Title/Prompt: Luck
Rating/Warnings: Teen
Word count: 2405
Summary: Maureen's down on her luck - but not for long.
Notes: Written for hopeonfire for the BSC Fandom Fest on DW.
Maureen sat at her dressing table in her black slip, carefully pinning her hair up into loose curls. She still had an hour before Richard was due to arrive, but she wanted to take her time. She wanted tonight to be special.
She looked at her reflection. She didn't think she looked too bad for forty-one. She tilted her head for a moment, critical of the lines around her eyes and the way the skin on her neck had softened, but happy with just about everything else.
She sprayed a delicate mist of perfume against her throat, and the phone on the nightstand by her bed rang.
"Hello?" She tucked the receiver against her shoulder and carried the phone back to the dressing table so she could finish her makeup.
"It's me."
"Oh, hi!" She smiled and leaned forward, brushing mascara onto her lashes. "Listen, you don't need to bring anything, I've got it all —"
"No, Maureen…" Richard interrupted, sounding apologetic. "I'm sorry, I think I have to cancel."
Her heart sank. "Why?"
"I think I'm coming down with something. I'd hate to pass it on. I'm sorry — I know this has been… We've both been looking forward to tonight but…"
She could hear it then — the low gravel quality to his voice, the added bluntness of his words thanks to a blocked nose.
She screwed the cap back on her mascara. "You poor thing. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, I'm fine. It's just a cold, and I don't want to cancel, but honestly I think it's for the best…"
The fact that his own disappointment apparently matched hers did little to comfort her. She looked at her reflection again, at the soft light glowing on her hair, her darkened lashes, the delicate straps of her new silk slip. She thought wistfully of what the next few hours were meant to be — just the two of them, a quiet, intimate dinner, wine, and a whole, uninterrupted night together. She had new lace underwear and stockings which were impractical and fiddly, but she felt sexy wearing them, and she'd wanted Richard to see her in them.
"We'll do it another time," she said. "Do you need anything?"
"No, no, I think I'm well supplied," he said. "Mary Anne is over at Kristy's. I think I'll just have an early night."
"Sure, sure." She plucked at the lace hem of her slip and thought about how rare it was for the two of them to find time together. "We'll have to encourage another sleepover at the Brewer house," she said.
"I'm sure it won't take much." The receiver rustled, and she heard the muffled sound of a sneeze.
"You poor thing," she said again. "Go and tuck yourself into bed. Lots of rest, and make sure you drink plenty of fluids."
"I will. And I'm so sorry, again." His voice softened. "It's just bad luck, that's all. I was really looking forward to tonight."
"Me too." She stared at her reflection. "Look after yourself, Richard. I'll call you tomorrow."
She put the phone back next to her neatly-made bed, doing her best not to think about everything she was suddenly missing out on. She and Richard hadn't had much time to spend together alone — tonight would only be the second night in their three-month relationship they could spend together without interruption.
After Richard's short-lived relationship with Sharon had ended, Mary Anne had been heartbroken. He had been hesitant to start dating again, unsure how she'd react to it, worried that things would go wrong again. And Maureen hadn't planned on dating anyone, especially so soon after her divorce.
But it had happened. Richard was sweet, and considerate, and somehow she just kept running into him. Stoneybrook was a small town, and there he was at the grocery store, and at the library. There he was at the PTA meetings, there he was at the Pikes' Fourth of July Barbecue. There he was, everywhere, and she realised quickly that she liked seeing him everywhere.
She sighed and took off her slip and her lacy underwear. She changed into jeans and her old Springsteen t-shirt and took her makeup off, looking at her carefully-pinned curls ruefully. Downstairs there was a bottle of wine in the refrigerator, and the chicken she'd been planning on cooking. Now she'd have to eat alone, and the wine would have to wait for another night.
"What a waste," she said to herself. Not just the effort she'd taken, but the whole evening — Stacey wasn't home, the house was empty and silent. She sat and thought about how much she'd been looking forward to Richard's company — to dinner, and being alone with him. She'd been looking forward to having sex. She'd missed sex, and intimacy, and someone touching her. The past few years had been so lonely, even before her divorce. Things with Ed had ended long before the formality of paperwork.
Things with Richard, however, had been surprising. She'd wondered, at first, if it had simply been the amount of time since she'd last had sex, or if it was so long without someone who had been so attentive to her. But the chemistry hadn't yet burned itself out, and she found herself daydreaming about him, and what it might be like to have entire nights with him, rather than a few snatched hours here and there whenever they were lucky enough to get them.
She cooked the chicken and sat at the counter to eat it. She pushed most of it around her plate, and didn't taste what she did manage to eat.
She thought about opening the wine, but she could never finish a full bottle by herself — not anymore — and she'd wanted to share it with Richard. She felt stupid for feeling so upset. Like she'd fallen backward into a teenage twist of angst and heartache over something shallow and ridiculous.
He'd assured her he was fine, but she found herself conjuring up fantasies where she went over to Richard's place, and found him in delirious fever. She'd mop his brow and soothe him and he'd mutter broken secrets and desires to her unselfconsciously as his fever rolled over him.
She stood at the sink and washed her plate, the rational part of her brain making fun of her for something so stupid, and reminding her that she shouldn't risk catching a cold, or what could potentially be flu — complicating Stacey's health was never worth it.
But, the other voice in her head countered, Stacey is with Mary Anne tonight, which means she's probably already been exposed to any sickness lurking in the Spier household.
Rational Maureen tried to take over again. If you're sick you have to miss work, and you can't afford that right now.
But the other side of her — the romantic side, the disappointed side, the side of her she'd had to keep quiet, keep delaying; the side of her which had lost out to responsibilities and careers and mortgages and motherhood — that side of her rose up, an unstoppable force demanding to be heard.
