Lincoln Woods

itxwillpass :

Lincoln didn’t know the details, he didn’t know how Bellamy had died and, for the longest time after they had first met, he didn’t even know that he was dead. It wasn’t until he had made a comment, one about wanting to meet her brother, that he learned of his death. After that he made sure to steer clear of the subject.

Maybe that was why it was so easy for him to forget about it, to not take into account the possibility that moving from her apartment and into his would be a difficult process. Lincoln’s hold on Octavia tightened as she spoke and he nodded slightly in response. “I know you do,” was all that he could say. What else was there to say? He couldn’t bring Bellamy back for her (even if he wanted to) and he had a feeling that any comforting words he might have to offer would only be ones that she had heard many times before.

Instead, he let the silence wash over them for a few minutes, his arm securely around her as he waited for the small hiccups to fade away. Only then did he speak again, only then did he ask “Do you want me to help you with this room?”

Her hiccups faded and her body calmed, breathing becoming easier as the moments ticked by (ones measured by the gentle click of the old-fashioned clock Bellamy always kept on his bedside table, a clock that still sat there, counting time, long after Bellamy’s time was up). The jacket was still clenched in her hands and Octavia wasn’t rushing to let it go. She allowed the moment to go quiet until Lincoln chose to speak up. There wasn’t much he could say, especially since she had heard it all before then. What words he did find, though, came in a comforting offering. One that Octavia didn’t find herself refusing.

Instead, she sat up and took a deep breath, wiping any residual tears, ones that had already dried against her skin, from her cheeks. Then, she nodded. “I didn’t think it would be this hard, but… I always just thought… you know, if I left it alone, he’d come back. Maybe he’d just walk through the door after his night shift and crawl into bed for hours. If everything was the same, it was like he could still be here,” Octavia admitted with a slight, guilty shrug. “Clearly that’s freaking ridiculous. I probably sound like a nutjob.”

It didn’t sound ridiculous, not really. To Lincoln it sounded exactly like what she had to have been feeling: grief. To him it sounded like a way that she learned to cope with the overwhelming sadness of losing her older brother, and more than that it made sense. He could understand what she meant, as much as he could having not suffered a loss like she had.

Lincoln pushed her away from his body, holding her out at arms length so that he could look down at her more properly. “You don’t, I get it.” He told her, his hand moving to cup her face, his thumb swiping across her cheekbone. “We have plenty of room for his stuff. He.....won't come back, but maybe it will help with the adjustment, of moving in."

He pulled her back in, strong arms looping around her body. He wondered if, maybe one day, she would be able to talk about her brother, to tell him about him. Lincoln had a feeling that he would have liked him.

Despite her expectations, the air never grew thick with confusion around them. Instead, Lincoln’s arms pulled her closer and he voiced reassurances in an understanding tone. Octavia hadn’t said much about her brother in the past. Even as she found herself falling for the man she didn’t hesitate to tuck herself against, Octavia never found herself opening up to him about Bellamy, just small little mentions of things here and there, ones she supposed he put together and used to figure out the gist of what was going on. His comfort was welcomed, nonetheless, and she found her breathing calming into small, soft hiccups and her tears slowing, fading against the material she held between her cheek and Lincoln’s shoulder.

“It’s not…,” Octavia began, but found herself trailing off, unable to express what she had hoped to say in words - or, maybe, just unsure of what she wanted to say in the first place. Eventually, she sighed and closed her eyes. “I miss him.” And she did. Only having lost Bellamy a few months ago, everything had been hard for her. From learning to pay the bills on her own (and doing everything she could to actually do so) to learning how to live on her own, without her brother who had always been her other half, the comforting voice to come home to at night, her home when they had nowhere to go. Things were hard without Bellamy and she knew it would get easier as time went on, but now? Having to pack up his stuff and move on, because he truly wasn’t going to just walk through the door at any moment, that was the hardest thing of all.

Packing had turned into an all day thing, not that he minded; he would rather get all of her things packed up and taken back to his place in one day’s time rather than over the course of two or three. He wanted her to feel completely moved into his apartment, wanted her to feel like she belonged, like it was her apartment as much as it was his and Elodie’s.

Lincoln wanted her to feel at home.

That was why they had decided to split up on the packing (well, that and he hadn’t wanted to intrude and help pack up what he had found out to be Octavia’s brother’s room). He had parted ways with her in the hallway, carrying boxes into Octavia’s room and quickly beginning to pack the items into the various boxes, his mind wandering as he did so.

Him and Octavia had told Elodie the good news that morning when she came running into the room to wake them up. Thrilled was an understatement for how she had acted and the memory of it brought a smile to hid face. The little girl had been bouncing up and down, talking about how much fun her and Octavia would have. She hand been talking nonstop even as they drove her over to Anya’s and, while she had wanted to join them in the packing, Lincoln had convinced her to stay with Anya with the promise that they would do something special with her when they had finished.

Octavia’s room hadn’t taken too long to pack up (the most stuff had come from her closet) and when he had finished he arranged the boxes in the corner or the room before leaving the room. He took the few steps down the hall to the room that he had seen Octavia vanish into. The door was cracked and he pushed it opened as he spoke.

“I finished packing up yo-”

Lincoln stopped mid sentence, frowning at what he saw. She was sitting on the floor, a half filled box sat beside her and a worn jacket in her hands. “… . .Octavia?” He asked, stepping closer towards her. “What’s wrong?”

Telling Elodie had been the easiest part of the process and arguably the most enjoyable too. The little girl was beyond thrilled when Lincoln broke the news to her that morning after she came bounding into the room to wake them up, as usual. The smile that stayed on her face until they dropped her off at Anya’s almost helped Octavia forget about just what packing up her apartment would entail.

