hi! my name is shelby (30s, she/her) and I like to relax by making up stories about mel and frank from the pitt.
I keep my stuff pretty locked down, so please do not repost any of my fics anywhere else. I want my fics to live only where I put them :)
I always work to rate and tag my fics appropriately, as well as warn for common triggers, so please take care (and let me know if I've missed something important).
while this blog is overwhelmingly pitt and kingdon-focused, this is my only blog so I do occasionally reblog and talk about other things (random photography, other film/tv, literature, etc.)
please feel free to hop into my askbox, anon or not, with any thoughts you might have. love y'all!
so i was inspired by @miracle-and-wonder's post yesterday, and decided to make a kingdon-specific (but can be modified for other/general fandoms too!) ao3 reading tracker.
free to use + mod how ever you like
remember to make a copy (file -> make a copy) to edit
png credit, inspo credit, and color codes are on the please read page
i tried to include a wide range of additional tags (general and kingdon specific), but you can add your own by editing the data validation rules
have fun, and please remember to not post your own fic ratings publicly where the authors can see it ! if you must rate fics like published books, do so in a private spreadsheet or in a private ao3 bookmark that is only visible to you !
Sex scene as character study is so good. What is your relationship to your body? What is your relationship to your partner? What lessons have you absorbed from the culture about yourself as a sexual being? How much do you have to trust someone before being comfortable with intimacy? What fears and insecurities come to the fore for you when you take your clothes off? It's so good.
How do they communicate? How do they expect others to communicate? How well do they understand their body and their own capacity for pleasure? What do they tend to do to make their partner feel comfortable? How comfortable are they showing emotion in front of others? How much insight do they have into what their own emotions mean and are connected to? What are they focused on during the encounter? How conscious are they of exchanges of power and vulnerability? very very very good
Love your stories but can’t quite get into the latest one: have you watched Season 2? That man is soft-dom’ing her all over the place.
I don't necessarily see him as particularly submissive in canon, it was just something I wanted to explore. I do think that there were moments in s2 (when they were working on the boat propeller injury, Frank's desire to be ~good at recovery~, his reaction to Robby telling him he did a nice job on the cervical reduction and the way he was clearly looking for approval for most of the day) that can lend themselves to a more submissive interpretation of his character.
Regardless, my favorite thing about writing fanfiction is taking a character out of canon and putting them in a place where they might make different decisions or have different aspects of their personality come out. This is kinda the same thing I feel about when people argue that Mel would never cheat. Even if she probably wouldn't on the show, what situation might she be in that would push her to make that choice? Just how bad would her loneliness have to get before she decided to do something selfish?
And so, what parts of Frank might mean that he would really enjoy being submissive? I think he likes being good at the things he's told to do and then being told that he's good at those things. I think he likes giving people what they need. That's what I tried to focus on.
"What would you ask me for," he said, "if you knew that I would give it to you?" He didn’t mean for it to sound so overtly sexual, but she was looking down at him on the floor in front of her and he was burning from the inside out, so he said it the same way he would if he were actively trying to seduce her, slow and low and pointed.
He watched her lips part and her eyes widen. She was always so expressive, he loved that about her, he loved that he could always tell exactly what she was thinking. Come on, say it. Just ask me. “It can be anything, Mel. I’ll give it to you.”
Mel needs to practice asking for the things she needs and Frank has an itch that needs scratching.
explicit | 7.2k words | complete | written for @sub-langdon-fest
mel king x frank langdon | 3.1k | mature | lotr-themed fluff
tags: established relationship; slight soft-domming; referenced sexual content
(written for the always-wonderful @mateo-diaz for her birthday! love you maur, hope you're having a great day!!!)
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Across from him, Mel stopped eating.
It took Frank a few seconds to notice; he was too focused on the big plate of lasagna in front of him. It took two days to make, and he thought it was something he could use to impress Mel. She was a picky eater, but spaghetti was one of her favorite meals, and plus: Frank liked a challenge.
She told him it was delicious after the first couple of bites, so when he stopped hearing her fork scrape against the plate, his eyes shot up. He found her staring at him, mouth slightly open, eyes narrowed.
“Hey, you okay?” Frank asked. “Is there something wrong? Weird spice? Too much ricotta?”
