A.N: Goodness knows where this came from. I was at a party tonight and the live band played Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol, and this started in my head. I wrote it down on my phone on the way back and finished it when I got in, but it turned out differently than I had planned. Ah, well, feedback is very welcome!
Disclaimer/Warnings: Spoilers up to the end of S1. Incest, and allusions to dark themes. I don't own Heroes, I'm just messing around with the characters, and all song lyrics included aren't mine either.
Enjoy!
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Claire sighs and sips woefully at her glass of water. Another day, another political event, another false smile to plaster on her face. She has learnt how to pretend so well, no-one has ever realised how much she is shouting for help inside.
Well, she thinks, no-one except one person.
A pair of dark brown eyes watches her from across the room, the feel of them on her back the only solace she is allowed within the throngs of political do-gooders. Her father is around somewhere, rubbing shoulders with men in high places, their wealthy, socialite wives being entertained by her step-mother.
Claire sighs again; at twenty years of age she still feels more like an Odessa cheerleader than the daughter of a New York Congressman.
She decides to move away from the crowds, black dress swaying along with her movements, the material flowing like liquid over her skin, and onto the balcony. Fresh air is a much needed necessity at this moment in time.
She feels the cold of Manhattan whip around her, wafting the sound of the band inside into the night sky. Claire is safer at night, the only time she can truly let herself be free from the bonds tying her down. Bonds of agreement, silence, and even familial ties; all are forgotten in the hours of darkness.
That is when she knows he is there waiting for her. Waiting for the last drop of sun to leave the sky and the last guest to leave the mansion.
…Waiting for his brother to go to bed so he can sneak into her room and make her feel alive in a way an uncle never should, the shroud of darkness shielding them from earthly view, the black night muffling her cries of pleasure.
At night, they transcend into the otherworldly, eyes full of only each other and a passion mortals cannot comprehend. For that is what they are, immortal. Two souls bound throughout lifetimes to be as one.
His eyes are watching her again, and the little contact makes her shiver. Inside, the first few notes of 'their' song drift into her ears, and she wonders if he's planned it that way, that he's finally given up with secrecy and wants to claim her in the day as well as the night.
But he's not like that, she knows. He's content with the quiet, with the hushed whispers and the sneaking around. They never speak when they're together, some part of them not needing to, but a part of her does. She wants to brush aside everything that makes what they do wrong and disappear into a new life of them, going to a whole new world where they can simple be.
A hand sneaks its way around her waist, always slow and tentative, as if he's afraid she'll break. His breath whispers against her ear and Claire's eyes flutter closed, hearts beating as one for a single moment in time.
"Those three words are said too much,
They're not enough."
A single, crystalline tear slides down her cheek as his lips ghost over the flesh of her neck, hands sliding to trace the curves of her body.
She wants so much to voice her thoughts, wants so much to be able to shake him from this routine of theirs, to tell him the fantasies she has when he isn't in her bed, the ones where they are simply together, smiling, happy.
He never smiles when he's with her or, if he does, she is unaware. The room is always in darkness, the moon even fearing to spy upon their illicit acts of desire. She shies away behind clouds until morning, although he always leaves before the dawn.
The door is bolted, and he crawls between the sheets of her bed, hands slithering across her skin and his mouth finding hers. She responds with the same eagerness of years passed, when he first crept into her room, but can't help but feel empty. It's only when they are one that she feels at peace, feels that bit of the puzzle sliding back into place.
When he's gone she's hollow again, forced to live through the daylight under false pretences. They hardly talk anymore, but Claire wouldn't – couldn't – have it any other way. She can't let him go, he is her touchstone, and she is certain she is his, however much she wonders sometimes.
"Can I see you later?"
The words breeze across her skin, and she's taken aback, he's never asked before. He's always just been there, assuming.
She bites her lip, suddenly feeling tense in his embrace. She needs to look at him, to read his expression, to see why this change has taken place here and now.
Slowly, she turns to face him, clasping his hands in hers. He looks down, avoiding her eyes for a moment, before glancing at her, almost ashamed.
Not caring who might stumble upon them, she brings his head down to meet hers, pressing their lips together forcefully. Of all the things she's felt over the years, shame has never been one of them, and she needs to make Peter see that's not what he's feeling, either.
He's just scared, as scared as she is to delve deeper into their relationship, to actually say out loud what the shared blood running through their veins is pumping around their body, into the very fibres of their being.
She feels him respond and smiles into the kiss, breaking away to hold him with her eyes, squeezing his hands in reassurance.
"Always."
And then she sees him smile too, the smile she usually misses in the dark. After that, they're running up the back way through the mansion, giggling and whispering to each other like a pair of children, hands grabbing at each other in ecstasy.
That night, for the first time, the moon shines down through the windows as she strokes his hair, and she smiles as he tenderly kisses her neck.
"If I lie here,
If I just lay here,
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?"