#god i h8 them so much kat is actual garbage & theyre gonna get married at the end of the season so here u HAVE IT i love them

[possibilistfanfiction]

i just wanna find a god (& i hope she loves me too)

[five SEVEN times kat doesn’t say i love you & one time she does. on ao3 babies]

//

 i just want to find a god (& i hope she loves me too)

 //

  love demands expression. it will not stay still, stay silent, be good, be modest, be seen and not heard, no. it will break out in tongues of praise, the high note that smashes the glass and spills the liquid.

—jeanette winterson, written on the body

 //

 1

 you have never prayed before.

 you were raised on science, on cognition and recognition and you remember from when you were small, your parents talking quietly in the kitchen over a bottle of wine while you pretended to read your independent chapter book for school: to love someone else is to recognize yourself; to know yourself in another, over and over again.

 you weren’t looking for that—you have never prayed before. you slept with boys and let them kiss you and when you touched yourself you didn’t think of them; you closed your eyes and imagined someone else’s hands on your body, someone tasting a path straight up the center of you, and maybe it has taken this long because you were raised to categorize your desire, to think about it and know it and never feel it.

 adena is praying in the morning light and you are in your underwear and you’ve only kissed, fell asleep kissing, fell asleep in her bed, smelling her shampoo, tucking her body against yours: a hand pressed against a hip, the small bones of her spine, the softness of her stomach.

 the words itch under your skin, so unexpected because you’ve never felt them before, you don’t know what they’re supposed to feel like. you’ve been in a church four times in your life, a synagogue twice, once in college you visited a mosque for your world religions class; you are not sure you’ve ever seen anyone pray with this kind of quiet reverence. you’re surprised, the way you want to say them so quickly, so powerfully, you can’t even think them.

 you stand quietly, transfixed and happy, your heart skittering all around your chest.

 adena smiles up at you and you realize, for a brief, brief moment, what worship is; you are almost able to see yourself again in her dark eyes.

 //

 2

 you cannot tell her why you can’t go with her. you love your friends and you love your job, those things you are absolutely sure about. you feel a tug toward her, like the physicists are wrong, have been wrong all this time, and you think this is a different power.

 but you can’t go. you can’t say anything to explain how terrified you are, how you want more than anything in the entire world to get on that plane with her. maybe that’s what stops you, maybe that’s what makes you so difficult and terrified.

 you had touched her last night with more confidence than you felt; the hours were waning and the sun was rising and her body was everything you wanted to know. the heat of her, the softness, the way she grew tighter around your fingers, your lips pressed to the space between her neck and shoulder, the remnants of her perfume. maybe you’re starting to understand worship because your shaking hands came close, the way she sucked in a breath.

 you’ve seen so many boys come, felt them inside of you, and it was easy. it didn’t mean anything, or sometimes it meant something—but it didn’t mean this : adena speaks in a language you don’t know and maybe it’s a command, maybe it’s a blessing, but she presses into you and you think only of the rich color of her skin, your fingers gripping her shoulder blades like wings.

 you’re mortified that you almost cry because you don’t do this, you don’t feel these things, you never have. you chalked it up to your parents and how you can explain anything away and how you’re the fun one, the one with no weights, no tragic backstory, nothing to tie you to anyone.

 ‘it’s okay,’ she says.

 you don’t understand, because it’s not okay, because you have never wanted this much. in college, you paid attention to boys who told you that you were beautiful and let you rant about injustices and laugh about cat memes; you liked pretty libraries in buildings that looked like castles, and parties where the music boomed into your marrow, and usually your communications classes, but your junior year one of your friends had convinced you to take some seminar on myth and feminism. you learned about origins all over the world, beginnings and becomings, the starts and ends of things, tied up in each other; trips to the underworld and trips to heaven and all of the terrible, fantastic earth between. the pomegranate was the fruit eve ate, maybe, and there was a woman before her, maybe, that loved herself too much for adam, and this fucking airport isn’t eden because you cannot go to a holy land with her. persephone ate a pomegranate too, you think you remember, and now there is hell ruled by a queen and spring and winter and celebrations and mournings and grief , you think, in how she opened up to you in the middle of the night like fruit in the dim light.

