( kings & queens | post-canon ) square one

[caipirinha]

She’s drunk, but not so drunk that she isn’t in control of her own head. For months she has had herself perfectly convinced that it was better this way, to keep whatever feelings she had left close to her chest, protected and hidden. She has told herself that she would never cross that line, not again, she would never risk the little that she has. They are better, better than they were when she first turned up on his doorstep. It’s become something familiar that she appreciates and cares about. And yet, all it has taken is some alcohol and a suggestion, the possibility of having that little bit more that she has missed so much, to break down the walls she has painstakingly built around herself. “We should stop.” It’s so simple. No rocket science, no quantum mechanics, just a simple phrase with an equally simple outcome, but it’s so much easier said than done. To actually stop would take herculean effort that she can’t be bothered with, not when his hand is warm and soft on her thigh, when his lips are so close to hers (muttering those insufferable words, “so stop”, in his insufferable manner), and she knows that she can’t. She swallows every hesitation and reaches forth to curl her hands into his shirt, to coax him closer, her voice a barely audible whisper. “I don’t want to.” - - - "We don't have to do this." Don't say that, she thinks. Don't give her any reason to see sense, because sense is lonely and it hurts. Sense doesn't remember the way he made her feel, just the way he left her, and it tells her that he's drunk and he wants a fuck, but it's being drowned out by the fitful pounding of her heart. In fairness, sense never played a very active role when it came to them. It always seemed to escape their priorities, somehow. No words leave her mouth, not a one, and she barely allows herself time to shake her head as one hand slips onto the nape of his neck, the other on his back while she stares at him, fearless even though she doesn't feel it. How are they supposed to stop when Bass has pushed her dress - fuck's sake, she still can't quite get her head around the fact that she's wearing one, but it's summer and it's hot and humid in the city - up past her hips, almost to her waist, when he is so close and so ready for this. It's impossible now. She kisses him, almost ferociously hard, her hands coaxing him closer until the very moment that their hips press together, and she has to pull away because a moan slides between her lips, she tilts her head with momentum and some thrilling realisation that this is actually happening. They're barely even undressed, but it's real and familiar, graceless and clumsy like they always were. The way he moves against her is maddening. It makes her realise just how much she's wanted this. Up close, she can feel the way his body has changed over time, the way his taut muscles have developed. Opening her eyes, she watches him lower his mouth and kiss her neck, watches the shifts in his expression, the lines that give away his age and give him a sort of roughness, the kind that tells you stories about him he'll never say. As he thrusts a little harder, her eyes flicker shut again and she gasps breathlessly, her nails scraping at his neck, digging into his short cropped hair as she angles her head so that her lips brush against his temple, encouraging murmurs tumbling out of her mouth as she curves her body closer still to him. (She corrects herself suddenly; she hasn't so much wanted this as she has wanted him. God knows she has tried so hard to move on, to try someone else, but she can't. She can't feel someone else's hands on her without wishing it was him, she can't kiss them without it feeling wrong. She can be his, and only his.) When their bodies eventually become still again, Cat finds that she can't bring herself to release him from her hold. Her arms stay curled around him, her lips remain wordlessly parted as light headedness washes over her. She wants to say his name in a heady voice, she wants to languidly kiss him until they fall asleep, but she doesn't. Instead she tries as hard as she can to remember this moment, so that she has at least the memory of this elation. As drunk and detached as she is from her common sense, she will never be drunk enough to assume this will last. In the morning, this will all be lost - and so will Cat.