Dear all,
thanks for reading. So, as promised, here is the new chapter. It is a bit ... intense at times, haha. I hope you won't find it to be too out of character, though.
As always, you can always reach out with any questions/comments, either here or on tumblr.
I hope you'll like this, and please please review? Even if it is just a simple i like it :)
much love, winter.
Sandcastles/The Bars Between Us
Chapter Thirteen
When the sky carried the color of the setting sun and their son was asleep in his booster seat and Lincoln was saying aloud everything he had already known, Michael wondered if they would still be there, in that parking lot, had their day had a different start.
Lincoln had shown up at their place in one of his worn-out t-shirts, claiming it was the perfectly acceptable attire for an afternoon barbeque. He smirked at Michael's choice of a dark blue shirt, something absolutely too formal for a beer that would likely spill over the rim at one point or another and for the grass stains to be undoubtedly attained while chasing kids around Sucre's backyard. Bryce, safely ensconced on his uncle's arm, noted that commenting on someone else's clothing was not a very nice thing to do, but Michael just laughed. He kissed the top of his son's head before leaving to get Sara. Of course he could just call her name, but the one thing he disliked more than yelling was letting go of an opportunity to lay his eyes on her.
The door of their bedroom was ajar. He knocked lightly, but unlike their son he didn't wait before pushing the door open.
She stood by the bed and her back, her bare back, was turned to him as her fingers fumbled with the zipper of her dress.
"I'm sorry, I…" he stumbled, pretty sure that just remembering his own name would take significant effort, but his body didn't retreat to give her space. As loud as the part of the brain instructing him to do so was, the reverence he had always prided himself on dissipated when her chin was on her shoulder and their eyes locked. He felt his skin changing color to a want impossible to conceal, while Sara was completely unfazed.
"It's fine, Michael," she smiled, although it wasn't, cornering someone like this, and he absolutely wasn't okay, not with the free will his bloodstream suddenly acquired. "Let's not pretend it was an immaculate conception. Would you mind helping me?"
His hands were shaking, yet felt as if they were of lead when he closed the door behind him. If he claimed to do it out of habit, he'd lie, for none of this was how he would usually handle things, and if he cited privacy, it would insinuate he had a control of his mind, which he absolutely didn't.
Who knew if his steps reverberated in her mind as they did in his. He would swear it was the loudest sound he had ever heard and derisively gave away how awkward his feet felt. How could this same pair of legs had gotten him out of so many perilous situations was a mystery to him, and the fact that her eyes were no longer on his did nothing to ease his breathing. When she faced her eyes forward, there was no other place for them to fall on than their bed.
Most of the handful of nights since the first they had spent together, they sneaked into their son's room when he was already sleeping, then tiptoed their way out before he woke. The couple of times they had stayed here, in this room, there was no hesitance and no excuse. By now the pads of his fingers, as well as his lips, had the shape of her face memorized. He kissed her mouth from every angle, with control that matched his indulgence, and while her fingers felt his stomach muscles constrict under their caress, his never strayed past the curve of her back. He wanted more, of course he did, and her heaving breaths indicated she did too, but it could never be just sex for them. And giving themselves over to the other in their entirety felt wrong when they could still barely say two words that didn't pertain to their boy.
"Lincoln's here?" she asked once he stood behind her, and he nodded before remembering she couldn't see him. He cleared his throat, but the voice with which he confirmed her words still didn't sound like him.
Her hair was falling down her back, and he gathered it between his fingers before moving it across her shoulders and letting it fall down her chest. It wasn't just because of his analytical mind that he noticed everything. The way she clutched the front of the dress to her breasts, the whiteness of her knuckles making him hope she wanted to let go as badly as he did. The complete absence of any marks on her skin, save for the couple of moles he remembered from the star-lit room in Gila. The graceful curve of her spine he now could trace with his eyes without any fabric being in the way; the hem of her underwear.
As he reached for the zipper, his knuckles brushed against her skin, by accident as well as on purpose. The finesse that could turn a random piece of paper into an expression of love was long gone. He held his breath when pulling the zipper up, but his blood was still rushing to all the inappropriate places.
Once the dress fit her perfectly and she smoothed out the creases on the front, he still didn't move back. She stilled when her tresses were once again in his hand and he flicked them back over her shoulder. He watched them fall down her back in all their lavishness, and suddenly his mind was clearer than ever before.
