#s7 is a crackfic | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

the-alpha-incipiens · 6 years ago

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untitled, incomplete golden queen/hooked queen cracky s7 au (rated m)

Over on my Twitter, I’ve talked about this terrible crack idea I had for a s7 au. It was mostly conceived before we had any real info about s7, except for that they’d be cursed. So the crackfic idea I had was that Regina and Gold are cursed!married, and Killian is a barista and he writes bad poetry. Regina and Gold hate each other, and (eventually) Killian is Regina’s sidepiece. I never finished the fic, for various reasons, but someone over on Twitter/curious cat really wanted to see what I had. So here it is, in all its unfinished glory.

Warnings for: Golden Queen sex, adultery/adulterous themes

Untitled crack s7 au

There are many, many things Regina Mills-Gold hates about Seattle. She’s been living here for a little over three months, and her husband has assured her she’ll get used to it eventually. That she’ll learn to love it. So far, all she wants is to go back to Maine. Back to weather that didn’t have her constantly fighting with her hair to keep it from frizzing, back to hardworking northeastern sensibilities instead of the more relaxed and yet somehow more pretentious northwest, and most of all, she wanted to go back to her tenure track position. Instead, she had to settle for adjunct, for teaching the classes no one else wants to a bunch of dull-eyed freshmen who for some God forsaken reason thought an 8 AM Monday-Wednesday-Friday Calculus class was a good idea to tick off their Math gen ed. requirement.

It’s how she finds herself sitting in a coffeehouse with a sizeable stack of exams to grade and a cup of coffee on the table before her. Her coffee has gone cold now, she’s sure. She takes a sip of it anyway, just to test it, and sure enough, the bitter brew is thick on her tongue. She grimaces, deposits it back on the table with disgust, turning back to the tests before her with even less enthusiasm. She should just order a new one, because God knows she’s going to be here even longer with this amount of tests to get through. She needs something to get through them, and alcohol is unfortunately not an option.

She startles when suddenly someone is standing beside her table, setting a cup in front of hers before smoothly picking it. Her eyes lift from the cup to the someone and she really shouldn’t be surprised to see it’s the barista.

“A fresh cup,” he says, smiling a little impishly at her. “On the house. You’ve been here a while, thought you could use a top off.”

This shouldn’t surprise her, because she’s been coming here lately and often. It’s not her usual coffee shop, in fact she usually preferred another place about two blocks away. But two weeks ago, she had detoured, because of traffic and running late for her Tuesday class, and well.

Regina isn’t blind, and just because she has a ring on her left finger doesn’t mean she can’t look. The barista – Killian, and he’s also the owner, she’s since learned – is quite attractive. Dark hair, carefully styled to look messy, and bright blue eyes, and a nice smile that makes her insides twist.

So yes, she’s married, but it’s not as if Iain is here, and it’s not as if she’s going to do anything. She just buys some coffee, and grades her papers, and occasionally ogles Killian when he’s behind the bar, pulling espressos and chatting up the female students who wander into his coffee shop, looking for something different than the swill campus has to offer.

She smiles at him, small and tiny, and murmurs, “Thanks,” as she picks up the cup. He knows her order by heart now, seemed to remember it from the moment he met her.

“Just a strong cup of coffee,” she had said, because when she’s grading exams or checking homework, she likes the bitterness, the lingering taste of it on her tongue with no added frills like special milks or sugars or flavorings. Just coffee.

“Impressive,” he had replied, ringing her up. “Nice and simple.”

“Good coffee doesn’t need anything else.” She still doesn’t know what made her say that; she’s not particularly in the habit of making small talk with men in coffee shops. Not even the ones giving her her drink.

Especially not ones that looked her up and down, not an ounce of shame as he checked her out, and she had frowned at the time, fiddled deliberately with her wedding ring. His blue eyes had been drawn to the motion, and he had sighed a little as he handed over her coffee.

That should have been the end of it. And perhaps it would have been, had she not come back the next day, and the next, and the next. Talked to him more, and more, told him little bite-sized pieces about herself as she got coffee and scones and graded her papers. She learned about him, too, about how he writes poetry, and used to play guitar, before he lost his hand in a freak accident.

