Author's Note: Sorry I haven't updated in a few weeks! Honestly, this chapter was like pulling teeth because I got totally wrapped up in a new show and can't stop obsessing over it. Also, school is really hectic right now because of midterms. I'm hoping to update once per week from now on, hopefully on Tuesdays since I finish classes relatively early on Tuesdays and have a good amount of time to write. Also, thanks for all the reviews and the lovely welcome back!
Chapter 12: Correspondence Part 1
Naomi
Sunday went by in a blur of chores and grocery shopping. That's right, Effy and I went fucking grocery shopping, and not just for breakfast cereal and biscuits and tea, but we did a full shop. We bought vegetables. Effy even moved the books she used to keep in our oven, which I'm assuming means we're going to be using it regularly now. I'm still in shock over the whole thing, really. I think this means we're going to start cooking at some point. Effy already said she is going to design some kind of chart to dictate who has to cook on which days. I'm going to fucking hate that chart. But that Sunday night, we went to bed early with our bellies full of actual home cooked food, thanks to Effy, since I genuinely cannot cook at all. I was being very serious when I told Emily that if I ever cooked for her, I would likely kill us all, either by food poisoning or by starting a massive fire.
I didn't see Emily again that night, but that was alright. I mean, I missed her and all that, but I really do appreciate my own personal time and space. Between the office and the near-constant fucking, Emily and I had been spending quite a lot of time together, and though I wasn't complaining, it was kind of nice to just have some time for myself again. I spent the evening catching up on my favourite TV shows, I had too many snacks, and I went to sleep relatively early. But, of course, I only went to sleep after Emily texted me saying goodnight. Apparently, I'm turning into a total sap. But I think part of me is kind of alright with that.
That Monday morning, I woke up feeling refreshed and rejuvenated and very ready for the day of work ahead of me. I bustled around the apartment, making myself some breakfast (which still only consisted of tea and garibaldis – old habits die hard) and getting dressed and ready for the day. I was about to lock up the flat for the day when I noticed that there was a letter set down on the floor in front of our door, with a note scribbled on the front saying it had been accidentally put in our neighbour's mail box. I grabbed the letter and saw that it was addressed to me, so I quickly shoved it in my handbag, mindful that I only had a limited amount of time to get to the tube, and locked up the flat and carried on my way.
The tube, as usual, was disgusting that morning, crammed full of smelly strangers who were invading my personal space. I spent the entire journey scowling and questioning why people chose to have no personal hygiene whatsoever.
I made it to the office on time, thankfully, and noticed that Emily was already in her office and typing away at her computer. I hung my coat in the closet and put my purse underneath my desk for the moment. As I hit the power button on my computer, I reached into my handbag and pulled out the letter from this morning, curiosity getting the better of me as I opened it up. I gave the letter a quick scan, reading through the most important words.
Brain function... deteriorating... attention span... unable to get in contact...unable to maintain normal conversation...prolonged period of time... visit would be encouraged... neurologist recommends...
I sighed and shoved the letter back into the envelope, which I then shoved back into my handbag. I held my head in my hands and tried to regulate my breathing – I could only take a few minutes before Emily would likely notice that something was wrong and inevitably start asking me questions.
Effy had been right the other day. I knew it was only a matter of time before my past would catch up with my present and I would be dragged kicking and screaming back down to Bristol to deal with it. I pulled myself together and began to focus on my work for today – reaching out to Elisaveta, confirming details of our trip to Bulgaria, confirming meetings and conference calls and press conferences and the like – but at the back of my mind, I was also focusing on finding a day which would work for me to travel down to Bristol.
We were leaving for Bulgaria on Thursday evening, which left very little time to get myself to Bristol, considering it was already Monday and I couldn't very well up and leave Emily with so little notice if I were to go tomorrow. I didn't want to wait until I got back from Bulgaria either, since we were going for a week and wouldn't be returning until next Friday. So it seemed like my only option was to ask Emily for Wednesday off, and pray that she would give it to me without asking any questions.
Emily stepped out of her office perhaps half an hour after I made my decision and sat on the desk next to my computer.
"Good morning," She said with a bright smile. I smiled back at her and noticed that her splint had come off and she had expertly covered up her bruising with makeup.
