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rarephloxes · 3 years

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@elucienweek, day IV, favorite headcanon ;)

It spiraled of out control. I still have no idea how this came about.

psa: english in not my first language, if you see any errors pls let me know, this whole thing is un'beta'd. I’d love to read what it made you feel!

moodboard

rating: M

wc: 6.129

Elain searches for herself and finds more than she ever expected.

or: Elain travels, kisses strangers, goes a little crazy and falls in love with herself. If it all happens in Paris so she can fall asleep to Lucien speaking French... sometimes the red thread just guides you home <3

(1)

Elain has been living in her sister’s boyfriend house for two months.

It is big enough of a place for them to be able to avoid each other without much effort.

Elain gardens, helps at the kitchens, walks around the green land surrounding the property.

Nesta comes to visit when it’s convenient for her busy schedule.

Elain tries to call, anyone.

She can’t remember the process of losing all her college friends.

She doesn’t know how she ended up a shell. A pretty porcelain doll meant for a man’s praise.

Not enough for the boy who plucked all her petals.

Elain wonders how she could possibly have let her life lead to this.

She does not know who she is.

Greysen cheated on her a month away from their wedding. With his dad’s PR assistant.

Rhysand manages to settle all the work that would have been hers to deal with: rescinding invitations, returning gifts, trying for refunds, canceling venues, canceling catering...

Feyre and Nesta agree company would be what Elain needs. So, they moved her into Rhysand’s house by the Sidra’s coastline.

Greysen texted her asking for his grandmother’s ring within a week.

She cannot bear the thought of parting with it.

She loves him.

She hates him.

There is a family dinner at the house, all Rhysand’s and Feyre’s friends come.

It’s a loud affair, drinks and food and laughter filling the corners of the quiet house.

Mor approaches Elain to tell how sorry she is.

“And to flaunt it on his socials? Trust me, babe. You dodged a bullet,” Mor said with a sweaty hand on Elain’s shoulder, “Get it?” Mor laughs “Because his dad was in the military?”

Elain smiles politely the rest of the evening.

When it is appropriate to leave the guests, Elain excuses herself and goes to her room with shaky hands.

Her breath stutters while she tries to plug her charger into a socket. She has not used her phone since the previous month, at least. When Greysen had asked for the ring.

A million messages appear on the screen.

He needs the ring, Elain.

He'll pay for it.

He’ll send someone to pick it up, wherever she is.

He needs it.

It’s not her ring, she has to give it back.

She doesn’t have to be a bitch about it, it’s a family heirloom.

She scrolls through her messages and finds it.

I love you, babe. Can’t wait to marry you ;)

There is a new photo on Greysen’s Instagram of him with his arms around another woman.

Elain’s birthday photo is gone, their engagement party photo is gone. Their New Year Eve’s kiss is gone, their one-year anniversary compilation is gone.

He deleted her existence from his.

He and Big Blondie are somewhere Elain knows. Not because she has visited it before, but because it was the subject of weeks' worth of preparations and months' worth of dreams.

He took someone else to their honeymoon trip.

Elain barely makes to the bathroom before emptying her dinner at the basin.

The days after that blur into each other in an endless stream of numbness.

Rhysand’s governesses, Nuala and Cerridwen, try to gently coax Elain out of her room.

When she finally leaves, there is a suitcase in her hands.

“I’ll go on a trip,” she says in a haste, going down the stair two steps at a time.

She meets Feyre at the airport.

“How did you- “

“The girls at the house,” Feyre explains, hugging her sister.

“I know it is rushed,” Elain explains “But I need to- “

“I know, you don’t have to spell it out for me,” Feyre laughs, silver lining her eyes “I’m glad to see you out of the house,”

“I just wanted to wish you a safe journey! Oh, and give you this,” Feyre fast speech stops when she places a black rectangle in Elain’s hand.

