Middle Grade
Wishbone by Justine Pucella Winans
Ollie Di Costa wishes things could be different.
He wishes the bullies at school would leave him alone. He wishes his parents would stop fighting. He wishes his sister Mia didn’t have to worry about things like paying for college. But most of all, he wishes he wasn’t so angry about all of this. When he and Mia find a two-tailed cat they name…
Tags: @lave-whump, @pebbledriscoll, @highwaywhump (tag list is always open, please asked if you want to be added/removed from the list!)
warnings: bbu general warning, WRU general warning, bbu conditioning and training, pet whump, creepy/intimate whumper, romantic whumper, lady whumper, defiant whumpee, escaped whumpee, resentful whumpee, memory stuff, description of physical injuries, dehumanization; a very fucked-up version of the Fake Dating trope, dubcon/noncon kissing, dubcon/noncon touching, alcohol, trauma survivor, trauma recovery, smut/consensual recovery sex.
~*~*~*~
**As close to chronological order as possible**
Part One: Midsummer / / Mistake (wij) / Photo / Secret / Edge / Darkness / Liminal Space / Roadside / Roulette / Dream / In the Pines
Part Two: Warmth (wij) / Troubled & Confused / Caged, Unseen / Behind Glass / Emmett’s Intake Paperwork / Sixty-Six & Seventy-Nine / Afterlife / Chained to a Bed (BTHB) /
Part Three: Boxes / Twisted (BTHB) / Dormeveglia (Faye) / Passing Notes / Cornered / Endless / In The Dark / Patterns / Sleep (wij) / Cafuné / Nemesism / Shiver / Confluence / Heartbeat / Nightmares (BTHB) /
I wanted to end the planned prompts for @whumpmasinjuly on something sweet, maybe a little sad. Just pure angsty sweetness between Emmett and Faye and baby August, I don’t know how else to describe it, and I won’t give any more than that away. Not whumpy, but I hope you enjoy!
Emmett’s Master List
Tags: @lave-whump, @highwaywhump, @pebbledriscoll @whumpinggrounds (Let me know if you’d like added or removed from the tag list)
cw: bbu general warning; referenced conditioning and training.
~*~*~
“How do I..?” Emmett struggled for words. it was as if the small bundle in Faye’s arms kept stealing them away from him. Every time he opened his mouth, the words dried upon his tongue. They jammed in his throat, his brain deciding they weren’t adequate for the moment.
Faye smiled at him, exhausted. “Hold him?”
Emmett nodded, coming to sit at the edge of the hospital bed. He let Faye quietly arrange his arms and hands, then rested the baby in them. She moved his hands, his fingers, and then sat back against the bed, satisfied.
“Thank you,” he managed in a frail voice.
Faye smiled gently, her eyelids drooping. “Of course, dear.”
He smiled at her for a moment, then all his attention was pulled back to the baby in his arms. Their baby. His baby. He was breathless, complimenting the speechlessness. He laughed under his breath, thinking about how he hadn’t been trained for this. This kind of care was not built into him. He knew in his gut that it would not come naturally, let alone easily, and the mountains of unknown still left to uncover shook him.
The weight of August’s small body in his arms made him want to try. The exhausted but elated shine in Faye’s sleepy eyes reassured him.
He wished he had brought his sketchbook. It had been left behind, resting on the kitchen table. Drawing was the quickest relief for his nerves. The swirl of emotions inside of him was cacophonous, echoing against his skull and ringing in his ears. His fingers itched for his pencils. There were too many small moments he needed to preserve on paper, right this second before they faded from memory.
“Hard to believe we were ever so little,” Faye murmured. Her eyes had finally closed, head tilted to the left. Her dark hair was spread over the sheets in a tangled fan.
“It is.”
Emmett cracked a smile -- she would be terribly upset to know how it looked right then. He wanted to take her picture. Not because he wanted her to see or because she looked especially beautiful. In fact, that wouldn’t be the word he would use to describe the woman he loved at that moment. No, he wanted her picture then because she finally seemed at peace. After months of seeing her in a thousand other states, here she was, resting.
“Faye?”
“Hmm?”
“Can I keep holding him?” He ran gentle fingers over August’s sleeping face, still pinkish and squished with newness. Emmett knew the question was childish, silly sounding. He knew the answer, but he was compelled to ask. Compelled to get all the uncertainty out of him before her sisters and father arrived in an hour or so. For now, it was just him and her and August in the blanket of very early morning.
