There are so many things she wouldn't dream of telling people at home, but each time she floats something to him that would send other people into fits of pity or disgust, he nods and it's as easy as that.
She toys with her hair, putting it in a braid and unbraiding it, because otherwise her hands will find something else to do. "I was a runaway junkie living on the beach. I had a lot of stoner friends I'd surf with or crash on their couches, if they had 'em. I was that for a long time. What about you?"
What was he before he was, from what she's gathered, a very powerful cook? (His story brought that home for her. They don't send you to Mexico to teach meth unless you're something different than the twitchy dealers she had known.)
He shakes his head and gives a shrug. His own hands are doing the same fidgety dance, picking at each other absently; stillness, sober, has always been difficult for him. "Before I was big-time, I was small-time, and before that..."
He hesitates, then snorts softly as he realizes: "Before that, I was a disappointment." He rolls his eyes, but he can't hide the bitterness in his expression. "A burnout, a druggie, a slacker. And before that, I was just... I dunno. Dumb."
"Dumb ones don't survive," Annie says softly, her thumb stroking the scar on her throat. She isn't talking about herself, though; or if she is, it's only because his scars are evidence that it's true.
She shakes her head and puts the makeup away, scoots closer to him. It's a risky move, but she's choosing to trust what he said earlier, and if she's no longer meant to fear him then she's free to act naturally with him. And that means she can tuck herself up against him and rest her head on his shoulder while she talks.
"I was all those things too, though. It's why I ran away, got into all the things I shouldn't have done. Just between us? It's why I like it here. The Admiral could've picked a million, billion-trillion other people at the same time he picked me. So I take this second chance stuff seriously. We can be better here than we were at home."
There's an instant of tension when she curls up against him, like a current going through his muscles -- but he doesn't move, and he doesn't make her move, and after a pause like a freaked-out deer he lets out a breath and leans into it. He tips his head to the side so he can breathe in the scent of her hair, letting it slowly, slowly start to relax him.
"I can't say as I like it here," he murmurs, "but I know it's good I get to be here, anyways. It's like rehab that way, right? And I know I got this chance... and I know I'd be screwed without it."
He lifts his eyes briefly to the ceiling, embarrassed to admit to this, but: "Chloe had to kind of talk me down the other day, when we got into Sweden... I always thought if I wasn't here, I'd maybe drive up to Alaska and live there for a while. But I didn't realize just how fucking cold it can get, Jesus. Anyway, it freaked me out, I guess. It was like a... like another door closing."
She tips her face to get a glimpse of him without really lifting her head off of him. Costa Rica was slammed shut on her without warning, and that is a wound that really won't ever heal. But she never counted Costa Rica--or anywhere else--as her trump card. She never had a place in her head that she used as a focal point when everything else had gone to hell.
He's embarrassed, but it sounds like a significant loss to her.
"Do you still want Alaska?" There's no shame in seeing a winter hellscape and deciding 'no', if you ask her. "Because Brazil's got some remote places, too, you know."
"That makes two of us," she says, like they're two people who have won the lottery. Partly she's joking. It's not easy living here. She isn't sure she'd still want to be a warden if she didn't have so much depending on her success.
"Does it drive you nuts having people around all the time?" When what he wants is solitude.
"Or up on the deck, 'cause it's pretty chill when there's not a party going on. There's, uh. Space." In both senses of the word. And he loves, loves looking out at the other kind.
"Yeah, I used to get so space sick when I first got here." Thank God for Jensen. "Now when I go up there I almost get the same feeling I do when I'm just drifting on a hot day, looking down at the fish under my board."
She ended up liking Alfie and Me, but every time she longs for the Enclosure she gets angry at them. Maybe that's a good sign.
"I was just thinking, you know, it's almost midnight. And...do you have someone?"
The grin that causes makes it hard to believe that an hour ago she was in tears, that they've just offered bare details on some of the worst parts of their lives.
"I think it's midnight now," she says. It's not. She knows there's at least another hour. But he is, indeed, sitting right there, close enough that she hardly has to move at all to bring a hesitant hand up to his jaw.
The last time he kissed her-- well, okay, the last time he kissed her, or she kissed him, was under the mistletoe in the elevator. But the last time he really kissed her, he had no idea who he was or she was, had no idea why it could be anything like a big deal. It had been a fun night with a hot chick. Easy.
This time, it's a very big deal and anything from easy, and all it takes is the brush of her hand to set his heart hammering in his chest. He hesitates for a few beats, too, but then he doesn't hesitate at all: he turns in towards her and clasps her face in his hands, pulling her into the kiss he'd wanted to give her in the elevator and every moment since.
