a/n: I PROMISE TO RESPOND TO THE REVIEWS ;-; you guys are not forgotten. we love you all so much! I hope you enjoy this one!
CHAPTER TEN
your hiddenness is home / else lasker-schüler, inward, into the light
It is hours before dawnbreak when he is stirred from his sleep from a dry throat. The glass of water he set down before bed is almost knocked over when he reaches for it clumsily, and he places the empty glass back down gently; careful of limiting the noise he makes to spare the other in his bed. The pillow is such a blissful comfort, he thinks as he settles his head over it and he stretches his arm behind him only to find an empty space and cold sheets.
It takes him a moment in his stupor to register it. He feels the sheets around him, searching for phone to check the time and that's missing too. Grumbling, he pushes the sheets off him knowing Chris would call or text or whatever else under the sun if he didn't respond to her messages, even if he did call her on his way home to avoid further interruptions. Blinking away the sleep, he gets out of bed and fumbles around his strewn clothes in search for the when he realizes the bathroom light isn't on either. Her clothes are still set aside neatly over the chair, so she hasn't left. He battles between getting back into bed or searching for her and the phone - and decides on the latter, wanting to avoid an empty battery come morning and search party looking for him.
Rubbing his eyes, he grabs what he thinks is a bathrobe, but it fits a little tighter than that. It doesn't matter. His footsteps are silent out of a different habit, stepping out into the living area. The lowlights under the cabinets are illuminating dimly for those half-asleep, but at the brink of calling for her attention, he realizes she's engrossed in something, hunching over the kitchen counter, that she doesn't even notice him come closer.
"Riza," he calls out, fingers fumbling over the buttons of what he can recognise not as his bathrobe, but a cardigan. She jumps and the plastic of the phone clatters noisily on the counter. She releases a high-pitched noise like she's been frightened.
Or caught.
Immediately, he tries to shake off the gut-sinking feeling; the familiarity of it is nostalgic in a way he'd rather not welcome, but she's looking at him wide-eyed, blinking like a deer in the headlights. He can't trust it though, his own intuition, when he's still rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He looks at the lit screen and the pieces fall into place. The notification bar is dropped down with previews of messages sitting on the screen. His eyes move from it back to her. "What were you doing with my phone?"
Hand on her chest, she swallows trying to catch her breath. "You nearly gave me a heart attack."
Roy bites the inside of his cheek and wills himself to wait, rather than to demand for her to answer. This isn't class, it isn't a space whether either of them has more power than the other. The klaxons aren't sounding quite yet but as the silence drags on he's finding it harder to remain level-headed.
She hands him the phone. "Someone's been trying to get a hold of you. Blowing up your phone every five seconds while I was out here going to get water."
He takes the device from her. "Did I leave it out here?" he asks as casually as he can manage, but her eyes narrows slightly, quick to pick up what he might be implying.
Her head turns back to the counter, gesturing. "I left mine out here too."
Finally, Roy wakes his phone and there are numerous messages, all from the same person. His body tenses at the same time that it goes cold. A sigh goes through him when he decides to take her at her word. Scrolling and skimming through, he thinks he simply can't be free of her today.
He glances towards Riza whose expression is far from readable. She isn't looking at him, but she is waiting. Any suspicion tapers from her natural nonchalance, her body language telling him that she's done nothing wrong. But he can't decipher more than that. The only time he knows what she's really thinking is when they're fumbling in between the sheets and only then does her face betray her. He clutches his phone from that thought and sets it back on the counter still on.
"An ex," he explains, though she hasn't asked him outright. "With far too much time on her hands. And liquor, judging by the horribly butchered messages." He pushes the phone to rest in the space between them, a tentative peace offering. He doesn't want to linger on why he feels the need to explain himself to her.
Riza takes the invitation to look with her arms wrapped around herself, and does so briefly. A ghost of a smirk lifts in the corner of her lip. "Axe?"
He smiles unbidden and stares down as the phone dims. "From what an axe wound she is."
Her eyes try not to look down to his torso, but she sneaks in a glance when the glass cup goes in the sink. He's about to tell her that Axe wasn't the cause of his scar but she pivots herself and the course of the entire conversation. "Papi?"
"It's…" An embarrassed chuckle leaves him as he finds himself going red. "Pet names," he answers simply.
