Fic - until gravity is too much (Lizzie/Darcy) pg-13, 1/1
Title: until gravity is too much
Summary: The most fascinating thing that happens during “Hyper-Mediation in New Media” is what the camera doesn’t manage to catch on film.
Rating: pg-13
Author's Notes: 2,176 words. Set post Vlog #80. Written for the prompts understanding, kiss, Pemberley, and desk over at Porn Battle XIV. This is decidedly less porn-y than I intended it to be. I realize all anyone wanted after #80 was makeouts, I'm just doing my job to help the cause! All mistakes are mine. These characters, however, are not.
Lizzie probably won’t ever be able to explain why, but she seeks him out afterwards.
Her keys are heavy in her hand, her weight shifting from left to right as she fidgets just outside his office door. Darcy’s back is to her, and she watches him for a moment, takes in the straight line of his spine, the hardness of his shoulders. He has nice shoulders, Lizzie thinks, but then rolls her eyes at herself because those are the sorts of things she should not think about Darcy. Those are the types of things she is actively trying not to think about Darcy. But the newsboy hat sits proudly on top of the files on his desk, and Lizzie can’t quite explain why, but the sight of it throws her. The whole past forty minutes with him has thrown her, and later, when this has ended as horribly as she assumes it will, she’ll blame it entirely on that. On him. On the way he unhinges her so effortlessly.
When she goes to speak, nothing comes out, and she has to clear her throat awkwardly like the sort of idiot she usually is in these types of situations. The sound causes Darcy to jerk his head up and glance in her direction, eyes widening and then softening immediately after when they land on hers. She smiles through her teeth. Darcy’s mouth twists. Neither of them manage a full smile. The beat of silence that follows is just as awkward as she knew it would be. Lizzie doesn’t really know if they will ever know how to be anything but awkward when it comes to each other.
“Lizzie. Hello.” He places the folder in his hands to the side, takes a step forward, towards her, and then stops. He’s careful with her. He’s always been careful with her, she realizes, but it’s different now. Now it’s conscious. “I didn’t realize you were standing there.”
“I just came to say thank you.” She adds sheepishly, “Again.”
This time when he smiles, it transforms his whole face. “You are welcome. Again.”
The silence returns quickly, the sound of it popping in her ears. She should leave. She never should have come here in the first place, but she did, and now that she is, it is kind of as if she is stuck. Her feet won’t move. Lizzie lingers in the doorway, weight even on her heels, and all she and Darcy can do is stand and look at each other as they try to figure out the right combination of words to say all the things they don’t know how to say to each other. Lizzie has never been very good at these things. History serves as witness. It’s one of the reasons, Lydia would say, that she is both lame and perpetually single.
They should be better at this by now, she thinks. She wants to be better at this now, and that is what propels her into taking a step forward, bridging the distance between them. He takes a step too, meets her halfway, and suddenly they’re standing in the center of his office, the dying light from outside filtering in through the windows and painting the room golden. It’s romantic, in some distant sort of way - their closeness, the light, the moment, but Lizzie is not Jane, and this is Darcy, so she tries not to let that cloud her judgment.
It’s difficult for her with him - which Lizzie realizes is probably the understatement of the century. She realizes there are thousands of people on the internet who can attest to just how difficult it is for her with Darcy, but it is. It is especially difficult here, at Pemberley, because she can see herself here long-term, she can see herself succeeding here, and growing in to the type of professional she wants to be. And even though Lizzie may have said otherwise just last fall, she knows enough about Darcy to realize he would never begrudge her any type of professional success. But that doesn’t mean she wants it because of him either, because of some sense of duty or whatever Victorian-era crap he likes to masquerade as chivalry.
When the silence breaks, they both move to speak at the same time.
“-Is that all you -”
“-You never said I’m sorry -”
“-Needed?”
They stare at each other. Darcy is no longer smiling. She shouldn’t say it again, but she does.
“You never apologized. For Bing and Jane. You’ve explained your actions, but you have never apologized.” He looks away.
Between them, there is a bold, angry and bitter line. Lizzie can see it; she can toe it because she placed it there.
