flora
The way Kaisel says her name sends goosebumps skimming across her chest, not sharp like static, but soft, like silk being drawn over sunburnt skin—gentle and electric all at once. It makes her smile, even as her lips part on a quiet, breathy moan, the syllables of his name curling against the back of her throat, too full of feeling to be sharp. Kai. Kaisel. Gods, Kai. But then he’s there, in her, and the world pivots around the ache that dissolves into satisfaction so deep she forgets what it's like to have ever needed anything more—until her body decides it does, until the slow, perfect stretch becomes a tease she cannot bear.
She cries out his name, the sound fraying with laughter at the edges, because gods of all the ways she'd imagined this in those late-night, half-joking daydreams—of sinking onto his lap just to see if she could make him blush, of licking a popsicle slowly down the stick just to ruin his train of thought—she had never quite imagined this. Never this heat. Never this tenderness. Never the dizzying realization that the boy who used to trail after the older kids with a quiet, too-clever smirk—the one who used to call her flo-ro just to watch her squawk like a wet bird—would be the one making her burn from the inside out.
It is absurd. Entirely impossible. And yet...inevitable, somehow.
His slow thrusts are steady, tidal, each one building upon the last until her spine feels like it’s arching toward something that hasn’t yet arrived but is promising to as his thumb becomes the axis her world starts to tilt around. She writhes beneath him without grace or apology, hips lifting to meet the rise and fall of his rhythm, chasing more, always more, far sooner than she expected. Her blush deepens to a blaze across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose, a flush of scarlet in the low lamplight. She hadn’t expected to be so undone so early, hadn’t expected her own hips to rise of their own volition, chasing more of his touch, more of him. Her body is molten and wild, and yet she feels so safe, so right.
Sliding her leg from his shoulder, she curls it around his waist instead, drawing him closer with the quiet insistence of someone who no longer wants even an inch of air between them. Her hands find him in turn—one threading into his hair, the other sweeping down his shoulder. Her fingers splay across the starburst scar on his back, that pale remnant from Jack’s anger, from the night Kai had gone too far for her. And maybe her ring can’t heal it now, but she presses her palm there anyway. Presses like her touch might rewrite its meaning. As if she could alchemize pain into purpose, violence into something tender and glittering and whole. After all, it was for her he’d earned that wound. And now, in this moment, it becomes something else entirely. Not a mark of regret, but of loyalty. Of love. Of them.
"Kai," she whispers, like it was the first time she'd ever said his name properly, her voice barely clinging to the air between them. Rolling her hips up against him again, she lets her fingers slide down from his hair, across the sharp lines of his cheek, and along the strong line of his jaw. Her thumb brushes the corner of his mouth, reverent, and her voice drops lower still—less a request than a surrender. "Like you love me." Because no one ever has fucked her like that, not really. Jack had always brought her to dizzying heights, knowing exactly what she wanted and when that they might eclipse everything else together. If there'd been love in it, it wasn't the sort Flora understood. And Koa had always fucked her with more haste than depth if only because that's what summertime flings demanded. Given time, he would have, had she ever thought to ask. But this? This is the first time her body has felt like something undeserving of bruises, not to be conquered or claimed, but kept. And gods, if he answers her the way she hopes—if he gives her not just the pleasure but the meaning she’s never dared to want—she’s not sure she’ll survive it. At least if she doesn't, they won't have to worry about the what-now's that will come with the dawn.
She cries out his name, the sound fraying with laughter at the edges, because gods of all the ways she'd imagined this in those late-night, half-joking daydreams—of sinking onto his lap just to see if she could make him blush, of licking a popsicle slowly down the stick just to ruin his train of thought—she had never quite imagined this. Never this heat. Never this tenderness. Never the dizzying realization that the boy who used to trail after the older kids with a quiet, too-clever smirk—the one who used to call her flo-ro just to watch her squawk like a wet bird—would be the one making her burn from the inside out.
It is absurd. Entirely impossible. And yet...inevitable, somehow.
His slow thrusts are steady, tidal, each one building upon the last until her spine feels like it’s arching toward something that hasn’t yet arrived but is promising to as his thumb becomes the axis her world starts to tilt around. She writhes beneath him without grace or apology, hips lifting to meet the rise and fall of his rhythm, chasing more, always more, far sooner than she expected. Her blush deepens to a blaze across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose, a flush of scarlet in the low lamplight. She hadn’t expected to be so undone so early, hadn’t expected her own hips to rise of their own volition, chasing more of his touch, more of him. Her body is molten and wild, and yet she feels so safe, so right.
Sliding her leg from his shoulder, she curls it around his waist instead, drawing him closer with the quiet insistence of someone who no longer wants even an inch of air between them. Her hands find him in turn—one threading into his hair, the other sweeping down his shoulder. Her fingers splay across the starburst scar on his back, that pale remnant from Jack’s anger, from the night Kai had gone too far for her. And maybe her ring can’t heal it now, but she presses her palm there anyway. Presses like her touch might rewrite its meaning. As if she could alchemize pain into purpose, violence into something tender and glittering and whole. After all, it was for her he’d earned that wound. And now, in this moment, it becomes something else entirely. Not a mark of regret, but of loyalty. Of love. Of them.
"Kai," she whispers, like it was the first time she'd ever said his name properly, her voice barely clinging to the air between them. Rolling her hips up against him again, she lets her fingers slide down from his hair, across the sharp lines of his cheek, and along the strong line of his jaw. Her thumb brushes the corner of his mouth, reverent, and her voice drops lower still—less a request than a surrender. "Like you love me." Because no one ever has fucked her like that, not really. Jack had always brought her to dizzying heights, knowing exactly what she wanted and when that they might eclipse everything else together. If there'd been love in it, it wasn't the sort Flora understood. And Koa had always fucked her with more haste than depth if only because that's what summertime flings demanded. Given time, he would have, had she ever thought to ask. But this? This is the first time her body has felt like something undeserving of bruises, not to be conquered or claimed, but kept. And gods, if he answers her the way she hopes—if he gives her not just the pleasure but the meaning she’s never dared to want—she’s not sure she’ll survive it. At least if she doesn't, they won't have to worry about the what-now's that will come with the dawn.
My house of stone, your ivy grows
And now I'm covered in you
And now I'm covered in you
