospital, you were sleeping and so, he let you sleep while he walked over to the glass so he could see his child. And surely enough Jack found him. The only baby with just a last name, meaning you wanted to wait until he was there to name him.
He felt a tear fall from his eyes as he looked at him, he knew he would do anything to keep his family safe.
Marcus Moreno
It was a quiet night, everyone was sleeping when you woke up. Marcus didn’t even move an inch when you got out of bed. You were in desperate need to pee.
But on your way back to the bed, you felt a terrible pain.
Of course, when you woke Marcus up, he was running around like a chicken without a head, thank God for Missy who was able to help you out.
This wasn’t the first time Marcus her his own baby and standing there he wouldn’t want this to be the last either. He cried. Tears rolling down his face while he held his youngest daughter.
Of course, Missy took multiple pictures of him which she planned on blackmailing her father later on in his life.
Oberyn Martell
Childbirth was something he was used to. He had many daughters before you even came into the picture.
But this was the very first time he held a son and not a daughter. It felt special, and as much as he loved his daughters, his heart still felt a different way to see the youngest addition to his ever-growing family.
He swore his entire life to protect him as he would be his rightful heir. You even caught a glimpse of a tear running down his cheek before he whiped it.
Javier Pena
Panic wouldn’t even begin to describe what he went through that day. He thought he would rather go after another Escobar guy instead of going through this hell, and he didn’t even had to do anything. He held your hand and that’s all. You did all the work.
His mind often went to that dark place, that dark place which told him to just run, leave and never come back, but he stayed.
And that dark voice in the back of his head disappeared when he held his daughter for the first time. And how glad he was that he didn’t leave.
Tiny little girl with his eyes. Perfection. He just stood there, frozen as he looked at her. Not even giving her to the nurses when they asked.
Pero Tovar
After your third child you thought Pero would have enough. You thought he would have enough and not want more children. But you were wrong. Two girls and a boy weren’t enough. He wanted more. And you were happy to give him more.
Each birth was more terrifying to him than the last. He loved his children all the same and he just loved you a little more as he held his second son. Each time he was reminded just how amazing you were and it made his heart explode.
Him, a rough swordsman, such a soft and kind father and husband. He never saw himself in that position. As you finally fell asleep, he watched the kids, showing them his youngest, like the proud father he was.
Prompt: soft pero tovar with an f!reader perhaps stranded in a cabin during a blizzard with this prompt: “no ones here. we can be as loud as we want.” (requested by @beskarboobs for my 3k follower celebration!)
Warnings: smut (18+ ONLY!), fingering, teasing, established relationship
Notes: Thank you for the request! I’ve missed writing Tovar so I was excited to write this one!! My update blog is @flightlessangelwings-updates to stay up to date on when I post!
~
“Fuck the winter!” you grumbled. The air around you chilled you to your bones as you wrapped your blanket tightly around you.
You had accompanied Tovar on one of his missions, since you always missed him whenever he was away from you. He wasn’t too sure at first, since the scowl-faced mercenary secretly always worried for your safety, but he knew you could handle a sword better than most of the men he’d traveled with so he reluctantly agreed.
Warnings: Fiends to lovers, oral sex (female and male receiving), praise, nipple play, hand jobs, vaginal sex
Comments: You and Marcus have been just friends for a long time, although everyone teases you that you should be more. Until another seemingly normal dinner at Marcus’s house turns into much more.
Co-written with @storiesofthefandomlovers
ClickKeep Reading only if you have read the Rating and Warnings and understand the warnings may not be complete to avoid listing spoilers. As AO3 says ’creator chooses not to use warnings’. You also agree that you’re the right age to be consuming anything here.
“Hey, you want to go out with all of us tonight?” You look up from your computer with a small frown, a leftover from where you were concentrating on the spreadsheet in front of you and not because you were interrupted. Being a forensic accountant was exacting work and you were one of the best in the bureau. One of your colleagues, Carissa, stands in the doorway with an expectant look on her face. “It’s two for one drinks and half off appetizers at Mel’s tonight.” She tells you, trying to sweeten the idea of going out with everyone you work with for happy hour.
You shake your head. “I have plans already.” You explain, not mentioning what you are doing.
“Pike again?” You press your lips together when her expression turns to a sly grin. “Are you sure that he didn’t transfer to D.C. to be with you?” She asks smugly. “You two spend a lot of time together.”
frankie x female reader (slightly no use of y/n or she/her pronouns just the word sister)
warnings: angst, language, tension, alcohol mention, mention of claustrophobia and slight description of anxiety, and language
summary: you moved away from your family and boyfriend at eighteen. when you come back home for your parents 50th anniversary you weren’t expecting a rekindling moment with a certain pilot.
authors note: THE ENDING IS EVERYTHING AND IM SO PROUD OF THIS FIC! PLEASE LMK WHAT YALL THINK XOXO
They say you’ll never forget your first. First crush, kiss, date, love and heartbreak. However for you, you could never seem to get rid of him. But you weren’t complaining. Francisco Morales was more than your first for everything, he was someone who held more than one could handle- he was your rock. Well that was until the day that “you” ruined everything.
Your parents were known as the sweethearts of your hometown. Marrying right after graduation, they settled in the same town and brought up you and your sister Em. Your parents were involved in everything, your mom being a teacher and your dad being a sheriff. It was hard to blend in to say the least. But there was an ongoing loop. Everyone graduated and stayed home. Your older sister, Em, even became a part of that treacherous loop. And you hated that loop. You always dreamed of big cities, fashion, traveling the world, but mostly just getting out of town. And you had promised yourself that nothing would hold you back from pursuing that. Sadly Frankie thought he could have kept you a little bit longer. But things change- actually a lot has changed since you’ve been back home for more than a weekend stay. Now you were traveling back home for your parent’s 50th anniversary extravaganza. And nothing could help prepare you for the next few days.
Your plane had landed around one in the afternoon. Grabbing your luggage you made your way over to the area where Em said she would pick you up. Looking around you didn;t see her red car. Dialing her number you were ready to direct her to your terminal.
“Hello?” Em said on the other line. She sounded groggy and as if she wasn’t in the car.
“Terminal 47 remember.” You said angrily, Knowing she forgot.
“Shit.” She said, then another voice was heard.
“Babe what time is it?” You gasped at the sound of Pope’s voice.
“Hold on, you first forgot your little sister’s arrival at the airport, and you have Pope in your bed Em! When did he come back? What happened to independency?” You said rather loudly into the mic.
“Shut up. You’re too damn loud.”
“It’s literally tourist season, getting a cab into town will cost me tripple Em.”
“Well don’t call the Millers, they went fishing this morning. You could call-” She said even more groggily. But you hung up the phone before she could finish her sentence.
You couldn’t take your sister right now. You love her most times but she would’ve killed you if you did this to her. You were gonna call the Millers but if they were busy there was only one person you could call. Hearing the phone ring you were ready to hang up. But then he answered.
Omg that’s was… absolutely stunning… it gave me a little Italy Kinda vibe at the beginning though . This was just so cute… I just adore this so so much . That last line though Uggh I felt my heart melt… you melted my heart how mean (and by mean I mean nice… ) of you. How dare you make my heart melt. This is 100% going on Frankie’s FA when I update next. Hopefully it’s soonish…
@reblogingqueen thank you sm for your kind words☺️☺️little italy is one of my favorite movies and i can now see the parallels hahahaha. much love mwah
Summary: Modern AU. You’re insecure about your cheeks, not liking how chubby they are, and worst of all, that when you smile they take over your face and eyes.
A/N: Is this from my own insecurity? abso-fucking-lutely! Did I write this on campus between classes? Also yes. Also a huge thank you to @writer-darling for always hyping me up!
Buttercup is used once as a pet name, sorry if you don’t like Buttercup BUT it works with the flowery pet names!
Summary: Modern AU. You’re insecure about your cheeks, not liking how chubby they are, and worst of all, that when you smile they take over your face and eyes.
A/N: Is this from my own insecurity? abso-fucking-lutely! Did I write this on campus between classes? Also yes. Also a huge thank you to @writer-darling for always hyping me up!
Buttercup is used once as a pet name, sorry if you don’t like Buttercup BUT it works with the flowery pet names!
Summary: Modern AU. You’re insecure about your cheeks, not liking how chubby they are, and worst of all, that when you smile they take over your face and eyes.
A/N: Is this from my own insecurity? abso-fucking-lutely! Did I write this on campus between classes? Also yes. Also a huge thank you to @writer-darling for always hyping me up!
Buttercup is used once as a pet name, sorry if you don’t like Buttercup BUT it works with the flowery pet names!
….ok ok we’re ACTUALLY the same person. High key this is one of my biggest insecurities AS WELL because my family points out how chubby my cheeks are ALL THE TIME (they do it as an endearment bUT STILL)
And honey, I firmly believe Ezra would have a MILLION nicknames for you and Buttercup IS DEFINITELY ONE OF THEM (so feel free to use whichever ones you like! )
Final note: I LOVED THIS
Tehe thank you and your beautifully STUNNING babes! ☺️
Summary: Modern AU. You’re insecure about your cheeks, not liking how chubby they are, and worst of all, that when you smile they take over your face and eyes.
A/N: Is this from my own insecurity? abso-fucking-lutely! Did I write this on campus between classes? Also yes. Also a huge thank you to @writer-darling for always hyping me up!
Buttercup is used once as a pet name, sorry if you don’t like Buttercup BUT it works with the flowery pet names!
Summary: Modern AU. You’re insecure about your cheeks, not liking how chubby they are, and worst of all, that when you smile they take over your face and eyes.
A/N: Is this from my own insecurity? abso-fucking-lutely! Did I write this on campus between classes? Also yes. Also a huge thank you to @writer-darling for always hyping me up!
Buttercup is used once as a pet name, sorry if you don’t like Buttercup BUT it works with the flowery pet names!
You stand in the mirror, ready to go out with Ezra for the evening, staring at your face. Turning your face from side to side to get a full view of your cheeks. You give a small closed mouth smile, a smile that doesn’t reach your eyes because you hate how your cheeks overcrowd your face when you do so. You try a full smile, your eyes squinting as your cheeks rise and take over. You think it makes your face look like a balloon expanding. You allow your face to drop and say a quiet ‘no’ to yourself before repeating the small smile, confirming to yourself that that would be your smile from now on.
You’re so wrapped up in your own head that you don’t notice Ezra standing some ways away, watching you, observing your actions and reactions. He knows exactly what you’re doing, he can tell by the judgment and hate he sees in your eyes. Ezra wishes more than anything that you’d see yourself the way he sees you.
“What’s plaguing your thoughts, Flower?”
You snap away from the mirror, startled at his presence.
“Nothing. Let’s go,” you reply hurriedly.
When you go to pass him, he sets his hand on your midsection, not allowing you to pass.
“Now, I may not be the most educated man but I ain’t no fool. What’s wrong?”
He moves his hand to the side of your face, forcing you to look at him. His warm umber eyes make you feel safe in a way that you can’t hold anything back from him.
“It’s petty, really. Self-absorbed”
”Well it can’t be petty if it’s got my flower wilting.”
You take a deep breath, “I don’t like my cheeks. Especially when I smile.”
Ezra’s brows knit in confusion, “Your cheeks?”
“Yes. They’re fat, they make my face round. They take up my whole face when I smile and cover the only nice thing about my face: my eyes.” You blurt.
Now, Ezra standing closely in front of you takes your face in both hands.
“Oh Buttercup. You’re absolutely perfect, your beauty alone is that of which artists dream. How can you dislike the fact that joy takes over your face, your smile is contagious. When you smile the world shines a little brighter.”
“But when I smile you can barely see my eyes”
Ezra kisses your forehead, “I can’t argue that I don’t love your eyes because I do, well I absolutely adore everything about you. However, when your smile reaches your eyes, it is like two heavens colliding. You should never be ashamed of how happy you are and look, the world needs your smile. I need your smile.”
You take a deep breath, letting his words sink in. A small seed of insecurity still lays deep within but it seems silly now in comparison to the adoration you get from Ezra alone. You look up at Ezra and can’t help but let out a laugh of relief, which of course gets you to smile.
“There’s my ray of sunshine! Now, shall we?”
Ezra offers his arm to you, which you gladly take. And for the rest of the evening, you can’t seem to stop smiling.
Hey guys!! I just wanted to know that I’ve made a new much prettier taglist form. Feel free to signup
Although, I must warn you, if you were previously on it you have to sign up if you want to stay on because everyone who doesn’t sign up will be removed. I’ll assume those who don’t sign up again want to be removed.
I may not always write smut, but my blog is intended for adults, so if you are under the age of 18, please respect my wishes and don’t interact with my blog. Thank you. If it turns out there is a minor interacting you will be immediately blocked, this also goes for those without an age in their bio.
My requests and ask box are closed until further notice.
Win A Date with Dieter Bravo Dieter Bravo x F!Reade
Summary:You are a fan of the actor Dieter Bravo, his PR team has come up with the idea to help him and promote a better image he would surprise one lucky fan with a date. Cameras rolling to show that he isn’t the bad boy Hollywood has set him up to be. He is trying to get the lead role in a new movie but the production company does not want his image to tarnish thiers. This is the story of his biggest fan meeting their idol, a date not going perfect but having a perfect ending. Words:3755 Rating:18+ eventual SMUT Warnings/Triggers: language…Dieter is his own warning A/N: This is sort of a request, but not an entire request. I saw a while back people waiting for someone to write a fic in the form of Win a Date with Tad Hamilton. I had already started writing ideas for something like this before I saw this ask. I haven’t seen that movie in forever and I hope this is just a fun little read. Shout-out to @heythere-mel for helping me and always being the hype women I need when I get into the self-doubt feels.
**Just like ao3, “creator chooses not to use warnings.” If you click Keep Reading, that means you agree that you’re the age to handle mature themes. Also by clicking Keep Reading, you understand warnings may not be complete in order to avoid spoilers for the story. **
An unknown caller comes across the screen as text messages come pouring in…
“Hello” you answer still in shock’
“Hello, is this..” he says your name again, the deep baratone voice sounds even better this close to your ear “Uhm, hello are you there?” He asks when you don’t respond
“Hi, hello. Yes, I’m uhm I’m here” the words flying out of your mouth so fast your pretty sure the melded together, “I wow…I was not expecting you, I mean a phone call from you Mr. Bravo”
Oh damn! What an asshole! I can only imagine how often this happens with a fan and actor though. You idolize them and they end up being nothing like you imagined when you finally meet them. I can’t wait to see where things go from here.
Win A Date With Dieter Bravo Dieter Bravo x F!Reader
Summary:This is just the set up for the story, consider this the teaser trailer for the movie. You are a fan of the actor Dieter Bravo, his PR team has come up with the idea to help him and promote a better image he would surprise one lucky fan with a date. Cameras rolling to show that he isn’t the bad boy Hollywood has set him up to be. He is trying to get the lead role in a new movie but the production company does not want his image to tarnish thiers. This is the story of his biggest fan meeting their idol, a date not going perfect but having a perfect ending. Words:724 Rating:18+ eventual SMUT Warnings/Triggers: Nothing much in this one A/N: This is sort of a request, but not an entire request. I saw a while back people waiting ro someone to write a fic in the form of Win a Date with Tad Hamilton I had already started writing ideas for something like this before I saw this ask. I haven’t seen that movie in forever and I hope this is just a fun little read.