“I can’t accept it,”

Feyre rolls her eyes and chuckles, “Yes, you can. It's a gift,”

Nesta appears minutes before Elain must cross the gates. They say their goodbyes in the hurried affection that has become such an intimate part of their relationship.

There is still a weight on Elain’s shoulders when she crosses the sliding doors, but when she turns and sees her sisters’ smiling faces waving at her, things do not seem so impossible.

Elain hops on a plane to Paris.

The first few days she spends at the City of Light are reminiscent of her time at Sidra’s House.

Elain sleeps, walks around her hotel arrondissement, eats when she remembers to.

She observes tourists and locals from her hotel’s balcony.

She becomes the unmoving voyeur to old couples, young couples, loud teenagers and the bold color contrast between tourist’s clothes and Parisians sober tones.

The mid-summer has the city like a swarm of ants.

Once, Elain watches as a group of primary school kids, in neon orange vests walks down the sidewalk, delimitated by a safety bright red tape held by all their puffy little hands, a kind voiced teacher pointing at the buildings around them.

There’s awe in their tiny little eyes.

A spurt of energy grows in Elain’s chest.

She looks at the constructions she has been staring at for the past few days with renewed eyes.

She wonders at all the different perspectives people have about the same subjects. A street can be a tunnel towards a bad memory, a painful public break up, an embarrassing trip on a loose rock, or the path to greater landscapes, the first view of the city one has just moved into, a toddler’s first steps. She wants to discover all the different perspectives she can have.

Elain grasps at her epiphany with every ounce of strength she has left.

(2)

Elain goes on a shopping spree that lasts a week. She wears her new clothes like she is a movie star during the recording of a film: multiple outfit changes through the day, different assembles of style for every meal. She tries every aesthetic she can think of.

She sees a beautiful lavender gown draped over a mannequin in a shop’s window. Her reflection lines perfectly with the dress’ silhouette. It looks too much like something Elain would buy, so she leaves the dress for the mannequin and walks to a different store.

Elain buys the most outrageously expensive and obnoxious faux fur coat paired with a black hat and face veil she can find on Champs-Elysées and pretends to be the mysterious widow from one of Nesta’s smutty novels for an entire day. She gets into fancy hotels and restaurants and cries prettily to hoard sympathy enough to not pay the bills from the, once again, outrageously expensive foods and drinks she orders, even managing to finesse a penthouse room for her to lavishly spend the afternoon. It works like a charm. She tips the bell boy and winks at him. He smiles at her like a fool.

When she’s Claudia, a moody therapist with a beauty mark right underneath her left nostril who wears tweed coats, high heeled tight leather boots, frog-printed scarves and talks in a smooth Brummie accent, she enters a conversation with an egocentric Frenchman and has a two-hour long discussion about a psychologist she made up. They both get kicked out of the café for disturbing the peace. She makes out with him for what feels like another two hours in the alley which leads to the establishment’s back door. When she decides Claudia has smeared enough of her red lipstick in Paul’s face and neck, she gives him her coat and scarf while Elain sneaks back into the café, under the disguise of using the bathroom, with the promise to later follow him to his apartment. She leaves through the front door and gives her bonnet to an old man she passes by as she runs across the street.

When she’s Petra, a struggling poet that uses thrifted, vintage Prada moccasins and long, light, flowery dresses with sewn-on, ink-stained pockets for pens and notebooks, she buys scenery art she finds intriguing on Pont des Arts and sends them to Feyre along a Notre Dame postcard.

When Elain is Eleonora, she shares cigarettes and kisses with a lonesome barista during her break named Sophie. Eleonora finds her while walking near the Senna and thinks her charming.

Elain becomes too many people in too little time. A few of her characters she writes down in a leather notebook she got from a pretty Brazilian boy that worked in a quaint, corner bookshop. He flirted with her like he needed to put a bit of the sun in his eyes into hers. According to the first yellowed page, his name is Rafael. His number is underlined with the intricate drawing of a vine. Elain paints her thumb in deep red lipstick and puts her fingerprint right next to where he had written ‘For the thoughts of the prettiest sad smile I’ve ever seen.’

