This chapter surprised me. THE SMUT is here, but it takes a back seat, and I think it's also different than any other smut I've written.
GOOD NEWS: the next chapter will be THE BIG DAY. And it's really clear in my head right now so I'll more than likely have it up sometime in the next couple of days.
Simon drummed his fingers on the table waiting for Max to return with the fourth round. He liked the Stumbling Goat. He was pretty sure he'd love it even if it wasn't reminiscent of the alehouses Ichabod and his school chums used to frequent, especially after exam weeks.
A memory of Ichabod's Simon particularly loved was the night he, Wallace Lannister, and Stewart Donnelly descended on their establishment of choice with the specific intent of drinking until they forgot the insufferable chore of Professor Sharpe's courses. The man was boring, dim witted, unworthy of his profession.
The three of them got so wrecked, when they woke up the next morning they were laying in a heap on the green of the Oxford courtyard. The back of Ichabod's shirt was ripped almost completely in two, Stewart was wearing a lady's bonnet, and Wallace had a spectacular bruise on his side. They also discovered pieces of paper stuffed down their trousers, each adorned with loose unskilled sketches of cartoonishly buxom women.
"Here ya go!" Max set a pint in front of Simon and slid into the booth with his own. He raised his glass. "To the fact that it took a walking fossil to help you lock down a woman!"
"I could have On my own!" Simon insisted, taking a swig of his beverage.
"Well it's a fucking good thing you didn't," Max took a generous gulp of his beer. "If Simon had a wifey of his own, who knows how you and Ichabod would have balanced out. You might have brushed off Abbie, flown back to Maine, and then I wouldn't have Kat."
Simon nodded, tipsy - ish. "Aaaaaaand then your life would be a meaningless pit, wrapped in a void, wrapped in . . . " he frowned. "Dammit, I didn't think that one through. . . Anyhow, I too am unspeakably thankful for the," he giggled, "the giant crow demon who gave me, who worked - who made - he did the thing."
"It's weird, right?" Max asked rhetorically. "There was a dead body so, y'know, a guy got killed, but . . . all your actual you stuff is still alive so Malphus didn't technically murder anyone. Except he did. But he didn't?" Max frowned. "I'm not drinking fast enough."
Simon grinned. "I'd make a fascinating discussion point in a philosophy or theology classes, wouldn't I? 'What defines personhood? Discuss.'" He took a small sip of his drink. His plan was to nurse beer number four long enough to stay level with the effect of beer number three so as to stay in descent(ish) enough condition to take on beer number five.
Max chortled. "Man, your ego would eat that up!"
"Indeed," Simon grinned. "It's a shame I can never reveal myself. My brain - mate being a Revolutionary War soldier brought forward two hundred plus years into the future by a witch is absurd, but I could probably onvince someone. its only my role in the Apocalypse prevents me from doing so. The general public shouldn't know about such things."
They suddenly realized a pair of attractive young women were standing next to their table staring at them with worry and a bit of fear.
"We're in a play." They said in tandem, both sporting 'please believe us' smiles.
"Rehearsing," Max added with a pretentious nod.
Simon mirrored his body language. "Got the lines down well enough to just," he clicked his tongue and clinked his pint glass against Max's "pop 'em out."
"Mm-hm," Max nodded again.
"Really?" asked one of the ladies. "What play? Are you performing at the Lincoln or the new place?"
The women were still well inside the just being social zone, but a few more of their . . . Simon recognized the cosmopolitans - and they'd likely cross over to the frisky/flirty zone. Best to scoot them along sooner rather than later.
He could see Max struggling for a response that wouldn't get them pegged as liars, so he jumped in. "Oh, neither. The play is only a drama exercise for a small theatre class. Our class was divided in half and we came up with the most ridiculous, outlandish script possible to trade with the other half, and now we must perform our given script well enough to . . . buy credibility, so to speak."
The other woman joined the conversation. "That," she pointed at them both, "is a great exercise. If my high school drama teacher had come up with an exercise like that, I may have stuck with theatre."
"Really?" asked Max brightly, as though Simon's bullishit story were true.
Don't! Shut up! Shoo them away! He sighed internally. I have to do everything, I really do.
"Well it's been lovely talking with you ladies, but class is tomorrow, so . . ."
"Right, sorry," one of them said with actual sincerity as they both took a step back. "But you're gonna do great, guys. Seriously the acting was spot on!"
Max and Simon both raised their glasses in gratitude and the women went on their way.
Simon heaved a sigh of relief.
"How did you come up with that crap outta nowhere? asked Max. "I almost bought it."
"I am well practiced in covert operations. " He took another sip.
Max blinked at him. "You fight the devil and bottle feed orphaned ferrets!"
Simon laughed. "But I was also a spy for the rebellion after I defected. And concealing my role in the war against evil also required stealth daily."
"Right." Max took a generous gulp of his beverage. "Ichabod brain."
Simon changed subjects without warning. "I think nights out like this will be easier once I'm wearing a wedding ring." He held up his hand, looked fondly at his ring finger, and imagined the white gold band that would be there in two weeks. A constant emblem of Abbie Mills.