**Just like ao3, “creator chooses not to use warnings.” If you click Keep Reading, that means you agree that you’re the age to handle mature themes. Also by clicking Keep Reading, you understand warnings may not be complete in order to avoid spoilers for the story. **
I’m so thankful for each and every one of you guys, so I decided to do a little celebration to celebrate my love and appreciate for y’all!! There are three options: ships,blurbs, and moodboards, and you can send in your requests/asks for any of these from now until 12:00 AM CST on May 28
Ships:
Send in any information about yourself that you think is important: looks, hobbies, likes, dislikes, random fun facts, whatever you want
Specify if you would like to be shipped with a Star Wars character, Oscar Isaac character, or Pedro Pascal character (if you don’t specify I’ll just choose from all three categories :))
Blurbs:
Send in the number of the prompt and the list it’s from, along with the name of any of the characters I write for, and I’ll write a little blurb! (between 400 and 700 words)
Send me any information, and I’ll make a little moodboard for you! Tell me your favorite color, favorite character, an idea or dream you have, a hobby, literally anything, and I’ll use that to make the moodboard
Feel free to be as descriptive or non descriptive as you want
Pairing:TF Boys x F!Reader Wordcount:15.4K Warnings: trauma. self-hatred. alcohol/drug abuse (this is srs this chapter). reverse harem. fluids. insecurities. angst. smut. injuries from choking. mentions of hair. rough sex. barf. Summary:She spirals. Things get complicated. A/N:wow this chapter took A MONTH. a struggle indeed because it dealt with some serious triggering things that i wanted to get right. you may find it hard to like our girl here, but she’s been through a lot. My utter thanks to@frannyzooey who sent me constant encouragement and help me with transitions and clearing up so many confusing parts. my gal @krissology who sends the most horny thots and ideas for the smut and dialogue. she literally worked her ass off writing the most romantically delicious book so order it or perish. i hope you all like because your comments make my life
The thing about living with men running a criminal enterprise was that they could get their hands on anything: alcohol, speed, benzos, automatic weapons, Bengal tigers, vintage Quaaludes (which she doubted still worked). It wasn’t terribly surprising that their “doctor” would also give her whatever she asked for.
Of course, of course, Ms. Faire. Sounds great. I’ll have it delivered.
It had started with the birth control. Pope had readily agreed when she had asked him about needing a script. No further comment. He’d ducked his head, his cheeks glinting pink as he wordlessly handed her a business card.
“Just call him,” he muttered. “He’ll give you anything you want.”
Word Count: 11.9K. LISTEN. This installment contains a large portion of what originally would’ve been a one-shot when I was in the early planning stages of this fic. And then, as per usual, I couldn’t control myself, and well, here we all are.
Rating:E | Semi-explicit PiV smut; drug & alcohol use; references to canon-related drug OD; language. My blog is 18+ only!
Warnings: PiV sex & sexual situations, alcohol & drug use, food mentions, pining & yearning, self-doubt, a little angst, feelings, some fluff… honestly, this has a little bit of everything.
A/N: All my love to @radiowalletand@astroboots who both allowed me to throw several tantrums while writing this. Sometimes it takes a village, and I’m so blessed to have you both with me on this ride.
———
Redding, California | May 2022
Without fail, the first day of filming always made her nervous.
It didn’t matter how much she prepared, how many deep breathing exercises she did, or how long she spent reviewing her lines—nerves bubbled in her belly like a pot simmering on a stove, creating a thick haze she had to act through.
As expected, Dieter appeared unbothered. He walked into hair and makeup (his call time an hour later than hers, she noted, with only a hint of jealousy) with an extra-large latte in one hand, phone in the other, and a smudge of charcoal pencil rubbed into his scruffy chin.
Of course he’d been drawing beforehand. He never reviewed lines the day of.
He’s always had more confidence than her.
It’s why he has an Academy Award, and you don’t, she thinks bitterly.
The director calls ‘action’, and Dieter slips into character as easily as taking his next breath, delivering his lines flawlessly. He’s an incredible force to witness—focused, comfortable, natural—he could’ve done months of prep or none; it’s impossible to tell.
She suddenly feels woefully inferior, and it only worsens when she misses the dialogue cue he feeds her.
“Shit, sorry–”
“Cut! Let’s try that again.”
She thinks maybe the director already regrets their talent choices for the film, and it sends her head spinning with thoughts of inadequacy. They should’ve picked someone who could take up as much of a scene as Dieter can, someone who has actually had decent work in the last few years, someone who won’t drag the whole thing down–
“Cut!”
Shit, she missed the line again.
The crew around her murmurs—imagined harsh whispers of doubt in her abilities, like they’re just now finding out she’s a fraud—she feels exposed, stark naked in front of a crowd. She sucks in a shaky breath, the world narrowing in, and two warm palms land on her shoulders.
“Hey, take a breath.”
It’s the lifeline she needs to stop her spiral dead in its tracks.
Dieter dips his head, eyes meeting hers, and he’s all warm encouragement and gentle smile in one short sentence.
“You’ve got this,” he reassures, the tenor similar to how it sounded two decades ago, with a hint of smokey age at the edges. On a shuddery exhale, she cracks a quiet inside joke.
“Pay isn’t shit this time around.”
A laugh breaks from his chest, lifting her spirits and giving her the confidence boost she needs.
“Even less of a reason for them to be pissed off,” he responds with a grin, and they both find their marks.
“Ready to try again?” the director asks, and she notices that they don’t seem annoyed at all. She nods, and the director calls ‘action’ once more.
They get the scene in the very next take.
———
The first few weeks of filming had been hectic. Some sets were half-built, wardrobe required constant adjustments and alterations, and a few filming locations had yet to be finalized. It was the nature of the beast, particularly with a project that leaned more independent, but he liked that about it. It made him feel young again, like he was just starting out.
It kept him on his toes.
And so did she.
Aside from her brief stumble on the opening take, she’d been the brilliant thespian he’s witnessed through her career. She was professional, engaging—the ebb to his flow at each of his winding curves. They played off each other perfectly; his relief was palpable when they picked up their natural chemistry as if it were shiny and new; something solid, sturdy, and unbroken despite years of dormancy.
She was cordial, lukewarm, and sometimes even friendly with him between takes. He savored every smile that stretched beyond her carefully crafted shell; felt the warm imprint of her palm on his forearm for hours after he made her laugh at a stupid joke. She had even pressed herself into his side during a night shoot, teeth chattering from the evening chill, seeking the body heat he willingly shared.
He wondered if she was always like this with her co-stars—friendly touches were a great, safe way to build up a little intimacy before filming scenes—or if (perhaps a little too hopeful) she couldn’t keep herself from touching him.
She kept her distance outside of filming hours, though.
She thwarted his attempts at rekindling their friendship—not cold or unkind, but also not filled with platitudes of another timeorsorry, not tonight. Each invite to dinner, coffee, a drink, or even a fuckinghike had been met with a polite but firm no thank you. It stung, more than he’d like to admit, but he supposed it was his penance, his cross to bear after abandoning her.
Maybe karma had finally come for him, putting her just on the other side of a wall and somehow more unavailable now than she’d ever been with an ocean between them.
They’d been set up in apartments by the studio—a duplex with a shared yard, two units side by side in a quiet, secluded part of town—and he rarely saw her aside from her morning dashes out the door for a quick jog, or if they had the same call time.
So, he soldiered on, content enough to make a great movie, pulling their careers back from the brink of death.
She had set boundaries. He was going to respect them.
Funny, he thinks, maybe therapy doeshelp.
Healthy coping mechanisms, he echoes in his head. He’d discussed them with his therapist, things to keep him occupied outside of work so he doesn’t spiral into unhealthy escapism so hard. Except that there wasn’t much of interest to him in Redding unless he wanted to hike or look at nature or drive the two hours to the tiny hometown he hadn’t visited in ages. He’d never been much of an outdoorsy type. He knew it was unfair to write the place off, but everywhere felt too small and dull after twenty years in LA.
Thankfully, filming kept him busy, long hours punctuated by small windows of sleep, and he was grateful because boredom was dangerous for him. It led to stupid choices and heavy consequences, and he was trying to be smarter.
On their first filming break—a long weekend for Memorial Day—he spent Friday pacing his apartment, listening to a Jamiroquai album, drawing more mountain ranges than he could get his eyeballs on (landscapes were his mortal enemy), and perusing the nearby grocery store for something for dinner.
Still a hopeless cook, he moseyed down the snack aisle, his gaze landing on a familiar white can with a blue cap.
He grinned, eyes lighting up behind his sunglasses, and quickly filled his basket with the essentials. The idea formed in his mind, maybe from boredom, possibly from his burning desire to spend more time with her and mend their friendship; he didn’t care to dwell on his reasoning, only to hang onto a glimmer of hope.
When he gets into his car, he taps out a text to her, quietly thankful she’d slipped him her number in case of emergencies.
Don’t make me regret giving it to you, she’d also said, though her lips curled into a playful smirk he recognized from their youth.
His thumb hovers over ‘send’ for only a moment before he taps it.
Picnic lunch in the backyard tomorrow?
He watches her type, then pause, then type, then pause. He prepares for rejection, a bitter thought clawing into his mind that she would need to run his invite by her PR team first, calculate if her reputation could handle his.
He silently scolds himself for being an ass.
Just when he thinks she’s chosen to ‘leave him on read,’ as the kids say, her response appears.
You know what? Sure, why not?
———
Perhaps against her better judgment, she agreed to lunch.
She was tired of doing everything everyone expected of her.
She knew he was lonely; she could practically feel it through the wall between them; she heard him pacing in the evenings, music playing in the background. She saw he’d been trying, in all senses of the word, and she continued to cold-shoulder him into oblivion over… what, exactly?
Something so old she no longer carried a fiery torch of anger, just the grief and regret of things she didn’t say.
She could use a real friend, at least. They both could.
She’d been lonely, too. She’s been lonely for ages now.
Her answer to his text had been met with a million and one follow-ups:
Are you sure?
Yes.
You’re not going back to LA for the long weekend?
No.
(To who? she thought)
Wine preference?
Something cheap, for old time’s sake.
It unleashed a flurry of texts—she would’ve never guessed he could carry on conversations via various blue and white bubbles, but they messaged back and forth for most of the evening. It was harmless fun, catching up while still avoiding the glaring elephant in the room; a bit of friendly banter back and forth as she giggled into her bed covers. He still had his delightfully weird sense of humor she adored, sharpened to precision over the last twenty-plus years. He sent her photos of paintings he had recently completed, and she responded with pictures of meals she finally learned to cook during the pandemic.
It was nearing midnight when she ended the stream of chatter with a simple I’ll see you tomorrow, D.
And now, tomorrow has arrived.
Dieter’s in their shared backyard, blanket tucked under one arm, canvas bag looped around the other, his signature sunglasses perched low on his nose. She spots him through the sliding glass door, nearly bouncing on the balls of his bare feet, a giddy swoop flowing through her lower belly. In the glitter of sunshine, he looks so much like a grown-up version of the boy who used to wait for her outside the diner in the early mornings while she wrapped up shift change.
She steps out into the yard; it’s sunny and warm but not sweltering, the perfect day to be outside. He greets her with a smile, his thumb hooking into the handle of the canvas bag perched on his shoulder as if to prevent himself from reaching out to her.
She wants to hate how she wishes he would.
“So, what’s the occasion?” she asks quietly, biting the inside of her cheek against a pulse of awkwardness. It’s so easy for her to drop her polished guard around him, and it makes her feel more exposed than she’s been in a long time.
He bites his lip, tipping his head back, afraid to admit the truth.
He gives it to her anyway.
“Yeah, uh… If I stay in that apartment by myself any longer, I’m gonna go fuckin’ crazy… ier.” His brows thread, tongue poked and pressed between his teeth, all awkward limbs and soft vulnerability. A pang of guilt collects in her chest—she’d let it grow and fester if he didn’t also look so incredibly endearing.
And if he wasn’t so god damn relatable.
“Yeah,” she huffs a soft laugh, pressing her sunglasses up her nose to hide her eyes, “same.”
He visibly relaxes.
She steps forward, feet swishing through the grass, and gestures to the ground. He snaps into action, unfurling the blanket with a flick of his wrists, spreading it out across the grass. He settles atop it, one long, toned arm motioning for her to join him.
“It’s no Echo Lake, but it’ll do.”
She laughs, the tension between them loosening, and takes her spot next to him, tucking her legs into a neat criss-cross. “God, I haven’t been there in years.”
“Me either. Don’t think we could get away with it now.”
She hums, watching as he pulls items from the canvas bag—pepperoni in suspicious packaging, a can of Easy Cheese, butter crackers. Her belly flutters when, for just a moment, he’s twenty years younger with a lot less weight perched on his broad shoulders.
“Really?” She points to the questionable culinary display between them, failing to hide her grin. He quirks a brow in her direction—half playful, all hope.
“I still can’t cook,” he admits with a shrug. She tips her head back, an unladylike guffaw bursting from her chest, catching the final curve of his broad smile when she looks back at him.
“And here I was thinking you were being nostalgic.”
His eyebrows raise, and he tilts toward her, dropping his voice into a stage whisper. “Hmm, just like that gift basket was simply congratulatory?”
She feigns innocence, pretending to be more interested in her nailbeds than his words. “That could’ve been anyone; it was sent anonymously.”
She holds back another smile for as long as possible in a sudden game of chicken as their eyes lock in a silent, playful challenge. One of his eyebrows wings up knowingly before he chuckles and shakes his head, accepting defeat. He reaches back into the bag, revealing an aluminum can, and presents it with theatrical flair.
“For the lady.”
“Wow, wine from a can. That’s fancy,” she teases gently.
Dieter only shrugs and pulls a can of seltzer from the bag. He catches her eyeing it curiously and sweeps his lip with his tongue.
“I’m…trying to take it easy,” he says by way of explanation, eyes flitting to the can in her grasp.
It takes her by surprise—he’d been trying in even more ways than she knew.
“Oh,” her tongue trips, inelegant and clunky in her mouth when she doesn’t know what else to say. A snarky quip would be cruel, but sickly-sweet sympathy feels hollow.
She settles for curiosity.
“Witheverything, or…?”
He huffs an ironic laugh, opening the can of seltzer to take a long pull before setting it down and stretching his long legs across the blanket with a sigh. Tilting back on his hands, he tips his head toward the sun, squinting against the warm rays even under the protection of his sunglasses.
A drop of carbonated water sits nestled in the crease of his bottom lip, begging to be brushed off with a featherlight thumb or even her own bottom lip—a memory she usually keeps tucked away until she’s alone late at night. It figures, she thinks, with the first cautious tendril of rekindled friendship, she’s already thinking about kissing him.
Maybe she never stopped thinking about kissing him.
Among other things.
It’s been too long. Dating was hard when you still carried a torch for someone else.
She’s always wanted to write off his past behavior as foolish when, in reality, she’s no better herself. The only difference between them is that he acted on his impulses. She was always too afraid.
She’s still too afraid.
“All of them, I suppose,” he finally answers, a few breaths after she assumes he wouldn’t. “In the beginning, it made it a little easier to handle… everything,” he gestures vaguely, and she knows exactly what he means by everything. Their world is not normal; money and fame, an existence that often feels so devoid of anything genuine it borders on insanity. There are days she feels like a zoo animal, something to be gawked at by the masses whenever they please.
Entertainment, existing only to be consumed and then disposed of.
Nothing more.
She doesn’t expect sympathy, would never dream of asking for it, knows how fucking unhinged it would make her sound to complain about her life and what kind of access to the world it provides.
It doesn’t stop her from feeling hollowed out and sucked dry.
She knows Dieter understands, too.
“It’s hard to slow down, you know?” He says it like an apology, a quiet acknowledgment that he’s used the perks of fame to cope with its emptiness while she rejected them, suffering alone and in silence.
She bites her lip and shrugs. “I never indulged much.”