She would be lying if she said they didn’t flirt with each other, but she has no moral qualms about little white lies. She’s grown to like the way he looks at her, the way he says her name in that accent of his, and well. She’s always been a sucker for a nice accent, especially British ones, if her husband is anything to go by. She tries to not think about him while she’s here, though.

Regina doesn’t lie to him about her whereabouts; always says she’s grading papers right here in this coffeehouse. Lying would imply she’s doing something wrong here, and there’s nothing too wrong about some harmless flirting. It’s not like it’ll go anywhere, because Killian has continued to be respectful ever since he saw that wedding ring of hers.

He wanders back off behind the coffee bar without another word, leaving her to her grading, and she should really get back to that. She takes a sizeable gulp of her fresh coffee, enjoying the burn of it down her throat, not too hot but cleansing the taste of her stale cup from her mouth.

Unbidden, she wonders if Killian tastes like this, but then she’s shaking her head to clear it, pressing that thought down and focusing on the papers before her.

She doesn’t know how much time has passed, but he wanders back over eventually, clearing his throat softly. “Regina?” he murmurs, and a shiver slides down her spine, makes her sit straighter.

“Yes?” she says, looking up, setting her red pen aside, and then she’s looking around. Everyone else is gone, and it’s darker outside than it should be for early evening, and—

“I’m afraid it’s time to close,” he says apologetically, and she’s the one who should be sorry.

“Oh, my God, Killian. You should have said something.” She rushes to stand up, bundling her papers, trying to shove them in her briefcase.

“You seemed very intent on those tests,” he shrugs a shoulder, as if it’s completely normal for her to keep him past his hours. “I didn’t have anywhere else to be, so I thought I’d give you as much time as I could.”

“Well thank you, but I hate to keep you,” she murmurs, grateful though she is, she’s sure her husband must be wondering where she is. She reaches for her purse, digging out her phone to check, but there’s not a single message or missed call.

Well then.

She sighs, shoving it back in, and reaches for the final papers to stick in the folder when she misjudges, somehow sending the stack to the ground.

“Oh, damn it,” she scowls, bending to pick them up, and then she feels the warmth of a nearby body. Looking up, Killian’s joined her on the floor, trying to gather the scattered tests, and he’s close, startlingly so. Her mouth dries, her tongue sticking to the roof, as she stutters, “Y-you don’t have to…”

“Let me help,” he smiles, and he does a better job picking them up than she does, distracted as she is by how near he is to her on the floor. When he’s gotten all he can, he hands them over, their fingers brushing, and she bites her lip.

Regina doesn’t know what’s gotten into her – in fact, it’s probably more like what hasn’t gotten into her. She’s not sure the last time she had sex. Sometimes her marriage is more like a sham, a facade, something they both got into and can’t figure out or be bothered to get out of. In fact, she thinks it’s possible the last time they had sex, they were fighting.

They do that a lot – fight and then fuck, or rather, fight and fuck, the argument spiraling into tension that can only be broken by trying to dominate the other, push them into submission by pulling orgasms from their bodies.

So that’s why she’s so attracted to Killian Jones right now, she thinks. Her own husband hasn’t touched her at all beyond a perfunctory goodbye kiss in the morning, and even when he does touch her, it’s not… satisfying. Oh, he likes to make her come, is not particularly selfish when it comes to that area of things, but it’s still about him, in some way. About the power he has over her body, over the way he can make her shake apart despite whatever hateful words they might have thrown at each other.

God, she doesn’t know how her life became this.

“Regina?” Killian is staring at her, and of course he is, she’s still on the floor, still holding that damn folder, and she wants to shove it into her damn bag and get the fuck out of here before…

She doesn’t know before what.

Regina rises, wrangles her things together, papers and folders properly stored away so she can head home. To her husband. Who doesn’t even seem to realize she’s been gone for hours. Or worse; who realizes but doesn’t care.

