Fic: Even When the Sun Goes Down [3/11]
Title: Even When the Sun Goes Down
Author: luna_plath
Rating: Mature
Pairing: Jon/Sansa
Word count: 4,200
Warnings: character death, sexuality, mentions of past abusive relationship,
Summary: The murder of Ned Stark shocks all of central North Carolina. While the police investigate the circumstances surrounding Ned's murder, his daughter Sansa Stark reunites with Jon Snow, an old family friend. An Afghan War veteran, Snow takes it upon himself to investigate Ned's mysterious death--whatever the cost.
AN: My version of Shae is inspired more by the show than canon. Also, Jon/Sansa is the main pairing in this fic, even though there are a lot of side pairings going on.
Sansa stood in front of the bathroom mirror with her makeup bag, swiping lip-gloss over her mouth and pressing her lips together. She brushed through her hair while Myranda chatted to her from across the hall, wondering if the white top she wore looked wrong against her pale skin.
“You look nice,” Myranda said, hands on her hips. She looked Sansa up and down suspiciously. “Are you all dressed up just for class?”
“Do I look dressed up?” Sansa asked, an unopened tube of mascara in her hand.
She wore a white camisole under her sheer, blousy top, along with a pair of jeans what were ripped at the knee. Her mother didn’t approve of these pants because Sansa hadn’t torn them herself-Catelyn Stark saw no sense in buying jeans that already had holes-but Sansa thought they made the outfit look more casual.
“You just have on more makeup than usual, that’s all.”
She frowned at the mascara in her hand, “Does it look bad?”
“No! Of course not.”
Biting her lower lip, she said, “I’m meeting Jon for lunch after class.”
Sansa didn’t want to admit it in front of Myranda, but she had been spending more and more time with Jon Snow. After the time they got coffee together she hadn’t wanted to see him, she’d felt embarrassed that she’d had a panic attack in front of one of her brother’s older friends, but one day she had been studying in the library and they had run into each other. Jon sat with her at the study table and they spent at least two hours talking. Sansa had gotten very little studying done that day, but she had learned that she and Jon had more in common than she thought.
He’d told her that he had panic attacks too, that he would see or hear something that reminded him of Afghanistan and his chest would get tighter and tighter until he couldn’t breathe.
“Have you been to a doctor?” she’d asked.
Jon had just shaken his head. “No. I know people who have, but I don’t want any medication and I don’t like telling people about this.”
“You’re telling me about it.”
He had blushed then, a half-smile spreading across his face. “But you’re different.”
Sansa decided against the mascara and brushed her hair one last time, dabbing a bit of perfume under her neck and on her wrists before grabbing her bag for class.
“When do I get to meet this Jon Snow?” Myranda teased.
She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks, but Sansa pretended that she wasn’t embarrassed. “I don’t know, soon maybe? We’re just friends.”
“Right. I hope you have a nice time at your friendly lunch.”
--
By the time Sansa got out of class it had already grown hot and sticky, but she hardly noticed as a curl of excitement began to twist in her belly. They were meeting at a restaurant called Nosh and, surprisingly, she was the first one to arrive. Normally Jon would be there before her and he would always choose a spot that gave him a clear view of the door and anyone who came in or out. She guessed it was one of those things he hadn’t been able to let go of from Ranger school.
She found a table that had a good view of the entrance and ordered a diet coke. By the time her drink arrived Jon was walking toward her, his bag on his shoulder and his dark curls pushed out of his face.
“You’re early,” he said, giving her the small half-smile that made the back of her neck tingle.
Sansa dragged her finger over the damp surface of her glass. “I came here as soon as I got out of marketing.”
“It’s still hard for me to think of you as a marketing major,” he said, ordering an iced tea with lemon.
“Why?”
Shrugging, he said, “I always thought you would end up in fashion. I remember you sewing all the time when you were in high school.”
“I wanted to study fashion, but I thought marketing would be more practical. I still sew all the time-I made this shirt, actually.”
Sansa bit her lower lip as he looked at her, his gray eyes making her feel like she was the only one in the room.
“It’s pretty.” Not fully looking at her, Jon said, “I mean it’s pretty on you.”
Hearing his words made every part of her feel sharp and tingly, like she’d touched a live wire, the charge snaking up her spine and making her skin flush.
Before she had a chance to say anything else the waiter came and asked for their orders. Talking to Jon had distracted Sansa so much that she hadn’t even looked through the menu.
--
After a long day teaching classes and working in the lab the last thing Tyrion Lannister wanted to do was go to a family dinner, but his life would be much more difficult if he refused, so once he got home from work he changed into a fresh button-down and prepared himself for a meal at his brother’s house.
Shae had changed into a sundress and sandals, a marked difference from the scrubs and comfortable shoes he normally saw her in. Tyrion was proud that his wife was a surgeon, even if it meant living with conflicting schedules, long work hours, and calls to go into surgery at two in the morning.
“Do you want me to drive?” she asked, taking in his careworn appearance.
“No, that’s alright,” Tyrion said. He was tired, but Shae was probably more sleep deprived than himself and he felt guilty at the thought of asking her to drive.
