AN: Thank you all so much for every review you posted, I highly appreciate it!
This (slight M_rated...) chapter I tried something different concerning the narrative perspective, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did writing it. Sometimes with multi-chapter stories you have to spice things up a bit :-) So wether it's too cheesy and fluffy you let me know, I imagine it like a duet of two people, hence this chapter has two titles:
Chapter Title "I Know Places" by Lykke Li and "The Water" by Belle Mt
DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the Chicago PD, Fire or Med characters, only my OCs!
"How are you and your hubby doing?"
"My hubby? What makes you say that? Who is he?"
"Checked Jay's profile pic lately? You guys look pretty married to me!"
Rianne smirked to herself when she found that recent conversation with Stella in her chats while scrolling through her messages, checking if there was anything important while they were on stop-over at Miami airport. It was 7 am on January 4th.
Jay was pretty preoccupied with his own phone while they waited for boarding to start. Only a few hours until they'd be back home. Rianne had some mixed feelings about that. Just thinking about the fact that they had to go to work on Monday again separately, filled her with some terrible separation anxiety already.
The closer they got to Chicago the more tense Jay got. Rianne tried very hard to reign herself in and not roll her eyes at him, typing away all business-like, serious face in place, as if he was already working a new case. She didn't ask what it was about, rather felt a small pang in her chest. She wanted him to keep holding on to his relaxation and calm so bad, not spiral backwards again and turn into a workaholic first thing when they landed.
At least he still hadn't changed said picture Stella's text a few days ago had alluded to.
A picture with her leaning over his shoulder, grabbing onto them from under his armpits. Her face partially obscured by her shock of wild and wet hair while she pressed a kiss to his jaw. Jay was smiling into his own phone-camera, hair tousled as well, nose scrunched up against the sun.
Rianne was wondering when she'd stop being so freaking in love with that happy face of his…
"I know places we can go babe. Where the highs won't bring you down babe. No the highs won't hurt you there babe. Don't ask me when, but ask me why. Don't ask me how, but ask me where. There is a road, there is a way. There is a place, there is a place…"
(Lykke Li "I know places")
I'm so glad I told you all about my fears. Because you don't hold that against me. It is possibly a reason more for you to try and protect me. As soon as talk at the breakfast table about the baby-news arise again you take my hand and squeeze it under the table. You're there, you're on my side. I know you want me to make up with my father, so I do. Because I know you're right, and because I share that notion of not parting with someone you love angry, twisted as it may be, not sure if you can work this out or not. And I know you've learned your lesson the hard way, as have I.
"I am no longer a child in a dysfunctional home. I'm an adult with the ability to make healthy choices, create boundaries, and live the life that I create."*
You don't laugh at me when I have to say that therapy-mantra out semi-loud before I go and tell my dad sorry for overreacting last night and that of course I wish him an Inés health and happiness and that I'll get used to the thought somewhere along the way and that I'll see them on New Year's Eve at the beach.
I begin to breathe easier the further away from the city we get, the more the airstream is tousling up my hair. I need space so desperately. Space with you to discover a new pace together. It's not the most spectacular scenic drive, but everything feels like freeing myself of invisible shackles that have been restricting my airway a little.
I can't believe you took your time to talk to that god-ugly dog that wouldn't budge from our posh car, promising him he would be joining us soon and that he didn't have to worry. This dog doesn't even speak English, but you succeeded in coaxing him to get out and made sure he was safe with someone holding on to him while we pulled out of the drive-way and got a head-start towards our next location, leaving my family behind for today at least. We're excited, this feels like it's only us for the first time in days. I guess we're gonna have to get a dog at some point though, because you look seriously upset for the first few miles that we didn't have space to take Dali with us.
Sometimes I wonder how someone so sweet and caring can be a hard-ass cop in Chicago. Though you definitely still look like one in your Ray Ban Aviator sun-glasses, easily driving us down to the coastline. Yeah, you still look like a cop, a very sexy one. One with a little more color to his face and arms, a little more scruff on his cheeks than usual. A cop that's testing his new toy for its limits and I love how you can't stop talking about how much you're enjoying that engine sound and telling me all about its technical features, although you know that I know nothing about that and I don't really care. But your excitement is priceless. A cop that's laughing uproariously with me about 90's techno songs I've found in an old playlist of mine. A cop who's hand is on my bare leg pretty much the whole time and who gets bolder by the minute.