Almost.

She hadn’t expected it to be an all day thing. In fact, Octavia owned so little that she hadn’t even expected it to be a half-day thing. She thought they would have everything packed up and be back in time to make dinner with Elodie. Instead, they were still in her apartment, the late afternoon sun ticking past the open blinds, and they definitely weren’t going to make it back in time for dinner. Not like she felt up to eating any time soon.

The idea to split up to maximize their packing efficiency came up and Octavia didn’t find herself arguing against it. Instead, she nodded, grabbed a few boxes, and suggested that Lincoln start throwing the clothes from her closet into the box left with him. There wasn’t much in her room, and since all of it was moving with her, she didn’t care how he packed it.

What she did care about was the room across the hall, door shut until the moment she stepped into it with two boxes in her hands. Everything was dusty and she resisted the urge to sneeze, an urge she had to contain every time she found her way into the room to curl up on her brother’s bed. Octavia started with the dust-heavy areas first, tossing clothes that Bellamy had grown out of long before he died into a box she’d give away later, stacking sweatpants onto a pile at the end of the bed to give to Lincoln. Putting the books and other trinkets Bellamy had laying around in his room wasn’t easy, but she didn’t find herself unable to do it. It wasn’t as bad as she expected.

Then, she came across his favorite jacket, tossed over his desk chair haphazardly. If Octavia pressed her nose against it just right and closed her eyes, she could feel his arms around her, feel the kiss he would always press to her temple before leaving for work. It smelled like cheap cologne and stupid heroism. It smelled like Bellamy. And with her face pressed against the material desperately, came the tears, so thick and heavy she felt herself choking on them as they spilled over her cheeks.

A new presence addressed her and Octavia buried her face closer to the material of the jacket, as though it would make her tears clear up and her feelings stop. It didn’t and Lincoln’s questions went unanswered, swallowed by heavy sobs and silence.

Lincoln took a breath and stepped further into the room where Octavia was holding the jacket to her face. The sight was heartbreaking for him, to see Octavia breaking down the way that she was? He hated it and yet … . . He wasn’t entirely sure if he could do anything to ease the pain that she had to be feeling (it didn’t take him long to connect the jacket and the room with being the reason that she was crying).

He moved beside Octavia, his arm going to settle around her shoulders as he pulled her into him. “It’s okay,” he told her, his voice a quiet whisper as he pressed his lips to the side of her head, trying to lessen the pain that she felt.

He knew that it wouldn't be easy. He hadn’t thought about how moving in with him would mean that Octavia would be leaving the place that she had shared with her brother. He hadn’t thought about how she might find it troubling to pack up her brother's things, to clean out his room.

Maybe he should have kept that in mind. This couldn't be easy for her, and seeing her so upset? It wasn’t easy for him, either.

"We can put his stuff in our apartment," he told her, not moving to take the jacket away from Octavia. "Anywhere you want. Just because you're moving in, it doesn't mean that you have to store his things away, okay?"

His apartment was going to be her apartment, their apartment. Lincoln wantes Octavia to feel as though that were true. If that meant having Bellamy's things around the apartment? Well, that wasn’t going to bother Lincoln.

Packing had turned into an all day thing, not that he minded; he would rather get all of her things packed up and taken back to his place in one day's time rather than over the course of two or three. He wanted her to feel completely moved into his apartment, wanted her to feel like she belonged, like it was her apartment as much as it was his and Elodie's.

Lincoln wanted her to feel at home.

That was why they had decided to split up on the packing (well, that and he hadn’t wanted to intrude and help pack up what he had found out to be Octavia's brother's room). He had parted ways with her in the hallway, carrying boxes into Octavia's room and quickly beginning to pack the items into the various boxes, his mind wandering as he did so.

Him and Octavia had told Elodie the good news that morning when she came running into the room to wake them up. Thrilled was an understatement for how she had acted and the memory of it brought a smile to hid face. The little girl had been bouncing up and down, talking about how much fun her and Octavia would have. She hand been talking nonstop even as they drove her over to Anya's and, while she had wanted to join them in the packing, Lincoln had convinced her to stay with Anya with the promise that they would do something special with her when they had finished.

Octavia's room hadn't taken too long to pack up (the most stuff had come from her closet) and when he had finished he arranged the boxes in the corner or the room before leaving the room. He took the few steps down the hall to the room that he had seen Octavia vanish into. The door was cracked and he pushed it opened as he spoke.

"I finished packing up yo-"

Lincoln stopped mid sentence, frowning at what he saw. She was sitting on the floor, a half filled box sat beside her and a worn jacket in her hands. ". . . . .Octavia?" He asked, stepping closer towards her. "What's wrong?"

Octavia listened to the girl repeat the phrase over and over. If she concentrated hard enough, she could almost hear herself, voice wavering less and less each time she said it. She didn’t dare think about a time when the phrase would stop working for Elodie, when she would be left to find other ways to get rid of her monsters, just as Octavia had turned to drugs to slay her demons. If she could help it, nothing would ever taint the small girl in her arms.

Elodie didn’t hesitate in exclaiming to Lincoln just how much she wasn’t afraid, just how much she was like her. Octavia didn’t have the guts to admit that she was still very much afraid.

When her gaze finally fell on the man beside them, her chest tightened. He was still blissfully unaware of her own coping mechanisms when it came to her demons - and agreeing to move in, telling him she loved him, holding Elodie close to them in the middle of the night like she was more theirs instead of just his, that all put the uncovering of her secret habit in the spot to destroy everything.

