#mr ben x ofc lydia

[tessa-quayle]

additional warnings for this chapter should include 1) read in private with a huge box of tissues, and 2) if you wear make-up, even the best waterproof mascara won’t be safe.

not hyperbolic when I say I can’t recall the last time a piece of writing (fanfic or otherwise) made me weep like this.  😭  couldn’t wipe my tears away fast enough and like Lydia, I'm tilting my head back all glassy-eyed and hoping our houseguests won’t ask ARE YOU OK.

the party and snow scenes were perfectly executed in outlining frustration, heartache, longing; I couldn’t help but think of Pride and Prejudice (at their worst, both these dorksicles are too proud and a wee bit presumptuous about their respective emotional baggage) AND Persuasion. Have you snuck in a Jane Austen AU?  (this is a compliment).  ❤️

I've told you this in the DMs, but I’m not shy about shouting it from the rooftops: get an agent, Rose.  

everyone reading this fic: 

Visiting - Chapter 9: Open Your Eyes

(Moodboard by @cutesyscreenname)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: It's the new year and the new semester. Reunited in Barrow for the first time since her hasty departure, Lydia and Ben have some talking to do.

Word Count: 10.2k (they have a lot to get through!)

Rating: Explicit (MDNI; 18+)

Content (chapter specific): Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (Lydia is 42, and Ben is 47); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; idiots-to-lovers; smut; fingering; PiV sex; strong language; alcohol consumption; weight and body insecurity; serious self-esteem issues; references to panic attacks and anxiety disorders; references to past infidelity (not by Ben or Lydia); angst central.

A/N: The title of this chapter is inspired by something Ben says to Lydia, which then made me think of this song by Snow Patrol. The video is a slightly edited version of C'était un rendez-vous, a 1976 short by the French director Claude Lelouch, so I feel that it fits this pair of idiots on multiple levels. (I frickin' love this film and I think it works gorgeously for the song.)

Thank you to everyone who's shown so much love for this pair so far - every comment, reblog, like, interaction, ask is just a joy to me.

Further A/N at the end of the chapter.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia's story and background.

Cross-posting to AO3.

Chapter 8 - Chapter 10

@lunapascal and @julesonrecord - this has been a tough chapter, again, and I've needed the guidance and encouragement along the way. Thank you, as always, for your love for the dorksicles as well as your incredibly wise and insightful suggestions and editorial eyes. Bendie are forever thankful. You may well spot some of your specific suggestions in this chapter...

Taglist:

@lunapascal, @julesonrecord, @cutesyscreenname, @tessa-quayle, @vermillionwinter, @iamskyereads, @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247, @love-the-abyss, @imaswellkid, @intheorangebedroom, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin, @littlemisspascal, @khindahra, @pedrostories, @readingiskeepingmegoing, @ruebyretro, @rhoorl, @red-red-rogue, @princessanglophile

Your father interpreted your tears at the airport in January as homesickness. 

“Just think, Lyd, it’s only a few more months, really.” He pats your arm, reassuring you as he always has. “And then you’ll be back over this side of the pond again and back to your real job and your normal life. And not so far away from all of us!”

You cried into his shoulder as you hovered near the entrance to the security screening area. 

A final hug, a wipe of your tears, a brave face, and a wave goodbye. 

You were homesick, or something like it. In this case, though, you were homesick for someone, not somewhere; homesick for him, for his smile, his kindness, his eyes, his careful embrace, his humour, his gentle strength. 

And you were sick to your stomach with the constant, nagging fear that you had already destroyed that new and fragile home, all by yourself.

You knew he wouldn’t be back in Barrow until just before teaching resumed for the new semester - a long-standing plan to make additional use of his time on the west coast by getting some research done in specialist libraries. 

You are torn between relief at not having to see him yet, not having to deliver your promised explanation, and feeling deeply anxious about the impact of the prolonged separation on Ben’s feelings towards you. He had suggested before Christmas that space was needed, and you’d agreed. The more significant that space became, however, the more you worried.

It wasn’t as if you were back in normal contact. Save for an exchange on New Year’s Eve, when you’d received a message from him sent at exactly midnight your time (and you reciprocated, setting your alarm so that you would wake just before midnight California time to send the message), there’d been next to no communication. 

Kate reassures you via FaceTime. “Lyd, calm down. Like I said at Christmas, if this is all it takes to change his feelings then it’s a doomed enterprise.”

“I think it might be a doomed enterprise anyway, what with me having to go back to my job over there in September.”

She rolls her eyes. “Alright, Apocalypse Lyd. Go on, catastrophise all you want. Not like anyone ever did a long-distance relationship or anything. Have you seen him yet?”

You shake your head. “He’s on research in California - pre-planned. Not back until next week.”

“You ready to talk it out?”

You pause, close your eyes, and take a deep breath. “Honestly? I won’t know until I see him again.”

“Happy New Year, Lydia!”

No such thing as January blues as far as Susan is concerned. You reach into your tote bag to retrieve a box of candies you’d picked up as a gift for her. “How were the holidays? I hope you got a well-deserved rest.”

You can hear her sincere expressions of gratitude and surprise as she starts to answer your question, but your mind is elsewhere. You cast your eyes along the rows of wooden cubby holes, each labelled with a staff member’s name.

B.E. MORALES

The sight of his full name makes your heart hurt. 

“…and that is why Nick’s mother is never doing the holidays with us again, so help me.” Susan pauses. “Lydia, are you okay? Don’t take this personally, but you look terrible.”

Hard not to take that personally, Susan.

You try to rearrange your features into something resembling a smile. “It’s probably just jet lag or something. And I had my hands full at home with the niblings - they’re both under four so…” you make a goofy face and shrug your shoulders, hoping to distract from the bags under your eyes and your worn-out complexion. 

Susan studies you for a moment and then beams. “Been there, done that! Nothing a cup of coffee won’t fix.”

Shit. The mention of coffee conjures up a mental image of Ben at your office door, armed with the two mugs. When you remember the smile on his face that last day you scrunch up your eyes, as if in pain. 

You fucked it up, Lyd.

The rest of the week passes in a grey haze. You oscillate between anxiety and profound sadness, cortisol rushing through your veins as you try to work out how you can fix it, and then a feeling of absolute exhaustion as you realise you probably can’t. Your to-do list mounts, unable even to distract yourself with work. 

The worst part is the knowledge that you did this. You’ve got no one else to blame. You freaked out. You ran away. You wrote your stupid note and you left him, all because you didn’t want to give in to the reality of your feelings - and the risk of loss that always comes with that.

Of course you fucked it up. You always do. You’re broken. Who would ever want you?

With a week to go before teaching, you lock into preparation mode. It’s a useful distraction, checking reading lists, planning seminar and workshop outlines, and catching up with some of your students who’ve already returned to campus. 

You arrange a tutorial with Nia, one of the students in the additional workshop groups run as part of Ben’s equality and diversity initiative, to discuss her initial plans for an “un-essay” assignment - a form of assessment that allows the student to respond to the brief in any number of creative ways. 

Her un-essay ideas include a reflective piece on food in poetry by Black women writers - with accompanying dishes. She’s a bright, smart girl, keen to tell you all the books she read over the break and compare notes on your choice of holiday movies.

Just before she leaves your office, she picks up her tote bag and rummages inside, producing a pretty, round tin and placing it on your desk. 

“Made you some of my peanut butter cookies. I noticed you like Reese’s, so I assumed you might like these, too.”

You beam at Nia, heart swelling at the sweet thoughtfulness of her gesture. “You’re so kind! I can’t wait to try these.”

She reciprocates your smile as she heads to the door. “There’s plenty there for you and Professor Ben to share. See you in class!”

Wait. What? Did the students think… shit. Maybe she just said that because he ran the programme. That was probably it. 

You open the tin, take out a cookie, and try not to think about it.

ANI: Hey Lyd! I’m just in the neighbourhood, you home? 

LYDIA: Yep, just putting away some laundry. You want to pop by?

ANI: Great! See you soon.

You buzz Ani in, leaving your front door open as usual once you hear their steps on the stairs. “Hey, Lyd. Just thought I’d call round to say hi,” Ani explains, taking off their big winter coat and hanging it on the coat rack in the hallway. 

“You want some tea? Or something stronger?”

Ani nods, settling themselves on your couch. “Tea would be amazing.” 

“Sure thing.” You continue the conversation from your tiny kitchen. Ani reminds you of the drinks party at Jen’s house on Friday night, in two days’ time - it’s her wife, Rachel’s, birthday, and she’s invited some faculty colleagues. 

Given how close she is to Ben, having joined the faculty at the same time, he’ll almost certainly be there - assuming he’s back by then. You feel nauseous. 

Ani gratefully takes their cup of hot tea - made strong, as they prefer - crosses their legs, and looks at you with what you suspect is concern. “Lyd, are you doing okay?”

“Why’d you ask?”

They sigh, placing the steaming cup down on the coffee table as you join them on the couch. “Lyd, you’ve been completely out of sorts since you came back. And I’m pretty sure it’s not just homesickness, as you claimed when Evan asked you if you were okay earlier this week.”

You open your mouth, ready to protest, but Ani shakes their head and places a hand on your knee to still you.

“We’re worried about you, Lyd. Obviously, it’s up to you what you do or don’t want to tell me, but just know that I am here for you. That we’re here for you.”

You sip your tea and nod, averting your eyes. 

Ani purses their lips, hands wrapped around their cup. “I could be way off with this, and yell at me if I am. But - Lyd, is there - was there - something happening between you and Ben?”

You stare at the floor, afraid you’ll give too much away in your expression if you look at them directly. 

“Lydia? If I’ve got this wrong, tell me. If it’s something else…”

Your voice is almost inaudible. “It’s not. I mean, you’re not wrong. That is… yeah. How did you know?”

Ani sips their tea, allowing themselves a little smile. “I mean I didn’t know know, I just had a feeling. I knew you guys were close but it’s academia, y’know? That’s not unusual, and he really wanted to help you settle in. But then we went out for your birthday, that’s what made me really wonder.”

You raise your eyebrows, still hunched up staring at the floor. They take their phone out of their bag, swiping through their photo album back through the weeks and months to your birthday weekend. “Look, we’re academics - we love the evidence, we search for proof. So here’s my source.”

Ani presses play on a video that, at first glance, is a selfie of them dancing at the bar with Evan, making faces into the camera. 

“Lyd, look at the action in the background.”

Even the slightly out-of-focus footage has captured the huge smiles on both your faces as Ben reaches for you and you move together in time with the music. He beams at you, eyes crinkling as he laughs when you throw in an extra move. Your eyes are shining. Your joy is so obvious, so beautiful after so many years of numbness and hurt, and so painful knowing what you would do to him just a few weeks later. 

Ani breaks the silence and tries to lighten the mood. “Basically, since then I’ve been waiting for you guys to finally wise up and just fuck. It took ages to convince Ev, for some reason. I think he was pissed that I saw it first. And then it turned out that David was on the ball first. Evan was furious.” You huff a laugh, covering your face with your free hand. 

“When I heard you’d spent Thanksgiving together, I thought the Eagle had landed. Wrong, of course.”

“We, um - we did kiss on Thanksgiving. But we thought it was by mistake.”

Ani rolls their eyes. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ. Fucking dorks. Fucking idiots, in fact.”

You giggle in spite of yourself. “And - David. He saw it in how we were together. He - he told me he thought Ben had feelings for me a couple of days before I went home for the holidays, and -”

“And I think he might have told Ben the same, to help you two realise. Or at least, to help you act on what you already knew.” Their voice is gentle and kind. “Are you going to tell me what happened?”

“I…shit.” You stammer, tripping over your words and trying not to cry. “I did something really fucking stupid. I ruined it, like I always do, and now I can’t fix it and -“

The tears start to fall. 

“I don’t know what to do. I… he’s really hurt. I hurt him, Ani. I care about him so much and I fucking hurt him. I don’t think I can make it right.”

Ani wraps an arm around you, pulling you in for a hug.

“Start at the beginning, Lyd. And whatever happened, you probably can fix this, you know?”

Ani puts their hands on your shoulders as you stand on Jen and Rachel’s doorstep. Their dark eyes are serious but kind, their face framed by an enormous black faux fur Cossack hat.

“What do you got, Lyd?”

You bite your lip. “I…I got this.”

“You got this. Let’s go, girl.”

At first, you think he didn’t come. You move through the hallway into Jen and Rachel’s spacious, open-plan living and dining room, scanning the clusters of guests for a familiar face. A mixture of relief and disappointment floods your brain. You can relax now, right? In search of a drink, you head for the kitchen, and -  

He’s talking animatedly to a couple of colleagues from literature, those kind eyes crinkling behind his glasses as he smiles and laughs. He’s wearing a plaid Henley shirt in a sort of blue and purple flannel, with a dark blue cardigan over it. Hair neat, but long enough to brush the top of his shirt collar. As gorgeous as you remembered - more so, even. 

Your heart races and your stomach leaps at the sight of him. Sure, you’re nervous. But it’s not just that. The physical symptoms of anxiety have much in common with the physiological manifestations of sexual and romantic attraction, after all, and a quick glance at him is enough to confirm just how bad you have it.

You reach for a glass of red wine from the selection of drinks set out on the kitchen island, and you beat a hasty retreat before he spots you. 

He saw you, of course. He’s been watching and waiting for you, observing the other guests just as you’d done, simultaneously hoping and fearing he would look up and meet your gaze across the room. 

Now that you’re there, he’s not entirely sure what he should do. Like you, he’s wary of confrontation, of taking action and getting it ‘wrong’, without knowing the consequences ahead of time. 

But, despite the slight thaw caused by your sporadic contact over the break, he’s also hurt and more than a little stubborn. You left with just a note. You casually brushed off the night you spent together, in spite of everything he tried to show you about how he felt about you. Surely you needed to make the first move now? 

Even so, his heart lifts when he sees you across the room. Photos on his phone don’t do you justice, don’t capture the way you move, the way your eyes catch the light, the essential you-ness that he has been so enamoured with. 

He decides not to let on that he’s noticed you. 

Ani catches up with you near one of the floor-to-ceiling fitted bookshelves that line the living room. “I know it’s easier to just hide here feigning interest in their book collection, Lyd, but -”

“I’m not feigning interest! I’m curious about other people’s books.” You tilt your head and continue reading the titles from the spines, until Ani moves their body between you and the books.

“Lydia. I swear to fucking God. He’s right fucking there,” Ani hisses, jerking their head in the direction of the kitchen. “I will march you in there and I will make you talk to each other.”

You can feel your palms getting clammy, and you place your wine glass down on a coaster in case it slips from your nervous grasp. “And what do I say, Ani? How do I do this? It’s not exactly private…”

They nod over at Rachel, who’s just come into the room, smiling and mouthing birthday wishes before turning back to you. “You’re a forty-two year old woman with a PhD, Lyd. It’s not beyond your capabilities to ask him to speak to you outside, or in their guest bathroom, or bedroom, or wherever.” Their tone is irritated, and you close your eyes as if shielding yourself from further hurt. 

“Lyd, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be harsh. It’s just - come on. We talked about this. I know exactly what you feel for him. I have a hunch he feels the same for you - everything you said suggests it. You fucking care so much about each other.” They inhale deeply, lightly reaching for your hand. “Why not just tell him? From what you said about that night, you made it pretty clear you were into him, and vice versa.”

You open your eyes and meet Ani’s kind expression. “And if it’s what I fear? What if all the space we’ve had has convinced him nothing more can happen?”

They squeeze your hand. “Neither of us know what he’s going to say. But you’ve been through so much worse, Lyd. You survived the kind of shit that could destroy some people. So, if it’s bad now - well, you’ll survive again. And if it’s good -”

“Then I have to leave it all behind in a few months, when the fellowship is done.”

Ani cocks an eyebrow. “Now you’re just making fucking excuses. Come on,” they take your hand and usher you towards the dining table, laid out with snacks, “let’s get some chips and dip first. Call it sustenance for the campaign ahead.”

Ani’s strategy, it transpires, is to take one of the vintage Chip n’ Dip dishes and to saunter into the kitchen with it, moving steadily towards the cluster of literature professors as you trail behind. 

She greets your colleagues enthusiastically and starts passing around the food. You can feel your face starting to burn as you try to cast a glance at Ben, to gauge his mood from the look on his face. You furtively take in his expression, and it breaks your heart. From the smiling, talkative man you’d seen when you arrived, his eyes have darkened and his lips are set in a firm line. 

Ani quietly nudges you, encouraging you to make the first move and break through the invisible shield he’s placing between the two of you. 

Your mouth is dry and your palms are clammy as you start to speak to him. You try not to think about the last time you’d seen him. “H-h-hi. D-did you enjoy the holidays?”

He turns slightly towards you, still avoiding looking at you directly. “They were good. Nice to be with family.” He sighs and takes a large sip of his wine. 

Silence. It’s all you can do to avoid your natural tendency to fill the gap with rambling chit-chat. You nudge him slightly out of the group to avoid being overheard.

“Could we talk, just for a few minutes? I need to -“

At this, he finally makes eye contact with you, and the hurt in his brown eyes is almost more than you can bear. He responds quietly but firmly. 

“You want to talk? You want to talk, here? Now? At a party?” He sounds incredulous.

“I told you I’d explain, and I told you it would be easier to do that face to face. So, here we are.” You bite the inside of your cheek to stop yourself from starting to cry or lashing out, channeling your anxiety and irritation into sarcasm. “Forgive me for taking this rare opportunity to have a very important conversation with you,” you hiss.

He huffs and rolls his eyes. “I don’t know what you really need to say, anyway,” he mutters quietly, “you made your feelings clear.” His expression is hard as he steps away and moves to walk out of the kitchen. In a reflex action, you reach out and lightly touch his wrist. He turns back for a moment.

“I told you I was sorry and that I could explain. That note… that’s not my feelings.” You drop your head to stare at the floor, before lifting it back to meet his gaze. “If you want to talk to me, I’ll be out at the front porch, okay? I need some fresh air, anyway. But I also really want a chance to talk. Please.” 

And he’s gone. 

You didn’t think through the whole ‘outdoor chat’ thing. New England January nights are colder than anything you’ve regularly experienced before, and you have been sitting on the front steps of Jen and Rachel’s home for what feels like forever. In truth, it’s been about ten minutes - but the more time that goes by without any sign of Ben, the more you despair. Although you’re snuggled into your bulky winter coat, face barely visible underneath your warm, red cable-knit hat and scarf set, the cold is starting to bite. 

You tug off a glove and reach into your pocket for your phone, composing a message for Ani:

Hey. I asked him to come out and talk but he doesn’t want to. I’m going home - just can’t be in there. I’m sorry - please apologise to Rachel and Jen for me, say I’m sick or something. x

You start off down the path from the front door to the pavement, double-checking the route on your phone. The house isn’t too far away from your apartment building, and a walk might help clear your head. 

“You’re fucking kidding me.” 

The snowflakes cling to your coat and hat, the flurries intensifying quickly. You swipe open the app on your phone, fingers stiff in the freezing weather. No cabs. 

“Fuck this.”

As you round the block and head for home, the tears start to fall, soaking into the woollen scarf wrapped around your mouth. 

“Where’s Lyd? Did you talk to her?” 

Ani finds Ben sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the shelves displaying Rachel’s substantial record collection, flipping through the vinyls as if he’s looking for something in particular. 

He isn’t. He just can’t bear trying to be normal and socialise with everyone else again, not after seeing you. There’s an ache in his chest as he thinks about the pleading look in your eyes when you asked him to come and hear what you had to say. 

His stomach churns as he wonders if you’re still waiting for him. 

He feigns interest in a copy of Blonde on Blonde, staring at the liner notes like he’s never seen the record before in his life. “She said she wanted to talk, that she’d meet me outside, but I - I couldn’t.”

Ani looks murderous and runs a hand over their dark curls.  

“You couldn’t? Or wouldn’t?”

“Does it matter? Given that you’re asking about this, I’m assuming you know what happened.”

Ani scoots down to sit beside Ben on the floor. Their voice is low but intense. They are not mincing their words.

“I know what happened. I know that she messed up. I have told her she messed up. She knows she messed up. But I also know why she messed up and that you need to hear her out. If not for your sake or her sake, then for all our sakes. I can’t take much more of the two of you moping around like this.”

He shrugs. Ani rolls their eyes.

“So help me, Benjamin Morales, you can be a stubborn fucking asshole.” 

Ben furrows his brow and sucks his teeth. 

Jen appears, her attention caught by the sight of Ani visibly berating Ben from their spot on the floor. “Have you spoken to Lydia, Ben?”

Ani raises their brows. “How did you know?”

Jen waves her hand, as if exasperated by her old friend. “I had my suspicions, eventually got it out of him earlier this week, now he’s being an idiot because he’s not doing what I told him and going to speak to Lyd.” She looks around her living room. “Where is Lyd?”

“Outside,” Ben mutters. 

Jen, face like thunder, pokes him in the back with the toe of her block-heeled boot. “I love you like a brother but if you don’t get the fuck out and find that woman, I will never speak to you again.”

You wrap your scarf tighter around your face, trying to shield yourself from the increasingly heavy snowfall. You have never been so grateful for the solid strength and warmth of your dark red Dr Martens. 

Thank fuck I wore jeans and a blouse, you think. Could have been the wrap dress. 

You pause for a moment to give your face a break from the onslaught of the snow and wind, turning your back to the persistent flurries. 

“LYD?”

At first, you think you’re imagining it. It’s a noise on the wind, whipping snow at your face and burying your heart cold and deep.

“LYDDIE?”

That is definitely not a noise on the wind. 

You turn around to see Ben steadily walking towards you, his black Dr Martens shoes crunching through the fresh snow that’s already covering your footprints. 

He’s wearing the merino wool watchcap you made him for Christmas, the Prussian blue perfectly complementing the navy wool of his pea coat. A little voice inside you pipes up that he couldn’t hate you, at least, if he was wearing something you’d made for him with your own two hands. 

“What the hell, Lyd?” He’s beside you, now, covered in a dusting of snow, big dark eyes staring intently into yours from behind his slightly fogged-up spectacles. “What are you doing out here?”

You are physically shaking with nerves and cold. “I wanted to talk to you, I wanted to explain, I told you where I would be, and…” you sniffle, glad of the snow as an excuse for your tears and red eyes, “And you didn’t even want to hear it. You didn’t even want to talk to me.” Your teeth chatter. “So…so I d-d-decided to g-g-go h-h-h-home.”

You wipe at your eyes with your gloved hands. “Stupid snow makes m-m-me cry,” you offer, by way of an explanation.

He doesn’t quite know why he does it. Maybe it’s his own need for reassurance, his instinctive urge to give you comfort, or maybe it’s the fact that, deep down, he’s missed you. 

Ben steps closer to you and wraps his arms around you, pulling you to him for a hug. 

“I’m so sorry, Lyd.” He holds you tightly for a moment before pulling away. “I was being a dick. I do want to talk.”

“I’m g-g-going home. Come with me if you want, and hear m-me out.”

“Okay. Fuck, it’s freezing.” He reaches into his coat pocket for his phone. 

“No cabs. It’s not that far.”

He nods. You reach over, instinctively, doing up the top button on his coat and pulling the knitted hat a little more firmly over his ears. 

He brings a gloved hand to meet yours, and for a moment you think he’s going to push you away. Instead, he gives your hand a little squeeze. 

“Let’s go.”

“Okay, heating is on, thermostat’s up, kettle is boiling to make some coffee - um, I know this is going to sound weird, but are you hungry? I think I had a single tortilla chip to eat at Jen’s.”

Ben is standing at the door of your tiny kitchen, an old, baggy hoodie of yours over his shirt and cardigan as an extra layer of heat, arms crossed over his chest and hands rubbing his upper arms as he tries to warm up. 

“I’m fucking s-s-starving.”

You have an urge to wrap your arms around him and get warm by sharing your body heat. But you haven’t even talked about it, yet. 

“Okay, well…” You poke your head into the fridge and freezer in succession. “I’ve got a frozen pizza.”

“F-f-fucking perfect.”

It all feels a little too normal as you sit in the living area with your coffees, waiting for the pizza to cook. You’ve wrapped yourself in your crocheted blanket while you warm up, legs tucked under you on the couch and hands gripping your mug for warmth. 

“I feel like I should be starting to explain,” you say, glancing down at your coffee. 

Ben shakes his head. “Let’s eat, first, and then we can talk. Better not to do that hungry.”

There’s still a few minutes before the pizza will be done. You try to make the most of these moments of “normality”, before you have to try to explain your actions to him and hope that he feels the same as you. 

“I did love your holiday makeover, by the way.”

He turns to look at you, a little smile creeping across his lips.

“You know I only got the polish off two days before I came back? Glitter is resilient.” He laughs to himself. “I think Jules liked doing it, though. How’s your gift-wrap injury?”

“Healed up. More worrying is the fact I don’t think I’ve located all of the stickers Cora put on my person over the break. I’m concerned one will turn up in some strange part of my body.”

Ben raises his eyebrows. “If I spot any unexpectedly I’ll be sure to signal it.”

“You had a good time at home, though?” 

He nods. “It was great to be with them all. You?”

“Same. Good to be home.”

You are reminded of the tears you shed at the airport, homesick not for your family but for him.

“Thing is, I was glad to come back.” He looks up at you, eyes curious. “Because this feels like home, too.”

You eat the pizza companionably on the couch, washed down with cans of soda. Ben offers to stack the plates in the dishwasher. As he returns to the couch, you broach the subject.

“Can we talk?”

He nods and settles beside you. Your stomach does backflips at the prospect of having to finally say the words you’ve been mentally rehearsing since the day you left. 

“I want to explain, and I want to - well, I want to try to make things right, because I did something wrong.” You look up at him, his dark eyes meeting yours, and it’s all you can do not to ditch the speech and try to show him what you feel in ways beyond words. 

“I’m so, so sorry, Ben. I…”

And then he’s bridging the gap between your two bodies; gently caressing your face with his hands; tilting your head to meet his gaze. His eyes ask the question, and before you’ve finished nodding your assent his mouth is on yours and he’s kissing you like he’ll never get the chance again: hungry but tender, urgent but loving. 

He brings his hands to wrap around your body, gently encouraging you to lie back on the couch and quickly pulling a cushion into position behind your head. 

Your brain is shouting at you about how you need to do this properly, to talk first and then act, if you both want to. 

Your body is responding rather differently. It couldn’t be any smoother if you’d rehearsed this: your legs opening wide to accommodate Ben’s gorgeous broadness, knees hitching around him as you try to pull him closer, hands tugging at the old hoodie, easing it off over his head, and fingers fumbling to undo the buttons on his flannel shirt. 

He breaks away from the kiss, moving his mouth to the side of your neck and working his way down to your chest with a succession of kisses, gentle nibbles, and light sucking, interspersed with little moans and whispers of your name. You can feel his hands roving under your blouse, loosening your tank from the waistband of your jeans so he can feel your soft, warm flesh in his hands. 

