#it’s not that a guy doesn’t want me | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

stellewriites · 2 months ago

Text

PART ONE

summary: by chance you and your emotionally unavailable husband meet a friendly couple that invite you stay at their farmhouse in scotland. however the time spent there with johnny & kyle has you questioning if there's a dark side to them you didn't see before.

a speak no evil au - masterlist

notes: manipulative johnny & kyle, piv, noncon, somno, never explicitly acknowledged abusive relationship between reader and her husband (financial, physical, emotional, coercive control), drinking, murder, it's dead dove horror people!! heed the warnings

you picked at the buttery croissant on the plate in front of you, trying your best to block out the sound of your husband’s voice as it grew more frustrated by the minute. you pitied the poor soul he was berating on the other end of the line, but you couldn’t bring yourself to feel bad enough to try and stop him, to turn his ire against you instead.

he wouldn’t listen to you anyway, hadn’t the first few times you’d asked when you’d first arrived on your honeymoon.

you scoffed quietly and shoved a bite into your mouth, chewing obstinately. two years late, but sure. your honeymoon.

elliot sighed heavily, and threw his phone down onto the table, rattling your coffee and gaining the attention of nearby hotel staff. “i work with fucking idiots, christ. how hard is it to follow instructions?”

“it’s why they keep you around, smartest one on your team,” you said appeasingly, the same rote answer you always gave him when he got in his moods.

“smartest one at the whole fucking firm more like,” he scoffed. you cringed at the scornful looks sent your way from the other couples on the retreat. “useless. the lot of them.”

the french riviera had been a dream destination for you for years, one elliot had known about from early in your dating days. the holiday he’d booked was all inclusive; tailored to honeymooners specifically with romantic activities on and off site and transport easily accessible in order to explore the area.

you felt as though you should’ve been having the time of your life as you sat eating breakfast looking over the beautiful beach view, but you’d never felt emptier. the sight of happy couples around you day after day had only highlighted your husband’s distance.

elliot had promised this trip would change things for you both, for your relationship, but the last six days had proven the opposite. if he wasn’t busy and distracted on his phone, elliot was complaining about the quality of the food, the amenities, even the bloody people.

it was too much and just the morning before you’d been tempted to ask him to cut the fortnight away short when he’d gotten an urgent email and then a frantic call from his boss.

you’d sighed in relief when he’d left you to wander the local area by yourself for the day; happy to escape his negativity for an hour even as you felt guilty for thinking so. you knew he worked hard, you knew his job was important, and his work meant you could afford your luxury apartment in London and be able to take trips like this one without stressing over the cost.

you’d taken the time to go to the market you’d read about on the plane, the place des lices, and tried every free sample of cheese that had been waved your way once you’d gotten there. but you hadn’t been the only one from your hotel to take advantage of the famous food stalls as you recognised the deep scottish brogue of one half of the couple that were staying in the room next to yours; it rose even above the busy hum of french chatter easily.

you’d turned your head and smiled when you caught his pretty husband’s eyes before turning back to the stall merchant and buying a chunk of fresh camembert for elliot to try. you’d been eyeing up the fruit stall further down and were debating the brie too if you spotted some good cranberry jam.

“you’re from the hotel, right?” you suddenly heard from your left. you turned to find the couple a lot closer than before, apparently taking your polite smile as invitation to join you. “i’ve seen you at the pool before. I’m kyle, this is my husband, johnny.”

“nice t’meet ye.”

you’d introduced yourself and shook their hands once your cheese was carefully packed into your tote bag.

“where’s yer chatty husband?” johnny asked, eyes scanning the crowd.

you flushed, a creeping sense of embarrassment rising as you thought of elliot back at the hotel shooing you off before you’d even sat for breakfast.

“oh he had some emergency at work he had to deal with,” you excused. “didn’t need me hanging around distracting him, so i went for a walk.”

“you’re on your own?” kyle asked with a concerned frown.

“yeah, but i don’t mind. i travelled alone a lot before we were together. i’m used to my own company,” you said with a soft laugh.

the pair swapped a silent look before focusing back on you. “well, we’d be happy to have ye if you’re feeling lonely, bonnie,” johnny offered. “we were thinkin’ of goin’ wine tasting after this now that we’ve got our snacks, if you’d like to join.”

you chuckled as johnny raised their bag and wiggled his eyebrows.

“i wouldn’t want to intrude.” you shook your head.

“it beats heading back to the hotel,” kyle cajoled. “unless you had other plans?”

you pursed your lips before letting a small, shy smile grow. “ok. wine tasting sounds fun.”

you had spent the afternoon laughing and eating the cheese, bread and fruits you’d bought at the market over glasses of wine with johnny and kyle, a wide smile never leaving your lips even as the three of you stumbled back up the steps to the hotel.

your phone had stayed silent the entire day and it wasn’t until you were waving goodbye to your new friends and opening the door to your hotel room that you wondered if elliot would be annoyed at you for staying out so long without contacting him.

you smiled a little shakily as you caught him leaving the bathroom with a towel slung around his hips. “good day?”

“fixed their mess if that’s what you mean,” elliot huffed, but he turned to you with a satisfied smile and nodded. he dipped his head down and kissed you sweetly. “what about you? good day?”

“mhm,” you hummed, your smile settling more firmly on your face at his easy mood. “i went wine tasting.”

“oh?” elliot grinned, looking at you a little closer and taking in the signs of your slight inebriation, the way you swayed slightly on your feet and the almost sleepy glaze over your eyes.

“met a few new friends,” you said. “johnny and kyle.”

elliot stiffened for a moment before smiling again, less genuine and with a sharper edge this time. “oh? that’s nice. i’ll be free to spend the day doing whatever you’d like tomorrow, darling. no need for friends on our honeymoon.”

“you will?” you asked as you started to undress, surprised he wasn’t asking for an extra day to check everything with work had settled. you didn’t look the gift horse in the mouth however. “there’s a great market i saw today we could go to. i wouldn’t mind going twice, the cheese is amazing—“

“sure, sure. fine. let’s just sleep now, yeah? i’m exhausted after today,” elliot interrupted as he dried himself off before climbing into bed.

“of course, yeah. we can figure it out over breakfast.”

which brought you back to now, with your croissant and your husband and your beach view and the ever growing pit of disappointment.

you skimmed your eyes over the other couples sat on the veranda with you and felt jealousy bubble and spit in your stomach. it was the small things you longed for, the easy affection you craved; legs hooked together under the table, feeding each other, shy smiles shared behind mugs, little jokes whispered on the breeze.

you felt tears prickle at your eyes unexpectedly and wiped at them hastily before elliot could notice.

“bonnie?” your head whipped up at the familiar voice and you smiled automatically at johnny and kyle as they made their way over. johnny was in a pair of shorts, and you saw a knee brace peek out from the hem.

“mind if we join you?” kyle asked, already pulling out a chair at your eager nod, ignoring the deep frown on elliot’s face.

“and you are?” elliot asked rudely, looking between the two men.

“this is johnny and kyle, the couple i told you about last night.” you laid a gentle hand on elliot’s forearm.

“oh, the wine tasters. right.”

“heard you were busy saving yer boss’ arse yesterday,” johnny said with a pinched smile. “yer bonnie wife didnae mention what ye did though?”

“i work for a powerful man looking after his money,” elliot explained vaguely, with an air of condescension.

you noticed kyle wave over a waitress and quietly order for both him and johnny, his palm settled firmly on johnny’s thigh beneath the table.

“oh aye? tha’s a lotta responsibility then. no wonder yer always looking so stressed on yer phone,” johnny laughed.

“oi, be nice, john,” kyle scolded, but the smile teasing the corner of his lips took away any bite the reprimand held.

“sorry, uh, emmet, was it?”

“elliot,” you corrected quickly.

johnny snapped his fingers and nodded. “right, right. sorry, my memory’s not what it used to be.” he waved at a rough scar at the side of his head.

“so how long have you two been together?” kyle asked as their drinks arrived. you saw elliot sniff at the vast amount of sugar kyle poured into his tea.

“five years,” you answered at the same time elliot answered, four years. you turned to him with a frown. “we’ve been married for two. we met before your promotion, remember?”

“are you sure, darling?” elliot asked.

“yes, elliot. i’m sure.”

kyle and johnny watched silently, eyebrows raised until you turned back to your croissant with a tense jaw.

“time flies ‘n all that,” johnny said, hoping to ease your tension.

“right.” you nodded. “what about you guys? been together long?”

“been stuck with him for a decade now,” kyle huffed, patting his hand on johnny’s leg.

“been blessed by me, more like, cheeky sod,” johnny muttered.

you laughed as kyle leant in to kiss his cheek obnoxiously. “met in the forces, just clicked.”

“been together ever since i caught him starin’ in the showers,” johnny boasted with a grin.

elliot shifted uncomfortably in his chair and johnny’s grin dropped minisculely and his eyes hardened.

“what’re yer plans today then, bonnie?”

“oh, uhm, we’re not quite sure yet,” you said looking to elliot. “maybe the market since elliot missed it yesterday?”

“you should join us on our cruise along the coast,” kyle said. “just us and the captain, and a fair bit of booze; views are meant to be unmissable.”

“sounds better than a market,” elliot chuffed before shrugging. “sure, why not?”

“really?” you were more than surprised elliot was willingly agreeing to spend more time with kyle and johnny given how on edge he’d been just sat with them the last ten minutes.

“what d’ye say, bon?” johnny leant over the small table with a smile, taking up enough space for you to feel surprisingly cornered.

“pretty hard to say no to ‘unmissable’,” you said and forced a laugh.

“great,” kyle said and johnny slumped back into his seat, throwing an arm around the back of kyle chair. “we’ve got an hour before we’re meant to be there so eat up, love.”

elliot bristled at their familiarity with you and wrapped his own arm around the back of your chair, his hand curling around your shoulder and squeezing just a tad too tight. “she’s already eaten.”

“what, that little pastry?” johnny laughed. “you’ll need yer energy for what we’ve got planned, hen.” johnny winked.

you felt yourself flush involuntarily, your heart thumped and your eyes widened at the accidental insinuation and you knew elliot had heard it the same way going by the agitated tap of his leg beneath the table.

“i’ll probably just have another coffee,” you said placating, and smiled thinly when elliot kissed your temple. “i can grab something for on the boat or afterwards maybe.”

“that’s my girl,” elliot spoke into your hair.

---

while kyle and johnny finished up their breakfast, you nipped back into your room to change into your swimwear underneath your dress and met them along with elliot at the steps leading down to the beach.

once you’d left the dock and were deep enough in the water that it became a mesmerising dark blue, it didn’t take much convincing to have you jump in the water with johnny as the boat idled in place. elliot had waved you off with a dismissive glance at his phone when you asked if he’d join and kyle had promised to have the towels ready when you’d both ran out of energy.

“not joining them?” elliot asked, sparing a quick glance at kyle as he sat down next to your husband.

“figured i’d keep you company ‘til johnny climbs back on board. we’re temporary neighbours after all, yeah?” kyle said. he looked over the side of the boat and shook his head at his husband splashing you despite your giggly squeals of outrage. “married for two years?” he asked out of the blue and waited for elliot to hum his agreement. “what you doing on a honeymoon trip then, if you don’t mind me asking?”

elliot sighed frustratedly as he locked his phone and put it down beside him, knowing he was going to get nothing done with kyle yammering by his side. “we’re busy people, only just found the time together to go.”

kyle raised his eyebrows in shock. “busy indeed.” he looked to elliot’s phone. “got any photos of the wedding?”

elliot nodded once, and not enthusiastically enough for kyle’s liking, as he pulled up the photo folder you’d made on his phone titled ‘happily ever after 🩷’ before handing it to kyle to flip through.

the younger man whistled lowly, eyes glued to the screen as he pinched and moved the photos to zoom in. elliot noticed how he paused on the photos of you, but flicked through the others quickly, not bothering to stop quick enough to take in your bridesmaids’ dresses or the expensive tiered cake or elliot’s flash suit.

he snatched his phone back when kyle licked his lips at a photo of you dancing with your friends.

“lovely gown,” kyle said with a smirk as he watched elliot seethe. “you really got lucky, eh? punching up like that.”

elliot’s eyes squinted in a glare. “excuse me?”

“come on, mate. you can be honest, it’s why you worry about the job, right? you want to keep that going for you so she doesn’t leave you in the dust,” kyle continued to goad him.

“it’s not me that needs to worry about being left behind,” elliot spat. he rubbed his hand over his mouth and jaw to hide his burgeoning smug look, but kyle saw it in his eyes, the self-satisfaction. “i’ve got options. plenty at that.”

kyle stared at him with a blank face. “oh yeah?”

elliot laughed meanly and dropped his hand. “oh yeah.” he tapped his phone against his palm for a moment, seemingly debating something before freezing as he heard you and johnny climb the short ladder back up to the deck, laughing all the while.

“done in already?” kyle asked, his mood already lighter.

“johnny’s knee is aching, thought he could rest it and we’d get a quick drink,” you answered with a wide smile, reaching for one of the beers stored in the boats built-in cooler and handing one to johnny.

“bonnie was jus’ telling me how she used to live in a much smaller area when she was younger,” johnny said as you both sat down opposite to your partners. “but you live in london now?”

“what is it with you two? always asking bloody questions,” elliot complained, hiding his unease behind a laugh.

“just making conversation, mate,” kyle said tersely.

you felt the air grow awkward and jumped in before your husband could make it worse.

“we moved to london for elliot’s work,” you said.

“and you like it?” kyle’s inquisitive, dark eyes had you willing to be more truthful than you would usually be, especially with near strangers.

“i have to admit… i’d always thought we’d be somewhere further from the city; its what i’d always wanted and elliot said he’d liked the idea of somewhere quieter. we met in my home town after all.” you caught elliot’s scornful eye and ducked your head. “but it just didn’t go that way in the end. and london is lovely, the apartment is— lovely.”

“you ever been to scotland?” johnny asked. “the countryside is like nothin’ you’ve ever seen up there.”

kyle nodded. “we’ve lived on the edge of falkland for a few years now; feels like the middle of nowhere sometimes. doesn’t get much better, i haven’t missed the city for years.”

“one of the best decisions we ever made,” johnny agreed, leaning over to kiss gaz softly.

you sighed wistfully.

“don’t think the hills would agree with my dear wife, but maybe we’ll take a trip up there some time,” elliot said unconvincingly. you swallowed thickly at his thinly veiled dig.

“when you’re not so busy, yeah?” kyle said staring your husband down.

elliot’s lips thinned. “yeah.”

“so how’re you finding france so far?” johnny asked. “enjoying yer stay?”

elliot sniffed. “could be better. from how this one went on about the place i was expecting a hell of a lot more,” he said snidely, gesturing to you flippantly. “i’d have picked bali personally.”

your shoulders hunched even as you felt indignation and anger burn the back of your throat. it wasn’t your fault elliot wasn’t taking advantage of the holiday, the lush area and the activities that promised to be unforgettable if given the chance. you knew you’d remember going in the sea with johnny for years to come, but you doubted you’d remember the boring dinners you’d been having with elliot in a month’s time, or at least not so fondly.

“think i’d have put the trip off for longer if i knew what this place was going to be like,” elliot laughed. “in fact—“

“why don’t you shut the fuck up fer once and let yer pretty wife speak, eh?” johnny cut him off with a sarcastic smile.

elliot was shocked into silence and you found yourself stuttering as kyle and johnny focused on you.

“what do you do when you’re not on a late honeymoon, love?” kyle asked.

“uhm, i don’t actually work currently,” you admitted sheepishly, your eyes darted to your husband as he grew redder in the face. “elliot makes enough to cover us financially and finding something in london was harder than expected after i had to suddenly quit my previous job when we moved.”

kyle and johnny cooed sympathetically.