Octavia subconsciously tucked Elodie closer, letting the comfort of the girl’s tiny braveness seep into her as well. She and Lincoln were still dressed, minus a shirt on his part, but she found herself willing to sleep in jeans for the entire night just so she wouldn’t have to let go of them. Not yet, at least. Maybe it would be better for everyone if she did eventually though? No - she wouldn’t. Octavia knew she’d never be able to let them go. Whatever mess eventually came, she’d deal with it when it did.

“Got that, daddy,” She teased softly through the darkness as Elodie tucked herself closer and let her hand trail to the stubble covering Lincoln’s cheek. “She’s gonna protect us tonight.”’ It was rare that he ever actually let it grow out, but when he did, Elodie always found the texture soothing. The little girl’s eyelids opened and closed a few times, opening less and less each time until Octavia was sure she had finally fallen asleep.

Looking at Octavia and Elodie just then, the way that Elodie clung to Octavia and fell asleep curled between the two of them, it was easy for him to forget that Octavia hadn’t been in their lives for even a year yet. The way that they all three piled into the bed together, it seemed like she had been in their lives forever, that Elodie wasn’t just his child. Octavia had taken to the little girl so quickly that he found that he had to remind himself more than once that Elodie was not their child.

Not that he would mind if she were, or if (if they ever got to be physical again without interruption) Octavia fell pregnant. Especially when she teased him, calling him ‘daddy’. It earned an amused look tossed in her direction and Lincoln quickly pushed the idea of a pregnant Octavia out of his mind.

He would be okay with that, but he didn’t need it. Not now, not yet.

He had Octavia and he had Elodie and, if things continued on the path that that they were on, Lincoln had a suspicion that Octavia would end up falling deeper into the mother role for Elodie.

He let little fingers rub against his stubble and his arm moved to drape across both of the girl in the bed with him. His own fingers brushed against Octavia’s shoulder, running up and down her arm soothingly.

Octavia knew Elodie was trying to be strong, even as the girl move ever so closer and insisted on staying with them anyway, she had to commend her on trying. It all reminded her of those nights she would find herself crawling into Bellamy’s bed, their mom absent from her own (not like she was ever present), afraid of the demons that lay beneath her bed, waiting. Bellamy would hold her near and tell her how to slay them, explaining sometimes that it was a line their mom used to tell them, but Octavia was too young when she would to remember it.

Instead, the way Bellamy told her in the middle of the night, stuck and she wrapped her one arm loosely around Elodie, fingers gliding gently up and down the tiny girl’s back for comfort.

“I did. All the time,” She found herself admitting without really thinking at all, but when she did, she remembered her own monsters too. They called them demons, and they often came in the form of all-too-close police sirens and children who just didn’t show up to school one day and yelling and screaming coming from each side of their apartment building and down the street and below their window. The demons followed them everywhere and they had often guided Octavia to her brother’s bed in fear.

She knew Elodie wasn’t afraid of those kinds of monsters, though. How could she be when she had, thankfully, never been exposed to them? But monsters and demons were similar and fear was still fear. “Sometimes, when you’re afraid, you just have to close your eyes and tell yourself that you are not afraid. If you can tell yourself that when you’re awake, you won’t ever have to worry about fearing your monsters when you’re asleep.”

Lincoln watched the way that Octavia spoke to Elodie, the way that she reassured the little girl that she used to get scared just like she did. Elodie seemed to be hanging on every word that the older girl said to her, and so was Lincoln. It was interesting to see someone other than himself have the ability to soothe his daughter after she woke up from a nightmare. It wasn't something that happened too often.

Elodie nodded against Octavia at what she said. "I am not afraid. I am not afraid. I am not afraid. I am not afraid.” her voice was quiet, wavering with some fear still. She took a deep breath and looked up to Octavia, repeating the words once again. “I am not afraid.”

Lincoln smiled at the two of them, and Elodie’s face brightened the more she repeated the simple phrase that Octavia had given to her. It seemed to be working and when she looked over to Lincoln, he raised an eyebrow.

“The monsters can’t get me, daddy, because I am not afraid. Just like Octavia,” Lincoln nodded.

“You’re right. They aren’t going to get you. But I’m going to keep you in here so that you can keep the monsters away from me, okay?” He knew from experience that once the little girl had a nightmare that she would continue to wake up if she were in bed alone. This gave him a way to prevent that while making Elodie seem brave. It worked, because the little girl soon nodded seriously towards her father.

“Don’t worry, daddy - - “ a yawn interrupted her. “ - - I’ll protect you tonight.”

The sound of the bedroom door creaking open had Octavia’s head tilting back, an irony-filled laugh tumbling from her lips as Lincoln retrieved his hand from her pants. The loss of contact was missed and she had to resist the urge to chase it as the door opened fully and revealed Elodie, shadowed by the hallway light behind her. “Sure you don’t wanna move in with me instead?” She teased as Lincoln settled beside her.

She could only be so upset that the situation hadn’t gone where her body had expected it to, especially when Elodie hovered just inside of the door, lips in a pout as she tiredly explained why she was there. Usually she had a habit of interrupting them in the mornings, when the sun was out, and they made the mistake of expecting her to sleep just that little bit longer. Now, though, the little girl was seeking out their safe haven because of a nightmare, a fear of the monsters, and her heart melted, mind no longer hazy with lingering want.

Elodie crawled between them and voiced her concerns and Octavia nodded in agreement with what Lincoln told her. There wouldn’t be a day where she’d let any monsters touch the sweet little girl, wouldn’t be a day where she’d let the badness of the world seep through innocent eyes and ruin the world for her.

Octavia’s hand soothed over mussed up hair and she spoke. “Monsters aren’t going to get any of us, Ella-Bee. They’re all afraid of warriors like us, like you. Even if they tried, your daddy and I wouldn’t let anything get to you, ever.”

