full title: on a tree in the garden i carved your name and the word is spelled desire
apparently it's too long for fanfiction dot net *facepalm*
so this was originally supposed to be part of a longer fic i was working on which got put on a hold. i don't know if i'll ever finish it but if i do, i'm still probably gonna use this scene regardless of posting it now on its own.
Slender beams of moonlight filtered in through Monmouth's floor to ceiling windows, illuminating the outlines of Gansey's miniature ghost town. With the light of the desk lamp he'd placed on the ground, he was able to see every detail with precise accuracy. Gansey was wide awake on the floor at two a.m., working on his Henrietta model, but that was so far from unusual that the strange thing would have been if he was sleeping. His glasses sat on the top of his nose, crooked due to an unfortunate accident of breaking and trying to fix the bridge of it with duct tape, and he was forced to adjust them every two minutes when they shifted too far right. It should be frustrating but Gansey welcomed the distraction tonight. He knew he ought to go and have them fixed properly, or at the very least, buy a new pair, but with his life speeding up around him, threatening to rush by if his attention slipped just for a moment, glasses always seemed to be stuck on the bottom of his list of priorities. And frankly, he never failed to forget he'd broken them until he put them on his nose at night and ah, of course.
Gansey adjusted his glasses again, for the umpteenth time that night, and focused on gluing a miniature cardboard roof for the post office in place. This was like every other night. This was normal. Except it wasn't.
Not when merely a room away, Blue Sargent was residing in Noah's bedroom, probably asleep by now and blissfully unaware of Gansey's raging inner turmoil. He was trying hard to think about anything besides her small body sprawled under the covers, dressed only in one of his old shirts, so close, so promising, so full of possibilities, but he found that even his Henrietta model couldn't hold his attention for more than five minutes. It was inappropriate and improper to fantasize about her while she was in the same vicinity, Gansey knew, repeated to himself over and over again, but much as his mind was of an old man sometimes, his body was still of an adolescent boy. There was a time he thought that would never be a problem for him, a time when he found it easy to turn down girls and ignore the apparent allure of sex most of his classmates couldn't seem to resist, but that was all before Blue Sargent.
Before Blue Sargent, it was easy. After Blue Sargent, it was drowning. To resist her, to deny his lips her lips - it was drowning. It was not just his physical desires either - truthfully, it was barely that, much as he did want her. But Gansey would have been satisfied with far less. What he really wanted was to slice away a piece of his heart for her safekeeping so that he would always be with her just as she was always with him. What he wanted was to tell Adam he loved - loved? - her and find no betrayal on his face afterwards. What he wanted was to be able to put his arms around her in public, to hold her hand in front of their friends, to play with her hair like Noah did, to take her on a date on Friday night. He wanted to be open about their relationship, he wanted there to be a relationship.
This is just a regular night.
But Gansey still found it impossible to close his eyes and submerge in a dream world. He knew that wasn't all Blue's fault - he was sleepless on a normal night - but her closeness certainly didn't help matters. He had tried, for his part, to fall asleep but it was as futile as telling himself to shake his feelings for her off himself. Normally, he didn't mind so much, normally, he was used to pulling all-nighters, but tonight he thought it would be better to turn off his turbulent brain for a few hours. Blue's proximity and unattainableness was agonizing. Because she was not to be touched, because it was forbidden, he could think about nothing but touching her. Such was the rule of the human mind.
He briefly pondered about the stack of sleeping pills stashed in a forgotten drawer somewhere in his desk.
His problem was, the mini Henrietta project was not much of a distraction tonight and he had been struggling to rebuild it to its former glory ever since it was trashed during the summer. Unsurprisingly, it was not as satisfying as making it for the first time. This also meant that a lot of the time he was just messing around with the tiny pieces of cardboard or glue or paint and pretending he was doing something useful. His hands might have been occupied but his mind was not and it was free to wander to things like Blue Sargent's legs while wearing his old shirt.
Gansey's hands slipped and the cardboard roof was smashed under his fingers. He let out an exasperated sigh and fixed his glasses straight again.
