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gazingupatthemoon · 5 years

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You Can Not Sit Idly By (13/?)

Found here at ff.net or A03

Summary: She doesn't know how to live during a time of war. Doesn't know how not to worry about the people she loves every second of the day. But she must, and more importantly, she has to find a way to end it all. The battle between dark and light is calling to her, and Rey is helpless to answer it. Just as helpless as Ben Solo is. (Star Wars AU, Reylo, Rey/Poe, Finn, Luke Skywalker, more)

Rating: E

As suspected, Ben is on his knees with his hands twisted painfully behind his back in seconds.

The urge to fight back makes his body tremble, flashes of bashing the Resistance soldiers faces into the ground near inescapable. But he knew this moment was inevitable. As the bodies swarmed and shouted around Ben’s pitiful form, chaining him up in everyway possible, he stared resolutely at the ground.

Breath in through the nose, and out through the mouth.

Count to ten.

Block out the sounds.

And most importantly, do not look at Rey.

Because Ben can only imagine the heartbroken look on her face as he is put under arrest, again.

He’s quiet, that’s most important. Riling up the already livid Resistance troops would do him no good now.

Ben had been quiet since last night, when Lando unceremoniously announced they’d reach the new base the next day. It was like a death sentence, for all Ben was concerned. Not even Rey could coax him to talk as she curled up around his body later on in their shared bed.

Their last night together.

It didn’t matter what Rey thought, or hoped, Ben knew the truth. He wouldn’t get to hold her like this again. Rey dreamed of a day that the Resistance would free him, and grant him some kind of leniency. She refused to believe otherwise. Refused to truly understand all the harm he caused. All the lives he took. It didn’t matter if he killed Snoke and fed them every First Order secret he had. Too much damage had been done.

But if it was to be their last night together, he would not waste it.

Ben chooses to remember every sacred moment on that bed with Rey, as he is pushed and pulled to his prison cell.

Her soft gasp of surprise when he rolled atop her body, and slotted between her open legs.

The heat of her skin, as he pressed open mouthed kisses up her neck, stopping to nuzzle the soft skin behind her ear.

The way her hands grasped his tunic, first for support, but then to tug at it impatiently. It went soon enough, followed by her own flimsy nightdress.

How he ever hoped that she would be his one day. Despite the fact of their unfortunate family connection. That she, by adoption only, was his cousin. That he loved her, but was too immoral and unworthy of her. That he hurt her, over and over and over again. Pushed her away. Scared her. Made her think he felt nothing.

That Rey should never have gave him another chance, let alone a second or a third. Or this.

He was blessed. He would die to be this blessed. He would die, maybe, to be this cursed.

“Rey,” Ben whispered that night, their bodies so close and so hot, as he captured her lips in a kiss.

She was always instable when it came to everything in life. This, apparently, miraculously, would be no different. She reached for his warmth at every angle. Kissed till their lungs burned for air. Till the heat in their veins threatened to burn them alive. Till everything would combust into nothing but light and pleasure.

Whispered pleas of “yes” and “more” and “please”.

Ben met Rey’s eagerness with his own wantonness. But while eager and curious desire sparked Rey, utter desperate adoration and lust plagued Ben. Rey. This was Rey. The girl of smiles and stubbornness and beauty and everything he always wanted and could never have. Rey, whom he’d always loved. Always denied himself.

Rey.

He would never get enough of her. Nothing, in any shape or form, would ever be enough.

But tonight would have to do.

Moans escaped into the otherwise quiet room as they drowned in each other, kissing, kissing and kissing.

Rey’s hands began tugging at his breeches, bold for a girl who had never done much more than this, but Ben wouldn’t dare break their embrace. It was too good. Too heavenly. All he ever wanted and would want in his life.

Rey, of course, the greedy little thing, would not be ignored.

“Ben,” She all but whined, offering him her neck instead of lips so she could tug harder at his pants.

Ben huffed out a laugh, but reached down to help her out. “Never were good with patience, where you?”

She merely rolled her eyes at him. Ben was about to say something else, witty and teasing, but all thoughts fled from his mind when her small hands encircled his length.

He was always hard for her. But this, to feel her there? Tugging softly, twisting experimentally. It was too much to bear. He would come undone in seconds. Then her thumb smoothed over his leaking tip, and he near groaned his voice to soreness.

“Like that?” Rey inquired. Curiously, but also with a hint of teasing. A girl who knew things, in theory, but had some hesitation in practice.

He groaned again at a particularly tough tug, and grabbed her by the forearm. “Not yet,” He begged, dragging her hand up over her head. “Let me savor this more.”

