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harryandmolly · 4 years

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Change of Pace - 21 (Summer 2019)

cowritten by @achinglyshawn

summary: Shawn and Maya meet again 10 years after life got in the way of love

warnings: language

wc: 6.7k

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Maya is pouting.

She’s been waiting for tonight for over 48 hours. He’s been busy at the shop and she tells herself it’s probably better because if they spend all their time together, they’re going to fall back into their summer lust without any kind of real foundation for a relationship.

So busy is good. She’s gotten to start work on another piece -- it’s a little darker, a bleak memory of lying tangled in her sheets in Manhattan unable to sleep because she’s been amped up on Adderall all day. It’s cathartic, though. Artistic release at long last.

She stares out her window in her paint shirt and now signature Daisy Dukes, head cocked, squinting out at the thunderstorm rolling in off the sea. She and Shawn were going to the food truck night in the next town over but the fat raindrops plunking on her weatherproofed deck are telling her to make other plans.

She lifts her phone to text him.

Maya: hi :) mother nature has no mercy. Want to come do movies and food at my place? We can watch the storm come in

Shawn: you mean you don’t want to eat street food in the pouring rain with me? :(

Maya: you mean you don’t want to come snuggle and watch movies with me?

Shawn: i always want to do my two favorite things with you

Shawn: what’re u thinking for food?

Shawn: i can pick up

Maya: sushi pls! That place on great st. with the funny name? They have that mt. fuji roll

Shawn: mt. fuji, extra gyoza, and the fancy tuna sashimi

Shawn: dessert?

Maya definitely does not even for a second think about texting him “me.”

Maya: I got bored yesterday and walked down to Russell’s Candy Shoppe on main and got cute vintage penny candy

Shawn: you’re sweet

Shawn: but im gonna need more than penny candy to have a proper dessert

Maya: then by all means grab some mochi while you’re there

Shawn: can i tell you a secret?

Maya: always

Shawn: i’m definitely gonna pick up one of those in-house ice cream cakes from the corner market

Maya moans a little at reading his text.

Maya: omg bring it on, baby

Shawn: i’ll text u when im on my way, sugar

Maya feels better about their plans now. She thinks she likes these better. A crack of thunder sounds distantly as she climbs the stairs. The power flickers when she’s in the shower rinsing off and her heart throbs hard in her chest. Sometimes it occurs to her how alone she is in this house and it gets to her.

She changes into clingy leggings and a cozy-cute hoodie from the Roxy catalog and by the time she gets back downstairs to light some candles, not too many because she doesn’t want to set “a mood,” it’s absolutely pouring. She hurries to find her garage door opener so she can leave it open for him and he doesn’t have to get drenched walking into the house.

Because that would be just an excuse for him to take his clothes off. Which they don’t need right now.

Shawn manages to stay mostly dry on his venture for food and ice cream cake. He’s got his slicker on and an umbrella in the back, but he’s thankful to see Maya’s garage door open when he pulls into her driveway.

He parks, shedding his raincoat before getting out of the Jeep. He navigates the food from the backseat, giving himself a free hand to knock on the door with.

He’s still not sure where they stand on him using her spare keys and letting himself in. He thinks he likes it better this way, for now at least. He likes the anticipation. He thinks it makes their time together that much sweeter.

Maya has her fingers wrapped around a wide-bowled glass of red and it’s halfway to her lips when she hears him knock. She smiles and puts her glass down next to his, already poured, hurrying on her toes to reach him.

“Hey you,” she murmurs, holding the door open for him to walk through. She takes one of the bags of food he’s hauling in. She expects he’ll want to take off his jacket and shoes but she doesn’t want to wait to kiss him just once before they should probably try to keep their hands and lips mostly to themselves.

She leans in and goes for a peck on his lips but when she gets there, she lingers slightly longer than planned. She missed him.

He almost drops the sushi when Maya kisses him. He’s not expecting it— they’ve been sticking with kisses on the cheek for greetings. It’s safer that way.