My warning that this is "soooo dangerous" makes you laugh and not stop until your fingertips brush against the seam of my panties. There's just no way that I can endure this torture while holding my breath for over four hours straight, so somewhere along the way I urge you to immediately stop the car so I can at least get a quick fix and kiss you like it's been forever since I did that, when in reality it's only been a few hours probably.
Your hands are making my body sing. I love how you say my name when things get heated. How your voice gets all scratchy and deeper, low and flirtatious, seductive. It makes me ache so much for you it's not funny.
"I didn't know her until it was over. She came like the water, good washes over me. Brings me her troubled mind, her demons play so well with mine. And we get tangled on the line lord, I got taken by the tide. And in the night, she gonna be, like a river washing over me, in the night, she gonna be like a river washing over parts of my mind that were lost in the fire for a long time…"
(Belle Mt "The Water")
Instead of the expected classical beach paradise we find ourselves in a heavily wooded area once we've reached our final destination. Mar Azul. It's a quiet town, laid out in a grid pattern of sandy streets. It's calm, rustic and it's windy, no shit.
Towering pine trees greet us, when we pull up in front of a couple of cube shaped houses. A few unique buildings blending perfectly into the nature around them, purposely unfinished concrete walls and a lot of wooden material. Maximal natural light is flooding into the house that we enter, because of it mainly consisting of full glass panels and black steel railings, offering a view of these old trees outside. It's like the forest-scape is the walls. A wooden deck is build around the trees, so that there are actually two pines in perfect distance for the must-have hammock, swinging in the afternoon breeze. It's surprisingly simple, unfussy and charming. Like some cabin I've been dreaming of. Obviously a cabin filled with expensive, yet understated looking furniture pieces, but still: This is my thing this forest calm.
It smells heavenly outside. The sun enhancing the warm and woodsy scent of pine-needles on sandy ground, the trees making it easier to bear the summer heat, acting as a natural canopy.
No upscale bars, no party noises on the widest beach I have ever seen. We have to climb over massive sand dunes to reach it. Still when it's really quiet you can hear the sound of waves crashing from far away.
I had almost forgotten what it felt like to stand in front of an ocean. In awe of that wonder of nature, that force, those waves rolling in, soft almost white sand beneath my feet.
I look at you and I see tears swimming in your eyes, but overall you look incredibly happy. You close them and take a deep breath, run your hands through your hair before holding them up, letting the wind play around your fingertips. Just like you did on our drive here from time to time with that content expression on your face. And I know that it's you I will be thinking of whenever I find myself standing in front of an ocean again. The you that is suddenly tugging at my hand, starting off towards the water, where the surge will wet our feet, whooping loudly whenever a splash of waters hits our naked legs with force. You let your body fall against mine and I catch you. Weightless like you were just delivered from every evil that has ever darkened your days. And I realize that the colors of our eyes are the perfect combination, just like the sea and the sky.
I've got so many favorite places but one of my all-time best is in your hug. It makes me feel so secure and warm in every part of my body. Like you will never let me go, like you got me. It's a hug I want to be wrapped in forever with your calm eyes looking down on me. That new scent I gave you for Christmas: You adapted it so very quickly that it's already become yours through and through and I breathe you in.
I'm so in love with every little thing about you. Your facial expressions, your dimples that show on occasion, sometimes barely even there. They're actually more prominent when you're annoyed with something and you pull a face. In general your face is so expressive that it always tells a story of its own.
Your kisses taste different here at the ocean. Smoother, fuller, more aware if that's even possible. Maybe that's how they feel when you're fully there with me, when you're on your way of surfacing from that wave of doubt and doom & gloom that's been holding you down.
I see your stubble in the light of the setting sun and find myself thinking that there's a very high chance our kids would have red hair. Given my own genes on my mother's side and your obvious predisposition. The thought shocks me a little and I press my face to your chest quickly. But as I breathe steadily with you the shock wears off, my heart calms down along to the beat of yours and I think this is something I can manage. It will get easier to think about these things, to allow myself to think about them. Because you know, you know now. And you're somehow not scared about that part.
This thing between us feels more serious than anything I've ever felt and although I am still scared to wake up or get too lost in it, I feel more myself than a half year ago. I think I found parts of myself with and in you.
There's something about the way you look at me when you've just come, so raw and pure. It's either the immediate eagerness in your eyes to give that pleasure back to me or the lazy, deeply satisfied expression that settles on your features afterwards. How you crawl up to me like a cat, completely relaxed, utterly spent. It's that look that gets me every time, keeps me under your spell, makes sure that I won't last long once you begin your torture on my body.
