Summary : You and James are divorced with a daughter named Mila, but the tension still lingers between you two when you both drop Mila off at one another’s house. You go to talk it out but it only ends in James’s bed.
Contains : James as a girl dad, slight angst, smut.
The rain had stopped just before I pulled into James’s driveway.
It left the pavement damp and shining, like the whole street had been freshly scrubbed. Mila was asleep in the back seat, one hand clutching her purple stuffed bunny, head tilted at that impossible toddler angle that always made me want to gently fix it and never quite dare.
I sat there for a second, engine ticking, the hum of the radio low.
I could see James through the window.
He was in the kitchen, sleeves rolled up, hair messy — not the kind of messy you style on purpose, but the kind that comes from real life. There was something soft about him like this. Something painfully familiar.
He didn’t see me at first.
Our eyes met through the glass, and he didn’t look away.
Not immediately. Not like he used to.
I stepped out, rounding the car and opening the back door gently. Mila stirred, blinked up at me with that dazed, half-asleep face only kids could pull off. I brushed her hair back, whispering, “We’re at Daddy’s, sweetheart.”
She blinked again. “Daddy’s?”
She sat up, clutching her bunny tighter, and I lifted her into my arms like I always did, even though she was getting too big for it. Her weight felt different lately — not heavy, just grown. Just not my little baby anymore.
James opened the door right as I reached the steps. He leaned against the frame, looking at her, not me.
“There she is,” he said, voice warm.
“Hi Daddy,” Mila mumbled, still clinging to my shoulder.
He reached for her and she went willingly — melting into his arms like it was the safest place in the world. He smelled like cedar and soap and something vaguely burnt, which probably meant he’d tried to cook again.
She buried her face in his neck.
I tried not to look too long.
“Thanks,” he said, eyes finally flicking to mine. “For bringing her. I know Sunday’s not usually—”
We stood there for a beat too long, Mila between us, a very real and very loved reminder of everything we’d been. Everything we still were, even now. Even after the lawyers and the division of books and the fight about who kept the cast iron skillet.
James shifted his weight, bounced Mila a little. “She said you guys made pancakes this morning.”
“She poured the batter herself.”
He smiled — the real one. The crooked one that used to undo me. “That’s my girl.”
Another silence. Another beat.
I looked away. “You should probably get her inside. She’s still half-asleep.”
“Yeah. I just—” He hesitated, glancing at me. “Can we talk later? After she’s down?”
My chest tightened, but I didn’t let it show.
He gave a small shrug. “Nothing huge. Just… stuff.”
He nodded, then turned to carry Mila inside, her little arm slung lazily over his shoulder, her bunny dangling from one hand. I stood on the porch a second longer than I meant to, watching her disappear into his chest, into the house, into the life that used to be ours.
He left it ajar, like he was still deciding if he wanted me to follow.
Or maybe he already knew I wouldn’t.
I stayed in my car for twenty minutes.
Tried to talk myself out of it. Tried to convince myself that whatever James had to say could wait until next week. That it wasn’t worth stirring things that had finally started to settle.
But the porch light was still on. And the front door was still cracked.
The house hadn’t changed much. A few more plants. Mila’s artwork taped to the fridge. A new coffee table that didn’t match the rest of the furniture. The same smell — detergent and wood and something warm. Something that used to mean home.
James was in the kitchen when I stepped in, leaning over the sink, a glass of water in his hand, back turned.
“She asleep?” I asked softly.
He nodded without looking. “Out cold. Barely made it to the pillow.”
I stepped further in. Closed the door behind me. That familiar click echoed louder than it should’ve.
He turned finally, leaned against the counter. Tired eyes. Soft jaw. That old James — the one from late nights and grocery runs and baby monitors at 3 a.m. — peeked through all the quiet hurt.
“You really came back,” he said, like he wasn’t sure I would.
“I said I’d think about it.”
“You used to say that when you already knew.”
I smiled faintly. “Still do.”
He gestured to the table. “Want to sit?”
He nodded like he expected that. Set his glass down. Rested both hands on the edge of the counter like it was the only thing holding him up.
And then he said, “I don’t know how to do this anymore.”
“Pretend it doesn’t still hurt when you leave.”
“You wanted the space,” I said carefully.
“I know. And I don’t regret asking for it. We were miserable. We fought all the time. Mila was hearing things she shouldn’t have heard.”
I nodded. “We were both angry.”
“But now it’s like…” He trailed off. Ran a hand through his hair. “You’re still here, but not here. It’s like a ghost version of us walks around every time we see each other.”
