candlewax & polaroids on the hardwood floor
Flora has seen Frey before—has stood in their presence enough times to know better. To brace, to breathe, but gods.
The second the air shifts and that saccharine, summer-slick warmth rolls through her kitchen, Flora feels her thighs press instinctively together, her breath catch sharp in her throat. It’s all she can do not to arch under the weight of it. Frey’s arrival is always like this: decadent and disarming, like every muscle in her body is being kissed and bitten at once. The floral-heat of their presence tangles in her nerves, tugging low and molten through her gut, blooming between her legs with a heat so real it almost shames her. Almost.
Because of course she thinks about bolting upstairs. About sliding her hand beneath the waistband of her shorts and chasing the pressure they leave behind. It wouldn’t take long. Not with Frey still echoing through her skin like the aftershock of a climax that never quite happened. But Kaisel’s in the kitchen. Kaisel, who is watching all of this unfold with wide eyes and the kind of slowly-dawning horror usually reserved for divine smitings and emotional vulnerability.
So Flora swallows her sigh, clenches her jaw, and rides it out.
It helps—barely—that Frey turns their attention to Kaisel. That they take their time, artfully draping gold over every inch of him, pulling a flush up his neck and leaving him slumped against her counter like a man undone. Flora watches, breathless and aching, and when Frey finally disappears with all the ease of someone flicking off a candle flame, she exhales shakily.
"Well," she says at last, her voice still a little raw around the edges, a rasp that only barely sounds amused. "That’ll teach you to steal the last scoop."
And she hops up onto the counter like nothing is wrong, like her legs aren't trembling with restraint. She plucks a few caramel chips from the bag, popping one into her mouth, and eyes him where he’s collapsed in shimmering, slitted humiliation. Her grin returns, all lazy delight. "Stunning, by the way," she drawls, gesturing with a chip toward the toga now clinging to him like a second skin. "But if you don’t think that was a decisive enough win—" she pops another chip into her mouth, lets the moment stretch, "—I’d be happy to call Frey back."
The second the air shifts and that saccharine, summer-slick warmth rolls through her kitchen, Flora feels her thighs press instinctively together, her breath catch sharp in her throat. It’s all she can do not to arch under the weight of it. Frey’s arrival is always like this: decadent and disarming, like every muscle in her body is being kissed and bitten at once. The floral-heat of their presence tangles in her nerves, tugging low and molten through her gut, blooming between her legs with a heat so real it almost shames her. Almost.
Because of course she thinks about bolting upstairs. About sliding her hand beneath the waistband of her shorts and chasing the pressure they leave behind. It wouldn’t take long. Not with Frey still echoing through her skin like the aftershock of a climax that never quite happened. But Kaisel’s in the kitchen. Kaisel, who is watching all of this unfold with wide eyes and the kind of slowly-dawning horror usually reserved for divine smitings and emotional vulnerability.
So Flora swallows her sigh, clenches her jaw, and rides it out.
It helps—barely—that Frey turns their attention to Kaisel. That they take their time, artfully draping gold over every inch of him, pulling a flush up his neck and leaving him slumped against her counter like a man undone. Flora watches, breathless and aching, and when Frey finally disappears with all the ease of someone flicking off a candle flame, she exhales shakily.
"Well," she says at last, her voice still a little raw around the edges, a rasp that only barely sounds amused. "That’ll teach you to steal the last scoop."
And she hops up onto the counter like nothing is wrong, like her legs aren't trembling with restraint. She plucks a few caramel chips from the bag, popping one into her mouth, and eyes him where he’s collapsed in shimmering, slitted humiliation. Her grin returns, all lazy delight. "Stunning, by the way," she drawls, gesturing with a chip toward the toga now clinging to him like a second skin. "But if you don’t think that was a decisive enough win—" she pops another chip into her mouth, lets the moment stretch, "—I’d be happy to call Frey back."
