Chapter Twenty-Nine: Try
He sighed and sat down on his bed after he walked them into the room. "Maybe you're right. If you're not sure about this, I shouldn't push it."
"Fiyero, please don't be hurt…"
"Don't be hurt? You're joking. Elphaba, I love you and all I want is to be with you. If you really wanted the same, you'd just do it." He shook his head.
"That's not it. I told you."
"Fae, don't bother." Fiyero felt utterly hopeless. "Look, if you want to end this, go ahead. I can't force you to stay and I don't want to force you, anyway. I want you to stay of your own accord, and clearly that's not going to happen. We don't need to continue the charade anymore, either. There's no point and that would just be too uncomfortable for me."
"I didn't say I wanted to end this!" Her voice was high and wavering slightly.
"Then what in Oz do you want, Fae?"
"Fiyero, I want you. There's no question about that. I love being with you and I love you. I just don't know how to do it."
"And you're not willing to learn."
"I didn't say that. Stop putting words in my mouth." He could hear the anger resonating in her words. "For Oz's sake, Fiyero, you're everything I could ever want and I've never felt the way I feel about you. Don't you ever question what I'd be willing to do for you."
"Then what's the problem here?"
"The problem isn't whether or not I want to learn. It's about whether I can, whether this is fair to you, whether this… whether this is going to make me someone I'm not."
"I don't want you to be anyone else. I just want you to be you."
"I know that. But the person I am, person I was… that girl doesn't love. She doesn't know how and she doesn't want to. I do want to, now, but… I've already changed so much."
"You're still you."
"I'm not sure I am anymore."
He grabbed her hand and stood her in front of the mirror. "What's different?" Fiyero wrapped his arms around her waist. "You feel the same. You're just as tall, just as beautiful. You've still got those slender legs, that sweet waist that fits perfectly in the curve of my arm, that tight abdomen, those gorgeous breasts, that supple neck, those kissable lips, that crooked nose that gives you character, those brown eyes so deep I still can't find the bottom…"
"Are you going to talk about every part of my body?" She flushed.
"I was getting around to all of them, yes. I love each of them." He turned her to face him again. "Fae, I'm yours. You don't have to be someone else to be mine."
He felt her body adjust against his, the tension leaving. "It is so easy being with you."
"Then why are you fighting it so hard?"
"Nothing is ever this easy, Yero."
"No, it's not. And I'm sure we'll have problems. In fact, we're having one right now. But together we can handle every one of them. I have faith in that. I won't leave your side if you don't leave mine." He kissed her mouth lightly. "I love you."
"I love you, too. Why do you want me when I'm so scared?"
"Because that's who you are. As long as I know you want to do this, being scared is fine. I can live with you being afraid, but I can't live with you not trying."
She looked up at him and put a hand on his collar. "I can try. I can't promise more than that."
Relief flooded his body and he pulled her against him, burying his face in her hair and murmuring, "That's more than enough." He stood there with her in his arms for what had to be half an hour before he felt her shift a bit. Fiyero didn't want to let go. "Stay the night?"
"Only if you promise to continue telling about each part of my body the way you were before," she teased. "I'll do the same to you."
"Oh, really?" That intrigued him. She wasn't usually so verbal with affection, and he was dying to hear what she would say. "We might have to start with that."
"Do I have to go in order?" She reached a hand up to touch the diamonds on his face. He knew she loved them. So many times after they made love, she would lie there and map them out with her lips or the tips of her fingers. It was a tradition in the Vinkus that men got tattooed like that, though he'd never quite understood it.
"You can do it however you want," he whispered.
"This might take all night," she said. "And what about things that aren't your body? What about things that are just you? There's no specific body part that makes you love me, none that makes you who you are. I can't name all of those, too."
"Why don't you think about it and I'll start, then?" He lifted her body and placed her on the bed. "Or we could always take turns."
"That sounds fair."
He kissed her temple. "Since we're also talking about things we can't see, I'll start with your mind."
"Are you going to kiss every part, too?"
"I intend to." He told her. "Your mind is sharp and clever. And yes, I know it's part of what makes you fight this sometimes, but I adore it, anyway."
"My turn, then? Well, I'm going to start with something more physical." Her hand was still on the diamond on his cheek. "I love the way the diamonds accentuate the color of your skin, the way they move as a part of you." She traced the one just below his neck, next. "They're mesmerizing."
"I've noticed you liked them," he smiled, lifting his shirt over his head so she could continue. "The first day we met, you stared, but not in the way people usually do. Even then, your eyes were following the path they made on my skin."
"You knew?" She looked horrified. "I… I just wanted to caress them. I'd never felt the urge to do that, and it was so strange to me."
"I enjoyed that I could affect you in such a way." He kissed her earlobe and nibbled at it. "I love how sensitive your ears are. I can practically feel you melt as I do this."
"We are never going to finish," she said.
"What if we just did one or two every time we do this, then? That way it doesn't get tedious." He continued to bite at her earlobe, tugging at it.
"You could never get tedious, my love." She leaned her head back into him. "How do you do this to me? It's not fair."
"I assure you, sweet Fae, you do the same thing to me." He told her, making his way down to her neck.
"You're going to leave a mark, aren't you?" She moaned.
"I might. There's a scarf here from the time I tied you up. If you don't want me to, I won't do it, though." He ran his tongue over the vein on her neck.
"Oh, Yero, you know I can't resist." She closed her eyes.
Afterwards, he continued kissing his way down her. "I don't know if I'll ever get enough of you. I try to be thorough, but every time I touch you it's like I discover something new and beautiful about you."
"Oh, you are very thorough. But I know what you mean." She ran a hand through his hair, tousling it a little. "I know my experience has been very limited when it comes to intimacy, but when I'm with you, even those times when we weren't really together, it feels like it's more than just sex."
"It's like making love," he said softly. "I get that, too. In fact, when you referred it so crassly after the first time, it hurt a little because I thought maybe it didn't mean the same thing to you that it did to me."
"I said it that way because I was trying to distance myself," she admitted. "It was so different from what I'd experienced before, I didn't know how to put it into words, and it had been so intense I was afraid."
"You could've told me."
"I should've. I'm so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you, Yero. I just want to make you happy and I got afraid I just wasn't enough for you."
"You are just enough." He told her. "Never doubt that."