“You’ll have plenty of chances to savor it, I want you now.”

“Rey…”

Maker, why would she not accept there would be no other times?

This was it. This was their moment.

Rey knew immediately to where his thoughts had drifted. Her eyes hardened at the words he wouldn’t say and the forlorn look that had took over his features. And just like that, Ben was the one on his back, and Rey was straddling him.

She needed no experience for this. Overcoming him had always been a trait, when they had been children. When Rey refused to be the young lady society expected her to be. When she punched and wrestled and rolled like the rest of them. Ben loved and recoiled when her body pressed against him in the past. Raged internally, heatedly, when she too intimately but innocently pressed herself against Poe or Finn.

But no, there was no time for that. Not when this could be their last.

Rey looked beautiful in her nakedness, and Ben was so overwhelmed he wasn’t sure what to look at. His eyes darted from her pert breasts, the smooth expanse of her stomach, the strengths of her thighs encaging his hips, and her hair that was wild and draped over her shoulders. But it was her face, so beautiful, so magnificent, that won his attention. Albeit, Rey looked furious as she gazed down at him, but Ben couldn’t but drown in his love for her. She had always looked so alive when she was angry with him.

“We will,” She began, and rolled her hot and wet center over his length. “Have more nights than this.”

Ben hissed at the sensation, and gripped her hips. “Again,” He ordered, unwilling to listen to her false hopes. He just wanted this with her tonight. No other worries or thoughts or words. Just he and her and their love for each other.

Rey rolled her hips over and over again, both of them momentarily silenced at the movements.

“Ben,” She breathed, bowing her head back and closing her eyes. “T-Tell me…what should I…how…”

Ben, again, was reminded of the fact Rey was so inexperienced at this. She was doing so well, she had been so easily fooling him. But he broke through his haze of lust to help her, even though he himself wasn’t exactly an expert at the topic. But this, what they were doing now, this felt good. He could keep doing this for her.

“Keep going,” He whispered, and slowly grazed his hands up her ribcage and to her breasts. There, he palmed them so gently, curling his fingers around their undersides before tracing around the nipples. Teasing, fluttering touches that kept coming and going.

Rey’s body trembled everywhere.

She continued to drag his aching cock through her folds, soaking him with her juices.

“Oh….feels-ah, so good…” She babbled, her movements increasing. The sound of their almost-coupling was obscene. Wet and loud, an erotic background to their moans and gasps.

So good, Ben couldn’t help but agree. But he needed to control himself. He would please her first, and then please them both after.

When her hips began to stutter, and her mouth was open and wordless, Ben pinched her nipples. It was the extra push needed for Rey’s whole body jolted a final time, and she barely contained the scream that escaped her lungs.

Ben caught her as she fell onto his chest, cradling her smaller frame against his own. His cock was still nestled firmly between her legs, getting wetter by the second. Ben rolled them over, bracing his arms on either side of Rey’s head.

“We’re not done yet,” He whispered huskily into her ear. He reached down and began to gently stroke her cunt with the tip of his length, bringing Rey back to conscious.

She gasped, “Ben!” Her hips stuttered in surprise.

“Sh, it will be fine, I promise.” He kissed her sweetly on the lips. “But do tell me if it is too much.”

Rey nodded silently and bunched up the sheet of their bed as Ben entered her, slowly.

Oh Maker, she was tight.

They both squeezed their eyes shut at the sensation. Ben needed to adjust, just a moment, for Rey’s sake as well, before pulling back. Rey was about to protest before he plunged right back in, quicker this time.

“Okay?”

“Okay.”

The pace was torturous but he needed this to be good for her. Ben watched her face intently to see how she is taking it all, and when she let out a pleasurable moan, finally, he began to quicken himself.

“Oh, Rey, kriff…I always knew you’d feel so-so amazing-”

“Ben, don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

“Never. Maker, never Rey. I love you. Love you so much-”

“Ben!”

She’s still sore from before, and Ben has been holding on for far too long. She’s too beautiful, her body too perfect, and he’s never felt such passion and peace in his life.

Ben comes with a roar, Rey following shortly after him.

Yes, this is what Ben Solo thinks as he is marched through the Resistance base.

There is some peace in this.

At least he’d like to think so.

If he is too die, and yes, certainly, he is to die, this is the best goodbye he could hope for. Images of his love. Her sounds. Her feel. Her love. Rey. All there is, is Rey.

Yes, Ben can die now.

Something loud and quick cuts through the air.

Rey is shouting something behind Ben, insistent, stubborn, and even Lando’s voice has raised in volume and emotion.

