Luna had always loved the decorations in her childhood bedroom. Together, she and her mom had fully decorated the space when she was thirteen, and even though small parts of the room changed as she got older, the main pieces remained the same. The room was chock full of nostalgia, and she didn't mind having to do a little stint in the place before the group of them found a replacement for the townhouse. Most days—if not all days—she found the gauzy curtains and the hanging twinkle lights and the glow-in-the-dark star stickers on the ceiling to be the most comfortable thing she could imagine. She'd spent a great number of hours during her teenage years watching how the lights reflected off the shimmery swaths of fabric, just thinking about her day or trying to plot a story in her head or simply staring aimlessly off into space.

Never, in all her years of gazing at her decorations, had Luna been quite so focused on them, however.

Not to mention, never, in all her eighteen years of living in this house, had she ever had a boy in her bedroom—and as if the term 'boy' could encompass all that he was.

Because here she was, lying on her side on a folding table atop a clean white sheet in nothing but a plain t-shirt and green thong, with Paul Donnelly seated on a chair behind her.

He had his tattoo gun clenched in his fist—red wrapping around its handle—and he'd been at the design on the side of her thigh for the better part of an hour now. Luna hadn't been able to catch a proper glance at him since he'd sat down in the office chair. She faced away from him, steadfastly staring at those damn decorations—trying to distract herself from his hand on her skin, the prick of the needle not enough on its own. She thought she'd be accustomed to his touch by now—this was, after all, her fourth tattoo by him and, not to mention, their third session on this particular one. His hands were still just as capable as sending shocks of electricity through her veins as they usually were, though.

His hands had also been in much more interesting and intimate places than the outside of her thigh, or the side of her hip. But now that she knew what those other touches felt like, the firm weight of his hand on her thigh just wasn't enough. He was, though, surprisingly causal with his touches, and he was always surreptitiously touching her hair, or fluttering his hand across her back. But they never had true heat behind them. Sure, some of his touches were less than chaste, but they were always too casual for her to interpret them as something else—something more.

Also, Luna believed that the tension between them was more built up now than it was before her cousin Jane had burst into her room unannounced. Because, despite her insistence that they'd be 'pushing their luck' if they continued with their sexy times, Donnelly apparently held no such qualms. His kisses as he'd pressed her up against the door had quickly turned more eager and passionate—from both of them. Then, he'd locked the door, carried her back to her bed, and that was that.

Her sex-experiment? A glaringly huge, eye-rolling success.

Luna's baseline was not just a baseline; it was a standard that she couldn't imagine anyone else reaching. But that went down months ago, and despite her being all for a repeat performance, Donnelly had taken her hastily uttered 'one-time thing' declaration to heart. She wouldn't trade what they'd done—and she couldn't regret it even if someone held a gun to her head—but now they were back to their casual teasing and flirty ways. Just like they'd used to. Nothing was new, and, really, nothing had changed. Sometimes, it was hard to look at him and realize she couldn't have him; so she distracted herself with other guys—faceless guys in nameless clubs—but just like she'd predicted, nothing had yet to compare to that night.

No one had yet to compare to Paul Donnelly.

And sometimes, especially since Scotland, they would lock eyes. She still hadn't been able to figure out what Donnelly was always searching for in her eyes, but she did know that he never seemed to find it. His gaze would always shutter, his emotions padlocking away behind his eyes, and she didn't know what she needed to show him to change this practiced outcome. She never pushed him in these situations, and she always changed the subject for him before he felt he had to say something he wasn't ready for.

She wasn't going to push him. She wasn't that girl—she'd never be that girl.

In light of all this, and to protect her heart from shattering into a million little pieces, Luna had taken to chanting whenever she got too into her feelings. One-time thing, one-time thing, one-time thing, she'd repeat—repeat until it was the only thought bouncing around her skull.

