Notes/content advis: Sex. Blindfolds. Allusions to past violence; alcohol; a certain amount of mood whiplash; questions of intent and the nature of a relationship, particularly this personal/nation issue. The actual sex/romance looks to be conducted in a pretty happy/sane/mutual way, but there are worries about uneven relationships. Well, this is definitely the most explicit thing I've written. I'd love to hear what people think of it! (Uh, the whole fic I mean - ...or certain scenes! Or the ending in particular.)
"You could tie my hands," Poland whispers, lying under her in France's bed, stripped bare but for the black silk band over her eyes.
And… no, France thinks, once she can think clearly at all; no, she couldn't.
She should not.
Of course the reason for this is to do with what's happened to Poland, how she has been made powerless out there in the real world. Though, of course, it isn't truly so straightforward. It should be possible for them both to understand that this is different; in their relationship, in their bed like this, this isn't about politics or power imbalance. It's not about that time. It's not about how Poland was bound hand and foot and they threw her in a dark cellar and left her there alone (—and now France feels a whisper of unease about the blindfold) whilst they talked and argued, because there was no question ever of having her voice at table…
(she thought they were never coming back and when she thought this she went a little crazy, thrashed about like she had demons inside, until she bled. —stop it, she thought, but it was a long time before she could listen to herself, STOP! when she was quite calm she thought: eventually I'll starve and then my arms and legs will be skinny enough to slip free. she just had to stay sane until then. until then. until then she made herself count, take 100 take 1000 breaths without screaming (she'd already shuffled around the length and breadth of the tiny place looking for something sharp or some way out). sometimes she worried about the air, so she held her breath like she was underwater until she forgot. oh the thing was she had never liked the dark but now was the time to get over that, wasn't it wasn't it. it was impossible to ignore the pressure at those pulse points and the clammy sticky ooze, so she concentrated close on it, and said to herself that it was meant kindly: they're not ropes she thought they're bandages—)
It's not about that. There is no need to be so dramatic; this is only play only fantasy, it's nothing to do with that. Don't you know how well people can compartmentalize and dislocate their experiences? (That doesn't sound at all good, now does it?)
"What is it you think we're doing here?" France asks afterwards and Poland replies, all wide eyed innocence, parroting back her very words, "Making each other feel good". That at least is a relief; if France thought for one moment Poland was using this to to work through her issues—
But if so, why not? Is this not reasonable or practicable? (Not without talking about it. For all that France is all about the physical and so eloquent in it, she is certain that words that should be used too in these cases. Used first.)
And too, France feels more than usually protective towards (her current lover) (Poland) (this girl in her bed).
Maybe it's true: maybe she, France, really is just romantically condescendingly of the opinion that Poland is something utterly fragile: a damsel and sweet wronged maid. Someone for France (France who dresses and speaks and writes as a man these days) to save.
That is not a good thought.
There was briefly one even worse.
There is much too much of the conqueror about her these days. When Poland whispered tie my hands and she offered up those delicate wrists held out in front of her and she lay on the pillows, her legs tangling silk sheets, bound eyes and so exposed so available... France thrilled with desire and she could have—something in her wanted to pin Poland down, tie her to the bed and take her then without a word, take far more than was offered, just because Poland would have been powerless to stop her—
(and because, too, wasn't this what Poland really wanted, just without asking?)
(—that assumption alone, let alone acting on it, breaks every rule France ever made for herself in loving.)
How it began, that first time—it was not planned; really it was not like France at all.
A late night salon, they were all throwing around ideas of art and reform—the art of Reform and the reformation of Art—all the latest colours and chromatic chords. Until it was past 3 and France, laughing, trying to keep a straight face, tried again: Now now now, shoo! My very dear darlings, get out of my house and I won't make you clean up this mess! —and the rest of the party guests finally left but then Poland found the last half bottle of wine, and we can't just leave that can we?—but Oh! she said, we should drink coffee. To balance it out. Coffee, France exclaimed, at this hour? Water, surely. Yes. Good idea.
So water too, but still: half a bottle of wine on top of everything else. Standing up is challenging at this point and they hold on to each other and accidentally waltz around the room, singing loudly and SHHHHing each other even more loudly.
France doesn't in fact generally get this far in her cups; it's a matter of control.
The sofa catches them as they collapse again and…
"…come to bed," France whispers, couldn't have helped it if she'd tried. The words have been there on her lips all along.
Poland just nods and grins and really maybe she's not as drunk as all that because it's more her supporting France up the stairs than the other way about, and they undress only somewhat (Poland in skirts and France in trousers) and fall into France's big bed and are asleep almost at once and that's that, their first night together: something of an anti-climax.