 you want to tell her, because it wouldn’t be enough but it would be something. but the words get stuck in your throat because they’re true, and they’re holy, and they’re a beginning and an ending; it’s too much and too soon and you hope she understands why you can’t go with her, why you can’t say them, why you would mean them too much for you to bear.

 adena walks onto the plane and you clutch your passport to your chest, stand still and will yourself not to cry; you watch the gate long after her plane has taken off.

 //

 3

 adena is topless, stretched in your shared, big bed, complaining mildly about how sore she is from hiking along the colca canyon all day, when your parents call. you’d been expecting it but you still curse your fucking perfect phone plan with its worldwide coverage that sutton and jane had demanded you get so they could be updated at all times on your trip.

 you roll your eyes and kiss your girlfriend and motion to your phone before you walk onto the balcony attached to your room and shut the door behind you.

 ‘hey.’

 your mother waits a few seconds before clearing her throat. ‘hello, kat,’ she says. ‘where are you?’

 you’re sure you’re on speaker and you’re sure your mother is taking the reins on this one because your father is more anxious, more judgemental, always caring but sterner.

 ‘peru,’ you say, a little thrill shooting through you when you glance inside and adena smiles lazily at you. ‘outside of arequipa.’

 it’s quiet again and then your father asks, ‘why?’

 ‘well,’ you say, and you grab the rail for support. you’re not worried, not really; your parents have always been lgbtq allies and you’re also completely independent; your friends love you, your boss has gotten you into every restaurant adena has ever wanted to try with the full knowledge that you’re dating—your hands are shaking because this girl in your bed has you rattled, has you 3,876 miles away from everything you’ve ever known, has you feeling things you’ve never understood about yourself.

 you take a deep breath and try again. ‘i met someone,’ you tell them. ‘and i needed time off, to just—’ to feel things , you want to say, but that’s confusing and they would psychoanalyze you— ‘to take a break from the city, and work, and to spend time together.’

 ‘that sounds,’ your father clears his throat, ‘relaxing. good for you to get away.’

 ‘i’m here with my girlfriend,’ you say, and it comes out of your mouth just like that: shaky, unsure, more certain than anything you’ve said to them in your whole life.

 a pause, and then your mother says, ‘that’s wonderful, kat.’

 it’s soft, softer than you expected, and you almost sniffle. the adoration you feel for adena has scared the shit out of you but you do know it’s very tender, and special, and it’s changed your identity, how you move through the world, in ways you don’t really know yet. but you know it’s different, because you’ve felt the shift.

 ‘we’re very happy for you. and,’ your dad says, ‘very proud of you.’

 you allow yourself a single tear and then wipe your eyes quickly, because this is a fun vacation and you’re having fun , holding adena’s hand and kissing her in front of the prettiest view you have ever seen, and this is heavier, bigger, more important than all of that.

 ‘thanks,’ you say, small and young and quiet.

 ‘kat,’ your mom says. ‘we love you so much.’

 ‘yeah,’ you say. you bite the inside of your cheek so you don’t start to really cry, because you want to tell them all about her, the set of her shoulders and how she makes you laugh and the remarkable way she sees the world. ‘i have to go. i’ll talk to you when we get back.’

 ‘safe travels,’ your dad says.

 you hang up and breathe a huge breath and let it out, look up at the expanse of stars you can’t see from the city.

 you put your phone down and a few minutes later you hear the door slide open and adena hugs you from behind.

 she’s quiet and she doesn’t press you to say anything, to explain. she kisses your shoulder after a while and says, ‘come back to bed.’

 you turn and smile and kiss her. ‘okay.’

 she lays you down and spreads your legs and takes you in, completely and with so much fullness you don’t know at all what to do other than let her lap at your center until you close your eyes and remember all the stars outside, until you don’t know your own name.

