She laughs when you tell her that you're her flying buttress. "A flying what-tress?"
"Oh honestly," you huff, feigning exasperation. "It's only the most well-known component of Gothic church architecture. The most amusing component too, if my high school classmates were to be believed."
"That still doesn't explain why you've called called yourself a flying mattress," she counters with the smile she uses to let you know she's teasing, gently, secretly pleased you're playing along and unwilling to yield. You reach for her hand, uncurl the fist she's been clenching all day, and hold it up, "Don't move." You make an arch with your hand and lightly press your fingertips to hers.
"The innovation of the flying buttress meant that Gothic churches no longer needed to have heavy walls to resist lateral thrusts of the vaults. They steadied the structure, allowed for reduced wall surface, and meant that they could have larger windows, filled with stained glass."
She doesn't move her fingertips away from yours and you revel in the slight contact.
She gives you the smile she saves for when she's understood whatever fact you've lain at her feet, which is always, "Well, you know, the stained glass is the best part of any church. So I suppose anything that creates more beauty is worthy of consideration, despite having a silly name."
You slide your fingers between hers, grazing her knuckles and linking your hands together. "Truer words have not been spoken, pretty girl."
She bends and kisses your hand, "I love you, my flying fortress."
A/N: i was inspired by this fic: post/58952784048/xix
I'm also enamored of the following quote from Chad Harbach's The Art of Fielding, "Owen didn't want anything from Coach Cox - not a starting job, or a better spot in the batting order, or even any advice - and so Coach Cox could afford to treat him as an equal. Much the same way, perhaps, that a priest appreciates his lone agnostic parishioner, the one who doesn't want to be saved but keeps showing up for the stained glass and the singing."