But come the morning, before their bodies quite suspect what's happened and the hangover hits, France wakes to see Poland bleary and beautiful, already awake and watching her. Poland flushes then and looks away, and France mumbles, "Morning…"
"Your hair's funny," Poland says.
"That I do not doubt."
"Your bed's comfy."
"Isn't it? Now you know why I'm never about before noon."
"I'm in your bed."
"Mmm. You should visit again sometime."
"Alright."
It's still far too early to wake up properly and punch the air and cry glory hallelujah, but that was a yes.
Poland stays.
It's not what France would have planned but as it turned out she could hardly have planned it better.
It gave them permission to touch each other. Just lightly at first, just a little, but when laughing together to bury your face in her shoulder, to hang on round each other's necks. When sitting together, to hold hands.
Poland was still… she didn't initiate often, unless it could be put across as spontaneous, like laughing. France doubts it's studied, but it certainly makes for a good study: how to intrigue and enchant, to make a person desire you so completely.
And she was so charming in her reactions.
As they sat through a most unsatisfactory concert, France reached for her hand again, and started just to stroke it gently with her fingers and thumb.
She could have sworn Poland stopped breathing.
And so she ceased and withdrew, wondering if she'd misjudged catastrophically, and to do so here, now, when Poland had no opportunity to escape or even protest—!
Poland's hand snaked into her lap to touch France's wrist. She nudged up against her shoulder, "hey," she whispered, "don't stop. That was nice."
Oh. Then indeed she would not stop. At once, she took Poland's hand back in both of hers, stroked slowly up and down her fingers, over the pads of her fingers and along every line on her palm, with pressure light just firm enough. Pushed up her sleeve a little and started to follow up the bones of her wrist, drawing circles with her thumb around where the blood pulsed. And watched, mesmerized herself, how the tension flowed out from Poland's body in a shuddering rush (but then how carefully she had always held herself!). How her breathing slowed and then quickened again—how she bit her lip and closed her eyes—
They didn't even notice when the piece finished, and jumped to hear the applause.
Poland's eyes fluttered open. Her pupils were blown wide. She could have had no idea what she looked like at that moment.
Such a small thing!
As for France, she was burning to the soul. And her plans began to consume every spare waking thought, and a good deal of her dreams.
For a long while, kisses still make Poland shaky. So much so that France asks more than once, are you alright, is this, shall I? before she continues.
(She may dress as a man but she does not subscribe to the code of wilful blindness to these things, the convention that says: if she's letting you then she's letting you and there's an end to it, help yourself!)
Step by step, she schools Poland in kissing, using plenty of words as well as practical demonstration, and stopping often to break the tension with laughter.
Then one night, they're together in the bedroom, kissing as the stars come out.
France's hand drifts down Poland's neck to trace the neckline of her dress. She breaks the kiss for a moment to ask "may I?"
Poland nods sharply—puts her hand over France's to guide her, yes, there.
And then a little gasp, like she's startled or in pain and France looks and though she hasn't pulled back in the slightest, Poland's grit her teeth and squeezing her eyes shut.
"No…?"
"Yes. Yes, keep going." She reaches out, more clumsily because her eyes are still tight closed, to try and stroke France's cheek with a hand that still shakes.
France pauses, letting out a sigh to let Poland know how she does like that. Poland still doesn't open her eyes.
France has an idea. She kisses Poland's mouth once more then takes her by the shoulders and murmurs, "Turn around? you don't have to look…"
She carefully shuffles her around, then smooths the hair out of her face.
"I can't…" Poland flexes her hands, "like, do anything here…"
"You don't have to. Let me."
She slides one hand up again and covers Poland's eyes.
"Yes…?"
"—yes," Poland answers, hardly a breath, and miraculously she relaxes.
"There." France holds Poland tight, stoops her head, and kisses Poland's neck, slow and firm and certain.
"Oh—oh."
For the first time, Poland has found her voice.
It is awkward to relieve Poland of her clothes one-handed though, so that's where the silk scarf comes in.
Something different this particular evening after dinner and conversation over the latest novels:
"Could you, do you think…?" France gets up and strolls to the mantelpiece. When she is sure she has Poland's full attention, and the low light is illuminating her to her best advantage, she takes out the blindfold and dangles it between her fingers.
Poland stares and splutters. "What?" she giggles, "you just carry that around with you, like in case we're caught away from home and totally overcome with passion?"