"You look beautiful."
The words left his mouth without his consent, and he couldn't believe he had never told her before. It had captivated his mind, every morning, every moment he laid his eyes on her in Fox River, messing up his cool concentration and best-laid plans. Later, on those scarce instances when his self-loath allowed him to remember her as she had been before her last day, he thought back to how surprised he was on their first day to discover that she was this beautiful, despite having watched her face on his wall for months. Even rarer did he recall their night in Gila, when the beads of sweat glistened above her eyebrows and he couldn't believe she had let him put them there.
And yet, somehow he had never told her.
"You're beautiful," he repeated as she glanced at him over her shoulder. Her lips, carrying the summer shade that his face would soon share, were parted, and she let her eyes get lost in his.
His hand reached for her hip, and under his touch she turned so that his arm was wrapped around her waist. If she made a step back, the back of her knees would hit the edge of their bed, but her desire for that was no bigger than his. She didn't stay put either, though.
With the tiniest step forward, she bumped her shoulder into his. Gently, yet it knocked all air of his lungs.
"We match," she said, and the hue of simple summer dress was the same as the one of his shirt. But it was merely an excuse to get closer to him; it had to be, for the distance between them remained decimated after her remark. They were close enough to each other for him to feel her breath on his skin and it made his blood seethe.
It was only a matter of seconds before he would lower his lips to her, ruin the lipstick so delicately applied, and forget about their son and his brother and the barbeque they were already late for. And from the way her chin was tilted upwards, her mouth all but offered, he knew she wouldn't mind adding a few more minutes to their delay.
Sara kept reminding their boy not to run around, but he always failed to listen and she never seemed peeved by it. Now his approaching treads counted down the seconds Michael still had to indulge in the feel of her while breathing out his erratic heartbeat.
Just before there was a knock on the door, he let go of her and stepped back, his hands again buried in the pockets to conceal their desperate want. She tucked the strands of her hair behind her ears, something by now he came to understand as her means of collecting herself. She was so much better at it than him; her skin wasn't reddened in the slightest while his might as well be on fire.
"Mom, dad, Uncle Lincoln says that if you two aren't ready soon, he'll get himself a beer," Bryce told them, opening the door but not stepping in, as though his parents' bedroom was out of bounds to him. His voice then dropped to a confiding whisper. "I really don't want him to start drinking before we get to Uncle Sucre's."
"Well, we don't want that to happen, do we," Sara laughed, as if intentionally making it impossible for him to take his eyes off her.
"Wow, mom, you look so pretty," the boy smiled at her, and, god, Michael thought, the truer words had never been spoken.
By the time they finally got to Sucre's house, Lincoln's forehead was covered with sweat. He had tried to ingrain in his brother a disdain for speed limits similar to his, and while there had been a stretch of a few years when it seemed he had succeeded, today Michael observed every fucking road sign they passed. Lincoln had plenty of names for drivers of such kind, but there was an impressionable young kid in the booster seat, retracing their journey with a map on his lap and pointing out points of interest that were located nearby.
"Uncle Lincoln, are you hot?" Bryce asked him just as a woman that must have been in her 70s and on her way to Mass overtook them. "Because I'm sure dad can turn the AC on?"
Sucre had cried when Lincoln called to tell him about Sara.
"Doc," he now managed before his voice vanished and his vision became blurry. He hid it by clasping his arms around her; but that was Sucre keeping it together, of course. He then wiped his eyes with the back of this hand and squatted in front of the little boy, who inquisitively observed his every move. Sucre kept opening his mouth, then closing it. When no words came out, he finally just pulled Bryce in his arms. Lincoln thought he held the kid way too tightly, but before he could point it out, C-Note did it for him.
"Whoa, Sucre, let the kid go," he said, squatting next to Sucre. "Hey, buddy. So you've been in France all this time, huh?"
"Well, I was getting worried," Sucre said to his two old friends. "I expected you guys like an hour ago."
"If he'd driven any slower we'd have been pulled over for impeding traffic," Lincoln snorted.
Thank god they then made their way to the backyard, through the house, onto the back porch and then down the three steps, for the meat on the grill was way past well done already. Sucre's eyes had dried, but Lincoln still didn't leave his side just in case. They bickered about the seasoning, and if they asked for Michael's opinion, he would not be able to give one since he was barely listening. His eyes were on Sara, just making sure she was okay, not overwhelmed by the attention, though he knew she would never let it show.
