cw: cheating, bad relationship, Soap x reader, Simon Riley x reader, yearning Simon, asshole Soap.
When Johnny first started bragging about his new missus to the team, Simon didn't think much of it.
With Soap, new girls came and went. This one shouldn't have been any different. That should've been the end of it.
Simon couldn't have given less of a shit.
But this one seemed different.
____ always looked so unhappy around Johnny.
Like the first time Simon met her.
Johnny had introduced her as his girl.
Few drinks later, she gently tugged at Soap's sleeve as the music changed.
"One dance?" Johnny didn't even look at her.
"Nah. Not in the mood, doll."
Simon simply watched from the other side of the room. He wasn't the dancing type either.
Hell. He'd probably step on her feet every ten seconds.
But if dancing meant wiping that sad little look off her face…
He would've become fucking Michael Jackson.
She'd visit the base every now and then just to make sure Johnny had properly eaten.
Always carrying a bento box.
Rice. Meat. Vegetables.
Enough food to feed half the bloody task force.
Sometimes she'd bring sweets for the whole team, too.
The moment she left, Johnny popped the lid open.
"Tch. Don't like this."
Without a second thought, he shoved the whole thing across the table.
"Anyone wants it?" Simon frowned.
The fuck?!
Simon would never do that.
Never.
If she had made that lunch for him…
He would've eaten every last grain of rice.
Hell, he'd lick the damn container clean before letting somebody else touch it.
Days kept passing, and Johnny kept running his fucking mouth.
Complaining.
Rolling his eyes whenever her name came up.
Like loving her was somehow an inconvenience.
How she wanted to dance.
How she always worried if he'd eaten.
How she texted him good morning every single day.
Then came the night at the bar.
Simon hadn't meant to look. Johnny didn't care enough to hide it.
One hand around another woman's waist.
Then..
...a kiss.
What the fuck was wrong with him?!
How could anybody cheat on such a perfect bird like ____?
If she were his… He would've thanked every God willing to listen just for letting her choose him.
Still. As furious as it made him…
That wasn't what finally broke him.
It happened back at base.
Johnny started talking about his first time with the missus.
"She's always asking for kisses. Wants hugs all the bloody time." The whole room laughed. Simon looked up from the paperwork in front of him.
"And don't even get me started on sex. She keeps trying to make it all romantic while I'm just trying to stick it in—" Johnny never got to finish that sentence.
The lieutenant's fist broke his nose before anyone even realized he'd moved.
"THE FUCK, RILEY?!" Blood poured down Johnny's face while he stumbled back, holding his nose. The room fell dead silent.
"I'm taking the missus away from you."
"You what?"
"Heard me."
Without another word, he turned around and walked out of the base.
Somehow, he ended up standing outside their apartment.
He wasn't even sure how he'd gotten there.
He just knew he'd started driving.
Now he was here.
"Oh… You're Johnny's teammate, right?" She smiled politely.
"…Yeah."
"What brings you he—"
"You know he's cheating."
Her smile faded.
"You already knew. You're not stupid." She didn´t answer. Didn´t have to.
Simon clenched his jaw.
"…Take me instead." She blinked.
"…Excuse me?"
"Take me instead of that fucking asshole."
"You don't even know me."
"I know enough." She looked away.
"I'd treat you better. The way you deserve." She turned to stare at him.
"…Why?"
For the first time that night… Simon hesitated.
Then he didn´t.
"I'd never make you beg."
. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁༉‧₊˚.
I know I can treeat youu beetterr, than he can...!!! 🗣️🗣️🗣️ Please give me a Simon Riley like right now ToT
pope cody who hates baz’s stupid and complicated espresso machine. he just wants coffee. but as soon as you start staying over he teaches himself to make cappuccinos, practicing pulling the shots and frothing the milk dozens of times so he can wake his girl up with her favorite drink.
of course, you’ve never brought it up, always happily sipping on your cup of regular coffee whenever you’re at the cody residence in the morning. so when pope wakes you up on a random tuesday with a perfect, frothy cappuccino, dusted with cinnamon just how you like you can’t help but set the hot mug down on the bedside table and pull him into a long, sleepy kiss, smiling into him as your heart flutters.
he’s anxious for you to try it, watching your face closely as you bring the cup up to your lips, your eyes locked on his over the rim of the mug. he feels his chest loosen when you let out a low moan, closing your eyes at the rich, creamy taste.
“good?” he says, fingers twisting into the duvet where its rest on your thighs.
“mm,” you hum, pulling back from the cup, a little white mustache of foam on your upper lip, “sooo good, my love.” and he just beams, leaning forward kissing the frothy milk from your lips.
Pregnant Reader is absolutely literally worshiped by Titus Danforth. The woman is his living breathing goddess; his own personal Persephone. She doesn’t lift a finger or feel an ounce of discomfort for a damn thing.
She’s provided fresh fruits and high vitamin smoothies nothing but the best nutrition for his heir.
She’s provided her own personal maid to be at her bedside waiting every morning with a cup of decaf hot tea and a copy of her favorite magazine or newspaper.
She is given a Michelin starred personal chef to prepare whatever she’s craving. She wants homemade vanilla ice cream with fresh peaches he’s on it. She craves the fluffiest egg salad sandwich at three am he’s prepping the eggs.
Reader has the finest silk gowns perfect for accommodating her expanding belly. The fine fabric is soft and light on her skin.
Titus pays a masseuse to give her foot massages and makes sure she can get pedicures and waxes to maintain the usual sense of self care she maintains prior to pregnancy.
She leisurely floats in the heated pool at Titus’ chunk of the estate because the floating is relaxing on her aching body.
She strolls around the estate with her anxious maid close behind because light exercise is good for her and the baby but Titus will lose it if she overextended herself
Titus hires the best doctors to make house calls at all hours of the day and night
Reader is doted on by her husband. He will stop meetings if she enters the room because she is feeling hormonal and weepy
He’s been known to take important council meetings in the comfort of one of the living areas forcing everyone to stand aside while he holds his needy wife in his arms on the sofa.
He throws a massive ball to celebrate the announcement of his impending heir. Who needs a baby shower when you can force other elite families to show up and show some appreciation and respect for the Danforth heir. The Danforths are an old and respected family after all and another member of the family is a reason to celebrate.
When she gets cabin fever Titus will relent and take her out for a day at the Danforth Country club, eating brunch and sitting by trying to pretend he’s not bored out of his mind while she gossips with other affluent council wives. He does maybe find a bit of smug amusement in how the staff fawns over a pregnant Mrs. Danforth.
Titus finds peace in the quiet moments of her pregnancy: resting a hand on her belly at night while they sleep, resting his head against the baby bump when he’s exhausted and wants to be close to his heir, feeling the gentle flutter of movement of his heir within her womb and the strong kicks.
Titus who takes his wife to whatever high dollar boutique she wants to buy little baby socks and overpriced wooden blocks.
Titus who has his staff set up the expensive crib and changing table and makes them set up baby seats in each of Titus’s vehicles.
Titus who shocks reader by baby proofing the Danforth estate it’s a great ordeal placing daggers and other sharp items out of infant reach.
Titus who is maybe just the slightest bit delighted to be a father….if anyone asks though he’s just relieved that he has an heir though….no he didn’t get weepy when he first felt his baby kick, shut up.
I don't remember the last time I was quite this excited about a skin that I'm making. I have no idea if all of this will end up in the final version, but I'm just having so much fun with seeing what I can actually do that I wanted to share some work in progress shots.
(honestly? the hardest part has been finding the images. any tips on where to get medieval illuminated artwork would be much appreciated!)
In the first image, the AO3 title and the lady/dragon are separate images so on a desktop monitor the AO3 part is on the left and the dragon piece is on the right.
Editing to add the github link: get the skin here!
Been using this skin for a while and it's lovely! But lately there seems to be a problem with an element on the work page. There's the picture of the scribe in the stats/tag box that gets repeated below in the work text, and I can't figure out how to remove him without removing the stats/tag box image as well. Unfortunately he's obscuring the text... Any pointers? (Screenshot to illustrate.)
[i woke up with this in my head so i just had to write it]
Ghost has one weakness. It is a big, round, perfect weakness, and it’s currently arched in the air directly in front of him.
You are on your hands and knees on the bed, face pressed deep into the pillows, your back curved in a gorgeous, deep arch that presents your ass to him like an offering. The soft glow from the bedside lamp catches the slick sheen of your skin. It is a view that short-circuits his brain every single time.
He stands behind you, one knee resting on the mattress, his other foot braced firmly on the floor for leverage. His black balaclava is pulled up just enough to expose his mouth and jaw, creating the perfect canvas for the guttural sounds he can no longer hold back. In his hand, his phone is held steady, the red recording light a tiny, glowing eye capturing every angle.
The camera is angled flawlessly, framing the obscene sight of his heavy, flushed cock sliding across the slick valley of your ass. He isn't even inside you yet; he is merely dragging the thick, weeping head up and down, coating himself in the combined mess of your arousal and his own precum. The sight of his dick nestled against your flesh makes his balls throb with a need so acute it borders on painful.
"Fuckin' hell," he rasps, his voice a low, staticky growl through the fabric of the mask. "Look at that. Perfect fuckin' view."
He shifts his hips, pressing his cock more firmly between your cheeks, the sudden pressure forcing a whimpering gasp into the pillow. He records it all, watching the way your flesh yields to his touch and the way your body trembles in desperate anticipation. This is for his personal collection, a private stash of sin reserved for the long, lonely nights spent in dusty deployment tents and freezing barracks. When he is overseas, surrounded by the grim, violent reality of his job, he will pull up these videos to remind himself exactly what he is fighting to come home to.
Finally, the teasing becomes too much to bear. Reaching down with his free hand, he grips the base of his shaft, lining the blunt head up with your dripping entrance. The camera zooms in slightly, capturing the exact moment he presses against your tight hole.
"Simon, please," you whine, pushing backward against him, desperate for the stretch.
He grants your wish, sinking into you in one long, powerful thrust. The groan that tears from his throat is animalistic. You are so fucking tight, so burning hot, gripping him like a vise. The camera shakes for a split second as he loses himself in the sheer sensation, before his training kicks in and he steadies his grip.
The view on the screen is purely pornographic. His thick length disappears into you inch by inch, your slick lips stretched wide around him. Directly above it is the masterpiece, which is his taut, heavily tattooed stomach. The dark ink seems to shift and twist with the roll of his muscles as he begins to move. The skeletal face and the roaring skull dance in the low light as his abs contract with each deep, punishing thrust.
He establishes a relentless rhythm, snapping his hips forward until the sound of skin slapping against skin echoes obscenely in the bedroom. Each thrust drives you forward, a choked moan forced from your lungs with every impact. He fucks you deep, deliberately bottoming out against the exact spot that makes stars explode behind your eyelids.
"Fuck, you feel so good," he pants, his eyes glued entirely to the screen of his phone, watching his own cock piston into you. He cannot get enough of the visual contrast between your soft, giving body pinned beneath his hard, demanding frame, and the way your ass ripples with every heavy slam of his hips. "Takin' my cock so well, sweetheart. Such a good girl."
Leaning forward to change the angle, the new position presses the hard ridge of his lower abs flush against the swell of your backside. The camera catches it perfectly, recording the friction of his skin against yours, the slide of his cock, and the way his muscles flex and shift beneath the ink. It is a work of art, and he is the twisted artist who gets to create it over and over again.
Looking at him out in the field, no one would ever guess it. He is the stoic, silent lieutenant with eyes like chips of ice and a presence cold enough to silence a room. Simon Riley is a man of few words, a fortress of absolute control and iron discipline. But in the dark, behind locked doors, that fortress crumbles entirely, and the man who emerges is a filthy, vocal, desperate animal.
The phone is eventually forgotten, discarded onto the mattress beside you, though the red light continues to blink, recording the raw audio of your shared undoing. Simon’s hand is no longer holding the device. Instead, it is wrapped securely around your throat, a firm, possessive weight that makes your head swim. His thumb presses gently under your jawline, keeping you exactly where he wants you.
"Fuck, yes," he groans, the deep, gravelly rumble vibrating through his chest and directly into your spine. He bends over you, his sweat-slicked chest pressing hard against your back, the fabric of his shirt bunched up under his arms to expose the full expanse of his inked torso. You feel every single word as a physical vibration. "Gonna fuckin' fill you up."
His hips remain a relentless piston, the steady slap of his skin against yours drowning out every other sound. He isn't quiet, not even close. Every breath is a ragged grunt, and every thrust is punctuated by a low, guttural moan that speaks of a pleasure so intense it borders on agony. It is the sexiest thing you have ever heard, especially that deep, dark voice, usually so fiercely controlled, now spilling a continuous stream of dirty praise and desperate demands.
"Want it all?" he pants, his grip on your neck tightening just a fraction. "Want my cum deep inside you, huh?"
"Yes! Fuck, Simon, yes… " you beg, your voice breaking into a wail. You are right on the edge, the pressure coiling so tightly in your gut that it threatens to snap. The feeling of his thick cock dragging against your inner walls, the possessive hold on your neck, and the raw, filthy words pouring from his mouth are entirely too much.
His rhythm suddenly falters, becoming erratic and frantic. He drives into you with short, sharp, bruising jabs, his breath coming in harsh, ragged gasps. "Fuck, I'm close. Gonna cum. Gonna fuckin' breed this sweet little cunt."
The word, delivered so raw and primal, sends you hurtling over the precipice. Your vision whites out completely as your orgasm crashes through you, your walls clamping down on his length in a series of powerful, violent, rhythmic pulses. You scream his name, a raw, soundless cry as your body convulses underneath his weight.
With a roar, Simon buries himself inside you. You feel the hot flood of his release as he pumps his cum deep into your core, pulse after burning pulse. His entire frame shudders against you, his hand on your neck the only thing keeping you both grounded as he rides out the most intense climax of his life.
He stays buried deep, his cock still twitching inside you, as if completely reluctant to leave the warmth of your body. His hand finally releases your neck, moving to brace his weight on the mattress beside you, but he does not pull out.
You can feel his cum, a warm, heavy slickness, beginning to leak from your heat, trickling slowly down the inside of your thigh. The filthy sensation causes you to instinctively clench around him again.
Simon lets out a low, breathless chuckle, the sound dark and thoroughly satisfied. "My greedy little girl," he murmurs, his lips brushing against the shell of your ear. "Made a fuckin' mess of you."
He finally shifts, slowly withdrawing his softening length. The sudden loss makes you whimper, but then he is using two fingers to push the thick, white fluid back inside you, his touch shockingly gentle compared to the rough driving from moments before.
"Don't waste it, baby" he commands softly, his tone brooking no argument. "I want you feeling me for days."
You can only moan in response, thoroughly claimed. You look back at him, at the man with the ice-cold eyes who has just given you the most earth-shattering, vocal, and dirty experience of your life. He reads the question in your gaze, the sheer disbelief and awe.
He simply smirks, the slow, wicked curve of his lips visible just beneath the edge of his mask.
"What?" he rasps, his voice still thick and heavy with sex. "You look at me like I'm some kind of fuckin' saint out there. This is what saints pray for."
And as he leans down to kiss you, slow and deep, you realize you are the luckiest sinner alive.
something, something, omega!reader who knew at a young age they wanted to be SAS.
but the SAS doesn't take omegas -- policy. safety measures, something about 'unit cohesion' and 'biological variables' and a hundred other clinical terms that all end up conveying the same thing: you are barred.
so you make yourself into someone else -- beta on paper, beta through school, beta in every room you walk into. the blockers have done their job so well for so long that you've stopped thinking of it as a lie. it's second nature, just a part of you now -- the alarm goes off, you take your pill, and you never miss a dose.
it's held for nearly ten years. it held through selection, through training, through the intakes forms you filled out without flinching. you even managed to pass the med checks. they never bother to take blood.
a year in you're hand-selected by captain price to fill an opening in a task force that doesn't officially exist -- which is essentially your fuckin' dream.
and just as price is about to put you through the training wringer with his alphas, the pharmacy subs your prescription.
they tell you it's the same formula, the same compound, just a different supplier. production issue. nothing to fret. but you should have fretted!
within a week the edges of what you've grown to know as your normal life begin to blur into something that you don't recognize. you mistake it for a cold, then a few days later it's more like the flu, but not quite. your brain keeps reminding you of when you were a teenager, you don't know why. you continue to mistake the feelings for everything but what it really it: your first real heat emerging after being suppressed for a decade.
and the 141 boys figure it out before you do.
you're mid-drill, going hand-to-hand with soap when he gets your back to his chest, his chin to your temple, a knife hovering over your throat when he inhales to let out a belt of a laugh. but the laugh never escapes, he chokes on it instead, and immediately releases you to step back.
that's when you feel it, the slick seeping into your underwear. you look around and all of them are staring.
price is the only one that doesn't appear confused or surprised, and he orders the rest of the men to clear the yard.
summary: the lads make john a hinge profile against his will, and to everyone’s surprise, he matches with you within ninety seconds
cw: mdni, fem!reader, age gap (30/43), idk how hinge actually works tbh, john price the feminist, alcohol, insecurities, fluff, smut, oral f rec, piv (14.4k)
John has been irritable for months and it's getting worse.
