Title: How to Solve Our Problems
Rating: T
Category: Harry verse, Richard/Camille, Established Relationship, Arguments
Summary: They hadn't had an argument of this intensity in years, so perhaps they were due one.
A/N: Set around the same time as "Futures" and "The Story" within Harry Verse. Bit of inspiration from a scene in Broadchurch that people who have watched that show may recognise. Lots of mentions/discussions of sex.
It was easy to tell if the children were out when he got home, because the house was so very silent without them. He could hear movement somewhere within the place, so Camille must have be back. He frowned, Camille had left work a little before him to go pick up Harry from school and Alex from nursery – so if she was here shouldn't they be as well? Had he forgotten something?
He located Camille loading the washing machine. "Where are the children?" he asked, as he took a moment to enjoy the angle she was currently presenting him. If it has been him, Camille probably wouldn't have resisted the urge to slap him on the bum, but he could never bring himself to do such a thing. It felt inappropriate, which was odd given how long they had been together.
She stood and turned to face him, "Harry has a birthday party after school today, remember? I picked him up and dropped him off their. And Alex is with my Mother because she felt left out, so Maman is taking her to that soft play centre and then she'll pick up Harry and bring them both home. Don't worry, you'll have your kids back in a couple of hours."
"Two hours?" He asked, not quite able to keep the excitement out of his voice. For the past two weeks Harry, Camille, He and Alex had gotten ill with some sort of vomiting virus in succession. This had meant he and Camille had not had the opportunity to be intimate in a fortnight. If the kids were gone for two hours, it seemed like a pretty ideal time to rectify that situation. Normally he and Camille were pretty much on the same page about such matters, but she wasn't returning his grin – instead it looked like something was seriously bothering her.
"What is the matter?" he asked, taking half a step towards her. She made a vague sort of gesture with her arm in the direction of the front room, and he realised whatever was bothering her was serious enough that she wanted to talk about it somewhere more comfortable than the utility room. He obediently followed her, but she didn't sit down as he expected – she seemed rather nervous.
"You know Jessica's Dad, William Steele?" She asked.
Richard thought carefully, but he wasn't much for spending a lot of time at the school gates, and though he could vaguely picture the girl he wasn't sure who her father was. "Not really," he admitted. "I would probably recognise him if I saw him."
"Well, maybe that is for the best." That seemed like a strange thing to say, but before he could question it Camille ploughed on with her story. "Today I arrived a bit early to pick up Harry and he was already there and he came over to chat to me and he was being a bit, um, flirty."
Richard shrugged, "Men paying you attention is hardly anything new." Camille glared at him for the interruption, so he decided he better let her finish before he spoke again.
"Well towards the end of the conversation he suddenly asked me if I wanted to grab a drink some time, that he knew a nice quiet bar up in the hills that was really rather discrete…"
Sod the not interrupting vow, Richard might not have ever been an expert in flirting but even he could figure out the not so subtle hints given by this William Steele fellow, "WHAT?" he half exploded. "Tell me he didn't realise that you were married, and that he isn't married either?"
Camille raised a hand in a placating gesture, and he made an attempt to calm down a little, crossing him arms so he didn't end up flailing them about in his rage. "I'm afraid he did know and I was married and he is married too. Obviously I said no very firmly and pointed out I was married. Apparently his excuse was 'not everyone is happily married', and I let him know I was. I then had to listen to another few minutes of him explaining how he doesn't 'get what he needs' from his wife anymore."
Richard did not doubt that Camille would have turned the man down, so her telling him that she had did not calm him down in the slightest. "You'll have to point him out to me, I need to have a word with him!"
"No, Richard, why?" Camille looked like this was exactly what she was afraid would happen. "I've dealt with it. He won't try again."
"He won't try again with you," Richard argued back. "But he could be hitting on somebody else's wife tomorrow."
"Is that really our business?" Considering how much anger Camille retained over her own father leaving, Richard was a little surprised by her reticence to get involved. Or perhaps she feared his interference would cause the man to leave his wife and child – but surely that was better than them being kept in the dark. She could see the resolution on his face, and with a small sigh asked, "Well, what are you going to say to him then?"
"I'm going to tell him he needs to talk to his wife and sort out their problems properly," he said. Camille looked quite impressed. "And if not he should divorce her."
That did not go down so well, and his earlier theory about her unwillingness to interfere seemed increasingly likely. He could tell she was particularly angry not because she immediately began shouting at him, no, if she had he would probably be alright. It was the fact that she had stilled and gone silent. A silent Camille was very much a deadly Camille.
"You're going to tell him to divorce his wife?" She asked, in the quiet voice he had learnt to fear very early on in their relationship. Richard couldn't remember the last time she had used it though.