But then he melts. Maya’s lips linger long enough for him to sigh happily against her mouth. His fingers tighten around the plastic bag handles as they begin to slip, and he only pushes back so he can catch the bottom of the bag with his hand.

He looks from the sushi to Maya, a bit flustered as he catches his breath.

“Hi,” he says, a grin pulling across his lips.

“I, uh,” He chuckles to himself, shakes his head. “I missed you.”

Maya doesn’t mean to knock him off balance but she’s a little pleased that she did. She smiles, giggling under her breath watching him scrabble to catch the sushi before he drops it. He secures his hand under the bag and smiles down at her.

“I missed you too. I guess that’s obvious by my pouncing on you when you walked in.”

She’s not really shy about it. She wants him to know she’s been thinking about him and that she wanted him to know that as soon as he got here. He deserves to know how badly she wants him.

Shawn grins, shrugging as he brings the sushi to the kitchen counter.

“Lucky for you, I like being pounced on,” he coos, untying the plastic knot keeping the bag closed.

She scoops up the bag with the ice cream cake and hurries it to her freezer. Despite the storm, it’s still hot out and she doesn’t want it to melt. The broad, long windows on the side of her house show the storm clouds rolling in, dark and threatening. She’s got plates and wine already set up for them and HBO up on the TV.

She looks over at him while they unpack the sushi. “Did you get a lot done at the shop?”

Maya let’s the freezer door bang shut, then helps him unload the wide variety of sushi he couldn’t help but order. He puts away enough himself, and he knows Maya always eats more sushi than she says she will.

Shawn hums, lifting a shoulder. “I finished a couple orders, but I still haven’t started on that new bass yet. It’s so fuckin’ delicate. I want to have a day I can dedicate to it.”

Maya nods. She knows the instrument he means, he told her about it while she was sketching him the other day. It sounds like an intricate job. She understands his desire to be as detail-oriented as possible, it’s a quality they share. She smiles a bit sheepishly.

“I guess I can share you with your shop for another day if you need me to.”

Balance is good. Slow is good.

She smirks at the insane quantity of sushi he ordered, knowing they’ll probably end up eating it all anyway. She piles some segments from a few different rolls on a plate and points to his wine glass with a wink while strolling barefoot toward her couch to eat.

“That’s for you, hun.”

Shawn looks up at the sound of her voice, sees her pointed finger and follows it to the full glass of wine she poured when he didn’t notice. He smiles and lifts his sushi-filled plate in one hand, reaching for the wine with the other.

“You know how to treat a guy right, don’t you?”

He follows her to the couch, toeing off his shoes so her can settle in as comfortably as Maya does. He leans back, kicks his legs up onto the coffee table.

“So,” he asks through a mouthful of rice, “What are we watching?”

Shawn plops himself down next to her in a way that says her house feels at least a little like his home, too. She adjusts her position next to him, swinging her legs up to fold beside her, leaning in up against his arm while she drops a sashimi piece in her mouth. She purrs at the taste of the fresh fish.

“I narrowed it down to,” she begins, swallowing her own bite, “‘We’re the Millers’ or ‘When Harry Met Sally.’ Food picker-upper’s choice.”

It was an old tradition of theirs -- whoever brought over food could pick the movie. They almost always agreed on stuff to watch, though.

Like a snake, Shawn unhinges his jaw around a plump piece of sushi, nodding and humming as he considers the options she gives him. He hasn’t seen the former, and he’s seen the later more times than he should probably admit.

He looks at Maya, watches the way her cheeks bulge as she pops pieces of sushi into her mouth. His lips twitch. She looks like a chipmunk, a little, her nose twitching as she chews.

Maya glances out the windows when another loud crack sounds closer to the house. The rain pounds harder against the windows.

“Gonna have good waves tomorrow,” she murmurs, handing him the remote, reaching for another bite of sushi.

He takes the remote, deciding he’s in the mood for something new and selects We’re the Millers. Presses play and sips his wine.

“Wanna have a beach day? Or well. Half day? I should go into the shop but I can hang out in the morning.”