"Easier how?"
Simon shrugged. "Fending off female advances. We're both quite handsome, you know. In fact you should probably marry Kat as soon as possible.
Max waved off the suggestion. "Neh - I mean eventually yeah, but right now we're both enjoying the illusion of non-attachment, if that makes sense."
Simon responded with a quizzical look.
"We're not like you and Abbie. At the end of the day I'd cut off my leg before being with anyone else and so would she, but we're both disgusting oglers. And we're flirty - to a point," he added hastily, not wanting to make it sound as though he and Kat were just roomies who had sex. "But I could care less if I catch her giving a guy the classic once -over glance." He took and drink. "Yeah, I'm sure I still wouldn't mind it even if we were married, but . . . I dunno, I guess we just like where we're at for now."
You're baffling, Max. Both Simon and Ichabod understood him perfectly well, but they couldn't imagine wanting such a relationship. At least it works for you two.
Ichabod only had one strong concern. "But one day . . . ?"
"Biggest yes in the fucking world!"
They both chuckled.
"To what's meant to be!" Simon raised his glass.
They clinked glasses and Max took another drink. "I don't believe Kat and I are only together and planning a future because fate carved it in stone for us."
You're confusing me Max. It's mean to confuse me while I'm getting drunk.
"But the Maxwell I knew would never have fallen in love so fast." Simon pointed out.
"Okay, we'll start there." Max took a small sip, also choosing Simon's pacing strategy. "Falling in love with her was clearly out of my hands and no way it would have happened without divine intervention or what ever you wanna call it, but then . . . " he sighed. "It's hard to describe . . . "
Really, I hadn't noticed.
"I felt it even my first night in town. As un-Maxlike as it was, I knew I wanted to be with her. But I also planned to fly back to Maine in three days like a sane person. Staying in Sleepy Hollow was a last minute decision. My last minute decision." He pointed to himself. "So was moving in with her right away instead of getting my own place. And I believe those were all my choices. No puppet strings."
It suddenly struck both Simon and Ichabod as funny that he and Abbie reveled in the notion that their love was fated. A destined romance. Meanwhile Max insisted that free will was the deciding factor in his relationship, regardless of divine desire.
"What was my point?" Max frowned. "Oh yeah. I'm damn sure I'll marry Kat at some point. No doubt at all, but fate can fuck off. We'll get married when we both want to."
They returned to more frivolous subjects after that, and eventually switched to consuming water for the sake of recovered sobriety (and avoiding terrible hangover). Both were nearly sober enough to drive by last call.
"No way!" Yelled Max when the bartender called it. He looked at his phone and groaned. "Uuuugh, it's one thirty. I promised Kat I'd be home before midnight."
"Why hasn't she texted you?" Simon asked as he chugged down water.
Max sighed. "Our philosophy is we shouldn't need to babysit each other. I'll have to apologize in the morning." He cannonballed his water. "Blueberry pancakes. I'll make those, she loves those."
I gave Abbie no particular time to expect me home, he thought, worried that the exceptionally late hour might annoy her regardless.
He and Max walked around town waiting for the water to render them both wheel-ready.
On the drive back to the cabin, thoughts of fate versus choice began to trouble Ichabod. He and Abbie were basically placed in one another's paths, they'd no control whatsoever. If not for that, would Katrina have remained the love of his life? Would she have realized on her own that it was wrong to keep her powers a secret?
Is what Abbie and I have just as predetermined as our role in the Apocalypse?
It bothered him all the way home. At one point he even pulled over to think about it.
Abbie was sleeping soundly, but in her dreamstate she registered the feeling of someone stroking her hair. It felt nice.
"Mmmm," she sighed.
The long fingers combed through her hair as they stroked.
More bits and pieces of the real world began to take on form and meaning in her mind. The pillow pressed against her cheek. The shifting mattress as someone else's body moved.
Cabin. In bed. Ichabod.
A soft kiss to her temple and the whisper of her name.
She rolled over on her back and saw his vague outline in the nearly - pitch dark.
"Did you enjoy your boy's night?" She asked while yawning and stretching.
"Mm-hm." He went on stroking her hair and face. "Sorry to wake you," he whispered. "But I have to tell you something."
"Okay," Abbie said, still trying to shake sleep out of her brain.
"Here," he guided her to sit up.
It's a sitting up conversation? At three in the morning?
"What is it?"
He scooted close to her and caressed her face.
"I choose you."
"Huh?"
"Being with you." Ichabod swept his thumb along her cheekbone. "I choose it."
Abbie blinked and shook her head. "He says to the woman wearing his engagement ring."
"No, I mean -" his other hand went to the mattress and slid over hers. "I mean that even being in love did not dictate that we be together. We are agreed that we fell in love some time before the night of Rankin's party?"
"Yeah," Abbie muttered, still tired but starting to pay real attention.
"If not for that kiss who knows when or if we'd have confronted our feelings. My first thought even as I continued to kiss you was 'stop it right now and return home' and 'it is your duty to stop this,' that sort of thing. Which means the kiss could have ended in an instant. Either or both of us could have rallied the strength. We chose not to. And then there is Katrina."
