#it's like watching a train wreck | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

porcelainseashore · 7 months ago

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I think I went through a full cycle of emotions tonight finally catching up on my reading list and jeez this really did a number on me, but in such a good way, don't get me wrong. I know you added in the label of pseudo-poetic nonsense, but I don't think it is at all! In fact, I think your writing has improved so much over the months (not that it wasn't already good enough to begin with), and I'm enjoying seeing you grow and explore things with your fics. Idk, I feel really happy for you if that makes sense? ❤️

Onto the fic itself, as someone who has been in open relationships before (on both sides, the girlfriend and the lover) and also basing this on my friends' open relationships, you really nailed how a fucked up one is like. And I can tell you that most of them are fucked, except for a minute few who take the time and effort to communicate and nurture each relationship within the arrangement. So, this really brings back a lot of memories, bittersweet and also reminds me of some bad times, but in a very poignant way. I love how you captured Reader's infatuation with Leon and the very grey actions he takes... because:

You know he knows, it’s too obvious for him not to know, that’s why he refuses to look into your eyes, opting to push your face - which he reminds you is gorgeous - into the mattress.

Exactly.

I loved how you chronicled Leon's time from RE6 to Death Island, how his work came into play and the subtle changes that show in his relationship with Reader - that was simply perfection. The most devastating part of this for me was actually the time where they share perhaps one of, or if not, the only romantic, intimate sex they've ever had to the soundtracks of Jeff Buckley and Mazzy Star. You're really reminding me of my teenage years, lol, except instead of sleeping with strangers, I was smoking cigarettes with my cousin while listening to these legends on the stereo. I think the saddest part about this scene for me is wondering if this is what they could've been or if this was all imagined in Reader's head. There were times where I attached so much more to a shared intimate moment or gesture that some guy made, only to realise that he never thought of it that way at all.

And the constant reminders of how Reader is just some girl, and not his wife, no matter how much she wants to believe in something more - that got me so bad. Like you can see this train wreck of a relationship happening, and you're heading right into the centre of it, but you just can't let go, you're willing to put yourself under the tracks and be flayed alive if you have to. That's what I'm getting from it and once again, exactly how such a situation feels like.

Finally, the last karaoke memory you placed in there was gold. I loved the juxtaposition of that to their final night together. Love the question of are we friends, lovers, or something more, because we built all these memories together, didn't you feel anything then? But then it just comes spiralling down, because that's the end of it. It's just a fond memory to look back on after the heartbreak. Beautiful. Simply, utterly, beautiful.

I would've loved to add in more quotes of the parts I liked, but I think this post would just become your entire fic, literally. Thank you for producing this godsend. This felt very personal to me and yes it ripped at my heart, but it was what I needed. I'm counting this as one of my favourites now.

never penelope, always calypso

pairing: leon x reader

cw: infidelity?, p in v, alcohol usage, oral sex, angst, smut, possible misuse of words, questionable metaphors, allusions to the odyssey (i'm cringe), pseudo-poetic nonsense

summary: leon is married to ashley and they have an open relationship. you become fwbs when he visits dc. accidental feelings happen

a/n: the title is a reference to the odyssey (no discourse/analyses allowed on this post!!)

wc: 5.5k

taglist: @rigorwhoring @porcelainseashore @mrswint3rs @dilfprayers @pawrincss

link to join taglist in bio! link to commissions & ko-fi in bio! link to ao3 in bio!

Winter 2012

You first meet Leon at a bar near your apartment. Outside, it's freezing, yet you order your drink on the rocks. Drunkenness makes your cheeks match your ears, rosy and slightly numb to the cold.

It’s been a rough day for you and the way Leon’s head hangs as he looks blankly into his glass - half-empty - lets you know that he’s in the same boat. He’s got blonde-ish hair, icy blue eyes, and a hint of a five o’clock shadow. His voice, low and tired, holds a sympathetic chagrin, subtle and genuine. He must feel your eyes on him because he picks himself up as best he can and smiles at you.

He’s not drunk. Neither are you, only tipsy.

“Hi,” you say because you’re not good with pickup lines.

“Hey. How’s it goin’?”

“It’s goin’,” you say because it’s the best way you can tell the truth without being too much of a downer.

“Not great, huh?”

