More Than Friends- Babe Heffron x OFC
"Wowza, Babe, she's one fine looking broad. Where'd you find her?"
Babe grinned when Bill leaned over him to look at the photograph enclosed within his letter from home.
"That's just Izzie," he answered, his eyes tracing the familiar shape of her crinkled ones.
The picture had been taken three weeks before he left for England; on his brief visit home before shipping out to war. His mother had, somewhat embarrassingly in his opinion, thrown him a leaving party, acting as though her precious boy was going to miraculously win the war singlehandedly. Izzie had of course come to the party, and the image in his hand was when he and Izzie had been caught digging into the buffet that his mother hadn't yet announced to be ready for eating. Izzie was grinning mischievously as she swallowed down the piece of chocolate pie in her mouth, and the camera had captured the moment that Babe had turned his head to look at her.
What the camera hadn't been able to capture was the feelings that looking at her had stirred up inside of him. The same feelings fluttering inside of his stomach now that he was reliving the moment in sepia.
"Well just Izzie is clearly someone very special if the look on your face is anything to go by," Guarnere smirked knowingly.
"We've been best friends since we were kids," Babe shrugged. "Since she was old enough to sock me in the mouth for stealing her ice cream when we were three."
"Friends, not even best ones, don't look at each other the way you're looking at her there," Guarnere determined. "Or the way you're looking at the photo of her now. And I take it by the way you're frowning now that you either didn't realise you was in love, or that you knew and didn't tell her… yet."
"The latter," Babe sighed, looking at the photograph for a second longer before tucking it safely inside of his breast pocket. "I'm an idiot."
"Tell me something I didn't already know," Guarnere patted him on the shoulder sympathetically, even as his lips tilted up into a smirk. He stubbed out his cigarette and stood at the same time as Babe, the two of them fixing on their hats the second they left the mess hall. "Aint too late to tell her, you know."
Babe didn't answer. Instead he just listened to the crunch of the gravel beneath his boots, while his mind took him back to the first time he realised he loved Isabelle Riley.
It was a quiet Sunday afternoon and Babe found his eyes drifting closed again as he lay with his head in Izzie's lap, her hand carding through his hair and scratching lightly at his scalp with her burgundy painted nails while she read Huckleberry Finn aloud.
Aged eighteen, it didn't matter that they were on the cusp of adulthood and already had responsibilities such as jobs, Mark Twain was still a part of their childhood that they weren't willing to forgo just yet.
"Stop snoring," Izzie tugged her hair, making him yelp. "I'm not gonna read if you're just gonna go to sleep."
"I was just resting my eyes," he scowled.
"Sure you were," she snorted, bending to kiss the part of his head that she had hurt before resuming her reading.
Babe, however, couldn't focus on a word she was saying; not with the knowledge that she had just kissed him. It didn't matter that it was just a friendly kiss; her lips had touched him nonetheless. And what a glorious pair of lips they were. Full and slightly turned down, he was ashamed to admit to himself just how often he fantasised about kissing them these days.
It had all started a few months ago back at Isabella's birthday. The one she had planned for months, driving him mad with every incessant and stupid detail. The day came and Babe turned up at her house early with strict orders that he needed to hang up decorations that neither she nor her mother were tall enough to do. Her mother answered the door looking exasperated, explaining that Izzie would be down shortly and showing Babe where to hang the all important decorations.
He had almost fallen off of the kitchen chair he was using as a ladder when Izzie swanned in looking like someone Babe was certain definitely couldn't have been the girl who used to roll around and wrestle with him on the dirty street, or who could spit further than most of the boys on their block. Because the Izzie in front of him now suddenly had a figure that made his mouth go dry; a figure that he had never noticed before.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" she had frowned. "Concentrate on that banner, would you? It's all wonky."
"S-sure," he had mumbled, his hands trembling as he turned his attention back to his job, unable to get the shape of her tiny waist and full hips out of his mind. And those lips… how did they suddenly look so damn kissable?
"It's raining," Izzie flung down the book, jolting him back to the present. She shoved him so that he rolled off of her and onto the floor. Running for the door, her eyes were alive with excitement. "Come on, Babe, it's finally fucking raining after weeks of this stupid heatwave."