Ronan had left to a place he didn't offer any information about hours ago, and, unless Noah was lurking somewhere in the shadowy corners, there was not a soul in the building besides the two of them. After spending the whole afternoon together under the pretenses of "researching" - which in reality consisted of Gansey and Adam actually researching, Noah and Ronan playing pool, and Blue alternating between the two - Blue had announced that she was not so willing to return to 300 Fox Way. The atmosphere in the house, she said, was uncomfortable due to Artemus' awkward presence, Gwenllian's unwelcome stay and Persephone's permanent absence. On top of that, she continued, her mother was still constantly trying to make up for her disappearance, which stopped being welcome at some point and started being annoying instead, and Calla, who, unsurprisingly, did not handle grief well, was angrier than ever, willing to take it out on any innocent bystanders. Gansey knew this had been going for a few months, ever since Artemus and Maura's miraculous return, but at last, it seemed, that Blue had had enough. She looked tired and worn out and vaguely sad, and all she was asking for was a night of peace. Gansey couldn't say no to her any more than he wanted to.
Blue had then called Maura who was either truly more lenient than usual, or trusted her daughter enough to allow her to spend the night at the residence of teenage boys. Well, a boy, tonight. But Maura couldn't know that. That would have just made it worse, especially if Maura knew about their... whatever this thing between them was. Attraction, crush, secret semi-relationship.
Ronan had left soon after and Gansey could see that Blue was as startled at this turn of events as he was. She probably didn't expect to be alone with him for the whole night and by her flushed, disoriented expression, she couldn't decide to be elated or troubled. Gansey mirrored the feeling. Troubled must have won in the end because not soon after Ronan's exit, she aimed for Noah's room, unused due to him being dead, and had only come out once for water. But that was hours ago. Gansey had conflicting emotions about this too. He wondered if she regretted staying now. He wondered if he regretted letting her. There was something about her nearness, something intoxicating about her presence here in Monmouth that left him completely unbalanced.
Is this what love feels like?
He'd wondered lately if he loved Blue. Sometimes he thought he did; when she looked at him out of the corner of her eye in Cabeswater, thinking he didn't catch her stare, when they were sitting next to each other at Nino's, bare calves touching, pretending neither of them noticed, pretending it didn't send both of their hearts racing. He thought he ought to love her then. Might be falling in love with her. Might already be in love with her. But then he remembered he shouldn't, that it was impossible, that her kiss could be deadly, that it would hurt Adam, and he squashed those feelings inside him. Attempted to. It was a failed experiment. It only lasted as long as the next look, the next touch, the next phone conversation. Blue Sargent lured him in every time, effortlessly, skillfully, unwittingly. Denying her was denying gravity.
In moments like these, when there was silence and there was darkness and just him and his thoughts, he allowed himself to dwell on his feelings for her. He imagined what it would be like to have her fully and not just partially, half-here, half-not, - not that she was a thing to have, she made that painfully clear - and his heart constricted in his chest in a way that was not entirely painful but not entirely pleasant either. Gansey knew he was lost.
He hadn't allowed himself to say it, not even to himself. He was afraid if he did, he would not be able to keep himself from saying it to her as well and to Ronan and Adam and shout it to the whole wide world and everyone who would listen, and what a mess they would be in then.
Gansey was almost sure she would withdraw from him if things got too serious. He was afraid to scare her away.
Blue emerged from Noah's room. She looked disgruntled and tired and mildly angry-looking. Gansey allowed himself a brief moment to admire the sight of her; her mussed hair sticking up in every direction, her tired eyes sliding over to meet his, his shirt hanging off her tiny frame, ending just below her kneecaps, the adorable pout resting on her lips. Her eyes were weary but clear - she didn't look as if she just woke up from sleep and Gansey's eyes found the clock ticking away on the wall, confirming that it was, yes, past two a.m. now.
Blue ambled over and announced, in response to his unspoken question, "I couldn't fall asleep. Noah's bed is uncomfortable. Cold." Blue paused to think about this. "Everything in his room is cold."
"You can use mine," Gansey offered generously and without thinking and then wondered if he sounded too eager. He hurried to add, "I doubt I'll be using it tonight." But even as he said it, he was thinking whether the image of her in his bed would be his final undoing.
Blue seemed to seriously consider his offer for a moment while Gansey warred with internal hope and dread but she ended up refusing it by a shake of her head. "No, it probably wouldn't matter. The problem is me, I have a hard time sleeping anywhere besides my own bed. I don't know what I was thinking." She let out a little laugh that sounded too bitter. Gansey knew she was thinking that maybe she could escape her madhouse for a while, and faint displeasure welled up in him at the thought of her disappointment. He didn't want her to go home unsatisfied.