Still my sex-exhaustion is not enough to get me through the first night in this new environment. I always seem to need a little more time to adjust, to feel safe. After a while I give up on trying to get back to sleep.
I find shelter in the hammock outside, listening to crickets and the ocean, hoping it will lull me back to sleep. At least I can rest assured I won't disturb your. But of course you bust me only a little later, wearing a smug smile (yeah, I know I'm in a hammock on my own which I claimed I wasn't the guy for, but it's just comfy for god's sake!) and the shirt you gave me for Christmas. I damn well knew you would do that at some point! I even asked if you had secretly bought it for yourself, which you denied loudly. So I guess you're busted too.
You say that you've had the weirdest dream and climb into that hammock with me kind of clumsily, covering me with your sleepy body. You tell me that you saw your abuela in your dreams, which is not so unusual, but that there was another female with her. You couldn't see her face, but just like it is with dreams sometimes you just know who that person is. Someone you only know from pictures in my apartment: My mum. You wanted to run up and talk to those two, but they always got away, obviously deep in conversation.
All the while you run your fingers over the outlines of my face in such an attentive way it's almost making me blush. While you're telling me this and my eyes are glued to your lips, my heart beats so very fast. At first I am not sure if you will believe me, but I have been dreaming about my mum too just before I woke up before.
So we fantasize about your abuela and my mum conspiring in heaven to bring us together, to bring us here. Expecting that we were exactly what we needed when we needed us: To heal, to grow, to become lighter again.
I admit:
"I guess I'm sad that we never established some kind of memorial routine for my mum. It's just so nice that everyone came together for your grandmother. I feel bad we didn't think of something. Me and Will at least…"
How much I regret this is suddenly very clear to me as I feel tears spring to my eyes. Do you know how many tears have already been shared between us?
You don't comment, you just kiss them away:
"It's never too late. Talking about her is also remembering. You don't need to make a whole ado like we do."
"Sometimes I would like to talk to her as the man I am now, you know?"
These words are out before I can stop them, something that happens a lot when you're around. At times I don't even know I am thinking these things before they fall from my mouth. You don't even ask what I mean by that because you get it:
"Babe you still can! I talk to my grandmother all the time. In fact I talked to her last night. You know what she told me?"
"What?"
"That I shouldn't worry so much. That she did a better job raising me than she did with my dad and that she's sorry for that. Sounds weird and maybe I made it up in my head but it gave me some comfort!"
I smile into your hair. Sometimes I think you are a witch and I tell you that. You just wink conspiratorially and say:
"Told you the story of my name, didn't I?"
"Tell me something about her!" I beg.
You've already told me tons of stories of your grandmother, the fearless protector of your childhood up until you were 14, up until she moved back to her home country. A day that you describe as one of the saddest days of your life. Still I like hearing about your idol, especially since this is just one of our talks we like to have at 'stupid o'clock' that mean the world to me.
"She was the best. You would have liked her, you would have loved talking and debating with her. She didn't take shit from no one, but was the warmest person I know! And she was very modern and straightforward for her age. She even got her driver's license when she was way over 50."
In my eyes you're very much like her.
If there was ever a barrier left between us it's slowly melting away, hour after hour, minute by minute spent together. The last boundaries and restrictions are being washed away from the shore, because nobody's picking them up anymore.
You with those starlit gleaming eyes I can't make myself look away from, you manage to color in all my grey areas one by one. You're my safe haven where I can let all my demons out. I know you will help me carry them for longer than five minutes.
Even after both my aunt and uncle arrive with their families the next day we manage to sneak off from time to time. Take early morning or late evening walks through the woods and on the beach. At night-time you mostly can't help yourself to scare me at least once because you seem to find it funny that I am a little skittish in the dark.
We sit in silence together a lot, it feels like comfortably healing. I didn't think you could do that, because of all this nervous energy vibrating around you most of the time. I could sit in silence with you for a lifetime and still it would mean more than a thousand words exchanged with anyone else.
I can reveal my darkest thoughts to you and you won't pull away. You can handle my fire and sometimes that's a lot to ask, because I know I can come across as a little too intense, think too much, feel too much.
It becomes very clear to me that you are also the one that can break me for real, because by now you certainly hold all of my heart in your hands. Please don't crush it!
You are so beautiful, sometimes I think you don't even know it, you don't get the magnitude of it. It's a delight to watch you shine brighter with every vacation day, like you're absorbing all the life around your.