He eyes her suspiciously. “We used to smoke weed in my bathtub all the time.”
She nods, wrestling with a dreamy smile. She wasn’t sure he remembered much of anything from their summer together.
“I’m surprised you remember.”
The remark has too much bite, and she presses her tongue to the roof of her mouth against a bitter wave of guilt. There’s still so much unsaid between them, and it oozes out through the cracks in her veneer whenever she’s around him because he’s always been the only one she can speak to freely. His stare is heavy, forcing her to busy her hands with opening the can of wine and taking a sip.
It tastes like shit—over fermented and syrupy sweet, a hangover in the making—but she doesn’t mind.
“I remember everything from that summer,” he admits with a low rasp, drawing her attention. When she meets his eyes, they’re laced with memories and wrapped in pain from her insinuation.
Fuck, maybe she is an ice queen.
Setting her drink down, she reaches for the spread between them. She offers him a salty, buttery cracker covered in the cheese-like substance, topped with an over-processed pepperoni, just the way he liked it all those years ago—her silent apology. He takes it with the delicate dexterity of an artist’s fingertips, popping the questionable concoction into his mouth with little preamble.
“Me, too,” she replies softly. He wipes a hand across his worn tee, the collar stretched, golden skin glowing in the sunshine. His gaze shifts, staring at the opening of his drink. He remains quiet, even though she can hear his gears turning.
She makes herself the same stack of over-processed, nostalgic bliss. She can’t hide her groan when it passes her lips, bursts of salt and cheese and a hint of spice melding together. She washes it all down with the shitty wine, and suddenly, it’s the summer of 2001 again. He hums, agreeing, setting out to make another. She assumes it’s for himself, but he presents it to her instead. She takes it with a grin and a playful wink, watching the corners of his mouth form into a smile.
Sighing contentedly, he leans back until he’s propped up on one elbow. She sneaks a glance at the plane of his torso; it’s more filled out now, but she can still recognize all the dips in his formerly lanky frame she used to explore with her lips. His shirt rides up as he adjusts his legs, exposing a sliver of tan skin that lures her eye line to the trail of wiry hairs leading into the waistband of his shorts.
She tries to hide her pavlovian response.
She presses her sunglasses back up her face, taking another sip of wine, blaming it for the flood of heat in her cheeks.
Silence falls around them, similar to the ones they used to foster together routinely—him with his sketchbook, her with a novel. While still tinted with awkwardness, there’s far less pressure for them to maintain appearances than they’re used to. They polish off the sleeve of crackers, snack sets made and passed back and forth, fingertips occasionally brushing, sparks of electricity on each pass.
Dieter breaks first. Silence always drove him crazy long before it ever got to her.
“So… why the goody-two-shoes bit?”
She didn’t expect the question, but it didn’t surprise her either. He asked it like he’s been dying to know, the much-needed answer to a riddle he’s tried to solve for two decades.
She licks at a salt crystal stuck to the corner of her lips; it reminds her of seawater-laced kisses and a smile more gorgeous than an oceanside sunset. Finishing her wine, she tucks her knees up, resting folded arms across them, and heaves a sigh.
“On my first big movie, I got some advice about public image and privacy from a few veterans. It seemed like the best way to handle things at the time,” she starts, ignoring how right they’d been with the never-fuck-your-male-costaradvice.
The rest had been a bit of a crapshoot.
“You always were smarter than me with that stuff. It must be nice, not having what everyone thinks is your life splashed everywhere.” His jaw ticks with the statement, annoyed but not jealous.
“It must be nice, having the freedom not to care what people think.”
Dieter laughs bitterly at that. “Freedom? A fishbowl is still a cage.”
She never thought about it that way, but he’s right. Their opposing publicity choices still landed them in similar places—two sides of the same coin.
“I always thought it would protect me. This perfect shell to keep the real me safe,” she pauses, emotion choking her. “But it just isolated me.”
He nods, pointing a finger in her direction. “Now that, I can relate to.”
“Oh, come on, everyone wants to be around you,” she teases, wine-warm fingertips pressing into his shoulder.
“Yeah, for a good time and a chance at their fifteen minutes. They want to party, do some drugs, have some sex,” he says that part quietly, an apology inscribed within the words as he speaks them. “No one wants to watch movies from the 40s, eat a box of mac ‘n’ cheese, or look at weird art.”
She twists onto her hip to face him, knees barely brushing his shorts-clad thigh. His hand twitches, moving to touch her leg before he pulls back, pressing his sunglasses up the curve of his nose.
“I do,” she admits with a grin. Through his sunglasses, he looks optimistic. She ignores how it causes her heartbeat to knock against her sternum.
“Still?” It’s a hushed question, like he’s afraid she’s merely appeasing him.
“Of course I do. I love those things.”
“We should do them sometime.” He says it casually, like it wouldn’t crush him if she said no, even though they both know it would.
“Yeah, we should.” Simple, honest, direct. She means it, and he knows it.
He settles onto his back, linked hands cradling his head, eyes squeezing shut behind tinted lenses. His cheeks sit high on his face, an etched smile keeping them there. She pushes away their lunch scraps, mirroring him on the blanket—back flat, hands behind her head, wine-filled smile warming her features.
Silence washes over them again, sunshine soaking into their pores and making them both feel lighter in their chests—the sacred act of merely existing together, under no pressure to perform anything other than breathing. It’s nice, she thinks, not to worry about looking sloppyortoo tired or any of the other insults the media machine loves to say about women for daring to exist in the world.
When she’s with Dieter, none of that matters. It never did.
Eventually, a cloud passes overhead and temporarily breaks the sunshine. She cracks open one eye to catch a glimpse of the moon, making itself known even in daylight. She smiles and laughs to herself.
“Hey, D?”
He hums, sounding like he’s on the precipice of sleep, quickly clearing his throat before responding, “Yeah?”
“How’s the stargazing here?”
His grin tells her everything she needs to know.
———
Redding, California | June 2022
That lunch had been like opening a door they both previously considered nailed shut.
As summer warmed the air, they fell back into something resembling their old easy friendship, making up for lost time—sometimes with chatter, sometimes silence—but always comfortable.
They were careful, Dieter mindful of tarnishing her good reputation despite her reassurances, and stayed within their temporary homes. They kept their back doors unlocked, tiptoeing through the shared yard to slip in and out unseen by potential prying eyes. It was thrilling in its own way, like teenagers sneaking out to break curfew, though instead of getting up to no good, they watched old movies and ate pints of ice cream.
Sometimes they’d order take out, deliberately avoiding that same order they’d shared the night that began their end. Sometimes, she would cook, showing off the new skill she’d picked up in quarantine. Over dinner, he would make her laugh between sips of wine with a joke or a story from one of his many previous projects. He found he could enjoy a drink or two in her presence, never experiencing the nagging desire to overindulge to fuel his front of the fun-loving party boy.
It was refreshing not to be switched on all the time.
When they had later call times, they would share quiet morning coffees in the backyard, her nose in a book or her script, his hands smudged in black charcoal while he drew, the soft scribble of pencil on thick paper filling gaps between morning bird song.
He would coax her into that same backyard on clear nights, pointing out his favorite constellations. He’d been right all those years ago—the stargazing in NorCal was leagues better than anything they could’ve ever seen in LA.
One evening, they split an edible—giggle-dry mouths and warm, tingly limbs sprawled out on a blanket under the star-dappled sky, trading old and new banter back and forth. He teased her for her firm stance on social media (‘it’s rotting our brains, D’), and she shot right back with clever quips about his concerns over Bluetooth and brain waves.
Their laughs slowed into hushed whispers, quiet confessions told across weighted puffs of soft breath, vulnerabilities dangled out for the taking in small, measured acts of trust. They shared failed experiences in dating, brushes with the ugly power-hungry types in Hollywood, the roles they didn’t get, and how it still gutted them.
She admitted how devastatingly lonely she’d been during the pandemic.
He admitted how insanely bored he’d been and where it led. What it almost led to.
Through the choke of held-back tears, the rumors she had heard confirmed, she asked only one question—why?
“I went from one trap to another; guess I was trying to get free,” he answered truthfully, eyes full of remorse.
“You never did like a cage.”
“How’d you know?”
She huffed a dry laugh, lifting one eyebrow best she could through the syrupy warmth of THC. “No strings attached? That’s a classic.”
He grimaced. “I’m sorry. Back then, I thought every relationship would be a cage.”
She curled into his side with a flimsy excuse of warding off the non-existent nighttime chill, draping weed-heavy limbs across his body. He pressed his nose to her crown, breathing her in, wondering what fancy shampoo she switched for the cheap coconut one from his memories.
“It’s funny,” she whispered, her breath tickling his neck, “I think the last time I felt free was with you.”
Without a second thought, his lips landed on her forehead; an old reflex resurrected to bring her comfort.
“Me, too,” he confided, pulling her close and listening to her breaths as they slowed into sleep.
A sense of peace washed over him, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. He knew it was foolish to let himself sink into it; he couldn’t shake the quiet dread at the back of his mind that it might be fleeting, that it was all one long dream, despite the tangible proof of her body curled into his. He blinked against a sting of tears, eyes focusing on the pinpricks of light mottled into the inky canvas above—a perfect backdrop for a dream—and let himself drift slowly into slumber.
They woke the following morning to sunrise and songbirds, wrapped around each other, dawn-fuzzy gazes and shy smiles shared between them before ordering breakfast and showing up to set ten minutes late—no LA traffic to blame.
They walked into the hair and makeup trailer together to curious glances, extra coffees for the crew in tow as an apology. Dieter cracked a joke; laughs erupted from everyone in the trailer, and all was forgiven.
———
Redding, California | July 2022
Summer rolled on, and with it, filming progressed.
Their mended friendship had only improved their on-screen chemistry. They captured several scenes on the first take, her desire for perfection driving him to strive for the same. She enjoyed his improv moments, pivoting with him flawlessly as if the new words had been the ones written in the script all along.
They didn’t stray far from one another between takes, excitedly examining their character motivations or why they chose a particular intonation in the last take. Sometimes their voices would dip lower, discussions of which movie to watch or where to order food from when the day wrapped, careful conversations had when others were out of earshot. When no one was watching, she would lean into his side and link her fingers with his, and he’d toss an exaggerated wink her way, drawing a laugh from her lips.
She couldn’t remember the last time she had so much fun on a set.
Some script adjustments came in ahead of the fourth of July holiday weekend. She didn’t bother to finish reading them before slipping through the back door of his apartment to talk shop, the faint scent of patchouli incense greeting her.
She smiles to herself.
Some things never change.
She finds him sitting at the kitchen island, his nose in his sketchbook, a beer on his right, a manila envelope with his script changes on his left—still unopened. He’d showered recently, hair mussed and damp, with no attempts to tame his wild locks; it’s endearing that he still didn’t care for maintaining appearances or keeping up with fashion trends, despite several brands chasing him with lucrative offers of a full closet for a photoshoot.
He always did clean up nice, she had noted through the years, images of past photoshoots and red carpet looks floating in her mind.
A song switches over, and she immediately recognizes the music pouring from his phone, the small, tinny speaker doing a disservice to Coldplay’s sophomore album.
“This album was the only thing I listened to for six weeks when it first came out,” she tells him in place of a greeting, throwing her newest script copy on top of his. He sits up, reaching for his beer, pointing the neck of the bottle toward the fridge—a silent offer to help herself.
“It’s a good album,” he agrees as she grabs a beer from the fridge, handing it to him to open even though it’s a twist-off cap. He makes quick work of it, pressing the cold bottle back into her hand, fingertips brushing hers with a warm spark that settles in the base of her spine.
That’s been happening a lot recently.
She attempts to quell her quiet desire, keeping the conversation flowing.
“It’s a great album. It came out when I was shooting my first big film. I’d get back from a long day of filming and just lay on my apartment floor and listen to it. It always reminds me of that time in my life.” She sighs wistfully, taking a sip of beer. It borders on the edge of too hoppy for her tastes, the bitter hit making her tongue curl against her teeth, but she doesn’t care enough to complain.
“I listened to it a lot when it first came out, too. It’s always reminded me of you.”
She waits for the inevitable joke or cheeky grin to accompany the admission with bated breath, something to cut the tension between them whenever things start feeling like more than just friendship, but it never comes, sending her heartbeat into her ears.
His casual confession—that he’d thought of her beyond their summer together—turns her insides loose and liquid. It’s not the first time he’s insinuated he thinks about her, but it is the first time he’s admitted it so boldly.
She reaches for her drink, hoping the liquid courage will soothe her suddenly parched throat.
He shrugs after a beat—perhaps the only explanation she’ll get tonight.
She’s too cowardly to admit the same. The album makes her think of him, too; in another imagined life where they stayed friends, stayed together, lying on the floor of his old apartment and listening to the album together. Even now, she can picture how they would’ve stayed up until 3 AM with his old AIWA stereo pumping the music into the small, cozy space. They’d analyze lyrical nuances between sips of cheap wine, listening and relistening to get them right; the ubiquity of iPhones and Google still ages away.
She blinks the dreamy fantasy away, takes another sip of beer, and taps the manila envelope on the island between them.
“Have you looked at your script changes yet?” It’s a skilled conversation move back into safer topics, but she knows it’s futile as soon as she sees the look on his face.
“Youknow the answer to that,” he says with a grin, eyes tracking down to his half-finished sketch. “I’ll look at them later. We’ve got a few days off anyway.”
Her eyes follow his, curiosity getting the best of her. “What’re you working on?”
He shrugs, setting the pencil down.
“I suck at landscapes, so I’m trying to practice. I’ll never understand how Bob Ross did it and made it look so easy.”
“He used paint, for one,” she jests, biting back a grin that spreads wide when he rolls his eyes. She points her beer bottle at him. “It’s possible he was also an alien.”
“Now you’re speaking my language.”
“Well, I’ll believe Bob Ross was an alien before I believe you ‘suck’ at drawing landscapes,” she replies, padding around to his side of the island to peer over his shoulder. “Could’ve fooled me.”
He shifts in the chair, making space for her next to him, and she wordlessly steps into it. Her side grazes his, a brief tingle of electricity running up her spine; she ignores it by asking him a question.
“May I?”
He nods, sliding the sketchbook toward her, his silent permission granted. A thrill runs through her—for how much of Dieter’s life he lives in loud, bold color for everyone with a shark-like camera lens to see, his art might be one of the few things where his privacy rivals hers.
“This sketchbook is pretty old. I’ve had a lot of long drawing breaks in the last decade.”
She flips to the start, paging through a decade’s worth of work; full to the brim of charcoal and graphite, subjects of all sorts—a creepy graveyard landscape, abstract shapes, light streaming through a window with a surprising amount of warmth from just the stroke of a pencil.
He’s just as talented with pencil and paper as he is in front of a camera.
She turns the page, a surprised ‘oh’ dropping from her mouth.
“Shit, I forgot that was in there–” Dieter moves to pull the book away, but she reaches for his wrist, halting him.
She leans closer, brows threading together as she takes in the life-like drawing on the page, her own eyes staring back at her.
It’s a stunning display of his skill, how beautifully he captured her on paper. She looks ethereal, like he drew her through the blurred haze of a dream, and it immediately feels like she’s reading the pages of his journal—private thoughts for his eyes only.
He stills, his breath locked in his chest, but she can feel the intensity of his eyes on her. Her thumb strokes the inside of his wrist as she appreciates the amount of detail he used to capture her on paper. She turns toward him, meeting his eyes.
“You prettied me up, thank you.”
He makes an awkward noise, his jaw shifting with confusion.
“I draw what I see,” he whispers, gaze dropping to her lips for half a breath. His eyes dart back down at the page, and she follows.