Riza looks down to the floor thoughtfully. "I'm not too well-versed in Spanish, but "papa" is "dad" and "papito" is-"
"It's a contextual language." He looks away, grinning despite his own chagrin.
"But, of course." She's smiling as she says it with teasing undertones, but that's something he likes so much about her that he can't stop staring.
He shrugs lightly. "Judge me all you want."
"Have full confidence that I intend to do that."
He doesn't respond, but they're still standing there, meaning there's something keeping her here, as if she's not sure. He doesn't know, something about her is still guarded and part of him wants to reassure her with a million kisses, but he knows his place and how the undefined protects them. "Do you have any previous significant others that come back to haunt you like this?"
Riza snorts. "No. The last time I had someone give me this much attention was in kindergarten. I haven't spoken to him in over fifteen years, but you never know."
"I find it difficult to believe that the last jilted lover from your past comes from kindergarten. There must've been others."
"If you must know, I was in an all-girls boarding school. Not a lot of chances to kiss boys there, but lovers? Ha," she says and sounds so jaded, like she's known a deep disappointment. For some reason, she looks away, rubbing an arm. "Hook-ups, sure, but find me a twenty-year old with the emotional maturity capable of love."
He'd rather not, if he's honest, but Roy smiles at her distantly. Out of nowhere, he scratches a metaphorical itch and asks, "Have you ever been in love?"
"No," she answers simply and her eyes return to him slowly, but he can't find any other meaning in them even as they catch the lowlight. "I can't say that I have."
He nods silently and is about to push off from the counter when she continues abruptly.
"What about you?" She sounds like she wasn't finished with the conversation, so he looks back at her. She nods her head, gesturing his phone. Her lips purse slightly, fleetingly. "Were you in love with her?"
He lingers on that curious expression that surfaced longer than he should have, mouth slightly parted from it. His eyebrows rise to snap out of it and responds, "I was. At one point. In the end we wanted different things."
Riza relaxes and uncrosses her arms, even though she says, "I don't know, it's painfully clear what and who she wants."
In response to her tease, he confesses in no uncertain terms, "But I don't want her." And it's like the words get stuck in her throat because her mouth is open, ready to speak, then she closes it, swiping the bangs from her face.
Roy doesn't know where this heavy atmosphere originated from or how it came about so quickly. He can guess it's in the bite in her lip just now or this prolonged silence. Maybe it's the way he's looking at her, because there are occasions where he lets his heart rest on his sleeve or maybe it's because he's said the right thing in the right tone with the right inflection, but for what end goal? Mentally, he refuses to name it, but he knows it's there, lingering in the spaces between his words.
Slowly, her lips curl into a smile which prompts him to do the same. He's urged to pull her into a kiss for one reason or another and he just knows it would feel different than all other kisses they've shared. It wouldn't be born out of the undercurrents of sexual tension that usually existed between them. It would feel more...intimate. A different kind of confession, really.
Riza looks away from him, still smiling, then she walks past him, patting his arm casually. "I'm going back to bed."
He stays there, watching the notification light blink for a few moments longer, before he follows her.
In the morning, he returns from the pharmacy with an unconventional haul of breakfast and two different contraceptives, deciding to spare her from the looks of judgemental cashiers, because who needs two kinds of birth control, you dog? Better safe than sorry. Out of them both, he knows he should be the responsible one, or at the very least as responsible anyone can be in this irresponsible situation. It was his mistake.
The apartment is still after he settles the bags on the counter and he figures she's still in bed. As he switches on the coffee maker, Roy stares at the buttons of the lit up machine, narrowing his eyes from the sobering realization of his other mistakes. Well, they're mistakes if he wants them to be, but they really should be, because he keeps forgetting and last night could have been a colossal fuck-up at any given moment on top of the monumental shit pile it already is.
The spare key, having her here when he's not, sleeping here - he's let his guard down so quickly. He tries to think of an excuse and the feeling of running away comes flooding back, but the anxiety isn't satisfied by that this time. He never should've asked her to stay. He needs to rectify that now.
The room is filled with natural sunlight when he enters his bedroom and she's still sleeping, lightly snoring underneath the covers. Roy quietly pads to her side of the bed; the thought of loudly waking her never goes into consideration. He sees her hair splayed out like a golden halo over the pillow and follows it to her face. He pauses. No, in actuality, he is paused: by the way the sunlight glows on her face, by the peace she knows when she's sleeping, by the own catch of his breath.