“Em?” Faye’s eyes had opened again, were locked on his face. Emmett felt himself still and tense underneath them, but forced it down. He let out a steadying breath; she could call him that. She wouldn’t use it to hurt him. She would only ever say it with love. “You can hold him as long as you like. He’s yours.”
“I can?” The words fell from his lips before he could think better of it. He coughed and tucked his head back to August, suddenly ashamed of himself. It was disquieting sometimes how easily he could lay himself bare before her. “Sorry, forget that. I know I can.”
“Em? Could you look at me?”
He did, not wanting to avoid her.
She held out a hand for him on the blankets.
He swallowed. “I don’t. I don’t know how-. I don’t think I can hold him with one hand, Faye.”
Faye nodded and pushed herself upright. She winced, letting out a slow breath. She twisted her hair at the base of her neck and leaned forward to kiss him. Emmett met her, still holding August close to him. When she pulled away, one of her hands rested against Emmett’s neck, the other was on top of August’s head, fingers smoothing his sparse dark hair.
“I don’t have anything important to say,” Faye said finally, her eyes lingering on August’s face. “But you need to know you don’t need to ask me permission. He’s your son, just as much as he is mine.”
“I know.”
“Are you telling me what I want to hear, Em?”
“No,” Emmett answers. He fumbled to thread together his tumbling thoughts into words, then a sentence, something comprehensible and meaningful. He doesn’t believe he gets the hang of it, all of the pieces feeling like near misses that he hopes she’ll grasp. She had always done it before. “I know I don’t need to ask. And I know he’s mine. Your family would hardly let me forget it.”
“Oh, Em-.”
“I’m not sure what to do or what to think right now.” Emmett sighed and shifted a hand so his fingers would touch her’s. “He’s a funny thing isn’t he? Small, totally new. He’ll be so much, it’s dizzying. He’ll never know what I used to be. All of that, he won’t ever know. He won’t know why I don’t have a family like yours, where all the little marks on my arms came from, what I was to... Well, that I ever belonged to someone.”
Faye didn’t reply, but he could feel her “patient eyes” on him. The expression she would wear when she worked, urging them and now him to say all of what was in his head and then more. So he did.
“Part of me wants him to know. I mean, he might ask some day. There are things we can’t shield entirely. And I don’t want to worry about that day, but I know I can’t and I won’t.” Emmett exhaled. “I want it to stay just like this for a while. Just us. I like that there are three of us now.”
“You do?”
“I do. It feels right, complete. Holding him now.”
Faye laughed softly. “I was just thinking. It’s odd seeing him when I could only feel him until a few hours ago.”
“I can only imagine,” Emmett smiled.
“Strange. But good.” Faye kissed his cheek, then his nose. “I like seeing you hold him.”
“You do?”
“Mhmm. I’ve never seen you look so hopeful before.”
In today’s edition of Publishing Drafts I’ve Had Saved For A While: Faye Murphy’s nightmares and Emmett trying his best to comfort her for @badthingshappenbingo prompt Nightmares. I’m really gearing up for Whumpmas in July here and trying to post this story more consistently, so you all can get to know them before that pops off. I really love them, I love Emmett’s story, and I hope you all do too! Enjoy!
Emmett’s Master List
Tags: @lave-whump, @highwaywhump, @pebbledriscoll (Let me know if you’d like added or removed from the tag list!)
cw: bbu general warning; nightmares, panic reaction, fear reaction, past physical injury, past strangling, past manhandling, predatory behavior (male to female). Essentially hurt/comfort, but be careful out here, folks!
~*~*~
Faye smiled to herself. She had missed her office at the clinic and it seemed to have missed her.
Tara had kept it just the way she had left it, save for the signs of the accident and some light dusting. All the neat piles or papers and patient files; all her pens and highlighters; journal articles, desk calendar, and carefully arranged sticky notes. Just as she likes, just as she had left them, no interference.
She reminded herself to thank Tara later, maybe buy her lunch.
On instinct, she rose from her chair and walked around her desk. Her favorite pen twirled through her fingers as she walked towards the door. She didn’t know how, but she knew her next patient stood just beyond it waiting eagerly for their time with her.