Maya watches Jason Sudeikis start to round up his band of misfits, enjoying the light comedy amidst the raging storm outside. She pops another bite of sushi in her mouth and follows it with a sip of wine.

“I’d love that,” she says, eyeing him from the side, “But if you have to spend the day at the studio, I can deal.”

She smiles supportively despite how badly she wants to take him up on the offer.

Shawn nods as he chews on a piece of tuna. He knows they’re both trying to navigate between wanting to be together all the time and giving each other space.

But they haven’t gone to the beach together since starting this take-it-slow dating thing, so he thinks a half day wouldn’t be too much.

“I can spare a half day to have some fun in the sun with you,” he says with a grin, reaching over with his chopsticks to steal a piece of gyoza from her plate, since he forgot to take some for himself.

Maya smacks at his chopsticks to sabotage him when he steals from her plate but the dumpling is in his mouth before she can protest.

“Rude,” she mumbles, elbowing him teasingly and scooting just a touch closer.

He’s warm and firm and smells a little woody. She doesn’t make a show of snuggling up to him, but she does unfold her legs and cross them next to his noticeably.

Shawn feels Maya shift closer, so he settles back into the couch and angles himself towards her. Luckily, she sits to his left, so he can casually drape his arm along the back of the couch, behind her shoulders, while still pinching sushi between his soy sauce-stained chopsticks.

Maya snorts a little at the TV and covers her mouth. This movie is so fucking funny -- she forgot how funny. It’s nice just to laugh with him and feel no pressure at all. The storm rages on around them. She absently hopes her studio isn’t leaking from the roof again, but she covered her pieces with dropcloths just in case.

“Jennifer Aniston is so hot,” Maya comments through a mouthful of salmon.

Shawn pauses, mid-pinch. He looks at Maya, watches her stare at Jennifer Aniston. He grins.

“I’ve always had the worst crush on her. Did I ever tell you that?”

He thinks he used to pretend not to have celebrity crushes because it made him lame or something. Or because he didn’t want Maya thinking he was a gross jerk, or something. Or probably because he didn’t want to say anything to make Maya think he wasn’t completely gone for her.

Probably a combo of all three. The reasons feel silly now.

Maya chuckles and leans into his arm a little, welcoming him to stay close to her. She shakes her head and daubs some wasabi on a firecracker roll for an extra punch. She shrugs.

“No, but it doesn’t shock me. All straight guys are obsessed with her. Understandably.”

Now that she’s thinking about it, she doesn’t really know who his celebrity crushes are. They never used to talk about that stuff, like they were afraid to acknowledge that they’d ever found anyone else attractive.

She angles herself toward him and quirks an eyebrow. “Who else, then? Spill the tea. Or whatever kids say now.”

Shawn’s got a mouthful of tuna and feeling cornered by the question. He chews and swallows and looks down at his plate as his shoulders lift in a small shrug.

“I dunno,” he laughs. He actually hasn’t thought about a celebrity crush in years. He’s been focused on work, and the only woman he ever thought about was Maya, when he was feeling self-indulgent enough to let himself.

He chews through a piece of salmon, glancing at her.

“Okay, actually. I do know,” he sighs, shaking his head and looking back to the TV. He smiles. “Amy Adams. Especially as Lois Lane.”

Maya laughs, delighted. “Of course! She’s totally got that wholesome-hot thing going on. That makes a lot of sense for you, actually.”

Maya glances out the window, considering it. She doesn’t, naturally, love the vision of Shawn and Amy Adams but she can see they’d look good together. Of course they would.

She hums low in her throat and bites down on her last piece of sushi, a slice of perfect toro sashimi.

“Amy Adams is gorgeous,” she admits. She’s gorgeous in a very different way than Maya is. She knows that. She thinks given the choice, Shawn would probably still choose Maya. That makes her smile.

“I think my number one celebrity crush is Mila Kunis, which is the most frat-bro answer ever.”