He wondered if he should warm her a cup of milk to relieve her sleeping problem but he was not sure they had any milk in the fridge. Maybe he could -
Blue sat down next to him crossed legs, mirroring his position, interfering with his racing thoughts. He tried not to tense up. She was not close enough for it to feel intimate but close enough to feel the warmth radiating from her body, to have a clear look at her face from the light of the desk lamp, to get his heart beating irregularly.
She asked, "I could keep you company? Help you with this." She both nodded towards the Henrietta model with her head and gestured vaguely with her hands. Gansey gave the model a disdainful glare. He was still not too happy with the rebuilding part but maybe Blue's company would lift his spirits. And two set of hands could work faster than one.
Still, he said, because his consciousness couldn't let him take the offer, "I don't want to keep you up, you look exhausted."
"Nonsense," she shook her head with a determination he knew he wouldn't able to get through. A delighted grin curved on Gansey's lips because that phrase was just so like him. An illicit thrill screamed through him at the recognition that he was rubbing off on her. "I'm fine, it'll be fun. But... do you happen to have coffee in that awful kitchen/bathroom/laundry room of yours?" She seemed reluctant to find out the answer.
"Uhm... there might be some diet coke in the fridge?"
Blue rolled her eyes, looking resigned but not at all surprised. "That'll do, I guess."
When she came back, she handed one of the coke cans to him and although he accepted it, he didn't open it. There was no reason for him to rely on caffeine to stay awake; sleep was nowhere to be found for him on a good day, and definitely nowhere in sight tonight. Blue's presence had chased away all the tiredness he might have felt earlier.
He asked once more, "Are you sure you wouldn't rather try to sleep?"
Blue answered with only a look which he could interpret perfectly; shut up or else. With a fond smile, Gansey watched as Blue opened her coke and tried not to stare at the way her throat moved when she swallowed. He quickly averted his eyes and imagined that Noah was sitting somewhere invisible to them, watching, that Ronan was still in his room, listening to his horrible music. This felt less dangerous if he told himself they were not alone at Monmouth. He felt less tempted to touch her, to reach over and hold her hand. She would need both of her hands for building cardboard houses anyway; he couldn't occupy them.
Gansey inspected the mini town before him. Blue's help could double the speed of the restoration to its original state and once that was done, he could move onto continuing his work. He had no idea how he would spend his insomnia filled nights once it was actually finished but that was a future worry for now.
Blue crushed her now empty can of coke in her hands and threw it to an indeterminable spot in the vast room. It landed with a loud clink. She clapped her hands together once and turned to him with an impish look. "Okay, Captain. What do you want me to do?"
Despite that remark, Blue, unsurprisingly, opted not to follow Gansey's precise instructions and chose to do things her own way. Gansey, at first, tried to guide her ("I usually cut that vertically, Jane, not horizontally.") but one scowl from her had him backtracking with his hands held up in the universal sign of peace ("But the way you're doing it is absolutely fine too, I was just making an observation.")
They worked varying between comfortable silence and idle chatter, meaningful glances and happy laughter. No one had ever offered to help him with this before and the gesture was oddly touching. Personal. Gansey stole a look at her sitting at the opposite end of the model. She was concentrating on applying glue on cardboard in a somewhat straight line, squinting in the vaguely dim light, the tip of her tongue sticking out of her mouth, one lock of hair falling into her eyes. Gansey smiled at the sight. He wanted to reach out to tuck the piece of hair behind her ear, smooth his hands over the silky black strands, curl one of it around his finger. His hand twitched. The urge was so strong that he dropped the scissor he was holding and placed both of his hands in his pocket.
Gansey had suggested that they work on opposite sides of the model so that they don't get in each other's way (so that they don't end up accidentally touching) but once, when she leaned over to get the red colored paint from his side, her hand brushed his and they both froze. He was sure the touch was unintentional but the way her hand lingered was not. With cheeks flushing, their eyes met for a second and then she was off and away in a heartbeat, running back to her side, reminding him of a spooked bird. Gansey could still feel the warmth of her skin on his if he closed his eyes and concentrated hard enough.
Blue looked up at him. Gansey realized he was still staring but by then it was too late to avert his eyes and pretend he hadn't been. He gave her an awkward sort of smile which she mirrored with her own pleased one. He put his hands out of his pocket and picked up a black marker, the first thing that happened to be in his way.
