Hey!
So this a crack! pairing one-shot and a bit fluffy and I'd love some feedback/advice because to be totally honest I'm not so confident in my fluff skills.
Also major thanks to Tash (all the lost souls) for beta-ing. She helped me so much.
Well. That's all. Enjoy :)
"But, Daddy, you don't even know him!" Massie Block screech-protested. This could not be happening. Was the world really breaking apart beneath her feet, or did it just feel that way?
"I don't need to know him," William Block replied firmly. "He's nineteen years old, Mass!"
"And?" Massie shot back, but she could feel the conversation slipping out of her control. The enormous entry foyer suddenly seemed chilled, as if the temperature had dropped a few degrees.
William looked incredulous. "And that's three years older than you!"
"So? Dempsey Solomon was three years older (A/N: I fudged it a bit from the book) than me," she countered, hands on her hips. She hoped no one could see the panic in her eyes and desperately wished there was a mirror somewhere, so she could see if she was masking it properly. Or if her mascara was smudged.
"It was two and a half," William said stiffly, "and you were in eighth grade."
"Nothing has changed." Was this what it felt like to beg? "And I really want you to get to know him before you starts 'forbidding'"—she made vicious air quotes that made William flinch—"me to see him."
"I am your father," William said steadily, but he was looking at the delicately polished spiral staircase behind her. "And I am allowed to enforce certain restrictions."
Massie opened her mouth to protest, or scream—she hadn't quite decided which one to go with— but he cut her off, his brown eyes meeting her amber ones.
"Mass, you've been lucky. I never gave you a curfew or set a limit on your credit card. Once, you got expelled out of school and I could have come down a lot harder." He paused, exhaling in a tired way. He started to pace back and forth, Kendra looking on anxiously. He turned to meet her eyes again. "Maybe I should have come down a lot harder on you. But my point is, you've had it easy. You've had it good. You got everything you ever wanted. And now, why can't you seem to do the one thing I ask you to?"
"Those other things, they don't matter! None of it matters! Give me a damn curfew, then. Take my stupid Visa away!" Massie shrieked hysterically. How could they do this to her? To them? She thought of the way his hair feel in front of his eyes and his beautiful, beautiful smile. The magical tingle that spread from her stomach throughout her body whenever they were together. They could not take that away from her. But they were.
She wanted to throw something, but there was really nothing to throw, besides the heavy silver candlesticks on the table next to her, and she doubted she could actually lift those.
William just shook his head slowly and looked away. Kendra bit her lip. Massie felt her mouth closing. Oh my God. They're actually serious, she thought numbly, they won't let me see him. They're not going to change their minds.
Desperately, she turned to Kendra, who had been mostly silent since Massie had waltzed in, cheeks flushed and glowing, spilling everything about him. "Mom! This isn't fair. Tell him it isn't fair!" Her voice cracked.
Kendra unpursed her lips and looked cautiously at her husband. "William, I really don't think it's that big of a deal—"
"Of course you don't," William snapped and resumed his pacing. "Even if I meet him that's not gonna change the fact that you both want me to condone her dating some guy in community college, with tattoos of God knows what—"
"He has no tattoos!" Massie yelled, before turning around and exhaling noisily in frustration.
"—who considers playing guitar in some broken-down bar a career and just wants to take advantage of her?"
"Dad!" Massie protested, making a disgusted noise and then covering her ears with her hands.
"That's not fair," Kendra said. "I'm just saying maybe you could just give him a chance? We should at least meet him first."
"You know, that's the problem with you," William said hotly, stopping his pacing once again. "You start with an inch of freedom and then you end up giving her a fucking football field worth of it."
"Oh, so it's my fault?" Kendra sounded outraged and her voice pitched up an octave, her face turning red with outrage. "I wasn't the one who gave her a credit card when she was still in elementary school! I said to wait until she turned eighteen, not eight!"
"That was for emergencies. And at least I try to set boundaries! You'd just be waving her off as she drives away with some pothead in a hippie van."
