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reviewdiaries · 1 year ago

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Be still my beating heart - examining that Nancy x Ace moment from 4x03

I am a wreck. Sure I went into this episode expecting to have my heart smushed into many tiny pieces, but that just, yeah, I’m going to need some time to recover. This season is unhinged, unhinged I tell you and I am absolutely here for it. It gets long beneath the cut…

We left Nancy and Ace in a cautiously optimistic place at the end of the last episode - a fragile bloom of hope, a desperate shared yearning, finally, finally in the same space of wanting to try. And once Nancy commits to something, she is all in. You see that building all episode, this breathless anticipation and want. Because finally they’re being open with each other, they’re talking honestly about their feelings and it is soft and beautiful, framed in warmer light and lingering looks in place of touch.

I’ve talked before about how the curse is forcing them both into actually talking with each other, and we see that so clearly in the beautiful little moments - how long have they known they liked the other? What do they want to do first when the curse is lifted? It’s intimate and raw and filled with So Much Eye Contact. After so long avoiding how they feel, letting the other one know, acting on it, suddenly we see Nancy and Ace in a much more stable place. Everything is laid bare, and now it’s just the two of them working together to defeat the big bad and it is beautiful to watch.

GIF Credit @nacesource

But nothing as beautiful as the moment we’ve all been waiting for, that kiss. You know it’s coming, right from the moment when Bess says early on that they’ll need to activate the curse. The kiss has been a delicious promise hanging over everything. And it’s a study in light. That first breathless almost where they were in near darkness at Icarus Hall, when the work of uncovering their feelings had barely just begun. The soft lamplight of Ace’s apartment as Nancy told him about the parallel timeline, of the kisses and intimacy they shared. And now this. Full, beautiful light, candles everywhere, not a shadow to hide in, nothing but the raw truth on display for everyone.

Ace has been so confident, settled in his feelings, the knowledge that they’re returned. A new stillness that has infused him right from the start, until this moment. Suddenly faced with Nancy in a circle of petals, faced with the reality of her, of this moment, his nerves return. He can’t hold her gaze anymore, suddenly filled with the scent of her shampoo this close, the knowledge that she’s already done this, and maybe he won’t live up to the hallucination - even though it was technically him and he knows it’s ridiculous he can’t help the fear that maybe this will ruin it, somehow this moment, this start, will be the end.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

Even as he stammers out an apology, a buffer, a rationalisation for his nerves, he’s reaching for her. He’s held himself in check for so long, laced his hands together to keep from touching her since the last time he tried to kiss her when he was testing his theory, and now finally he can let his desires off their leash and touch her. She’s so beautiful, so steady and sure, she doesn’t look nervous at all and somehow that helps him, as he reaches out to cup her cheek and the side of her neck.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

He doesn’t so much draw her to him as use his fingers tangled in her hair to anchor himself to her, stop himself from floating away on the breathless anticipation of finally stepping in and closing that last distance between them.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

And at that moment where every other time he’s had to pause, to stop, to back away, Nancy finally reaches for him. Mirroring where his own hand is cradling her face, mouth opening underneath his and god this is so much more than he could ever have imagined. And he has imagined it so much. Hundreds of idle moments in school, washing dishes at the Claw, watching her kiss Park and Gil and wishing so much that it was him she was with. And these last days, after she told him about the parallel timeline and her eyes fluttered shut as she breathlessly recounted kisses and skin and hot murmured words against skin. He can’t help but pull her close, tug her into him so she’s flush against him and he can feel her warm and alive and real.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

There’s nothing now for him but her. Nothing but her fingernails scraping through his hair and using it to tug him closer, angle his head to deepen the kiss. Tongue sliding against his, that soft breathless noise he’s heard her make when the pieces slot into place in a particularly difficult mystery, that sound of satisfaction, of a complete whole, of the world tipping back onto its axis.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