Eventually, Elain gets tired of her new clothes. She sells the ones she has tailored herself to thrift shops. She spends a full day carrying around a suitcase filled with the pieces she still has and gifts them to people on the streets she thinks might like them.

That night, she closes her eyes and randomly chooses a place to move into from the 5 Stars Hotel session of a battered City Guide. She has but a big shoulder bag to pack.

Before she leaves, she kisses the kind concierge with a strong Italian accent woven into his French on the cheek. He plucks a rose from one the flower arrangements in the reception and gifts it to her in a curtsy. He promises to never forget her. She promises the same with her eyes. When her cab arrives, she crushes the flower in between the pages of her new diary and sews it with the leftover sewing thread she finds on her bag, and carefully writes Sergio’s name and the date below it.

During her 5-day stay at Hotel de Crillon, Elain only takes off the fluffy white robe to take hour-long baths in the obscenely big bathtub. She goes to the spa multiple times a day and eats everything on the room-service menu at least twice.

Elain buys train tickets on a whim. She still only has one pair of jeans and a coat, the shirt she was wearing now stained with wine.

Nevertheless, she turns a scarf she finds hidden in her bag (a pleasant surprise!) into a shirt and goes to Saint Tropez.

(3)

She finds a villa to stay by stumbling upon it after aimlessly strolling around the city.

She puts on heart-shaped sunglasses.

On her first night out, a new summer dress flaring around her knees, she befriends a group of girls on vacation.

Elain introduces herself as Connie.

They eat pasta and drink pretty colorful drinks until they are all laughing and squealing happily with each other. Elain, while faking her name, doesn’t fake the story she tells the girls.

At least not most of it.

Amanda, the beautiful blonde, invites Connie to the yacht trip they will have in two days.

The next day, Elain runs around the city in a flurry of movements to buy swimwear appropriate for someone’s sugar daddy yacht.

Connie, Amanda, Brandy, and Nora get on a boat with Constatin, owner of half the cellular data companies in France, and drink all his rosé.

Like his namesake watches, Constantin is well polished, beautifully crafted and greying in the ways that make him attractive to young women.

Nora, the writing major, and Brandy, the recent graduate from fashion school, tan topless at the deck.

Connie, runaway bride, joins them.

Elain jumps into the calm, cold, dark blue and crystalline waters of the Atlantic Ocean until she is not afraid to do it anymore.

She dives as far as she dares below the surface and cries.

Their days together are carefully unplanned and unimaginably fun.

They party endlessly. They sell kisses 1 euro each in the streets. They buy cigarettes, get high by the beach, and take photos in Amanda’s digital camera of every adorable old couple they pass on the street.

They eat gelatos and wink at the passerby.

They dance with strangers and laugh at each other’s runny eyeliners.

They all give a parting kiss to the last stamp Elain glues on the top corner of the envelope containing Greysen’s ring.

“For good luck,” says Brandy.

“No, mine is definitely for wishing it gets itself lost in a pile of letters and ends up in Turkmenistan,” laughs Nora with a huff.

If it’s not Connie’s name in the paper, it’s none of their business.

They part ways with promises to email. They all doubt they will stay connected. Elain will never forget them.

Elain goes to Belgium for a week.

She is offered a round pink pill from a boy whose lips taste like sugar at an open-air festival.

She pretends to swallow it and parties as if she didn’t.

Poor Laurent waits for Nora to appear at the festival’s main gate, the unkept promise of a wild night of love with a beautiful stranger going cold in his brain.

He couldn’t know Nora is well settled in her Manhattan apartment by the time the last of the techno set ended.

Elain flees by sunlight’s first rays to her hotel, pops the drug in her mouth and thinks of the interesting new colors she finds on the wall.

Elain spends her days in Germany sober.

She goes to most museums in Berlin and cries at every single one.

She walks in the paved tracks of Tiergarten and silently prays for all of those whose pain is greater than hers.