She's beautiful, a thought intrusively comes to the forefront.
A few moments later, he finds himself outside of the bedroom, banging his head softly on cabinet doors.
When he re-enters, he holds a glass of water, ibuprofen in case of any hangover, and the emergency contraceptive. Roy sets the glass down on the nightstand of her side and gently nudges her, sitting on the edge of the bed.
Riza groans softly, stretching as she blinks in the light. He can't help the small smile that forms over his lips and she smiles back. "Good morning," she says sleepily.
"Good morning," he says back. He hands her the medicine and she looks at the capsule, confused. "I went to pharmacy already and breakfast is on the counter."
She raises her eyebrows, depositing the pills in her mouth and reaching over for the water. "Bedside service, is this going to be a usual thing?"
He pushes himself up and says the first thing that comes to mind that'll ruin this moment, "Only when you let me go bareback."
Where others would be annoyed, she's amused, spitting out her water and chuckling from it. He smiles, because of course he's not in any trouble.
The conversation of the night before opens a different ease with her. The days go by without him realizing that he's getting too comfortable around her presence. He's slipping further down into something without any real means of getting himself out. The feelings are shelved as he welcomes the break from university classes, but he realizes how behind he really is on a deadline due in the middle of the week. Before he knows it, the weekend has passed him by and they've barely had more than to do than just eat and read and review.
She tidies around around when she gets bored and something twists inside him, wanting her to stop. The thought resurfaces that he should send her home, because that'd be the right thing to do, but he's selfish and doesn't want to because he loves her...company. He also rationalizes she's staying because she doesn't want to go back to her own place while her roommates are away. Roy doesn't blame her - it's one thing to live alone, but when you're used to the sounds of flatmates it can be disconcerting to suddenly be without.
The tension of the deadline culminates Tuesday, the evening before it's due. He's hardly said anything to her all day besides a few grunts and mumbling until he finally sends her to go find some takeout for dinner to give him a chance to sneak onto his small balcony that overlooks a part of East City. The cigarette he lights has been tucked away for months but it catches fire quickly enough. The smoke burns pleasantly in his lungs and the nicotine gives him that immediate gratification he yearns for before he exhales. Unwisely, perhaps, he checks his messages on his phone.
14 new messages.
His expressions sours and he exits the app, breathing in a long drag of the cigarette.
"Taking a break?"
He snorts at her standing against the threshold. "Something like that." He flicks the filtered end of the cigarette with his thumb and the ashes fall on the tray next to him. "You came back quick," he notes as he brings it to his mouth again.
"I bought ingredients instead of takeout," she says simply and leans against the doorframe with crossed arms. Curious, not accusatory, she points out: "I didn't know you smoked."
"I usually don't, but it takes the edge off when it comes to stress. And ingredients for what?"
"To cook."
"You can cook?" He doesn't mean to sound so incredulous, but he didn't know many peers at her age who could successfully put together a dish. Then again, his own worldview was a little skewed from his own upbringing, and that's when it hit him: if her apartment was emptied, why not go to her parents? There's so little he knew about her that he didn't let himself ask, didn't stop to even consider.
"I can and I won't charge you this time. It'll keep me busy in between things you want me to do."
He smiles, something he's been catching himself doing a lot of lately, as he puts out the burning end of the cigarette. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you're being awfully nice to me."
"I'll never let you see the light of day if you tell anyone."
"Dry as ever, Miss Hawkeye. But it's a tempting offer."
She ends up making a kind of chicken pasta dish with cream - admitting that she never really bothered with recipes, just kept trying with ingredients until she had figured something out.
"You don't use recipes?" Roy finds that a little hard to believe. "Do you just throw things together and hope they taste good?"
Riza shrugs as she adds a little more cream to the saucepan, and stirs. "I mean, if I'm baking a cake or something I'll find one because baking is literally a science unto itself. With cooking there's a lot more leeway." She takes a sip of wine and leans against the pantry door, watching him. "Does that frighten the scientist in you?"
He snorts into his wine glass and shakes his head. "No. I'm more interested in how long it took for you to become a master cook."
