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foxybouquet · 4 hours

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Okay so like hear me out….

Number 3 from the angry confessions list with Secondo…. 👀🤭

(I would let him angry fuck me until I forget my own name- I MEAN WHAAAAAAATT???? Who said that?)

-💖

For you, my darling Heart!

I hope you're happy and healthy and horny and well 💖

“You… What?”

“You… what?” you whisper, flexing your trembling hands and then flexing them into fists, as if that will send all of whatever-it-is you’re feeling out of your body. Otherwise, you might combust, “You wanna say that, again?”

You stare at Papa Emeritus the Second and he stares right back. Except, for probably the first time ever, his eyes are wide with fear and panic, a sheen of sweat shines through his paints and he swallows nervously, “I do not want to say it, again,” he murmurs, turning away, tugging at his collar.

You’re sure you didn’t hear him correctly. Sure that the man you’d been secretly in love with for Satan knows how long did not just profess his own love. For you. On the night before your departure. Surely not, you think, huffing out a nervous laugh. And then you meet his perfect, mismatched eyes and a new feeling bubbles up. Something dark and angry and fueled with years of burning and yearning. A shudder rushes up your spine and you clear your throat, “You wanna say that… again?” you repeat yourself - it’s hardly a question - and you see Secondo shrink up a bit and it scares you even more. Secondo doesn’t lie. Secondo doesn’t fib. That’s his whole thing - he says it like it is. So you take another step forward and put a finger under his chin, “Look at me,” you say and after a moment of hesitation, he obeys, eyes meeting yours, “Say it, again.”

“I am in love with you,” he mumbles.

“Oh, my god,” you exhaled, “You fucking asshole! You… you… absolute cock-socket!”

Secondo straightens, blinking a few times. He’s never been called a cock-socket before and he’s blue-screening in real time, his entire system buffering, “What do you call me?” he asks, brow furrowing, shaking his head in confusion.

“I called you a cock-socket,” you squeak, voice pitched with emotion, “Want me to repeat that? Cock-socket! Fucking… fuck!”

Secondo snorts and folds his arms over his chest, “Are you finished?”

“No, you goddamn cum-skull,” you snap and that one knocks Secondo a step back, tears burning your eyes, “You could have told me,” you hiss, “Fucking hell, Secondo,” you say his name and it rolls off of your tongue, practically on fire, blazing with spite, and his hand goes to his chest, “From the moment,” you pull of your veil and run your hands through your hair, “Oh, my god. You… me,” you turn back around, giving him a once over, jaw cocked, shaking your head, “Fuck you, Secondo. Oh my god, I have never met someone so arrogant so… so self-centered in my life!”

You’ve hit a nerve, speaking to him like that and his own anger flashes dark in his eyes, “I am Papa, you do not say those things to me. You also,” he struggles to find his words, frustration and confusion and shock clouding his senses, “You also do not come to me. You also are… oh, you are a stubborn thing,” he groans, pinching his nose and shaking his head while you fold your arms over your chest, cocking your hip.

“You’re not Papa right now, shit-stick. Just one more asshole guy, like all the others. Just Secondo. Playboy, asshole Secondo.”

He scoffs and closes the space between you, lowering his voice as if you’re not alone and he doesn’t want anyone to know his horrible secret, “Well, I’m sorry I fell in love with you, okay? But it happened and I can’t do shit about it.”

He’s a breath away and it’s - as it always has been - intoxicating. You close your eyes and take a deep, cleansing breath but it backfires as you inhale his scent - aftershave, incense, too strong espresso and that extra cigarette he wasn’t supposed to have. He smells like the person you’re supposed to spend the rest of your life with. He smells like a kind, caring man who feels everything far too deeply; hiding behind icy stares and walls too thick and high to traverse. He smells like Papa and Secondo and he’s right there and you want to touch him so badly it hurts. Your entire body trembles. You ache for him, his proximity only making it worse. When you open your eyes he’s staring down at you, his eyebrow arched, that Secondo glare on his face, and it irritates the wound, making that anger swell back up like a rogue wave, “You could have said something,” you say through gritted teeth, tears burning your eyes, “You could have said anything, Secondo. You could have never said anything and let me rot with this horrible, nightmare of unrequited love,” tears spill over and you shove Secondo’s shoulder, your voice rising, “You could have tried to not let me make plans to leave, you know?” you hiss, “Instead, you’ve tortured me beyond belief,” you sob, “You’ve let me sit here consumed. You’ve let me pack all my shit and transfer to another fucking country, Secondo! What the fuck!?” you swipe at your tears and shove him, again, “So, yeah. Fuck you. Fuck you, shit-stick Secondo.”

