“I’m just going to-thank you. I’m good now.” (Abby/Townsend) (I just love Abby a lot and I will not apologize for it)
Never apologize for it. She’s amazing in every capacity and I’ll die by that. More Tabby from this list of prompts. Y’all are suckers for ‘em, and I’m here for it, because I am also a sucker.
It wouldn’t be as much of a problem if he hadn’t just spent the morning cleaning the kitchen.
And true, it isn’t his kitchen, but perhaps that is even more reason for his rapidly building concern because his kitchen would never have been in such a state to begin with. Days old dishes and stains on the stovetop. Backsplash that is more splash than not, and a series of small plants in desperate need of a good watering. Abigail Cameron is, unambiguously, an absolute slob.
But somehow he doesn’t mind so much. Truthfully, it gives him a sense of routine and clears his mind while he waits for their omelettes to settle. There’s not enough credit given to the calm of running water, or the back-and-forth squish of the sponge. He’s never been a man of meditation, but if he were, it would come to him in the form of morning dishes before a lazy Sunday breakfast.
And it certainly helps that, upon waking up to coffee and bacon and a freshly bleached sink, a certain sort of smile always crosses over Abigail’s lips. It helps that when the sunrise inches through her sparkling high-rise apartment, she seems to melt as though the world is just a little bit warmer. He’d wash any dish that earned him even an ounce of her attention, and he’d wipe down a thousand countertops, just as long as she promised to sit herself on top of them.
She has her legs wrapped around his hips. Pulled him in nice and close. “You don’t have to do my dishes, y’know.”
She’s taller than him, up here, and her fingers fiddle with the collar of a Six shirt that’s been stretched with age. Green eyes bare into him, far too intense for so early in the morning, and there’s a moment when he nearly tells her that he knows. He knows he doesn’t need to do them. He simply wants to.
But the vulnerability of the words puckers like lemons on his lips. “Well,” he says instead. “Someone has to.”
“Always the charmer, Townsend,” she says, and dawn brings out a sleepy tenderness in her that stands in stark contrast to the desperate and unsettled want of her evenings. Her sunrise kisses are that of a softer, steadier nature than those at sundown. “But since you made breakfast, I guess we can let it slide.”
He’s not usually one to complain—really, he’s not—about the lingering peppermint affection of someone so unfairly beautiful as Abigail Cameron, except that he did spend the morning cleaning the kitchen, and she has just spilled some coffee.
It’s really not that much. Just a splash of an ambitiously full mug. It’s not that hard to ignore.
Especially given that she’s made her way across his jaw, now. Leaves behind an entire trail of kisses down his neck and settles at his collar bone. It’s one, two, three pecks before she squeezes him in closer.
And the coffee drip, drip, drips down the side of a mug that reads World’s Best Aunt. It’s going to leave a ring at the bottom.
But she’s fussing with his shirt again, and only good things happen when she starts fussing with his shirt.
Although if they leave the coffee, it could stain the countertop.
But she’s whispering in his hear now. “Earth to Townsend.”
And he’s looking over her shoulder, towards a nearby rag. “It’s just...”
She pulls her sleeve over her hand, leans back to reach her mug and gives it a swipe. Then, without so much as a moment’s hesitation, she gives the counter a good dry as well. The coffee stain joins the collection at Abigail’s cuffs and, for a moment, he thinks that she must be able to read minds.
But, of course, she can’t. She’s just a very good agent. “Better?”
He looks at the now clean countertop, then back to her. “Thank you,” he says. “I’m good now.”
With that, she grins. “You’re good now?”
“You said you like it when I use Americanisms.”
“No, no, no,” she says, and at some point, his hands have landed on her hips. At some point, her arms started hanging from his shoulders. “I said it was cute when you use Americanisms. Like how a puppy is cute when they can’t walk on grass. Or how a baby is cute when they can’t roll over all the way.”
Her hands ease into the hair at the base of his neck, and there’s a shiver that bubbles in his back—the warm kind. The good kind. Everything about her is good. “Is that so?”
“Is that so,” she mocks in a faux accent. Then, in her own voice, “You heard it here first, folks. Townsend is a big ol’ baby.”
“And this, after I cleaned your kitchen.”
She shrugs. “Did you see what I just did there?” she says, pointing at the admittedly clean spot. “I helped.”
And despite himself—despite the person he’s always been, and the person he thought he’d always be—he laughs. He laughs with his whole body. “Oh.” It’s a warning, more than anything else. “If you want to see help, I’ll show you help.”
“That doesn’t even make any—”
But she doesn’t get a chance to finish, because he’s kissing her, now. She needs that, sometimes. Someone to just shut her up. And he’s more than happy to oblige. Sunrise draws no such tenderness out of him, so he scoops her up from the countertop, keeps her mouth busy, and they leave their omelettes to burn.
