For some reason, this asked to be written today. For Want of Other Idleness has been a fic I have written sporadically over the course of... almost three years to the day. Shit. I didn't realize it had been that long. I feel a little sentimental about it, but I don't want to be a girl on my period about it so I will just say thanks for the ride.
Thank you for all the support you have shown me and this story. Thank you for your patience and feedback. Thank you for believing in Alice and Claire. Perhaps I'll do a sequel one day, but for the time being, this is the end of this fic as I believe this is a good stopping point and I don't want to leave this open indefinitely.
Please enjoy this final chapter and let me know what y'all think or if you'd like to see a sequel. Maybe something with a plot other than mush and angst. ;-) And all mistakes are mine, by the way.
Alaskan mornings were either cold or cool, regardless of the season.
Alice lifted the cigarette to her lips automatically, inhaling the heavy smoke without giving the action any thought. It was habit, but when she tried to remember exactly when it had begun, she could not pinpoint her first cigarette. Perhaps it had been in Raccoon City? Had Jill given her a cigarette? The former S.T.A.R.S. officer smoked more than anyone she had ever met, blaming it on the stress of a city full of zombies and a corporation that did not care if they lived or died.
A smile crept its way onto her lips. Jill. She wondered what had happened to her after they had split up. Surely she was still alive, if only because she was too damn stubborn to die.
The screen door creaked open behind her, but she did not turn around. It had been two weeks since Alice had found the town of Abernathy, Alaska, since she reunited with the leader of the convoy, Claire Redfield. Her lover. Even as the younger woman snaked her arms around Alice's waist, she found the thought odd.
Lover. Partner. Girlfriend. When everyday had been a battle simply to stay alive, and every night was a brief interruption in the struggle, relationships were not complicated. Alice found comfort in Claire; Claire had found comfort in her. There wasn't time for labels or complicated discussions. What they were had not been important then.
During their months of separation, it was clear that they deeply cared for one another, loved one another. They needed one another in a way that Alice was still defining.
She laughed quietly as Claire snagged the cigarette from Alice's fingers and replaced it with a cup of coffee.
Claire was indeed her lover and partner. Girlfriend sounded so trivial and asinine. It might had been appropriate Before, in a world before the Undead, when they could go to the movies or dinner or whatever people did when they dated. But labeling their relationship at all still seemed unnecessary. They were simply… together.
How else could she give voice to her feelings? To the surge of pride and affection she felt at the sight of the younger woman, explain how her heart sang and soared with its own beat and rhythm at the simplest of gestures: a smile, a touch, the cute little noises she made in her sleep. How could she articulate the clawing need she experienced whenever Claire was more than a few steps away, the desperate uncertainty when she was out of sight? How it all went away the moment Claire returned, replaced with a sense of solace and belonging that seemed to reach her very core? What word could approximate the swell of love that consumed her? Or the happiness she had never experienced before this woman? Or the longing and warmth that pooled in her stomach and flooded the rest of her body at Claire's touch.
No, there were no words, no phrases or labels…
Claire rested her chin on Alice's shoulder and planted a gentle kiss on Alice's neck. "I used to sit on this porch every morning wishing for you. Or at least a cigarette." She whispered, following Alice's gaze over the budding dawn wilderness.
"If I had my choice between myself and a cigarette, I'd choose the cigarette too." Alice teased and plucked her cigarette back from Claire. It was little more than a stub now, but she dragged on it one last time before crushing it under the toe of her boot.
"That isn't what I meant and you know it." Claire nipped her neck playfully, but then her voice wavered. "I needed you. You told me once it wasn't enough to survive, that I had to live. But I found that when I was without you, I could only survive."
Setting the coffee aside on the porch railing, Alice turned in her arms, framed her face with her hands. "Well, now we can both live."
When their lips met, it was a slow, deliberate kiss. Alice drew it out, letting her lips linger on Claire's for several moments before moving. It was torturously sensuous, not swayed by the urgent passion that both women felt. Alice could not help but smile, satisfied, at the quiet whimper that escaped her lover.
She broke the kiss, their faces still touching, their lips only barely separated. "Let's go to bed." Grinning, she caressed the soft skin under her thumbs.
Confusion clouded Claire's features momentarily before she comprehended Alice's intention. "Oh. Oh, yes!"
