when i go towards you it is with my whole life.

[heorte]

You came to the side of the bed and sat staring at me. Then you kissed me—I felt hot wax on my forehead. I wanted it to leave a mark: that’s how I knew I loved you. Because I wanted to be burned, stamped, to have something in the end— I drew the gown over my head; a red flush covered my face and shoulders. It will run its course, the course of fire, setting a cold coin on the forehead, between the eyes. You lay beside me; your hand moved over my face as though you had felt it also- you must have known, then, how I wanted you. We will always know that, you and I. The proof will be my body. — louise glück

Comments

[heorte]

It very nearly works. Ellis has long been in the habit of giving Wysteria most things she asks for, and that instinct coupled with the fact that he is not so much done with kissing her as he is drawing up short at the building pressure demanding more beyond that, sparks up a flinch of movement back towards her mouth.

His fingers stroke gently down her neck instead, as Ellis draws just slightly further back. Just enough to see, not enough to disturb her hands, more re-establish the space between them.

"I'll kiss you as long as you like," is not a hard thing to offer up. "But I think—I'd like to go slowly, beyond that."

This is perhaps too direct, but Ellis doesn't know how to talk around his intentions satisfactorily.

"And I need a minute. To breathe."

[heirring]

If she is disappointed to relinquish that space, no part of it shows in her face (visible now that they aren't cinched so close). She is flush, yes, but all fondness, and to breathe prompts a sudden, delighted burst of laughter from her. The hand in his hair softens and, turning her face, she plants a swift laughing kiss above the wrist of the hand he so gently traces her neck with.

"How pleasing to be dangerous in so many respects," she declares to the sky, and is still some measure of self-satisfied as she tips her face to look at him and say— "We may be as measured as you like, Ellis. I couldn't bear to exhaust you."

[heorte]

Yes, she is exceedingly dangerous. Ellis does not bother to reaffirm his agreement, or outline all the various ways in which Wysteria is a particular kind of menace. Instead, he ducks back in to kiss her, slowly and thoroughly. Despite all his claims of needing to catch his breath, he has enough for this.

"You," he says, softly against her mouth and painfully sincere. "You are perfect."

[heirring]

"The seems highly unlikely." She says it against his mouth, the opposite of an intimate whisper. There is a laugh in her voice still, clinging at the edges of that kiss no matter how slow or deliberately he has made it.

"But I love to hear you say it, so won't argue further. Now," she says, playing at serious in his arms. She gives his hair the smallest tug. "Kiss me just once more and try your best to be a little selfish about it. Then I will release you. Those are my terms."

put a bow on this y/n

[heorte]

Impossible, he wants to say.

But coaxed forward by the sweet, appealing lilt of her voice and the gentle tug at his hair, Ellis lets go of her hand. He cups her face, reclaiming the scant space set between them so he can kiss her again.

In terms of being a last kiss, it's likely not very helpful. Ellis kisses her deeply, fingers sliding into Wysteria's hair, tips her head slightly back though it's not strictly necessary. Laid side by side, their difference in height isn't important. It's only as close to selfish as Ellis can get. There's the sense of sinking into her, of wanting so badly to get closer despite already being drawn flush together. The kiss spins out, on and on and on, until Ellis nips very lightly at her lower lip, and draws back enough to speak.

"There," is breathed out, his hands gentling and drifting to the nape of her neck. "Did that fulfill our bargain?

Yyy

[heirring]

What is she expecting? Truthfully, she doesn't quite know. Something slow and firm, maybe. Sturdy and patient in that way he has which is not to humor her, but certainly a kind of indulgence. Even the press of fingers shifting into her hair isn't unexpected but—

But the way he tilts her chin up and this, how he absorbs the space they'd remade and fills it completely, is. There is a thrill in it that catches her breath. That becomes the most pleasant ache. The tangle of her fingers in his hair becomes a pressing thing, and between them where her other hand is at liberty she finds some unexamined grip on him. His side. The fabric of his damp tunic is easily clutched there.

The brief catch of teeth elicits the softest sound from her as he draws back. For a moment, her face remains tilted up—something heated and heavy through the whole of her—and her initial noise of protest is a formless, thoughtless thing. And brief, as a moment later she recalls her terms enough to regret them.

"Oh." Her hands on him come grudgingly undone. "Yes. I suppose it ought to."

And then, in a burst of lively self inflicted agony: "—Oh, how terrible! You must promise to never listen to me again, Ellis. And certainly never to make any other agreement with me!"

She thumps him in the shoulder for good measure before managing to both extricate herself and collapse dramatically onto her back in the clover.

(Which is, really, the best version of a last kiss she could have possibly contrived.)

coolcool yell your wishes at me for a new thing into discord and i will grant them

[heorte]

There is a fleeting urge to follow her down, bracket her face with his hands and kiss her again, and again, and again.

Instead, Ellis lands on his back, head returned to the saddlebag, and reminds himself of all the reasons he'd said it would be the last to balance out how very badly he had wanted to continue on. Across the crushed bed of clover, his hand steals into hers.

And, true to form, there's a stretch of quiet in answer. Ellis' grin remains even as the deep rise and fall of his chest evens out. Eventually, he kisses her knuckles.

"Come along," is so, so fond. Ellis is levering himself up already, drawing her by the hand with him. "We should start our ride back, before it gets dark and cold."

Before they are tempted to stay. The pleasure of being sun-warmed and slightly damp will go with the sun, and Ellis wants to hold onto it, ride back with the sun on their faces.

It's a good day. He wants it fixed in his mind as such.