If they had only been having dinner with his brother and the children then Tyrion would have been delighted at attend, but he had never gotten along well with his sister-in-law, no matter how devoted she seemed to Jaime, and his father would certainly be there as well. It was no secret that Tyrion was not the son Tywin Lannister had hoped for, and that fact had become painfully obvious now that Jaime was running for governor while Tyrion tried to teach police process to disinterested students at what his father called “an average state school.”
As they stood on the doorstep to Jaime and Cersei’s extravagant home, Shae reached for his hand and squeezed it. Tyrion squeezed back in gratitude.
Myrcella opened the door and let them in, full of questions for Shae about college and medical schools. His niece would soon be a senior in high school and she wanted to be a doctor-she was always asking his wife questions about biology and the work it took to become a surgeon.
Leading them into the living room, Myrcella said, “I’m just worried about getting into schools. I want to apply to Duke but it would be terrible if I didn’t get in.”
“Don’t worry too much, if anyone is smart enough to get into a good school it’s you,” Tyrion said.
Myrcella smiled at him. She looked very much like her mother, he thought, but Tyrion had never seen Cersei wear such a kind, genuine expression.
The rest of the family was waiting in the living room. Tyrion and Shae both hugged Tommen, who got up to greet them, while only saying hello to Joffrey, who seemed more interested in his cell phone than their arrival.
“Kind of you to finally join us,” his father said, a glass of scotch in his hand.
“I’m sorry, it’s all my fault,” said Shae. “I was late in getting home and I didn’t want to show up in my scrubs from work.”
“Now that we’re all here why don’t we get started,” Cersei said. She was smiling but Tyrion knew better-that smile only hid her annoyance with their lateness.
“Let me get you a drink,” Jaime offered, sensing the tension in the room.
As his brother poured him a generous glass of liquor Shae helped Cersei and Myrcella bring the food into the dining room. Everyone took their seats and Cersei had to remind Joffrey several times to put his cell phone away before he complied. They all bowed their heads while Tywin said grace, even Tyrion, who hadn’t stepped foot in a church since his uncle Kevan’s funeral fifteen years ago.
While his father talked with Cersei about an upcoming event for Jaime’s campaign, Tyrion turned to his two nephews.
They couldn’t be more different, he thought, noting Tommen’s easygoing expression and Joffrey’s aura of boredom and contempt.
“Tommen, I hear that you’ve become the new star of the lacrosse team at school,” Tyrion said.
Tommen lit up, eager to talk about his team and his best friend Bran Stark, who also played with him.
“Bran, isn’t he the younger brother of that girl, Sansa?”
“Yeah, he is,” Tommen said quickly, but not quick enough for Tyrion to miss Joffrey’s sour expression.
“Is something going on there?” Tyrion asked. “Aren’t you and Sansa dating?”
“We’re on a break,” Joffrey said, irritated. “Ever since her father died she hasn’t wanted to do anything.”
Tommen and Myrcella both looked afraid to say anything, glancing at their older brother before returning to their food.
“You can hardly blame the girl,” Tyrion said sympathetically.
Scowling, Joffrey said, “I can blame her for going out with other guys when we aren’t really broken up.”
He got up from the table, leaving his chair pulled out and, from the sound of his footsteps, retreating upstairs.
“Look what you did,” Cersei said angrily, looking like she wanted to follow her oldest son upstairs.
Jaime placed a hand on the small of her back. “Let him be alone for a bit. I’m sure he’ll come down later.”
Cersei sat back down but not before throwing a nasty look his way.
Finishing his glass of scotch, his father said, “Joffrey’s better off without the Stark girl. He doesn’t need to be mixed up with her family, not with what happened to her father.”
In Tyrion’s opinion, one could hardly hold it against Sansa Stark that her father had been murdered, but having already caused enough upset that evening he kept his thoughts to himself. Mirroring his father, Tyrion finished his drink. As far as he was concerned the evening couldn’t be over soon enough.
--
The fall session began in mid August, making Sansa feel like the summer had practically disappeared. During the last few weeks of the July session she had made an effort to spend more time with Myranda and her friend Mya from class, even if she still found herself hanging out with Jon nearly ever weekend.
Mya Stone was a business major from a small town in the mountains that Sansa had never heard of, but she told great jokes and was the most athletic girl Sansa had ever met. One evening they’d met in the library to study for a marketing final, and when it had come time to leave Mya had thrown her gym bag over her shoulder while Sansa stood outside of the library to wait on a friend.
“I’ll wait with you until they get here,” Mya offered. “You don’t want to stand outside by yourself, it’s dark.”
Smiling, Sansa agreed. Despite her tough exterior Mya was a sweet girl who tried to take care of everyone, especially her friends.
“Who are you meeting up with?” Mya asked.
“I’m going over to Jon’s house to hang out for a bit.”
“Is this the Jon that Myranda told me about?” she asked, playfully waggling her eyebrows.
Sansa felt her cheeks heat up from the teasing. Thankfully, it was past nine o’clock and dark enough that her friend wouldn’t be able to notice.