Elodie’s (and Lincoln’s) attention turned towards Octavia as she spoke and soon Elodie was moving closer Octavia, big eyes turned up to look at her. Lincoln could tell that his daughter trusted what Octavia was saying, and that was pleasing to him. She had never turned to anyone other than him for comfort after a nightmare- even Anya who had been around since the day that she was born. To see her turning to Octavia instead of him? It only added to the growing list of things that told him asking Octavia to move in had been the right choice.

“Okay. . . . .” Elodie trailed off, hesitantly. “But I still want to sleep in here,” she paused, glancing over towards Lincoln. “Just in case.” A small smile formed on Lincoln’s lips at that; she was still scared, but she was trying her best to hide it. He pulled the blankets around Elodie who had settled in against Octavia and leaned over to press a kiss to her forehead.

“Of course you can.”

Elodie seemed to relax at that, and then she was turning her gaze back to Octavia, her lower lips still pushed out just the slightest. “Did you ever get scared that the monsters would get you?” she asked, her tone curious. Lincoln knew what she wanted to hear; Since meeting Octavia that first time the little girl had grown to admire her. She wanted to be like her.

She wanted to know that Octavia had fears when she was little, just like Elodie did now.

It didn’t matter that Lincoln hadn’t replied, because the kiss he responded with and the hand tugging her down the wall, into the room they had been unofficially sharing for the past few weeks, said it all. Octavia didn’t need much more reassurance. Sure, everything still seemed too good to be true, like a dream she had never been told she could dream, but after seeing that room, the pictures of their memories that sat neatly on the dresser, it was both too good to be true and a complete reality.

And Octavia had a feeling that wasn’t going to be fading anytime soon.

She remembered Clarke saying once that reality sucks. Up until this moment, she had agreed with her. Reality was why she lost her brother. Reality was why she grew up on frozen chicken nuggets and oatmeal. Reality was why she was working in a strip club in the first place. But those realities led her here, to this one, to meeting Lincoln and Elodie and starting this life she had never counted on.

In this moment, Octavia couldn’t disagree with Clarke more.

Lips were moving against each other and once Lincoln’s hand slid up her shirt, her back pressed into the thick mattress beneath them, she sighed contently into his mouth, her own hand moving to grip the hem of his shirt before tugging it up. She didn’t break the kiss though, not yet, not until his shirt had risen all it would rise without breaking it and then Octavia only allowed them to stay separated for just a moment, long enough to lose the shirt, before she was back on his lips.

From beneath him, she made quick work of pulling the blanket over their bodies. Even with her fully dressed and Lincoln still in pants, and their luck supposedly looking up that night, they never knew just when they’d get a tiny visitor.

It was part of the reason why Octavia burned on, the passion between them growing each minute with the heated air around them, both a combination of the late September weather, the emotional night they experienced, and the lack of connection they had been able to steal in this way since the first time. Her hands didn’t hesitate before skimming down his now shirtless top, smoothing over muscles and tanned skin until they reached his waistband and she used a particularly distracting kiss as leverage to pull his hips down onto hers, grinding upward for maximum affect. It was a mystery how they both had survived so long without the other.

His fingers splayed across the soft skin of stomach as he deepened the kiss much further. He wouldn’t break the contact this time, not until she did first- which seemed like it came all too soon for his liking. He was rewarded, however, with the movement of her hips grinding upwards enough to illicit a low groan from him before he was breaking the contact of their lips once more.

Although they never left Octavia completely.

Instead, his lips moved to graze across her jawline, down to her neck, and finally along her collarbone as his fingers slipped teasingly beneath the waistband enough to ghost teasingly just above her clit. He never got the chance to go any further than that (even despite the way that his body had reacted to her grinding up on him) because, like most nights they tried to do anything remotely physical, the sound of the doorknob turning pulled Lincoln’s attention away from Octavia.

“Daddy. . . . .” came the sleepy voice of a little girl who had just entered the room and was rubbing tiredly at one of her eyes. Lincoln withdrew his fingers from Octavia’s pants and pushed himself off of her, propping himself up on his elbow. “What’s wrong, baby girl?”

At that, Elodie’s bottom lip jutted out. “I had a bad dream. Can I sleep with you and ‘Tavia tonight?”

Lincoln frowned, shifting so that he could motion for her to come further in the room as he nodded. He wasn’t going to tell her no and he had a suspicion that Octavia wouldn’t mind having the little girl in the bed with them (even if it did derail any plans of continuing what they had started). Elodie moved towards the bed, pulling herself up into the bed and crawling between him and Octavia.

“I don’t want the monsters to get me,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Lincoln shook his head. “They won’t get you Elodie, not with me and Octavia here.”

“But what if they do?” she asked, looking between the two of them. “What if they get you first and then me?” Elodie sniffed sadly at the thought of that.

The last thing Octavia wanted Lincoln to do was pull away from the kiss, and yet, he did just that. Eventually, it dawned on her why. They were standing in the middle of the living room, with a view from the hallway where any tiny head could peak around the corner. Even though their kiss was purely innocent at the moment, Octavia wasn’t looking to keep that way for long. So far, the night had provided her with a new home, a safe place in Lincoln, the confidence to put her feelings into words… maybe they’d get lucky and avoid any interruptions that night too?

His hand found hers and their fingers fit together naturally, the closest thing to perfection she has found in her young life, and it wasn’t near enough connection Octavia wanted, it was enough to get her to follow him down the hallway, flicking off the lights on the walls as they went. The hallway light, however, stayed on (per Elodie’s request, just in case she needed to find her way to Lincoln’s room - their room, now - in the middle of the night) and she was so focused on following him to their room, she almost walked straight into him when he stopped in front of the spare room.