“I should be going,” she says, and then he’s reaching for her, touching her, and no, he should not be doing that. She should not be letting him do that.

She should not tilt her face toward his, she should not lick her lips, and stare at his, and she should not…

He tastes exactly like she imagined: Coffee, and something like sea salt, and something uniquely him. It’s addicting, and her tongue seeks out more of it, presses against the seam of his lips, urges him to open to her.

She drops her things to the floor, uncaring as he wraps his arms around her, his hand at her cheek, cupping her jaw as he kisses and kisses her. His other arm bands around her waist, pulls her as close as possible, and this is lovely.

Gentle.

Nothing at all like Iain’s kisses, bruising and passionate in all the wrong ways. Whereas she’s all tongue and teeth with him, she’s soft and hungry with Killian. Desperate for more, but restrained, and—

Iain. Her husband.

She jerks away from him, tries to ignore the little moan of protest he lets out, places her palms flat on his chest as he dives back in for more. She wants more, too, wants to kiss him again, more, wants to feel his mouth on other, more sensitive parts of her body.

“We can’t,” she says, her eyes falling to her hands, to the golden band that encircles one finger, binding her to another. “I’m married.”

Killian bites his lip, and it’s smeared with her lipstick, and swollen from being pressed against her own, and that’s really far hotter than it should be. “Does he know where you are right now?” he asks, and she feels her face shift with her confusion.

“What? Of course, I told him when I left…”

“You’ve been here a while. Has he called or texted? Anything to see if you were okay?”

It’s her turn to bite her lip, and she’s staring him in the eyes now, so she doesn’t miss the way his gaze falls to her mouth. Or the way his eyes darken as her teeth dig into the flesh of her lip.

She wishes for a moment that it was his teeth instead of her own.

“That doesn’t change anything,” she says instead. “He’s still my husband.”

Killian nods, and he releases her, steps back. Runs a hand through his naturally (but carefully gelled to look) messy hair, and says, “All right then. I’m sorry. But… he doesn’t deserve you, you know.”

“That is really none of your business,” Regina snaps, and she sounds foreign to her own ears. She’s not usually so bold, but then again, tonight is a night of differences.

She should leave. She should absolutely, definitely, leave. He’s just questioned her marriage, something he has no right to do, just because she kissed him. Or he kissed her. She’s not even sure who started this. But she’s going to end it.

She’s going to walk out, and walk away from him, and never come back to this coffee shop.

He doesn’t try to stop her at first, but she reaches the door, prepared to fling it open when he says, “Wait.”

“Killian, we are not doing this,” she scowls, frustrated now, especially when he moves right behind her, and she can smell him. Smell the coffee and his cologne and damn him, damn him, damn him.

But then he’s fishing out keys, sliding them into the lock, muttering, “I locked us in here, okay? I told you, it was time to close.”

Oh, right. He had said something about that.

She burns hot with embarrassment instead of lust, her cheeks flushing, and she hopes he doesn't notice. Hopes he thinks it's lingering arousal, and not mortification at her assumption.

Killian opens the door for her, steps out of her space so she can leave. He's watching her, with barely concealed lust and perhaps a bit of guilt for what they've done, and Regina knows it's reflected on her own face.

“Regina,” he says before she walks out, quickly continuing, “I'm sorry about tonight. I hope… I hope I haven't made you uncomfortable. About being here.”

The awkwardness sets in then, a writhing, breathing thing in her belly, rooting around deep to suck up any remaining lust. She swallows harshly, almost choking on it, has to take a breath to steady herself. “I think it’s best if I don’t come back here anymore,” she says, and doesn’t meet his eyes, focuses on a point just over his shoulder.

Staring at the wall doesn’t mean she misses the way his eyebrows bounce, his entire face falling into something stricken, like she’s just dropkicked his puppy in front of him. It makes her stomach flip with guilt, and funny how hurting him is what makes her feel guilty, and not the fact that she was kissing a man who is not her husband. But then he’s nodding, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows hard.

“Of course.” There’s a hesitance, a moment where he seems at a loss of what to say. Then, “Well. Good night, Regina.”