He knows it the way you know a tooth is starting to rot from the inside, tongue prodding at it every hour.
On Wednesday, he reamed Johnny out for being three minutes late to the briefing. It was the kind of reaming that had everyone's eyes turned down into their coffees and files while Johnny stood in front at attention, toes squared, ears hot.
John went on and on, red-faced, telling him that his 'admin's a disgrace', and that he'd better 'get a fuckin' grip before you're explaining your timings to your old CO'.
Somewhere in the middle of it — around ‘disgrace’ — John heard himself.
He finished the dress-down anyway. Ending on a firm threat of a year-long inventory assignment.
It was rough enough to watch that when the room cleared out, Simon hung back. He stayed in his seat, leaning back with his arms folded, eyes following John as he aggressively organized his paperwork at the front of the room,squaring stacks that were already square.
"You need somethin', Riley?" John asked, never looking up.
Simon's mouth was twisted beneath his balaclava as he weighed his options. He wasn't especially eager to be John's second victim of the day, but it'd been miserable for weeks with no stop in sight. In the end, he decided to be straight—
"Y'need'a get laid, boss."
John's hands immediately froze.
That unyielding anger came up his chest right on schedule — insubordinate, out of line — and then couldn't quite find his footing in it because the truth was a trapdoor just under him.
His eyes flicked up and across the room, ears warming up just like Johnny's had an hour ago.
"Bloody ornery, you are," Simon went on. "'ave been."
Simon wasn't wrong, John knew that.
The work winds them all too tight — adrenaline that can't be spent, images that don't erase, choices made under duress that keep them questioning at three in the morning. And everyone's got a valve that lets the steam out. Johnny shouts his out at the football. Kyle has somewhere to be lately that he's cagey about, and Simon has whatever Simon has, no one asks.
And John drives home, shuts the door, and the house is quiet, his walls holding all the built-up pressure.
Ten months since his usual I'm-Home-Hookup found herself a steady bloke and stopped answering his calls. He'd told himself the whole time it was casual right up until it ended, when he learned it had actually been load-bearing.
And was that affecting his mood? Maybe.
His eyes narrowed on Simon and his jaw ticked at the hinge. He threw his chin toward the open door.
"Fuck off out've my briefin' room, Lieutenant."
Simon's chair scraped across the linoleum when he stood, sighing through the cloth over his face.
"I jus' think—"
"OUT."
The door clicked shut behind him, and John stood in the silence for a moment.
Then he squared the stacks again.
——
Johnny never volunteers to bring the beer, yet here he is at half seven with a box of glass bottles rattling on his shoulder, grinning under the porch light. Behind him, the headcount runs long by one. Three men when John only agreed to two. Kyle with a canvas bag full of crisps. Simon at the back, hands sunk in his pockets.
"Thought it was just you and Garrick?"
"Aye, well." Johnny shoulders past him into the hall, close enough that their shirts drag. "Simon heard there was football."
"Simon doesn't care about football," John retorts as the rest of them push their way inside.
"I care 'bout football," Simon lies through a simper no one can see, wiping his boots on the mat.
Unfortunately for John, his team is undoubtedly adept at what they've trained in and he doesn’t always catch when there’s fuckery afoot.
Under his nose, in his very own home, Johnny distracts him with talk about the match while Kyle lifts his phone from the side table just beside his elbow. Simon waits an appropriate amount of time before slipping away to the kitchen to guess the passcode, which he manages in one go.
"Gonna have to talk to him 'bout that…" Kyle mumbles as he swipes to the App Store.
"He textin' anyone?" Simon cranes his neck over Kyle's shoulder. "He used t’see tha’ one bird… wot was her name…?"
"Leah," Kyle answers flatly. "Laura?" he second-guesses as he thumbs in the passcode again to approve the install: Hinge Dating App. "M'not lookin' at his texts, mate. Be lucky he doesn't RTU us just for this. Plus, I think he said she started seeing some—"
"—y'know, Cap," Johnny's voice cuts through, a warning for the men in the kitchen. "I can get ye another beer, y'don't have…"
Simon and Kyle glance up from where they've leaned against the counter and freeze when John appears in the doorway, face screwed with suspicion. His eyes flick between the phone in Kyle's grasp and the faces lit behind it.
His initial thought is that the phone's got a nice, durable case, proper practical. His second thought is to start patting down his pockets with his free hand — which all turn up empty.
The room's gone still, a collective held breath to see which way the tension'll break.
"That's my phone."
"It is," Kyle agrees carefully.
Johnny appears at John's shoulder, squeezing past into the kitchen. "Cap, before you start—"
"When'd you nick it?" His eyes accurately settle on Kyle, the slickest of the bunch.
"Doesn't matter when, sir. We just—"
"It matters to me." John puts his empty beer bottle on the table and uses both hands now to pat down his pockets a second time, not quite believing his own team got the drop on him. "Professionally speakin',” he mumbles.
"Wot really needs addressin' is your passcode," Simon grumbles. "0-0-0-6?"
"Christ," Johnny snickers.
John chooses to ignore them and holds his hand out, palm up. But Kyle doesn't fork it over. Instead, he looks back at the screen and watches the progress ring around the icon close in on itself.
"What're we doin' right now?" John presses, stepping closer.
"Jus' take a seat, boss," Simon suggests, gesturing to the kitchen table just as Johnny yanks a chair out, beaming something mischievous.
John looks at the chair, then looks at Johnny.
"Think I'll stand."
"Suit yourself," Johnny spins the chair around and drops into it, arms folding over the back.
Kyle checks the screen one more time before turning it around. A new little white icon sits on John's home screen, Kyle points at it. John squints to read the little letters beneath it.
"What's Hinge?"
"It's a dating app," Kyle answers and places the phone on the table.
A dating app….
Grown adults sorting through each other like they're shopping. Swipe, tap, Add to Cart. He's heard the lads chat about it for years — the 'ghosting', the games — and always thought: thank god that's not me.
Under the simmering contempt, the idea of typing hello to a stranger who might simply never reply (left on read, whatever ungodly hour of the soul that phrase was invented in) shoots something cold through him.
There's a beat of hesitation before his eyes snap to Simon, the scowl on his face carrying the weight of Wednesday's interaction.
"This is you, then?"
"Team effort," Simon corrects without a flicker of shame.
"It's no' the dodgy kind of app, it's for relationships," Johnny explains. "Says so in their slogan: 'designed to be deleted'. You make a profile, upload a few pics, answer some—"
"I know how online dating works, MacTavish."
Johnny squints. "Do ye, though?"
"You've been rank for months, sir." Kyle tells it plainly. "Whole teams sayin' it."
John feels like he’s been put on a rinse cycle in the wash. His nostrils flare as he snuffs his irritation back down his chest lest he prove them right in his own kitchen.
"So that's what all this is? A Friday night welfare check?"
"It's no' a welfare check," Johnny defends poorly, voice cracking at a pitch too high.
"It's a bit of a welfare check," Kyle shrugs.
"Right." John reaches for his phone. "Well, thanks for the concern, lads. Truly. Warms the heart."
Kyle slides it just out of reach. "Just give it a shot, sir," he implores. "Try it for the weekend. If you still hate it, I'll delete it and we'll never bring it up again."
John's chin tucks to his chest and he glowers at him from under his deeply furrowed brow. "You'll delete it now," he orders, except these men have never listened to him off the field.
"I could," he agrees, wrestling a smirk. "And you can keep spending your Friday nights with us."
It's meant as a joke. It doesn't land as one.
Because John looks around at the three of them and knows in a few hours their engines will fade down the street and that hulking quiet will pour back in, the one he keeps calling peace.
So… he pulls out a chair.
Simon pushes off the counter and Johnny's grin pulls wider.
"Go on," John surrenders, falling into the seat with a sigh. He does not look at any of their faces because whatever's on them’s going to make him cross.
Chairs scrape and Kyle settles down at John’s arm, Simon looms over them from behind, all crowded around the one screen.
The basics go quick — name, age, pronouns. Kyle finds his rhythm working through the questions.
"Drinks? Socially. Smokes…?" Kyle seesaws his head a bit. "We'll say no."
"I smoke cigars," John protests.
"That's a personality trait, not a habit." Kyle scrolls. "Height?"
"Six-two," Johnny says immediately.
"He's six-foot," Simon corrects.
"Aye, and on the app he's six-two."
Kyle selects 6'. "Occupation?"
That one hangs in the air a bit longer than the rest, and John doesn't quite know why. His hands turn palm-up on the table with the question.
"Consultant," Simon offers.
"Civil servant," Kyle tries.
"Military," John answers irritably off the edge of a scoff.
Three sets of eyes come up off the phone — Johnny's eyebrows go high, Kyle's mouth opens to argue, Simon tilts his head just enough, as if to say: if you say so.
"It's not a state secret that I serve," John says, eyebrows pulling close with confusion.
Kyle types it despite whatever he's got hanging on the tip of his tongue. And in the little silence afterward, the obvious question finally comes to mind.
"What've you lot got on yours, then?"
The simple question sends a tidal wave of overlapping chatter and excuses over the table.
"Ah, well—" Johnny starts.
"I actually—" Kyle says, at the same time.
"Different app," Simon adds, under both of them.
"—see, it depends," Johnny goes on, trying to gain volume over the others, "I like to keep the profile fresh. Rotate the pics, the bio—"
"—don't have one," Kyle is saying over the top of him, "because me and Amara are— well, it's not official-official, but it's a thing, so—"
"Been usin' Feeld," Simon finishes.
When the wave recedes, the full picture comes into view: Johnny reinvents himself on a cycle, Kyle has Amara, mentioned now for the first time ever. And Simon—
"What's Feeld?" John asks.
"No," Kyle says before the question has its punctuation, quick and stern, head whipping back and forth. “Absolutely not. We'll talk about that another time."
"It's not for you," Simon adds.
"Right," he mumbles, taking a pull of his beer, settling back against the chair. He inhales and looks off at the window. "M'glad it's amateurs running my love life."
"Enthusiasts," Johnny corrects.
The rest goes quicker.
"What kind of connection?" Kyle reads. "Options are: Long-term. Short-term. Short-term, open to long. Long-term, open to short."
"Short, open to long," John answers without hesitation.
Johnny opens his mouth but Simon glares at him just as quickly through his ragged eyeholes, and he closes it without a word.
His profile photos have to come off the lads' phones since John's camera roll offers nothing but screenshots of maps, car parts, and three random pictures of the K9, Xena, from another unit on base (he’s been trying to snatch her for his own team for months).
He watches the photos of himself go by and it's a strange census, seeing a year of himself entirely through other people's eyes. Makes him queasy, so he takes another bitter gulp to wash the feeling out.
There's a short argument about the proper order the pictures should be presented, Johnny wins.
After, Kyle starts explaining what a good prompt does, how to choose one. He hardly gets any words out before John's holding his hand out the same way he did half an hour ago.
"I'll do these myself."
This time, Kyle hands the phone over.
The lads drift to the far end of the table to finally give John the space they've neglected to all night.
Fresh beers are cracked open and a bag of crisps demolished as they fold into their own conversations. The match they’ve been ignoring comes first, then Amara, whom Kyle spends five minutes refusing to elaborate on, and somewhere in there Simon mentions an oddities shop he’s been meaning to stop by.
John sits with his reading glasses on, typing slowly, brows low in concentration.
When he finally sets the phone down, all three of them quickly move behind him.
"So, their profile comes up on screen," Kyle reaches over to demonstrate. "Have a look, read the bio. If you wanna chat to her, tap the heart. If you don't, hit the X, and you'll never see her again. Simple."
The first woman is on a beach holding a cocktail the size of a fishbowl. X.
"Okaay," Kyle drawls, mouth pulling straight. "Sure. Was there a reason, or…"
"No."
The next woman is at a festival covered in glitter and feathers. X.
So is the one after. X.
A woman in her work scrubs. X.
A woman holding a child. X.
A woman in a bikini on a lake (his eyes linger). X.
It's not that they're not lovely. Some of them probably are. But every picture is a performance — arms out, teeth out, look how much fun I am. Advertisements.
"The fish," Johnny mourns as another goes down, a woman on a small boat holding a big trout up. "Cap, she was fishin'. You love fishin'!"
"Wasn't her fish," he grumbles under his breath.
"Whose fish d'you reckon, then?"
"Bloke she cropped out," Simon says, and John tips the neck of his beer toward him.
"Give me criteria," Kyle pleads, both hands on the back of John's chair, gripping with restraint. "I can work with criteria."
"He's calibratin'," Simon says. "Let 'im work it out."
Simon's giving him too much credit. He's not calibrating. He's not reading these women, he's not even really looking at them. Each X is just the whole premise being declined, proof accumulating that he was right about the app all along, and if the profiles run out, well, he tried. Right? The lads witnessed it. He can get back to his peace with a clear—
His thumb stops and hovers, then pulls back to the outer edge of the phone case.
Huh.
There you are.
Up a trail somewhere, hills of green grass rolling behind you, hood half-blown off, one hand trying to catch it. You're laughing at whoever's taking the picture, smile wide.
John's not sure he's ever seen eyes twinkle before, but that must be what yours are doing, shimmering even under overcast.
You're very pretty.
For the first time, John taps the profile open.
30. Executive Assistant. 4 Miles Away. Short-Term, Open to Long-Term.
Executive Assistant, so you likely work too much. That's familiar to him, something he understands inside-out.
There's a photo of you in office clothes at what looks like a retirement party, smile an edge more saccharine than the one on the hill.
Another of you criss-cross on the floor, a black and caramel cat stretched out and content in your lap, belly-up. Shirt low cut, cleavage to feast on. He is sixty percent gentleman about how long he looks at it.
And at the bottom:
The best way to ask me out is by: using words.
I recently discovered that: I'm better in person than I am on here.
John huffs an amusement through his nose. He spent more time on his profile than he thinks you spent on yours. Seems like you're tired of the same things he's already tired of, one night in.
Behind him, the lads have gone silent, holding their breath.
John taps the heart and his screen goes bright with a wash of confetti, both your photos ringed together:
IT'S A MATCH!
"Oh, shit, she already matched with you," Kyle cranes his neck closer to inspect.
"Gimme that." Johnny plucks the phone from John's hand. "No way," he scoffs. "Fuckin' fit. A bit young for you, Cap, aye?" He looks at John, then back at the screen like the two won't reconcile in his brain.
"Careful," John warns mildly.
Johnny hands the phone back, muttering something in Scots only Simon could translate.
John doesn't hear much of it anyway. He's already looking at your photo again.
Better in person.
Yeah. He'd bet you are.
"Right, sir," Kyle says. "Now we wait. Midday tomorrow the earliest. Message her any sooner and it reads keen."
"It'd be accurate," he deadpans.
"There's rules, Cap," Johnny says. "No messagin' straight away, no double-textin', keep a wee bit of mystery."
John turns in his chair with a scowl to look up at the three of them.
"So, you're tellin' me a woman says she's interested in you and you… make her wait?"
Silence.
"I mean, when you put it like that…"
"Yeah, s'a bit fuckin' rude, innit?" John derides, turning back around.
He's already typing, screen tipped away.
"Sir," Kyle pleads. "At least let us read it."
"This is a two person conversation, not a five piece."
He presses send and quickly pockets the phone.
——
Four miles away, a phone lights up…
——
Your windows are open to the last of a long evening, warm air breezing through the sheer curtains. You’re finally on the couch. Shower taken, its heat still damp in your skin. A glass of off-dry riesling teeters precariously on the arm, cold from the fridge and sweating through its stemless glass.
Twix is a puddled tortoiseshell furnace against your thigh, one paw twitching through a dream, her purr winding down as she drops deeper. And on the telly, Last Christmas is on. You've seen it a dozen times, that's why you leave it — it's mindless.
The second glass goes down easier than the first, tart on your tongue, blooming warm in your belly and over your cheeks.
Somewhere in the lull, your thumb opens Hinge, a reflex to being bored. You don't really expect anything from it anymore.
A man holding a fish, sunglasses on. X.
A man whose photos are all group shots. X.
A man who is 6'2" and it's his entire personality. X.
Your thumb knows the rhythm without you.
The next profile slides into view and you pause, thumb hovering.
He's handsome in that sort of rugged, classic way. His beard is salted at the edges, lines beside his eyes creased deep, cheeks faintly rosy. He's mid-laugh at what looks like a Christmas party, red and green tinsel drooping off the beams behind him; head slightly tipped, one heavy hand flat on the table. He's not cackling, you can tell it's more reserved, but it's probably still more than he usually offers.
John. 43. Military. Four miles away. Short-Term, Open to Long-Term.
The one thing you should know about me is: I'm gone a lot for work. But when I'm home, I'm home.
Most men bury the catch in the fine print, but he's leading with it.
You don't know yet whether that's honesty or efficiency. You suspect that with him they might be the same thing.
His second photo is of him on the tailgate of some enormous vehicle, fatigues taut over his thighs, thumbs hooked through his bulky khaki plate carrier, looking up from under the brim of his hat.
Two truths and a lie: I've never seen Star Wars. I have a lie-in every Sunday. I've had tea with a warlord.