Riza turns back to the saucepan. "I had to grow up quick," she says briskly. He knows that there is a story buried in those words, but it's clear it is not one she's comfortable sharing with him just yet. He fiddles with the stem of the wine glass, and mentally shelves that topic into the box marked 'Riza' in his head.
Late on Tuesday night, Roy meets the deadline with about as much fanfare as can be expected with the sending of an single email update to his editor. His research was coming along fine, but it had been some kind of cruel irony that he didn't even have the energy to do much beyond drag himself to bed night after long night of going over literature that he wouldn't normally touch with a ten-foot pole. Roy enjoys academia and the relative freedom along with it, but the theory could never even begin to compete with the experiments he used to be involved with. Sure, he theorizing was still part of the process even then - he wasn't a complete heathen - but there was something satisfying about getting to prove his ideas right. He didn't work well with abstracts, with "maybe" or "possibly" or "down the line", with the knowledge that some parts would forever remain unknown to him.
There is also something satisfying about walking into his bedroom and seeing seeing her already in the bed, asleep. Even if he feels too exhausted to do anything but crawl into bed and draw her close to his chest, it's quickly becoming one of those simple pleasures Maes was always yammering about. Her faint perfume is more than enough to relax him, making him smile drowsily, and send him quickly to sleep.
The morning after his deadline he wakes much later than usual, and he's unsurprised when he shifts and finds only cool sheets between his arms. He dozes there for a while, trying to listen for any familiar sounds, but the warmth of the bed and the exhaustion he still feels drags him back down, and he drifts off once more.
The second time he wakes, he makes sure to roll over and grab his phone - 11:08am glares back at him, and he grumbles as he forces himself out of bed. He shuffles towards the bathroom, and hopes that a shower will wake him up, even at least a little bit. His eyes are beginning to feel the strain of the long nights of pouring over drier academia than the Sahara, and as he steps into the bathroom, he wonders if he can just crawl back into bed after this. Riza would understand: long nights and procrastination were probably second nature to her by this point.
He spends too much time just standing in the shower and possibly dozing again, but at least when he exits the bathroom the change in temperature makes him feel somewhat more ready to face the day. He rubs at his face roughly, brushing away the sleep still stuck in his eyelashes. Tonight they'd be ordering in; he was craving stuffed crust pizza and he damn well deserved a quality pepperoni special.
He wanders down towards the kitchen, adjusting the towel wrapped low around his hips. Riza is curled up on the couch, and she flashes him a quick smile, picking up her mug in salutation. "Feel better?"
He gives her a noncommittal grunt and makes a beeline for the fridge, grabbing the leftover stir fry she had made last night and digs into it with gusto. She really was a great cook, despite her protests that it was nothing special. At her age he could barely put together a meal like this, and she did it all without referring back to instructions.
"Yeah," he says finally, after a few minutes, putting the now-empty bowl and fork into the sink. "I'm sure my editor will tear it to shreds but that's par for the course in academia."
Riza nods, humming in thought. "When do you need to have the final draft completed by?"
He opens his mouth to answer, and then shuts it again, shaking his head with a bemused expression. "I wasn't aware you were going to be my live-in assistant. Do I not deserve a break?"
She grins, and it's like her whole body suddenly relaxes, comfortable in this familiar territory of playful banter. He too, feels it, in spite of the cool morning, feels her eyes on him, decidedly further south than where his own are. The towel is low enough that he knows the scar is poking over the top, but in his gut he knows that she doesn't see it in the way that others have, and will continue to do. There is no fleeting pity, no pull of the eyebrows as she acknowledges its existence - no, Riza Hawkeye is instead focused on something else entirely. She rises from the couch and walks towards him with purpose, the skirt of her dress pulled up by the oversized sweater she wears on top.
"Of course you do," she tells him, clasping her hands behind her and stopping before him. "And I need to go back home to grab some stuff anyway-"
"Like what?"
Riza gestures to her outfit. "I can't keep resorting to stealing your clothes. I might be a poor student but I'm not desperate."
A slow grin grows on his face as he realises whose sweater that she's wearing actually belongs to. If he didn't know her better, he'd accuse her of deliberately going out of her way to seduce him with cheap tricks that definitely go straight to his dick. "I don't know," he replies thoughtfully, moving closer to her, fingers slipping under the hem of the dress, stroking the skin of her thighs lightly, "'desperate' is a good look on you." His voice has taken on that low, soft quality that he knows she enjoys so much - and it takes a lot of willpower for him not to cling when she pulls back, smiling apologetically, instead of picking her up and taking her back to the bedroom. Generally their interactions were always laced with the undertones of sexual agency: this was easily the longest they had existed within each other's spaces without ending up in bed together, and if he was perfectly honest with himself, that was...peturbing.