 //

 4

 she’s so beautiful. she’s so beautiful. you take a deep breath because you’re terrified of so, so many things, honestly, but you know that jane was right and that nothing has to be perfect and it’s okay because you—

 you can’t think the words yet but you know they’re true because you relax the moment you taste her. it’s different, and a little odd, but her body responds and you find her clit easily and you know what drives you over the edge—she’s a fucking pro at it, holy shit—and when she twists her hands in the sheets you pause and tug them to your hair.

 she swallows. ‘you sure?’

 it’s ragged and quite possibly the sexiest question you have ever been asked, in all its care and consent, and you feel heat pool between your legs and wow, you never knew pleasuring someone could be this rewarding.

 ‘yes,’ you say, and her pupils are blown and her smile is lazy. ‘are you?’

  ‘kat, ’ she says, tugs you down right where she wants you, and you laugh. ‘i have never been more sure of anything in my life.’

 you kiss down her body and run your tongue along her, inside her, and she guides you gently until she’s close. her fingers twist in your hair and tug and her whole body stills, tenses and tightens and you’ve felt her orgasm before but never quite like this, never with this much power. her hips start to shake and you bring her down gently before she tugs you up and you remember watching people take communion once: the body as offering, drinking the wine as sacred. perdition, benediction.

 ‘holy shit,’ you whisper, mostly to yourself when you sit up and wipe your mouth, but she hears and lets out a very weak, very sated laugh.

 she pulls you toward her and you’re so turned on you sort of want to get yourself off grinding down on her thigh, but you kiss her for now. it’s hard, to not say the words, to not offer them with her like this, boneless and lingering in your mouth.

 ‘you,’ she says, kisses you, ‘are a very fast learner.’

 it makes you laugh, and your kiss is messy and terrible because you can’t stop smiling. her hand snakes down your body, though, and she looks at you very tenderly, and you nod and breathe out a yes and you’re lost in her, thoroughly and genuinely, her body something unknown, familiar, the way she touches you is new every time, practiced and familiar and she whispers words along your skin as she coaxes another orgasm out of you.

 you have begun to pray, you think, like this; it is very hard not to say the words.

 //

 5

 you’re putting your underwear back on so you can actually go to work when she leans forward and touches your hip, traces down your thigh.

 ‘i love these,’ she says, and your heart is suddenly stuck in your throat.

 you know all about body positivity, have been tweeting about it for two weeks now, have been reading extensive articles about women of color and self care—but this is different. ‘my stretch marks?’

 she nods, presses the softest kiss against them. ‘your body made room for you to become,’ she says, like it’s the simplest thing in the world. ‘i enjoyed photographing your friends, but it meant everything to photograph you.’ she sits up further and kisses your cheek. ‘how i see you.’

 it’s too sweet and too honest and too much; no one has ever cared for you like this.

 you kiss the top of her head, linger there for a moment and think the words, hope so much she can feel them.

 ‘i’m late,’ you say, get off the bed.

 her smile is small and she grants you this; you hop into your pants to make her laugh and you think she knows.

 //

 6

 she has a lot of very beautiful, very handsome, very queer friends and suddenly you’re uncomfortable because you don’t know where you belong in this world; you’re unsure and unsteady and very, very worried.

 your chest feels too tight and your stomach knots and the base of your skull prickles when another girl, with gorgeous tattoos and a shaved head and a perfect leather jacket, touches adena’s hand, and it’s a kind of physical reaction you have never felt before, ever .

 you don’t know what it is and you feel stupid, because adena is beautiful and talented and brilliant and queer , and why wouldn’t she have friends who share the same interests, are in the same world?

 you take out your phone and text jane and sutton: sos

 jane texts back first, right away: What’s going on?