You move to shove him, again and he catches your wrist, “You think I have not suffered?”

“You think it’s been fun?” you snap, your voice shrill and shaking - Secondo’s touch, his hand around your arm is distracting enough, lust swirls with your anger, need throbbing between your legs while rage burns in your belly, “You think I’ve just been kicking my feet, laying in bed while I draw in my journal with gel pens? Mr. and Mrs. Papa Secondo?” he smirks - in his way - the corner of his mouth turning up, eyes sparkling for a second before returning to their hardened, unreadable gaze, “Don’t fucking laugh at me,” you try to jerk your hand away from him but he pulls you closer, “if you kiss me, I’ll kill you.”

“If you leave, I’ll die anyway.”

You kiss him, then, because you might die too if you don’t, “Don’t let me go,” you whisper against his lips, first contact obliterating any thought or feeling or need. It was just Secondo, kissing you. His eyes were closed and his other hand slid around your middle, his arm wrapping around you, pulling you up against him, “Don’t let me go,” you whisper against his lips and he groans, “Don’t let me leave. Don’t let me go.”

“I thought you wanted to go,” Secondo teases, smirking again, his hands cupping your jaws. He bumps his nose against yours, “You have a flight to catch, I thought?”

He’s poking at you and it’s working and you try to shove away from him, again, “Fuck off,” you say, unable to differentiate from hurt and anger and excitement and the overpowering need to just keep on kissing him. All the evenings you watched him take a Sibling or two or three to bed. Ghouls and Sisters paraded in front of you for years and you glare up at him, kiss him and then pull your face away, craning your neck, “Why?”

“You showed no interest.”

“Then you’re blind and an asshole,” you growl, “Let go of me.”

He doesn’t let go, “You just asked me not to.”

“Secondo,” you surrender - by only a hair - leaning into him, your body begging for more.You curve up into him, against him and it does not go unnoticed - by either of you - how well you fit together. How lovely it feels. Your mind is telling you to rip him in a new one, your heart demanding that the rest of you give in, too. Your plane leaves in five hours. You should already be in the car, headed to the airport. But you have time. You have time for this. It’s probably the worst decision you’ll ever make - go this far, this fast with such little chance of it going any further than this. You’ll get nothing more than a walk of shame and a silent ride to the airport; your heart would still be broken, you’d still be lonely. But at least you’d get a taste. And so you give in to everything you’ve ever wanted and it consumes you. Secondo follows your lead. He pushes you towards his desk, turning you and guiding you until you’re up against it - his mouth never leaving yours. He moves to turn you around and you fight him, “Not like that,” you say, pulling yourself up, sitting on the desk, “You’ll look at me,” you demand, testing his patience and his authority but he swallows, nodding. And then it’s a flurry of hands. You help him lift his robes up over his head and the land in a pile of sacrilege on the floor. You tear open his shirt, buttons clattering across the floor and the desk, and it earns you a growl and a glare but, nothing more. Your mouth finds his chest, burying your face in the dark hair - thickest over his sternum - and he groans, hands tangling in your hair as you trace circles around his nipple with your tongue; sucking and biting. You can feel his heart - pounding, racing - beneath your mouth and it makes your pussy throb, your clit ache and your heart break all the more, “I need you,” you admit, finally surrendering completely, finally giving into this, your lips only parting from Secondo’s flesh to beg him for more. You look up at him as he takes off his gloves, his hands cups your jaw, thumbs catching errant tears, “I need you, Secondo.”

“I am here,” he says, his voice low and soft. You imagine there’s a bit of giving in, too. A tender, soft touch replaces the grip he had on your wrist a few minutes ago. His gaze softer, his chest rises in slow, even breaths. He leans down and kisses you - it’s hesitant and slow but it's full of heat. Your hands slide down to his belt and soon his pants are caught around his thighs and his cock bounces free, he lets out a satisfying groan, his head falling back as you stroke him, peppering his chest with kisses; reveling in the coarse, dark hair.