He moved his body closer to hers. "My first desire was to abide by my vows come hell or high water. Difficult as it would have been, brutal as it would have been, there was no gun to my head the next morning when I declared my desire to pursue us in the face of all risk. I could have spent the next days showering Katrina with attention and promises to repair our marriage."
She shifted in the mattress and he placed a hand on her leg, massaging gently.
"What did you think our future would be, Abbie? How did you imagine us in the years ahead?"
Abbie cleared her throat. "Doing our job and being friends."
"Even if we wanted otherwise?"
She nodded.
"And that's easily how it could be now." He moved so close to her that one leg slid beneath hers, the mattress giving way to his weight. "Right at this moment we could be in our separate homes having spent the day fighting side by side, and wishing like hell things between us were different."
Abbie made a soft sound and moved further onto his lap. "C'mon, we woulda cracked eventually."
"Possibly." Ichabod placed a kiss just to the side of her mouth. "We may have encountered a thousand circumstances begging us to choose our feelings over everything. But in every instance we would be the ones to decide whether to resist or give in. So I just wanted you to know," he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her body close enough to kiss his way down her neck. "Regardless the role of fate in our feelings for one another," he placed as soft kiss to her mouth, I put that ring on your finger. You said yes."
She met him in a deeper kiss and brought an arm around his neck as she changed their angle in order to begin Operation Straddle Crane.
"Dearest," he muttered against her lips. "We can sleep." He ran his hands up her back, pressing her closer as she rose up on her knees to gain leverage. "I won't mind, I only woke you to - mmmmm," he moaned, accepting the fall and slide of her tongue against his. "To express . . . I apologize," he whispered even as her hips began a barely detectable rock that threatened to arouse him. "At this hour it was terribly selfish. You needn't feel obligated on my account."
"I don't," she whispered as she let her hips become less subtle and guided his hands beneath her shirt. "Choice is the theme of the night, yeah? I choose to have sleepy ' love you' sex." She chuckled softly, kissed his cheek and widened her straddle to offer more friction. "I know it's not ambitious," she whispered as she cradled is face in her hands. "I just like us together."
She felt him grow between her legs and pushed against the clothed hardness while she brought him into a long series of soft, shallow kisses. "Besides, aren't you planning a hell of a night for us in two weeks?" She nipped his lip and brushed the tip of her tongue over his. "Isn't that your grand plan?"
He nodded, lifting up his arms so she could pull off his shirt, followed by her own.
She dismounted and shimmied out of her underwear. "We'll make up for it then."
She prompted him to scoot to the edge of the bed and make enough room between his legs for her to kneel.
He drew in a long breath and his head lolled back as she undid his pants and ghosted tiny tingling kisses all over his torso. "I love you so much," he said as he let the breath out, indeed too tired to care about or object to the prospect of quick, no frills sex.
When she had him out of the pants she crawled back between his legs and ran her warm tongue over the inside of his thighs in small strokes as she moved forward.
He clutched the edge of the mattress when she pressed her tongue flat against his base and drew up, sliding her mouth down on him without pause when she reached the tip.
"You are lovely," he whispered, his voice quaking as he watched her.
She stayed at it for only a few moments before crawling back into his lap. Rather than allow her to take and ride him, Ichabod lifted her at the waist and settled them both across the bed at an angle.
"What?" Abbie chuckled as he gazed down at her in total silence.
The silent gaze continued for a few more seconds before he replied. "Two weeks" He swept his hand over the base of her throat, her breast, and down the curve of her hips. He hissed as he entered her, met with more pressure than usual because he'd nothing to prepare or further wet her (though she was aroused enough to welcome and encourage him deeper). "Two weeks and we are made complete."
Abbie moaned softly and looped her arms beneath his, running her hands over the long, lithe muscles of his back as they tensed and released in response to his movement.
The rhythmic, gentle roll of his body as he worked slowly inside her.
He ducked down to kiss a light trail from the flesh beneath her earlobe to the contours of her face, sighing against her flesh as he went. Though the encounter was mellow, his flesh still shivered when she answered each sigh.
The familiar dull ache began to consolidate and build in his rigid length, made more intense when Abbie's feet began to slide up his legs from his calves to as far up as she could go before hoisting over his narrow hips. She whined quietly and gripped his shoulder blades when he sped his pace from a gentle rocking to a deeper thrust. She wasn't even aware of his hand between their bodies until his fingers swept through her, dipping brieflu inside her before settling at her clit with a stroke that alternated between firm and gentle.
She shuddered, lifting her hips to meet his every approach while trying to think of something to say in response to the sweet sentiments that came so naturally to him. Her wanderings must have shown in her expression because suddenly his face was low over hers, the back of his hands stroking her cheek.
"Just be here, Abbie." he whispered. "I need you here."
His breath hitched when the slight clutch of her walls grew closer.
"I need you here, it's all I need . . . "
He began to flick his thumb over her clit and sped his thrust as he repeated the words over and over,
"It's all I need,
It's all I need,
It's all I need."