Right. She should leave, should stop staring at his wall, should absolutely not look at his face, even though that’s exactly where her eyes go. He’s watching her, not intently, not even like he’s burning her into his memory, just… sadly. Regretfully. But she has to go, and never come back, because she’s married and she loves — well, she doesn’t love — either way, she has a husband, and she needs to go home to him.

So she mutters a soft “Goodbye,” and quickly exits the shop, not looking back at him as she steps out onto the streets. She resolves to put him and his coffee shop and his coffee-flavored kisses out of her mind, to go back to her usual place instead, as if she never stopped going.

* * *

When she gets home, her husband is still awake, going over various business reports in their bed. He knows she hates that, when he works where they’re supposed to sleep. But instead of picking an argument about it tonight, she starts undressing the moment she closes the bedroom door.

He looks up at her, surprised by the careless, uncharacteristic way she drops her blouse and skirt to the floor. “Are you feeling all right, dear?” he asks, just in time for her to cross to the bed in nothing but her bra and panties.

It’s not one of her sexiest sets, but she knows she looks damn good in this particular shade of turquoise, and it’s satin, not cotton at least. His eyes widen just the same, lingering on her cleavage (she smirks, knows exactly how well this bra lifts and pushes her breasts together), following the line of her torso.

“I’m fine,” she assures him, decides to leave her underwear on for him to remove, but she reaches back and unclasps her bra. Lets it slip down her arms and dangle from the fingertips of one hand, a teasing eyebrow arched at him as his tongue swipes at his lower lip. Then she’s pulling the papers from his lap, unceremoniously dumps them to the floor with her bra, before straddling him.

His hands fall to her hips, his head tilting back so he can look up at her. “Are you sure?” he murmurs, his voice going low, husky, and the way his accent thickens sends a shiver down her spine.

“Never better,” she mutters back, before she claims his mouth. He’s still shocked, she can tell, and that’s fair, considering how long it’s been since either one of them initiated like this. It takes him a moment to reciprocate her kiss, takes her tongue brushing against the seam of his lips before he returns it properly, his head tilting and his mouth opening for her.

Her tongue slides against his, tasting him, and she bites back a moan of disappointment. He tastes familiar, unsurprisingly, but not like what she wants to taste. She wants coffee and the faint taste of the sea, not brandy and the oddly smoky flavor her husband has always had, despite not smoking a day in his life.

Regina pulls away from his mouth then, kisses down his jaw instead, and tries to tell herself she shouldn’t be thinking about Killian’s lips when she’s on her husband’s lap like this. Should not be thinking about the things they could have done in that coffee shop, or maybe she would have let him take her back to his place. Maybe they would be in bed right now, like this, her hips grinding against his growing erection as her fingers make quick work of his shirt…

Iain tries to flip them, then, as she undoes the buttons on his pajama top but she resists, plants her hands firmly on his chest.

“No,” she tells him, the corners of her mouth tipping down into a frown as she looks down at him. “Like this.” Because this is how she would have taken Killian, she’s sure, she would have shoved him onto his back down on the floor of the shop, would have ridden him into the ground just to feel like she had some sort of control.

He scowls at her, and she knows how he likes to feel in control, especially whenever they’re intimate. She must have him feeling particularly off-kilter, starting this and then not letting him take her how he wants. Not that she’s usually submissive when they have sex — most times they’re too busy fighting each other tooth and nail, trying to force the other to submit and never quite succeeding — but she’s at least compliant when they’re not fighting.

“What if I want to taste you?” he says, but not with any real desire. It’s a bargaining chip, she knows, something he’s willing to do to get the upper hand. This sort of wheeling and dealing is all too common in their sexual escapades.

Regina almost relents anyway, because she loves a good round of oral, and she could imagine Killian easier with her husband’s head between her thighs. But no, she’s not supposed to be thinking about Killian, this isn’t about him, she just needs to fuck. Needs the release.

So she shakes her head, dives back in and kisses him harshly, hopes that’ll take his mind off taking the lead. She nips at his bottom lip for good measure, murmurs against his mouth, “I want you inside me,” and he moans, a soft and subtle sound that has lust shooting through her.

