DATING: START, maybe...
The morning brings a soft fuzziness to your mind as you shift on your mattress. There's more than your own warmth here- there's a hard, bony hand wrapped around your arm, a body pressed against your back, and a presence that tickles the hairs on the back of your neck. It's not breath, but it's close to it.
Is there a skeleton in bed with you?
As gently as you can, you shift onto your back, glancing to the side. Sans lies next to you, still clinging to your arm, his expression peaceful as he sleeps. You can't help but blush at the closeness, the implication of having your crush in bed with you, and a quick glance under the covers finds you both fully dressed, so at least no funny business has taken place. 'More's the pity' whispers a part of your mind, but you push it away, flustered.
You can't remember how Sans got into your bed. Or Papyrus, if the indent in the mattress next to you is anything to go by. In fact, you can't remember anything about the night before, beyond the three of you sitting around the table drinking cider...
Sans sighs in his sleep, and you stiffen, slowly rolling out of bed and getting up. You'd love to stay under the covers with him, but you'd be too tempted to snuggle up and kiss his sweet skull all over, pull him close and give him all the affection you proclaim to him with your flowers. But what if he pushes you away? You'd never recover.
Instead, you pad over to your suitcase and pull out a soft flannel shirt, one that you might have stolen from Papyrus at one point, and start getting changed. The smell of coffee from the kitchen is mouthwatering, and you're not paying attention to Sans when he rolls over and opens his sockets, his hazy eyelights fixing on you as you're undressing.
You let out a hum, stretching as you toss your clothes from the night before into your suitcase, turning as you start to pull the shirt on, until you finally spot Sans watching you. For a moment you freeze, unsure if he's actually awake, then blush as you realise he's caught you in your underwear. Well, there's no point in running away. You continue dressing, giving him a nervous smile as you button up the flannel. "Good morning, sleepyhead. Didn't expect to have a guest in my bed..."
"Uh-" he clears his throat and rubs his sockets, a faint blue spreading over his cheekbones, and sits up, looking confused. "Me neither. I can't... really remember?"
"Neither. I think we just drank too much and got sleepy." You chuckle, and turn away, going to the kitchen to pour yourself some coffee. God bless Papyrus, you silently think, and bring Sans a mug as well, sitting down on the mattress with him. "Papy was gone when I woke up, as usual. I've gotta do my usual rounds on the flowers and bees... what's on for you today?"
"Dunno... some packing, some weeding... eggs... might head down with Pap later to help with the house." He shrugs, sipping at his coffee, his eyelights slowly moving over your body- not leering, not like that weirdo at the pub, but softly, curiously. Maybe it's just ok because you like him, but he doesn't make you feel u comfortable. You wish you could be confident enough to show him what was under your shirt again.
"We should do something," you say before you have a chance to stop yourself.
He raises a browbone. "Like what?"
Like kissing, your mind whispers, and goddamit, why is kissing on your brain this morning? "Movies," you manage to say, trying to get your mind back on track. "We could... go to town? See if anything's on? Maybe late afternoon?"
"Oh..." He glanced away, looking like he's considering it, and for a horrible moment you think he's looking for a way to let you down easy. But then he smiles a shy smile and nods. "Yeah, we can do that. Say, 4 or 5?"
"Perfect!" You grin, giving him a friendly punch and getting up, padding back to the kitchen, looking for the pancakes Papyrus always sets out for the two of you.
"Aye, is this a date?" He calls from the living room, and you peer out, your heart pounding. Instead of answering, you simply smile.
"Wear something nice."
You're buzzing all day about your date- well, you haven't called it a date yet, and Sans hasn't asked again, but you like to think it's a date. And maybe you're buzzing a little from the alcohol that might still be in your system, and wondering what happened the night before. You feel like it might have been more than just sleeping, but you just can't remember. Regardless, you feel happy, like you've finally gotten something off your chest, even if you're not sure what that is.
Your day goes as planned, driving out to the house to check on the progress, help out a few small tasks, approve the moving of furniture or putting up walls. You check on your flowers, watering, weeding, pruning, and then moving into the bees, cleaning out and harvesting the honey from the hives that are due that day. You like working with other people buzzing around as well as the bees, watching them patch up the roof and hurry around painting and measuring and hammering as you spin the frames and empty the honey into buckets.
You're so grateful for the town you live in, the friendly people who are taking time out of their days to fix your house. The most you can do for them is send them home with free honey and flowers- it might put a dent in your earnings, but they deserve it. You make sure the ice cold water is flowing, and that everyone gets a smile and a thank you. And when Papyrus arrives, you wave and grin at him, your heart swelling with love for the skeleton who deserves so much.
As you and Sans head off to the movies that afternoon, Papyrus thinks about the snapshots of memory he can vaguely see from the night before. He's not sure if it's a fantasy or a dream, or if it really happened, but the ghost of a feeling of your lips on his teeth echos through his mind as he sits on the couch and ays his hand over the spot he was sure you were sitting in.