  adena has a million friends who might not have been just “friends” and idk , you type.

 sutton’s bubble pops up and you wait a few moments before: kat. are you jealous??

 you take a moment to take stock of all of your physical sensations and then roll your eyes at yourself because that is so your parents that it’s ridiculous, but, yeah, you type, i guess?

 jane responds first: Babe, Adena is crazy about you

 you nod to yourself and text back the a-okay emoji because you can’t do anything other than that, and you order yourself two shots. you wait a few minutes for them to kick in, making distracted and honestly mediocre conversation with a few of adena’s friends and then you walk over to her, smile and ask her to come with you. she furrows her brow but she does, climbs over like four people and they all laugh and you take her hand and lead her to the bathroom and you shove her, rougher than you ever really want to, against the door once you’re inside, and kiss her once.

 ‘kat,’ she says, admonishing and still gentle and you want to cry. she pushes back on your shoulders. you feel like you’re spinning and you’re so angry, so sad and insecure and you hate it; hate that you feel inadequate because adena cares for you so steadfastly and you have a million friends and you have jane and sutton who you’re incredibly tactile with, and adena is with you every day and every night but right now all you want to do is sink to your knees in this dirty bathroom in brooklyn and make sure.

 she cups your cheek and looks at your face closely and says, ‘i’ll see you at home.’ she doesn’t sound gentle but she doesn’t sound too pissed off either, mostly a warning.

 you’re even angrier then, but it’s mostly panic, you think, and you swallow and nod and say, ‘fine,’ sharply. you recognize you’re being immature but it doesn’t feel like you can control it, like you can control anything, and your hands are tingling and you text jane and sutton to meet you at the bar near your apartment.

 they do and you tell them what happened—what you did—and they wait a minute before sutton says, ‘yikes.’

 you sigh and nod because she’s not wrong.

 jane slings an arm over your shoulders and orders you another drink. ‘just talk to her,’ she tells you, firm and gentle. ‘she cares about you, you’re living together, you give her tons of attention. there’s no reason she would cheat.’

 ‘also no reason you should shove her against a bathroom door because you’re jealous,’ sutton says, and you throw a handful of peanuts at her.

 ‘it was not my finest moment.’

 you want to tell them, but you have to tell adena first, she has to be the first to know, because sutton and jane already know everything and from the way they look at you softly you’re sure they know exactly what you so desperately want to say. so you have another drink and you’re truly on your way to very drunk but you feel better, albeit guilty. jane kisses your cheek and sutton slaps your ass and they make you plan brunch, adena included, for the next morning.

 when you get back to your apartment adena is on your couch, reading something in persian, and when you put your things down on the table she looks up. she’s angry and her eyes are red-rimmed and fuck .

 ‘that was not okay,’ she tells you.

 ‘i know,’ you say. ‘i know and i’m sorry, i just—’

 ‘no,’ she says, standing. she’s shorter than you but you feel small. you’ve never had a fight of any sort of romantic consequence before because you’ve never cared about anyone enough to even get close to this kind of anger. ‘you don’t get to make me feel like that.’

 you look down and clench your jaw and you wish you could tell her. you’re drunk and tired and all you want is to get into bed with her and hold her and feel her body pressed into yours, solid and heavy and sure. ‘i’m sorry,’ you say again.

 ‘honestly, kat,’ she says, thinks better of what she’s going to say, shuts her mouth and then shakes her head. ‘they are my friends. you have your friends, and i am not jealous of them.’

 ‘yeah,’ you say, ‘i know.’

 she sighs. ‘you cannot do that again.’

 you nod, a bit of the tension easing in your chest. ‘i just, i—’ you want to, so badly, the words tugging at you like the beginning of the world, the big bang, all the star stuff jane likes to go on about when she’s drunk and emotional. ‘i care about you, so much, adena.’

 her face softens, just a little. you sit at the table, heavy and drunk and exhausted.