She stole Amanda’s camera, and uses it for capturing the flowers she likes best along the way.

She rents a car and visits only the towns whose name seem weird enough to order a visit.

She talks to the grumpy, old salesmen at flea markets.

She takes a train ride that crosses Germany, Switzerland and Lichtenstein borders within the same hour.

She drives a Cadillac down the Italian countryside and blares Lana del Rey on her speakers.

She skinny dips in a brook by a tiny village.

She tries to go by using only 25 euros a day.

She eats a slice of pizza from every little stand she sees on the streets of Rome.

She takes a boat trip to Greece.

She day drinks.

She walks around Athens pretending to be a Goddess.

She misses her family.

It’s easier to admit she doesn’t miss Greysen.

Before getting on a plane back to Paris, Elain sends Nesta, Cassian, Rhys and Feyre a postcard scribbled with ‘I’m only using burner phones!!! I promise to get in touch more often, miss you all very much!!’

Elain rents an apartment at Marais and buys a bicycle.

There is an easiness in the way she breathes now.

She smiles at her many faces in every reflective surface she encounters.

(4)

She meets him with the scent of Paris’ spring encompassing her every breath.

He asks her what sorts of flowers a man should buy for a woman he loves.

“That depends,”

“On what?”

“Which type of love are we talking about?”

“What about love at first sight?”

Elain can’t help but laugh, her shoulders tensing with the attempt to curb her chuckles.

“Ok, I’ll admit it! That could’ve been a bit smoother” he says, half the sun in between his lips.

“Who are you buying flowers for, Mr.…?” Elain asks, the corners of her eyes watering with the intensity of her giggles,

”Just Lucien,” he sags a bit, laughs with her, “My mom is flying back home in a few hours, and I want to see her off with a bouquet,”

“All right, Just Lucien,” she jokes “Try pink and yellow roses, with the white tulips. The tulips do not actually mean love, but they are too pretty not to mix in with the flowers. Spring is when tulips start to bloom,”

They leave the stand, Lucien with a big, opulent bouquet and Elain with little bulbs she can plant in her apartment.

“Hm…?”

“Brandy” she supplies while setting her precious bulbs into her canvas bag.

“Would you like to grab a coffee? Only if you’re not busy, I mean, only if you want to?”

When the corners of his mouth pull up, they tug at a once-dormant thread in her ribs.

Elain smiles at the way he stammers. She wouldn’t have taken him for the shy type, with his well-kept red hair, pretty eyes. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

“Good, I know a place, but we’d have to take the metro- “

“Or we could just walk a block or two to find a pretty corner to sit down.”

They end up not sitting down but sipping their drinks as they aimlessly walk around her neighborhood, Lucien’s frame towering over hers.

He is wearing a suit, but no tie. She wonders what he sees when he looks at her trusted, soil-stained dungarees.

They are reaching Pont Marie when Lucien suddenly stops, in midst of telling her about how he and his eldest brother trained their dogs to scare away his tutors when he was a nothing more than a scrawny, trouble-prone boy.

”’Listen, Brandy,” he stops, cursing when he glimpses at his watch “I promised my mom I’d take her to the airport and I have meetings today I can’t postpone, but if you’re still in the city tomorrow, I’d really like to- “

She places her pointer and middle finger over his lips. It’s the first time they purposefully touch. “I’ll text you where.”

She likes the way he makes her smile.

(5)

They meet at Pont Neuf.

“I have something to tell you.”

“Oh, Lord” he pleads with wide eyes and sagging shoulders “You’re not about to tell me you’re married, are you?”

The word, strangely, doesn’t hurt to hear when it’s his voice pronouncing it.

“Oh, God. No, no, that was not- “she interrupts herself in a laugh. If Lucien notices her voice sounds a bit off kilter, he doesn’t mention it.

“I lied to you,” she admits, an anxious smile on her lips.

