Short story

Author's note: I got a request to write an unapologetically romantic flash fiction short story set during a time when Gin and Sherry were in a relationship in which they actually consider/confess their feelings. You could say this is as close as I came, though if you're at all familiar with my portrayal of Gin's character talking seriously about what he feels in not exactly within him. Which is why the premise of this story is shortly after their first time when emotions and brain chemicals are running high. As for this story being unapologetically romantic, you'll have to decide for yourself.

A distant figure in a white coat and blue scarf hunched her shoulders against the cold and made her way across the park's paths to where Gin stood.

Winter wind whistled through the barren boughs and blossomless branches overhead. The botanical gardens had been drained of vivid color, leaving the ponds to echo the dull wash of browns and occasion spot of evergreen. In a matter of months those same ponds would instead reflect the stark contrast of spring grass and subtle pink shower of pastel petals. Now, however, there remained little vegetation left in the gardens to sway with the wind's call.

Several strands of her red-brown hair, vibrant in comparison to her surroundings, whipped into her face and across her red flushed cheeks. She wrapped her heavy winter scarf a third time around her neck and scowled at Gin as she came up to him.

"You're singularly awful at picking romantic locations to meet up, you know." Her angry pout was only made cuter by the bright red hue of her cheeks from the cold. It suited her coloring.

"Heh," he pulled on an amused grin and tugged an olive green beany from his jacket. He slipped it over her wind-blown hair, still treated to a glare from Sherry. She'd left the item at his apartment and refused to dawn it that morning despite the cold because it didn't match the outfit she'd decided on. "And you're not particularly good at choosing locations secluded enough to meet up." He answered in kind.

"Barren is more like." She eyed the gnarled trunks of trees and the remaining twigs of ground cover that looked like they had been combed over by something that had raked the life from them. "And too cold."

"So long as it chases other people away." He offered her an arm.

She gave a huff, but pulled closer to him all the same and started walking along the path with him. "Is it any wonder we're alone here; what's the point of coming to a place designed for viewing cherry blossoms when there are none to see exactly?"

He glanced at her. Her lips were still pressed together and she eyed the branches as though she gave personal offense that they had dropped their leaves in the previous season. That wouldn't do. "I assume you mean to ask what matter was of such importance to warrant a place so deserted."

"Well?" she muttered to the gravel in front of her.

He stopped, and she was jerked back by the unexpected tether of his arm. He spun her back into him and secured both arms over her front. She gasped. He grinned. "It's so if I want to grab you and kiss your neck like this," he spoke directly to her ear and kissed the back of her neck. "I don't have to think about the dozens and dozens of people crammed on blankets under the trees on that hill over there, or the milling crowds on the paths." Her fiery hair brushed against his face, the most vivid and fragrant thing in the area. He felt the fast beat of her surprised heart beneath his arms.

A rather flustered "Oh," was all she managed. He tugged her scarf loose and continued to kiss along the side of her neck. She put up with this for a moment before turning to face him. She paused a time to regain her breath before asking. "So there's not something about work we needed to talk about?"

"Not today," he answered, studying her face at their close proximity. He had a different kind of conversation in mind that afternoon, one of the sort that didn't require so many bothersome words. Her cheeks burned an even brighter shade of red than they had from merely the cold. She hadn't been so effortless embarrassed in much more intimate situations just the previous night, but perhaps it was the public setting that had her so responsive. He'd be telling a great lie if he said he didn't enjoy her flustered reactions.

"You're staring." She broke a long moment of eye contact with a coy glance at their feet. He raised an accusing brow. And she hadn't been? He gestured to a nearby retaining wall of large river stones that would offer a decent place to rest, and she took the opportunity to break away and take a seat. "So-" she began, the idea for how she was going to progress the conversation never fully forming on her lips.

Her eyes had found his again. Neither of them seemed to notice the lack of words to serve as background to the banter of their steady gazes. "The reason-" she tried again, "if not work, why meet here?"

"Isn't it natural?" He stepped closer to the wall where she had pinned her position. "To want to see you after last night?" In truth, he wanted to do significantly more than see her.

He leaned minutely closer to that desire with every second that passed. The rock wall she sat on was just above the level of his waist and he stepped between where she scissored her legs.

She bent her head down and kissed the edge of his mouth lightly, then hovered there with the side of her face against his. "Why do I feel like I'm the only one terrified of where we're going? Of everything we're doing… and the future…"

"Because you're not close enough yet to feel how my heart is racing." He reached out and pulled her against his chest from the small of her back. Their necks fit together like two halves of a locket. He had spent his whole professional life suppressing fear and masking its symptoms. Allowing himself to be shaken was dangerous. He wrapped the whole of her slight back in the fold of his arms. "It petrifies me like nothing else I've ever faced; How much I want you, need you; what that means; what it changes." But still, that fear didn't extinguish the ache for her. "And even knowing that, I still want you."

She let out a breath like she was relieved and pulled back so she could see his face. She was grinning like she was in the middle of a laugh, the corners of her eyes gathering water. He kissed her on a sudden whim to taste that happiness and was not disappointed.