The quiet call of a person desiring nothing more than to be the sole focus of their lover's attention. His body warmed and his length strained when he saw and felt her return from whatever thought had taken her away.
A shiver hummed through her core. It felt to him like a delicate caress encouraging his release.
"Cum," she asked in a quiet, mewling voice as her breath shallowed and quickened. "Please Crane."
He worked at her clit until another shudder coursed through the wet muscle surrounding him, and they both gasped softly as he came.
It was sex stripped down to basics, but it gave them what they needed. They fell asleep minutes later, still sprawled sideways.
Life went on as usual in the following days. A soul eating demon. A possession. A non corporeal once human serial killer spirit. Your typical Apocalypse Posse workweek. Max and Katrina insisted they would take care of sending the killer back to hell so Ichabod and Abbie could go home and relax for a while.
Ichabod drove.
"Are you serious?" He muttered, leaning over the steering wheel and slowing down as they trundled down the long driveway. There was an unfamiliar car parked in front of the cabin, and a tall woman with frizzy blonde hair tied up in a bandana leaning against the trunk.
"Ha-HA!" He smacked the steering wheel and brought the car to a screeching halt.
I think we're in Simon Land now, thought Abbie as she got out of the car and her fiancée sprinted toward the woman.
"How the hell did you track me down?!"
"How dare you not email me about the move!" She pointed to the cabin.
Simon laughed and the two shared a robust bear hug.
"Oh please," Simon scoffed. "Email. We never email, we just dive bomb in for a visit once every two or three years."
"Yeah, well when I went to your old place and a pregnant lady answered the door I was totally thrilled for you for two seconds before her husband showed up. Anyhow, I called your friend Tyler and he have me your new address, caught me up on stuff - and this is officially not a visit!" She jumped back and punched him in the arm. "This is a freakin' pilgrimage. I had to meet the miracle woman!" She turned to Abbie. "You must be Abbie." She grinned.
"Uh . . . " Abbie smiled. "Yeah."
"I'm Pamela, and woman you must have magical powers if you got Mister Simon West to move faster than a snail with a fifty pound shell."
Abbie wagged her eyebrows at Simon. "Magical powers honey. Now you know."
"It's your fault I'm like this!" He cried in Pamela's general direction.
She cleared her throat. "That reminds me. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." She ticked off on her fingers as she went. "That's it right? We're down to five?"
"Indeed," Simon replied with a smirk.
"Woohoo!" Pamela threw her fist in the air like a victorious boxer. "Past the midway point!"
The two were so jovial, Abbie couldn't help but be entertained despite her absolute cluelessness. "I am missing a ton of backstory here, guys. Who wants to let a girl know what's up?"
Simon gave Pamela a sidelong glare. "It all began when she deflowered then abandoned me."
Pamela shook her head and sighed. "We were sixteen and we just knew we were soulmates -"
Both shuddered at the utterance of the word.
"So three days into our 'relationship'" she made air quotes. "We're screwing like rabbits, naming our future kids, and having deep, dead serious talks about whether we want to buy a house in England after we graduate to be near his family, or the States to be near my family."
"Or both," Simon chimed in. "I believe dual citizenship was discussed as an option? Anyhow, it was all very profound and googley eyed."
Pamela took back the narrative. "Four months later I applied to this intense three year international program to study archeology and prehistoric anthropology - like, by the time you're eighteen you're going on digs and stuff, it's that intense."
"And you got accepted, so you dumped him and took off." Abbie finished for her, as it seemed the obvious ending.
"Uh . . . nnnnnnooooooooo," she mumbled, toeing the dirt.
Simon took over while Pamela toed. "We swore our eternal devotion, planned to visit at every chance, and as soon as I graduated we'd start our perfect lives together. For the first few months we emailed almost daily." He paused. "And then what happened, Pamela?"
She sagged with a self - deprecating groan. "Once I got away from our teen-brain dreamland, I pretty much realized it was bullshit, but instead of nutting up and dumping him I just . . . took longer and longer to respond to his emails until . . . I . . . stopped."
Simon smirked. "Leaving behind a pitiful pile of devestated,sixteen year old boy." He turned to Abbie again. "I must have sent dozens of emails begging to know if she'd met someone else, or she was just too busy to stay in touch, or . . . " he tried not to let a full on smile break loose and ruin his admonishing tone. "Thus began my pattern of extreme hesitance in relationships."
Pamela pointed to her face with both hands. "Shitty. Shittiest ever."
Abbie's eyes shot back and forth between the two of them, baffled. "Aaaaannnd yet you seem to be buddies now."
Pamela grinned, glad to be moving out of the 'I'm an asshole' part of the tale. "I was at a dig in Nairobi and there was this team of wildlife preservationists monitoring an elephant population not three miles away from our site, so we all kinda socialized and by pure coincidence," she pointed to Simon, who raised his hand.
"I was on the team."
"Yup," Pamela nodded. "And how I treated him was the worst thing I've ever done in my life, so as soon as I recognized him I ran over, apologized, and begged, begged, begged him to forgive me."
