VESPER
Vesper huffs out a low laugh, the sound wry and paper-thin as it brushes against her shoulder. "Bein’ a shitty employee’s a lot harder when it’s the family business," he mutters, voice rough with the ache of things he can’t fix. His brow furrows faintly, not with amusement exactly, but with the hollow kind of irony that tastes bitter even in the back of his throat. One hand curls lightly in the blankets near her ribs, as if pretending he’s not still holding on.
They don’t move much after that. The hours bleed together in slow waves, marked only by the soft crackle of dying fire and the small, unconscious shifts that happen when two bodies cool and settle. Time has no edge to it here, just a deep, strange stillness that wraps around them like the dark outside the window. Her leg remains hooked over his, her cheek occasionally brushing against his collarbone, and even as sleep threatens to drag him under, he resists.
He doesn’t want to lose this; doesn’t want to wake in some colder bed weeks from now and wonder if he imagined the rise and fall of her breath, the press of her knees against his hips, the shape of her mouth around his name. But this can’t be a beginning no matter how much of her he wants to carry with him, it would only weigh her down if he stayed. There’s too much of him she’ll never know, too much he’ll never be able to say. He can feel it humming at the edges of her mind, that instinctive reach for something solid, some truth that won’t slide out of her grasp once he’s gone. And gods, he wants to give it. Just once, to tell her everything.
But that’s not how this ends.
So he watches instead. Watches the slackening of her muscles, the gentle drift of her mind as it finally begins to slip beneath the surface of sleep—not the tense mimicry of it she held onto before—but the real thing, the soft, unguarded kind that only comes when she thinks he might still be here when she wakes. He’s not sure what part of that lie he hates more: the fact that he let her believe it, or the fact that some part of him wishes he could make it true.
Still, he lingers, longer than he should. Long enough to smooth a stray curl behind her ear with a tenderness that makes his throat tighten. Long enough to map the constellation of her own freckles, to memorize the curve of her lip and the warmth still gathered in the dip of her collarbone. Long enough to fix her—this version of her, sweat-slick and quiet and shining in the glow of firelight—into the deepest part of his memory like a star pinned into place.
Then, slowly, he exhales. It’s silent, final, and filled with the kind of grief that doesn’t deserve a name. Careful not to stir her, he slips from the couch, shifting just enough to press his feet to the floor without making a sound. The hand that had held her for hours curls into a fist for a moment, then releases, empty. He doesn’t dress, instead, with a whisper of darkness, he misty-steps into the kitchen. No creak of the floorboards. No rustle of fabric. Just the shadows peeling back like they’ve been waiting for him. There, he gathers the scattered pieces of his clothes, one by one. His coat, his belt, the shirt she’d pushed from his shoulders. But he leaves the sweater where it is, tangled around her like a second skin. He tells himself it’s to avoid waking her.
And then he’s gone, slipping out into the dark that always seems to call him back, into an emptiness that settles with a heavy familiarity around his shoulders.
~FIN
They don’t move much after that. The hours bleed together in slow waves, marked only by the soft crackle of dying fire and the small, unconscious shifts that happen when two bodies cool and settle. Time has no edge to it here, just a deep, strange stillness that wraps around them like the dark outside the window. Her leg remains hooked over his, her cheek occasionally brushing against his collarbone, and even as sleep threatens to drag him under, he resists.
He doesn’t want to lose this; doesn’t want to wake in some colder bed weeks from now and wonder if he imagined the rise and fall of her breath, the press of her knees against his hips, the shape of her mouth around his name. But this can’t be a beginning no matter how much of her he wants to carry with him, it would only weigh her down if he stayed. There’s too much of him she’ll never know, too much he’ll never be able to say. He can feel it humming at the edges of her mind, that instinctive reach for something solid, some truth that won’t slide out of her grasp once he’s gone. And gods, he wants to give it. Just once, to tell her everything.
But that’s not how this ends.
So he watches instead. Watches the slackening of her muscles, the gentle drift of her mind as it finally begins to slip beneath the surface of sleep—not the tense mimicry of it she held onto before—but the real thing, the soft, unguarded kind that only comes when she thinks he might still be here when she wakes. He’s not sure what part of that lie he hates more: the fact that he let her believe it, or the fact that some part of him wishes he could make it true.
Still, he lingers, longer than he should. Long enough to smooth a stray curl behind her ear with a tenderness that makes his throat tighten. Long enough to map the constellation of her own freckles, to memorize the curve of her lip and the warmth still gathered in the dip of her collarbone. Long enough to fix her—this version of her, sweat-slick and quiet and shining in the glow of firelight—into the deepest part of his memory like a star pinned into place.
Then, slowly, he exhales. It’s silent, final, and filled with the kind of grief that doesn’t deserve a name. Careful not to stir her, he slips from the couch, shifting just enough to press his feet to the floor without making a sound. The hand that had held her for hours curls into a fist for a moment, then releases, empty. He doesn’t dress, instead, with a whisper of darkness, he misty-steps into the kitchen. No creak of the floorboards. No rustle of fabric. Just the shadows peeling back like they’ve been waiting for him. There, he gathers the scattered pieces of his clothes, one by one. His coat, his belt, the shirt she’d pushed from his shoulders. But he leaves the sweater where it is, tangled around her like a second skin. He tells himself it’s to avoid waking her.
And then he’s gone, slipping out into the dark that always seems to call him back, into an emptiness that settles with a heavy familiarity around his shoulders.
~FIN
rot gut whiskey's gonna ease your mind
but when the hell are you gonna ease mine?
but when the hell are you gonna ease mine?
☆ has a pale star tattoo beneath his left eye, and freckle-sized constellations move across his skin
☽ hair changes from bleached blonde to brown
☆ telepathic: Sunlit Shadows | The user can read the surface thoughts and emotions of those within a 60ft radius. Control is excellent. Note: "Thoughts and emotions" include anything written in a character's narration in a post.
☽ hair changes from bleached blonde to brown
☆ telepathic: Sunlit Shadows | The user can read the surface thoughts and emotions of those within a 60ft radius. Control is excellent. Note: "Thoughts and emotions" include anything written in a character's narration in a post.