How much France appreciates the first person plural in that sentence! And it's certainly an idea. She walks back towards Poland. "We should. At someone else's party. Hiding behind a curtain. In someone else's bedroom. We should try it sometime. But what I was thinking…" Passion, is what she was thinking. She indicates the piano. "Could you play for me, with this on?"
At first Poland demurs, but France reminds her that she once let it slip—this is an old party trick of hers, like Mozart.
So, alright then. A performance. She seats herself at the piano, grins, and nods to France, who hands her the blindfold. She ties it over her eyes with a neat bow.
Of course she can do this. She settles herself, feels the keys beneath her fingers.
And begins to play. There she is. Vibrant. In control. Or—it's more like a dance. She moves with the music, forcefully pressing in one moment, then yielding and bending to its caresses.
Passion.
And afterwards, she sits and waits, expectant.
France says nothing, but Poland must know how she's being watched now, if she didn't before.
Her lips part. "France…?"
And France comes to her, touching, talking softly, letting her know: this is where I am, and this is what I shall do with you next... She doesn't settle in place yet—she circles her: one button, one kiss; unlace, caress... Until Poland is stripped to the waist, the tops of her dress and chemise undone, slipped off her arms the fabric pooled there like her skirts.
Poland has small breasts, small like everything about her (and she seems so small under her clothes, especially given how she favours the most excessive of puffed sleeves!), but they are perfectly suited and still so sensitive… as is that place inside her shoulder, under her collarbone, another secret vulnerability that France will exploit without mercy…
At last, France settles on the piano bench with Poland perched in front of her, between her legs. And again she does nothing for the space of a few breaths, hands resting a fraction of an inch from Poland's hips. Then she licks the shell of Poland's right ear, nips at the earlobe (small ears too, still sensitive) and Poland cries out and shudders pleasurably.—what next? runs her lips down Poland's neck to that special place. Collarbone. Teeth. Just gently. And now to use her hands.
France is still in waistcoat and shirtsleeves: she knows how Poland likes the rough fabric against her bare skin so she pulls her closer, holds her tighter against her chest, hands crossed over her front, fondling her breasts, then rubbing and pinching her nipples hard (she should have worn gloves—imagine that; another time, another time…) as she leans in again and sucks at the delicate skin of Poland's neck.
Poland's head lolls back and she whimpers, completely lost, and France doesn't stop, and it's not until France's hand strays lower into her skirts that Poland finally comes to her senses—
"Here?" she asks, in what would be half a laugh if she could spare the breath.
"Mmm… yes?"
"A-alright then—yes."
"Then, wait there a moment; I'll be right back."
Poland squeaks, a soft regretful don't-leave-me, but France must.
And she can't help drawing out the moment. Watching Poland again sitting there, hands clasped in her skirts, breasts pert, chest rising and falling with her quickened breathing. Lovely, untouched, and waiting alone in the dark. France wonders for a moment—like this? she could just watch her, she could touch herself to distraction to that image—and Poland alone with the anticipation, they could drive themselves sweetly mad…
She arranges things and comes back, takes Poland's hand to lead her over to…
"What's this?" Poland asks, almost sliding over in her stockinged feet.
"One of the sheets. The hearth rug isn't as comfortable as you might think…"
(Of course this was planned.)
France gently pulls her down to sitting.
"Wait," Poland says, drawing back, stroking the sheets under her fingers appreciatively, "you—you first."
Does she mean…?
"You spoil me rotten," Poland says, shifts so she's kneeling and slides her hands up to hold France's waist, leans to touch their foreheads together. "Let me do this."
Who is France to argue with that?
"Only…" Poland smiles. "I forget… what you're wearing…"
France takes her hands and guides her. Poland smooths with her fingers spread over France's chest, even pressure, reacquainting with the shape and feel of the fabric, then gets to the buttons on the waistcoat, the shirt…
She works carefully, not fast, feeling her way, head bent close as she bent over the piano keys. Lips a little parted. France feels her breath on her neck, then those lips are pressed in the hollow of her throat as Poland spreads open her shirt-front.
France feels like she is being unpicked and unravelled completely. Poland presses her lips to all her secret knots and locks and everything falls wide open.
"Oh, Poland, Poland, darling…"
She wants to touch her in return but she won't yet. She will let her do this. It's astonishing. France feels she is being worshipped, or she is being remade.
Poland kisses her mouth again, then her throat, then her breasts, each one. She sucks and swirls her tongue around, flicks it across an erect nipple; she has a hand at France's back to support her, otherwise she might just collapse, or melt. France is almost glad for her own sake too that Poland can't see her face now. It is unusual for her to be so overcome.