"If they can't sort out their problems," he reminded her.
"But you think that because she won't sleep with him, he should leave her?" She persisted in her line of questions.
Richard couldn't help himself, he answered with another question, "You would rather he have an affair than leave his wife?"
"That is not what I was saying and you know it! Now don't avoid my question!" She snapped straight back. Richard was starting to feel angry himself now, felt that Camille was being unreasonable. If she just thought about it she would see he was right.
"I think he should get a divorce rather than have an affair! Especially when one of the women he tries to crack on to is my bloody wife! He is clearly unhappy if he is looking for other women, and I doubt she can be happy either because I am pretty sure happy couples have sex." She opened her mouth to reply, but he got in before she could, pointing at her and saying, "And before you start arguing back I will remind you again that I said they should try to sort out their problems first."
"I am willing to accept that," she spat, though she hardly sounded sincere. "What I am not willing to accept is your apparent attitude that a wife should exist to satisfy her husband's sexual urges!"
"Now you are being deliberately contentious!" He threw his arms in the air and turned away from her whilst he tried to take a moment for a few calming breaths. However Camille misinterpreted the action as him trying to hide something from her.
"Oh I'm being deliberately contentious, thinking a woman has a right to say no!"
"I DID NOT SAY SHE DOESN'T!" He exploded, but how could he not given the accusation? What the hell was she thinking, why were they having this argument?
Camille must have realised on some level that wasn't what he was saying, because she didn't push that particular point any further. It didn't mean she was finished with the argument though, "So, I suppose if I decided I didn't want to have sex with you anymore, you would divorce me."
The answer to that came to him surprisingly easily, "I wouldn't have to divorce you, I'm pretty sure we'd kill each other before either of us had the chance to contact a lawyer."
That shut her up, well for all of 10 seconds at least, "What is that supposed to mean?"
"Oh we sort out half our problems using sex," he couldn't help using a tone that implied his answer had been oh so obvious.
"No we don't," she denied. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"Camille you still do things that wind me up nearly every day…" That probably wasn't the best way to open his explanation, because it meant Camille wasn't willing to let him finish it without comment.
"And you think I'm not annoyed by you and your pedantic arguments and your, your pompousness and, and, and your complete inability to let a minor grammar mistake slide!"
"Argh!" He rubbed his hands across his face. "Are we arguing about grammar now? Because I think I have better things to do if we are."
"NO!" She said loudly, coming forward to poke him in the chest, something that really riled him. "No, we are still arguing about sex."
"There you go, something I'd rather be doing than having this argument!" He said this even though he knew it would (if it was possible at this stage) make her angrier.
"Yes, of course, because that is how we solve our problems isn't it? So of course you want to have sex now!"
"Yeah I do," he wasn't shouting anymore, given her current proximity there was very little point. He'd always thought she was beautiful when she was angry, and despite still being really quite pissed off with her it was those sorts of thoughts that were starting to come to the forefront of his mind. But he had one card still to play, "And I don't think I'm the only one…"
Her instant reaction was to bristle at Richard's implication, but then Camille realised she had a bit of a predicament on her hands. Somehow, she had become pressed up against him during the fight. His hands were resting lightly on her hips, her palms flat against his chest. She had no memory of how this had come to occur, but she knew that the main reason for her high heart rate and heavy breathing might not be anger after all. She wanted him. Camille looked up into his face and tried to will him to kiss her. She knew it was unlikely. Richard rarely won arguments outright, and was perfectly aware he had a chance to score some major point here. Eventually, with a growl of frustration, she hit him hard on the chest with her fists and then pressed her lips hard against his.
Thankfully, he responded instantly, wrapping his arms around her waist and somehow finding a way to pull her closer. She shoved the jacket from his shoulders and on to the floor whilst Richard was concentrating his efforts on getting the buttons of her shorts undone. Camille decided he probably had the right idea about not removing more clothes than were necessary. As tempted as she was to just drag him down on to the floor, the only logical part of her brain still functioning reminded her that they might be just a tad old for that now, so she started pushing him towards the bedroom all whilst refusing to stop kissing him. They made it to the bed, with the odd stumble…
Afterwards Camille lay half collapsed on top of him. They were both breathing heavily, not quite able to speak yet. Her head is buried in his neck, and Richard eventually brought a hand up to stroke her hair before shifting and gently disentangling their limbs. Camille plucked at the material of Richard's shirt, which he was still wearing as they never got round to removing it, and then almost at the same moment they both began to laugh. Richard reached an arm out blindly to the bedside table where he normally kept a bottle of water and ever the gentlemen offered it to Camille first. She took a few much needed gulps before she passed it back to Richard, who drank about half the bottle.