"I'll be back soon," she explains, her smile sly and promising.
He nods slowly, before frowning. "Why didn't you just go sooner? The front door works both ways, you know."
Her cheeks tinge a little, realizing that he's right. She stammers slightly, "It didn't come to mind."
He chews over what that means for longer than he intends to: she's still waiting there, awkwardly hovering for him to respond. "Then let me drive you as repayment for your noble sacrifice," he tells her, flashing her a warm smile as he makes his way back down the hall towards the bedroom.
"It's really not a big deal…" she answers, hesitating in the doorway. "And you've been running yourself ragged these last few days - I don't need a lot, just a backpack and my laptop."
He shakes his head as he shimmies on a pair of jeans and an old t-shirt. "The deadline has been met, and my editor is as pleased as he's ever going to be. Please, let me see outside these walls. I think I've forgotten what the colour green looks like." He grabs a cap to go over his hair and sunglasses to go over his face. "There, no one will recognize me now."
She laughs and gives in. "Fine! Lead the way, chauffeur."
The closer they get to her apartment, the tenser her body gets. She's fidgeting with her fingers with thoughtful state out the window, biting her lower lip every so often. Though it isn't a long ride, there is a need for a merciful distraction so he pushes the button that turns the radio on his console with conviction.
Unfortunately, he forgets himself and his tendency to sometimes listen to music in his car at full volume. The car swerves slightly from his wincing from the sudden blast of sound and she's yanked off from her thoughts. He says a meek apology, though he wants to laugh because she's staring at him incredulously.
"Is this how you normally listen to music?"
He smirks a little. "Maybe."
"Are you trying to go deaf?" She shakes her head and turns the knob to listen. "What does Roy Mustang listen to?"
He leans on the driver side door and scratches underneath the cap. "Why don't you find out?" He's slightly grateful seeing that her complex is the next turn. It's some merengue-pop mix song, he hasn't heard of, edited for radio, but she's turning her head and narrowing her eyes, trying to make sense of the music that isn't in her language in a genre that she's probably never heard of before.
The engine shuts off and he opens the door to quiet the car. "Isn't it the best thing you've ever heard?" he asks her sarcastically.
She gets out of the vehicle and from the looks of it, she's trying to be nice about what she has to say. It only makes it him smile. She begins to nod, fishing out her keys, as she sympathetically says "It has a nice melody to it, I can see the appeal."
Roy leans on the threshold, well aware of the shit-eating grin on his face. "I've never heard that song before."
That earns him a glare as she continues digging in her seemingly endless bag, which is amazing given how tiny it is.
"Besides you don't listen with your ears. You measure it with your hips."
Without looking up, she mutters, "What the hell does that mean?"
He perks, a little stunned and a little perplexed. "Like dancing."
She raises an eyebrow, but doesn't look at him, still focused on the mysteries of her keys in her absurdly small bag. "You dance?"
"You can't?" Roy shoots back.
She gives him a look that he cannot translate as anything but does it look like I know how to dance? as she unlocks the door. Riza lets him before her and he's relieved to hear that it's still empty.
"I'll be quick," she says simply, unknowingly awkward.
He takes off the cap and sunglasses and sets them down on a nearby surface, running a hand through his still-damp hair. "What, not even a tour? What a gracious hostess you are."
She stops and pivots back. "We had the wine cellar removed last month, so there's not much to show."
Roy pauses, momentarily confused before he realises she is joking. "It scares me a little that you say that with such conviction that I actually believe you for about five seconds."
She laughs then, properly and loudly, her hand raising to partially cover her mouth. "I'll remember that the next time I need to bullshit for one of your assignments," she teases, winking.
She gestures grandly from where they stand in front of the door, but her explanation is anything but. "That small alleyway there is the kitchen. Down the hall is Olivier's room, here's the living room. The one bathroom is over there and on this side is Rebecca's room and then my room next to it."
"Quaint," he comments. "So, you really can't dance?"