“What do you mean you’ve never seen Lord of the Rings?”
“What?” he asked back flatly.
“Just now,” Mel explained. “You said that you’ve never seen Lord of the Rings. Is that true?”
“Uh, yeah,” Frank stammered out, placing his own fork down beside his plate. “Is that… is that a problem?”
Their relationship was new, something that both terrified Frank and made him feel like he was a teenager again. It officially started three months ago, shortly after he accepted an offer to become a new attending physician in the ED. By that point, the King sisters had engrained themselves in his life so fully he had a hard time remembering what it was like before then, before that terrible Fourth of July when Becca had her UTI, and Mel had her deposition, and the two of them were fighting worse than they ever had before.
On the day of the job offer, he was supposed to meet Mel at the thrift store. She had just purchased a new set of barstools for her apartment after Frank pointed out that her old ones could barely hold her weight, let alone his. It was a warm day in March, and he drove over in his Subaru since they wouldn’t fit in Mel’s car.
All he remembered was how excited he was to tell her. She’d become the person he wanted to tell everything to. His first text in the morning, the reason why he spent all winter taking photos of dogs wearing sweaters on his morning runs, his emergency contact after he finally updated his home address once the divorce got finalized.
Frank asked her to dinner a week later. A date, he’d clarified, just to make sure she understood. A real one. He’d kissed her on the sidewalk after he walked her home, and once Mel was safely inside her apartment, Frank knew that he wanted it to be the last first kiss of his entire life.
However, as he stared at the incredulous face of his girlfriend, Frank questioned if he was about to be kicked to the curb.
“How?” Mel demanded.
“I don’t know,” he responded lamely. “I didn’t really go to the movies a lot as a kid. My mom thought it was too expensive.”
“But you’re not a kid anymore,” Mel argued. “What about when you were in college?”
Frank laughed. “Mel, I played football; we were not watching movies with elves and dwarves on the weekends.”
“What about the books?”
“They have books?”
Mel made a little noise of distress and put her head into her hands. An alarm bell went off in Frank’s head, and in an instant, went to crouch by her side.
“Hey, hey hey hey,” he said gently, his hand ghosting over her arm in case she didn’t want him touching her. “What’s going on? Is this about the movie?”
“Movies,” Mel corrected with a groan. “You didn’t even know that.”
“Movies, sorry,” he replied quickly, “but is it really just that? How I haven’t seen them?”
Mel moved her hands away, looking down to meet his eyes. “Well, no,” she admitted, fiddling with the hem of her shirt. “But kind of. They were my favorite movies growing up. My dad used to watch them with me, and he gave me his old set of the books when I read them for the first time. The problem’s always been that Becca doesn’t like them.”
“I see,” Frank nodded, understanding completely.
“I thought when Becca moved into Middle Hill I would have more chances to watch them, but if you don’t like them, then I can’t do that since I don’t want to make you watch something you don’t like.” Mel stated the whole thing like it was a fact, but Frank’s eyebrows pulled together.
“But Mel, baby,” he asked, now reaching up to take her hand in his, “how do you know I don’t like them if I’ve never seen them?”
Mel’s eyes narrowed, her lips parting. “I don’t,” she said tentatively, and Frank swore he could see the gears in her head turning.
“If you want to do it, I would love to watch The Lord of the Rings with you,” he told her enthusiastically. “It’s something that means a lot, and I want to share that with you.”
With that, all the sadness left her face.
“You mean it?” she asked, breaking into a smile.
“Of course! Let’s finish eating because having dinner is very important.” They were still working on making sure Mel ate real food three times a day. “After though, we can start up the first one if you want?”
“Oh no!” Mel shook her head, looking quite offended. “No, it’s already almost nine, and the extended edition of Fellowship is almost four hours.”
“Four hours?!” Frank thought he could hear his jaw hit the ground, but Mel continued on.
“We have to make time for it, and oh!” Her hands flew up to her mouth in excitement. “Sunday! We both have Sunday off!”
“Okay,” he laughed, rubbing her knee affectionately. He loved when she got like his, when her cheeks were round and pink and he could feel the buzz coming off her skin. “We can definitely find four hours to watch on Sunday.”
