She finds him in her apartment a cold winter's night, when the chill seeps into the crooks of her elbows and the nape of her neck, moves through her to her very bones. She's unwinding her scarf on the foyer when she detects movement out of the corner of her eye. She freezes, cold crackling on the inside of her throat, fear lingering under her tongue.
It's only a moment before she turns the lights on, fumbling gracelessly at the light switch. He's standing in her kitchen, expressionless, dark and imposing against the stark white palette of tile and porcelain. Sorely out of place.
"Don't scream," he says immediately. She doesn't know if she has enough breath in her to scream. "I'm not going to hurt you. I just need to stay here a little while."
Questions struggle vainly against the shock in her throat and die; she still can't speak.
He stares at her and this is the first time she really looks at him. Strong jaw, harsh eyes, dark tangled hair. His shoulders are solidly masculine, his arms tense beneath the thick fabric of his shirt. She sizes him up, watches the hard cut of his mouth and the contrasting soft undertones of something else in his face (pleading, almost?).
Finally, the silence between them strung thin and fragile, she nods her head and murmurs, "Alright." Trepidation builds heavily in her stomach but she tries to ignore it. He relaxes and she warily strips her coat from her shoulders, gives him a wide breadth as if he's a dangerous animal.
The city breathes around them, teeming with destitution.
She wakes once in the middle of the night, a presence settled heavy on her chest. It's pitch black in her room save for the slanted light from a streetlamp outside, dirty and yellow and dim. She can't move, staring straight ahead, curled tightly into herself. After a moment she hears the floorboards creak and her bed corner dips, the stranger (it can't be anybody else) settling onto it. She tenses, shuts her eyes.
She hates herself, hates herself for letting the man in, for allowing herself to be in this situation. He'll kill me, she thinks, tears forming quietly at the back of her throat. He'll kill me and this is what I get for being such an idiot. I just wanted to help him, I just-
The softest touch against her arm, a mere breath in the velvet dark of the night. She doesn't move, and he ghosts his fingers across the bare skin of her neck.
I'm going to die, she thinks.
He leaves abruptly, just as quickly as he came, and tears streak down her cheeks.
The morning is bright and frozen against her window. She gets up, determined to make breakfast. The stranger's still on her couch, sleeping fitfully. He's tossing and turning and grunting softly in his sleep, and she knits her brows, concerned.
She stands by his side awkwardly, watching him struggle. "Hey," she says finally, touching his shoulder. He jerks awake, catches her arm with a jarring speed, her wrist caught in his tight grip. She inhales sharply and her eyes go wide, and immediately he lets go of her.
"I'm sorry," he murmurs to her, looking away. She nods.
Clears her throat, tries once, twice: "Are you alright?" He glances up at her as if surprised, but nods finally. "Do you... want some breakfast?" He gives her a wide-eyed stare (again the surprise) but says yes all the same.
She makes eggs and bacon, a simple breakfast but filling nonetheless. The stranger sits at her table, the image of him unfamiliar and unsettling. She's across from him, watching him over her orange juice, eyes curious.
"What's your name?" She asks finally, quietly, almost ashamed for asking.
He waits a while before saying, "Jason."
"I'm Michelle," she tells him, and he blinks at her. His expression (or lack thereof) never changes, and after a while she looks away. Quiet but for the sharp clanking of forks against plates until she asks, "Are you staying again tonight?"
"Yeah," he answers. "Just for tonight. I'll be gone by tomorrow."
The silence is deafening.
She goes to work, trusts him enough to be in her apartment alone (she can see the weight of that trust in his eyes as she leaves). The air is bitter against her face, nipping her nose cruelly. She hates the biting cold the city brings, but remembers when she was back in the west and hating the heat. She was never truly satisfied with the weather.
When she gets home he's sitting at her table, drinking some tea and staring absently at the wall. He doesn't seem to hear her for a little while, so she deliberately throws her keys on the table.
He jerks up and around, lightning fast, muscles coiled and ready for (ready for what? a fight?) anything. When he realizes it's her he exhales, sits down slowly.
"You okay?" she asks. He sips from the tea and nods.
His shoulders are still tense and she stares at them, at the muscles moving beneath the cotton of his sweater. She runs her eyes over him, the rugged, handsome lines of his features, the pleasing athleticism of his body. She flushes when she realizes what she's doing and leaves abruptly, to go take a hot quick shower and be rid of her inappropriate thoughts.
Her shower lasts ten minutes and then she's out, pink from the hot water and nearly suffocating from the steam. She walks out to find her pajamas, forgetting that the man is there. Coincidentally, he's walking right outside her bathroom door and she runs into him, hard, gasping "Oh!" as she falls.
One hand scrabbles to secure the towel around her-mercifully, it stays in place. She's sprawled on the floor, legs absorbing the cold from her hallway tile. He's managed to stay upright and now he's watching her, staring at her.
The towel is short, riding up one of her thighs. She notices his eyes lingering, notices him taking in the smooth pale skin of her neck and the bell-curve of her shoulders. She's glad that the heat gave her such a pink to her cheeks; she wouldn't want him to see her blush under his gaze.