I leaned back against the wall, arms crossed. “Because what we had was real. That doesn’t just go away, James.”
He looked at me, eyes fierce and quiet. “Then why did we let it go?”
That question landed like a punch. I didn’t answer right away.
“Because love stopped being enough,” I said finally. “Because we were exhausted, neither of us wanted to be the one to fix it anymore.”
He closed his eyes like he didn’t want to hear it, even though he knew it was true.
“I didn’t stop loving you,” he said.
“You stopped showing it.”
That cut through him. I saw it — in the way he shifted, in the way his jaw clenched like he wanted to argue and couldn’t.
“And I stopped asking for it,” I added, softer now.
The air in the room felt too still.
“You know I’m still in love with you, right?” he said suddenly.
“That’s not fair,” I whispered.
I swallowed hard, my throat thick. “You can’t just drop that on me like it means nothing.”
“I’m not. It means everything.”
He crossed the room slowly — not sure of his footing, like I might flinch if he got too close. He stopped just in front of me, inches away.
“I think about us all the time,” he said. “Not the bad fights. Not the walking on eggshells. I think about you in the kitchen at midnight, singing to yourself. I think about the way you used to wake up first and bring me coffee even though you hated the smell. I think about the first time you let me hold Mila, and you looked at me like I wasn’t broken anymore.”
“I never stopped wanting you.”
My eyes burned. My mouth parted but nothing came out.
He reached up, thumb brushing the side of my face, gentle. Familiar.
“I know we’re not supposed to go back,” he said, quieter now. “But for just one night… I don’t want to feel like strangers anymore.”
The smart thing would’ve been to walk away. The safe thing.
But I’d never been safe with James. I’d only ever been real.
So I closed the distance.
He kissed me like he’d missed every inch of me. Not rushed — reverent. Like he wanted to relearn my taste, my rhythm, the way my hands curved around his shoulders. His mouth moved against mine with the same weight it always had — intention layered with grief, love, and want.
My fingers gripped the front of his shirt, pulling him closer as his hands slid to my waist, grounding me in the moment. He backed me into the wall gently, his hips flush against mine, our breath shared, shallow.
We moved together like people who knew every detail — every sound, every tell, every way the other fell apart.
His hand slipped beneath my shirt, fingertips brushing over familiar skin with aching caution. He paused, breath ragged against my neck.
“Tell me to stop,” he whispered.
I kissed him harder instead.
And then we were stumbling toward the couch — not frantic, not clumsy, but like gravity kept pulling us back into each other. Clothes slid away in slow, quiet layers. Fingers mapped skin like rediscovery. Everything familiar felt new again.
He kissed my shoulder, my collarbone, the hollow of my throat. He took his time, memorizing instead of rushing, as if this might be the last time.
I arched into him, hands tangled in his hair, hearts pressed too close.
His fingers explored places that had been untouched for too long. Soft whimpers escaped my lips, arching up into his touch like I might not survive without it.
He pulled his fingers away from me, sucking the wetness we collected off them. My eyes nearly rolled back at the familiar sight.
Then his body came down over me, hands gripping my waist firmly as he lined himself up. My eyes were hooded, lips parted like I knew what to expect next.
The fire crackled in his living room, warming our intertwined bodies. His breath was heavy against my skin as he lined himself at my entrance like he was hesitating. Like he knew that he wouldn’t come back from this.
He pushed into me in one quick thrust and our bodies shuddered at the sudden sensation. My back arched into him, nails clawing his back muscles. His face contorted into something so handsome I almost came undone at the sight.
His fingers wrapped around my waist and brought me towards his thrusts, my breasts bouncing at each collide. He hovered over me, groaning like an animal. His cross necklace swung back and forth in front of my face like a filthy reminder of what we were doing.
“So beautiful…” he muttered into my neck, enticing a moan out of me. He shouldn’t be saying things like that. Things that make me feel like we were back to square one.
The sound of our love making filled the room, nasty and beautiful.
And when we came together, it wasn’t wild or rushed or messy. It was slow and aching.
It was us — complicated, beautiful, broken. Afterward, we lay in silence. His arm draped across my stomach. My head on his chest. Neither of us said what we both knew.
That this didn’t fix anything. That it didn’t mean we were back together.
That it only meant we still felt everything, too much, too deeply, too permanently.
His fingers grazed mine. “She looks more like you every day,” he said quietly, referring to Mila.
“She’s got your stubbornness though.”
He smiled, eyes closed. I stared at the ceiling.
And for a few minutes, I let myself believe that maybe, love wasn’t gone.
Just resting. Waiting. Still there, under everything we couldn’t say.