“Yes. We’ll probably just end up watching a movie and drinking beer, I swear,” Sansa explained.
Before Mya could tease her anymore Jon met them in front of the library, wearing a v-necked shirt and jeans and making Sansa stare at the extra bit of exposed skin on his chest. A few of his dark curls hung in his eyes and she had to remind herself not to reach forward and brush them out of the way, that Mya was there watching them.
“Hey,” Jon said, his car keys in his hand. “You all finished?”
“Yeah. Jon, this is my friend Mya.”
Mya introduced herself and said goodnight to the both of them, heading in the direction of the gym. Sansa could tell that her friend was full of questions but she was grateful that Mya had chosen to keep them to herself for the present.
Sansa knew that she would have to tell her friends more about him eventually. Still unsure of how to define her friendship with Jon, Sansa hadn’t talked to Joffrey about their relationship since they’d gone on a break. She wasn’t sure if Jon even liked her, if he thought of her as his friend’s little sister who needed to be taken care of or as someone he liked in her own right.
As August rolled into September the situation only grew more complicated. Sansa knew that she was bound to run into Joffrey on campus, they shared a lot of the same friends and he was a business major, meaning there was a chance, however small, that they would be in classes together. She continued to see articles about her uncle in the papers and the questions, stares, and poorly concealed looks from classmates became more than Sansa could handle-and all of this was in addition to her anxiety over what to do about Joffrey.
Eventually Mya and Myranda wore her down until, after two or three glasses of white zinfandel, she told them everything. Myranda asked her lots of questions about how Jon acted around her, about his body language and the way he looked at her and was she sure that she hadn’t gotten some kind of vibe from Jon? Mya stayed silent during the whole conversation, but once Sansa and Myranda had run out of impressions to discuss she flat out told Sansa to pick Jon Snow.
“He’s ten times nicer than Joffrey,” Mya said simply. “I never wanted to say anything when you were with him but Joffrey Lannister can be so full of himself.”
Sansa decided she’d had too much wine to think about the topic logically.
“I don’t even know if Jon likes me,” she explained. “And I went on a break with Joffrey because my dad died and he just…he didn’t seem to even care. I tried talking to him and he always acted like I was wasting his time.”
At this point she began to cry, her voice breaking and tears filling her eyes. Myranda hugged her close and told Sansa how sorry she was and that she only wanted things to get better for her. Sansa wiped at her eyes and gulped down the last of her wine in a long swallow, wondering how she had ended up here, drunk on a weeknight and crying about her father’s murder. She had never expected for this to happen to her family, but it had, and every day she had to wake up and acknowledge the loss her family had experienced.
“I’m going to take a shower and then I’m going to bed,” she explained, wiping at her eyes.
Sansa got in the shower and tried to wash every speck of unhappiness form her body. She washed her face, washed her hair, and scrubbed at her skin until it was pink and the bathroom mirror was completely fogged up.
--
After a few days Sansa was able to think about her situation with Joffrey more clearly. Eventually she realized that no part of her wanted to continue their relationship, it was only the matter of talking to him and making it official that scared her.
In between her classes on Thursday Sansa met up with Jon at the cafeteria, the both of them seated at an out-of-the-way table. Sansa was glad to have a chance for them to meet up, especially since he’d been busier with the start of the fall semester-he’d been given more responsibilities in the lab he worked in.
“It probably sounds like boring work, but I’ve learned a lot from Professor Lannister.”
“Tyrion Lannister?” Sansa asked.
“Yeah, he teaches in the criminal justice department. He’s a lot nicer than what I expected,” Jon said.
Joffrey had always told her stories about his “useless” uncle Tyrion who taught at their school and wasn’t interested in the family business. The way Joffrey had described him, Sansa expected Professor Lannister to be the kind of eccentric teacher with tenure that no one wanted to have as a instructor, but as Jon explained the type of research Joffrey’s uncle did her opinions about him began to change.
Sansa didn’t have much time before her next class, but when she stood up to leave, instead of grabbing her bag and walking away, she impulsively decided to give Jon a hug. For the first second he seemed surprised, then he quickly recovered, his arms fitting around her waist while his smell enveloped her.
Feeling short of breath, Sansa said, “See you later.”
Jon gave her the half-smile that made her feel fluttery and flushed along her neck. As she walked to her business class, the afternoon sun warming her skin, Sansa couldn’t stop thinking about how it had felt to have his body so close to hers.
--
Sansa tried to focus on the required reading for one of her classes, her back against the wooden headboard and her textbook spread across her lap. The sound of her phone ringing broke her concentration. Picking it up, she swiped “answer” before fully reading the name of the caller.
“Hello?”
“Sansa, it’s me. We need to talk.”
Joffrey’s voice came over the line, making her wish she had taken a better look at the caller ID before answering.
“Okay,” she started, but Sansa could barely get a word out before he cut her off.
“I’ve seen you out with other guys, Sansa. We may be on a break but that doesn’t mean you can mess around behind my back-“
“I think we should break up,” she said.
The conversation didn’t last very long after that. Sansa could tell that Joffrey was mad at her, that he’d called her expecting to hear her apologize and beg to stay with him, and when the words “break up” came out of her mouth he became increasingly angry.