She spots the date in the bottom right corner, next to the messy scrawl of his initials—his very own maker’s mark. Warmth blooms in her stomach, spreading into her chest as she puts all the pieces together.
“You drew this 10 years ago?”
“I told you, I took a lot of breaks–”
“This was the day after you won your Oscar–”
“You looked so pretty that night, and I–”
Words fall away, his heated eyes drifting back to her lips, and the warmth in her belly slides down into her hips, her blood immediately spiked with arousal.
She swears the air sparks between them, thick like ozone before a thunderstorm.
Shewantshim.
It sits there now in the center of her belly, louder than it’s been in years. He’s all she’s ever wanted; desire sharpened to a pinpoint; it would be unbearable if she didn’t welcome it so willingly.
In one quick move, her hand twists into the front of his tee, pulling him in to meld her lips to his. It’s messy, a little clumsy, the angle awkward from his perch in the chair. He stiffens, a noise of surprise catching in his throat, and she pulls away just enough for her mouth to hover over his, their foreheads pressed together.
“What is this?” he asks breathlessly, hands floating over her hips, a tremor running through them. Her laugh breezes across his full bottom lip.
“A kiss, you idiot.” It’s affectionate, her fingers twirling in his collar to tug him even closer, but his eyes go wide and wild like he’s locked in a dream. She draws back, wondering if she’s made a mistake and read the moment wrong. “Unless you don’t want–”
“No,” he says with conviction, finally allowing his palms to rest on her sides, “I definitely do. I never thought you’d want–”
“Well,I do, so come here and kiss me, Mr. Bravo.”
She pulls on his collar again, and this time, he goes willingly, lips meeting hers. It’s shy, tentative at first; the soft brush of plush lips, a set of shaky exhales, a shared, warm gaze under hooded eyes, his thick fingers curling into her shorts. She brings one hand to his stubbled jawline, encouraging his mouth to slant over hers. He breathes into her open mouth—a raspy, shuddery whisper of oh my god against her lips—before cradling her face in his palms and seeking her tongue with his own.
Her only thoughts are him—the hoppy hit of beer on his lips, the cheap green apple shampoo he’s always used mixed with an expensive-smelling cologne she can’t place but has savored more than she’d like to admit the past few weeks, the warmth of his palms seeping into her cheeks. It’s a heady rush that would set her off balance if they weren’t clinging to each other so desperately.
He whimpers, and it goes right through her, every nerve-ending lighting up with buzzing electricity. It’s nothing like the kiss they shared for the camera a few weeks ago—awkward, uncomfortable angles that look good on film, people shouting directions, an intimacy coordinator with firm instructions on how to kiss as if they were clueless—this one is real, familiar, like knowing the way through one’s hometown no matter how long it’s been between visits.
Refusing to break the kiss, he stands, and the stool kicks out behind him, clattering against the floor. Startled, she pulls away.
“Wha–”
“Don’t worry about it,” he growls, recapturing her lips and deepening the kiss. His hands cup her face again, fingertips cheating into her hairline, and he uses his solid body to cage her against the island’s edge. The counter digs into her back, but she doesn’t care, fingers spearing into his shower-damp hair to pull him flush against her.
He’s everywhere, invading her senses—inhaling her exhales, swallowing her breathy pants, chasing the taste of beer and summer on her tongue—his hips press to hers, and then she feels him, hard beneath the thin material of his shorts.
Her blood sings, and she clenches around nothing.
The kiss becomes smooth and fluid; it’s a dance they both know by heart, stuck in their memories from twenty years worth of quiet longing. It’s soft puffs of warm breath and desperate whines and rediscovery, a return to each other, a return home.
Eager for him, she lets one of her hands slip under the hem of his tee, her fingertips dancing along the top edge of his shorts, and he breaks the kiss with a gasp.
“Should we… talk?” he asks, dotting her face in sweet pecks, his scraggly beard dragging against her soft skin.
“Later,” she breathes, craning her neck to allow him access to it, arousal gathering at the apex of her thighs, soaking into her underwear, “after.”
“After?” It’s less a question and more a confirmation that they want the same thing; he sucks a kiss into the spot where her shoulder and neck meet while waiting for her response. She moans, feeling him twitch against her belly in response, and nods, her fingertips hooking into the band of his boxer briefs.
“Please,” she begs, unwilling to ask again.
“Fuck,” he utters, finding the hem of her shirt and guiding it over her head. His lust-dark eyes drop to the swell of her breasts, and she watches as his tongue nestles in the crease of his bottom lip, contemplating his next move while he catches his breath.
She shoots him a sultry smile, sex-kitten eyes, and pouty lips, arching her back just so, and it has the desired effect. With a pleasured sigh, his mouth drops to her chest, groans planted on the curve of her breasts as he presses hungry kisses into her skin.
His hands move to the button on her shorts, and she temporarily halts his progress.
“Your bed? We’re not young anymore.”
He nods, scooping her up with a soft grunt, his back giving a small protest as he walks toward his bedroom. She laughs into his shoulder, repeating they aren’t young anymore, but she loses all words as her back hits the mattress and he crawls over her, the weight of his hips pressing into where she wants him most.
He wastes no time, hips grinding against hers, providing a delicious weight and friction where she’s soaked and throbbing. He kisses her again, and she could drown it in, in him—the slow roll of his hips as it blooms pleasure up her spine, his hands roving her exposed skin, leaving tingles in their wake. Even the soundshe’s making pull her deeper into his current, whispered adorations (baby, gorgeous, beautiful), pants and grunts and groans, expressions of awe (oh my god andoh, fuck); it’s been so long, she thinks she could come from listening to him alone.
They strip each other bare, muted apologies for rounder, aging bodies met with enthusiastic compliments and desirous kisses across planes of skin. They let themselves get lost in it, in each other; the discovery and rediscovery of mapped sensitive spots paired with loud, sloppy kisses; sighs and gasps and moans filling the room, the rustle of the sheets as he slides her firmly under him, her throaty laugh when a pillow he haphazardly shoved away flops onto her face.
He shushes her with his mouth and uses his hand to draw different noises from her lips, sliding two fingers through her center. His head falls to her chest when he feels how wet she is—how wet he’s made her. She cants her hips up, seeking friction, and he delivers, fingertips expertly circling her clit until she’s crying out against the wall of his chest, and he’s grinning like the cat who got the canary.
Through the blissed fog of her orgasm, she kisses him until he’s breathless; when she breaks it, she begs for him, fingertips wrapping around his hard cock and lining him up at her entrance.
His first slip inside her is everything, weighty and full with a stretch that sends sparks to her toes; he cradles her head in his hands and weaves a pleasured groan onto her tongue when his hips nestle within hers.
“Fuck, I missed this,” he murmurs against her temple like he might tattoo the words there if she allowed it. “I missed you,” he adds, a golden thread of emotion stitching them tightly together.
Her palms press into his shoulders, encouraging him to move, and words fall away.
Their bodies used to snap tightly together like pieces of a brand new puzzle—edges clean, sharp, and unmarred. Now, their edges are softer, a bit frayed, but still made to lock in place, a perfect fit even after the passage of so much time.
He tries to draw it out, wants to make it good for her, for both of them, but she hooks her heels over his thighs, and he loses the last drops of brain power he possesses.
They quickly find the easy rhythm they once knew so well, buzzing electric and fiery warmth with each desperate, eager thrust of his hips. Her nails claw into his back, hushed pleas of please, baby spurring him on as they breeze over his ear, words he’d only heard in his dreams and fantasies.
The world drops away, time measured in heavy breaths and quickened heartbeats, kisses exchanged like a secret currency only for them. She comes first with a bitten-off gasp of his name, squeezing and pulsing around him until she pulls him over the edge with her, his face buried in her neck as he fills her with a choked cry.
They melt together on the mattress, sweet adorations and soft kisses shared in a post-orgasm euphoria—curved smiles, breathy laughs, the brushing back of hair—each movement is simultaneously newly exciting and achingly familiar.
She thinks she should feel worried that they let things get messy once more, but everything feels so right in the moment, just like it’s always felt when she’s with him; she doesn’t have the presence of mind to care.
She’s gotten pretty good at handling messes, anyway.
———
They spend the remainder of the evening in his bed, rediscovering each other as the sun dipped well below the horizon. While the stamina of their early twenties was gone, their passion for each other was not, fueled by two decades worth of desire.
He couldn’t remember the last time he wanted someone to stay in his bed (it was her, it’s always been her, only her), but he kept her there, pulling orgasm after orgasm from her until she begged him for a break, in the same tone etched across his eardrums—exhausted, but completely satisfied, sending a wave of pride through him.
In the afterglow, they tackle one of the final hurdles of their past.
He didn’t mean for it to happen like this, their bodies pressed together under the too-warm duvet, unwilling to separate long enough to kick it away, choosing to enjoy the prickling waves of heat flowing between them.
“I meant it earlier. I’ve missed you,” he confesses, repeating the words without the easy excuse of the heat of the moment. They’d sat on the tip of his tongue since she glared at him during the table read, a rare show of her true feelings under her carefully crafted mask; it had served as a beacon of hope that this hollow industry hadn’t stripped away her entire personality, the one he knew and secretly cherished.
She’s gone so quiet that he wonders if she’s asleep. He’d almost believe it if not for the way she’s holding her breath, and he realizes why a moment too late.
“Then why didn’t you call?” The question carries no heat, and still, it burns him.
It’s his turn to hold his breath.
She tilts her head, looking at him from where she’s nestled into the crook of his arm, silently pleading for an answer. There’s no anger in her eyes, but he almost wishes there was—it would be easier to bear than her raw, honest display of heartache.
“I did,” he starts, tongue thick with guilt. “When the towers fell. You didn’t answer.”
Her brows knit together, eyes narrowing as her mind drifts back to then,twisting through time and weaving the unknown pieces together before she heaves a bone-tired sigh.
“I went out for a run to clear my head.”
Dieter’s blood runs cold. “Oh.”
Shit.
“I– I thought you were screening your calls.”
“I was, but I would’ve picked up for you,idiot.” She taps his nose, all tender affection, but he’s already on the precipice of a spiral, groaning as the realization sinks in.
He’s been a colossal fucking idiot.
Her fingers dance along his jawline, drawing his eyes to hers. He wants to bask in the intimacy of her touch, press his cheek into her palm and let the warmth of her skin seep into his, but her eyes reveal she has more to say.
“You could’ve left a message, Dieter,” she whispers, all the hurt she’s held onto bleeding into her tone. The way her sharp tongue curls around his name nearly shatters him.
She’s right. He could’ve. He should’ve. The fact that he didn’t has haunted him for an eternity.
“Yeah, you’re right. I don’t know why I didn’t…”
Silence fills the small space on the pillow between them. It’s uncomfortable—heavy and suffocating—making him want to crawl out of his skin. Go find a fifth of whiskey and some white powder, stumble home with a nameless, good-looking stranger, and get lost in them, no tricky conversations to be had besides kicking them out afterward.
Hecan’t go back to that life. Not now, when they’re this close to something that feels like reconciliation, like coming home.
He shakes his head, willing the truth to form on his tongue.
“Actually, that’s a lie. I knew I fucked up. I should’ve called when I landed in Berlin, and I could give you a million reasons why I didn’t, but they’d just be tired old excuses. The truth is, if I had heard your voice… I would’ve been on the next flight back to LA.”
His exhale is heavy, breathing away the weight of guilt he’s carried as penance for the last twenty years. Her hand strokes a delicate pattern across his bare chest—he tries not to think about how it hadn’t been that long ago when someone else’s hands carved the same path in his skin after saving his life.
After giving him a chance to make amends, giving him the chance to be here, like this, with her—somewhere he never thought he’d be again.
He’s been such a fucking dumbass for far too long.
“You wouldn’t have come back to LA. There’s no way I would’ve let you no matter how much I missed you,” she murmurs.
“You missed me?” He knows the question is silly; the signs are there when he reels back through his memories. Her quiet support through the years—their eyes locking across every crowded room they shared, the one and only after party she ever attended, the gift basket, the longing in her eyes as she fixed his bowtie backstage—he wants to choke on how fucking foolish he’s been.
“Of course I’ve missed you. You were my best friend,” she pauses, a tear glittering in her eye. His thumb catches it before it can slide into her hairline. “You still are.”
That admission breaks him, because he feels the same way.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” his voice breaks into a dry sob, and she shushes him, coaxing him to nestle over her. Wordlessly, he rests his head on her chest, ear pressed over her heart, counting the steady beats that used to lull him into a peaceful sleep. Her fingers card through his sex-wild hair, and he can’t think of a single high that’s ever felt better.
“I forgive you. I already did a long time ago; I just didn’t realize it until recently,” she whispers, nails running over his scalp, sending a wave of chills across his back. “I hope you forgive me. I didn’t need to be such a cold bitch for so long.”
He laughs in disbelief. She would think she had something to apologize for. “No, I deserved it, and then some.”
He props up onto his elbows to kiss her properly, something deep but slow and unhurried, savoring it after spending so much time dreaming about whether or not he’d ever kiss her again.
“Hey, D?” she asks, breaking the kiss. He hums, his lips mapping a path across her jaw and neck. “What’re we gonna do now?”
He wants to laugh again. She’s always been worried about what comes next instead of living in the moment. Though he supposes it comes with the territory—both this life they live and whatever fucking miracle happening between them.
“I don’t know,” he tells her honestly, and she cracks a silly grin.
“Me either.”
They fall into laughter, and she tucks herself along his side, nestling deep into the sheets.
“Sleep on it?” he asks quietly, kissing the crown of her head. She nods, pressing her face into his neck. It’s nearly the same position he’d held her in the night he told her he was leaving—like she was trying to become part of him so she’d never have to lose him—and it carves right through him. He tries not to think about how they’re only a few weeks from returning to LA to wrap up shots in the studio and what that might mean for them.
Now who’s getting ahead of themselves?
Her breathing evens out, the sound of his most cherished lullaby, and he allows it to pull him under the veil of sleep alongside her.
———
In the muted grey light of pre-dawn, her phone chimes. Dieter groans, shoving his face into his pillow, as she squirms away to silence the alarm.
“Whyyyy?” he whines, reaching across the bed for her. She props up on one elbow, sleepy eyes studying his face.
“Yoga,” she offers in a sleep-thick voice as her only explanation.
“Fuck that. Let me sleep another hour, and I promise to bend you into as many positions as you’d like.”
She hums, something that sounds like a low, amused laugh, but still hesitates, legs creeping toward the edge of the bed like she might actually leave it. He reaches for her, one arm wrapping around her torso, and pulls her close, a gasp falling from her lips. Through the fog of his sleep-addled mind, he whispers the words he’s never said to anyone. The words he sometimes wishes she would’ve said, back when he was too terrified to admit he wanted to hear them.
“Please stay?” It’s a weighty request, all his vulnerability perched out onto a limb for her to take and either crush or cradle.
She’d been understandably cold toward him in the past, but never cruel.
Thankfully, he’s only met with affection, one palm curling over his jaw, her thumb stroking his cheek as she smiles, pillow lines still imprinted across her face.
“I’ll stay,” she breathes with conviction, and he lets himself believe she means it beyond that moment. She brushes her lips to his. “But you’d better make good on that promise.”
He chuckles darkly, encouraging her to turn in his arms and press her back to his front. He wraps one arm around her, nestling his lips over her ear, a low rasp poised to devastate her in the best way.
“Oh,I will.”
———
Redding, California | August 2022
The end of summer and on-location filming was near the horizon, but that didn’t stop them.
