This was written rather quickly. It's only short but I just wanted to create a quite, important moment between the characters. This is about as fluffy as my writing gets. Also the lights that go up in a tube against the wall of Jack's living room are called fairy lights because I don't know what else to call them. Reviews would be loved.
Against the Roar of the Storm
Ronnie rises before the sun, a ghost woman leeched of colour by the pre-dawn gloom. She gathers all the items of clothing she can find within the shadows and retreats to the bathroom. She's ready to leave even though she can't find her tights when she catches Jack dimly reflected in a mirror she'd never really noticed before. He fills half the bed as if the memory of their nights together had trained him to keep space free for her.
They had fucked; there really was not another word for it, on numerous occasions since their last brake up. Those encounters took place in what she considered moments of strength for her and moments of weakness for Jack. A few times in their club, and, eventually, they ended up in a mass of tangled limbs in his flat. They are not a couple and she feels like a stranger in his home.
She thinks about when they were together and how far apart they had become. Sometimes she thinks that he liked vulnerability and when they were alone she had welcomed a chance to be weak for once. But he had hurt her and she had cursed herself for ever thinking of letting him into her heart. She had never been good at forgetting or forgiving and yet she still misses him.
In the darkness Jack sighs and shifts reaching for her in his sleep.
She pulls her coat tightly around her, ashamed of having broken her promise already.
***
Ronnie did not recall falling asleep on his sofa. She woke up a little past midnight, the clean lines of the room even sharper in the gloom, the blanket covering her soft and heavy. She shrugged the blanket off and put on her shoes. Fairy lights spilled a faint golden light into the darkness drawing her towards his bedroom door even as her mind told her to leave.
She sighed willing herself to stay strong and she turned to leave.
She walked smack into Jack.
"I went to the club, couldn't sleep." he said.
He wore jeans and an open leather jacket. She slipped her arms around him and pressed her cheek to the solid comfort of his shoulder. His skin radiated heat through the crinkled material of his shirt and she scratched her nails lightly over his sides making him sigh. He grows hard against her stomach.
She reaches for his waistband, but he catches her wrist.
"I can't do this, Ron." His voice heavy with resignation.
She bit her lip and looked away, her cheeks hot. "I understand."
"You think you're stronger if you stay distant," he told her. "You make people need you and then you walk away when you need them back."
She froze. A reckoning had been hanging in the air for days, and she wanted to choose wisely. Jack looked uncertain, shy, and Ronnie had an image of him smiling at her over a glass of champagne. Her heart squeezed and nearly broke.
"Not anymore," she said, taking his hand. They both believed her.
He leans down to kiss her and then lead her to his bed.
Lightning forked outside, thunder rolling loud and deep. He teased her breasts with his tongue, and she threads her fingers through his hair. Jack pushed into her deliberately, unhurried. She did not plead with him to go faster. She let herself go as the rain and the wind lashed against the windows, nearly drowning the sound of his name on her lips.
She pulled his mouth down to hers, savouring his weight as he moved within her. He cupped her face in his hand and he kissed her deeply, making her breath tingle down to her lungs. He trailed his fingers up her waist and stroked her neck. She held his gaze instead of closing her eyes and tossing her head back.
"Ronnie," he said.
She touched his cheek, traced his features with a fingertip. Her hands skimmed over his body, learning him over again. She let him tell her she was beautiful.
She let him make love to her.
***
Ronnie picks up her bag, the scraping branches outside muffling her footsteps on his creaky floor. She pads out of the bedroom before putting on her shoes. She makes it to the front door and stops, staring out into the night.
She had told him she loved him, begged him not to leave. She was naïve then and thought she was making a commitment. Wiser now she knows that being open and honest is much more powerful than three words. In this moment she understands that it takes great strength to live for someone, particularly when you don't always know how.
Ronnie returned to his bedroom and watched for a second as Jack dreamed quietly. Black clothing and cold eyes were flimsy armour against his trust. She climbs back into bed.
He wakes and kisses her drowsily, mussing her sleek hair. She burrows against him, his arms shutting out the roar of the storm.