The sky is pink with the morning in his third picture. He's thigh-deep in a lake, turned away from the camera entirely. (You're noticing it's a common theme that he does not look at the camera for any photo.) The sunlight catches the breadth of his back and shoulders, cotton molded around muscle.
Don't hate me if I: call instead of text. It's quicker.
You giggle just enough that Twix's ear rotates toward you in reproach.
It's kinda cute when older men put more effort into their profiles.
But the alarm is already going off somewhere in the back of your skull — too good, probably old photos, probably has a wife — it has never once failed to ring. But you're two glasses in, and the heart really costs nothing even if the conversation seems off.
You tap it, and put the phone facedown on your thigh.
On the telly, Emilia Clarke is busy falling for a man you happen to know has been dead the entire film. You mouth one of his lines along with him, not really invested, wine warm in your chest, Twix breathing slow against your leg.
Then your phone buzzes against you once, and you ignore it, because you have rules about lunging for male attention. But then it buzzes again, and, well, you just turn it over to have a look. Maybe it's your mum, you don't know!
HINGE: You and John matched!
HINGE: 1 New Message
You open it.
Evening. Not much good at using the app, but I really wanted to chat to you. How's your Friday night?
You hum to yourself curiously. Not an innuendo or emoji in sight.
i actually volunteer helping the elderly with technology, happy to walk you through it.
friday's been average. wine and a movie on the couch. how's yours?
You put the phone back down and focus on the film, but his reply comes within the minute.
Ouch. Friday's alright. The lads invited themselves round for the match. Still here, unfortunately.
you're messaging me with guests in the house? terrible host.
They invited themselves. Hosting rules don't apply.
What movie are you watching?
You glance at the telly where a dead man is mid-song and weigh lying about it.
You could be watching anything. You could pick something more interesting, something with a deep lesson, educational, historical, something niche to come off cool and worldly.
you're not allowed to judge me.
Judging is sort of my life's work, but I'll do my best.
You snort. Twix relocates to the far cushion in protest.
it's called 'last christmas'. i don't know why it's on in july, but i've probably seen it twelve times. it's good background noise.
The reply takes slightly longer this time. You picture him all big hands, small phone, and then stop picturing him, because that's how it starts.
Twelve times? Must be decent.
it's objectively not. the love interest is dead the entire film lol
Dead?
it's a twist. it's festive!
You and I have very different definitions for "festive". I've got a few questions. But I'll save them.
You smile.
so, your lake photo. did you catch anything that day?
Not a thing.
hours in freezing water for zero fish?!
The fish aren't the point.
do tell, what's the point?
The mist off the water. The quiet. The no one expecting anything from you.
It's the first real answer a man has given you on this app in, like, six months.
You feel oddly like you've been handed something and should keep your hands still so it doesn't spook.
that actually sounds really peaceful.
i've never been fishing, but i do love nature in the mornings. i have a trail by me that i like to trek early on weekends.
That the trail from your photo?
it is! my best friend actually made me go that day, i wasn't in the mood. complained the whole way.
Doesn't show.
Good photo of you.
Beautiful, actually.
You stare at the screen and feel warmth tickling your nape, sliding lower, molten and slow.
Every instinct you have reaches for deflection.
oh! thank you. the wind did most of the work lol
No it didn't.
— and he just takes the deflection off you, like being returned something you've dropped. You press the cool curve of the wine glass against your cheek and remind yourself, sternly, that this is a stranger on the internet.
well, for the record your photo's not bad either. handsome smile.
Somewhere past ten, you notice the conversation keeps not ending.
how long have you been on hinge?
It's my first night, actually.
first night???
Profile's about two hours old.
yikes, so i'm just the practice woman then, huh?
Practice implies I'm planning to do this again.
——
John's still at the kitchen table, reading glasses pushed up into his hair now, beer gone warm at his elbow. The lads have migrated to the living room doorway — close enough to monitor, far enough to pretend they aren't.
He knows they're watching, and he's been watched by better.
What he can't seem to manage is his fuckin' face — it keeps doing things beyond his control, and every time your reply comes he has to reel it back to neutral, and he can tell by the quality of the silence behind him that he's not reeling nearly fast enough.
"He's smilin' again," Johnny murmurs, elbowing Simon in the ribs.
"Shameless," John mumbles, without looking up. "All of you."
He's typing when the floor creaks jus to his left. When he glances up, Johnny has drifted to his shoulder under the pretense of collecting empties.
"Need another, Cap?"
"I need you three feet back, MacTavish," he replies, thumbs tapping away.
A minute later it's Kyle from the doorway, "If she asks about hobbies, don't lead with the cigars. They poll badly amongst females."
"'Females'?" John grimaces, face down, thumbs still at it. "Say it with me Garrick, 'women'."
Then Simon, who hasn't moved or spoken in twenty minutes, asks, "Wot's she sayin', then?"
John rolls his eyes and sets the phone face-down, pushing himself up out of the chair.
"Time to go, lads," he says with an obviously fake smile, gesturing his arm out towards his front door. "Goodnight."
"It's no' even eleven oclock!" Johnny complains.
"Then the night's still young. Go on, fuck off."
They go — bottles gathered, snacks cleaned up, Simon herding Johnny down the hall as he’s still negotiating.
Then their engines fade down the street, and the quiet pours back in, right on schedule. Except tonight it arrives and there's a phone lit on his kitchen table with your name on it, and the quiet — for the first time in a long while — has to wait.
He locks up, kills the TV, then drops into his armchair with the phone already unlocked.
did the football finish? who won?
He glances at the dead telly. Hasn't a clue.
Couldn't tell you.
omg lol you had ONE reason for guests tonight!
I got distracted.
by what? 😇
I think you know by what.
Nothing comes back for a minute. He pictures you on your couch, that cat beside you, deciding what to do with it — and it occurs to him, mildly horrifying, that he's enjoying this. The wait. The little emoji with the halo, transparently unrepentant. He finds himself smiling at the ceiling like there's something written on it.
anyway!
Anyway.
He'll allow it: retreat granted. There's no rush.
The cat in your photo. Yours?
yes! that’s twix. she's a menace.
Good name.
she prefers men that ignore her.
Then we'd get on fine. I'm very good at ignoring cats.
It goes on just like that: easy.
You ask if he's a morning person and learn he's up at five most days by choice; he learns you consider five the middle of the night.
He talks about the Brecon Beacons — the actual Beacons, the ones he loves, not the ones that nearly killed him at twenty-two. You tell him you've always wanted to go, and he catches himself already planning the route he'd take you. Then quickly chastises himself.
How's the average Friday held up?
certainly improved
Mine too.
He puts the phone on the arm of the chair and sits in his quiet house, and for once it doesn’t feel so desolate.
——
The following morning he's up at five. He starts drinking his coffee at the counter, looking out the window over the sink, the sorbet summer sky bleeding morning.
He thinks of you before he can stop himself. Asleep, presumably, five being the middle of the night and all. Then he takes the coffee out to his back step for some fresh air.
He wonders if he was any good with the messaging last night. It's the longest he's ever sat with his phone in his hand, period. Let alone chatting with someone. There's no debrief for it, that's the trouble. No one to tell him whether ‘I got distracted.’ read as charming or desperate.
He runs the entire two-hour exchange back over and over and finds no actionable errors, but remains unconvinced.
He goes for his run at six. The route climbs uphill around klick seven, and somewhere on the hill he thinks about your photo, your smile, your mouth. He wonders what you smell like, what you sound like when you're being sarcastic.
By noon he's under the Land Rover draining the old oil, and he catches himself pondering what you might do on a Saturday. Whether you slept in properly. Whether the cat allows it; he grew up with one himself and knows how demanding they can be when they're ready for a feeding.
He hasn't messaged yet and neither have you.
He couldn't say exactly why he's held off. Something the lads said about being keen, and rules, and mystery lodged somewhere he can't reach to dig it out. He's not normally a man that takes doctrine from Johnny MacTavish, and yet… here he is.
It's a stupid fuckin' rule.
The afternoon goes long and gets quiet in the old way.
The house at four o'clock has a particular acoustic he knows down to the plumbing, and today, for the first time, he notices himself noticing it. It never used to be so obvious. Years of Saturdays like this one and it took his phone going quiet for half a day to show him the loneliness so plainly.
By the evening he's got Chinese takeaway at the kitchen table, eating it straight from the carton, chopsticks shoveling fried noodles down his gullet while he does the crossword from the morning paper in his head.
That's when his phone lights up for the first time all day, buzzing three times in succession — he absolutely hates how quickly it's in his hand.
spent six hours wedding dress shopping with my best friend. i need a glass of wine and a lie down.
thought of you on the tube home
He reads the second message again.
Thought of you.
He’d been drafting the same admission since noon and something in his chest going catastrophically hot.
are you still up? i know sundown is bedtime for your generation.
And there's the sarcasm.
Outside the window, the sun is — he checks — still up. Barely. He's got that going for him, at least.
Just in time. Was about to take my dentures out.
Thought about you as well.
He types the second line fast before he can be a coward about it. If you can say it, he can say it. Fair's fair.
I do have a question now though. It's not your wedding we're shopping for, is it? That'd be proper inconvenient for me.
lol no! maid of honor. today was purely supervisory.
don't really see myself getting married anyway.
the dresses were stunning though!
He’s picking up on a pattern. Three messages arriving like one exhale — the vulnerable thing said flanked with distraction.
Nothing wrong with that.
Successful trip then? Or is there another six hours coming?
successful! she found it. there were tears and champagne.
what about you, how was your saturday?
He’s had a day spent purposefully not doing the one thing he wanted to do.
Quiet. Nothing worth typing.
hm. sounds like you should ring me then…
He looks at that one for a moment and blinks, the inside of his cheek finds itself between his teeth.
For all their blabbering, the lads did not warn him about this bit. Not that he can't speak on the phone, he prefers it. You're essentially quoting his profile back at him. But he's been thinking about something since roughly the fourth time you crossed his mind today, and a phone call isn't the ask he's been building up to.
Could do.
Truthfully, though. I was just working up the courage to ask you for a drink.
Courage. He's used that word in citations, for men who ran toward gunfire, heroes. Now he’s using it to describe the act of asking a woman on a date, and the genuinely undignified part is that it's regrettably accurate.
Your reply takes a minute. He watches the dots start and stop, and start again. God, he's been shot at with less suspense.
Then your message comes through and it's just a number. Ten digits. It buzzes in his hand once more.
for logistics.
He stares at it for a beat and then he's up out of his seat. Takeaway abandoned, at the fridge with his phone still in one hand, snapping the cap off a beer on the lip of the counter, and then he's out the back door into the garden where the evening's gone navy and the air’s still warm from the day.
He saves your number first. Then he stands there a moment, beer sweating in one hand, thumb over the call button in the other.
——
You’ve just tipped the bottle over your glass when the phone starts buzzing against the counter.
Unknown Number. Local.
“John?”
“Evenin’.”
Fuck.
His voice lands an octave lower than you were braced for. A honeyed gravel that seeps into your ear and slides thick over your spine, pooling somewhere behind your ribs.
You set the bottle down before you drop it.
“So you actually do ring,” you manage.
“Said so on the profile, I think.”
“I half thought it was a bit.”
“I don’t really do bits.”
“No,” you say through a grin, picking up your glass and drifting toward the couch. You drop your voice into a gravelly impression of him: “You’re a very serious man.”
The laugh that comes down the line is quiet — more breath than sound, warm at the bottom of it, like you’ve caught him somewhere he doesn’t usually go.
“That meant to be me?”
“It’s uncanny, I know.”
The line goes quiet a moment — the good kind, neither of you rushing to fill it — and in it you catch the sounds of his side: a whirl of breeze, the faint ring of a glass set down on iron. He’s outside. You picture a tidy yard with tall dark hedges, a big man pacing slowly with a beer.
“Am I interruptin’ the wine?”
“The wine and I are happy to share the time.”
“Good.” There's a pause that you can hear his smile in. “I have a beer out here. Seemed only fair we’re both suffering the same.”
“Are we having our drink right now? Is this it?”
“No,” he says immediately, unamused even — which is very amusing for you. “This one doesn’t count.”
The speed of his reply sends something fizzing under your sternum. You tuck your feet up under yourself and take a slow sip.
“No?” you tease.
“I had imagined I’d see your face.”
“Been imagining, have you?”
You are very glad he cannot see your face right now. Cheeks warm and strained, you press the cool of the wine glass briefly against them in turns
“Nothin’ mucky if that’s what you’re gettin’ at.”
“Mm, no, 'course not. You’ve been a proper gentleman. Haven’t even thrown me a cheeky pick-up line.”
“I could workshop somethin’ for you if you’d like.”
“No thanks,” you giggle into your glass. “It was a relief when I opened your first message and it wasn’t a riddles-three about your dick.”
You can hear his scoff and recoil on the other end.
“Is that what it’s come to?”
“Unfortunately.”
There’s a short silence you’d swear is him coming to terms with the modern world, and you bite down on a smile.
“Right,” he says, and there's a controlled shift in his voice. “My question...”
Your stomach does a free-fall, nauseating and fluttery, fifteen again on the Detonator at Thorpe Park.
“Mm?” you hum around a sip, deeply casual, a woman entirely unbothered, curled so tight around the phone that Twix doesn’t have a leg to lie on.
“There’s a pub about halfway between us, Lamb & Flag. I’d like to take you for that drink tomorrow. Will you come?”
Then you remember what tomorrow is and sigh, immediately irritated with your whole family.
“Ugh, I want to say yes,” you sulk. “But I’ve got Sunday dinner with my family tomorrow. My mum would hunt me for sport if I flaked.”
“Fair. Wouldn’t want that on my conscience.”
“I could do a weeknight? After work?”
There’s a pause on his end.
“I’d rather not promise you a weeknight,” he admits. “I rarely get away on time, and I’m not startin’ this by standin' you up.”
You go quiet for a beat, you were ready for the usual ‘ahh, well, we’ll figure something out’. But instead got a man mindful of your time; a unicorn, really.
“Also fair. And— and thoughtful.”
“Friday, then?” he tries hopefully, you catch the small lean in his voice.
“Friday’s perfect,” you agree. “It’s a date!”
“It is,” he agrees, smiling.
The conversation should end there but it doesn't.
You learn things no profile has a field for; that he talks slower than he types, that he hm's real low in his throat when he’s considering something, that when you make him laugh it rumbles, so rough at the bottom that you feel at the back of your knees.
Somewhere past the hour mark you stop scrutinizing the call for red flags and just talk, and you only notice you’ve stopped when Twix jumps onto the couch and you realize you’ve been lying down for a while, phone balanced on your ear like you’re seventeen.
Eventually, you yawn.
“Right,” he says, and you can hear him moving, standing up by the way he tries to muffle a stiff groan. “That’s my cue.”
“Aw, no! I’m fine, really.”
“It’s late, love. And you’ve got your family tomorrow.”
“True. And you’ve got… whatever it is old men do on Sundays.”
“Lie-in, according to my profile.”
“Ha!” you bark, vindicated alone in your living room, having forgot about his little 'two truths and a lie'. “That’s the lie, I bet. I don’t think you’ve ever had a lie-in in your life.”
A low sound of amusement rolls down the line. “Goodnight,” he says, declining to confirm.
“Night, John.”
You sit a minute in the amber shine of your lamp after the line goes dead, phone loose in your hand.
——
Sunday morning, you text him at 8:12 AM.
good morning. how was the lie-in?
Wouldn’t know. Been up since five.
the lie confirmed!
He doesn’t dignify it. You don’t expect him to. You grin at your phone while you wait for the kettle to boil.
Your mum will later describe you, over dinner, as ‘suspiciously cheerful’.
The day swallows you — the drive, the roast, your mum’s questions, your brother’s kids. It’s near ten when you’re finally home, shoes off, replying to the last thing he’d sent that morning.
survived. my mum sends her regards to whoever put me in a good mood. her words.
Regards received. Sleep well.
——
Monday morning, John’s at his desk with his coffee going cold because somewhere between the canteen and the walk to his office, his phone buzzed, and it was you and he hasn’t stopped looking at it.
good morning :) big meeting today. does this say “promote me” or “she tried”?
[ PHOTO ATTACHMENT ]
You, in your hallway mirror — chin tipped, black short-sleeve blouse with a wide collar exposing the smooth skin of your upper chest and collar, grey pencil skirt stretched over the curve of your hips and thighs, one knee bent like you’d just been lowering your foot from fitting on your heel.
His eyes are stuck on the soft-looking flesh just above and between your knees when a rap lands on his door and forces a cough from his throat.
Johnny eases it open with Kyle behind him holding a folder, Simon's behind them both, holding nothing, not even a pretense.
His phone goes face-down on the desk at a compromising speed, shifting to sit up straigher.
Simon’s eyes go to John’s hand over the phone, then to his face before he leans in the doorway with his arms folded.
“Mornin’, Cap. Good weekend?” Johnny asks, falling into the side chair in front of the desk with a theatrical groan.
“Fine.”
“Aye? Do anythin'?” He smiles, waggling his eyebrows. “Anyone?”
“You’ve got thirty seconds to develop a work reason for being in my office, Sergeant.”
It's an empty threat and everyone in the room knows it.
Kyle sets the (empty) folder down and steps back behind Johnny. “How’s it going, sir? Did you have any luck with Hinge?”
