"come along now, little darlin'" (Black Swan)
Title: come along now, little darlin'
Author: la_petite_singe
Rating/Warnings: PG-13
Original Prompt: Black Swan - Nina/Lily - f/f: thought she deserved no less than she’d give / well happy birthday / her blood’s on my hands / it’s kind of a shame cause i did like that dress (x)
Summary: Lily's version of the events of that night when they went out clubbing together. Kind of a what-could-have-been...?
Notes: I've never written second-person before, so...yay. Betad by the lovely mutantjules.
You had a feeling she would be one of those affectionate types once the drugs took hold--she’s so tightly-wound; they’re nearly always the wildest ones underneath, the ones with the most to give. And sure enough, as soon as you’re on the dance floor together, her arms are around your neck and she’s breathing in your ear, "This is amazing. Amazing. Oh, there’s so much." And you laugh and hang onto her, feeling her long hair tickling your arms and her faintly sweaty skin, and somehow you feel like you’ve been waiting for her for a long time and she’s finally here.
You suggest another round of shots just to see what she’ll say, and she laughs a wild sound you haven’t heard from her before and she cries “Yes!” in a voice that makes people around you turn to look. When the bartender brings them over she looks at you with enormous eyes and says "Can we do that thing--you know, where you drink them off someone else...? I saw it in a movie once," and you want to wrap her in your arms and hide her away forever, because sometimes the world is just a little too big for her.
You throw salt on your neck and her tongue is eager and unpracticed there, and she can barely get her mouth around the glass but you don’t mind because her nose nudging against your chest is making you laugh and sigh at the same time. She nearly drops the glass when she throws her head back, but you catch it in one hand and she cheers with both arms in the air, and when she dives for the wedge in your mouth she puts both hands on your face and doesn’t take her mouth off of yours for a long, long moment. People around you are cheering, but all you can hear is her soft panting and the sound of her tongue against your lips, and you know you’ll never taste another lime without thinking of her.
"Well, well," you say as you slide onto stools at the bar once she releases you, looking around and giggling with shock at how brave she is. "Looks like Odile’s finally here." Your arm fits just perfectly around her shoulders, it seems. "I knew you had it in you."
She nuzzles her head against you again. "I’m the Swan Queen," she says dreamily. "I always knew I’d be her someday. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to be. You know, I wouldn’t..." She turns her head and grins into your face through a haze. "I wouldn’t be anything else for Halloween when I was little. Just the same outfit every year. White tulle, and feathers...I wanted to wear it every day."
You laugh again. "Somehow I can imagine that," you say. "Guess you were born for the part," but somewhere behind your mind you’re thinking, what kind of little kid only wants to be a girl who kills herself for love? I wanted to be Catwoman every year.
"’S all I ever wanted to be," she says again, lifting her right arm as if for an arabesque. "And it’s all I’m ever gonna be."
It takes a few seconds for you to really hear her words over the pounding music and the pleasant hum in your head. "Whaddya mean, ’all you’re ever going to be’?" you ask. "This is gonna lead to so much more cool shit for you. Once people see you dance this part, you’re gonna have all kinds of offers. Especially if you’re Thomas’ little princess," you add, nudging her with a teasing elbow.
She shakes her head in a slow sweeping motion, back and forth. "No," she says. "This is it. I don’t want anything else after this. Never gonna be more perfect."
"C’mon, don’t say that," you tell her, because somehow you can tell that she really means it; the drugs and the music and the night aren’t talking for her, they’re letting her talk for herself for once. "You can want whatever you...want. There’s always more perfect out there. You just have to go get it." Maybe it doesn’t make sense, maybe she can’t understand you. But you want her to know that she deserves more than what she lets herself have, more than what she thinks she has to give.
She grins at you again, eyes half-closed, and when she turns to put her arm around you she nearly falls off the stool. You catch her like you caught the shot glass, and the bartender glances over. "Maybe she’s had enough," he says, and you just smirk back. Enough is something she’s never had before.