Taking off after her, the front door was flung open, almost hitting him in the process, and she was running out into the street without even bothering to put her shoes on.
"Izzie, it's pouring it down," he frowned from the safety and dryness of the doorway. "You're getting soaked."
"I know!" she grinned, spinning around like a kid in a playground, her dress clinging to her body and her hair sticking to her face.
"Babe, come on!" she giggled, closing her eyes and lifting her face to the grey sky as she stuck out her tongue to catch the cool, crisp rain water.
Babe smiled, feeling the reach of her infectious joy grasping and pulling at him until he found his feet moving of their own volition until he was standing out there in that rain with her.
Hands entwined and wet faces laughing at each other in innocent joy; that was the moment when Babe Heffron realised that he was hopelessly in love with his best friend.
… … …
"That another letter from Izzie?" Bill asked, breathing into his cupped hands in a fruitless bid to stave off the biting Bastogne cold.
"Yeah," Babe smiled. "She says that while she knows my Christmas is most likely gonna be awful but that she doesn't actually care because at least I won't be forced to sit at the dinner table with her grandma, listening to her farting through the whole meal. She also says that my mom has been knitting everyone ugly Christmas and I should count myself lucky that I'm avoiding that particular horror."
"I like Izzie," Guarnere laughed. "Not how you like her, obviously, but I like that she aint all soppy with you. She's just writing to like she doesn't give a shit that you could get killed any second and it's… refreshing."
"Izzie doesn't do soppy," Babe murmured, choking on a loud laugh when he saw the separate piece of paper with a lipstick kiss stain of her lips on it and a little note on the back.
In case you and your buddies want a little cheering up this festive season; you can all have a chance at kissing the horniest woman in South Philly… your mom.
"If you don't marry this fucking broad, Heffron, then I will," Bill roared with laughter, tears streaming down his face as his entire body shook. "She's a riot."
"Yeah, she is," Babe agreed., lifting the page to his nose and swallowing when he realised he could smell her lavender perfume. "I'm gonna tell her, Bill. When we get back home, I'm gonna tell her."
"About damn time."
… … …
Home.
A place he had thought about every single day since he had left. A place he had oftentimes thought he would never see again.
Babe had every intention of going straight to his home– the home he shared with his parents and brothers– first. But his feet had just carried him to the end of the opposite end of the street until he was standing outside of Izzie's house, staring at their handprints which had been cast in the wet cement of her front door step when they were ten years old.
Crouching down, he placed his hand over his much smaller decade old one and felt an uncomfortable prickle of tears behind his eyes. He might have been a legal man when he had last seen these handprints but he most certainly hadn't been a real man then; not like he was now.
"Babe?"
His eyes closed as he worried that for just a moment she was a figment of his imagination; the apparition he had dreamed of for the last few years.
"Babe, are you alright?"
Her hand touched his shoulder and the familiar scent of her perfume overwhelmed in the best possible way. Standing up on trembling legs, he wasn't prepared for the moment he would finally lay eyes upon her for the first time in so long.
Her black hair was set in loose curls that cascaded down her back and over her shoulders, and the long lashes fanning her piercing blue eyes had a light dusting of mascara on, only making her eyes seem even more vivid. And her lips, the full lips currently trembling with emotion, were painted in a deep red that made her skin look even paler than usual. Pale but not sickly.
"No," he croaked, reaching out a trembling hand to cup her cheek, swallowing down the thick lump in his throat when she placed her own over his and her eyes filled with tears. "I'm not okay because I need to do something."
"Alright," Izzie frowned, craning her head to look up at him when he stepped closer.
He felt Izzie freeze the moment his lips met with hers, and he was half expecting her to push him away and sock him in the mouth, but instead her arms wound themselves around his neck and she kissed him as though she was as desperate as he was.
Groaning, Babe let his hand wander up her waist, his thumbs brushing just beneath her breasts as their tongues met hungrily. Izzie's own groan was enough to have Babe pulling her closer against him so that she could feel his desire hardening between them.
Izzie grabbed him by his dog tags and, without coming up for air, she dragged him up the front step and pushed open the front door.
Kicking the door shut behind them, Babe lifted Izzie into his arms, his hands finding purchase on the bare skin of their thighs which she wrapped around his waist. Izzie was writhing against him, head thrown back and her eyes closed as he moved his lips to her neck, sucking and kissing and biting as he carried her up upstairs, never once thinking to even check if her mother was at home or not.