She sat on the patio swing, between Kacee and Maricruz. Sucre's middle daughter brought her a glass of lemonade, walking carefully so as not to spill a drop, while Lila, the oldest, was ecstatic to show Bryce the mementos she kept from her trips to Mexico. Sucre's youngest, just a bit over a year old, was wailing in Maricruz's arms. Sara was telling her something, supporting her words with instructive movements of her hands, but rather than doing as suggested, Maricruz simply handed the baby to Sara. The quieter the baby's wails became, the more Michael's heart swelled.
Sucre had to say his name three times to get his attention. There was a beer in his hand, but Michael just shook his head, saying he'd have whatever the kids were having.
C-Note's eyes popped out in affected shock.
"Snowflake! Remember when you used to be fun? How you put those bombs together and we would go and break into buildings?" he was laughing about it now, but laughter had been the furthest thing from anyone's mind when any of their actions could have gotten them killed.
"I have a family to take home now," Michael smiled without even trying as his eyes found his son again. Sucre followed his gaze, his vision of course once again blurring slightly.
"A boy, huh? Papi, three times I pray to God for a boy and I get three girls."
Michael just shrugged, listening to the admirable Spanish in which his son all of a sudden started conversing with Sucre's daughter. He hadn't even realized he could speak Spanish.
Bellick was supposed to come, too, but got held up in Montana, where he was tracking down an escaped convict. Because he still hadn't found a trustworthy coworker and had a mortgage on his and his fiancée's new house, he promised to fly to New York some other time. Henry's relative was in a hospital, so he had to decline the invitation as well. Before Sucre could repeat whatever lie Paul Kellerman had given for not coming, Lincoln interrupted him.
"Fuck Kellerman," he said.
For the first time that day, Michael's attention wasn't fully on Sara. His chin jerked in Lincoln's direction when he realized that Lincoln didn't know the two things about Kellerman yet. After his brother had left for Panama, Michael hadn't figured it mattered anymore; and in the elation that surrounded the return, he forgot that they had never discussed what he had known for a couple of years. And just because Lincoln more often than not refused to acknowledge the past, it didn't mean that he ever truly let go of it.
"Oh, come on, Linc," C-Note said. "Kellerman is not that bad."
But Lincoln of course wouldn't hear it.
"Fuck him," he repeated.
God, it had been years, almost a decade, since she had last felt like this, Sara thought as she sipped the lemonade and the gentle afternoon breeze kept ruffling her hair. It wasn't that she hadn't worn a dress in years; she had one on every time she went to Bryce's school or when they went to eat in a restaurant that was fancy by their standards. And come the summer, she wore dresses shorter than this one to combat the heat. But all those times, she wore it as a mother; she had never thought twice about the amount of skin it exposed or just how well it fit her body. And absolutely never had she been aware of the eyes it attracted, and she relished in the found-again feeling of being a woman.
Now when there were people around, it was laughingly easy to hold his eyes, to withstand their unwavering focus without seeking the neutrality in their surroundings. Maybe the crowd made feel safer; perhaps it smartened her up, making realize just how much she hated the distance between them now when they weren't alone with the space to fill up.
Bryce's new uncles had decided to teach him about sports. Bryce knew the basics from playing with kids that kept coming and leaving their home in Lille, and his eyes widened when the men's instructions evolved into a historical overview of the most important players and games. But since each man had his own favorite team, they started throwing names around and statistics whose glory they couldn't quite verbalize.
Michael sat down on one of the porch steps. The botched history lesson seemed to entertain him as much as it did her, and the arguing was soon eclipsed by the silent talk of their eyes.
She hadn't even noticed Lincoln breaking away from the group until he walked past her and toward the table with food.
"Taking a break from maternal duties, Sara?"
She thought it was alarm that she discerned in Michael's eyes just before she broke their contact to focus on Lincoln. At first she planned to simply laugh away his remark, but after he cast a glance at her over his shoulder, she realized he wanted her to follow him. With her glass being only half-full, she might as well.
He cleared his throat as she stood next to him. She felt Michael's eyes on them, although and especially because their backs were turned to him.
"Look, Sara," he started, and his hands couldn't quite get the right grip of the plastic plate. "You probably don't remember but… Back in Fox River, I asked for something."