"After a good deal of yelling I told her she owed me a huge pile of apologies. I believe I stopped her at twenty five. Thereafter we settled on a dozen and decided just for shits and giggles that in future she would owe me one less apology each time she swung in for a visit."
"Here endeth the saga!" Pamela said with a deep bow. She was on her way back up when she froze and her eyes bugged out. "You're engaged!" She yelled, leaping upright, her body gripped by an ecstatic spasm of shock. "Oh my God, Abbie! You're like . . . beyond a miracle!"
"Oh this?" Abbie wiggled her ring finger. "No, I just really like topaz so Simon got me -"
"No way," Pamela shook her head. "I know a non traditional engagement ring when I see one, I fucking wore one for six months." She held up a hand to stop Simon from asking. "Long. Annoying. Story. I'll tell you over . . . how do you feel about pizza? What's good around here?" She looked at Abbie. "You're welcome to come along."
Abbie grinned. After a week steeped in the Apocalypse, Pamela was like a breath of really excited air. "Thanks, but you two'll just be catching up, talking about a lotta of people I don't know, so . . . anyway I've got a bunch of paperwork to catch up on." (Not a lie. Cop dramas always skip over the epic fuckton of paperwork involved in being a cop.)
"K, well I gotta go check into a hotel and get settled, how about . . . lunch at threeish, you pick the place."
They exchanged contact information and said their goodbyes and as soon as they entered the house Abbie sat down at the table ready to take on paperwork. She had two breaking and entering forms filled out before she realized Simon was in the living room pacing and muttering. (She assumed it was Simon. She was almost never wrong on a guess.)
"Y'okay?"
After a moment's hesitation, he approached and stood in front of her as if to present a formal speech.
"Um . . . you may want to rethink not accompanying us."
Abbie frowned. "Why, does she throw herself at you?"
"No! No no, she would never!" He paused, every muscle in his face clenched with awkwardness. "But we do always seem to end up in bed at some point."
Abbie gave him a confused look and drummed the edge of her notepad on the table. "And you're worried it'll happen again, even with -" she held up her ring finger.
Simon shook his head. "I'm am completely, totally certain that it won't."
She shrugged. "Okay, so why do you want the supervision?"
"Because I'm always completely, totally certain it won't happen again," he whined in frustration. "So is she!"
"Who starts it?"
"We can never tell!" He threw up his hands and went back to pacing. "It's like someone throws magical sex dust on us and off we go! It's not sad 'what could have been' sex, and it's implicitly understood that neither of us intends it as the start of something." He stopped and raked a hand through his hair. "It all ends in a laugh and a hug and a firm declaration that it absolutely will not happen on her next visit."
"And then it does?"
"Every goddamn time." Simon said with a nod. "Except once."
Abbie shrugged. "So it can be done."
"She was called away suddenly, her Grandmother died."
Abbie groaned and put her head in her hands, for the first time truly concerned that Ichabod's and Simon's lives may not mesh so well. Then a thought dawned on her that made it even worse.
"You had no choice," she muttered.
"Pardon?"
"Remember the conversation Ichabod and I had about how he chose this and I chose that? You didn't."
"What the hell does that matter?" Simon yelled. "I loved you from the moment you first kissed -"
"Because of Ichabod's feelings. If you'd been Hoover vac'd into, I dunno, Kim Lee's body, what then? Would you be straight or gay? All about animals or all about leather carving? Or would you bounce all over the place?"
"It's not as if I was hypnotized!" Simon's face was beginning to redden. "What does it matter if nothing about me conflicted with Ichabod's feelings with regard to you? There are plenty of other points at which my preference has overridden -"
"If you mention the eggplant again, I will rage!" Abbie said firmly, her finger pointed at him to convey her own growing annoyance,
"My point is," Simon tried to explain, "the man I was before would of course never have chosen to fuse his entire consciousness to another person, but I am so glad," he fell before Abbie, who turned her body toward him. He took her hands tightly in his as if she might slip over a cliff if he didn't hold on, and laid ardent kisses to the back of each. "I am so indescribably glad for my situation. To have you. To have," he ran his thumb over her diamond-less engagement ring on the verge of tears. "I would not give this up for the world."
"But you'd give it up to nail Pamela?"
"God!" He stood up with a growl. "It is an entrenched pattern, Abbie, and our most distinctive traits are the ones most likely to win out over the other! As I said, I am sure even at this moment that nothing inappropriate will occur, but I have been wrong every time previous! That's why I asked you to come along! So that whatever the hell it is that sparks off this ridiculous habit of ours has no chance of re-surfacing."
Abbie took a beat to absorb all the details.
It was a long pause that left Simon twisting with worry.
"Has it ever happened while you were in a relationship?" Her stomach twisted into painful knots when Simon grimaced.
"Serious or just dating?" He asked.
"Oh my God!" Abbie leapt from her chair, almost knocking it over, and stalked into the living room. "So what about the girls you weren't seriously dating? Did you confess? Break up with them?"
"Girl," he said, avoiding her eyes. "It only happened once. And neither. Pamela has no bearing on my day to day life, and the woman and I weren't serious enough to . . . she ended things with me a few weeks later over an unrelated issue."