"So tell me," she began, "what happened to your glasses?"
"I broke them," Gansey murmured around the marker, twisting the cap off with his teeth. He instinctively reached up to fix his glasses again.
"Duh," Blue deadpanned. "I meant how? And why haven't you, owner of millions of dollars, had them replaced yet?"
"I never seem to remember," Gansey admitted truthfully. He noticed that Blue had stopped working on her side of the model and begun to slowly shuffle towards him. The movement was so subtle he wouldn't have noticed if he wasn't watching her carefully. But he was always watching her carefully. Extensively studying her body language, examining the shifts in her expression in correspondence with her mood, cataloging every new discovery in a mental file hidden in the part of his brain dedicated only to Blue Sargent. He was attuned to her; he wanted to be an expert of her, to know as much about her as he knew about his dead kings and the early 15th century and magical ley lines; he wanted to be able to give lectures about her if he so wished. More so, he desperately, desperately wished she felt the same way about him.
Watching as she approached him from the corner of his eyes, Gansey idly applied black ink on the cardboard set to be the hospital. "I was studying a biography on Iolo Goch, Glendower's poet, but I fell asleep and well," he gestured to his broken glasses. She was beginning to near him and he hurried to say something else because his stomach jumped at her closeness and his mouth burned with things he couldn't say aloud. "It wasn't very interesting."
That wasn't entirely true but it wasn't entirely false either.
Now she was standing just inches away from him and when he stole a look at her sideways, he tried not to notice the flecks of gold in her eyes.
He wanted to kiss her.
He always wanted to kiss her.
Blue's eyes sparkled in amusement. "I didn't think it was possible for you to be bored by anything that's old and medieval and welsh. Are you sure you're my Gansey? Is this a sign of the looming apocalypse?" She was teasing him with a smile bright enough to light up the entire room, he thought painfully. His heart was thudding at her words, my Gansey. He tried not to dwell on it now; he put in the corner of his mind reserved for Blue stamped with a reminder to obsess over it later.
"I didn't say it bored me," he countered, now completely facing Blue, mini Henrietta forgotten. "I was tired, it was a long read and he's no Glendower."
Blue's hands twitched at her sides, she seemed to hesitate, and then she was reaching up to finger his glasses, pushing them up his nose to sit perfectly straight again. He could feel the heat radiating from her tiny hand, could almost taste the softness of her palm, the sweaty warmth of her fingers. Her hand was red and blue and yellow and green at places, a rainbow of colors stained by paint. It would be so easy for her to just move her fingers until they were touching his cheek, sliding to the back of his neck, tugging on his hair and pulling him closer to kiss, - Gansey swallowed. Her attention was immediately drawn to his throat; he could see her eyes following his Adam's apple as it bobbed. How famished they were both, he mused, how ravenous to feel so undone from one simple touch.
Blue let her fingers graze his nose as she pulled back, her eyes dark and wanting, and he couldn't help a pleased sound escaping from the back of his throat. She wasn't looking at him anymore but he couldn't stop looking at her. Her cheeks were tinted pink as she said, very quietly, unlike their previous conversation tone, "You should get them fixed."
Gansey knew he would.
They didn't speak after that. She returned to her side of the model and they worked in silence for hours until the sun began rise and the rigid tension in his muscles dissipated. He guessed it was about seven when they finally quit working on his mini town and Gansey noted with satisfaction that with their combined efforts, the small Henrietta town was now as good as it was before the incident. He was endlessly grateful for her help.
Blue walked next to him, her hands on her waist, her eyes raking over their handiwork, turning to him. "It looks great." Her voice held none of the earlier strain anymore.
Gansey nodded, too overwhelmed to speak properly. "Yeah."
Don't say it, do not say it, don't -
He was overcome by his feelings for her, overcome by her presence. Right there, right now, in the glow of the dusky sunrise, she looked ethereal. Unreal. A goddess he should want to die for.
Gansey shook himself out of it before he said something that would get him in trouble. He had no idea when Ronan was coming home and Noah could pop into existence any minute but he did not want to let go of Blue yet. It was a rare Saturday with no plans made in advance and the idea of spending it with Blue was too tempting to deny. Gansey was weak.
He said, "Do you want to have a movie marathon? Unless you want to try sleeping again," he added quickly, realizing that she might be tired after spending the whole night awake and in moderate labor.