The door was opened and what once held boxes and other items that had no use around the house, now held a bed and a dresser and drawings with uneven lines and random colors. Octavia looked to him, hesitantly with her bottom lip pulled between her teeth, before she released his hand and stepped into the room. Even with the bareness, lacking the personal vibe a bedroom usually had, this room felt more lived-in than the one she had at her apartment.

Her feet led her around the room and her fingers skimmed over the pictures, drawn by Elodie and muddled with crayon indents and marker bleeds. She could make out herself in some of them, along with Elodie, and the addition of Lincoln in a few. Her heart melted and she had to blink a few times before the tears that threatened to escape actually did so.

Despite her efforts, Octavia couldn’t prevent one from rolling from the corner of her cheek, dropping quickly from her chin, when her gaze fell on the photographs lining the dresser. Some were of the three of them, silly selfies and a photobooth picture they had taken during their impromptu trip to Chuck E. Cheese’s. Some were just of her and Lincoln, most taken at crooked angles and with blurred edges that only a camera person who’s four-years-old could manage. Then, there were the ones of her and Elodie; cuddled on the couch after they fell asleep early during movie night, intent coloring on the floor of Elodie’s room, so many more moments that she hadn’t even realized Lincoln had captured.

She only wiped her cheek, already dried and tear long gone, after she was done gazing over the photos, and lingered just a second longer before making her way back to Lincoln, pulling him down for another kiss, deep but more passionate than sexual, a silent thank you that she couldn’t put into words. “It’s beautiful.”

Lincoln hadn’t been sure what he was expecting to happen when Octavia saw the room, but it didn’t matter because Octavia’s reaction? He could almost feel his heart melting at the way that she moved in the room. Him and Elodie hadn’t done too much in the room- drawings done by Elodie lined the walls and pictures placed in simple frames adorned the top of the dresser, but Octavia seemed to love it.

He leaned against the door frame as he watched her trail her fingers across the pictures Elodie had drawn and he watched as she looked over the captured moments. She looked in awe of everything, and it pleased him. He wanted Octavia to feel like this was her home too, because it was. Even before she had officially agreed to move into the apartment with him and Elodie, he had always felt like she was supposed to be there.

Having it just be official was nice.

Lincoln lowered his head easily to capture her lips and was disappointed when she pulled away. He didn’t respond to her words, instead he pulled her back into a kiss, a small one that ended quickly, and then he was taking her hand and leading her further down the hall and to the room that they had been sleeping in.

He had barely pulled her into the room and shut the door behind them before his lips were moving against hers again, one hand moving to the small of her back, the other resting beneath her shirt and on her hip bone. He kept his lips on hers as he moved them back towards the bed and he lowered her onto it.

Tonight seemed to be going well. He had high hopes that the lucky streak would only continue as he let his hand move further up beneath her shirt.

He didn’t say the words back, not at first, but Octavia didn’t mind. She didn’t say what she did with the intent on hearing them back, she said them because she felt like she could, because they were running through her veins, slamming against her heart, begging to be said before it was too late. They were just words and she knew, even in knowing Lincoln for just a few months and being intimate with him for a lesser amount of time, that they didn’t need words to explain how they felt, that actions and fleeting glances and touches worked just as well to get their message across.

You’re my home. I belong with you.

Love was always so subjective anyway. At one point, Octavia had been thoroughly convinced that she had loved Atom - and what a joke that was. However, Atom was never her home, she never felt like she belonged with him. With Lincoln, it was different, but those three words were the only way she knew how to express what she was feeling vocally, and she wanted Lincoln to know, without question, how she felt.

When he took her chin, lifted her eyes to his, and questioned her with a simple confirmation, she nodded reassuringly and accepted the lips he pressed against hers. Then, Lincoln pulled back, resting his forehead against hers, and he returned the words anyway. Octavia let her gaze lift, for just a moment, and saw the stars align in his eyes.

She had never been one to believe in the fates of the stars. She had been read enough mythology as a kid to know that most of the constellations were just people shoved into the sky, locked in place, never allowed to return to Earth. Octavia knew what it felt like, to be trapped. How can someone look at such trapped souls and see beauty? How is Lincoln able to look at her and see love? The sincerity of the moment hung in the air, floating around them, and in acknowledgement of his response, Octavia slid her hands to his front to cup his jaw, leaning onto her toes to capture his lips in another kiss.

Lincoln didn’t pull away from this kiss, instead he let his hands fall back to a position on her waist, tugging her in closer. He hadn’t expected for those words to be exchanged for a much longer time (certainly not before they had even defined what they were) but he didn’t care. There was something there between the two of them and three little words weren’t going to change that. He would be hard pressed to believe that anything could ever change that. Not with the way he had grown so comfortable with Octavia.

He wanted to keep her safe, to be there for her, and she was letting him. It made him happy that she was allowing him to do so, and it showed in the way that his lips moved against hers, soft and gentle yet full of emotion.

Too soon he felt himself pulling away from the kiss and he ached to press his lips against hers once more, to feel the softness that her lips provided. But standing in the living room when Elodie could wake and make her way out of her room at any given moment? It wasn’t the ideal place to be kissing Octavia the way that he wanted to be kissing her.

His hands dropped from her waist and he reached for her hand, waiting until their fingers tangled together before leading her down the hallway. This time, two doors were opened- his room and the one he had made up for Octavia. For a moment he hesitated before stopping in front of the room he made up for Octavia. “This is the spare room. Elodie and I fixed it up for you, in case you wanted a space of your own.” He glanced down at her briefly. “You don’t have to use it, though. I prefer sharing my room with you, anyways.”