John could make them work for it. He’d planned to. But all three of them are standing in front of him trying so hard to look casual it’s a wonder none of them have pulled something.
"Have a date Friday. Drinks."
Johnny is ready to blast out of his seat, but Kyle shoves him back down by the shoulders, digging his fingers into the pressure points on either side of his neck until he relents with a hiss.
"That's great. Same woman or…?"
"The same."
“Good, good, good,” Johnny says, and means it — John can hear that he means it, he can also hear the restraint he's keeping from unloading shite advice.
“We'll stop buy Saturday for the debrief,” Simon says, already turning around, and Kyle picks the folder back up like it had a purpose all along, and they file out the way they came.
"I'm not debriefing you on my date. Don't come!" John calls to them half-heartedly, but the door's already shutting on top of his words.
He turns the phone back over.
Promote you, he types.
You look lovely.
Your reply comes before he’s picked his pen back up.
well now the meeting feels easy. thank you x
He gets on with his morning, but by noon he suspects he's looked at that damn photo a dozen times.
——
The rest of the week goes standard. Your Tuesday runs long and his Wednesday runs longer, and the messages carry throughout it all. His texts arrive before your morning alarm even sounds, your replies go mid-commute — nothing heavy, just remaining in each other's orbit of interest as Friday chugs slowly into view.
Thursday night, near nine, he rings you, having first texted to ask if he could, which you’re beginning to understand is just how he’s built. It’s a short call by your new standards with him. He only wanted to confirm you’re still on for the pub, but he had you grinning into your pillow until you fell asleep.
———
You leave work at five on the dot, and you’re in front of your open wardrobe by six.
The little black dress comes off the rail first. Goes back. Comes off again. Back. The floral one gets as far as your shoulders before you pull it off over your head and drop it on the bed, where Twix immediately sits on it.
The silky baby blue halter’s been hanging on the door since you bought it. You put it on like you hadn’t already decided and do the tie at the back of your neck twice before the bow sits flat and neat. You pull on some jeans and rummage the closet for your chunky heels.
You press some strawberry perfume to your throat in the mirror and try to comfort the nerve-ridden woman in the reflection.
“It’s just a pub,” you tell her.
She doesn’t seem convinced.
———
The pub is exactly the kind of place you imagine he'd frequent — quiet, all old mahogany and low brass lamps, no telly anywhere. You claim a stool, hook your heel over the rung, and decide not to order anything yet simply because it just feels polite to wait.
You're fifteen minutes early which means you're left alone with your anxieties.
The last of the sun lies across the bar top in warm stripes, and you trace one with a finger while you wait.
You’ve done this before, and it almost never goes how the phone promises. There was the guy whose photos were six years out of date. The one who spent both drinks talking about his ex and then sent a payment request for half the tab. The one who, two hours in, hadn’t asked you a single question about yourself. And John has been too good to be true for a week, and you know how that saying ends. Tonight is where you find out how, find out he really is just a man between deployments looking for entertainment and a shag.
It felt good, though. All week. Being excited about something. You’d forgotten the feeling.
You pick at the hangnail on your thumb until it stings.
You don’t have to wait much longer for him.
He casts a shadow when he comes through the door. Broad. Tall. Smart olive polo fighting for its stitching across his chest and where it grips into his biceps. He’s tidied his beard in comparison to his photos, hair less kempt in a purposeful way.
He scans the whole room before he finds you and stops looking anywhere else. He smiles tight and restrained, pleasant, but like he’s pacing himself, and by the time he crosses to you, your tongue has gone dry and whatever you’d planned to open with has shriveled away.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hi,” you smile.
He smells clean, a bit like pine and amber, and faintly like there’s tobacco somewhere on his collar.
“You’re early,” he adds, almost pleased.
“So are you.”
“I’m always early.” His eyes drop to the empty bar top in front of you, then come back. “You haven’t ordered?”
You shake your head once, legs shifting to cross. “I wanted— I was waiting for you.”
The lines beside his eyes deepen and he holds out his hand, says your name for the first time, and his hand swallows yours — big and dry and calloused across the palm where yours is soft — and you hold on a beat too long. He doesn’t mention it. You add that to the list of things you like about him, which is getting embarrassing for something four minutes old.
“What’ll you have?”
“Uhm, whatever you’re having,” you decide.
He signals the bartender with two fingers and opens his mouth — and there’s a brief second where he looks at you first, and you notice for the first time that his eyes are blue, and you get stuck, and it seems so does he. By the time he looks back, he’s lost the name of the beer he’s drunk here a dozen times.
“Two of the, uh— the local,” he manages.
You pretend not to notice. He knows you did.
He pulls out the stool beside you, and more of his cologne wafts around you as he sits, turned to face you, legs spread, one knee pointing between yours.
The pints arrive wet from the tap, and for a second neither of you says anything at all. You trace a bead of condensation down your glass.
“Funny, isn’t it,” you offer, sheepish. “We’ve talked every day for a week, and the second we’re actually in front of each other…” You trail off, cheeks warming, eyes fixed on the fizz jumping over the rim of your beer.
“You’re nervous?” he asks, a cheeky lilt on it.
“A bit, yeah. Aren’t you?”
“Not at all.”
You squint at him. “I don’t know if I buy that.”
“Hm.” He takes a sip that lasts a little too long, and the tips of his ears have gone pink.
Your cheeks are doing about the same. You drink your beer — cold, hop-bitter, helping — and let him have his lie. It’s a generous lie anyway. It’s a lie shaped like a man trying, and you’ve been handed far worse shapes.
“So,” you start. “I haven’t asked why you’re even on Hinge. You don’t seem the type.”
“I’m not,” he chuckles, and offers nothing beyond it.
You wait. He just sips his beer. You hike a brow.
“That’s it? That’s your answer?”
“Well, it wasn’t my idea. The lads put me on it.”
“The lads — your guys from work?”
“Yeah.”
“They what, talked you into it?”
“No.” He turns his glass a degree. “They nicked my phone and made the profile behind my back.”
“And what made them do that?”
He takes a moment with that one. He could give you a cover story — you can almost watch him weigh one — but then he doesn’t.
“Their assessment,” he laughs to himself, “was that I’d been… cranky. Needed gettin’ out of the house.”
“Cranky?” you repeat, delighted.
“Their exact words were a bit different.”
“Hm.” You look at him — at ease, half a smile living in his beard, one arm resting along the bar. “You don’t seem cranky to me.”
“Yeah, well. Guess they were right, then.”
Your neck goes hot and you have to look away from him. “Well,” you manage. “They do good work, your committee.”
He huffs into his pint, and lets you recover.
“Okay, next one, then. Military.” You tip your glass toward him. “What do you actually do?”
He sets his beer down and you can see him carefully choosing which door to open. “What d’you want to know?”
“I don’t know. What’s your day look like?”
“Depends on the day. Paperwork, mostly. Meetings.” A beat. “Sometimes we go away.”
“Away?”
“Away.”
“For how long?”
“As long as it takes.”
“Doing…?”
“Whatever they need me to,” he says easily. “S’not me being mysterious. I’d tell you if I could.”
“That must be so strange, though. Having this whole— like, most of your life you can’t talk about.”
“You get used to it.” Then, because you’re still looking at him expectantly, not filling the space the way people usually do: “There’s loads I can say. Ask me what six weeks of rain in a jungle smells like. Or what a month in the desert does to your skin.”
“What’s a month in the desert do to your skin?”
“Nothing good, love,” he answers, shifting to face you better. “The beard’s load-bearing.”
You laugh into your beer, and it makes the next one easier to ask.
“Do you like it? Like, the whole life of it?”
He goes quiet on that one. Longer than he’s gone quiet on anything else you’ve asked. You can see him thinking on it.
“It’s what I’m best at,” he says finally. And then, mostly to his glass: “It’s all I’ve known, really. Been doin’ it since sixteen.”
You turn that over. There’s a whole life folded up in that sentence and you notice you want to ask about all of it, which is not a thing you’ve wanted to do with a man in a very long time.
The second beers arrive, and the conversation stops keeping to lanes — his lads and your best friend, the wedding in October, the neighbor whose bins are apparently a whole saga. You’re midway through the story of your work feud when a birthday party arrives loud and glittering behind you, and John, without so much as glancing down, reaches down and hooks his hand under the edge of your stool, and pulls.
The whole thing drags six inches across the floor with you on it, your knee sliding neatly between his, close enough now that his voice drops to match the new distance. You’re looking up at him, pulse tapping somewhere that has your thighs pressing together.
“Go on,” he encourages. “She said what?”
It takes you a moment to find your place, but you go on.
The bar only gets louder from there, the birthday table multiplying, and when a booth opens up in the back corner, John tips his chin at it.
“Go grab that,” he says, turning back to the bar. “I’ll get another round. Want the same?”
“Actually—” and you hesitate out of nothing but habit, out of years of a man’s face going tight when you complicate an order, “—could I do a vodka cranberry this time? I could get the round—”
His brows furrow with something akin to bafflement, brief and genuine. “You can have whatever you’d like,” he says, and suddenly you feel silly, your hand crossing to grip your elbow.
“No—I know. I just—”
“Whatever you’d like,” he repeats, gentler. “And—” he grimaces, like what he’s about to say pains him deeply. “Don’t ever offer to pay on a date with me again. Properly wind me up, that will.”
“S-sorry,” you shake your head, like you can rattle the habit loose.
“None of that either,” his eyes have gone crinkled at the corners, warm all the way through, and he raps two knuckles soft on the bar top like the matter’s settled. “Vodka cranberry. Go, sit.”
“Actually— I’m gonna go freshen up quickly. Two minutes.”
And you go, biting down on a smile, ears hot — embarrassed and looked after all at once, which is apparently a combination that works on you.
The bathroom is cooler than the bar and a quiet that leaves your ears ringing. You reapply some lipgloss and wash your hands and look at yourself in the dirty mirror, buzzing warm at the collarbones, eyes shiny, mouth half-curved.
It’s going well.
It’s going suspiciously well.
And every time it’s gone well before, this is exactly when you started hunting for the catch. So you dry your hands on the rough paper towel and leave before you can start.
He’s in the booth when you come back, settled against the wall side, the last of the evening gone from the windows and the lamp above him glowing gold over the table. Your drink is waiting — pink, iced, a lime wedged on the rim — set neatly across the table at the seat opposite.
You look at the seat opposite.
Then you slide in beside him instead. Your thigh a heated inch from his, reaching across to relocate your drink.
You don’t look at him, but you can tell John’s a bit curious of the arrangement. His arm comes up and settles along the back of the booth behind you, and it oddly feels like it was always going to end up here, his thumb grazing the bare skin of your shoulder. He picks up his beer with the other hand.
“Comfortable?” he asks, low, and with entirely too much satisfaction.
“I am,” you say, and the first sip of the vodka cranberry is cold and tart and sweet all the way down, blooming behind your sternum right where his voice has been landing all night.
The booth is easier than the bar, somehow — closer, quieter, the birthday party more muted — and the talk drifts wherever it wants, his low laugh arriving against your shoulder through the arm behind you. At some point the lull comes; ice softening in your glass, his thumb resting an inch from your shoulder. And maybe it’s the vodka, or the arm, or the running list of things you like about him that you’d need both hands to count now—
“How long ago was your last relationship? Like a real one.”
He takes a deep breath before answering. “Honest answer?”
“Preferably,” you giggle softly, and he smiles — most of it lost in the beard, enough that you wonder if there are dimples under there.
“Longer than what sounds good out loud,” he admits through the pull of it.
“Say it out loud anyway.”
“I was thirty-two. So, almost ten years ago.”
“Ten.”
“Mm.”
“A whole decade.”
“You can stop countin’ the years to me at any time, love.”
“Sorry, sorry.” You’re grinning. He is too. “It’s just, quite the gap in romance.”
“It went quick,” he says, and it’s a joke, and it’s also not. “What about you?”
“Ended about a year ago, we were together four.”
“Mm.”
“It was fine. Amicable— mostly,” you shrug.
“Mostly,” he repeats — not pushing, just setting the word down where you can see he heard it.
“Mostly,” you confirm, and leave it there.
The ice ticks in your glass. And the next question’s been sitting in your chest, so you take it out while you’re brave.
“Can I ask something and you not be offended?”
“Startin’ well,” he says, nodding on for you to continue.
You settle further into the booth and your shoulders press against his warm arm behind you, his fingers brushing over your shoulder. You lean your head back, turned to his face.
“What’s changed? Between thirty-two and now that you’re trying dating?” You mean just to ask the question, but you find yourself rambling on. “Because if the honest answer is nothing, and this is just— a-a hookup with, like, really good manners, that’s fine. Genuinely. I’d just rather know now.”
“Fair,” he says. “Asked myself the same thing this week.”
“Yeah? And what was the answer?”
“I’m tired of the quiet,” he starts, pausing as his eyes drift away in thought. They come back to you just as quick. “Used to come home to it like a reward. Now it just feels… empty.”
Something in your chest slides sideways.
“So, no. Not a hookup,” he continues with a breath. “But I can’t promise you’d be happy with the alternative either. I can be gone longer than I’m home.” His thumb brushes along your shoulder, once, like an apology.
“Guess I wouldn’t know unless I gave it a go.”
You say it lightly, and the exhale he lets out has a smile riding on it — and something in his shoulders comes down, some held thing you didn’t notice until it let go.
“No,” he agrees, low. “You wouldn’t.”
You’re suddenly aware of the distance between you — or the lack of it. Somewhere between sitting down and the vodka you’ve ended up awfully close: near enough to count the grey threaded through his beard, to catch the beer on his breath, near enough that the light between you has stopped reaching the space. Near enough that you can feel the heat coming off him, and your heartrate has picked up on it before the rest of you has.
His eyes flick down to your mouth. Quick — half a second, there and back — but you catch it, and it lands low in your stomach and stays.
Neither of you leans back.
And the pub carries on behind you — glasses clinking, the birthday table shouting, a till drawer slamming — all of it arriving from somewhere far off and dreamlike.
You move closer. Barely. Imperceptible. Your pulse is in your ears now, drumming out the last of your sense—
“You know,” you say, quiet, pitched for the six inches between you and nobody else, “you can kiss me. If you’d like.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Mhm,” you grin.
“Well,” he says, matching your volume, low enough that it lands somewhere below hearing, “I was going to be a gentleman about it. Wait til I walked you out.” His gaze drops to your mouth again, slower this time, no secret. “But if you’d rather have it here in the booth, I won’t argue.”
“I suppose I could be patient.”
“Mm,” he says, and doesn’t move.
Somewhere in the world, presumably, time is passing.
His jaw shifts.
“I’ll go pay the tab,” he decides.
And you’re both up and out of the booth quick, and you watch him stand at the bar with his back to you, shoulders set, and you press one cool knuckle to your own cheek and find it burning.
You two make it out the door.
The night’s gone hazy and July-thick, and you get maybe four steps down the side of the pub with his hand a light at the small of your back before you glance up at him and he glances down.
Whatever was left of patient dies right there on the pavement.
He moves you.
One hand finding your hip, the other your jaw, and then your back meets brick, warm through the thin of your blouse and against your bare shoulders, and his mouth is on yours.
Whatever mindful version he’d planned for the end of his gentlemanly walk out must have been spent in the booth — this is the interest. The kiss opens on a low rumble out of his chest, one you feel travel through his ribs into yours, and his tongue slides against yours, all beer and him, and you grip the front of his shirt with both fists just incase the wall behind you vanishes.
He kisses you thoroughly, his beard catching along your chin, a chafe you know you’ll feel tomorrow. A thigh slots half between yours, not pushing, not touching, but it’s not any less inviting. You could bare down on it, get the friction your body is craving, he’d let you, but you restrain yourself. His thumb strokes a slow line along your jaw in obscene contrast to what his mouth is doing — and it blooms down through you, fervid, liquescent.
He pulls back just far enough to breathe — forehead near yours, both of you loud with catching your breath — and when you open your eyes his are dark.
“Very gentlemanly,” you croon.
“I walked you out first, yeah?” he says, unrepentant.
You giggle against his mouth, and he claims it for himself with one more gentle kiss, and then he steps back a seemly distance, hand smoothing once down over his beard, shoulders resetting, breath evening out, everything going back in its place except his eyes.
“Walk me home?” you ask.
“I drove. I’ll give you a lift.”
You look up at him, all vodka-warm and enjoying yourself. “Well, just so you know, I share my location with my best friend and she knows exactly what pub I’m at, and has your name and photo, so—”
“Good,” he replies, no hesitation. “Smart girl. Keep it that way.” He finds his keys, fishing them out of his pocket. “I’m taking you straight home. You have my word.”
He draws an X over his heart, your lipgloss shining at the corner of his crooked mouth.
——
The car smells like-new — clean upholstery and faintly of engine oil, everything squared away, nothing rolling around in the footwells.
The drive is short. The radio murmurs. His hand rests easy on the gearstick a few inches from your knee — close enough that you spend two full streets aware of nothing else — and the streetlights slide over him in slow bars, catching the grey at his temple and the small satisfied set of his mouth.