For the most part, they maintained professionalism on set, Dieter honoring her desire for privacy. He learned a few things from her, like striving to be more subtle and biting his tongue against every thought that filtered through his mind instead of just spitting it out for anyone to hear.
But she learned from him, too. She was a little less tight-lipped, more friendly, and less worried about a cloudy spot or two on her polished finish. She found it made things… easier, freeing almost, not to be so concerned with her public reputation all the time.
She still valued privacy above all else, but Dieter made convincing arguments for occasionally bending the rules.
It’s probably the only reason she let him pull her into her trailer for a quickie when a set repair required a delay in filming for part of the day. Even then, he still took care to be discreet—one large hand clamped over her mouth while the other pumped two fingers into her wet core, begging her to come for him before anyone noticed their absence. After they finished, he checked for curious onlookers, sneakily slipping from her trailer back to his own, everyone none the wiser.
When the days wrapped, they eagerly made their way home, slipping into a routine: a shared shower, filled with soft kisses and sudsy shampoo; food, eith
This chapter contains graphic descriptions of violence, including Joel briefly being violent with Sparrow, graphic descriptions of wounds and post-apocalypse wound care, graphic sexual content, and descriptions of childhood trauma
A/N;I should have called this chapter ‘exposition dump’ My endless gratitude and thanks to @the-ginger-hedge-witch,@radiowallet and V for reading through this for me to reassure my garbage brain that it was not garbage.
This chapter contains graphic descriptions of violence, including Joel briefly being violent with Sparrow, graphic descriptions of wounds and post-apocalypse wound care, graphic sexual content, and descriptions of childhood trauma
A/N;I should have called this chapter ‘exposition dump’ My endless gratitude and thanks to @the-ginger-hedge-witch,@radiowallet and V for reading through this for me to reassure my garbage brain that it was not garbage.
The question makes you jerk, your body jack-knifing into rigid posture as you rear away from him, his hand clamped on your hip, his eyes searching your face for an answer. You wriggle, trying to remove yourself from his grasp as he presses himself a little harder into you. You’re covered in sweat and cum and a day’s grime.
“Doesn’t matter” you mutter, wrenching his arm from your skin, skittering over the pile of soft dusty clothing. He watches you with a furrowed brow as you grab at the clothing you had found that fit. A pair of dark wash jeans, hiking boots and a few shirts, none of them covered in holes or blood.
Unease settles in his stomach. In the weeks since you left Boston, you’ve offered nothing about yourself he doesn’t already know, bits and pieces picked from the little you’ve offered, the little he’s seen. The pens in your pockets, strapped together with twine and duct tape, more valuable than the clothes on your back, the equipment to make the forged ration cards that almost got you killed.
He’sassumed.Assumed so many things about you, from your age, to the life you lived inside the razor wire safety, that you took it for granted, that you were living on the edge of starvation, that you were going to Denver to get out of Boston, that the rumours of an active community had somehow reached your ears, and you were looking to start over, looking to run away.
The rumours out of Denver talked of Fireflies. That the militia group had scrubbed out the military, painted their symbols and sayings on the grimy brick, as though spray paint was a yellow brick road, their leader a woman behind a curtain.
Tess had run into them a few times. Tiny little splinter factions that talked of revolution, of taking the earth back, of the search for a cure. It made him laugh, the blind optimism of their cause, as if the world didn’t end with an order and a terrified cry that fell suddenly silent.
Joel watches as your fingers shake, you’re still sticky with his cum, your own, your skin still flushed dark and your breath not quite back to normal. Is this part of it? Were you asked? To trade your body for information about him, about Tess? What information could you have gained, those wide-eyed pleas of his name enough to shatter anyone’s resolve.
It turns to a thorned vine in his stomach, biting and savage, the knowledge that he would have told you anything for the heat between your legs, the soft slip of your skin and a whimper.
He’s moving before he realises it, vision going black to grab you, wrench your bird-like body to look at him. You’re fighting immediately, tears in the corner of your eyes as you scratch at his face, the exposed skin of his chest, frantic and scared.
“Who are you?” he’s loud, too loud, voice cracking in your ear like an explosion
“Get the fuck off me, get OFFme” you’re screaming, kicking and clawing until his skin is under your nails, beading blood on your fingertips. His grip only becomes tighter, shaking you towards him as you collide with his chest, his teeth bared, and skin flushed.
“I don’t know!” you scream, the words you don’t speak, the words you neverspeak leaving your throat like a bullet from a chamber.
His hand drops from your arm as you stumble backwards, colliding hard with a table, its contents spilling onto the floor with soft thumps, both of you heaving breaths as dust scatters around you like falling glitter.
“I don’t know” you repeat, rubbing your arm as you turn away.
“What do you mean?” he says, his voice slow, calm and deliberate.
“I don’t know who I am”
You watch his lip curl, the sneer flashing across his vision, the briefest flash of something sorrowful, a mourning not completed. Your eyes flick to the table blocking the entrance, your coat laying heavy on the table blocking the door. Your fingers itch, searching for the familiar softened edge, the anchor.
“What do you know?” he asks, his hands raised, palms up as he steps back from you.
You sink to the floor, hands on your knees as you look at the lines in your palm and begin.
*
Whenever I try to figure it out, I always come back to the things I know for sure. I know I had a mother, a father. I know I had an older brother, and I know his name was James. We lived in a house, and I used to think it was a big house, but I don’t know if I think that because I was so small.
I know they had jobs, but I don’t know what they were. James babysat me most days, picking me up from a room that was bright coloured and had kids in it – I suppose they were my friends. He held my hand as we walked home and played games like counting the number of pink flowers, or collecting dandelions for me to blow on.
My favourite snack was something dusted with crystal sugar. My room had animals on the wallpaper, and I was always kissed goodnight before I went to sleep. Mum and Dad called me sweetie, honey, love. James called me kiddo, or brat if I was in his way. I know he was older.
I can figure he was about 14 then – because I saw the kids grow up into those same too big limbs later on, not quite fitting in their skin, and I remember him seeming that way. King Kong in a backwards baseball cap. He was nicer to me than I think most older brothers are. I don’t remember him making me cry, maybe he did, but I’ve cried about so much maybe I forgot.
That day? The last day? It was just starting to get cold. I remember I asked my mum to tuck me in tighter, wrap me together in sheets and soft blankets before she smothered my face in kisses and I fell asleep. I think I had good dreams, I want to believe that. That little girl deserves it.
The sound woke me up. Loud banging and bright lights and I thought it was the Fourth of July again, the pretty colours in the sky. But when I looked outside the air was choked in smoke and fire. I could hear people screaming.
I don’t know why they didn’t wake me earlier; if Mum and Dad were just hoping I could sleep through it, like it was a nightmare I could wake up to in the morning. If it was better to see charred corpses than burning bodies. I’ve seen both now. There’s not much difference.
James woke me. He came into my room and picked me up. I thought it was strange because he never did that anymore, telling me I was getting too big for it, despite Mum and Dad never seeming to mind. He carried me to the living room and the TV was on, there were images of everything on fire, and that was the last thing I remember seeing on a screen.
Mum kissed me on the head. She told me it was going to be okay, that she had packed us a bag and we needed to go, like a little holiday, just for a while. The noises scared me, but James called it an adventure, so I nodded, chewing on a strand of my hair.
James covered my eyes when we went outside. I could smell it though, the sweet char of a world on fire, the smoke curled into my nostrils and its never left. He buckled me in, sliding in next to me and didn’t let go of my hand. I could smell burnt rubber when dad pulled the car out.
I wonder why they left so late. If they took their time with preparations in the chaos, if the car was full of canned food and warm clothing. If they anticipated a long stay in the middle of nowhere. I don’t remember what was in the back seat.
I remember my Dad’s knuckles were bleached on the wheel, like bone. I remember the windows rolled up and the radio off and flashes of more explosions on all sides of us. I don’t remember the turns we took to take us out of the suburbs. I remember horns, loads of them, loud and screaming.
I don’t know if we hit them, or they hit us. But the car got hit anyway. It flipped, at least onto its side, because my cheek felt cool against the glass. Mum pulled me out, and her neck was sticky with blood when I wrapped my arms around it.
We ran. Dad dragged James by the arm and I tried to keep my face buried in mum’s coat, it was soft and fuzzy warm. I was still in pyjamas, they had little pink pigs with curlicue tails and heart eyes. I had pudgy toes, and I think there was glitter polish on them. It caught the light from the town on fire around us.
The first infected I ever saw was running at me. You know the newly turned, the fresh fresh ones, they foam at the mouth? They’re rabid, they snarl and scream. You can almost see the person fading away as the infection takes over, killing the humanity like a candle.
Dad had a pipe, I don’t know where he got it from, and I just watched him hit them and keep running, dragging my mother by the arm, and James by the shoulder. I was crying then. My tears were cold. The alleyway we hid in was dark, and James cupped my cheeks and kissed my forehead, trying to calm down my screaming.
A gunshot made us run again. That was when I saw the trucks for the first time. You know them, they’re still in all the zones. They’re like supply trucks, but these ones were full of soldiers, and they sprayed bullets like confetti. Looking back, I’m sure they hit some innocent people, some uninfected that were just running, or injured, or scared.
I’m sure it came from a good place. I can know that, I can believe it. That it was a good choice in the chaos, to offer some kind of safety. My parents weren’t the first to hand their kids to soldiers, to be sequestered in a truck. I don’t know if they offered or were forced to take them, the wailing babies and the scared little kids covered in snot.
James screamed. He grabbed at me as my father held him back, around the shoulders, like you would a man. Like he wasn’t a teenager. He grabbed my wrist so hard I was sure it broke. When they yanked me out of his grip, he took a piece of me with him. You can still see the scar, see? Right there.
I could hear my mum. She was yelling, words of comfort. “Sweetie, it’s going to be okay, sweetie, it will be over soon”
I think that’s where it turned sour, those candy sweet nicknames full of hope and love. Because if there was ever a time? To give me something to cling to, something to build on? It was right then, but this is right now and I know better than they did, I know what they failed to give me by offering me comfort instead of my name.
It was too dark in the truck. We crashed into each other as they drove, tiny little kid fingers pushed into each other until when they opened the canvas back, we were just a heap of crying bodies, clinging to each other for warmth. It was some kind of bunker, I think.
All concrete and fluorescent lights. Scratchy blankets that they wrapped around each of us. There was a woman officer there, her uniform was covered in blood, and she shed her clothes down to the white undershirt, bleeding pink. She played games with us, sang songs I cant remember now, wiped our faces with damp towels and tucked us in. Three to a cot.
The lights never went off. The chaos never went away. I think it took them three days to figure out it wasn’t going away. That this group of scared sickly little kids were their responsibility now, that they had to take care of us.
That woman, I wish I could remember her name, she took care of us. We ate canned food that tasted like nothing, and she scratched a hopscotch court into the concrete. A lot of us asked when we were going home. They didn’t answer us.
They asked us every day. What our name was, when was our birthday, could we remember where we lived? Over time, the kids that calmed down could remember. I didn’t have anything to grab on to. All I could remember was my name was Sweetie. But they knew that wasn’t right.
They shipped us all off together anyway, sending us to one of the first quarantined zones. It was a defunct military base outside of Denver. There were wounded there, not infected. It was a little community of broken people. Another woman, a civilian, tried to teach us all.
She called us her little ducklings, because we would follow her and cling to her cardigan. One by one, they matched us up. Birth records and memories, and surnames memorised matched little kids with families, with relatives that survived. I know now that 60% of the population was infected or killed that first night. I think that number got higher in the weeks that followed.
Nobody ever came to claim me. I couldn’t remember my name, I didn’t know where I lived. And there were lots of boys named James who had little sisters. So, they left me, to cling to whatever I could from wherever I was.
I got in every truck they offered, I slept in every bed they gave me, choked down every meal until I couldn’t remember different. But I wanted them to know, my mum and dad and James, that I was alive. That I was surviving, that they made the right choice.
I assume they’re dead. I guess in a way I died with them that day. I want to deliver these. Somehow let them know that I still have breath in my lungs. And then I will find some other reason to keep living.
Because what other choice do I have?
*
Joel thumbs through the bundle of postcards. Its thick, heavy in his grip, wrapped with a rust red twine. You untie it and let them spill into his palms. They’re shards of a life you didn’t get to live. Some of them are angry, jagged spikes that pierce his gut as the force of your devotion to the family you didn’t get to know wave at him in inky black.
“Dear Mum, Dear Dad, Dear James”
Joel glances at his watch, the smashed shards of time winking back at him in the dusty light. You gather the postcards back together, tying a neat bow with twine. He watches as you run your finger across a softened edge, see the tear fall down your cheek as you slip it back into the pocket of your jacket.
“I try not to be too angry with them. They did what they thought was best, given the circumstances. I survived, isn’t that what they wanted? Isn’t it better to be a starving, homeless, nameless person, than a bleeding corpse in the street?”
Joel doesn’t answer. You watch as his eyes flick back and forth between your face and the broken watch on his wrist. Each breath seems to cost him effort as his gaze settles on your face. He’s stripped, the hard edges of his furrowed brow softened into such mournful sorrow. You recognise the expression from the last time you looked in a mirror.
His fingers are soft on your cheek. Dragging tracks through the tears he wraps his hand around the back of your neck, tugging you gently closer to him. He hugs you like a lover. Pressing his forehead against yours, full body against your skin as you feel the weight of whatever he isn’t saying weigh you down too. Your arms wrap around his middle, he presses a kiss to the crown of your head.
Joel hears the glass shatter, the vengeful, hateful scream of the front windows exploding, bodies entering in its midst, cackling and laughing. He shoves you to the ground, instinct as he spreads his body wide and turns.
There are too many of them. You count four, covered in grease like streaks of war paint, carrying rusted machetes and feral grins as they circle inward. His gun is too far away, his bow, all of it discarded as though mottled glass would keep you safe, as though this town was deserted.
They seem to ignore you. Circling towards him with weapons raised as he inhales. He hopes you run. Hopes you grab that jacket and its hidden treasure and get away from here, scramble across the broken glass and run like you have something to lose, because you have something to live for. He has nothing, but the desire to help you do it, heart hammering in an empty chest, an echo chamber of guilt.
The first one drops with a fist to the face. Blood explodes from his nose as he rushes Joel, his weapon raised. Joel takes it from him as he falls. Its glinting a mean red, rust and old blood on the edges as he swipes at another, causing them to jump back.
They’re faster than he is, weaving towards him through racks of forgotten clothing as he leads them away from you, still sprawled and shocked on the ground. They move as a team, attack and retreat as you watch his eyes focus, finding the leader with a hard stare.
The next one jumps for him, landing on his shoulder with a hunting knife raised. You hear the gush of blood as Joel throws them to the floor, the rusted blade cutting a jagged line across their throat. You watch as he stamps on their face for good measure, the gurgling howl of the dying cut short.
“Get out of here” he snarls. You don’t know who he’s talking to. Your hands scrape on broken glass as you crawl backwards, somehow ignored by the group he has whittled down to two. You feel the sting of it on your palms like a shot of adrenaline and move faster, clutching a glass shard that cuts your palm as you scramble to your feet, running towards your supplies still laying on the useless barricade he made for you.
Something grabs you and you react, spinning to plunge the glass into something soft. It’s a woman. She’s not much older than you. You watch her eyes go wide as the shard embeds in the join between her neck and shoulder, the thick ooze of red blood calling her hands forth to clutch and gasp at it. Blood trickles from her mouth as she tries to breathe. You watch her fall, you watch her die.