"What, did another bang-buddy ex come to town?"
"That is completely unfair!" Simon bellowed and stomped to the living room, officially furious. "One! I confess one ex to be an anomaly in in my life, and you assume I was so flippant in general?!" voice shook as the rant continued. "That the Simon before Ichabod must have been a thoughtless two timing ass?! I wanted you to know what the man I was before would have done because regardless of my confidence -" he grit his teeth again. Hard. "I refuse to allow my own ego to pose even a minuscule risk to us, and now I stand before this, this . . . firing squad!"
Abbie's skin got so hot she thought she might explode. "EXCUSE ME?"
"Well what would you call it?!" Simon walked behind the couch as if wanting to place a physical barrier between them. "We've gone from arguing about Pamela to my character in general! And I, I," he began to sputter, "I was HONEST about this! I could've taken my usual gamble and left you here ignorant! What would that have said about my character?!"
Abbie crossed her arms, still pissed but uncertain how to respond.
For a long moment the two glared at one another on silence. Finally, Simon closed his eyes and sighed.
"We can't risk it. Ichabod and I." He pulled his phone from his pants pocket. "If I'm asking for a damn chaperone it's clearly a bad idea."
"No," Abbie said quietly. She frowned and her head cocked to the side. "No, it's a good idea."
"Um . . . were you paying attention to that spectacular row?"
She shrugged. "Like you said, the thing with Simon and Pamela always happens."
"Yes."
She chewed her lip. "Both of you have absorbed one another's traits on the big stuff. And at the end of the day . . . "
Simon waited patiently for her to continue, hovering between anxiety and hope.
"At the end of the day you actually didn't fall in love with me. You just got shoved into Ichabod's skin and," she snapped her fingers. "Like that."
"It doesn't mat -"
She held up a hand to stop him. "I know. It is what it is and it's not like I don't believe you, but at least at first it was a default feeling."
I'm still confused.
"How does that make it a good idea for Pamela and I to -"
"Test drive." Abbie replied simply. "Or I'll never be sure if what we have now can stand up to who Simon was before."
Simon walked slowly back around the couch as Abbie spoke. He was starting to see her thought process.
"If even dating someone couldn't break the Simon-and-Pamela pattern for you, then it's big fucking deal. The perfect test drive."
By then she and Simon were standing close enough to touch, so Simon took her hands and held them gently.
Let's see if I have this right.
"So if I pass it proves . . . well, I don't have any previous deep loves, but let's pretend I did, and I used to pine for her before joining with Ichabod. If that woman were to come to town wanting me back, we'd know Simon's previous feelings can't hurt us because I do now genuinely love you on my own merit? Yes?"
Abbie smiled, the angry heat in her body mellowed to the warmth of a cozy blanket. "If the way you feel about m stops you from doing something Simon's always done?" She shrugged and her smile grew wider. "I can marry you."
An unspoken question played shamefully over his features.
What if I fail?
As always, he was 99.9% certain he'd pass but well, history.
Abbie read his face and pursed her lips, trying to sidestep her own anxiety. "That's another conversation."
Ichabod roared to life. Ruin this for us and I will hurl our body off a cliff!
Abbie stepped close and gave his arms a squeeze. "Now you're gonna take a breath, and I'm gonna take a breath, and you are gonna have awesome pizza with your teenage twu wuv - who I do really like by the way."
He squinted at her, dubious. "A woman I've confessed to sleeping with literally every time she visited and you're still inclined to like her?"
Abbie scoffed as she returned to her paperwork. "Pft! I am not gonna be that dumbass bitch who lets her man off the hook but decides the other woman is a hoe." She sat down and gave him the sweetest, wifely-est smile she could. "If she's a hoe then so are you, baby."
He smiled back at her and bowed. "I appreciate your candor."
Abbie tried not to let it nag at her, but in the back of her mind a small whisper of concern refused to shut up.
This may be the stupidest decision you ever made.
A few hours later she was seeing him off to his lunch date.
STUPIDEST, STUPIDEST, STUPIDEST!
She and Simon stood on the porch as he checked his texts one last time to make sure Pamela knew where to meet him,
"You stipulated that I conduct myself exactly as I would have before Ichabod, with the exception of sex, yes?"
"Uh-huh." Abbie paused for a moment then rolled her eyes. "What, do you usually do hands stuff under the table while you're chatting?"
Simon chuckled. "No. But we do usually spend hours and hours catching up - even absent the sex bit." He cleared his throat. "If I did the same this visit I'd be coming home six, maybe even seven 'o clock. I thought under the circumstances you might prefer . . . ?"
"Nope," she chirped casually, shaking her head. "Everything the same. I gotta know. And you won't be able to lie if anything does happen because if nothing Crane would rat your ass out."
And off he went.
Abbie promised herself she would keep her cool in the meantime.
Five minutes later she texted Jenny, Kat, Frank, Max, and Kim Lee. 'NEED DISTRACTION, ALL AVAILABLE ASSES, GET HERE ASAP!'
Kat and Kim Lee were the first to show up, bearin Chinese takeout.