"I don't remember the last time we ended one of our fights like that," he said, stroking her hair again.
"Well we haven't really had a proper fight like that since the children came along," Camille replied. "We did use to have them all the time when we were staring out. Do you remember our first big fight?"
"Yes," He said, and she could hear the embarrassment in his voice. Towards the start of their relationship they had fought one evening whilst at her mother's bar. One second they'd be screaming at each other out on the patio and the next she was dragging him upstairs, into her old room. They'd fallen asleep afterwards, Richard on too big a high after the lovemaking to really think about where they were. In the morning her mother had breezed in with tea and coffee with them both and she didn't think Richard had ever been more mortified.
"So you two made up then?" Her mother had asked. Camille had to answer, because Richard had frozen and was presumably trying to wish himself out of existence.
"Yes, Maman, we made up. Thank you for the coffee." When she had made to sit on the edge of the bed, probably in order to discuss breakfast options or quite possible just for a chat, Richard had practically squeaked. Camille had felt sorry for him, so said to her mother firmly, "We'll be out in a little while!" Catherine had taken the hint.
"I thought we had agreed to never mention that again" Richard said now, it amused her the memory could still make him squirm with discomfit.
"Oh come in, it is hardly the one and only time it has happened!" Camille protested. Richard groaned, he probably didn't want to remember the half a dozen other occasions her mother had caught them post-sex. Thankfully she had never interrupted them during it. "Fine, here is a better example, how about the time we were fighting in the car because I wanted to start trying for a baby straight away and you wanted to find a new house first."
"Camille, I can't look at our car without remembering that most days!" She giggled at that.
"God, we do sort out of problems with sex, don't we?" She finally admitted.
"Oh Christ!" He covered his face with his hands. "I'm sorry about what I said earlier, about you winding me up all the time, in my head I sort of had a rather romantic statement all planned out but it just went horribly wrong!"
"Well it wouldn't be the first time…"
"No, look," he rolled on to his side and she shifted on to hers so they were facing each other. "I know that I wind you up every day as well, say the wrong thing…"
She felt the need to assure him she was hardly perfect, "Yes, and sometimes I snap at you unnecessarily and God knows what else."
He didn't comment on that, "Anyway, I always felt that, you know, when it comes to the end of the day and when we, you know, still make love it's like your forgiving me for all the times I was an idiot that day."
Camille smiled softly, reached a hand up and gently stroked a finger down his cheek, "That is rather romantic. But you know, you should be glad you didn't manage to get it out."
He looked puzzled, "And why is that?"
"Well if you had said that, it is very likely I would have immediately stopped being mad at you and taken you to bed to make passionate love. But you didn't, so this way you got to have angry sex and make passionate love."
He grinned, "I've always loved your optimism."
Catherine loved her grandchildren, but right now she was exhausted, and was rather glad of the fact that she could hand them back. Alexandra had 'gotten stuck' at the soft play centre, insisting Catherine clamber awkwardly up to rescue her, but really the girl had just wanted her to come and play. The two children had bickered on the walk back and though it was only a mile she had seriously considered hailing down a taxi – or calling Richard to come get them in the car. She had persevered though, and with relief opened the front door with her key.
Harry immediately ran off to his room to fetch some book he had been talking about on the way home and was desperate to show Catherine. Alex threw herself dramatically on to the sofa and switched on the television, in search of any of the programmes she was so passionate about. She had sort of expected her daughter or son-in-law to appear at the arrival of their children, but that was not the case. She feared for a moment they might not actually be here, but then she noticed a shoe discarded in the hall, and she knew exactly where they were.
Catherine knocked very loudly on the bedroom door, and prayed they had at least checked the time to make sure they were finished before she came back. There was no reply, so she cautiously opened it. Richard appeared to be practically comatose in bed, and the sound of the shower told Catherine of her daughter's whereabouts. Ah, it was time for one of Catherine's favourite activities, making Richard as uncomfortable as possible…
"Richard!" She called brightly. "I've brought your children back!"
Though he had slept through the knock, the sound of her voice was enough to wake him. He sat up very quickly looking exactly as horrified as she had expected. He glanced down to confirm the sheet was actually covering him and then cleared his throat, "Right, yes, if you just give me a minute I'll, um…"
Catherine had no intention of leaving just yet. "So, you and Camille enjoyed having a break from the children then?" She phrased it as a question, even though it was clearly fact.
"Uh…Yes?"