"Good morning, Emily. You look great without the splint..." I say, catching myself at my stupidity. "Not that you didn't look good with the splint. It's just, you know, nice to see you back in tip top shape...not that you weren't in sh-"
"Thank you, Naomi," Emily replied, trying to stifle her laughter as I was ready to repeatedly bang my head against my desk in hopes that I would end up unconscious. "The sentiment is very much appreciated."
I blushed and smiled at her. Emily smiled back and went to grab something she'd printed.
"Are you working on confirming all the calls and details of the trip to Bulgaria? We should make the most of our time there, since we're technically losing some time since we'll be there on the weekend and we won't be able to fit in any meetings with government leaders and organizations in that time, but we should be able to fit in a good amount of time with Elisaveta," Emily asked as she shuffled through the documents she'd printed. "Also, have you printed out the tickets and confirmed everything with the airline? The last time I flew with them they tried to tell me I didn't pay for business class, so please make sure our booking is correct."
"Already working on all of that," I replied as I sent off a final email to a Bulgarian TV station who was interested in interviewing us and Elisaveta about the attack.
"Excellent. Also please cancel all unnecessary conference calls for Thursday, I'll need to be at home all day packing for the trip, so obviously I won't be here in the office to take calls. I'll also need you at my flat to help out with some packing," Emily said in a suggestive tone as she looked around the workspace and ran her finger from one edge of my shoulder, all the way along my back, and ended at my other shoulder. Her movements left goosebumps in her wake. I cleared my throat and composed myself before replying.
"I'll work on cancelling those calls right away. And I'm sure I can accommodate your request."
Emily smiled at me and straightened the documents she had in her hand.
"Well, I think that's all I need from you, Naomi," She said, slowly moving back towards her office. "Is there anything else that you can think of?"
"Actually..." I said, making the word sound far more drawn out than necessary. "I kind of need to ask you something. Work related, obviously."
Emily shrugged and sat back down on the desk. "Shoot."
"I kind of...need to have Wednesday off. I have some stuff I have to do in Bristol before we leave and it just snuck up on me this morning."
Emily nodded.
"Sure, Naomi, no problem. That's everything?"
I nodded in response and she smiled before walking back into her office.
With that burden off my shoulders, it was far easier to focus solely on my work, and the day seemed to fly by. Emily and I had forgone lunch, so we decided to leave the office early for the day and beat the commuter rush on the tube home. Once Emily and I were safely in the elevator, I let out a huge sigh. It was actually difficult to restrain myself from talking to Emily like I normally would, or flirt with her, or other small things about our...relationship?...that I wouldn't have noticed before. But obviously, when you're within the confines of the office, you notice all the small couple-y things that have developed that you're not able to do at work, and it makes it that much more difficult to deal with in two respects.
Firstly, it's difficult to hide those things – you end up wondering if you're smiling just a little bit too much when she speaks, perhaps you shouldn't touch her at all, perhaps you shouldn't lean in close when she speaks to you. And secondly, it's difficult, well at least for me, to face the fact that Emily and I already have those couple-y things to hide. I mean, we aren't a couple. Technically, we aren't even exclusively fucking each other (except we kind of are since I admitted to her that when I did sleep with someone else, I didn't enjoy myself). But we were developing quirks like a couple, we flirted like a couple, we moved around each other like a couple – with subtle touches and glances – and we definitely had to watch what we said in the office, since it was easy to forget that most coworkers don't spend the entire weekend together and know the details of each others' everyday life.
I heard Emily sigh too. Perhaps she was having the same thoughts as I was – maybe she wasn't ready for the couple-y stuff? Maybe I should just back off a little bit?
"Do you want to come over for dinner?" I found myself asking, despite the fact that I literally just thought I should back off and perhaps leave Emily alone for a bit.
Emily looked at me, clearly surprised at my offer.
"You don't cook," She said, raising an eyebrow at me. "You keep books in your oven."
"Effy and I went out grocery shopping yesterday and bought real food. Vegetables, even. And she created this chart thing that says who has to cook each night, and tonight is my night to cook, and if I remember correctly I do owe you dinner. And Effy took the books out of the oven, so chances are, with your supervision, I will not start a fire. So... do you want to come?"
Emily smirked.
"Yes, Naomi, I'd love to come," She said with a suggestive smirk, just before the elevator doors chimed open. I stared at her as she sauntered away from me, towards the exit of the building, leaving me open-mouthed, in awe, and frankly very turned on.
