Here there be angst...and smut
'Nor gives it satisfaction to our blood,
That we must curb it upon others' proof;
To be forbod the sweets that seem so good,
For fear of harms that preach in our behoof.
O appetite, from judgment stand aloof!
The one a palate hath that needs will taste,
Though Reason weep, and cry, 'It is thy last.'
Abbie rose from the couch shaking her head violently. "You don't get to do this." She insisted again. "You don't get to come here and drop bombs on me in the same breath as goodbye."
He stood and came to face her, inches from her. "It is not fair, of that you are most correct, Abbie. The unfairness of it could all be written into some Greek tragedy and played out in three parts." He moved a scant centimeter closer to her. "But it does not alter or change any truth of the situation." Crane stopped then, his eyes glazing over mistily. "I love you."
Whatever words were at the tip of her tongue faded and slid back into her throat, forced a large lump around even air could not travel. "I can't do this with you." She said again.
Crane nodded his head and took her small hands into one of his. "Yes you can. I have never met anyone with more strength and sense of purpose than you." He angled his head to fix a fiery stare into her doe eyes. His blue ones burned and threatened rain. "It's not a matter of choice, Abbie. I have none on both fronts."
"You always have a choice, there is always another way—"
"And continue a fight that we could lose? Or worse yet that you could be killed in?" Crane shook his head and sighed. "No, no I cannot bear the thought of that."
"You don't need to protect me. " Abbie insisted. "I can handle whatever comes my way…our way."
"I do need to protect you, Abbie." He hissed. "Don't you see that? As little choice as I have the only consolation that I find in this despicable situation is that I get to protect you." Crane tugged her hands to pull her closer, but Abbie held her ground.
"What happened to doing this together?" she asked wetly.
Crane smiled then, "We are. Is that not obvious? My returning to my own time will end this madness. There will be no more evil pursuing the streets of your town. Don't you see that? I told you before I was a man living on borrowed time. This negates that, Abbie. I return to my own time and you get to have a life. Abbie you get to get married, grow old. Have friends and family."
She wanted to tell him that none of that mattered to her without him here. It was on the tip of her tongue to denounce his courtly gesture and gentile sense of honor. She shot venom instead. She stepped out of his grasp and further away from the desperate man, Abbie felt the anger tangle itself around her like a coiling serpent. "You just want to go back to your own time. This never meant anything to you." The inferred I hung in the air between them. "You can go back to your life, to your wife. And I get to remain here and clean up your mess. As usual."
He could not have looked more hurt had she swung her Louisville slugger at his head. He physically flinched at her words and his hands began to twitch. "How can you say that?" he asked.
"How can you leave?" Abbie countered with arms folded.
"You would have this war go on? Abbie, you know full well what my wife has brought with her from Purgatory. I have no choice." He swallowed audibly and spoke. "It is not my death I fear, Abbie. You say the word and I will stay. But I will leave to only have this war continue on and no one to, as you have said, 'have your back. Abbie, I have no choice, Katrina has seen to that."
It was the cold water of truth that hit her full on. If he stayed, the final plague might get him. Leaving ended a war and righted all of the things Katrina set into motion. "I know that!" she screamed. "Don't you think I know what she has done?" Abbie fell onto the couch again, the exhaustion becoming a physical clench in her belly.
Crane slid beside her and took her hands again. "Abbie, I don't want to leave you. If it were up to me…." He shook his head. "I once told you that despite everything, we managed to find each other."
The bottle on the table flew across the room and marked the wall with a satisfying crunch. To his credit, Abbie was pleased top see that he did not flinch at the crash. "Why does this have to happen?" she screamed into his face. "Why does this have to happen? Why do we have to be the ones to sacrifice?"
"Because it is our destiny." He shrugged. Crane pulled her to him and wrapped his arms around her. "Because we are bound to each other as if sealed at birth." He wnt on drawing her near. "Because your scent is as indelible to my nostrils as if it were my own."
"Crane, stop talking." Abbie smiled and pulled his face across the small distance. Her hands twisted into his soft hair and held him to her as she raked her lips across his mouth. If Crane had been surprised by her actions he did not show it. Instead, he leaned into her like a dutiful Great Dane and plied her with pent affections. He hummed a nameless tune into her lips and she answered his ancient call with her own song of wonder. Why had they never done this before? Why had they waited so long until it was nearly too late?
Why did it ever have to even be too late?