“Great start to a relationship,” he jokes, leaning onto the railing, crossing his arms. Her eyes catch the way the open buttons on his shirt shift to allow the light bouncing from the river to illuminate the golden hue of his skin.

As if just realizing what he’d said, Lucien opens his mouth and lifts an apologetic hand as if to explain his true meaning but-

“I know what you meant,” Elain cuts him off, “My name is not Brandy.”

He smirks at her “I didn’t think it was,”

Elain pushes him in mock outrage, trying to conceal her smile “It could’ve been,”

“Well, yes,” he holds the hand that made contact with his shoulder and looks so deeply into her eyes she can’t help but gasp, “But I read people for a living. Also... you do not look like you’re named Brandy,”

“What do I look like my name is then?”

“Juliet”

Elain rolls her eyes, but she knows the blush on her cheeks gives her away, “Would that make you Romeo?”

“If you want to,”

Lucien had slowly pulled her close. If she takes a deep breath, her chest will touch his.

“It’s Elain,” she whispers, because she doesn’t trust her voice to do much else “My name is Elain,”

He tucks a brown flyaway that is stuck to her cheek and places it behind her ear. The line his fingers trace on her skin grows light of their own. “Beautiful,”

He didn’t stray his eyes from hers for even a moment.

Elain feels silly to think that she has never felt like this before.

They spend the day speaking into the shrinking space between them. They eat croissants with rosé at Lucien’s favorite café. They go to Elain’s favorite patisserie for macaroons.

They order one of each flavor and share them. Lucien asks for pen and paper in perfect French. There’s a pink one that tastes exactly like the smell of perfumes. The pistachio macaroon is sage green and nutty in the perfect balance. The vanilla bean is creamy and basic (complimentary). The blueberry is purplish and basic (derogatory).

They museum hop. He tells her about his mom in front of the history-book-famous DeLacroix painting.

She tells him about her sisters in front of the Hammurabi Code.

They talk about the paintings and their worldviews.

They share mediocre mac-n-cheese at the Louvre’s cafeteria.

They count how many steps they need to cross the big painting which hangs in the wall opposite of the Monalisa (The Wedding in Cana is 22 Elain-steps long and 19 Lucien-steps long)

Almost every piece of art they visit she has already seen. Looking at all of it again with Lucien by her side feels like discovering something new.

He has a clever remark for every comment she makes.

Lucien kisses Elain with his thumbs pressing her jawline up. Her hands find their place grasping the front of his shirt. They become a fleeting fundamental part of Psyche Revived by Cupid’s kisses.

She doesn’t have the breath for teasing him about the spot he chose for their first kiss.

When the ringing in her ears diminishes, she hears cheers and applauses.

Lucien smiles, “Hold on tight,” he whispers against her lips before tilting her back in an elegant bow to kiss her to the grand excitement of their audience.

When she smiles against his lips their teeth clash together.

They climb all the 280 steps to watch the sunset at Arc de Triumph’s roof.

They photobomb all the travel groups that pass by them.

They are walking near the Pallais Garnier when bold letters catch the corner of Elain’s eyes,

“Oh, I can’t believe it,” she giggles and pulls Lucien with her, “there’s a ballet presentation today!”

He laughs and she covers his eyes before he has the chance of reading the banner “Guess what Ballet it is,”

“How many chances do I have?”

She hums as if in deep thought, “Three!”

“The Nutcracker,”

“Nope,” she pops the p.

“Giselle,”

She tuts negatively, “Come on, last chance!”

“I need an incentive,”

“I’ll give you one if you get it right,”

He presses their foreheads together, her fingers still over his eyes “Give me a tip?”

“It’s a love story,” she counts “And a tragedy,”

“Romeo and Juliet?”

Elain laughs and snakes her arms around his neck “I made it too easy for you,”

He hugs her and spins them around to hear her laugh again,

“I wish we could watch it,” she laments, and she starts walking down the sidewalk again.

“Why can’t we?”