"To look after your brother when you're gone," Sara said without skipping a beat. She wasn't sure what to make of surprise his face was stricken with.
"Yeah. And I guess by now you know I didn't exactly return the favor."
Her hands reached for the jug of lemonade, but her fingers froze on the handle.
"How bad was it, Lincoln? When he thought I was dead?"
He sighed. His eyes darted from one meat choice to another, just like his mind was choosing what to tell her. While a part of him firmly believed that this was something his brother should tell her himself, he had known Michael his whole life and had been the one raising him for a large chunk of it. And that motherfucker was always economical with the truth when it pertained to himself, much less about the things he no longer deemed important, regardless of anyone else's opinion.
But then again, what good would it do to her, knowing Michael had spent evenings looking for her features in sketches of unidentified bodies and broke Lincoln's nose in the wake of his breakup with another woman? Lincoln might have started opening up to the idea of resolving, rather than burying stuff, but was still fucking selective as to what exactly should be out in the open.
"Do you know about the Company? What it was, what it did? What happened to it?"
"A bit, yeah," she nodded, and he hated how she was hanging on his every word.
"And you know about the tattoo?"
"Yeah."
"Then what else do you need to know? He did it for you. All of it. Bruce Bennett sure as fuck knew what he was doing, making that video."
From the way her head jerked toward him he knew that despite his caution, he said too much.
"Fuck. You didn't know about that."
"What video?"
The meat he had put on the plate suddenly assumed a weight of the world. He pinched his eyes shut. Even though he now knew it to be fake, just like the movies, it had been on his eyelids for too long for him to be unflustered with a flip of a coin.
"Just forget I said anything, Sara," he said, perfectly aware she wouldn't.
"What video?" she repeated and he felt her hand on his forearm. He looked at her, convinced this was a point he could get across without using words. Her face lost the little color it had and he knew she got it in one. Even after the tape had been destroyed and discredited, no details were needed for a mere mention to wreak havoc. "Of me being…"
The squeeze of her arm and the intensity of her eyes wanted him to tell her more right when he wanted to be silent the most. A quick movement of his finger showed her how it had all ended, and he thought the horror would knock her over. Somehow she managed to stop her eyes from turning to Michael. Bryce was on Michael's lap and they talked, but not for a second did Lincoln think his little brother was unaware of their backs turned to him.
As Sara slowly breathed in and it sounded painfully like the breaths that had beleaguered Michael the months, years after her supposed death, Lincoln covered her hand with his, the best reassurance he could think of.
"I just wanted him to be… better, you know? And he just wouldn't let go. Maybe I just didn't understand, I don't know. But I would have never pushed him if I had known about you and Bryce."
Before she could gather her voice to assure him that she would have wanted the same, a sound of a gunshot pierced the air.
He had never seen her like this before, Michael realized as the day had comfortably settled into the afternoon. He sat down on the porch, on the second step, from where he had the perfect view of her. She had worn makeup in Fox River, but it was subtle and professional, just like the clothing she had opted for. Now, when they were spending their days strolling around New York and picnicking at all their favorite spots in Central Park, she kept it simple with leggings and a casual top. It wasn't that the lipstick was conspicuous and the cut of the dress daring; it was a simple summer dress and the color of her lips was just barely darker than usual, but he couldn't take his eyes off of her.
He hated to be this man, but he observed the way her dress fell over the curve of her breasts. His eyes trailed the hem of her dress that ended above her knees, then traveled down her legs, so perfectly shaped, all the way down to her ankles, so gracefully crossed. He remembered how good it felt, having those legs wrapped around his hips, welcoming him, urging him on. It should abash him, thinking of her like that, and he knew his indiscreet glances didn't escape her attention. When she didn't avert her eyes, he found himself being even more captivated.
Michael didn't think much of Lincoln passing Sara on his way to the table with food. But when she got up to follow him, breaking the contact that finally seemed unbreakable, a rush of asinine panic hit him, the one that overtook him so effortlessly when she was involved.
He didn't notice their boy running to him until his small arms were already wrapped around his neck and Bryce's head was nestled against his chest.
"I don't think I like sports that much," Bryce told him, still watching Sucre and C-Note out of the corner of his eye.
"I don't either," Michael said softly.