The kiss is still thrumming under your skin like a struck glass, low in your belly, at the back of your knees — and you catch yourself doing the thing you swore off doing: imagining forward. Him in your doorway. Him in your kitchen on the weekend. Him coming home from wherever away is and it being your door he—
You look out the window. Four miles has never taken so long.
He pulls up outside your building and sets the handbrake, and the engine idles, and neither of you move.
The dashboard glow makes everything blue.
You want to ask him up. That's not the question; that got settled somewhere around the second kiss in the alley, possibly earlier, possibly around the moment he walked into the pub, or whatever. But there's the other thing you can't evict from your head: do you really want to sleep with him on the first date?
"So," you say.
"So…”
You look at him — streetlight in the grey of his beard, arm along the wheel, he’s in absolutely no hurry to resolve you.
"Did you have a good time tonight?"
His head turns. There's a beat where he just looks at you, and you watch him physically decide not to make a joke of it.
"Yes. Best night I've had in a while," he says.
"Would you—" and god, you're thirty years old and your heart is doing this anyway, "—want to see me again? Like this?"
"Was already plannin' to ask you to dinner." A small crease starts at the corner of his eye. "Was workin' out whether to do it now or ring you tomorrow, so I didn't seem overly—"
"Keen?"
"Keen," he confirms, gravely, like the word's been a burden to him all week.
And that lands warm and the relief does something reckless to your mouth, which is that it stops guarding it.
"Okay. Then I'm going to say something, but you can't look at me while I say it."
“Right.” He scrubs a hand over his twitching lips and looks out the windshield, obedient.
"I want to ask you up."
"Mm."
"And I'm having a whole debate about it."
"I can hear it," he says. "Been losin' to the engine for about a minute now."
"Just—,” you sigh, “—shut up." But you're smiling at the dashboard. "It's just— I spent all week wondering if this was a hookup thing for you. And you answered that, and I believe you, I do. But there's this small, paranoid part of me that's like, well, that's exactly what a man would say at the pub, isn't it? And then there's this other, stupider part that thinks if you come up, you'll—" you take a deep breath, your fingers hooking into each other on your lap, and make yourself finish it, "—think less of me. First date and all."
He's quiet for a second, lips pursing.
“Can I look at you now?” he tries.
“Yeah.”
"You want to know where I'm actually at?"
"Truly just desperate for a man to be honest so I know what headspace to put myself in."
“Alright.” He shifts to face you, wrist still hanging over the wheel. “I want to come up. Badly, if you want some extra honesty.”
The badly goes straight between your thighs.
“Okay,” you manage. “Noted.”
“I haven’t lied to you once tonight. And I’m takin’ you to dinner whether I come up or not.”
“And, like— you wouldn’t think—”
“Think less of you?” He frowns, like the math’s not mathing. “For doin’ the same thing I’d be doing? Together?”
“When you put it like that…”
“For what it’s worth, I’m sat here havin’ a version of the same debate. Been out of this a long time. Didn’t want you thinkin’ that’s all I came for. So if you’d rather I kiss you at the door and drive home, I’ll do that and consider it a perfect evening.”
And maybe it’s the ease of him, the total absence of pressure you’re always braced for on nights like this, that settles it for you.
“Would you like to come up?”
——
The stairwell smells of somebody's late dinner and warm dust, the day's heat still trapped in it, and you take the stairs ahead of him to the second floor.
John is a gentleman.
John has been a gentleman all night.
John gives himself the length of one flight of stairs off the clock — the sway of you in those jeans, the shift and give of you with every step, the smooth line of your bare shoulders under the halter's little bow — and by the landing he's a gentleman again, and if you felt his eyes like a brand on you, and by the half-smirk you throw over your shoulder you did, neither of you says a word about it.
Your flat smells like you — the perfume he got to know at the pub, but underneath it, clean laundry, a candle burned down sometime this week — and a blur of black-and-caramel bolts across the living room and vanishes down the hall before he can so much as get a look at her.
"That was Twix," you say, her paws still pattering away. "She'll start her background check and circle back."
"Sensible."
And then the two of you are standing in your living room with the whole car’s worth of honesty sitting in the middle of the floor, and you look at him, and look at the kitchen, and say:
"Do you want a drink? I have wine. Or, um. Tea? I might have a beer from—"
"I'm alright," his mouth pulls at one side.
"Water? I'm gonna have water."
"Then I'll have water," he says like he’s surrendering.
He watches you go — and he could laugh, not at you, but because he knows exactly what he’s looking at. The two of you agreed in plain English on why he’s standing here, and now you’re in your kitchen filling glasses neither of you want, and wiping down a counter that, from where he’s stood, was already clean.
So he gives you room. Settles against the arm of the couch, takes a slow lap of your shelf with his eyes — you and a woman he guesses is the October bride, you on a hike somewhere sunny, you and Twix bravely on the balcony — and he wants you the whole time, low and patient, in his back teeth, but doesn’t move on it.
Your pace. Your move.
You come back with the waters, and hand him his, and hold your own in both hands like you might drop it. He takes a sip, looks at you over the rim of it.
“You’re nervous,” he says.
“Not at all.”
“Mm.” He nods slowly, deeply unconvinced and taking a page from your own book. “Don’t know if I buy that.”
He watches it land, watches the laugh come up out of you before you can stop it, head tipping back, throat bare, and half your nerves seem to leave with it.
He likes that.
He sets his glass down. Then, gently, he takes yours out of your mid-fidget hands and sets it down too — he tips your chin up with one knuckle, and kisses you.
Easy-like, cold from the water, cranberry still faint on your tongue, your breath catches once against his mouth and then lets go. Your hands slide flat up his chest and stop over his heart — which is going quicker than he’d care to admit, and he feels the exact moment you find it out, the little hum of discovery you make.
When you pull back to look at him, whatever nerves were left in you are gone from your eyes, and they’re twinkly a lot like the first photo he ever saw of you.
You take his hand off your waist, lace it through yours, and guide him backward toward the short hall.
In your bedroom he finds the tie of your halter at the back of your neck and pauses with the ends between his fingers, silk warm from your body. One pull and it gives, the fabric sighing loose, and he follows it slide down with his eyes first, then his mouth — the slope of your throat, over your shoulder, then the soft skin below your ear that tastes of strawberry perfume and salt. His beard drags over your neck and a shiver flows through you so he does it again, slower. You shiver harder, fingers curling into the front of his polo.
Good.
You tug the hem of his shirt up and he reaches back, pulls it off over his head one-handed, and drops it somewhere he’ll look for later. He unhooks your bra just as easily, and when your palms spread into the coarse hair over his bare chest and down his toned stomach, the muscle jumps under your fingertips, he hears his own breath go rough.
“Okay,” you say, a little wonder in it. “Wow, yeah, that’s….”
“Mm?”
“Nothing. Just— I knew military, just didn’t realize… this much military.”
“Lodging a complaint?” he askes, amused.
“Definitely not.”
The rest goes gradually — his belt, your jeans peeled down warm thighs with his calloused palms flat against your skin the whole way, a hop and a giggle when the denim catches your ankle and he steadies you by the elbow — and then you’re bare in front of him, lamplight pooling gold along your shoulder, your hip, the soft curve of your stomach. He stops with his hands at your waist and looks.
“Say something,” you murmur, half a laugh, shy at last under the attention. “You’re oggling.”
“I am.” His thumbs press slow arcs into your hips. “Give me a minute. Been picturin’ this since Tuesday and I did you no justice.”
You pull him down onto the bed by way of an answer, and the mattress sinks with a soft complaint, and then it’s just skin — so much warm skin, soft everywhere he’s hard, giving under his hands, smelling of perfume and the clean sweat July dampens into everyone.
He stretches out alongside you, one heavy thigh over yours, and takes his time. The curve of your waist. The full weight of your breast, thumb dragging over your nipple until it peaks and your breath stutters. The inside of your thigh, where the skin is finest and the heat pools. You move under his touch the whole time, restless and rising, fingers in his hair, at his shoulders, and the small sounds you make land somewhere at the base of his neck and prickle there.
Then he shifts down the bed, kisses the soft of your stomach, the plush crease of your hip, and looks up the length of you.
“Can I?”
“You— yes,” you breathe, trembling feebly. “Yes, obviously, you don’t have to a—”
His mouth is on you before the sentence ends.
You’re sweet and slick against his tongue, already so wet the first slow lick slides easy, and the sound you make is high and caught somewhere low, thigh twitching against his ear, one hand flying to his hair. He hums — feels you feel it — and settles in. No rush. Long soft strokes of his tongue until your hips learn the rhythm and rise to meet it, then his lips close warm around your clit, sucking gently, and your whole body pulls tight.
“Oh my god— okay— okay—”
“Mm.”
“Don’t be smug—” and your voice climbs off the end of the sentence as he slides two thick fingers into you, curling them, tongue still working, and whatever the rest of that scolding was, he never learns it.
“Could do this all night, sweetheart,” he murmurs against you, and feels the words land in a shudder. Your breathing changes. Your thighs start trembling, your hand fists in the sheets — and he keeps the pace exactly the same until you’re pulling at him. Hair, arm, anything you can reach.
“John— John— come— I want you. Now,” you whine, “Please.”
He comes up the length of you slow, mouth mapping stomach and sternum and throat on the way, and settles over you on one forearm—
"I should've said this in the car," he starts, eyes on yours. "I don't have a condom. Wasn't assuming tonight would end up here."
"I don't have any either. I actually checked the drawer before I left tonight." You push his dampening hair back off his forehead. "I'm on the pill, and I trust you. But I'd still feel better if you pull out. Is that okay?"
He nods assuredly. "Then I'll pull out," he says flat and plain. "You have my word."
"You and your word—" but you're smiling, and then you're not smiling, because he's already moved and taken himself in hand and dragged the head of his cock through your folds, coating himself in you, and notched against your entrance, and the smile falls open into something much, much better.
He pushes in slow, watches your face the entire way — he couldn't look elsewhere if a grenade went off — your brows drawing up, your lips parting around a breath that doesn't finish, your nails biting little crescents into his forearms — and fuck, the feel of you: scalding, soaked, tight enough that he has to stop twice, jaw clenched, sweat sliding at his temple, feeding you his cock an inch at a time and pulling back, then giving you more; the slick easy give of you around him unspooling something in his stomach.
"Talk to me," he murmurs, gravel-low. "Alright?"
"Yes." Your voice has gone breathless and small and blissed. "You're— god—"
"Christ, you’re snug," he exhales shakily, eyes finding yours. “Relax for me, baby. Breathe.”
"I am breath—oh. Oh—shhit—"
John’s seated all the way, hips flush to your backside, and both of you go quiet — a shared beat of stillness, you fluttering around him hot and full, his body coming down, forehead dropping to yours, ten months of silence pulling a sound up out of his chest that he couldn't have stopped if he knew it was coming.
Then you shift your hips, experimental, a slow grind up against him, and that stillness is over.
He moves slowly; long level strokes dragging all the way out so you both feel every hot stretch of the return, your breasts pressing soft against his hairy chest. Your heels slide up the back of his thighs and he budges his hips closer, holding deep and pressing the head of his cock into your furthest wall. Your hands squeeze the meat between his shoulders and his neck as he pushes a small squeal out of you.
"Right there—right there—right there, don't—"
"I won’t," he murmurs against your jaw. “I won’t move.”
"—okay maybe move a little—"
He breathes something restrained through a smile. "Make your mind up, darling," he grunts.
“It’s hard to— mmm—think like this,” you half-moan against his cheek.
“Don’t think, then.”
It’s all your talking that undoes him more than anything, he realizes distantly. He’d forgotten there was a version of this with laughing in it; a version with a woman eagerly gripping him and grinning against his cheek in the second before a moan carries her voice away — and every time you say his name, breathed and broken, something in his chest cinches another notch tighter.
He draws back and drives home again, and whatever you’d been about to answer with comes out as a punched huff.
You don’t think.
He feels the difference in you immediately — your body dropping the manners, hips rising to meet him harder than he’s giving it, heels dragging him in by the thighs on every stroke, a low frustrated sound building in your throat when he keeps the same controlled pace. You’re not asking for anything. You’re taking it in inches, greedy and unaware of yourself, nails dragging down the small of his back, pulling—
“Harder?” he asks against your ear.
"Yes, please."
He hooks your knee up over his hip and opens you wider—“So polite.”—and gives it to you deeper, his weight behind it, your headboard cracking against the wall. You go loud and lovely underneath him, clutching, slick heat and plush skin and your nails scoring lines down his back that he hopes, viciously, will last long enough to admire.
He works a hand between your bodies, thumb finding your clit, riding the motion you’ve bkth created.
"That's— John— You’re gonna make me come," you sob.
"I know. I feel you. Squeezin' me like— Christ. Go on—fuck."
He watches it arrive before you do, a shiver running ahead of the wave; your spine arches up off the bed, your cunt clenches around him in long pulsing, aching, waves — it takes you under, and you pull him with you.
He holds you, murmuring filth and praise in equal measure against your ear—
How good—
How gorgeous—
You’re mine now, you know that? Hm?—
It’s watching you eagerly nod along with his babbling that finishes him. He lasts maybe ten more strokes on borrowed time, heat gathering alacritous and irrevocable at the base of his groin — and he rears back onto his knees, pulling out of you with a growl that tumbles from his throat, fist working his cock over, soaked with you, spilling hot across your stomach and hip in thick ropes, head hanging, shoulders heaving, your thighs still bracketing his knees.
When he lifts his head, you’re already looking at him.
Glowing down to your chest, lips parted and kiss-swollen, wearing him low on your stomach — and neither of you says anything. Neither of you looks away either. His chest is still heaving. Your knee presses in against his side, and the corner of your mouth starts to curl, and his does too, helpless about it.
He comes down on his side, careful of the mess he’s made of you, one arm heavy across the pillow above your head. The curtain breathes at the window beside the bed and the night comes in and cools the sweat on his back, and he can see your heartbeat going hard at your throat, the rise and fall of your stomach not yet settled. He gently fits his thumb against your pulse, just to feel it going.
He kisses you, your mouth lazy under his, and then your temple, and the crown of your head, and you make a low, boneless sound and turn your face into his hot neck, and the two of you just lie there breathing each other in, tangled and settling, your finger drawing slow shapes on his forearm.
"John?" Small, against his throat.
"Mm?"
"Would you mind grabbing me a cloth? Bathroom's just across the hall."
He's up before the sentence finishes, annoyed at his own carcass the whole three steps to the door, ten months out of practice and it shows, he used to know this part, the part where he takes care of you before you have to ask.
You bathroom is small and smells of your shampoo, fruity, herbal. He runs a flannel under the warm tap, wrings it out, catches his own eyes in the mirror over the sink — wrecked hair, beard ruined and shiny with your lipgloss. He turns, craning his neck spotting a blooming red scratch coming up nicely at his shoulder.
He comes back and cleans you up properly, kneeling on the edge of the bed, one hand steady at your hip while the warm cloth moves over your stomach — thorough about it, frowning slightly the way he does when he’s concentrating — and you watch him do it propped up on your elbows with an expression he can't quite read and doesn't need to. It's warm, whatever it is. And it’s aimed at him, so.
"You're staring," he says, not looking up.
"You're tidying me."
"Should've done it before you asked." He folds the cloth, sets it on the nightstand, and stretches out beside you again, this time gathering you into his chest. "Out of practice."
"I'll allow it," you say, magnanimous, settling your cheek against his pec. "The rest was very in-practice."
He huffs into your hair.
Your fingers trail idle through the hair on his chest, down over old pinked scars, and you ask him about them — whether the jagged line at his shoulder hurt, what caused the puckered one under his ribs — and he answers more honestly than he means to, your weight settling heavier against him as the adrenaline drains.
There's a soft thump from the hallway, then, and a moment later a small shape appears in the doorway — sits, tail wrapping her feet, and surveys the wreckage: the trail of clothes, the stranger man in the bed, you draped over his ribs.
She stares at John.
John stares back.
"We have an audience," he says.
You look over him to see your cat, "Twix, John. John, Twix."
Twix holds his gaze a moment longer, supremely unimpressed, then steps delicately over his discarded shirt and exits the way she came and he feels you giggling before he hears it, the shake of it against his chest.
"That went well," you say, overly pleased.
“Yeah?”
“Mhm.”
"Well, consider me chuffed."
Some comfortable minutes later he feels you surface a little out of the drowse, feels your breathing change, going careful; feels your face arrange itself against his skin before you speak.
"You don't have to stay, by the way." Light. Smooth as eroded stone, polished by use, he imagines. "If you'd sleep better in your own bed. No pressure either way."
And there it is — the same maneuver from your texts, the honest thing dressed up so you can't be caught caring — except this time he can feel your heartbeat while you run it, quick against his ribs, betraying the whole performance from inside.
He keeps his hand moving on your arm, slow, so you know nothing's landed wrong.
"I'll head home," he says. "Not because I want to," he clarifies.
“No?” you ask.
"Believe me. This is about the last place I want to leave." His hand doesn't stop, slow up, slow down, steadying you through it. "I'd like at least one proper dinner between us before I go makin' a habit of your bed."
You lift your head off his chest and look at him — hair wrecked, eyes searching his face for the trick — and he lets you look as long as you need to because there's no trick to be found. He meant it.
“Alright," you agree.
