Fic - We Were Never Good With Continuity (Lily, Rufus/Lily) pg-13, 1/1
Title: We Were Never Good With Continuity
Summary: What does it say about them that she can't remember a time in her life when he wasn't a part of it in some way. They've been here before and it doesn't get any easier.
Rating: pg-13
Author's Notes: Spoilers for and up to 2x11. 1,447 words. All mistakes are mine. These characters, however, are not. Read and enjoy! Feedback is a lovely, lovely thing.
Lily’s fingers curl around the wineglass, diamonds in her wedding band glimmering in the dim light of the loft and she unconsciously uses her pinky to twist the band so the light doesn’t catch the stone.
She sighs, heavy and weighted, the air leaving her in a long whoosh of air.
It’s the cheap wine in her glass, she thinks - a red, dry, from the corner market probably. Rufus is a scotch man, always liked the feel of the tumbler between his fingers, and Allison passes through her thoughts briefly, in Hudson happier than her and Rufus combined.
The irony tastes bitter on her lips, and she washes it down with another sip of wine, and there’s a look from across the room, his eyes on hers, smile on her lips and her heart does that thing it so often does when he’s involved.
Maybe it’s this, too. Them. Jenny and Eric huddled together with Dan and Vanessa watching TV in the living room. Serena on her way. Rufus and her, separated by distance and time and all the things they don’t know how to say to each other anymore, with soft glances, and wistful sighs filling the space between instead.
“You want to talk about it?” He’s near her now, her side an inch away from his as he rests his back against the counter behind them. Lily takes in the arch of his back, the stubble on his chin, the way his voice sinks into her skin and deeper.
Another sip of wine. “Not much to say, really.”
Rufus raises an eyebrow, nudging her and her mind wanders backwards, through the cloudiness of years and decades, his fingers on her stomach, between her thighs, his lips a whisper on the skin between her collarbone and shoulder. She does this a lot these days, lets her mind wonder to happier times, and isn’t ashamed enough to look away.
“I doubt that.”
More wine and she unconsciously takes a side-step closer, inclosing on what little personal space he had put between them. Rufus doesn’t seem to mind.
“He, uh, well,” she smiles tightly, teeth and all, and wonders if he thinks the lines near her mouth are as unsexy as she finds them. “Eric found files in Bart’s study. On us. Me I can understand, but my children? I don’t know. It’s was just taking things a step too far.”
“We both know that Bart has never been one for boundaries,” he says, a hint of smile in his tone even if it’s not evident on his face. He seems smug almost and Lily knows he’s happy she’s here, but it’s more than that, too.
Another side-step, him this time, and her side is now flush up against his. She breathes him in.
“You know,” he begins after a pause. “it’s the file on you that I don’t understand, actually. Shouldn’t he know all of that stuff to begin with? What’s the need for a file?”
“Everyone has their secrets, Rufus.”
There’s a small smile playing on his lips, a hint of the idealism she fell in love with all those years ago.
“Isn’t that what marriage is about though? Taking your deepest and darkest secrets handing them over and saying for better, for worse?”
Lily finishes the wine in her glass and reaches forward for the bottle. He pours it for her without even asking. “I think you’re asking the wrong girl.”
Rufus chuckles mirthlessly. “Probably,” there is a sigh, then, “What do we know about marriage anyway?”
“You made yours work a hell of a lot longer than I could have ever managed.”
“Yeah, well, out of sight out of mind, right?” He says and it takes a minute to sink in but when it does it’s like a sucker punch to the gut, deep and wounding and she fiddles with the hem of her shirt to avoid eye contact. A long pause, a step back, an assessment of the line drawn between them. “Do you love him? Bart I mean?”
“In my own way,” she answers without thinking, a simple truth, and isn’t even taken aback because this is her and this is Rufus and she could lie or act affronted, but he’d see right through it, so what’s the point?
Her mouth opens to say more, but she doesn’t. She bites the inside of her cheek, rolls the glass between the palms of her hands. Lily wants to tell him that she gave up on fairy tales and happily ever after a lifetime ago. She wants to say that somewhere along the way she started regarding love as this secondary thing. Something that was nice to have, sure, but paled in comparison to things like security and stability. She wants to tell him that there’s that idealistic part of her that believes true love is once in a lifetime but she’s already had it and let it go so everything else is pretty much negated for her, isn’t it?
She says nothing and it’s not a surprise to either one of them.
“Fair enough.”
“Do you remember our first thanksgiving?” She asks before she can stop herself because the past is something that weighs heavily on her mind these days, but the smile that spread to his face makes it worth it.