Iain’s hands slide from her hips then, trailing over her back and sides to her breasts, and this time, she’s the one moaning as he cups her, his thumbs and forefingers gripping her nipples and tugging on them roughly. He knows she likes a rougher touch, knows exactly how to rile her up, and he’s putting that knowledge to full use now as he kneads her breasts.

Her mouth falls away from his, her head falling back to her shoulders, her hips rocking and grinding. She’s beginning to slicken, can feel the wetness pooling between her thighs as she moves over him. His mouth seeks out her neck, his teeth scraping over the sensitive skin just under her fluttering pulse, drawing out another moan from her.

“Like that, Regina?” he whispers against her, punctuating it with a firm roll over her nipples, and she bites down hard on her lip to stop from giving him another sound of pleasure.

But he knows her too well, and he wants to hear her, isn’t willing to give up that much, so he shifts, his lips dragging down her collarbone to a breast, and she just manages to strangle the moan in her throat when he captures a nipple between his teeth.

She closes her eyes tight, one of her hands coming to hold his head to her chest, and fuck, it feels good, the way he sucks at her while his fingers work her other stiff peak. Killian flashes through her mind, and she imagines him doing this to her, with one arm wrapped around her waist to hold her in place, his only hand on one breast and his mouth on the other. The thought has her breath hitching, her nails scraping in Iain’s scalp as she grips him tighter to her, the rhythmic motion of her hips stuttering for a moment.

God, she can’t do this, can’t think of another man while she fucks her husband, but fuck, it’s not like he’ll know. So she pushes the guilt down deep, and lets her imagination run wild as she lets go of his head, no longer holding it to her breast so she can try to shove his pajama bottoms off. It takes a bit of maneuvering, Iain sliding down a bit so he can get leverage to lift his hips to help her, and he’s pulling her underwear off too, leaving them both naked. He takes initiative, drops his attention from her breasts to the apex of her thighs, and for a moment, she appreciates the way he looks at her.

Then he’s sliding a hand between her thighs, fingers trailing over sensitive skin before finding her wet folds. She doesn’t even care at the smirk he wears when he finds how slippery she is; it’s not for him, anyway.

“Mmm, so wet, Regina,” he murmurs, reaching up with his free hand to draw her into a kiss, just as he puts pressure on her clit, and she whines low in her throat, biting down hard on her lip to hold it in. He tsks, cups her cheek so his thumb can brush against her mouth, drawing out her lip. “None of that. Let me hear what I do to you.”

Except it’s not him, not even with that bedroom voice that goes straight to her core. It’s Killian, his fingers slipping inside of her right now, and his accent, God she bets he sounds so sexy in bed like this. Hopes he would talk to her, too, tell her how wet she feels just like Iain is right now, and fuck, she needs him to stop talking but needs him to keep going, too.

“Fuck,” she gasps, her hips rolling into his hand, and it’s a little awkward, but his thumb is working her clit, his fingers curling inside of her.

“Come for me,” he orders, fucking her faster now, his free hand moving from her hip to her breast, and oh, that might do it. Might be enough to pull her over, but she doesn’t want to, not yet.

She shakes her head, drops a hand to his thus far neglected cock, and she huffs a little laugh when he groans low in his throat. She’s really not been fair, letting him do all the touching, and so she takes him in hand and strokes, distracts him from his rhythm long enough to say, “Want this inside me when I come.”

God, how she wants to sink onto Killian’s cock, wants to clench and squeeze around it with him deep inside her.

Iain hesitates, pumps his fingers inside her and makes her shiver with his thumb rubbing circles over her clit, and she thinks he might refuse. He’ll do that sometimes, deny her the way she wants to come and makes her come his way instead, and she hates him for it. But then he pulls his fingers free, urges her over his cock, and then she’s taking him inside, gasping at the sensation.