“Actually, there’s a way I’ve always wanted to watch them,” she said. “You do it all in one day, and you make a bunch of food that fits into the Hobbit schedule: breakfast, second breakfast, elevenses, all those.”
“Sure,” Frank replied, not knowing anything she was talking about. “If that’s what you want to do, we can make it happen.”
“No, I want to do this for you,” Mel insisted. “I’ll go to the store and buy all the things and prep them; you just need to sit on the couch and let the magic happen to you for all eleven hours. Sound good?”
Frank attempted to process the concept of watching movies for eleven hours straight, but then Mel leaned down and kissed him, and he stopped thinking about anything at all.
*
*
*
After their shift on Saturday, Frank drove them both to the grocery store for Mel’s big shopping trip. She had a list a mile long, more food for one day than Mel usually had around for a whole week. He thought it was a bit overambitious considering he’d seen her try to cook for the two of them — four when Becca and Adam came over — but she was so excited that Frank couldn’t bring himself to say anything and simply pushed the rapidly filling cart behind her.
Mel’s plan lived inside a very elaborate Excel sheet that she had been working on all week. The two of them were to wake up bright and early Sunday morning and immediately start Fellowship of the Ring while Mel set up granola and yogurt to go with their tea and coffee. While that was going on, the oven would be prepped for an elaborate French toast bake. Their third meal would consist of cheese, meats, and crackers followed by potato soup for lunch when they started The Two Towers. Following afternoon tea and cookies, Mel wanted to take the time to make a whole pot pie for the two of them with a chocolate cake for “supper.”
“I feel like I’m cheating,” she told Frank in the check-out line, “but I don’t think we need to have two big meals like that back to back.”
“Considering we’re about to consume five-thousand calories each, I don’t think any part of this is cheating,” Frank responded with a laugh, but Mel still frowned.
“I want to do this the right way,” she said sternly. “You deserve the best experience for this.”
Frank wrapped an arm around her waist as the cashier loaded a third bag into their cart. “The best experience is just going to be watching with you,” he reminded her. “Anything else is just a bonus.”
That still didn’t make the worry-lines in her forehead go away, and when they got home, Mel went straight into the kitchen. Frank stayed nearby offering help that she refused in turn. She was determined to do it all herself, cube every piece of bread for the French toast, dice every potato that would be soup. The only time she took Frank up on his help was to break down the rotisserie chicken that would go in the pot pie, but only because the process grossed her out so much. It was well after midnight and Frank was dozing on the couch when Mel came back into the living room covered in flour and declared prep to be done. Groggily, Frank sat up and followed Mel into her bedroom.
The first time Mel slept with Frank – really slept, no funny business – she was out for seven hours straight, something she claimed she hadn’t done since high school. She said it was due to how exhausted she was, coming off days of back-to-back shifts. The issue with that theory was that it kept happening. When Frank stayed at his own apartment, Mel would fall back into her old ways and clock three or four hours of uneasy rest, but the second Mel rested her head against his chest, she would be fast asleep.
The night before their Lord of The Rings marathon was no different.
Frank woke to a loud yelp from the other side of the bed. He opened his eyes to find Mel sitting upright, her hand covering her mouth.
“I overslept!” she cried out. “I forgot to set an alarm, and it’s after nine!”
Frank rolled to his side, and the big red numbers on Mel’s clock showed that she was right. It was 9:08, two hours after Mel was supposed to wake them up for breakfast and the first movie.
“No no no no.” Mel repeated as she pushed off the blankets and darted for the door. Frank rubbed his eyes a few times before throwing on a shirt and following her out into the living room. He found Mel in the kitchen, his apron over her pajamas, frantically preheating the oven.
“Okay, you go get the movie started,” she called over her shoulder, sprinting back over to the fridge. “I can have first breakfast out right now.”
“Mel,” Frank stated, trying to get her attention with no use.
“It’ll take a little while to get second breakfast up, but what I can do is combine it with elevenses,” she pressed on.
“Mel,” Frank cut in again. He moved around the counter to where she was filling her arms with bowls and spoons from her cabinet.