I want, it said. I want, I want, I want.
She slipped her arms into her jacket and grabbed her keys.
I want.
She drove over to Bradford Court and pulled her car into the drive, glancing nervously in her mirrors at the Kishi house across the street.
Stacey knew about Richard, but Maureen didn't particularly want Claudia reporting to Stacey that her car had been outside his house overnight. Stoneybrook was a small town, and the rumor-mill was already running quite efficiently on the small intimacies Richard and Maureen had cautiously revealed.
Claudia will be at Kristy's with the other girls, Maureen told herself, forcing her gaze away from the lights in the Kishi windows.
Richard had seen her headlights, and he met her at the door, looking tired, his cheeks flushed with warmth. "I warned you to stay away," he said, but he smiled at her.
She felt another hot spike of want go through her, and then a wrench of shame. "God, Richard," she said, half-laughing, despair and regret mingling into something near hysteria. "I'm so sorry. I just wanted…" She shook her head.
"Come in," he said, his voice soft. "Please. Come in."
She followed him inside. The house was dark except for the light on the landing, and the light behind her on the porch. "I'm sorry," she said again. "Were you in bed?"
"I wasn't asleep," he said, and he turned away from her to cough into the crook of his elbow.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, and her hand went to his back, between his shoulder blades where the soft towelling of his bathrobe was pilled and worn. He turned to her, and her hand went to his shoulder, and down his arm, up down up down up down, trying to comfort his illness and soothe her own guilt with motion and touch. "I'll go," she said.
"No, no, I just…" He bowed his head to hers briefly, but swayed back again almost immediately, looking chastened all of a sudden, his hair rumpled, his cheeks pink. He looked younger. "I don't want you to catch this," he said, and his hand rubbed over his chest, over his striped pajamas.
"Oh, everyone knows these things get around before the symptoms even show," she said.
"Well, coughing all over you probably isn't going to help much," he said. His voice was deeper, rougher, and it flared the spark of desire Maureen had been nurturing all evening.
"I'll go," she said again. "I promise. I just wanted to see you. Just for a minute." She leaned against him and he lifted his chin so she could tuck her head against the crook of his neck. She could feel the heat of his skin against her brow.
"Mm," he said, and he linked his arms around her waist.
They rocked there for a moment, the light on the landing sending striped shadows through the banister and down the stairs. Maureen closed her eyes and leaned into him and thought about how long it had been since someone had held her like this.
"Your hair looks nice," Richard murmured.
She was afraid her laugh sounded more like a sob. "Thanks. I should take it out now." She tensed herself against a sudden ache in her throat. She thought about the new dress on its hanger and the silk she'd pulled over her skin, all for the purposes of Richard undressing her again.
She felt him tense against a cough, and they were both standing there together, clinging to one another and rigidly fighting unwanted energy welling up inside them. Maureen squeezed her eyes shut and told herself to count to ten, and then she'd let him go and she'd leave.
And then Richard cleared his throat, and his fingers slipped gently into the curls piled on her head, feeling cautiously for the pins holding everything up.
He eased one free, and Maureen let out a deep breath.
One by one he searched for each pin, his fingers disturbing the stiffness of her hairspray, gently untwisting the loops and curls she'd constructed, his fingertips brushing her scalp and the back of her neck so her blood rushed and the tension all melted away. The scent of her shampoo rose into the air.
He cupped the pins in his palm, and she held her hand out for them and stuffed them into the pocket of her jeans.
He tucked a curl behind her ear and smiled at her. "You look beautiful," he said. "I'm sorry tonight didn't go to plan."
"It isn't your fault. Just bad luck." She smiled at him. She no longer wanted to cry at the loss of what might have been. His fingers gently undoing her pinned curls had unwound something in her. "I'll cook you dinner another night."
He gave a short laugh and turned away to cough again. It sounded deep and raw, and she rubbed his back with one hand and reached over and flicked the porch light off with the other.
"Upstairs," she said. "Back to bed."
He nodded tiredly. He didn't protest when she followed him up. He took her hand and flipped the light off at the top of the stairs, leading her to a warm glow of his bedside lamp, the sheets on his bed turned down and rumpled.
Maureen tossed her jacket across the top of his laundry hamper and unhooked her bra, pulling it through the sleeve of her t-shirt. She slid her jeans down and crawled into Richard's bed, leaning across him to shut the light off.
"I'm going to snore," he said, warning and regret sharing equal measure in his voice.
"I don't care." She kissed his brow and slid down beside him. She could feel the heat of fever coming out of him and knew it would be a restless night — blankets kicked back, pulled on, fever and coughing and heavy breathing.
"Have you taken anything?" she asked. "Ibuprofen? Have you got cough syrup?"
"Mm-hm," he answered drowsily, and she lay on her side and let her eyes adjust to the darkness. She could see his silhouette on the other pillow; she could hear his breathing and feel the warmth of his body across the mattress.
"It's been a long time," he said quietly, "since somebody took care of me."
She stroked her thumb across the back of his hand. "Me too," she said. She hesitated before her next confession. "I miss it. I miss being one half of a partnership. I miss having someone to lean on."
He rolled towards her, his hand sliding under her t-shirt, assurance and purpose in the movement, his palm cupping her hip. "You don't want to be lonely anymore."
The sting of tears was suddenly in her eyes. "Yeah," she admitted. She put her hand over his. "Even when I was still married, I felt so lonely."
He was so close to sleep. His arm was heavy across her, his voice was low. "I have you now," he murmured, and the weight of future promises carried over to her. "I'll take care of you."
She smiled at him in the dark. She stroked her fingertips over his arm and felt his hold tighten on her ever so slightly as he wavered on the edge of sleep. "Lucky me," she whispered.