They came up for air in tandem, first he drew breath, then she. The entire time the unspoken sadness was the third person in the room. It looked on to the couple on the couch and wordlessly prodded them into action.
HE clutched at her head with one hand and tore at her shirt with the other. Abbie felt weightless and solid all at once as she felt his long fingers grappling with her hair, her skin her clothes. Abbie wanted to consume him, to devour every inch of him as he deftly pulled her shirt over her head. His mouth came to rest on her shoulder as she hungrily puled at his shirt. There was a ripping sound as the ancient shirt tore on its way; the tearing sent the two into a feral erratic rut.
Years later, she would still recall every finite detail of their first coupling on the couch of her living room. The rum soaked scent from the thrown half empty bottle; the heavy melancholy that the two of them attempted to ward off with ardent touches and fevered clutches. Abbie would recall how she fell over the coffee table as she tried to take off her jeans; and how he caught her in his great pale hands just as she slipped. She would recall her need for him reflected in his need for her.
On the couch, finally laid bare to each other as they should have been from the very start; their breaths came in ragged puffs as they stared at each other like virgin newlyweds. He marveled at her small waist and full breasts, and she was in awe of his narrow hips and broad shoulders.
There were no words as they allowed their two bodies' access to one another. Nude skin to skin contact felt like a balm on their souls, as if the past thirty years had been a desert for each and only now found the oasis after dehydration.
He met her brown eyes with his watery pools and asked a silent question. Abbie answered without even a nod and took him in her hand. With her other hand, she pushed him into a sitting position and rose to his lap. Abbie placed her hands on his shoulders and sank onto his waiting shaft like a home run on a perfect spring day.
They moved together like a symphony conducted in perfect synch. His hands held onto her breasts and she leaned in to kiss every inch of his face she could reach.
"Abbie.." he chanted between staccato breaths that were more prayer than biological. Abbie rose and fell as Crane undulated his hips; when she felt the wave rise to its peak, Abbie through her head back and allowed Crane's hands behind her to hold her up as he surfed the last wave with her.
In the after, they lay on the couch together panting, the air thick with their mingled scents and Crane found that Abbie was the perfect blanket.
"We would have met in the library." He said after a short silence. Abbie raised her head questioningly and he went on. "I met you in the library. At college." he nodded as if it made perfect sense.
"Crane, we are from two different centuries. There is no way I would have met you in a library in your time. I wouldn't have even been allowed into one-"
"I never said my time, or your time." Crane corrected pulling her impossibly closer. "Please, Abbie." He pleaded and she acquiesced. He wanted to have a history with her, and so she played along.
"I was looking for a copy of The Hound of Baskerville." She giggled into his shoulder.
Crane rolled his eyes. "I saw you in the stacks from the other side of the shelves." He went on. "I followed you as you moved through the books. You didn't know I was watching you."
"Yes I did." She smiled. "Why do you think it took me so long to find a Sherlock Holmes book?"
Crane squeezed her ass in his large hand and spoke. "I asked you out…"
"You stumbled and stuttered over each and every word." Abbie supplied. "It was cute."
"Is that why you said yes?" he smiled.
"I said yes out of pity. Where was our first date?"
"Oh, poor students of meager means, we would have dined somewhere befitting of our station."
"Crane, you did not take me to McDonald's for our first date."
"Abbie, I loved you upon first seeing you." He broke then, his eyes meeting hers as he kissed her nose. "I would have taken you everywhere."
She wasn't sure if it was such a safe game, but Abbie felt a comfort in it; an erasure to the crazy that their lives had been. "We would have dated for three years." She went on.
"I don't think I would have needed that long to know I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you." Crane rose from the couch and carried Abbie into her bedroom. He laid her on the bed and sat at the end between her parted thighs. "Your scent is like ambrosia." He sang as he scooted between her thighs.
Abbie laughed despite herself. "That is the corniest thing I have ever heard."
"Still," he nodded as he kissed his way up her lean legs and inhaled deeply. "It holds true."
"Crane," Abbie warned bringing her legs together. "You don't have to—"
"Would you deny a dying man his final meal?" Crane asked from perched elbows.
"Don't," she pleaded.
He wasn't sure if she was begging for reprieve from his chosen act, or the analogy he used to convince her. Crane slid her legs open again and pounced upon her mound before she could offer another complaint. In the end, she was the one singing for his supper.
XxXxXxXxX
After they had come down a second time, they lie on the bed together. The alarm next to her read 11:47 pm in angry red numbers, and Abbie fretfully counted the hours.