Dropping her onto the bed when they reached her room, Izzie's eyes never left Babe's as she climbed onto her knees and yanked off her dress, followed by her slip, leaving her clad in peach satin underwear. Babe's own clothes were being strewn behind him somewhere until he was left in only his underwear, his hard length straining hungrily against the fabric.
"Izzie," he murmured, running a finger beneath one of her brassiere straps. "I'm not sure we should… I wasn't trying to-"
"Babe please," Izzie reached around to unfasten her brassiere and flung it away, biting her lip apprehensively at the sight of Babe's darkening gaze on her hardening nipples.
She took his hand and brought it up to touch her, silently conveying that she wanted- needed- this as much as him. She didn't tell him that she had waited so long for this; that she has dreamed of this since she was fifteen and first realised she cared for him as more than just her friend. Nor did she tell him that he was the first person to touch her in such a way.
"Fuck, Iz," he sounded like he was almost in pain as he pushed her back onto the bed, his mouth latching onto a nipple immediately; tongue circling and teeth gently grazing that dusky pink peak as his hand moved between her satin clad thighs to feel the wetness waiting for him.
And wet she was; obscenely so, in fact and he kissed his way down her stomach, tugging at her panties until his face was between her legs, and so close to her glistening centre that he could smell the overwhelmingly musky scent of her desire.
Glancing up momentarily for her permission, her almost imperceptible nod had him gently parting her lips and running a finger up her before pushing it inside; watching her eyes squeeze shut and her mouth part just enough to expel a small moan. He added another finger, watching Izzie's face for any sign of discomfort as he stretched her slowly, his fingers pumping in and out, drawing even more wetness from her. Wetness that his tongue captured as he licked her in one long stripe, holding her quivering thighs apart as she tried to cage his head in with them in a subconscious bid to stop him from moving. Not that he had any plans on doing that anyway.
Instead he tasted her again, tongue pushing inside of her and hands reaching for hers as they sought for something to grasp. He circled her clit with his tongue, feeling like God Almighty when she muttered his name in a whispered cry over and over again.
Freeing his hands again, his tongue continued to manipulate her while his fingers resumed their slow and calculated love making; the two working in tandem to have her crying out in release as her whole body convulsed beneath him.
Babe kissed his way back up her body once her tremors had died down, lavishing languid attention on her breasts and nipping at her neck; resisting the wholly primal urge to mark her as his. When his lips finally met with hers again, he pushed his tongue inside of her mouth, wanting her to taste herself on him.
Izzie's arms were around him as he pulled back to look down at her, touching his body without fear or hesitation until she reached the waistband of his boxers.
"We can stop," he kissed her softly, resting his forehead against hers as they tried to momentarily stop the exhilarating spinning wheel they had found themselves on. "If you want."
"I don't want to," she stroked his cheek and smiled, and Babe wondered if she had always looked at him in the way she was looking at him now. "I just… ah heck, this is embarrassing," she slapped a hand over her face.
"It's just me, Iz," he took her hand and kissed it reverently.
"Yeah, I know but I feel like an idiot 'cause we're the same age and I bet you can't even remember how many people you've had sex with, and I'm just here not even sure I'm gonna do it right 'cause I have no idea what I'm actually doing apart from what I've heard, you know."
"First of all, I mighta had sex with other broads– and only 'cause I didn't think there was ever any chance of doing it with you– but this isn't sex, Izzie. This is… you know I love you, right?"
"Well, I didn't know that," she snorted softly. "Until now obviously. And even though that declaration was wholly unromantic, I guess I should tell you that I love you too. And I've missed you so fucking much."
"Right, well, with that cleared up, I need you to know this is special, ok? And I aint never done special before so I reckon I'm scared I might do it wrong as well."
"Shut up, you idiot," she rolled her eyes, making Babe grin because this was the Izzie he had missed.
"Shutting up," he smirked, bringing his lips to hers again as he tugged off his boxers and took himself in hand, lining up against her entrance.
The humour from mere seconds before faded into breathy moans and soul searching expressions as Babe slid himself inside of Izzie slowly, their lips melding as though they were made to fit together and their breaths mingling as one entity.