It was comforting, in the beginning, to have something she was so sure of, something she could reply on to be absolutely certain. She hated Darcy. Darcy was a bad guy. These were two points of absolute fact, and Lizzie - well, Lizzie likes dealing with facts. She excels best when she’s dealing with facts, with certainty. But now that those facts are changing, now that she’s here and she’s realizing Darcy maybe isn’t the guy she thought he was, the line is constantly blurring, the boldness growing more and more dim. She finds herself toeing it constantly, this once bold and angry line. Lizzie finds a part of herself she is not ready to admit exists thinking just maybe when he looks at her the way he does.
Then, all too clearly, Lizzie remembers Jane’s heartbreak, the long nights spent lying awake listening to the sound of her sobs just one room over, and the line becomes bold again, harder to cross.
Clearing his throat, Darcy averts eye contact, moves around her, and closes the door. Maybe he’s gearing up for a fight, maybe he thinks she’s going to yell, but she’s not, she won’t, and closing the door is rather pointless because there is barely anyone still working anyway. She turns, watching him, taking in the way he reaches up to rub at the back of his neck for a split second before allowing his hand to fall back into place at his side. His fingers fidget, but resist curling into fists. It’s a tick of his, a rare depiction of vulnerability, and Lizzie recognizes it immediately, files it away.
She’s starting to amass all of these useless tidbits of information pertaining to all things Darcy, but she has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
When he glances at her then, he looks both stricken and proud. Lizzie hadn’t realized that was possible, and the incredulous laughter catches in her throat.
“I am sorry that I hurt your sister. I am sorry that I hurt you,” he tells her.
Her voice is quiet when she asks, “But you still aren’t sorry for doing it? Even now that you know the truth?”
Darcy presses his mouth into a straight line. “I was looking out for my friend. Surely you can understand that,” he says tiredly.
Lizzie nods, quick and severe, and knows Darcy reads the meaning behind it: She is capable of understanding, but understanding doesn’t equate to acceptance. It doesn’t equate to forgiveness - even if a significant part of her is slowly realizing the forgiveness isn’t hers to give.
It comes out of nowhere - his touch. Darcy reaches for her, his fingers spreading over the skin at her wrist, and the suddenness of the contact literally makes her dizzy. She doesn’t move away. She stares at their hands, then his face, at the way he’s looking at her with a mixture of affection and uncertainty. Her eyes flick to his mouth unconsciously. This is not unlike any situation she’s ever been in before, but it is the first time she’s ever been in this situation with Darcy, this is the first time he’s initiated physical contact, and she absolutely hates that the part of herself housing the immediate reaction to pull away is drowned out by the part that, well, doesn’t.
He takes a step closer, and suddenly he’s too close. It’s confusing. She can’t think. Lizzie shakes her head, starts to move away.
Naturally, this is also when she kisses him.
It starts with a rising panic that catches in her throat as her mouth slides against his. Darcy is unbelievably still at first, his spine rigid even though she literally has to fist her hands in his shirt to pull him down to her height because he’s so damn tall. But he’s still, like he’s holding his breath, waiting for her to pull away, and she starts to, starts to admit her mistake, murmur her apologizes when his mouth finally starts to move against hers. There’s a sudden rush of warmth that sparks at the base of her spine and spreads. His hands reach up, tangle in her hair, and she makes a sound in the back of her throat that she’s never really heard herself make before. Darcy kisses her back harder.
But this kiss is not romantic.
It’s messy. Desperate. His mouth is warm. He tastes like mint and tea, and she gasps when she feels his tongue slide along her lip. The keys she had forgotten she was holding drop to the floor, and she moves that hand to his back, flattens her palm between his shoulder blades, tugging him closer until he’s flush against her. She feels his hands start to move slowly, like he’s asking permission, and Lizzie gives it to him by kissing him harder, deeper, flicking her tongue against his. His hands are at her back immediately, moving down quickly thereafter, lingering near her hips. His fingers dig in, curl into the fabric of her dress. She swallows his soft moan, claims it as her own.
Before she knows what’s happening, their feet are moving, not stopping until her back hits the corner of his desk.