A stupid but quick tumble on an upturned tile has Ben looking up, and he is immediately met with the sad-no, disappointed look of his Uncle. Luke has looked him like this before, but this time, there is a twinge of anger. Resentment. The words they shared last they were together still a fresh wound in both their minds. Oh, how his blood boils at the sight of his Uncle. Ben wants to rage. But he also wants to cry. He wants every emotion in his body to boil over and burst.

As this storm brews in his veins, as well as his heart and mind, Ben trembles but keeps it at bay. It’s a terrible price, to keep all this passion just beneath the surface, but he is sure his eyes shine with the torment. He had never been good at hiding his emotions. A fault he’d never grown out of. But now, despite it all, he hopes Luke sees it. Sees it, mourns it, feels guilt over it. Ben is too blame, of course, he always to blame. But, somehow, he wishes Luke would take some of the burden as well. See the wrongs he had done, the lies he wished to cage Rey with, the immoral lengths he would have gone to protect her…

If only.

The memoires, the passion, he shared last night with Rey seemed to quiet as Ben was met with Luke’s cold blue gaze.

Then Ben sees more.

His mother, walking beside him and the soldiers. Not looking at him. Shouting orders. But not looking at him. Ordering where to put him. Where to keep him. Not. Looking. At. Him.

Then Han rushes up to her side and he looks. Oh, he looks. Not the coldness of Luke, Ben immediately notices. His mouth actually goes dry by the emotions pouring out of his father. Fear, but for him, not of him. And affection? Sadness? Ben can’t hear, everything is quite loud, but it seems that Han maybe been arguing with Leia…for his sake?

But his mother, still straight-faced and starring ahead, just replies to her husband with clipped words.

It’s the family reunion he expected, but still wasn’t prepared before.

Ben then notices they are heading to a door. He’ll be locked away soon. But Rey. He needs to see Rey one last time. He twists his head, even though the solder gripping his shoulder makes it difficult and a tad painful.

She’s not too far off. She stared right back at him, her eyes wide and fearful. Maybe now, she’s finally realized. Maybe she regrets refusing to give him a proper goodbye. Or pretending this would all work out somehow.

He sees, with little care, Finn and Poe at her sides. Finn is talking wildly, his arms flinging this way and that. Poe has a large gauze wrapped on his upper body. He still, and quiet, looking at Rey, and then following her gaze to him.

Ben doesn’t want to notice them. Or his family. Just Rey.

Her eyes are the last Ben sees before he is pushed through the door.

It’s as good as ending he could have hoped for.

#star wars #reylo #ben solo #kylo ren #rey #skywalker family #solo family #reylo ff #you can not sit idly by

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austennerdita2533 · 7 years

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Day 6: Canon-ish

A/N: This is the first part of an intended 4-shot. Basically, my idea is to craft some kind of Klaroline kiss/moment for each season of the year while also showing the two of them at various points (and emotional states) in their relationship. I started thinking about how Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall all have a different look or feel about them, and I thought it would be fun to play with that thematically/symbolically. Plus, it’d give me an excuse to play with seasonal imagery.

Anyway, this part is Winter. It’s canon until Liz’s death and Caroline’s grappling with the loss. I’ve also ignored all things Stefan and Caroline. (Loss. Angst. Hurt and Comfort.)

This gave me loads of trouble, so if it’s terrible I apologize but I couldn’t bear to edit it any longer haha. Enjoy. :)

(FF.net)

xx Ashlee Bree

A Kiss For All Seasons

Part 1: Fold Into Me, Shivering

Winter’s kiss wisps across her forehead at a time of shivering delirium and despair.

She’s gone.

It’s not a dream because each breath in tastes metallic and rough, because each breath out rattles and hisses like a dented whiffle ball which has sunk beneath sediment and drowned in the shallowest of streams. It’s real life. It’s real loss, too. And real loss throbs.

It breaks—tearing, cracking, pulling, shattering, rupturing, wrenching a person into angles so painful or contradictory, that life itself feels distorted. It plunges emotions into a vise that’s so unbearable and inescapable at times, it almost feels impossible to still be alive let alone be expected to stand.

Or talk.

Or move.

Or think.

Or cry without wiping at eyes and waiting to find blood puddled on fingertips instead of tears.

At times, grief even makes it difficult to exist.

After someone dies, especially if you loved that person, the world begins to clutter in a way it never did before: it pinches in at the sides so all the noise can spill in unheard, unseen, clouding your mind and chest with smog that refuses to lift so you can breathe easy again. Everything becomes drenched in the blacks and purples and blues of a bruise, too, until there’s nothing left for us to do but crash to our knees. Until all we can do is shrink inside our gloomy new reality and burn our lung’s raw with missing.