Waking up next to you was a shock, but a pleasant one. For one small moment he held you close to him, breathing in your scent as he nuzzled your hair. But then he had to leave, and he carried the feeling of your soft body in his arms through his day, his usual permanent smile even softer and wider than usual.
He was surprised to find you were going on a date with Sans- for a moment he thought maybe his brother had finally worked up the courage to bare his feeling and get the girl of his dreams. But even if it was a 'friend date'- according to Sans, your intentions were unclear- he was happy for him. Maybe Papyrus would ask you out later, when you had come home with Sans. Would there be kissing? It was weird to think about his brother kissing someone, but this was you, and your lips were on his mind...
Glancing around the quiet home, wondering what he should do to stop thinking about kissing you, his eyelights fell on a book that lay on the coffee table near your mattress. He'd seen you reading it before- you'd said it was about flowers. Curiously, he went to pick it up, flipping through the pages. A few were more worn than the others, and he wasn't sure why, at first. It was simply lists of flowers and colours and meanings- he skimmed the words, wondering what was so interesting about this book. And then he stopped on 'sunflower- dwarf', and glanced at the table, where the little sunflower sat in it's little glass, bobbing it's bright little head. The meaning was 'adoration'.
Well, that could be a coincidence, right? He flicked through the pages again, trying to remember what the other flower was called. Was it a daffodil? No, that was the last flower, they both had bulbs, though... Ah, tulip!
'Tulip- red: passion, declaration of love'.
He stared at the words until they blurred, wondering if this meant what he thought it meant. His first instinct was to think that you didn't know what you were doing, but this was your book. Your well-read, studied book. You poured over these pages and knew exactly what the flowers meant. But still, he was finding it hard to believe.
Straightening up, he went to the shelf that held the pressed flowers of days and months past, opening the pages carefully, glancing over the names and meanings on the worn-out pages.
'Rose- Yellow: Joy, friendship'.
'Camellia- White: You're adorable'.
'Gardenia: You're lovely, secret love'.
'Daffodil: Regard, unrequited love, you're the only one, the sun is always shining when i'm with you.'
His hands were shaking when he finally, carefully closed the book of dried flowers.
The movie was an old zombie film, campy and quirky with plenty to pick apart and laugh at. By the time you and Sans emerged back onto the street, it was dark, and the stars twinkled down at you almost as much as Sans' eyelights did. Threading your arm through his, you pressed close, smiling happily as the two of you wandered down the street to your truck.
"I'd ask you for a drink, but..." Sans gestured to the main street, where the two pubs each side of the road were closing their doors. You had driven an hour to the nearest town with a cinema, but even so, there wasn't enough traffic to keep the pubs open past 9pm. Old farmers needed their sleep, you figured.
"It's alright, I think we drank enough last night," you laugh, squeezing his arm. The breeze ruffles your skirt, sending goosebumps across your skin, and you wish you had worn something warmer than your thin, pretty dress that you saved away in your closet for potential dates.
"Yeah, I'd rather remember tonight," he chuckled, stopping at your truck and turning to look at you. He's always handsome in your eyes, but tonight he's gorgeous. He's somehow found a smart suit in dark blue, and an open necked shirt (flannel of course) in blue and yellow, showing just enough collarbone for your eyes to want to explore further.
"Me too," you say softly, smiling. "I knew you'd scrub up well. I wouldn't want to miss Sans the skeleton actually looking hot for once!"
"You think I'm hot?" he grinned, waggling his browbones at you, his hands slipping around the small of your back and drawing you closer.
The tension is thick and this time, you're not going to joke your way out of it. You slip you arms around his neck, your fingers gently tracing the dip where his ear would be, and feel him shiver under your touch, lidding his sockets. This is it, you've decided. You want more than anything to kiss his smile, and you're going to risk exposing your feelings to him. "Yes..." you hum, brushing your nose against his nose bridge. "I think you're very hot. And I have a big fat crush on you. So there."
"Ah..." he murmurs, suddenly sounding unsure. Is this too much too fast? Does he not feel the same even after all the flirting? He chuckles, the laugh vibrating in the air between you. "Well... thank the stars for that. I thought I'd be risking years of friendship to do this..."
And your anxieties melt away as he closes the distance and pressed his teeth to your lips, kissing you the way you've been wanting to all day. And you sink against him, letting out a soft moan as you kiss him back lovingly. It's a bit of a bend, tilting down to kiss the shorter skeleton, but you hardly notice when fireworks are going off behind your eyes.
This... is perfect.
Eventually, the two of you get into the truck, the empty street too chilly for your unprotected legs. It's tempting to start kissing again, but you start it up and rumble back towards home. You're both glancing at each other with these big, silly grins on the long trip back, while music plays softly in the background, the soundtrack to your romance.
"The more that you say, the less I know
Wherever you stray, I follow
I'm begging for you to take my hand
Wreck my plans, that's my man..."
It seems the cat is out of the bag...