The boy then repositioned himself so that he was able to look directly at dad, blocking Michael's view of Sara. Being unable to read the body language of hers and his brother's turned backs lost on importance when he was embraced by the tiny arms of his son.
"And the Coke is so funny. It's mango flavor, dad. And I like mango and Coke is okay, on sugar and special days, but why would anyone mix them?"
Michael didn't know. His fingers were still impossibly gentle as they moved the loose strands of hair off the boy's face, but just like Sara's, they kept falling back. One more thing he definitely got from her, he smiled.
"I didn't know you speak Spanish," he said.
"A bit," Bryce shrugged. "I know I was supposed to grow up in Panama."
"Mom told you that?" Michael hoped his son didn't notice how thin his voice became. "Well, maybe we could go there now. For a holiday."
Bryce shook his head.
"But Uncle Lincoln says everything about Panama is horrible."
Michael laughed and instinctively leaned to his right to find his brother. Laughter and whatever remark was to leave his mouth was quelled somewhere in his throat, because Sara's shoulders were sloping and her hand was on his brother's arm. Even though the tresses hid her face from him, cold pierced through him. Of all the things Lincoln might have just told her, Michael couldn't decide which one was the best to hope for.
Bryce noticed that something was wrong.
"Dad?" he asked carefully, but before Michael could swallow down his dread to reassure his son, a gun was fired.
The group gathered in Sucre's backyard had heard the sound too many times not to have formed an instinctive reaction, and they had lost too much to bullets for panic not to rush through them. Michael covered the back of his son's head with one hand, placed the other in the middle of his back and pulled him onto his chest.
He was too far to get to Sara, again, and the fear he had thought he would never experience again was cutting him in half. His eyes dashed to her, desperate to find her and afraid of what he would find. He saw Lincoln push her behind his back, too quickly for him to make sure she was okay. As the eyes of the two brothers met, they simultaneously realized the gun wasn't fired anywhere near them and that everyone was okay.
"It's just kids with BB guns across the street," Maricruz said calmly, and Michael's arms around his son loosened. He knew he should say something, but his hands ran up and down his son's arms without the company of words. Bryce's forehead was furrowed, a result of dad's intense reaction rather than the fear. Over his son's head, Michael saw Lincoln move to the side, and there she was. The blue of her dress was too dark to show any trace of blood should there be some and her chest was heaving and her eyes gave away how terrified she was, but she was fine. His eyes traveled from the top of her head to her feet, twice, before he let himself breathe out.
C-Note, who had thrown himself onto the ground and somehow managed not to knock the grill over, got back on his feet.
"What kind of a neighborhood are you living in, man?" he glared at Sucre, who just mumbled something incomprehensible in response. C-Note then grabbed the baseball bat and ran around the house to the driveway to see for himself.
Lincoln ran a hand over his scalp and walked over to where Maricruz and Kacee were sitting with their kids, just making sure they were all okay.
Sara's eyes were still on Michael's, and this time, he was the one looking away.
"Go to your uncle," he said to their son. Bryce nodded and ran to Lincoln; he had closed half of the distance when his path collided with Sara's, and Michael watched her bend down and kiss their boy on the forehead. She seemed to be clinging to him with a much greater relief than the one permeating his arms. When she finally let Bryce go, she hurried to the porch, to him, and she walked up the stairs, past Michael, barely casting a glance at him.
Perhaps after that what followed was inevitable. It had always been like this for the two of them; they had always needed that one push for the certainty to depart their secluded minds and shape the reality. The first time he had kissed her, it was because of his brother, yet the keys had been the furthest thing on his mind when he leaned in. The second time, he had thought they only had seconds before he would lose her, either to handcuffs on his wrists or in death. Maybe it was the perfect moment he was always waiting for, the perfectionist he was, and only when she had been slipping away did he let himself admit that there was nothing perfect in the world apart from their love.
He waited until she was inside the house, the tapping of his fingers on his thighs increasing in impatience. The clicks of her heels as she climbed the three steps up the back porch resonated in his mind, eclipsing the music playing and the children chortling. He was the only one to hear the door close. No one would notice them gone, he decided, maybe just tricked himself into believing.
He followed her, stealthily and with his head bowed, much like that afternoon in Gila. His steps acquired soundlessness with ease, as if once again carrying out a plan which had all the odds against him. He passed through the kitchen and the living room until he saw her standing on top of the staircase. After their eyes locked, she vanished from his view, like mirages that had come for him every time he had thought the Company finally beat him.