As if reading her mind, Crane leaned over and flung the offending object across the room. "We did not date for three years." Crane insisted once he had settled next to her again.
"Oh really?" Abbie challenged with a raised eyebrow.
Crane turned to face her and placed his hand on her face. In the dark she was surrounded by him with every one of her sense. His touch, his scent, his taste mingled with hers still lingered where he had kissed her after she had exploded for a third time. Crane's voice rumbled in her ear and tickled her lobe as he spoke. "Abbie, I am a man out of time."
Her heart caught at his words. "I know, but I also know that whatever this is…was…will never be…"
"It's everything." He nodded in the dark. "If I'd had the chance with you, a real honest chance, Abbie, we would move mountains and slay dragons."
She brought her finger to his lips. "We can't sit here for the last six hours and play what ifs." She surprised herself with her own strength of purpose. Crane, however, wasn't surprised in the least. Abbie had always been the one to stay on point. He was the soldier but she always completed the mission.
Abbie pulled him closer and kissed his mouth. Wet hungry kisses that dragged across her lips and burned like fire. Their second round had been slower, not hurried nor frenzied. He had rocked gently between her drenched thighs and took the long way home. Now, Abbie found herself ready for round three. She touched him then, tested his readiness. "Annie," he choked. "I will die with you tonight until I have nothing left in me for all of eternity."
"Not bad for an old man." Abbie grinned as she allowed him inside again. She knew there would be pain and aching in the morning. But, it was to be a physical manifestation of what she would be feeling internally.
She welcomed the burn.
XxXxXxX
It was 1:46 am when they slid into Abbie's small shower stall together. The fumbled under the hot spray desperate for each other. Abbie clung to Crane's neck while he took her against the wall. They came together just as the water turned from tepid to freezing.
"Is it too late to order a pizza?" he asked.
Abbie nodded but padded across her kitchen floor and pulled out two frozen Tombstones. The look on his face made her want to cry as he realized it really was a last meal.
"Abbie," he began as they sat on the couch together waiting for the pizzas to be done. "If there was another way, you know I would."
She nodded. She knew. It still did not change the hard nugget of sorrow that was forming in her throat, the one that got bigger with each passing tick of her kitchen clock. "I don't want to go over this again." She whispered.
"June wedding? " He started in a forced jovial tone. "We had a June wedding. You seem like a woman that would—"
"Halloween." She righted taking a sip of the coffee he had produced. "And it was in City Hall. Just me and you. Jenny too."
He nodded and sipped his own coffee. "Miss Mills—"
"I'm back to Miss Mills again?" she teased.
Crane took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. "We don't have much time left." He announced.
"I know that." Abbie spat back.
He took her hands again and laughed to himself that they were in the exact same place as they started this evening, only far less dressed. "Miss Mills…Abbie…."
"Spit it out Old Man."
"I don't want you to think I would not have you come with me….that is…"
She nodded. He would never ask her, and she would never go. Her skin color left a giant sized no in that column. "Crane, I know that was never an option." She gave him her best reassuring look. "I wouldn't put myself through that hell, nor would I want you to have to see it."
"If things were different…"
"They're not." Abbie pushed.
"But if they were, Abbie I would—"
Abbie raised her hand and set her coffee onto the table. "I thought we agrees we would not spend the last few hours playing what ifs. What ifs get you depressed and to be honest, Crane. I don't need help in that direction."
Crane nodded and twisted his hands nervously. "We did not consider anything about safety…"
"Excuse me?" she asked.
He looked at her then and spoke. "We did not consider…conception."
Without realizing it, she through her head back and laughed. Abbie felt tears running down her cheeks as she continued to howl into the couch pillow.
"Abbie, I fail to see the humor in a situation that could have far reaching repercussions…"
His righteous indignation only made her laugh that much harder. "Crane, please stop." She giggled.
He stared at her for a time then rose when the timer went off in the kitchen. Crane returned with the two pizzas and set them on the table in front of them. "I don't know why you are not concerned about it." He said after three slices.
Abbie shrugged. "I would rather not think about it, Crane. There are a lot of things tonight I would rather not think about. Like how to murder a red head."
He nodded as he chewed, a thoughtful look glazed across his face. "Still, if it is a possibility—"
"It's not," Abbie insisted and dusted her hands together.
"I would hate to leave you in a shameful predicament." He went on.