“We can do soup with tea, but just have a late dinner when we start Return of the King, and then I think– ”
“Mel.” Frank stepped right in front of her path. She almost dropped the bowls, spoons, yogurt and honey in her arms as her eyebrows shot up. “Let’s take a breath here, alright?”
He held his hands out, and dutifully, Mel transferred some of the items over to him.
“What’s going on with all of this?” he asked gently, placing the bowls on the counter before turning back to her, crossing his arms.
“We overslept!” she repeated, flinging out one of her arms wide. “We’re behind schedule for today by almost half of one of the movies! We need to start right now if we have any chance of finishing today!”
“Okay.” Frank gave a nod. “Why is it important that we do all of them today?”
“So we can do all the meals!” Mel answered. “This is supposed to be the ultimate way to watch the movies, and it’s your first time.”
“That’s true,” Frank said, and that’s when it started clicking. He liked solving problems with Mel like this, asking her questions until he could sort through the details for the thing that was really bothering her. “But why does that matter? You didn’t watch them like this for the first time, and you’re a huge fan.”
“Right, but I care about you, and I wanted you to have the perfect experience.”
Ding ding ding. Jackpot.
Frank took the rest of the things from her arm, setting down the big container of vanilla yogurt and jar of strawberry jam before taking her by the hand and leading her over to the stools on the other side, the same ones he picked up for her months ago. He let her sit down first, holding her hand the whole time.
“Mel,” he started, meeting her eyes, “do you remember when we had sex for the first time?”
“What?” Mel’s spine went straight, her cheeks starting to redden.
“When we had sex for the first time,” Frank repeated. “Do you remember what happened?”
The blush on Mel’s face spread to her ears, and her eyes darted over to her couch by the window.
“Let me refresh your memory,” Frank grinned. “It was our third date. We planned it during our second date after which we made out in my car for twenty minutes. We went to the movies, and we had a large popcorn and two cherry ICEEs and your tongue was bright red all night.
“You invited me inside because I think you said you wanted to give me a book or something?” Frank questioned as Mel smiled, remembering the easy lie she told to get him in her apartment. “I ended up turning on some rerun on TV, and you brought out two cans of ginger ale that neither one of us touched because the second you sat down, I couldn’t keep my hands off you.”
Frank knew it wasn’t one of his finer moments, but seeing Mel with her hair down, her lips still artificially red, and wearing a sweatshirt she got at the Smithsonian last year was too much for him. He remembered pulling her into his lap, letting his mind go blank as he wound his fingers into her hair, pressing his tongue against the seam of her lips.
“I’ll spare you the details,” he said, but he could tell Mel was thinking about them too. Fumbling for the buttons on the other’s jeans, their shirts thrown on the ground. Mel telling him about her virginity, her IUD, and Frank’s response that he was okay with both. He remembered the groan he couldn’t silence when he pushed inside of her, how tight she was, the way her thighs quivered as they settled into a comfortable rhythm. Mel tipped her head back over the arm of the couch when she came, and Frank leaned over to kiss her when he did the same.
“What does that have to do with us watching the Lord of the Rings?” Mel asked after a beat. She nervously tucked her hair behind her ears, shoulders creeping up.
“Because – believe it or not – half-dressed on the couch was not the way I wanted to have sex with you the first time,” he told her. “And I’m sure that’s not how you ever saw yourself losing your virginity, right?”
“Well, no,” Mel shook her head, “but it didn’t matter. It was perfect.”
“Exactly.” Frank gave a big smile and cupped her face with his hand. “Sweetheart, I wanted to take you out to a nice dinner, bring you back to my place, light some candles, and really do the whole thing right, but that’s not what happened.
“Instead, what happened was even better that I could have imagined all because it was you,” he said finally, holding her gaze firm with his. “We could have had sex in the car, in a king-sized bed in a five-star hotel, right here on the counter, it all would have been perfect, and these movies are the same way. Any way we watch them is going to be perfect because I get to watch them with you.”
In an instant, Mel’s eyes started to well up. A tear started running down her cheek, and Frank brushed it away with his thumb. Her hands went to his neck, and she pulled him in for a damp, sloppy kiss.
“I love you so much,” she said when she pulled back, her voice thick and weepy. “I’m sorry for all this… mess.”