It’s too much, too soon, and her heart is racing. She has to pull back, and when she does, he nods, his breathing heavy as he closes his eyes and drops his head. He says something, but she can’t hear him over the sound of her heart pounding in her head. Darcy presses his mouth to the skin at her collarbone and she shudders. She counts her breaths, tries to even them out. She thinks about before, their conversation on camera, runs it backwards and forwards in her head just as she had when she walked the distance form her office to his, and it calms her - have something to focus on, something to dissect and analyze.
She is the first to speak.
“Do you still…” She is about use the term love, but it tastes foreign on the tip of her tongue, dirty. She closes her eyes when she continues, “Do you still have feelings for me?” she asks before she can lose her nerve, before her brain kicks in. Her voice is not like her own. It shakes and she knows the answer already, knows what he will say, but she wants to hear him say it. She can’t keep taking things from him, can’t keep expecting him to make such allowances for her, she knows this, but she also hasn’t always been the nicest person.
Darcy laughs, but it isn’t kind. The sound of it and the loss of warmth as he moves away from her causes her eyes to snap open and slam into his.
“Yes,” he tells her, unashamed, and it would sound more incredulous, she’s sure, if he wasn’t still trying to regain his breathing.
He stares at her then. He stares at her the way he did just twenty minutes before during filming, the way he did last week, the way he did last fall. It’s open and honest, the way he looks at her, vulnerable, and it’s too much. He’s still too close. With a foot or more of space between them, he is still too close. Lizzie goes to take a step back, but there is nowhere to go. The panic rises in her throat again, but she swallows around it. Lizzie thinks of lines and boundaries. She wants to hate herself for kissing him, and maybe she will later, but it was a really good kiss. It was the best kiss of her life probably, but she’s not about to tell him that. She’s not about to admit that aloud. She’s not ready to admit that aloud.
“I have some things I need to figure out,” she says instead, slowly. He nods. Looks hopeful. She thinks about kissing him again. “We can’t do this until I figure those things out.”
“No,” he replies. There is the barest hint of a smile spreading across his mouth. “We cannot.”
“But I want to,” she tells him quietly. “I want you to know that I want to.”
Darcy reaches for her again, his touch slight, tentative as his fingers circle around her wrist.
Lizzie stares at their hands for a long time.
Summary: The most fascinating thing that happens during “Hyper-Mediation in New Media” is what the camera doesn’t manage to catch on film.
Rating: pg-13
Author's Notes: 2,176 words. Set post Vlog #80. Written for the prompts understanding, kiss, Pemberley, and desk over at Porn Battle XIV. This is decidedly less porn-y than I intended it to be. I realize all anyone wanted after #80 was makeouts, I'm just doing my job to help the cause! All mistakes are mine. These characters, however, are not.
Lizzie probably won’t ever be able to explain why, but she seeks him out afterwards.
Her keys are heavy in her hand, her weight shifting from left to right as she fidgets just outside his office door. Darcy’s back is to her, and she watches him for a moment, takes in the straight line of his spine, the hardness of his shoulders. He has nice shoulders, Lizzie thinks, but then rolls her eyes at herself because those are the sorts of things she should not think about Darcy. Those are the types of things she is actively trying not to think about Darcy. But the newsboy hat sits proudly on top of the files on his desk, and Lizzie can’t quite explain why, but the sight of it throws her. The whole past forty minutes with him has thrown her, and later, when this has ended as horribly as she assumes it will, she’ll blame it entirely on that. On him. On the way he unhinges her so effortlessly.
When she goes to speak, nothing comes out, and she has to clear her throat awkwardly like the sort of idiot she usually is in these types of situations. The sound causes Darcy to jerk his head up and glance in her direction, eyes widening and then softening immediately after when they land on hers. She smiles through her teeth. Darcy’s mouth twists. Neither of them manage a full smile. The beat of silence that follows is just as awkward as she knew it would be. Lizzie doesn’t really know if they will ever know how to be anything but awkward when it comes to each other.
“Lizzie. Hello.” He places the folder in his hands to the side, takes a step forward, towards her, and then stops. He’s careful with her. He’s always been careful with her, she realizes, but it’s different now. Now it’s conscious. “I didn’t realize you were standing there.”
“I just came to say thank you.” She adds sheepishly, “Again.”