This wasn't quite working at the moment, as she listened to him talk aimlessly about SFO's latest get-together. She wasn't ashamed to admit that she loved listening to him speak. He had a little Philly lilt at the end of his words, and he had such a distinct way of saying her name that it made her heart ache a little bit with longing. She and Donnelly had grown close enough in the recent months that she can say she cares deeply about him without sounding like an insta-lovey fool—that outside of Tom and Elliot, he was, quite possibly, her best friend. She knew that she wasn't his, though, and she was okay with that. Because just as no one could take the place of Tom and Elliot for her, no one could take the place of Oscar and Farrow in Donnelly's life. But she wouldn't mind sliding into a different role—being a different kind of best friend.

And though all signs pointed to that not happening anytime soon, Luna was going to remain confident about it. Confidence is key… even when what you want doesn't work out. Especially if what you want doesn't work out, if Luna's experiences were anything to go by.

Right when Luna was about to open her mouth—when she was about to give voice to one of the random thoughts bouncing around her brain—there was a knock on her bedroom door.

"Hey, Luna," Farrow called through the wood. "I left my med kit in there."

"You can come in!" she yelled, though she was careful not to jostle herself as Donnelly's needle again pierced her skin. She expected to just see Farrow popping into her room, but her brother followed behind him and she had to resist the urge to cover herself. Luna and Moffy had always been close, but him seeing her in her thong wasn't exactly a comfortable position for her to be in.

He seemed to be feeling the same way as he was currently glaring into the ceiling and muttering out, "Luna."

"Sorry, Moffy!" she was quick to say. "I didn't know you were with Farrow."

Still, despite her discomfort in being seen a little more than half-naked in front of her brother, it wasn't like she was completely naked. Luna's found that having tattoos had boosted her confidence. She'd always been comfortable in her own skin—she'd had to be because the public and the media have been hell-bent on making her uncomfortable—but the tattoos have made her knee-jerk reaction to cover up disappear. Plus, from Moffy's perspective, the thong she was in wasn't revealing much more than her average swimsuit usually did. Only Donnelly could really see anything anyway—something that Moffy seemed to zero in on as he turned his Loren Hale-esque glare onto Donnelly.

"You have my sister in a thong on a table in her bedroom–"

"Moffy!" Luna interjected. Her face was on fire—a veritable erupting volcano.

Donnelly lifted his tattoo gun in the closest gesture to surrender she'd ever seen him make. "It's for a tattoo, man."

"No shit," Farrow added casually. He crossed the room to inspect the sprawling tattoo that snaked up the side of her leg, curling over her hip and trickling onto the side of her ass. It was a big tattoo, and the size of it had intimidated her slightly when she'd first seen the drawings Donnelly had done—no matter that she was the one who wanted it to be that big in the first place. Now, she was just beyond excited about the entire thing—all the intricacies of the galaxy that Donnelly was bestowing upon her skin. It consisted of ballpoint-pen fine-lines that were perfectly curved and then perfectly straight. It was, in all honesty, one of the most beautiful drawings that she'd ever seen, and she was honored that Donnelly had drawn it for her with such care.

"Shit, this line work is insane," Farrow said.

Donnelly smirked—one of his smirks that quirked his mouth in the most attractive way and made that spark enter his eyes like it did when someone paid him a true compliment. "You're not the only one with good hands," Donnelly said.

Oh boy, did Luna know that.

"What the fuck, Donnelly?" Moffy was glaring at Donnelly, then the walls, then the tattoo gun in Donnelly's hand—obviously unamused and not knowing what to do about it. "My dad lives here," Moffy continued. "He eats, sleeps, and breathes in this fucking house."

Luna groaned and collapsed back onto her side, throwing her hand over her eyes in an attempt to shield herself from this embarrassment. She really couldn't blame Jane for spilling the beans to Moffy—it was unfair of Luna to ask Jane to keep something so big from her best friend, Luna knows she would have had a tough time keeping something of the same caliber from Tom and Elliot. But ever since Moffy'd found out, he'd been looking at her differently. She didn't feel as though he were judging her, per se, but it was like he was seeing her in a new light. Like she was officially grown up in his eyes and he wasn't sure what to do about it. Other people that she'd hooked up with had always been faceless guys to her older brother, just names that she'd mentioned off hand and experiences she'd been even vaguer about.