The feel of Lincoln in her arms was great, but the feeling of being held in his arms too? Even better. Octavia allowed herself a moment to soak it all in, face pressed against the material of his shirt, fingers clutching lightly at the fabric against his back, a gentle kiss pressed to the top of her head followed by what felt like forever of silence. Comfortable, soft silence. For once, she found no worries inside of her mind.

Lincoln was the kind of man who made you wonder what you ever did to deserve him. It’s exactly the kind of wondering Octavia did every time they had a moment like this, a few seconds to relish in each others presence. Even if they wouldn’t be in an apartment where you couldn’t hear anything in the silence of the night or a part of the town where you needed nothing but one lock on the door, she knew she’d still feel safe in Lincoln’s grasp.

By the time the man tucked his chin on top of her head, fitting against her like he was carved with her in mind, and spoke, Octavia was already lost in thought. She thought about the last words she had said to Bellamy, as he rushed out of the door with a half-eaten hot pocket in his hand, late for his night shift patrol. They weren’t the words she should have said, the words she would have said if she could go back and do that night over. Then again, if she could go back and do the night over, Octavia wasn’t so sure she’d leave him walk out of the door in the first place.

But she knew, above all, she’d change the words she said to him.

The strong heartbeat against the skin of her temple caused her own heart to beat in sync and Octavia decided that she never wanted to let that happen again. She never wanted to leave something unspoken, to hold something in just because it always went unsaid or because it was too soon. Any time could be the last time you see someone, and Octavia didn’t want to get to one of those times without Lincoln knowing how she felt.

So, he spoke, asked her a question she honestly didn’t catch a word of, and she responded in a mumbled reply that wasn’t really an answer at all. “I love you.”

Lincoln was expecting Octavia to speak, but what he wasn’t expecting? He wasn’t expecting what she said. I love you. The words echoed in his ears and for a moment, he wasn’t sure what to say. It wasn’t that hearing her say those three words put him off, or that they scared him. In fact, they made sense. They had fallen into such an easy routine with each other, had gotten so close in such little time.

Hell, he had just asked her to move into his apartment.

The words she said. . . . .they made him feel good. More than good. They made him feel great, and so he pulled back, his arms dropping from around Octavia and his hands settling on her shoulders. He wore a soft smile as he looked at her. “Yeah?” Lincoln asked, one hand moving to her chin, tilting her head up so that he could see her eyes before he close the space between them and pressed a small kiss to Octavia’s lips.

When he broke the kiss, it was only to respond to what she had said. To tell her that he felt the same way, because he did. He had to. That was the only way to describe how infatuated he was was with this girl, right? Love; it had to be. Even if he couldn’t recall the last time that he said those words to anyone other than Elodie and Anya, and even then it wasn’t the same love.

He had never told Elodie’s mother that he loved her, and he never regretted that. What he had had with her had been quick and rushed. It had been a one night stand resulting in a pregnancy that Lincoln stuck around for. Maybe he could have loved her, but he was never given the chance to find out before she was slipping away when a week old baby slept in the nursery that had been set up in Lincoln’s apartment.

He was glad, though. If he had he wouldn’t have been able to get to know Octavia like this, and knowing her? It had made his life better already. “I love you, Octavia.”

Lincoln dropped her hand as soon as they were through the doorway, presumably to take of his jacket, but Octavia couldn’t help but miss the contact. It wasn’t something she needed, she had lived for months without any contact outside of work. There was something about Lincoln that made her ache for the contact, though, want it, even if she didn’t need it. Still, Maya was standing and talking to her and Octavia let her arms cross in front of her chest, eyeing the book in the girl’s hands.

Bellamy would have gotten along with her, she could tell.

She smiled at the mention of Elodie, a little girl who wasn’t hers but felt more and more so each day. Moving in permanently would only increase that feeling, and while some might be anxious at that idea, Octavia found herself more looking forward to the future than anything. “I’m more than excited, too,” She responded politely, smile still lingering on her lips.

Her head nodded and she offered her goodbyes as Maya made her way to leave, waiting for the door to shut to move to turn the single lock that safeguarded the door from the outside world and slipped off her boots by the door. Then, Octavia shed her jacket and tossed it on top of Lincoln’s on the chair before padding her way to the man who stood just a few feet away from her, arms wrapping around his waist as her forehead buried against his chest.

Octavia wasn’t sure if it had been a long day, or a good day, or something in between, but that didn’t stop the need she felt to have Lincoln near her, to hear his heart beating against his chest, to remind herself of what home really means and what it had come to mean for her recently.

He stood by the chair, a picture that Elodie must have recently drawn sitting close by and his eyes focused on it. She was such a happy little girl, and the drawings that she frequently produced showed that (especially since lately the drawings began to feature Lincoln and Octavia with her). He picked the picture up and moved it to the counter before Octavia was coming towards him.

Lincoln’s arms fell around Octavia’s small frame when she wrapped her arms around him, pressing a gentle kiss to her head before letting his chin rest on top of Octavia’s head as he tightened his hold on her. He didn’t question why she was hugging him, he didn’t want to. Maybe because he wanted his arms around her as much as she wanted hers to be around him.

Having this girl in his arms had quickly become one of his favorite feelings.

Before long, though, Lincoln was breaking the silence that had settled around the two of them, to ask a simple question. “Did you want to go lay down, or stay out here for awhile?” His voice kept a quiet tone, even though he knew them talking wouldn’t wake his daughter up. She was, for the most part, a heavy sleeper.