Joels shout of pain draws you away from the new corpse, his shirt torn by a rusty blade as you watch the man with broader shoulders than the rest run at him, weapon raised. The fight is brutal, all sharp knives and bruises as you watch them trade punches, knees to the gut. Joel loses his blade first, wrenching the other man’s wrist with a resounding crack. You’re frozen watching them, attacking each other like infected, biting and scraping as blood drips from a cut on Joels lip, the man’s eye swelling shut.
He manages to get Joel in a headlock, trapping his arms as he takes the kicks to his shins with grunts of pain. He says nothing, pressing down on Joel’s throat as you watch him struggle, his face turning slowly red.
The gun is in your hands before you realise, the metal cool to the touch. It shakes in your fingers as blood seeps across the floor to your feet, pooling shiny and garish in the light. The click of the safety is loud, booming in your ears. It’s heavy, so heavy as you raise and pull the trigger, easier than flicking a switch.
The flash from the muzzle surprises and blinds you. Through the blinking starbursts in your eyes you hear a roar of pain, the sound of a body hitting the floor, feet stampeding towards you as you wildly aim, try to fire again, fingers slippery with blood as you fumble.
“Get off me!” you scream, feeling a shoulder connect with your stomach, your body lifted off the ground as though you weigh nothing. Your arm catches, tears on a piece of broken glass as you’re carried into the afternoon, your stomach rolling with every step as you scream and scratch and thrash.
There’s a door, a ringing in your ears you can’t shake, your vision blurry. You’re going to vomit, the jostling, the pain of each heavy step as you hear a boot connect with metal, the skittering of hinges kicked free. You scramble the minute your feet touch the ground, running blind away from whoever grabbed you, panting and half sick.
“Sparrow” Joel shouts, loud and frightened as he grabs for you, his hand slicking blood as you twist away from him, still fighting against a now dead enemy.
He looks at his blood-soaked hand, the rivulet of red over his knuckle, heart pounding and ears still ringing from the gunshot in the enclosed space. It’s yourblood. Your blood on his hands, and you’re bleeding, right here in front of him and not again, never again, not now, not now, not again, please.
“Joel” you gasp, salvation in a syllable as his hands rush over your body, pulling you and pressing against your stomach, your chest, covering you in sticky warm blood as the air takes on a copper tang. He’s frantic, grabbing at the sodden dress, pulling it away from your body as he murmurs words you can’t make out, sounds that make no sense.
“Joel” you say again, catching his cheek in a bloody palm. “Joel, I’m okay”
His eyes are wide and sightless, lip quivering beneath his beard as he searches you, looking for the source of it, ripping flimsy fabric between his shaking fingers until he presses his hand to your stomach, ragged deep breaths shaking his frame.
“It’s my arm. It’s just a scratch, Joel, I’m okay” you repeat, scratching blood-soaked fingernails into his beard, still and silent as you wait for his breathing to calm.
He presses his forehead against yours, eyes closed as he pulls you into him, wrapping you in his arms, his body fever hot as you let him lift you, another counter beneath your thighs as you feel the waves of nauseating adrenaline leave your system, each breath expelling it like poison.
Joel nudges his nose to your cheek, spreading his palms wide against your back as he steps closer between your thighs. You were here, a half an hour ago, just before he asked a question and the world cracked wide like a goose egg, splitting the universe into more chaos.
His lips are soft, a deliberate brush against your own as he shifts to cup your cheek, stroking your jaw as your pulse beats against his fingers. Engulfed in the smell of gunpowder, the crackling heat of a fire, the softness of damp earth, he kisses you. Slotting his mouth to yours like a missing piece, you share his breath, feel the barest hint of his teeth against your lip.
He’s warm, like the lazy sun in an afternoon, filtered through the branches of trees to caress your face and lift you, tilt your chin and part your lips, seeking more, drinking in the taste of him on your tongue, heady and full of sorrow.
You had never imagined it slow. In the delirious moments between wake and sleep, his hand splayed wide across your belly, the imagined kisses were frantic, feral and snarling as he snapped his teeth, bit down on soft flesh and consumed you, greedy and unhinged.
His fingers brush your cheek like the first snow, tracing to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, tug lightly at the end like the ringing of a bell, the turning of a page, something fresh and clean beneath. It feels like falling, the drop and swoop as you taste his tongue, feel the flutter of his hand on your jaw.
He swallows your moan with a tightening of a fist, twisting the gore soaked fabric in his hand as he pulls you closer, presses your chest to him, no space for your beating heart to run. Instinct guides you, shoving his shirt off his shoulders, leaving only a grimy tee as you grab at his shoulders, leaving bloody handprints in your wake.
“Joel” you whimper, feeling something hungry sink its fangs into your belly. You need to feel, something, anything,that isn’t pain or fear or sorrow. He’s a tower, a beacon of guiding light as he runs his mouth across your jaw, nipping lightly at your chin.
“I know little bird” he murmurs “I know”
“I need, I need”
“I got you” he says, a hand travelling to your thigh, hitching it over his waist as you grab at him, pressing as much of your skin as possible against him, needing to feel the still living tissue beneath your fingers as he fumbles with his jeans.
It burns like cleansing fire. He breaches you with a soft groan and a kiss, pulling you to sink onto him as though salvation was the join of your bodies. Every nerve ending lighting up with his hips flush against your own, sticky skin on sticky skin.
You’re not inexperienced. Before Joel there were boys with protruding ribs and a kind smile, men with nothing to offer but an escape for an hour, a soft touch, a softer kiss. Joel allows you no escape, trapping you with his body and the weight of emotion alike.
You move like dancers, soft and fluid as he chases your lips, hungry for a taste of the pleasure pouring from you, his fingers tightening around your thigh as you feel the scrape of denim on your skin.
“More, please more” you’re half sobbing, wrung out and squirming as he thrusts harder, spearing your insides with a force that cramps your lungs, chokes the tears before they fall. He’s pressing bruises into your skin, marking it, erasing pain with pleasure as he murmurs into your skin.
“I’ve got you, I got you Sparrow, I’m here”
You come with a cry of his name, a stuttered thrust deep inside you as you feel him follow you, pulsing hot and aching inside you as it spreads new warmth throughout your body, a softened ember glow.
He kisses you, wrapping his arms around your shaking body as you come down, unshed tears soaking into your lashes, vanishing into the air. He presses his lips to your cheeks, your eyelids, gently stamping your grimy face with affection until your heartbeat returns to somewhat normal.
You run your hands across his shoulders, feeling the snag of clotting cuts in the fabric, the expansion of his lungs as he breathes. You feel his shoulders, his spine, the wide expanse of his ribs when he winces, a brief crease of pain across his features.
Pulling back, you look, running your hands across his chest until you see it, the ragged hole in his shirt, the seeping blood that’s stained it to the waist.
“Oh my god”
“It’s alright” he says, batting your hand away from the wound “It’s nothing”
“What did that? Did they get you with a knife? Joel, we need to get you some antibiotics, let me see, let me see”
“It wasn’t them.” He says, twisting away from you, righting his jeans as you feel the slip of him between your thighs, pooling beneath you.
“Then what was it?” you ask, reaching for him again. He grabs your wrists, pinning them together with one hand as he lifts his shirt, an angry ragged wound across his ribcage.
“It glanced me. Just needs to be cleaned, same as your hands”
“What glanced you, when?”
“Bullet, little bird” he says, tightening his grip as he watches the realisation crest over your face.
When you struggle, panic in your limbs, he pulls you close, wrapping an arm around your shoulders as he traps you to his chest.
“You did the right thing. You got him, he’s dead, you saved my life” he says, pressing his lips to your hairline.
“Ishotyou” you cry out.
“Your aim could use some work” he says, and you watch in disbelief as a grin crosses his face. “I’m going to clean you up, then I’m going to ask you to give me a few stitches, ok?”
He pulls Meryl’s moonshine from his backpack, pouring it over your hands as he swipes the blood away. He treats you like your something precious, swiping a clean cloth across the shallow cuts on your arm and hands. He tears bandages from a shirt, wraps your palms in them, sealing them with a kiss. Each time you reach for him, he dodges, shaking his head as he grabs your new clothing, allows you to dress.
They fit you like no other clothes you remember, jeans thick enough to chase away the cold, a shirt that swings below your waistline. Shoes that hug your feet and feel like soft earth beneath your toes. Joel nods appreciatively, wrapping an arm around your waist to kiss you again, staining your new shirt with drops of his blood.
He takes his shirt off, ripping it into long strips as you watch, the broad muscles beneath his chest twitching as he tears threads with his teeth. He sequesters the blood-soaked portion, making it the same size as the others, laying them flat on the counter to dry. He tosses you a small tin, ALTOIDS,raised on the front of it, the edges weary with rust. Inside is a needle and thread, some loops of paracord and a pair of tweezers.
“Just like a pair of jeans” he says, offering you the moonshine as he nods towards his ribs.
You take a swig before you sterilise it, threading the needle with shaking fingers as he watches silently. He sits like a statue, allowing you to press against his skin, hesitating as you poke and prod at him, the wound still bleeding over your fingers.
“My day was a lot like yours” he says quietly.
You look up at him, confused.
“Chaos” he says, nodding back at the wound on his side.
You pinch the edge of it together, seeing fresh red blood ooze from the gaping mouth of it, dripping down his side, his skin stained a deep mottled red.
“I should have woken her up too. But we didn’t know what was going on. And it was just me an’ her, and I didn’t wanna scare her.”
You press the needle into his skin, feeling his breath hitch beneath your fingers as you force it through the flesh.
“I’d put her to bed, she’d fallen asleep on the couch after waitin’ up for me. So, I think she woke up scared. She certainly was soon enough anyway. First infected I ever saw was my neighbour. His name was Jimmy. Decent enough guy, had a beer with him a few times. He came crashing through the glass door and ran at us. I had to shoot him. Sarah was terrified.”
“Who… who is Sarah?”
Joel pauses, glancing at the watch on his wrist.
“My daughter” he says softly.
You try not to react, but your hands shake so much you almost drop the needle, your focus suddenly intense on his skin, unwilling to look him in the eye.
“I got a brother, same as you, ‘cept I’m the older one. Tommy, he showed up with a truck and we did the same, planned on getting the hell out of there. I could hear Sarah in the back, reacting to the houses on fire, the crowds of people.”
He winces to the tightening of the stitches, fresh blood pouring over your fingers.
“Same as you, our truck got hit. Sarah broke her leg, so I carried her. We were doin’ okay. Got out of the main drag of Austin anyway, where they were all gathering. Mighta been the same day as you, same time you were being carried by your momma, I was carrying my baby girl.”
Dread clutches at your stomach, hot and painful.
“There were bodies everywhere. I tried to tuck her head to stop her from seein’ it, but she was a lot bigger than you were, so I’m sure she saw everything. The burning buildings, the people, the dyin’, the turning… but we managed to get out of there, somewhere quiet where I could look at her leg, breathe for just a second, try to figure out what to do. Still don’t know what I woulda done different”
Sorrow steals his breath for a moment.
“Same as you, we ran into a soldier. Some kid with a flashlight and a radio. We weren’t sick, they were chasin’ us, and Sarah was crying out cause she was in pain.”
“D-Did they take her?”
He laughs, bitter and cold.
“They killed her. Is that the same thing?”
You tie off the stitches, pressing your hand hard against his chest, feeling the life in his veins from the pulse of his blood.
“He was aiming at me, but Tommy shot first. And then Sarah… I was right there…”
You thread your fingers between his, staring at the dried blood flaked on his knuckles. You let the silence hold you, cradle you both as everything you’ve lost somehow breathes in the room, an entity just out of sight.
“I miss them too” you say, resting your head on his shoulder as the sun begins its descent, streaking mournful purple across the sky.
Joel kisses you again, bitter and gentle, hauling you into his lap to press his grimy chest against your clean clothes, tangling his fist in your hair. You want to tell him you’re sorry. You can taste the same on his lips, the copper tang of mourning.
He traces his hand across your heart, feeling it beneath his palm as you bury your face in his neck.
“I keep thinking, I’m going to die out here. And when I do, I’ll be all alone, with letters to a family that died trying to save me. I don’t know if I’m more afraid of dying, or of living having let them down.”
Joel strokes your cheek. He wants to lie to you, to take the weight of your secret off your baby-bird frame, hold it in his chest, weigh it down with his own regret and sorrow. Let it sink beneath the waves until neither of you can feel it. The lie tastes like tin on his teeth. He gives you all he can offer, a kiss and a promise, more than he’s ever given anyone.
Frankie…Frankie from across the street Frankie Morales x F!Reader
Summary:A new neighbor moves in across the street and he is the most handsome man you have seen in a long time. You know he is out of your league but will the annual neighborhood block party be just the ticket you need to make a move Words:2762 Rating:18+ Warnings/Triggers: PTSD trigger with firework sounds, language, drinking…eating? A/N: Hoping this little drabble gets me out of my writer’s block and I can get back to the multi chapter stories I started.
**Just like ao3, “creator chooses not to use warnings.” If you click Keep Reading, that means you agree that you’re the age to handle mature themes. Also by clicking Keep Reading, you understand warnings may not be complete in order to avoid spoilers for the story. **
The annual fourth of July block party was quickly approaching and it seemed like the perfect time to finally introduce yourself to the new man who had moved in across the street from you. It had been about a week since you saw him and your heart skipped a beat. A pair of jeans that fit him perfectly in all the right places, especially when he would bend down to pick up a box. A light gray shirt that looked like it was about to bust at the sleeves due to his broad shoulders and large biceps. “I wonder how strong he is?” you think to yourself biting your bottom lip. Watching him work was a thing of beauty. His friends weren’t half bad looking either. But you had a thing for a man with shaggy brown hair. He could feel eyes on him and he snapped his head in your direction. A smile spreads across his face and oh it is a beautiful smile. He gives a little wave and suddenly you feel incredibly awkward for staring at your new neighbor. Waving back you quickly move away from the window, now trying to hide the fact that you were still watching him work.
And that’s how your relationship with him had been going, staring at him from your window. Watching him trim the bushes along the driveway, watching him cut the grass. Taking his shirt off when it got to hot “Shit, how can he be that hot?” his golden hued skin glistening with sweet, his broad shoulders, pushing the lawn mower with ease. His ‘dad bod’ was working for you and you were wondering how he would feel pressed up against you. You worked for a school so you were on summer break and watching him was a new favorite pastime. You noticed he would leave early in the morning for work, and come home late in the evening. He didn’t seem to have someone special in his life as he was the only person you would see come and go from the house. You had wanted to go over and introduce yourself so many times, but you felt he was so out of your league that every time you talked yourself up enough to go over it was either too late in the evening or he had turned in for the night. Tomorrow was the Fourth of July bash and you were hoping that you would finally be able to introduce yourself, you also prayed that he would be there.
You walk down the street to the small park at the other end of the block. Carrying the cherry and apple pies you had baked the day before. Setting them on the table with the other desserts you notice Mel, not only your best friend but also the reason you now live where you do. She had told you about the house that just went on the market near her and you jumped at the chance to be her neighbor. She was standing next to four very attractive men, one of them just happened to be the man who lived across the street. The three other men must be the friends that were there helping him move in. She gives you a smile and motions for you to come over to where she was standing. In your mind, you were moving walking over like in those music videos super sexy and slow motions. However, your feet were glued to the ground where you were standing unmoving. You wave back at her, trying to buy yourself time and get your brain to translate to your feet to move. The signal finally gets sent and your feet move you to where she is standing, next to the grill.