She had expected their first kiss (first real kiss, after all this time) to be tentative, hesitant. Brief.
It's not.
It had taken every ounce of willpower to kiss his cheek and be done in the elevator. She had wanted this, though; a kiss with the freedom for her to savor it.
She's not alone in that, and now that he finally has the real opportunity he doesn't waste it. It's none of what she was expecting: it's deep and steady, searching, longing. Anything but brief.
When they finally come up for air, he finds himself at a loss, struck momentarily speechless. He rubs his thumbs over her cheeks, staring down into her eyes.
It simply isn't possible, even for her, to keep a mask up with the way he's watching her. She has never looked back so steadily at another person, not this close, not without knowing what was going to happen next.
When she had brought up midnight she had planned the next step: a quick joke about oh, no, it's not midnight after all, have to do it again. But humor is often a shield for her, and she finds that she's without it right now. The smile tentatively pulling at the corner of her mouth has nothing to do with that.
She's so elated her voice ought to be strong, loud, but she can only manage something like a whisper. "Can we do that more often now?"
"Yeah," he whispers back, not yet smiling, not wanting it to seem like a tease. He moves a hand up to comb it through her hair, looking at the silky strands falling over his fingers. Then her eyes, then her mouth with its smudged berry-sexy-red lipstick.
"Definitely," he adds, and now the corner of his mouth does tick up slightly in turn. "Yes."
It isn't a smile now, it's a grin, a laugh that she is holding back because she wants to be suave, but it comes as an almost squeak and she kisses him again.
He's going to have a fair amount of red on his lips at this rate.
If she can live with the beard, he can live with the lipstick. In the moment, he's all too happy to live with the lipstick; and he really is, he realizes to his own surprise as his mouth finds hers again. He's happy. Not for forever, not even in a way that's really going to stick just yet... but the last time he felt this way, this strongly, was so long ago that he almost doesn't even remember it now.
He's smiling when they break again -- like, actually, really smiling. It might look a little strange, the way it creases and warps his scars, but he also looks younger than he has since the flood took all the weight of memory off him. "Annie," he murmurs, pressing his lips to her cheek, her ear, her temple.
Her fingers stroke through the hair at the nape of his neck, down his back a little ways to the tattoo there, and back up. Her grin is going to be all but permanent the rest of the week, dimming only when her friends need her to be serious.
"I really like you," she says like it's somehow a secret, and tops it off with that grin. "Happy new year, Jesse."
I love you, he thinks, wildly, giddily, but there are certain kinds of crazy he still knows to hold back on. "You, too," he tells her instead, resting his forehead against hers. In theory, they have time. He's here because he's tried to make himself believe they have time.
He traces his fingers over her cheek, her jaw, re-learning the feel of her now that he knows her. "To, um, both of those," he adds as an afterthought.
She closes her eyes, holding still (apart from her fingers still trailing along his back) and just enjoying the sense of someone wanting to study her so closely.
"You could stay the night." She has a roommate. Maybe that's awkward. Is this what college would have felt like? "We don't gotta do anything, but you could stay."
Is that moving too fast? Is it possible to move too fast if your relationship began with sex, sped into panicky fighting, and landed here?
He hesitates, not because she's approaching his boundaries, but because he's similarly trying to figure out where the boundaries are. As far as he's concerned, if he's succumbed, he's succumbed; sex won't make that much more true, especially when it's technically already happened. Besides, he's used to moving quickly, at least physically and in every other sense.
But if she has a concern... He draws back enough to look at her, trying to gauge where the mixed messages he thinks he's hearing are coming from. "If you're worried about Elizabeth coming back, you could take some things and we could go to my place..." he offers carefully. Is that subtle enough? Too subtle?
The offer erases all her uncertainty about what he wants, and leaves her free to indulge in what she wants. Her expression stops being tentative, and turns simply, intensely hungry.
She kisses him once more and grabs a bag, some clothes--not anything to sleep in--a comb. She steals a glance at him. "Do you have neighbors?" Who might complain.
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cw drugs
She toys with her hair, putting it in a braid and unbraiding it, because otherwise her hands will find something else to do. "I was a runaway junkie living on the beach. I had a lot of stoner friends I'd surf with or crash on their couches, if they had 'em. I was that for a long time. What about you?"
What was he before he was, from what she's gathered, a very powerful cook? (His story brought that home for her. They don't send you to Mexico to teach meth unless you're something different than the twitchy dealers she had known.)
