A/N: Inspired by "Almost Lover" by A Fine Frenzy. Tell me (kindly) what you thought if you feel like it.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Promise.
"I should have known you'd bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do."
2024
"I feel like you've gotten heavier," he whimpers against her mouth as he lifts her in his arms. He manages to hold their kiss as he walks them to her bed. Though they are vampires, and they can do so many amazing and wonderful things, this—him holding her and kissing her so fiercely—somehow succeeds in impressing her more than anything else.
She wraps her legs around his waist extra tight in silent admonishment, but he is one thousand years old. Baby vampires like her cannot harm him. Physically.
He sits down on the mattress, in the same place he always does. It sinks to accommodate his weight, as if it knew he was coming today and had prepared itself accordingly. Her legs are still coiled around him, her heels pressing hard into the base of his spine. They are fusing themselves together. Her lips consume him, just as his hands squeeze every bit of her clothed body.
"Vampires can't gain weight," she reminds him, though it is fruitless. He knows this fact. He simply enjoys teasing her. Taunting her female pride.
He releases her lips. His hand grasps her blond ponytail and she allows him to pull her head back, glad beyond belief when his warm, scratched lips collide with her flesh. Her pulse, visible and inviting in her neck, vibrates with each gentle suck he provides. Eventually he drops her hair and goes for the hem of her t-shirt. It is pale blue and adorned with a smiling, cartoon puppy dog, but he doesn't seem to care as he rips it off of her. He tosses it carelessly behind them and now, because she was at home when he tapped her door with his centuries-old knuckles and that meant she had already thrown her bra to the ground, she is bare before him from the waist up.
His greedy, dilated eyes travel around her breasts, across the plane of her stomach. Fingers follow, delicately tracing every scar they can find. She has plenty. More than last time. She has been in battles since she last saw him. Has bruised and not healed.
"This one," he says softly, the pad of his index finger finding a long, thin line of taught, creased skin.
She stares at him, directly into his eyes. Her lips are parted, desperately awaiting another kiss. "Werewolf scratch," she divulges.
His fingers continue their trek, but she is tired of not kissing him, so she leans forward and eagerly overlaps their mouths. He inhales sharply, caught off guard by her initiation. He is usually the instigator, she knows. He is the one always coming to her. But she secretly enjoys these annual visits of his. She craves them. And when he is here she is brave and sexy, and she wishes to hold onto those feelings for as long as possible. Kissing him and touching him allow her to do that.
She opens her mouth wide in invitation and he quickly slips his tongue between her teeth, a low groan echoing from his throat in appreciation.
It is her turn now to begin undressing him. Though she does not want to she pulls away from him, making quick work of his black jacket and deep blue shirt. His skin glows in her dark room like he is a light. Her light. If possible, her pupils swell more as she follows the curves of his bone and muscle. She lets a single finger glide through the soft curls on his chest and passes the pad over his nipples. He gasps at her boldness.
This is what they do. Every year. Every winter. He comes to her, drunk on power and hungry for sex. Wild, unadulterated sex.
Truthfully, he is hungry for her. Once, years ago, he told her that he was constantly aching for her touch, her lips. Twelve months was all he could suffer through before the anguish became too much to bear.
In the moments after his admission she cursed the vampire race for still owning the ability to cry, for her eyes welled and Klaus disappeared from view.
But this is what they do. Because it feels good, and because they are too stubborn—too stupid, too foolish—to remain together for more than twenty-four hours.
She lies to herself. Tells herself she does not mind the distance between them 364 days a year, but her body becomes weak the closer the earth gets to the cold months.
Her mind goes blank all of a sudden as he bows his head and takes her breast in his mouth. His tongue sweeps saliva atop her skin. She shivers in response, her hands automatically burrowing in his untamed curls. She yanks and pulls as he goes to her other breast, wondering all the while how she can be dead and still feel so alive.
Perhaps he is bringing her to life with each touch. Shocking breath into her lungs with every tug of his teeth.
Then he is standing up, mouth moving up her chest to her collarbone, further to her neck, and to her lips. He sets her down on the floor, arms not letting go of her. They do this as well. Stand together in the moonlight, their unnecessary breaths evening out as they stare deeply, clichedly into one another's eyes.
"I missed you," is all he says.
She says nothing.
She missed him too. Each year the pain of him leaving her grows. One day it will kill her.
This is her favourite night of the year. The night he knocks on her door. Sometimes she decides she will not open it. She will let him suffer and wait in the frigid air. But then he knocks a second time and she abandons her reckless idea.
They are each other's addictions. Though she is dead already she cannot live without him.
Silently, he removes her shorts. Unties the bow that holds them together and watches as they tumble to the ground. Next, it is her turn. She focuses on the button of his trousers, teasingly pressing into the seam of his fly. He lurches forward at the unprovoked touch, but steadies himself enough to allow her to pop the button and slide the trousers down his legs. Next go his briefs, then her pants until nothing stands between them but the singing air.
Now they are completely naked. The night can truly begin.
She blinks, and before she has an opportunity to open her eyes he has once again taken her in his arms. No longer are his stares warm and gentle, his touches kind and playful. He throws her to the bed and climbs over her body. Blood rushes beneath her skin, turning it pink. He is flushed too—she can see just barely how his skin burns.
There is no foreplay. Not for round one. Not when they have twenty-three more hours. He fills her in one smooth motion, clamping his mouth over hers so her loud cry falls into his lungs.
She would have thought that after having done this countless times it would have lost its vice grip on her. But each time he comes to her place and strips her to her damned soul she cannot move past how fresh and new it feels. How much it still takes her nonexistent breath away.
What they do is beautiful. It is ravenous at times, and at others it is tender—the stuff of romance novels and indie films. They never label it. He is not her yearly one-night stand. She is not his lover.
He pushes into her quicker, moving them about the room. Occasionally she is on top, holding on to his shoulders, scraping her claws into his flawless skin. Others, he is the dominant. His wolf side shows itself then, his eyes feral and crazed. His throat releasing growls and snarls.
It always ends the same way—her on her back, him above her. She always finishes first as his Old World manners would not see it any other way. Then they lie on her bed until they are both ready for another round.
Soon, twenty-four hours is up. The sun has set again and they have lost a day. Sometimes they will say parting words, others he will vanish out of the door while her back is turned.
This time they dress in silence, him in the clothes he wore when he arrived and her in a new set of pyjamas.
She is already freezing without his touch.
He does something strange tonight. He moves in front of her and takes her hands in his. His thumbs twirl against her knuckles.
"'Til next time, love," he whispers, bending down the half a foot it takes for him to reach her and capturing her lips in one last, dizzying kiss.
He leaves immediately afterwards, not waiting for her reply.
This is what they do. He comes to her door once a year, when the sky is bleak and snow covers the ground. And each time he does, she is compelled to open her home to him.
Maybe one day they will stop this. Maybe she will find a man to take care of her and he will find a woman to do the same.
But she knows the truth. She knows why she never lets the few man in her life get too close. She does not want this to end. Does not wish to fight the pull she feels toward him.
So she closes her bedroom door and sits on her bed, counting down the seconds until he arrives at her door again.