You're oblivious of the way people look at you, especially your people. How they look up to you, how they want to be your friend, be close to you. But you're so independent on your own, you don't need the attention. It's not that you think you don't deserve it, but you feel you're just better of on your own. I wish you would let people carry some weight for you sometimes.
You're a natural leader. Everyone is looking to include you in the planning for the next days, especially the planning for New Year's Eve that's going to lead into your birthday straight away. And the way your little cousin looks up to you is really adorable.
You'd make such a great mother. There is no denying that. And I absolutely love this side of you. How you make sure everyone's needs are met in a silent, unpretentious way. Managing to fulfill Amanda's wish to have a sleep-over and taking away my fear that it could be awkward with me there too or that I will scare her in the night if I somehow find myself drowning in one of my nightmares. But you look at me and tell me that it's gonna be fine, that you're going to wake me up if you find me restless and struggling. Because you say you don't wanna spend a night away from me if it's not really necessary. I guess I have never shared a queen size bed with two other persons, but it works. And seeing you cuddled up with that curly-haired girl just does something to me.
Then again there are moments when you're a little child yourself, a boundless youth. Someone who doesn't hesitate to participate when we come up with the idea of doing a human pony race on the beach. You just instantly hop on to my back, cling to me like a pro and laugh your heart out at the pure silliness of it and then get fake-mad that we didn't make first place because of all the laughing. Seems like we're exploring more facets of our friendship.
You wear your scars with dignity. Not yet pride, but dignity. I wish that one day this is the way you carry the scars on your soul instead of trying to hide them so well and wasting so much energy doing it.
Seeing you interact with my family it's very clear that you are a man that is instantly well liked and respected. And you don't even need to put much effort into it. You even mange to make me see them in a different light too.
Your presence is quiet and serene, alert and observant, your humor subtle and sophisticated, never overstepping. You're honest, brutally at times, but still respectful and polite if you're not being offended.
Every day, gradually, I understand something more about you. The things you've seen, witnessed, every questionable thing you've done, all you went through: you will have to carry that with you for the rest of your life. Some scars of yours will never really heal and you've made your peace with that, or you're about to. I have to let go of the idea that I can change it all for you. I need to worry less, because I can't help you all the way, as much as I would want to. Still I would do it all for you and I hope you know that. And maybe that's enough!
You worry about details just as I do, thankfully concerning different topics. But all in all I think we're probably the same kind of stupid sometimes.
But then again you're the girl who is doing cartwheels on the beach and wants me to help her get her legs up until she's in a solid handstand. Why? Because you can. It doesn't serve any purpose, other than: you just feel like it. So you do it. I admire that about you.
Just like your ability to get completely lost in music and words and stories. Even if I slump down on your warm body, wet from a recent swim you only slightly flinch and keep reading. I find myself falling into your rapt and relaxed status loving that you always let me invade your space without question. So I rest my head on your sandy stomach, you absentmindedly begin to stroke my hair and neck, just the way I like it and if I ask what you're reading about you start quoting poetry at me. The sun has increased your freckles on your nose and cheekbones, making you look like a rakish little girl.
It's these moments where fear knocks at the back of my heart. It's that fragile state of absolute luck, when you're afraid to breathe too heavily because you're afraid you might wake up and upset the balance with one false move. I never thought I could feel something equally as deep as my pain. Sometimes I feel so powerless in the face of this love. Because I feel so insanely safe with you.
I want to breathe you in all day, every day and sleep with my forehead resting against your shoulder while you're clutching my hand against your heart.
I realize I don't really need anything, I just need you by my side. You're my armor whenever I lose mine, my guardian when I'm feeling lost. You look at me and see me. Me! Not the front, not just one side of me, it's like you see everything that I am. And it is okay. It will be okay as long as you look at me like that and say: "You're okay love! You will be okay!"
I sit behind you in the sand, massaging your shoulder because you said they were hurting from playing beach volleyball all day with the boys. I tease you that maybe you're getting old and you pinch my legs that are resting beside yours.
Like probably a hundred times before I get lost in the feeling of your smooth skin under my fingertips, the uncountable freckles decorating your strong arms and shoulders, your backside. You don't even know what a beauty of a man you are, inside and out. You don't know the half of it.
The insides of my left wrist have a new 'stamp'. You drew a 'J' and a heart on me when I discarded my pen before. It makes me smile because it's so cheesy and adorable that a grown man would do that.