“A complete shitshow if I’m being honest.”

“I can relate.” He thrusts his right hand out and you take it. His palm is calloused with a life much rougher than you’ll ever know. “I’m Leon.”

You tell him your name and he releases your hand from his grasp.

You recount your disastrous day and he laughs at all the right times and keeps his smile sympathetic for the rest of your story. He doesn’t say much about himself, and the next morning you worry you were venting, but you come to find over the years that he prefers to listen rather than to talk. He has unparalleled patience. He’s not like other guys. You’re just like other girls.

The one time he speaks over you is to insist to the bartender that he is paying for your drinks too when he asks to close his tab.

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to.”

He grabs his wallet from his back pocket and you notice on his left hand, a wedding band. It was all just friendly conversation, you realize. Your smile drops and you don’t have time to pick it back up before he turns to you.

“What’s up?” He asks.

“Nothing.” You give him a fake smile.

“You sure?” He probes you with minimal force. His questions never make you feel like you’re being interrogated, strapped to a metal chair despite the fact that a gun sits on his hip; not like an interview either with bright lights an audience; more like a surgery, penetrating, tearing and mending your organs while you’re numbed by alcoholic anesthetic.

“Mhm,” You respond. You are already falling into a dreamless sleep, breathing, but comatose.

“Okay. Do you live close? We could split a cab.” He places his hand on the small of your back and whispers while you walk to the exit, “Unless you want to come back with me to my hotel.”

You look at him, almost angry for her – the woman you don’t know – and yet, still wanting. He removes his hand quickly. “Whoa. I’m sorry. I clearly misunderstood the situation. I thought we were having a flirtatious conversation and that it was heading that direction. I apologize for overstepping your boundaries.”

“No, I was flirting, but…” You point to his left hand. “You’re married.” There is a part of you that is already willing. You’re his puppet, his ragdoll, willing.

“Oh, yeah,” Leon says with a smile, thinking of her. He holds up his hand, proudly displaying his wedding band. “I am married, but we have an open relationship.” He sounds so honest you’re tempted to believe him. But, there is still a sliver of your consciousness left.

“Prove it. I don’t want to be involved with a cheater.”

“Prove it? Alright. Would you like me to text her and ask if I can invite you back to my hotel room?”

“Sure.”

You don’t think he’ll do it, but he does. Her name in his phone has a heart next to it. You notice it when he shows you her response: Have a nice time :).

He calls her ‘baby’.

He calls you a lot of things during the act, but mostly your name once it’s over.

He calls you ‘gorgeous’ as in, “You look fucking gorgeous like that” When he looks into your eyes from above you. You’re on your knees with his cock down your throat while his hand holds your hair in a makeshift ponytail. You look gorgeous if gorgeous means messy - the mascara that was already smudged when you entered the bar mixes with tears and drips down your face. You look like a canvas drenched with paint water. Filthy and accidental. And in an abstract way, something that could be conceived as beautiful in the eyes of a downright horny beholder.

Leon holds your wrists above your head when he fucks you. His grip is firm just like yours is around his cock, though it’s not your intention. In fact, you want more of him, all of him.

He calls you ‘darlin’ as in,“Darlin’, you’re squeezin’ me so tight. I’m not gonna last like this.” When you’re on all fours and he’s feeding himself to you from behind. One of his hands guides his cock to your entrance while the other holds your hip – that one continues to steady you while he’s fucking you at a merciless pace. With the other, he runs his fingers through his hair – you can see him in the mirror, sweat beading on his forehead.

He calls you ‘babe’ as in, “C’mere, babe.” When he beckons you towards him, lying in bed with his head propped up enough to see you. “Want you to sit on my face”. When you comply and sit on his face, your thighs drown out his words but the noises he makes reverberate through your entire body. Much to Leon’s dismay, it’s the last orgasm you can handle that night. (You have to walk home tomorrow, right?)

There is a distinct difference between babe and baby. The difference being that he calls you one and his wife the other.

That first night, you go for three rounds, only stopping because Leon ran out of condoms and neither of you feel like going to the pharmacy to buy more. At least, not until the next day.

The next morning when his alarm rings, you grab his phone from the bedside table and hand it to him. You catch a glimpse of his lockscreen. It’s him with a woman. “Is that her?”