“It’s probably sold out,” she mentions at the big decadent building near them “we also can’t watch the ballet in our clothes. These things have dressing codes,”

“Okay...” he looks around them as if planning something “Let’s try it like this: I’ll see if I can buy tickets,”

She looks at him in disbelief.

“Wait! Wait,” she smiles, and he pulls her close, “Believe in me, ok?”

She nods. She can’t remember a moment in this day she has not smiled because of him.

“We’re close enough to Rue de la Fayette, we can buy something appropriate. There’s one hour for us to get ready and meet here before the first act begins,”

There is a shiver in her spine when he says we.

“Do you really want to do this, or is it just because you think I want to do it?”

“And pass up the opportunity take you on a date to see the French Ballet? Do I look like a fool to you, Elain?”

She brushes her lips against his and giggles.

“Let’s do it, then.”

While Lucien runs up the stairs towards the ticket's office, Elain crosses the street and goes in search of a very specific mannequin.

She reaches the store she has been to in what seems like a lifetime ago.

A little breathless from the fast pace track she had to make until the shop, she tries her best to explain to one of the workers her circumstance.

“There’s always a little extra luck for lovers in Paris,” Elain is told.

Elain doesn’t feel the need to explain that they aren’t really lovers.

Marie takes her to the worker’s lounge where there is a shower Elain can use.

Marie appears with another woman, Cecile, together they dress Elain in her beautiful lavender dress.

Ella has a make-up bag; Stella has dry shampoo. Elain ends up in sat down at a table with Frenchwomen flying around her.

Elain’s hair is falling to her waist in gentle curls due to the braid Lucien’s careful hands had woven into her hair at the Jardin de Tuileries.

After forty-five minutes, Elain leaves the store with a skip on her step.

Lucien is already waiting for her in front of Ópera Garnier, dressed sharply in a tuxedo.

It seems that Paris is indeed a lucky place for lovers.

“Mademoiselle,” he greets, kissing her knuckles,

“Monseigneur,” she blushes under the candle-lit light of his eyes.

They sit together at the Balcon, near the orchestra.

“How did you get these seats?”

“Told them I had a lady to impress,”

The lights turn down and Elain is swept away by the music, Lucien’s fingers in her palm guiding her through waves of sound and magic.

“We could totally do that,” he whispers like a conspirator in her ears, a shiver blooming over her spine and growing until the crown of her head.

As the Balcony Pas de deux evolves in front of them, Romeo, in all his earnest adoration, lifts Juliette with his head devotedly pressed to her stomach, the grace of their movement leaving no doubts of the love they feel.

Elain quells her laugh lest she bothers the audience around them.

During intermission, Lucien and Elain are standing on the red-carpeted stairs, she a step above him.

Elain kisses both of his eyelids while he reads aloud from the performance’s booklet they received at the entrance.

“What’s this for?”

“Your eyelashes are red,”

Elain goes down the steps leading down to the Ópera’s foyers, a bright spot of lavender amongst the departing crowd, with melodies singing in her bloodstream. She feels as though a wind could lift her towards the stars in the sky, the ending note of the orchestra still vibrating in her ears.

“Come with me.” Lucien asks with his hands on her cheeks.

Elain realizes she doesn’t want to make up an excuse not to go.

They take the metro to the hotel he’s hosted at. Lucien carries her on his back for the last few blocks, her heels dangling from his fingers.

Their chatter dies down by the time Lucien squeezes on the elevator button. The air suddenly heavy, warmly pressing down on her skin, the hairs of her arms standing alert.

Their gazes meet in the mirror as the elevator rides up to his floor.

She is sure he can see her chest fluttering for the powerful rhythm of her heart.

She is sure she can hear his heartbeat.

There is a buzz on Elain’s skin, as if a rabble of eager bees had taken cover in her stomach.

The red of his hair looks soft and inviting, his eyes solemn and hungry.

She wants him.

Desperately.

Passionately.