"Ew, that would never happen," Massie blurted. "Hippie vans are so disgusting."
Kendra started to open her mouth and suddenly Massie felt tired. Tired of the fighting. Tired of them taking digs at each other and using her as ammunition.
"Fine! Forget it," Massie said loudly, causing them both to look at her. "You win," she said to William. Her shoes clicked against the wooden floor as she stomped around angrily, hoping to make it to her room before she burst into tears.
oOo
She curled up on her bed, phone to her ear and fingers anxiously playing with the edge of her Mexican blanket, waiting impatiently until he picked up. Beep…beep…beep…be—
"Hey." Finally! Her face split into a grin, even though there were still tear tracks on her face. His voice was like a raft in the middle of a raging storm. Without it, she'd have sunk a long time ago.
"How did it go with your parents?" Kendra and William's arguing could still be faintly heard. Phrases like 'all your fault' and 'should have never trusted you' and 'you ruin everything' floated up the stairs and into her head. She shook her head angrily, wishing the thoughts would scatter with the motion and fly across the room and into her garbage to be forgotten. But they stayed, stubbornly, in her head, like a horror clip constantly repeating itself.
"My dad freaked and said I couldn't see you anymore." She rolled her eyes. "But it's okay. I'll get around it."
His end was silent for a moment. "What, are you going to lie to them now and sneak around?"
"Awh, you're concerned. That's too cute. But seriously, don't worry. If they ask, I'll say I'm going to visit Cam. Or Alicia. Or anyone else."
After a moment—she sensed he was trying to read her through the phone, find out where she was emotionally— he said, "Are you sure it's okay?"
"Yes," Massie lied. "It's fine."
"I love you no matter what," he said gravely.
Massie attempted to smile, but she almost burst into tears instead. Why couldn't they just give him a chance and see how amazing he was, just like she had? "I love you too, Harris."
oOo
The smell of Inez's homemade paella roused Massie out of the nap she hadn't planned on taking. Groggily, she looked at the time. Eight o'clock already? She headed to the bathroom to freshen up, but the sight of her tearstained face just reminded her of the argument with her father that had led to yet another fight between Kendra and William.
She splashed some water on her face, re-did her make-up and changed out of her now-wrinkled clothes into something nicer.
The front doorbell rang and the chime echoed throughout the vast mansion. Wondering who it could be, Massie frowned and headed to the entry foyer. William was already there, his large frame blocking out the visitor, but by the way his back stiffened, it was either solicitors or her Aunt Marge.
"Dad, who is it?" Curiosity getting the better of her sworn oath to never speak to him again, Massie looked at her father uncertainly. "Dad?"
William turned to face her, his mouth in a straight line, and she finally got a glimpse of the visitor. "I'm going to tell Inez to set an extra plate for dinner," he said curtly before marching off.
The leather jacket, those green eyes, they were all familiar, but it took a minute for her brain to take it all in. She didn't understand. "Harris?"
"What are you doing here?" Massie said through a plastered smile, which, incidentally, she let crash to the floor the minute William was well out of earshot. "Didn't I tell you this place doubles as a war zone?"
"You might have mentioned that," he said wryly, his eyes darting around her house. It was the first time she had seen him the least bit intimidated. She'd been imagining having him standing her doorway for a few days now, but actually seeing it was…unnerving. The atmosphere was colder than it had been in her fantasies.
"Harris." Massie spoke slowly and seriously. "Why are you doing this?"
His green eyes locked onto hers and that tingling magical feeling came with such a vengeance she found it hard to breathe. "Because you're amazing. And I don't want you to have to lie or hide or choose me over your family."
"But it's fine," Massie stated airily, trying to make the entire matter seem more casual, to lighten the growing tension. "I want to be with you and I don't care what they think."
"Yes, you do. Because you have morals and if I made you break them, I wouldn't deserve you."
"You do understand," Massie stepped closer to him, "my dad might actually take the rifle off of the mantel and shoot you."
He cupped her face. "I'd take a bullet for you."
"You're so cheesy."