“My wife? Yeah.” He hands you the phone and lets you see her. She’s beautiful. More so than you. You understand why she lets him do this. And why he shows her off with no hesitation and a prideful grin. You’d brag about her too.

You imagine their first date, their wedding, the sex they have in their home that they share, and every other thing while Leon makes a trip to the drugstore across the street.

“Sorry I took so long,” he says when he climbs back into bed, “there was a long line at the checkout.”

It’s okay, you think, you gave me time to decide that it’s better if I leave now.

And yet, the second he lies down next to you, your decision changes. The prospect of lazy morning sex with Leon is too beautiful to resist. Even in retrospect, if it were purely about the sex, you wouldn’t regret any of it, it was even better than you imagined it would be.

When he takes the blue box from the plastic shopping bag and jiggles it in front of you, playfully asking the question, you nod. None of this requires words.

You sit up in bed, closing the gap between you and your objective, but he stops you. “Don’t get up. I’ll come there.”

He’s quiet despite the room being empty of sleeping children and nosy parents. The hustle and bustle of the city on Saturday morning covers up any sound. His wife knows anyway and she’s 1000 miles away. It’s for the sake of your ears, still acclimating to the ceaseless knocking at your eardrums that comes with being alive. He moves slowly, spreads your legs for you, removes your panties - the boring beige pair you wore to work the day before. He runs his hand over your folds like he’s petting a stray animal, getting you to ease up and let him in. Two fingers mold you to his liking. He fits you for himself despite being taken. He feeds your desire and sets you free when he’s finished. (You’ve finished too, so it’s not cruel, is it?).

He steps into the shower alone.

If getting some more material for your spank bank was your goal, then you accomplished it. Not just the sex but the sight of him with a towel around his waist, his toned body on display. It’s the first time you’ve seen it in the daylight. He only removed his pants when he fucked you from behind. And the night before, you only got a glimpse of his beauty in the dim of the lamp-lit room.

The ounce of self-restraint that remains in your being, holds you back from ripping the towel away from him and kneeling before him, begging him to use your mouth.

There is a piece of you that regrets not taking the opportunity while you had it. You would have another memory of him to fill the Leon-shaped hole inside you. Better yet, he could’ve called you pathetic and told you to leave, and ruined it all before your infatuation could turn into something worse. But, he wouldn’t do that. And that’s why you like him.

Summer 2012

It was supposed to be a one-time thing. Well, honestly, it wasn’t supposed to be anything at all. You had each other’s phone numbers but no plans were made and the goodbye hug didn’t feel like a ‘see you later’, more like a ‘have a nice life’.

But a couple months after your first meeting, he texts you. “I’m in town. Are you busy tonight?”

You happen to be very free and though you denied it at the time, very infatuated with Leon. In your mind, it’s simply the fact that he’s the best sex you’ve ever had and none of it has to do with the fact that during the second night you spend together you’re mere centimeters away from love-making when he bites your lip, tugging lightly before he flips you over to fuck you harder. You know he knows, it’s too obvious for him not to know, that’s why he refuses to look into your eyes, opting to push your face - which he reminds you is gorgeous - into the mattress. Your mascara still runs while you wonder if he’s still thinking about you when your face no longer serves to remind him of the woman whose cunt he uses.

But that happens later. You meet at the same bar because Leon is oddly unfamiliar with the area despite having lived here years ago. Maybe he wanted to forget. That’s a question you never bother to ask.

“I was constantly working. I went out with Ashley on the weekends when she wasn’t busy, but she always picked the restaurant. So, you’ll have to be my tour guide,” he says.

You amble around downtown because you’re not decisive like Ashley. You didn’t prepare anything besides what your matching set of lace under your clothes. In June, the sun stays up late, and though they say that certain crimes of the flesh are only committed at night, for the two of you daylight can be far more dangerous.

Simply fucking in his hotel room one night was well within the boundaries of whatever “this” is; however, kissing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial when the sun begins to set makes you feel like a teenager, being romanced for the first time and risking your overbearing parents finding out your dirty little secret. But, none of this is secret. Leon’s wife knows, passersby know, the statue of the 16th president of the goddamn USA who sits behind you knows.