For a moment, she doesn’t move, simply holds the position and digs her nails into his shoulders. She’s close, knows it won’t take much with how riled she is. Takes a deep breath and then starts moving, shuddering at how good it feels, and soon she’s taking him in hard, deep passes, the way she wants to fuck Killian, without any regard or concern for anything except her orgasm.

Beneath her, Iain grunts and groans, his hands gripping her hips, perhaps trying to still them or at least slow her pace, but she scowls, reaches down to take hold of his wrists and wrench them over his head, pinning them to the bedding as she takes his mouth with hers, a deep and passionate kiss that leaves her breathless, has her head spinning as pleasure burns hot through her body.

It doesn’t take long before she’s spiralling, her hips jerking, her rhythm beginning to falter as her orgasm sparks, catches into an inferno that explodes out from the center of her being. She cries out, the sound muffled by the way her mouth has gone slack against Iain’s, unable to maintain the kisses any longer, and then she’s sitting up, changing the angle and extending the ecstasy as he hits just right inside of her.

“Oh! God, Ki — ah!” she gasps, moans, her body trembling as pleasure recedes like a wave. Her hips slow to a stop, and she sags into Iain’s chest, sweaty and sated as his hands, now free from her own, seek out her hips again.

She moans when he fucks into her, continues his thrusting, seeking his own orgasm now. He follows her over soon after, almost silent as he spills into her.

They stay joined like that for several long moments, his hands on her hips still as she rests against his chest, catching their breaths and letting their heartbeats slow. It’s not until she rises off of him and stands that he says, “So what brought this on?”

She’s just gathered up her underwear and bra, is seeking out her skirt and blouse, when that makes her freeze. “What do you mean?” she asks, trying to not sound guarded, but her husband just raises his eyebrows at her. She’s not so sure she succeeded at sounding innocent, even as she adds, “A wife can’t have sex with her husband without some sort of reason?”

Iain simply stares, and fuck, she hates that. Hates it when he just stares at her, like she’s a goddamn child he can wait out, as if she’ll give herself up if he locks her in with his gaze long enough. Fortunately, she’s used to it, well equipped to handle something as penetrating as his stare, and she levels him with one of her own. Challenges him right back with a subtle arch of her eyebrow, the one she uses on students who show up late to her class.

He bends first, and she has to bite the inside of her cheek to stop her relieved exhale. “Of course, dearest,” he says, and Regina almost rolls her eyes at the nickname. He’s pouting, petulant over not getting his way, but she has — well, okay, she has plenty to hide from him right now.

But he doesn’t need to know that, definitely does not need to know that the thing that got her so randy was that she made out with a hot one-handed barista at her preferred coffee shop.

Feeling particularly victorious, she picks up her skirt and blouse so she can discard them properly, and heads off to the bathroom with a flippant, “I’m going to take a shower.” By the time she’s done, he’s put away his business reports and settled into bed, his bedside lamp off, and his back to her.

Regina climbs into bed and turns off her own lamp, sliding under the covers and turning away from him. No goodnight kiss, no words exchanged, but she’s not even surprised. This is their routine, and apparently not even a roll in the hay will change it.

* * *

Regina lasts all of a week in her resolve to not go back to Killian’s coffee shop. She returns to the place she had been going before she ever set foot there, and tells herself she doesn’t have to see him ever again. It’s not like they had been particularly close — he served her coffee, for God’s sake, they were hardly bosom buddies. There was an attraction, obviously, but it didn’t matter. She’s not some lovesick teenager, unable to go without seeing her crush (a crush she shouldn’t even have, because again, married, as if she could ever forget).

And yet, by the time a week has passed, she finds herself missing him. Missing the coffee shop. The one she had so enjoyed before she ever walked into his just feels wrong now, and she’s not sure how much that has to do with almost all of the baristas being student-aged, as opposed to the blue-eyed, dark-haired Brit who was closer in years to her. She shouldn’t want to go back there, should not put her marriage in jeopardy, but then again, it’s been a week, and in that week, she and Iain have shared maybe two entire conversations that weren’t complaints about work or Chinese for dinner?