 ‘you have to trust me,’ she says, but she walks toward you and squeezes your shoulder. you turn and kiss her wrist.

 ‘i do trust you,’ you tell her. you don’t know how to explain anything else.

 ‘i’ll take the couch tonight,’ she says, and you nod, swallow back tears because she deserves her space, and she deserves full consent, and she deserves gentleness.

 ‘take the bed,’ you tell her. you’re guilty and you don’t want to sleep in it without her.

 she’s already curled up on the couch though, stubborn and you really don’t think you should pick a stupid fight right now, so you walk over to your bed and clumsily take off your shoes, throw your clothes in a pile to be dealt with tomorrow.

 your bed is too big and you can’t fall asleep and maybe an hour later you feel the mattress dip and a slight, strong arm wrap around you, feel warm, sweet breath on the back of your neck.

 ‘i couldn’t sleep without you,’ she admits, very softly, and it makes you start to cry. you want to be embarrassed but you’re too drunk and too tired and the residual anger and jealousy has worn off into sadness—you hurt her.

 you turn over. she wipes your tears in the moonlight, leans forward and kisses you, very softly.

 the words are on your lips and you kiss her with them in your mouth but you have never said them to anyone before and you think, maybe just a little, they would end you. she backs up and kisses your cheek and you can’t say anything, because it seems like they’re the only words you know right now; all that is left of you.

 ‘you taste like tequila,’ she says, and you laugh and she’s your whole world, heaven and hell and pomegranates and shaky hands and this bed, in this room, in this city where you can’t see any of the stars unless you look for them. she’s so beautiful.

 ‘it’s my slutty, try to feel better shot.’ she laughs. ‘i did… a lot of them.’

 ‘i’m still mad at you,’ she says, ‘but i am flattered as well.’

 you roll your eyes and she sighs and burrows into your chest and you tangle your legs.

  she’s mine, your heart says fiercely. she’s mine.

 //

 1

 you’re on the fucking long island rail road because jane had some writer friend from college with a house on the beach and it’s summer and hot and you would complain but your parents are using your hamptons house and they had invited you all but honestly you would much rather not , and this is better than the beaches close to the city, and driving, at any rate, even if it is long island.

 the train goes to a city named babylon, which is apparently a gold mine for jane and adena, who together know more facts about the original babylon than you truly thought was possible.

 ‘ and ,’ jane says, ‘in the judeo-christian old testament, babylon, or babel, was the place where it’s said people tried to build a tower to heaven.’

 sutton smiles at you with fond annoyance and you roll your eyes.

 adena grins. ‘in the book of revelation, the whore of babylon ruled over an evil, apocalyptic kingdom.’

 jane nods eagerly. ‘mystery,’ she says, in a grand voice, ‘babylon the great, the mother of all harlots and abominations of the earth.’

 sutton snorts and you squeeze adena’s hand and she laughs.

 ‘i have been there,’ adena says. ‘to photograph the remains of the old city.’

 jane gets a dreamy look in her eyes, and you know she’s about to ask a billion questions, but sutton interrupts. ‘this is fascinating, but let’s discuss our opinion on edibles at the beach.’

 you laugh and jane scowls and adena kisses your shoulder. your friends bicker about whether jane should eat any, because last time she had gotten so paranoid on your fire escape she started crying about how far it was from the ground.

 you watch adena smile, watch the way she sits, slouched, practiced, worldly in her seat, think about how you had kissed her for ages in your bed this morning, and then on the couch, and then how you had kneeled before her like she was an altar, like the part of her body you wanted to taste the most was sacred.

 your prayers aren’t the same as hers; you say them into her center when she comes and you trace them into her skin when she’s asleep. she has taught you how to want , how to desire and respect and how to worship.

 you have been praying for months now.

 her hijab is pale blue today and it matches the sky, and your friends are making her laugh with some sort of familiarity, some fondness, and you know what really brings them together is you .