He is staying in the sort of hotel suite that has a living room, adorned with rococo era sofas and coffee tables, watercolor and impressionist paintings on every wall, an upright piano at the corner of the room, music sheets spread over it, its beautifully woodsy color matching the room’s color scheme.

What takes her breath away, though, is the view from the floor to ceiling windows right in front of her.

The sprawling city below them is alive. Light and movement intertwined in a stunning performance of humanity and art.

As if on cue, the Eiffel Tower’s lights started to glow in their hourly show.

This is beyond any dream she could ever had.

“Pinch me,” she breaths, unbelieving.

Lucien holds her, his chest pressed to her back, his arms curled around her until there is one hand at each side of her waist.

There is a hundred thousand words in the tenderness of his touch.

When they kiss, it is rushed and sloppy, Elain’s hands unapologetically relieving Lucien of his clothes.

Somehow, her panties are off before her dress is.

There’s magic in your eyes, he worships.

He can’t stay away.

She doesn’t want him to.

Be with me.

She feels the deep scar tissue on his back and opens her eyes, startling, a hesitant question in them.

“I’ll tell you," He promises with his nose curving along her cheek.

She has no reason to not believe him.

Elain is still shaking with the remnants of her second orgasm, her mouth and cheeks sticky from him, she he finally slides home within her.

Elain can’t string one coherent thought when he kisses her ankles and thrusts inside her so reverently she wants to cry.

She shatters one last time, prompting his release into the innermost piece of her, both their frames sated and deliciously spent.

With the way he stares at her right before they both fall asleep; Elain deeply understands the meaning of afterglow.

(6)

Lucien sometimes wakes her up with the whispers of his lips below her navel.

Elain sometimes wakes him up in the middle of the night, straddling and flexing herself around his body until he rocks back into her with a sleepy moan.

She tries to feel ashamed for how much she wants him. She can’t.

They ride bikes at Bois de Boulogne and feed the swans, looking for serendipities along the trees.

She always lets him order for her so she can listen to him speaking french for a few minutes longer.

He tries to count the freckles in her face and frowns when her mouth distracts him.

She tells him about her father.

Lucien is the seventh son of a lengthy line of brothers.

Elain tells him about Greysen on a Sunday. It’s midday and they have yet to leave their bed. Lucien has one leg draped over hers, she diverts herself by drawing faces in the canvas of his skin with her fingertips.

Lucien tells her about Jesminda. The maid’s daughter that lived in the estate house he grew up in and stole his heart with the tug of her crooked smile.

They fell in love. They got engaged.

There was a car crash. She was driving. She died and he didn’t.

“Is that how you got your scars?”

“A few of them, yes.”

They weep, sheltered in their lover’s embrace.

She holds him close like she wants to pull him inside her ribcage and keep him safe and ensconced within her, side by side with her caring heart.

There are three very peculiar words building in the back of throat.

It comes a time when he is generally staying at her house, and the few times he’s had to go to his hotel room to pick fresh clothes got him too far away from her. So, now his suitcase rests on top of a dining table chair in the corner of her room.

Finding a routine together feels like rowing a boat along the tide. It feels comically like fitting the last few pieces of a puzzle, a little room for error, all the chances to make it right.

They get their groceries from the market down the street every Monday.

There are the days he has meetings to attend (mainly Tuesdays). Then, he spends the whole night making up for his absence with his head between her legs.

They go cycling most mornings at Bois de Boulogne. They cook together every night and bar hop every Saturday.

They do laundry and make love and don’t talk about the coming of Autumn.

(7)

They have just returned from Marseille when Elain finds the black envelope standing in her mailbox, Lucien climbed the stairs first, taking their bags up while she checked for bills.

She recognizes her sister’s round penmanship, as well as Night Court Inc. stationary.

Feyre is getting married at the end of the month. She misses Elain dearly. Feyre wants Elain to be a bridesmaid. Feyre need help with preparations.

Feyre needs Elain back home.

Elain enters the apartment that became his as much as hers and ponders on how to tell him she is leaving.

