"There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you." – Maya Angelou
He knew he couldn't be anything besides a writer because of what it did to him physically. There was a very long list of activities that he enjoyed, any number of paths he might have been able to pursue with success, but nothing else came close he effect that conjuring words and arranging them had on him. It was an all-consuming fire that smoked his vision, rendering him unable to see anything else, a burn that wrested control of his fingers from him and filled them with a sort of possession that wiped his mind clean. The story raged like a storm in some oceanic, impregnable depth in his head, coming up and out of him of its own pure volition. He was merely a vessel in those moments, where it was all speed and breathlessness and the crippling, pleasurable need to get it out, get it all out and onto the page, before his limited human mind caught up with him and blindly swallowed up all he wanted – needed – to say. Writing made him feel invincible, super human. It wasn't something he chose; rather, like something unworldly, it seemed to have randomly selected him.
What he loved almost as much as the heady rush of being struck by a fit of inspiration was that it usually came from nothing. Often, he found, he was stymied when he set time aside and repeated over and over to himself that he had writing to do. Forcing it had never done him good. Like exercise, it was well intentioned and beneficial, but sometimes his mind, like a stubborn muscle, refused to cooperate. These torrents that unleashed themselves onto his keyboard came without warning. It was clear skies, singing birds, the whole deal, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, it overtook him and created a stunning imbalance between body and mind. He wouldn't sleep, his eyes straining through the dark to connect with the unnaturally bright laptop screen, his deltoids raging from cruel overuse, the night slipping back into day, impatient, giving up on him ever retiring. But how could he? It was all a necessary sacrifice, like holding your breath in order to swim underwater. He just had to. It scalded his veins and punctured his lungs to act otherwise, a reflex, an instinct. All to later go back with a clearer mind, separated from the whole raucous ordeal, and smile at the words, read them like they came from someone else, proud and satisfied and physically and mentally at peace. Creating a world was a purge.
This time it doesn't come from nothing. This time the unavoidable, overwhelming, pulsing onslaught comes from everything.
She's sleeping on her stomach, her open mouth having found a perch against her outstretched arm. Her back is a slope in the dark, the exposed skin inviting and yet somehow too great to ruin with his touch. Her warmth consumes him, quiet, unmerciful, and it stills all the breath in his lungs because she came for him, pleaded for him, and now they're together. They shared control. They languished over each other's bodies. Naked in his bed, she's sleeping soundly, worn out from almost dying and from living all over him, against him, around him.
When he first met her, she made him write. A few looks, several distinguishable traits, a row of teeth sunk into a lip, and a breathy tease into his ear, and he found himself with a wealth of material to mine. He had never tired of watching her, never gotten bored, and even though it had long ago ceased to be about the books, he was constantly picking up on more and more, like her life was a spider web and he was able to watch as she caught it all so easily. A mystery he was never going to solve. He watches her breathe from the doorway and commits it all, takes it in, smiles with pride and satisfaction and peace because he has given her everything and will keep doing it, again and again and again, because it will never be enough.
He goes into his office after he finally tears his gaze away from her silhouette fighting back against the darkness. This is the only way he'll ever abandon her. He'll surrender to the need as it comes for him, only because he has to, only because this time the fire is building because his mouth has been intrepid within hers, because she's heaved perfect sobs against him, because she is returning his unchecked devotion. Finally.
It's enough of a trigger.
The ridges and valleys of the keyboard feel like a sigh of relief against the pads of his fingertips. He at once realizes this will take no effort. He will not have to exhaust himself searching for the words. They are already there, have always been there, inscribing the part of him that was fashioned from and for the inevitable. Her.
He taps her name against the keys. It emerges from the white, four letters that bind his chest, flood his throat with singing emotion. He does it again, like he's ensuring her life.
Kate. For Kate.
One rattling breath in the calm before the storm. One elongated moment. It's all he has, and then he is released, jumping down into a turbine of recently recorded memory that will forever brand him. He'll never forget any of it, not as long as he lives, but words have always been his way, integral to who he is, and there is nothing of him that he won't give of for her.
You were new to me and not at all in one moment. It was a realized dream, my discovery of you. And every new piece you offered to me was enough on its own to make any man feel that he had seen the promised land, but I kept going, addicted to the reveal, the exploration, wanting and claiming and reverently lavishing what I had been given. So new, like the discovery of fire, the change that is the catalyst for everything, the thing that elevates a pathetic creature and makes him worthy. Makes him human. It was building a new home, filling it with everything of mine that is of importance, of value, swearing upon each and every surface my commitment. It was revelation, and it was all I needed.
It was new, and yet it was nothing new. I knew you. Even as you came alive under me, even as I beheld worlds previously unknown – only dreamed of, longingly, constantly – I already knew it all. It was a past life catching up with me, inhabiting my hands so that they knew where to touch you, enlivening my mouth so that it knew how to taste you, animating my lips so that they knew what words to give you in those moments your eyes were begging for them. You're you, and I have loved you for so long that even with all the glorious new raining down on me, this overjoyed, grateful supplicant at your feet, I am given shelter by knowing you. My last first time, my final maiden voyage, was every time with you. I made love to you already knowing how to do so. Was there ever any other conclusion to us? I can't imagine it, Kate, because when I touch you (and know that I will always touch you), it's proven to all have been a circle. I've always known, and yet, I had had no idea.
A/N: Hello everyone! I've missed writing for my favorite show so dearly (though I've been reading some amazing fics to keep me quite occupied). I'm currently working on a fic I'm very excited about as well as hoping to update "White Blank Page." This was just something small that was a bit cathartic for me. I hope you enjoyed.
But of course (late disclaimer!) I don't own these characters (even though I mentally refer to them as my babies).
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Thanks for stopping by!