“You may have been here,” you mumble against his pec, “But you have taunted and tortured me.”

“I have only done what was needed to meet my needs,” he growls, his hands in your hair tightening, pulling your face up to meet his eyes, “I, too, have suffered.”

“Poor thing,” you coo and it’s far too contemptuous to be comforting. His nostrils flare and his lip twitches - it is neither grin or smirk but it fans a flame in your belly you’re not soon to put out.

“You think I have not seen you?” he snarls, one hand leaving your hair and the other, in its absence, tightens its grip at the base of your skull. He pushes your dress up your thighs and groans and it’s so close to a whine, you smile wickedly, “You think I have not had to sit by at rituals? And watch what is mine get fucked? Fucked on my altar? On my throne?”

“Oh, Secondo,” you say, but your words - the silly little comeback knocked out of you as his fingers slide across your pussy. You’re already dripping and Secondo smiles, too - triumphant, “I was just,” you inhale and then exhale, attempting to retain some semblance of control, echoing his own silly excuse, “I was just meeting my needs.”

“What needs?” Secondo matches your tone - a condescending croon as he strokes you, teasing your clit and testing your entrance, “What needs do you have? Hm? Such needs that I have to hear about Omega’s fat cock in your ass? Or that feral little fire ghoul of Terzo’s knotting you? Inside that which is mine. Marking that which belongs to me.”

The slap lands hard and fast across Secondo’s face and he is stunned into silence, eyes wide and mouth hanging open, “I do not belong to you.”

You pull your head away, jerking out of Secondo’s grasp and you lean back on his desk, spreading your legs wide, “You are mine,” he growls and you shake your head, pushing your fingers through your pussy, spreading yourself open for him, “You have been so since you stepped over that threshold,” Secondo thrusts a pointed finger at his door and then at you, “You. Are. Mine.”

“No,” you say, slipping two fingers into your pussy. It feels good but, you know he feels better. Secondo swats your hand away, lacing your fingers with his as draws them to his mouth, tongue licking off the slick that shines on your fingers. He moans, the taste he has only dreamt about like honey on his lips, “You, Papa Emeritus,” you smirk, “You belong to me.”

He’s angry, then.

But so are you.

He gives you no time to prepare, no time to adjust, as he pushes his cock into you. Your head rolls back and your eyes flutter shut. How delicious, how perfect he fits. How good he feels. The thick of his cock, his heat matching yours, the throb of taking him fully; you can feel him at the very center of you and you never, ever want him to leave. You gasp as he pulls out, the lack of him frustrating and you realize how addicted you are. And then he slams back into you and you are lost.

Secondo fucks you hard and fast. The desk underneath you and its contents around you are jolted - papers crumpled beneath you, ink spilling, long cold coffee toppling over. It’s too much and it’s not enough. Someone is sobbing and crying and someone else is wheezing and growling and after a few moments, you realize it’s you and Secondo. You arch off the desk and cling to him while he rails into you; arms around him, face pressed back against his chest. His arms come around and keep you there. You want to tell him you belong to him, want to say his name, let it drip off your tongue with so much love and need he’ll never have another but, you can’t say anything. Not when he’s holding you like this. Certainly not when he’s fucking you like this. You can’t talk or breathe or think.

Your core tightens and Secondo’s pace starts to lose its rhythm, “Come with me,” he growls and his voice jolts you back to reality and you feel everything all at once. And, as is your way, you rattle him with your disobedience - coming undone before he can join you. Your orgasm breaks you to your core, you’re coming on him then - whining and crying against his chest. It doesn’t take long, not when your body tightens and trembles around his cock like that. Thunder rolls in his chest - a deep, rumbling growl as he comes - filling you up, taking your breath away, again. He forces you to look up at him and he kisses you - so sweetly and so carefully - it threatens to pull another orgasm out of you and his own breath hitches in response.

You don’t let him move. You close your eyes and hug him around his middle and wrap your legs around his. The tears come then and you cry. You cry and Secondo kisses your hair and he rubs your back. But he says nothing and you thank Satan for small miracles. You sniffle and try to scoot closer to Secondo but, frankly, you can’t get any closer, “I have to go,” you whisper, clinging to him; not going at all.

“I canceled your flight.”

“You what?” you snap your face up to stare at Secondo, who is looking smug as a bug.