But what truly feels wrong is how chaste it is, how his hands cup your cheeks like a chalice. In a crowded bar, you drink gin and tonics for the Eucharist. Tomorrow, you deal with the unholy hangover.

Still, you’re not sure if this is romance or friendship until you’re walking side by side and your pinkies inch their way closer until they brush against each other. You interlock them playfully for a second, but Leon pulls away rather than grabbing your hand fully. The one time he does take your hand, it’s to guide you through a crowd. He does not interlock fingers with you. He does not kiss your knuckles before he lets go.

Later you end up at your favorite bar because you are his amateur tour guide.

“If this is your favorite, then why weren’t you here the night we met?”

“Would you have preferred I were?”

“No. I’m just curious.”

“The other bar is closer to home. Quieter, too.”

You’re practically yelling at this point over the band that’s playing. It takes two drinks for you to stand up and dance. It’s not some sort of high school prom slow dance. It’s stupid and drunken, but Leon spins you around and his hands are on your body - the less intimate parts - for most of the duration. He doesn’t have to flirt with sensual touches because he doesn’t have to lure you into bed. You are already planning to accompany to his hotel room.

Usually, he is in town for a week at most, and busy for the majority of the time. You see him for a night or two each visit. However, one night after the usual routine of going to the same bar, drinking old fashioneds and Leon picking up the tab, he takes you to the apartment that he’s renting for the next 3 months.

“Three months?” you ask.

“Thought you’d be happy,” he says. “After you admitted that I’m the best you’ve ever had.”

“Cocky much?”

“Wanna find out?” He raises an eyebrow, daring you to take him up on his offer. He’s still unpacking in the bedroom, but you don’t find that out until later because you don’t make it that far into the apartment. You end up fucking on the couch. And then on the living room floor.

What you have is not romance but it’s dangerously close. You realize this when you accidentally take one of his t-shirts home and you wear it to bed again that night before washing it. Because it smells like him and you miss him. That’s not something you ever plan to admit to Leon, and because you don’t say it aloud, it’s not real. It’s only real when he says, “you should just keep a toothbrush here.”

So nonchalant that it catches you off guard. “What am I, your girlfriend?”

“Sorry for being logistical.” He huffs, though you can’t tell if he’s really mad or not.

On his next run to the pharmacy to buy condoms, he gets you the toothbrush.

It’s summertime and Leon has a balcony that overlooks the Washington Monument, so naturally, you eat your dinners outside. Leon cuts back on his drinking, so you often make lemonade instead – from scratch, like your mother used to.

Over dinner you ask him, “Why don’t you just move to D.C. if you spend so much time here?”

“I lived here for years – so did Ashley – and we both hated it. But her dad has a house in Vermont, and we spent our first anniversary there, and we realized we wanted to spend as much of our lives as we can there.” When he speaks, he doesn’t meet your eyes. He’s looking for the memory, reliving it with a smile on his face. You can feel the tranquility.

“Makes sense. If I had a father with a second home in Vermont, I would probably move there too.” Plus, I’m not tied to anything here. Except maybe you, Leon.

“It’s gorgeous in the summer. It sucks that I have to spend it here.”

“Wow,” you say, jokingly, “So, being around me really sucks that much?”

“No, you’re the only part of it that I like.”

You’re left speechless, flustered by his words, and you both know that he shouldn’t have said that despite the fact that it’s the truth.

“Anyway,” he transitions, poking at his salad, pretending to be incredibly interested in the lettuce in an effort to avoid your face. “This lemonade is great.”

“It’s my mother’s recipe. A little extra sugar.”

You take away the plates – his enthusiasm about his salad has faded. He stays on the balcony for a moment because he knows you want to do the dishes – “It’s kind of therapeutic,” you said to him. “Clean plates make you feel like your life is together”.

Regardless, when he comes in, he says, “You know you don’t have to do that.” because that’s in his nature. Other people make messes and he cleans them up.

“I know,” you say, and he doesn’t protest.

You have sex because it’s either that or watch TV. It’s rough and impersonal, and over relatively quickly.

And then, it’s five o’clock somewhere, and somewhere is right where you are, so you pull out a bottle and toast to something stupid like the sex you just had or the TV show you’ll watch until you fall asleep.

