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colibritas · 2 years ago

Text

syzygy

pairing: bobby marks x f!detective (camilla reyes) (past) (listen. i know.)

word count: 1,738 words | rating: T, brief mentions of alcohol ig?

summary: The detective goes on a walk and stumbles upon a memory. (post book 3 Bobby route - vague spoilers ahead!)

author’s note: i have no words and no excuses but i think it would be neat if they get some closure B) i literally can’t believe my first fic for this fandom heavily focuses on bobby marks, don’t look at me

read on ao3!

There’s a weathered old wooden bench near the cliffs at the lighthouse, where the stars shine brightly on clear nights, and the breeze coasting in from the ocean is cold but smells like salt and memory.

Camilla doesn’t pass it often, these days. The nostalgic ache it stirs in her tastes like cheap rum and cheap promises, makes her feel a little too hollow.

She’s not totally sure what brings her there tonight. She knows she shouldn’t be wandering the shaded paths of Wayhaven alone at night, with her blood calling like a siren song to every Trapper and toothed creature in a hundred miles.

But there’s always been an itch in her soul, compels her to wander to ease the stirring. Walking a beat used to help, particularly at night when she had Tina’s laughter to keep her company.

Now, the shadows are no longer friends to shelter her, but the promise of some new horror to steal her away. There is no laughter to keep her company, just the whisper of the wind and the way her skin prickles at the groaning of the trees.

The waves lapping along the shore still her mind with a static fuzz, and the night is quiet and velvet. It’s late summer, the perfect time for a near-midnight walk, and the dying embers of the season are pleasant to warm herself to even though clouds cover the blanket of stars. A soft summer storm had swept through earlier that day, and the air is fresh and verdant with the ghost of it, grass and earth damp beneath her shoes. As she approaches the bend where the bench looks out over the waterline she slows, seeing a worried figure seated there, hunched over.

The smart thing would be to turn and walk away before they notice her, and she nearly does before she catches a glimpse of caramel-coloured hair dripping with silver in the faint moonlight. It would still be the smart thing to turn and walk away; now more than ever, maybe.

“Bobby?”

He spins to face her, coiled like a spring as he leaps to his feet. Tense, anticipatory. She raises both hands like a white flag. “Just me. Didn’t want to sneak up on you. Is that pepper spray in your pocket, or are you happy to see me?”

Camilla nods at where his hand hovers not too far from his belt.

He settles back into a more Bobby-like cadence and forcibly relaxes. “I’m always happy to see you, angel,” he drawls. It’s not very convincing. Even through the dim light she can see the shimmer of tension in his fingers. “You just caught me by surprise, is all.”

Slowly, she steps toward him, still keeping her hands raised at first, but lowering them as he eases his own arms down at his sides, looking a little less like he’s going to snap and blast pepper spray in her eyes. His gaze is unfocused in a way she’s not used to, no longer liquid and confident. She approaches like she might a wounded animal before settling down on one edge of the bench. He sits at the other, and a thick, heavy quiet settles on its haunches between them.

And, eventually, once the blanketing silence grows too oppressive in the warm night:

“I don’t think I’ve seen you here since we broke up,” he says, voice a little too loud, a little too strained against the darkness.

“Because I haven’t been,” Camilla mumbles. “Figured you’d probably not want me skulking around if you decided to bring a new partner here.”

He goes a bit quiet, at that. “C’mon, Camilla,” he mutters. “This was our spot.”

The tide rolls in. It smells like summer. Reminds her of warm, sloppy kisses at the tail end of summer break, the wooden slats of this weathered old bench uncomfortable under the heels of her palms, and the first time he said he loved her. She’d believed him, then.

The ache gnaws at her.

“You still come out here often?” She asks, instead of saying the thing she really wants to say. She’s not sure if she wants the answer to this question, either, now that she thinks about it, but it’s already out of her mouth and she can’t take it back. Maybe she’ll get lucky and he’ll deflect it with some sort of flirtation or angle, anyway, like he always does.

“Yeah. When I need to think,” he says instead, the moonlight softening him, fuzzing his edges.

She bites back the short reply at the tip of her tongue. He doesn’t deserve her scorn, not when he says something genuine for once. Something in her, the ungenerous part that’s still a little raw, reminds her that he’s often used his own vulnerability as the scalpel to cut her open in the past. It’s long past the time when she should have stopped falling for it, but she still does every time. Hook, line, sinker.

“What were you thinking about?”

“How fucked up it’s all gotten,” he says with a strained laugh. “I mean, Jesus. You ever see all of this coming?”