He was still able to reply, so Catherine needed to up her game. She therefore walked further into the room, pausing to pick up Camille's shorts and underwear and fold them neatly on to a chair. When she turned back, Richard looked like he was willing a hole to open up in the ground and swallow him. "I do think it is important that couples find the time to be intimate with each other." Ah, excellent, he was now blushing profusely. "Honestly, Richard, you needn't be so embarrassed. This is hardly the first time I've caught you in this situation. Perhaps you should consider investing in an alarm clock…"
"Oh stop teasing him, Maman," her daughter said as she emerged from the en suite in her towel. "He deserved the nap!"
"Camille!" Richard squeaked in protest, causing both women to start laughing at him.
"Do you want to stay for dinner?" Camille asked her, and Catherine nodded an agreement before retreating to allow Richard's embarrassment to diffuse a little.
Harry was practically shivering with excitement when Catherine went back to the front room, clutching a copy of 'Bugs Rule! An Introduction to the World of Insects' Catherine sat down and resigned herself to Harry telling her about every species in the book until something else came along to distract him.
"And this one is called Oak Processionary Moth!" He was explaining with gusto when his mother entered the room.
Camille, seeing the book Harry had out, shot her a sympathetic look and then said the magic words that got the attention of children everywhere, "What shall we have for dinner?"
Harry and Alex both leapt to their feet and began putting in requests at the same time, it was impossible to understand what either of them were saying. Richard now followed his wife into the room and tried to restore some order, "Hey, hey! One at a time."
He pointed at Harry first. Camille had confessed to Catherine that he kept a book detailing when he let either child get their own way, so that things would always be split evenly between them. Clearly it was Harry's turn to get his say first. Of course, they had needn't of bothered, because Harry requested what he always requested.
"Can we have pancakes for dinner?"
Richard looked amused, but Camille let out a rather dramatic sigh that was then copied by Alex, who also rolled her eyes. This seemed to increase Richard's amusement.
Camille's voice took on a long suffering tone, one Catherine recognised from all the times she had to explain to Camille that they could not have crisps instead of vegetables, "Harry every day for the last 4 months you have asked me if we can have pancakes for dinner."
"Yes," the boy replied simply.
"I don't want pancakes," Alex piped up, she had remained silent for a remarkable amount of time. "I want crepes."
"Right, then, both of you. In the last 4 months how many times have I actually said yes to pancakes or crepes for dinner?" Ah, Camille was trying to appeal to the scientist in Harry. He might have grasped the concept of a hypothesis and experimental design years ago, but Catherine still felt reasoning with a nine year old was pointless. In her experience, children didn't respond to reason until they were about 25.
"Twice, on my birthday and on Shrove Tuesday," he replied smartly.
"And I have also told you, both of you, that those are the only days I will ever let you have pancakes for dinner. So what are you hoping to achieve by asking me repeatedly?" Camille sounded truly exasperated. Alex decided to ignore her mother and do forward rolls on the sofa instead. Harry, however, seemed quite pleased she had asked.
"An anonymous result," he replied.
Catherine exchanged a confused look with her daughter, but then Richard stepped in, "I think you mean anomalous, Harry."
"Yes, that, anomanous!"
"Anomalous," Richard enunciated clearly.
"That's what I said!"
Seeing his son's frustration, Richard backed down. It was pretty close anyway. Camille was staring at Richard now, a look that said 'this is your fault, there is no way he inherited that from me and I expect you to deal with it'. Camille turned around, probably about to tell Harry his father would be explaining why they were not having pancakes, but paused when Richard suddenly wrapped his arms around her from behind and whispered in her ear, before kissing her quickly on the neck. Catherine had no idea what he said, but it certainly made Camille smile. The children both looked dismayed by the display of affection, Harry making a face and Alex crossing her arms and glaring as if her parents were on some sort of final warning.
With a small sigh, Camille conceded. "Fine, we're having pancakes for dinner!"
"I don't want pancakes!" Alex cried out.
"I'll make you crepes, Alex!" her mother reassured her. Camille would actually make exactly the same thing for everyone, but Alex didn't seem to care as long as the name they were given upon presentation to her was correct.
"You know what this means, don't you Harry?" Richard asked his son.
"I have an annoymillus result!" He cried happily. "And I get pancakes for dinner. Best day ever!"
"Ah, but when scientists get anomalous results they have to try and come up for an explanation for them," Richard pointed out, causing Harry to frown with contemplation as he considered the matter.
"Well, you did whisper something to Mum just before she agreed," Harry piped up.
"Very good observation there, my son," Richard said, looking genuinely pleased.
"So did you blackmail her into making pancakes?" Harry asked seriously. "Because you know that's against the law, Dad."
Richard lost the pleased look. Catherine, on the other hand, burst into laughter.
A/N: Willowsticks assures me that 'cracks on to' is an actual phrase. I have never heard of it, but used it in the story regardless.