 ‘i love you,’ you say, turned toward her, and softly.

 jane and sutton stop talking and you can see their eyes grow wide and adena looks at you with the gravity of every myth, every beginning, every prayer. it’s heavy and peaceful and you think, distantly but in a very concrete way, that you want her for your whole life, that you’re so goddamn lucky.

 ‘uh,’ sutton says, ‘we are going to visit the bathroom.’

 jane nods and gets up and drags sutton with her, but not before she can give you a big thumbs up and grin with a wink.

 you shake your head and turn back to adena, open up your shoulders so you can face her fully.

 ‘sorry,’ you say, ‘i’ve been wanting to tell you for months and i didn’t mean to say it in front of my friends, on this fucking train, but, i just—’

 ‘i love you too,’ she says.

 you can’t help but smile and you wish you could tell her that she’s some sort of god and you think she’s all you’ve ever wanted. but you don’t know the words for that, the way your heart has bloomed in your chest and whenever you’re with her rooms are brighter, are gold, even this train is a kind of sanctuary—how you have mapped the cathedrals of her ribcage and the tattoos like tiles, like patterns, that sprinkle her skin. you’ve mapped her body, all the indentations and little scars and hurts and triumphs; she has done the same to yours: you recognize yourself through her; she is what you know.

 you lean toward her and you’re smiling too hard so you kiss her forehead and her nose and her cheeks and her chin. ‘i love you, i love you, i love you, i love you.’

 she’s laughing and delighted and you said them; you meant them with all your heart.

 she laces your fingers together and nods and sutton and jane come back.

 ‘we ate edibles in the bathroom,’ jane announces. ‘to celebrate.’

 ‘oh god,’ you groan, and sutton grins.

 adena motions toward you.

 ‘you sure you wanna take care of all of us?’

 she shrugs. ‘how hard could it be?’

 ‘i love her too,’ sutton says, and you take a bite of the brownie.

 adena ends up having to spread sunscreen all over jane and sutton because you’re all too stoned to care by the time you actually get to the beach, but she insists. you lie with your head in her lap and she’s the only person in the world who you let touch your hair and she knows that so she runs her fingers through it, scratches at your scalp.

 you squint up at her. ‘you’re so beautiful, adena.’

 ‘you’re high.’

 you shrug. ‘still, very beautiful.’

 she lets supervises you as you all splash around in the ocean even though objectively it’s fucking freezing, and you tug her in to her knees amidst shrieks of protest. she laughs though and you eventually all traipse back to your towels and collect your stuff.

 jane throws up in a trash can on the way to the train and adena makes sure she drinks plenty of water and your feet are kind of numb and tingly so she wraps her arm around your waist.

 she gets you all back to the city and orders jane and sutton a lyft to their apartment and then takes you home, undresses you.

 you’re definitely much less stoned but she feeds you cheese and bread and grapes in bed, getting crumbs everywhere until you’re smiling and sated.

 ‘you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,’ you say.

 ‘i am very glad you are in my life, kat edison.’

 you smile and tug her down, kiss her skin without any pretense, among the remnants of offerings.

 you have said the words and you’re relieved, peaceful, and you fall asleep.

 you wake up first, have to get ready for work. nothing is different, not really.

 she is yours, to cherish and to fight with and to worship. you dip down to kiss her forehead before you go.

 she smiles and snakes the sleepiest hand out from beneath the covers to cup your cheek, doesn’t open her eyes. she runs her knuckles along your skin and you kiss them and she says something in persian; you don’t know the language but you do know what her prayers sound like.

 ‘i love you down to the small bones,’ you tell her. you kiss her once more and head out into the blistering heat, get ready to shoot off a tweet. the sun is warm and when you get home in the evening you will eat her out for two orgasms, long enough that the food in your stove burns and you order pizza, and you will love her then too: you have learned how to pray.