This time when he smiles, it transforms his whole face. “You are welcome. Again.”
The silence returns quickly, the sound of it popping in her ears. She should leave. She never should have come here in the first place, but she did, and now that she is, it is kind of as if she is stuck. Her feet won’t move. Lizzie lingers in the doorway, weight even on her heels, and all she and Darcy can do is stand and look at each other as they try to figure out the right combination of words to say all the things they don’t know how to say to each other. Lizzie has never been very good at these things. History serves as witness. It’s one of the reasons, Lydia would say, that she is both lame and perpetually single.
They should be better at this by now, she thinks. She wants to be better at this now, and that is what propels her into taking a step forward, bridging the distance between them. He takes a step too, meets her halfway, and suddenly they’re standing in the center of his office, the dying light from outside filtering in through the windows and painting the room golden. It’s romantic, in some distant sort of way - their closeness, the light, the moment, but Lizzie is not Jane, and this is Darcy, so she tries not to let that cloud her judgment.
It’s difficult for her with him - which Lizzie realizes is probably the understatement of the century. She realizes there are thousands of people on the internet who can attest to just how difficult it is for her with Darcy, but it is. It is especially difficult here, at Pemberley, because she can see herself here long-term, she can see herself succeeding here, and growing in to the type of professional she wants to be. And even though Lizzie may have said otherwise just last fall, she knows enough about Darcy to realize he would never begrudge her any type of professional success. But that doesn’t mean she wants it because of him either, because of some sense of duty or whatever Victorian-era crap he likes to masquerade as chivalry.
When the silence breaks, they both move to speak at the same time.
“-Is that all you -”
“-You never said I’m sorry -”
“-Needed?”
They stare at each other. Darcy is no longer smiling. She shouldn’t say it again, but she does.
“You never apologized. For Bing and Jane. You’ve explained your actions, but you have never apologized.” He looks away.
Between them, there is a bold, angry and bitter line. Lizzie can see it; she can toe it because she placed it there.
It was comforting, in the beginning, to have something she was so sure of, something she could reply on to be absolutely certain. She hated Darcy. Darcy was a bad guy. These were two points of absolute fact, and Lizzie - well, Lizzie likes dealing with facts. She excels best when she’s dealing with facts, with certainty. But now that those facts are changing, now that she’s here and she’s realizing Darcy maybe isn’t the guy she thought he was, the line is constantly blurring, the boldness growing more and more dim. She finds herself toeing it constantly, this once bold and angry line. Lizzie finds a part of herself she is not ready to admit exists thinking just maybe when he looks at her the way he does.
Then, all too clearly, Lizzie remembers Jane’s heartbreak, the long nights spent lying awake listening to the sound of her sobs just one room over, and the line becomes bold again, harder to cross.
Clearing his throat, Darcy averts eye contact, moves around her, and closes the door. Maybe he’s gearing up for a fight, maybe he thinks she’s going to yell, but she’s not, she won’t, and closing the door is rather pointless because there is barely anyone still working anyway. She turns, watching him, taking in the way he reaches up to rub at the back of his neck for a split second before allowing his hand to fall back into place at his side. His fingers fidget, but resist curling into fists. It’s a tick of his, a rare depiction of vulnerability, and Lizzie recognizes it immediately, files it away.
She’s starting to amass all of these useless tidbits of information pertaining to all things Darcy, but she has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
When he glances at her then, he looks both stricken and proud. Lizzie hadn’t realized that was possible, and the incredulous laughter catches in her throat.
“I am sorry that I hurt your sister. I am sorry that I hurt you,” he tells her.
Her voice is quiet when she asks, “But you still aren’t sorry for doing it? Even now that you know the truth?”
Darcy presses his mouth into a straight line. “I was looking out for my friend. Surely you can understand that,” he says tiredly.
Lizzie nods, quick and severe, and knows Darcy reads the meaning behind it: She is capable of understanding, but understanding doesn’t equate to acceptance. It doesn’t equate to forgiveness - even if a significant part of her is slowly realizing the forgiveness isn’t hers to give.