“i’ve picked up painting recently though, which has been different. not necessarily any good at it, but i like it,” you said.

“an artist? yer after my heart, hen. i sketch a little myself,” johnny said. “now ye’ll have to come visit us just so you can paint the views.”

kyle was quick to pull out his phone to share some photos. he stopped on one of johnny on the top of a steep, grassy hill; his arms thrown up the air, backpack on the ground next to him and a wide grin stretched across his face, his mohawk a little longer than it was now and a mess in the wind.

“wow, it’s gorgeous there,” you gushed, trying not to focus on johnny’s strong stance highlighted by the rising sun behind him.

“that’s the view just behind our house,” kyle grinned. “forty minute hike to get there, at most.”

you gawped. “no way.”

johnny nodded.

“think you’re maybe overestimating her painting skills there, boys,” elliot snickered as he looked at the photo. “if you saw what she’s done so far you’d realise it’s definitely just a new hobby.”

“show us,” kyle suggested kindly, not bothering to look at elliot.

you hesitated before reaching for your bag and pulling out your phone. you handed it over with a shy smile.

“oi, these are good, bonnie,” johnny said immediately, stood looking over kyle’s shoulder. his brow was pulled into a frown as he concentrated.

“i’d buy ‘em,” kyle added, looking up at you to smile.

“ha! right, yeah,” you laughed, thinking he was teasing. you put down your beer and took your phone back, dropping it into your bag. you leant in to kiss elliot’s cheek and stood. “who’s going to join me in the water? elliot?”

“i don’t think so, darling. maybe another time,” he said.

“i will.” kyle stood. “did johnny show you how to dive off the front?”

your eyes widened in excitement as you shook your head and followed him, waving at the captain sat at the helm of the small boat as you passed.

johnny watched the pair of you go before turning to glare at elliot silently, not breaking eye contact even as your husband frowned and shifted uneasily, eventually looking down at his phone to avoid johnny’s unwavering, cold gaze.

---

“i don’t like them,” elliot said once you were back in your hotel that evening.

“who? johnny and kyle?”

“who else?” elliot scoffed. “they’re too familiar with you, they— they fawn over you. flirt relentlessly, in front of me—“

“oh come on,” you laughed, unable to stop yourself even as elliot grew angrier at your casual dismissal. “they’re married, don’t be bloody daft.”

“don’t call me stupid.” elliot warned.

“i’m not, i just—“

“whether they’re actually interested in you or not isn’t the point,” elliot seethed. “they’re doing it to wind me up. to get away with humiliating me and you encourage them.”

“i— what? we were just having fun,” you said.

“oh i know, i saw how you clung to them in the water when you thought i wasn’t looking. fucking slut.”

you gaped at elliot, taken aback by his harsh words and sharp tone. you took in a deep breath and tried to level your own voice.

“they’re just friendly.” you bit your cheek. “if anything, you’re just jealous i’m getting more attention than you for once.”

“what was that?” elliot whipped around to face you and you felt your blood run cold even before he took a step towards you. he gripped you roughly by the back of your neck and tugged you forward so his lips rested at your temple and you followed limply, keeping your hands by your sides. “you better not play up tomorrow, darling. whatever they offer, we’re busy. this our honeymoon, not a fucking jolly for you to try and meet other men.”

you seethed in his hold, furious at his accusations and the irony of his ill-placed jealousy. but all the same you nodded gently. “ok, elliot.”

“good.” he kissed your round cheek with a loud, sarcastic smack before turning towards the bathroom. he shed his clothes as he walked, leaving them in a trail you knew he expected you to pick up and closed the door behind him, leaving you stood motionless in the centre of the hotel room.

---

you dodged johnny’s bright grin and kyle’s sweet invites to hang out over the last week of your holiday with a pained grimace.

after the first few mornings of suddenly stilted conversation over breakfast, they stopped joining you and elliot and you were happy they were able to continue enjoying their honeymoon even if you weren’t.

elliot didn’t say in so many words, but he didn’t trust you not to gallivant off if left alone like before, so you were stuck waiting in the admittedly lavish hotel room on the days elliot got pulled back into work over the phone and on his laptop. too important to leave until later, he’d said. but he’d promised each time to take you out for a dinner that had continued to be forgotten about.

with only a few days left you were stuck waiting by the road, the little moped you’d rented for the day parked and so far unused while elliot nipped back up to the hotel to grab his sunglasses. it’d been twenty minutes already and part of you wondered if he’d gotten lost. you wished he’d left the keys with you instead of pocketing them so you could keep yourself entertained with a quick ride around the block, get used to the feel of the bike before joining onto the main road.

a squeaky horn, two beeps in quick succession, had you flinching from your moody thoughts and looking up as kyle and johnny pulled to a stop in front of you.

“long time no see, love,” kyle said. he nodded down at the bike with a grin. “where you off to?”

“and can we join?” johnny asked with a waggle of his eyebrows.

you snorted. “nowhere. not until elliot comes back at least.” you shrugged. “he’s got the keys,” you explained.

“how about we take you for a quick ride then,” johnny offered and kyle immediately started getting off from behind him.

“no, no i couldn’t. thank you. elliot will be back any second, im sure,” you said quickly, worried elliot would grow mad if he saw you sat behind johnny on the bike.

“ok, love,” kyle placated. “how about we swap numbers then, in case we don’t get to see you before your trip is up? i want to see more of your paintings.”

“we’re off home in about two days or so, figured yours would be about the same,” johnny said.

“what about email?” you suggested instead. your couples therapist had suggested regularly reading each others texts to try and gain back trust between the pair of you. the irony that it was now you trying to hide a conversation in your phone wasn’t lost on you, but you knew elliot wouldn’t want you talking to them after this trip. “i can get pretty chatty in a text, so email might be better,” you lied flimsily.

“sure,” johnny nodded along, clearly not believing you. “whatever you’d like.”

“you can have john’s email,” kyle said with a smirk, the expression growing when the scot sighed and swatted at kyle’s thigh behind him.

you watched them with confused amusement until johnny read out his email.

[email protected]

“wow. that’s very myspace of you,” you laughed even as johnny rolled his eyes.

“soap’s an old nickname, you’ll probably hear me call him gaz sometimes too. old habits,” johnny explained.

“from the military?” you confirmed and they nodded.

“i say it when i want him to listen. gets him standing to attention when i call him soap,” kyle said teased.

“anything you do gets me standing to attention, handsome,” johnny said, sultry and playful.

“oh piss off,” kyle laughed as he pushed johnny’s face away, pretending to groan in disgust when johnny caught his wrist and messily kissed his palm. you felt your stomach clench at the brief sight of his tongue poking between kyle’s fingers, lapping at the webbing before he let him go.

his tongue there and gone again in a second. you’d almost think you’d imagined it if you didn’t see the spit glisten in the sun before kyle wiped it on his shorts.

you blinked to clear your head and turned away even as the thought of johnny’s mouth around kyle’s fingers replayed over and over in your head.

turning away meant you caught sight of elliot making his way back. it had your thoughts sobering and you looked back to the couple with an apologetic smile. “i’ll see you guys later hopefully, but if not i hope you enjoy the rest of your honeymoon guys.”

“ye trying to get rid o’ us?” johnny pouted, mischief clear in his eyes.

“no, but I know elliot will want to set off straight away so—“

“we know when we’re not wanted, love,” kyle sighed, winking at you to soften the words and let you know they weren’t offended, just pulling your pigtails. “take a hint, johnny, let’s go check out the beach.”

“aye aye, sir,” johnny saluted lazily before revving the moped back to life and waving at you over his shoulder.

“ready to go?” you jumped slightly at elliot’s voice behind you, you hadn’t realised he was so close already and when you turned around you could see he was tense.

“ready when you are,” you said and moved out of the way of the bike.

elliot didn’t mention johnny or kyle and you were thankful; the day had barely begun, you didn’t need an argument to ruin it already.

you swung your leg over the bike behind him and cuddled close, smiling when elliot rubbed a warm palm over your bare knee next to his thigh. today could be good if you just let it, you reminded yourself as elliot set off clumsily.

you lifted your head from his back once he’d managed to get the hang of controlling the moped a little better, becoming confident on the roads after a few minutes, but you wished you hadn’t.

his collar was rustling in the wind and had slipped loose around his shoulder, revealing a smudged lipstick mark previously hidden by his button up overshirt. you felt your breath hitch, unable to look away even as your eyes started to burn.

your gut clenched and rolled unpleasantly, like you could throw up any moment but your jaw was firmly clenched closed. your hands shook where they were holding elliot at the waist and you finally clenched your eyes closed.

with trembling lips, you held back a sob.

today could be good if you let it, you repeated. so let it.

---

you didn’t see kyle or johnny before you left and you didn’t mention what you saw to elliot either.

instead you went back to london, to the dreary rain and the empty flat and the weekly couples’ appointments.

you lied when your therapist asked how your honeymoon went. you grinned and turned to elliot with wide sparkling eyes and reach for his hand to hold between yours as you simpered, “simply perfect.”

but it wasn’t and elliot new it.

the breaking point was when johnny sent your throw-away email account a message one afternoon with a photo attached at the bottom. you grinned when it loaded on your laptop and you zoomed in to see your smiling face, then kyle’s, then johnnys.

it had been taken on the boat on your way back to the dock after a long day swimming and drinking and laughing. elliot had kept to himself for most of the trip unless spoken to, but after an hour you’d managed to ignore him well enough. it wasn’t until kyle pulled him up on your way back, slapped his phone into elliot’s hand and asked him to take a photo of the three of you with the water and island in the background that you remembered he was there.

“elliot, be a good lad and take the photo for us won’t ya?”

“why not ask the captain—“

“he’s done enough dealing with us fer the day, aye? oh— wait, did ye want tae be in it with us?”

“no. thank you.”

they’d thrown their arms around you, pushing and pulling you to their liking until you were stood by the edge of the boat, and smiled. your shoulders were sensitive where johnny’s arm laid over the top - sunburnt you thought at the time - and your hair was still wet from your last dip, but your smile was wide and glowing even as elliot had gritted his teeth.

despite his grumbles he’d done as asked and you’d been dying to see the photo ever since when johnny cooed, “aw, lovely photo to remember ya by.”

now you felt your cheeks heat as you saw how your swim shorts had rucked up high on your thighs, damp and clinging, showing off more skin than you’d realised. your swimsuit at least covered your stomach and cleavage well enough, though johnny’s hand on your shoulder held one of the thick strings of your suit where it had tied at the back of your neck. he was in the middle of playing with it, tugging it so it was taut but not enough to loosen the bow. you don’t remember feeling him pull at the string holding your suit up over your breasts, though you were distracted by the tight hold gaz had on your waist, the handful he’d grabbed as he knocked your hips together.

god no wonder elliot had gotten mad that evening. if you hadn’t known the two were married, you’d have assumed they were trying to get between your legs by this photo alone.

you read the message johnny had sent along with it.

missin you and yer sweet laugh, bonnie!

forgot to send the photo earlier, i think the three of us look well fit, we’ll have to go swimming gain sometime. gaz suggested leucate plage if yer still in love wih france, but im sure there’s a few different au naturel beaches we could try ;)

you sputtered a laugh at that, scoffing at the idea of going to a nude beach especially with those two. bloody hell, elliot would have a fit, you thought gleefully.

but for now we thought you could come visit us like we’d said before? the countryside could be good for you and the ol’ ball n chain. we’d be happy t have ye both for the week, we’ve got the room. just let us know, yeah?

yer handsome pal,

johnny

you shook your head at his theatrics. emailing johnny felt like having a slightly unhinged penpal and reading his emails never failed to brighten up your day, you could hear him in the way he typed. you also loved when you assumed gaz would steal the phone to use his account to talk to you, the lack of scots and shorthand was always a dead giveaway between the two.

you bit your lip and found some of the photos he’d sent previously of their home and garden. it was gorgeous simply put and although the anxiety of admitting to elliot that you’d kept in contact with them had your palms sweating, the deep urge to go visit them ultimately won out.

you bit the bullet over dinner that same night. steak, specially made to soften elliot’s mood.

not that it helped much.

“what?” he dropped his cutlery and pushed back from his seat, needing distance from you as he processed you’d been lying to him. “why would you do that?”

you didn’t have an answer. or not one that elliot would like, so you felt yourself begin to shrug before you thought back to your last session.

“our therapist said it could be good for the relationship if i made some friends separate to yours,” you said.

“she also said you needed to focus trying more with my friends,” elliot reminded.

“but your friends aren’t offering to stay with us for a week in the highlands, elliot. if they were then i’d be all for it!”

“so if i tell my friends that we’ll spend christmas at the ski lodge with them this year, you won’t whine about wanting to be at home together, this time,” he challenged.

you swallowed. he knew you hated skiing and his bitchy judgmental rich friends. it wasn’t even as though it was his easy going friends that liked to go, it was the worst of the bunch that purposely left you out or talked down to you, made it impossible to try without embarrassing yourself.

but fine. you could deal with that this year if it meant your friendship with kyle and johnny was allowed to grow.

“sure,” you said with an obviously fake casual shrug. “so we can go?”

elliot huffed. you sprung out your next argument.

“our therapist also said it was important to let me take the lead a few times. in order to let me regai—“

“regain some power in the relationship, yeah, i know. i was there.” elliot nodded. he seemed to think it over. “this will help you trust me again?”

you reached across the table and held his hand, smiling at him hopefully when he looked back at you. you tried not to think of the lipstick stain in france, tried not to let the hurt cloud you eyes. “yes.” you stood and walked to stand by his chair, chest warming when he wrapped an arm around your waist. “the honeymoon felt forced,” you admitted, making sure to keep eye contact even as he stiffened. “we both felt it, you can admit it, i’m not mad. but this would be new and an adventure. like old times, elliot.”

he nodded a little less resignedly. “sure, old times. ok.”

you smiled, dipped down to kiss him deeply, rubbing his clean shaven cheek with your thumb.

“thank you. this will be fun, i promise. we’ll get to relax and just spend some time together, yeah? no pressure of what we should be doing as a couple or at work or— or—“

elliot softened as he looked at you stutter to find another reason. “yes, darling. it’ll be good.”

you stepped out of his grasp.

“i’ll let them know we can go, what date do you think would be best?”

---

“fucking hell, you had one job. look out for the stupid carved owl in the tree and that’s when we know to turn left,” elliot seethed as he drove, the sun growing dimmer by the minute. you’d spent the entire day driving up north using the directions, had set off that saturday morning in hopes that the traffic wouldn’t be as busy as midweek. “so where are we now? you insisted on following their directions instead of using the satnav, so where the hell does it mention this endless fucking shitty, unpaved road? eh?”

you hunched down in your seat next to him and reread the instructions from soap, hoping to find a clue as to where you were on the, admittedly adorable yet detailed, map he’d drawn. you’d found it endearing when you’d first saw it but now you were thinking it was more of a necessity.

elliot snatched your phone from your hand and split his focus between the dark road and your phone, scrolling erratically to find the directions in the email he wanted. your hand hovered between you, eager to take your phone back but hesitant to foul his mood further.

your eyes caught on movement on the road and you quickly gripped the wheel to swerve and avoid hitting a deer that had wandered out from the trees. “fuck, elliot, watch out!”

he slammed on the breaks and dropped your phone into your footwell as he automatically gripped the wheel to take over from you.

you both sat still, panting; anxiety and adrenaline pumping through your body as you tried to tell it and brain that you were fine, it could calm down, you were ok. you rubbed at your shoulder where your seatbelt had dug in.

elliot started up the car again, silent, and went slower down the road until the headlights caught on a misshapen tree. you squinted before pointing it out. “here, look. i think that’s the owl, go left.”

it only took a few minutes before you could see the lights from kyle and johnny’s farmhouse. the shape of their barn and surrounding smaller outbuildings stark against the natural curves of the hills and trees they were settled amongst.