In Caroline’s case, icicles splinter across her chest whenever she blinks against the harsh whites of morning to relive the tragedy all over again.

Mommy.

Instead of Liz’s death providing her with comfort or relief now that she’s no longer suffering, the unfair and untimely permanence of loss hollows her out until she’s raw—numb—freezing. The air around her tastes as toxic and as gritty lead. The din of life, which was once so variable and mellifluous and exhilarating to her ears, rings like television static in her head now. Blurring one minute of monotonous agony into the next without end. More than that, the rising sun in the distance (the same one that used to stream vivid, happy yellows through her window every morning), is far too weak or indirect to do anything besides snake across her moistened cheeks with it pale rays before it leaves her cold and dejected again.

Caroline’s parentless now. Alone. She’s still loved by a few friends, of course, but she feels so incredibly, unbelievably, disconnected from them all.

She’s more or less invisible. A ghost.

None of them see me. None of them know what I need.

She’s a ghost girl stuck in this endless life on her own: more hollow than haunted, more sorry and solitary than surviving. She’s an undead warrior on the outside, perhaps, but she’s all but a living, feeling woman shriveling into pieces of nothing within.

“Please don’t leave me,” her body trembles, the words scraping and shrieking inside her own mind as pain paralyzes them in place so they can’t slip down, so they can’t vault out from her throat. “I need you, Mommy, I still need you…”

But Liz is no longer there to answer. She has taken her last breath, has spoken her last goodbye.

There’s no one here who cares for Caroline unconditionally now…no one else who listens. There’s no one around to hold her hand, to kiss away her nightmares, to kill her insecurities so she can fulfill her dreams. There’s no one left who loves her in ‘alls’ instead of ‘somes’—no one.

How could leave me like this, Mommy? How?

Eyes dark-circled with sorrow and exhaustion, Caroline lies curled on one side of her mother’s bed with her knees hugged to her middle. She never stirs; she never sleeps. She stares out the paned window at a February sunrise obscured by indigo snowflakes that drip from the clouds like sleeted tears that the winter needs to cry. Fresh powder bleaches the ground and builds mounds so high they touch the trees, bending branches until they snap like broken rubber bands, burying all sounds of life beneath it except for the squawk of a nearby crow.

In places where the sky meets the horizon, bleak plums, grays, navies, and ivories scratch the edges of Caroline’s vision and almost make her long for blindness. The world outside as stark and as bone-chilling as the nightmare gnawing her apart on the inside:

Mom died, Mom’s DEAD.

But she can’t be gone, she…no! Mom? Mommy, where are you?

Mommy I—please stay. I need you to stay, okay? I’m not ready to live in a world without you. I—not yet.

It’s too soon, it’s too soon!

Mom?

MOMMY!!!?

Shadows scuttle along the walls. The floors. The furniture. Speckling her room like pox of rotting melancholy, they seem to grow larger and more formidable with each tick of the clock on the wall, their black edges curving into sharp spindly fingers that slice at entering streaks of light like a sword; their trunks expanding to root into corners as if they refuse to timber away.

Caroline, however, makes neither a move to halt their proliferation in her room nor to purge them from the space. Instead, she watches with blinking apathy as one detaches from the doorjamb at the far end of the room like a silky talon and crawls closer. It almost glides across the floor.

How will the shadow consume her, she wonders? With a bite? With a few nibbles? Or will it gulp her down whole and damn her to its full belly of despair, plummeting her into a pit of darkness with no end?

She watches as the shadow drifts forward with a slow yet assured grace. Its movements are cautious. Soundless except for the stray floorboard which creaks when it edges along the foot of the bed and crosses into streaks of daylight, exchanging shadow for skin, swapping an ‘it’ for a ‘him,’ as a man stoops to kneel beside her head.

This isn’t just any man, though.

Oh, no.

But one with eyes that are rimmed in lightning yellow. One who smells of cedar and cognac and cologne. Tastes of oranges dipped in rust. Touches with hands made of calloused buttercups. And snaps necks for sport.

He’s someone who charms a crowd with dimples and drawled threats before he strikes swiftly, and completely. He’s a wolf who’s determined to paint away his personal miseries with other’s blood. This is a man who often stars in Caroline’s dreams, and his face is one she not only recognizes, but knows—

Intimately.

“Kl-Klaus? Is that…is that really you?” she croaks uncertainly.

“It is.”