Faye had always wanted to help people -- a fact that felt trite to admit but was the whole truth. When she was little, that need to help was directed towards he Barbie dolls and baby dolls. In middle and high school, it was giving the best advice she could to her friends, sisters, and cousins. By college, she had found the right path -- a career as a psychiatrist.
She had devoured each lesson, raced through each certificate and degree and internship she needed to be able to practice. She had thrown herself mind, body, and spirit into her patients and working her way towards practicing on her own.
The accident had shaken her to the core and left her scraped up, but she wasn’t about to let it stop her.
She hated being away from it all. She had missed the joy, the satisfaction that came with each day’s sessions. With knowing she had helped someone step in the right direction and move towards healing. Her heart pounded happily in her chest as she reached for the door handle.
She couldn’t wait to get back to it.
“Hey there, peaches.”
Faye blanched. “Lee?”
The man smiled at her, familiar and charming. “Did you miss me?”
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said, stunned and near-stuttering. She took a step back, as if just being inside the threshold could protect her. “I’m working right now, Lee, and-, and-.”
“And, and, and,” lee mocked, his usual shit-eating grin turning sharper with each passing second. He leaned against the door frame then stepped forward, as if proving he could. Purposefully invading her space with that mean smile, neat haircut, and khakis he never ironed himself. “C’mon, Faye-baby. You know how to finish a sentence.”
She stepped back further, into the center of her office. Lee matched her pace for pace, eventually closing in on her. “You have to go, Lee. I--.”
“You what?”
“I don’t want you here,” Faye stumbled over her words, then over a chair. She caught herself on her desk and leaned back against it. She was trapped now, caught between furniture and the ex who had happily kicked her when she was all the way down. “I have patients to take care of and things to catch up on, and we aren’t together anymore, Lee--.”
“Oh don’t be like that, peaches,” Lee dismissed her protests with a blithe wave of his hand. He kept moving closer and closer, but Faye’s shoes were stuck fast to the carpet. His smiling face darkened, becoming more threatening now. Fear worked its way up her throat, sticking tight against each breath. “I know we had a little trip-up, but I’m a caring guy. I’m patient. You just needed time to get your mind right after your little meltdown--.”
“It wasn’t a meltdown!”
“You were hysterical, Faye!”
“I was not hysterical!”
“Look at you. You’re hysterical right now,” Lee said with mocking concern. He leaned forward, trapping her between his arms against the hard edge of her desk.
Faye froze, panic eating up her insides and seizing her fully. He was close. Too close. So very very close. She could feel his breath at her ear, on her neck. She could feel his hand skimming against her thigh over her skirt. She wanted to scream and swat at the hand. She wanted to push him out of the door, out of her office, and lock him in the hallway.
Lock all of it, everything, outside of the safety of her office.
“C’mon, peaches,” Lee whispered, taunting. “I know you still want me. I know you do, look at you. I know you’ll come back after you’re done with this washout you’ve been shacking up with.”
Faye let out a gasp, the only sound she could muster.
“Didn’t think I knew about him, now did you?” Lee chuckled. His hands moved up her legs, hips, waist. Just like he had done so many times in four years. it hadn’t terrified her then the way it did now. The same fear coursed through her as it had when his hand was wrapped tight around her throat.
His hand was on her throat again now.
Squeezing. Tighter, tighter, tighter.
“You can’t leave me, Faye,” he whispered. He squeezed harder, hand shaking her. Just as before. Somehow worse now. “I won’t let anyone else have you.”
She couldn’t even scream.
~*~*~
Faye awoke with a yelp, fingers scrabbling at her neck. Ghostly fingers pressed against her windpipe and not so easily pushed away. Something heavy lay one her right side. Something pressing her down, holding her down, keeping her from moving. She thrashed, tangling herself in the bedsheets until she fell over the side of her mattress and onto the floor with a bang.
The weight was gone.
The fingers were gone.
She could get away.
“Faye? What’s wrong?” A groggy voice sounded somewhere above her. She got her bearings in the dark bedroom and turned to see Emmett, bleary eyed, peering down at her. “Shit, are you alright?”
She could only stare, words gone and utterly confused.
“Faye?” Emmett held a hand out to her over the side of the bed. She took it numbly, rolling up onto her knees but unsure her legs would hold her. Just holding his hand ground her to the reality around her. it kept her still-flaring fear a little subdued. “Faye, are you alright?”