“we’re here,” you said excitedly. “they said to pull around the side of the barn to the garage they have at the side. their house should be riiight there.” you grinned as you parked directly in front of it on the gravel next to their truck.

“great,” elliot said sarcastically. you didn’t mention his tone knowing that having to drive all day, several hours longer than you’d both expected, would have rankled anyone’s mood.

you climbed out without a word and got your bags out of the back of the car. when you rounded back to the front you found johnny and kyle walking to meet you already, their front door left open behind them.

“bonnie! ye made it,” johnny said as he jogged over to you excitedly. you let go of your suitcase as he pulled you into a hug as soon as you were close enough, scuffing his stubble against your neck in his excitement.

“down, boy,” kyle laughed, nudging johnny out of the way to give you his own hug. once he pulled back he nodded to elliot and smirked. “thought you’d maybe gotten lost, we were ready to start a search party.”

elliot bristled but johnny spoke up before he could defend himself.

“aye, but tea is still warm and ready to be served, an’ ahm fucking starving so let’s get inside yeah?” johnny slapped elliot’s shoulder before leading you all to the house. “done a big roasty fer the pair a’ye, so i hope yer hungry.”

the heat encompassed you as soon as you stepped inside, led through to the kitchen-stroke-dining room. the food smelled divine and the warmth accumulated from the oven and the fireplace had your shoulders relaxing instantly.

the house was far from modern with its mismatched old wooden chairs around the handmade table and the well-loved couch you could spot through in the next room, nothing like your lifeless flat in london. but the farmhouse was still stylish in its own way, in the colour of the cabinets, the throw on couch, the wallpaper leading up the stairs. though more importantly, it was homely. lived in.

“i can imagine the drive wasnae easy for first timers, so sit yerselves down and i’ll plate the food, gaz’ll get the wine,” johnny said.

you pulled out the chair next to elliot, leaving the two opposite you empty.

johnny clapped his hands as if to say voilà when he put down your heaped plates a minute later.

“this looks amazing, johnny, you cooked this?” you asked, eyes round and barely stopping yourself from digging in to be polite.

“have a great sous chef,” he said and patted kyle’s arse when he passed by with the wine. kyle smirked.

“how did you find the drive up, seriously?” kyle asked as he poured your drinks. he took a seat with johnny and gestured for you to start eating; now with permission, you didn’t hesitate.

“it was fine. might’ve been easier if we were given an address instead, satnav might’ve made it quicker,” elliot said as he pushed around some of the steamed vegetables on his plate.

“the views made taking our time worth it though, the valleys we passed were gorgeous,” you gushed. “i didn’t realise there were so many small lakes too.”

elliot sniffed irritably, but you didn’t notice. in fact you’d barely noticed how he played with his food more than ate it as you were too busy chatting and eating. you were going crazy for the hearty roast dinner, you could see in the colour and in the bursting taste of the veg just how fresh it all was; nothing like the store bought stuff you usually got at home.

you hadn’t had anything home cooked in so long that you hadn’t made yourself, and when you told kyle and johnny so they both reared back as though slapped.

“oh love, you’re missing out, that’s not right. don’t worry we’ll take care of you while you’re here,” kyle promised.

elliot cleared his throat. “got any salt?”

johnny’s eyes flickered tersely from elliot to the roast beef he was poking on his plate and back up again. “sure. let me just grab it for ye.”

“cheers,” elliot smiled thinly.

“top up?” kyle asked and gestured to your wine glass. you nodded before turning to elliot, but he wasn’t looking your way so you held your glass out.

“thanks. god, after this and the long drive i think i’ll be ready for bed; sorry excuse for company on the first night,” you apologised.

“we’re just happy to have you here,” kyle assured you as johnny sat back down. your husband doused his food in salt before making a better dent in it, downing his wine quickly afterwards with a wince.

“yeah, i think it’ll be an early one for us tonight, won’t it, darling?” elliot said and started to stand, rudely pushing his unfinished plate away. “in fact, i think i’m pretty tired now.”

you looked down at the last few bites of your meal and the full glass of wine forlornly but stood alongside elliot.

“it really was a fantastic meal, thank you so much, johnny,” you said.

“anytime for you, hen,” he said. “here, let us show you to your room.”

“i’ll grab the dishes while you take them up, johnny. you cooked so i’ll clean,” kyle said, hooking a finger in johnny’s jeans to catch his attention when he stood up. you felt a sharp pang at their easy domesticity. sure they’d said they’d known each other, been together, for a decade, but it still ached that you and elliot where struggling so obviously in comparison despite your sixth anniversary nearing on the horizon.

you gave kyle a fragile smile as you followed johnny upstairs with your bags to your room for the week.

“i’ll leave you to it, see ye in the morning,” johnny said as you settled into your room.

“this is amazing,” you said with a small laugh, disbelief and joy mixing into something like hope as you started to get undressed. the view out of your bedroom looked over the front garden and you felt giddy at the idea of staying with your new friends for the next few days and exploring the area further.

“it’s… quaint,” elliot said.

you turned to him, your mouth pulled tight. “please don’t start.”

“what? it’s just… smaller than what we’re used to,” he said with a shrug, starting to laugh as he gestured at the room. “i mean look at this place, and the bed.”

“keep your voice down at least, elliot,” you hissed, eyes sharp on the closed door of your bedroom.

“darling, you know i get overheated easily, and by the looks of it we’re going to be pressed side by side all night. and i doubt they have a/c,” elliot huffed. he sat down on the bed and rolled his eyes when it squeaked. “oh, come on.”

“we could open the window,” you said stubbornly, ignoring elliot as he shifted to make the bed squeak again.

“and let in the smell of sheep shit? not your brightest idea,” he scoffed. “christ and never mind the bloody noise on top of that. good thing i brought my ear plugs or i’d never get any sleep.”

you bit your tongue when you thought of the constant traffic noises that flooded into your apartment at all times of the day and night, the light pollution that did its best to creep past your blackout curtains.

“i’m sure you’ll get used to it after the first couple of nights,” you said instead and moved to join him in bed. you reached for his hand and squeezed it, leaning in for a kiss, teasing your tongue at his lips for a split second before pulling back. “just… please be nice?”

he sighed.

“fine,” he conceded. “i was just expecting something a little nicer considering the price of the trip we met them on.”

you scowled at him and let go of his hand. “you’re being rude.”

you leant over to turn off your lamp and laid down facing away from him. neither of you noticed the shadows shift under your door, the light footsteps heading away from your room.

---

you woke up the next morning to find elliot already in the shower, you could hear the pipes from the bathroom next door and noticed his suitcase had been half unpacked.

you were grateful he’d let you sleep, you’d gone to bed frustrated and you didn’t want to carry it on this morning. it was a new day and you were eager to have fun.

you walked over to the window and pulled back the curtains. as you gazed out your eyes naturally drifted to johnny, stood near the barn you’d passed on your way in. he was small given the distance but you couldn’t help but stare as he rhythmically chopped logs into smaller, more manageable pieces.

he was sweating, the repetitive action of driving the axe up and then through the thick wood obviously tiring, and you felt water pool in your mouth as you looked on gormlessly.

the sleeves of his thick checked shirt were rolled up his forearms and part of you wished he’d decided to chop the wood in the driveway so you’d have a clearer view of his muscles at work. he wiped his face on his bicep and suddenly turned to the house, to your window.

you ducked away before he could catch you and started to get dressed out of the line of sight the windows may provide. with your face aflame and anxious butterflies rampant in your stomach, you needed to get your head on straight and decidedly not ogle your new friends.

with one last stern word to yourself you headed downstairs back to the kitchen and found gaz pottering around.

“ah morning, love. coffee?” he offered, holding out a cup. you took it gratefully with a small thank you and sat at the table again. there was a plate of toast in the middle, enough slices freshly made made for the four of you, and you reached forward for one. “i was thinking me and soap could show you a hiking trail nearby, make a day of it.”

“the one you showed me on your phone?” you asked, nodding enthusiastically regardless of his answer.

“this one’s even better,” gaz said, smiling fondly. “just might take longer.”

“coffee? thank you, darling,” elliot mumbled as he swiped your coffee from your hands without asking and distracting you from answering gaz. you’d barely had a sip before elliot was finishing the drink off in one go. “mm, bit too milky for my liking,” he told you and sucked his teeth.

“probably because it wasn’t for you,” kyle said flatly. “we’re going on a hike today, care to join or has work called you in already?”

“i’d love a hike,” elliot said brightly. johnny walked in through the front door as elliot continued to talk about the hikes he’d been on before, heading to the sink to wash his hands and leaning up to kiss kyle as he passed. “work can wait for the great outdoors. my wife here knows how much i love going on— on uh, on hikes and finding new trails and mapping them out.” elliot stumbled over his words for a second, taken back by the kiss.

johnny’s shoulders shook with a silent laugh and he turned and winked at you as he opened up a cupboard door that hid his face from your husband.

“oh, so you two go together?” kyle asked.

“no, no,” elliot laughed like the thought was ridiculous. “i go with my mates. not really her thing.”

you pursed your lips; you hated it when elliot answered for you, especially when he was wrong. which was often. instead of fussing though, you focused your ire on another slice of toast from the centre of the table.

“right.” kyle stood from his chair and went to lean next to johnny on one of the kitchen counters. “we’ll pack a bag full of snacks and drinks and then we can be off. give us fifteen minutes?”

you nodded, thankful for the excuse to leave elliot at the table, and went to grab your walking boots before coming back to wait with elliot near the door.

“quicker to get there from the back,” johnny said and led you through the rest of the downstairs out into the back garden.

it looked like it could spread for acres if not for the looming trees of the forest fencing it in.

to the left was their chicken coop and a small locked shed. if you turned around you’d see your cars parked, the garage and then the barn further up.

the chicken coop was on solid muddy ground, closer to the gravel front, whereas the shed was further up on the flat grassy area that began to rise into a small hill further back and closer to the trees; there was a small iron table sat with four chairs closer to the house and you couldn’t wait to use it, imagining sitting out there for lunch or breakfast.

to your right you took in their allotment, the large raised beds full of blooming vegetables; tall beans climbing the trellis arches from one side to another. you saw noticed the glint of a greenhouse hidden behind it all. everything was encouraged to grow to its fullest and you bet the food they’d served the night before had been grown by their very own hands.

“we’ve got strawberries if ye’d like tae pick some over the next few days,” johnny said as he walked you down to the end of the garden, catching the way your eyes were glued to the allotment.

“i’d love that, i haven’t been strawberry picking since i was little,” you said.

johnny nodded. “settled then.”

---

the hike wasn’t difficult, but living down south in a very flat city hadn’t built up your cardio for the steep hills and climbs at all.

“this is a good place to stop for lunch,” johnny said, apropos to nothing.

he squeezed your arm as he wandered off the path towards the edge of the hill. you were halfway there to the top, but already you were loving the views.

“knee bothering you, johnny?” kyle asked as he pulled out a rainproof sheet from his bag and started placing the food out in the tupperware boxes.

“something like that,” he said.

you laughed when you saw johnny pull out a bottle of wine from his.

“just tryin’ tae make use of all the wine we bought on holiday, hen,” he snickered.

you sat down and helped them spread the food out while your husband paced from the ledge to the path and then to the blanket, only to start again.

“have a seat elliot,” you said encouragingly, patting the space you’d left purposely empty next to you.

he slumped down with a huff and kyle side-eyed him.

“how was your night? sleep well?”

“hope the room wasnae too small,” johnny added, biting into a cheese cracker as he looked to your husband.

you felt your stomach drop and your face heat up. “no, not at all—“

“i think i’m just used to the finer things,” elliot said, picking up one of the packed travel cups pointedly and pouring himself some wine.

“we slept fine,” you said firmly as you frowned at elliot. “it’s perfect.”

“ah, we’re just joking around, hen, no need to fash,” johnny teased. “you pack yer paints?”

“shit.” your face dropped as you looked at him. “i completely forgot when i was packing, i was too excited.”

johnny grinned. “you can borrow mine, it’s alright.”

“if they’re not dried up that is,” kyle said with a laugh. “i’ve not seen you touch paints in years, johnny.”

“they’re water paints, gaz, they’re meant tae be dry,” johnny said with a roll of his eyes. he looked to you and covered the side of his mouth. “yer a breath o’fresh air, ye have no idea. i love him but he doesnae have the eye fer it, you know?”

“im right bloody here,” kyle said exasperatedly, making you laugh.

“fucking hell,” your husband muttered under his breath before standing. “i think i’m gonna go ahead and have a look at the trail, get a lay of the land. i’ll turn around in ten and meet you back here.”

“are you sure?” you asked at the same time johnny warned him, “don’t go off the path.”

“why not?” elliot asked, taking it as a challenge despite johnny’s grave tone.

“go straight so you don’t get lost,” johnny repeated seriously. “it’s a tricky place, these woods. one wrong turn and you’ll ne’er be found.”

elliot stayed silent for a moment, left off kilter by johnny’s intense eyes, before laughing, waving him of with a scoff. “sure thing, johnny.”

you watch your husband walk off with an uneasy feeling before kyle and johnny’s easy going nature distracted you once more.

before you knew it it’d been twenty minutes, but you were too busy talking about how they’d ended up moving out so far away from their original shared home, that you hadn’t noticed elliot wasn’t back yet.

“it’s great here, but it can feel… lonely sometimes, just the two of us,” johnny admitted as he looked to kyle. the handsome man nodded and knocked their knees together.

“i know how that feels,” you said, three cups of wine having loosened your lips.

“yeah?” kyle asked softly, tilting his head to meet your downcast eyes.

you opened and closed your mouth a few times before taking a deep breath.

“i want a baby,” you said weakly, sadly. you were quiet as though hoping not to be overheard. “elliot doesn’t think it’s the right time, but im starting to doubt it’d ever be the right time if it were up to him.”

you blink at the anger that had seeped into your last words and gasped as you realised that you’d actually finally said them out loud. not even your therapist had gotten you to admit this.

“oh god, please forget i said that,” you begged them suddenly, wide eyed and pleading. “please. don’t say anything to elliot about it. i— i think i’ve just drank a little too much,” you tried to excuse yourself.

“hey, it’s ok,” johnny said with a concerned frown.

“i didn’t mean it,” you rushed out.

kyle moved to elliot’s previous spot and pulled you in for a warm hug, calming you down.

“it’s normal to want things and to be disappointed when the person that promised you them can’t deliver,” he whispered. you sniffled and slowly wrapped your arms back around him with a nod, tears building behind yojr closed eyelids. you slumped into his hold further when johnny’s large hand rubbed soothingly across your back below kyle’s arms.

it was nice. simply being between them and being comforted by them was nice.

you leaned back and wiped at your eyes with a sniffly laugh.

“thank you, guys, i— thank you.”

gaz squeezed your shoulder for a moment before finally letting you go.

you felt fidgety, needing to do something with your hands and to keep them from staring at your red rimmed eyed, so you reached for a handful of grapes when it suddenly occurred to you that elliot wasn’t back. you looked at your watch and swore.

“elliot’s not here yet, shit what if he’s lost?”

“he won’t be,” johnny reassured you, standing alongside you and grabbing your shoulders. “he’s an experienced hiker, right? he probably lost track a’time like we did.”