Dizzy, disbelieving, greens and blonds and brown leathers all swirl together in front of her, so she rubs at her puffy eyes then squints harder at the blurred shape of him. Her next words come out more froggy and weak than questioning.

“You came back. You’re—here,” Caroline says with a puff of breath. “You’re back in…back in Mystic Falls?”

“I am.”

“But I didn’t call or—no…no texts were sent?” He nods in confirmation of this, which puzzles her further. “You couldn’t have known that she—and the funeral? No way could you have been there because I, because I never…”

“Wait a minute,” her brows pinch, heavy lids lifting slowly to his face, “did you…did you break into the house?”

Klaus compresses his lips together, shrugs at her sheepishly. Caroline responds to this by smashing her face into her pillow with a groan and an agitated ‘un-freaking-believable.’ Then, in one swift movement, she throws the blankets over top of her and rolls over flat. Onto her back.

“Don’t be angry with me, love.”

She snorts. Pulls the covers higher.

“I realize my relationship with my family is dysfunctional at best,” he tries cautiously, his voice dipping low, “but I do have experience in parental loss. I know what it’s like. How it feels. The way it cuts you and—” she crosses her arms, holds her breath “—burns.”

Caroline cringes and squeezes her arms tight like she’s holding herself together.

“I only worried on your behalf because I know how deeply you cared for the sheriff, so I trailed you home…lingering outside in case you bolted with no reference to your humanity because I didn’t want you to do anything rash you’d regret later. I just, I wanted to keep you safe and protected. To…help you avoid any extra pain.”

"It wasn’t until you screamed that I couldn’t—it didn’t seem right to—not when you sounded so—how could I not look in?”

He pauses for a moment. Clears his throat, cracks his knuckles.

“Anyway, I thought you might be in want a friend,” he offers placatingly, pressing his palms flat against the sheets so he can lean forward a bit and hover above her. “Someone to be a shoulder. A punching bag. A hand for you to squeeze. Whatever…” his voice wobbles uncomfortably, “whatever it is you need.”

“And what if what I need is for you to, you know,” she swallows hard, “get the hell out?”

“Then I’ll go, Caroline.”

She tuts but it lacks bite. “Go where? Back outside to hide behind more snow until I snap?”

Resigned, almost as if he’d expected this kind of reaction, he draws back with a small hiss like he’s been stung, “No,” he answers cooly, his words heavy and flat, “I’ll do as you bid and head home. To Louisiana.”

The air between them becomes stagnant. Oppressive all of a sudden.

“You mean you’ll leave me here?”

“Yes.”

“Alone?” she asks.

“If that’s what you wish,” he sighs, “then yes.”

“Oh.”

Time seems to slow here, silence stretching and growing like a beanstalk weed between their two bodies. Klaus plucks at a mattress spring with his thumb, its notes sharp and discordant underneath her back as he stands to pivot on his heels, readying himself to glide back into the shadows from whence he came. Leaving her alone in Mystic Falls again, setting her free like he promised two years ago.

Caroline hears him shrug his arms into his jacket with a grunt. Or maybe it’s a growl? A humph? Regardless of the noise he makes, there seems to be a sluggish dereliction to his movements. A hesitancy to proceed. And it’s probably because he’s preparing himself for the long trek through miles upon miles of snow that’ll weigh him down like ice before he reaches New Orleans. All of that slush waiting to seep in, hoping to blacken his toes…

He’s more than likely dreading the sound of orange embers crunching into snowy ashes beneath his feet as he retreats from her warm hearth and stomps out through the door again. He probably loathes the idea of submerging himself into a frigid morning all because she’s almost commanded him to go. Leave.

To go off on his own and freeze like me.

At the thought, a fresh chill kisses the back of Caroline’s neck. It momentarily anesthetizes her lungs and she cannot breathe; she cannot think. She cannot feel anything except the frostbite which pricks down low, too low, and buries itself somewhere below skin deep.

The whole world shifts inside her own head again as arctic wind gusts across a few remaining fragments of coziness: of old memories tinged pink with brandy smiles or marshmallow’d cheeks, of scarved hopes for the future knitted in bright, pretty patterns, of rich caroled dreams hummed sweetly into ears with full-bodied meaning, of soft painter’s hands which curled over top of stupid fears or desires like mittens to ease her shuddering, warming her to the bone. All of them slipping away on a sled she’s about to let crash straight through the North Pole so they may never resurface again.

Except how could she bear it? How could she survive the barrenness without them, all the cruelty? How could she find the strength to keep breathing after she lets one final sliver of warmth slip away because she’s bitter and hurting and broken? Where would her optimistic flames entomb themselves? In permafrost? In tundra? In icebergs crowding the sea?