You gasp at the sensation. Your body is silently screaming for Ben, begging wordlessly for him to unzip your jeans and slip his hand between your soaking folds. Even so, your brain still wants to have a say. 

“Ben…Ben… wait.” He pulls away but remains close to your body, looking up at you. 

“You want me to stop, Lyd?”

You shake your head. “No, never, but… we were supposed to talk and -”

“We will.” He places a soft kiss to your exposed décolletage, and you moan. 

You pull him towards you and kiss him firmly on the mouth, lifting your hips towards his and feeling the friction of him, already hard in his dark jeans.

“Fuck, Lyd…”

“Fuck it, we can talk later.” You encourage him to move off you and wriggle yourself off the couch, taking him by the hand. “C’mon, let’s go to bed.”

You’re lying on your bed, Ben’s solid, comforting weight on top of you, both of you working urgently, desperately, to undress each other. You’d eased him out of his flannel shirt as soon as you got into the bedroom, pausing for a moment to admire his beautiful body in the slim-fit grey T-shirt he was wearing underneath before peeling it off him as you fell onto the bed. 

He’s murmuring into your ear and trailing his lips down the line of your neck as his fingers undo the buttons on your blouse. “Fucking missed you so fucking much, Lyd,” he mutters, sucking so perfectly at your neck that you feel like your entire body is arching off the mattress. He sits you up slightly so he can tug away the blouse and peel off your tank top, tossing it aside as he reaches around to unhook your bra. 

His big hands grope your tits, fingers gently pinching your nipples before his tongue swirls over them, triggering a cry of pleasure from you. 

“FUCK, Ben, I really missed you, too…need you, baby.”

He moves his hands down to undo your jeans, slipping his long fingers inside. You’ve already unbuttoned his jeans and you pull down the zipper before sitting up to tug them - and his boxer briefs - down. His cock springs free, already hard and weeping, and you grip it gently before giving it a few strokes.  

Ben groans loudly as he looks down, wanting to see your fingers working his cock. He pulls off your jeans and panties and meets your gaze again as you open your legs wide. 

“This okay?”

You nod frantically. “It’s fucking perfect.”

He smiles and reaches between your legs to drag two long fingers over your folds. The look on his face is one of surprise and arousal. 

“Fuck, you’re so wet, Lyd. So wet for me already.” He looks down to watch his fingers working through your slick, occasionally dipping his fingertips into your cunt and making you cry out with need and desire. “What do you want, baby?”

He keeps fucking you with his fingers as he looks into your eyes. It seems that’s what triggers your first orgasm: his big eyes gazing at you, so warm and so kind, while his thick fingers are pushing in and out of your pussy, making lewd, wet noises.

“Oh, fuck!” You come on his fingers, a wicked little smile on his face. “You, Ben, I want you. Want you to fuck me hard. Need you.” 

He pulls his fingers out of you and sucks them clean, closing his eyes as he feels your taste on his lips and tongue. The sight makes your pussy throb, but you need more.

“You ready for me, Lyddie?”

You nod and spread your legs as he quickly lines himself up, pushing inside you in a single, fluid motion that seems to knock the air clean out of your lungs. You reach up and take his head in your hands, pulling him down for a kiss as he starts to move. He drags his cock in and out, slowly, deliberately; dark eyes watching you writhe and mewl under his broad body.

“Please, Ben -”

He begins to fuck you harder, deeper, rarely taking his eyes off you. Despite the urgency it’s imbued with a tenderness and a desperate need that matches your own. Your body responds intuitively as you hitch up your knees and shift your hips slightly to meet his firm thrusts and take him even more deeply. 

You fuck each other as though you’re trying to fuse yourselves irrevocably together, using your bodies to take the first step towards overcoming the rift and separation. The sensation of soft, warm skin, of fingertips trailing over a breast, a bicep, a thigh, begins to say the words you still don’t quite know how to articulate.

Your hips are moving quicker now, fucking him as much as he is fucking you, and Ben leans back a little to look down at where your bodies are joined. He looks up at you from under his lashes, half-smiling as he admires the way your body moves in perfect sync with his. You reach for his strong forearms, fingers gripping his firm, lightly golden flesh to give you greater purchase as your hips roll upwards, trying to sate your longing and your frustration. Ben lets out a deep, guttural cry. 

“Fucking hell, Lyd!” 

“Want to fuck you, baby,” you murmur, not letting up the rhythm. “Please. Want to get on top.”

He rolls carefully onto his back, holding you in position around your hips as you shift your knees and brace your core. The change in position has his cock hitting you at a different angle, grazing against that perfect, spongy spot just inside your cunt, and you take a moment to savour the feeling before beginning to ride him. 

You move with intention, purpose, determination, trying to let your body speak for you before you use your words, later. The sight of his beautiful face, eyes screwed up in pleasure and mouth slightly open, sends a pulse thrumming through you and almost gets you off again. You want more. You want to give him more. You want to give him everything. 

Your hands reach down your body, seeking his broad palms and thick, gentle fingers; you place one hand over your left breast and encourage him to use the other to start massaging the slick-soaked pearl of your clit. 

You cry out his name as you come, rhythm faltering a little. Ben encourages you to lift yourself off his cock for a moment, pushing himself up to a sitting position against your headboard before you straddle him again, taking his hard length deep into your warm, wet cunt and making him groan loudly. 

The two of you, again. You and him, him and you, clinging to each other in mutual desire and reassurance. Bodies pressed together, the heavy weight of your tits pushed against the broadness of his chest, the warm softness of his tummy grazing against yours. You kiss, his tongue swiping at your lips and exploring your mouth: two as one. 

He breaks away as he fucks up into you, arms still wrapped around you. You close your eyes, keening with pleasure. 

“Open your eyes, Lydia.”

You blink, meeting his coffee-brown gaze. He smiles and caresses your face, slowing down the pace as he does so. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

“Just slowing down a little or I won’t last, baby.”

You pepper his neck and shoulders with tiny kisses, seeking out the little freckles and marks you love. Each press of your lips to his skin is a silent apology, an unspoken explanation, an attempt to convey through touch what you feel for him, how much he means to you.

I am so sorry. I missed you so very much. I need you. I care about you. I hate that I hurt you. Please forgive me. 

And I love you. 

“I’m close, baby. Gonna lie you back down, is that okay?”

You nod, kissing Ben as he eases you onto the bed. He pulls out for a moment as you change positions, and you whine a little at the loss of his cock inside you.

“Hey, it’s okay, baby,” he murmurs, planting a soft kiss to your breast as he slides back inside you, “I wasn’t going anywhere.”

You twine your hands around his neck and reach to run your fingers through his dark curls, listening to the obscene sound of your wetness against him as he fucks you. You hitch up your legs and slip down a hand to grip his ass as he drives in and out of you.

“Fuck-fucking hell, baby - jesus, that feels so good. You feel so fucking perfect, so fucking wet. Taking me like this -” 

He stutters as he buries his face in your neck, thrusting harder and faster as he gets closer. You wrap your arms around his broad back, finding arousal and reassurance in the warm softness of his body. 

“I love having you inside me, y’know,” you whisper in his ear. “I love taking you, all of you, feeling the stretch in my cunt when you fuck me.”

Your dirty talk has the desired effect and you watch as his body stiffens and expression changes. He groans as he comes hard, continuing to fuck into you as you feel him fill you, hot and deep. 

He doesn’t pull out immediately, pausing while he’s still on top of you to plant a lingering kiss to your lips. He takes in your fucked-out expression. His own is similarly wrecked, eyes hooded and pussydrunk, perspiration glistening on his face and body. 

“Fuck, baby, that was…”

“Fucking incredible.”

You trace your hand over his jaw, gently feeling the scratchy hair underneath as you move your fingers to his lips. 

“I missed you so fucking much, Ben. I’m so sorry.”

He takes your hand in his and kisses your fingertips, then pulls out and lies back beside you on the bed, still holding your hand. 

“I missed you so, so much, Lyddie.” He looks up at the ceiling, suddenly puzzled. “How did we end up at this end of the bed?”

You giggle. “I didn’t keep track of the logistics but we covered a lot of ground tonight.” You kiss the firm skin of his shoulder and sit up. “I’m going to freshen up. Be back in a minute.”

When you return, Ben is under the comforter, lying back on the pillows at the head of the bed. You stop for a moment to take in the image. You had forgotten this was the first time he’d ever been over to your place, and he looks right at home.

He smiles warmly as you climb back into bed, shivering a little as you discard your robe. He wraps an arm around your shoulders and pulls you close to his side, tucking the comforter around you to keep you warm. You nuzzle into his chest, humming contentedly to yourself.

“Lyd?” His voice is quiet and soft and it makes your heart sing to hear it like this, in bed, naked and sated and cuddled together. 

“Mmmhmm?”

“You - you framed my card.”

You had framed his birthday card, and it had sat on your nightstand since November. And you forgot he would see it. 

Shit. 

You look up at him, a little panicked. The look on his face immediately reassures you, and you reach up to trace a finger along the grey patches on his jaw. 

“I just really loved it, the card, the message. And it…it meant so much.”

He blushes a little. “That’s really…it’s great.”

He holds you a little closer. 

“Ben?”

“Mmmm?”

“I’m going to explain.”

He brings his other arm around you and plants a kiss to the crown of your head. “Okay, Lyd. I’m here.”

You take a deep breath and lightly rest your hand on his chest, trying to ground yourself with the rhythm of his heartbeat and the feeling of his warm skin. 

“I left the way I did because I was scared.” You tilt your head up to look at him. “Not scared of you, I’d never be scared of you. Scared of - well, scared of a lot of things. And I’m not even sure if I can explain them all properly, but I’ll do my best.”

You nuzzle a little more into the warmth of his side, cheek pressed lightly to his chest. 

“I had such a wonderful time with you that night. It was amazing. You know that, right?” 

Ben looks down at you. “I do.”

“But then I woke early, and it was like the little bully that lives in my brain decided it was going to do its worst. I panicked, Ben. All I could think was that you would realise it was a mistake, eventually, and see how I was old and unattractive and broken, and…” You pause for a moment, trying not to let the tears fall. “And that I didn’t deserve someone like you.”

“Oh, Lyddie. No, Lyd.” Ben squeezes you gently, planting another kiss to the crown of your head. 

“I tried to talk myself down, I really did. But it’s one thing doing that in the light of day, it’s another altogether at five in the morning. So it was like the defences just went back up.”

“Defences?” 

“Like… I dunno. Defences against feelings, or wanting someone properly? Shit. I’m not explaining this very well.”

He shakes his head. “You’re doing perfectly fine. If you want to stop, just say.”

Another deep breath. “It’s not the only reason. But…the way everything fell apart with my last relationship, it - it made me harden myself because…I don’t know, I convinced myself if I kept up defences around my heart and soul I wouldn’t get hurt again? Something like that. It was fine to have hookups or one night stands, but anything more serious - couldn’t happen.”

“So you pulled up the drawbridge.”

You nod. “And it wasn’t just about protecting me from getting hurt again, it was about protecting others from me fucking everything up, like I always do. Ruining things, like I always have. And then there’s the visiting thing.”

“You don’t fuck everything up, Lyd, you don’t ruin things, and it’s so sad that you think you do, because - well, have you ever considered how much you make things better?” You look up at him, eyes disbelieving but filled with emotion at his words. 

“And what do you mean, visiting thing?”

“Me being a visiting professor, me having to go home to my permanent job… the way I was feeling that morning, all I could think was how this would have to end, and how - how I couldn’t handle the thoughts of not having this, because of the way I felt - the way I feel - about you.”

You trace patterns on his chest with your fingertips, trying to quell the anxiety that threatens to overwhelm you. 

“I didn’t come here looking for anyone. I was happy with my life the way it was - I wasn’t wandering around lost and lonely, desperate for a partner. My life was great, really. And then I met you, and I realised what I felt for you. I was starting to open myself up again, and I’d never, ever thought I’d do that. I never thought I’d have those feelings again, let alone…fall for someone. And certainly not someone as wonderful as you.”

“Lyd, you…”

You shake your head, wanting to get the words out while they’re flowing freely. “Over the holidays I realised that’s what was really scaring me. That’s what was at the root of it all, all the fear and panic - the way I feel about you, the way I care so much about you. It was so big, you know? The realisation of what I felt, of how much I cared, the knowledge that you had feelings for me, too. Sleeping with you, knowing how good that was, feeling like I wanted to stay with you like that forever.” 

You pause for a moment. “And then my stupid, stupid brain kicks in, because it’s wired to run from things that feel like they’re going to overwhelm me.”   

He gives you another cuddle. “That is not a stupid brain and you know it.”

“It feels like it is. It’s ironic, I thought I had to run so I didn’t ruin things. But turns out I might have ruined them anyway.” You pull away a little, still keeping a hand on his chest but propping yourself up so you can see his face properly. “I hate that I hurt you. I hurt you. And I feel so terrible that my own issues - my past - made me feel like I needed to do something stupid and in the process to hurt the man I…care so much for.” 

You shake your head ruefully. “I don’t want to be scared any more. I don’t need to be scared. And I don’t need the past to affect my life now, I won’t let it. I just hope that, regardless of what you want to happen with us, that you can -” 

You’ve been really good with the tears so far. You’ve managed to keep them at bay. But they’re prickling, gathering in your eyes and clouding your vision of Ben’s kind face and broad shoulders, and they won’t stay put much longer. You tilt your head upwards, trying to stave them off. 

“Forgive me.”

Ben reaches up to wipe away the fat tear that’s rolling down your cheek, his thumb stroking softly across your face. He sits up in bed and wraps his arms around you. 

He doesn’t say it to you, but he was ready to forgive you as soon as he looked into your eyes at Jen’s house.

“Of course, Lyddie. Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt - still hurts a little - though, and that’s important too.” 

You pull back slightly and take his left hand in yours, tracing your thumb over his tattoo. 

“I know, Ben, and I’m so, so sorry.”

He takes a deep breath. “Thing is, you’re not the only one who was scared. Is scared. Love is scary, y’know?” He meets your gaze, his eyes and expression perhaps more vulnerable than you’ve ever seen them. “Especially when it’s new love. It’s exciting but it’s terrifying because… well, because it’s fragile, and it can be lost. And that feels even more of a risk when you - when you have lost love.”

“I mean it, I don’t want my past -”

He shakes his head. “I don’t mean your past, I mean mine. You’re not the only one who’s scared, and you’re not the only one who was fucked over.”

Oh, shit.

You nuzzle against his shoulder. “You can tell me, if you want.”

He rests his head against yours. “Shit. It’s…it’s a long time ago. But it fucks you up, doesn’t it?” You nod silently. “I met the person I thought I’d be with for the rest of my life during my doctoral programme. Six years, all fine, and then one day - that was it, out of the blue. The usual explanations: unhappy for a long time, we grew apart, all that kind of thing.”

“Sounds familiar,” you say wearily. You heard it all the day your ex left. It was like a script had been pre-circulated.

“You can guess what’s coming next, then.”

“Someone else?”

“There was someone else. Like I said, it’s a long time ago, Lyd. A lot longer than yours. It’s all in the distant past now, and therapy helped a lot early on.” He sighs. “But I guess I did something similar to you. Put up the defences, wasn’t looking for anyone, kept everything very casual, on the rare occasions it happened.”

You bring an arm around his torso, holding him close.

“And I was happy. I was really happy: I had wonderful friends, eventually I got a job I love, I have my family, my siblings, their kids. I was fine.” He pauses, jaw ticking. “I was fine, and then - then you came along.”

You pull back. His tone is confusing.

Ben turns to look at you, takes in your worried expression, and kisses the top of your head. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean ‘you came along and ruined things’, please don’t worry.” You visibly relax and squeeze his hand. 

“What I mean is - you came along, and you changed things. You changed everything. You think you ruin things, Lyd, and that just couldn’t be further from the truth. I… fuck. You changed my life, changed the way I thought about the future, about what I wanted, about opening up again.”

Tears threaten at your eyes again. “So when you woke up and I wasn’t there…”

He looks up, and his eyes are red-rimmed. “I thought it was happening again. And it just felt like I shouldn’t have opened up and let you in.”

You swallow, trying to stop yourself from crying. “Fuck, Ben. I’m so fucking sorry, I’m just such a fucking broken mess.” 

“Lyd, for fuck’s sake.” His tone is firmer, more stern. You look at him, a little surprised. “You’re not a broken mess. You - fuck it, you just weren’t loved the way you should have been. The way you deserve to be.”

“Jesus, Ben, I -” You pause, and he looks at you expectantly. “Well, that makes two of us. You weren’t loved like you deserve to be either, based on what you’ve said.”

He smiles softly, looking at you from under his lashes. “We’re quite a pair.”

You caress his face, reaching up to gently bring your fingers through his hair, and place a tiny, soft kiss to the beautiful curve of his nose. 

“I think we are quite a pair, actually.”

You blink awake in the wee small hours, eyes adjusting in the darkness as you take in the handsome sight of Ben’s sleeping face. The last time you woke up with him, you panicked and fled. This time, you smile softly, noticing that his hand is resting lightly on your hip, and lean in to gently kiss his warm, broad chest. 

His hand shifts and he smiles, eyes still closed, as he traces the curve of your body over your hip, your waist, and onto the heavy fullness of your breasts. He seeks out your nipples with his fingertips and you sigh with pleasure, reaching down to take his cock, already stiffening, in your hand. He kisses you, moaning as you stroke him a few times, and then carefully rolls you onto your back, positions himself on top of you, and uses his knee to open your legs a little wider for him.

“’M still wet, baby,” you murmur, voice thick with sleep. “Fuck me.” 

He lines himself up to take you: slowly, gently, still drowsy. You feel every inch of him as he fucks you to a slow, steady rhythm. Between the drag of his cock working in and out, and the silence punctured only by the sounds of you and Ben panting, your bodies moving against each other, you’re close to the edge before long.

He gets you there with a well-timed thumb to your clit, gently circling it until you fall apart again and he lets go inside you, kissing your neck and mouth as he pulls out before helping you clean up, moving in for some cuddles, and falling asleep again with you in his arms. 

It’s definitely not the kind of sex that cheesy novels are made of, but it makes you happy because of that. It’s soft, intimate, settled - domestic, even, like you’ve been together a long time. You still need to talk about what you both actually want, of course, but - if this is anything to go by - it feels like you might well be on the same page.

He’s not there when you reach for him in the morning. You sit bolt upright, suddenly paranoid that Ben might have done to you what you did to him. 

But then your eyes adjust to the morning light filtering through the blinds, and you can hear clattering and humming coming from the direction of the kitchen. You reach for a pair of pyjama pants and an old sweatshirt, and pad from the bedroom into the living and dining room and through the door into the tiny kitchen. 

Ben is standing at the main counter, his back to you, measuring out coffee for your filter machine while humming random melodies to himself. He’s wearing the big, old Paris Review hoodie you’d loaned him when he came home with you the evening before, as well as his boxers and a strangely familiar-looking pair of brightly-coloured socks, covered with a pattern of books and pens and - 

Oh, fuck. Those socks. Your Christmas present to him. He’d worn them to Jen’s party.

You take a few short steps across the kitchen floor and wrap your arms around him, pressing your cheek to his shoulder blade and inhaling deeply. 

“Hi, Lyddie.”

He turns and shifts his body so he can see you properly. He’s got his glasses on, his hair is tousled, curls sticking up in every direction, and he’s the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen in your life. 

“You look a lot better in that hoodie than I do.”

He looks down at the magazine logo on the sweatshirt. “Were you a subscriber?”

“It was a gift from a friend years and years ago. We had a running joke about the idea of a magazine reviewing Paris, she saw it and ordered it for me. It’s cosy, isn’t it?”

He beams and puts an arm around you, gently pulling you to his side as the coffee machine splutters into life. “Very cosy, baby.”

“It’s nice, here.” Ben looks around the apartment as he sips the coffee, sitting beside you at the small dining table. “It’s very…”

“Basic?”

He arches an eyebrow over the rim of his mug. “I was going to say it’s very you. You’ve made it your own, even if it is basic.”

You reach for his hand and squeeze it, marvelling at the butterflies you feel at the simple sensation of the touch of his hand, even after having slept with him twice.  

“Ben?” 

He looks at you, eyes soft and warm. 

“I want this. Whatever this is, right now, I want it. I want to try it, anyway. I want you. I want you and me, I want there to be an ‘us’. I meant what I said last night, I’m not scared. Well, I am, because I still don’t know what happens when I have to leave and what if that ruins everything and then -”

He squeezes your hand in return. “Lyddie, you’re spiralling.”

You laugh and take a deep breath. “I guess what I’m asking is - if I wasn’t a broken weirdo who ran out on you, what would you want? What do you want?”

“Lyd, please. You’re not a weirdo, and you’re not fucking broken. You’re strong, and smart, and funny, and beautiful, and - fuck, you’re a fucking goddess, Lyd, and I’ll tell you that every goddamn day.” He looks at you, expression deadly serious before softening into a smile. “Surely you know I want this, too? You, me, an ‘us’? How could I not?” 

You put your hands to his face and pull him in for a kiss. No more fear, even if this was scary, in its own way.

And you remember something he said last night. 

“Ben, can I ask you about something you said last night?” 

He smiles beatifically and nods. 

“When I was explaining about being scared, you said something like ‘love is scary’. I… I’m just wondering about your word choice.” Your mouth feels dry and you take another sip of coffee. “Was ‘love’ generic, or…specific?”

Ben’s eyes widen for a moment, a tiny flash of panic passing through.

“It was specific.”

You nod. “So…”

He rubs his hands together, one of his nervous ‘tells’. “So, I said ‘love is scary’ because - I love you.” The look in his eyes is cautious but warm, hopeful. 

“I love you, Lydia. I love you very much. I hope that’s okay.”

You gently place your hand on top of his, quelling his anxious gesture. 

“I love you too, Ben. Very much. So, yeah, that’s okay.”

The two of you burst out laughing for a moment before leaning in for a soft kiss. It felt so normal, so comfortable: both of you still with your bed-heads, dressed in random loungewear, sitting at your dining table in your little apartment, saying you loved each other for the first time. 

Ben twines his fingers through yours, smiling. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to be able to say those words to you, Lyd.” He blushes a little. “Came close to saying it a few times before.”

You arch an eyebrow exaggeratedly and grin at him. “Oh, really? Well, that makes two of us.”

You lean over to rest your head on his shoulder. “And you know we said last night that neither of us had been loved the way we deserved?” He hums and nods in agreement, planting a kiss to the top of your head.

“Maybe we can try loving each other like that?”

“I’d like that very much, Lyd.” Another kiss, another squeeze of your hand - and, out of nowhere, his tummy rumbles audibly, triggering another fit of giggles.

“Think you and me deserve to have a nice breakfast, too.” He pushes himself back from the table and stands up, still holding your hand. He holds you closely. “And then…”

“And then - we come home and make up for lost time.”

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more; other dividers by @cafekitsune)

Further A/N: Like many of us, I'm sure, I have spent much of the last week listening back to the work of the extraordinary, late, great Sinéad O'Connor. This song, from her 2014 album I'm Not Bossy, I'm The Boss, leapt out as a perfect fit for Lydia - in general, but especially in this chapter. Rest in power, Sinéad. (And if you haven't yet read her memoir, Rememberings, do it - it's brilliant.)

[tessa-quayle]

spotlight on the OFC

(fanfiction recommendations) :)

the reader insert, the second person, the y/l/n convention (which, for me, can disrupt the text and i haven’t gotten used to it - not criticizing those who do it - i'm the problem, it’s me 🤪) are all the rage in fanfiction.  i get the immersive appeal, and many of the fics i love and enjoy employ the second person.  

richly drawn original characters draw me in and capture my attention. I appreciate how creative folks get with their OFCs, the headcanons, and how they have fun showing off these OFC’s quirks and strengths and interior lives and histories.  it’s a joy to read.

here are a few great OFCs in the Pedro Pascal Character universe.  the stories are engaging and this is a fairly diverse list of OFCs (by that I mean race/ethnicity, life experience, nationality, disability).  as always, each author issues their own warnings.

listed in alphabetical order by writer:

@iamskyereads - Ezra (Prospect) x OFC Beatrice 

ongoing series (Compulsion).  love the sci-fi world-building in the first chapter. Beatrice is a sharp and compelling protagonist who’s suffered a traumatic brain injury and has PTSD.  

@intheorangebedroom - Frankie (Triple Frontier) x OFC Gabrielle 

complete series (Pleased to Meet You).  angsty intercontinental love story between everyone’s favorite pilot and a cool French woman.  the descriptions of different cities are vivid.

@jazzelsaur - Frankie (Triple Frontier) x OFC Ellie

complete series (Between the Raindrops).  the slow burn here is a smolder in the best sense.  Elliot (Ellie) is a widow who lives next door to Frankie.  the weight of grief and angst in this series is remarkable. 

@jomiddlemarch - Joel (The Last of Us) x OFC Grace

loose-fit series (On Call for the Apocalypse).  crossover with Ted Lasso.  set in Jackson WY between seasons 1 and 2, Grace is a snarky doctor (scratch a cynic, find a romantic) hanging out with Joel and Ellie  (format better on AO3)

@julesonrecord and @lunapascal ( @stardustandskycrystals) - Dieter (the Bubble) x OFC Andie 

ongoing series (Curls).  we’re rooting for Dieter and Andie amid all the drama and shenanigans surrounding a pregnancy and a wedding.  this reads like a novel you finish in one sitting.  

@ladamedusoif - Mr Ben (SNL) x OFC Lydia 

ongoing series (Visiting).  Lydia is a European art historian who goes to teach at an East Coast liberal arts college and meets the dashing Mr Ben.  delightful and smart (and I'm not just describing Mr Ben).

@radiowallet - Marcus (We Can Be Heroes) x OFC Amy

ongoing series (Eyes Open).  Single parents Marcus and Amy find love in the workplace, HR be damned.  Amy contains multitudes and the portrait of her as a mother is especially real and sweet.

@whatsnewalycat - Din (Mandalorian) x OFC Charlie

ongoing series (Passenger).  Gritty, dark, cool AU where Din Djarin is a trucker/bounty hunter and Charlie is making her way west.  this fic has a lot of postmodern energy.