“Smores!” she wraps her arms around you giving you hug, her arm still wrapped around you as she introduces the men she was standing with “…and this is Fish, he lives across the street”
“Fish…” you think to yourself as you finally get to see him up close. He is so much more handsome up close and your heart starts to race. His dark brown eyes almost hidden by a black baseball cap turn to focus on you. He has a mustache, the shaggy chestnut brown hair you had admired from far away had little curls on the end. It melts your heart, he smiles and a dimple appears making you fall in love with him even more. “Hi…” you smile and start to put your hand out when he almost drops the burger he was flipping.
“Hi” he says oh god, even his voice is sexy
“Anyways, I was just telling the guys here how amazing of a baker you are. And that you actually are the home education teacher down at the highschool” she sounds like your mother trying to impress friends
“Thanks, Mel. Can I uhm have a word with you…over there?” you nod towards the swingset where the little kids were playing.
“What are you doing?” You ask her. Not really angry, just more wishing you had a bit of liquid courage before you had talked to him
“Wingwoman, you’ve been talking about him since he moved in and have nothing about it…plus I saw his friend Pope walking to the park thought he was cute and well here we are” she waves her hands about as she talks of course she thought Pope…wait what kind of name is Pope?
“Did you see what she was wearing?” Fish asked his friend. Pope taking a swig of beer
“Shorts and a shirt, like every other girl here?” Pope responds acting as if it’s not big deal
You had thrown on a pair of jean shorts, one leg blue with white stars the other leg with red and white stripes looking very much like the American flag. Paired with a white short sleeved v-neck shirt
“She’s wearing the flag, she was literally draped in freedom. She was absolutely beautiful and like an idiot almost dropped a burger” he groans “and why did you tell her my name was Fish. She’s gonna think I’m weird”
“But you are…” Pope grins giving his friend a punch in the arm
“Shut up”
“He’s a vet, used to be a pilot…firefighter now. Helps battle wildfires” Mel tells you as the two of you sit on a sidewalk with chalk and a few of the small children from the black
“A firefighter huh?” your mind drifts off to thinking of how strong he must be, thinking of him carrying you. Mel snapping her fingers in front of your face trying to get your attention.
“Thinking about him, all hot and sweaty…carrying you over his shoulder dropping you on the bed?” She smirks knowing that’s exactly what your thinking about
“What? No!” She laughs at that “ok, maybe”
All the families moving to their little tables and blankets enjoying the burgers, hot dogs and even a few steaks. You and Mel were joined by Fish’s friends
Pope, who later found out is actually named Santiago and Frankie were in basic training together and became best friends. Frankie took on the role of woodland firefighter which led him to where he is now. Benny and Will were blood brothers as well as being in the army together. They actually helped Frankie land the job, putting his pilot skills to good use. He was apparently on call for the evening and had to run to a call. You liked his friends and oddly enough you were getting to know him very well without him actually being there.
The sun was starting to set, the kids running around the park with sparklers, and some smoke bombs being lit to keep the smaller ones entertained until the show would begin. Mel getting closer to Santiago as the evening continues on and you slowly find yourself becoming a third wheel. Frankie still hadn’t returned and you figured you missed your chance to actually meet your neighbor. Benny and Will drinking a beer and playing some football with a few of the other men
“Hey…I think I’m gonna head home” you get up from the bench. Mel had found a place on Santiago’s lap with his arm wrapped around her.
She smiles and is about to get when you shake your head telling her to stay and enjoy the fireworks, you catch Benny looking your way and wave at him. Making your way down the street back to your house the sun is just breaking the horizon and the street lights lighting your path.
“Hey S’mores” you hear a voice call out you look towards the direction the voice came, seeing Frankie sitting on the front steps of his porch
“Frrr…Fish, hi” you head toward him instead of the sidewalk leading to your front door
“You wanna sit?” and you nod your head sitting on the step next to him. “So what did, Pope tell you?”
Unsure of how much you should tell him, and actually wanting to hear it from him “oh nothing much, just that you two met at basic” he smiles taking a sip of his beer you could tell he’s been nursing for a while “that your name is Fish…and you were a pilot”
“Mmmhmm sure, he’s got a big mouth”
“He said the same about you…” you respond back and Frankie spits out the beer he was about to swallow, laughing using the back of his hand to wipe away the beer on his chin. You liked his laugh, you wanted to be the one to make him laugh “why Fish?”
“Catfish actually, callsign that they still insist on calling me. The name’s Frankie” he wipes his hand on his jeans and puts it out towards you which you take. Shaking his hand while telling him your name “What it’s not S’more’s?”
“Melody gave me that when we were kids. We met at a summer camp and that was the only thing I ate all summer. She told me I was going to turn into one and she started calling me that. Do I wanna know how you got Catfish?” You turn your body to face him, a few of the smaller fireworks just starting to rise in the night sky
“That’s a story for another time…” you see him give a small finch with a small pop
“Sooo…firefighter huh?” You ask trying to help distract him from what is going on
“Yeah…I was a pilot in Delta and I help fight fires from the air. Needed something to do with my free time now” a few more fireworks lighting up the night sky “I retired, things were going south and I needed this”
You nod your head, listening to every word he said. His voice was something like you’ve never heard before. He had a storyteller voice something, that no matter what he was talking about it would sound interesting and make you pay attention to it. A light breeze gives you a small shiver despite it being July. He shrugs off his jacket and places it around you, without saying anything. “What a gentleman” you think to yourself
“So what do you normally do during fireworks, to help?” You ask
“Shower…a long shower”
“Oh….ooooh” it took a minute for you to read between the lines. You were unsure to laugh, but he gives you a small chuckle and you smile
“Sorry…it’s not bad, I just don’t. I like when I am in control of my environment” he runs the back of his neck. Concerned that he might have said the wrong thing. More fireworks are starting to go off. The pops getting louder
“It’s ok, talk to me. I want to help you…” it was crazy you just met him and yet you feel like you have known him forever
“This…this is crazy” he continues to rub his neck but turning his body to face you “I know we just met but I’d really like to kiss you. If that’s alright. If not….”
“Frankie” you say his name as he starts to ramble.
He doesn’t hear you so you say it again. He stops and looks at you, he stops mid word, his mouth slightly opened waiting for you to say something “yes…it’s ok. I’d like that”
He takes a deep breath before slowly closing the distance between the two of you. His lips tentatively find yours, a loud pop from one of the fireworks, Frankie accidentally biting your lip. He panicked and pulled away from you “Sorry…sorry I am so sorry” your fingers moved to your lip, realizing your fine and he didn’t bite you nearly as hard as he thought he did. His hand moves back to his neck, and he turns to look away from you. Looking down at the ground and avoiding all eye contact
“Frankie,” you scoot closer to him. A hand being placed on his thigh “wanna try it again?”
“Really? I didn’t fuck that up?” He still looks at the ground, you reach for his face turning him to look at you. You smile at him and shake your head ‘no’ this time it’s you who decides to close the distance.
He sighs as your lips find his. Gentle at first, a few moments of you in control pass before you feel the shift. Frankie cups your face, he licks the seam of your lips asking permission to deepen the kiss. Your lips slightly part and his tongue darts inside as the fireworks continue to light up the night sky. His tongue brushing over yours, the grand finale taking place behind your closed eyes. Reds, blues, and yellows flood behind your eyelids. One thing is for sure you’ve never felt this with anyone before. The hand that isn’t resting on your shoulder, holding you in place holds your waist.
He breaks the kiss, quickly pecks your lips before giving you a smile. Thumb stroking your cheek, catching your breath you slowly open your eyes. His chocolate brown eyes are soft and you swear you can see the fireworks reflecting in them. You bite your bottom lip and go for it again, grabbing the collar of his shirt and bringing him back to you. You liked the feeling of his lips on yours and wanted to experience it more, longer, never letting it go.
His hand on your hip slides down your thigh, moving it so your legs are draped over his. You move your arms around his neck. The jacket sliding off, his body warmth radiating on to you. You both try to make your bodies as close as possible, his lips move from yours to your neck. Nipping and licking on your pulse point and you can’t help the moan that escapes. The grand finale has nothing on the feeling that Frankie is giving you.
Your fingers wind into his hair, grabbing some and tugging on it. Frankie moans his lips leaving your skin and moving to your ear “you’re playing with fire if you do that again” he growls low and husky into your ear. Sending a spark through your body and suddenly you are very much a fan of fires
“Maybe I like to play with fire” you try to smile but it is quickly replaced by a moan when he bites your ear, his lips going back to work. Kissing along your jaw and finding your lips again
“Born in the USA….” You hear someone singing “I was born in the USA”
Frankie keeps his lips on yours, the signing becomes a little louder now. Frankie doesn’t seem bothered as his focus is solely on you. Your fingers threading through his soft curls. The grip on your leg tightens, “born in the USA…I was born in the USA….Fish was born in the USA”
“Oh my god Benny there are more words to the song!” Will yells breaking you from the kiss with Frankie giggling and resting your head on his shoulder
“No other words matter…I was born in the USA” he sings again more like slurs again walking about the steps to Frankie’s house “Fish, gonna get lucky in the USA”
“Benjamin Miller!” Will yells and you can’t help but laugh
The two men walk inside and the mood slightly changes. “Sorry…” he mutters “they can be a bit much”
“Continue this tomorrow?” you ask lifting your to look at him and he smiles nodding his head. You were incredibly happy that his was your new neighbor, a neighbor you finally like.
Author’s Note: Here’s the newest update! Finally! Apologies for taking an extra few weeks but I got here, we ready! I’m posting this a day earlier than I normally would because I’m impatient and just want it out there for y’all. I also only proof read this a few times so it’s likely riddled in mistakes. I hope you like it anyways.
In this one, we have a little party here, and a little party there. Tension thick enough to cut with scissors and perhaps Jealous!Dieter makes an appearance. I can’t be too sure though ♀️ Guess you’ll have to read and find out. Their outfits are based off these costumes: 1,2,3,4. Bisous!
Next update for this little series is coming soon. I try and update every Friday.
Summary: Dieter Bravo is the celebrity host on a new dating reality TV show and she was signed up by her friends as a joke. She decides to try and stick it out for the prize money and keep everyone else away from her.
Disclaimer: ✨ If you are under 21, please do not interact.✨
“Car dans mes yeux, ça se voit La fièvre dans les yeux, oui ça se voit Mon cœur se serre, j'ai du feu dans la voix Le plus souvent, c'est quand je pense à toi” Fever (feat. Angèle) - Dua Lipa
Anthony nearly tripped over his own feet when he spotted Dieter standing near the edge of the pool. At first it was due to him being out in the main area, which wasn’t cause for much concern, but when he realized who was floating in the pool he jumped into action. He whipped out his walkie and immediately sent word to Jemma while smacking the camera guy closest to him and pointing in the their direction.
“Pan over,” Anthony hissed, “Pan over!”
They quickly set themselves up and even the boom mic was adjusted accordingly to try and pick up on their conversation. Of course Dieter chose to approach her now. She wasn’t wearing a mic pack. Anything related to water meant they weren’t required to wear their mics and Anthony had to give Dieter kudos. The man was slick. He may have come off aloof, but he’d given some thought to what he was doing.
Anthony crouched down and watched the tiny screen of the camera with thinly veiled glee. This was it, this was the content they were looking for. They all watched as Dieter sat down, inviting her to join him and the rest was going to be history. He could feel it.
He grinned to himself, without meaning too, he’d become invested in these two, and not just because their situation was a priority for him. After him and Jemma had gone through all the original tapes and the subsequent ones that came along at the end of each filming day, he found himself wrapped up in whatever world these two were currently in. It was hard no to be. There was a certain magic watching their relationship unfold. Especially when they didn’t know that there was a whole crew dedicated to their story and however it turned out.
Anthony had been the one to push the dates when introducing the new contestants. At the time is was a tactic to try and rock the boat, so to speak. However, it didn’t have the affect any of them were expecting. Well that wasn’t entirely true. Kevin fell for the trap, hook, line and sinker. The fall out giving them an amazing sequence for the show and mixing up the dynamic within the whole group. But when it came to the other two, all bets were off. Instead of causing a rift, it brought the two of them closer together and he wasn’t even bothering to pretend it wasn’t an exciting turn of events.
Between him, Jemma and their little crew, they needed to find more ways to foster the budding relationship developing. Anthony had a few ideas up his sleeves, and hopefully everyone else was on board. Tonight, allowing him to put one of those ideas into motion. See what kind of traction it would bring them. Altogether they needed more ways to keep these two in each other’s orbits. For the show of course, but also for all of them to see how this all played out.
The whole crew of them assigned to this secret project were all equally invested in their turnout. None of them had any idea how it was going to go, given Dieter’s reputation, the rules of the show and well, how opposed to making any kind of meaningful interaction their rogue contestant was. However, for the past few days, it was becoming much more obvious how willing both parties were to be around each other. It may not be the explosive dramatic event that they were used too, but watching them slowly come around was arguably even more satisfying.
Anthony’s walkie chimed to life and as he looked down to grab it, the mic guy kicked him int he shin to get his attention. With a curse on his lips, Anthony looked up to find the guy inclining his head aggressively towards their subjects. Anthony furrowed his brow but looked over at them, then down onto the screen of the camera to find it zooming in. Anthony’s mouth dropped at the subtle but direct touch. There was quiet intimacy in the way Dieter’s hand clutched at her calf, then the swipe of his finger along her bare ankle. The contrast of their skin tones illuminating in the bright sunlight.
All of them held their breath, waiting to see the reaction. None of them knew what to expect but seeing the way she lifted her feet to cross them over Dieter’s thigh had them all vibrating with anticipation. It was the first time they’d openly touched each other, and they’d gotten it all on camera. This was so much more than any of them had expected. Anthony grinned widely to himself, plucking his walkie off his belt and connecting with Jemma. This opened up a whole new chest of opportunities.
~(TRC)~
She stared at herself in the bathroom mirror. There was a lot of commotion going on around her but she was immune to it. She smoothed her hands down the front of her costume, the one-piece suit bright and colourful. A mix between lime green and electric blue. She turned from side to side, admiring the matching coloured feathers that she had strapped to her upper arms. She’d fastened her head piece on and loved the way it framed her face.
She felt great. She couldn’t expressly pinpoint why. Maybe it was the outfit, or maybe it was the fact that her housemates were warming up to her again, or perhaps it was because she spent time with Dieter earlier in the day. Whatever it was it had her excited for the night ahead of her.
She continued to primp and prime herself in preparation for their welcome party coming up. They hadn’t had one since the very first night, but with new contestants around, the producers decided now would be a good time to throw one. If they’d announced this a few days ago, she would’ve been annoyed at having to join in, but today? Today, she was all in. She was ready to have fun.
She backed away from the mirror and was quickly flanked by Jasmine, Shereen and Christina. The new girl, Tamara, was still gathering her berrings to the house dynamics and it didn’t help her case that she was one of the parties to wrong Christina. It had proven to be a bit of a switch in the ordering of most liked to least liked and she found herself no longer at the very bottom. She felt bad for Tamara, but she was balancing on a thin rope and wasn’t sure when it would eventually snap.
She felt bad, but looking over at the newest housemate, she didn’t appear to be bothered in any way and that settled her guilt for the time being. There would be time to offer an olive branch later. At least tonight they were all getting the chance to relax and unwind in fun way that would hopefully quiet down the drama.
The feathers framing her arms began to shift and she looked over to find Jasmine repositioning the arm band to straighten them out a bit more. She smiled over at her and Jasmine winked back. As a group they continued to get ready together, all of them fawning over the vibrant colours and accessories of their costumes.
Every now and then, when there was a quiet moment, she let herself drift back to this morning and spending time with Dieter. She wondered if he’d make an appearance at the party. She hadn’t figured out if he was into the whole scene or if he really was here to stay lowkey and only do exactly what was written out in his contract. She let herself fall into false hope that he’d at least stick around for a drink or two.