"I try."
"Harris…" she murmured softly, smile fading, eyes looking up at him.
"Massie, I want them to know about us," he said looking straight in her eyes, holding onto a connection so fragile and frayed.
She went up on her tiptoes, her face so close to his. She could practically feel the electricity crackling around them.
"I love you, fool," she whispered, her lips crashing against his. They parted like the Red Sea under the pressure and she tangled her hands through his hair and he pulled her tiny waist closer to him. She quieted his moans with her mouth and felt a shiver past through her body when her shirt rode up a bit and his bare hand touched her skin.
"Whoa," he said, breaking away. "If you do that during dinner, he might actually shoot me."
"Come on, Romeo," she laughed, grabbing his calloused hand. "Dinner with the Capulets?"
oOo
"Are you okay?" His thumb wiped away stray tears from her cheek. She turned away from him, wondering why she had even come. His messy apartment was dark and oddly menacing, but then again, everything seemed darker right now.
"Hey, hey," Harris said gently. "Don't do that, don't shut me out."
"Harris, it's all falling apart, it's always going to fall apart," she leaned against him, closing her eyes. "What does it matter?" she asked quietly. His apartment was eerily quiet, so silent she could actually hear the pulse of his heart through his shirt. The steady tick-tock beats made him feel more real, more vulnerable. Like this was the turning point. They could be something serious, or they could be nothing. And that scared her.
"Mass," he turned her around and she realized how stupid they must look, sitting on the tiled kitchen floor, his back to the kitchen island and her in some stunned stupor. His green eyes searched her face. "People fall out of love all the time, but just because they stopped loving each other doesn't mean they stopped loving all together. They still love you and the future's not set yet, Massie. They still love each other; they just need to remember how."
Massie looked up at him, her eyes watery but her face dry. Her features where set in a broken expression, her emotions, for once, splayed out clearly across her face, as they had been since Kendra and William had told her they were separating. The fading light of dusk emitted from a dusty window, illuminating her amber eyes in a haunting way.
"That's beautiful," she said, her voice faraway and so distant. He could almost believe she wasn't here, that she was someplace far away from all the pain and the heartbreak. Some place with butterflies and fairy godmothers and where a wish upon a star actually came true. "That's really beautiful."
Harris wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight, hating how defeated she looked and the pain in her eyes and the hurt that was in a place in her heart so deep even he couldn't reach it.
oOo
They stayed like that for a long time, until dusk faded into dark, until blurred grayish-white stars dotted the night sky, and until they sharpened and became more defined and twinkled like diamonds, and until it all faded into nothingness. They stayed together, two people trying to believe in love in a world where everyone was degrading it.
oOo
"Thank you."
The autumn wind swept her auburn hair under her gray knit beret around her face, but for once she didn't seem to notice. He leaned against the doorframe of his apartment complex. He wished for the millionth time things were different; that he had a better job, that he had made something better with his life so William would actually accept him.
"For what?" he asked, genuinely curious.
Massie looked down at her shoes. "What you said about people falling out of love. I know you thought I wasn't really listening, but I was. And," she paused, eyes flicking as quickly up to meet his as they did to meet the ground again, "and it really helped."
"I meant it," Harris said, wondering what it was about her that made him so painfully honest. "I don't want anything to hurt you like that."
"Harris," she murmured, her eyes finding his, uncertainty gone. She moved closer, almost as if she couldn't help it. Her gloved hands took his face and brought it closer to hers. Her lips were cold but he barely noticed.
"Harris, I think I'm in love with you."
People come into your life all the time. Some for a short time, some for a long time. Some you never realize and some who change everything you are. They give you more than memories. They give you happiness. Sadness. Tears, laughter, cries, pain, hurt, love, kindness, joy, luck. But sometimes, you just want someone to give you what's impossible. Someone to stay when you say leave. Someone to wait when you say go. Someone who hears what you can't bring yourself to say out loud.
Stay with me.
Because I need you.
Hope it was enjoyable :)
xx
Bree