She breathes in and out audibly to dismiss his query. "I'm going to get what I need," she says pointedly.
He snatches her wrist and she looks at the hand over it, then his face; he's holding a finger up. "Hold on a minute." He had stretched to catch her hand so he straightens. "Are you nervous about having me here?"
"No," she lies and that knowing look resurfaces from him. "There isn't a rational reason for me to be. The complex is nearly emptied and I doubt anyone could have recognized you." She shrugs slightly. "I suppose the entire situation hits home, so to speak... With you here."
He lets her hand go. "Would you rather me go? Because I have no-"
"No!" Riza interjects quickly, almost desperate to avoid communicating the wrong thing, and calmer this time, she repeats: "No. And to answer your question: it's not that I can't dance; I wasn't given an opportunity to learn."
He smiles tenderly and offers, "Would you like me to show you?"
"...Why?"
"It's fun." He shrugs. "Something different than academia or whatever else has been going on in the last few days."
"I don't -" she relaxes her shoulders, huffing. "All right, fine. Show me."
He digs out his phone from his pocket. While he's searching through his phone for what would be best suited for a beginner, he says, "We'll start simple and Bachata is probably the easiest one to learn. It's finding the rhythm in your hips and moving them to it. Three-steps to the right, three steps to the left. Repeat. It's simple." It isn't thought, it can get more complicated than that, but he'll spare her the watches him saunter side to side as an example while still fixed on his screen and covers her mouth to stifle a giggle.
"Simple enough, it seems." He sets the phone down on the end table and takes her hand, leading her to the middle of the living room. He's still smiling, and he realises that he's proud of showing her this and unafraid to show share this side of him. He holds both her hands, her fingers really. He talks her through feet placement when the song picks up and she follows or rather, tries. She's too busy counting the paces, inattentive to the tempo or melody of the song. She's off-beat and looks clunky and weird and endearing. She looks at him and he's looking at her, swinging their hands to the song.
"Having trouble?"
Riza frowns, "A bit."
"You're too busy looking at the technical aspect of it." He lets go. "Counting, am I right?"
"Possibly."
Roy circles around her, behind her, and his hands fall on her hips. "Feel it here. With each step." He applies pressure to her left hip to nudge it forward and step, then the other side to create a mini-sway back, as if creating momentum for each step in that direction until he guides her in the opposite direction.
With his breath hitting her neck.
"Does that make more sense?"
"A little. It'd be better if I knew what was being said," she quips, not unkindly.
He twirls her around unexpectedly, leaving on hand on her waist and grabbing her hand. "The song title translates to 'Indecent Proposal', if you're so curious."
"How fitting."
"It talks about this man being so attracted to this woman, he asks her if she's ever misbehaved. That an adventure is more thrilling if it's a little dangerous. He asks her if she'd let herself be seduced. If she thought it'd be prudent - this indecent proposal."
She kisses him then. It doesn't feel like she's trying shut him up - well, maybe she was, but in any case it was certainly the best way to achieve that end - her lips are warm against his own, hips moving of their own accord, still a little uncertain, but with more conviction than before. She draws him close, allowing her body to relax and mold to his. When he moves, so does she: and he lets himself be distracted by the curve of her lips and the curves under his hands, lets himself be brought to her as a supplicant on his knees, begging for more. The music guides them, guides her - and as it swells, so does she, rising onto the tips of her toes and sliding her arms around his neck, pulling him close.
Her breath is sweet and he wills himself not to groan as she gyrates her hips, growing bolder with every passing second. She draws back slightly, bright eyes darting between his. She's flushed pink, a furtive smile tugging at her lips, an even pinker tongue poking out to wet her lips.
How did he ever think he stood a chance against her, against this image? Even in his wildest and most vivid dreams, he could never conjure something like this: he could never get the exact texture and shade of her lips right, bright with blood flow and delicate bites, he could never recreate the exact way her chest heaves as she struggles to catch her breath.
Perhaps he stares at her for a bit too long, because he's pushed back to the couch and she crawls onto him, and kisses him again fiercely. Her hands cup his face, fingers push back his hair. It feels wonderful, and that feeling only intensifies as she rests herself fully on his lap, hips shifting against his own. His hands automatically rest on her hips, and he barely has his fingers under the fabric before her hands leave him and cross over herself. The sweater is discarded and she makes quick work on the myriad of buttons on her front. Easily, he catches her fingers and kisses them softly, before continuing the work himself. Riza shrugs out of the sleeves with practiced ease, and groans as his head dips towards her chest. He kisses the flat expanse of her sternum, pulling the fabric of her cups to the side.