“You weren’t going to leave,” he says, running a thumb over your lip, tracing the curve of it, “Not really.”

“I stand by my statement,” you nip at his thumb and he inhales sharply, “shit-stick.”

“I am your arrogant shit-stick, though, si?” he laughs and it’s the most perfect sound in the world, “Your, uh, how you say? Cum-brains?.”

“Cum-skull,” you correct him, pulling him back down for another kiss, “You’re my cum-skull.”

“And you are staying?” he asks, eyes worried, tone full of hope, “You are staying here at the abbey? With me?” You nod and he groans, “And?” he asks, waiting patiently. You don’t give it to him and he shakes his head, “You are stubborn.”

“Yes. And you are arrogant.”

“My stubborn, beautiful girl,” he says, running his fingertip down the length of your nose, pressing it against your lips, “But mine.”

You give up the last of it - the last white flag flies high, the last bit of resistance and turmoil, the last of the aching and the hurt and all the pent up need. It’s all gone. He’s here and you’re here and you kiss him one more time. And then another. His mouth wanders, pressing to your cheek and along your jaw. He nuzzles into your neck and you wrap your arms around his, “I’m yours,” you throw in the whole damn towel, “I am yours. Completely.”

#delicious #it’s Secondo Sunday I guess!#papa emeritus ii #secondo #papa emeritus 2 #papa secondo #papa x reader #secondo fic #secondo x reader

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foxybouquet · 2 days

Text

copia/f!oc, 4k. sophie's having a Bad Day. copia does something about it.

banner by the divine @enjoy-my-swearing, special thanks to @anamelessfool for the beta read

everything's orchestrated, follow the arrows - ao3

“Motherfucker.”

Copia freezes mid-step, poised over the one floorboard that cracks like a pistol underfoot when it’s this warm and humid. It would be even louder than the almost musical sound that just rang out through their cozy little apartment. Sophie’s rarely that vehement over something as simple as breaking a glass while washing dishes– though for a lady once bound in service to Christ, his wife has an admirable ability to curse like a dockworker. He doesn’t generally have to tread lightly around her, but perhaps it’s best not to startle her just now.

Truly, he hadn’t meant to sneak up on her. He’d been going cross-eyed over a spreadsheet for a while, and lurched from their little home office towards the kitchen for some water, maybe to make a sandwich for himself and another for his lady.

It’s the grinding sound, too much like the broken crockery before, like something caught in the garbage disposal, that catches somewhere in his chest. He hasn’t heard that sound often, but he’s heard it enough to know what he’s hearing. Even over the sound of the water running.

Ah, he thinks, sidling up to the kitchen doorway. It’s a terrible thing, being right.

His darling wife, his precious Sophie, is hanging her head over the kitchen sink, her shoulders bowed and shaking. The kitchen window catches the afternoon light, its frame of Devil's Ivy turning to milkglass, the air to gold, her sleek hair into some fabulous alloy. Even from here she’s beautiful, sloppy in her father’s flannel shirt, the sleeves rolled perfectly past her elbows. She raises one hand to swipe the inside of her wrist at her snotty nose– it’s an endearingly disgusting gesture– and the slice of red in this haze of green and gold is as loud as a scream. It nearly stabs the breath out of him, and it’s only the habit of a lifetime of communal living that keeps him from making a noise at the shock of seeing it on the pale underside of her forearm.

Copia leans against the doorway, and watches his wife cry.

This isn’t entirely unexpected.

Every morning she burrows herself into his skin like a tick, indulges so beautifully in the sin of sloth, just the way her husband has taught her. Even when the air conditioning broke last August, she’d wriggle herself a little closer into him. She would sigh like a cat when he slid his arm around her, when he pressed a kiss to the back of her neck just to taste the salt on her skin.

This morning, she’d taken a call, extracting herself from the warmth of her husband’s arms in the diffuse pre-dawn half-light, everything the same shadow of itself. The sudden lack of warm wife in his arms had done more to wake him up than anything else, listening to her tense Spanish down the hall. Today was supposed to be her day off, but she’d been gone before the streetlights, leaving him coffee, leaving him a bagel with cream cheese and cherry jam.

Leaving him to pace around the apartment like a caged tiger.