Another shared smile and Lily remembers younger versions of themselves, cooking all day, sipping on beers and watching football. They had laid in bed all afternoon, wrapped around each other like the line where he began and she ended didn’t exist and when she looks back on the two of them, it’s those things she likes to remember the most. Those times when it was like nothing else mattered. Those times when happiness was this tangible thing that was so close she could taste it.
What does it say about the two of them, Lily muses, that she can’t remember a time in her life when he wasn’t a part of it in some way?
“I remember you burnt the mashed potatoes,” he says fondly.
A corner of her mouth twitches upwards. “But I made some mean cranberry sauce.”
“You went down to the corner market and bought it, Lil. I don’t think that counts.”
His voice is teetering on the edge of teasing and she misses this sort of thing. This familiarity. This blurring of the edges between friends and lovers, the intimacy of standing so close to someone and just being.
Lily misses a lot of things these days.
A chuckle and she covers the dryness with a smile. “Yes, well, that’s why I always left the cooking to you, wasn’t it?”
They laugh and it’s a nice sound, almost foreign to her ears, and she breathes it in, makes a memory of this moment for later when she’s forgotten what the sound is like again.
“God,” Rufus breathes, and the way his eyes light up is something sort of beautiful. “We were happy, weren’t we?”
“Yeah, we were.”
There’s a look again, and Lily should look away, avert eye contact, but doesn’t. It’s a moment where, if they were two different people, in a different place, one of them would lean in, brush their lips against the others. It would be a rekindling of sorts. A new beginning, a reinvention, and later, there would be skin against skin, a familiar dance. But they aren’t, and she knows better, and he looks away at just the right moment, always there, it seems, to save her from herself.
Lily wonders idly is if this is how love stories really go: two people who loved each other but never find the right page.
“I’m happy you’re here, Lil,” he says and she reads the I miss you in-between the words.
“I am, too.”
She nearly smiles, nearly wishes for years ago when he was a distant thought that kept her warm at night.
It was easier then, easier to adjust day by day, to look in the mirror with her shorter hair and sharper angles and not see the girl underneath that she’d buried along the way. Easier to forget what it was like the be a half of a whole instead of constantly looking for the missing pieces of herself that had been scattered somewhere along the way.
Instead she gets here and now, him next to her, side against hers, close but not close enough, the diamonds of her wedding band hidden between her fingers, out of sight, out of mind.
Lily turns her head a little, just to watch him, and counts the lines on his face and the spaces in-between his breaths.
It’s all that’s left, really.
Summary: What does it say about them that she can't remember a time in her life when he wasn't a part of it in some way. They've been here before and it doesn't get any easier.
Rating: pg-13
Author's Notes: Spoilers for and up to 2x11. 1,447 words. All mistakes are mine. These characters, however, are not. Read and enjoy! Feedback is a lovely, lovely thing.
Lily’s fingers curl around the wineglass, diamonds in her wedding band glimmering in the dim light of the loft and she unconsciously uses her pinky to twist the band so the light doesn’t catch the stone.
She sighs, heavy and weighted, the air leaving her in a long whoosh of air.
It’s the cheap wine in her glass, she thinks - a red, dry, from the corner market probably. Rufus is a scotch man, always liked the feel of the tumbler between his fingers, and Allison passes through her thoughts briefly, in Hudson happier than her and Rufus combined.
The irony tastes bitter on her lips, and she washes it down with another sip of wine, and there’s a look from across the room, his eyes on hers, smile on her lips and her heart does that thing it so often does when he’s involved.
Maybe it’s this, too. Them. Jenny and Eric huddled together with Dan and Vanessa watching TV in the living room. Serena on her way. Rufus and her, separated by distance and time and all the things they don’t know how to say to each other anymore, with soft glances, and wistful sighs filling the space between instead.
“You want to talk about it?” He’s near her now, her side an inch away from his as he rests his back against the counter behind them. Lily takes in the arch of his back, the stubble on his chin, the way his voice sinks into her skin and deeper.
Another sip of wine. “Not much to say, really.”
Rufus raises an eyebrow, nudging her and her mind wanders backwards, through the cloudiness of years and decades, his fingers on her stomach, between her thighs, his lips a whisper on the skin between her collarbone and shoulder. She does this a lot these days, lets her mind wonder to happier times, and isn’t ashamed enough to look away.
“I doubt that.”
More wine and she unconsciously takes a side-step closer, inclosing on what little personal space he had put between them. Rufus doesn’t seem to mind.
“He, uh, well,” she smiles tightly, teeth and all, and wonders if he thinks the lines near her mouth are as unsexy as she finds them. “Eric found files in Bart’s study. On us. Me I can understand, but my children? I don’t know. It’s was just taking things a step too far.”