She touched up her mascara, leaning closer into the vanity mirror and found herself lost in her memories. Even thinking his name had her nerves on edge in the best way. Everything about him felt electric and caused a current to run through her. She couldn’t explain it, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to try. She felt a tingle on her ankle and smirked to herself as she felt the phantom caress from this morning. She could still feel his warm hands laid out comfortably on her legs and she had to hide the sigh threatening to escape.
“Hey,” Jasmine bumped her hip against hers, “You good?”
“Hmm?” She murmured, glancing up to see Jasmine staring at her with an amused expression. She flushed a bit at being caught up in her thoughts as if Jasmine knew what she was thinking about and gave a hasty smile, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.”
Jasmine arched an eyebrow and gave her a potent stare. She capped her mascara and turned to stare back at Jas. Jasmine grinned and nodded, appearing to accept her answer but with a look of ‘we’ll talk later’. She gulped, it was as if Jasmine knew something. Not that there was really anything to know. Dieter and her being friendly with one another wasn’t new. She was sure all the other housemates were on a good terms with him. She knew she had a little bit more of a friendship with him, but that’s all it was. They were friends by proximity and it was fun. There was nothing else to know.
She continued to stare as Jasmine walked over to one of the smaller vanities and adjusted her eye shadow. There really wasn’t anything to know. Dieter and her were friends. She scrunched up her nose knowing full well she was lying to herself but wasn’t going to acknowledge it.
~(TRC)~
Dieter allowed himself to be corralled by Jemma and a few of the other crew members to attend the festivities. It was with veiled reluctance that he agreed. He was unsure about getting too involved with ongoings of the contestants, but there was a tingling at the base of his spine that drove him to making the decision. He wanted to be there. He could continue lying to himself but deep down he knew exactly why he wanted to be in attendance. However, he would continue to ignore the obvious inklings of real emotions growing in him.
The last party the house hosted had been at the very beginning and he was scarce for that one. Sticking around only to make sure all his pleasantries were administered and then retreating to his room to unwind. However, now he knew the contestants a bit better and wasn’t as adverse to mingling. At least, not when it came to her. They had a good rapport, light and carefree. To him, she was a breath of fresh air. Someone who was more than aware of his celebrity but didn’t boil him down to only that. She saw past the fame. She saw him.
He knew that he was letting himself be convinced to participate, past more than just having his presence there. The crew had persuaded him into following the dress code. He sighed, realizing now that it may have been a better idea to sit this one out. Make his contractual appearance and then leave it be. Perhaps putting up a bit more of a fight at how much they were expecting from him.
He didn’t dislike the theme, it was fun and set the tone but that’s what he was worried about. The tone of the evening. A party was one thing, but the theme of Carnival was another. He wasn’t sure he had the stamina to keep up with the rest. He closed his eyes, his age catching up to him for a moment. Albeit this would be a much less smaller version, it still had the potential to keep up with the traditional energies.
He glanced down at the intense blue shorts and thick neck piece set on the edge of his bed. He knew the idea behind the costume was to go shirtless, but he was honest enough with himself that he didn’t want to be that exposed. He crossed his arms over hiss chest and drummed his fingers along his forearm, considering his options. He didn’t have much by way of wardrobe, but what he did have was simple enough to match with the colours he was presented with.
Resigned to his predicament, he grabbed the shorts, headpiece, and necklace and stopped to grab a plain white linen button up. It only took him a few minutes to get himself dressed and he glanced at himself in the mirror. It wasn’t much but he found that he liked it. He couldn’t be one hundred percent sure, and maybe it was the colours, brighter than anything he’d wear regularly, or it was the prospect of getting more time with her, but he felt good. There was a low simmer inside his chest that had him looking forward to the night ahead.
He shrugged his shoulders, shifting his shirt until it sat more comfortably on him. He opted to leave it unbuttoned, playing to the theme but still giving himself more comfort. He turned the tap on, running his hands underneath it and then running his fingers through his hair. He wet his curls and detangled them with a few swipes of his hands until his signature tousled look was set in place.
Checking for all his essentials, he pat down his pockets before reaching for the door. He did one last scan of the room and paused when he caught sight of his night table. He turned over the options in his mind. He argued with himself that he wasn’t old, but on the other hand he was older than them. He knew it probably wasn’t the best idea nor solution but it would help him keep up with the rest. He’d pay for it in the morning, but he figured that he could deal with those repercussions when he was presented with them. Nothing to worry himself over in the present.
Resolved in his decision making, he stepped up to the piece of furniture and pulled the drawer open. He picked up the baggie and opened it gently. He scooped up a small amount, only enough for a bump, and snorted it. He sniffed deeply, making sure he get it all and then rubbed his fingers against the tip of his nose before closing the baggie and dropping it down in to the drawer again.
With renewed vigor, he pushed the drawer shut and rolled his shoulders back. Now he was ready. He checked the time then left, letting his door slam shut behind him.
~(TRC)~
They had been called to gather on the beach, where the crew had set up a little dancefloor and bar for them. Their crew was acting as their bartender as well as the DJ. The speakers were placed in a square around the designated area and quiet house music was playing in the background. She laughed to herself when she noticed the speaker they’d dressed up. Even Betty was out to party tonight.
Jemma and Anthony signalled for everyone to group together and come closer to the speaker, while they waited for their host to come down. She was standing, sandwiched between Jasmine and Shereen, with Christina hovering close to Jas’ other side. Tamara was a little ways off to the far side of Shereen and then the boys were all milled around to their left, hyping each other up while they waited for the kick off.
She noticed right away as the crew starting to reposition themselves, cameras pointing in the opposite direction, and when she followed their lead, she found herself watching as Dieter walked down the pathway leading to their little paradise on the beach. She felt the air in her lungs cease and she froze. He hadn’t laid eyes on her yet, but she knew he’d notice right away, just as she had.
Jasmine felt her reaction and looked over at her, studying her face before following her line of sight. Jasmine let out a quiet noise, akin to a gasp and she snapped back to focus. She furrowed her brows in feigned confusion and turned to Jasmine. Jasmine’s eyes were wide, a flicker of understanding in her eyes. Remembering to start breathing again, she inhaled noisly but continued to pretend like she didn’t know what assumptions Jasmine was connecting together.
She turned her attention back to Dieter only to find his gaze now leveled on her. His eyes roamed her body, taking stock of every detail of her costume. She noticed as his eyes snapped over to Jemma and then back to her. That was interesting. It made her wonder, did the crew know about their little nightly meets? Did they know about the drugs? Did them knowing change things for her?
Before she could be overwhelmed by her thoughts, Betty chimed to life and Dieter dazzled them all with his lopsided grin. Shereen handed her a drink and she thanked her silently, taking a deep gulp from it and then paying attention to the announcements being made.
It was all par for the course. No, tonight wasn’t a free for all. Yes, the rules still applied. Of course, have fun, blow of steam and most of all, dance! Once Dieter and Betty finished up their spiel, a new round of drinks were handed out and the music was turned up until she could feel the bass beating in time with her heart.
She was immediately pulled into the group, both Jasmine and Shereen spinning her around with them. She giggled out loud, closing her eyes and letting the vibes take over. She lifted her hands into the air and danced around with the girls, letting loose and shedding all her anxieties. She jumped up and down with Christina, bopping along to a new song, singing the lyrics out loud to each other.
Her and Shereen wrapped their arms around each other and two stepped their way side by side, waving their drink filled hands as they shouted along to another song. She reaches out and grabs Jasmine’s hand, twirling her around and then being twirled around in turn. They laughed and smiled as they all celebrated together. The sun was setting further and further, casting a beautiful glow over the group and splashing oranges and purples across the horizon.
Everything about the night was turning out to be perfect. Or, almost perfect.
~(TRC)~
Dieter wasn’t sure what to do with himself. As soon as the music started, he was handed a cup, filled to the brim with something sweet and alcoholic. All the contestants had taken over the dancefloor and he was not getting caught up in that. Instead, he leaned against one of the tall bar tables they had placed periodically around the dancefloor. Jemma joined him for a little bit, keeping up some small talk and pleasantries but she was eventually called away by the job and she left him to occupy his own company.
He had half a mind to ask her about the situation he’d found himself in, but Jemma seemed too innocent to have a hidden agenda. He’d have to keep a close eye on her for a bit. Maybe it was a coincidence but given that this was a reality TV show, he highly doubted it. He knew they’d be noticed together this afternoon but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. He’d been spotted chumming it up with other contestants before. How would his time with her stand out in any way.
Regardless, he found himself constantly distracted. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from her even if he tried. From the second he laid eyes on her, he’d been captured. It wasn’t only because of her costume, but also because the moment their eyes met, he was reminded of every revelation he was trying to suppress. All the things he was willfully in denial about. They had fun together. They were friends.
He was sure he could’ve left a long time ago, but every time he mustered up the energy to leave she did something to make him want to stay. He hadn’t even spoken to her directly since the party started, but she continued to hold his attention. The way her body swayed in tune to every song without fail. The carefree way she threw her hands into the air. The shimmy of her shoulders when she leaned into one of the other contestants. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her. Everything she did calling to him. He cleared his throat and slammed back the reminder of his drink.
He’d lost count a while ago of how many cups he’s downed. He was well and truly tipsy and rolling with it. He felt his inhibitions loosen, not that they were all that tightened up in the first place. If he had been anywhere else, he’d have jumped into the fray already, but here, he was less on display and he wanted to keep it that way.
He noticed as she stopped dancing, fanning at her face and miming something to her companions. She slipped her way through the group and under moving limbs until she was a few steps away. He watched as she glanced around, taking in her surroundings and zeroing in on him. She flashed him a brillant smile and he gripped the table top to steady himself. She bounced over to him, her feathers fluttering with her movements.
He immediately turned to the bar and grabbed the nearest bottle of alcohol and glasses. He didn’t even register what he’d grabbed, choosing instead to start pouring. When she approached the table, he held out the glass to her and she accepted with a nod and a smile. He waited until she took a sip for him to raise his own glass and drink.
As she set her glass down on the table, she leaned her forearms on it and tilted her head up at him.
He smirked down at her, and winked, “We match.”
He waved an aloof hand between the two of them, bringing the fact that their costumes were the only two that matched into the spotlight. She grinned and nodded, laughing.
“I can only assume you had something to do with this?” She quipped, “Do I need to report a peeping Tom among us?”
He arched an eyebrow at her, pinning her with a heated stare, “I wouldn’t stoop that low. I’d seek you out and you know I would.”
She pulled back, a look of astonishment on her face. It was the most forward thing he’d said to her. Bordering on acknowledging the current between them. The one they were content to let run it’s course without ever outrightly admitting to anything.
He chuckled at her reaction and rolled his eyes playfully, “If we’re going to blame anyone, I would bet on Jemma, or one of the other crew members. They seem to enjoy causing ripples in the routine.”
She nodded in agreement and then moved to slide around the table and stand directly next to him.
“Are you having fun at least?” She asked, “You’ve been over here in this corner all night, alone.”
He glanced down at her, belatedly noticing how close she now stood to him. He swallowed and nodded, “Yeah, yeah I’m alright. I’ve had something to keep me entertained the whole time.”
She raised her eyebrows at his response but the recognition of his unsaid words registering in her expression. She grabbed her drink without taking her eyes off him and took a sip.
“Well I’m glad that you’ve found something to keep you occupied.” She smiled as she set her glass back down on the table, then turned to watch her housemates on the dancefloor, “I’m sure that whatever it is was enjoying the attention you gave it.”
His grin widened as he watched her side profile. He could see as she shot a glance over at him under hooded eyes and he stepped in even closer, brushing his chest against her shoulder. In tune with his movements, she shifted on her feet until she was angled against him in an open ‘v’ towards the beach.
He bowed in closer to her, crowding her space and watching her reaction carefully. He didn’t want to make her uncomfortable but she pulled him in with her presence. Everything in him wanting to be as close to her as he could possibly get. She gave him a soft smile, her eyes glittering as she looked up at him. He wanted nothing more than to grab at her hip and tug her the miniscule distance between them and line her body against his. But, he knew he shouldn’t. He flexed his fingers, curling them into a fist and then relaxing them. Leaving his hand to hang in the empty space behind her.
He let out an exhale, watching as his breath washed over her face causing her eyes to flutter shut. He ground his teeth together as her head tilted up, the column of her neck elongating. He rolled his lips together, desperately shutting down all the ideas that were starting to swirl in his head. All of the experiences he’d been turning a blind eye to now bubbling to the surface. Falling victim to his own urges, he leaned in, his lips only a few inches away from her ear and murmured her name. He felt the shiver that ran through her then kept his gaze trained on hers as she turned to meet his.
“Hey babes!” A voice called out towards them, shocking them both out of their reverie. “Come back, we miss you!”
Their attentions snapped towards the caller, both of them abruptly stepping apart. Her shoulder knocked backwards into him and he let out a soft grunt before moving to the side. However, losing his presence behind her had her stumbling into the open space. She flung a hand out in an attempt to catch the table and bring herself balance but he was faster. His reactions kicked in and he reached out and wrapped an arm around her waist, and tugging her forward. She fell into him, her hands landing flat against his chest, keeping her steady.
His heart raced, realizing that he’d unintentionally done exactly what he was trying to avoid moments before. She stared up at him and he stared down at her. Her chest was expanding against his, while his breath came in heavy pants. She swallowed thickly as they found themselves nose to nose, staring deep into each others eyes.
It was a long moment where they held onto each other, stunned into silence. The air around them charged with the unspoken connection between them. Sooner than he would’ve liked, he felt her breathing level out and her fingers contract against him before she was pushing away. He let her go, his arms falling back to his sides and then tucking his hands safely away into his pockets.
The music of the night slowly trickled back into his awareness and he spared a look over at the dancefloor. Jasmine was standing on the sidelines, smirking over at the two of them. He closed his eyes and let out an exhale through his nose. That could be a problem, one that he didn’t want to have but one that he also didn’t want her to have to deal with.
Realistically, nothing had even happened. Whatever it was that this was between them could easily be waved away. He didn’t want to complicate things for himself. He didn’t even know what it would mean if he fraternised with the contestants. Was it even allowed? Had there been a clause written into his contract? He didn’t remember one but he also only skimmed it, trusting his lawyers to warn him of anything truly shady. He nearly groaned out loud when he thought of all the implications that could arise.
His eyes snapped open, when a warm hand laid across his forearm, tearing him out of his thoughts. He focused his gaze and found her giving him a soft, almost shy smile. An expression he’d yet to see grace her features and it sent him reeling. A moment of true vulnerability from her and he was caught up in what his fucking contract might say.
He forced himself to calm down while she backed away, walking backwards towards the dancefloor. He angled himself to the side, studying her as she went. She kept the smile on her mouth, letting it slowly curl into a smirk and he laughed lightly to himself when he saw it. She gave him a cheeky wink and went to turn away but then paused. He held his breath, waiting for what would come next.
“Goodnight, Bravo.” She called over at him.
He laughed, his shoulders shaking with his mirth. The tension was still thick between them but she managed to find a way to dissipate it while also keeping their fire ignited. He inclined his head towards her, offering her the same sentiments and with one last bright grin, she spun around and rejoined her housemates.
He faded into the shadows, taking a moment to himself while he let his eyes wander up and down her body while she fell into step with one of the guys on the dance floor. If this had been any other situation he’d immediately have his back up, jealous and ready to start a fight. But not tonight. Not here. Something about their situation made him pause. He knew there was nothing to be up in arms about.
He had her. She had him. Whether either of them was ready to admit it or not.
He turned on his heel and with a hidden smile for himself, he retreated back to the house to call it a night.