“Is this what the whole break was about? You used your dead dad as an excuse to cheat on me-“
Before Joffrey could say anything else Sansa hung up the phone. Breathing heavily, she stood up and grabbed her purse, putting on the first pair of shoes she could find and walking out the front door.
--
Jon was sitting in the living room with his laptop and a couple of books from the library, trying to get ahead on a paper that was due next Wednesday. He didn’t want to spend all of Tuesday night working on this assignment, and he didn’t want to spend his weekend working on it either, which is why he’d decided to start on it early.
His decision may have been rational but it did very little to motivate him. Sam and his girlfriend Gilly were making dinner in the kitchen, with Ghost watching them from his spot on the floor, just waiting for either of them to drop a scrap of food. Jon looked over the pages he’d marked and tried to find a quote, but he dropped the book and stood up once he heard someone knocking at the door.
“I’ll get it,” he called, but Jon doubted Sam and Gilly even heard him. Sam was telling a particularly gruesome story about one of the cadavers he’d dissected in the lab, his story occasionally being drowned out by Gilly’s disgusted reaction.
Opening the door, Jon said, “Sansa.”
“Hey,” she said, her car keys still in hand. “Sorry if you’re busy, I just wanted to talk.”
“Yeah, come in,” he said. “Why don’t we go in my room? That is, unless you want to hear Sam talk about the body parts he chopped up at school.”
Sansa giggled, the small laugh visibly taking away some of the tension in her shoulders. She followed him into his bedroom and Jon had a moment of panic, wondering if he’d left out any dirty laundry. Thankfully there was nothing embarrassing upon first inspection. Sitting next to Sansa on the bed, he felt a strong shiver of heat over his skin, his mind instantly reminding him that they were alone in his bedroom and Sansa Stark was sitting awfully close to him.
Pushing her hair behind her ear, she said, “I got a call from Joffrey earlier. He got mad at me because he’d seen us out together.”
Jon had to force himself to maintain a neutral expression. He’d known all along that Sansa had a boyfriend, it was one of those pesky thoughts that nagged at him whenever he started to think about her, but he had never been sure if Sansa was interested in him. Joffrey Lannister was exactly the kind of boy she had dated back in high school, and Jon had wondered more than once if Sansa was only hanging out with him because he understood what it was like to loose a parent.
“I broke up with him,” she said, her hand inching closer to his.
“Why?” Jon asked, his voice sounding ragged to his own ears.
“Because spending time with you is more important to me than going out with Joffrey,” Sansa shared, her cheeks flushing pink.
Jon laced his fingers with hers, looking her directly in the eye for a long, heady moment before he leaned forward and kissed her. He brought his hand up to cup her face, catching Sansa’s lower lip between his and brushing his thumb over the apple of her cheek. Slipping his arm around her waist, Jon could feel her tremble next to him, one of her hands fisted in his shirtfront. She ran her fingers through his hair, making him shiver when her nails dragged over his scalp.
They kissed like that for some time, with Sansa practically pulled into his lap. Jon held her close to him and marveled at how small she was, at how soft her skin of her lower back felt as he eased his hand under the hem of her shirt. He pulled away and kissed her neck over and over, pulling at the band that held her ponytail in place and sending her hair cascading down her back.
His lips against her neck, Jon said, “I’ve wanted to kiss you for a long time.”
Sansa pulled his face to hers and brushed his lower lip with her tongue, making him feel like there was molten heat curling in his belly. Jon eased her down until they were both laying on the bed, her arms around his neck while he tried not to put too much weight on her, a moan slipping out of him when she eased her legs apart and shirted his hips between them.
Jon was sure that she felt his arousal, but it felt impossibly good when her hands slipped beneath the hemline of his shirt and explored his back, mapping their way across his spine and shoulders. He kissed her and held her close, forcing himself not to grind against her or push her into anything too quickly.
When Sansa pulled away from him and took off her shirt, revealing a pale pink bra with lace on the cups, it became much more difficult for Jon to take things slowly. He shed his T-shirt and reveled in the feeling of her skin against his, kissing her breasts through her bra and laving his tongue against her neck. Sansa sighed and rocked her hips against his. Still confined to his jeans, Jon could feel his cock growing painfully hard, her little sighs and soft, keening moans making him want to slide his hand inside her pants.
When Sansa reached between them and stroked him through the front of his jeans Jon pressed his face into her neck, rolling his hips against her touch. The sound of her phone interrupted them, giving him a much-needed moment to collect himself, to remember that this was Robb’s sister and Ned Stark’s daughter and that he could not sleep with her now, no matter how much he wanted to.
“It’s my mom,” she said to him, answering the phone.
His breathing slowly returning to normal, Jon watched Sansa’s expression quickly change from calm to distressed. She sat on the edge of the bed in silence, her hand clutching the phone tightly while Jon thought of all the things the call could possibly be about.
“Okay, okay mom I’ll be there tomorrow. I love you too.”
Her shoulders hunched, she hung up the phone and turned to him, her eyes wide with shock.