Leon doesn’t drink but when he does (which is only when he’s with you. Ashley doesn’t let him indulge like that because she’s more sensible than you are) your conversations venture into topics that you would typically shy away from. You find yourself talking to Leon about his sex life outside of you.

“Do you guys fuck, like, immediately, when you get in the door?”

“Sometimes, yeah. Depends on how long I’ve been gone and how gross I am.”

“Do you think about it a lot? When you’re not with her?”

“Of course I do.” The question sticks in your mind: when we’re having sex too? “But we have phone sex,” he says, oddly prideful.

“That’s good. I’ve never been very good at phone sex.”

“If you’re horny enough it doesn’t matter.”

And that’s probably true. You have sex again shortly thereafter and you wonder if he’s thinking about her. You notice that he does not say your name when he cums.

February 2013

The next year you see him on Valentine’s Day. “Shouldn’t you be spending this with your wife?” you ask.

“I would be if I were at home.”

“You could go home or at least, call her.”

“I could call her, and I did, earlier today. But, it’s just a day. It’s not like it’s our anniversary or one of our birthdays.”

It’s just a day, so I’m spending it with you. It’s just a day, you’re just a girl.

“When’s your anniversary?”

“March 16th,” he says without missing a beat. Because he remembers things. As do you. For better or for worse.

“Are you going to go home for that?”

“No, she’s coming to visit.”

“Oh. That’s nice.” You probably don’t sound very convincing but you’re already making new plans for that week mentally – not that you had any explicit plans with him.

“You could meet her,” he offers, and you think he must be joking but it’s not that funny so you don’t laugh. He doesn’t laugh either because it isn’t a joke.

“Wait what?” you say. “Don’t you see how that’d be a little weird?”

“She knows you exist.”

“Yeah, but-”

“-And,” he leans in to whisper into your ear because you’re in a relatively fancy restaurant where you probably shouldn’t be speaking too loudly about such topics, “I don’t know if you’re into women, but I think she’d be into you.”

It’s a blessing that your dress is black because you choke on red wine and it dribbles down your chest and onto your clothes before you can catch it.

“Sorry. I’m now realizing that sexuality is a sensitive topic and maybe I shouldn’t have broached the subject like that.”

“It’s not about my sexuality. It’s about the fact that you just asked me if I wanted to sleep with your wife.”

“Well, I was hoping to be there too in that hypothetical.”

“It’s your anniversary. I shouldn’t be there. You two should get some alone time.”

“You’re probably right about that.”

He asks you to help him pick out an anniversary gift for his wife. You study pictures of her to see what style of jewelry she wears. Apparently you’re good at buying gifts because you see a new picture of her as his lock screen in which she’s wearing the necklace you picked out.

It’s silver not gold, so it’s not the necklace you care about but the jewelry behind the glass that you gazed at while Leon talked to the cashier.

But before the necklace, before the picture, before Leon’s anniversary, you leave the restaurant together the same way you arrived except you’re covered in red wine. You complain about the way your heels leave blisters so he carries you to the front door - bridal style, ironically, but you’re the only one thinking about it. It’s just a name that comes from an old tradition. It’s like how Valentine’s Day is just a day. He gets down on one knee and because you’ve already imagined him in this position, seeing it play out in front of you startles you, but he’s just unbuckling your shoes. He sees the look on your face - you try to play it off - and he laughs because he knows what you’re thinking, but then again, he doesn’t know anything at all. To him, it’s a silly misunderstanding. To you, it’s a cruel joke you’ve played on yourself.

In his bedroom, where you spend most of your time together, he unzips your dress like he’s trying to save the wrapping paper on a gift.

“It has wine all over it, and I got it on sale,” you say. “You don’t have to be so… gentle about it.”

“Would you prefer I rip it off of you?”

But it’s already slipping past your knees, dropping to the floor, revealing your bra and panties, revealing the secret - that you made an effort, that he is opening a gift, and the gift is a woman in lingerie. His face says enough, the way he looks you up and down, with arousal coursing through his veins but a certain fondness and admiration in his eyes.

You distract him by unbuttoning his dress shirt - slowly because you’re pretty sure this is the one he likes. There’s no tie to undo, no tie to pull him into bed by. He doesn’t like things around his neck. Once, he tried to wear one and couldn’t tie it himself, and you had to help. He only kept it on for a second because he felt like it was suffocating him.