He is not kind about his kisses here, nor is he kind about the bites that follow. She brings out the worst in him sometimes, the perverse part of him that likes to see how she struggles and reacts against him. He loves pushing her, loves seeing how she reacts to new sensations. This time is no different. She shivers against him as he draws a nipple into his mouth, squeals as he nips at the sensitive bud. The other gets the same, albeit softer treatment from his fingers: he rolls it between his fingers and pinches when she seems to be getting too comfortable. Her fingers grip at his hair tightly, almost painfully when he sucks hard - hard enough, he knows, to bruise.
Her hips are insistent against his own, rubbing over the same spot that is already uncomfortably tight - he doesn't know whether the constant pressure is better than a lack of it - and even he finds himself groaning with her, hips thrusting upwards. Her fingers are trailing all over him, like miniature brands that leave trails of heat in their wake as they work their way down his body.
He thinks he hears a click nearby, but then Riza is kissing him again, her hips working in tandem with the music still playing from his phone. He's too preoccupied for any thoughts beyond how soft her lips are, and how warm she feels under his hands.
The both of them are too engrossed in one another to notice the newcomer crossing the threshold, rummaging around in her bag. "The fuck is that noise Riza-" she calls out, stopping at the same time that Riza looks up, and shrieks.
She twists violently in his lap, limbs digging into him as she tries to re-button her dress and move off him at the same time; he's left winded and with a growing sense of terror gnawing away in his gut.
"Olivier - I- I didn't realise-"
Roy, unwisely, turns his head to look at them both: Riza is still struggling to do even half of the buttons, and her flatmate's gaze lands squarely on him, a frown digging deep into her eyebrows. Her mouth parts slightly.
"I know you," the blonde girl says slowly, still frowning, eyes flicking to Riza who has gone very still, and very pale.
"You're-"
"Olivier-" Riza pleads.
"From the campus handbook-"
"Please-"
"Professor." Olivier spits the word out darkly, her face tensing. Roy rises from the couch, brain scrambling for a response that is coherent, sound: the blood is rushing through his ears and his heart is salsaing in double time. Riza has lost all colour and she's more distraught than he's ever seen her.
The moment stretches on and he feels like the world's biggest asshole when he sighs and shakes his head, scooping up his keys and his phone, pressing pause. The silence afterwards is deafening. "I think I'm going to go."
"I think that's best," Olivier snaps in her stead and they extend glances until he switches to Riza and she gives a short nod, not betraying anything else. Her arms are tightly curled around herself, and she pulls away from him when he walks past.
The door shuts behind him loudly, and he runs shaky hands through his hair, blinking rapidly in the cool air.
Olivier is pacing in front of the couch - back and forth, back and forth - with anger creased in her eyebrows. To avoid feeling like a scolded child, Riza sits with her spine ramrod straight, fully dressed now, hands folded over her knees. On the inside, she wants the ground to swallow her whole, wants to sink into the fabric of the couch and become one with the faded fabric.
The last thing she anticipated was Olivier walking in, much less finding out about all of this. Carelessly dumb doesn't begin to cover it. Anyone else could recognize him by his car, or whatever other features. She was asking for trouble.
Olivier stops abruptly in front of her and she starts slow and tempered, with an emphasis in each clause until it escalates in volume towards the end: "When I said - I don't care about who you were fucking, that did not extend to fucking your professor."
Riza doesn't say anything. It was a moment of weakness - the text, not the sex - in search of support for a morally questionable decision which still is and Riza admits that; she should have never gotten her involved in the first place. She lets Olivier say her piece.
Olivier points at the door as if he's still there. "This is your big secret? The one you've been keeping from Rebecca? She thinks you're going off with some mystery frat boy and she won't shut the fuck up about it."
There is a prickle of guilt for keeping it from Rebecca.
"Hey," Olivier beckons, prompting Riza to look up. "Is that grade worth it? What was it, for Chem Lit? Too good to study like the rest of us?"