“Just a dream,” she managed to squeak out, more to herself than to him. He squeezed her hand. It was calloused and rough and solid around her’s.
“Can you stand? Did the fall hurt you?” He asked gently.
She shook her head and began to stand. “I don’t think so. Just bumped up, I suppose. I can get up. I’m just... I’m shocked.”
“Want me to check?” Emmett pushed himself up to sitting, the sheets pooling around his waist. Faye felt the faintest blush creep into her cheeks. He was shirtless, which she already knew. He always slept shirtless. But it struck her just then as she slide back onto the sheets.
You’ll come back, after you’re done with that washout...
Faye swallowed tightly against the echo in her brain. She stared at her fingers, still resting inside his grasp. Gentle, so gentle. She couldn’t shake the latent feeling of being watched, of Lee standing too close and just out of sight, waiting to pounce again. She slid closer to Emmett, leaning against him and savoring the warmth of his skin against her’s.
He held her close, his fingers cradling the back of her head and trailing through her hair. Comforting, sweet. He was always so sweet with her. “It was just a dream, Faye.”
“I know. A bad one.”
“It can’t hurt you. No matter how bad. I know that doesn’t help much... Tell me if I should just keep quiet.”
“You’re fine. it helps, hearing your voice.” Faye closed her eyes, tucked herself up against his shoulder. He was warm and sturdy, his voice a settling rumble passing from his body to her’s. It was a low, deep tone -- rolling thunder, waves at midnight. So very different from Lee’s. Whether he knew it or not, Emmett was slowly pulling her from her nightmare’s grip.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“It isn’t worth talking about in the dark.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, for now,” Faye whispered. “Maybe in the morning. Daylight is better.”
Emmett allowed himself a chuckle. She soaked up its feeling, a cat in sunlight. “Sorry, it’s just. It is morning.”
“So literal,” Faye giggled, a little dreamy sounding. She pushed herself up and kissed him. Everything about his was warm and solid and safe. She wanted to be wrapped up in him, smothered by him, protected by him. “What will I do when you go back home?”
His hands were soft at her waist, her hair. “I don’t have to go back.”
“Yes, but you should,” Faye answered. “I’ll figure out something, Emmett. I always have. But I do love you visiting.”
He hummed something in response. Sleep was starting to take back over his body, sagging and then rolling back down onto the sheets. He pulled her back down with him, covering her with blankets and threading his fingers through her hair, tracing small circles on the small of her back. He kept her close to his chest.
She was happy to curl up close to him. She wasn’t tired any longer and probably wouldn’t find her way back to sleep, but stayed put if only to feel him fall asleep underneath her. She would move off of him sooner than later, afraid that her weight would inspire vicious visions of Rhiannon Maddox. For now, she rested against the rise and fall of his chest.
After you’re done with that washout you’re shacking up with.
Faye’s stubbornness kicked in hard and fierce then. She wouldn’t be done with Emmett and the man wasn’t a washout. He was strong and wonderful. He was someone discovering himself in real time. Someone she could encourage and love on and be proud of. She was proud of him. Lee had had everything handed to him and at one time Faye had found stability in that -- in his old money family and all that he could lavish her with. Emmett had an innate strength and that was all the stability Faye needed.
She tilted her head up to look at him. His face was smooth with sleep. Emmett Kerr was a lot of things, a lot of things Faye loved or would learn how to. But she wouldn’t ask him to stay with her. She wouldn’t keep him. She wouldn’t trap him.
She loved him, but he deserved the choice.
In the dark, wrapped in his arms, Faye prayed he chose her.
My dear gentlefolk, I’d like to introduce to the stage: Faye Murphy. There was a small taste of her in an ask a few weeks ago, but now she’s here for good. I hope you enjoy :)
Emmett’s Master List
Tag: @lave-whump, @pebbledriscoll, @highwaywhump (Tag list always open! Let me know if you’d like to be added!)
Warning: bbu general warning; implied training, implied conditioning, trauma survivor, trauma recovery, suspicion, hesitation, memories. Nothing too dangerous in here, folks, but let me know if I’m missed something!
~*~*~*~*~
“I want you to talk to someone,” Oliver began quietly. “Nazanin too.”