Shawn laughs. Everyone loves Mila Kunis, so he’s not surprised, just like she wasn’t surprised about Aniston.

He picks up another piece of sushi, swishing it around in the soy sauce on his plate. He shrugs, “Yeah, probably, but the frat-bros aren’t wrong when it comes to her. So it’s okay.”

He pops the whole piece in his mouth, chewing greedily as he tries not to think about Maya and Mila Kunis making out. He doesn’t need to go there, not if they’re gonna keep this night PG-13.

She knew Shawn would agree about Mila. Every straight man in North America agrees about Mila. She likes that they’re talking about this kind of stuff now and not hiding it away because they’re worried about getting uncomfortable. She doesn’t even mind that they share celebrity crushes. Crushes are fun.

“Can I tell you something, though?”

She puts her plate back on the coffee table and leans back against the warmth of his arm around the back of her couch.

She smiles up at him. “Always.”

Shawn follows Maya’s lead, lifting his plate from his lap to set it on the table. He wipes his sticky fingers on his napkin and tosses it onto the plates with the rest of their debris. When they’re both settled again, his arm casually on the back of the sofa once more, Shawn finds the words for his admission.

“I always, like, had celebrity crushes, I guess, but. I don’t know. I never crushed on anyone as hard as I crushed on you. I only really went to that art show in college because I knew you were going to be showing pieces and I wanted to see them, and see if I could catch a glimpse of you, too.”

He’s never admitted that to her. He always felt weird about it, before. Now it feels silly. He was a boy with a crush, not some creep. Well, he hopes Maya sees it that way, at least. He glances at her, lips pressed together as his heart rattles in a cage.

What a reckless thing to admit. Oh, well. He wanted her to know. He thinks she deserves the truth.

Maya doesn’t mean to laugh, exactly. She’s not laughing at him. She’s laughing because she’d never guess that hearing something like this from him now would have her quite so smitten and bashful. It’s 15 years ago, this night he’s talking about. And he makes it sound like it was last week.

“God, I love that. I… thank you for telling me that. That’s…”

She trails off, going very pink and giggly. She’s acting more juvenile now than she did that night she met him when they were both just kids. She remembers how sweet and vulnerable he seemed then, hands in his pockets, gazing up at her pieces that she kind of hated like they were worth a fortune to him.

He doesn’t expect her to laugh. He partly expected her to be weirded out, partly expected her to maybe find it sweet. He didn’t think what he said was very funny, though.

Shawn raises his brows.

“You, ah, you’re welcome,” he replies, corner of his lips twitching with the urge to smile, because her laughter is infectious.

Her laughter peters out, and then she looks at him in a way he feels like she hasn’t before. Well, maybe since college. It’s a look that sears him from the inside out, had his breath catching in his throat.

She swallows. It was so long ago. But when she looks up at him now, he looks just the same, sweet and vulnerable as ever, undeterred by being unlucky in love.

She thinks his luck is changing.

Slowly, carefully so he can stop her if he wants, she tucks a hand around the back of his neck and guides his lips to hers for a deep, perfect kiss.

Shawn goes easily when Maya pulls him close, her lips moulding to his in a way that has his heart hammering. He groans, reaching around to cup her face, tilting her head back to sweeten the kiss.

Maya’s trying not to think about the fact that this kiss is maybe the longest they’ve shared since they rebooted their relationship. She doesn’t want to get clammy and anxious, she doesn’t want to overthink this. She wants to relax.

Maya murmurs gently into his mouth when he holds her cheek. She lets her weight settle back, necessitating the need for him to come forward to meet her.

She doesn’t know how long she’s going to get to keep him like this. She gently swipes her tongue into his mouth, tickling her fingers up the nape of his neck to twist and pluck at the tiny curls there that she��s missed.

Shawn aches from the tenderness of the kiss, from the way she melts into the couch and coaxes him with her. He leans on to his hip, falling after her, his arm slipping down around her shoulders.

Her fingers in his hair sends shivers down his spine, and he accepts her tongue eagerly with a gentle hum.