He never wants to let her go now he’s found this, torn between wanting to cradle her like something precious and fist his hands in her hair to pull her head back for easier access to her neck. Lost in the desperate longing he’s kept so deeply buried for so long and the slow dawning realisation that this is her, this is Nancy, his Nancy, finally in his arm and beneath his lips and god he wants to just live in this moment forever.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

The sigil burns as the curse fights to take hold, Temperance fighting for control even now, furious at their open defiance. He pulls back slightly, taken aback by the stinging reminder after being so lost in the feel of her. But she follows him and he cannot resist, not now, tugging her in deeper, never wanting this moment to end.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

For a moment light flares behind his eyelids, but Nancy’s hands are in his hair and pulling him closer to her, and she’s lifting up onto her tiptoes, trying to get closer, closer, always closer. He can feel it in the rapid pulse beneath his fingers, the stuttering inhalations against his cheek. She is as undone by this as he is, ripped open by hope and longing and this sudden freedom to actually touch and taste and love.

GIF Credit @nancy-drew

He doesn’t feel steady on his feet, like the world is spinning and the only fixed point are the ten places he can feel Nancy’s fingers pinning him in place like a trapped moth. The world feels like it’s burning and his chest is burning and suddenly he’s being pushed away from her by the curse exiting him, eyes still closed, like if he just doesn’t open them then he can stay suspended in this moment forever. Lips still seeking hers, brushing his nose against hers to just stay in this moment of being close to her without knowing if it’s worked or not for just a heartbeat longer.

But it’s there and it’s real in a way the abstract thought of it never was, and he still lingers, still holds on to Nancy, his fixed point, his north star, hands on her arms, her fingers, still struggling to catch his breath when Nancy has stolen it so thoroughly, kissed away every thought and feeling beyond the desire to step back in and claim her lips again.

And it’s beautiful and it’s terrifying and for a moment staring at it Ace is so completely lost, frightened by the enormity of it and the desperate hope that maybe maybe, just maybe, this will work and he can kiss her again in a moment. And as soon as he thinks of her, as soon as he looks at her again, he steadies. Because Nancy is it, she is worth anything, and if this hasn’t worked, if this is his last moment then he will go having finally known what it feels like to kiss her, to pull her close and show her just how much he loves her.

GIF Credit @horseshoe-bay-ledger

But it’s Nancy who crumples into him, and you can see the moment that he knows this hasn’t worked, that this has gone wrong and god damn it he just wants to be with the woman he loves and he could kill Temperance for doing this to them, for causing so much heartache and pain and predicting every way they were going to try and break the curse. But he can’t even allow himself to fully feel that despair and fury before he’s catching Nancy and calling for water and then more panicked for someone to call an ambulance, because he was fully prepared to put his life on the line but never Nancy’s. That was the only reason he pushed so hard, because he knew she’d be safe, that it was all him and he could take that chance if it meant trying, if it meant the chance to finally kiss her lips and pull her close.

GIF Credit @livelovecaliforniadreams

But Nancy suddenly pale and unconscious in his arms is terrifying in a way he hadn’t anticipated, hadn’t prepared for in all his musings about hope and trying and dying being worth it. A tiny voice in the back of his head telling him this is why Nancy didn’t want to try, that this was what she’d experienced with him and no it’s too much, too real, too terrifying and why won’t she open her eyes?!

GIF Credit @livelovecaliforniadreams

The adrenaline from a few moments ago replaced with something sour and terrifying that makes him want to scream at the world, promise he’ll behave, never push her again, never underestimate how much it hurt, god never kiss her again if she’ll just be ok. Anything, anything, please. Just open her eyes and breathe and tell him she’s ok. He can’t bear the thought of a world without her in it - her smile, her laugh, her brilliant brilliant mind. He’d do anything, rocked by the desperate high to low of having her and losing her and now the memory of their first kiss (their only kiss) will always be entwined with the thought of her limp and lifeless body in his arms, hair spread around them like blood, and the taste of fear in his mouth.

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