june, year two.

They're watching telly together, just cheesy sitcoms that are there for background noise more than anything, and she's lying on his couch with her skinny ankles crossed in his lap, her head propped up on the arm rest, and as she watches the telly he watches her.

Her whole face crinkles when she laughs – the corners of her eyes, her nose, her chin, they all scrunch up, and he thinks it's the most adorable thing he's ever seen, so he makes her laugh as much as possible.

He rubs a hand against the protruding bone of her ankle, slipping it up and under the edge of her sock. She yelps and leans forward awkwardly to slap his hand away.

"Stop that!"

"Stop what?" he asks as he gently tugs the sock off her foot.

"No, give that back!" she exclaims, trying to launch forward and failing miserably.

He holds the woollen sock in the air and observes the stitching, green dots against a bright yellow background. He drops it on to the floor, next to discarded boxes of Chinese take out, and starts tickling the bottom of her foot. She flails, kicking hard against him and trying to get free, but he bends forward and holds her in place, grinning evilly as she screams for mercy.

"No, stop, stop that!" she shrieks, trying desperately to pull her foot free.

"You have hideous taste in socks, do you know that?"

She yells, accent more prominent than ever, "My socks are fine, I just have hideous taste in boyfriends!"

He drops her foot.

"What?"

She's staring at him, panicked, and as soon as he releases her she pulls her knees up under her chin, hunching in the corner of the couch as far away from him as she can get. Her round face is flushed, and he wants to kiss her but he doesn't know if she'll let him.

"What?" he repeats, and she stays silent. "Did you – did you just call me your boyfriend?"

She jumps up off the couch in an explosion of gangly limbs and flustered panic, immediately sweeping around the room and cleaning up the mess from their dinner. She uses her hair to hide her face, speaking at a million miles an hour.

"It was an accident, you know, I didn't actually mean to call you… that. Because you're not. You're not that, and I'm totally fine with it, because this is just a casual thing and casual is good, we're not looking for anything long term and we agreed that we wouldn't -"

While she talks he slowly regains control of his limbs and stands, walking over to her so that when she spins around he's there, right in front of her, staring into her eyes and trying to tell her that it's okay. He gently takes the containers from her and puts them on the coffee table before clasping her hands in his own.

"You called me your boyfriend." He could have said it teasingly, but he doesn't. He says it earnestly, with enough happy surprise to make her start to uncoil.

Her anxious lines begin to soften, expression shifting into one of hope and body pitching forward ever so slightly, closer to him. She looks at their feet and mumbles, "Shut up."

"Does this mean I can finally call you my girlfriend?"

When she looks up at him he registers that her eyes are the most beautiful colour in the world, but he doesn't have time to read the expression in them before she's kissing him. It's not like their other kisses; this one is tender, and open, and she's so very, very vulnerable with the way that she's clutching at his jacket as though she's scared he's going to slip away from her if she loosens her grip. But that's never going to happen, he decides as his lips part against hers and they share a breath. How could that ever happen? How could he let go of the most wonderful thing that's ever come into his life?

"You're not hideous," she eventually murmurs against his lips.

He smiles, cupping her beautiful face in his hands. "I am a bit."

"Yeah, just a bit," she laughs, and he feels as though everything in the world is exactly as it should be.

a.n. if you're enjoying the story (or even if you're not) please leave a review and let me know! if there's any particular scenes you want explored or more of a certain genre (angst, fluff, etc.) just ask and i'll happily write it. thanks for reading!