The thought of Elodie had her softly smiling the entire journey home, responding to Lincoln’s casual conversation (as though asking her to move in with him was as normal as anything else) as they drove, but ultimately falling back into thoughts on the little girl who would be sleeping when they got home. Home. Octavia was never really sure she belonged anywhere. With Lincoln and Elodie though? With them, she had the first real taste of belonging somewhere, and she had a feeling that was kind of what home was supposed to feel like.

Lincoln’s question came to an end as the car did, both stopping and waiting for her. Everything had been so unexpected, Octavia hadn’t even had a chance to realize that moving in with him would mean packing the things in her apartment into boxes. She tried to think about that, her whole life, the only things she’s ever known, packed away into a few boxes. There was no doubt that most of her stuff would be left or tossed to someone in the apartment building who needed a springy couch or dresser that was probably older than Verna, the lady who used to check in on Bellamy and her to make sure they were still alive when their mom went missing for a few days.

Some of her more personal items would fit into two, three boxes tops. Octavia never really desired much and had shared so many things with her brother, she never really had much of her own to begin with.

But, there were things she wasn’t sure should go into boxes - and yet, things she wasn’t sure she could toss to someone else in the building either. Things that had once belonged to Bellamy, things that still would belong to him if he hadn’t… The bubble of anger Octavia often felt when she thought of her brother and how he died and how he just left her rose familiarly in her stomach and she willed it back down, tamed it with the prospect of spending the night with Lincoln and seeing Elodie in the morning and not having to worry about said things for awhile.

Octavia wasn’t sure when he wanted her to completely move in, but she knew it’d be a process.

Finally, her door opened and she ducked out of the car, making sure to press a kiss to Lincoln’s cheek for the gesture. She had so much on her mind, opening the car door was the last thought she had. But an important one, nonetheless, especially if she expected to curl up in bed with Lincoln’s arms around her any time soon. “Thank you,” Octavia spoke softly, waiting for him to lock the car before they could make their way up to his apartment.

The softness of her lips against his cheeks, even so shortly, felt nicer than they usually did. Maybe it was because she had just agreed to move into his apartment with him and Elodie and he was running on a high from that, but either way, he was happy and he hadn’t yet considered the possibility of the room with the closed door being difficult for Octavia to leave.

Lincoln locked the car doors and took Octavia’s hand again, leading her into the apartment complex and up to the his apartment. Maya was there when he unlocked the single lock and pushed the door opened, a book in her hands. She looked up, a smile on her lips as she greeted both Lincoln and Octavia.

“Elodie couldn’t stop talking about you tonight, Octavia. She told me all about your plans with her in the morning. I think it’s safe to say that she is more than excited.” Lincoln dropped Octavia’s hand and put his keys on the counter, shrugging his jacket off and hanging it over the back of a chair as Maya stood up to gather her things.

Lincoln was glad to hear that; he could only imagine how excited his daughter would be when she came running into the room to wake the two of them up and they told her that Octavia would be moving in.

It would be a great morning.

Maya moved to the door, offering them each goodbyes before she slipped out of the apartment, leaving the two of them alone.

Octavia should have expected this. Everything was going too great for it not to happen. Plus, they had finally had sex - wasn’t that all guys ever wanted from girls like her? But… Lincoln hadn’t seemed like any other guy she had met (minus Monty, who lived across the hall from Lincoln and was possibly the sweetest cinnamon roll she’d ever met). He had seemed the exact opposite really. All good things come to an end though, they had to. How else would bad things have room to grow and flourish?

And her life had been nothing but bad, so she would know.

It was alright, she’d be alright. Maybe not in that moment, though. Not with the hot tears already pricking at the backs of her eyelids and her heart sinking and sinking until she wasn’t quite sure it was even in her body anymore. Octavia knew she shouldn’t have gotten attached, but she couldn’t help it. Lincoln was sweet. Elodie was sweet. Together, they had been everything she had never tried to look for because she knew she’d never find it. But she had found it - and of course, now it was gone.

She should have expected this.

But she didn’t.

Octavia also hadn’t expected the response that came from Lincoln, either. Two for two, she was going great today. He had taken her hand back in his and just when she had prepared herself for the final blow, the nice guy let down, the ‘we can still be friends’, he asked her to move in with him instead. Wait, what? She hadn’t collected her sinking heart, yet, and she found she didn’t have time to because instead of waiting for her to answer, he continued nervously before trailing off with a shrug.

It was a gesture that told her he was completely, one-hundred percent sincere. “You want me to…,” Her voice trailed off, filled with disbelief and curiosity. She wanted to ask him to repeat himself, to make sure she heard him correctly, but her mind had already wandered. Octavia thought about her apartment, how she hated going back there every night before she met Lincoln and how that hate only doubled after she met him. She thought about the room with the Always Closed Door and the rats who scurried through her walls and only ever ate the good Cheez-Its she splurged on. She thought about the worn couch and the five locks on her door and she nodded.

“Okay,” Octavia finally agreed - simply. Even if they weren’t officially dating, even if they did end with the nice guy let down in the future, he was offering her a way out of the hell hole she had grown up in, and she wasn’t going to say no.

It seemed like she took forever to finally give him an answer, and in the time he had resigned himself to thinking that she would say no, that she didn’t want to move in. He could deal with that, yeah, he could deal with it even if he found himself really wanting her to say say. . . . .

And then she answered.

And the answer that she gave was exactly the one that he wanted to hear.

The smile returned to his lips and he nodded. “Good, great,” he told her, happiness coloring his tone as he tugged on her hand, gently, guiding her towards the car. He let go of her hand so that he could move around the driver’s side, sliding into the seat and starting the car. Once she was in, he looked over at her, a crooked smile dancing on his lips. “Elodie is going to be thrilled.”