“It’s not mess,” Frank told her sincerely. “You did such a great job prepping everything. We’ll make it through what we can today, and freeze the rest for later. Right now, all I want to do is start the first movie and have a great breakfast with you, okay?”
Mel nodded and kissed him again, and then the two of them got to work. The French toast went into the oven while they had their tea and coffee on the couch wrapped up under a blanket. They paused the movie to leisurely fill their plates and mugs and then return, eating off the coffee table while Mel ran through every fun fact she knew with each scene.
“Do you want to do The Two Towers today or wait until we have another day off?” Mel asked him once the movie was over. They were going around stacking their dirty cups and plates together from rounds of breakfast and snacks.
“Let’s save it for another day,” Frank answered. “We can set aside the time for it, make more snacks, turn it into another little date for us.”
That made Mel smile and she gave him a quick kiss. “You liked it, right? They’re such good movies.”
“Of course,” he said back. “I’m already looking forward to the second one.”
Another kiss before Mel skipped into the kitchen with their dirty dishes, her hair swinging behind her.
Truth be told, Frank thought the movie was fine. A fun fantasy, but he wasn’t at Mel’s level of enthusiasm, nor did he want to be.
However, Frank thoroughly enjoyed their morning of cuddling, of listening to Mel talk about this thing she loved, of her face lighting up with excitement. That was his favorite part, and something he could easily watch for eleven hours a hundred times in a row. Frank would always look forward to seeing her like that, spending more time with her, getting to know her as they settled into their forever one perfect step at a time.
post s2 finale, explicit, 1.3k
not technically mutual masturbation but spiritually mutual masturbation
The closed cervical reduction had gone well.
Mel just wishes she had been in the room for it - instead she'd been finishing up her charts, thinking about the way she doesn’t know her sister as well as she thought she did and about the deposition that went so terribly and about the way she doesn’t even know what she’s doing all of this for, sometimes, but what else could she be doing?
She'd asked around for details about the reduction and felt a happy buzz whenever someone indulged her. Then Frank had found her in the ambulance bay later and she asked him about it, too.
It was his first day back and she hadn’t been expecting him - he’d come in on short notice, which was only disappointing in that she'd planned for his first day back. She'd picked out an outfit, a nice jacket with embroidery along the collar that she'd bought especially and her mother's small pearl earrings. She'd even considered borrowing some of Becca’s nice eyeliner, if she could figure out how to apply it in time.
Instead he came back to her as she usually is.
She doesn't actually care. She'd been so happy to see him that the outfit hadn't crossed her mind until she was driving home.
He'd held his hand out to her that night, palm down and fingers spread, to show her the way it was trembling. It was slight, a fine tremor that reminded her of her favorite setting on the vibrator she uses maybe once every six months, gentle and barely there.
She'd almost reached out and taken his hand. She wonders what he would have done if she had.
Now she's laying in bed, thinking about Frank Langdon as usual, and she's proud of him. She can't remember if she told him that, if she used those words. She'll make sure to tell him later.
Abby's still out when he gets in, somewhere watching fireworks with their kids that should have gone to bed hours ago. Frank assumes she’s avoiding him in the same way he was doing everything in his power to extend his shift and put off coming home.
He looks at his right hand under the warm spray of his shower.
It’s steadier now, but still shakes a little when he thinks of the closed cervical reduction, or the conversation he had with Robby, or with Santos, or - Mel.
He wasn't sure why he’d shown her, except that she was there and interested and the whole thing made him feel something close to giddy for the first time in months.
She'd looked at his hand and he'd watched her face as she’d thought one thing and then another and then asked him to teach her.
He wants to know what the first thing was.
Mel rolls onto her side. Then her back. Then she gives up and digs around in the bottom drawer of her nightstand, kicking off her panties and sleep shorts as soon as she finds what she’s looking for.
She presses the vibrator to her entrance, circling slowly as she eases it inside, bit by bit, and tries to keep her mind blank - this usually works, not making it about a person but just about the feeling.
But tonight she can’t stop thinking about the tremor in Frank's hand.
She closes her eyes.
Frank reaches out and turns the heat up when he’s been in the shower so long that the water begins to go cold.
He thinks about the way Mel had smiled at him. She had asked him to teach her.