"Darling love," she whispers and the words catch, "so good, oh that's good."
"Mmm, now lie down, alright?"
She does but she still wants to watch, up on an elbow—
Poland prods her stomach. "Hey. I said, lie down. Relax! I totally have this."
She does. She's so very thorough, very earnest. France could say she's taught her well, but Poland has certainly been paying attention. She's been learning France's body like she learnt the piano keys long ago, and she's been doing it always by touch alone.
France almost commits her cardinal sin of impatience and just undoes her own trousers she's so eager. Poland shoos her and does it, only allowing France to lift her hips so she can pull the garments away completely.
Still in her skirts and stockings, Poland straddles her. And France can stare as much as she wants. Or she can lie back and close her eyes too, feel what it is like to be connected only by touch, and the sounds of their breathing and her own groans of ecstasy.
The first touch at the inside of her thigh shouldn't be a surprise but it makes her pant. She lets Poland spread her legs apart.
"Hmm..." Poland says, considering.
And then she uses her mouth.
And, oh, the sweet girl, she has become so very adept at kissing. By the time Poland parts her folds with her tongue and presses inside, France is panting hard, keening and rocking her hips up to meet her. Then her fingers again, rubbing fast and a little too hard, just how France needs it, don't stop, "don't stop—" she begs, she demands, even as Poland pushes her over the edge.
Sound and reality fade back in and there's Poland now lying beside her, nuzzling at her shoulder, and then looking (but all unseeing) up into France's face as if seeking approval.
"Oh, that was very good," she tells her. "You're amazing. …I can see," she adds, "that I shall have to work very hard indeed to reward you as you deserve…"
She moves fast, rolls them over so Poland is underneath her, already breathing too fast, heart pounding. France feels they are quite done with teasing for the day. "So are you ready?" she whispers.
The rest of Poland's clothes are quickly and expertly dispensed with. France takes barely a moment to admire the sight of her naked body: pale hair and the darker curls between her legs, the stark black across her eyes, cheeks almost as red as the silk sheets she lies on, before she's upon her, kissing her deeply so that Poland groans as she responds, opens to her tongue and this new pace. France's hand travels down, squeezing her breast again, down, between her legs, strokes her there once so firmly that Poland yelps.
Imagine if she had gloves on… The next best thing: she tells her thought, whispers it warm and dark so Poland can imagine it too: imagine those two fingers but leather and stitching, the blunt and texture of that pumping in and out—Poland is so wet it would be easy. In, out, pressing deeper and harder against the pressing walls...
"I'm—oh, please—I'm—"
France would know without being told. Poland is writhing on her fingers, desperate, nearly there, but not quite. Well, France wanted to leave her mouth free anyway. Her own mouth to Poland's neck. Not so gently now, as she drives her fingers in and up one last time.
Poland comes with hardly a sound, just a sharp inhale of breath then released.
After a while, France wraps the sheet around their bare bodies and they nap like cats before the fire, and bliss it is.
Maybe there should be another rule: that you shouldn't ever be so bared to someone with your heart as well as your body. Not both. But France is a romantic and wants to believe that you can have it all. That you have to.
Getting Poland to talk about what had happened, the things that were done to her, was almost harder than getting her into bed.
But it was achieved. What was more, France found herself sharing her own thoughts and memories, even the things she was unsure of: honesty that was still too fresh to have hardened into Truths.
The scandalous pulsing frisson of a secret shared, that's something like sex in itself: heady, addictive, and sometimes cause for regret. (Not this, though. Not them. Not her. Never.)
But since France knows now, knows far too much, about the partitioning, and the dark room, about Russia, Prussia and Austria, and the aching loss that is Lithuania, about the white bracelets of scars,
and since she's protective of her—
"you could tie my hands…"
—she can't help fearing that it is that straightforward.
The trust Poland is showing her is suddenly terrifying.
(If it even is trust: Poland may now be past the possibility of that.)
But she can't say, she can't say to Poland: you should not trust me in this way, because to say that is in its essence violence, a threat.
—France would not have gone so far. This has nothing to do with politics, and one can separate fantasy from reality. Yes of course one can. However.
However.
"…no," says France, once she can think clearly at all. "I'm sorry. No. I don't think I should."
She has to consider her own mental state also.
Poland is silent.
France moves off her, lies on her back, blinks up at the ceiling.
Then she hears Poland shift and sit up.