Blue plopped down on his bed, the mattress bouncing under her; Gansey tried not to notice how nice she looked on his bed. "I don't know, do you have anything in your DVD collection that's not Glendower related? Something that a semi normal human being, such as myself, could enjoy?"
Gansey winced as he scanned his brain for a movie that would make her want to stay. "I have... all the Harry Potter movies?"
A grin spread across Blue's pink lips and she pushed herself up farther on Gansey's bed, settling against his pillows. "Then I guess I'm not tired."
Gansey, after launching the first movie, and after a moment of hesitation, climbed into bed with Blue, encouraged by her patting the spot next to her with an expectant stare. They were so close; they'd been closer before, but never like this, never in a bed. Although he carefully didn't think about anything impure, the whole ordeal felt really intimate. He wanted to scoot closer, throw an arm around her shoulder and have her lean into his chest, have her hair tickle his cheek, her small body warm his. He wanted to smell of her. Instead he slowly moved his hand until it was resting right next to hers, their skin touching but barely, his thumb reaching out to stroke her wrist in soothing small figures. She exhaled a sigh next to him, shaky and unstable and content. He had his eyes trained on the screen the whole time but he could feel her gaze slide to him, watching, and after a moment she lifted her hand and laced their fingers together. It stayed like that for the rest of the movie.
They ordered pizza for breakfast, and then later for lunch, because neither of them could be bothered to cook. (If Gansey was honest, there wasn't anything edible in the fridge anyway.) She paid half of it both times, no matter how much he insisted that it was his home and she was his guest and it was just good manners, honest, that's all. She shut him up with a glare pretty quickly; they were both in a good mood, both happy and comfortable, and he wasn't willing to botch a perfect day with trivial things like money. During the movies, they continuously took time to ignore the screen and turn to each other, sometimes playing a game of thumb war (Gansey lost all three times but Blue was grinning ear to ear with every victory and Gansey thought he might have won too, after all) and sometimes discussing important matters, such as their opinions on the characters and sorting each other into their respective Hogwarts houses. ("You would be Gryffindor, right along with Ronan." "Hmmm. I don't know, I think Ronan is secretly a Hufflepuff. But you are, without a doubt, a Ravenclaw.")
Before Gansey knew it, hours have passed, they were on the third movie, and Blue's head was resting on his shoulder, his on hers, and his fingers drawing lazy patterns on her cotton covered back. He didn't know how they ended up in this position but it felt as natural as if they had always been doing this. He could hear her breathing, even and slow, and he wondered if she was falling asleep. He let his own eyes close. The movie was forgotten. Blue let out a serene sigh, snuggling closer. Gansey cradled the back of her head, his fingers tangling in her short black waves, pulling them from a sitting position to a lying one. Blue's head fell on his chest, over his heart and he, very cornily, thought it was fitting since she already owned it anyway.
When Ronan came home minutes later, the door slamming behind him, an image of them stretched out in bed greeted him. Both of their eyes shot wide open at the sound and Blue discreetly slid farther away from Gansey while he tried to pretend he was watching the movie. Ronan's gaze was knowing and typically disinterested.
"Don't bother," he told them as he made his way inside his room, the door slamming again behind him. Gansey looked at Blue wide eyed and guilty, her expression mirroring his. He felt ugly, unpleasant regret clawing up his throat, choking the air out of him - not because they had almost fallen asleep together, he couldn't regret that, rather because they were caught red handed. Then a moment later he realized that Ronan seemed far too unsurprised to find them cuddling in his bed to not have already suspected something. He wondered what gave them away. Was it the hand holding? Did he stare too much? Too often? He was always so conscious of looking at her too long in the presence of the others, Gansey couldn't imagine it was that. Did Ronan just simply know him too well? He wondered if Adam knew.
After a long minute of awkward silence, both of them looking anywhere but at each other, Blue pulled herself together. She inhaled, steeled her gaze, turned to him. She gave a shrug - it said, "Well, he already saw us," and Gansey pulled her towards him. Exhaustion was beginning to overtake him. Blue's warm body on top of his was soothing, soft, comfortable. He felt calm. He didn't want to think anymore. Ronan and everyone else were soon just a distant memory in the back of his mind, the feeling of Blue in his arms remaining the only coherent thought he had. It was peaceful.
Before his mind turned completely blank, he thought that falling asleep would be easier if he had Blue by his side every time.