I know I said this had ended but there was a request for more. Also I wrote this with a blinding headache, I hope it makes sense.
This is a nocturne for insomnia. They cannot sleep when they are apart and they do not sleep when they are together.
He comes to her bed as often as they dare. He has become almost used to her body opening for him like a flower, blossoming dark and passionate colours in the night. That doesn't mean it has ceased to make him tremble, or that he craves it any the less.
It pains him that they have to be so quiet. He wants to be able to tell her the thinks she makes him feel, now that he has finally found the words- so many words- to voice it, he wants to be able to hear the sounds that correspond to the snatches of the looks he catches on her face as they make love. He wants to be able to hear that sound she's stifling when her back arches she presses the back of her hand to her mouth.
He loves watching her in her dark uniform, with her dark hair, in the light of the servants' hall. It reminds him of the darkness in which she swallows him up. It's a miracle no one else has caught the look on his face as he watches her in these moments, only her. She gives him her smile for a moment, letting him know she know what he is thinking about.
It is no secret to her that he has never loved a woman before. She tells him that that is the very last thing she cares about.
"Besides, you're the only man I've ever been in love with either, so what real difference does it make?"
They have these little conversations in the moments in between times when no one else is in the servants' hall. They know they should be more careful, that Thomas could be lurking round the corner at any given moment, but some things have to be said, actually articulated out loud, and made plain.
The nights when he can come to her become beyond bliss, the most merciful release. He cannot allow himself to think about them until they are happening; their prospect is overpowering. He wonders if everyone who is in love feels like this.
The languid movements of her lithe, white limbs not longer seem like a mystery to him; he recognises even the most beautiful patterns they form and draw as they enclose him and bring him to her. He has always loved the sight of her hair, he is allowed into its smell now, the silken feel of it beneath his fingers and against his face.
Lying together with her is so familiar, he had done it, he had held her close to him in the dark before he had even kissed her. He bestows kisses to her now enough to make up for it.
He learns gradually, steadily about the secrets her body possesses. He'd never been with a woman before but neither of them lets that be an obstacle. She knows what she is doing and he lets her take the lead, lets her sit straddling his legs, his waist, lets her kiss him in ways that make him wish they didn't have to be so damned quiet.
He has never been possessed by a person, never been able to let anyone pull him apart like she does with the utmost languid gentleness.
He counts down the seconds until they can meet again, savours the memory of being able to all sense of time in the dark with her.
And it is one such moment, when time and the sight of everything other than her is gone that he gasps out into the blankness,
"Phyllis, marry me."
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