You’re stuck in a mutual trance until you hear the neighbors fucking - not making love, fucking. You throw your head back laughing and Leon drags his hands down his face in faux-exasperation, laughter peeking through his fingers.

“Way to kill the mood,” he sighs.

“Should I go get the broom,” you ask, intending to bang on the wall between apartments.

“I think it’d be a little hypocritical.” Considering how much sex we have. Considering the fact that we’re about to have sex.

“Okay, but we don’t sound like that.”

He shrugs with a stupid grin.

“Oh God, do we sound like that?!”

“I hope not.”

“Leon,” you draw out his name, not quite whining, not quite begging. Not yet.

“Here,” he says, and sticks a CD in his stereo, something he rarely uses. He prefers the quiet. There’s too much noise these days, he once told you.

"You sound like an old man."

"I feel like an old man."

When he stands in front of you in only a white undershirt and a pair of slacks, his belt lost somewhere along the way, while you’re freezing to death in black lace lingerie because he keeps his apartment at 70 degrees maximum, you let go of all inhibitions, and let your surprise be a pleasant one when you realize what album is playing. Grace. As if you have any left.

“I love Jeff Buckley,” you say.

“Everyone loves Jeff Buckley.”

“Not like me.”

The soft music doesn’t fully cover the sounds of your noisy neighbors but the sentiment does. All you can think about is Leon when he’s atop you. You make out like teenagers, savoring it in a way that makes it feel like there’s no expectation that the two of you will have sex.

But slowly, it becomes more than that. His hands cup your breasts, his tongue flicks your nipple, his hands spreading your thighs, his fingers brushing over the fabric. And then the CD stops. It’s been 52 minutes. It’s like a parent knocking at the door, interrupting the magical moment. When Leon stands up to choose another CD, he sheds his shirt too.

Fade Into You plays as he walks back to you and you want to ask ‘How did you know?’, but you opt for taking off his pants instead. You lie face to face atop the covers with the lights only dimmed while he thrusts slowly in and out of you. You worry you’ll start singing along because you know all the words to this album. But Leon’s mouth rarely leaves yours - except when his face is between your thighs.

It’s slow, intimate, undeniably romantic. Only urgent when you’re both nearing the edge and he picks up the pace. You cum together and wade through the aftershocks with heavy breaths. So Tonight That I Might See fades out and covered in sweat, you bask in the shared euphoria that tries to fill the melancholy air. You fall asleep to the sound of his heartbeat.

July 2013

Once, after a particularly terrible mission, you meet Leon at his hotel room and he fucks you so hard he has to keep his hand over your mouth for the duration to avoid a noise complaint. A second noise complaint.

Another time, he fucks you so hard the condom breaks. You’re on birth control but he has a wife, a wife that’s not you, so he offers to buy you the morning after pill, and since there’s no logical reason not to take it, you agree. Before you pop the pill in your mouth, you ask him, (mal)apropos of the situation, “Do you think you’ll have kids?”

You let him answer while you wash it down with a gulp of water.

“We’ve been trying actually.” You see the way he smiles and it makes you choke on the water. You wouldn’t have been surprised by a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’, but you realize what his statement means: he would never buy her this pill. He wants to have a baby, but not your baby. He doesn’t love you like that. He doesn’t love you at all.

August 2013

You realize you love him right after he leaves. The best and worst part is that you do not see him until 2015. Almost 2 years later. You don’t hear anything from him or about him and sometimes you assume he was KIA, more optimistically, MIA. (Really, he’s just drunk and busy most of the time.)

If Leon died would his wife send you an invitation to the funeral? Who are you - the mistress, a friend of the family, a long-lost somebody?

Summer 2015

When he calls you in July, you half-assume that his voice won’t be the one on the other side. It’ll be someone else who recovers his phone from the ashes of whatever the fuck he’s fighting. You’ve started to forget what he sounds like and it terrifies you.

“I’m gonna take some time off,” he tells you.

“You deserve it since you’re always working so hard.” You understand what ‘time off’ means. It means time away from you too. It means he goes back to where he belongs – in bed, beside his wife.