@yespolkadotkitty - Pero (Great Wall) x OFC Jade

complete series (Fighting Blind).  Fun, winsome adventure between a museum curator and our favorite Spanish warrior.  Love the time-travel element, the nod to the Asian diaspora, and the rich world-building.  This series is stay-up-past-your-bedtime reading.

feel free to share your fic recs and favorite OCs/OFCs (your own and/or others)!  ❤️

[murder-senpai]

F A N F I C T I O N

Oh, hello there!! My name is Murder-senpai! I’m new here to tumblr sooooo don’t mind me being awkward n’ stuff. So this is gonna be like, what fandoms and characters I write for sOoooOoOo

AU’s and other stuff I’ll do: ABO, genderbend, hanahaki, soulmate, supernatural/power, soft yandere/ stockholm syndrome, coffee shop, modern, fantasy, baby/kid versions of characters, babysitter, neko, inu, kitsune, post apocalyptic, zombie, flower shop, book store, dragon, fairy tale, high school/college, mafia, pregnant, steampunk, merpeople, pirate, pirate/merperson, prison, reincarnation, famous, vampire, werewolf

There is more shit I’ll do but I can’t really think anymore so just request

(reader insert crap)

I will NOT do nsfw. This is a christian minecraft sever 

You CAN request multiple character/poly and platonic stuff

If your not specific, I will choose between headcanons or a fic/drabble

If you request angst, I will give it a fluffy ending unless requested otherwise

Please be specific in your request   ex: reader gender (fem, male, gender neutral)

Edit: I will now take character x character, character + character platonic stuff, aus (like, medevil bnha, or a story about friendship or enemies to friends or adoption, anything really), and stuff like that

Current hyperfixation (aka, what I will probably write better for/ do more): dream smp

Will probably put the scenario in a non specific arc

Fairy Tail:

Natsu

Gray

Loke/leo

Laxus

Sting

Rouge

Gajeel

Zeref

Jellal

Jackal

Lucy

Levy

Juvia

Guildarts

Freed

Erza

DBH:

Connor

Hank

Markus

Gavin

nines

ATLA:

Aang

Zuko

Sokka

Katara

Toph

mai

ty lee

azula

BNHA:

Izuku

Katsuki

Shouto

Denki

Eijiro

Tenya

Toshinori

Shouta

hizashi

fumikage

neito

mirio

takami

hitoshi

inasa

Enji

keigo

rumi

momo

mina

ochaco

dabi

shigaraki

overhaul

sir nighteye

kurogiri

toga

twice

Inuyasha:

Inuyahsa

kagome

naraku

miroku

koga

sesshomaru

sango

BNA:

michiru

shirou

nazuna

alan

marie

pinga

Sherlock:

Sherlock

john

moriarty

mycroft

greg

molly

Harry potter:

harry

ron

hermione

draco

cedric

Black Butler:

ciel

sebastian

bard

finny

ash

claude

alois

triplets

william

grell

ronald

undertaker

joker

dagger

agni

soma

pluto

beast

lizzy

mey-rin

ran-mao

edward

aleistar

vincent

real ciel (I refer to him as astre tho)

snake

charles grey

charles phipps

gregory

cheslock

joanne

maurice

herman

clayton

lawrance

mcmillan

edgar

blavat

seiglinde

MLB:

Marinette/ladybug

adrien/chat noir

gabriel/hawkmoth

nathaniel

marc

luka

alya

nino

felix

bridgette

chloe

TPN:

emma

ray

norman

don

gilda

leslie

Undertale:

sans

papyrus

frisk

toriel

chara

asriel

asgore

grillby

gaster

mettaton

blooky 

AU’s- underfell, mafiatale, mafiafell, underswap, swapfell

Beastars:

legoshi

haru

louis

juno

gouhin

melon

Gravity falls:

dipper

mable

ford

wendy

robbie

bill

AU-reverse falls, monster falls

SVTFOE:

star

marco

tom

toffee

Hazbin:

alastor

angle dust

charlie

husk

vaggie

lucifer

val

vox

Pokemon:

Gladion

ash

clemont

serena

james

jesse

zeraora

lucario

mewtwo

zacian

zamazenta

literally any pokemon but those are my fave(and human versions ofc either is fine)

guzma

kukui

alain

lysandre

bede

hop

leon

milo

allister

raihan

marnie

piers

ACNH:

tom nook

raymond

lobo 

kabuki

lolly

marshal

Isabelle

redd

fang

Avengers:

tony

steve

bucky

clint

natasha

dr. strange

thor 

loki

peter

Voltron:

lance

keith

shiro

hunk

lotor

pidge

Aggretsuko:

tadano

haida

hyoudou

The hobbit:

literally JUST smaug

MLP:

twilight

pinkie

apple jack

rainbow

fluttershy

rarity

discord

Maid sama:

takumi

misaki

shoichiro

the three idiots

aoi (totaly gives off a ciel/lizzy vibe don’t even lie)

sotaro

tora

kanade

kuga

koma

yujiro

shosei

Naruto:

naruto

sauske

kakashi

itachi

gaara

neji

shikamaru

kurama

kiba

OHSHC:

tamaki

haruhi

hikaru

karou

both twins

kyoya

hunny

mori

kasanoda

nekosawa

Cells at work:

white blood cell

red blood cell

killer t cell

Little witch academia:

atsuko

diana

sucy

lotte

amanda

andrew

louis

frank

Pucca:

pucca

garu

tobe

abyo

Glitter force:

emily/Miyuki

kelsey/Akane

lily/Yayoi

april/Nao

chole/Reika

ulric/wolfrun

rascal

Glitter force doki doki:

ira

maya/Mana

rachel/Rikka

clara/Alice

mackenzie/Makoto

TMNT(2012):

leonardo

raphael

michelangelo

donatello

splinter

april

ROTG:

aster bunnymund

north

pitch

sandy

jack

tooth

Soul eater:

death the kid

soul 

black star

maka

stein

Aot:

levi

eren

armin

mikasa

jean

erwin

IT(2017):

pennywise

richie

beverly

eddie 

stanley

ben

bill 

henry

patrick

victor

belch

bowers gang

losers club

kamisama kiss:

nanami

tomoe

mizkui

kurama

otohiku

mikage

jiro

The outsiders:

dallas

darry

ponyboy

johnny

two-bit

steve

soda

Diabolik lovers:

shu

reiji

ayato

laito

kanato

subaru

yui

karlheinz

kou

azuza

carla

ruki

richter

yuma

shin

Hamilton:

alex

john

king george

george washington

lafayette

hercules

philip

aaron

thomas

Venom(2018):

eddie/venom

Tokyo mew mew:

ichigo

zakuro

tart

pie

Kisshu

Fran bow

Fran

remor

itward

mr. midnight

Steven universe

steven

connie

pearl

amethyst

larz 

sadie

garnet

lapiz

peridot

spinel

Haven't you heard i'm sakamoto

sakamota

Shou

Gargantia on the verdurous planet

ledo

amy

Animaniacs

yakko

wakko

dot

Over the garden wall

wirt

beast

Sonic

sonic

tails

knuckles

amy

shadow

Snow white with the red hair

Shirayuki

zen

obi

The sacrificial princess and the king of beasts(manga)

Leonhart

Sariphi

Lanteveldt

Anubis/Sirius

Jormungand

Fenrir

Nir

Joz

Ilya

Beetlejuice(musical)

beetlejuice

lydia

Creepypasta

Jeff the killer

slenderman

offenderman

trenderman

splenderman

ticci toby

masky

hoodie

BEN drowned 

eyeless jack

laughing jack

homicidal liu

zalgo

clockwork

Jason the toymaker

puppeteer

Yu-gi-oh

Seto Kaiba

FNAF

Freddy

bonnie

chica

foxy

golden freddy

toy freddy

toy bonnie

toy chica

mangle (male and female ver pls specify)

marionette ^

springtrap

william afton/ purple guy

baby

funtime freddy

ennard

nightmare freddy

nightmare bonnie

nightmare chica

nightmare foxy

nightmare mangle

fredbear

nightmare fredbear

Cuphead

cuphead

mugman

devil

king dice

Bendy and the ink machine

bendy

boris

alice 

Duck tales

Scrooge (aged down tho)

webby

della

donald

louie

dewey

huey

launchpad

lena

Dream smp

everyone (all platonic. Will do reader stuff, but would prefer more character +character interactions, specifically, SBI. PLSSS give me sbi stuff, ill marry you)

[ladamedusoif]

Visiting - Overview and Masterlist

(moodboard by the wonderful @cutesyscreenname)

*cross-posted on AO3*

*Series In Progress*

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

About Lydia: A couple of years ago she'd have told you her life was over. Now, at 41, Lydia has realised the future is hers to make - even if that means never opening her heart up again.

She's an art historian and European - though this should not be taken to imply a specific appearance or ethnicity! Her family and other aspects of her background are established.

You'll notice that the physical descriptors for Lydia are deliberately loose, other than: her age, that she's fem/AFAB, her hair is starting to grey, and she's got stretch marks and a whole metric ton of issues with her own body. In other words: she can look whatever way you want her to look in your own imagination, bearing these aspects in mind, and be from wherever you want her to come from.

Rating: Explicit (18+) - individual chapters will have their own ratings (there's a lot of fluff and angst ahead) but smut will be very clearly signalled. Expect bad language throughout. If you read beyond the warnings on each chapter, you are agreeing you're 18 years or older.

Content: Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (she is 41 and Ben 47 when the story begins); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; explicit smut (eventually); discussion of infidelity and emotional abuse; discussion of self-esteem issues; references to body issues; strong language; alcohol; I'll update if I need to as the fic continues

A/N: My love for Mr Ben is well-known but I couldn't stop thinking about him as a literature professor and, well, here we are. This is my first fic, and it's written as an AU with nary a sprinkling of canon about a character who existed for five minutes in a sketch. Make it make sense, Rose.

This is going to be a multi-chapter series (I have a plan and an outline document and everything). I plan to add some headcanons for Professor Benjamin at some point, and will pop some little drabbles in amongst the full chapters.

There will be smut - but this is a slow-burner. You have been warned.

Main Series:

Chapter 1 - The Visitor

Chapter 2 - Bright in the Sea

Chapter 3 - Ghosts

Chapter 4 - Save Me

Chapter 5 - This Must Be The Place

Chapter 6 - If You'd Accept Surrender

Chapter 7 - Forget Who We Are

Chapter 8 - Sister Winter

Chapter 9 - Open Your Eyes

Chapter 10 - Something About You

Chapter 11 - My Favourite Work of Art

Chapter 12 - If I Must Have A Future

Chapter 13 - Coming Soon!

One-Shots and Drabbles:

An Inspecteur Calls: A Pedrotober One-Shot

Books: A Merry Fic-Mas One-Shot

Christmas Tree: A Merry Fic-Mas One-Shot

Please let me know if you'd like to be added to a taglist!

Thanks: to the people who made me feel less bonkers for developing an entire world around Ben and Lydia - @cutesyscreenname, headcanon collaborator, moodboard creator, and Prof Benjamin E. Morales enabler supreme; the incredibly encouraging, kind, and heroic fic writers whose understanding of how to embrace the sensitive and emotional hidden side of 'canonical' characters is an inspiration - @lunapascal, @imaswellkid, @julesonrecord

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more)

[tessa-quayle]

this married mother of two would also like to look and appreciate and KNOCK SOME SENSE into these “idiot dorksicles” 😂

at the risk of weeping again (it’s the onions, I swear, I'm not crying you’re crying), I need to reread and study how you wrote this because it is one of the best - if not the best - examples of POV back-and-forth switches.  So smooth, unlike our favorite dorksicles.  And that interlude where their quotes to their families are side-by-side - fucking virtuoso. it’s ferociously brilliant without being precious.  the fic isn’t even over and the audience is already on their feet. 

just a few more thoughts: 1) love how the families are low-key staging interventions, 2) I spy that Pedro tattoo shout-out ;), 3) so many mentions of holiday movies but have y’all noticed this chapter is like a holiday movie too?!, 4) appreciate the moon landing and Saturn V part - great evocative choice for so many reasons, particularly in capturing Ben and Lydia’s connection, angst, wonder, ache, and hope so overwhelmingly well.  But it begs the question: who’s Michael Collins here? 😎

Visiting - Chapter 8: Sister Winter

(Moodboard by the wonderful @cutesyscreenname)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: The morning after brings complicated feelings as Ben and Lydia return to their respective families for the holiday season.

Word Count: 7.7k

Rating: Explicit (MDNI; 18+)

Content (chapter specific): Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (Lydia is 42, and Ben is 47); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; idiots-to-lovers; references to PiV sex; strong language; alcohol consumption; weight and body insecurity; serious self-esteem issues; references to panic attacks and anxiety disorders; references to the holidays; both Ben and Lydia come from families that mark Christmas; angst central.

A/N: The title of this chapter is inspired by Sufjan Stevens' eponymous song, which is one of my go-to Melancholy Winter Tracks. And yes, it was really weird writing Christmas in July.

I'm so grateful for all the love I've had for this story and for this pair. Every comment and reblog and ask is a little lift to my soul!

This chapter introduces Lydia and Ben's extended families. In addition to their chosen and found families, both in work and in their friendship groups, this pair are from closely-knit families of origin - though of course, that brings with it its own challenges.

Further A/N after the chapter to avoid spoilers.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia's story and background.

Cross-posting to AO3.

Chapter 7 - Chapter 9

@lunapascal and @julesonrecord - thank you for cheering me on and offering wise and practical advice with this difficult chapter. @tessa-quayle - I am always so touched by your enthusiasm for these idiot dorksicles (a term I am appropriating from Jules).

Taglist:

@lunapascal, @julesonrecord, @cutesyscreenname, @tessa-quayle, @vermillionwinter, @iamskyereads, @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247, @love-the-abyss, @imaswellkid, @intheorangebedroom, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin, @littlemisspascal, @khindahra, @pedrostories, @readingiskeepingmegoing, @ruebyretro, @rhoorl

Ben is a deep sleeper - or maybe he was just completely worn out after your exploits that night. 

Either way, he doesn’t even move a muscle as you shift towards the edge of the mattress, fumbling your way out of bed and carefully tip-toeing across the floor, gathering your underwear and dress as you come across them on the floor.

The panic hit you when you woke around 5am, eyes flicking open suddenly in the dark stillness of Ben’s bedroom. The only sound was his soft, steady breathing, interspersed with the occasional tiny snore. In slumber, he somehow appeared even more handsome, more beautiful, snugly nestled into his pillow and hair sticking up at all angles. Fragments of light peeked around the edges of the blinds, picking out some of his features.

Whereas a couple of hours before his lovely face had felt like a comfort, in the wee small hours of the morning it triggered doubt. Your brain promptly forgot everything he had said about how beautiful he thought you were, how much he’d wanted you. Instead, it struck up a familiar, repetitive chorus.

He couldn’t really want you. He’s so gorgeous. You don’t deserve him. He’s sexy and kind and good and you’re a mess. Even if he thinks he wants you now, eventually he’ll realise he’s made a mistake. 

In the light of day, you might have been able to muster the little tricks you’d learned in therapy to quiet the voice of your inner bully. In the early hours, vulnerable and anxious in Ben’s bed, the chorus simply grew more insistent. 

So you carefully get out of bed and pick up your clothes. You pad out of the bedroom and find the bathroom, hoping that a splash of cold water might reset your thinking. 

Instead, the sight of yourself in the mirror just serves as further evidence for the case against you. Your makeup is smudged, settling into every line and wrinkle. You look jowly and heavy: matronly, even, and certainly not worthy of the handsome, good man whose bed you’d shared. 

You feel the defences around your heart building themselves back up again. 

You shouldn’t have let them down in the first place.

Still, you seem to want to somehow change your own mind. You tip-toe back across the hallway and peer around the door into the bedroom, as if maybe seeing Ben might quell the panic that’s beating a frantic, jolting rhythm in your chest. 

He’s still in the same position, his back to you as you stand at the door. There’s not a lot of him that’s visible, save for the tufts of messy hair and the outline of his broad form under the comforter. 

The panic eases momentarily as you feel a surge of affection and want. For an instant, you allow yourself to remember how good it felt to make love with him, to laugh and kiss and hold and touch and fuck together.

You have to leave in a few months. It would have to end one way or another. You couldn’t face that. You couldn’t go through the pain. And what if you hurt him, too? Better to get out now.

You return to the bathroom to dress quickly and quietly. In the semi-darkness, you pad down the stairs and retrieve your shoes, bag, and coat from the hallway. 

What the fuck are you doing?

“I’m getting out before he has the chance to reject me. Before we get too deep. Before I have to go home. Before it has to end. Before I hurt him.” 

Before I fuck it up, like I always do. I always ruin everything.

You remember from Thanksgiving that there’s a little notepad in the kitchen, for shopping lists and reminders. You think for a few moments before writing a note to Ben, folding it over and affixing it to the front of his fridge with a magnet. 

You know this is going to hurt him.

“Better than really hurting him further down the line, even if I’d never want to. I don’t deserve him.”

You try to block out the memory of the evening before, urgent declarations of want and your bodies pushed together against the hallway wall, as you quietly open the front door and leave. 

His immediate instinct as he blinks awake and stretches his long arms is to reach for you, to find your soft, warm body and pull you to him for another kiss, another cuddle; another chance to feel you, so wet and tight and perfect, as he sinks back into you.

“Mmmmm. Morning, baby.” Nothing.

Ben sits up and realises he’s on his own. He wanders around the upper floor of his home, calling your name, as if he’ll summon you out of the ether by repeating it.

He moves down the stairs and into the hallway, now filled with the crisp morning light of midwinter. Still nothing. 

His final hope is that you’re in the kitchen. Maybe you couldn’t sleep. Maybe you were hungry, or thirsty. 

“Lyddie?”

No you. Just a note.

“What the fuck, Lyddie. What the fuck are you doing?”

He leans back against the countertop, staring at the folded piece of paper - at his name, carefully inscribed in your neat, flowing script.

Dear Ben, 

Thank you for last night - it was great, really. I thought it would be easier if I just headed out. I didn’t want to wake you. Safe travels west. Happy holidays. See you soon. - L.

“Fuck.”

The thing that really drove you out of the safe warmth of Ben Morales’ arms and bed and out into the half-light of a December morning, walking home to your empty apartment alone and afraid, wasn’t your fear of fucking up - at least, not really. It was part of it, true, but what tipped the balance was not just fear, but feelings.

You pack the last of your things for the journey home for the holidays and try to ignore that simple fact. You had kept your defences up so sturdily and so dutifully for a long time, until he came along. Until you had to go catching feelings for a man who lived an entire ocean away from you.

You were frightened of fucking up because what you had - the friendship, whatever situation you entered into when he pressed his lips to yours and took you into his bed - meant the world to you. You were scared of hurting him, and of being hurt, because you cared about him so much. 

It was a strange paradox: you had done something that hurt the two of you now, in order to avoid the potential for greater pain further down the line. You’d always had a natural inclination to run from things that scared or overwhelmed you, after all. In your own, tortured logic, it made sense to run from the sheer force of your feelings for Ben. 

As you checked and double-checked the apartment while waiting for your cab to the airport, you remembered David’s words and felt a little guilty. You’d tried, though. You’d tried to let the light in. You just hadn’t expected it to blind you.

You’ve been avoiding your phone, save for sending a message to your family group chat to let them know you were safely en route to the airport. When your mother’s name pops up, you open the message.

MOM: Good woman, Lyd, you’re there good and early! Time to have a nice coffee and a bite to eat. Can’t wait to see you! 

Your mother was always thrilled when you got to the airport ahead of schedule, knowing your propensity for last-minute panic. You had no idea how to explain to her why you were sitting, red-eyed and heartbroken, in an airside coffee shop three whole hours early. 

You still hadn’t opened the two voice notes from Ben. A missed call on the phone, which you spotted after you got through security, then the two notes. Part of you had hoped that if you just ignored them long enough, they’d go away. Typical Lyd.

You take a deep breath and a sip of your enormous festive coffee, topped with whipped cream and sprinkles and reeking of peppermint syrup. You pop in your earbuds and press play.

The sound of his voice is like a knife to the heart. You’d feared anger, but instead Ben sounds like he’s aching.

“Hi, Lyddie - Lydia. I, uh, I got your note. Um. I guess I thought we were on the same page, about… about last night. Maybe not. Sorry if I got the wrong idea. I… anyway. I guess you’re on your way home now, or about to be. I’ll, um - I’ll talk to you. Happy holidays. Safe travels.”

It’s all you can do not to run out of that airport and hop into a cab back to his place, to hold him, to tell him how sorry you are, to beg him to forgive you for being a fucking idiot.

You’ve fucked it up. Told you you would.

You press play on the second voice note. His voice, still cracking a little, sounds stronger, steadier, more determined.

“Hi, just wanted to say - I don’t regret it. I don’t regret that we spent the night together. I’ll never regret that, no matter what. It meant something to me. I don’t want you to regret it, Lyd. Please.”

Before you can talk yourself out of it, you press ‘call’. He doesn’t answer. 

Ben listens to your voice note again while he’s sitting in the departures lounge, a day after you’d passed through. He hasn’t slept very much in the last day and a half. This morning, when he was washing his face and trimming his beard and moustache, he was sure he’d aged a decade in the space of less than 48 hours. The delay to his flight gives him plenty of time to nurse an enormous black coffee, though he wishes it was something even stronger.

“Hi. I’m at the airport. I tried calling, but - I guess you’re busy. Or maybe you just don’t want to talk. I understand why you - listen, I’m so sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, I don’t know what - I can explain, it’s just - it’s hard not being able to do that face to face. I promise, I can explain. I can. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Ben.”

Your voice catches at that point in the voice note, and he can hear you trying not to completely break down. It breaks his heart every time he listens to the message.

“I guess I will see you in the new year, then? I promise I’ll explain then. Safe travels west. Okay, then. Bye.”

Jet lag is a bitch. But you summon the strength and focus to slip in your earbuds in the privacy of your childhood bedroom at home, and press play on the next voice note he sent you. 

You might be imagining it, but his tone is softer. He still sounds hurt, but calmer, somehow. 

“Hey there. I’m just about to fly out. I got your message and - yeah. Probably best to see how things are in January. Maybe it’ll be good to have some space, clear our heads. Anyway.” He pauses, his voice quieter. “It’s good to hear your voice, Lyd.”

Oh, fuck. He wants space. Fuck. That’s not good. 

You take three attempts at your response before you manage to record a coherent message. 

“Hey. I hope the flights are okay, and that you get there safely. Yeah - um, yeah. Space, clear our heads. So, guess I’ll give you your space, until I see you and can explain. And it’s so good to hear your voice, too.”

You press send, your eyes glancing over the little round picture of Ben at the top of the screen. You say the words you’d left unsaid at the end of your message. 

“God, I miss you, darling.”

TJ Morales waits inside the arrivals hall at San Francisco International with his twelve year old twin sons, Dylan and Carlos. There’s only eighteen months between TJ - Thomas Juan, to give him his full name - and his older brother, and despite living on opposite sides of the country for a decade, they’re very close. It’s become an annual tradition, when Ben returns for the holidays, for TJ and the boys to pick him up.

This year, the three are decked out in an array of Star Wars-themed Christmas shirts to welcome Ben home: Dylan’s printed with a pattern of C3PO in a Santa hat, Carlos wearing a shirt emblazoned with Chewbacca wrapped in fairy lights, and their father wearing a pattern rather sweetly titled ‘We Wish You A Merry Sithmas’.

The running joke in the family was that TJ was the ‘cool brother’, a title he’d given himself when they were in middle school, much to the amusement of their parents. In many ways, that dynamic held fast to the present day. TJ, with his laidback personality, his long dark locks and neat beard, his array of plaid shirts, band T-shirts, and casual hoodies, still seemed to embody West Coast cool in a way that his more serious, anxious brother didn’t. His job certainly helped - a sound engineer for a video game studio, the kind of job both boys could have only dreamed of as they hid their shared Game Boy from their younger sister, Teresa.

Even so, as Ana Morales liked to remind people when she spoke about her sons, when she’d asked a three year old TJ what he wanted to be when he grew up, his answer was clear: “I wanna be like Ben.”

The sliding doors open and passengers begin to stream out, excitedly greeted by their families and friends. The two boys keep watch at the barrier, their dark curls bobbing up and down as they compete to spot their beloved tío first.

“Tío Ben!!” 

Carlos wins this year, waving frantically to his uncle as he pushes his luggage trolley through the doors.

Ben grins widely as he wraps an arm around each of his nephews, ruffling their hair as they show off their new holiday shirts. TJ throws his arms around his big brother, embracing him tightly. “Welcome home, hermano. We missed you.”

As he pulls away, TJ notices how tired Ben looks. His smile, genuine as it is, doesn’t reach his eyes. 

“You okay, Ben?” he asks in a low voice as they follow the boys out of the terminal and in the direction of the parking lot.

Ben nods, putting his arm around his brother as they walk. “I’m okay. Just tired. It’s been a long semester. I’m so glad to be home with you guys - it’s been forever.”

“Can I ask you something, Lyd?”

Your younger - only - sibling, Kate, is bouncing her one year old daughter Evie on her lap while Cora, her older girl, dances around the room and sings along to Encanto.

“We don’t talk about Bru- sure, of course. What’s up?”

“Are you alright? You’re normally full of energy when you’re home for the holidays and you just seem - I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like someone’s turned down your brightness.”

You haven’t said anything to Kate about Ben - well, nothing more than acknowledging him as part of the wider group of friends you’d established at Barrow. You certainly haven’t told her about your growing closeness, or what had happened, or - god forbid - your feelings for him.

It wasn’t that you two weren’t close enough for sharing that kind of confidence. You’d been brought even closer together since your ex-partner had cheated and left. You just felt like if you actually articulated the words, it would make it too real. Too much. Too fragile, too likely to disappear like every other crush or love affair you’d ever had.

“I’m just tired, I think. It was a lot in a few months - moving there, adjusting to a new environment, meeting all those new people, doing new classes. You know I’m always wrecked at the end of the semester.”

Kate raises an eyebrow sceptically while Evie chews on a giraffe-shaped teething toy. “There’s something off.”

You exhale, frustrated. “I’m fine.”

“Did you meet someone?”

Your eyes widen. How the FUCK does she know?

“I don’t know what the hell you’re on about. What gives you that idea?”

“You were happy when we’d talk and FaceTime. You were always so excited going out with your new friends. And now you’re back here you’re tired and gloomy. It just makes me wonder, you know - was there more than intellectual stimulation going on over there. If you know what I mean.”

You roll your eyes. “Jesus, Kate.”

“They’re working you too hard, Benjamin. Doesn’t your poor brother look tired, Thomas?”

TJ exhales and takes a sip of his coffee. He was used to the annual routine - their mother fussing over Ben like he’d been thoroughly neglected since the last time he was home. 

“I asked him earlier and he said he was fine. Didn’t you, B?”

Ben nods. “I’m fine, mom.”

Ana Morales does not seem convinced. “Well, you’ve got a couple of weeks now to rest up. We’ll take care of you.”

TJ shoots a look at the twins, who giggle conspiratorially.

The door into the kitchen opens and Lucy, TJ’s wife, staggers in carrying a precarious stack of lilac-coloured cake boxes printed with the logo for Pun in the Oven, her bakery and coffee shop in the city. Ben and TJ immediately stand up to relieve her of the burden, placing the boxes on the kitchen table as Lucy - or as she’s more usually called, Luce - wipes her brow and grins in the direction of her brother-in-law.