Taking two stairs at a time, he retraced her path, catching a glimpse of her at the end of the hallway. Once again she made sure he saw her, then disappeared into the room that turned out to be the bathroom.
She didn't let him ask her if she was alright. The door had barely closed behind them when her hands cupped his face and her lips were pressed against his. Unlike the first time she had kissed him against the backdrop of the lights of New York, there was no hesitance, and once her mouth opened under his, it was shamelessly easy to forget that he could count the days they were together with one hand in hers, while he would need both for the years the mere memory of her could bring him to his knees.
There was a vanity a couple of feet away, and after he perched her on it, it turned out now they could look into each other's eyes without either titling their head. But they had been caressing with their eyes for days now and their bodies were done being ignored. Her mouth tasted of lemon, and by the time his lips moved elsewhere, hers were all but bereft of the lipstick he had appreciated in the morning.
She tilted her head backward, as though knowing how desperately he needed to kiss the skin whose smoothness was unmarred, trace the path no knife had ever taken. He paused, relishing in the throb of her heartbeat under his lips, then kissed his way downwards, and the closer he was to the hem of the dress, the plainer his need was and more tortuous it would be to stop if she asked him to. His hands followed the curves of her body through the fabric of her summer dress, and when he looked up to see if it was okay, there was no objection in her eyes. He could unzip the dress, but getting it off her would take time he wasn't willing to miss out on. Instead he slowly slid the strap of her dress down her arm, kissing every inch of the paler skin revealed.
He cupped her breast, feeling its jut in his hand before lowering his head and closing his mouth around it. She arched into him, and he slid his hands behind her back so that she couldn't slip away. He knew he should loosen the grip, that there would be purple prints of the pads of his fingers on her skin tomorrow, but he had been too close to death too many times and definitely without her for too long to worry about that when she didn't seem to want to leave his arms.
There was a proper place and a proper time for this, he somehow managed to think, and nothing about their current purlieus made that list. Not someone else's house, as though they were still fugitives in hiding, and definitely not the bathroom, as if this was something so sordid it needed to be drowned in water.
And it certainly should not take place now, when he still hadn't held her face in his hands enough and kissed away the years they had been apart. So much more she still needed to hear before he could claim her like this, presumptuous enough to believe it was a prerogative of his.
But then her knees spread and his hands, desperate to touch her in all the ways denied to him in the colds of their separation, were on her thighs, too high up to conceal his want, yet somehow so innocuous in their intimacy. Her legs enveloped his hips and her ankles were clasped together, leaving him no other path but the one leading to her. Somewhere in the back of his mind he couldn't remember whether the door was locked, but her fingers undid the buttons of his shirt, one after another until her hands were too low for any misconception. He leaned his chin on her shoulder as her hands undid his belt before he felt them around him. It wasn't enough for either of them.
He grabbed the hem of her dress and tugged it upwards until it was gathered above her hips. He pulled the underwear off her, and all the shoulds and nobleness he had thought he possessed evanesced when they silenced their moans in a kiss.
The deeper he moved in her, the more their kiss deepened, but the faster they moved, the more their rhythm fell apart and the more often their kiss broke. His forehead fell into the hollow of her collarbone and he closed his eyes, for just a sight of her could push him over the edge and he didn't want it to end, not now when there was finally nothing between them anymore.
When he dared to look at her again, it didn't seem like it was a struggle for her to hold back, to not chase the high with all her might. Her eyes were shut, lips barely parted, and unlike his chest, hers wasn't rising and falling in an avaricious need. She was still, and the wet under her eyelids wasn't just sweat.
He realized that her hands did nothing more than rested on his shoulders while his clung to her, still remembering all too well how rapidly he had once lost her. He forced them off her, and the cool of the vanity, the sight of her in this place brought back the self-loathing that had been his loyal companion for years.
It wasn't supposed to be like this.
"Don't," she whispered after he moved back, almost completely out of her. Her arms reaffirmed their hold of him. One of her hands cupped the back of his head, and he closed his eyes as her lips found his again. The kisses they exchanged were chaste, interrupted by pads of her fingers tried to wipe off the lipstick she had left on and around his mouth.
