Things you said after you kissed me
He wakes up, sprawled gracelessly on a foreign sofa, to the smell of coffee. He vaguely remembers Abby talking on the phone in the other room while he was contemplating the dying potted plants on her windowsill.
And nothing else.
He's grateful to be alone in the living-room, furiously blushing for falling asleep on the couch and dreaming of her, kneeling at his feet, tugging at his pants...
In the early light of the morning he finds her interior design choices match her fashion sense, although the house looks lived-in and cozy (so he thinks maybe he was hallucinating the dead plants too).
He follows faint scraping sounds till he finds Abby rearranging her daughter's shoes in the rack under the stairs. Gone are the dress and the make-up, her curls are gathered in a loose braid falling on her shoulder. He doubts she got much sleep done, yet she looks lovely.
"Hi," she greets him with a shy smile "I'm making coffee."
He beams back at her stupidly and excuses himself to wash up in the bathroom - where she already arranged clean towels for him - and he wastes way too much time realigning the small bottles on the bathtub edge he knocked out clumsily. When he takes a first look in the mirror his hair is a mess of tangles so he finger combs them back and hopes for the best. He can't do anything for the stubble and for the first time in years he considers letting it grow into a full beard.
When he steps out she calls from the other room asking about breakfast and a few minutes later she moves around the kitchen in grey yoga pants and a printed t-shirt (setting up pans and bowls for eggs and bacon) and Marcus can't help feeling blessed. He sits at her table with a mug of hot black coffee and somehow it doesn't feel foreign at all - he's dumbstruck, though.
She sits opposite him and starts buttering toasts.
Occasionally she sips from her own mug of coffee and checks the skeleton of a clock hanging above the door to the hall.
Clarke is due to arrive soon, he thinks, he doesn't know exactly when - maybe Abby told him before he fell asleep on her like a tool and he's forgotten - so, mortified, he doesn't ask. He just thinks about the gentle shape of her bare foot swaying under the table and occasionally brushing his jeans.
"Did you sleep a bit?" he asks instead.
"A bit," she replies squinting at him in the clear morning light above the rim of her mug. Everything about her bursts with the tension of impending happiness, the glint in her eyes, the corner of her lips, the delicate curve of her neck, the grip on the mug... Marcus can't quite reconcile the feral bundle of nerves snapping back at him on the side of a desert road with the fair creature now sitting in front of him, but he's sure the all teeth and nails Abby Griffin is still there, temporarily lulled.
Somewhere in the back of his mind he's telling himself to stop staring but he's thoroughly dismissing it as interference.
He is not used to rich breakfasts, he never finds the time for more than coffee and jam on toast since Vera Kane passed away, but when Abby asked how he liked eggs he had to answer - something - and he must admit he's hungry. Maybe she's a great cook, maybe not, but he has to refrain himself from devouring eggs and bacon and buttered toasts and the whole bread slices she's spreading with cherry jam.
The doorbell surprises them both - she with jam smeared hands and he with a mouth full of toast he has to gulp down with coffee. Nevertheless Abby bolts out of her chair with a triumphant grin, throwing the door wide open to greet her child, and he follows, a few steps behind.
"Clarke!" Her voice catches but her smile never falters.
Clarke Griffin turns out to be a mini Abby with long golden hair curling in the breeze, a blue striped summer shirt and white shorts, wrapped in her mother's embrace, and frowning.
Marcus watches the girl's reluctant arms slipping around her mother's shoulders, hugging her back, then trying to pull away as Abby starts peppering her cheeks and nose and forehead with kisses.
"Mom, please, this is so embarrassing!" protests the teenager eyeing her accompanying friend and his father just down the few steps to the front door.
Abby laughs, kneeled on the floor and looking up at her daughter with glistening eyes, she keeps combing her hair back and whispering I'm so sorry, it won't happen again over and over, and he knows to her, in that moment, no one else is there but Clarke. It almost feels wrong to stand there lurking so he purposefully checks the tip of his boots first, then retrieve his leather jacket from the coat hanger near the door and dips his hand in the pocket of his jeans to feel the shape of his car keys.
"It's ok, Mom, I'm almost thirteen. I can take care of myself," Clarke grumbles with a roll of her eyes that makes her mother bite her lip and squeeze her tighter.
When finally Clarke succeeds disentangling herself from Abby's arms it's because Thelonious Jaha and his son step up to the door and Abby exchanges a few heartfelt thanks with them. Clarke then stares at him, the stranger in her house, with big blue eyes and the same scowl as her mother. Adorable.
He tries a friendly smile at her but the girl narrows her gaze with a pout that endears. He thinks in a few years that beauty mark on her upper lip will make everyone fall at her feet.
"Thelonious, this is Sheriff Kane, my saviour," introduces Abby, then turns to him. "Doctor Thelonious Jaha, Head of Neurosurgery at Ark Medical Center, and inestimable neighbor."
Marcus detaches himself from Clarke's uncomfortable scrutiny to shake hands with a tall African-American man wearing a perfectly ironed white shirt - feeling inadequate for reasons that elude him at the moment.
His son is suspiciously well mannered to be Clarke's age and gazes at his badge and sidearm with undisguised apprehension.
"Thank you for driving our Abby safely home," intervenes Jaha Senior.
My duty comes out too smoothly to be a truthful answer, Abby ducks her head pursing her lips to conceal a smile and rushes everyone inside with the promise of breakfast - and a detailed tale of her adventures.
Marcus lingers on the threshold, ready to leave, seizing the opportunity to say his goodbyes, and thanks. Abby looks deceived (probably out of politeness), insists he rests a bit longer but Jaha is quite too eager to point out: "The sooner the Sheriff leaves the sooner he'll arrive back home, Abby, we kept him already too long."
He's right, of course, the sooner he drives off the sooner he can crash in his own bed and sleep for a month - and dream of her again. But she touches his arm and asks him to wait just a little longer while she digs for her wallet in her bag.
Marcus is taken aback, raises his hands, scratches his nape, failing to look casual. "I don't think it's necessary, really."
"Well, Raven will, and the rental car is still at the garage," she comments, then adds regretfully: "I don't have enough cash on me but this is my number, let me know what is due, please," she requests handing him a card.
"But your phone is broken."
Everyone turns to Wells, whose father would very much strangle at the moment, and Abby sends Clarke looking for pen and paper.
"Are you sure you can drive home on so little sleep?" she asks Marcus while he writes down his own number on a scrap of stationery with the hospital's letterhead.
He nods, dismissing her concern: "It's ok, your friend is right, the sooner I leave..." and he trails off with a hand gesture. Thelonious Jaha is looming at the front door, checking on the kids already stuffing their belly in the kitchen and keeping an eye on them at the same time - and Marcus knows Abby is completely oblivious of the Head of Neurosurgery being in love with her when she thanks him (for everything as ambiguous as it might sound to Jaha listening in), waves goodbye, then swiftly stops him, running bare feet in the middle of the street before he can get into his car, cups his stubbly cheek, awkwardly raises on tiptoes and presses soft lips to the corner of his mouth.
"May we meet again," she wishes for his ears only.
Marcus tries not to make a fool of himself and only grins back a lopsided smile.
When he drives off and turns the radio on George Harrison sings for him Got My Mind Set On You.
AN: just when you thought 'road trip' was over...