It comes out of nowhere - his touch. Darcy reaches for her, his fingers spreading over the skin at her wrist, and the suddenness of the contact literally makes her dizzy. She doesn’t move away. She stares at their hands, then his face, at the way he’s looking at her with a mixture of affection and uncertainty. Her eyes flick to his mouth unconsciously. This is not unlike any situation she’s ever been in before, but it is the first time she’s ever been in this situation with Darcy, this is the first time he’s initiated physical contact, and she absolutely hates that the part of herself housing the immediate reaction to pull away is drowned out by the part that, well, doesn’t.
He takes a step closer, and suddenly he’s too close. It’s confusing. She can’t think. Lizzie shakes her head, starts to move away.
Naturally, this is also when she kisses him.
It starts with a rising panic that catches in her throat as her mouth slides against his. Darcy is unbelievably still at first, his spine rigid even though she literally has to fist her hands in his shirt to pull him down to her height because he’s so damn tall. But he’s still, like he’s holding his breath, waiting for her to pull away, and she starts to, starts to admit her mistake, murmur her apologizes when his mouth finally starts to move against hers. There’s a sudden rush of warmth that sparks at the base of her spine and spreads. His hands reach up, tangle in her hair, and she makes a sound in the back of her throat that she’s never really heard herself make before. Darcy kisses her back harder.
But this kiss is not romantic.
It’s messy. Desperate. His mouth is warm. He tastes like mint and tea, and she gasps when she feels his tongue slide along her lip. The keys she had forgotten she was holding drop to the floor, and she moves that hand to his back, flattens her palm between his shoulder blades, tugging him closer until he’s flush against her. She feels his hands start to move slowly, like he’s asking permission, and Lizzie gives it to him by kissing him harder, deeper, flicking her tongue against his. His hands are at her back immediately, moving down quickly thereafter, lingering near her hips. His fingers dig in, curl into the fabric of her dress. She swallows his soft moan, claims it as her own.
Before she knows what’s happening, their feet are moving, not stopping until her back hits the corner of his desk.
It’s too much, too soon, and her heart is racing. She has to pull back, and when she does, he nods, his breathing heavy as he closes his eyes and drops his head. He says something, but she can’t hear him over the sound of her heart pounding in her head. Darcy presses his mouth to the skin at her collarbone and she shudders. She counts her breaths, tries to even them out. She thinks about before, their conversation on camera, runs it backwards and forwards in her head just as she had when she walked the distance form her office to his, and it calms her - have something to focus on, something to dissect and analyze.
She is the first to speak.
“Do you still…” She is about use the term love, but it tastes foreign on the tip of her tongue, dirty. She closes her eyes when she continues, “Do you still have feelings for me?” she asks before she can lose her nerve, before her brain kicks in. Her voice is not like her own. It shakes and she knows the answer already, knows what he will say, but she wants to hear him say it. She can’t keep taking things from him, can’t keep expecting him to make such allowances for her, she knows this, but she also hasn’t always been the nicest person.
Darcy laughs, but it isn’t kind. The sound of it and the loss of warmth as he moves away from her causes her eyes to snap open and slam into his.
“Yes,” he tells her, unashamed, and it would sound more incredulous, she’s sure, if he wasn’t still trying to regain his breathing.
He stares at her then. He stares at her the way he did just twenty minutes before during filming, the way he did last week, the way he did last fall. It’s open and honest, the way he looks at her, vulnerable, and it’s too much. He’s still too close. With a foot or more of space between them, he is still too close. Lizzie goes to take a step back, but there is nowhere to go. The panic rises in her throat again, but she swallows around it. Lizzie thinks of lines and boundaries. She wants to hate herself for kissing him, and maybe she will later, but it was a really good kiss. It was the best kiss of her life probably, but she’s not about to tell him that. She’s not about to admit that aloud. She’s not ready to admit that aloud.
“I have some things I need to figure out,” she says instead, slowly. He nods. Looks hopeful. She thinks about kissing him again. “We can’t do this until I figure those things out.”
“No,” he replies. There is the barest hint of a smile spreading across his mouth. “We cannot.”
“But I want to,” she tells him quietly. “I want you to know that I want to.”
Darcy reaches for her again, his touch slight, tentative as his fingers circle around her wrist.
Lizzie stares at their hands for a long time.