I would totally get your name tattooed across my heart, I think it's long there anyway. When I tell you that I can feel your smile before I see it. I wanna hold on to every second of this so bad.
I take pictures of actual moments, people, landscapes for a change and it feels nice to discover that I am pretty good at capturing those things too, not only surveillance shots for a case. Pictures of that grand wide ocean, toothy smiles and piles of food, you pulling silly faces, you being totally oblivious of me taking pictures of you, those are my favorites.
We talk about things that we haven't talked about. Small things. Like if we do have an actual anniversary date and what date would it be? There could be several. Is it the first time I kissed you? The first time I took you to bed? Although you protest that it rather was the other way around: That you jumped my 'delicious bones' as you put it. Or the first time you stayed over at my place? The accidental or the deliberate one? You tell me that I've been on your mind constantly ever since I grabbed you in the back-room of Molly's and that you think this is where your timer on us starts. But you're not opposed to not choosing and having a 'kiss-aversary' and 'bone-aversary' as well as a thousand other anniversaries.
New Year's eve is here. My father and Inés have arrived today as well and I manage to stay relaxed. We're having an asado on the beach on front of my aunt's cabin, which is actually closer to the dunes than the other two my family owns.
I look up from the drink in my hand and meet your eyes, meet your smoldering look from across the improvised dance-floor on the wooden-deck of the house. You know you're killing me with that look, so I sway my hips a little more to make you pay. And it's working.
Though I can already feel it's gonna physically hurt to leave this magical place with you the day after tomorrow, I can't wait to start another year with you, hopefully one of many more to come.
This year had it all. The good, the bad, the ugly, the sad. Still I'd do it all over again if it meant I would end up here, right here with you.
Whenever I see you dance it turns me on, even watching you from a distance. Just seeing you enjoy yourself, bend your body, know that that music really owns you and you own the rhythm of it. You can dance through life and you absolutely move me. These last days have turned out to be some honeymoon-phase we can't seem to put a stop to, a desire for each other that is a progression to everything we already felt since we've fallen for each other. You make sure I know you're mine completely. We're in sync and every touch just comes so naturally. Every inch of your body is mine to kiss, to hold, to caress, if in passing or on absolute purpose.
I can't help myself, catch you in an embrace from behind and tell you that I can't hold out until this party's over, that I need you bad, like right now. I can see that you love me being vocal about my needs, dragging you away from the sandy dance-floor to have our first official party-quickie in the bathroom of your aunt's cabin.
There is something really sexy about the urgency, the half-clothed state, the taste of something forbidden, something half-exposed. You don't know how happy this makes me.
My cousin is knocking on the bathroom door at 11.45pm and you're covering my mouth with your hands to keep my moans from escaping, while you pant into my neck, arousing me even more if that is at all possible.
Esme calls out that she will save us some champagne for later, obviously having caught on to what we are doing.
We stifle childish laughter, but then you begin to move inside me again, kiss my neck, pull my hair and push me over the edge just minutes before the clock strikes midnight. You sit me down on the bathroom counter, pushing my sweaty hair out of my face and just stare into my eyes, your own pupils gleaming, satisfied, still excited. Outside there is loud Spanish counting down to be heard and then suddenly the distant sound of fireworks going off:
"Happy new year and happy birthday my love!"
And with your soft and salty lips on mine I just know that this is the best start into the year I could have wished for.
A few hours later we have made it back to bed with a serious buzz from new year's and birthday toasts, when suddenly my phone alarms us to a video call. It's from Chicago. They just started the New Year over there, behind in time, wanting to include us on their festivities in a maximal packed Molly's bar and of course get their Birthday Wishes in. It's weird seeing all those faces because I feel so far, far away, in another time and space. Their cheery voices and laughter a reassurance that some people are eagerly waiting for us to come back and let them in on our holiday adventures. So that is something to look forward to at least.
"This doesn't look like one hell of a party over there!" Kelly shouts into the camera, obviously a few drinks in, Stella punching his arm for his teasing.
We laugh, snuggling deeper into the pillows. I rest my head on your shoulder, look up at you and say:
"It's a party for two!"
* Quote by Nedra Glover Tawwab
Perfect soundtrack to this chapter / songs that inspired me:
Bebe "Que llueva"
Justin Jay, Josh Taylor, Benny Bridges "What Do You Want"
LÉON "You and I"
Timecop1983, Trevor Something "My First Crush"