“let’s get this packed away and we’ll go catch up to him,” kyle suggested. you nodded, easily calmed once given easy orders to occupy your busy mind

---

“elliot?” you called out as you walked, johnny and kyle on either side of you, looking out into the trees in case he’d gone off track. “you there? elliot?”

“stop shouting, christ, i’m here,” elliot complained further up the trail. he was slouched against a tree. “took you all long enough.”

“oh my god, what happened,” you said as you crouched next to him, looking at the sorry swollen state of his ankle.

“twisted it looks like, worst-case it could be a sprain,” kyle said from over your shoulder. “should be fine, we can get home with him leaning on our shoulders, right, soap?”

johnny tutted in disappointment as he stared down the path instead of at your injured husband.

“the waterfall was only five minutes away as well,” johnny said to no one in particular. he crouched next to elliot. “c’mon then, let’s get you back.”

your husband bristled. he looked longingly down the trail johnny had gestured to just a moment before.

“we should still go, i’ll be fine,” he insisted. “we should go to the waterfall.”

gaz raised his eyebrows incredulously as he helped elliot stand, but he stayed silent.

“you want to lean on me or johnny?” he asked.

“whoever gets us there quicker,” elliot said, face pinched.

kyle rolled his eyes and set off walking, leaving elliot to wince until he matched kyle’s stride. luckily the walk wasn’t long before the four of you cut off the trail and found yourselves stood at the bottom of the waterfall, a light mist of water splashing at your bare skin from where you stood.

“holy shit.”

johnny nudged your shoulders together with a laugh.

“impressive, right?”

“to say the least,” you huffed.

kyle had helped elliot sit down by the edge of the plunge pool with his leg stretched out as you’d taken in the view with johnny, though you soon took a seat next to elliot when you noticed he was situated as comfortable as could be. you pulled off your shoes and socks and shuffled forwards a little to dip your feet in the water, kicking lightly and grinning even with how the cold bit at your toes.

elliot stayed stern faced even as he looked at the impressive feature, but kyle and johnny took no notice.

they started to undress, throwing their clothes down haphazardly by their bags.

“you coming in?” kyle asked you cheekily.

“we go in every time we’re here, tradition now,” johnny explained once he was stood in his underwear.

“i don’t have my swimsuit,” you said hesitantly.

“jus’ go in yer kegs like us,” johnny dismissed the worry.

“it’s probably for the best she’s said no,” elliot said meanly, one eyebrow raised as he looked over your relaxed form, your stomach rolls obvious and plush under the afternoon sun and your thighs spread thick where they pressed against the edge of the natural pool. you suddenly felt the need to layer up in your baggiest clothes. “she’s happy enough sat with me. isn’t that right, darling?”

you felt embarrassment, hot and sharp, flood from your face to your toes as you stared at him. this was your husband. a man that took delight in belittling you.

“oi,” johnny warned from where he stood waist deep in the water.

you ignored them both and stood suddenly, shucking off your clothes with tight angry movements, a smile only eventually pulling at your lips when kyle wolf whistled playfully.

johnny joined in jeering and clapped as you stepped carefully closer to the edge before jumping in. once you resurfaced, you resolutely faced away from the scowl you knew would be on your husband’s face. you were past caring.

the cold of the water had you sucking in thinner breaths until you acclimatised, and you were grateful it was deep enough to brush your collarbones as you could tell your nipples were babbling from the chill.

“be careful, love, there are fish in here,” gaz said as he drifted closer to your front. his smile was bordering on mischievous but it eased your slight reservations of being in the water. “but don’t worry they don’t bite.”

you felt a sudden pinch on your buttcheek and you squealed before johnny’s laugh and warm chest at your back registered. you flushed hot and dug your elbow back into his ribs as they laughed, both barely giving you space to float alone.

they guided you closer to the waterfall with easy going smiles and it wasn’t until you felt their capable hands on your hips and tummy to keep you from being dragged under as you held your hands under the heavy pour that you looked back guiltily at your husband. you pushed off and away from them but continued to swim a little while longer until elliot kicked up a fuss, bored.

“are we done now? it’s getting dark, we should be heading back,” he spoke up when it looked like the three of you weren’t tiring any time soon. “and then there’s dinner to think of.”

“you offering to cook, elliot?” kyle said as he climbed out of the water.

elliot scoffed. “not likely. with the ankle and all,” he said patronisingly.

gaz smiled thinly. “of course.”

the three of you dried off as best you could before dressing and heading back to the farmhouse with elliot leant between johnny and kyle.

even as your clothes chafed against your damp skin, you couldn’t bring yourself to regret swimming. thought the cold was biting even through your coat, and a warm shower was calling for you back at the farmhouse.

---

once you were back you showered quickly and then ran a bath for elliot. you helped ease him in so he didn’t slip and further injure himself.

“put on a real fucking show today,” he grumbled once he was laid back. you cupped the water over his hair carefully.

“what do you mean?” you grabbed the shampoo and began lathering it.

“don’t play dumb,” he hissed. “acting like that, like a whore, with them. again.”

“i wasn’t—“

“you’re a fucking hypocrite,” he said harshly. “punishing me for one little mistake but now you get to act like this with other men?”

you let your hands hang over the edge of the tub in shock. “you cheated on me. more than once, elliot. that’s not a little mistake.”

“we’re past this,” he said tiredly with a shake of his head, rubbing his hand over his forehead to wipe away the dripping shampoo.

“then why did you bring it up?”

he turned to look at you, disgust clear on his face.

“you’re ugly when you get like this,” he said simply. “leave me to it, i’ll call you in when i need a hand getting out.”

your lip trembled as you stood and went back to your room. as you closed the door behind you, you heard elliot mutter to himself, “he’s an absolute idiot thinking this was only a twisted ankle, clearly not a doctor. the swelling has hardly gone down.”

you didn’t react, heading to the room next door with watery eyes. as you were tidying up your clothes, sniffling back angry and hurt tears, there was a knock on the doorframe. your turned to see johnny with a plate in his hand.

“thought i’d make things easier and bring his tea up fer him,” he said and put it on the bedside table. “do you want me to bring up yours too or will you be joining us?”

“oh, i’m not hungry, thank you johnny,” you said with a watery smile. the food looked delicious but elliot’s words had soured your appetite. “i think i’m just going to go to bed as soon as elliot’s alright.”

“ye sure?”

“mhm.” you nodded.

johnny nodded, said a soft, “let me know if ye change your mind.” he pulled out a pack of pain tablets from his pocket with a little wave and dropped them on the bed and then left.

you waited for elliot’s shout before you went to help him out of the bath and back through to your room. you left him to dry and dress himself and once he was sat on the bed with his food, you turned your back to him and willed yourself to fall asleep quickly.

part two

want to email johnny? click here!

#it’s here!! and posted correctly hopefully!!#face claim for elliot of oliver jackson cohen bc he’s hot but he plays an arshole really well #i’ve had a lot of fun writing this over the last month #took me forever but it turned out a hell of a lot longer than i’d anticipated too #hoping the email idea doesn’t flop and goes well!!#thank u kai for helping me with my ocs and thank you birdy for helping me pic the fic title!!#ily guys :’)#full disclosure idk if the area i chose is all that solitary Imao i've never been to scotland never mind falkland or the reservoir #i just looked at google maps lol #soapgaz x reader #soapgaz #soap x reader x gaz #johnny soap mactavish x reader #kyle gaz garrick x reader #johnny mactavish x reader #kyle garrick x reader #cw noncon #tw noncon #cw abusive relationship #tw abusive relationship #let me know if more tags are wanted or needed #fat reader #johnny soap mactavish #kyle gaz garrick #johnny soap mactavish x reader x kyle gaz garrick #johnny mactavish x reader x kyle garrick #soap x reader #gaz x reader

389 notes · View notes

sil-te-plait-tue-moi · 2 months ago

Text

My heart is a bloodhound!

PART 1 ★ PART 2

Quick summary: It happens again, when the year festers into August again and leaves the two of you raw and vulnerable like open wounds.

Word count: 15K… 🤓

Warnings: canon-typical mentions of death, violence and injury (there is mention of like eating people but idk); grief; misogyny; Rust's personality; semi-public SMUTT T-T (MINORS DNI); same level of pretentiousness, maybe a little more, as the first part.

A/N: Holy fuck this sucked the soul out of me (wish Rust Cohle would suck the soul out of I MEAN WHAT), i am super proud of this though!! Went through many iterations and this was the least shit! 🎀🎀🎀 This is technically part two to The idler wheel but can be read by itself too. May or may not write other things for this guy but for the time being, I need a cleanse 😭 BUT please please enjoy and please please interact, i love reading comments and so many lovely people commented on the first part, im gonna do my best to respond to any/all this time 🤘MWAH MWAH

***

It’s difficult to differentiate between the thrill of being left alone here with him and the slow-sinking dread of the implications of that.

With the return of the musk of the summer, those three ruthless, windless, unrelenting months that would seem to drag on for several lifetimes when I was a kid, the memory of where I was last year—and the year before that, and the one before that—hangs brightly in my mind. Stale, not quite dead – so bright. Crawling with mildew.

Stepping into the bar had felt like entering another dimension. Maybe it was the suits that gave it away – every single God-haunted patron—the truckers, the farmers, even the old dog lying at a man’s feet—had turned, sensing foreigners as acutely as the immune system registers a bodily threat. I knew Johansson felt it: that dark pull over the back of the neck. But under Marty’s overconfident, swaggering lead, that winning smile, we soon assimilated. Skin swallowing a bullet.

God forbid you ever leave the town you grew up in. Shame on you if you don’t, though. How sanctimonious of me to change my mind and return after earning a spot amongst the lucky few escapees.

Something in this place still irks me.

At least, in Brooklyn, there was always noise: cries of a baby in the apartment over, the discord of traffic bursting through the streets below, the rush of a crowd, the overlap and slur of private conversations. At least the badness would stare you right in the face; at least people were evil to be evil. At least there were corners where things could hide, where it made sense for shadows to exist: all to explain the paranoia that stalked me.

But here?—it seems so open. Like, if a rare, hot wind would blow through a Louisiana town, it could do so in one straight path, through walls, through people, without ever getting disrupted. Everything is so light in the blazing sun, you can practically hear it: the hum of rays passing over every surface. Nothing should be able to hide. And, at night, with no sun, no rays, there is no noise. Maybe a dog. And ghosts. But perhaps it’s just the area in which I live.

When Marty started drinking, flirting with the twenty-one-year-old barkeep, Johansson’s face had stiffened. He himself had never even touched a bottle of beer – devil stuff. We shared a look once the blond detective started gabbin’ like an idiot.

“Know what Maggie thinks?” he had laughed, slumping over the sticky table of the booth, big, sweaty palm choking out his drink. “She thinks you might be pissed at me.”

Johansson blinked hard to keep his nose from wrinkling, but, even then, he couldn’t keep from physically cringing away. “Who?” he asked, confused by those hazy, unfocused eyes.

Marty cracked a toothy grin – there was that slight gap between those front two, which had been charming at first and only managed to thoroughly disgust me now in moments like these – and pointed his finger right at me, accusing. “You.”

My stomach churned dangerously at the sight of him.

“Marty,” his partner had drawled, a low warning.

Waved away like a fly.

“Naw, it’s like—you’re on your high fuckin’ horse or somethin’.”

The words were spoken through a laugh, but I knew there was meat behind that so-called good mood. He was one of those people that tended to overcompensate. A mistake, an ill feeling. He liked to point out how I was alone, and often, too, poorly disguised as a passing joke, complete with one of those shit-eating grins that seemed to come so easy to him.

Shouldn’t he have been happy? Not only had he gotten our case, by then, but we’d handed it over with smiles on our damn faces. Nice enough to walk them through the original crime scene, introduce them to the key witnesses. Complicated. We didn’t have to do shit for ‘em, but we did. Hell, even that beer he was clutching to his chest was paid for out of the goodness of my own fuckin’ heart. Who was he to moan about the situation? He was the one who insisted on staying in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere, brushing off any and all pointed questions on whether his family would be missing him at dinner.

“You know, I’d rather you were pissed,” he continued, where, really, I should have just smothered him into silence.

Rust was staring into the side of his flushed face, iron-grey eyes like a drill, like he was thinking the same thing.

“Look, you’re smilin’ at me now, but I sure as hell don’t trust it, buck. You wanna bite my head off, don’t ye?”

Like I ever could have done that.

Though the familiar weight of rage curdled in my chest, I would never admit it to the likes of Martin Hart. When he got like this—jealous, insecure, whiny—I wondered whether it was just a temporary lapse, or if this him, this true him, just lay under the surface all the time.

It wasn’t that fucking hard to plaster on a smile and take what you fucking got – I did it all the time. He could dream of a different life, but this was the one we were dealt. Fact that his grown ass hadn’t accepted that by now twisted violently in my gut. Between the two of us, I was the one that knew this – so why did he get myfucking case?

In my head, I’d let Salter have it, too. How could I ever admit I had an ego? How could I ever admit I had a mind to wrench the teeth out of the sheriff’s fucking gums?

But I have plenty of practice acting like things don’t bother me, which is why it was so easy to plaster on my amiable smile and laugh, “C’mon, man, you know it’s only ‘cause o’ the workload.” Not that you could comprehend that, lazy fuck. To Marty, my kind’s natural state was amiable—anything otherwise would be a defect—so I’d expected to convince him. “You’ll do right by it, ‘m sure.”

If he were sober, I know he would’ve bought it – he could convince himself that the way of the world was right and I was only being sweet to be sweet, because he deserved it.

But Marty was drunk. Piss-drunk, loud drunk. His mind was clumsier than usual, unable to muster the energy to jump points, ignore the evidence, like he did daily. I hoped I had the power—if I had to let the case go, I wanted to at least retain an into its goings-on—but there was only one way to really have power over men like Marty when they were drunk, and I had had no interest in being one of his girls.

My partner twitched beside me, picking at some spongy, yellow fluff protruding from a thin split in the chocolate-brown fake leather of the booth. He was just as furious as I was beneath his fort of calm.

Marty took a swig of his beer. “She wants you over soon. Maggie. Barbecue or some shit.”

“Maybe you should go home,” Johansson interjected, sharper than intended. If I were him, with his body, with his life, I’d have hit the fucker—long time ago, too. I couldn’t, but Johansson wouldn’t. He didn’t lack the temperament for brutality—I’m not sure anybody does—but, rather, couldn’t justify it to a necessary degree in his head. “I’m going home,” he’d reasoned kindly – he made it sound so easy. “Just let me take you. It’s on my way.”

Itching to leave, to return to the comfort of his wife and his little daughter. Marty had always found Johansson’s fondness of them disingenuous, had disliked my partner as long as they’d worked in the same office. He complained to me once that none of his stories seemed complete. When I asked him what he meant by that, he couldn’t answer—but I knew.

Breath short in my chest, I had half-expected Marty to lunge over the table, scratch Johansson’s eyes out. Only, Rust leaned over, dipping his head down to mutter something quietly into his partner’s ear, which was all flushed red.

And then he went willingly into Johansson’s car, stumbling through the still, open night into the backseat.

My partner had squeezed my shoulder goodbye – I’m not sure why I didn’t leave with him. Now, I was doomed to leave with Rust.

There, he sits across from me, smearing the ashy tar of his half-smoked, flaking cigarette over the mottled glass ashtray dragged over to his side of the table, little circles, waves, absent-minded art. Has me transfixed, some hypnotist.

If I look down like this, if I sacrifice the opportunity to look at him, I earn his careful attention: this sits in the back of my idle mind. I’ve been taking advantage of it more and more since summer broke through the sweetness of spring, which has since curdled like milk, sour. His stare drags over my face like fingers – I can almost feel his touch pressing into the softness of my cheek, dragging over the ridge of the orbital bone.