"Hey," Poland says, lightly, and pushes off the blindfold. France turns to her and feels an untoward sense of relief. It's as if she starved for the sight of those eyes, was afraid that behind the silk were empty sockets bleeding or dead-white-eyes of a blind haunting spirit...
France sits up too. "Sorry," she says again.
Poland shakes her head and actually looks at France before she kisses her. And she peeks up quickly into her troubled eyes again before she kisses and nuzzles at her neck, throat to shoulder.
(She'd only learnt to do that with her eyes bound.)
"It's alright," she says, "I don't mind, it was only an idea I had I thought you might like."
—was that a test? were you trying me? France holds back the poisonous words. Now, in bed, hazy with sex and tiredness, her skin hot but Poland's body coaxing her back under the sheets, is not the time.
Later, the next morning, unhappy, she asks.
Poland says, no, no it wasn't. Says again she just thought it might be nice. Fun, you know. But only if you wanted to go for it. It's fine as is.
Stop. France should stop now, but she doesn't.
"What is it you think we're doing here?"
"Making each other feel good…"
The coffee in the pot is all finished and there's nothing else between them to pretend to be busy with.
Of all the times for Poland to be looking right at her. France knows she is visibly upset.
"Is that all I am to you, a distraction?" she asks.
Poland frowns. "I… What did you think we were doing? Are you in love with me?"
"Yes," says France, honestly, but equally honestly has to add: "but then, I tend to be in love with a lot of people."
"Well then!" Poland looks confused, and hurt. "But, look, I don't... I mean I don't do this stuff with just anyone—with anyone at all, I haven't, and if I wasn't serious, th-this would be wrong—"
(Oh, no, please, thinks France: don't bring your morality into this…)
It could be even worse than that.
A horrifying realisation dawns.
It could be even worse.
"Do you… do you still think it's wrong?" she asks, her voice a rattle. "And are you—is that what this was? All along, pushing yourself to take more and more, counting, holding your breath, holding yourself underwater, did you even want any of it?!"
(It's not like France to be so overcome.)
"No! No—France! I mean, no, that's not true! I did, I do love being with you, and… the things we do together, I do." She gulps. "Not… always… at first. I. Do have to make an effort sometimes."
The bottom drops out of France's stomach. An effort! She doesn't— All this time. And France thought she was being so careful, so patient and forbearing, so good and kind beyond reproach—what has she done?
"That doesn't mean—!" Poland almost cries, panicked, jumping up from her seat and backing away, "France that doesn't mean anything, just. That I'm a bit." A desperate, wringing gesture of the hands. "—right now…"
"Yes I know," says France, harsher than she intends, "but that's not about to change, is it?"
"Excuse you!" Poland retorts, furious as if she'd been slapped in the face. "I'm going to—this is going to change, I'm going to change!
France stands too. "So you mean, come back in a couple hundred years or so when you've got your country back together and we'll talk?!"
"Well—maybe yeah!" Poland is trembling with anger now. "Also, wow, a couple hundred years? Way to have faith in me, France!" Fighting stance wide and rooted, she flings her arms out. And lets them fall. "…Look. The whole of Paris is a distraction for me. I shouldn't even be here."
Let it ring.
"—but I want to be. I want to be here, with you. France… this isn't it, the end for us, is it?"
It may well be the end of something.
"Can you look me in the face and then kiss me?" France asks, broken and demanding. "Can you love me out here in the light?"
"I… I can try."
And then and there she kisses France, so bravely. France starts to cry.
it never was going to last.
.
.
.
.
.
.
epilogue: in a couple hundred years, or so
a cottage in the countryside
the greening smell of the dawn dew
on the cool breeze through the window that ripples our hair
and cools the sheets of the bed where
we both lie dreaming.
I kiss the inside of your outstretched wrist and forearm.
they share a bed here but they don't touch each other intimately anymore – not how you would call intimately (though they are intimate friends). poland, france thinks, would probably describe herself as celibate these days, or some other word. as a concept it's long since had its heyday but then poland was never one to follow trends as they happened.
they are both so much older now.
a brash, guarded, loud, melancholic and fastidious person, she more-or-less reconciled with herself. she accepted that she still wanted affection and to give it, and affection expressed through touch, within certain limits. and france, coming at it from as it were the other direction in terms of her other relationships, is more than happy to share with her exactly this. they fill an unusual space in each other's lives.
don't regret the past—not that part, that part was exciting after all
don't regret the past, but the past isn't here now
today is green things and growing, cotton sheets and bunches of lavender
and the city is far off
there's precious little stability in the world but we now we know its value.
you let me share your life, in the dark and in the daylight.