Lincoln began to drive, taking the familiar route back to his apartment and making small conversation on the drive there. “We can bring your stuff over whenever you’re ready.”

It was one of the last things that he said before pulling into the parking lot and turning the car off. Then he was getting out of the car, moving around to the opposite side to pull the door opened for her. He was excited; Octavia was going to move in with him and Elodie. Who knew what doors that would open up for the two of them?

Octavia nodded, already looking forward to spending the next morning with Elodie. In the months since she had started spending time with Lincoln, she and the little girl had become close, and she found herself falling for the girl just as fast as she was falling for the little girl’s dad. They had quickly taken a spot in her heart that had recently been left empty, one that she never thought she would fill again.

She watched him finish up his job at the bar, cleaning what was probably the only clean surface in Polis to begin with. A shiver coursed through her and she willed herself not to think of the things she was forced to touch each night and instead focused on Lincoln and the view he provided her as he tossed the rag beneath the bar and stepped outside of the box that held him the entire night. Octavia may be biased, but she thought he looked even better outside of it.

Her hand took his as he nodded toward the back door and she tangled their fingers together, the feeling of his skin on hers made her heart skip a beat. She never pictured her life ending up like this, going home with a hand in someone else’s, going home to something, to a home - at least, to something that felt like a home. It wasn’t her home, but was home really a place anyway? If she had to answer a question about where her home was, her answer would definitely not be her apartment.

Her answer might just be Lincoln and Elodie, though, and her heart skipped a few more beats at that.

Then, it stopped completely.

I wanted to talk to you about something.

The smile that had once lit up her face swiftly faded away, replacing the curve of her lips with a frown. She stopped the pace they had set and let her hand fall from his. “Here it is,” Octavia mumbled, a sad look on her face. She knew what this conversation was, so she explained. “The ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ talk, right? I guess it had to happen eventually.” Of course, how had she expected to live in this dream much longer?

Lincoln let his thumb brush across the back of her hand as their fingers twisted together. It was so easy to fall into this with Octavia, like it was just something that was supposed to happen, like it was meant to be.

It was a great feeling.

Except, their fingers being tangled together? It didn’t last long because almost as soon as Lincoln had gotten the words out, Octavia was pulling her hand from his. Well, this was a great start to a question that should have caused happiness. His smile turned into a deep frown, his brow creasing in confusion as she spoke.

She thought. . . . .She thought that he was ending what they had? He shook his head, his hand reaching out to take hers once more. “Octavia, no. That isn’t what I wanted to talk to you about. In fact, that is pretty much the opposite of what I was wanting to talk to you about.”

Lincoln let a breath of air leave him as he focused on her, keeping her hand in his for as long as she would let him. “I wanted to ask you if you wanted to move in with me,” he said, waiting a beat (certainly not long enough for her to be able to answer him) before continuing. “I figured. . . . .you spend enough time at my place as it is, and Elodie adores you. You don’t have to if you don’t want to. I cleaned the spare room out, too, in case you wanted your own space- not that I’m complaining about sharing my room with you. I just thought-” Lincoln cut himself off with a shrug, letting the question hang for her to answer.

If the sight of Lincoln from the back had caught her interest, the view of Lincoln from the front had her grin growing even wider. It wasn’t even a sexual interest at the moment, even though she wouldn’t say no to sneaking in some heavy fondling in the back of his car because Octavia has no doubt if they start anything when they fall into bed, Elodie will find her way to them, her timing always impeccable. The grin was caused by something more than just sexual, something that had said grin reaching her heart, pulling the strings, making it dance to a rhythm both she and Lincoln seemed to be in tune with.

The rhythm scared her a little bit. Octavia hadn’t felt like this about anyone - ever. So feeling like this about someone she had just met a few months ago? Especially now that it was just her, alone in the world, and she had no one to tell her whether this was a good or completely horrible idea? Yeah, it was a little more than scary. Maybe even terrifying.

But Lincoln… Lincoln didn’t make it seem so, and Elodie made it seem so even less. There was nothing scary about the two of them and Octavia found herself falling further and further into their world.

Maybe she wasn’t alone after all?

“Yours,” She stated simply, leaning on the bar with her elbow, chin settling into her palm as she watched him. It was a simple decision, one she didn’t even think twice about. There was no one waiting for them in her apartment, no one besides the rats that somehow kept digging their way through her walls. Her apartment was nothing but just that, an apartment. His, though, his held a little girl who would be looking for them in the morning and the comfort of a feeling she could only describe as home. “There’s a certain little Ella-bee looking forward to Saturday morning cartoons and cereal. I promised her I wouldn’t miss it.”

Lincoln was pleased to hear that she wanted to go to his apartment, for more reasons than one. The most important one, though? It gave him the perfect lead in to asking Octavia to move in with him. “She’ll be thrilled, then.” He said, his voice only matching the way that his face lost the edge of dealing with drunk patrons upon hearing Octavia’s voice.

He was falling, hard and fast, and while he hadn’t quite yet identified those feelings he felt as such, he didn’t mind it. There was just something about Octavia that never failed to brighten the bar for him. And that fact that she was so good with Elodie? It was like icing on the cake. It only made him hope that much more that she would say yes to moving in with him.

Lincoln swiped the rag across the bar once more before tossing it beneath the bar and reaching for his things. He was ready to leave, and besides, he wanted to ask her before they got to the apartment. Lincoln came out from behind the bar and held his hand out, inclining his head towards the back exit and waiting for her to take his hand before leading her outside. As they approached the door, he cleared his voice, pulling the door opened as he spoke.

“So, I wanted to talk to you about something.”