He wraps one hand around himself and presses the other flat against the tile.
It’s so inappropriate. He’s trying to save his marriage, he really is, and this woman just wants professional guidance from him, some nice, mentorly advice. Fuck.
He lets himself go there.
She's not even really focusing on the thought of it, it just keeps coming to her. Frank's fingers, shaking inside of her, pressing and curling and gentle.
She thinks about what she should have done out there, craning her neck to watch the fireworks with him. Imagines reaching out and just -
Holding his hand still. Covering it with both of hers. Just to say I see you, I have you, you're okay. She imagines the trembling would have stopped. Or maybe it wouldn't have, maybe it would get worse, jerky and surprised and unsure, and that would have been nice too.
She’s wet and buzzing around the vibrator.
She pulls her feet up, flat on the bed, knees bent, to get a better angle.
The way it would go, Frank thinks - the teaching, that lesson she'd asked for - he'd stand behind her as she laid out on a bed in front of him. He’d have to stand behind her, that's how you do it. He’d put his hands on her neck and press down gently in the right spot, to demonstrate.
She'd be tense at first, but eager. She’d pay close attention. She’d close her eyes - he knows exactly what expression she’d have on her face.
He'd lean in and say something low near her ear. Feel how firm my grip is. You feel that?
His hand slides faster.
He thinks about her head tipping back slightly, her back arching. He thinks about how he'd have to lean in closer to maintain the position, his face over hers, watching, and his hands on her neck. She'd feel how still his hands were. She'd know he was steady, for her. He'd be so careful not to hurt her.
I've got you, he'd say. I’m not going to hurt you, I’m not going to do anything. I just want you to feel where my hands are.
He slides his entire forearm against the tile now, and presses his forehead against it for balance. He groans through gritted teeth.
Mel doesn't mean to but she makes a loud sound.
She's thinking about his hands - just his hands - and then she’s thinking about the soft way he talks to her (only her, as if she wouldn’t notice that) - you’re a sensitive person, I need you - and her mind runs it all together and gives her something new that makes her whine.
She imagines that his hand is inside her and he’s talking, saying something - she doesn’t know, something reassuring and sweet. I’ve got you, she imagines him whispering. I’ve got you.
That's what does it. Her whole body tenses and shakes and she gasps.
Frank imagines the ways her body might move when she’s close. Her squirmy physicality that she probably thinks he doesn’t notice but he can’t help thinking must carry over into bed.
He thinks about her biting her lips, trying to be quiet, but whimpering through it anyway.
He thinks about her voice saying his name, Frank, not Langdon, the way he’s going to ask her to address him the next time he sees her, when he offers her his phone number and tells her to text him anytime.
Mel pulls out the vibrator and flips over onto her side when she comes, her hips pumping and her hands and feet flexing and the thought of Frank just murmuring shh into her ear, stroking her hair. I’ve got you.
Frank shouts her name when he comes. It’s a surprise - he’d thought he had more in him, but when he runs his thumb over the head of his cock he thinks about Mel looking up at him with her eyes wide and her mouth open and her pink tongue sticking out and he comes so hard it brings him down to his knees, hitting the tile floor with a loud thump that he’s going to feel in his back later.
Mel falls asleep quickly after that, even though there’s an uncomfortable wet spot on her sheets now, even though she doesn’t bother to pull her panties and sleep shorts back on.
Abby and the kids are still gone when he gets out of the shower. They must be at her parents for the night. She should have told him, and they’ll fight about it later, but it’s actually fine - better for the both of them if he can sleep alone tonight.
It’s weird. It’s a totally involuntary twitch, some sort of reflex, because that name - Melissa King - tugs at something small and malformed in the back of his mind.
He can’t even get a good look at her. From where he stands he can just see the slim line of her shoulders and, briefly, when she turns, the soft profile of her face. It’s a quick but full-feeling impression, almost like he already knows her and can fill in the gaps.
He can picture her so clearly. He knows the shape of her eyebrows and the exact upturn of her nose. The freckles on her naked back. Her thighs, soft and so sensitive. Give him a pen and paper and he thinks he could sketch every inch of her.
Oh, right, it feels like - Mel. There you are.
There's something strange about Mel King. Frank is the only one who seems to notice.