Shawn slides his hand from her cheek to the back of her neck, fingers weaving through her dark, silken curls. He breaks the kiss only to dive in again, this time sucking lazily at her lip, though lightly enough to stay away from anything too tempting.

God, he feels so fucking good.

He purrs into her mouth and it’s gorgeous. It eggs her on. When he parts from her to suck at her lip, she whimpers and pulls her other hand up to his chest to feel him breathe.

He feels so sturdy and stable. She wants to just hang on him by her fingers in his hair until their limbs fall asleep. She moves her hand up a little higher to massage the back of his neck as he leans over her.

The thunder remains loud. In fact, if Maya were paying attention, she’d notice it’s the loudest it’s been. But she’s not. She’s consumed by him.

Shawn doesn’t think they’ve ever kissed like this before. He keeps thinking that lately, that all the kisses they’ve shared in the last couple weeks are different. This is the closest to making out they’ve gotten, and it’s nothing like how they would make out in the beginning of the summer. Or when they were in college.

She’s tender but eager, pliable but steady. She kisses him like maybe she really could fall in love with him again, and not like she’s just throwing caution to the wind for nostalgia’s sake. She’s making his stomach twist with fucking butterflies.

She hums into his mouth this time, pulling away just slightly, “This is ok, right? This is fine?”

His lips fall to her jaw when she pulls back without warning. His eyes open, brows raising as he leans away to get a proper look at her. Her cheeks are flushed, lips swollen from his ministrations, but he notes a worried gleam in her eye like she thinks he really might say it’s not okay.

“Yeah,” he rasps, maybe too eagerly, “Yes. It-- I mean, it’s totally okay with me, if it’s okay with you. Is it? Okay with you? Cause we can do something else. Anything you want.”

Maya smiles, her eyes drifting shut. She lifts her hand from his chest to cup his cheek and exhales a little chuckle.

“Yeah. I’m-- Yeah. I missed this. I just don’t want to move too fast. I just…”

She pecks her lips to his quickly, as if to tide her over. “I don’t know how fast is too fast and how slow is too slow.”

She swallows and looks up into his beautiful brown eyes. She brushes her nose against his and continues her fingers’ calming motion through his hair.

It feels impossibly cheesy to think, but Shawn’s sure he could look into Maya’s eyes. Especially when she looks at him like that. He’s lost in that look, and in the rhythmic stroking of her fingers in his hair like he loves so much.

His hand finds her cheek once more. He shakes his head.

“I don’t either, sugar,” he murmurs, thumb brushing across her round, pink cheek, “It’s not— well, this isn’t something I’m used to navigating. But what I do know is, I really, really enjoy kissing you.”

He smiles, his lips brushing against hers as her does.

Maya’s lips spark as his skim across hers. She inhales and lets herself have him, just a little more of him. She lifts her hand up higher in his hair and secures it, fingers vined in his curls, wrapping the other arm around his shoulders.

“Then let’s keep doing that.”

“Yeah, let’s keep--”

Maya’s lips are on Shawn’s before he can finish his eager agreement. She pulls him in with small palms against broad shoulders, has him sinking further until he’s nearly pressed on top of her.

She’s not sure where to put her hands so she keeps them confined mostly to his neck and shoulders. She gets just a little daring when she seeks out the hot skin just under the collar of his T-shirt with her sneaky fingertips. She feels under control, though. And it’s not even a little boring.

He behaves himself, keeps an arm curled safely around her shoulders while his hand rests on her hip, high enough to remain innocent. He finds himself sucking on her lip once more, flicking it gently with his tongue before getting it between his teeth. He’s delicate with all of it, less insistent or voraciously desperate than he was only a few weeks ago.

He finds, really, that he enjoys this much better. This is how they should’ve been kissing all along.

Maya’s fingers find his skin and send a shiver down his spine, have his fingers curling into her hip. She leaves soft, subtle strokes along the base of his neck that shouldn’t send him reeling nearly as much as they are. He groans into her mouth, then moves his hand on her shoulder to the back of her head. He cradles her carefully while he rolls off of his hip, sitting back and pulling Maya with him.