“Robert Baratheon has been arrested for my father’s murder.”
--
Author: luna_plath
Rating: Mature
Pairing: Jon/Sansa
Word count: 4,200
Warnings: character death, sexuality, mentions of past abusive relationship,
Summary: The murder of Ned Stark shocks all of central North Carolina. While the police investigate the circumstances surrounding Ned's murder, his daughter Sansa Stark reunites with Jon Snow, an old family friend. An Afghan War veteran, Snow takes it upon himself to investigate Ned's mysterious death--whatever the cost.
AN: My version of Shae is inspired more by the show than canon. Also, Jon/Sansa is the main pairing in this fic, even though there are a lot of side pairings going on.
Sansa stood in front of the bathroom mirror with her makeup bag, swiping lip-gloss over her mouth and pressing her lips together. She brushed through her hair while Myranda chatted to her from across the hall, wondering if the white top she wore looked wrong against her pale skin.
“You look nice,” Myranda said, hands on her hips. She looked Sansa up and down suspiciously. “Are you all dressed up just for class?”
“Do I look dressed up?” Sansa asked, an unopened tube of mascara in her hand.
She wore a white camisole under her sheer, blousy top, along with a pair of jeans what were ripped at the knee. Her mother didn’t approve of these pants because Sansa hadn’t torn them herself-Catelyn Stark saw no sense in buying jeans that already had holes-but Sansa thought they made the outfit look more casual.
“You just have on more makeup than usual, that’s all.”
She frowned at the mascara in her hand, “Does it look bad?”
“No! Of course not.”
Biting her lower lip, she said, “I’m meeting Jon for lunch after class.”
Sansa didn’t want to admit it in front of Myranda, but she had been spending more and more time with Jon Snow. After the time they got coffee together she hadn’t wanted to see him, she’d felt embarrassed that she’d had a panic attack in front of one of her brother’s older friends, but one day she had been studying in the library and they had run into each other. Jon sat with her at the study table and they spent at least two hours talking. Sansa had gotten very little studying done that day, but she had learned that she and Jon had more in common than she thought.
He’d told her that he had panic attacks too, that he would see or hear something that reminded him of Afghanistan and his chest would get tighter and tighter until he couldn’t breathe.
“Have you been to a doctor?” she’d asked.
Jon had just shaken his head. “No. I know people who have, but I don’t want any medication and I don’t like telling people about this.”
“You’re telling me about it.”
He had blushed then, a half-smile spreading across his face. “But you’re different.”
Sansa decided against the mascara and brushed her hair one last time, dabbing a bit of perfume under her neck and on her wrists before grabbing her bag for class.
“When do I get to meet this Jon Snow?” Myranda teased.
She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks, but Sansa pretended that she wasn’t embarrassed. “I don’t know, soon maybe? We’re just friends.”
“Right. I hope you have a nice time at your friendly lunch.”
--
By the time Sansa got out of class it had already grown hot and sticky, but she hardly noticed as a curl of excitement began to twist in her belly. They were meeting at a restaurant called Nosh and, surprisingly, she was the first one to arrive. Normally Jon would be there before her and he would always choose a spot that gave him a clear view of the door and anyone who came in or out. She guessed it was one of those things he hadn’t been able to let go of from Ranger school.
She found a table that had a good view of the entrance and ordered a diet coke. By the time her drink arrived Jon was walking toward her, his bag on his shoulder and his dark curls pushed out of his face.
“You’re early,” he said, giving her the small half-smile that made the back of her neck tingle.
Sansa dragged her finger over the damp surface of her glass. “I came here as soon as I got out of marketing.”
“It’s still hard for me to think of you as a marketing major,” he said, ordering an iced tea with lemon.
“Why?”
Shrugging, he said, “I always thought you would end up in fashion. I remember you sewing all the time when you were in high school.”
“I wanted to study fashion, but I thought marketing would be more practical. I still sew all the time-I made this shirt, actually.”
Sansa bit her lower lip as he looked at her, his gray eyes making her feel like she was the only one in the room.
“It’s pretty.” Not fully looking at her, Jon said, “I mean it’s pretty on you.”
Hearing his words made every part of her feel sharp and tingly, like she’d touched a live wire, the charge snaking up her spine and making her skin flush.
Before she had a chance to say anything else the waiter came and asked for their orders. Talking to Jon had distracted Sansa so much that she hadn’t even looked through the menu.
--
After a long day teaching classes and working in the lab the last thing Tyrion Lannister wanted to do was go to a family dinner, but his life would be much more difficult if he refused, so once he got home from work he changed into a fresh button-down and prepared himself for a meal at his brother’s house.
Shae had changed into a sundress and sandals, a marked difference from the scrubs and comfortable shoes he normally saw her in. Tyrion was proud that his wife was a surgeon, even if it meant living with conflicting schedules, long work hours, and calls to go into surgery at two in the morning.
“Do you want me to drive?” she asked, taking in his careworn appearance.
“No, that’s alright,” Tyrion said. He was tired, but Shae was probably more sleep deprived than himself and he felt guilty at the thought of asking her to drive.