Her eyes narrow on the cold ones looking down on her. Her mouth is shaped into a hard frown now. It's a low blow, even for her. Her frigid roommate is notoriously ruthless, but Riza would hope she knows her better than that."I'm not fucking him for a grade, Olivier."
"You're fucking him for something. Think, Riza." She pokes at her own temple. "This happens all the fucking time. Sleazy professors preying on students stupid enough to take the bait, thinking they are getting ahead."
Unwilling to be chastised any longer, Riza stands up with fists tightly wound as her jaw is clenched, "Don't think I'm fooling myself here, assuming I don't know this is as bad as it looks, because I do. And I don't need you to repeat it back to me. I'm capable of looking after myself. I made my choices, all right? This is different."
Her full lips quirk subtly, frustratingly, to accompany the smug look on her face. Her shoulders begin to quake from the chuckle she's holding back, mocking her, and she continues with a tone of fake sympathy. "Right, yes, of course, of course.This fucking creep of a man is different, he understands you, he buys you nice shit because of course he fucking looked up your file and he knows you're on a scholarship, that you have next to no money, and he's promised to write you a letter of recommendation for next year's intake if you'll just suck his dick."
Riza feels the heat of her cheeks like they've been slapped, hard, across her face. She has a protest ready but it dies in her throat when Olivier goes on.
"Didn't you recently get a new work-study position? Did he get you that? Do you not see that you're literally exchanging favors for sex here?"
Riza's throat tightens and she tries to swallow, rooted in the floor where she stood. Her voice comes out meager, "It isn't like that…"
"He suckered you into a contract to work with him, to keep you around at all times, and you don't even think to leave because it's different or it's not like that. Bullshit. What happened to the last person in this position? Or was that wasn't brought up because the interview process was less verbal and more physical?"
"Enough!" Riza yells over the tail-end of her last accusation. She has no doubt her eyes are glistening, judging by the way they burn. It's hurtful and heavy in her chest, sinking with the weight of a metric tonne.
An emotion has finally settled on Olivier's face and Riza recognises it with dawning horror: pity. "Oh. Don't tell me you think you have feelings him. Or, worse - do you think he loves you?" She says, but it's more like she's spitting out the words, taking a step back and shaking her head disapprovingly. "I would've expected something so self-destructive and reckless from Rebecca, but not you. I can't believe you'd throw away your scholarship for some dick."
"Are you done?" she asks with a trembling lip. Riza doesn't wait for an answer she begins gather her things - and his sweater that she had been wearing. "Must be nice looking down from your high horse."
"Don't be such a brat. He's your professor, who has the power to fuck up your entire career-"
"Then pretend you didn't see him and give another two months and the problem will be over," she sneers.
"You're going to continue seeing him?" Olivier is livid, her face turning a curious shade of pink, her full lips thinning dramatically. It would almost be hilarious to Riza if she wasn't in the firing line.
"It isn't anyone's business but my own," Riza replies stubbornly.
"You're making it my business by bringing him here - where I live. Or have you forgotten? If you get caught - and I guarantee you will - talk will get back to me. You're not fucking up my degree along with yours. Think! As soon as he finds out about your dad you know he will run."
"Don't-"
"You said so yourself - he just sits there and won't even talk to his only daughter, but yeah, Professor Magic Dick is gonna be the daddy you never had."
There it is, her tipping point. Riza spins on her heel away from her flatmate. By this point she's beyond consoling, beyond rational words. She's insulted, angry and embarrassed. She doesn't have the patience to tolerate Olivier's sanctimonious attitude any longer. Family is off-limits. She wants to insult her own family? Fine, but that doesn't warrant a reason to drag what family Riza has.
"Riza-"
"Fuck you." Riza pours every inch of hatred she feels into the words, her hands clenched painfully. "I'm done listening. Tell your father to hire someone to bear your insults."
Riza storms down the hallway, roughly wiping at her face to stop the tears she can feels forming - they're painful ones, prickling harshly at the corners of her eyes. She doesn't have to listen to this, be belittled and condescended to: she's an adult, for fuck's sake - her choices were her own, and the consequences too. She hears Olivier follow her, can only imagine the sharp words being primed to cut her down further. Riza twists her head back to look at her flatmate through her tears, and manages one last scathing retort before she slams her bedroom door behind her:
"Nothing in my life has ever been ideal Olivier. I'll take what little happiness I can get."