"Fuck Izzie," Babe had to stop for a moment before he embarrassed himself. "This is…"
"I know," she murmured, wrapping her legs around him and touching every inch of his face with soft fingertips, taking in every detail of how he looked in that moment; how different yet how unchanged he was.
She was mesmerised by the way his brow furrowed as he started to move finally, and the way his hands seemed to touch her everywhere all at once. The look in his eyes was so intense that she had to close her eyes before she did something stupid like cry. The sensations his movements were eliciting were far more than anything the girls at work spoke of, and she threw her head back against the pillow and gasped when she felt herself going over the edge again. And even though it lacked the intensity of the first one, the mellow wave of the second was still far from forgettable. Especially not with the way she was still riding out the pulsating undulations when Babe's hips started to buck more erratically, and Izzie opened her eyes in time to see Babe's face contorting in exquisite agony as he spilled inside of her with a huff of a grunt before he captured her lips again. He kissed her languidly as he shifted them so that she lay upon his chest, listening to the thudding of his wildly beating heart until they both drifted off to sleep.
… … …
"And so I said to Babe that if he didn't marry you then I would…"
Izzie laughed. Something she had done a lot of the last two times they met Bill and his fiancee, Frannie. And sitting in Babe's favourite restaurant on this saturday dinner time was no different.
"You know, I was gonna come see you when I got back to Philly," Bill said. "Meet the girl had Heffron so smitten."
"You should have," Izzie told him, smiling as Babe returned from the bathroom and sat back down beside her at the table.
"Should have what?" he asked, one hand reaching for his glass of beer and the other reaching for Izzie's hand, lacing their fingers together and rubbing his thumb and across her knuckles.
"Bill wanted to come visit me when he got back home," she explained. "Bet he coulda told me lots more stories about you."
"I told him he couldn't visit you or he'd look like a stalker," Frannie said with a smirk. "First and only time he's ever listened to me."
"Thank god for that," Babe muttered. "Woulda ruined my chances with Izzie for sure."
"You almost did that yourself," Bill grinned. "So when's the big day, Babe? We could always have a double wedding if you're looking to save a little money."
"Oh," Babe looked like a deer caught in headlights. "We're not… I mean we haven't… It's just…"
"Christ calm down," Bill cackled. "Didn't mean to make you start crying."
"I'm not!" Babe exclaimed. "It's just that me and Izzie aint talked about marriage, you know."
"Well, I heard Izzie and Frannie yakking about it when they were making cakes at ours last week," Bill smirked. "Got her sights set on a dress from that boutique near Gimbels, haven't you, Iz?"
"Jeez Bill, way to scare off my man for me," Izzie rolled her eyes, hoping no one could see through the fact that it bothered her just how afraid of marriage to her Babe seemed. "Look Babe, it was just girl talk alright? Frannie's all excited for her day and I was just talking hypothetically about if we ever got married, but I'll never mention it again and-"
"This wasn't how it was supposed to go," Babe cut her off, standing to his feet and reaching into his jacket pocket. "But the stress of carrying this thing around without losing, just on the off chance that I find the perfect unexpected moment, is getting to me anyway."
This time it was Izzie's eyes bugging out of her as Babe dropedd down onto one knee in front of her. Meanwhile, Bill was grinning like the cat who's got the cream and Frannie was already crying tears of happiness for her new friend.
"This aint romantic and it aint special," Babe murmured nervously, opening the velvet box in his hand to reveal a beautifully simple emerald ring, which just so happened to be Izzie's favourite colour. God, he wished the whole restaurant wasn't now watching them. "But Izzie, you're more than my best friend; you're the other half of me, and I know without any doubt in my mind that it's me and you for life. Well, if you say yes to this proposal that is," he grimaced awkwardly. "Oh good, you are gonna say yes, aint you?"
"Course she is," Bill muttered, scowling when Frannie smacked him on the arm.
"Of course I am," Izzie grinned, throwing her arms around Babe and sending them both sprawling onto the floor in front of the now cheering and clapping restaurant. Kissing Babe once before pulling back to look down at him, she smiled again. "I love you, Babe Heffron."
"Not as much as I love you, Mrs Heffron to be."
The End.