“We both know that Bart has never been one for boundaries,” he says, a hint of smile in his tone even if it’s not evident on his face. He seems smug almost and Lily knows he’s happy she’s here, but it’s more than that, too.
Another side-step, him this time, and her side is now flush up against his. She breathes him in.
“You know,” he begins after a pause. “it’s the file on you that I don’t understand, actually. Shouldn’t he know all of that stuff to begin with? What’s the need for a file?”
“Everyone has their secrets, Rufus.”
There’s a small smile playing on his lips, a hint of the idealism she fell in love with all those years ago.
“Isn’t that what marriage is about though? Taking your deepest and darkest secrets handing them over and saying for better, for worse?”
Lily finishes the wine in her glass and reaches forward for the bottle. He pours it for her without even asking. “I think you’re asking the wrong girl.”
Rufus chuckles mirthlessly. “Probably,” there is a sigh, then, “What do we know about marriage anyway?”
“You made yours work a hell of a lot longer than I could have ever managed.”
“Yeah, well, out of sight out of mind, right?” He says and it takes a minute to sink in but when it does it’s like a sucker punch to the gut, deep and wounding and she fiddles with the hem of her shirt to avoid eye contact. A long pause, a step back, an assessment of the line drawn between them. “Do you love him? Bart I mean?”
“In my own way,” she answers without thinking, a simple truth, and isn’t even taken aback because this is her and this is Rufus and she could lie or act affronted, but he’d see right through it, so what’s the point?
Her mouth opens to say more, but she doesn’t. She bites the inside of her cheek, rolls the glass between the palms of her hands. Lily wants to tell him that she gave up on fairy tales and happily ever after a lifetime ago. She wants to say that somewhere along the way she started regarding love as this secondary thing. Something that was nice to have, sure, but paled in comparison to things like security and stability. She wants to tell him that there’s that idealistic part of her that believes true love is once in a lifetime but she’s already had it and let it go so everything else is pretty much negated for her, isn’t it?
She says nothing and it’s not a surprise to either one of them.
“Fair enough.”
“Do you remember our first thanksgiving?” She asks before she can stop herself because the past is something that weighs heavily on her mind these days, but the smile that spread to his face makes it worth it.
Another shared smile and Lily remembers younger versions of themselves, cooking all day, sipping on beers and watching football. They had laid in bed all afternoon, wrapped around each other like the line where he began and she ended didn’t exist and when she looks back on the two of them, it’s those things she likes to remember the most. Those times when it was like nothing else mattered. Those times when happiness was this tangible thing that was so close she could taste it.
What does it say about the two of them, Lily muses, that she can’t remember a time in her life when he wasn’t a part of it in some way?
“I remember you burnt the mashed potatoes,” he says fondly.
A corner of her mouth twitches upwards. “But I made some mean cranberry sauce.”
“You went down to the corner market and bought it, Lil. I don’t think that counts.”
His voice is teetering on the edge of teasing and she misses this sort of thing. This familiarity. This blurring of the edges between friends and lovers, the intimacy of standing so close to someone and just being.
Lily misses a lot of things these days.
A chuckle and she covers the dryness with a smile. “Yes, well, that’s why I always left the cooking to you, wasn’t it?”
They laugh and it’s a nice sound, almost foreign to her ears, and she breathes it in, makes a memory of this moment for later when she’s forgotten what the sound is like again.
“God,” Rufus breathes, and the way his eyes light up is something sort of beautiful. “We were happy, weren’t we?”
“Yeah, we were.”
There’s a look again, and Lily should look away, avert eye contact, but doesn’t. It’s a moment where, if they were two different people, in a different place, one of them would lean in, brush their lips against the others. It would be a rekindling of sorts. A new beginning, a reinvention, and later, there would be skin against skin, a familiar dance. But they aren’t, and she knows better, and he looks away at just the right moment, always there, it seems, to save her from herself.
Lily wonders idly is if this is how love stories really go: two people who loved each other but never find the right page.
“I’m happy you’re here, Lil,” he says and she reads the I miss you in-between the words.
“I am, too.”
She nearly smiles, nearly wishes for years ago when he was a distant thought that kept her warm at night.
It was easier then, easier to adjust day by day, to look in the mirror with her shorter hair and sharper angles and not see the girl underneath that she’d buried along the way. Easier to forget what it was like the be a half of a whole instead of constantly looking for the missing pieces of herself that had been scattered somewhere along the way.
Instead she gets here and now, him next to her, side against hers, close but not close enough, the diamonds of her wedding band hidden between her fingers, out of sight, out of mind.
Lily turns her head a little, just to watch him, and counts the lines on his face and the spaces in-between his breaths.
It’s all that’s left, really.