"For the record, I'm Korean," Kim Lee specified as he stepped over the threshold and headed for the kitchen to unpack the food. "So don't be askin' me any stupid questions about Chinese culture." He opened one of the containers and sniffed. "Or Korean culture, actually. Call my my grandparents if you wanna know that shit - do you wanna have this on plates or out of the carton?"
Abbie was already becoming distracted from her worry.
I love you Kim Lee, she thought. Take away the swish and I would totally marry you.
"Cartons are fine."
I'm already marrying two dudes, what's one more?
She knew Max would come, but she honestly figured Jenny and Frank wouldn't show up. Frank had a daughter to spend time with and Jenny had a compulsive need to eat, breath, and shit the Apocalypse to the extent that she might as well expand the archives room to add on an entertainment center and a nice breakfast nook.
They pulled kitchen chairs into the living room, pillows from the bed and linen closet. It felt a lot like the giggly, carefree sleepovers she and Jenny never got the chance to enjoy.
She and Jenny exchanged a brief look, and she knew they were both thinking the same thing.
So this is what it's like.
"Okay," Jenny said through a mouthful of sweet and sour pork, perched and hunched over on the back of a chair. "Why are we here?"
"More specifically," Frank pitched in from his pillow on the floor. "Why were we ordered to parachute in via the urgent beacon of all caps? The font of anger and/or emotional distress?"
I need more Spicy Chicken before I answer that.
She made them all wait while she finished her morsel.
"I basically sent Ichabod out on a date. Well, not so much Ichabod as Sim -" Abbie, Jenny, and Frank froze and tried not to look at Kim Lee, which meant Kim Lee could tell he was being TOTALLY NOT STARED AT.
"It's okay," he said as he popped a lone cashew into his mouth. "I'm in Kat's coven, that's how we met." He gave Kat and Max a half offended scowl. "You didn't tell them that?"
"I kept forgetting," Kat sighed as she reached out to squeeze Kim Lee's chopstick wielding hand. "You're a really crap witch, sweetheart."
"I know. It extra sucks 'cause I'm from a whole bloodline of magic mofos." He pointed to himself. "So I'm the relative ALL the others juuuuuust don't talk about."
Everyone gave him 'you poor baby' looks.
"It's okay. They're not mean or anything but between that and my," he indicated his hair, bracelets and general queerness. "None of them can get their heads around, like, anything going on here."
Abbie found it soothing to sit back and listen to conversation as it meandered away from her (possibly stupid) decision. Hours went by, and hints of deep gold began to tickle the horizon.
Abbie mostly listened to everyone chatter while Kat and Kim Lee tool turns playing with her hair.
"I - mmff," Max finished his bit of broccoli before continuing. "I was a badass holding that portal open long enough for Kat to do the incantation and toss what's his face back to hell."
He fished through Kat's takeout container without asking.
Kat did the same to him. "Ripping open a closed portal and holding it open is like a metaphysical arm wrestle. It was his first time ever taking on that much pushback without any help." She beamed at Max as she stuffed a too-large bite of garlicky beef into her mouth.
"I wish I'd taken pictures." said Frank. "Actually I should start keeping a photo-journal. Of all this shit!"
"You seriously sent Ichabod on a date?" Asked Jenny, taking a sharp turn back to their original topic. "Funny, smart, pretty-eyed Ichabod?"
"And he's on this side of the pond," Frank added, "so the accent alone does half the work for him."
Jenny sat baffled. "And it was your idea?" She pointed to Kat with her chopsticks. "Can you check her pupils and tell me if they're either dilated or super tiny? Smart money says she's high."
Abbie laughed as Kat leaned close to her face with an amused grin. She let the 'examination' continue for a brief second before pushing the woman away. "It's an ex of Simon's, and we're . . . test driving. We wanna make sure full-on Simon wants to marry me, and it's not just the I-feel-what-Crane-feels thing."
Max raised his hand. "Hey, instead of hurling him at a possibly available vagina stuffed with dangerous history, you coulda called me up for a three second conversation. 'Yes, Simon loves loves loves you.' End of test drive."
"Then why would said vagina be a problem in the first place?" asked Frank, beginning to swing around to Abbie's way of thinking.
Max pointed his chopsticks at Frank, but spoke to the small audience in general. "Because 75% of married couples cheat at some point, and it's just not possible that so many people are flat out douche bags, which means that even The Good Ones are not immune to full on, flat out, straight up, what the fuck, stoopid."
I do not get long term relationships, thought Jenny.
"Uh . . . you're okay hearing your man say something like that?" she asked Kat.
Kat poked Max in the side with her chopstick. "If either if us is ever unfaithful we have a one week window in which confessing to the other won't result in an automatic break up."
"Possible break up depending on circumstance," Max added. "But not automatic. After the one week is up, though -"
"We're fucked." They finished at the same time.
Frank mulled over the Max and Kat's rule. "Huh. You two are either doomed, or rock solid."
None of them had heard a car drive up, so they were all surprised when Simon came bursting through the door.