He goes until he’s lying on the couch, Maya relaxed on top of him as they continue to kiss lazily, as if they’ve suddenly got all the time they never had before.

Maya thinks this feels more like exploration than anything they’ve ever done together, maybe even dating back to when they first got together in college. Even then, everything was frantic, hurried, desperate. This is different.

As he teases her lips and tugs her on top of him when he lies down, Maya starts to wonder if they’ve ever just… made out. I mean, of course they have, but have they ever made out just to make out, and not because they didn’t have time to have sex? If they have, Maya doesn’t remember. Maybe they’ve always been a little bit desperate.

Maya shifts on top of him, getting comfortable. She props herself up on her forearm and lets one of her legs slot between his without getting too suggestive. She pulls up from the depth of the kiss a little, brushing the tip of her nose against his. She pecks little soft kisses on his top lip, then the bottom one, then his nose.

“This is nice,” she whispers, kissing his cheeks next.

Maya eases into him so well. She practically melts on top of him, sighing into his mouth as his hands glide up the length of her back until he reaches her shoulder blades.

Shawn smiles as she drops quick kisses to his lips. He tries to catch her with a kiss of his own, but she moves to his nose, then his cheek.

He smirks into the soft angle of her jaw, his nose brushing against her cheek as he nods.

“This is really nice, Lu,” he murmurs, pressing his lips to the soft skin just beneath her ear. He trails to her jaw, where he idles, humming at presses kiss after gentle kiss to her skin.

His lips trail off after hers do. They make her smile and shiver a little. She hugs him closer, lifting her fingers through his hair like she used to when he couldn’t fall asleep. She closes her eyes and lets herself wonder if it’ll be like this for them for a while. Or forever.

Maya hears her throat clear. She doesn’t study whether or not asking him this while they’re in this position might be a bit tactless. She just wants to feel like she can always ask him anything.

She pulls up, disconnecting, rather reluctantly, his lips from her smooth jaw. She swallows and cups his cheek, brushing her thumb along the underside of his beautifully defined cheekbone.

He’s distracted with the sweet taste of her skin when she pulls away from him. He blinks his eyes open, smiling slightly as she strokes his cheek.

“I have to ask,” she says, voice wavering, “With Leah… when you married her, did you think it was going to be forever?”

Shawn’s brows raise. That’s not anything he was expecting her to ask.

He’s not sure how to answer.

“Ah—“ he wets his lips, looking down between them. He takes a breath in, looks back up at her. “I wanted it to be. I told myself I would make it last. But, uh, I don’t—“ he smiles, closes his eyes and shakes his head, “I don’t think I ever really felt it in my gut.”

Maya nods thoughtfully and looks down at her fingers brushing against the freckles on his neck.

“I guess I was hoping you’d say that,” she confesses, “Not because… I mean, obviously I want you to be happy, but if you were happy with her you wouldn’t be here, so…”

She closes her eyes and shakes her head. She’s getting tangled up. She blinks a few times and starts again.

“I just mean that everyone always says you just... know. And I’ve never understood it. I don’t think you can understand unless you feel it. If you say you didn’t truly feel like it was forever, I think maybe that gives me some weird hope that the knowing thing, it’s real.”

She hopes it’s ok she’s blabbering about this. She feels like it’s a touchy subject to bring up, not just because of Leah, but because they’re supposed to be taking it slow.

Shawn can’t control the adoring smile that splits his lips as Maya babbles. He doesn’t think he’s ever heard her ramble like this, like she’s nervous to be honest with him. Even when she told him she’d been lying about New York, she was clear and concise.

He doesn’t mind when she gets flustered. He likes thinking that maybe he makes her as nervous as she makes him.

The way he smiles at her assures her she wasn’t out of line, she wasn’t even really ruining the mood. He smiles like he knows something she doesn’t. It’s not infuriating the way that it was at work when the guys on her team thought they were smarter than she was. He smiles like he’s been there and he wants to help her through it.