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He hesitates, then snorts softly as he realizes: "Before that, I was a disappointment." He rolls his eyes, but he can't hide the bitterness in his expression. "A burnout, a druggie, a slacker. And before that, I was just... I dunno. Dumb."
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She shakes her head and puts the makeup away, scoots closer to him. It's a risky move, but she's choosing to trust what he said earlier, and if she's no longer meant to fear him then she's free to act naturally with him. And that means she can tuck herself up against him and rest her head on his shoulder while she talks.
"I was all those things too, though. It's why I ran away, got into all the things I shouldn't have done. Just between us? It's why I like it here. The Admiral could've picked a million, billion-trillion other people at the same time he picked me. So I take this second chance stuff seriously. We can be better here than we were at home."
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"I can't say as I like it here," he murmurs, "but I know it's good I get to be here, anyways. It's like rehab that way, right? And I know I got this chance... and I know I'd be screwed without it."
He lifts his eyes briefly to the ceiling, embarrassed to admit to this, but: "Chloe had to kind of talk me down the other day, when we got into Sweden... I always thought if I wasn't here, I'd maybe drive up to Alaska and live there for a while. But I didn't realize just how fucking cold it can get, Jesus. Anyway, it freaked me out, I guess. It was like a... like another door closing."
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He's embarrassed, but it sounds like a significant loss to her.
"What did Chloe say?"
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Which is legit, although in the moment it had felt exhausting, and still does a little now.
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Because she's not wrong about what he's looking for: the real priority is finding a spot where his closest neighbor is a mile away.
"It's not like I gotta decide any time soon," he adds, drumming his fingers against his knees. "I'm gonna be here basically forever first, so."
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"Does it drive you nuts having people around all the time?" When what he wants is solitude.
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So yes, kind of.
"Or up on the deck, 'cause it's pretty chill when there's not a party going on. There's, uh. Space." In both senses of the word. And he loves, loves looking out at the other kind.
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She ended up liking Alfie and Me, but every time she longs for the Enclosure she gets angry at them. Maybe that's a good sign.
"I was just thinking, you know, it's almost midnight. And...do you have someone?"
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Or possibly: I'm sitting right here.
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"I think it's midnight now," she says. It's not. She knows there's at least another hour. But he is, indeed, sitting right there, close enough that she hardly has to move at all to bring a hesitant hand up to his jaw.
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This time, it's a very big deal and anything from easy, and all it takes is the brush of her hand to set his heart hammering in his chest. He hesitates for a few beats, too, but then he doesn't hesitate at all: he turns in towards her and clasps her face in his hands, pulling her into the kiss he'd wanted to give her in the elevator and every moment since.
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It's not.
It had taken every ounce of willpower to kiss his cheek and be done in the elevator. She had wanted this, though; a kiss with the freedom for her to savor it.
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When they finally come up for air, he finds himself at a loss, struck momentarily speechless. He rubs his thumbs over her cheeks, staring down into her eyes.
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When she had brought up midnight she had planned the next step: a quick joke about oh, no, it's not midnight after all, have to do it again. But humor is often a shield for her, and she finds that she's without it right now. The smile tentatively pulling at the corner of her mouth has nothing to do with that.
She's so elated her voice ought to be strong, loud, but she can only manage something like a whisper. "Can we do that more often now?"
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"Definitely," he adds, and now the corner of his mouth does tick up slightly in turn. "Yes."
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He's going to have a fair amount of red on his lips at this rate.
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He's smiling when they break again -- like, actually, really smiling. It might look a little strange, the way it creases and warps his scars, but he also looks younger than he has since the flood took all the weight of memory off him. "Annie," he murmurs, pressing his lips to her cheek, her ear, her temple.
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"I really like you," she says like it's somehow a secret, and tops it off with that grin. "Happy new year, Jesse."
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He traces his fingers over her cheek, her jaw, re-learning the feel of her now that he knows her. "To, um, both of those," he adds as an afterthought.
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"You could stay the night." She has a roommate. Maybe that's awkward. Is this what college would have felt like? "We don't gotta do anything, but you could stay."
Is that moving too fast? Is it possible to move too fast if your relationship began with sex, sped into panicky fighting, and landed here?
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and in every other sense.But if she has a concern... He draws back enough to look at her, trying to gauge where the mixed messages he thinks he's hearing are coming from. "If you're worried about Elizabeth coming back, you could take some things and we could go to my place..." he offers carefully. Is that subtle enough? Too subtle?
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She kisses him once more and grabs a bag, some clothes--not anything to sleep in--a comb. She steals a glance at him. "Do you have neighbors?" Who might complain.
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cw implication of torture
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oh right this got nsfw a minute ago
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