Donnelly is the first person that she'd slept with that her brother actually knew—that he actually saw and interacted with on a regular basis.

Luna uncovered her face enough to catch Donnelly's eye before he said, calmly, to her brother, "Yeah, I know."

Donnelly doesn't panic; she'd never seen even a flicker of that emotion enter his face, and he's the same way now. What's worse, though, is the resigned look she sees in him now—as though he's preparing himself to be shit on. As though he's bracing himself to hear that he's undeserving, that she was too good for him and he needs to watch himself. And suddenly, everything between the two of them made so much more sense, and Luna realized she'd played her own part in making this bed for them. When she'd said "one-time thing", she was just trying not to scare him—or herself for that matter. She was trying to keep Jane from poking around too much. But really, all she succeeded in was pushing Donnelly further down that rabbit hole—in making him feel like he was undeserving of being more than a one-time thing.

He couldn't be more wrong.

"Could be worse, wolf scout," she vaguely heard Farrow say as he picked up his med bag.

But his look had turned slightly desperate, as if he were begging her not to rock the boat.

"How?" her brother wondered.

"We could've walked in on them doing other shit together," Farrow said with a little hidden smirk.

Slowly, and hating herself a little but willing to do it for Donnelly, Luna said, "Noooo."

Nothing about Donnelly outwardly changed, but he placed a secret, comforting, and thankful touch on the small of her back—casual even, if Farrow or Moffy were to see it.

"Me and Donnelly—that was a one-time experiment," Luna finished.

It hurt her a little to say it out loud again. And when Donnelly did his adorable thing of pushing his wire-framed reading glasses with his elbow, Luna had to force her face not to shift. She had to force herself to only look at him out of her peripheral.

"Dad's going to see this tattoo," Moffy added, "and he'll know Donnelly inked it and saw you half-naked."

She saw red a little bit, all her thoughts converging on her at once. What was so damn bad about Donnelly seeing her half-naked? Really, what was so wrong with it? And why did that singular comment make her think that everyone was so up in her business?

"I can do what I want with my body," she said firmly. "Mom already said she'd calm Dad down if I got another tattoo."

As Farrow showed Moffy where her tattoo was, and the two were sufficiently distracted with each other, Luna smiled a little sadly at Donnelly. He slanted an unreadable look at her, but his hand made another pass at her back—a little more obvious and lingering this time around, but she wasn't going to complain. Before she did something remarkably rash, she spoke up again.

"I've been planning this tattoo for a long time. Donnelly worked on the sketch for weeks."

That was true. She'd first brought up the idea of the tattoo over text, and when he'd come over the next day to jot down some ideas and get some basic drawings down, they'd been sufficiently side tracked. Then Scotland happened, so they had to put it off even longer. But that time in the Highlands had given them some more time together—it was hell being trapped there with nowhere to go, but some of her favorite additions to the sketch happened in that month-long period. That time also proved to her that she was a pro at avoiding temptation—or at least withstanding it.

"She wanted fine-line black and white so she could color it in with marker whenever," Donnelly added to Farrow. He looked as if he was trying to communicate non-verbally with Farrow, and by Farrow's little nod, he apparently understood whatever Donnelly was trying to say.

"Okay, but Maximoff isn't wrong. Her dad is going to kill you."

Yeah, Farrow was right. No matter if she raged about it 'till she was blue in the face, Loren Hale was immune to all of it. He'd protect his two daughters until the death, even if they insisted they were fine. Donnelly, however, was the most blasé person she'd ever met, and most things rolled right off him. He'd told her once, after she'd said something along the lines of 'you're too hard on yourself', that if he was shit to himself, then the shit others would say wouldn't be quite as shitty. As full proof as that theory had apparently proven, she hated it and he never got away with saying bad things about himself in front of her. But it seemed he had a real response this time—no shit talking involved.