Carefully, Shawn slides his hand from her shoulder blade to the back of her head, fingers curling in her hair. He nudges her nose with his, dropping a soft kiss to her lips as her babbling dies down.

“The knowing thing is definitely real. I promise.”

Maya’s breath hitches. As he pulls back to speak, her lips follow his. She bites down on her lower lip to keep herself from muffling his words in her mouth.

He’s not sure he’s allowed to say, Because I know with you, yet. They’re trying to go slow not only physically, but emotionally too. He can’t help his gut, though. She’s always had a hold on his heart in a way no one else has ever managed. He couldn’t change it even if he wanted to.

(He knows. He tried. It ended in divorce.)

Her stomach completely flips. On some level, she knew. She knows he loves her. He’s always been the one that was sure. Even now, after everything, he still knows. It makes her want to squeal and throw herself into him and never let him leave, not that he wants to.

As she looks down at him, she feels safe. That much is certain. She doesn’t feel a rush to get to where he is now. She’ll know when she knows. She believes him.

Shawn’s answer seems to placate Maya, who bites her lip and looks down at him like she couldn’t be happier with what he’s said. He tucks a few loose strands of hair behind her ear, fingertips brushing gently over the shell.

She dips her head and kisses him again, settling back into his body as the storm starts to pass. The rain is getting lighter, the thunder quieter. Soon it’ll just be silent around them.

Then, she kisses him. It’s firm, but sweet, and feels like she’s trying to tell him she’s gonna love him back one day, just as much as he loves her. He hums into her mouth, his fingertips still toying lightly with her ear and massaging her scalp.

He lets her kiss him for a few seconds and she thinks maybe he’s going to let her stay there lavishing him with kisses as long as her heart desires. Needless to say, they’d end up being there a while.

His gentleness is so comforting she feels like she could fall asleep just lying here, kissing him. She doesn’t want to.

He pulls away after a moment, not because he wants to, but because now he’s got a question for her, and he’s not sure he’ll find a better time to bring it up.

He kisses her cheek, then the angle of her jaw.

“Can I ask you something now?” he murmurs, nosing her temple softly.

He shifts back and it’s probably for the best because her eyelids are fluttering and she’s so lost in him she almost can’t find her way back.

She nods at his prompt, tracing her fingertips along the contours of his throat.

Her fingers find his neck, and Shawn’s eyes fall shut. He lets himself revel in it for a moment, in the way she touches him so lovingly. His heart hammers, stomach twisting, and now he’s all the more nervous to ask his question.

He takes his time asking and she can’t pretend it doesn’t make her more anxious. It’s good, she has to remind herself, the openness feels hard right now but it’s just because you’re not good at it yet.

He wets his lips, finally blinking to look at her again.

Shawn smiles, brings his palm to her cheek.

He swallows, takes a breath. “Is it okay that I know because of you?”

He figures she already knows. But there’s a difference between an unspoken truth and a spoken one. He wants to be sure she knows what he means. He feels like he’s been transparent with the way he feels about her, too much so in the months before now. But he wants her to know it wasn’t all just nostalgia and longing for a comfort he once knew.

Maya stares down at him in wonder. He’s saying what he thinks she’s saying. He’s not dancing around it, he’s not being coy, he’s telling her he loves her and he’s going to forever. Her breath comes short in her chest. She closes her eyes and exhales through her nose nice and slow.

“God, yes. That’s… more than ok. That’s amazing.”

Amazing.

Amazing is his new favorite word. It’s amazing, she thinks, that he’s in love with her. She thinks the way he feels about her is amazing.

He thinks she’s amazing.

She kisses him again, just quickly, because she’s not done yammering.

“Because if you know that means I’ll know, too. When… it’s time.”

Now she is being somewhat coy, but she knows he knows what she means.

He smiles into her kiss, too busy thinking about the way she purred when she said amazing.

As always, however, Maya manages to grab his attention. He lifts his brows, taking a slow, calming breath through his nose. His tongue darts out, wetting his lower lip.