"I'm sorry," she says quickly, moves to get up. He helps her, one hand clasped firmly around her elbow, her skin thrumming beneath his touch. When he pulls her up they're all too close together, and she inhales shakily.
God, she wants. Her body aches and she wants, she wants to touch him, wants him to touch her, wants everything from him. She shakes with an effort to keep still, curses inwardly. His eyes flick from her eyes to her lips, and she can tell what might happen, what he might do if she just stands still-
Instead she backs up, the moment broken, an awkward smile on her lips.
He acknowledges her denial, acknowledges that if he forces anything, he'll regret it. So he turns from her, and they're back to the silence, the avoidance, the hesitance.
She wakes again in the middle of the night. The streetlight throws it's dirty light violently into her room, and she can feel him at her back, feel him oozing tension and something else entirely.
She hardly breathes, eyes still closed. He walks over to her, leans over onto her bed. Her eyelashes flutter when he touches the sharp line of her collarbone. He bends his head down to her neck, breathes her in, touches his lips the slightest bit against her skin. Heat jumps up into her belly.
She takes that moment to stop pretending and opens her eyes, looks up at him. He takes his mouth from her neck, slowly, watching her. She blinks against him, against the black of his eyes in the light, against the hard line of his jaw.
She sits up and he recoils. She stares at him, stares and stares, until finally she can't stand it anymore. She jerks forward, catches his mouth in hers, and then they're tangled together, breathing into each other's mouths, eager fingers against pliant skin.
It's still so cold in the apartment but all she can feel is the heat of his touch, the burning trails his fingertips leave upon her skin. She hisses when his hand travels down, beneath the thin cotton of her panties. Insistence against her and she moans delicately.
She hasn't been touched like this for months, not since she broke up with her last deadbeat boyfriend. She's not really one for one-night-stands, either-finds the thought frightening, almost (what makes this man different, she doesn't know).
He burns. Everything about him burns-his mouth, his hands, his skin beneath her lips. He moves one finger into her slowly and she bites his neck the slightest bit. He groans into her ear and shifts, just enough so she can feel his hard-on pressing into her leg.
And her stomach aches, a deep throbbing in the pit of her, eager and undeniable. She hastily shucks off her clothes, aiding him with his. She roams his bare chest with her lips, grazing over every inch of him. Her fingers snag on bumps in his skin, odd rivets, out-of-place patches of flesh that she can't identify. When she pulls back to look at him, she sees why.
His body is covered in scars. They mar his otherwise smooth skin, little flecks of imperfection. He's got a nasty bruise on his stomach, and a long cut running across one shoulder. He looks nearly broken before her, more vulnerable than she's seen him, eyes unsure in the dirty light.
"Oh," she murmurs, traces one hand along a line of shiny, new skin. His hands are stilled at her things, solid against her supple skin, comforting in the dark of the room. She wonders briefly if she should stop-if the baggage the stranger's carrying is too much, if whatever he's caught up in catch her too.
But he's only staying one more night.
She kisses him again, hungrily, some unfamiliar sense of lust searing through her nerves. The hesitation she saw in him is gone; he lays her back against the bed, settles himself between her legs. God, how she wants.
He pushes himself inside easily and she gasps, arches against him. She's deliciously full, satisfied. He kisses her roughly and she moans into his mouth, wanting more, needing more.
He moves against her; she pulls her nails across the skin of his back. He groans, ever so quiet, right into her ear. She gasps in reply.
"Fuck, Jason," she breathes. He kisses her hungrily and she moans into his mouth.
Then his hands are on her wrists and he's pressing them into the sheets near her head and for a moment it's too much. Her breath catches in her throat, her ribs close mercilessly over her heart.
It takes only a second for her reaction to take place, and he realizes a heartbeat later. He pulls away from her, leaving her bare and shivering.
"I'm sorry," he says suddenly. He is breathless, shaking.
She swallows fear-acrid and bitter against the back of her mouth but she doesn't give a fuck, not now-and pushes herself into a sitting position.
"No," she says to him simply. Her tongue isn't aligning with her brain and she can't say anything else, so she pushes him back against the bed.
They fuck like animals, dirty and raw in the cold of the night. She can't remember how many times she comes, or how many times he does, either.
He's still in her bed when she wakes. Surprise isn't forgiving, and she has to calm her breathing before he notices and wakes up.
He's awake in a few seconds anyway. They stare at one another; after a while their breath syncs up.
They don't speak while they dress, but their hands are always finding a way to settle upon one another. When they're done, they move into the hallway.
She opens the door for him, hands him his backpack. He turns back once.
And she can't help it. She goes to him, wraps her arms furtively around his neck, suddenly afraid without knowing why. He puts a sturdy hand on her waist.
"Be careful," she whispers to him. "Wherever you're going, whatever you're doing-be careful."
He nods. The ghost of his lips across her forehead and then he's gone.
She'll slip back into the old routine soon enough, she knows. But for now, she'll relish the deviation.