"Your baby is a blood-relative of mine," Donnelly began, "and I'm Xander's bodyguard. Which means that I'm like family. Murdering me is like murdering one of his own."

"Man, you've got Cobalts Never Die tattooed on your knee." Farrow barked a laugh. "Loren Hale isn't going to think you're one of us."

While preening at the fact that Farrow considered himself a Hale, she was simultaneously really bummed that Farrow would say that Donnelly could never join the Hale Clan. While she believed that her dad would put any potential boyfriend of hers through the literal wringer, she'd like to believe that he'd let him in eventually. He did it with Farrow, what was so wrong with doing it with Donnelly?

"I won't let my dad kill him."

Even though it would potentially make this hypothetical situation even worse, Luna would pull out all the stops and tell her dad everything. If he knew the whole truth, the likelihood that he'd kill Donnelly would go up, but he'd also be more likely to listen to her if she put it all on the table.

Really, it was a fifty-fifty shot. The Emperor of Petty ™ was a force to be reckoned with on a normal day.

She noticed her brother's glazed look, and it pulled her out of her own stupor. "I'm hung up on the 'your baby' part," Moffy began. Then he started speaking directly to Donnelly. "You know that we're just temporary dads to Ripley? At some point Scottie will be released from prison, and we plan to help him get clean for reunification."

"What?" Donnelly gaped.

His hand—though it was a closed and clenched fist this time, rather than a swipe of a thumb or a press of a palm—pressed against her back, as if he were looking to her to steady him.

Farrow continued Moffy's trail of thought. "If Scottie's willing to take the steps to be healthy for his son, then we have to respect that, Donnelly."

Donnelly pushed off from the table, upset. Luna watched, helpless.

"Donnelly–" Farrow began, seeing the betrayed look on his friend's face.

"Scottie isn't looking to get clean, Farrow," Donnelly said. "He laughed in my face when I saw him."

"Wait, you talked to him?"

"I went to the state penitentiary," Donnelly confirmed. Luna knew this; he'd called her about it after he'd gotten back to his apartment. He said that he couldn't tell Oscar or Farrow—that they knew too much of the history, and he didn't want to drag up shit that he'd rather have stay buried. Donnelly continued, "He's just holdin' onto his parental rights because he knows Maximoff Hale has the baby. So when he comes out, he's one-degree away from this family."

Farrow and Moffy look murderous at this declaration. Luna had too, when Donnelly had first told her. Ripley deserved more than to be a bargaining chip—to be a way 'in' and used to exploit and blackmail. He deserved Farrow and Moffy. Interrupting the staring contest between her brother and his fiancé was the garage door opening.

"Your dad's home," Farrow stated.

Drawing in a sharp breath, Luna almost flung herself off the table to make sure everything looked "normal." But Donnelly was already rolling his chair back towards her and placing that hand on her back again.

"Wait, I have to clean your tattoo first."

"I'll stall him," her brother promised, but he was cut off by her Uncle Ryke's voice yelling her dad's name. Ryke was always loud, so she wasn't too worried, but Moffy and Farrow were already sprinting out towards the commotion. That made her stomach sink a little, but she still stayed put—letting Donnelly wipe down her thigh. After her infection from the tongue piercing, Luna never wanted one again. She'd tried to play it off all tough, but she'd had a horrid fever and everything had felt heavy for days. So, she took some deep breaths and calmed her heartbeat. Donnelly apparently misinterpreted her sigh—for what, she didn't know—but he spoke up.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly as he grabbed another damp paper towel.

She looked down at him incredulously. "What the hell for?"

"For causing all of this…" he gestured around vaguely, "mess. There's tension between you and your brother now, and it doesn't take a fuckin' detective to put the pieces together."

"What pieces?"

He just looked at her.

"Wait, because we slept together? That you're the reason for the 'tension?'" she asked, her brows furrowing.

He nodded, and finished drying her leg—wrapping a bandage over the portion he worked on today. All without looking at her.