I caught up to Emily and we walked together to the tube station, our hands occasionally brushing as we moved. I resisted the urge to just grab Emily's hand – fucking and dinner, that was okay, but holding hands as we walked back to my flat so we could fuck and eat dinner? Apparently not okay in my mind.
When we finally made it back to my flat, I hung our coats up in the closet and went to get changed. Emily slipped out of her heels and followed me into my room.
"Can I borrow a shirt and some track pants or something? I don't really want to stay in this, it's not comfortable," She said as she watched me change. Normally that would turn me on - her watching me change and offering to wear my clothes, both seem to be weaknesses of mine – but at the moment I was so hungry that I was completely focused on changing and getting started on dinner. I guess that's my payback for skipping lunch today.
"Of course you can," I said as I tossed her a top and a pair of track pants. While Emily finished getting changed, I went into the kitchen, laptop in hand, and began to search for recipes. I needed to find something relatively easy and very fast because I was starving.
Emily came out a few moments later, and read the recipes over my shoulder.
"Let's make this one," she said as she pointed to a baked pasta recipe. It seemed like it would be pretty easy, and it was the shortest out of the recipes I'd been looking at. "I've made it before and it always turns out really delicious."
Emily started to grab the things we needed from the fridge, while I grabbed the pots and the baking dish and the pasta. We were able to work together in harmony quite easily, and with minimal effort really. Since we were so used to how we worked in the office, it was pretty easy to cook together. We occasionally bumped into each other though, since my kitchen was really quite small, but that just added fuel to the fire. I was starving, and I'm sure Emily was too, but as I watched her mix the pasta and the cheese and the cream and all the other ingredients together, all I was thinking about was getting close up behind her, pinning her body between me and the countertop, and fucking her til she saw stars. And then right after I would have those kinds of thoughts, my stomach would growl and I would be reminded of exactly why I couldn't do that. I did want to eat at some point in the very near future, and fucking Emily would distract her from finishing dinner.
I don't know how it happened, but with minimal help from me, Emily managed to get the pasta in the oven and set a timer for 20 minutes.
"You didn't help very much at all," Emily said as I began to gather all the dirty dishes and pots and started to wash up. "You just watched me while I mixed things."
"I boiled the water for the pasta," I replied while I filled the sink with hot soapy water. "And I handed you the salt and pepper while you were mixing."
I started to wash up. I felt Emily move behind me, and she wrapped her arms around my waist, pressing her chest into my back and hugging me tightly.
"You know, Naomi, if I didn't know better, I'd say you only invited me over here so I could, once again, cook for you," She whispered as she kissed my shoulder over the cotton of my shirt.
"That definitely wasn't my plan," I said, because it honestly wasn't. It wasn't my fault that Emily looked so fucking hot while cooking. Well, Emily looked pretty fucking hot while doing just about everything. So I told her that while she kissed my shoulder and eventually her lips moved up to my neck. It was definitely the most pleasurable way I've ever washed dishes.
I grabbed a dish towel and dried my hands while I left the clean dishes in the rack to dry. I grabbed Emily's hands, which were wrapped around me, and moved them so I could move just enough to turn around in her arms.
"I think I like this much better," I said with a smirk as I leant down and captured her lips with mine. Her hands moved up my back and her fingers pressed into my neck, moving my lips impossibly closer to hers. I gently bit at her bottom lip, which made Emily mewl into my mouth. She tangled her fingers in my hair, pulling slightly at my hair while her tongue brushed against mine. I let my fingers trail across her arms, drawing light patterns and circles on her skin, leaving goosebumps on her skin.
We only had a few minutes to make out before the pasta would be finished, but neither of us were rushing this. I loved kissing Emily, I loved how passionate she became when we would kiss like this. And sometimes it was nice to just kiss her, knowing that it wouldn't immediately lead to sex.
Eventually, the timer went off and though it startled us both, we didn't separate right away. Emily pressed gentle, soft kisses to my lips before pulling away from me with a smile. I smiled back. She grabbed the oven mitts and pulled the pasta out of the oven while I grabbed two bowls, completely unable to stop smiling like some kind of lovesick teenager.
In a moment of weakness caused by Emily's kisses, I think about how nice it would be for Emily to be mine. Completely mine. My girlfriend. I mean, nothing would really change. We would still fuck and hang out and eat dinner together and watch movies together, but it'd be with feelings. Not that I didn't have feelings for Emily already. I was really trying to deal with the realization that I definitely did have feelings for Emily and that I kind of wanted to tell her all about them and instead of fucking her I wanted to make love to her and it was all disgustingly cheesy.