“BENJAMIIIIIIIIN!” She grabs Ben and pulls him in for a hug, smiling widely. “Missed you, man!”

Ben smiles softly at her in turn. “You look great, Luce. Any new tattoos since I saw you last?”

Luce arches an eyebrow and holds out her left hand, revealing a simple outline of a heart in purple ink in the space between her index finger and thumb. 

“Hope you don’t mind, dude. Took some inspiration from your bullseye for this one, just because I always thought the placement was cool.”

Ben spreads the fingers on his left hand, flexing his thumb slightly as he looks at the small bullseye tattoo he had done during his junior year abroad. 

“I’m honoured. Any chance your husband might get a matching one, eh?” 

Luce giggles and wraps an arm around TJ. “You know he hates needles. He got our initials done, that was enough for me. He was so brave.” She plants a kiss to TJ’s cheek, triggering dry-heaving noises from their sons.

Ana surveys the stack of cake boxes on her table. “You didn’t need to, Luce. This is far too much.”

Luce shakes her head and holds up her hands. “Nonsense. Just a couple of the leftovers from today and a few extra batches of the holiday specials I threw in this morning. Plus, for the homecoming…”

She lifts the lid on one of the boxes and pushes it in Ben’s direction.

“Coffee and walnut - your favourite.”

Ben’s eyes light up and he hugs his sister-in-law. “This is the best gift I could ask for. Thanks, Luce.”

“Don’t you think he looks tired, Luce? He needs to rest, poor boy.” Ana tilts her head at Ben, who is already searching for a knife to cut a slice of the cake.

Luce does think Ben looks tired, but there’s something else that’s just not quite right. A sadness, somewhere, or a resurgence of his anxiety. You can see it in his eyes. Maybe her husband knows more.

“We’ll look after him.” 

There’s always been something special about Christmas Eve. As a child it was the anticipation and excitement for the day to come, desperate to go to bed but too excited to sleep. As an adult, drafted in to help prep the food for the next day’s dinner, you peeled potatoes, sliced carrots, and monitored the turkey slowly cooking in the oven while listening to carols and Christmas songs on the radio. 

More than that, there was something in the air - maybe not ‘magic’, contrary to the message pushed in every TV ad since November. But possibility: of transformation, of newness, of togetherness, whether with blood family, found family, or whatever community you chose for yourself.

Or, just maybe, you’d completely internalised A Christmas Carol. Never mind Charles Dickens, that was mostly the Muppets’ fault.

The arrival of your little nieces in recent years has brought back some of the old traditions from your own childhood. You’d been followed around for most of the day by Cora, who had turned three a few months before.

“How does Santa bring all the things, Auntie Lyd?”

You smile and continue peeling potatoes. “I think he has some magic that lets him have a really big sleigh that just carries all the toys for everyone.”

“But then it’s too big and won’t fly.”

“No, it will. Because it’s magic.”

“But then he has’ta come down the chimley.” She gazes up at you, narrowing her eyes. “Should just use the magic to put the presents down.”

You’re stuck there. Thankfully, your brother-in-law Marc arrives in search of another slice of cake, and you palm her off on her daddy. 

With Cora and Evie safely in bed and asleep, you and your parents help your sister and her husband set up the living room, carefully setting out the Santa gifts and filling the little stockings embroidered with each girl’s name. 

Marc takes a careful bite out of the slice of cake and drains the glass of port left at the fireplace. “I don’t know how he isn’t absolutely rat-arsed, with all the port and whiskey and that being left out for him. No wonder he’s falling down chimneys.”

With your parents gone to bed, and Marc watching Die Hard on a random movie channel, you and your sister unwind for a bit with tea and Christmas cookies. She eyes you up, as if steeling herself to make a confession. Or, as it turns out, to encourage you to make one.

“So, who is he?” Kate poses the question at the kitchen table, hands wrapped around her gigantic Christmas mug of tea.

You put down your own mug and sigh.

One of Cora’s favourite questions about Santa Claus is how he does it all in one night. Apart from magic, which even at three she seems sceptical about, you tend to cite time zones as an explanation.

After all, how else could Cora and Evie be already starting to wake up to their gifts on one side of the world, while Santa hasn’t yet visited the extended Morales clan on the other?

With Luce and TJ hosting Christmas this year, they extended an invitation to Ben and Ana to stay with them on Christmas Eve. In truth, they hoped being roped in for an 80s Christmas movie marathon with his nephews would help distract Ben a little. Maybe even get him in the holiday mood. 

By 11pm, Lucy has finished the prep for tomorrow’s meal and is shooing her sons to their beds. Their grandmother retired a couple of hours before to the guest bedroom, carrying a dog-eared copy of A Christmas Carol - she likes to read the last couple of chapters every Christmas Eve, even if Tiny Tim always makes her cry.

“I’m going to head up, babe - don’t stay up too late. You have all the stuff for the sofa bed, Ben?”

Ben turns to acknowledge his sister-in-law, nodding. “All here. Thanks, Luce, it’s really nice spending Christmas Eve with you guys.”

She smiles warmly. “It’s our pleasure. Teej, I’ll see you in a bit? G’night, Ben. Merry Christmas.”

The Morales boys are sitting on TJ’s couch, each drinking a beer while Scrooged plays, quietly, on the TV. 

“You gonna tell me what’s going on?” TJ runs a finger along the condensation on his bottle of beer, sleeves rolled up on his blue flannel. 

Ben fiddles with the cuff of his own, pine-green checked shirt. “As in…?”

His younger brother fixes him with a glare.

“As in what - or should I say, who’s - on your mind?”

“He’s called Ben. He’s a literature professor at Barrow.”

“Her name is Lyddie - I mean, Lydia. She’s a visiting professor. I’m sure I’ve mentioned her?”

“I met him on the very first day. He was my - what did he call himself? - my ‘welcome wagon’.”

“We went to dinner, as we normally do with the visiting people. And we just…man. Clicked. As friends.” 

“I mean, I made a Big Night reference and he got it? Honestly, I hadn’t had such a good time in…I can’t remember. I told him about what happened - the shit hitting the fan, and all that.”

“I guess we just started hanging out. Having coffee, talking - just friendly stuff, you know? She was new, we had a lot in common. I - I liked having her around.”

“He was so sweet to me when I was settling in. Like, I have made some really good friends over there. But sometimes he’d bring me coffee in the afternoon, and - I dunno, I started to look forward to it.”

“She’s unbelievably smart, TJ. Doesn’t think it. Always puts herself down. Same as when you try to tell her she’s pretty. But she’s so fucking bright, I swear to god. And she has the best taste in movies and music. And she is pretty. More than pretty.”

“And he’s so kind and giving. He’s running this whole diversity programme to try to make Barrow less white and wealthy and he’s had so much shit about it from fucking dickheads who think Ben’s not as good as them because he’s Latino and because his parents had to fucking work hard for a living. Assholes. All that and he’s really goddamn handsome.”

“And she’s a bit of a firecracker when she wants to be. You know that culture war idiot Lacroix? She just went for him at the away day because he was giving me shit.”

“He’s so fucking funny. The biggest dork you’ve ever seen. Actually did a ‘reeling you in’ dance at my birthday drinks to get me on the dancefloor. Once, he laughed so hard in my office that his glasses flew off his face. Hanging out with him is - was - so great.”

“She’s got this knack of knowing how to lift my spirits. I said to her one day that I’ve never laughed as much in work before - I meant before her.”

“I was the only person to get who he’d dressed up as for Halloween. That was a fun night - at Evan’s. You know Evan. You’re mutuals with Evan on Instagram, right? We were a little bit merry. Well, a lot merry. It sounds so fucking dumb but we touched and I swear I could feel electricity going off in my brain, and I…I hadn’t experienced that in years. Years.”

“Had her on my lap on the ride home from Evan’s. I put it down to being a bit drunk on Spooky Margs but honestly, I didn’t want to let her go when we got to her place. I’ll explain the Spooky Marg another time, man, you do not want to know.”

“We do - did - a lot of movie nerding out together. Did I show you the gifts he got me for my birthday? And the card? He got me a Hitchhiker’s Guide card. Y’know, because -��

“42. The answer to the ultimate question. She’s 42. I don’t think I said that to you. I guess I should have known there was something there the day I ordered that card, huh.”

“I knew there was something there on my birthday, for sure. And dancing with him, to that song - fuck. For a couple of minutes I just let myself pretend, you know? But he never did anything more, not that night.”

“I wasn’t drinking when we went out for her birthday, but she was. So I didn’t want to make a move, in case she wasn’t interested and felt I was trying to take advantage. But I wish I had.”

“He ended up alone in Barrow for Thanksgiving, so he invited me to come over. I’m sure I told you about this? The parade, the movie? Well, it was - it was really nice. God, that’s such a shit way of explaining it. It was just -”

“Mom did a video call, remember? And she saw her and she was all nice as pie and then she was giving me shit about whether Lydia was my girlfriend, and why wasn’t she my girlfriend because she was so pretty and so funny, and - god. You know what she’s like.”

“And all day I kept thinking ‘I wish I could tell you how I feel’, and then I’d remember I was just fucking visiting. I’m temporary. It’s temporary, by default. And he couldn’t want someone like me. And you know I can’t go through that hurt again. You know, Kate. You saw me at my lowest.”

“I did think about asking her out that evening, TJ. I did. But she’d said some stuff about being ‘good friends’ or something, and I just thought it was safer not to. I didn’t want to ruin what we already had. You know? She probably wasn’t interested, that’s what I thought.”

“I went to give him a kiss on the cheek to say thank you.”

“I turned to meet her. I wanted it, wanted to kiss her.”

“And we kissed, accidentally. For a couple of seconds. At least, I thought it was accidental. Don’t look at me like that, it wasn’t long.”

“I wasn’t brave enough to kiss her like she ought to be kissed. She panicked and I thought she didn’t want it.”

“I should have kept kissing him.”

“We didn’t see each other for a couple of weeks, between conferences and travel. And fuck it, I missed her.”

“We messaged all the time and I still missed him. We didn’t talk about Thanksgiving. Not until - well.”

“So I told her I meant it. Meant to kiss her.”

“I don’t know what it is but tying a man’s tie is so intimate and so hot and - yep. We kissed properly.”

“We ended up back at my place the night before she went home.”

“We…we were together, the night before I came back over here.”

“I’m not being ‘coy’, TJ. I - okay, we slept together. Happy now?”

“Yes, okay, yes, we slept together that night, at his place.”

“And I asked her to stay. I wanted her to stay over. I was ready to drive her home and get her stuff. I would have gone to the fucking airport with her. Anything.”

“I woke up in the early hours and I just - fuck. I just lost it. I flipped. All the dark shit just came roaring back up.”

“She left a note. I couldn’t believe it.”

“The sex was not bad, fuck off! I can’t believe I’m about to say these words to my baby sister but - best sex I’ve ever had. Four times. Four fucking times.”

“I know I’m blushing, dude. It was really, really fucking good. Really good.”

“Who am I, Kate? A fucking cliché? I left him a fucking note? All because I couldn’t handle having real fucking feelings, because I knew I’d fuck it up. Like I always do. And oh look - SHE FUCKED IT UP. Again.”

“I really thought we were on the same page, you know?”

“He left me a voice note. Here, listen.”

“I tried calling her, but she was already at the airport.”

“I called him back. No answer.”

“I don’t think I would have been able to speak to her. She left me a voice note, too.”

“It would be easier to explain in person, right? Wouldn’t it?” 

“Maybe we needed the space and time apart, anyway. Especially if she regrets it.”

“He said we could do with the space. He said he hopes I don’t regret it. How could I ever regret that, with him? I’ve fucked it up, Kate. I know it would have been pointless anyway with the temporary visiting stupid situation, but - still. I ruined everything.”

Kate reaches over to pat the back of your hand, her festive, red and green manicure glittering as the light bounces off her nails.

“You probably didn’t, love. You always think you did. Can I - can I see a picture of him, if you have one? Want to see this nerdy sex god for myself.”

You open your phone and swipe through your pictures, finding one you’d taken of Ben on Thanksgiving. He’s holding his plate stacked with blueberry pancakes, smiling and bespectacled on the couch as you watch the Macy’s parade.

“Here he is.”

Kate studies the image carefully, eyebrows raised. She zooms in and out a couple of times.

“Well, hello, gorgeous! He’s handsome. Really handsome. Look at that smile, whew. And those eyes!” She zooms in and out again. 

“May I remind you that you are a married mother of two?”

“I can look and appreciate, can’t I?” She swats the air as if brushing your comment away.  “Fuck, it’s like someone engineered him in a lab for you. He even kinda looks like a mature version of those imaginary boyfriends you used to draw in your diary when you were thirteen.”

“He is fucking handsome, isn’t he? He’s so - wait, what? How did you know about those?”

Your sister rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “Bitch, I read that thing cover to cover. You were so dramatic. Still are. You got any of the two of you together?”

You open your photos and pull up the photos Ani took of you and Ben dancing the night of your birthday drinks. “These are probably the best.”

Kate’s expression changes when she swipes through the set of pictures, zooming in every so often to look at your and Ben’s expressions more carefully. She looks up at you, hands you back the phone, and looks like she might cry.

“You okay?”

“Fucking hell, Lyd, you’ve got it bad. Both of you - I mean, look at the two of you! I know they’re just pictures but on top of everything you’ve said? I don’t think he’s just got a ‘thing’ for you, I think he’s really into you.” She chews on a cookie. “Remind me what you said in the note again.”

You recount the contents of the missive. 

“It’s just… you clearly have serious feelings for him. You’ve told me all these things about this wonderful guy. You told me it was the best sex you’ve ever had. And then you say ‘it was great’ to him in a shitty note?! I can understand why he’s pissed off.”

“I screwed this up, didn’t I?”

Kate throws her head back in frustration. “Still dramatic. You screwed it up a bit, but - surely he’s not that much of an asshole that he wouldn’t hear you out?” She drains the last of her tea from the mug. “Admittedly if it wasn’t Christmas, I’d be putting you on a flight to San Fran. However - talk when you get back. Explain face to face. Don’t assume the worst. I don’t think he can turn off his feelings that easily.”

“You don’t know that she regrets it. You don’t even know why she left without saying goodbye. You said she’d had some rough shit in the last couple of years. She said the night together was great in the note, didn’t she? And she’s been in touch, so… I dunno, man. I wouldn’t write her off.”

TJ takes the last swig from his bottle of beer and slaps his brother on the thigh.

“Can I see a photo of this Lydia, then?”

Ben sighs and digs around in his jeans pocket for his phone. He chooses the one he’d taken of you on Thanksgiving, sitting in the diner with your grilled cheese sandwich and basket of fries. You’re still wearing your glasses after the movie, smiling at him in your thick cable-knit sweater.

“That’s Lyddie - I mean, Lydia on Thanksgiving. She made that sweater herself, you know. She’s a talented woman.”

TJ smiles as he studies your features, zooming in a little on your bright, happy face.

“She’s a pretty woman, too. Beautiful smile, gorgeous eyes - kind-looking, and you just know she’s smart and funny as hell.” He turns to his older brother, wrapping an arm around his broad shoulders. “Your girl is lovely, Hubbell.” 

Ben smiles and huffs a laugh at the reference. “Quoting The Way We Were at me? Hi, Mom.”

“Hey, Ana Morales has good taste in movies! Remember the VHS copy she always used to put on and cry at?”

Ben smiles at the memory. He turns to TJ, eyes full of emotion - worry, sadness, and affection. For his little brother, of course - but for you, too.

“I mean it, Ben. She is lovely. She sounds lovely - disappearing act aside, of course. And the way she’s looking at you in that picture - fuck, man. You can just see how much she likes you. You’ve every right to be hurt and angry, but - maybe don’t give up on her. You’re both too fucking old to let a chance like this slide, bro. Don’t let her go.”

Christmas Day is a chaotic whirlwind of overexcited nieces, a family dinner delivered like a military operation, and fighting over what to watch on TV. Same as it ever was. 

It’s nice. It’s comforting. But you’re impossibly lonely, embrace of a loving (if stress-inducing) family unit aside.

Since you’d cut and run a few days before, the steady stream of communication back and forth between you and Ben had essentially ceased, save for the voice notes. It’s become such second nature to you, the constant contact, and the rupture is all the more brutal as a result.

In the early hours of Christmas morning, lying wide awake in your old bed, you remember that during the Apollo missions to the moon they had a thing called LOS, or Loss of Signal. When orbit took the craft to the dark side of the moon, all communication between Mission Control and the astronauts became impossible for a time. 

LOS was nerve-wracking, particularly in the first attempts at lunar orbit. What if they never re-established contact? What if something happened on the dark side, leaving the crew lost forever while the rest of the world carried on? You have heard the recordings, the hiss of static fraying the nerves of those on the ground awaiting the return of the signal, the sound of a voice spinning through the vastness of space.

You’re in extended LOS, you realise. In spite of yourself, you smile, thinking how in any other circumstances Ben - with his Saturn V model and his Apollo 11 sweatshirt - would love the analogy.

“Did you send him a happy Christmas message yet?”

Kate doesn’t even look at you as she says it, all casual. She’s too busy scraping the remains of the Christmas dinner off the plates before stacking them in the dishwasher.

“The fuck?” Her ability to read your mind is starting to become disturbing. 

She swivels. “Did you send Ben a message wishing him a happy Christmas? If I was you I’d take a nice picture and send it. You look cute in that dress.”

“Do you think he wants a Christmas message from me? I doubt it. He wants space.”

Kate closes the dishwasher and presses the start button.

“I don’t think he knows what he wants, probably. Other than you. I’m sure he wants you, going on the way he looked at you in those pictures.”

You make a whining noise. “That was before.”

“You and your apocalyptic thinking. Unfortunately, Lyd, if you want to fix this you’re going to have to be the one leading the fixing. Start with a message.”

She sidles over to the kitchen counter, where your phone is safely tucked away to avoid doom-scrolling, picking it up and waving it menacingly. 

“If you don’t, I will.”

“FINE. But I’m not sending him a cute selfie, that’s ludicrous.”

You retreat to your room. It takes you a full half-hour to pick a photo and compose a message.

A notification appears at the top of your screen.

KATE: SEND THAT FUCKING MESSAGE

Breathe. Send. Run away.

Ben sneaks another buñuelo from the pile made by his mother earlier that Christmas morning. The sweet, spicy kick of the cinnamon sugar with the fried dough lifts his spirits - as does the sight of his three niblings side by side on the couch, engrossed in a game on Dylan and Carlos’s Nintendo Switch. A twin sits on either side of their youngest cousin, Julia - Jules to all - and helps her manoeuvre the controller and work her way through the game.

Newly-turned seven, and the daughter of Teresa Morales and her Irish husband Pádraig, Jules might be the youngest in the family but is a tiny force of nature. Though he didn’t have favourites among the three, Ben had a special connection with Jules, who routinely mailed him letters and drawings every couple of weeks. He would diligently respond with a hand-written letter, usually enclosing a couple of packs of stickers or a new book for her to read.

“I’M BORED NOW.” Jules hops off the couch and saunters over to her tío Ben, who’s sitting at the table in the dining room off Luce and TJ’s living room. “Can I have a buñuelo?” 

He brushes cinnamon sugar out of his moustache and off his dark red sweater, and looks over at his sister, who rolls her eyes and nods in resignation. “Your mom says yes, so…” He holds out the plate. 

Jules scrunches her nose up in delight as she takes a bite, then cocks her head as she studies her uncle. “I think you might be sad.”

This is a perceptive kid, Ben thinks. 

“I’m okay, Jules. Just a little tired.”

She chews another bite of her snack and shakes her head. “No. I think you’re sad. I can make you happy, though!” She makes a serious face. “Wait here, okay?”

She returns carrying a bundle of brightly-coloured hair clips and what looks suspiciously like a couple of bottles of nail polish. 

“Mama always says she feels happier when she gets her hair done. And has her pretty nails.” 

The little girl perches herself on a chair, sets out her equipment, and gets to work, tongue peeking out as she concentrates on painting Ben’s nails (she adds a glittery topcoat for extra effect) and carefully placing hair clips in his hair. 

“Everyone, tell tío he looks pretty!”

The rest of the extended Morales clan turn to look at Ben. Dylan and Carlos immediately grab their phones to take photos. TJ raises his eyebrows and nods approvingly. 

“That makeover stays put for the rest of the day, Ben.” Teresa is deadly serious, not wanting her little girl to see her handiwork undone. 

“Wouldn’t dream of it. Thank you, Jules. I feel much better.”

You allow yourself a glance at your phone later that evening, a glass of champagne lending you some extra courage.

Still nothing.

You cast a glance at the contents of the little gift box Ben had left for you before leaving Barrow. A beautiful, dark red notebook, subtly personalised with your initials in embossed lettering - and a set of Nouvelle Vague-themed film button badges.

“Stupendous as always, Luce!” 

Ben and TJ carry stacks of empty dinner plates into the kitchen, the family well-fed and content after their Christmas meal of beef and a seemingly endless selection of side dishes. 

Lucy is preparing dessert, which mostly consists of the cakes and cookies left over at Pun in the Oven when they closed for the holiday the day before, served with ice cream and fresh fruit.

“Your mom did a lot of the work, guys. Can’t take all the credit. Hey, TJ, can you carry this cake stand in with you? Thanks, babe.”

She notices that Ben has a somewhat wistful expression on his face as he sorts out the dirty dishes.

“Hey, I just wanted to say - I asked TJ if he knew what was going on with you, and…”

Ben nods and smiles. “He told you.”

“I’m with him, Benjamin. From what you told TJ, I think this is worth fighting for. Or at least, it’s worth giving her a chance to explain properly.” 

He casts his gaze downwards. “You know, when I saw those photos the boys took of my ‘makeover’, the first thing that popped into my mind was ‘I better send these to Lyd’.”

“You miss her.” Luce pats him on the back. “So why don’t you? Send them, I mean.”

Ben turns to her in astonishment. “Seriously? We said we were giving each other space, time… and I’m still not sure what she wants.”

His sister-in-law rolls her eyes. “If you don’t send her a happy holidays message with one of those pictures - I will. And you know I don’t fuck around.”

He stands with one hand on his hip, bringing the other up to cover his face. “I know you don’t. Shit. Okay. I’ll do it. But only so you - or worse, TJ - don’t.”

Luce does a tiny dance for joy as Ben turns to leave. She spots - and recognises - a baby pink no-crease hair clip sticking out of his dark hair at the back of his head.

“JULES, have you been in our room??”

Ben settles himself at the desk in his brother’s home office, where he’d deliberately left his phone all day. He’s still not convinced that Luce is right about sending this, but she’s a woman of her word. 

He holds your gift to him, unopened, in his hands. He unwraps it quickly.

A pair of brightly-coloured socks, patterned with books and pens. And a soft, hand-knitted, merino watchcap in a Prussian blue, with a little tag stitched inside: Hand Knitted by Me.

He didn’t expect your name to be there, waiting for him, when he turned over his phone.

You had chosen a slightly chaotic photo of yourself that your brother-in-law had taken, of Cora bopping you in the face while trying to stick a huge bow on you. It would at least, you hoped, make him smile.

Happy Christmas, Ben. I was injured in a gifting incident earlier today. - L.

He selects a photo of himself showing off his painted nails, his hair festooned with coloured clips, while Jules beams in the background at her handiwork.

Merry Christmas, Lyd. I got a holiday makeover courtesy of Jules. - B.

You each hope that the other will somehow be able to read, in the gaps, the words left invisible:

I’m so sorry.

I don’t know why you did it.

I care so much about you.

I really miss you.

I think about you all the time.

I want you.

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more; other dividers by @cafekitsune)

Further A/N: TJ's 'Your girl's lovely, Hubbell' is, of course, a reference to The Way We Were.

[ladamedusoif]

Christmas Tree (Professor!Ben x OFC!Lydia)

A Merry Fic-Mas - December 22

Part of A Merry Fic-Mas: A Pedro Boys Holiday Fic Calendar - click for masterlist.

Follow my writing blog @ladameecrit and turn on notifications to keep up to date with my fics!

Pairing: Professor!Ben (Mr Ben AU) x OFC!Lydia 

Word count: 908

Rating: Mature; 18+ MDNI

Warnings: Allusions to smut; mild swearing; established relationship; references to Christmas but secular.

A/N: A little imagine from the Visiting universe - this isn’t a flash forward, because Visiting is as-yet unfinished and still seeking a resolution, but I wanted to write for these two in a Christmas setting again. (And I couldn't resist that gif from The Bishop's Wife!)

MDNI banner by @cafekitsune

You draw the living room curtains and step back to survey your handiwork. Your first Christmas tree together, and you’d wanted it to be just right. 

Ben stands in the middle of the doors that divide the living room from the dining room and kitchen, oohing and aahing at the tall tree shining with hundreds of tiny lights that reflect off the many baubles you’ve hung from its branches.

“Hit the lights, baby,” you ask, “you can’t really see if the lights look right unless you have darkness.”

He does as he’s bid, and the living room is illuminated only by the cosy glow of the stove in the fireplace and the warm white of the Christmas tree. You screw up your eyes to assess the overall effect, using a trick your grandfather had taught you years before. 

“You think it’s okay, Ben?” You turn to face him, smiling at the way the gentle light of the tree picks out his handsome features and the twinkle in his eyes as he takes it in. 

“It’s…perfect. You are so talented, Lyddie.”

You beam at his praise. “It’s just a case of working out where everything needs to go. And we can add to the baubles over time - I know most of these are from my original collection, but soon there’ll be ones that are ours, with our memories attached to them.”

There’s no response. You turn back to see if he’s still there, and notice that he’s fiddling with the stereo system in the dining room, carefully placing a record on the turntable and setting the stylus to the right track.

The intro begins, and Ben spins to face you with a mischievous look on his face. He starts to dance in your direction as the familiar opening of the song plays from the speakers.

“Baby, what is going on?”

He wraps an arm around your waist and takes your hand, pulling you to him and leading you into the rhythm of the song. As the vocal begins, Ben joins in, mimicking Bruce Springsteen’s New Jersey rasp:

“Merry Christmas, baby

You sure did treat me nice

Merry Christmas, baby

You sure did treat me niiiiice

I feel just like I’m liviiin’

Livin’ in para- shit, Lyd, I can’t sustain that, sorry.”

You throw your head back and laugh, wrapping your arms around his neck and swaying your hips in time to the music. “Just dance with me, darling man.”

Ben’s coffee-brown eyes shine, cheeks flushing a little. He brings his hands to your hips and moves with you, his body flush against yours. He can’t help join in again, in his usual voice, for the bridge:

“Santa came down the chimney

Half past three

With lots of nice little presents for

Lyddie and me”

You both giggle as he reaches again for your hands, twirling you around and under his arm before bringing you back into hold. He looks so beautiful in the soft light from the tree and the fire: like pure comfort and love distilled in human form. You can’t help but nuzzle in to his chest as the song enters the final bridge and chorus.