“Yeah?”
“Yes. Dinner sounds nice.”
"Mm," he hums, contented. He presses a kiss into your hair and untangles himself, face scrunched with visible reluctance, and dresses while you watch from the bed with the sheet gathered loose around you.
At the door he stops.
"C'mere."
You come to him in the sheet, and he kisses you properly, one hand cupping your face, thumb at your cheek. You go languid against him. He takes his time. Long past politeness. Long enough that leaving starts to look renegotiable, and he breaks away before he starts.
"G’night," he says, low, still holding your face.
"Goodnight."
"I'll ring you about dinner tomorrow."
——
The flat is quiet. But it's a different quiet than the one you left this morning and you stand in the middle of it grinning.
Twix reappears at the edge of the counter and stares.
“I don’t need the lecture, I’m grown,” you tell her and start walking back to the bedroom, you hear her little jump to the floor and her feather steps catching up with you, “I can have sex. I deserve it, even.” You drop into your bed with a sigh. “You’d understand if you still had ovaries.”
18+ MDNI can't get enough of you :: simon riley x fem!reader
simon can't get his hands off you. no matter where you are, at home or in public. and once you're in his grasp, there's no escape. not that you ever want to escape.
whenever you're in his vicinity, his eyes are fixed on you, paying no attention to whatever the hell is happening on the telly or the constant yapping of your friends, no matter how much they yell for him to listen.
his eyes follow your every move, drinking in your otherworldly beauty, with only one thing on his mind; how to get you alone and all to himself.
you're at home, wearing only his shirt and a pair of cute panties, greeting him in the morning with your bed head and puffy face still laced with sleep. you'd think nothing of it but he's done for.
"goddamit, woman. wha' are ya tryin' to do?" he says as a feral need takes over him. he pulls you in his lap, strong arms wrapping tightly around you. no chance to escape. "simon!" you squeak, giggling in your hands.
his lips crash onto yours, stealing your breath in an instant, large hands roaming your body under the shirt, breathing "god, you're so fuckin' hot, love." while squeezing every piece of flesh he can find, guiding you to lay back on the couch, getting in between your legs and humping his growing bulge onto your core. "gotta have you, love. please." simon begs desperately as you try to catch your breath.
and with only a nod, he's taken his hard drooling cock out of his pants and pulled your panties to the side, before impatiently plunging himself inside your tight hole, letting out a sigh of relief into your neck.
he holds you so tight while setting a rapid pace, giving you no time to adjust as you whine and writhe beneath him. he's thrusting with such force and determination you'd think your body is on fire, thick mean cock stretching you so wide and repeatedly punching your cervix you lose your mind entirely.
his hulking body pressing you further into the cushions, hot breath fanning into your neck as he lets out breathy groans beside your ear, using your body to relieve himself.
on nights out with friends at the pub, simon holds you flush against him, hand pressed onto your waist as thoughts of how to ruin you take over his mind.
he can't take it anymore, the bulge in his pants growing by the second, painful and desperate. he needs to have you, feel your body against him. he needs to see your pretty pussy dripping for him as he stretches you out on his fat cock, feel your soft warm walls wrapped around him in a vise.
he breaks the conversation abruptly without a care for the confused looks he's getting.
he pulls you into the bathroom and bends you over the sink, bunching up your dress around your waist before yanking away your skimpy panties, making you gasp and complain about how expensive it was. "shut up. i'll buy you another one."
and with no warning, he shoves his cock into your needy cunt, gripping your hips tightly and slamming into you mercilessly, sending you into a state of feverish ecstasy as you chant his name, loud moans punctuated by each vigorous thrust leaking out the door and reaching the ears of every passerby.
﹙ ¹⁸⁺ ﹚ ₊ ❜୧ A QUICKIE WITH YOUR HUSBAND SIMON.
you're sorting through what feels like the millionth tiny sock when simon comes up behind you, large hands settling on your hips. "kids are occupied," he murmurs against your neck, and you can hear the suggestion in his voice.
"si, i have to get this done," you protest weakly, but you're already leaning back into him. wash day waits for no one with three kids, and you're drowning in tiny clothes. "and they won't stay distracted for long."
"exactly why we should be quick about it." his hands slide around to your stomach, pulling you flush against him. you can feel he's already hard, and your resolve wavers. "been thinking about you all morning, luv. watching you bend over sortin’ laundry..."
"you're terrible," you breathe, but you're already turning in his arms. seven years of marriage and three kids later, and he still looks at you like he wants to devour you. "we have maybe ten minutes before someone needs something."
"can work with that." he's already lifting you onto the washing machine, hands pushing up his sweatshirt that you wore around the house. "fuck, no panties? you trying t’kill me?"
"it's wash day, baby," you remind him, wrapping your legs around his waist. "everything's in the dirty hamper." but your explanation dissolves into a moan as his fingers find you already wet.
"fuckin' convenient," he growls, working you open with practiced efficiency. there's no time for slow and sweet; not with three kids in the house. "always ready for me, aren't you, swee'eart?"
you bite your lip to keep quiet as he replaces his fingers with his cock, pushing in with one smooth thrust. "simon," you gasp, nails digging into his shoulders through his shirt. "fuck—w-we have to be quiet."
"then you'd better keep that pretty mouth o’yours shut," he says, setting a punishing pace immediately. the washing machine rocks with the force of it, and you have to brace yourself against the wall. "can't have the little ones hearing what daddy does to mummy."
the filthy words in his rough accent make you clench around him. he notices, of course he does, and smirks against your neck. "like that, do you? knowing i'm fuckin’ you while our babies play down the hall?"
before you can respond, there's a loud bang on the door. "mommy! mommy, open!" your five-year-old's voice cuts through your haze of pleasure. "need you!"
simon doesn't stop, if anything going harder. "mummy's busy, swee'eart," he calls out, voice impressively steady for someone currently railing you against major appliances. "go play with yer sister."
"but mommy!" another bang. "daisy took my doll!"
you try to answer but simon chooses that moment to hit that perfect spongy spot inside you, and all that comes out is a strangled sound. he covers your mouth with his hand, eyes dark with amusement and lust.
"mummy's folding clothes," he lies smoothly. "she'll be out in a minute, go tell daisy t'share."
"don't want to!" your daughter whines, and you can hear her stomping her little feet. "want mommy now!"
"ella." simon's voice drops into what you call his lieutenant voice — gentle but brooking no argument. "go play. we'll be out soon."
there's a moment of silence, then you hear her stomp away muttering about simon being unfair. the second she's gone, simon removes his hand from your mouth.
"such a good girl," he praises, but you're not sure if he means you or ella. "keeping quiet while i fuck you senseless. though i bet y’wanted to scream, didn't you?"
"simon, fuck, please," you gasp, feeling your orgasm building embarrassingly fast. the combination of his cock and the thrill of almost getting caught has you on edge. "i'm gonna-"
"i know, luv. she's fuckin’ squeezin’ me." his thumb finds your clit, rubbing tight circles. "c'mon then. cum all over my cock before another one starts bangin’ on the door."
as if on cue, you hear your two-year-old calling from somewhere in the house. "mama?"
the use of your married name plus the perfect pressure on your clit sends you over. you bite his shoulder to muffle your cry as you cum all over his cock, whole body shaking with the force of it. he follows right after, groaning low in your ear as he fills you.
"mama!" your toddler's voice is getting closer.
"shit," simon pants, pulling out and quickly fixing his clothes. he helps you down, steadying you when your legs wobble. "y’good?"
"just peachy," you breathe, smoothing down his sweatshirt. you can feel his cum starting to leak and clench your thighs together.
"though i'm going to need to shower before i finish this laundry."
He enjoys using it as a pillow when laying down because "that's the most comfortable place, love". You found him falling asleep on it on more than one occasion.
Gaz loves kneading the flesh with his hands when he's stressed, his version of making biscuits he calls it, but you gotta be careful when his movements comes to a stop, you have no more than a second to try and get away before his teeth plunge in.
He loves watching you walk around the apartment in the tinies shorts or his boxers, patting you affectionally as a greeting, knowing just how needy he is by how long his hand lingers there.
Sometimes when he's feeling cheeky, he'll lightly pinch one of your ass cheeks while passing by, getting a special kind of satisfaction from you letting out a small gasp and scrambling for an excuse if there are other people around. The embarassed expression on your face makes it worth the light slap on his shoulder.
Kyle uses spanking both as a reward and a punishment, heavy palm falling down just right, a satisfied groan escaping his lips at the sight of it jiggle. Later he smears aloe vera over the bruised skin, muttering praises about how brave you were and how good you took your punishment.
It's no surprise that his favourite position is doggy style, ass in the air, back arched. Letting out a mean laugh when you try to get away, your fingers pulling at the sheets in an effort to anchor yourself before he pulls your hips back and slams his dick harder:
"Where do you think you're going, baby? Stay right here and let me take care of you."
Gaz knows what he likes and that is eating ass after a hard day at work or after an especially long deployment. He calls it his dessert so if he sometimes sneaks in a bite or two, you'll see the bite-shape marks in the mirror later.
It goes without saying that he likes anal, he starts first by fingering you, teasing you about being eager when your walls starts clamping on his digits. He slowly adds another finger until you get frustrated and tell him to just put it in already. It first started as a joke, but now he refuses to use anything other than a specific peach flavoured lube, the smell of it having an almost pavlovian effect on you.
You know what's about to happen when he tells you lay down on your tummy and let him do all the work. He puts a pillow under you, a string of drool on the sheets as he keeps going, trapped under his weight as he leaves kisses between your shoulder blades, licking the thin layer of sweat on your back. When he asks you if you want him to fill you up, the only answer you give him is a broken moan and a "Please, Kyle" before he empties himself inside you.
Unbeknownst to most, Phillip Graves is not the worst ex husband in the world.
Not the best, but the man just shy of a B.
Theres not a doubt in his mind that he loved you, he still loves you. But sometimes love can be a little messy, adding a little too much over protectiveness with small hints of jealousy and maybe it just wasn’t the right time.
Co parenting isn’t a issue for him, doesn’t need to be asked twice about doctors visits, or the little graduation ceremony held at the end of the year for your one year old who hasn’t a clue what’s going on at day care. He’s recording the milestones and sending them to you when he’s not deployed, asking to hear the babies voice when he’s is— hell, the man is still paying your bills in the house he left for you and your baby even though you told him not to.
It’s when you bring a new man around, old habits don’t die soon. Phillip Graves doesn’t mind arguments in the parking lot at the meeting place, or sizing up the first guy you tried to bring around wip just couldn’t handle the intimidation from Graves, randomly popping up to your house with the key he still has to see if the ‘cameras still work’ or the ‘drain is clogging right’ just as you’re about to make out with the person you were dating.
The bastard.
Today’s no different, the southern man actually approved of the guy you’re seeing for once. Didn’t put up a fight, had a look in his blue eyes you just couldn’t read. A tension in his shoulders when he picked up your baby for his last couple of days before deploying, ‘oh, this might actually be the end of it.’
But after two months, all he wants to see if you and your kid. Hear the rabbles and babbles of your beautiful child you created while you smile and go through all the pics he’s missed out on. But today is quiet, babies down for a nap, Phillip can hear the rustling of laundry upstairs, the tv low to some show with 7 seasons. You’re pretty when his eyes land on you after making it upstairs, curls in two low ponytails, small hoops in your peircings, plain violet mid sleeve tee shirt that just compliments you so well, jeans that hug every curve on you just the way he likes. Mouth watering.
He gives the open door to your bedroom a knock. “Hey sweetheart.”
You try your bed to smile, but it’s meek, “Hi Graves, welcome back.”
Graves blue eyes wash over you, gh way you keep shifting on your feet, a little drained, “What’s wrong honey? You alright?”
You couldn’t hide it even if you tried, “Me at that guy I was dating broke up.”
He leans against the dresser, turning the volume lower on the tv, he takes it in, nodding, “Huh.” But now the question is, why would anyone on gods given earth want to break up with a prize like you? He feels his jaw lock, “Can you tell me what happened or was it just some bullshit.”
A bit of both.
You sigh, “He couldn’t fathom that I would put our child before him. And when I told him he should rethink it, he tried pinning it on me. That I could leave the baby with you—“ you take a frustrated deep breath out. Putting your energy into folding the pile of clothes on your bed. It shouldn’t be so heavy on your mind- but it’s gnawing at you. Irritated you that someone felt entitled like that, even if you’d only been dating him seriously for 4 months. Phillip would never think like that—
“I bet you’re happy it ended though right?” You try to laugh it off, eyes finally meeting his. And he’s got so much a soft look on his face when he looks at you, but it’s disgruntled, eyebrows knitted together, leaning against the dresser with his arms folded over his chest.
“Why would I ever want you t’be unhappy [+]?” Says it as if it’s a curse. The whole thing below him.
“Doesn’t matter that we’ve fought like cats ‘nd fuckin dogs, ‘nd broke my fuckin hard slidin me divorce papers— maybe I fuckin needed it t’ open my eyes.” And Graves slowly crosses the room towards you. “But I’ve always wanted what’s best for you and our kid, that aint ever gonna chance ‘long as I’m alive. You and the baby come first, doesn’t matter what’s going on. That includes making sure yer done right by even if it ain’t from me. I’ll knock the fuckin lights out that bastard or anybody else over you darlin, that clear?”
You nod, butterflies swarming in your stomach just as they’ve always have. Graves hand found itself low on your back, other hand lifting your chin.
“Good,” his thumb runs over you plump lips, planting a much needed one on them. Gentle, warm, Phillip pulls away, back of his knuckles rubbing up and down your back. “How ‘bout we take it easy, stay together as a family. Put on some Pixar movie, get all the snack ya like, cuddle up close. Just like we used t’, huh?”
You’re breathless, mind hazed over you can’t help but give him a, “yes.”
Almost as if the military man had planned, your babies cries fill your ears from the monitor and not too far down the hall.
Graves gives you that classic charming smile, “You finish this up, I’ll get the baby changed.”
It’s so easy for things to fall into place, easier when you force them too.
Maybe if Graves had known how perfect you’d fall back into his arms, he would’ve sent a stupid bastard who didn’t deserve you your way sooner.
a/n: graves is fvcked but he’s my fvcked up southern man.
ghost found you the way he assumes you found your collection of stray cats, soaked to the bone from a sudden storm and crouched behind a dumpster to hide from someone who wouldn't think twice about hurting you.
it must be that soft spot that soap keeps insisting he has that makes him stop with his cigarette half lit and stare at you shivering in the cold, well past the hour when pretty things should be home or in someone else's bed, your mascara running rivers down your cheeks and your lipstick smeared, a nice bruise blooming on your cheek where someone hit you (probably the same person that smeared your lipstick). you look up at him with wet eyes and a pitiful expression and he can't stop himself from offering you the cigarette, eager to taste your lipstick stain when you hand it back to him with shaking fingers. it feels like the beginning of the end to invite you upstairs to the little attic flat he's renting.
he doesnt pretend to be a gentleman when he offers you a towel and tells you to warm up in the showrr, doesnt turn around or avoid staring at you when you hesitantly strip. just as well when you pilfer one of his shirts and curl up on the mattress he's shoved in the corner, your lips still trembling as you hold your arms out to him.
its a bad move, mixing business with pleasure, but ghost hates the city and he can't say he feels bad turning his back on it to bury his face between your soft thighs. the same way he doesnt feel bad exchanging numbers in the morning when you set off to wherever home is with a pep in your step. the sex is meaningless, its a time killer for an otherwise boring mission
so then why does he feel his stomach clench when you tell him you'll miss him? why does he recognize your strays with the same familiarity as spotting gaz at the pub? why does he keep a budget line running for that shitty little attic flat that he said he was never coming back to?
and why the fuck do you keep texting him like you were something more than a convenient hole for him? (and why is he starting to think there might not be anything convenient about you?)
simon riley husband x shy and quiet wife who doesn’t know how to tell him that she bought a kitten 🫢
concur your timid tendencies
pairing: husband!simon “ghost” riley x shy wife!reader
summary: you surprise your husband with a new family member— if you can find out how to tell him
masterlist!
a/n: soooo cuteeee, anon :))) had soo much fun writing!! requests are open!
“awww, who’s the cutest girl in the world?” you quietly say in your best baby voice, “you are! that’s who!”
while your husband was away at work today, you decided to go to your local animal shelter, finalizing the adoption process for the precious kitten you’ve been bonding with over the last month.
it took you a while to muster up the courage to actually go to the animal shelter four weeks ago, your shyness getting the best of you.
simon usually helped you concur your timid tendencies, having you order takeout food over the phone, schedule his and your doctor appointments— some of his forms of exposure therapy. but, the brute happened to be absent from home daily, having to spend most of his days at work, meaning he couldn’t assist you all the time.
wanting to try your own form of exposure therapy, you started visiting the animal shelter, especially whenever you got too lonely. the puppies and kittens were always great company! animals were easier to be around than other humans— except for your si, of course.
and you may have gotten too close to one— an adorable kitten began following you everywhere you walked. she even started to yowl when you left the animal shelter, tugging at your heart strings. “she seems to really like you,” the vet said, squatting down beside you to pet the kitten, “would you be interested in adopting her?”
you were nervous about adopting your new pet, especially since you didn’t know how to tell your husband. you didn’t start going to the animal shelter with the goal of adopting, it just happened.
if anything, simon should be excited you added a new addition to your little family. she could help with your loneliness on the days he’s working, notably when the man gets deployed— his deployments were always excruciating to deal with alone. you needed this kitten.