He has just left the bathroom, the sound of running water and the smell of his favorite bath salts lingering in the air. He is tan, tired, and unbelievably hers.

For four weeks, at least. And Mother knew how many more few days she gets to steal before going back.

She puts the letter in her bag and hugs him, scenting salt and sunbeam on his skin.

She tells him of the letter after they finished washing their dinner dishes. He has just opened the book he was reading, a bit of sand sliding from in between the pages unto his uncovered torso.

She presses gentle fingers on his lips before he has a chance to say anything.

She doesn’t want to hear him say that it is ok that she has to go.

She doesn’t want to hear the empty promises of an ephemeral springtime love that turns into something more.

“Thank you, Lucien,”

Elain closes her eyes before kissing him and misses the catastrophic way the candle in his eye's sputters and wilts.

(8)

Elain arrives in Velaris International Airport to her sisters’ and their friends’ loud cheers.

Elain smiles, truly smiles at them, and even if a part of her still thinks of home as a little apartment in Paris, she welcomes their familiar hugs and questions that come a mile a minute.

Settling back into Sidra’s House feels like being back to the beginning, so Elain rents out a new place near downtown.

She goes to a Tea House with Nesta and Feyre. They discuss Cassian, Feyre’s wedding and her sisters ask enthusiastic questions about her wanderings.

She doesn’t yet know how to tell them about Lucien. How she went away to forget a painful love and found herself a new one. Or how she pretended to be multiple people for thrills.

She does tell them, however, of the slow healing of her spirits.

And about her still newborn plan of opening a flower shop.

Helping with the wedding planning is surprisingly cathartic. She picks the flowers, goes cake tasting with Feyre, organizes the seating arrangements, chooses the catering company…

She also decorates her new apartment and paints one of her walls a familiar shade of red.

Feyre and Rhysand say their vow to each other at dawn, under a perfectly curated vine of white tulips, black irisis, and many tones of pink roses.

At the ceremony, Elain is paired with Rhysand’s other brother, Azriel.

He has a handsome face and an aura of mystery he wields like a sword.

His eyes are the wrong hue of brown.

That doesn’t mean Elain wastes his skillful dancing abilities.

She and Azriel are dancing to one of Feyre’s favorite Frank Sinatra songs when suddenly-

“Would you mind if I stole her from you?”

Elain would recognize that voice until the day she laid her head to rest.

Unsure, Azriel looks down at Elain, a question in the way he stands.

She nods but doesn’t dare to turn around.

Elain’s view is filled with the warm tones of a neck she has memorized with her lips.

“It’s weird, I’ll call it, how I never connected the dots that Elain is quite the unusual name. That Feyre and Nesta with a sister named Elain is an even more unusual family name combination,” He starts to explain while they twirl in the dance floor. “I mean, how many people do you know with those names?”

Something inside her heart unfurls.

“Not realizing that I somehow already knew of you without knowing you. That I can admit was an honest mistake,” his throat bobs “The unforgivable mistake was letting you go with too many unspoken words between us,”

The gentle hand in her waist gives her the strength to look into his eyes.

“I didn’t say anything in Paris because I thought that it was what you wanted, a clean break up. A rebound so you could rebuild your life here being new person,”

“And if that truly was your intent, I’ll finish this dance and leave. I’ll make peace with your decision and move on,”

“But if there’s a chance I was wrong, if there’s a chance you think of our times together and knows that it was real, if there’s a chance you can forgive me for not fighting for you, if there’s a chance you love me just as I love you-”

She kisses him before he starts to ramble.

Their teeth clash when they smile against each other.

“Don’t fly away from me ever again, dove.”

“I won’t.”

#elucienweek #elucien #Lucien vanserra #Elain archeron #acotar #elucien headcanons #ana writes #modern!au #paris!elucien #traveling!!#being wooed #falling in love!!#this is a mix of personal experience and intense google maps searches #elucien fanfiction #elucien fanfic #elucien fic

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