“You’re okay?” he asks after a couple slowed heartbeats, pulling me out of the honey-pit of my thoughts.

I dart my eyes up, breaking the spell – his observation retreats, clouds, and drifts away to fix on the broken clock on the wall, the one that reads one forty-five at eleven o’ clock.

Primarily, his question irritates me. Nobody asks “are you alright?” imploringly, not unless it concerns themselves and their own wants. Salter had asked me that, right after telling me he was pulling me from my case, and, then, I had thought about crying, just to unsettle him. But what good would that have done? He’d only asked “are you alright?” to test the waters, to see if there was a future possibility of letting him pull the rug out from under me with zero consequences. Again. I couldn’t win.

But Rust doesn’t want much from me. He doesn’t even want the case, really, which just twists the knife even further.

“You—you know I’m good in there, right? In the box.” I carve a jagged thumbnail into this message in the table, twisting the characters wider, or taller, risking splinters.

Why should I have to give it up? And to a fucking idiot? Marty wasn’t the one who stayed all those late nights alone at the office, wasn’t the one scoured over heaps of files under low light, wasn’t the one who took the fucking beating when the suspect fought against arrest. Marty was not the one who conducted an interview like that.

My mouth thins into a hard line, but I know the words will come out whether I let them voluntarily or not. Around Rust, it’s that way. I should’ve left when I could.

“It’s just that—it was so weird,” I continue, my head pulsing with the unwanted memory of that cabin. Marty didn’t have to experience it, Rust didn’t have to experience it—but I did. “Not jus’ wrong, or sad. Makes me feel strange, thinking about it.”

Often, the suspects underestimate me. Johansson’s broad shoulders and tough-set jaw come off as offensive—nothing like my voice, low and gentle, and my eyes, sympathetic and warm. I’m the mother who will never judge, who is spilling over with unconditional love.

Beneath this, though, I am good at the maths of the job, the connections. Though all detectives technically develop the same constituent skills—close attention to body language tells and other biological betrayals—I ain’t sure most understand the sensitivity and strength required to confront shit like this head-on. To not avert your eyes at the mutilated woman on the bed. To inspect her eunuched boyfriend’s severed appendage, to have steady hands when photographing the scene—with flash, of course, to highlight every detail with sufficient clarity—for evidence, which must be returned to and examined again and again, each time with greater fervour still.

I could name a few who’d joke about a thing like that, to ease the burn of that image in their heads, to sleep better at night, to leave behind the uninvited, vicarious sensation of a knife teasing over the meat of their dick.

But the boyfriend’s corpse, we eventually located separately in a cabin in the woods, laid into the basement freezer, so peaceful, such a brutal image. Pretty parts of him preserved for mauling.

And Salter has the fucking audacity to take it away. He wasn’t the one to see something like that, to feel sick to his very stomach, to gag and have to turn away, to cringe and writhe like his skin suddenly wasn’t his, like he ought to pick himself out. I’ve been reeling with that image for weeks, living with motion sickness, and have been denied the relief of vomiting.

“So, you need me to get that confession.”

Rust comes back into focus, perfectly still.

I nod, the back of my neck prickling with mean goosebumps. “Campbell, his DNA was all over the bodies. He was proud of it, even.” My ribs still glow with the phantom-sensation of his brutal kick there when we located him. Stomach clenching, I struggle to remain level. “But there ain’t no way in hell she wasn’t involved. He denies it, but the house is registered under her name. Maiden name, Phelps.”

“I read,” he confirms.

I tremble in frustration – I almost wish he hadn’t.

“It’s just—this lady’s tough.”

Eyes darting over to the dim-lit bar, scouring the scuffed hardwood floor, I can feel my face growing hot with indignation. Christ, it sounds pathetic, like a whiny kid insisting on continuing a task all wrong in order to protect their damaged pride.

“You know Johansson: once she starts with the tears, he can’t see past ‘em. Southern manners ‘n’ all: a crying woman is a delicate thing not for a man to understand but to comfort. But, with me, it ain’t the same. She doesn’t respect me.”

“What d’you mean ‘respect ’? Don’t need respect in this game.”

I scoff, which would’ve been a dire mistake with anyone else. “Y’wouldn’t know what I’m on about,” I tease through an easy smile, though I’m not feeling so funny at the moment.

He inclines his head down to me, an invitation to elaborate.

My boot feverishly taps against the floor, thrumming light like a jackrabbit on the run.

I sigh, mouth twisting. “She keeps asking me if I’ve slept,” I confess. “Says I look like her daughter.”

For all my mothering, here comes a perp who’s desperate to play me at my own game.

I can see how intelligent she is: some hollow glint in her eyes with nothing behind; past that gleaming screen of kindness, something black, like a cherry pit.

Sitting across from her, it felt like looking into a mirror. Not just physically—though her skin is a similar shade to mine, her nails bitten and splitting like mine, and she looks close to what I imagine my own mother could’ve grown into. It was in the way that, when I smiled, she smiled. When I took a sip of my coffee, she would drink some tea. At times, it would even seem like she would speak in my voice: the pitch, the intonations, the phrasing all far too similar. I was reluctant to tell her my name. It reminded me of this folk tale, of these tall, dark creatures who only required your name to speak like you, to look like you, to replace you in your own life. Its victim would die—in some way or another. Wander the woods, eaten alive.

A harrowing feeling had crept over me, winter pressing against the two-way mirror – I was sure Johansson, on the other side, would pick up on it. Only, when I confessed my worries to him, he’d given me this doubtful look, and I really wasalone then.

“She’s playin’ you,” Rust states simply, tracing his fingers over his mouth like some pseudo-cigarette.

“Yeah.” I grind my teeth together. Under the table, where he cannot see, my fingers curl into a tight fist, trembling with my secret violence. “And now Salter wants Marty to have it? Bull.”

I should’ve socked him right in his dumb, slack fuckin’ jaw. One day, I will.

“He don’t want Marty to have it,” Rust retorts smartly, a half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. His eyes are warm in the dark – I should’ve taken my chances, raced to meet ‘em, but I’m too late. “He wants me to have it.”

Yeah, well, I wish what was mine would stay mine.

Even if I’m inclined to be pissed off at Rust by proxy, I just can’t be. The difference between him and Marty is that he actually pays attention, real attention, not the selfish kind. Just by watching, I can tell he knows exactly what he could say, how he could act, in order to appeal to somebody—which is why I find it so odd that he chooses not to. I sacrifice my damn dignity to keep myself palatable. He does not. As a result, he is not well-liked at the office – people tend to feel caught out by him; they don’t like to feel observed, known.

When did being seen become a threat? I thought it was intimate. Though, I suppose, a piece of shit never wants to believe they’re a piece of shit.

Everyone’s the hero of their own story.

Rust slides Marty’s half-empty beer across the table to me, which I receive with a crooked smile and a quick hand.

“Sure I won’t catch whatever he had?”

He shrugs. “Y’ain’t as deadbeat as the rest of ’em. Oughta drag you down to their level.”

I snort. “What, you don’t think you’re deadbeat?”

He huffs. “I’m worse.”

Bitter, the beer washes over my tongue, leaves that funny aftertaste I never really liked, not the first time, not the last. I don’t suppose I’ll ever turn one down though, not if it was offered to me: I’d accept it if only to win points with whoever it was, points I could spend at a later date.

“Maybe,” I start, “if you were a little more deadbeat, you’d be popular. Go out with the boys.”

When he meets my eyes momentarily, smirking, I have to grip my hand over my knee, fingertips digging into bone, and consciously remind myself via mantra not to let my face freeze. He hums, voice smooth and low like liquor, “What, like youdo?”

I should be pissed off, really. Maybe I will be. Instead, though, I choke on the smart retort I had meticulously configured in my head, some quip that would’ve maybe interested him based on what caught him before.

I don’t know whether it would have been worse pretending like it never happened. That’s my strong point: pretending. It’s his, too, when he wants it to be. Maybe we could’ve outlasted it – all we needed was stamina.

But, instead, it’s this. Looking across at each other and knowing exactly what’s going on in the other’s head. I can see exactly how he thinks of me, what he wants to do. When he tilts his head ever so slightly, my neck glows with a promise, like the movement was mine in the first place. When I would bite at the pendant of my necklace, he used to narrow his eyes, like he ought to yank the chain off my neck. But now, he looks on softly, so unlike him, his own fingers at his own lips. I know what it feels like – I’ve kissed him there, too.

“Don’t give me that. At least Geraci would stop shit-talkin’ ye,” I manage, tearing myself away. “Swear he’s stuck at sixteen or somethin’. But—you don’t mind it, do you?”

He shakes his head. “‘f he was smarter, maybe I would. Jus’ likes the sound of his own voice.”

The clock has replaced me as his focal point – I can’t help but feel jealous.

“S’why I like you,” I mumble from behind my beer. “First time I met you, I thought you’d make me feel stupid.

That seems to get him.

He blinks, a barely noticeable twitch. “Do I? I don’t mean to.”

Can I spin this? I’m sure, if I were a little more awake, I’d be able to spin this.

Some evil part of me hopes to make him feel guilty, to trick him into feeling tenderness for me, though I know the pursuit of that would be in vain. The type of men I know how to work—creatures of habit that take the exact path you want them to, to believe that they’re the real seducers—Rust seems entirely separate from that. He can sniff out rehearsal and practice, that robotism, like a dog – he sees it enough in criminals, doesn’t he? That’s why he’s called in for favours across state police departments.

When I met him the first time, I shook his hand, smiled, friendly-like, only to be met with rigidity and stoicism. No trouble, of course: some people just are that way. Wild horses on the highway. But his quietness?—now, that had set alarm bells off in my head. Boys at the precinct were loud – you couldn’t pay ‘em to shut up about their weekends, their football, their college years, their fuckin’ yards. When I was first exposed to it, I thought I’d gain a lot of friends. But then I realised they weren’t so much talking with me as they were talking at me. It’s why they’re so easy to read: they just tell you everything you want to know right off the bat. Even their secrets are bursting at the seams of their fat mouths, begging to be released.

But Rust?—doesn’t talk until he finds it necessary. It’s impressive. Before that, though, the trait was enviable. I had—have—no comparable method. Even though, at first, it can seem blunt, even cold, his eloquence is refreshing. Never running in circles – only determinedly forward. So intimidating, almost like a freight train – I have to consciously keep myself from jerking back and out of the way.

How low he must really think of me then, to see me like this. And I know he does: he sees. Everything I might have done to prevent it perhaps even had the opposite effect. I hate, I burn, I curse: it’s ugly. I cry over cases I would’ve left behind in two months tops, anyways, onto the next. I obsess over just another woman in the box. I think about him almost constantly.

“You don’t,” I mumble, wondering if I ought to be wishing myself far away. “Make me feel dumb, that is. Not me. Others, I can’t speak for.”

We’ll have to leave soon – no doubt, this local bar is used to slow days and early nights, a blissful routine rudely disrupted by two outsiders who haven’t even really shown them good business. I glance over at the barkeep, slumped over the scuffed wooden counter and flatly watching the football up on the boxy TV set, and I recall my first job. Then, too, I’d let men twice my age buy me drinks, flirted with them. Was worth the tip money.

Rust hums, though I really wish he wouldn’t speak at all. “Don’t pay mind to what Marty said.”

My neck prickles.

He’s not trying to console me, is he? No, that’s not like him. Besides, it’s not like any amount of coddling could reverse the merciless truths I’m constantly reminded of in this line of work – if I’ve learned anything about sympathy, it’s that it doesn’t fix shit. If anything, it’s just another complication. It can seem beautiful, but, really, it isn’t. I can miss it, miss its warmth, miss the kind, sweet nothings my husband would whisper into my hair on the hardest nights, but it never changed the fact that I would have to get up in the morning and do it again. Rust knows this, has maybe lived this, so he’s not trying to console me.

Maybe he’s trying to defend Marty.

Sharp and sure, that anger comes lurching up in my throat, slashing and snarling.

The sensible part of me—what I hope is the larger part of me—knows this is not possible. Rust understands Marty’s faults better than anyone, even himself, even his wife.

“Thing is,” I mumble bitterly, “he really means it, don’t he? He just don’t show it.” I trace the warm, smooth rim of the bottle with a light finger, though my mind is currently toying with the idea of jamming it violently down the opening. “Maybe it means more that he does keep it hidden – at least some part of him knows it’s wrong.”

Placid in the periphery of my vision, Rust shrugs. “‘s what separates us from our killers. Feelin’ it ain’t the problem. Resistance is where strength is tested.”

“Ego,” I chuckle darkly.

He hums. “Fragile ego.”

Underneath my smile lies an uneasiness stirred by his criticism.

Rust is not gentle with his opinions – I don’t suppose that’ll ever change. Resistance is a losing game – not even he is immune to the impermanence of these things. I’m sure he said that to me once, on a night like this.

I’ve never been very good at refraining from things. Even from an early age, I just couldn’t say no. Teenage years: alcohol, drugs, sex. If it was tossed my way, I’d take it, anything I could get, hungry to experience something.

Ha!—maybe I actually am more like Marty Hart than I’d like to admit. He’s trying to be an adult, albeit really, really poorly. As long as he believes he’s a good, family man, then his reality is protected. But I know I’m rotten, really. One of the boys at the precinct will call me pretty—in that sick way somewhere between the unchecked lust of a man and his paternal right to claim—but, below, I know I’ve got sickness swimming through my veins. Not blood. Something accumulated over the years, maybe from pretending all the time.

I feel like I want to cut things, break them. Told myself to hang on until I retire, but I don’t see that happening any time soon. I’ll break. What will Rust think of me then?

Maybe I was his low point: that fault in resistance.

Some awful, gnawing feeling collects at the pit of my stomach, like black tar. Must be all those cigarettes.

“Wha’s in that head?” he probes suddenly, stealing razor-sharp, fleeting glances.

I shrug, swallowing down a bout of nausea. “I dunno.” And I really don’t. Behind the surface tension, I don’t know what I feel, only that I do, and it’s so, so much. “It kinda—makes me happy to see him like that: jealous. ‘Cause he knows I’m good, and he’s wondering why he’s finishing what I started. He knows he don’t deserve it. Not like I do.”

My confession lingers in the air like smoke – I have mind to reach a hand up and wave it all away, or suck it down, deep, erasing reality. Fuck. I’ve always been a little off when reading into Rust’s quiet – with that tightrope he seems to have mastered, I know I should avoid any step at all—it could just as easily miss its mark—but I can never seem to help myself.

I stare at him—and I think it makes him uncomfortable, though there’s nothing there, not any normal human reaction, in his face for me to draw from. That’s fine. In my gut, I’m pretty sure I’ve got it down.

“You want to be seen as competent,” he finally says, a simple-enough statement.

I scrunch my nose up distastefully. “No, I want to be competent.”

“Well, what good is bein’ somethin’ if there’s no-one there to witness it?”

Unable to press down an exasperated sigh, I close my eyes, roll them with all the subtlety I can manage.

Foul words push under my tongue, like vomit.

I don’t know if I’m in the mood for this tonight: smart conversation. What feels like debate. Maybe if he hadn’t been given my case, I’d take him up on the challenge, but I’ve already lost.

I eye him, try to figure out his game.

“I dunno, Rust,” I tell him flatly. “I think that’s called having an identity issue.”

He cocks an eyebrow. “Most people do.”

My chest burns. “This isn’t a go at me, is it?”

Slow, he draws the ashtray towards him from across the table, as if the grind of the glass against the wood is a noise that ought to be savoured.

I could be deaf, but reading his lips would be easy: “And how’d this be about you exactly?”