Claire fell back onto the bed, her hands fumbling with the buckle of Alice's belt. It had been fourteen days, thirteen nights since Alice had returned to her, but the one aspect of their relationship they had not yet returned to was sex.
It had not been intentional. Their reunion had been emotional, overwhelming. They were reacquainting themselves with one another, learning where each other fit in their lives now that so much had changed. Claire felt incredibly vulnerable, all of her weakness, all of her pain lay bare and exposed to her lover. Sex would have been too much.
Alice was learning how to fit into a life where she did not run, did not fight. She was no longer alone under constant threat. Instead of relaxing, she became hyper vigilant, restless without a purpose or goal or enemy. Over time, she had fallen into a routine and some of that old wariness began to melt away as she gradually began to accustom herself to safety, to happiness.
The time had never felt right. Until now.
But Alice stilled Claire's hands as they succeeded in unbuckling her belt and began working on her zipper. Wordlessly, she held Claire's eyes and pushed her hands away. Puzzled, she met Alice's eyes.
"No rush." Alice whispered and lowered herself on top of her lover and kissed her slowly, as if they had been separated only moments instead of months, as if their kisses were just a casual expression instead of the manifestation of the depth of their collected emotion. They kissed as if they had all the time in the universe, as if they were safe from the Infected, from the world. They kissed lazily, until Claire physically ached, and her lungs hungered for breath.
Alice's patience did not stop with kissing. Clothes were slowly shed until they were skin to skin. Every touch was unbearably gradual, and Claire submitted herself to Alice's exquisite torture.
The lovers consumed each other of the slow enjoyment of two people well acquainted with hunger and longing. With each touch and caress and kiss, they spoke every word, shed every tear, embraced every emotion they experienced in their time of separation.
Claire cried out when Alice gently entered her yet held back from climax, wanting to feel Alice inside her, a part of her forever, when they ceased to be a couple and they became a single entity of affection and adoration and love.
And hope.
Hope beyond measure or equal. Some distant part of Claire's mind recognized the feeling that gripped her with equal force as the urgent sexual need that also seized her. It was hope. Hope that she had fought so long for fear of disappointment. Hope that she had not allowed herself that her lover might never return, and she would be alone forever. Hope that swell and rose with every measured thrust. Hope once denied and now renewed.
Alice pushed her towards the edge of climax, coaxing her to the edge of a physical and emotional catharsis that drowned out all thought with pure feeling. Abandoning any restraint she had been clinging to, Claire pushed into her lover, grinding against her hand, her body, her mouth until she came with a savage scream and forceful shudder mirrored by Alice's own quaking release.
Claire felt her body sag into the bed utterly depleted of all energy. Alice lay half on top of her, thigh still pressed against her, hand withdrawn and resting on Claire's stomach, cheek pressed against her shoulder. She felt utterly relaxed, as if her muscles and bones had all melted. Her breathing evened and her heart slowed. Eventually, she felt Alice lift her head and brush her lips against her cheek.
Without opening her eyes, Claire smiled and reached for Alice's hand and moved it to her chest and placed it over her heart. "This is yours. Forever."
Alice stiffened against Claire, as if surprised by the gesture, but quickly recovered. Shifting, she reached over Claire for her free hand and placed it over her own heart so that each woman could feel the steady rhythm of the other's heart. "And this is yours, forever." Alice whispered thickly, and Claire heard rather than saw the raw emotion replaced with a smile. "Does that mean you want to take my name?"
"You already have a town named after you, you egomaniac!" Claire teased and gave Alice's hand a playful squeeze.
"I suppose Alice Redfield sounds nice." Alice mumbled, grinning into Claire's shoulder.
The younger woman did not respond, but she pressed Alice's hand against her heart more firmly. Could anything be that simple? She opened her eyes and found those of burning ice and blue gazing up at her. Perhaps it was precisely that simple. "No… I think I like Claire Abernathy better." Their lips met, then tongues and neither woman pulled away for a very long time.
Again, from the bottom of my heart, thank each and every one of you for reading and supporting this story. Leave some final feedback if you'd like.
And may your shotgun always be loaded and may the zombies never find you. Godspeed and good hunting.
-Jayden A. Scott