The only thing that’s changed on that particular front is the amount of sex; she’s become almost insatiable in seven days, her sexual appetite for her husband seemingly increasing when really she’s almost always picturing another man when he’s inside her. Or if she’s not imagining Killian, she’s trying to convince herself she still wants her husband like this. Tries to put dark-haired baristas entirely out of her mind, and focuses on him, on that husky, Scottish-accented bedroom voice she loves, on the way he responds to her, and how he makes her feel.

Unsatisfied, mostly. Used, depending on how he reacts to her advances or he initiates.

Three days ago, he bent her over their kitchen island, fingerfucking her to a climax that had her knees shaking, but it had been almost perfunctory in its execution. He hadn’t kissed her lips, had turned her so she faced away from him. He hadn’t fucked her either, had pushed away her hands when she tried to see to his erection.

It left her feeling dirty, worse than kissing Killian did, and that’s a laugh riot. Making out with another man makes her feel less like a whore than being fucked by her husband. But it had been so detached, the way he looked at her, and gripped her wrists as she reached for his belt (and that was another factor; he had stayed dressed, had ripped open her blouse and pulled down her bra and shoved up her skirt, pushed her panties to the floor until they were around her ankles, but he was still composed, as if he hadn’t had three fingers buried inside of her), and told her No.

Perhaps that encounter is what drove her here, to the coffee shop she swore she wouldn’t return to. If she’s going to feel like trash, she might as well do it with someone she was attracted to. Someone she actually wanted to be with.

She walks into the shop with much more confidence that she feels, though the moment she sees how packed it is, she almost wishes she hadn’t bothered. She didn’t want her first time back to be with a huge audience, and she thought the later hour would spare her from too many people witnessing what could be an awkward reunion. But he’s hosting an amateur poetry reading night, of course, and it’s packed in all the wannabe poets from the English department. It’s only reinforcing that this was a mistake and she should go back to her house, to her husband, to hate-fucking and imagining something better.

But she’s here now, so she might as well get a damn coffee, and go over her lesson plans (the excuse she was going to use for being here). He’s not at the counter, thank God. She doesn’t want to see him yet, like this, with a crowd of people and her irritation flaring over how stupid she is.

By the time she’s gotten her black coffee (and gone a few rounds with the annoying barista that yes, she wants it black, just a coffee, nothing fancy, no she doesn’t want to try the latest substitute milk fad or whatever sweetener is now all the rage) and made it to a table, she has somehow managed to not see Killian even once. That feels a little like victory, though she’s not exactly sure what she’s been victorious over. As it is, she gets out her lesson plans and settles in to enjoy a bit of amateur poetry.

It’s not an awful experience, some of it’s actually good, but there’s an undercurrent of teenage rebellion that most of them still haven’t shaken. A kind of vanity that manages to eschew pretension and emulate it at the same time, and it’s to be expected, she’s sure. Most of them are young; she recognizes a handful of sophomores from one of her classes.

She doesn’t really look up at the small stage until she hears his voice. She’s not sure where he’s been all night, but suddenly he’s standing up there, speaking into the microphone, thanking everyone for coming and making the night such a success.

“Before I bring this night to a close, I thought I’d do a little reading of my own work,” he announces, and the crowd gives a politely enthusiastic round of applause, with some of the regulars whooping encouragement.

He looks good tonight, though Regina would be hard-pressed to come up with a time that he didn’t look good. But he’s wearing a blue, checkered button down and black skinny jeans, and a fedora, and all right, so he’s working hipster chic a little harder than even he usually does. But it fits him, especially on stage preparing to perform.

Then he opens his mouth, and ruins it all.

The poetry is… bad. Has her cringing the moment she hears it. She doesn’t fancy herself a critic, but even she can tell the rhythm is clunky, forced. It’s free verse, so no rhyme scheme, but it’s still clichéd, and riddled with turns of phrase that might have looked nice on paper, but make no damn sense when said aloud.

But the worst part is that it’s about her. She almost doesn’t notice at first, between all the coffee metaphors that are way too on the nose for someone who owns a coffee shop to make, but he mentions something about a queen, and her dark-roast eyes, and how she walked out of his life. It’s her, it has to be her, and she wants to die. Wants the floor to swallow her up, wants to run out the door and never come back like she said a week ago, but she can’t leave now. Everyone would see.