You take her back on the dance floor (or maybe she takes you; it’s hard to tell) and for a while you disappear into sound; into the pounding base and the sound of your breath-and hers too, when she leans in close and slides her hands down to your hips. There are colors too, of course, there always are; you think you discover ten new ones every time you slip inside the drugs’ grasp. But this time there’s even more, sights and new pictures you’ve never had before, things you didn’t even think were in your mind: bright pink butterflies, it seems, bursting before your eyes like fast-blooming flowers. There’s a huge, pale, cold moon as well; you half-reach out for it, expecting to feel your fingers scraping rock. And--strange faces, moving fast everywhere around you, sharp beaks and orange eyes and feathers, dark silky feathers that you can almost feel against your face. For some reason you’re sure it’s all hers, in a way, and when her fingers close painfully tight on your arm and she gasps “did you see that?” in your ear, you hear yourself saying yes without even knowing what she means.
After a while you head for the bathroom and she follows you, fingers still tangled in yours. You push her into a stall, laughing: “Get in there, you won’t know you have to go ‘til it’s too late!” You hear her humming behind the metal door and you can’t help but laugh again; when you look in the mirror your hair is wild and there’s a grin on your face that you haven’t seen there in years. It’s like she gave that back to you as well. When she opens the door and makes for the sink, though, she nearly falls again onto the dirty tile, and you have to rush to grab her. She’s giggling again, but you can see the exhaustion settling over her face; she always looks stressed to you, really: there’s always some kind of worry darting between her eyes, but now it’s a sleepy, pleasured look. She looks--you can’t help it--almost like you think she might if you’d just made her come; you’re shocked at yourself for thinking it and then you’re surprised that you’re shocked; you didn’t think anyone could do that to you anymore.
You want to keep her by your side all night, but you can tell she’s had it. You take her outside and the boys follow and hover in the doorway; you know they’re waiting for you to come back inside and you can sense that old feeling of their eyes like hands on you, but right now you don’t care about anything but her. She’s so light under your arm as you try to flag down a cab, and she’s humming again, a familiar tune under her breath. You wonder if she sings it in her sleep. “Here’s one,” you say as a yellow car veers towards you, and when she turns to look and realizes, she grabs onto you.
"Come with me," she whispers, her eyes hungry on your face. "Let’s go home, Lily. Please?" And then she’s kissing you again, missing your mouth by an inch or two and trailing soft words on your jaw, your neck. "Come on, I haven’t seen the night sky yet."
You don’t even have to think about it; you know you want to. You want to show her the things that she’s been missing, you want her to find herself against your skin and lose your hands in her hair. But she’s so new, she seems so young and her face is so open with longing. She’s still lit up and singing with the drugs; she’s more herself than she’s ever been and yet she’s not entirely inside herself, and it wouldn’t feel right to show her everything she’s not ready to remember yet. So you just smile at her and kiss her on both cheeks, and you open the door of the cab and say "You’d better get to bed, you’re onstage tomorrow. Just show ‘em everything you showed me tonight and they’ll all be fuckin’ floored."
She looks at you sadly through the window, and you have to force your eyes away and tell the driver her address. You can’t help but watch as she disappears down the street, and you lift a hand and wave when she’s too far away to see. You can’t remember the last time you felt this way; you’re not used to nights like these ending with regret. You thought that wasn’t something you bothered to allow anymore. Maybe she’s showing you new parts of yourself, too.
You go back inside and soon there’s more dancing, more loud red-green-blue laughter and a dozen hands all over. And for a while you pretend it’s just like any other night; you throw back your head and give them that smile they’re all waiting for, and eventually you come down and there’s just ringing in your ears and smoke in your heart and just the faintest taste of lime to let you know she was ever there.
But later, when you’re in a dark bedroom and Tom’s mouth is rough on your neck and his artless fingers are trembling on your bra clasp, you’re still thinking of her. You’re wondering what she’s doing now and wishing your hands were still on her waist, wishing she was still murmuring in your ear and asking you to show her into the garden of everything she’s never allowed herself to have. You want to be the one to show her what perfection really is.