“dada’s gonna be home soon, kitty!” you lifted the feline, snuggling her in your arms. “how am i gonna introduce you two?” you mumbled more to yourself, awwwing at your girl’s sweet purrs.
you played with your kitten in different rooms around the house, migrating from the living room, up the stairs to your bedroom, and even the bathroom— she had so much energy for such a tiny kitty.
placing a bowl of water and food down for her, you watched her consume it. “you’re probably really hungry, huh?” you giggled, petting along her back.
then, “hon? m’ home!”
it must’ve been a funny sight— you paused any movements, your kitty doing the same at your husband’s deep, thick accent.
“that’s him! we have to go kitty!” you scooped her up, lightly jogging up the stairs. hope si doesn’t hear me, you thought, placing the kitten in your bedroom. talking to her now, “please stay here and don’t leave! i have to prepare simon to meet you. i love you,” you kissed her, exiting the bedroom.
“sweet’eart?” you heard your husband again.
rounding the corner, “hi, si!” sweetly leaving you. throwing your arms around your husband’s neck, “how was work today?” just gotta act normal.
simon responded, encircling his arms around your waist, “same ol’, same ol’.” he kisses your cheek, pulling away, “wha’ were ya doin’? took ya a bit to come.”
thinking, oh great, questions! while putting on your best poker face. “you know, just listening to music in my headphones! i couldn’t hear you at first,” you replied, grabbing his hand to pull him towards the kitchen. “heard. jus’ don’ have it too loud next time, yeah fawn? could be dangerous for ya if it’s not m’ comin’ in,” he squeezed your hand in response. “yes, si! i didn’t even think about that!”
you ate dinner with your husband, chatting about the activities you both did today— you purposely leaving one out. simon was surely gonna find out about the kitten sooner or later, and you were okay with it being later! you just didn’t know how to tell the brit.
“luvie’?” your husband pulls you out of your thoughts, “wha’ are those doin’ agains’ tha wall?”
following where he was pointing, your eyes widened, landing on the kitty’s food and water bowls. shit, how could i forget to put those away!
“i-i don’t—” you stuttered, trying to come up with an excuse, but nothing.
simon raised an eyebrow, “mhmm?” vibrating deep in his chest. the man was having fun with this. “have somethin’ ya needa tell m’?” “n-no, si—”
meow.
a beat of silence.
“wha’ was tha?”
you winced, turning to look at the culprit in the doorway. “surprise!” you waved, walking to grab your kitten, she always follows me everywhere. i should’ve known better.
Summary: You bring your daughter into the world with Jack's help. Literally.
Pairing: Jack Abbot x Pregnant!Reader
Content warnings: MDNI, Al-Hashimi and Dana cameos, anxiety, labor (positive experience for Baby Mama ((with the exception of one ignorant nurse)) b/c I love her and could never let anything awful happen to her that doesn't serve the storyline), Jack is an excellent advocate/support person, epidural is used as well as other methods of pain relief, possible medical inaccuracies, childbirth, fluff, baby is named but is given a silly and cute nickname that she will be referred to as going forward (y'all voted on this)
Word count: 6,131
Series Masterlist | Read on ao3 here | dividers by @/lariesographic
Author's note: the things I know about labor and childbirth now... I'm not traumatized b/c I'm mature, but this is lowk more than I wanted to know at this stage of my life. some of this stuff is random things I learned from the TikTok for you page, and then some of it came from very detailed Google searches, and some is from birth stories I watched on YouTube. I tried watching birth vlogs, but some of these dads seemed evil, so I couldn't do it, plus it was kind of scary for me, so yeah. anyways I hope you enjoy b/c this series has lowkey become my baby so pls lmk what you think and here's your reminder that reblogs (empty or not) are good for your health! ily thank you for being here pls enjoy! <3
additional note: if you are on any of the taglists here and don't reblog this post after liking/commenting, you are getting side eyed hard.
40 weeks and two days. In other words, hell. That’s the state you’re currently in.
You just had to all but push Jack out the door to go to work, but he’s gone. Sure, you told him to go, but now you’re bored. You’ve watched all of Adam Sandler’s and Queen Latifah’s movies, so now you’re not even sure what to put on the TV.
Eventually, you decide to put on an episode of Shameless, and once you’ve got all your snacks and two drinks nearby, you’re ready to camp out on the couch for the foreseeable future.
//
At noon, Jack’s left hand can’t stop tapping against his leg while he fills out a chart on one of the computers in the hub. His mind can’t get off of you, and he was just a little uncharacteristically harsh on one of the residents. He prides himself on his stern but empathetic approach; he hasn’t snapped at anyone in years.
Al-Hashimi walks over, calmly, with no readable expression on her face. She leans over, elbows on the countertop.
“Whitaker will get over it,” she says softly. “So there’s no need for you to feel this bad about it.”
Jack looks up at Al-Hashimi through his lashes.
“You said your wife’s due date was September third, correct?” she asks.
Jack looks back at the computer and nods. “Yeah.”
“It’s the fifth.”
“I know,” he says, a little annoyed and snippy. He sighs and looks at her again. “Sorry.”
Al-Hashimi sighs and considers her words for a moment. “My ex was the same way before I had my son. This isn’t an abnormal reaction to waiting for your baby to be born. The doctor tells you the due date, and even though we all know babies come on their own schedules, you expect them to come when they’re ‘supposed to.’”
Jack finally logs out of the computer and leans back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest.
“Am I wrong to suspect your wife all but kicked you out today because you were maybe a little overbearing?” Al-Hashimi ventures.
Jack’s brows furrow. “What do you mean?”
“You’re a passionate man, Abbot,” Al-Hashimi says, seemingly holding back a smile. “And while your wife definitely loves you, she’s uncomfortable, and at this point, overdue. The last thing she needs is a husband who won’t bend to her will because of his own anxiety.”
Jack frowns.
“I bend,” he mutters under his breath.
Al-Hashimi grins. “I’m sure. I just mean to say, she needs you to be relaxed and amenable, not tense and rigid.”
Okay, maybe she’s got a point. He can’t imagine what it feels like to have an entire baby pushing his lungs out of the way and fuck with his center of gravity. You need him to be calm and willing to do what makes you happy and comfortable.
Jack nods and sighs.
“You’re right. I need to relax more,” he says.
Al-Hashimi smiles softer now. “You’re going to be a great father. We’ll miss you on paternity leave.”
Jack perks up at that. “Eh, you’ll all manage. I might bring the baby by for you all to meet once she’s big enough.”
“We’d all love that.”
Just then, Dana calls Jack’s name.
“Abbot, I got your wife on the phone,” she calls out.
Without missing a beat, Jack’s out of his chair and heading over to Dana, who’s got the hospital landline in her hand.
“Sweetheart?” he speaks into the receiver.
“Hi, I didn’t want to take the chance of you missing the call on your personal phone.”
“That’s fine. Are you okay?”
You pause on the other line for a moment.
“Um,” you begin. “I think I’m in early labor. Contractions every eight minutes, 30 seconds long. I think I had the bloody show or whatever that stuff is.”
Jack’s heart is in his throat. When he tries to talk, he can’t. He clears his throat and sighs.
“Okay,” he says. “How’s the pain?”
You sigh. “Uh, like day two period cramps, but I’ll live.”
Jack rubs his temple. “Okay. You want me home, I take it?”
“Yes,” you say quickly. “Please. As fast as you can, but don’t drive like a maniac; I’m okay so far.”
Jack nods even though you can’t see him. “Okay, I’ll leave now. You got this, sweetheart. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
When you hang up, Jack hands the phone back to Dana, his eyes wild.
“Whoa, is it baby time?” she asks him, one hand on his forearm to steady him.
He nods, his body gearing up to be your rock for the foreseeable future.
“Yeah,” he says, panting like he just ran ten laps around the E.D. “She’s in early labor. Eight minutes apart, thirty seconds long.”
“Okay,” Dana says calmly. “Al-Hashimi can handle things on her own down here until another attending gets here. And besides, we’ve got all our best residents today, so you’re leaving everyone in good hands, Abbot.”
“Right. Yeah, I know,” he breathes.
Dana pats his arm.
“I’ll call Dr. Rosen in. Good luck, Dad,” she says as she steps back over to her workstation.
Jack mumbles a ‘thanks’ as he starts moving on autopilot. He makes a beeline for the locker room to grab his bag and then heads straight for the parking lot.
He’s prepared for this moment in his last few therapy sessions. He just has to drive back home, ask you what you want from him, and do exactly that.
//
When he pulls into the driveway, he takes a minute to compose himself. As soon as he walks through the front door, he’ll be a rock, completely steady and dependable for you. His only priority is you and the baby.
After some deep breaths, he shuts the truck off and grabs his things before heading inside.
“Sweetheart?” he calls out as he locks the front door behind him.
“I’m in the kitchen,” you call out.
Jack drops his bag on the floor and pads into the kitchen to find you making sandwiches.
“Are you hungry?” you ask, looking up at him momentarily.
He smiles softly and walks up to you, wrapping his arms around your waist and pressing a kiss to your cheek.
“How’re you feeling?” he asks.
“Okay still,” you say as you cut both sandwiches diagonally. “I just had a contraction right before you walked in.”
Another kiss to your cheek. “Any progress?”
“No, it’s the same as when I called you.”
“Okay, um, do you want to sit at the table or on the couch?” he asks softly, stepping back to take both plates.
“Couch,” you decide.
He leads the way, setting both plates on the coffee table so he can help you get comfortable on the couch. Once you say you’re good, he hands you your plate and sits next to you.
After a minute of realizing what’s going on on the TV screen, Jack’s brows furrow.
“Wait, this fifteen-year-old is gay, and his hookup of choice is a 35-year-old?” he asks, looking from the screen to you.
You snort. “Yeah, but later in the show he gets with an age-appropriate guy, so it’s–” You sigh and clear your throat. “Fuck, that hurts. Anyways, this guy’s gonna be okay.”
Jack’s eyes go to his watch to time the contraction, his right hand offering itself to you, which you gladly take.
“I don’t even get to yell at you and tell you this is all your fault; I did this completely to myself,” you sigh as the contraction wanes.
Jack smiles sympathetically and brings your knuckles to his lips.
“Yell at me all you want,” he says softly. “You’re doing an incredible thing here for both of us,
After lunch, Jack changes clothes and removes his prosthesis when he gets back to the couch. The two of you stay there for a couple of hours, softly talking over the TV as the contractions grow more intense.
“You’re doing good, sweetheart,” he mutters softly when another one comes. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” you mutter softly, your grip easing up as the contraction lessens. “Can I sit on your lap?”
He’s a little surprised, but he nods anyway and scooches all the way back to the corner of the sectional, his legs straight in front of him. You lower yourself onto his lap, your back to the plush arm of the couch, one hand resting on Jack’s shoulder farthest from you, the other on your belly.
Jack joins hands with you on your belly and drapes his other arm around your shoulders.
“I’ve narrowed down my favorite names,” you say softly, head tucked under his chin.
“Let’s hear ‘em.”
“Vivian. Felicity. Colette. Amelie. And Charlotte has grown on me.”
“I’m happy with those,” he says softly.
You press a soft kiss to Jack’s chest. “We’ll know when we see her.”
Jack hums in agreement and kisses the top of your head.
//
Around 6:00 PM, things feel more intense. You’ve had contractions every 5 minutes, each lasting a minute, for the last half hour.
After asking what you want to do, Jack helps you to the car, triple-checking that the bags are in the trunk and that the baby’s car seat is in place. Before heading to the hospital, he goes through a Dairy Queen drive-thru, and the two of you eat dinner in your car.
When you’re done, you start really making your way to the hospital.
Triage goes well. Both you and the baby have good vital signs, contractions are consistent, and the cervical exam confirms that you are four and a half centimeters dilated.
Check-in is easy, but it causes some anxiety. It’s all real. This is really happening. The baby you’ve wanted since you were a little girl playing with dolls is about to come into the world. You want her. You wanted her so badly, you made her all by yourself, and she’s about to come.
You’re about to get hooked up to monitors that tell you she’s really coming.
Jack holds your hand as the two of you are led to a room.
You hand the hospital gown back to the nurse in the interest of wearing the birthing gown you bought online after it was recommended to you by your cousin after she had her baby. The nurse, Rhiannon, hooks up the fetal monitor to your belly, though this one is sticky and allows for movement rather than the belts you’d seen on TV shows before.
“Okay, last thing is an IV, or what we can do is an IV port that isn’t connected to any tubes or wires until you decide that maybe you need an epidural or we end up needing to administer a different type of medication,” Rhiannon says as she readies her equipment. “Either way, I’ve gotta poke you.”
“Port sounds good.” You hand Rhiannon your arm with the best veins and turn your head toward Jack, who’s looking at you with the same awe he had in his eyes the first time he saw you naked and when you put his wedding ring on him in the courthouse.
As Rhiannon gets to work, she asks, “Do you know what you’re having?” in an easy voice, clearly confident in her ability to multitask.
“A girl,” you answer, smiling at Jack.
He reaches out a hand to tuck your hair behind your ear, his thumb caressing your cheekbone.
“Yay,” Rhiannon says, clearly smiling. “I love girls. I have two nieces. You guys are gonna love having a girl. Um, how long have the two of you been together?”
“Um,” both you and Jack say at the same time.
You laugh softly. “We got married about a month ago. We met, like, over three years ago when I moved in next door.”
“Neighbors to lovers, that’s so cute,” Rhiannon says as she finishes up. “Okay. I skimmed over your file before I walked in, but I think I remember seeing you wanted to wait on the epidural for freedom of movement, correct?”
You nod as you turn over to look at your nurse. “Yeah, that’s right.”
Rhiannon nods. “Okay, well, as soon as you do want it, if you end up wanting it, just press the call button, and I’ll come in, and we’ll find the anesthesiologist, okay? Perfect. Good luck, and I’ll check back in later.”
Then it’s just you and Jack, and a contraction hits almost as soon as the door shuts, and your fingernails dig into his skin.
He leans his forehead against yours, and with his free hand, he gently scratches your scalp.
Since you’ve stopped being able to talk through the contractions, he’s stopped talking to you during them. For one, you can’t answer, even if he is just praising you, and for two, he can only imagine how annoying the sound of his voice is going to get towards the end of this anyway, so he’ll keep his mouth shut as much as he can.
As the contraction wanes, you loosen your grip on Jack’s hand and let out a soft sigh.
“You okay?” he asks after a moment.
You nod and smile tiredly at him. “I love you.”
Jack smiles and pecks your lips. “I love you, too. I’m gonna dim the lights, okay? That sound good?”
You nod again.
He kisses your forehead before he stands and dims all the lights. It’s about 8:30 at night, so things are naturally winding down with the exception of your uterus and cervix.
When you’re satisfied with the lighting, you hold your hand out. Jack sits on the edge of the bed and takes your hand, putting his free hand on your belly.
“You’re doing really good, sweetheart,” he tells you, his expression one of sincerity and love. “You’re handling everything really well. I’m so proud of you.”
You smile and lean your forehead on his shoulder, sitting with your legs crisscross, your left knee brushing against his left thigh clad in soft sweatpants.
Jack tilts his head down to kiss your hair, his left hand gently brushing up and down your back.
“You wanna switch positions soon?” he asks softly.
You nod and look over at the birthing ball in the corner. He heads to the corner to bring the ball to the middle of the room, then helps you stand from the bed, a gentle hand at the small of your back as he leads you toward the ball. You take both his hands as you lower yourself onto the ball.
“Feel okay?” he asks softly, crouching in front of you, hands on your knees, fingertips brushing yours.
“Yeah,” you mutter softly.
You cup his jaw with both hands and lean in to kiss him. You can tell it surprises him at first, and you can’t really blame him, but after a few seconds, he starts reciprocating, his hands sliding up the length of your thighs to rest on your hips while you gently sway them on the ball.
When he hears you moan, out of pain and not pleasure, he pulls back, but you lean back in.
Jack lets you take the lead. As soon as you pull him back in, he’s back to kissing you with all the love in his heart. His hands on your hips press in, hoping the counterpressure will help.
Once the contraction passes, you pull back, eyes glazed over as you look at him.
“The article I sent you a few weeks ago,” you say breathlessly. “On kissing and oxytocin and labor and stuff. Sorry, I thought you remembered.”
Realization hits him quickly.
“Oh,” he sighs, smiling softly. “Okay, I remember now. I’ll kiss you all you want.”
//
A few hours go by pretty peacefully. At around 9:15, Rhiannon comes in to do a cervical check and tells you you’re at six centimeters. She cracks a few jokes, keeping things light, and when she leaves, you tell Jack to make a reminder to nominate her for a DAISY award when you get home.
Around 11:30, the contractions pick up in intensity. In the middle of the room, you stand with your arms around Jack’s neck, face buried into his chest. He keeps his hands on your hips to deliver counterpressure during contractions, now two and a half minutes apart.