I’m able to fight off the initial instinct to wince, the way in which he delivers the words, calm and deliberate, stinging like a slap to the face. What’s worse is the growing impression that he’s as bored of me as I am.

With a furrowed brow, I watch him, heartbeat thrumming in my ears.

“I ain’t out to get you, s’you can quit lookin’ at me like I kicked you or somethin’.”

Frowning shallowly and trying to pretend like I’m not, I glance away and commit to rearranging my face—but at the glimpse of that twitch at the corner of his mouth in my periphery, I know I’m only digging a deeper grave for myself. The noticeable heat of my embarrassment must please him.

Playing with the food.

And I’ve got nothing to say to him—not a single word or phrase up to par, nothing to measure up to Rust’s clinical detachment, let alone destabilise him. He might’ve been reciting the coroner’s report. There’s nothing I can say to scathe him—and fuck, I want to leave a mark, prove to him that I can. I scan him for weakness, but either I’m still too stunned to see it or there is none. I have no plan of attack and no line of defence.

Rust seems to soften in the knowledge of this.

“I mean,” he begins, knowing now that I’m really listening, “identity ain’t fixed – it’s not permanent. I don’t scrutinise my appearance. I don’t mind my body, and my body don’t mind me. My personality hardly feels under my control – ‘s just somethin’ that is and will be—‘n’, I guess, will change, but only against my will, never because of it. Feels pointless to feel insecure about that.”

Is this supposed to be some fucked-up attempt at advice?

My priorities changed, but this place never has, never does, never will. So, it’s all dumb and the people are dumb and this bar is dumb and the boys at the precinct are dumb and, fuck, I wish Rust were dumb, too. I feel pathetic, and he does not alleviate that feeling at all. If he were dumb, I could laugh at him and make myself feel better. I could laugh at myself for sleeping with a dumb man. Instead, I think of him religiously and crave his approval. Afflicted with the knowledge that he needs to be corrupted to want me, that I’m awful enough to want it enough to corrupt him again. Tainted waters. It would be so much more comfortable if I could look down on him.

My skin writhes and ripples, and I know the only thing that would soothe it is if he touched me. Jesus and the sick man—or some polluted version of that.

My world swings under a bout of nausea as it begins to spiral – the beer does not help.

Maybe he’s waiting it out, like I’m trying to. Forgetting is the wisest decision anyone could make, the most fortunate outcome. Though, my efforts are paradoxical: I think so, so much about not thinking about it all.

“Sure seems like y’think about yourself a good deal, too, s’don’t you criticise me,” I mumble, clumsy. It’s a mistake to even open my mouth again – he’ll use it all against me eventually.

Rust hums again, low, some muscle twitching in his jaw, like his body has no clue what to do when not blindly occupied with a cigarette. “Never said I don’t think about myself,” he rectifies, staring at the sweaty palms I’m wringing together tightly against the lip of the table.

I allow my mouth to pool with saliva, trying to combat the increasing dryness of my mouth.

“Guess the thinkin’ part is where insecurity comes from in the first place,” I add after swallowing.

When my eyes dart up to look at him, his are on my throat.

Immediately, I look away.

Maybe this is the bad kind of intimacy.

The intensity of his attention is looming, sifting through my thoughts like sand.

Sometimes, I think he has me figured out but just couldn’t care less about what he’s found. He’s feeling the power of my burning desire for him – maybe it amuses him. Maybe he’s waiting to mechanise it, letting me sit idle while a use for me finds him (if ever). Maybe I know things. Maybe I can break things open. Maybe he can take my cases from me. Maybe I can tire him out, put him to sleep.

It’s almost worse that he hasn’t put me to work yet.

Maybe it really was just something in the water. Maybe all I need is to visit somebody close to me.

“Ever heard o’ that theory? ‘bout internal monologue?” Rust asks softly, leaning in and tipping his head down like only I’m worthy of hearing this here.

My leg jerks and I can’t place why. I nod, face hot.

“I think ‘s bullshit—‘bout some not having one. Think everybody’s got that voice in their heads.” He pauses, squints. “Mm, maybe that’s a little generous.”

I laugh – I hope it makes him feel good. In truth, I know he couldn’t care less.

“What d’you think it’d be like? No voice.”

The world seems so close right now, wrapping its fuzzy arms tight around us, buzzing in my ears, shadows fur-soft over my face. What does he want me to say? I wish he’d tell me, offer me respite.

I shrug, and it’s honest, my resignation. “No voice don’t mean no thought.”

“Alrigh’. Then, what about no thought?”

I shrug again. “I like thinking.”

He huffs, angling himself back away from me. Have I disappointed him? Somewhere deep in the pit of my tummy, there’s that fleck of worry, something that tastes an awful lot like vomit.

I expect him to finally stop talking.

But “I get tired of it,” is what he says instead. “In between cases, or these—moments where I feel like I could burn a hole through myself ‘f I spent ’nough thought on it. ‘s heavy, like they weigh me down.” He pushes the ashtray away, his fingers the only part of him moving.

Swept up in the rising tide of your own life, hurting around you in some never-ending circle or spiral of which you happen to be the centre. Swimming with black-eyed angels. I know how he feels – I used to feel that way. Maybe I still do, sometimes. Clinging on to the tenderness my husband used to have for me like it could save me from the guilt I would feel when I moved on. No-one would pull me out: that much was true enough. That memory of stability, of the good times, only depressed me, moving from Brooklyn back to Louisiana. Feeling small in my own life, like a piece on a chessboard, with no semblance of control, only duty, chasing this idea of who I used to be. Hunting down the bad men, wondering what upper hand is driving them across the squares, contemplating the carpenter that fashioned the pieces. Too big of a big picture can be detrimental. The fact that I know this to be true doesn’t make me an exception.

“I think you’re tired of the things you think about,” I muse, a headache beginning to expand between my temples – perhaps the heat has finally gotten to my head. “Space better occupied by other shit.”

I’m careful not to pay attention to Rust’s reaction, if there even is one, since the weight of his interest is pressing over my face where I really wish his lips would.

“Like what?” he challenges.

His eyes glint with curiosity, a blade’s sharp edge.

I bite my tongue.

“You think you know me?” It’s more a statement than a question.

I shrug. “You think you know me, don’t ye?”

Though, he kinda does. I think he’s proud that he can read me, but maybe that’s me overcomplicating things. Maybe I’m just another person to him. I wonder if he thinks I’m predictable. Boring, negligible, painfully average. Good for one thing, and that one thing was a mistake, anyway.

Look at him, now: his eyes have dropped to elsewhere, but there’s a soft smirk that curls up on his face, the hint of a pink tongue that traces lightly over his teeth.

Geraci always talks shit about that look whenever Rust closes yet another case, securing a tough confession. “So fuckin’ up ‘imself, ain’t he? Jesus.” Sure, he pisses me off—for different reasons. I’ve long since come to the conclusion that he’s worthy of admiration.

He smiles to himself – I don’t trust it. “You’re calling me arrogant.”

“Are you?” I press, gnawing at the inside of my cheek. I’m surprised at the tepidity of my voice, considering how I’m covered in boils and burns in my head.

He doesn’t have anything to say to that, only hums in response, seemingly amused.

“Doesn’t have to be a bad thing,” I murmur. “People are scared of bein’ known, so nobody really tries no more.”

“I don’t observe people for intimacy purposes.”

Then why does he fucking look at me like that?

A year ago, I’d have put it down to my own desires warping my perception of reality. Really, he wasn’t interested; he was only paying me my due amount of scrutiny in order to keep his mental file of me up to date. Really, he didn’t want to touch me; really, he was just someone who fiddled with his own hands, maybe to remind himself that he could be his own from time to time. Lust is such a dangerous thing – any deeper than surface level, and it has the very strong potential to kill you. If you want something against your better judgement, do you really even want it? The haze of having Rust come so close to me is dampened by such doubts.

But at this point, he either wants me, or I’m crazy. Shit, maybe I’d rather be just that. I’ve seen his eyes like this—dark and bottomless—when hands were unzipping my skirt, or dragging over my skin. To deny intimacy? Now that’s arrogance. Anddelusion. Shit, and I thought he was so above all that stuff. Does he think I can’t figure him out?

Surely his opinion of me can’t be that poor.

My hand cramps up as I punch down the instinct to pinch the bridge of my nose.

“Sure you do,” I press. And I’m right. I hope I’m right.

His stare thickens into something different, what I think might be a black, molten form of gratification. Then, it hardens, cools in a split second into these tough, jaw-breaker pellets. I’d say it was confrontational, but then his eyes flutter just as he happens to swallow thickly. Is that his pulse in his throat?

I rub at my puffy eyes with a stiff set of fingers.

Rust drops his eyes, brushes his hand over the side of his blazer where his cigarettes are sitting warm and ready beneath.

“What, you—lonely again or some shit?” he asks.

I almost recoil at the sudden bitterness of his tone.

I snort good-heartedly, but, really, the comment stings just right—he knows where to press—all the breath knocked out of my chest. “O-kay, Rust. That an accusation?”

“No. ’S an observation. Thought you jus’ loved those,” he combats flatly.

Chest burning, I have to save myself, jump ship, and look away. My mouth tastes like grainy bile.

“You were lonely last summer. That’s why you came to me.”

The dim light above us flickers, his face phasing in and out of shadow before me like a candle in the wind.

I roll my jaw.

Does he look back on it with disdain?

“No,” I snap instinctively, instantly burned by the satisfaction that crosses his eyes.

My breath hitches plaintively. Every fibre of my body trembles and burns to defend myself. There’s not a single word that could repair his opinion of me.

“Or—yeah.” Shut up.

I rub at my temple, desperate for relief – do they have pills for this shit? – which does not come. If he feels any pity for me, it certainly doesn’t show.

The harsh line of my mouth trembles. “I just thought you understood me. Or made an attempt to, at least, but maybe that part was self-projection. ‘Cause nobody ‘round here’s like you. I know you think that’s stupid and I was being naïve or—” I swallow though my throat is dry as ever, “—or dumb, or somethin’, but that’s what I felt. At the time.”

His gaze is fixed on my neck.

“At the time,” he echoes. It’s a question, I realise after a couple moments.

“Yeah. Fuck y'want me to say, asshole? 'm not—I’m not gonna embarrass myself with you, Rust. That what you want me to do? Show you just how dumb I can get—?”

“Sure like to speak for me, hm?” he bites back quietly, making it so damn easy to run right over him, to feverishly stamp out that insufferable fucking softness to his voice. Shit, I wish he’d just raise it and yell at me already.

“—Yeah, whatever. You like this shit, don’t you? Y’think you deserve a fight?—well, I’ll give you one. That what you want? ‘Cause what?—what, you get to ignore me, pretend I don’t exist, act like you’re above fuckin’ me—” his eyes flit away, bringing my roiling frustration to a crest, “—No, don’t you fuckin’ look away,” I scold, a bite, jutting a crooked finger into his space.

He obeys, but that look in his pale eyes is so hollow, it almost makes me feel bad for saying anything at all. Almost.

I try to press down my anger, but it’s spilling over, now, far beyond things so trivial as control. I clasp my hands together in a prayer that they will finally listen to me and not move again.

“Fact that you feel anything at all makes you feel like shit, huh?”

His expression has glazed over, cool and smooth.

Half-expecting him to walk out and rightfully abandon me here, I stare hard at him, like I might chip into that exterior. If I managed it, I’d slip it in my pockets as proof. Silently, I beg him to prove me right.

“Sorry,” I snap. No, I’m not. I hope it cuts at him. “You do what you want, I don’t fuckin’ care. But, please, do not patronise me like that again, Rust.”

God offers no help with the silent plea I send Him. He does not care, so I shouldn’t care, and that’s the end of things. I’ve survived worse natural disasters than him. He’s just a man, and this is just what happens with them. Still, the disappointment floods like poison under my skin. I’m a stupid girl, really.

“I understand if you regret things, but you don’t have to say it out loud. It’s mean. But, fuck, I dunno, maybe you mean to be.”

I take a moment to untangle the knot in my throat. He watches it all, quiet again, his eyeline sitting heavy over where the skin shifts and stretches over my neck.

I adjust the collar of my shirt, fiddle with the gold necklace that sits hot over the contour of bone. Rust stares as I wedge the small pendant tightly in the vice of my thumb and forefinger.

“Feels like you don’t even fuckin’ like me half the time. All the time.”

Christ, I should’ve left with Johansson.

My heart is racing like a wild mustang – it’s a surprise, really, that that old hunting dog lying over by the bar hasn’t noticed, singled me out as something to chase, to kill. My belly’s exposed, soft and ripe and asking for it. I forget, sometimes, that there are things out there that kill things that kill, too.

He doesn’t plan on giving me a break; I wouldn’t deserve it, anyway. “Wha's it matter to you if I like you or not?”

My cheeks burn furiously.

I stare at that bone-bird tattoo that fledges from the nest of his sleeve. With the way my head’s spinning, it almost looks like its skeleton wings are actually moving, unfurling and ready for pilgrimage.

“It don’t.” It’s a disgrace to myself to answer that god-awful question, but what’s more pathetic is the way I shrink into myself when Rust’s attention crowds in over my face. “I jus’ thought you knew me almost as well as I did.”

“And currently?” he asks.

The moment hangs.

“Just answer. I already know – just wanna see if you’ll lie again.”

I close my eyes a second—mistake—and breathe, breathe in and then breathe out, shaky but slow. It’s no use.

“Same.”

He nods. “Not better?”

I shake my head. “No, never better.”

Furrowing his brow, Rust tilts his head down slightly, a soft curl falling gentle over his tense forehead. “But you wanted intimacy.”

So it is intimacy to him?

Maybe this should count as a win for me, but it certainly don’t feel like it. This isn’t the slow slip and slide of last summer’s end – though the heat had swallowed whole everything from here to the other side of the Mississippi, there was something so clipped about the words that left me, left him. I’m sure I was more drunk then than now, but, even so, my mind had been so level, like I’d done it all in my sleep. Now, here, I have done it in my sleep. I’ve revisited him a hundred times in my daydreams, but all that practice has left me for dead. I would’ve killed for an opportunity like this a month ago – it’s like he’s taunting me. It should be easy.

Rust is smart enough to make me wonder if he wants me to feel this way.

Intimacy is planned and eventual, whether that’s due to his power or some cosmic fate. Everyone knows the decision they’re going to make, somewhere in their brains, deep inside. People only ask for advice to condone their decisions, to spread out the responsibility, which, at the end of the day, still remains solely with them. Shit, he’s rubbing off on me: I sound like a fuckin’ asshole.

No, all this thinking won’t save him from the sensation of human feeling, emotions. No amount of planning prepares you for skin-to-skin touch. No time spent evaluating can undo it either, and I’ve tried so hard. His way doesn’t work.

“Everyone wants intimacy,” I end up rambling, voice thin and dry and brittle. “Even folks that don’t want intimacy want intimacy. ’s not love or sex, really, I don’t think, though those are good, too. It’s not a way to find yourself. It’s jus’ trust. Or companionship—”

“And that’s what you want?”

Carefully, I rake my eyes over his face. Does he ever flush from the heat?

Hopeless and too muddled to bother with concealing it, I try to assess whether he’s displeased with me. I try to memorise this moment, so I’ll be able to turn it over in my head later, just another one of my crime scene photographs.

“Dunno yet,” I confess quietly. “I’ve had partners. And partners. When I was younger, I thought I’d have this life packed chock full of amazing relationships, and these—connections.”

The soft, disappointed eyes of my husband come to mind, which haunt all my relationships. I’m so hungry for another body, for connection. Why does it seem so easy for other people?