(x-posted to A03, maybe.)
Author: la_petite_singe
Rating/Warnings: PG-13
Original Prompt: Black Swan - Nina/Lily - f/f: thought she deserved no less than she’d give / well happy birthday / her blood’s on my hands / it’s kind of a shame cause i did like that dress (x)
Summary: Lily's version of the events of that night when they went out clubbing together. Kind of a what-could-have-been...?
Notes: I've never written second-person before, so...yay. Betad by the lovely mutantjules.
You had a feeling she would be one of those affectionate types once the drugs took hold--she’s so tightly-wound; they’re nearly always the wildest ones underneath, the ones with the most to give. And sure enough, as soon as you’re on the dance floor together, her arms are around your neck and she’s breathing in your ear, "This is amazing. Amazing. Oh, there’s so much." And you laugh and hang onto her, feeling her long hair tickling your arms and her faintly sweaty skin, and somehow you feel like you’ve been waiting for her for a long time and she’s finally here.
You suggest another round of shots just to see what she’ll say, and she laughs a wild sound you haven’t heard from her before and she cries “Yes!” in a voice that makes people around you turn to look. When the bartender brings them over she looks at you with enormous eyes and says "Can we do that thing--you know, where you drink them off someone else...? I saw it in a movie once," and you want to wrap her in your arms and hide her away forever, because sometimes the world is just a little too big for her.
You throw salt on your neck and her tongue is eager and unpracticed there, and she can barely get her mouth around the glass but you don’t mind because her nose nudging against your chest is making you laugh and sigh at the same time. She nearly drops the glass when she throws her head back, but you catch it in one hand and she cheers with both arms in the air, and when she dives for the wedge in your mouth she puts both hands on your face and doesn’t take her mouth off of yours for a long, long moment. People around you are cheering, but all you can hear is her soft panting and the sound of her tongue against your lips, and you know you’ll never taste another lime without thinking of her.
"Well, well," you say as you slide onto stools at the bar once she releases you, looking around and giggling with shock at how brave she is. "Looks like Odile’s finally here." Your arm fits just perfectly around her shoulders, it seems. "I knew you had it in you."
She nuzzles her head against you again. "I’m the Swan Queen," she says dreamily. "I always knew I’d be her someday. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to be. You know, I wouldn’t..." She turns her head and grins into your face through a haze. "I wouldn’t be anything else for Halloween when I was little. Just the same outfit every year. White tulle, and feathers...I wanted to wear it every day."
You laugh again. "Somehow I can imagine that," you say. "Guess you were born for the part," but somewhere behind your mind you’re thinking, what kind of little kid only wants to be a girl who kills herself for love? I wanted to be Catwoman every year.
"’S all I ever wanted to be," she says again, lifting her right arm as if for an arabesque. "And it’s all I’m ever gonna be."
It takes a few seconds for you to really hear her words over the pounding music and the pleasant hum in your head. "Whaddya mean, ’all you’re ever going to be’?" you ask. "This is gonna lead to so much more cool shit for you. Once people see you dance this part, you’re gonna have all kinds of offers. Especially if you’re Thomas’ little princess," you add, nudging her with a teasing elbow.
She shakes her head in a slow sweeping motion, back and forth. "No," she says. "This is it. I don’t want anything else after this. Never gonna be more perfect."
"C’mon, don’t say that," you tell her, because somehow you can tell that she really means it; the drugs and the music and the night aren’t talking for her, they’re letting her talk for herself for once. "You can want whatever you...want. There’s always more perfect out there. You just have to go get it." Maybe it doesn’t make sense, maybe she can’t understand you. But you want her to know that she deserves more than what she lets herself have, more than what she thinks she has to give.
She grins at you again, eyes half-closed, and when she turns to put her arm around you she nearly falls off the stool. You catch her like you caught the shot glass, and the bartender glances over. "Maybe she’s had enough," he says, and you just smirk back. Enough is something she’s never had before.