The back porch was quiet and dark. The summer night was all humidity punctuated by cricket song, fireflies, and far away on other porches. Nazanin was at one of them -- a baby shower for a close friend. Emmett had helped her make the dessert she left with. Emmett leaned back in his chair, the wrought iron squeaking as he did. He tilted his head up to the dark sky, cooling the back of his neck with the cold condensation from his drink glass. Lemonade and bourbon for him; Oliver just had vodka.
Emmett had liked it better when they weren’t talking.
“I know someone. She’s good, knows her shit,” Oliver kept talking, clearly disliking the other man’s continued silence. “She doesn’t have to know you were ever... well, where you came from, but she works with survivors and I think it could help. To talk it all through.”
Emmett let out a slow breath. So much for hoping silence would beget silence. “I like my sketchbook just fine, Oliver.”
“You might need more than a sketchbook someday. Like the days when you don’t want to get out of bed, when Naz sneaks you chocolate at breakfast.”
“No. Thank you.”
Emmett took a long drink. It felt good to say no to someone; anyone really. He could now without the harsh sting of guilt in his throat.
“Would you think about it?” Oliver asked. “Naz will push you harder than I will, but will you at least think about it?”
“Why?”
“Why will Naz push you or why should you think about it?”
“Why should I think about it?”
Oliver took a drink and cleared his throat. Hesitating, stalling. The man hated confrontation more than anyone Emmett had ever met. “B-Because she’s coming to visit next week. For a few weeks.”
“She was already invited before you moved in, Kerr, so don’t go down that path,” Oliver shot back. “She’s my best friend. We’ve known each other since we were eleven. I’m -... um...”
“You’re what, Oliver?”
“I’m just saying. If you wanted to test it out, try out a shrink’s couch when its still technically my couch, she might be a good place to start.” Oliver exhaled the last of his breath, then inhaled again. Vaguely irritated -- something the man was rarely capable of being.
Emmett catches him shift in the weak light coming from the house behind them. He crosses his legs, running a hand through his hair. Oliver was handsome, in an ordinary comforting sort of way. Emmett didn’t often mull on it -- the man wasn’t his type at all -- but it occurred to him every so often. It occurred to him now, a strange mix of half-light and a genuineness that softened his annoyance.
He sighed, relenting but only an inch. “What’s her name?”
“Faye.”
“How long has she been at this therapy thing?”
“Four, five years now... She knows her shit, Emmett. And she’s handled some shit of her own. At the very least, she can sympathize.”
Emmett stared out into the dark backyard, right at the top the fence line separating their yard from the neighbor’s. “You trust her? Really trust her?”
“With my life,” Oliver answered quietly. He drummed his fingers on the sides of his own glass, staring at the same spot in the fence. “She pulled me out of a frozen pond in high school, so you can take that endorsement as gospel.”
Emmett went quiet. Everything about therapy was unappealing. It felt like airing dirty laundry to a stranger, picking open stitches to let that same stranger poke around on the inside. He didn’t like marinating in memories -- they were mostly bad memories, given that he didn’t have many others and the rest was hollow greyness inside his skull. It felt like the “bad thoughts” he had been warned against in the Facility. He was always waiting for a headache to rear up.
He didn’t enjoy the idea of explaining that to Oliver or Nazanin, let alone both of them. Emmett was perfectly content licking his wounds and putting all the residual pain into pencil drawings. It didn’t make sense to bother anyone but himself about it. Rhiannon, the three years he had lived with her, what she had ordered him to do -- that could stay his secret. Fooling himself into thinking anyone could or would commiserate only hurt him in the end. Didn’t it?
“How long have you known her?” He asked at last, now trying to fill the silence himself.
Oliver hummed as he thought. “Since we were ten, so... twenty, twenty-on years.”
“That’s a long time,” Emmett mumbled. He took a drink, finally feeling the alcohol warm in his skin. He glanced sideways at Oliver, his tawny hair and white tee shirt backlit like a bad scene in a good movie. He’d never tried to pull anything over on him, had never lied to him. Oliver was... decent. He was a decent person. “Okay. I’ll think it over. No promises.”
Oliver raised his glass in the air. “Good enough for me.”
~*~*~
Faye Murphy was short.
From the upstairs windows, that’s about all Emmett could make of the woman. Short, dark hair tucked into a neat bun, sunglasses over her eyes. She and Oliver were going back and forth in the driveway. Teasing, he guessed by the look of it. Nazanin had said at breakfast, after Oliver had left for the airport, that the pair was more like siblings than friends.