“Truth is, it don’t happen all that much. To me, at least. You?”

Surly and bone-tired, Rust shakes his head. “Didn’t have much hope for it growin’ up,” he admits.

“But you wanted it,” I press, clumsy and clinging to the sag of his voice. Of course, he’ll pick up on the trace of hopeful, aimless, false victory that undercuts my words; he’s the only one who ever could.

For a moment, though, I second-guess myself.

It’s pathetic, really: I’d give almost anything to walk as him for a day, though, even then, I’m not sure I’d understand him any better.

Sometimes, my imagination runs away from me: in my dreams, I do. I wake under the impression that we’re one and the same, that, just maybe, he, similarly, is dreaming as me. It’s a pulsing obsession, difficult to conceal. Whenever a moment becomes still, I think about it: at night, he is transported; in his dreams, he touches with my hands, sighs with my voice, tastes with my mouth. Then, at least, that would explain these funny sensations I get in the morning: so weathered and worn, a strange ache in my muscles, like I’ve been sleepwalking.

How else could he know me so well?

Or maybe I’ve really fucking lost it. Somewhere along the way – maybe after seeing that half-eaten body swaddled in thin cotton in its freezer cradle – I think something else took the wheel. Why that thing is racing towards him, I have no idea. It’s laughable, really.

Rust blinks calmly down at his hands. “Reckon the deniers are dumb?” he murmurs.

Squeezing the bridge of my nose, I do my best to press back against the foul memory of dismembered limbs. Whoever had eaten the man—who was now beyond recognition—did they feel satisfied? Comforted with how forever close he was to them now? When I was small, I used to think sex was crawling into another person's body, like a cave, and letting all of their insides warm you, love you, wrap you tight.

I swallow thickly.

“Your words, not mine,” I reply through a tight smile. “Reckon it’s easy to find a distraction.”

"Have you given up?" he asks. “Finding a distraction?”

I don’t entertain him with a proper answer to that – I merely shrug and scratch at my scalp, tucking loose strands of sweaty hair back into the loops of my braid. Rust must be frustrated with me. To want a companion, to want the good life. Rivalling Marty in my delusion.

He slides his hands into his lap, continuing: “Distraction is the way to peace?”

I shrug again – I think it’s starting to piss him off. “For a time, I guess.”

“So, ‘s that how you’re takin’ quittin’? Think about other stuff whenever you want a smoke? Occupy yourself?”

Once I realise my leg is going dead, fuzzy from sitting still so long in this dark booth, I flex my thigh, flex my hands under the table, wide-open and then tight-shut, processing the blank slate of his gaunt face. I press my fingers into the sticky vinyl, delight in the interrupted drag of them up, up, up as they curl to fists, my shoulders up to my ears.

When he says things like that, it makes it so hard to dislike him. I almost wish he’d ignore me, like he did the first couple weeks before it became clear to the both of us that it couldn’t be undone: his back constantly to me, sending messages only through Marty, refusing to look in my direction, like I might tempt him again into being a version of him he hated. At least, before, his coldness hadn’t been directed at me specifically. Then, it was a retaliation, a wall meant to keep me out. Where were his books on philosophy then?—to tell him that attachment leads to desire leads to suffering? That kind of suffering would be better than this kind.

This is worse. This is so much worse. I’d rather not have something at all than have it toy with me like this.

It takes a considerable amount of co-ordination to fabricate the apathy in my posture, my eyes, my expression, to compensate for the unease that pulses like a new artery in my throat – though, at the silvery glint that flickers in his eyes, I know it’s all for nothing. He’s already seen the hurt that, really, I can’t pin on anyone but myself. He’s raking his eyes slowly over my face. It’s fucking mean. Do me the favour of a mercy-killing, God.

I never even told him I was trying to quit.

“What,” I begin, concentrating very hard on keeping myself from stammering and from slurring, from crying and from grasping at his hand, “like that association thing?”

I’ve heard of it, obviously. I know every trick at this point: old wives’ tales to the latest research papers at the state university library. It’s psychological: whenever you want something, instead, think of awful, gross, repulsive things, and make yourself hate it. I’ve tried it before, but it doesn’t always work. How can you convince yourself that one thing is disgusting when it’s undeniable how good it really was?

Rust nods.

“I mean, I tried it,” I tell him lowly.

Overstatement: I tried it for approximately three days and two nights before I caved, unlocking the drawer in my study with shaky, desperate hands, hungry.

“But I’m always thinkin’ about it.”

Shit. He seems to have regained a nerve: Rust stares calmly ahead at me—not through me or just past me; at me. This is what I wanted, isn’t it?

He leans his weight over his forearms upon the table, on offence. Is this how he works his suspects? Well, shit, I’ve studied his methods from the privacy of the other side of the false mirror enough times to be able to answer that, actually: this is how he works his suspects. Initially, at least, to gauge their personality, their wants, their fears, what they need him to be.

Thing is, I can’t pin down his intention with me. Is it just the satisfaction of the kill? Or maybe revenge for what I did to him last August. I broke down his walls: an unforgivable sin. I condemned him to the effort of building them back up, of shoving me out—if I ever managed to intrude in the first place. Maybe I deserve this.

With his sleeves folded back, the dark lines of Rust’s tattoo jut out, growing along his tawny, leather-tan skin like lichen. I try not to stare.

His eyes complete a pre-emptive scan of my face, and, really, I know I should not let him see any change there in my expression, though my mouth twitches to frown. I try to gather my forces. I try to prepare myself for it, for that inevitable intrusion.

“‘f you’re so desperate for it, why’re you fightin’ back?” he asks, unblinking and cruel.

My mouth twists, and I let it fall into the frown it wants. “‘Cause I wanted to feel better.”

It sounds dumb because it is dumb, even though it’s true.

Low, he hums. He straightens, softens, and finally leans away. It’s like the vacuum around me leaves with him, and, there, now, it’s easier to breathe.

He must note the way my chest rises and falls so stiffly, like there’s a weight resting over my heart.

“Withdrawal’s a breeze, ain’t it?”

“You’re not fuckin’ funny,” I scoff, digging my nails punishingly into my palm. He smokes and drinks like he welcomes cancer, or hopes for it, so I don’t think we’re on a level playing field.

He quirks his head. “Well, do you?”

“Do I what, Rusty?”

Amused, he rolls his jaw. Good – I hope I’ve provoked him.

“Do you feel better?”

I run my tongue over my teeth. “Sometimes,” I reply truthfully. “Not right now.”

He searches my face.

“I can give you a ride home,” he offers.

Fuck, and what will that be like? Ten times worse than this. I’ll come away the husk of a woman, worn down by his disapproval. My own fault for wanting anything from him in the first place, really.

Teeth gritted together, I shake my head, ready to pull a muscle in my damn neck. “Didn’t mean anythin’ by it. Sorry.”

No, I’m not. I ought to slap him, and then run away, back home, or back to my house, or to a brand new city. Or he could finally cuss me out, save me the wondering. Then, I could lick my wounds and they would finally stop reopening.

I scratch at my scalp.

Rust eyes my hand like he’d like to rip the bad habit away from my body. For a moment, I think he will—the tendons in his hand flex and writhe under the skin—but, no, he only brushes a thumb against the valley between his nose and cheek, and he holds his tongue for once.

“Wasn’t offended,” he corrects firmly. “I’ll take you home.”

Flashing with annoyance, my eyes dart up viciously to penalise him. “And what?” I hiss.

He sits back, doesn’t answer the question.

Jaw clenched, I wait to see if he’ll look away, but he doesn’t.

My irritation soon fizzles through, condenses to a low, simmering understanding, steadily tended to by the intensity of his steadfast gaze.

Oh.

My eyes soften.

Oh – I have him, don’t I?

He shows no signs of the tentativeness he had displayed last time—if Rust could ever be tentative. His eyes do not shift and scuttle around me; they meet mine, challenging my comfort. He does not tuck himself into a corner; he remains leaned over the table, just like that. How could I have known?

I stare back, brow pinched in confusion.

In the heat of last August, I’d peeled away from him knowing exactly how I’d convinced him he wanted me. Maybe I was evil for it – a good person wouldn’t use somebody’s faults against them, would they? And maybe that’s what it was: selfish. If he hates me, he’d be right to.

Which is why I’m so puzzled that he doesn’t. Or rather, indifference was the baseline. Hell. And this? I don’t know.

Swelling dangerously with the well-loved memory of his delirious mouthings over my skin, I grow rigid.

My temples throb and ache, the threat of tears still very real.

“Mind?” he asks – I watch, wide-eyed, as he pulls a pack of Camels from his pocket.

Trembling slightly, I shake my head, though saliva is already pooling over the pit of my tongue, warm and soft, just like my desire. Luckily, he’s too preoccupied with his lighter to see it: how my body ripples at the scrape of his voice.

The promise of nicotine dances like a phantom in the mouth, just from watching him place a cigarette between his lips. When he flicks open his Zippo, the sharp, shuddering candle of it taunts me, and I finally understand what they say about moths and flames.

I watch him take a long drag.

That all-consuming hunger lurches up in me again, and I swallow the warm spit that’s steadily been filling my mouth.

Oh, Christ. This can’t be real. Desire shouldn’t be this bloody. Desire shouldn’t be the thing with teeth and claws, the ugly thing that tips into violence. Or obsession. With how often my thoughts return to us in the summer, I’ve wondered obsession as a possibility. The difference between myself and those who commit crimes of passion is control. Rust is dangerous for me. What is he thinking? What’s in his head? I ache to pry it open and explore, to swim close to him, for my skin to melt into his, to consume and be consumed. Not a moment’s peace, and that’s what I’m chasing, isn’t it? Peace and quiet?

I don’t have to say anything – he can read it all, mulling over the fine changes in my expression, the softening of my body, some pre-emptive instinct. Will he touch me tonight?

With a cautious hand, ready to jolt back if met with teeth, I reach out to him and remove the cigarette from his pinched fingers—which he allows—then bringing it to my mouth, taking a drag myself, nice and slow, good and deep, a sigh, like home.

He watches me.

“Don’t say anything.”

And he doesn’t. He just watches, watches, watches as I take another drag. He shivers, and I feel it reverberate through my bones.

“What are you thinkin’ about?” I ask him softly, pressing down a quivering breath, smoking his cigarette. I’ve never mustered the courage to ask before.

For once, though, I really don’t have to: I know exactly where his head is. Where else? He’s back in that room, infected by the drowse and drunken fever of August, with me, living it again. Where I’d coaxed him into the temptation, wicked as the snake in the garden. He should’ve pushed me to leave with Johansson and Marty – of course, I would’ve stayed. I’m a rotten thing, and my heart is a bloodhound. He’s the better of the two of us. I’ll take whatever of him I can get – anything.

He meets my eyes directly, so hopeless, so raw. Is he asking? He shouldn’t be.

But what will he have me do? I’m at his disposal, really.

“And?” I ask, throat dry.

When he moves to speak, the words that leave him are low and slow: “You did something to me,” he manages.

I scoff.

“S’that a good or bad thing?” I ask.

Rust huffs like what I said was funny. More likely, though, it’s the way my eyes are so wide, the way my hand is pressed between my thighs, that amuses him. “Can’t decide.”

My mouth trembles as my eyes scrape over his neck, which I know, I remember, to be hot and alive, thick with it over the pulse. I was so high off of it: his warmth, his weight, his press.

I indulge in one last drag, using the last scraps of my energy to conjure the pungent stench of rotting flesh in the cruel sunshine, the pick of eager flies and their cacophonous buzzing, the churn of vomit in the stomach. I look at Rust and try to do the same: the months of silence, his back decidedly turned to me, him accepting my case, and his arrogance and his apathy and his severity. He is a harrowing connection that I should rather not have made.

The technique doesn’t work. I don’t know why I thought, even for a minute, that this time would be different from the last.

With him staring calmly at me, like I deserve it—the trap, the squirming sensation over my spine, the hopeless, unavoidable heat that claims my face—it’s just another arrow pointing to the same conclusion. Maybe we should just let August have its way with us again. Twin plagues.

Trembling ever so slightly, blood so warm, so thick, I flick ashes out into the tray between us.

“I should put this out,” I mumble, though my hand yearns to return it to my mouth.

“’s my cigarette,” Rust mutters.

“Sorry.” I offer my hand to him. “Want it back?”

I know what I must look like to him, pupils dark, the size of the moon, like a plate. Here, in the darkest part of the dark bar, I open myself to him, warm, molten, inviting. And God, this must be a dream—because I know what he wants, and I know that he’ll accept me. How we got here doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe he’s thought about it for some time, and only now, in a moment of stillness with him, have I even noticed. Too caught up in the fine details of a painting to think of the artist’s intention, which is always more important.

Silent, stare inexorable, he accepts the cigarette, only touching my fingers quick, like I’d burn him. Maybe I will. Serves him right: he was always going to haunt me either way. I ought to get mine while I still can.

The hunger laps at me.

I want to coax him open-wide. I want to peel away his demeanour and wrap myself close to him. Body heat is the best way to keep warm, isn’t it? I’m sure I read about that somewhere. It’s still fresh in my mind, like a cut. I can’t manage a day without playing it over at least once. I want it again: I want to breathe him in and let him sit in my chest and seep into every cell and let him be part of me that way, at least until the next breath.

He can see it in my eyes: the freneticism of my thoughts, racing like a storm, desires like bullets like rain.

“You ever think about what you want?” I try asking him, voice strained tight over my heart in my throat.

“People only ever think about what they want,” he parries, batting away any trace of diffidence. He secures his cigarette between his lips, shifting. “Let’s leave.”

At his first movement, I slide out of the booth.

Sometime during our conversation, the place emptied out. It must have been around when I finished Marty’s leftover beer that the weight of the locals’ beady stares—which had already faded to the back of my mind, in the same way that a dark alleyway can still make you uneasy though you know nothing would ever happen to you there—finally left me. There are no witnesses left to see me following after Rust like a dog, my body thrumming like the lone bug zapper out on the porch, which cracks! just as we exit.

The broken clock reads three o’clock when we leave, but I know that, really, it’s only midnight.

Fortunately, the heat has cracked for once, like old, beat-up, splitting leather. Stepping out onto that night path, the breeze is warm and fragrant, dancing over my cheeks, playing gently with the loose threads of my hair. It’s a clear, blue, never-ending night – the dirt road which accompanies us is a long, winding, indigo river that spills unseen over the far, far horizon. The neighbouring fields—one a rolling stretch of grass; the other of wheat—are alive in the wind, flung one way on exhale, drawn the other upon inhale.

Thank God for the noise of it: their rustling whispers, in a language we can’t understand; the soft whistle of a passing gust of air; the firm, crisp crunch of dry mud and dust under my boots. Thank God for the sway of things: the cradle of humidity; the press of my arm to Rust’s, which he permits only for a second, with his face angled away. Then, he slows, coming to walk just behind me, still parallel.

Flickering strands of long-grass brush my knuckles – I grab onto one, pull the seeds off it in an easy swipe, and scatter them as we go, one by one.

Briefly, I glance over my shoulder. Sure enough, his eyes are fixed on me, on my every movement, like he’s making sure I’m actually real. The corner of my mouth twitches up into a smile.

Rust’s cigarette flares between his lips.

I scratch gently at my wrist, reminded of the flowing of my blood just beneath the skin, hot and thick.

You get nowhere in life just hoping things will fall into your lap like this—and, anyway, what good is getting something that you didn’t work for? Where’s the gratification? It’s artificial, feeble as plastic. Christ, it was even a struggle to get my head around Johansson and his propensity to dole out favours. I understood a write-up – won’t pretend I’m above ass-kissing – but tidying up the office kitchen and keeping quiet about it? I thought it was stupid: letting people reap the rewards of your own effort, and for what?