Sophie’s charmingly old-fashioned, in her way. She hasn’t quite figured out why some of her text messages are blue, and some are green. Or why some have Read: 6:23 AM at the bottom and some just have Delivered. She certainly hasn’t figured out Share My Location. It isn’t that she’s stupid, or even incurious– he could never love a woman like that– it’s just that these things are orthogonal to the way she thinks.

It’s a good thing he keeps an eye on her. Someone has to. And that’s just what he did, all day, watching her little blue dot on the C train all the way up to Washington Heights, and then the A train all the way back to Rockaway Beach. It made him wonder if she’d left her phone on the train, if something had happened to her– but then she’d stayed on the edge of the water for so long that his gut churned. She wouldn’t have left him, wouldn’t have just walked into Jamaica Bay without a word of explanation, without at least a note, a text message, something. Delivered, not Read. Suicide is a mortal sin, and besides, his Sophie would never abandon him.

He had an idea of what happened, if he’s honest. He’d kept her little village in Colombia in his weather app, even after all this time. Monsoon season, and the infrastructure she’d nearly dedicated her life to still incomplete. It wasn’t hard to make an inference. So there’s absolutely no reason his gut should be this tight, no reason why his hands should shake.

Sophie wouldn’t abandon him, so he’d let himself pace their apartment once, twice. And then he did what he’s always done, and worked, tried to bury himself in the ledger of this little non-profit, making the numbers dance from red to black. He’s a skilled accountant, but he’d had to triple-check himself, reread every row and column. He’d only let himself check the map every twenty minutes, only let himself text her after the sun hit the curtains.

Delivered, not Read, and he happened to be looking as it flipped to Read: 2:38 PM, as three little dots popped up, and then he could breathe again. It almost didn’t matter what she said in response. She’s alright, she’ll be home soon. Does he want anything?

He’d tilted his head back, looked up at the popcorn ceiling, and listened to his wooden chair crack in counterpoint to his spine. He’d felt his breath moving in his lungs.

Just you, baby.

It had taken all of his considerable willpower not to pounce on her as soon as he heard her keys in the lock. He tried not to suffocate her, he did, he knew he’d devour her entirely if left to his own devices. So he’d made himself wait three whole minutes after she got in to stretch and pad down the hallway to see her, already curled up on the couch and frowning at her laptop. She hadn't paused longer than to take off her shoes, hadn’t said a word to him, didn’t even look up when he came into the living room.

But, on top of a napkin on the corner of the coffee table, she’d left a sweating can of his favorite milk tea, still cold from the bodega. It hurt his heart in the best way. His wife, his precious Sophie, almost never left the house without bringing him back something, whether a drink or a snack or even just a couple of flowers she picked. He prayed to his Lord Below that he never took it for granted.

He’d moved to her, run a hand over her babyfine hair and kissed her temple. She grunted, patted his wrist absently. She was Working. She’d probably been working even on the train, running logistics and writing emails and connecting Person A to Person B over the phone. He’d left her to it. It would have been supremely counterproductive to do anything else, at that point.

Now, he’s leaning against the doorway to their kitchen, watching his wife cry. Watching her bleed.

It’s something of a shock, honestly. She hates crying, hates it nearly as much as he does. He’s seen it before, but rarely. He can count the number of times on both hands, and have fingers left over. They’d both wept, the first time they went to bed. He’d caught her weeping the morning after, as she’d come to the conclusion that her vocation was over. That had been hard.

Harder still had been the thought running through his head, at the time. He hadn’t done anything irrecoverable, yet. He could leave her, just like that, faith broken and alone, and go back to his Ministry. It would be an impressive feather in his cap, truly corrupting a Bride of Christ. A Papa hadn’t pulled it off in a few hundred years. It would go a long way towards securing his legitimacy, still more than a few wagging tongues. Collect her rosary like a trophy and go trotting home a hero.

He couldn’t, of course, any more than he could have torn out his own heart. That might have been easier. What he’d done was get down on the cold tile with her and pull her into his arms, tell her that he was sorry, but that he couldn’t be sorry for loving her. She’d put her hand over the terrible brand over his heart, and closed off that line of thought for him forever.

This, though. His jaw aches, biting back the nearly physical need to go to her.