If they had only been having dinner with his brother and the children then Tyrion would have been delighted at attend, but he had never gotten along well with his sister-in-law, no matter how devoted she seemed to Jaime, and his father would certainly be there as well. It was no secret that Tyrion was not the son Tywin Lannister had hoped for, and that fact had become painfully obvious now that Jaime was running for governor while Tyrion tried to teach police process to disinterested students at what his father called “an average state school.”
As they stood on the doorstep to Jaime and Cersei’s extravagant home, Shae reached for his hand and squeezed it. Tyrion squeezed back in gratitude.
Myrcella opened the door and let them in, full of questions for Shae about college and medical schools. His niece would soon be a senior in high school and she wanted to be a doctor-she was always asking his wife questions about biology and the work it took to become a surgeon.
Leading them into the living room, Myrcella said, “I’m just worried about getting into schools. I want to apply to Duke but it would be terrible if I didn’t get in.”
“Don’t worry too much, if anyone is smart enough to get into a good school it’s you,” Tyrion said.
Myrcella smiled at him. She looked very much like her mother, he thought, but Tyrion had never seen Cersei wear such a kind, genuine expression.
The rest of the family was waiting in the living room. Tyrion and Shae both hugged Tommen, who got up to greet them, while only saying hello to Joffrey, who seemed more interested in his cell phone than their arrival.
“Kind of you to finally join us,” his father said, a glass of scotch in his hand.
“I’m sorry, it’s all my fault,” said Shae. “I was late in getting home and I didn’t want to show up in my scrubs from work.”
“Now that we’re all here why don’t we get started,” Cersei said. She was smiling but Tyrion knew better-that smile only hid her annoyance with their lateness.
“Let me get you a drink,” Jaime offered, sensing the tension in the room.
As his brother poured him a generous glass of liquor Shae helped Cersei and Myrcella bring the food into the dining room. Everyone took their seats and Cersei had to remind Joffrey several times to put his cell phone away before he complied. They all bowed their heads while Tywin said grace, even Tyrion, who hadn’t stepped foot in a church since his uncle Kevan’s funeral fifteen years ago.
While his father talked with Cersei about an upcoming event for Jaime’s campaign, Tyrion turned to his two nephews.
They couldn’t be more different, he thought, noting Tommen’s easygoing expression and Joffrey’s aura of boredom and contempt.
“Tommen, I hear that you’ve become the new star of the lacrosse team at school,” Tyrion said.
Tommen lit up, eager to talk about his team and his best friend Bran Stark, who also played with him.
“Bran, isn’t he the younger brother of that girl, Sansa?”
“Yeah, he is,” Tommen said quickly, but not quick enough for Tyrion to miss Joffrey’s sour expression.
“Is something going on there?” Tyrion asked. “Aren’t you and Sansa dating?”
“We’re on a break,” Joffrey said, irritated. “Ever since her father died she hasn’t wanted to do anything.”
Tommen and Myrcella both looked afraid to say anything, glancing at their older brother before returning to their food.
“You can hardly blame the girl,” Tyrion said sympathetically.
Scowling, Joffrey said, “I can blame her for going out with other guys when we aren’t really broken up.”
He got up from the table, leaving his chair pulled out and, from the sound of his footsteps, retreating upstairs.
“Look what you did,” Cersei said angrily, looking like she wanted to follow her oldest son upstairs.
Jaime placed a hand on the small of her back. “Let him be alone for a bit. I’m sure he’ll come down later.”
Cersei sat back down but not before throwing a nasty look his way.
Finishing his glass of scotch, his father said, “Joffrey’s better off without the Stark girl. He doesn’t need to be mixed up with her family, not with what happened to her father.”
In Tyrion’s opinion, one could hardly hold it against Sansa Stark that her father had been murdered, but having already caused enough upset that evening he kept his thoughts to himself. Mirroring his father, Tyrion finished his drink. As far as he was concerned the evening couldn’t be over soon enough.
--
The fall session began in mid August, making Sansa feel like the summer had practically disappeared. During the last few weeks of the July session she had made an effort to spend more time with Myranda and her friend Mya from class, even if she still found herself hanging out with Jon nearly ever weekend.
Mya Stone was a business major from a small town in the mountains that Sansa had never heard of, but she told great jokes and was the most athletic girl Sansa had ever met. One evening they’d met in the library to study for a marketing final, and when it had come time to leave Mya had thrown her gym bag over her shoulder while Sansa stood outside of the library to wait on a friend.
“I’ll wait with you until they get here,” Mya offered. “You don’t want to stand outside by yourself, it’s dark.”
Smiling, Sansa agreed. Despite her tough exterior Mya was a sweet girl who tried to take care of everyone, especially her friends.
“Who are you meeting up with?” Mya asked.
“I’m going over to Jon’s house to hang out for a bit.”
“Is this the Jon that Myranda told me about?” she asked, playfully waggling her eyebrows.
Sansa felt her cheeks heat up from the teasing. Thankfully, it was past nine o’clock and dark enough that her friend wouldn’t be able to notice.
“Yes. We’ll probably just end up watching a movie and drinking beer, I swear,” Sansa explained.