This was such a bad decision.

She sits there, mortified, head bowed as she stares unseeing at the papers before her, waiting for it to be over. She exhales heavily when he finishes, and there’s clapping, but more importantly, the sound of chairs scraping against the floor. She’s free.

Regina stands, keeps her head down as she gathers her stuff, and just as she’s about to bolt from her table, she hears, “Regina?”

Fuck.

She stills, squaring her shoulders, and deliberately turns around to look at the man she was trying to escape from. God, he looks even better up close like this, standing a respectable few feet away, but he gets pushed closer as people begin to filter past them. Swallowing around the lump in her throat, she manages a perfectly neutral, “Killian,” and pushes down the urge to fidget under his gaze.

He just stares a moment, taking her in, and that’s not helping her nerves. “It’s nice to see you,” he finally says, smiling softly, one corner of his mouth tipping up into this hopeful little grin.

“Surprise,” she grimaces, trying to make it teasing, casual, but she misses the mark quite a bit.

“A very nice one,” Killian assures, humoring her, and then he’s looking at her things gathered in her arms, the finished coffee mug on the table. “Were you leaving?”

She’s almost forgotten that yes, she was in the middle of making her escape. “Oh, um,” she stutters, mentally cursing her inability to keep her voice steady, “Yes, I was about to head home.”

“Oh. Is there any way I could convince you to stay? Just for a coffee,” he murmurs, and there’s that hope again, she can see it plain as day on his face.

“I don’t think that’s wise.” Regina is proud of the way her voice is firm, unwavering, but then he’s muttering a soft please.

“I miss talking to you, Regina,” he adds, and her mind flashes back to his poem, the one she knows without a doubt was about her, and then the memories of the last time they “talked” come flooding back. She wonders if his lips actually tastes as good as she remembers, or if distance and only kissing him the one time has enhanced it.

She thinks about Iain, who is most certainly not waiting up for her, though he might be awake when she gets home. He will be in bed, with his book, or in his office, going over some paperwork. He will ask how her day was, without any interest, and she will ask him about his with the same level of false enthusiasm, and maybe, they will fuck.

Maybe she will take him inside of her body and think about the man standing before her now instead.

None of that is what she wants, if she’s honest. What she wants is Killian, even now, even when she had convinced herself she could stay away. Even with his bad poetry about her still ringing in her ears.

“One coffee,” she agrees, a sly little smile of her own acting as a counterpoint to his beaming grin.

* * *

One coffee turns into two, turns into having a bagel, turns into hanging around as he prepares to lock up. They’ve talked this entire time, except when he had to go do his job, and now it’s just the two of them. She’s helping him move chairs and tables back into their proper alignment, instead of how they were gathered around the raised stage area for the poetry night. Despite what all they’ve talked about — and there has been plenty — they’ve avoided any mention at all about what happened the last time they found themselves alone in this coffee shop.

Regina’s honestly not sure what they’re doing. What she’s doing. She shouldn’t be here, certainly not alone with him, shouldn’t have come to this shop at all. She wants him, she knows that, and considering how she’s felt about her husband lately, she’s playing a dangerous game being in Killian’s presence.

She’s wiping down a table when Killian speaks, his back to her as he maneuvers a chair. “What made you come here tonight, Regina?” he asks, finally broaching the subject they’ve pointedly ignored all night.

It makes her freeze, has her anxiously chewing on her bottom lip even as he turns to face her, bright blue eyes and honest face, sincerely curious as he regards her.

She doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t want to tell him how she missed him because she’s been thinking of fucking him every time she fucks her husband. Or how her husband makes her feel alone, even when they’re lying in the same bed, naked and physically sated while emotionally she craves more.

#i'm alive!#i no longer remember how i tag anything anymore #don't mind me i'm just here posting unfinished fic #hi how is everyone #this place seems so alive #lowkey afraid the tumblr police are going to come for this post :/

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