Emmett dithered at the window, wondering whether he should be downstairs before she came in the front door or be called down after. As he watched her walk around the car to retrieve her bags, then hug Nazanin, he decided he would split the difference. He would appear in the front hall right as they were walking in the front door.
He caught the faintest flash of copper in her deep brown hair. It caught his breath, fear slingshotting through him so quickly he had to hold the window frame to stay standing. He took a breath, rubbed his eyes.
The woman standing on the driveway took off her sunglasses.
Not Rhiannon, he reminded himself.
She, Oliver, and Nazanin began walking towards the front door. Swallowing the shock, he made himself move out of his bedroom and into the hallway. He could hear their happy chatter as he reached the top of the staircase, dawdling once again.
“No, you should have been there it was hysterical. I’ve never heard Wynn scream so loud in my life.”
“Have I ever told you you’re a terrible person, Faye?”
“No, just that I’m a terrible friend. Same difference right?”
“Right.”
Emmett stepped to the side, out of sight as the door closed and they came to stand in the entry hall. So much for splitting the difference. From where he stood tucked against the wall, he could see small bits of them -- Oliver’s shoes and Nazanin’s hand and bracelets, two small bags resting on the first landing step, the back and shoulders of the new arrival. He waited for them to move, to get just a little bit further down the hall before he made his way down, but they didn’t. They just kept talking, standing right there on the threshold.
“As far as I’m considered, Naz, you’re the only one who could possibly make Williams interesting again. You’re not just going to recycle the movies like everyone else does.”
“Well, that, and I couldn’t give a shit about Liz Taylor.”
“I respect that.”
“You’ll have to come back when we finally get to put it on stage.”
“I will. I’m tempted to just keep asking you questions until you smack me.”
She had the same lilt in her voice as Rhiannon. Well no, he thought, not the same. Rhiannon’s was genuine, but only brought out to get her way, to smooth talk someone into something or add emphasis to her pouting. Faye’s didn’t fluctuate, going in and out with the amount of emphasis on her words or the topic they were on. It was just there -- a gentle rolling over of consonants, slow and deliberate.
He was beginning to feel silly, self-conscious about his quiet watching. It was strange, but he liked his look-out spot. The small spike had eased, his anxiety lowering to a simmer as he watched Faye. She tilted her head and crossed her arms when she talked about herself; lowered her arms and tangled her fingers together behind her back when Oliver or Nazanin were speaking. Her hips slid fluidly from one side to the other when she changed the weight on her feet.
“Mother’s doing well. Eh, well... as well as she can. We’re still trying to figure out what we’re dealing with, how much help dad needs, you know? Miranda’s already offered to move, but I don’t think we’re there yet.”
“She hates Jersey that much, huh?”
“Nah, just her department. She’s thought about quitting before, so now she’s just clawing at the wall.”
Taking a breath, Emmett pushed away from the wall and stepped back towards the stairs. He rested one hand on the bannister, still listening, still waiting. Still watching the trio’s every move until something told him it was alright to descend. The hesitation was strange, but not uncomfortable.
“Even after catching that creep out in the Pine Barrens?”
“Apparently... I don’t know much more’n that though. Miri won’t talk about it.”
“I wouldn’t either if I knew my sister would psychoanalyze me the whole time.”
“What makes you think I don’t do that to you already?”
“Oh no, I know you do. Helps me sleep at night.”
“Oh does it, Ollie?” Faye shot back with a teasing laugh, her head tilting back just slightly. More of her came into view as he walked slowly down the stairs, careful not to hit his head. “I’m so glad, really I am, I-! Oh. Hi there.”
Emmett looked up into amber eyes. Startling, bright, focused and nearly bird-like; surrounded by black lashes and precisely drawn winged liner. If it weren’t for the circumstances, they alone may have sent him back to his room. It took him a few moments to see the face those eyes were set into -- heart-shaped, friendly, a smattering of freckles to soften the line of her nose and arch of her eyebrows. Emmett cleared his throat and held out a hand to the woman. “Hi. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too, stranger,” Faye said, cheerful but careful. Balancing her enthusiasm, probably having spied the startled flash in his eyes. She took his hand, shook it once. “I take it you’re the visitor Oliver was telling me about.”
“I hope so.” A faint smile pulled at his lips. “Emmett Kerr.”
“Faye Murphy.” She squeezed his hand and stepped away, as if leading him down the stairs. “Here. You’re too tall for those stairs.”