“I never thought I’d get a vacation – I tried, but it got interrupted. Bio-terrorists don’t care about vacation time as it turns out.”

“How long is your time off going to be?”

“I’m not sure yet. We don’t technically have paternity leave, but I think the DSO feels-”

“Paternity leave?”

“Yeah. I forgot to mention, Ashley’s pregnant.”

The “trying” they were doing finally worked. She must be so happy – they both must be so happy. You force yourself to be because it’s cruel to hate a child. It’s not the baby’s fault that you’re in love with its father.

“That’s… awesome, Leon. I remember you saying you were trying, so, congratulations.”

“Thanks,” he says, and the smile on his face looks genuine but you see his hands come out of his pockets, only to retreat. He was going to hug you. But something holds him back. Though she’s physically carrying the baby, he takes on some of the weight it seems.

“You’re gonna be a great father,” you say. And that’s the one statement that you mean wholeheartedly.

The next words to leave your mouth surprise you both. “How far along is she?”

“Not sure about the exact number of weeks, but she’s pretty far into her second trimester.”

“Does she have a bump yet?” “Can I see a picture?” “What about the ultrasound?” You’re just tearing your own heart out so he can’t when he inevitably leaves. Or, maybe you’re not. Maybe you’re curious to a fault. Maybe you’re genuinely a little bit happy because you do love him. That’s what makes it worse.

You realize that this is the last time you’ll see him. He’s not dying, and will likely return to DC, but his wife will call him, ask him to switch to video so she can show him the baby that sits perfectly on her hip. In your mind, she’s walking around their kitchen, still in frame while the phone sits on the counter and he watches, imagining the joy he’ll feel when he takes on half the weight of parenthood while he lets her sleep in on the weekends.

You can’t be in the shower across the hall while he sings to a baby over the phone. You know he’ll sing.

He has a better voice than one might expect and you know this because he once got drunk enough for you to convince him to sing karaoke.

“C’mon,” you say, nudging him in the direction of the stage.

“I don’t sing,” he says, though he’s smiling.

“Everyone sings.”

“Even you?”

“Especially me.”

“I’ll make a deal. If you sing, then I’ll sing.” He’s already holding your hands, you don’t have to shake on it. But you do (and he spits on his palm first to seal the deal and you tell him it’s disgusting but mimic the gesture anyway).

You sing Like A Prayer, and though you can’t hear his voice over the surrounding noise, you can see him singing along by “Heaven Help Me”.

He sings Jessie’s Girl, and you would be enthralled even if he completely bombed, but you’re a face in the crowd of dozens, singing along with varying BAC’s, you’d guess. You’re not Jessie’s Girl, or Leon’s girl, you’re just a girl.

But the last night you spend together, you let yourself believe that you’re Leon’s girl when you fall into bed with him. When you interlock your fingers you pretend your ring is at the jewelers or on the bedside table. When he fucks you, he’s being quiet because you can’t wake up the neighbors or the baby in the nursery. In your mind, your husband is making love to you after he’s returned from the war.

He explains what happened at Alcatraz and you’re Penelope, he’s Odysseus, except there are no other suitors for him to kill. No bow to shoot, no olive tree bedpost.

But like them, you sleep together in a familiar room. Finally, fully, skin to skin, he gives himself to you. He gives himself to you temporarily, it’s sweaty and sickly sweet. You kiss until your lips turn red, catching your breaths forehead-to-forehead until you hold his cheeks in your hands like a pomegranate, ripe and rotting.

He grips your hips until they bruise, and barely pulls out in time to spill his seed on your inner thighs, only a bit ends up inside.

It’s not the first mistake you make together but it is the last.

His trip is barely long enough for him to stand outside the bathroom and pray for one line while you sit alone praying for two. Silently, you show him the result.

“What do you want to do now?” he asks.

“Watch TV, I guess,” you say.

You sit next to each other on the couch. He leaves in the morning as was always the plan. You kiss him goodbye and with the same lips, he kisses Ashley hello.

You were never Penelope. You’re Calypso, and he longs for home.

#this has become one of my personal favs #i'm shook and speechless #liz you did it again #open relationships and falling in love #it's like watching a train wreck #but hurts so good #you say poetic nonsense i say poetic prose #porcelain fic recs

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