“How’d you get to be so good at dancing, Ben?”

He kisses your hair and you can hear him smile. “My parents. They always used to dance together in the house during the holidays, they’d go dancing at weekends sometimes - it was their thing.” You feel him pull you a little closer. “My dad had moves. And when I was a little kid, I asked him to teach me.”

You chuckle, humming happily against his broad chest, clad in a soft, dark blue plaid flannel shirt. “So you’ve been working on your moves since you were a little kid?”

He laughs in agreement. “Kinda. I think I just looked at them and thought I’d like to have that, someday. Someone to dance with you, no matter if it’s just at home.” He pulls away slightly and looks at you. “I dunno, it just seemed so…loving.”

As the E Street Band plays the final bars of the song, you lean in and caress Ben’s handsome face before kissing him. “It was loving. It is loving.” You can’t help but run your hands over his back and down to the waistband of his jeans, hooking your fingers against the denim so you can bring him tight to your body and walk him over to the couch.

His lips find yours again as you lie back on the sofa, Ben’s warm body between your legs and your fingers working to unbutton his shirt as he slips his hands under your oversized denim shirt and reaches for your breasts, pulling a whine of pleasure from you. You move one of his big hands to the waistband of your leggings, encouraging him to tug them down as you fumble to unbuckle his belt and unzip his jeans.

He pauses for a moment to take you in: the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, without question. If he said this now you’d roll your eyes and brush it off, pointing to your bare face and wrinkles and wobbles and greys and the slightly schlubby clothes you’re wearing for putting up the tree - but here, now, about to make love and with the lights from the Christmas tree sparkling in your eyes so full of love and affection, he thinks you might just be at your most beautiful.

[tessa-quayle]

This is beautiful.  So many things to love that were well captured: the nonbinary character Ani, the hilarious line about the micro/macro-aggressive fucker Kevin L being born with the National Review in his clutches, LEGOS!, the pain of academic and corporate team-building exercises, and of course: the slow burn between Lydia and Ben.  🔥

Visiting - Chapter Two: Bright in the Sea

(moodboard by the wonderful @cutesyscreenname)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter Summary: Lydia continues to settle in at Barrow College, developing a closer friendship with Ben as well as other colleagues. Not everything is smooth sailing, however, and things come to a head at a staff team-building away day at a New England beach.

Word Count: 6.5k (??)

Rating: Mature; will become Explicit in later chapters.

Content (chapter specific): Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (she is 41 and Ben 47 when the story begins); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; strong language; thinly-veiled racism and discrimination; accent discrimination; "anti-woke" culture war nonsense from academics; not all historians, etc; alcohol consumption; discussion of anxiety and panic disorders as well as coping methods.

A/N: This chapter is part world-building, part "dealing with academic assholes", part meet more characters - all woven through the growing friendship between Lydia and Ben. I guess this is mostly fluff but kinda angsty at times? I did warn you it was a slow burn...

Much of this chapter is set around academic administrative and 'team-building' activities. Trust me when I say that these are the norm if you work in a contemporary university or college (and that I'm jealous of the Barrow people having a cute beach house for these events).

Also trust me when I say that the views and attitudes of K. Wright Lacroix are scarily common in academia on both sides of the Atlantic, and kicking against this is vital.

The title of this chapter is taken from the lyrics to Laura Veirs' song 'Cast a Hook in Me'.

I also listened to Lisa Hannigan's Sea Sew album while writing the last scene, and 'Sea Song' from that record feels very fitting for these two.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia's story and background.

Further, short A/N right at the end to avoid any spoilers.

Taglist: @cutesyscreenname; @lunapascal; @fuckyeahdindjarin; @julesonrecord; @tieronecrush; @perennialdoll247; @vermillionwinter; @iamskyereads; @imaswellkid; @love-the-abyss; @tessa-quayle; @javierisms

The universal language of twenty-first century academia is, it seems, all-faculty meetings in airless lecture theatres, fuelled by terrible coffee and slightly stale cookies. 

For you, though, attending your first proper meeting of the year at Barrow was a novelty, and the mid-September residual sunshine and warm temperatures (by your standards) meant that your new colleagues were in an upbeat mood. 

Well, more or less.

“Are you ready for your first mandatory death by a thousand statistics? Fuuuuuck me, I hate this shit.”

Ani Sen stands at your office door, hip cocked, dark curls piled on top of their head to show off their freshly trimmed, back to school undercut, and impossibly funky, bright green glasses dangling from one hand. 

“It can’t be as bad as an all-staff briefing I once had,” you suggest, scooping up your notebook, pen, and iPad and popping them into a tote bag. “Twenty minutes with the head of department and every slide had an animated graph, pie chart, or word art on it. I felt nauseous.”

Ani grimaces. “Okay, that does sound fucking awful. But where we lack in pointless animations, we make up for in tedium. And dick-swinging.”

The first time you met Ani, a fellow art historian and specialist in contemporary art, you’d been in awe of how cool they were. Mid-40s, smart, stylish, and highly accomplished, Ani’s coolness was positively glacial. They were also sweet, kind, and incredibly funny, their brand of sardonic (and sweary) humour chiming perfectly with your own. 

Ani’s best friend in the faculty was Evan Rhys, a colleague of Ben’s in the literature department. Where Ani was dry and sardonic, Evan was bright and effervescent. He was about 40, tall and rangy, piercings dangling from one ear, and a perpetual spark of colour in the faculty corridors. When you first met him, Evan was sporting a shock of bright orange hair and a lurid green slash-necked jersey shirt, paired with white jeans and a pair of Converse exactly the same colour as his hair. 

He was, perhaps unsurprisingly, a huge student favourite. Rather more surprisingly, for a college professor entering middle age, he also had an Instagram following in the tens of thousands. (Ani was completely at a loss as to why he was so popular. “It’s just photos of him in those fucking outfits!”, they whined. “Maybe it’s because he matches them to his hair.”)

Between them, Ani and Evan had wasted no time in ensuring that you were invited for lunches, coffees, and introductions to the colleagues they thought you’d like to meet. Or, as Ani put it, “I’m gonna make sure you meet the non-fuckwits first.” 

There was no shortage of fuckwits, apparently. Ani had drawn up a masterlist - “in case I’ve forgotten someone is, or has been known to be, a dick.” You had scanned it casually, feeling an unexpected surge of relief when you note that Ben Morales’ name is absent. 

You knew deep down that he wasn’t a fuckwit, though lord knows what he thought of you. But you had had one day to get the measure of the man - Ani had been working here, alongside him, for several years. 

“I met Ben Morales on my first day,” you mentioned, trying to sound casual. “He was tasked with doing the welcome for me. Seemed really nice, actually.”

Ani closed their eyes and makes a sort of “awwwwwh!” noise, as if they’d just seen a red panda or a sea otter or some other furry creature of equivalent cuteness. 

“Oh, definitely not a fuckwit. Me and Evan have coffee with him or sometimes go out with a bigger group to Murphy’s - that’s the one bar that even students usually steer clear of. Ben’s the anti-fuckwit, actually, in every sense. Just an all-round good guy.” They raised an eyebrow. “Total fucking dork, though.”

Total dork or not, Ben had continued to take his welcome duties seriously. A couple of days after your welcome meeting, he’d met you in the staff lounge yawning at the filter coffee machine while it brewed up a fresh pot. 

“Are we running you ragged already?”

You turned, smiling when you realised who it was. “I swear to god, I get the worst slumps around 4pm. Trying to get ahead of this one.”

He nodded sympathetically and brandished his blue mug. “Why do you think I’m here?” 

The next day, around the same time, you were about to get up from your desk in search of coffee when you noticed a familiar silhouette in the glass panel of your office door: Ben, bearing two cups of coffee (one black, one with creamer). 

“I hope you don’t mind? I was getting some for myself and remembered what you said about your 4pm slump, so…”

You beckoned him into the office and to a spare seat, gladly accepting the cup and placing it on your desk. “I’m so grateful. Coffee to your door? Come on, that’s the dream.” You rummaged in your tote bag, producing a small box of cookies and shaking them in his direction. “Unfortunately these are all I can offer by way of a thank you.”

It had only been a couple of weeks since you started at Barrow, but in that time the coffee call had developed into a bit of a habit on days where you were both around in the afternoons. He’d claimed that the companionable chatting that accompanied the coffee was just to see how you were getting on and make sure you had everything you needed, but you suspected that he really just liked having someone to talk about books or movies and swap silly stories with.

And you like it, too, especially when you manage to make him laugh so hard he has to take his glasses off to wipe his eyes. You’d bonded with some of your closest work friends (of all genders) at home in a similar way. It felt easy and natural with Ben from the start, and - with Ani and Evan - you were glad to have found such welcoming people so soon.

There was no sign of him at the all-staff event, though. You slip into a row of fold-down seats alongside Ani and Evan, who’s nursing the biggest iced coffee you’ve ever seen. 

“Have you prepared her?” he asks Ani, who’s retrieving a pen and notebook from their bag. 

“I have. From what she’s said, this is a universal experience. She’ll be fine. Right Lydia?” 

He swigs some coffee, ice cubes clattering inside the enormous plastic goblet. “Not every college has a Professor Lacroix, though”, he muses, ominously. 

You are about to ask who Professor Lacroix is when you feel a brush of fabric on your right arm and detect a familiar scent: clean soap, paper, bergamot, slightly spicy cologne, and with the addition, now, of coffee.

“Okay if I sit here?” Ben is gesturing to the empty seat beside you, at the end of the row. He’s a little more formally dressed than usual: black jeans, checked shirt, and a dark red tie. Somehow he’s managing to carry a cup of coffee, his glasses, and a folder all at once, and an old conference tote bag is slung over his shoulder. 

“Of course!” you nod, moving your things over to clear space. He sits down and puts on his glasses before turning to you with a smile.

“Benjamin,” Evan says, nodding and raising his enormous iced coffee in Ben’s direction. Ben reciprocates the gesture, nodding with exaggerated ceremony. Evan’s gaze shifts to focus on Ben’s tie.

“Um. Benjamin. Are those…giraffes?”

You turn to look a little closer. Sure enough, Ben’s tie features a pattern of tiny giraffes, woven into the silk fabric. He looks down and lifts up the tie.

“My brother’s kids got it for me at the San Diego Zoo,” he explains. “I promised them I’d wear it for the first talk I had to give this year.” 

Evan remains sceptical, sipping on his coffee as if the tie has personally offended him. You are about to tell Ben about your eldest niece’s love of giraffes when Professor Jennifer (Jen to most, Jenny to very few) Arden walks up to the end of your row. 

Jen is head of the literature department at Barrow and a formidable figure in the world of gender studies, with a publication record as long as her arm. She is petite and fine-boned, her dark bob neatly slicked down, and she always looks perfect: beautifully tailored palazzo pants, gorgeous silk blouses, and a collection of statement necklaces that you covet greatly. She’s incredibly smart, deeply charismatic and very no nonsense, but has been extremely kind and welcoming thus far, embodying the perfect blend of “do no harm, take no shit” that a role like hers requires. 

She’s also close to Ben, having joined the department around the same time. One day over lunch, Ani had mentioned to you that there’d even been a student rumour about them being secretly married. “Someone in one of my classes once claimed - no, swore blind - to have met them grocery shopping in town with their kids. Their KIDS!!” Ani laughed so hard the tears ran down their face. “Her wife is a goddamn paediatric surgeon for crying out loud, and a gorgeous one at that! I mean, no offence to Ben but if they saw Rachel they’d realise how wrong they were, because she’s incredible.” 

Jen checks in ahead of the staff briefing, making sure you’re okay with being introduced to the entire faculty (do you really have a choice?) and confirming that Ben’s ready for his presentation. 

“It’s going to be great, promise. It’s vital work.” She pats Ben’s shoulder in a gesture of reassurance.

Ben looks up at her, his expression uncertain. “And if there’s a backlash…?”

Jen raises an eyebrow. “Then we deal with it. Don’t let the bastards grind us down.”

When she's returned to the central podium you ask Ben about the presentation, wondering why he’s preparing for a negative reaction. This sort of trepidation was normally only seen when someone was about to announce a faculty restructure or cuts. 

“It’s the next stage in the diversity and inclusivity initiative we’ve been working on,” he explains, opening his folder to retrieve some of the documents. “It’s a team effort - I’m just the person who reports back on the committee’s plans. Unfortunately, some colleagues aren’t quite so keen and -“

He’s interrupted by the loud voice of Professor Andrew Whitney, faculty dean, calling for attention as the meeting gets under way. “I’ll explain later,” Ben whispers, dark eyes serious behind his glasses, “but…well. You’ll see.”

Professor Whitney introduces you about halfway through the meeting. “…who will be with us for the entire academic year, working in Art History. Lydia?” He scans the lecture theatre. “Perhaps you could introduce yourself more fully, tell us about your expertise and plans for the year?”

Panic rises in your chest. Public speaking is literally part of your job, but something about the rows of expectant faces makes you want to sprint up the steps of the hall and run.

A gentle nudge from your right. “I think that’s your cue. You got this, don’t worry.” 

You nod appreciatively at Ben as you get to your feet, introducing yourself and explaining your research interests. “So, uh, yeah. I’m really excited to be here, and thank you all for being so welcoming so far.”

You sit back down as quickly as possible, heat rising in your face. Jen stands up at the podium and leans into the main microphone. “A reminder too that, as is traditional, Lydia has two elective modules open to students on any major/minor combo in the faculty, so please do encourage your students to sign up! Lydia, would you like to tell us what these are?”

You stand up again. “Um, semester one is a course on unpacking the gaze in visual culture, focusing on the female gaze and queering the gaze; semester two is focused on readings in radical theory and applying this to visual culture studies. All welcome! No prior knowledge required!”

Jen grins at you from the podium and lightly applauds. You suddenly become conscious of a theatrically loud tut-tutting coming from the other side of the lecture theatre, where a pale man with sandy-coloured hair and dressed in a navy blazer, chinos, striped shirt and bow tie is staring directly and disapprovingly at you. 

Evan leans over. “That’s Professor Lacroix. I think you’re his worst nightmare. Apart from Ani. And me. And probably Ben, after this.” He gestures towards the podium.

Ben is standing at the rostrum, loading up his PowerPoint presentation. He seems a little nervous, rubbing his hand on the back of his neck and occasionally fiddling with his tie. 

When he glances around the hall and meets your eye, you can’t help but give him a little thumbs up, mouthing “you got this!” in a reciprocal act of reassurance. He half-smiles, and starts the presentation. 

He’s a natural: convincing and engaging, every detail meticulously prepared and evidenced. The project, it transpires, focuses on making Barrow - historically associated with providing a liberal arts education for the “elite” (translation: rich white people) - more inclusive and diverse through a range of admission schemes, scholarships and grants, and ongoing support. 

You can see why Ben is the committee’s spokesperson. His passion for the project is plain to see as he outlines the supports being introduced - monitoring progress for students who’ve entered through the new schemes, offering extra, free support services and guidance to help them throughout their degrees, and so on. 

“A liberal arts education is for everyone,” he says, “A college like Barrow is for everyone. We’ve started to make this a reality, and this year - with your help - we’ll ensure every student gets the support they need.” 

Applause ripples through the theatre - except from the po-faced Professor Lacroix, who exhales, rolls his eyes, and does the most half-hearted attempt at clapping imaginable. 

Ani leans in to you as Ben walks back up to his seat. “Lacroix is Fuckwit Numero Uno. King Fuckwit. The Fuckwit Tzar.”

Sure enough, when you look back over in his direction you notice that Lacroix has his hand up. Andrew Whitney calls on him to ask his question, and you swear you can hear everyone around you doing a sharp intake of breath. 

“Professor Whitney,” Lacroix drawls in a bizarre mid-Atlantic accent, ���I suspect you know what I am about to ask. But I must once again express my concerns about the direction of travel in this faculty.” To your horror, you notice a handful of his colleagues in history nodding appreciatively. 

“Fuuuuuuck offffffffff”, Ani mutters under their breath. You steal a glance at Ben, whose usually open and friendly face has fallen into a scowl, jaw ticking as if he’s biting his tongue for fear of what he might say. 

Lacroix turns in your direction, and gestures to himself. “We haven’t been introduced. I’m K. Wright Lacroix, Professor of American History.”

“The K stands for Kevin,” Ben whispers in your ear. “Or Kunt”, Evan adds, draining his iced coffee and forcing Ani to suppress a giggle. 

Lacroix isn’t that old. Hell, he might be younger than you, but he’s got that countenance of someone who came out of the womb clutching a copy of the National Review. He continues speaking, now addressing the entire hall. 

“Over the last couple of years this college has drifted in a dangerous direction,” he pronounces, as if addressing a rally. “We have had the incursion of critical race theory, gender ideology, and now we have our visiting professor offering radical theory to our students. Meanwhile, traditional subjects and approaches - the bedrock of the liberal arts education! - are forgotten.”

You want the ground to open up and swallow you. This isn’t the first time you’ve had this shit thrown at you. It won’t be the last. But the tacit acquiescence to this guy’s bullshit is mortifying. 

Ben is clutching a pen in his right hand, long fingers gripping it like he’s afraid to let go. 

“And of course, we have just heard the latest from Professor Morales and his comrades - pardon me, committee - in their efforts to kill off the grand Barrow tradition of high standards and academic excellence. And I ask once again - where will it end? Who will we ‘cancel’ this year?”

There’s something about the way he pronounces Ben’s surname - technically correct, if one was speaking Spanish, but with an extremely exaggerated accent intended to reiterate its “foreignness” - that makes you feel sick. Coupled with his use of “comrades”, the implication is clear. You’re appalled and surprised. This sort of thing would result in immediate action if it happened in your institution. Wouldn’t it?

The seats in the lecture theatre are close together, and as a result you can actually feel Ben’s entire body tense up. Ani is throwing their hands up in exasperation. 

“Can we move on? This isn’t adding anything to the meeting, for crying out loud!”

Professor Whitney waves his hand in a call for calm. Jen Arden is rolling her eyes and shooting daggers at K. Wright Lacroix. 

“Thank you, Professor Lacroix. As ever, your comments will be noted.” Professor Whitney looks at his watch. “I think that’s us done. A reminder: the annual away day is on Saturday, at the Barrow beach house! A wonderful opportunity for some team building and lobster rolls, as always!”

In your experience, an “away day” literally meant going to another room on campus to eat terrible buffet food while doing team exercises and focus groups. There was no “away” involved. It comes as a surprise, then, when the reaction to Professor Whitney’s announcement from the room is decidedly muted. 

“Why does no one seem to like a beach away day?” you ask Ani as you pack up your things. 

“Because they expect us to attend at weekends, because the actual beach time involves stupid shit like scavenger hunts or building a raft, because Andrew fucking Whitney thinks that’s how you build collegiality and interdisciplinary working,” they hiss. “Plus, it’s cheap - the college owns the property so they don’t have to pay venue hire.”

You turn to ask Ben if it’s really as bad as all that, but he’s already gone.

You swing by the college canteen, in search of some sustenance to bring back to the desk. Evan is still fuming from the briefing. 

“Fucking historians I swear to fuck!” he hisses, assessing the selection of sandwiches on offer. 

“I mean, they’re not all like that guy,” you offer, trying to defuse the tension. You’re still smarting, too - not so much from the stuff Lacroix had directed at you, as the casual racism and classism in his comments about the diversity initiatives. About Ben. 

Evan exhales and reaches for a hummus and roasted vegetable wrap. “I know. Some of my best friends are historians, as they say. It’s just Lacroix. He gives them a bad name. And he’s always had it in for anyone who isn’t a cishet WASPy fucker.”

“Why doesn’t anyone do anything? I mean, he’s clearly guilty of implicit discrimination, at a minimum.”

Evan rolls his eyes. “First, he’s a bit of a nepo baby. Family of academics. Well connected, especially to the head of the college. Well off. So the college leadership doesn't really bother pursuing it when the issues are raised.” 

He fills a paper cup of filter coffee for himself. “Secondly, the Barrow way is that colleagues - as in, permanent employees of the college - aren’t allowed to directly confront colleagues unless it’s specific to a class. There’s a process involving filling out forms. Supposed to stop confrontation and tensions, apparently.”

“What the fuck??”

“I know. It’s toxic.”

You fill a coffee cup for yourself, add creamer, then pour another. Black, this time. You pick up two donuts: one glazed, one powdered sugar. You walk with Evan as far as his office and then continue along the corridor. 

You can see him through the glass panel in his office door, sitting at his desk. He appears to be reading something on his computer screen while absentmindedly playing with a little bobblehead figurine on his desk, lightly tapping its head so it wobbles back and forth. 

You knock gently, holding up the coffee expectantly when Ben looks up. He nods, beckoning you in. 

“This is very kind. Thank you.” He looks deflated. He takes off his glasses, pinches the bridge of his nose, and exhales. 

“I’ll leave you be. I just thought you might appreciate the coffee -”

Ben shakes his head, gesturing for you to sit down. “No, no. Just a bit of a headache. I probably need caffeine. Stay. Please stay?” 

You sit down in the chair facing his desk, opening the bag of donuts. “Glazed or powdered sugar?” 

His eyes widen and his mouth forms a little “o” shape. “Ooh. I think I’ll go with powdered sugar.” He smiles as you hand him the donut on a serviette. 

Ben’s office is, well, very him, inasmuch as you know what “him” is after a couple of weeks : a substantial desk with an anglepoise lamp stands in front of the tall windows, covered in piles of papers and books; a mid-century armchair sits in one corner with a low table beside it and a floor lamp behind, also stacked with books; and there’s a whole wall of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, all heaving with texts of various shapes and sizes (and in several languages, you’d noticed). Family photos and framed prints are dotted here and there, and you’ve been meaning to ask him about some of the trinkets that you can see on some of the shelves.

“I was really impressed by what you said today about the diversity and inclusion initiative, you know,” you say, sipping your coffee. “It’s such important work, and the plans are great. Like Jen said, it’s vital.”

He shrugs and chews thoughtfully on his donut, powdered sugar lightly dusting his moustache. “You saw what I meant about some colleagues not being keen.”

You raise an eyebrow. “I know I've only been here a few weeks, and it may not be my place to say it, but… that guy’s just one asshole. One asshole on the wrong side of history, ironically for a historian. And he shouldn’t be allowed to treat colleagues like that. Especially not the way he…well, how he referred to you.”

Ben sighs, resigned. “It’s not the first time, probably won’t be the last. It’s not that simple here, unfortunately. There’s a rule -”

“Evan mentioned it to me. And - again, might be speaking out of turn - in this case it’s fucking stupid. Anyway, more importantly - the scheme sounds fantastic, and I’d be glad to talk over some of the equivalent stuff we do at my place sometime. Maybe share some best practice and swap ideas?” 

Ben tilts his head and smiles. “I’d like that.”

You scrunch up the paper bag. “Before I go, I’ve got two questions.”

He raises his eyebrows. “Go on.”

“One. Is the beach away day really that bad, and what’s the dress code? Because I’m not sure I want to do bathing suit chic in front of the entire faculty.”

He huffs a laugh. “It’s not that bad. Just be prepared to help academics who’ve never as much as changed a lightbulb complete a scavenger hunt or assemble a raft from a selection of junk. And shorts are about as far as anyone goes. Thankfully.” 

You feign wiping sweat from your brow. “Phew. Okay, question two. Can I see who that bobble head is?”

He turns the figurine around. “It’s our old pal Indy. I know you’ve probably never seen a professor with a bobble head in their office before. Please don’t judge me.”

“Judge you?!” Your grin is wide and genuine. “Just wait until you see my historical figures Playmobil collection. I love this! He’s got a PhD and everything. Didn’t you say he’d given you a misleading expectation of what it would be like to be an academic, though?”

He smiles at the figure, sending Indy’s head bobbing in its Panama hat. “I did. Not so much the fighting Nazis thing. More so that he never had to do any admin. And that he could climb out of his office to escape students.”

“That said… some might argue that you’re fighting oppressive and would-be dictatorial individuals, just at work rather than in the field? Wait - I didn’t say that. You never heard anything.” You mime locking your mouth and throwing away the key. 

Ben gasps before collapsing in a fit of laughter. “Holy shit, Lydia, you’re the only one who could get away with that.” He rests his hands on the desk and tries to recover his composure. “Fuck. I really needed a laugh.”

You nod your head as you open the door to leave. “At your service.”

“Has everyone found their teams and their colour-coded sticker?”

Andrew Whitney is trying to corral an entire faculty’s worth of humanities academics into five teams for his grand team-building exercise - as Ani predicted, this year it involves building a raft. To promote interdisciplinary communication (per Professor Whitney’s introductory talk, delivered that morning), the teams are mixed, with people from various departments working together. To your relief, K. Wright Lacroix is on a different team, one primarily made up of other historians. Ben is on a team with Evan, and you and Ani are working together with a mixed group of musicologists and literature colleagues. 

Though most of your colleagues remain cynical - Evan, for example, is wearing huge sunglasses, an enormous black hoodie emblazoned with the word NOPE, and a brightly-patterned pair of board shorts - you’re enjoying the relatively warm mid-September weather, stiff ocean breeze notwithstanding, and appreciating the novelty of seeing the New England coastline. Not having banked on a professional visit to the beach so soon, you’ve rustled up your most beach-appropriate and practical attire from your limited wardrobe: a pair of dark green cropped linen culottes and a long-sleeved Breton striped top, with a trusty pair of vintage-style leather sandals. 

Ani stamps their Teva-clad feet on the sand and pulls up the hood on their tie-dye oversized sweatshirt, wrapping their arms around themselves to warm up. “You know the drill, right? We just have to make something that’s going to stay afloat for like, a minute.” 

You nod. “And we can use the pile of beach trash in the middle as our source for components, and the aim is to work together to decide on a design and execute it. Is there a prize?”

Ani looks at you with a pitying glare. “Two guesses, girl. I’m motivated by spite. I just wanna beat the shit out of fucking Master and Commander over there.” They flick their head towards Lacroix and the historians, who seem to be assessing wind speed and direction by holding up fingers and tossing paper handkerchiefs into the air.

The building process is less an example of teamwork and more a sociological case study in group project dynamics, where one or two people take the lead and do most of the work while the rest kick back. Ani’s desperation to triumph over Kevin Lacroix and his crew has them going hell for leather in designing a simple but lightweight structure, dispatching you to gather plastic bottles and twine for the other team members to bind together. 

You wander over to see how Evan and Ben are getting on. Evan is literally motionless, sitting in a lotus position on the sand with his hood up and shades on. Ben, clad in a pair of dark red shorts, a navy zip-up hoodie, and a grey, well-worn Wilco Yankee Hotel Foxtrot T-shirt, is constructing a mast and sail of some sort from a long twig and an empty plastic bag. The ocean breeze has left his hair a tousled mess and he appears to be squinting against the glare despite wearing his sunglasses, but he looks like he’s in his element. 