Deep-down, Caroline knows that one biting word from her would silence Klaus for good. One more dismissive statement is all it would take to send him back to New Orleans where he belongs, thereby freeing her up to mope in this room forever. There’d be no more judgment to combat from him, no more concern. But to what end?

So her mouth can match the blue which has settled in around her heart since her mom passed away? So she can shudder harder at the falling flakes of grey and white which accumulate outside her window and aim to bury her beneath centuries of unrelenting snow? So life’s color can leak and harshen until it’s nothing more than a dead block of ice for her to kick?

As if winter isn’t teeth-chattering enough already!

Licking her lips, Caroline exhales before she slides the blanket down the bridge of nose enough to peek up at him. She rakes over his consternated expression. She watches when his body stiffens and squares in preparation of her next words. It’s as if he’s waiting for a dismissal to scythe through the air and lash him up.

“Okay, and what if—” she gulps, her voice dry and a little muffled. “What if I say I don’t want to be alone in this room right now? What then?”

Klaus’ eyes widen, hope spilling into their depths. But only for a second. A scratch of his chin followed by one, two, blinks and it sinks back into his pupils like an illusion. Like it was never there.

“I’ll make sure you aren’t. You won’t be, if that’s what you desire,” he says simply.

“And if I cry?”

He shrugs. “Then you cry.”

“I think I’m out of tissues.”

“You can use my clean sleeve then. I’m sure it’ll do just fine,” he offers drily.

She quirks an eyebrow. Shoots him a dubious look.

“What? I’m not allergic to tears, Caroline, for Christ’s sake.” He rolls his eyes. Wanders closer again. “Not immune to them either, unfortunately, if that’s what troubles you,” he adds under his breath.

Dragging a desk chair behind him, he erects it near her bedside table with a flick of his wrist. And sits.

“But you’re allergic to me, is that it?”

When he opens his mouth to respond only to slam it shut, puzzled, she gestures nonchalantly and says, “You can sit next to me on the bed, Klaus. There’s more than enough room for two, you know. It’s not like I think you have cooties or anything.”

Scooting over and up, she pats the open area with her hand. He doesn’t move.

“Well, come on then!” she tries again, less sarcastically this time. “Take off your shoes so you can climb in here. It’s drafty.”

After a few more seconds of gawking silence, Caroline, feeling both tired and fed up, rolls her eyes before she launches herself onto her knees to grab him by the hand, forcibly tugging him down onto the sheets beside her—shoes be damned!

They crash back against the pillows intertwined: Klaus’ arm braced ‘round her shoulders to cushion the fall; her nose scraping the lapels of his jacket. Her chin bangs against his clavicle and they tumble into the headboard cuddling. It’s an accident, of course, but one that feels comfortable. Oddly natural, too. And instead of shrugging him off or pushing him back so she can erect an elaborate pillow fort between them like she ordinarily would, she veers from expectation and tradition by throwing the blanket over his legs.

Next, she curls into the crook of his neck. Rests a hand in the center of his chest. Exhales. And thaws against his side as she listens to the rush of his ancient heartbeat, feeling it thrum through her own bones like this lullaby:

‘Hold me close; hold me tight; and everything else will be alright,’

Klaus initially tenses at the intimate contact. Afraid to move a muscle in case she changes her mind or wants to pull away, probably.

When she doesn’t, he relaxes. One hand drops atop the one of hers already on his chest while the other fingers silky tresses near her ear, plucking them strand by strand so they fall back against her sweatshirt with a sweet tap tap. His mouth also teases the crown of her head. It hovers close enough for her to feel each tickle of his breath against her skin, but remains far enough away that she misses the softness of his lips.

Sliding down lower onto the mattress, he kicks his shoes off onto the floor, lets a foot hook around her ankle, then folds her tighter into the furnace of his arms.

“I must say,” he murmurs against her hair, “a literal pillow is the last thing I expected to be for you today.”

“It’s only because I’m cold. February sucks and I miss my mom, okay? Don’t read too much into it.”

“Whatever you say, love.”

“Oh, shut up, will you? I can hear your smirk from here,” Caroline huffs into his shirt.

“Ah, sweet, sweet proximity.” Klaus sighs contentedly. “It’s half the battle, truth be told.”

“Ugh! You’re so exhausting.”

“I don’t see why,” he answers wryly, “it’s not as if I’m complaining.”

“No, but I know what you’re thinking.”