Before Mya could tease her anymore Jon met them in front of the library, wearing a v-necked shirt and jeans and making Sansa stare at the extra bit of exposed skin on his chest. A few of his dark curls hung in his eyes and she had to remind herself not to reach forward and brush them out of the way, that Mya was there watching them.
“Hey,” Jon said, his car keys in his hand. “You all finished?”
“Yeah. Jon, this is my friend Mya.”
Mya introduced herself and said goodnight to the both of them, heading in the direction of the gym. Sansa could tell that her friend was full of questions but she was grateful that Mya had chosen to keep them to herself for the present.
Sansa knew that she would have to tell her friends more about him eventually. Still unsure of how to define her friendship with Jon, Sansa hadn’t talked to Joffrey about their relationship since they’d gone on a break. She wasn’t sure if Jon even liked her, if he thought of her as his friend’s little sister who needed to be taken care of or as someone he liked in her own right.
As August rolled into September the situation only grew more complicated. Sansa knew that she was bound to run into Joffrey on campus, they shared a lot of the same friends and he was a business major, meaning there was a chance, however small, that they would be in classes together. She continued to see articles about her uncle in the papers and the questions, stares, and poorly concealed looks from classmates became more than Sansa could handle-and all of this was in addition to her anxiety over what to do about Joffrey.
Eventually Mya and Myranda wore her down until, after two or three glasses of white zinfandel, she told them everything. Myranda asked her lots of questions about how Jon acted around her, about his body language and the way he looked at her and was she sure that she hadn’t gotten some kind of vibe from Jon? Mya stayed silent during the whole conversation, but once Sansa and Myranda had run out of impressions to discuss she flat out told Sansa to pick Jon Snow.
“He’s ten times nicer than Joffrey,” Mya said simply. “I never wanted to say anything when you were with him but Joffrey Lannister can be so full of himself.”
Sansa decided she’d had too much wine to think about the topic logically.
“I don’t even know if Jon likes me,” she explained. “And I went on a break with Joffrey because my dad died and he just…he didn’t seem to even care. I tried talking to him and he always acted like I was wasting his time.”
At this point she began to cry, her voice breaking and tears filling her eyes. Myranda hugged her close and told Sansa how sorry she was and that she only wanted things to get better for her. Sansa wiped at her eyes and gulped down the last of her wine in a long swallow, wondering how she had ended up here, drunk on a weeknight and crying about her father’s murder. She had never expected for this to happen to her family, but it had, and every day she had to wake up and acknowledge the loss her family had experienced.
“I’m going to take a shower and then I’m going to bed,” she explained, wiping at her eyes.
Sansa got in the shower and tried to wash every speck of unhappiness form her body. She washed her face, washed her hair, and scrubbed at her skin until it was pink and the bathroom mirror was completely fogged up.
--
After a few days Sansa was able to think about her situation with Joffrey more clearly. Eventually she realized that no part of her wanted to continue their relationship, it was only the matter of talking to him and making it official that scared her.
In between her classes on Thursday Sansa met up with Jon at the cafeteria, the both of them seated at an out-of-the-way table. Sansa was glad to have a chance for them to meet up, especially since he’d been busier with the start of the fall semester-he’d been given more responsibilities in the lab he worked in.
“It probably sounds like boring work, but I’ve learned a lot from Professor Lannister.”
“Tyrion Lannister?” Sansa asked.
“Yeah, he teaches in the criminal justice department. He’s a lot nicer than what I expected,” Jon said.
Joffrey had always told her stories about his “useless” uncle Tyrion who taught at their school and wasn’t interested in the family business. The way Joffrey had described him, Sansa expected Professor Lannister to be the kind of eccentric teacher with tenure that no one wanted to have as a instructor, but as Jon explained the type of research Joffrey’s uncle did her opinions about him began to change.
Sansa didn’t have much time before her next class, but when she stood up to leave, instead of grabbing her bag and walking away, she impulsively decided to give Jon a hug. For the first second he seemed surprised, then he quickly recovered, his arms fitting around her waist while his smell enveloped her.
Feeling short of breath, Sansa said, “See you later.”
Jon gave her the half-smile that made her feel fluttery and flushed along her neck. As she walked to her business class, the afternoon sun warming her skin, Sansa couldn’t stop thinking about how it had felt to have his body so close to hers.
--
Sansa tried to focus on the required reading for one of her classes, her back against the wooden headboard and her textbook spread across her lap. The sound of her phone ringing broke her concentration. Picking it up, she swiped “answer” before fully reading the name of the caller.
“Hello?”
“Sansa, it’s me. We need to talk.”
Joffrey’s voice came over the line, making her wish she had taken a better look at the caller ID before answering.
“Okay,” she started, but Sansa could barely get a word out before he cut her off.
“I’ve seen you out with other guys, Sansa. We may be on a break but that doesn’t mean you can mess around behind my back-“
“I think we should break up,” she said.
The conversation didn’t last very long after that. Sansa could tell that Joffrey was mad at her, that he’d called her expecting to hear her apologize and beg to stay with him, and when the words “break up” came out of her mouth he became increasingly angry.