Briefly, Copia considers just ducking back into the hallway. Sophie’s a mess, and she hates being a mess. Watching her like this feels voyeuristic, feels like listening to her masturbate. It’s the kind of falling apart she’d only do if she thought she was unobserved. He’s never seen her so unguarded. The thought makes him suck in a breath, sharp, at a blinding flash of jealousy. He wants this, wants to see her this vulnerable, to see every tiny private thing. It's an almost physical lust, to see what it looks like when she's broken. He wants her to give it to him willingly, to break like this in his arms. Not alone.

She hears it, and her head whips around, hackles up, eyes wide and feral. Like a small predator, something less than apex, cornered. Something with sharp teeth. There's blood on her face.

“Sophia,” he says, aching.

Now he can see the color of her eyes, so bloodshot that they’ve gone a shade of seaglass. He reaches for her, keeps his hands where she can see them, moving slow and cautious. “Babylove. You’re bleeding.”

“What? Oh.” She looks at her hands as if they are attached to someone else. Or maybe not: she’d have more compassion for someone else. She turns back towards the sink. “I’ll take care of it.” Shrugging it off. Shrugging him off, and the instant of rage and despair at her rejection is nearly blinding.

He moves past it, already shucking off his gloves and stuffing them in a pocket. He lays a careful hand on the sweet curve of her waist, and looks over her shoulder. “That looks fairly deep,” he says, soft but not too soft. She’s tense, but she isn’t actively cringing away from him.

“S’fine. I’ll handle it.”

“There’s self-sufficiency and then there’s absurdity. Let me help you. You don’t have to do it alone.”

The red is still pulsing out of her skin into the running water, a splatter on the shards of glass in the sink. Damn, not the Depression glass. No wonder she’s upset. He knows that isn’t all of it, can’t be all of it. She’s been crying for some time now, he can see that.

“It’s not– Copia, it’s a scratch.” It really isn’t. She’s sliced deep; he sees the flap of skin. She’ll be lucky if she doesn’t need stitches.

“Let me feel useful, hm?” He touches her wrist, where she’s holding it under the stream, water running over his fingertips. “You taught me how to put a bandage on, have a little faith in me. Or at least your teaching abilities.” He’s trying to keep it light, but she hangs her head, silent. He presses his cheek into her hair. “Sophie,” he murmurs. “Not so much to be consoled as to console, yes? It would be a consolation to me, if you would just– let me help you.”

He wants more, of course. He wants all of it. She’d been preoccupied for days, not so much on edge as distant, absent. He’d rather she slap his face than hear sorry, honey, what was that? one more time, like she wasn’t there at all.

Her hand is so small, in his. Strong and callused and small. He waits. He has spent so much time, waiting for her.

Finally, she leans her head back against his cheek. “First aid kit’s on top of the fridge.”

He squeezes her waist, kisses the top of her head, and his shoulders go a little loose. It’s something. It’s a start, anyway.

There’s so much blood that he leaves fingerprints on the white metal box, and he swallows to keep his throat clear. It won’t help Sophie if he panics. He’s never been faint at the sight of blood– innoculated, you might say, at a young age. But he hasn’t had to deal with this much of his wife’s blood, before.

Copia sets the box down next to the sink, and feels the solid click of the latches in the balls of his thumbs. Sophie keeps it well-stocked, and he finds betadine and gauze and medical tape. She’s kept her hand under the spray, obedient. That’ll make it easier, that she isn’t kicking harder. It’s not quite a relief.

He bends over her hand, flashing back on Asheville, so long ago now. Even under the soap and the blood, the smell of her is still the same. Leather and amber, sunlight, clean and animal. It makes it hard to see, for a moment, but he blinks it back to look, to check for shards of glass. It looks clean, and it didn’t go so far as to cut a tendon, but her poor hand. He looks up at her face, and that’s worse. Watching her cry was one thing, delicious in its way, but seeing her face looking defeated, looking at him with love and longing and something like despair, is a blow to the heart. Seeing her like that feels like a violation.

“Honest assessment, now, Sophie. You’d know more than I would. Does it need stitches?” He smiles at her, and it feels a little grotesque. He’s trying. “Consider that I need you to have that hand. I couldn’t live without your handjobs now, it’d be a cruel thing to do, depriving me like that.”

She smiles, more in recognition of his effort than genuine amusement. “No. Little to the left, and probably. Lucky.” A bitter twist to that last word, and it feels like a knife to his gut. “I’ll follow up with Dr. Olin though, if it’ll make you feel better.”