There’s a knock on the door, and the nurse who walks through isn’t Rhiannon.
“Hi,” she says. “Rhiannon is otherwise occupied at the moment, so I’ll be doing your cervical check. My name is Jane.”
She snaps some gloves on, and as you try to peel yourself off of Jack to greet the new nurse, another contraction hits. This one steals your breath and pulls an almost animalistic moan from your throat. You dig your fingernails into the back of Jack’s neck, but he doesn’t waver.
“Oh, honey, why don’t you just get the epidural already?” Jane asks. “There’s absolutely no reason for you to feel the need to cause all that ruckus and scratch up your husband’s neck. I’ll call the anesthesiologist.”
All this from your knockoff of Rhiannon before the contraction is even over, mind you. Jack doesn’t miss a beat.
“There’s absolutely no need for that,” he says immediately, hands still steady on your body. “If my wife wants an epidural, she’ll ask for one, and she certainly doesn’t need you to make decisions about her body without even giving her time to think. Now, if you don’t mind, she’ll opt out of the cervical check for now. We’re happy to wait for Rhiannon.”
Eventually, you hear the door open and close, and once the contraction is over, you look up at Jack.
What a man.
“Am I really scratching up your neck?” you ask with a soft and feeble voice. “Or being too loud?”
He shakes his head. “No, of course not, and don’t worry about it anymore.”
You sigh softly and press your cheek to his chest.
“Could you do the cervical check?” you ask. “I feel like I should be further along, and I don’t wanna wait to find out.”
It’s a little bit surprising to hear this request, but if he’s going to catch the baby in a few hours, he can definitely check to see how dilated you are. Hopefully you’re nearing the end, and he can inspire some motivation with the news.
He nods and kisses your forehead.
“Yeah, sweetheart. Let’s get you back on the bed for a second,” he says softly as he guides you back toward the bed.
Once he’s got you in a good position, he heads to the counter and takes some sterile gloves, then heads back to the bed where he takes a look, and for about a minute, he’s both your husband and a doctor.
“I do want an epidural,” you say breathily while Jack checks you. “I just want to be the one to ask for it. I’m asking for it, Jack. Unless you say I’m at a ten, I’m asking for a fucking epidural.”
Jack nods and looks up at you, simultaneously pulling the gloves off.
“You’re at a seven. Do you want me to step out and ask for you?” he asks.
If you press the call button, fucking Jane might come back in, and hers is the last face you want to see even if you didn’t get a good look at it.
You nod and reach for his hand, another contraction building. He lets you pull him in for a kiss, doing anything you can to minimize the pain before you get some real relief.
It’s somewhat strange, kissing you in this situation. It’s not doing anything for him in the way kisses this passionate usually do, but it’s causing another emotion entirely.
You’re so in control, and he’ll do anything to make sure you keep that. He’ll kiss you through the pain, he’ll rub your hips, he’ll let you scratch up his skin, he’ll tell off a nurse for you. Anything you want. The admiration he has for you right now is unlike anything ever before.
You’re such an incredible woman; he already knew that. But witnessing you bring life into this world and stay so strong through it all is strengthening his feelings toward you. Not that they ever faltered.
When it’s over, you pull back, and Jack exits the room as quickly as possible. Thankfully, the first nurse he sees at the nurse’s station is one he knows.
“Hey, Abbot,” she greets as he approaches.
He smiles but gets right to the point. “My wife wants an epidural. Where’s the anesthesiologist?"
“Uh, she’s finishing up with a patient right now, but there’s no one else waiting. Do you know how many centimeters she was at the last cervical check?”
“Seven, just a few minutes ago.”
The nurse nods. “Okay, I’ll send her in in a few minutes.”
He quickly thanks the nurse and heads back to your room, making it just in time for your next contraction.
Just as he walks through the door, you reach your hand out, whimpering softly. He grabs your hand and reaches around with his free one to rub your back.
This time, he kisses you, moaning softly against you every so often to get your mind literally anywhere else besides this room.
When it’s over, and you lean your forehead against his, he tells you that the epidural is on its way.
“You’re doing really good, sweetheart,” he says softly. “I’ve seen lots of labors and deliveries, but this… It’s incredible. You’re doing such a hard thing so amazingly.” He pauses and kisses your cheek. “I’m more in love with you, and I didn’t think that was possible. You’re gonna be such a good mom. I know it. Our baby girl’s so lucky to have you.”
A silent tear falls down your cheek, brow furrowed as you focus on his face, every wrinkle, every freckle, every short hair of his stubbly beard and the smooth and gravelly sound of his voice.
Jack doesn’t tell you not to cry. He just smiles softly and wordlessly wipes your tears with the back of his knuckle.
“I love you,” he whispers. “I’m so lucky to be here.”
You shake your head and reach out to cup his cheek.
“It’s not luck, Jack,” you say softly, your voice thick with emotion. “I chose you. You chose me and this baby, and I chose you back.”
He leans in for another kiss. This one just because, not particularly for pain relief, even if that’s an added plus.
You breathe him in, and take his hand and guide it to the side of your bump. He feels your skin tighten underneath his palm with another contraction. He keeps his hand perfectly still, hoping not to overstimulate you, and keeps kissing you.
After it passes, you stand with Jack again, only this time with your back to his chest. He holds your belly up for you one last time, taking the weight off your back for you, his lips pressed to your hair as the two of you slowly sway. You rest your palms on his forearms and stare across the room at the baby warmer, empty for now.
Soon, the anesthesiologist comes in and sets up for the epidural. She lets Jack stay in the room for the procedure and instructs him to stand in front of you, hands in yours.
Once it’s administered, and you’re in a comfortable position on your side, and the room is cleared, Jack turns off almost all the lights. He brings one of the chairs up to your bedside and holds your hand.
Within a few minutes, the epidural kicks in, and your eyes start to droop.
“Feeling good?” he asks softly, bringing a hand to cup your belly over the blanket.
You nod, a happy smile on your face. “Yeah, I can finally sleep now.”
Jack pulls his phone out of his pocket and props it up against your water bottle on the side table to record a video.
You cover his hand on your bump and admire the sight of your wedding rings and hospital bracelets brushing against each other.
“What are you most excited about becoming a mom?” he asks softly.
You hum thoughtfully.
“Shaping a person,” you say. “Showing her things and watching her form her own opinions on them.”
Jack smiles and nods along.
“What about you?” you ask.
Jack sighs and chews on the inside of his cheek. “Probably the same. Just getting to witness her and see her grow and learn and experience the world.”
You smile brightly at him, and he leans in to peck your lips.
“Okay, last chance for betting,” he says.
You giggle softly and shut your eyes as you think, then open them again.
“She’ll come after 6:00 AM, seven pounds and ten ounces, 19 inches long. That’s my guess,” you say.
“My guess is before 6:00 AM, eight pounds and one ounce, 20 inches long.”
You smile. “Either way, I’m excited to meet her.”
“Me, too,” Jack says softly, reaching out to tuck your hair behind your ear. “I already love her like crazy.”
Your smile widens, and you squeeze his hand. “I know. She’s gonna be perfect.”
“Yeah,” he whispers. “Just like you.”
He leans in to peck your lips, and before he pulls away, you mumble out an “I love you.”
“I love you, too.” Then he stops the video and puts his phone in his pocket.
“You wanna get some rest?” he asks softly, his hand moving from your hair to your cheek, his thumb brushing back and forth against your skin.
You nod. “I love you, baby.”
Jack leans in for another kiss. “I love you, too, sweetheart. I’ll stay right here.”
“Take your prosthesis off,” you remind him.
He nods and leans back in his chair and pulls his pant leg up. Once it’s off, he places it out of the way but still in reach. By the time he looks back at you, your breathing is deeper.
He smiles and leans down to kiss your bump for possibly the last time.
“I’ll see you soon, baby girl,” he whispers.
//
At almost 3:30 AM, Rhiannon comes back in for another cervical check.
Jack wakes first.
“Hi,” she says, speaking softly. “It’s time for another cervical check.” She snaps on some sterile gloves. “I find that it’s better for you to wake her up than me.”
Jack nods and gently rubs your shoulder to wake you. He presses a kiss to your cheek and whispers for you to wake up.
Your eyes flutter and land on Jack.
“Rhiannon’s back to check your dilation,” he says softly.
You nod, and Rhiannon helps you turn over on your back while Jack puts his prosthesis back on.
When she’s done checking you over, Rhiannon smiles.
“It’s baby time,” she says as she pulls the gloves off. “I saw in your chart that you wanted to use the squat bar, lower your epidural dose to push, and that if there were no complications that you wanted Jack to catch the baby. Still good with all that?”
You nod, yawning softly.
Rhiannon gets everything ready, and soon the bed is modified to accommodate the squat bar. Your OB-GYN, who was thankfully working the night shift, comes in, along with a second nurse, and suddenly, you’re just waiting for the next contraction so you can push.
You were a little nervous that pushing would take hours, but after only about 40 minutes of pushing and grunting and Jack whispering praise in your ear, your doctor smiles.
“Abbot, it’s your turn,” she says as she steps to the side.
You turn your face toward Jack, sweat dotting your hairline but the biggest sparkle of excitement in your eyes. You lean in for a peck, and Jack whispers, “I love you, sweetheart.”
“I love you, too,” you sniffle, smiling brightly.
Jack gets into position, your OB behind him, clearly monitoring the situation, but Jack’s delivered hundreds of babies, even just delivered one last week, so she’s not too worried about him biting off more than he can chew here.
Once he’s got sterile gloves on, he gets his hands into position.
“Alright, sweetheart,” he sighs, letting the doctor inside of him take over just a bit, though it’s clear the man in front of you is still your husband first and foremost. “On the next contraction, give me a big push.”
Rhiannon counts for you as you push. You white-knuckle the squat bar and breathe deeper than you ever have as you bear down.
“Good, good, good,” Jack mutters softly, his hands on the baby’s head, holding back tears by the grace of God. “You’re doing so good, sweetheart.”
With a soft whimper, you take a break from pushing.
“You’re doing great,” your doctor says from behind Jack. “Less than five pushes, I’d say.”
You nod and focus on your breathing.
“You wanna feel her hair?” Jack asks. “She’s got a lot.”
“Mhm,” you hum softly, the lack of sleep catching up to you.
Jack takes your hand and guides it between your legs.
“That’s not me?” you joke.
The entire room lets out a soft chuckle, with the exception of Rhiannon, who snorts softly into her shoulder.
“No,” Jack says, eyes crinkling as he smiles. “That’s our baby; she’s got a lotta hair.”
You smile and take a steadying breath as another contraction builds.
“Okay, sweetheart, you got this,” he says softly, growing serious again as he focuses on the baby.
That push delivers the head.
“Perfect,” Jack praises. “Just a couple more, sweetheart, let’s get the shoulders out.”
Two pushes later, the air is pierced by a sharp but oddly beautiful cry.
“She sounds kind of like a bird,” someone remarks. “So cute!”
You let out a sob of relief and hold your hands out as Jack places her on your chest.
Looking down at the squirming infant is all it takes to fall completely in love with her.
“Hi, baby girl,” you coo at her, holding your hands over her back so she doesn’t get cold. “Hi. Hi, sweetie. I’m your mama.”
At some point, Jack has moved from your legs and peeled his gloves off because now you feel his hand on your shoulder and hear him whispering in your ear, “You did so good.”
The baby continues to cry, but seems to begin to settle on your chest.
“Wow, you’re really here,” you whisper, tears streaming down your face uncontrollably. “I love you so much, beautiful baby girl.”
You look up at Jack on instinct, and tears are streaming down his face. He kisses your temple, then gently gives the baby his finger so she can wrap her first around it.
“Hi, baby girl,” he whispers. “I’m your daddy.” He sniffs. “Wow, you look just like your mom, sweetie.”
At the sound of her daddy’s voice, the cries die down into softer whimpers, still mad about leaving her warm home, but obviously happy Mom and Dad are near.
You press your lips against her head, uncaring about all the gunk on her head.
“Oh, God, she’s amazing,” you sigh, eyes shutting for a moment as you soak it all in.
You look over at Jack, and he smooths your hair back.
“You did incredible,” he whispers, eyes red-rimmed as he lets his tears fall.
You smile and blink out your own tears. “I love you. Thank you for catching her.”
Jack smiles back and kisses your cheek, then you turn to kiss his lips.
After another moment, you feel the need to push again. You swear softly under your breath and gently push on instinct. After about a minute, you vaguely hear your doctor tell you the placenta’s out, and you sigh relieved again.
“You’re all done,” Jack tells you. “You both did amazing.”
Once the cord turns white, Jack cuts it, and a few minutes later, the second nurse takes the baby over to the warmer to do some testing.
You send Jack over after he takes his shirt off, excited to see him actually hold the baby for the first time.
Jack stands near the baby warmer, eyes following his daughter’s every move as the nurse weighs, measures, and does everything else.
“Okay,” the nurse sighs, smiling at the screen that says all the levels are good. “Baby Abbot is seven pounds and eight ounces and 19 inches long. Five-minute APGAR score of ten. Congratulations. Jack, you can hold her now.”
Excitedly but carefully, Jack reaches his hands around the baby’s body and brings her to his chest. The nurse helps him cover her with a blanket, then he walks over to the chair by your bed.
Once everything else is determined to be okay, everyone leaves the room with soft whisperings of congratulations.
Jack sighs and smiles at you with all the love in his heart.
“You’re both incredible,” he says. “I’m in awe of you.”
You smile tiredly and sigh contentedly. “I’m so fucking happy.”
Jack smiles again, then stands and hands the baby back to you.
Soon, a lactation consultant comes in and helps you and the baby figure out the latch. Once you get the hang of it, you’re left alone again.
“Charlotte,” you say softly, looking at the baby.
Jack nods, the back of his finger caressing her cheek. “Charlotte Vivian Abbot?”
He looks to you to gauge your reaction. You smile.
“I like that,” you mutter softly.
Charlotte Vivian Abbot. Seven pounds and eight ounces. 19 inches long. Born at 4:26 AM on September 6, 2026.
Perfection in a very small package.
//
You and Jack manage to sleep for close to an hour before the baby is restless. After nursing, you’re starving, but luckily, Rhiannon brings you some breakfast before her shift ends.
“It’s not the best food, so if you’ve got people coming, you should ask them to bring you some food. Though, you can get food delivered, too. Anyway, my shift is ending, but I wanted to tell the little birdie and her sweet parents goodbye,” she says.
You smile and look down at the baby.
“Birdie,” you muse. “That’s cute.” Then you look back at Rhiannon. “You’ve been really incredible. I can’t thank you enough.”
Rhiannon smiles and shrugs. “I’m just happy things went well. You three make a very cute family. Okay, I’ve got a breakfast date, so I’ve gotta go. Bye, guys.”
Then she’s gone.
“Birdie,” you sigh, smiling at the baby. “I like that, it’s cute.”
Jack sends the birth announcement to his parents, your mom and stepdad, his sister, then Robby and Dana.
After that, he puts his phone on “Do Not Disturb” and puts his focus on you and Birdie. A little later, though, he notices a text from his mom asking if it’s okay to call at some point. You say it’s fine, and Jack steps out into the hall, leaving you alone with the baby.
You had put her into a pink onesie so she wouldn’t get cold once the hospital AC started blowing a little too hard for your liking.
Your little pink baby is finally here. She’s tiny and perfect and yours.
You hold her up by her armpits for just a moment, still supporting her head. The two of you just look at each other for a moment. Her face is scrunched up, but she’s perfect.
It’s hard to put into words how you’re feeling right now. You wanted this baby enough to raise her on your own. Jack is outside the door, but there was once a very real reality where he wasn’t supposed to be.
And looking at her right now, it’s so clear to you that it would absolutely be worth it to be her mom by yourself. Anything hard that would come with raising her on your own would have been worth it, because the look in your daughter’s eyes that you can’t name is telling you that it all would’ve been okay.
You’re incredibly fortunate to have Jack by your side, but you could handle Birdie alone, and so could he. She’s worth all the pain in the world that got you both to the place of being her parents.
You bring her back to your chest and soak in her snuggly body and soft baby noises. You kiss her downy hair and keep your hands secure on her back.
“One day, I’m gonna tell you all about how you got here,” you say softly. “Just know for now that it was all very special and very precious, just like you, little Birdie, and that Mommy and Daddy love you very much.”
end author's note: wow the baby is here and I feel like I gave birth myself bc this series is such a labor of love lol. original Doctor Google was meant to be a one-shot, so thank you to everyone who believed in this story's potential and politely asked for more <3 pls let me know what you want to see from this story! (requests are open for that)
after hearing about when s3 of The Pitt is going to be set, it is safe to say I will probably never reference canon again (at least in a big way), so pretty much anything is possible over here. thank you guys so much for reading! I know I have no schedule for this series at all and that can be annoying, so anyone loyally reading along is a fucking G in my book. for anyone who ever feels like you're annoying leaving persistent comments, whether it's an emoji or a more thoughtful comment, I guarantee you that you are not annoying, and in fact are someone I look forward to getting notifications from. I'm crazy; I see everything. ily all and pls be well <3
p.s. for anyone who is curious: Birdie is a virgo sun, cancer moon, and leo rising
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