“You-- ah-- You mean because of me, right? I mean, I guess that’s what you probably mean but I just wanna--, you know, for the, uh, the sake of clarity, eh?”

Maya’s nose twitches as she tries to tamp down a ridiculous smile. She feels a little more empowered now to skip right past coy. She pecks his lips again, pulling up to press her forehead to his.

“For the sake of clarity,” she begins teasingly, “I mean that if you really know that this is it for you, that you want me forever, then I trust your judgment. And I believe I can get to a place where I know, completely certainly, that this is it for me.”

It’s the best she can do for now. It’s honest. It’s not overreaching or underselling. It’s exactly how she feels. And it feels good to be that candid.

Shawn swallows, arms dropping to her waist when she gets close, murmuring low.

She gives him the closest thing to I love you he can think of. Closer than he ever thought he’d get so soon after— well, after screwing up and fighting and rebooting the entire thing.

But it’s not a total reboot, because there’s history between them. They’re just not so afraid of it, anymore.

He smiles, then catches her lips in a gentle kiss, because she’s there, and one day she’s gonna be in love with him again.

Small victories, right?

“Just, take your time, okay? We have so much time. I’m really— I’m looking forward to it. To the journey, or whatever,” his voice rasps and he rolls his eyes at himself at the end, but he means it.

He thinks, maybe, he’s ready for the real kind of relationship he never was before.

Maya tips her forehead back against his when he rolls his eyes. She closes hers and strokes the pad of her thumb down his throat.

She doesn’t think she’ll need much time. Falling in love with him again seems a foregone conclusion. She appreciates more than she can say that he’s being so patient with her. It’s one thing to hold off on having sex for a while but to give her the space to come to her own conclusions about their relationship, it takes a lot of strength, maturity and confidence.

So how could she not be in love with him?

The truth is, it’s not about him, the reason she can’t fall into this with him now. Maya has been a shell for 12 years, by choice. She feels like she’s still learning to live again and not just exist. Letting Shawn in all at once will fill the holes in her that she hasn’t spackled yet, but she won’t be whole. She has to spend time with herself, learn to be and love herself again before she can love him the way he deserves to be loved.

After a few pleasantly, comfortably silent moments, Maya tilts her head and drops her lips onto his once more. She sweeps falling hair up behind her ear and leans into it.

“Thank you,” she murmurs sincerely into his mouth.

He kisses the thanks from her lips, humming softly as he cups the back of her head and strokes his fingers lovingly through her hair. He pulls back after a minute, when he feels his stomach growl to remind him of the ice cream cake in the freezer.

“Mmm,” he hums, fingers finding her chin so he can tilt her head back, “You know how you can really thank me, Lemon?”

He smiles, then sinks his teeth into his lower lip to feign coy innocence as he tilts his head at her, as if his request is something she’ll need convincing to do.

Maya’s heart reaches up into her throat. She squirms on top of him slightly. His fingers feel almost too hot on her skin. Watching him bite into his lip has her almost panting on top of him.

“What…. Uhm, how?” she stutters.

A slow, cheshire cat grin splits Shawn’s lips. He reaches for the disobedient strand of hair that keeps falling in Maya’s face, tucks it behind her ear while his thumb grazes her jaw.

“You can help me eat the ice cream cake in the freezer that’s calling my name.”

He raises his brows, eyes crinkling at the corners as if to ‘Gotchya!’

Maya’s face goes a little red and she rolls her eyes, burying her bashful face into his neck while she laughs.

“You’re such an idiot,” she groans, kissing along his throat while she hauls herself up on her hands over him. Reluctantly, she peels off the warmth of his body and helps him off the couch, keeping their fingers tangled on the way to the freezer. She swings his arms around her waist and hobbles them both over.

They sit at her bar with pieces of cake. They talk about nothing and everything. They don’t go back to the couch. She walks him out a couple hours later when they’re both nearly half asleep. She kisses him goodnight. He calls her ‘sugar.’ She’s so happy.

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