“It would.”

He bends to his task, then, pushing the nausea to the back of his mind. She only hisses at the sting of the antiseptic, and he thinks he does alright, hiding the flinch. Watching the blood bloom on the gauze feels otherworldly, too vivid to be real, screaming red spreading through blinding white. He wraps the soft cotton over her delicate bones, counting every freckle, tracing a tiny scar between her knuckles. He knows where that came from, knows how she got every callus, and counts himself blessed. (By what, by who, doesn’t really matter.)

He can’t restrain himself from kissing the back of her hand after he’s taped her up, and doesn’t try. She looks a little steadier now, and he’s glad. He reaches to run a hand over her sleek hair, to lean in and kiss her forehead, and breathes deep of the smell of her. “Go sit down, babydoll,” he says, and for a wonder, she does, slipping away from him.

He turns to grip the sink, and lets himself react.

Copia gives himself a full thirty seconds to shake, and to see if he’s going to vomit into the sink, looking at her blood turning pink on the porcelain. The light’s too bright, his hands feel far away. There’s a faint smudge of her blood on the back of one of his hands, and for a moment he thinks he might lose the battle with his stomach. He jerks to rinse it away, and breathes in for a count of three, holds for a count of four, exhales for a count of five. He has to do it three times before he’s steady.

He fetches water for both of them, drinks half of his glass and refills it, grabs a packet of those almond cookies she likes. Then he steels himself to go to the living room.

She’s so pale, under the skylight, her skin in contrast to their burnt orange couch, the dark blue of her grandmother’s afghan thrown over the back. She looks washed out, ghostly under the pale light, hollowed out. He wonders when she ate last. What hurts him more is how grateful she looks when he settles in next to her, presses the water glass into her left hand. Every time, every little kindness, she’s faintly bewildered. Sophie reacts to kindness with the bafflement of a dog being shown a card trick. While he loves her for never taking it for granted, it scrapes him raw that she doesn’t seem to trust it.

Her phone buzzes, and he watches her take a breath, square her shoulders, and reach for the damned thing. He lets her get it all the way out before he takes it from her, gently but firmly.

“Copia, I have to–”

“No.” He isn’t harsh, but he is implacable. Somewhere he registers that his voice is pure Papa. “I know from experience that you type perfectly well with one hand, but no.” He sets it to the side, out of her reach, and reaches down to sweep her legs into his lap. Gratifyingly, she moves with him, tucks her head under his chin. She isn’t fighting him, and it almost makes him more worried. Maybe she’s just responding to his tone, but he’ll take it. He has to.

There’s a fine tremble to her, a faint vibration deep in her bones. She’s on the ragged edge of something, he knows what it looks like just before she works herself into dropping in the traces. He lets her chew mechanically on the cookie, even though there’ll be crumbs everywhere. It’s fine. This is more important than how badly he’ll squirm if any of that goes down the front of his shirt. “Tell me what’s wrong.” He isn’t asking.

Copia knows that he’s a hypocrite. Sophie will give him space to brood and sulk, will get the fuck out of his way for a few hours when he needs it. She isn’t a patient person, but she’s patient with him. It’s taken work; neither of them knew how to live with just one other person before they were together. She hadn’t even been gone half a day, and he wants to coil around her and squeeze, wants to swallow her whole. He couldn’t give a good goddamn. She’s hurting, and he needs to know why.

“Sister Doctor Jane,” she says, so small, and his stomach drops. “She’s been hurt.” Sophie’s brave captain, in Colombia, a woman of iron discipline and boundless compassion, hidden under a faintly acidic brand of acerbity. It was Sister Doctor Jane that had founded the mission, and Sister Doctor Jane that Sophie was the most bitter about disappointing, when she’d left the order for her heathen man.

The woman had actually flown up for the wedding. Copia shook her hand, even, and had felt about two inches tall under her assessing gaze. He remembers the exchange, her grip frim, how she’d leaned in and breathed, “Do not fuck this up.” Sophie told him later that she’d never heard the doctor swear before. “Most assuredly not, signora,” he’d promised. He hopes he isn’t fucking this up now.