So, the buzz of earning Rust’s touch that first time?—shit, nothing compared. No drug, no high; nothing. I really thought I did something. Satisfied some secret ambition I didn’t know I held. To have him like that. To be able to replay that night, swallow it like a pill. To look at him and know what was underneath his clothes and his skin, and perhaps further inside, too. Shit, I took so much from him, but the mental gymnastics of the effort justified it, right? And, now, he’s going to give it all up again. Wants it, even.

Haven’t I played this out a thousand times in my head? I’ve seen the future—a number of futures—where I’m able to argue for his affection. Fight for your love – that’s what my daddy used to tell me whenever he was feeling sentimental after yelling.

I’ve had endless conversations with him in my head, edited accordingly as time passed, as he changed, as I changed, as the air between us changed. Possible flirtation seemed silly, futile, after a week. Sex appeal would go unnoticed by him – wasn’t like he looked, anyway. Not the type to chase tail. I found myself longing for him to please linger uncomfortably in doorways to rooms I was in, to leave things near me and come and collect them just after I was gone so that, maybe, he’d still feel the warmth of my presence and understand it was only ever warm that way for him. The idea of genuine confession always sprung up during the quiet nights alone together in the bullpen, but I was always able to talk myself out of it when he wouldn’t so much as glance at me after two, three hours.

It must be a million threads of conversation up in my head, which is why I guess it’s so hard to untangle the great knot and retrieve just one, because, now, there are no words that come to mind when it matters. Or maybe it doesn’t matter: I don’t think he needs convincing at all.

“What you so quiet for?” he asks faintly.

When I look back, he’s stark against the brooding sky like some shadow-man. His outline hums like he’s pulling away into his own silhouette.

I can’t seem to smile. “Nothin’.”

He won’t push—at least, not on this—and I’m glad for it.

Rust’s beat-up semi is all lonely sat in a dip up in the road, waiting for us. Same semi he’d driven me home in from work this one week I was getting my car fixed up, in which a series of slow, mutual interrogations would take place along the light-streaked highway. In the office, you were lucky to drag a full sentence out of Rust, but, alone, it wasn’t so hard to get him to talk at all.

Maybe I had just wanted to be better than him, to learn how he worked, how he was such a good interrogator, and bleed him dry. That was why I couldn’t look away: every choice in his demeanour could help me surpass him.

Even then, I learned to be careful with my looks. I had the feeling he’d morph into something else if I stared long enough, the way the shadow in the corner of your bedroom changes shape when you’re bone-tired. Sometimes, he would. And on the Thursday night of that week, when he had pulled over and thrown up, shaking, into the dark thrush, I hadn’t uttered a word as he climbed back into the driver’s seat. But, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, I’d stared at him with the filmy eyes of a hungry nocturnal animal.

Then, at least, the curiosity wasn’t a burden. Not like it became when I drove myself home come that morning after.

I could tell it was different the moment I shifted awake, feigning a sleep for just a couple more minutes.

Dressed again and putting on a pot of coffee, his back was to me. I had shuffled up, pulled on my clothes, and I knew the stupor of the night had faded. So, really, when I stepped past him and he closed the door behind me without a word, I shouldn’t have been upset.

When I reach the pick-up first, I twist to look at him.

Rust has slowed to finish his cigarette at a safe distance, eyeing me warily.

He crushes the stub into the dirt, then glancing out into the long night.

“Straight home?” he asks.

I shake my head, and the rigid line of him gives just a little. It’s so dangerous to be seduced by your own influence, but the realisation that I’ve had any at all is fuel enough to the plea in my wide eyes.

Rust advances haltingly. If I move, I’m sure he’ll flinch and bolt. So, I test the theory: better to weed out what’s already decayed.

I angle myself towards him, open like a door. He tosses his jacket into the bed of his pickup, stepping through.

The heat seeps back between us, slow and thick like a flood of molasses, and it becomes very clear, suddenly, that we never should’ve tried to barricade ourselves. Pretty sure Rust’s known this a while, anyways: he’s the one who leans in for me, kisses me slow.

This time, his hands are quick to curl around my body, where the tension in that tight cord all down his spine has snapped. Or just eased up on him—but that’s unlikely. And unimportant. With his firm touch petting up my spine, climbing each rung, it’s all unimportant.

A pulse of arousal strikes me like an electric current as Rust pulls the blouse out of my skirt, his face close to me.

His tongue pushes into my mouth again, and I hum over the husk of nicotine. It’s a haze in the brain, one I’ve missed. My skin tingles and my thoughts warp in this leer, like a nic rush, only I haven’t had one of those in years and years.

I can’t exactly call what I’m feeling satisfaction. There’s no win to this. My teeth sunk into him so sweet last time, and the thrill of getting him, of tripping him up with his own desire, was almost as good as the actual feeling of him inside me. But it’s different now: so obvious, it’s funny. Though my first instinct is to doubt and pry apart, maybe want is the most trustworthy thing a person can feel. It’s animal and instinctive, and it’s inevitable, so it’s always true. Ugly, sometimes, but always there. There’s no room to question his want, because I can taste it on his tongue, I can feel it pressing over my stomach, I can hear it in the way he hums at the sear of my skin.

It must be a favour to me: the blatancy of it all. For however direct he may be, I’ve always felt that Rust has these plans within plans. Nothing is as it is on the surface: you have to dig to get to the good stuff. It’s disorienting, having it all laid out for me. And I’ll take anything he gives me.

I don’t want to leave any room for doubt in his mind either.

So, I clutch at him hungrily, so drunk on his warmth, and thump my back against the door he opens for me to close it again.

I don’t ask, and I’m glad that he doesn’t make me, only presses my body flush against the cool surface of his side-door, until the only part of me free to move are the fingers that curl over his arms, as if they could sink through the fabric and then the flesh underneath. There’s only dogs and ghosts out at this hour, anyway; eyes in the long-grass. No-one but them and him to see my hips jerk against the precise hand under my skirt.

He hadn’t looked at me this much before. Even when my eyes go glassy and I have to blink hard to try and regain my smarts, to not finish too quickly, I know he’s staring at me like a scientist.

When the next needy noise is drawn from me, I bury my face into his neck to save myself the embarrassment of being seen like this, even though it’s pointless. His fingers are dragging aside the damp fabric of my underwear anyway, sliding through my silky desire. When his knee shoves between my legs to keep apart, he changes the pressure of his hand, circles tightly over where shame does not apply. Restraint is a man-made practice that never prevails over biology. I should know this. Still, though, my face is hot as I whine into his shoulder.

Rust doesn’t ask me to look at him, not yet, and I’m so grateful for it. I bite into the meat of him at the push of one finger, then keen all the way to my toes at the hook of two, rocking against his palm thoughtlessly as he fucks the both of them in deep.

The clink of his belt buckle barely processes through the smoke of sticky eyes and open mouths and the press of his body. But the absence of his hand from my hip, of it working between us?—that’s what ushers normal sensation back into me. I recover from the limp slump against him, but not quickly enough to understand or resist him guiding my hand to wrap around his swollen cock, coated with spit.

He grunts as he tightens my grip around him, coaxes my hand how he wants it. In the back of my mind, though, of course I remember. Only, his fingers are so far inside that my head is spinning, teetering on the precipice of another thought I know I’ll lose, one that dissolves at the slight scrape of nail, one that would never matter as much as the soft then firm press of him against my cervix. My eyes water, and there licking at me is only a faint, abstract impression of embarrassment when Rust grips over my jaw, calloused heel of his palm heavy on my neck, and hauls me away from the hiding spaces of his body’s crevices.

“What, you fuckin’ shy now? You wanted it, so look,” he mumbles, digging his fingers into the soft parts of my face a little more, like there’s some hidden button beneath the surface that can make my droopy eyes fly back open. There must be because, somehow, it works. He angles my face by the scruff of my neck.

I can only stand to look between us for a few jumpy heartbeats before my eyes settle on the comfort of his even face, which he seems to accept readily, breath hitching. He does not blink. The intensity of his observations hounds me, lights me up like points on a star, even when my vision smears and melts at the dizzying curl of his fingers. Lucky for my weak knees he’s got his hand over the nape of my neck, his thighs pinning my own. I shake against him, some pathetic thing, and tremble when he keeps massaging there deep inside.

“Don’t go dumb on me, girl,” Rust scolds quietly when my hand loosens around him, his own having to leave the heat of my neck and come down to correct the pressure, the pull. My head lolls without the support of his hand. “Ain’t gon’ say nothin’?”

Words spill uselessly into a pool before me, slipping through my fingers. My pulse slams in my throat, lower, too, against his touch, each beat meeting him as he works me over again.

What I manage is a choked noise, all clogged up inside. I have little to do with it: just a body, a heartbeat and a compulsion to be near, nearer, nearest to him. Half a mind that’s lagging worse than the computers at work, that realises far too late that the body is curling into itself again, so tight, so wet, and fuck, fuck.

He removes his fingers, that slow drag, and tells me to turn. When I don’t—completely without, dull and aching—Rust twists and shoves me against the window, which goes cloudy at the breathy moan pushed up from my slack stomach.

Slow-like, a cold hand snakes under my shirt, smooths up my burning spine, all the way up, all the way down, hooking in the waistband of my skirt, knuckles burrowing into the soft dimples in my back. My whole body shivers as he slides his palm over the back of my neck—a comfort for which I’m desperate to become familiar—and squeezes gently. If I keep my eyes open, all I can see of him is that black silhouette in the window, a reflection. A homogenous mass, humming at the edges, devoid of the detail of things: can’t see the way he drags his thumb up along the line of my spine, traces where it meets the skull; nor the way he steps forward, teases the air out of my lungs, enjoys it, tugs my hips closer to him by the gusset of the underwear webbed between my thighs; nor the way the cool metal buckle presses red lines into flesh.

The sight of Rust doesn’t matter so much as the understanding that it’s him behind me, that it’s his truck my cheek is being pressed into, that it’s his—fuck—that it’s him sliding through the heat of me, so close. The tip notches and makes it all the easier for my eyes to flutter shut. It helps with the vertigo that follows the rough push of him inside.

My fingers grasp for the little ridges in the door. Best place for them ends up to be under my mouth, though, to keep my head on my shoulders, to muffle the noises I was sure only animals made. My knee jerks sharply against the truck at the first white-hot pulse of pleasure – I hiss, smearing the drool at the edge of my mouth with the back of my hand, so glad he isn’t in clear enough line of sight to chastise me with his tendency to notice and never forget.

But he knows—he must fucking know by now—because the heavy hand clasped over my scruff curls around my face, and Rust forces two fingers into my parted mouth, presses over my soft tongue.

He pulls himself out just to feel the total length of me taking him again, so painfully slow. Feel the initial resistance, the spongy give, the sweet slip, the drag, all of it. So full, I feel sick with it. Overindulgence. Knocks me weak, doesn’t mind it when I bite down on his fingers to take most of the weight out of my sob. What I take from him, he takes from me—we’re even that way—so Rust, already with his nose flirting with the crook of my sweaty neck, nips over my erratic pulse, pushes his tongue over where I’m sure he can see the skin throbbing with the violence of it. Vampire. He could draw blood and I wouldn’t mind: he knows I need bloodletting.

So fucking dumb to think for a second it could be sated by just one time. I needed it again before it even ended – I knew it in the split second he touched me. The grief of closure was as adamant as a shadow. Stupid. He must think it, too, because, shit, the snap of his hips is mean. Punishment: you should’ve known.

“We ought’a be in your bed. I should be fuckin’ you through your bed,” he complains gruffly, his mouth dragging over hinge of my jaw.

I moan around the fingers in my mouth, which hook together with his thumb to pinch the fleshy inside of my cheek, challenging my lost focus. No matter. There’s nothing we can do now.

The seize of my body doesn’t take him by surprise at all, not that I expected it to, and the words that follow are easy, like he’s been thinkin’ of them as loud and clear as day as it would be to speak ‘em: “Shit, that feels good, sweet girl, huh? Tha’s it, just take it. That’s good.” And he lets the warmth gush out before stuffing it back in. “You’ll take one more.”

I stare at the endless field to the side of us, melted over the curve of his door, shivering despite the humidity that always finds you around here. I choke more on my own tongue than his fingers as Rust fucks me slow, like I deserve it.

“Need it s’bad, huh?” he drawls into the shell of my ear. “Why you gone all quiet on me, baby?—thought y’wanted it.”

He drags his fingers out of my mouth, daring me to speak. He slides his hand between my stomach and the side-door, gliding down between the thighs, smearing my dripping arousal over the skin.

My toes curl tight again as he pushes deeper than before, sits there like he knows my mind will do the rest of the work. The grate of his zipper as he shifts draws a mangled sound from the pit of me, not hidden by the brace of my trembling arm.

He zeros in on my clit, all sticky, and circles tight. I shudder.

“Give in,” he says to me in a voice so low and soft that it barely reaches me above the high frequency splitting through my skull. He rolls that bright pearl between his finger and thumb. “You feel it?”

Mindless and eyes all milky, I still manage a nod, grateful for the mean pin of his knees against my shaking thighs.

He hums. “So give in.”

Fuck, this is absurd. The mind can just about string two and two together when Rust lends a forearm beside my head for me to rest on, to grip over: so he’s pictured this, wanted this, for how long? I knew the stagnancy was a front, swallowed something else, but—my mouth goes wet and slack over his forearm at the languid roll of his hips—but it wasn’t realistic to imagine it was this. Rust struck me as someone incapable of reconciling himself with his wants. Shame over acceptance because he thinks it’s atonement. Should’ve known better than to think Rust believed in redemption.

The silhouette in the window is looking over the empty road, scanning for cars that won’t ever come—but his hand is warm under the tent of my shirt, easing over my waist, slow, as everything clamps up, trembling, again. Body and a heartbeat, he tugs my hips back to him, again and again, until he’s a hot, shuddering line all through me, face in my neck, crushing the fight out of my lungs.

His nose presses over my cheek, and his breath is coarse there, too, panting, when he lifts his heavy head. My throat goes so loose and open, greedily drinking in the sweet-sticky scent of him.

“C’mon, now,” he says to me once he’s pulled my underwear back up, dragging the cool, damp gusset against the mess of me for good measure. He pinches my hip, then over my thigh, like that might get me to quit shuddering. “Time to go.”

When I don’t move, he smooths a hand gently over my hair. Tucks a loose chunk of it back into the mess of my braid before deciding it’s best if he lets it loose completely.

Rust winds down the window as he holds open the door for me to clamber onto the bench.

“Y’can sleep ‘f you want,” he mumbles once he’s got me curled up on the seat, leaning through the frame. He tilts his head – the shadows have always hidden his eyes, but I like how the pinch in his brow has melted away at least.

If I had half a mind, I’d use it to shove his face out my goddamn way. Instead, I settle for the narrowing of my eyes and a decided huff. “Won’t.”

Lie. I fall asleep like anything, mellowed by the sweet rush of wind over marshland, the spirit of it weaving inside, and the weight of Rust’s hand tucked in the tight bend of my knee.

#rust cohle #rust cohle x reader #true detective season 1 #rust cohle x reader smut #the idler wheel td #marty hart #true detective #i want to [redacted] his [redacted] until he [redacted] all over-#who said that #female manipulator doesn’t need to manipulate in this one??? crayzay #fic is basically them talking but im hoping ive been accidentally super introspective and deep #her vibe is like mannnn i have to make this guy love me #and his is like girl you don’t have to try I literally already do #i know it’s 15K but i swear it feels shorter if you get into it #got #whatever #only took me a year 😃#fucking finally

164 notes · View notes