Emily served up two bowls of the baked pasta for us, which we took into my bedroom and ate while we watched some TV on my laptop. When we both decided we want another helping, I went back into the kitchen and filled our bowls again. Effy walked in as I was dishing up some more pasta, and she looked absolutely floored that I actually managed to cook and not burn the apartment down.
"Wow," She said as she helped herself to dinner. "Is it edible?"
"Emily did most of the actual cooking, so yes, it's delicious," I replied. She took a bite and groaned.
"Can she move in?" Effy asked as she took another bite and moaned quite loudly.
I laughed and grabbed mine and Emily's bowls and headed back to my bedroom.
Emily was sat on my bed, patiently awaiting my return. I smiled at her and handed her the bowl.
"So what are you really going to be doing in Bristol? Visiting ex-girlfriends maybe? Or maybe visiting current girlfriends?" Emily joked as she took a bite of her pasta. Or at least, I hoped she was joking.
"Definitely no ex girlfriends or current girlfriends. At all. Like there's none even in existence," I replied. Emily looked at me and seemed rather surprised. So, perhaps she wasn't joking then...
"You've never had a girlfriend at all? Like not even in college or anything? Not even a girl who you just dated for one week?" She asked with wide, surprised eyes.
"Nope. Not at all. I was pretty busy constantly running away and living on the streets. I've never even been on a proper date, usually I would just pick girls up in clubs and fuck them in the bathrooms or go back to their place, or something," I replied before thinking that perhaps it was possibly offensive for Emily to hear about that. "Sorry if that bothers you or offends you or something. It's just, that's the way it was, you know?"
"Naomi, are you forgetting how we met? I'm pretty well aware that you used to fuck a lot of girls," She said, seeming rather tense and actually quite offended.
"Well, it wasn't a lot of girls," I lied. Emily looked at me in a way that clearly said I know you're lying because I am not an idiot. "Okay, so I have slept with quite a few girls in my time."
Emily sighed and continued eating her pasta in silence. I'd lost my appetite because I'd clearly upset her. I put my bowl down on the floor next to the mattress and curled my legs up into my chest and wrapped my arms around them. I waited for Emily to finish eating before I spoke to her.
"I'm sorry, Emily, that's just the way things were. They clearly aren't like that anymore," I said. Emily rolled her eyes. "No, really, Emily. I'm not seeing anyone else, I'm not sleeping with anyone else. Ever since that night I accidentally phoned you-" at this, Emily shot me a very stern glare. "I haven't slept with anyone other than you. And I like it that way, and I want it to stay that way."
Emily blushed slightly.
"Well, I haven't slept with anyone other than you since I met you that night at the club," She said. "Does that mean something?"
I shrugged.
"It can mean whatever you want it to mean," I replied. She huffed.
"Naomi."
"Yeah?"
"Do you want it to mean something?"
I sighed.
"Look, Emily, I'm really not used to this kind of thing."
At this, Emily deflated.
"I'm not finished," I continued. "I'm not used to this kind of thing, and it's all really scary for me if I'm being totally honest. You know that, you know I'm scared about it. But the thing is, lately, I've been feeling kind of like it's okay for me to be scared about it. Because I really like you, and I like spending time with you, and we have the best sex ever. And in the mornings you make this really cute noise when you're just starting to wake up, and it makes me smile. And you're so fucking sexy, and smart, and you're even sexier when you're at work. And you really challenge me to become a better person, both at work and outside of work. And I think I want to take a chance with you, because I'm really tired of pretending that I don't have feelings for you when I really, really do."
Emily reached over and grabbed my hand and effectively ended my mini-rant. I looked up at her, and she was smiling at me so brightly. It was like she held the light of a thousand suns, radiance and beauty and warmth just gleaming off her.
"Are you serious right now?" She asked me as she raised herself up on her knees and moved so she was sitting in my lap. I smiled at her.
"Yes, I'm very serious right now."
She tangled her fingers in my hair and smiled at me even bigger.
"I want to take a chance with you, too, Naomi."
And then she pushed me back on the bed and kissed me.
A/N: Thanks so much for reading and please don't forget to leave a review!
I'm going to try to update this every Tuesday between 11pm and midnight.