Leaning her forehead on his, she shifted her hips until she felt all of him in her again. Their bodies were in perfect sync, yet again out of the rhythm he wanted to give her. He slid his hand between them and she moved against his caress. He tried to breathe through it but was losing the battle as he felt her tightening around him, felt the touch of her hands that still retained the gentleness his had lost, the hotness of her breath giving away that her want was as urgent as his. He gave her all he had, and as they clung to each other, he wished he had more even though it seemed to be enough for her, at least today.
His breathing hadn't yet calmed when she got out of his arms. She pulled the strap of the dress back up, concealing the places his lips had ignited. His hands were on the vanity again, supporting his weight, and unlike her, he couldn't face his reflection in the mirror. From the corner of his eyes he watched her tuck the tresses back behind her ears, even though they ended back in free fall by the side of her face as soon as she turned her head. A blush rested on her cheeks, and her fingers that ran over it couldn't take it away.
She reached for a hand towel and wetted it. It wasn't for her, though. A hand on his shoulder prompted him to turn to her, and she wiped the remnants of the lipstick off his face. He knew he should say something, namely the words whose euphemisms he had been uttering since she had seen the tattoo, but he couldn't raise his eyes to hers. But he couldn't lay them anywhere else either, not on the lips whose taste was still on his tongue, not on the chest he had given insufficient attention to. He settled on buttoning his shirt back up, like he was a fucking teenager.
Her fingers didn't slide under his chin to tilt it upwards, and neither did her eyes loom on his, imploring him to look at her. She leaned closer to his shoulder, but she wasn't seeking an embrace. She kissed him right above the heart, and he hoped she heard it leap, for he couldn't put in words. Maybe she heard nothing, or perhaps indulged in the sound; her lips lingered long enough for a breath to hitch in his throat.
His breathing wasn't intact until she put the towel back down and walked toward the door. With a hand on the knob she paused, and he wondered whether her knees felt as unsteady as his. If she was giving him another chance, more space to say something, he pretended not to realize it. He watched her leave the room and listened to the fading sound of her steps.
The sunlight was running low by the time they stopped at the store on their drive home. Sara had said they needed milk for the morning, but they both knew there was something else they had to get. If he was a better man, he would go with her, for it was their problem, and he detested the idea of her believing he thought otherwise. But that would require acknowledging their encounter, and he still had no idea how to say he regretted it while at the same time not being sorry in the slightest. So he just sat behind the wheel, slouched forward as though it mitigated his shortcomings, and watched her figure disappear in the distance.
Even Lincoln sensed something was off.
"What the fuck are you doing, Michael?" he asked.
"Watch your language, Linc," Michael said, even though his son was fast asleep in his booster seat, tired from running around all day and meeting new sets of uncles and aunts and cousins. The map with which he was tracing their drive home had slid out of his tiny hands, now only a crumpled heap by his legs.
Lincoln had always been a definition of tough love, but recently something – or, rather, someone – had induced a change in him. Just months ago he would yell and berate and achieve the absolute opposite of what he wanted; now he rubbed his head, his eyes vaguely focused on cars entering and leaving the parking lot.
"I have never given you much of a reason to look up to me, Michael," he said. "But I have screwed these things up more times than I can count. And fuck, am I screwing it up again. And I know that you two have been through a lot of shit. But you guys have now and the future. And that fucking outweighs the past, you know?"
Michael looked away from his brother the second Lincoln turned in the passenger seat to face him.
"Look, man, why don't I take Bryce for a few days? And you guys can go somewhere, talk, be with each other. I mean, it has never been just the two of you, you know? You can't be just parents. Or maybe just for one night. Take her out for a dinner, something."
It was a change Michael definitely liked and appreciated, but right now, he couldn't do much more than tap his fingers on the wheel. Lincoln inevitably took it personally.
"And now you'll remind me that I'm still staying at my son's."
"No," Michael smiled, forcing his eyes to focus on his brother. "Thank you."
Then he remembered the realization he had earlier in the day. If the two of them finally started being honest with each other and he wanted it to stay that way, then there was no incentive to leave it unspoken.
"Linc, there is something you need to know about Abigail," he started. He didn't get to tell him, though, as Sara returned before he could continue.
"I got the milk," she said, and when their eyes met in the rearview mirror, they both knew the shopping bag in her hands carried a weight much greater than that of a carton of milk.
END OF PART TWO
To Be Continued.
Broughttoyouby:::winter.