He notices you and waves, and you move a little closer. Your culottes flap against your legs in the wind, and you have to rest a hand on your brow to shield the sun enough to see him properly.

“I think you’re enjoying this, Professor Morales.”

Ben stands up, leaning forward to brush the sand from his knees and thighs. The gesture draws your attention, unconsciously, to the strong, lean muscles of his legs. 

Your brain immediately remembers, unbidden, that he cycles to work. 

He shrugs but his smile says it all. “Transferable skills!” he admits. “Building Lego taught me everything I know.”

A roar from Ani jolts you. “Lydia get your ass over here we have like ten minutes I swear to fuck!”

“They want to beat Lacroix,” you explain. Ben lowers his sunglasses and looks at you conspiratorially. 

“Who doesn’t?”

And then he winks at you.

Ani is a pretty good raft-builder when they’re out for blood. Your team's haphazard construction bobs around in the surf while its captain whoops and cheers it on from the shore. The musicologists have long absconded to the beach house, hoping to steal an early march on the lobster rolls, so it’s just you, Ani, and a couple of the literature people left to witness the triumph of the SS Fork This Shirt.

“I thought you hated this stuff?” you ask Ani while they jump up and down in the sand. 

“I love it when I’m winning and Fuckwit Tzar over there is not.” They gesture to where Lacroix is hastily trying to fix the mast on the overly elaborate ship his team had constructed out of an old plastic barrel. “Hey, historians!" Ani roars. "Oceans are battlefieeeeeeelds!” 

Lacroix’s raft is the only one not to successfully set sail, which makes Ani even happier. Evan embraces them in a hug as you all stroll up to the beach house for the long-awaited lobster rolls.

The beach house, which was left to the college by a former professor, is an early twentieth-century building with shiplap cladding painted a pale blue with white accents, accessed from the beach via a white wooden staircase. Two white Adirondack chairs sit in a small garden facing the ocean, perfectly placed to admire the view.

You fall into step with Jen Arden and Ben as you join the rest of your colleagues inside. You’re all ready to dive in for a lobster roll when Andrew Whitney puts himself between you and the food. Never a wise move, but this is technically the boss, after all. 

“So tell me, Lydia, are you settling in okay? What made you want to come to us for the year?” 

You have your responses down pat. Professor Whitney seems impressed enough, moving on to ask about your plans for your elective classes. 

You’re in the middle of explaining the concept of “queering the gaze” when a familiar but unwelcome face appears alongside the faculty dean. K. Wright Lacroix sips his white wine as he tries to insert himself into the conversation, and you feel deeply uncomfortable. 

The next time there’s a natural lull, he pounces.

“I’m not here to critique your ideology this time, my dear. I am here to offer some friendly, constructive advice. Your accent, it's…difficult to follow. Impenetrable, at times. You speak very quickly, you know, and not all of us are used to having colleagues or tutors with an accent.” 

You silently try to draw on some of the grounding techniques you’d learned for anxiety, willing yourself to stay calm. 

“Technically, everyone’s got an accent,” you say quietly. 

He understood that, alright. “Be that as it may - think about your new surroundings.” He speaks to you as if you are from another planet. “Speak more slooooowly. Enunciate. Yes?”

Your eyes are starting to prickle with tears but fury is rising in your chest. Fuckwit Numero Uno, indeed. 

“There’s nothing wrong with how Lydia speaks, Kevin.” Ben, behind you, has overheard the last part of the conversation. “No one else has trouble understanding. Do you, Andrew?”

Professor Whitney is flustered, eyes darting between the three of you. “I…do not.”

Kevin Lacroix looks like he’s sucking a lemon. “Another bit of friendly advice, Lydia.” He flicks a glance at Ben before returning to stare at you. “Choose your friends here carefully. Though, admittedly, it looks like Morales here has already won you over.”

That fucking exaggerated pronunciation, again. 

The red mist descends. 

“Oh, okay. Enough. There you go again. I know your colleagues can’t say this - but I can. I’m not a permanent colleague, am I?” You’re trying not to raise your voice, but it’s taking every ounce of self-control you have not to let this creep have it. 

Lacroix looks startled, clearly unused to someone letting rip. 

“I don’t know exactly what your problem is, but I can take a pretty good guess. And if this is the stuff you throw out in public about someone like Ben - I mean, about Professor Morales - then I can only imagine what you say in private about your colleagues. And it’s disgraceful. No wonder you can’t abide the work being done to make this a more diverse and inclusive institution.”

You do not notice that the hum of conversation in the rest of the room has died down, as your colleagues turn their ears and eyes towards you.

“I genuinely don’t care if you think I speak quickly or not, but I do care that I’m about to spend a year in a working environment where someone can undermine their colleagues on the basis of their ethnicity or identity or gender or their first language or even just what they teach. That is not the image this college should want going out into the world.” You glance over at Andrew Whitney, who shifts uncomfortably.

“I don’t need your advice on how I speak, Professor Lacroix, and I certainly don’t need your advice on choosing friends. I think I’ve done pretty well so far on that front, you know?” 

It’s only when you turn to meet Ben’s gaze that you realise everyone has been watching and listening to you tearing strips off K. Wright Lacroix. There’s a note of concern in Ben’s eyes, and when you look for Ani you see them mouth the words “Fuck, Lyd”.

You fucked up. This isn’t how they do things. Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Fuck.

“Um, Professor Whitney? I will follow the official complaints procedure, just to keep everything above board, and…yeah. Excuse me.”

You walk as quickly as you can out of the house, settling on one of the wooden chairs out front as you try to quell the panic starting to grip your whole body.

Deep breaths, and the sound of the sea. Eyes closed, you concentrate on your breathing and on the waves lapping at the shore.

“Hey.”

Ben is standing beside you, a plate with a lobster roll in one hand and a glass of what looks like lemonade in the other. “I don’t think you managed to get a lobster roll in there, did you?”

You shake your head, and he hands you the food and drink, tilting his head as if he’s trying to read your mood. 

“I wouldn’t mind some company, if you’d like?” You gesture to the other chair, placed just to the right of yours. He does that little half-smile of his and sits down, looking out to sea as you tuck into your food.

“Oh, fuuuuuuuck me!” 

Ben turns, startled. You swallow the bite of your lobster roll.

“M’sorry. It’s just so good. I didn’t realise how hungry I was. Or hangry, maybe.”

“You didn’t have to say that, you know? Inside.” He looks back out towards the Atlantic, brow slightly furrowed.

“I’m really sorry, Ben. I just…me and my big mouth. I am so sorry if I’ve caused trouble for you, and - fuck. Not even been here a month and I’m a troublemaker. Typical.” 

“You’re not a troublemaker, Lydia. I meant that you didn’t have to feel it was on you to take Lacroix to task like that.” He turns slightly towards you and a smile creeps over his face. “But I’m kind of glad you did. Dropping that ‘international reputation’ thing with Andrew Whitney there? Fuck, Lyd. It was…pretty badass.”

“I just hate that fucking gatekeeping shit from people like…him. It’s hard enough making it in this job without connections and family prestige or whatever he’s got.” You shrug. “And anyway, you stuck up for me and my accent, too.”

He hums thoughtfully as he watches the surf breaking on the sand. “It’s what friends do, isn’t it?” 

You study his profile for a moment. The art historian in you is somewhat tickled by its near-classical proportions, noting the strong curve of his aquiline nose. You’d never noticed the little heart-shaped patch of bare skin in his beard before, either.

“It’s really beautiful here, isn’t it?” you say quietly, turning your gaze back to the water. “Maybe they’ll let me just move out here for the duration of the visiting role, keep me in lobster rolls all year.”

He chuckles. “It is beautiful. It’s nice to have the ocean relatively close. And hey, if you do stay here and need help eating the lobster rolls, well…”

A crunch on the gravel of the front yard interrupts the conversation. Ani has come to find the two of you. 

“They’re loading us back on the buses to campus now, dudes. You okay, Lyd?” 

You pop the last of the lobster roll into your mouth and give them a thumbs up. 

“More than okay. Apparently, I’m a badass now.”

This time, you wink at him.

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more)

Further A/N: Kevin Lacroix's comments to Lydia about how she speaks and her 'having an accent' are, believe it or not, based on actual stuff that was said to me by a colleague at a conference in the US.

Reminder: everyone has an accent.

Thanks, as ever, to the Visiting headcanons and sounding board: @cutesyscreenname, @julesonrecord, @lunapascal, @imaswellkid

[tessa-quayle]

The smut is hot.  Evan and David and the suspicion: hilarious.  The text messages are perfect.  This chapter is a fucking journey.  ❤️🔥

Visiting - Chapter Four: Save Me

(Moodboard by the wonderful @cutesyscreenname)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: It's the morning after the night before, as the guests at Evan's Halloween party try to process his (alarmingly strong) cocktails - and Lydia tries to understand what her brain and body are trying to tell her about her feelings towards Ben.

Word Count: 3k

Rating: Explicit (18+) - from the start.

Content (chapter specific): SMUT (oral sex, f receiving; fingering); Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (she is 41, about to turn 42, and Ben 47 when the story begins); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; strong language; alcohol consumption; weight and body insecurity; reference to relationship breakdown.

A/N: This chapter is shorter than usual - originally chapters 3 and 4 were going to be a single chapter but it makes more sense to separate them. Further A/Ns at the end, to avoid spoilers.

I'm not kidding when I say this is straight into smut.

The title of the chapter is inspired by Aimee Mann's song Save Me, which I've thought of as a very Lydia-coded song for a while:

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia's story and background.

Thanks, as ever, to @lunapascal and @julesonrecord for being so supportive and screaming along about these Beloved Dorky Idiots.

Taglist: @lunapascal, @julesonrecord, @cutesyscreenname, @tessa-quayle, @vermillionwinter, @iamskyereads, @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247, @love-the-abyss, @imaswellkid, @intheorangebedroom, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin, @littlemisspascal, @khindahra

“I know you have another one in you, baby. For me?”

You don’t know how many times you’ve come. All you know is the wet heat pooling between your legs, the throbbing of your clit, and the tongue licking lightly at your soaking folds.

In the distance, there’s a furious sound, repeated over and over. 

“I can’t…”

He slips a long, thick finger into you, then another, sending your hips thrusting from the bed. “It’s okay, baby, come on now.”

His voice is so reassuring and calm, as if he wasn’t completely taking you apart for the umpteenth time. 

The noise continues, becoming rhythmic and more irritated. Even with this frustrating soundtrack, you can feel yourself becoming more and more aroused. 

“That’s it. That’s it, Lyddie.” 

At the sound of the nickname you steal a glance downwards. His dark eyes twinkle as he winks at you, and you let out a gasping cry as your body jerks upright and your eyes snap wide open. 

Daylight.

Your head is pounding and the sunlight hurts your eyes as you turn, squinting, to look at the time on your sunrise alarm clock. 

There’s a needy ache between your legs. You peek down the bed, part of you half-expecting to see him there. It had all been so fucking vivid, so real. You gently put your hand between your legs, immediately feeling a soaking wetness. 

As your brain starts to wake up properly, you pause and fall back onto the pillows, staring at the ceiling and wondering what the hell was going on in your unconscious mind. 

The noise that had provided the rhythmic soundtrack to your somnolent sexual scenario has resumed. You realise with a jolt that it’s the buzzer from your intercom, and leap out of bed.

Ani’s scowling face peers at you through the camera. Their grey morning suit has been replaced by a pair of gym leggings and their enormous tie-dye hoodie, and they’re holding two huge paper bags from McDonald’s. 

They’re still wearing the tiny Dracula tinted spectacles.

“I’m so sorry! I’m letting you in now, door’s open!”

You’ve hauled on a pair of lounge pants and a soft, ancient sweatshirt by the time Ani has made their way up the stairs and into your apartment. Your rumination over the meaning of your dream would have to wait, and you push the impossibly strong visual image of those brown eyes looking up at you from between your thighs out of your mind.

“I was asleep. You want some coffee or something? What’s in the bags?” 

Ani nods towards your tiny kitchen, and you lead the way. “I don’t normally do this, Lyd, but when I feel this bad the only solution is to eat too much McDonald’s breakfast and then regret it.” They plop the two big bags of food onto your counter. “I couldn’t remember if you were a veggie or not so I ordered two of every McMuffin variation.”

You hug them gratefully. “You’re a star, Ani. My body is screaming for this.”

That’s not the only thing your body was screaming for this morning. 

No. Nope. Push it away.

You put on a pot of coffee (there are two coffees with the breakfast order, but you suspect you’ll need much more) and grab some plates and paper towels. Ani unpacks the food, plucking a hash brown out of the bag and eating it as they do so.

“How did you get this, by the way? Surely you aren’t in a fit state to drive?”

Ani shakes their head and swallows a bite of fried potato. “McDelivery. Walked over, ordered it on the way, got it for here. Come on, girl, I need to sit on your sofa and let the carbs heal me.”

You carry the food the short distance to the living area and settle in, handing Ani a spare blanket as you wrap your crocheted granny throw around you. Then you remember last night.

“Where’s Cass?!”

Ani licks a glob of tomato ketchup from their finger. “Had to head back early to the city. We got to hold each other’s hair while throwing up this morning though, it was pretty special.”

You glance down at the egg and cheese McMuffin you’ve unwrapped, deciding to pause before they resume their story.

“She’s really sweet, though. And funny. And so, so fucking hot. That mouth! Jesus Christ. Sorry if that was TMI.”

You shift slightly, feeling yourself heating up, and smile over at your friend. “So you’ll see each other again?”

Ani shrugs, looking a little awkward. “Yeah, I mean…it’s a distance. But - yeah. I’d like to.” They nod to themselves. “Even if it’s just a hooking up thing. For now. We’ll see.”

For a moment you consider telling Ani about your dream. You decide to wait.

They sip from their paper cup of coffee. “You hear anything from Ben?”

Your voice is a little too high, too casual, but in their hungover state Ani doesn’t seem to notice.

“No, don’t think so? Should I have done?”

Ani reaches for another hash brown. “Nah, that’s not what I mean, it’s just cos he’s probably feeling it too this morning, and you were together pretty much all night and all… so I thought maybe he’d messaged you to check in.”

“I haven’t actually looked at my phone yet.” You get off the couch and go to retrieve it from your room.

“No shit, Sherlock. Ignore the ten missed calls from me.”

“Hey, Lydia?”

Ben stands by the back door of Evan’s car, hands in his coat pockets, head tilted as he looks at you. The streetlight above is reflected in his glasses.

“Yes, Detective?”

He smiles and walks up to you. “Let me walk you to the door of the building, okay?” You start walking in step.

“You don’t have to do this, you know. It’s right there.” 

“Yeah, I know, but…what if the Zodiac’s around?” He raises his eyebrows over the frame of his glasses and you giggle quietly, still feeling the effects of the Spooky Margs somewhat as you reach the front door of the apartment block and key in your code.

He waits until you’re safely inside and about to close the door. 

“Thanks for making sure I got home safe, Detective. Message me to say you got home, okay? And thank you for saving me earlier.”

“Saving you?”

“From the fall? You got me just in time.” He casts his eyes to the ground for a moment before looking up and smiling. 

“Any time. Say the word, and I’ve got you. G’night, Lyddie.”

BEN: sdlkhgiudflahlw!jkdh (1.30am)

BEN: what (1.50am)

BEN: so zzzzzzzzz right now sdfdkg 😴 (2.00am)

BEN: I’m so sorry, Lydia! Was trying to message you to say I got in okay and I was so tired and sleepy*. I’m so sorry, this is so embarrassing. *tired and drunk on Spooky Margs (8:45am)

BEN: Hope you aren’t feeling too bad this morning (8:55am)

BEN: Me right now (9:00am)

He’s sent you a gif of Cameron Frye in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, tucked up in bed and saying “I’m dying”.

You giggle as you walk back into the living room, holding your phone. It’s a relief that you are able to communicate as normal with the real man, as opposed to whatever fictional avatar your sleeping brain cooked up.

LYDIA: I’m on my way over to borrow your dad’s fancy car!! (I’m not. I’m in no fit state. May never process those Spooky Margs. Welp.)

LYDIA: Dracula just showed up and I don’t know how they haven’t crumbled to dust in direct sunlight. 

BEN: *consults Bram Stoker* No, he’s got nothing on that scenario.

LYDIA: They’ve come equipped with McMuffins. Stoker didn’t count on that. Anyway, drink all the water! Have some coffee! But mostly water. 😊

“He’s alive, I’m guessing.” Ani has put back on the tiny dark glasses and is curled up in a corner of the couch.

You hold out your phone with the gif. “Sent me this at 9am. Poor Ben.”

Ani rolls their eyes. “Poor Ben?? He’s not the only one.” They reach for their coffee. “Though I think he must have crossed the line from ‘merry and tired’ into ‘praying for the sweet release of death’ after we dropped you off last night. He was fine when you were there and then he was all quiet and leaning against the window and shit. I think Evan was afraid he was gonna hurl in the back seat of his car.”

“I know you have another one in you, baby. For me?”

The heat surges in you, hangover or no hangover. You push the memory of your dream away again. You’re no Freudian, but you read enough “what does my dream mean” magazine articles as a teenager to know that dreams are often symbolic, not literal. 

A sex dream does not mean you want to have sex with someone, for example. 

You rationalise it quickly in your brain. It's been a while since you've had the kind of comfortable, safe physical closeness you had with Ben last night. He was obviously on your mind. Makes sense that he might turn up in a random situation in your unconscious.

And it wasn't like you hadn't had the odd, harmless, platonic crush on friends in the past. Right? All good.

Ani looks at their phone and looks over at you. “Evan says hi. Wants to know if you’re okay. Said you were chatting shit about moustaches or something to Poor Hungover Benjamin last night.” They cackle to themselves.

“The fuck? I don’t remember doing that. What does he mean?” 

Ani looks up and proceeds to deftly tap out a reply to Evan. The response is immediate. “I have no idea what he’s on about.”

You glare, head thumping. “Just fucking tell me.”

“He says: ‘Just tell her In The Cut, the female gaze, moustaches.’” “What?” And the memories start to clear through the haze. “That’s not…oh FUCK.”

After the lipsync, Ani and Cass had disappeared. You had gratefully moved from the arm of the couch to stretch out at one end. Ben had turned his body to face you from the other end, resting his legs on the sofa. 

“Holy shit, are those Halloween socks?” 

Having discarded his black lace-ups, the full extent of the pattern became clear: little white ghosts dotted across a black background, interspersed with grinning pumpkins and skeletons.

Ben blushed a little, but wriggled his toes contentedly. “They’re thematic! I like it. I like a good thematic sock.” 

You raised an eyebrow, leaning back into the sofa, still buzzed from the cocktails. “I am pretty sure those aren’t canonical for the costume, cute and all as they are.”

He pulled an “I am so affronted” face, feigning total indignation. “You don’t know. Maybe you just haven’t watched Zodiac closely enough, Lyddie.”

You rolled your eyes good-naturedly. “Well, I’ll just have to watch it again, won’t I? ‘M gonna check the director’s cut and everything.”

He couldn’t sustain the playacting and chuckled, deep and warm. “Should actually watch that movie again. ‘S so fucking good.”

You nodded along, eyes closed and humming in agreement. “Mmmhmm. Though, let’s be real,” you said, shifting yourself forward slightly, “the best cop Ruffalo? In The Cut.” You sat back against the sofa again. “So, so hot.”

Ben exhaled in agreement. “So hot. Whew.”

It was at this point that, in hindsight, your mouth was in gear before your brain was properly engaged.

“‘S like, perfect example of the erotic female gaze, right? But also about the vulnerability of the women?”

You always did struggle to stop talking when you were off on one about cinema. Or books. Or art. Or specific episodes of 30 Rock. Or anything you were passionate about.

Throw in a couple of Spooky Margs, and your mouth was going to run and run.

You raised an eyebrow and looked dreamily into the middle distance.

“And then there’s the ’tache.” You sighed. “Swear to god, that movie gave me a ‘dodgy cop with moustache’ thing. Whewww, he could get it. So hot. And kind of a form of feminist praxis.”

“Hot praxis,” Ben echoed.

Other than that, his only response was to distractedly start running a finger over the hair on his upper lip, a pensive look on his face, as if he was pondering a very deep question. 

You hadn’t realised Evan and David were watching and listening attentively from an armchair, a couple of feet away.

You sit with your head in your hands as Ani pats you on the back with one hand, another McMuffin in their other.

“I honestly don’t know why you’re so stressed about this. It’s not like you said ‘y’know what Benjamin, I love your moustache and you could get it’. You were specifically referring to a movie and an actor. You weren’t even saying ‘I like all fictional moustachioed cops.’”

You moan into your hand as the cringe and hungover paranoia threaten to break you.

“It’s just so mortifying. First I nearly fall on the goddamn floor, then I start talking shit at him about cops with moustaches and hot feminist praxis and - why am I fucking like this?”

Ani chews thoughtfully. “Why are any of us like this?” They sip their (second) cup of coffee. “He’s not wrong, though, it would be hot praxis.”

It would probably feel less embarrassing if you hadn’t woken up thinking about…that. The sensation. The feeling of his (imaginary) mouth on you. The look in his (imaginary) eyes. The smile.

You pick up your phone and grimace. “Should I message him and explain?”

Ani looks horrified. “And explain what, exactly? I’m sorry I told you I thought Mark Ruffalo was hot with a moustache in In The Cut, and I’m worried you think I’m weird because you also have a moustache and I wasn’t being weird? Jesus, Lyd, be real.” They pause, and ask quietly: “You weren’t, like, actually trying to…suggest…?”

Their meaning hits you and your jaw drops. “No, I obviously wasn’t suggesting anything!”

‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks’, pipes up your inner Queen Gertrude.

Ani helps you clean up and then heads back home for a long bath. Cass has been sending them messages all morning, and Ani’s little smile each time they get one makes you very happy indeed.

Not too far from your place, Evan and David are doing a final tidy up while their last few guests get ready to go for brunch.

“Is it wrong that I feel smug about not being hungover?” Evan asks, putting away the bottles of tequila and crème de menthe.

David chuckles, stacking plates in the dishwasher. “I hope the others aren’t too sick, though.” He closes the door of the appliance and sets the cycle going. “I meant to say, I didn’t know Barrow was so strict about discretion and staff relationships.”

Evan turns to look at him, expression confused, running a hand through his bright blue locks. “Discretion? Are you talking about us, or…?”

“No, I mean - I only realised after the fact that they didn’t go home together, and I wondered if that was some weird rule.” He closes his eyes and tries to recall names. “The scientist and the detective… Lydia and Ben?”

Evan pauses and then doubles over, laughing. “Oh, babe, no. They’re not together.” He continues wiping down the countertop. “They’re just close, he was the first person she met here, they’re total nerds together, they can get the nerding out without disrupting the rest of us, it’s just a whole vibe.” He motions with his hand, as if brushing the notion away.

David continues to look at him, arching an eyebrow. “Maybe. I guess everyone’s got friendships like that, huh. It was just…” He inhales. “There was just something. But then maybe I’m overthinking it.”

Evan nods, patting David’s arm. “I think you might be. Just because we're coupled up doesn’t mean everyone else is - or wants to be.”

David smiles and reaches for Evan’s hand, twining their fingers together. “Oh, so it’s ‘coupled up now’? Not just a ‘thing’?”

Evan plants a soft kiss on David’s mouth, and grins, before returning to the clean-up operation. David looks pensive.

“I don’t want to be crude about your colleagues, but - are you absolutely sure they aren’t even fucking?”

“Ex-cuse me?” Evan wheels around, horrified. “Yes, I am sure. Babe, if that was happening I would fucking know.”

Your Sunday plans primarily involve putting on some laundry, and then napping in front of a comfort movie, accompanied by a huge bottle of water and strong, hot, sweet tea served in your biggest mug. And some cookies, of course.

“I’m allowed, I’m hungover,” you say out loud, to no one in particular.

By late afternoon, the laundry is done and haphazardly folded - anything neater was too taxing for your hungover brain to process. Wrapped up in your crochet blanket, you are starting to doze off in front of The Muppets when you notice your phone light up.

BEN: Was ‘Hurdy-Gurdy Man’ always this sinister or is it just because of this movie?

He’s included a photograph of what you presume is his TV, and you recognise one of the early scenes in Zodiac.

LYDIA: I’m gonna go with both? But I definitely didn’t associate it with serial killing before the film. Thanks Fincher!

Later, another picture: this time, Mark Ruffalo as Dave Tosche, complete with shoulder holsters.

BEN: Who the hell is this guy??

LYDIA: A really bad impersonator.

BEN: His hair is a lot better than mine though.

You pause as you consider your reply.

LYDIA: Hmmm

BEN: Hmmm?

LYDIA: It’s…of its time. A little heavy for my liking. Don’t sell yourself short.

BEN:

LYDIA: Whoa. Uncanny.

The little dots indicating that Ben is composing a message flash intermittently. Eventually, you think he’s decided not to reply, and snuggle back into your blanket.

The screen lights again.

BEN: Maybe you're right about not selling myself too short.

BEN: I mean, he doesn’t even have a moustache. 😉

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more; other dividers by @cafekitsune)

Further A/N: I don't think there's a need for as many explanations or annotations on this chapter, but for reasons, I should probably provide some evidence of what Lydia's thinking of when she refers to the morally-dodgy, moustachioed cop (Det. Giovanni Malloy) played by Mark Ruffalo in Jane Campion's In The Cut (2003).

(What do you mean, I think you have a type?)

[tessa-quayle]

if you’ve seen Before Sunrise, there’s this exquisite scene early in the film where Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy are in a listening booth, headphones on, smiling and blushing and sneaking furtive glances at one another as the music plays.  it’s a master class in yearning and sweet sweet tension - this chapter takes all of that energy and takes it to the next level and relieves that fucking tension.

The tying-the-tie scene and what follows are 3-alarm erotic.  Ben and Lydia are fully clothed and it’s hotter than the filthiest smut you’d just read on your dash.

And when they finally do the deed?  I wept and smiled at how perfectly the scene played out: Ben as the consent KING, the self-effacing humor, the awkwardness, Lydia’s self doubt and insecurities (I want to give her a hug and tell her she is ALL of us), the sexual hunger and that giddiness - all beautifully portrayed and a fucking journey.

I'll confess, I’m a bitchy snob, I’m at a place in my life where I don’t have a lot of time to indulge in something just for myself, and when I do, I'm glad there’s a fic like this on this goddamn app to let me escape and grin like an idiot.  ❤️

the real MVP of this chapter: that tie.  😎

Visiting - Chapter 7: Forget Who We Are

(Moodboard by the wonderful @cutesyscreenname)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: As the semester winds to a close, and Lydia and Ben prepare to go their separate ways for the holidays, it's time to face facts about what happened at Thanksgiving - and indulge in some holiday cheer.