"Do you regret saying yes to me?" Luna asked quietly, swinging her legs over the side of the table and sitting up to face him. She was afraid of his answer. They hadn't stopped teasing each other—hadn't stopped their flirting—and really, not many aspects of their relationship had changed. They just knew what it was like, now, when they jumped over that line in the sand. But, she was still scared. Luna leaned forward and braced her hands on the table, staring at the carpet.

"Not even a little bit," he said definitively.

"Then why would you assume that I'd regret it?"

"Because whether or not you wanna admit it, I am the reason that things are weird between you and your brother—we are the reason."

"Well, then he's gonna have to grow up and get over it. And it's not like we're lying to him about anything—it has been a one-time thing. Really, if he were smart he'd realize that the one he should be pissed at—if he's gonna keep up this angry big brother front—is me, not you, Because little does he know, you're the one who has to constantly shut me down."

"I haven't shut you down," Donnelly rebutted as he took apart his tattoo gun and put his ink bottles back into their case.

"Not in so many words, no, but you haven't exactly been open to it either."

"Says who?" he asked, that smirk of his snaking across his face.

"You!" Luna laughed. She had to resist the urge to tell him that he was sexy as all hell at the moment.

"Okay," he said, laughing a little with her, "ask me now then. You haven't asked me outright yet."

"Fine." She grinned. "Paul Donnelly, can I make out with you?"

"Nope," he said, popping the 'p'. He was still grinning as he threw his packed-up tattoo bag over his shoulder.

"You're such an ass." She shook her head at him, but she also couldn't stop grinning. She hopped off the table and grabbed her discarded sweats from the floor, pulling them on and preparing herself for whatever situation she was about to find downstairs. 'Doomsday,' her brother would say. 'We're preparing for doomsday, Lunalien."

She could feel Donnelly watching her as she tied up her sweats, just as she'd felt his stare on her legs and on her ass as her skin disappeared under the fabric. He was still a doofus, but that didn't mean his stare didn't make her all tingly. She swung to face him, catching him in his staring, and she pointed a finger at his face as she walked closer to him.

"Okay, Mr. Nope, I have a rule then," she stated. She was within arms-length of him now, and she poked him none too gently in the chest. "You can't look at me like that… not if you're not gonna follow through. It's cruel and unusual punishment. You've already set up all the other guys for failure, so you can't eye-fuck me and then expect someone else to properly take your place. Because that can't happen—physically impossible."

She'd started off jokingly, and she'd had every intention of just flirting with him and playfully busting his chops. Then she, predictably, got all in her feels and it turned a little too serious.

"Sorry, babe," he said, and he sounded genuinely apologetic.

"Good, okay," she said lamely. "Well, I'm gonna go and be mopey in my living room or something."

Before she'd even turned partially away from him, Donnelly grabbed her arm and pulled her back into his chest. Before more than a slightly shocked exhale of breath could escape her, his lips were on hers. The force of it almost took her off her feet and she was decidedly not thinking at the moment, but it was if her hands knew exactly where they were supposed to be—her mouth knew exactly what it was supposed to do. This was only their second kiss and though it was months in the waiting, all that time was worth it. She hadn't realized that the memory of his lips had diminished—had faded slightly—but now everything, everything, was rushing back. Her hands were in his hair, and his arms were wrapped completely around her waist, and he was walking her back towards the table she'd just jumped off of.

Breaking from his mouth, she took one second to jump back on that table before frantically pulling him back towards her. His tattoo bag thudded to the ground and he slid his hand across the smooth skin of her back under her white t-shirt. Everything ratcheted up a thousand degrees, and, without really thinking, Luna wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him in. It was his turn to groan, and she was impossibly close to him—as close as she could get with them still having their clothes on. His hand had descended to her ass—one of its favorite (and most frequently ventured) places to be—and he used that one hand to lift her slightly off the table.

She felt almost completely boneless in his arms. She didn't know how her arms were still holding onto his neck—how her ankles managed to stay locked securely around his waist—but here she was. Kissing him as passionately as she could—as fully as she could—just in case she had to wait another several months for another moment like this to come around.