“Is this what the whole break was about? You used your dead dad as an excuse to cheat on me-“
Before Joffrey could say anything else Sansa hung up the phone. Breathing heavily, she stood up and grabbed her purse, putting on the first pair of shoes she could find and walking out the front door.
--
Jon was sitting in the living room with his laptop and a couple of books from the library, trying to get ahead on a paper that was due next Wednesday. He didn’t want to spend all of Tuesday night working on this assignment, and he didn’t want to spend his weekend working on it either, which is why he’d decided to start on it early.
His decision may have been rational but it did very little to motivate him. Sam and his girlfriend Gilly were making dinner in the kitchen, with Ghost watching them from his spot on the floor, just waiting for either of them to drop a scrap of food. Jon looked over the pages he’d marked and tried to find a quote, but he dropped the book and stood up once he heard someone knocking at the door.
“I’ll get it,” he called, but Jon doubted Sam and Gilly even heard him. Sam was telling a particularly gruesome story about one of the cadavers he’d dissected in the lab, his story occasionally being drowned out by Gilly’s disgusted reaction.
Opening the door, Jon said, “Sansa.”
“Hey,” she said, her car keys still in hand. “Sorry if you’re busy, I just wanted to talk.”
“Yeah, come in,” he said. “Why don’t we go in my room? That is, unless you want to hear Sam talk about the body parts he chopped up at school.”
Sansa giggled, the small laugh visibly taking away some of the tension in her shoulders. She followed him into his bedroom and Jon had a moment of panic, wondering if he’d left out any dirty laundry. Thankfully there was nothing embarrassing upon first inspection. Sitting next to Sansa on the bed, he felt a strong shiver of heat over his skin, his mind instantly reminding him that they were alone in his bedroom and Sansa Stark was sitting awfully close to him.
Pushing her hair behind her ear, she said, “I got a call from Joffrey earlier. He got mad at me because he’d seen us out together.”
Jon had to force himself to maintain a neutral expression. He’d known all along that Sansa had a boyfriend, it was one of those pesky thoughts that nagged at him whenever he started to think about her, but he had never been sure if Sansa was interested in him. Joffrey Lannister was exactly the kind of boy she had dated back in high school, and Jon had wondered more than once if Sansa was only hanging out with him because he understood what it was like to loose a parent.
“I broke up with him,” she said, her hand inching closer to his.
“Why?” Jon asked, his voice sounding ragged to his own ears.
“Because spending time with you is more important to me than going out with Joffrey,” Sansa shared, her cheeks flushing pink.
Jon laced his fingers with hers, looking her directly in the eye for a long, heady moment before he leaned forward and kissed her. He brought his hand up to cup her face, catching Sansa’s lower lip between his and brushing his thumb over the apple of her cheek. Slipping his arm around her waist, Jon could feel her tremble next to him, one of her hands fisted in his shirtfront. She ran her fingers through his hair, making him shiver when her nails dragged over his scalp.
They kissed like that for some time, with Sansa practically pulled into his lap. Jon held her close to him and marveled at how small she was, at how soft her skin of her lower back felt as he eased his hand under the hem of her shirt. He pulled away and kissed her neck over and over, pulling at the band that held her ponytail in place and sending her hair cascading down her back.
His lips against her neck, Jon said, “I’ve wanted to kiss you for a long time.”
Sansa pulled his face to hers and brushed his lower lip with her tongue, making him feel like there was molten heat curling in his belly. Jon eased her down until they were both laying on the bed, her arms around his neck while he tried not to put too much weight on her, a moan slipping out of him when she eased her legs apart and shirted his hips between them.
Jon was sure that she felt his arousal, but it felt impossibly good when her hands slipped beneath the hemline of his shirt and explored his back, mapping their way across his spine and shoulders. He kissed her and held her close, forcing himself not to grind against her or push her into anything too quickly.
When Sansa pulled away from him and took off her shirt, revealing a pale pink bra with lace on the cups, it became much more difficult for Jon to take things slowly. He shed his T-shirt and reveled in the feeling of her skin against his, kissing her breasts through her bra and laving his tongue against her neck. Sansa sighed and rocked her hips against his. Still confined to his jeans, Jon could feel his cock growing painfully hard, her little sighs and soft, keening moans making him want to slide his hand inside her pants.
When Sansa reached between them and stroked him through the front of his jeans Jon pressed his face into her neck, rolling his hips against her touch. The sound of her phone interrupted them, giving him a much-needed moment to collect himself, to remember that this was Robb’s sister and Ned Stark’s daughter and that he could not sleep with her now, no matter how much he wanted to.
“It’s my mom,” she said to him, answering the phone.
His breathing slowly returning to normal, Jon watched Sansa’s expression quickly change from calm to distressed. She sat on the edge of the bed in silence, her hand clutching the phone tightly while Jon thought of all the things the call could possibly be about.
“Okay, okay mom I’ll be there tomorrow. I love you too.”
Her shoulders hunched, she hung up the phone and turned to him, her eyes wide with shock.
“Robert Baratheon has been arrested for my father’s murder.”
--