His wife is speaking. “It– it ain’t been good, the last couple days, down there. The foundations for the last wing of the hospital weren’t– there was a design flaw. The rain’s been s’bad they got washed out. Been tryna coordinate evac with Sister Isabella. Izzy’s good, but y’know what the signal’s like, down there.” Too well. Especially when the weather isn’t cooperative. “Sister Doctor was getting the last of the patients out when the roof caved in.” She straightens, in his arms, rears back to look at him, and he recoils a little from the ferocity of her eyes. “So forgive me, Copia, if I ain’t taking too much time off for a cut on my hand.” The venom in her voice startles him, burns him, even if he knows most of it is directed at herself.

Sophie reaches for her phone again, and it takes him a moment before he can gather himself, before he grabs her around the shoulders. “No. No, Sophia– stop struggling, listen. Listen to me.” She does still, but it’s a coiled stillness, ready to strike. He tightens his grip for an instant. “You are going to let me help you.” He can feel her muscles slack in surprise, confusion, he’s not sure. “Woman, with the number of tours I’ve coordinated, do you think I don’t know about logistics? You think so little of your people that they’d turn down assistance from a man sworn to the Devil?” He’s murmuring into her ear soft and sweet, the kind of seductive that he’s used on her before. He knows it’s effective. He knows it’s unfair.

What he doesn’t expect is that he gets almost exactly what he wants. Nearly in slow motion, his beautiful wife, his precious Sophie, burrows into his shoulder and makes a strange wet wounded noise. It doesn’t register at first what’s happening, how she shakes like she’s coming apart at the seams.

He doesn’t know what to do but hold her, looking up at the light, how it’s filtering through the matching Devil’s Ivy around the skylight, threaded through the rough blonde wood bookshelves that Sophie put up with her own hands. His books and hers, some of them annotated in both of their hands, copies of Meister Eckhart and Anton LeVay that they’d sent back and forth from her mission, from his tour, commentary to each other in the margins. They’re better than any love letter, white passionflowers and Burano lace pressed between the pages.

“Sophie,” he’s saying. “Sophie, I want this. You’re not alone, you’re not ever alone. I’m with you, babylove. That’s what this is, that’s what this means, I wasn’t just sharing your bed and your name. I want to share your life. Let me, let me in, let me help, let me be with you. Don’t make me be alone.”

He has her life, he knows. Of course, it isn’t just her life he wants, it’s her soul. He wants to feel the warp and weft of it in his hands, even if it burns him. He knows he’ll never get her to deny Christ, likely can’t lead her further down the path of self-indulgence than he already has. Isn’t she in his arms, even now? He thinks, perhaps, she may have even made him truer to his own principles, refined him in his own selfishness. Isn’t he holding her, instead of living his life for his flock? So it’s a small concession, really, helping her people tonight. In her own way, she’s brought him closer to Satan, his brave wife. And she may never deny Christ, but he knows that she’d never deny her husband, either. He’s read First Corinthians, the same as she has. He knows what she hopes for, in her secret heart. Maybe she thinks this is a concession, but really it’s just that he can’t stand to see her in pain, not if there’s something he can do to ease it.

Copia strokes her hair, and waits for her to settle, rocks the sweet weight of her in his arms and croons little nonsense noises to her until she’s steady again. Brave and true and strong.

“Here is what will happen, Sophia,” he says, when he can feel her still and breathing clear. He doesn’t have to see her raised eyebrow to feel it, either. “I will make food– alright, I will order food. We will work on this, together. We’ll figure it out, yes? And when you and I can do no more for your people, I will take you to bed and comfort you the best way I know how. Hopefully, you will let me comfort you with my dick.” And that does get a laugh out of her, and even if it’s watery, it still feels like he’s won something.

In the end they don’t quite save the day, though they salvage much of it. More than she could have, alone. They’re up the rest of the night, with making phonecalls and checking weather reports and supply chains and directing resources from a thousand miles away. When he finally has her in his arms, in their bed, exhausted and sated, the streetlights are flickering out in the face of the dawn, and he thinks he’d follow his wife anywhere, anywhere. Even into the light.

#I’m crying #this man doesn’t exist #he should #we should all have one like him #the band ghost #the band ghost fic #this is SO GOOD Elise #papa emeritus iv #papa emeritus iv x oc #papa iv #papa iv x oc #copia x oc #copia #the band ghost fanfic #popia

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