"Clear out." He ordered, not looking at anyone but Abbie as he marched across the room and attacked her mouth as though there weren't five people around them scrambling to close take out containers and hustle out the door.
By the time the last of them left, Abbie was reduced to panting in those brief moments when he pulled back enough to allow them both air.
"This is either, mmmmm - a guilty kiss bec - mm, mm - because you failed, or - mmmmmmmm, a victory kiss."
"Victory kiss," Simon gasped as he hoisted her in the air. "There was not so much as a skirmish between myself and Ichabod - and we agreed he would stay far back and quiet to keep so I'd -" he strode toward the bedroom but got derailed by a wall.
Why do we have walls?
"So I'd be on my own."
"And nothing?" Abbie whimpered against his mouth as he worked frantically to unbutton her shirt one handed. "Not even a goodbye kiss?"
"No," he replied as he nuzzled and kissed her throat, basking in the feel of her rapid pulse on his lips."Massive goodbye hug as always, not the slightest temptation for more." He thrust a knee between her legs to keep her propped up and pressed to the wall as they worked together to remove her shirt.
Then his.
Abbie tossed his shirt well clear of their bodies so he wouldn't slip on it, as they were wobbling and unsteady to begin with.
"Abbie," he rasped, head thrown back so she could drag her mouth over the contours of his throat and shoulders. Her adventurous tongue did wonderful things, and his whole body felt starved for more. The urgency was more than just lust. He'd cleared the final hurdle. That last lingering shadow of a question mark was eradicated, leaving nothing in its wake but an unhindered path to life with Abbie.
Everything fell away from his mind but a vision of them together. Smiling at one another, and steadily older and older.
He felt her legs slide up his waist as he lifted her higher, so her head was above his and he had easy access to the whole landscape of her midsection.
He moaned and whispered her name against the flesh of each part.
Her fleshy belly.
Fit abs.
Soft, enticing breasts.
All the while feeling her fingers rake through his hair. Caress his face. Grip his shoulders.
"Simon," she whispered. At first it spurred him on. "Simon."
Then he realized from the flat pressure of her hands at his shoulders that she was prompting a halt.
"What?" He asked worriedly as he lowered her to the ground.
She swept her hands down his chest, her expression troubled. "I do understand us. You. The both of you. But . . ."
A part of he and Ichabod's joined souls sensed an invisible fist poised to close around them both and crush an entire future. Still, he held steady and tried not to betray their fear, loathe to let a sympathy or guilt impulse dictate Abbie's next words.
She'll say what she needs to say, both men thought in harmony. And you will not muzzle her.
Her hands rested at his hips as she stared up at him. "I'm used to looking at this face and calling you either Ichabod or Simon." She chuckled softly, nuzzling his chest and placing a light kiss to his collarbone. "I can even tell when you're in that oddball halfway space. But switching between names when we're researching or eating breakfast is different than switching names when we're . . . together. It feels weird. Are you following me?" She looked worried. "Am I just blathering here?"
Both Simon and Ichabod flooded with enormous relief. Abbie had seemed so hesitant and worried that given the events of the day they were braced for another catastrophe.
"How about this," Simon pecked a chaste kiss to her lips, his one hand at her waist in a manner reminiscent of her first kiss with Ichabod. "At least when we are making love . . ." he kissed her again, this time lingering, "the name 'Crane' can be a unilateral identifier?"
"You'd be okay with that?"
Simon smiled. "I've noticed that though you often call him Ichabod in the course of a day, during sex, particularly in climax, you almost always use the name Crane. It's the name you're most comfortable with. The one you're accustomed to calling out when . . . " he locked his eyes on hers as his fingers danced over the button and zipper of her pants.
He saw the worry drain from her eyes and met no resistance when he undid her pants and used the open fabric like reigns to steer them to the bedroom.
It was the longest walk possible over a tiny span of space. Between traveling, undressing, and the overwhelming urge to paw at one another as though they'd just gotten engaged that second, the journey was several times interrupted by a graceless stumble into a wall, or whatever furniture had the poor manners to get in their way. Every time it happened one or the other (or both) of them seized the chance to truly devour the other for a moment. Clutching and lunging, hands diving beneath pants and underthings to gradually hitch them down as well as win fleeting contact with their mutual arousal.
Wet. Hard. A physical reality so damn unlikely and mutually fought for.
By the time they tumbled to their destination there lay a path of clothes behind them, beginning with a puddle of shirts in the living room, and ending with simple black panties dropped just at the foot of the bed. Added in with the displaced lamp stands and fallen knick knacks, it formed a record of events. Like tree rings radiating out from the center point of them.
The sex had always been good (even when it was your basic 'I just need to connect' variety), but Abbie couldn't remember the last time she'd craved or pursued his body with such a primal lust. It felt like something derived from genetic memory. A time before the rules of so - called civilized conduct seeped into and altered even the most basic of human interactions.
Sex without rule. Without etiquette. A sweating, grunting, old as earth performance played out on a stage as big as all life.
Despite the fact that the actual ceremony wasn't for another six days she knew in her bones when she came, and as she watched him cum, that it was the first time The Cranes ever had sex.