Word Count: 11.4k (it's worth it)

Rating: Explicit (MDNI; 18+) - for real.

Content (chapter specific): Smut; Professor Ben College AU; smaller-than-usual-for-this-fandom age gap (Lydia turns 42, and Ben is 47); canon is not a thing here; slow burn; idiots-to-lovers; fingering; oral sex (F and M receiving); praise kink; tongue-in-cheek size kink; discussions of sexual health and explicit consent; Ben and Lyd are consent masters; safe but technically unprotected PiV sex (talk about it first, people); creampie; strong language; alcohol consumption; weight and body insecurity; references to the holidays; did I mention the smut?; tiny bit of angst for good measure; smutty mcsmutterson.

A/N: The title of this chapter is taken from Father John Misty's song "Real Love Baby", which - to quote @julesonrecord - has become one of the songs for this pair of idiots as they come to terms with what they feel about each other. I listened to this a lot while drafting and writing this chapter.

I'd also recommend the classic "Fall at Your Feet" by Crowded House as a song with an appropriate vibe for this chapter. (God, I love this song so much.)

("Who knows where that might lead?" jeez alright Neil Finn hit me in the feels, why don't you?)

I'm so grateful for all the love I've had for this story and for this pair. Every comment and reblog and ask is a little lift to my soul (I mean that!)

And I'm extra pleased to be posting this important chapter this week, given that OG SNL Ben, the character that got into my head and made me think "imagine that man as a college professor of literature", is technically now Emmy-nominated.

They're idiots, the love might be requited, but they still have a long way to go, trust me.

Further A/N after the chapter to avoid spoilers.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia's story and background.

Cross-posting to AO3 (got delayed this week because of The Attack!)

Thanks, as ever, to @lunapascal and @julesonrecord for loving Bendie as much as I do, and for being patient sounding boards as I work out how to tell this vital part of their story.

Taglist: @lunapascal, @julesonrecord, @cutesyscreenname, @tessa-quayle, @vermillionwinter, @iamskyereads, @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247, @love-the-abyss, @imaswellkid, @intheorangebedroom, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin, @littlemisspascal, @khindahra, @pedrostories, @readingiskeepingmegoing, @ruebyretro, @rhoorl

“So you’re in at what time tomorrow?”

“It’s not tomorrow, mom, it’s the day after tomorrow. Actually, it might be the day after the day after tomorrow with the time difference? Let me check, I’ll confirm later.”

You’re discussing the final arrangements for your flight home for the holidays with your mother by phone, while simultaneously checking over your end-of-semester to-do list. 

There’s always a certain giddiness in the air - tempered with panic, as everyone tries to get as much work as possible wrapped up - as the first semester winds to a close for the winter holidays and the student body starts to thin out, and Barrow is no exception. All that’s left on the calendar are two events, happening tomorrow: the Founders’ Luncheon, a formal event considered a vital part of the college’s fundraising activity; and - much more importantly, from a faculty staff perspective - the informal annual staff holiday party, held in the evening. 

You zone out a little as your mother starts telling you how busy she is with the preparations for the holidays. Looking through the glass panel in your door, you see a familiar figure standing further down the hallway, glasses dangling from his mouth as he opens his office door while juggling a stack of books. 

A little smile creeps across your face, but there’s an ache in your chest: yearning tempered with uncertainty. You haven’t actually seen Ben in person since Thanksgiving. He’d been away at a big comparative literature conference in the south, and by the time he’d got back you were leaving for New York, where you were speaking at a week-long conference on eighteenth-century art. 

You’d been in touch, though. While you were both away, you kept up the constant back-and-forth of messages that you’d grown used to over the last couple of months, a steady stream of jokes and gifs and selfies and commentary on everything: from the books you were reading to the shows you were watching, to the most mundane, everyday experiences. 

Well, almost everything. In all of those exchanges, neither of you had ever brought up Thanksgiving, or the accidental, sort-of “kiss” that had haunted your dreams and fantasies over the last couple of weeks.

Ben turns just as he’s about to go into his office. He smiles, raises a hand, and gives you a little wave

“Hey there, stranger.”

He’s there at your door, a mug of coffee in each hand, as usual, and a soft, if nervous, smile on his face. 

“Hey stranger, yourself.” You take your coffee gratefully and sit back in your desk chair. “Why does it feel like I haven’t seen you in forever?”

Ben shrugs and leans against the doorframe. “Conferences, travel - and I guess it feels longer because we’ve seen each other pretty much every workday, right?” He takes a substantial sip from his mug, and looks at you. “I can’t stay, I’ve got a supervision meeting, but, um, how have you been? How was the conference?”

You throw your head back and flail your hands excitedly. “Oh my god, it was amazing! Full disclosure - I might have skipped the occasional session because I was in New fucking York. But it was so worth it. And the paper seemed to go well, so - all good. How was yours?”

He exhales and shakes his head, rolling his eyes for comic effect. “The paper was a rushed job, I was basically in a hotel in Louisiana for four days, my daily treat was a trip to the CVS across the road, as you know - but yeah, the discussions were good, the work was interesting…” He raises an eyebrow and smiles mischievously. “Still - clearly I should have become an art historian purely for the conference locations.”

Neither of you seems willing - or able - to bring up the elephant in the room. Perhaps you just didn’t need to talk about it. You’d both seemed surprised by the “kiss”. You both seemed to understand it as unintentional. Maybe further discussion was unnecessary. 

You reach into your desk drawer to retrieve a pack of luridly-frosted holiday cookies. “Hey, take a couple of these for that meeting. You need the extra sugar and artificial ingredients to get you to the end of the semester.” 

Ben’s face lights up. He walks over to the desk and takes two of the cookies, holding them in his big palm carefully. “Damn right I do.” He looks down at you, and you feel the smile spreading across your face at the sight of those eyes at close quarters. 

You take a deep breath. “Ben, I -”

A knock at your office door, still ajar. To your surprise, it’s David.

“Hi Lyd, hi Ben - I’m not interrupting, am I?”

“Not at all,” Ben reassures him. “I was just leaving.” He turns back to face you before he leaves the office. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Lyddie, at the luncheon?” 

You nod. “And the holiday party. For god’s sake, don’t forget about the party or Susan might kill you.”

He grins, pats David on the shoulder, and wanders down the hall to his office. David closes your office door and sits in the chair in front of your desk.

You extend the pack of cookies towards him. “Help yourself and try not to think about the amount of edible glitter involved. So, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

David gingerly picks up a cookie shaped like a snowman. “I’ve been up with Evan this week, and realised I wouldn’t see you before you go home,” he explains, nibbling a little of his cookie. “I wanted to call by and wish you safe travels and happy holidays.”

Before you can start to return the sentiment he puts up a hand, gently. 

“There is something else. Lydia, can I say something to you? Between us. It will never leave this room.”

You shift in your chair. “Sure, of course - oh shit. Is… is Evan okay?”

David smiles and nods, reassuring you. “He’s fine. It’s not about Evan, actually. It’s about you.” 

You feel your eyebrows shoot upwards. 

“Well, really… it’s about you. And Ben.”

Oh, fuck. Fuck. 

You get a sudden, strong memory of David in the cab on the night of your birthday drinks, looking at you intently as Evan confirmed that Ben was single, contrary to Amy’s rumour mongering. 

What did he know?

“Oh, okay. Okay.”

“I don’t know how else to put this, Lyd, but I think that man - I think Ben has feelings for you. Strong feelings.”

You feel your face heat and your mouth start to dry up. There might even be tears pricking your eyes. You try as best you can to control your breathing.

“David, no. I don’t think so. He’s never done anything to suggest otherwise, and he’s had the chance, so -”

David tilts his head to one side, his eyes kind and serious. 

“Lydia, I’m a theatre scholar. I study bodies and expressions for a living. I know what’s real, and I know what’s performed. And I’ve seen you two together enough, and heard each of you talk about the other enough times, to know that he has real feelings for you.” He looks at you intently. “And… to be fairly certain that you have feelings for Ben, too.”

The pricking sensation has turned to real tears, rolling heavy and slow down your cheeks.

“Please, please don’t tell Evan.”

David crosses to your side of the desk and wraps an arm around you. “It’s okay, sweetheart, it’s okay.” He hugs you as you protest that Ben just wants to be your friend, that he couldn’t possibly want someone like you, and then pulls away, looking at you face on.

“All that might be true. Maybe. But…just see. See what happens if you let the light in, just a little. You might be surprised.”

Before you leave work that evening, you pop into the main faculty office, a small, festively-wrapped parcel in your hands. Susan barely notices you pass, wrapped up in counting glasses and bottles of wine for the party the next day.

You scan the rows of cubbyholes, each one labelled in alphabetical order for a staff member, until you find it: 

B.E. Morales

You place the little parcel on top of a couple of academic publisher catalogues, addressed to Ben. 

A couple of rows above his, you notice something in your own mailbox: a gift box with a Post-It on top. 

Another explanatory Post-It, you think, placing the box in a tote bag.

A very small Christmas gift, if you have room in your suitcase. - B.

You bring it home and place it carefully in your hand luggage.

Your invite to the Founders’ Luncheon had arrived just before Thanksgiving: a small, gold-edged cream-coloured card with the event details printed on it in elegant black lettering. 

“Does everyone attend this?” you’d asked Susan, studying the invite carefully. 

She shook her head. “A select few. We usually nominate the visiting professor to attend, though - so be prepared to smile and gladhand anyone who looks like they might be willing to donate to support the diversity and inclusion project. Or maybe even a new wing for the library, if you’re extra convincing.”

You hummed thoughtfully, wondering what you could dredge up from your wardrobe that would be formal enough for the luncheon and still be appropriately festive for the party later the same day. 

“You’ll have at least one familiar face there, though,” Susan added, stacking a pile of freshly-copied course materials. “Ben’s been asked to deliver the address that kicks off proceedings - trying to get philanthropic support for the diversity stuff he’s been working on. He’s nervous as all hell about it - you can imagine - but I think he’ll be pleased to know he has you there for moral support.”

In the end, you’d plumped for a crimson vintage-style swing dress with three-quarter length sleeves and a cross-over neckline: demure enough to wear to the lunch and look like a Serious Intellectual, but ready to be dressed up with some well-chosen holiday accessories for the party later. 

Though Ani insisted it was nothing fancy, everyone seemed extremely excited for the holiday shindig: a gathering of colleagues in one of the bigger teaching rooms in the building, fuelled by eggnog, wine, and party food. You had already heard in detail about Evan’s carefully-curated playlists. It seemed like the perfect way to blow off a little steam after a busy semester.

The party was due to start about 5pm, but first there was a formal lunch to contend with. All morning, you’d been silently repeating ‘elevator pitches’ about your work, the importance of the progress already made in diversity and inclusion, and the resources the college needed to continue it. Visitor or not, you were ready to do your best with the wealthy donors who might write a fat cheque - and get a tax break in return. 

You’re running over the list of talking points in your head as you meander down the corridor on your way to your office, about an hour before the luncheon is due to begin. 

“Motherfucker!”

The loud swearing stops you in your tracks. His door is ajar. You knock lightly. 

“Come in.” Ben turns, sounding frustrated, but brightens and visibly relaxes when he realises it’s you. 

“Oh, hi Lyd! Sorry, I’m just…” He stops and runs his eyes over you from top to toe. “Wow, you look…great.”

You can feel your face burning, and try to deflect from his words. “So do you. I mean… you’re all fancy.”

He’s dressed more formally than you’ve ever seen before. A white button-down shirt, slim navy dress pants, black lace-up Oxfords. The collar of his shirt is turned up, and he’s holding the source of his irritation: a dark green tie.

Oh, fuck me. He looks so good.

He exhales sadly. “I can do this without a mirror - usually. But it’s like I can’t remember how to do it today, and I think I’m losing it.”

“Might also be because you’re thinking about the speech, no?” 

He sighs and looks a little sheepish. “You know me too well, Lyddie.” 

You feel heat spread at the nape of your neck. Pull yourself together. 

“Can I help at all? With the tie? I could act as your mirror, or help to get it right…”

His eyes light up and he drapes the tie around his neck again. “Oh, please? I need to run through the address one more time and I’m already late. Here: it’s probably quicker if you just do it for me at this stage.”

Oh. Oh, no.

Your instinctive need to help had overridden whether or not you could actually cope with this: physical proximity, first of all, but then having to tie Ben’s tie? With all the intimate domesticity it implied? It could end you there and then. 

You take a deep breath and move a little closer, taking each end of the tie in your hands. 

“I can literally do one knot, so I hope this is what you’re after,” you say, and he laughs lightly. You begin to knot his tie, muscle memory kicking in from your school days, when a tie was part of your convent school uniform. By necessity, you’ve had to edge closer still to him, and you can feel his dark eyes burning into you as he watches your fingers work. 

David’s words from the day before continue to run through your brain on a permanent loop. 

Let the light in, just a little. 

You look at Ben through your lashes, mouth drying and a telltale throb fluttering through your core. 

“Hope I’ve done this right. I’ll just adjust it and then I can take a picture so you can check.” You tighten the knot slightly and work it up towards the hollow of his neck, eyes trailing up to meet his gaze. 

Let the light in. 

You bring your hands up to fold down his collar and, almost without thinking, graze your fingertips off the grey patches that you love so much, just at the corners of his jaw. 

Ben closes his eyes for a moment, and you can see his breathing speeding up slightly. He swallows hard.

“I meant it.”

You fold down the collar and adjust the knot, praying that your heart will stop beating quite so quickly and that the ache between your legs will dissipate. Still, you don’t stop touching him, bringing your right hand to rest lightly on his chest, just over his heart.

“Meant what?”

He opens his eyes and looks at you. “I meant it. On Thanksgiving. I…meant to kiss you.”

Your eyes widen and your features soften in understanding. “Ohhhh.”

He brings one hand up and places it over yours. “I know you didn’t mean it, you went in for a kiss on the cheek and - I’m sorry, I just have to tell you, Lyd. I… I wanted to. And I should have kept kissing you, the way I wanted to.” 

With his free hand, he strokes your cheek with his long fingers, the warm span of his palm carefully cupping your jaw as if you’re the most delicate thing in the world. 

You smile shyly, reciprocating his gesture as you stroke your thumb along the scruff on his jaw. “I was going in for a kiss on the cheek…but I meant it, too. I wish I’d been braver that night.” You giggle. “And yes, you should definitely have kept kissing me.”

For an instant you remember the defences you’ve built up around yourself: around your heart and your soul. They were a protection and a comfort, a suit of armour deflecting even the slightest possibility of future pain and loss. You cannot be hurt or disappointed if you never expect anything. Never let anyone in.

But even the best armour is not completely impenetrable. The first weakness was exposed the day you realised what you actually felt for this man, even if you could barely admit it to yourself. 

Smiling softly, Ben drops his arm to your waist to pull you close to him, continuing to caress your cheek with his free hand. “You…you’re so beautiful. I…”

His tongue darts fleetingly across his lips, as if he’s looking at a delicious morsel, and it’s enough to make you almost feral with sheer desire. 

He angles his head slightly, gently nudging at your nose with his. His soft, pink lips meet yours, slightly open, in a warm, perfect kiss.

With a light moan, your tongue immediately seeks entrance to his mouth. He tastes of peppermint and coffee, of sweetness and bitterness all at once. You reach for his tie, not breaking the kiss, and gently tug him along with you as you walk backwards towards the wall of his office until he’s almost pressing you into it. 

As he kisses you ever more deeply, he wraps his arms around you and pulls you in, tight as he can to his body, slowly moving his hands over your back and hips, and trailing his fingertips across your ass. In return, you run your hands through his hair and stroke your fingers down one side of his neck, eliciting a groan from him, before breaking away to wrap your arms around the broad span of his back. 

You have felt his warm body before, when you’d hugged, but this was something else entirely. No need to worry about whether you’d lingered a little too long in his arms. No need to suppress the desires that had haunted and tormented you. Now it was time to express them.

Ben breaks off the kiss momentarily, pausing to look at you with those intelligent, sensitive, coffee-brown eyes. A wide grin spreads across his handsome face. You feel his cock pressing, half-hard, against you in his dress pants. The sensation sends another wave of wetness to your centre. 

“What are you smiling at, Professor?”

“You. Beautiful, gorgeous you.” 

It’s all you can do to stop the happy tears from falling. Instead, you wrap your arms around the back of his neck and pull him in for a deep kiss, hungrily tasting each other. He breaks away and moves his mouth to your neck, pulling a moan of desire from you that’s probably louder than was wise in a workplace. 

He’s working his way down to your collarbone when your eyes snap open and you freeze. Ben looks at you with concern. 

“Are you okay? Is this too much? We can stop. We can slow down. Whatever you…”

You shake your head frantically. “I wish we didn’t have to stop but, Ben: the fucking luncheon!”

His eyes widen in panic. “Oh, FUCK! FUUUUUCK! What time is it? Fuck fuck fuck -”

You look at your phone and try to calm him down. “You’re fine, you’ve got like twenty minutes before it starts. Hey,” you reach for his hand, “remember the message of Hitchhiker’s Guide? Don’t Panic. And maybe relax a bit, so you’re not… visible. Ahem.”

He raises an eyebrow and laughs. His breathing slows a little, and he squeezes your hand gratefully before planting a final, chaste kiss to your lips. “I’ll see you over there. Might be a bit late for the holiday party, depending on how many people they want me to meet after, but we can, uh, pick up where we left off?”

He looks so sweet and so painfully shy that you almost can’t believe this is the same man who was pushing you into a wall and kissing you like his life depended on it only a few minutes before. 

You lean in for just one more kiss. “Abso-fucking-lutely we can.”

His address to the luncheon is, unsurprisingly, brilliant. Erudite, warm, funny: infused with the passion you saw him bring to his work and to his subject every day. He is so talented: he wears his learning lightly, his natural charm working to hook the audience in and hang on his every word.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that he looks so gorgeous up there at the podium: smart suit, curls neater than usual (you suspect he’d run some wax through his hair after you left him), and that tie.

That fucking tie. You can’t even look at it, because it immediately sends your brain right back to the feeling of tugging it to pull him against you, to the taste of him, to the way his big hands roved over you, gentle but needy, to the way his body revealed just how turned on he’d become by kissing and touching you. 

Fuck. You try to ignore the ache between your legs, choosing to focus instead on the handsome man at the podium. 

You listen attentively to Ben making a powerful case to the large hall full of wealthy donors for the importance of making arts and humanities education accessible. The room fills with applause as he brings his address to a close, and you clap as loud as you can, looking at him with a broad smile on your face. As he walks across the stage, he turns and spots you. 

“Was it okay?” He mouths the words towards you. 

You nod enthusiastically, and give a subtle thumbs up. He does a tiny air punch, and grins at you as he disappears off stage. 

“I’ve switched up the playlists - no one really wants more than an hour of festive hits, even if it’s curated by me. Vegan no-pig in blanket?”

Evan proffers a tray of party snacks, having come over to join you near the tables set up with drinks and food. The music has become much more eclectic: fewer holiday hits, many more danceable, extremely cool, crowd pleasers. A few people are even starting to clear space in the centre of the room as a makeshift dancefloor. 

“Where’s Benjamin?” Evan asks as you chew on a no-pig in blanket. “You’re normally joined at the hip.”

You try not to choke on the pastry, grabbing a glass of red wine to wash down the food. “He was doing the address at the founders’ thing, remember? I think they wanted him to stay around afterwards to meet possible donors. It’s all about the diversity and inclusion programme.”

Evan nods, satisfied. “I’m not keeping any food for him, though.”

The strains of “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” are abruptly cut off as Jen Arden taps on her wine glass. “Head of department holiday speech time! Don’t worry, I won’t keep you from your partying too long - I want to see everyone out on that floor!” 

Her words are succinct but heartfelt, thanking everyone for the hard work that had made the semester successful and noting your arrival and integration into the Barrow community. You blush slightly as the eyes of the room turn in your direction. 

“And as some of you know, Ben Morales delivered the address at the annual Founders Luncheon today - an important part of fundraising for the inclusion programme he’s been spearheading.” Jen looks around the room, seeking out her friend, eyes resting on the doorway as Ben finally arrives. “And here he is now!”

Ben shyly acknowledges the applause in the room, making a beeline for the food and drink. Pure coincidence, of course, that you happened to be standing over there, too. He stands behind you and greets Evan. 

“Well, did you secure the megabucks? Are there hessian sacks printed with dollar signs currently filling your office?”

Ben huffs a laugh. “We have to wait and see, I guess. They seemed nice. Weird, though, talking to people you know are multi-millionaires. Billionaires, even. You keep thinking, ‘why do you need all that money?’”

He shakes his head and reaches for a glass of red wine. As he does so, he trails his hand along your lower back, fingertips grazing the top of your ass. For an instant you wonder if it was an accident, until you feel the palm of his hand pressing lightly but deliberately into the small of your back. 

Evan is talking at length about the snack selection at this year’s party and is clearly oblivious to Ben’s shenanigans and the heat rising in your face as you struggle to maintain your composure. Glass of wine obtained, Ben continues the conversation with Evan, studiously avoiding your attempts to catch his eye.

He’d been explaining his holiday plans - Ben is going west, trying to make up for some of the time lost when he cancelled his trip at Thanksgiving, and is really excited about it - when Evan spots an incoming call on his phone. “Oh shit, it’s my mom. I better go talk to her - sorry guys!”

He exits the room, already talking loudly to his mother about her holiday menu plans. 

As soon as you’re both alone, you swivel to face Ben head-on. 

“Um, excuse me?”

He smirks. “Excuse you?”

“Benjamin Ernesto Morales. You know what I’m talking about. You’re lucky I didn’t spontaneously combust in front of Evan.”

He chuckles. “Ah, that was just a friendly hand placement. Nothing more to it.” He arches an eyebrow, and once again you can feel desire - no, need - rushing through you. The urge to kiss him here, in front of everyone, without a thought for the (possible) consequences, is overwhelming. 

“You, sir, are a menace. Why didn’t I know about this before?”

He does that half-smile that makes you melt, and shrugs his shoulders. “Hey, on another topic - where’s Ani?”

“They messaged me this morning. In bed with a migraine, poor thing. I think these things wait until the end of the semester, just when you’re about to relax, and then bam.”

He makes a sympathetic face and nibbles on a cookie. “So it’s just us, then?” His gaze is both gentle and flirtatious.

“Us, and the rest of the faculty.” You gesture around the room, giving him a look that says “no funny business”.

He gently moves his hand along the edge of the table until it’s within touching distance of yours, and gently runs his fingertips along the back of your hand. You reciprocate by stroking the side of his hand with the pad of your thumb. 

It’s so stupidly chaste, like something from a Georgette Heyer novel about maidens and gentlemen in Georgian England, and yet it’s one of the sweetest, most intimate things you’ve experienced in a very long time.

Ben’s eyes widen as the music changes and the unmistakable opening bars of “Edge of Seventeen” begin. “Oh, Lyd!” He outright grabs your hand now. “Let’s dance, come on.”

He looks perplexed when you don’t move. You beckon him closer with a tilt of your head, and whisper into his ear, feeling your cheeks heating.

“I can think of something better than dancing, but we might need to be somewhere more, um, private.”

His expression shifts as understanding sets in. “Oh. Ohhh.” He grins, looking you up and down. “Yours or mine?”

Praise be to Stevie Nicks. “Edge of Seventeen” got so many colleagues out on the ‘dancefloor’ that the two of you were able to slip away completely unnoticed.

You unlock the door of your office and switch on your desk lamp before pulling down the blind over the glass panel. The soft light illuminates his handsome features as you turn back to face him: the strong line of his profile; the softness of his mouth, lips slightly parted; the glint in his warm eyes. He’s taken off his suit jacket, and with a smile you suddenly recall the first time you noticed how beautifully broad he was, standing in the kitchen at Evan’s Halloween party.

“Hi, Ben.”

“Hi, Lyddie.”

You’re standing close now, face to face. You walk your fingers up towards the knot of his tie, looking at him through your lashes, and tug it so that he’s right up against you, beautiful dark eyes taking you in. He leans in with a smile and kisses you slowly and deeply, the bristling sensation of his moustache and beard against your lips and face going straight to your core.

The pace was never going to stay slow. You wrap your arms around him and he pulls you tight to his body, moving his hands over your hips and ass and pulling little gasps and moans from you. The mints and coffee of earlier are replaced by the taste of red wine and sugar cookies on his lips and tongue. 

You start to run your hands through his hair, stroking your fingers down the side of his beautiful neck, loosening the knot of his tie, and opening the top buttons on his shirt to create a little more space for you. He inhales sharply when you break away from the kiss to gently lick and nibble at his neck and collarbone. You can feel him hardening against you, again. 

He pulls away slightly, keeping his hands around your waist. For the first time in your life, you actually understand what romance novelists mean when they describe a character as having ‘lust-blown eyes’. Ben’s coffee-brown eyes are near black, pupils dilated and lids heavy, conveying a potent mixture of sweet affection and utter desire. He lifts his hand to stroke your cheek gently, dragging his thumb across your bottom lip, before gently moving you towards the edge of your desk. 

He’s nervous. He moves some of the piles of your papers and books out of the way, careful not to disrupt the chaotic ‘order’ you maintain, so you have more room to sit on the desk. As you sit on the edge, you notice his hands are trembling a little. You feel a bit better about the quivering sensation that’s been running through you since you entered the office together, a mixture of desire and nerves.

You hitch up the skirt of your dress a little, opening your legs and creating more room for him as he stands between them, resting his forehead against yours.

“You okay, Ben?”

He looks at you in surprise. “I’m great, Lyd, I’m just…it’s…I’m really glad.” 

You feel a surge of affection in your chest. “So am I. And I’m glad for this tie.” You use it to pull him close to your body again, kissing him hungrily. He leans against you, hands on your waist and back. 

“Is this okay? Can I…touch you, Lydia?”

Something about the way he says your name, softly but purposefully, sends you utterly wild. 

“You know you can, Ben. I’m all yours,” you whisper, edging closer and slowly moving a hand down his broad torso, strong and soft at the same time. You reach his waistband and keep going, brushing your hand lightly over the bulge straining against his dress pants as you maintain eye contact. “I want you.” 

He closes his eyes, letting out a soft moan, before bringing his hands - those beautiful, big hands - up to softly caress your breasts as he moves his mouth to your neck, planting gentle kisses and sucking the skin ever so gently. 

It’s miraculous that you don’t come undone there and then, tipped over the edge by the feeling of his hands on your breasts, his mouth working the sensitive skin at the base of your neck, and his cock growing ever-harder underneath the light massage offered by your palm. Your fingers work at the buttons and zipper of his pants, desperately trying to get access to his hard length. 