"Trust me, Crane. There is nothing shameful about that anymore." Abbie wiped her mouth with a napkin and looked at the clock again. Crane turned to get his own look at the clock and nodded. "Sun will be up soon." He noted with bowed head. The ritual was to be performed at sunrise. Katrina claimed it was the safest and most accurate time to achieve the right result. They had battled all night against the sun, and now it was one fight they knew time had come to lose.
"Abbie, if you fall—"
"Not gonna happen, Crane. Just let it go." She insisted.
They shared a look and rose together. He took her hand and led her to her rumpled bed.
XxXxXxX
"Didn't think you two would even be capable of walking today." Jenny grinned from the porch. Crane and Abbie stood on the steps of the cabin as the first rays of sunlight began to peak over the tops of the trees. Jenny wondered to herself if they even realized they were holding hands.
Abbie flashed her sister a sad strained smile and Crane had the decency to only allow his ears to blush.
Katrina pushed her way out of the screen door of the cabin with a haughty look of indignant disbelief. "My love, you have been gone all night." She addressed the man on the stairs.
"Yes, I have." Crane nodded with a small smile at the woman by his side.
Katrine opened her mouth in further protest only to shut it again. Her husband and his….friend, were not only holding hands, there was physicality between them that made her seethe with envy. She niffed and waved her hand. "I had to prepare everything on my own." Katrina pouted.
"I am sure you managed just fine. You needed little help to get here." Crane muttered.
"Ichabod, all that I have done I have done for—"
Crane raised his free hand to stop her. "I have precious little time left to spend with the woman I love. I will not spend it listening to you cluck." He tugged Abbie's hand and led her into the cabin. Abbie passed a look to her sister that could have melted sugar. Jenny gave her thumbs up and followed the pair into the house leaving the red head gawping after.
Jenny turned to Crane and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Look, I know how you feel about my sister, and I know how she feels about you." Jenny rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
He offered a sad smile and shook his head. "Either way, I am lost to Miss Mills."" He crooked a finger toward Katrina as she ambled into the cabin. "She has seen to that."
"It's not right." Jenny said staring in the direction of Crane's accusation. "She had no right to do this."
"True." Crane nodded. "But it is done, and there is no sense in mulling over it when there is work to be done." He turned to the younger woman. "Abbie will need you, in the coming weeks…will you give me your promise to look after her."
"That is a question you never have to ask, Crane." Jenny fired.
He raised his head and looked at Abbie as she seated herself at the table. "With all she has been through, I fear this will end her. Or me. Or both."
"You'll survive it." Jenny assured him. "Abbie may be a wreck for a while, and she will never quite get over it. But, eventually, she will be all right too."
"Indeed." He nodded slowly.
"One more thing," Jenny tossed pulling on the tall man's arm. Crane arched his neck to hear Jenny's lowered tone. "Watch yourself with Big Red." She shot a glance at the advancing woman. "She's….not exactly happy you and y sister made the beast with two backs. Plus, I think she's a bit…unstable."
"Duly noted." Crane responded with a knowing smirk.
Katrina came to his side and Crane smoothly pushed past her and moved to sit next to Abbie at the wooden table. He attempted not to go over what he would miss once he was returned to his time. The list was far too long with one name repeated for most of it. He sighed and tried to right himself to the mission. If there was one thing she had taught him it was to complete the mission no matter the pain of it.
For the first time in his life he had no idea what he would do or who he was or where he would end up. Upon returning he knew he would never be the same man that woke up in that cave two years ago. Too much had happened. Katrina had assured them that they would return to the exact same point in time, that he could live his life and be a father to the child that grew into pure evil. It was the one shining star in the entire ordeal.
He was certain he could not be a proper husband to Katrina any longer, the last ten hours with Abbie was proof of that. There were few options in his day for a marriage that was over; divorce which thanks to King Henry VIII he could get, but not without a stigma that would stain his very existence. Could he leave her to her own devices? Would Katrina be able to fend for herself? And what of the pregnancy he was returning to?
"You got a lot to think about." Abbie whispered at his side.
Crane nodded and drew a deep breath. "I don't want to have to think about any of it. This entire situation has rendered me unable to process anything properly." He took her hand in his and tried to smile but it came out broken and smudged.
"I bet Katrina has always had that affect on you. On most men." Abbie smiled and nodded.
"You have no idea. Only, I assure you none of it is for the better."
"Oh, I never doubted that."
Jenny rounded with books and bags in the center of the living room. She had spelled out every nuance of tactical necessity while leaving the voodoo stuff to Big Red. "Sorry guys," she announced with all the reverence of a priest "It's time to go."