“Shit, Bobby. If I saw half of this coming I’d’ve bought several lottery tickets by now. I’d be relaxing on a beach somewhere, with a margarita in each hand and not a care in the world.”

“I hope one of the margaritas would be for me?”

“Not a chance, get your own damn margaritas.”

They both chuckle a little, soft and quiet. It’s easy, until it hurts. Their laughter trails off into silence.

The waves against the beach. Kisses that tasted like cheap rum and empty promises. The ache gnaws her hollow, licks the meat off her bones.

She tucks her knees up to her chest and leans back. The wooden planks dig into her spine, but it feels real and not like the haze of memory.

“If I asked you something right now, would you tell me the truth?” She whispers into the breeze. Almost hoping the wind will catch her voice and toss it high above their heads where no-one will hear it.

Bobby hesitates. “At this point, angel, I don’t think you’d believe me if I lied.”

“Did you love me?”

“Camilla,” he says, sounding strangled. He forces a laugh. “I don’t think anyone could’ve grown up with you and not fallen in love with you.”

She squeezes her eyes shut. The truth from him hurts more than the lies, sometimes.

And, quieter, he says: “Of course I love you. —Loved.”

“Then why—”

“I don’t know,” he lies.

They quiet, that silence sitting hunched between them still.

He bridges it first. Stretches a hand across the ten inches of eternity between them; she sees the movement from the corner of her eye. He’d never been one for romantic gestures, when they were together. It was all— pageantry, ego-stroking. And she (fatherless, motherless) had devoured every morsel of attention like oxygen to a flame even if she knew deep down it didn’t mean to him what it did to her.

Hook, line, sinker. She closes the space, brushes her knuckles against his, and he interlaces their fingers. The summer air is warm, but his hand is cold. There’s a tremble to the pulse she can feel thrumming in his wrist, like a hummingbird heart.

“It’s too late for us, isn’t it?” He mumbles.

Camilla gives his hand a squeeze. Years ago, she might have felt a spark of hope at their interlocked fingers, the way his hand warms at her touch.

“I think that ship has sailed.” She turns to give him a small smile. There’s no spark of hope there anymore, just a used-to-be. A sigh runs ragged over his lips. He looks… tired, actually. A little worn. Not quite as coiffed and shining as he usually is, though he still strikes a handsome silhouette with the faded moonlight casting him in soft, luminescent edges.

“Yeah, I thought so.” He hesitates. “Are you… happy?”

Camilla thinks of warm brown eyes, honey-sweet, filling her mouth with poetry.

“Yeah,” she says.

“Even with the world going crazy and knowing there are monsters out there that want to kill you? With the danger?”

“The world was already crazy, and I was already in danger. Have you seen my car?”

He grimaces. “I try not to. You can hear it before you see it, anyway, so you can just scrunch your eyes closed and—”

“Okay, okay, I get it.” She can’t help the grin that spreads across her face. “Some part of me honestly still feels like… like I’m going to wake up tomorrow and none of it will be real. But yeah. I’m happy. I don’t have to do it alone, you know?”

When he falls silent, she nudges herself across the gap, until their knees touch, their shoulders bump together. “And you don’t, either.”

He sighs, releases her hand so he can stretch an arm around her shoulder. It’s a move he’s made before, sitting here on this bench, but it doesn’t feel the same. None of the fire, like whiskey burning a trail down your throat. None of the heavy-lidded gazes. She’s surprised to find that it doesn’t hurt. It almost feels… comfortable, this time. She’ll always love him, too, a part of her recognizes—but not the way she used to.

“I don’t, huh? You think you can get me the number of any of those sexy agents, then?”

“Ugh, you suck.” Camilla swats at his knee playfully, no real bite to her words. He laughs in response.

His arm pulls a little closer around her shoulders, and he points up at the sky. “Hey, look.”

The clouds have parted, and above them the sky glitters like a gown studded with so many diamonds. When she hastens a careful glance up at him, he’s smiling. A small smile, relaxed, not the usual suggestive smirk she’s grown used to. She feels her face light with a smile, too, and it feels a bit like forgiveness.

The stars shine down on them and the waves crash, but the air tastes like rain and summer, like damp grass and fragrant earth. It’s not the same as it was because they’re not the same as they were, and it’s… good. At least in this moment, the ache she’d grown used to feels like the dull twinge of a broken bone healing.

#the wayhaven chronicles #twc fic #twc fanfic #bobby marks #bobby marks x detective #yikes!!!!!!#oc: camilla reyes #dropkicks this and RUNS #no editing we die like men!!!!!#oh also i guess there’s some nate/detective if you squint

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