Title: Not Tonight
Author: ScullyAsTrinity
Rating: PG-13, a tad dark imagery.
Disclaimer: Honestly though, if I owned them, would I be worried that I didn't have enough money to purchase Christmas gifts? Come on now...
Spoilers: Holy Night
DEDICATION: To Jackie, I got off the phone with her and immediately wrote this.
Summary: If the distressed look on his face hadn't alerted her, the crimson drops had, awakening a despair within her that she didn't know how to deal with. She moved toward him, the sadness within her own being dimming. Spoilers for sometime after the PTS…
---
All he felt was the colors. They were pooling around him, pulling him under. He pinched the bridge of his nose in a desperate attempt to stave them off. They refused to obey, and he groaned, deep and low in his throat, wanton and lonely, hurt and healed.
She came to him. Of course she came to him. He called out, so she came. Her brow, the porcelain creased and cracked from worry. Wondering. Hoping. She called to him, but he was so sunken in his despair all he could hear were the demons screeching paths through his head.
His lip came to rest between sets of strong white teeth. They pierced the skin and he bled there, feeling nothing but a dull throb somewhere in the vicinity of his chest. In the back of his mind, he registered that it was well past quitting time, even for him; he wondered why she was still there.
The ache escalated into a jackhammer effect and he cringed, deeply. He cut through the delicate skin of his lip deeper and red blood seeped out over the crest of his bottom lip and dripped onto ivory paper resting on his desk; flowed down his chin oh so slowly, as if performing a strange form of osmosis.
If the distressed look on his face hadn't alerted her, the crimson drops had, awakening a despair within her that she didn't know how to deal with. She moved toward him, the sadness within her own being dimming.
A soothing hand reached out to touch his hair. He would have none of it, he reached out and batted it away, a resistant sob breaking free, his head falling onto his folded hands upon the desk. He felt a fresh rush of anger sweep over him as he let the tears break free.
He couldn't be in his right mind, she surmised. Salt and water washing over pages and pages of memos for the reform bill initiative. The bill was important to him, he'd spent countless days working it to perfection, the details finally molding like clay under his political hands.
"Let me help you." She whispered, more frightened than she had really ever been before. Her eyes, stark wide, blue and endless, tearing up. She resisted stepping forward, instead giving a few beats to attempt to compose himself. Josh's head remained cradled in the supposed safety of his own arms. It was only when he stopped sobbing that she reached out to him.
"Josh..." A harsh, harsh whisper... Scared of him. She was scared of him for the first time in her life. Rooted to the spot she listened for more words, but none came. She stood there, unsure of what to do, wallowing in a pit of helplessness. She couldn't leave, physically, but couldn't stay mentally.
Torn.
Suddenly, without pre-empt, he leapt from his desk chair, tears having streaked down his cheeks and stalked to her. Her eyes took on an air of surprise and retreated with every step that he took toward her. Tie disheveled, hair askew. Soon, she was pressed against the closed door, panting. Scared and anticipatory.
She panted through her mouth. Waited for him to speak.
When he did not, she made a feckless attempt to.
He silenced her with his mouth. It wasn't soft, as she had dreamed many times before; it was hard and frightening. As reluctant as she was, her lips opened under his and his tongue swept brutally in, tangling with hers. He moaned and pressed her harder against the wood.
She groaned, whether in pain or in pleasure she didn't know, but she continued to kiss him regardless. When his lips moved to her neck she pressed against him.
"Josh, Josh no." And he stopped, his normally unruly hair even more disheveled. He stroked it back as he regained his breath. His eyes were unfocused, she could tell, and he hands dropped to his side and clenched and unclenched furiously.
"I know." His chin connected with his chest, ashamed. A pink tongue licking his lips and steadying his mind as he smoothed out his shirt.
"Josh no." A gentle hand tipped his chin up so that blue eyes met deep brown ones. "Not... not tonight Josh. Soon. Not now." And she dipped her head and kissed him gently on his bruised lips, backing away incredibly slowly.
"Soon." He whispered back, resting his forehead against hers and embracing her, in a manner that promised more.
Just not tonight.