He’s pulled up your dress, running his hands up your thighs and towards the warm, wet apex of your legs. He lets out a sigh of pleasure as he traces his long fingers from the top of your stockings to the bare skin of your upper thigh, leaning back to look at your body with a sort of delighted rapture. You silently congratulate yourself for choosing to wear hold-ups instead of regular pantyhose under your dress.

Even in this moment, part of your brain starts to worry about the state of your body and its many flaws, wondering what he is going to think about the you that’s under the scarlet fabric. That said, he seems to be keen so far. He grabs handfuls of the soft flesh on your thighs and hips, grunting with pleasure into your mouth. He feels insatiable already, one hand still caressing your tits as the other slips right between your legs and starts to rub at the soaking crotch of your panties. You’re trying to keep it together, moaning as you move your fingers against the waistband of his boxer briefs, ready to take him in your hand and attend to his pleasure.

Suddenly, the lights in the corridor come on. Laughter and loud chatting from a group of colleagues fills the air. Both you and Ben freeze, breaking off the kiss while your hands stay put.

“Shit… do you think they heard us?” you hiss, unsure what the rules are around this kind of thing at Barrow.

He turns to look at the door of the office, trying to see how close the group was. 

“I don’t think so. I don’t think we were that loud, were we?”

You smirk and raise an eyebrow.

“We weren’t, but we were just getting going…”

He rests his forehead on your shoulder and laughs before looking at you again, withdrawing his hands and straightening your dress. 

“Shall we get out of here? I can call a cab…”, he offers as you nod in agreement. He quickly does up his fly before grabbing his phone from his jacket pocket and pulling up the relevant app. “This is going to sound so cheesy, but - your place or mine?”

You giggle. “My apartment looks like a packing monster threw up in it, so, if you’re okay with yours…”

He smiles and nods enthusiastically, tapping in the details. “Five minutes. They’ll be at the main entrance.”

“Five minutes, so that’s two minutes to get to the door - and three minutes for another kiss?”

He chuckles deeply and pulls you in again.

Ben fastens his seatbelt in the back of the cab, looking at you expectantly. The street lights have him half in shadow, half in light, and you have to focus for a moment to answer. 

Fuck, he’s so sexy. 

The little voice deep inside you still whispers about how someone as fucking hot as him surely couldn’t want someone like you. But you manage to hush it, focusing on Ben’s beautiful face.

The cab journey is short - no more than five minutes along the quiet streets - but feels like an eternity. You’ve spent the entire ride making out in the back seat, like horny students rather than two forty-something academics. Pulling up at his house, you and Ben try to retain at least a little decorum as you hustle to the front door.

“I hope you gave that guy a good tip,” you joke as Ben fumbles for his keys, one hand resting on your ass.

He grins. “The tip was three times the cost of the ride. Think that should cover him for enduring our, uh, shenanigans?”

The front door opens and the two of you step inside. You pause for a moment to take each other in, you trailing your fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck while his thumb caresses your cheek. Your lips meet again as you peel off each other’s coats and fall back against the wall in his hallway, your hands fumbling to undo his pants again while he dips his long fingers, finally, into the wet heat between your legs. 

“Oh, fuck!” It feels like you’ve been waiting for him all your life. And, judging by the noises he’s making, the feeling seems to be reciprocated.

“God, Lydia, baby, I can’t believe you’re this wet for me already,” he purrs, sounding genuinely surprised and stroking the inside of your cunt firmly while his thumb works your clit. “You feel so fucking good.”

Ben resumes his work on your neck, moving more urgently now than he had in your office. His moustache and beard brushes against the sensitive skin of your neck and shoulders and makes you wetter still as he continues to massage your clit, occasionally slipping a finger into your pussy. You moan deeply, feeling yourself tightening around his finger as you get ever closer. 

“Fuck, I want you,” he whispers in your ear. “I really want you, Lyddie. I need you. You know?”

You whine with pleasure, one hand inside his briefs palming his cock as he works you to the edge. You can feel the orgasm about to burst deep inside, focused on the sound and sensation of his fingers - Ben’s big, strong fingers  - sliding in and out of you. 

He doesn’t stop, but he sounds a little more vulnerable. “Is that okay? I hope that’s okay,” he continues, and you feel like you’re about to black out.

“I…fuck…that’s more than okay, that’s - Jesus, I want that. And I want you, I need you, to have you, I want you…fuck, Ben! I think I’m going to fucking come, I…”

He looks down to where his hand is working you towards your climax. “That’s it, good girl. You’re so close. Come for me, beautiful girl.”

Good girl. Beautiful girl. Praise kink: activated.

Somehow he manages to look sexy as hell and sweetly shy as he brings you to the edge, eyes warm and dark. “I can’t believe I’m finally getting to make you come, I…I’ve wanted to, so badly.”

You come with a gasp, cunt throbbing and tightening around his fingers. It has been a long time since you’ve come this hard. Your eyes shoot open, looking directly into his. 

He strokes the side of your face with his other hand as he takes you through the aftershocks. Your wetness soaks his fingers as you kiss him, trying to express your gratitude for what he’s made you feel, leaning against the wall of his hallway. 

You break away, able to concentrate more effectively on the way his cock is now fully hard under your hand. “Fuck, baby, that was… holy shit. It’s, uh… it’s been a while.”

He blushes and kisses your forehead. “Can I take you to bed, Lyddie?”

You grin and start to giggle. He looks confused. “What? You don’t want to?”

How can you explain the myriad feelings racing through you in this moment? Excited. Nervous. Happy. Horny.

“I do, Ben. You know I do. I’m just, I dunno, I’m - I’m happy. And I really, really want you.”

He gives you a flash of that sexy fucking smile as he withdraws his hand from your panties and gently moves yours from his cock. 

“Come on.”

Taking your hand, he leads you up the stairs.

You notice almost nothing about Ben’s bedroom as the two of you enter, besides the side lamp he quickly flicks on and the pile of books he moves off the bed before turning his attention back to you. Lips locked, you focus on unbuttoning his shirt while he tries to get your dress off. 

In an instant you are standing before him in black and red bra, black (sensible) high-waisted panties, and hold-ups, his shirt, tie, and pants already discarded.

His eyes widen as he takes you in, gaze lingering over the black lace and red satin of your bra. “Wow. Holy shit.”

Instinctively, you move a step backwards and wrap your arms over your body protectively. You are suddenly overwhelmed by all that is wrong with your body: its size, its awkwardness, the stretch marks from weight lost and (more commonly) gained, marks and scars, a belly that is far too squishy and soft, in your opinion, hips that are too wide, breasts made heavier and less, well, perky with age. And that’s before you get on to your perennially crunchy knees.

You feel every one of your forty-two years, and then some. The fact of his utter gorgeousness leads you to only one conclusion.

God, he’s probably only ever fucked hotter people than me. I can’t compare, surely? 

You feel exposed. The defences - physical, sure, but emotional, too - have been irretrievably breached, and the fear of rejection scares the shit out of you.

The sight of Ben Morales before you, wearing just his boxer briefs (and, you notice for the first time, a pair of candy cane-patterned socks), makes you even more anxious about how you must look to him. He is a gorgeous vision, easily the most beautiful man you’ve ever even seen, let alone gone to bed with: lightly golden skin, strong arms and legs, broad shoulders, and a soft tummy that is as adorable and sexy as you’d imagined. 

And best of all, that beautiful, kind face, now looking at you with real concern.

“Are… are you okay? Lyddie? Are you alright? We can stop, we don’t have to -“

You shake your head and bring your eyes up to meet his. 

“I really don’t want to stop, Ben. I mean it, I want you…I need you in every way. It’s just… I mean, this,” and you gesture loosely to your body. “Like, I’ve had sex since my last relationship but it wasn’t like this, it wasn’t…this. It wasn’t…it didn’t mean…”

He reaches his hands towards you to bring you in for a hug. You take a deep breath as you try to explain properly.

“I haven’t been naked with someone like you…someone I actually care about in a long time. And I’m scared that you won’t like what you see, because you look so good and hot and so beautiful. You’re just so beautiful, Ben. And I…I’m not…”

He holds you closer and places a gentle kiss on your forehead. “I wish you could see yourself the way I see you,” he whispers. “I wish you could understand what it feels like to have looked at you, to have thought for so long about what it would be like to hold you, to kiss you, and now to finally touch you.” He’s blushing. 

“Kinda wish I could see myself the way you seem to see me, too. Don’t think I’ve ever been called ‘beautiful’ before. Before…you.”

He is still holding you, warm and gentle against his broad chest. You are suffused with a feeling of absolute safety. 

“I mean it, Lyd. If you don’t want to go any further we don’t have to.”

You pull back, bringing your arms to your sides and resisting the urge to hide yourself from his gaze. You look him in the eyes and shake your head with a soft smile.

“I know. We’re keeping going. I want this, too.” 

He kisses you and reaches around to undo your bra, struggling against the hooks.

You reach behind you, keeping your eyes on him, and deftly undo the bra. His mouth moves immediately to your breasts, tongue circling first one nipple and then the other before pulling back to admire you, chest rising and falling and eyes widening as he looks at you. 

Has anyone ever looked at you like that before? Like you are the most perfect creature to ever exist?

Mind you, you’re looking at him in much the same way. 

“You are so fucking beautiful, Lyd. You are. Let me show you how gorgeous you are.”

You smile shyly, still a little conscious of your body, and sit back on the side of the bed. 

Oh, shit. The sensible part of your brain butts in, abruptly. 

You need to talk about this now, not in the moment.

“Uh, Ben? Before you do that, can we maybe talk about, um, health and that?”

He looks confused. “Health? I had a cold in October but - oh. Yes. Yes. I get you.”

He scrabbles around for his pants. 

“What are you doing, Ben?”

“Getting my phone to show you my last screening results. We have the tests as an option on annual physicals and I had mine in August.” He locates his phone and looks at you fondly. “Just before you came over, as it happens.”

You bury your face in his shoulder, giggling affectionately. “Ben, love, I trust you. Just tell me, I don’t need to see them.”

He kisses the top of your head. “All good. And you?”

You nod, still feeling deeply awkward but relieved. “Also all good. Last test just before I came over. Funny, that. I’ve got a contraceptive implant thingy, as well.” You point out the little plastic device just under the skin of your upper arm. “And I haven’t been with anyone since, obviously.”

“Me neither.” He grins and whispers in your ear. “I did have a crush on someone in work, though.”

You smile and run a hand over the salt-and-pepper scruff along one side of his face. “A crush, huh? So you were waiting for them?”

He nods and kisses you softly as he gently encourages you to lie back on his bed, before swiftly discarding the candy cane socks and joining you in bed. 

For a couple of moments you just lie there together, hands trailing across each other’s bodies. You look at his handsome face, and the realisation that you’re actually going to sleep with him dawns. It triggers an unfortunate, involuntary surge of giggles.

“Why are you laughing?” He’s running his hand along the curve of your hip, fingers tugging at the waistband of your panties. 

“I’m not laughing, it’s just…” You start giggling again and hide your face against his broad shoulder.

“Okay, that’s definitely laughing. What did I do?”

You look at him and feel the affection and desire catch in your throat. “You didn’t do anything, baby, I’m sorry. It’s just - we’re basically naked and in bed together and…I’m excited?”

He laughs too, now, chest heaving as he pulls you tight and kisses you, slowly and deeply. You reach for his body, leg wrapping around his and one hand slipping to his hard cock while he caresses and sucks on your tits. His hand is inside your panties now, eagerly seeking out the warm, silky wetness of your folds. 

“Going to take these off, is that okay?” You nod, moaning as he tugs down the black fabric and lifting your hips so he can drag them over your ass. You kick them off as he rolls you against him, one hand grabbing the flesh of your ass while the other rubs small circles over your clit. 

You lean back slightly to look at him, your hands now tugging at the waistband of his boxer briefs. “I want you naked, too,” you murmur, breasts resting on Ben’s chest. “Want to go down on you for a little bit. Is that okay?”

His eyes widen. “God, yeah. Fuck, please, Lyd.”

His boxers discarded, you move down his body, one hand already gently stroking his hard length. You resist the urge that strikes you to drag your teeth over the soft flesh of his tummy, maybe even to bite him. 

You plant a gentle kiss to the tip of his cock, flicking your gaze up to meet his as you take him, hard as hell, between your lips, tongue gently flicking over the head. 

The gesture drives him crazy, and he groans, low and long.

“Fucking hell, you’re good at this. You’re really fucking good at this. So fucking…oh God, Lyd.”

You smile at the praise as you continue to take him deeper into your mouth, fingers tracing around the base of his cock and stroking him lightly. The bulge you’d first felt in his office earlier that evening did not disappoint. 

“Fuck, Lyd, I won’t last if you keep that up,” he hisses, breathing ragged as you use your tongue to lick up and down his shaft. 

Gently, you remove him from your mouth and push yourself back up the mattress, Ben’s strong hands guiding you back into place against the pillows. He drops his hand back to your soaking pussy as you feel the warm, solid softness of his body on yours. You inhale his masculine scent deeply: his cologne, leather, paper, and still a hint of wine from his lips. 

You never want to be anywhere but here. 

He begins to trace a line of kisses from your mouth down to your breasts and tummy, slowly bringing himself down the line of your body until he is nestled between your legs. He runs a finger along a patch of stretch marks on your hip before kissing them softly. With care and a kind of reverence, he plants kisses on the soft flesh of your belly, starting just under your belly button, and working his way down as far as the hair that covers your mound. 

He gently pushes your right leg out to make a little more room and open you up, lifting your leg over his shoulder, before beginning to lick purposefully at your glistening folds. You cry out with pleasure, one hand reaching back to grip the wooden headboard of the bed and the other dropping to the back of Ben’s head. You trail your fingers through his hair as he eats you out, moaning as the line of his nose nudges rhythmically against your clit while his tongue explores you.

It doesn’t take much to bring you back to the edge, and when he brings a finger up to massage you while his tongue slips in and out of your cunt, you come on his face, hips rolling up and back as you climax. 

He grins as he shifts his body back up the bed and you reach for him, pulling him in for a kiss so that you can taste yourself on his lips. He hums with pleasure and pulls back to look at you, rubbing a thumb gently against your cheek before nuzzling in at your neck. His weight against you is somehow devastatingly erotic and perfectly reassuring. 

He pulls back again and you wrap your arms around his broad shoulders, opening your legs even wider as you feel the heavy, hard length of his cock pulsing against your core. He rolls one of your nipples between the tips of his fingers, letting his broad palm cup the soft flesh of your breast.

Your voice is quiet, but determined. “I want you to fuck me, baby. Please. Fuck me.”

“I’m going to, darling.” He drops a hand to your soaking pussy, making sure you’re ready. He looks deep into your eyes and you try to make a mental screenshot of this moment: what it feels like to have him above you, to have the weight of his body against yours, to feel the tip of his cock nudging at the lips of your cunt; to look into his eyes and see them dark with lust and warm with affection, to have him tracing his fingers across your mouth and jaw before asking, silently, for a final gesture of consent. 

You nod and gently move your hips down as if you’re going to take him into you all by yourself. He moans loudly, guiding himself slowly and steadily inside you until he bottoms out. The stretch makes you gasp, though it’s in no way painful. You close your eyes as you adjust to the sensation of him filling you, warm and heavy.

He’s looking deeply into your eyes when you open them again. “You okay?” He gently strokes the side of your face with his long fingers. 

“Mmmyeah,” you sigh, distracted by the pleasure of having him inside you. “You’re big, you know,” you murmur. “You’re such a big boy.”

As soon as the words leave your mouth you screw up your face with embarrassment. 

Lydia, what in the fuck was that? Did he already manage to fuck the filter out of you with his fingers? Did he induce some sort of malfunction in lydiabrain.exe?

Ben’s eyebrows are raised but you can tell he’s trying not to laugh. 

You’re fucking this up, Lyd, as usual. 

“Oh god I’m so cringe, I’m so sorry -“

He stops you with a chuckle and a soft, sweet kiss. “I mean, it’s a hell of a compliment.” He arches an eyebrow and looks endearingly smug. “Would you like your big boy to fuck you now?”, he purrs. 

This time, you’re the one who can’t help but giggle as you roll your eyes in mock horror at the cheesy line and he grins in response. You can’t remember the last time you felt this intimate with a lover. 

“I would like that very much. Move, Ben, please.”

He takes it slowly at first, keeping his body close to yours as he uses his hips to pull out and push back into your core, over and over. The rhythm is steady and insistent, and your body responds in kind, your hips moving to meet him and your legs widening and hitching up to take him even more deeply. 

He’s starting to increase the pace slightly and you whine, digging your fingers into his broad shoulders. “You feel so good, Lyd,” he pants, “so fucking good. So warm and tight.”

“You like how tight I am for you? You want to see how much I can take?” you coo in his ear as you trail your hands down his back before spreading your palms over his ass, triggering a growl from deep within his chest as he fucks you faster. 

“Want you to take it all, baby, know you can…” A grimace flashes across his face, though he doesn’t stop, and you wonder if something’s wrong. You bring your hands back up to his shoulders and run a finger along the bristling hair on his jawline.

“Are you okay? Do we need to stop?”

“Sorry, just a tight muscle somewhere -“ He looks a little sheepish, as if his body is letting him down.

“Hey,” you murmur, “get on your back. I want to fuck you on top.” His eyes widen with delight and you shift your bodies together, keeping him inside you as he eases carefully back onto the bed and you straddle him.

For a moment you stay just like that, quiet and still. He looks you up and down, smiling at the sight of you and brushing the tips of his fingers gently over the weight of your breasts and the curve of your hips and thighs. You run your hands over Ben’s chest, gazing at his body as if it were a treasure. When you start to trace your fingers over his tummy, he seems to shrink back a little, embarrassed by his physique. 

In response, you shift forward, pulling him out of you slightly so that you can lean in and run your tongue and mouth over the soft flesh of his stomach. He’s looking down his chest at you, and you look up from under your eyelashes. 

“This is a really sexy tummy, you know. Probably the sexiest I’ve ever seen in my life.”

A smile flickers across his face. “You don’t have to say that -“ 

You silence him by sinking back down onto his full length, pulling a cry from his lungs. With a roll of your hips you start to ride his cock, keeping your fingers on his tummy. As you pick up the pace he can’t keep his eyes off your breasts, and he greedily lifts himself up to suck on your nipples. The sensation of his tongue tracing the outline of each nipple is enough to throw you off, and you have to really concentrate on the rhythm you’ve set with your hips and ass.

Months of pent-up frustration and desire find their release as you fuck Ben harder and deeper, his hands digging into your hips and thighs. “Fucking hell, Lyd, you’re amazing,” he rasps, eyes flitting between the fluid movement of your hips and the bounce of your tits. “Feels amazing. Feel good for you, too?”

You nod, not wanting to break the rhythm. With a smirk, he slips a thumb to your clit and starts to rub circles over and around it. You cry out his name in response. 

“Fuck yes, Ben, keep doing that, keep doing…that’s it, fuck!”

“Are you going to come again for me, Lyd?”, he murmurs gently, the quiet of his voice in stark contrast to the obscene, wet noises coming from your cunt and the dirty talk he’s sent tripping from your tongue.

For the third time, the tightly-wound coil snaps deep inside you. You can feel your cunt pulsing around Ben’s cock as you ride out your peak, feeling him tightening between your legs. He’s close. He sits up, pausing to kiss you and to suck on your neck for a few moments while he caresses your tits, before easing you over and onto your back again so he can finish with you underneath him.

“You’re so close,” you whisper to him as he starts to fuck you again, hard and steady. “Let go, baby. Come for me.” 

He picks up the pace, the wetness of your pussy letting him take you as hard as he wants. He’s still holding back. 

“Let go. Come in me,” you purr, hitching your hips slightly to let him go even deeper. “I want your come in me.”

That’s enough to tip him over the edge, and Ben’s rhythm stutters and finally breaks. With a gasp and a shudder you feel him come, crying out as he fills you, cock buried deep within you and beads of sweat dripping from his chest onto your tits. 

He stays put for a moment or two, panting into your neck as he tries to pull himself together. You run your fingers through the soft curls of his hair and hold him close. 

“Thank you.”

His words are almost inaudible, barely a whisper, and you aren’t entirely sure if you’ve heard them or imagined them. You respond with a kiss to the top of his head. 

After a couple of moments Ben pulls away and gets out of bed, pulling the comforter around you before crossing from his bedroom to the bathroom across the hall. He returns with a washcloth and a towel, cleaning you up and gently drying you off. He places one more kiss on your belly and smiles, moving back up to join you at the head of the bed.

You lie close together, facing each other in a comfortable silence. He strokes a little pattern on the curve of your hip while you absent-mindedly trace a finger over the constellation of dark freckles across the top of his chest. 

He tilts your chin up to look at you, stroking your cheek as his big dark eyes gaze into yours. You plant a soft kiss on the little bare patch of skin along his jaw before shifting back to look - really look - at Ben’s face, mapping it with your eyes. The slight furrow between his brows. The line of his nose. The specific shape and colour of his lips. The little divot in his bottom lip. 

“Was - was that okay?” He looks at you intently with those big, baby cow eyes, waiting for a response. 

You are surprised by the question and by how quiet and awkward he sounds, given that he’s just made you come deeper and harder than you have in years. Or maybe ever.

Three. Fucking. Times.

“It was…” you search for the right word as you run your fingers over his strong bicep, “amazing. I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever come that hard before, honestly. Was it good for you too?”

He blushes, a wide smile creeping across his face. “Pretty spectacular, Lyd. You on top? I mean…” He mimes fireworks exploding with his hands, and you bury your face in his chest as you laugh. You stay like that for a little while, tucked into his side with a big, stupid smile on your face and your arm wrapped around Ben’s tummy. He holds you close to him, tilting his head to rest on yours.

The gesture brings you back, suddenly, to Halloween. His arm around your waist. Your arm around his shoulders. His head resting against you, yours against his. 

Fuck, you two are idiots.

“We should have done this ages ago,” he murmurs, and you worry for a moment that he might be able to read your mind.

You reach for his hand, twining your fingers together. 

“Was it worth the wait, Ben?”

He squeezes you tightly. “Every fucking minute.”

It’s still comparatively early when you fall asleep (the joys of a 5pm party start time), you as the little spoon, Ben dozing off with an arm around you and his hand gently holding your breast. His body is warm and comforting against your back, and you listen for a couple of minutes to the sound of his breathing slowing, steadying, into sleep. 

You don’t sleep for very long - maybe an hour or two. You blink awake, noticing that the lamp is still on, and that Ben’s broad hand is still in place against your soft skin. You caress the back of his hand with yours, trying not to wake him but wanting to feel him under your fingertips again. 

“Mmmmm. Hi, baby.” He drowsily starts to kiss the back of your neck, and his fingers begin to squeeze lightly at your nipple. It grows hard and pert as he nuzzles into your neck, his mouth tracing a line of kisses along your shoulder. You are still wet from earlier, but can feel the ache building again between your legs. He shifts closer to you, and you feel his cock, hard again, pressing against your ass. 

You keen quietly with pleasure, still sleepy, your body starting to grind against his. He whispers a question into your ear, and in response you drag his hand down your body, lifting your leg ever so slightly so he can feel for himself.

“Christ, darling, this just from me playing with your tit?”

You hum your appreciation, nodding. “Mmmm. And the orgasms.”

He chuckles quietly. “Can I have you?” He shuffles down slightly, his hard length already notching at your thighs. 

“Always,” you purr, and he reaches around to tilt your face to his. He kisses you as he lifts your leg, drapes it over his, and carefully pushes inside you. The stretch is still new, but more familiar now, and you mewl a little as he bottoms out. 

It’s slow at first, intense and intimate as he works up a rhythm while still half-asleep. He moans into your neck as he fucks you gently, praising you over and over. “You feel so good, Lyddie,” he whispers, “taking it so well.” He sucks lightly at the crook of your neck, making you whimper with pleasure. 

“You’re so beautiful. Beautiful girl,” he sighs, rolling his hips firmly but slowly as he thrusts up into your pussy. 

“I lo-... I love y-your…body. So soft for me.”

“I love your body too, baby.” You drop a hand between your legs and touch yourself. As he realises what you’re doing, he picks up the pace, fucking you harder from behind until you come with a cry.

His hand drifts to your uppermost hip, holding you in place as he fucks - and talks - you through it. “That’s it, baby. You feel so good when you come like that for me. I lo-” 

You know he’s close, both from the stuttering rhythm and the fact he can’t use his words any more. He mutters and curses as his movements become more staggered. With a moan that seems to come from the depths of his soul, he spills into you with a final thrust, panting into your back as he stays inside you for a moment. 

You turn your mouth to his again, and he kisses you with hunger and gratitude.

You are both utterly wrecked, in every sense, lying flat out on the bed together as you come down from a shared high. 

“So I know you’ve got your flight tomorrow,” he says, fingers idly running up and down your forearm, and you brace yourself for him suggesting you should probably go home. 

“But if you’d like, you can stay the night? I can drive you to your place as early as you need.” 

“If you want me to? I don’t want to impose…”

He shakes his head. “It would be a pleasure. I want you to stay, you know? Would you like something to sleep in? A t-shirt?” You nod in response. He’s holding your hand, rubbing his thumb against your palm. 

He retrieves two T-shirts and a pair of boxers from a tallboy that stands against the opposite wall of the room, holding the shirts up for your approval. 

“REM 1999 tour shirt, or study abroad souvenir?” He really is gorgeous, you think, even when he’s standing naked making silly faces and pretending to model each shirt. Actually, especially when he’s doing that. 

“Ooh, vintage Universidad de Málaga 1996, please.” He crosses back to the bed and hands you the faded red cotton shirt before pulling on his own. 

“That’s a precious relic,” he says with mock seriousness. “It is a privilege to wear that shirt.”

“Understood. I respect the power of the shirt.” You bow your head, crossing your arms across your chest reverentially and he laughs gently. 

He clambers back into bed, wrapping his arm around your shoulder and pulling you close under the comforter. You rest your head on his shoulder, hands on his chest, and sneak little glances up at him. He’s already starting to drift to sleep, lids heavy and breathing slowing into a steady rhythm. 

Oh, fuck. He’s so gorgeous. He’s so beautiful.

The last word slips, unbidden, from your lips, and he looks confused for a moment before breaking into a gentle, sleepy smile. “So are you.”

The afterglow is cosy and safe. He holds you close with his strong arms, and your fingers are entwined with his. It is both new and familiar, strange and reassuring; a first time, and like you’ve been doing this forever.

(bookshelf divider by @animatedglittergraphics-n-more; other dividers by @cafekitsune)

Further A/N: They got there. They have a long way to go (please don't hate me - it can't all be sunshine and orgasms roses). Next chapter sees some more Christmas "cheer", albeit on other sides of the Atlantic.

Thank you so much if you've been with them this far - don't forget, of course, that Lydia is just visiting...