You take her back on the dance floor (or maybe she takes you; it’s hard to tell) and for a while you disappear into sound; into the pounding base and the sound of your breath-and hers too, when she leans in close and slides her hands down to your hips. There are colors too, of course, there always are; you think you discover ten new ones every time you slip inside the drugs’ grasp. But this time there’s even more, sights and new pictures you’ve never had before, things you didn’t even think were in your mind: bright pink butterflies, it seems, bursting before your eyes like fast-blooming flowers. There’s a huge, pale, cold moon as well; you half-reach out for it, expecting to feel your fingers scraping rock. And--strange faces, moving fast everywhere around you, sharp beaks and orange eyes and feathers, dark silky feathers that you can almost feel against your face. For some reason you’re sure it’s all hers, in a way, and when her fingers close painfully tight on your arm and she gasps “did you see that?” in your ear, you hear yourself saying yes without even knowing what she means.
After a while you head for the bathroom and she follows you, fingers still tangled in yours. You push her into a stall, laughing: “Get in there, you won’t know you have to go ‘til it’s too late!” You hear her humming behind the metal door and you can’t help but laugh again; when you look in the mirror your hair is wild and there’s a grin on your face that you haven’t seen there in years. It’s like she gave that back to you as well. When she opens the door and makes for the sink, though, she nearly falls again onto the dirty tile, and you have to rush to grab her. She’s giggling again, but you can see the exhaustion settling over her face; she always looks stressed to you, really: there’s always some kind of worry darting between her eyes, but now it’s a sleepy, pleasured look. She looks--you can’t help it--almost like you think she might if you’d just made her come; you’re shocked at yourself for thinking it and then you’re surprised that you’re shocked; you didn’t think anyone could do that to you anymore.
You want to keep her by your side all night, but you can tell she’s had it. You take her outside and the boys follow and hover in the doorway; you know they’re waiting for you to come back inside and you can sense that old feeling of their eyes like hands on you, but right now you don’t care about anything but her. She’s so light under your arm as you try to flag down a cab, and she’s humming again, a familiar tune under her breath. You wonder if she sings it in her sleep. “Here’s one,” you say as a yellow car veers towards you, and when she turns to look and realizes, she grabs onto you.
"Come with me," she whispers, her eyes hungry on your face. "Let’s go home, Lily. Please?" And then she’s kissing you again, missing your mouth by an inch or two and trailing soft words on your jaw, your neck. "Come on, I haven’t seen the night sky yet."
You don’t even have to think about it; you know you want to. You want to show her the things that she’s been missing, you want her to find herself against your skin and lose your hands in her hair. But she’s so new, she seems so young and her face is so open with longing. She’s still lit up and singing with the drugs; she’s more herself than she’s ever been and yet she’s not entirely inside herself, and it wouldn’t feel right to show her everything she’s not ready to remember yet. So you just smile at her and kiss her on both cheeks, and you open the door of the cab and say "You’d better get to bed, you’re onstage tomorrow. Just show ‘em everything you showed me tonight and they’ll all be fuckin’ floored."
She looks at you sadly through the window, and you have to force your eyes away and tell the driver her address. You can’t help but watch as she disappears down the street, and you lift a hand and wave when she’s too far away to see. You can’t remember the last time you felt this way; you’re not used to nights like these ending with regret. You thought that wasn’t something you bothered to allow anymore. Maybe she’s showing you new parts of yourself, too.
You go back inside and soon there’s more dancing, more loud red-green-blue laughter and a dozen hands all over. And for a while you pretend it’s just like any other night; you throw back your head and give them that smile they’re all waiting for, and eventually you come down and there’s just ringing in your ears and smoke in your heart and just the faintest taste of lime to let you know she was ever there.
But later, when you’re in a dark bedroom and Tom’s mouth is rough on your neck and his artless fingers are trembling on your bra clasp, you’re still thinking of her. You’re wondering what she’s doing now and wishing your hands were still on her waist, wishing she was still murmuring in your ear and asking you to show her into the garden of everything she’s never allowed herself to have. You want to be the one to show her what perfection really is.
(x-posted to A03, maybe.)