“Perhaps you do,” he hums in that assured, taunting way of his, “but you can’t fault me for being more than willing to comfort you given the chance.” His fingers draw soothing circles on her back. “So, if body heat is what you need from me right now, then fine—take every last ounce of mine and zip yourself up in it. Wrap it around you like a duvet, because it’s all yours.”

“Suuure,” Caroline drawls sleepily. She yawns. “Until I accidentally elbow you in the nose once I fall asleep, you mean.”

“No. I’m here and I won’t leave you. Not even if you make me bleed,” Klaus says, all pretense gone.

“Oh, you and your ridiculous promises. I swear!”

He responds to this with a low chuckle. It soon flattens into something more weighted and measured when he draws her in to deposit a sweet, earnest kiss across her forehead.

“Ridiculous or not, sweetheart, the promises I make to you I do and will keep. You can count on that,” he adds in a whisper. “You can count on me.”

Emotion clogs her throat at this; stings the corners of her eyes.

It’s right at that moment, with Klaus’ firm and unshakable finality, and his body spooned around her, that Caroline feels a ring of fire spring to life around her heart, thawing her all the way through with hope and waking her up to one devastatingly beautiful enormity: he’s the one person left who’s always wanted to be there for her. And he isn’t going anywhere. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not in a hundred more lifetimes.

“I guess we’ll have to wait and see about that, won’t we?” she shivers, cuddling closer and melding into his warmth.

“Don’t worry, love. Time is on our side.” She feels Klaus’ lips tug upward in smile. They sweep across her forehead again in kiss, but this time, they deliver promise as well as comfort, “We will.”

Thanks for reading. xx

#klaroline #klarolineauweek #klaroline drabbles #klaroline fanfiction #half agony half hope #ashlee bree's writing endeavors

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literarygoon · 4 years

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So,

The forest surrounding Skmana Lake was like a symphony.

During the day a multitude of avian voices would permeate the foliage with their shrill tittering and plaintive screeches, and the resulting soundscape was inescapable for the lumberjacks running North America’s largest log flume during the summer of 1928. These barbarous men spent all their waking hours amidst the slow-groaning trunks of monstrous trees hundreds of years old, drunk on mountain air and confident in their relentless victory over nature. All around them was the constant applause of slapping leaves, the sighs and whispers of the wind, and the soothing burble of the flume’s diverted flow — which transformed into a sloshing roar every time they sent a log hurtling down to the Adams River eleven kilometres away.

Sometimes the work teams sung solemn, masculine hymns as they sawed, building to the thunderous climax of crashing wood when these noble titans would finally fall to mere men. They were David, and the trees were their Goliaths.

After his years in Scotch Creek, it took some time for Shuswap Joe to remember the language of the woods. After stashing his final shipment of Shu-Scotch in a remote crevice in the mountains, he’d spent nearly a year evading the authorities and devolving into the feral state of his youth before walking into a nearby logging camp and applying for a job under a fake name. It felt good to be in the company of men again, because his headspace was nothing but torturous, never-ending conversations with two women that he had loved, now dead. Their names were Mistress Molly and Lucy Applewater, and they haunted him with accusatory eyes, forever unsatisfied, these floating spectres from his past. Since the escape he’d become terrified by his own mind, and welcomed any distraction from the visions it conjured of bullet-riddled corpses, slit throats and fiery conflagrations.

Now that he was back in the forest, divorced from the belching chug of modern civilization, Joe regained his awareness of the music all around him. A squirrel proudly rhapsodizing for its mate, the percussive hiss of a mountain stream sluicing through moss-covered rocks, the crunching of leaves underfoot — all of these awakened a primal yearning within him that he couldn’t quite name. He had never been a religious man, and had never once stepped foot in a church, but nonetheless he felt the presence of a watchful deity controlling everything around him like a cosmic conductor. He longed to add his voice to the chorus, to find the right words to bellow into the wilderness, to transform his solitary sadness into a song.

Grief was his constant companion. As a younger man Joe had become convinced that fate was on his side, that the universe was conspiring on his behalf, but now it seemed the opposite was true. How else to explain his plummet? First he’d lost his mentor, then his bootlegging business, and finally his home at the River Eel Saloon. What had he done to deserve this? Why would the universe let him sip from the cup of prosperity, only to fling it away? More than once he found himself standing at the lip of some dizzying precipice, contemplating the plunge and what might await him on the other side. He felt like he’d already lived multiple lifetimes, like he couldn’t take any more sadness or loss, like his story was already written and simply waiting for an ending. Eventually, with tears dribbling into his tri-coloured beard, he would will himself away from the edge and beat his fists bloody against nearby tree trunks out of mournful frustration. What was the point of all this?