“I know. I’ve hit my head a few times,” Emmett replied smoothly.
Surprisingly smoothly.
He was still trying to get a feel for her, trying to understand what was polite pleasantness and what was her real persona. Trying to find the line, just like he had with Rhiannon; always trying to find the line.
Down in the entry hall with them, he could get a better look at her. She was, indeed, much shorter than all of them, but held herself with a half-minded rigidity -- shoulders squared, back straight, chin up, but as though she did not know she was doing it. She was dressed in a loose white shirt that hit at her waist and a pair of fitted pale green pedal pushers that picked up from there. A scarf was threaded through her dark hair and wrapped around her ballerina bun. Her sunglasses were tucked into the waistband of her pants.
Everything about her was old fashioned. Not put-upon though -- he thought back to Rhiannon chirping about “old Hollywood glamour” as she sprayed her hair, applied red lipstick, put on a dress that covered up more of her chest than usual. It was thoughtful, considered, but seemingly effortless. He couldn’t help himself from thinking about how the eyeliner -- practiced and neat -- made her eyes seem larger, sharper; how the soft pink lipstick brought out the summer blush in her cheeks.
“Did you hit your head again just now?”
Emmett blinked, swallowing down the thoughts. “No, not this time.” He shook his head, casting a look at Oliver that he hoped asked for a little help. “Sorry, I’m not great at this.”
Faye laughed under her breath. “The whole getting to know you thing?”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t worry about it.” She shifted her weight again, one hip raising as the other lowered. “First time I met Naz, I had red wine spilled down the front of my dress at a wedding. Why she still talks to me, I’ll never know.”
Naz rolled her eyes. “Why wouldn’t I? That was the most interesting part of that whole weekend.”
“That was? Not spray painting plastic toys gold on the front yard?”
“I don’t remember much of that. Paint fumes.”
“That makes two of us.”
As they walked to the living room -- Faye and Oliver chatting idly, Emmett trailing well behind -- something shifted in his chest. A sort of sliding feeling, something rolling to an edge and dropping a few inches. A feeling he couldn’t place, couldn’t remember if he had ever felt it before. It let an odd warmth settle in his stomach. Not spreading, just sitting there. It left him on edge, closer to confused than upset; tingly and off-kilter in the chair he had picked.
He stayed quiet for a long while, listening to the chatter around him and trying to feel a part of it. Trying to peel apart Faye Murphy as she talked and teased and laughed. Trying to solve what the newfound feeling in his gut was. Trying, desperately, to find the line.
He felt the moment she leaned in, tilting her face up to his. Faye’s lips were soft, slotted against his perfectly. His stomach flipped pleasantly as they moved against his. He remembered Rhiannon’s hands pushing his face into that same position, roughly pulling him down; remembered how his stomach had clenched and threatened to spill over every time.
But this was different. This was warm and easy, gentle and sweet. Faye’s fingers roamed over his skin and hair, holding but never pulling; guiding but not forcing. He leaned closer, pressing her against the couch, a fresh curl of warmth in his gut as she wrapped her arms around his neck.
hey there anon, thank you so much! I don’t think you meant to tap into a piece I am working on right this very minute, but you did and I’m glad for it. Enjoy :)
~*~*~
2. “Can I kiss you?”
(quick warning: mentioned past noncon/dubcon + Rhiannon, but its fluff!)
Faye hiccuped through tears. Even in the dark, he could see the redness blotching her nose, the smear of wetness on her cheeks, the rubbed patches around her eyes. The sleeves of her bathrobe smelled like vodka. “It’s not worth staying up for.”
Emmett crouched down in front of her, where she was curled up on the carpet. “If you’re this upset, its worth something.”
“It really isn’t.”
“Why don’t you let me decide that for myself, Faye?”
Emmett let his eyes wander over her, curled up at the foot of the couch. It wasn’t the first time he’d taken her in -- her old-fashioned clothes and dimpled smiles, the curve of her legs; her dark hair and glittering eyes reminding him of someone he’d rather not think about. Her sparkling laugh, the little sway to her hips when she walked. It made him warm on the inside, left him staring longer than he should have.
He stared even now. Even as she was wrapped in her bathrobe and nightshirt. Even though her eyes were dulled from crying and she smelled like alcohol. He found himself enthralled; being pulled in without knowing why or how or how to stop it. Rhiannon never left him feeling this way -- wobbly and warm and tight. He didn’t quite know what to do with it.