He pulled back first, his breathing just as heavy as hers and his hands still possessively placed on her body.

"Maybe someone else shouldn't take my place," he whispered into her mouth.

His voice cracked when he said it, and Luna may have felt her heart crack along with it. This is, really, what she'd been wanting to hear him say since they'd hooked up—before they'd even hooked up, if she were being honest with herself. But something deep inside of her told her she needed to ask this next question—needed to have this next conversation—even if it hurt her.

"Are you sure?" she whispered back. "You've seen from Thatcher and Farrow that it's harder for you guys—security, that is—than it is for me. For my family. Are you sure that you're ready for all the—in your own words— 'shit' from your past to be public knowledge? Because even though it doesn't define you, the media will try to spin it that way."

His silence was telling, but the way his hands tightened on her waist and the way he twiddled with a lock of her hair let her know that he wasn't at all happy about his gut reaction. His eyes told an even sadder story—one full of childhood traumas that still lingered as adult demons—and it made her own eyes burn with tears when their gazes locked.

"It's okay," she said sadly. He let out a humorless chuckle and rested his forehead against hers. "I'm not going anywhere, so you can take your time, Paul. No one's rushing you, or forcing you to do anything you don't want to do—especially not me. I'm not angry with you—it's a big decision and a big deal, everyone knowing everything about you. If I wasn't born into it, and if I was able to get away from it all without having to leave my family behind, I'd have said 'fuck you' to the paparazzi and hightailed it out of here years ago."

"You mean that, too, don't you?" he asked, genuinely curious.

She wasn't sure which part of her little speech he was referencing, but she still said, "Are you surprised by that?"

"No," he said softly.

It was silent for a moment.

"It's completely your choice when and where or even if," Luna said softly. She kissed him, then—her mouth as soft and gentle as her voice. One of her hands reached up to cradle his face, her thumb brushing along his cheekbone. She'd never kissed anyone with such tenderness before, and by the way his chest collapsed on an exhale, she knew he hadn't either.

Pulling away from him this time was akin to actual torture, but she knew she had to because if she was even a second longer in the circle of his arms, she wouldn't be able to stop herself from having sex with him. They'd be too close to that edge, and if they weren't even ready for her family and his friends to know that they wished to be more than a 'one-time thing', then they definitely weren't ready for the emotional and cathartic sex that that kiss had promised. So, she hopped off the table with one last parting glance, squeeze of his hands, and no words. She made it all the way to the door before she heard her name on the ghost of his breath—uttered so low, she almost missed it. She turned, with her hand on the doorknob to make sure she didn't go running back to him.

"You're pretty great, you know that?" he asked. His tattoo bag was already back on his shoulder. "Truly and amazingly one of a kind, Luna Hale."

She grinned, but at her hands—not trusting herself to look at him. She knew that, for one of the few times in his life, his emotions were going to be plastered across his face. Not to mention her expression. Luna felt both achingly sad and truly seen for the first time in her life, and he was the only one that had ever given her this swirl of emotions in her gut. He saw her for all that she was, and he judged her for absolutely none of it. They weren't going to be happening today, but his voice and his touches held the promise of 'someday.'

"I'll see you tomorrow, Paul," she whispered, and she risked a small smile in his direction—wiping a tear from her cheek as she did so. He looked equally as wrecked as she stepped out of the room, but he didn't pull her back this time.

So she left him in her childhood bedroom and went in search of the commotion that had long since passed on the floor below her.

first, this whole fic has now been beta'd by the wonderful drwatsonn :)) the chapters are all updated and she's fresh and clean now *chef's kiss*

(some dialogue in this chapter are taken directly from hlu.)

i so so hope that y'all enjoyed this last chapter of tattoos! i'm sorry for the long wait, this chapter just WOULD NOT come into being. But she's here, she's way angstier than i expected, and i'm pretty happy with how she turned out.

i'm thinking about writing a little 'extra' thing from Loren's pov showing all the times he's noticed her new tattoos. we shall see though, don't know how many people would be interested in that beside me lol