Then one night he happened upon a small grove of bobbing mushrooms, red-spotted and dew-slick in the moonlight, right as his stomach growled out in hunger. By this point his body had transformed from his Scotch Creek heyday, tautening with muscle from climbing trees and swinging axes, his broad shoulders narrowing to a washboard stomach. During his walkabouts he’d been living on a diet of berries, Shu-Scotch and the occasional river eel — so the proud fungi were a welcome feast. He plucked them up in handfuls, gobbling greedily, until the entire patch was bare before him. It reminded him of his youthful days living in solitude, back before Nanor stole his innocence, when the forest provided for his every need. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he murmured a quick prayer of thanks to the purple night sky and continued on his perambulation.

At first Joe didn’t acknowledge the warm throb in his jugular, the curious weightlessness of his limbs, the way his footsteps seemed to take on a deeper resonance. But before long he was singing, and it was as if he’d known the words all along.

“The river brought me life and the river taught me death,” he sang, his voice echoing through the silhouetted trees. “My mother gave me nothing and that’s all that I’ve got left.”

He wrapped one arm around a tree trunk and spun around it, dancing with his stationery partner. “The river taught me patience and the river taught me pain. My father gave me nothing and it’s with nothing I’ll remain.”

By the time he reached the second verse Joe’s soul had vacated his body to float formless in the ether. He was not himself, not really, but a universal energy that animated this silly little logger body. His selfhood was nothing but a stubbornly persistent illusion, just a temporary lodging for something far more eternal. Some part of him had always known this, he realized, so how had he forgotten? He watched himself traipse through the woods drunkenly the same way a parent watches their child take their first faltering steps. This was the beginning of something new.

Eventually he broke out to the shore of the Adams River, right by the mouth of the log flume. In front of him was the rapid known as the Lion’s Head, and the hellish current that had swept him into Nanor’s lair as a child. He’d seen it countless times in his nightmares, but never like this. As he stood in quiet rapture the scene began to transform before his eyes, swirling hypnotically, until the white light glinted across the waves. It was morning now, and he wasn’t alone. On the far bank a sun-browned pregnant woman was rising out of the water, dripping and naked, her dread-locked hair dangling to the base of her spine. She shrugged into a rainbow-coloured robe hanging from a nearby branch, then crossed to a small beach fire crackling amidst the rocks.

The river gave me life and the river taught me death. My mother gave me nothing and that’s all that I’ve got left.

In much the same way that Joe knew his body was an illusion, he now understood that somehow he was looking at his long-dead mother. Her robe flapped around her protruding stomach, which was decorated with deep pink claw marks. She was singing too, and her voice echoed to him across the water as she produced a handful of red powder and blew it luxuriously across the flames. The crimson cloud expanded, breaking into fiery spiralling spirits that dispersed far above her head. She was praying, Joe realized, or maybe performing some sort of ritual. Retrieving a small drum from the ground, she hopped and danced spasmodically, ululating along to the heart-like beat of her drum. Her music filled the air until it drowned out all other sound, until the music seemed to be coming from some cavern deep inside himself.

Then, just like that, she was standing beside him. He saw now that his mother’s face was streaked with soot, her eyes like glowing embers from her fire. She had been crying.

“I don’t understand what’s happening,” he said, to break the silence. “I don’t know how I got here.”

She smiled, but her eyes were still sad. “You don’t need to understand, my love. And you probably never will. We’re not meant to have the answers.”

“Will you tell me what to do next? I’m lost, and I don’t think I’ll ever be found. This world has taken everything from me. Everything that mattered to me, everything I built. It’s all gone.”

She cupped his face with one hand, and met his gaze. “You can never lose the things that matter. Every breath you take is a gift from me, a gift that I paid dearly for. The river has other plans for you.”

“What plans?”

“That’s not a question I can answer. It’s a question you’ll have to answer for yourself, sweet Joe. But keep your eyes on the heavens, because your salvation will come from the clouds. She’s coming already. She’s on her way and you have to be ready for her.”

“Who’s coming? Ready for who?”

His mother was crying again now, silent tears that drew lines in the soot. She let her hand drop back to her side, then took a moment to brush her dreadlocks past her shoulders. Somehow he knew without asking her that this would be the only time they would meet; he could see in her eyes that she was readying herself for a final goodbye. Behind her the flume erupted, and a log struck the river with a mighty splash. The world was starting to go dark around them as his vision blurred with tears. He was losing her all over again.

Just as she was fuzzing out of existence, he reached out to grab her and clasped nothing but air.

“Look to the skies,” she said. “That’s where you’ll find her.”

The Literary Goon

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