Emmett reached out, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ears. “Why are you down here?”
“Bad dream,” Faye murmured, cotton-mouthed.
“What do you have bad dreams about?” Emmett lowered himself down onto the floor. He was wary of how close he was to her, wary of how he wanted to be even closer, to touch her. It was a foreign feeling, but not unpleasant.
“Don’t worry about it,” Faye shook her head, glancing up at him with a frail smile. “I’m like you, I don’t like talking about things that might make me a burden.”
Emmett hummed, but didn’t move. He glanced out the sliding glass doors leading out to the deck and the city spread out beyond it. He heard her sigh and shift, then a small hand come to rest on his shoulder.
“You should go to bed. I’m going to be up for a while.”
“Do this often?”
“Yeah.”
Emmett hummed and turned towards her. He felt himself run fingers softly through her hair. “I’ll stay up with you. I don’t like sleeping.”
“Why not?” she asked, breathless.
“Bad dreams.” He leaned forward, resting hands on either side of her. Their noses brushed. Her eyelashes tickled against his cheek. “Faye.”
“Emmett.”
“Can I kiss you?”
He felt the moment she leaned in, tilting her face up to his. Faye’s lips were soft, slotted against his perfectly. His stomach flipped pleasantly as they moved against his. He remembered Rhiannon’s hands pushing his face into that same position, roughly pulling him down; remembered how his stomach had clenched and threatened to spill over every time.
But this was different. This was warm and easy, gentle and sweet. Faye’s fingers roamed over his skin and hair, holding but never pulling; guiding but not forcing. He leaned closer, pressing her against the couch, a fresh curl of warmth in his gut as she wrapped her arms around his neck.
Emmett made his way through the main floor, winding through family friends, extended family, and too many others to reach the front doors.
No one pays him any attention, or he doesn’t see if they do.
Single-minded attention, focused on getting outside.
He walks out the doors and takes a rush of cool, humid night air to the face. There, he thought, that feels good. He takes a deep breath, feeling it in his lungs, calm his spinning mind and the tingling skin of his arms and neck.
He sits down on the porch steps, concentrating on slow, even breaths. Staring off at the gravel driveway, the dark oaks and their curtains of spanish moss. He looks up. Save for the lights of the house, there stood a sky full of stars.
Dark but shining.
A conglomeration of all the things in this world meant to make anyone feel small. Insignificant. Understand their true place in the vast sweep of the cosmos.
In the end, none of the opinions would matter.
In the end, none of what had happened to him would matter.
Emmett, Faye, what he had done to survive Rhiannon; the low-burning anger, the deep confusion, and the cold, unforgiving stare of Faye's sister, father, others... none of it matters.
Nazain had told him once to think of things on a geologic timeline, within the lifespan of the universe. It made everything smaller.
Rhiannon's shadow at his back? The plenty of people in the house behind him?
They were blips, anomalies, unregistered.
So why did it hurt so goddamned much?
Emmett slouches on the bench, tipping his head back to look up. He was looking at the same as he had with Faye, with Rhiannon, with Oliver and Nazanin, whoever he had been before any of them. Every other night in every other place with the only other souls who had known Emmett Kerr.
Known him as a person, a real person. As complete, not potential.
He stares up at the night sky and internally interrogates himself over why that simple fact —one that had never been certain before just then— wasn’t enough for any of them.
His eyes water. The sky blurs. He bends over, elbows to his knees, and tries to find the alright. Breath catches in his lungs, sticks fast and tight in his throat.
He swears he can feel Rhiannon's hands on his shoulders. The way she did when Emmett was new. Then palms settled on the outside curve of his collarbone, a chin resting on top of Emmett's hair.
Emmett jumps at the feeling -- very solid, very real -- wiping furiously at his eyes. He turns to see Faye settling uneasily onto the step next to him. He rolls his tongue around in his mouth, trying to collect himself. "H-Hey?"
"Hey," she says quietly. She rests gentle fingers at his cheek, her other hand resting near her stomach. "Are you okay? You left in a hurry."
"No," he gasps. His hands shake the drink in his hand and he has to set it down on the weathered wood. He takes her hand in his and squeezes tight, as if it was the only thing keeping him there. "They think I ruined you, Faye."
