by the light of the moon she rubs her eyes
Title: Diamonds
Character/s: Alex, Tony
Spoilers: For everything, specifically the events of 6.04.
Rating: R
Word Count: 1650
Summary: After Michael’s death, Alex whisks Tony out of Bradfield and up into the Highlands.
A/N: I’ve been meaning to write this particular scene forever. It’s kind of rather special to me.
*
The house is silent, around them.
She hasn’t spoken, not since he asked her if she was alright to drive, and that was hours ago.
He follows her tiptoeing feet down halls she walked as a child, and if he weren’t so utterly exhausted he could imagine her, a long-haired firebrand at eight, or eleven, chasing her brother over the old polished wood floors.
He follows her, and she leads him into a parlour room lit with a dying fire. She closes the door behind him, and even though this brings her close enough to brush against his arm as she passes, she doesn’t meet his eye. His own throat feels hoarse, and he doesn’t know what to say, anyway.
The fire revives a little as she tends to it, the room brightening as she finds an old library lamp on a side table. It’s a handsome room, like he’s quite sure the entire house must be; a faded map framed along one wall, a scrolled desk bare and dusty in one far corner. It’s only when he turns to scan around that he realises it isn’t a parlour at all.
An enormous, clearly antique bed made with a quilt in shades of green lies beneath one high window, through which the mountains are visible as dark lines against the night. Moonlight clear as water spills through the glass and across her face as she moves to reveal another door, turning on the light in a small ensuite bathroom with walls tiled the yellow of church candles.
She turns back to look at him from feet away, and finally she speaks.
“Get cleaned up. There’s towels, everything you need in there.” She tilts her head toward the ensuite, and her hair swings like a pendulum with the movement. Her voice begins to catch, and fade.
“If you need help with your injuries…”
Something bristles within him. “I’m fine.”
He moves past her, suddenly livid with an inexplicable aggression. She’s ordering him around, as if he were a child, irresponsible and a nuisance. The door is heavier than he expects, and he hears her startled gasp as it slams into place with a finality he hadn't intended.
The pipes groan, but the water is scalding and it shocks the grazes and scrapes along his back and shoulders, reminding him of the movement of the van, of the force of Michael’s hands around his throat. A black wave of nausea rises, and he doubles over, retching.
He stays under the water a long time, long enough for him to be uncertain whether she’ll still be there, in the room, when he returns.
She is.
He can see her spine, a straight ridge like the mountains outside, a dividing range between the narrow lines of her shoulders. It’s a silly thing to wish, but it occurs to him that if she would just turn around, just look at him instead of ducking her eyes away like she’s afraid of him, then things would begin to be okay. She doesn’t move, so he dresses quickly in the warmest clothes he brought, and scours his brain for some words which might make a difference.
He starts, like always, with her name.
“Alex?”
She doesn’t turn, but a tremor runs through her limbs. The moon has gone, hidden behind cloud or perhaps the craggy horizon. The fire has dimmed again, the last embers glowing dull ochre. He moves toward her, and his legs feel like stone as he crouches by her feet.
Even without the silver of moonlight the sharp lines of tears are bright, obvious, running down her face. His anger is gone, as if it never was there to begin with.
“Alex.”
He’s seen her like this, defeated, but it’s never been his fault before. Her hands are cold, and he winds his fingers through hers, an attempt to infuse her with heat from his shower, his blood. She makes a broken noise that stabs inside his chest. She draws in a ragged breath, digs her fingernails into the palms of his hands.
“I should’ve been there.”
Words he’s heard before, and it’s like everything is on repeat, but he’s never been in this room, never knelt at her feet in this house, in the dark. He tells her the same thing he did forever ago, when it was Ben.
“No.”
“I should’ve been there, if I’d been there-”
“If you’d been there, Michael probably would’ve gone after you as well. Don’t make me imagine that, Alex.”
Finally, she looks him in the eye.
Her devastation is so complete, so horrific to look upon that tears spring from his own eyes, stinging against his tired skin. He manages to move, to sit beside her and pull her into a half-embrace. She crumbles like a wall against him.
He can feel her eyelashes against his neck, feel her tears pressing wetly into the collar of his shirt. He holds her as best he can, given the ache in his arms and the way it always hurts when she gets close, and breathes the scent of her hair, momentarily perplexed as to whether the fragrance is sandalwood or cedar. He whispers against the softness of it.
“I’m sorry.”
Her reply is gently muffled by his shirt.
“What for?”
A swirl of laughter moves within him, hysterical, perhaps, but doesn’t escape.
“For everything, always. For making you upset.”
She shifts, lifts her head, looks right into him. She’s so close, close enough for him to make out each sweeping, dew-wet eyelash, every miniscule freckle across the bridge of her nose. It’s easier to study her, to catalogue the things which make her herself than it is to look back at her, but there’s a new determination in her now, a steeliness he recognises well.
The still-cool fingers of her right hand curl around his cheek, slip behind his neck, gentler than anything he’s ever felt in his life. His eyes close, and when they open again her forehead is pressed to his, her breath moving against his mouth.
It’s too much, but he can’t seem to move, pinned like something helpless beneath her hands.
He finds her eyes in the dark.
He’s imagined it before, of course, what it might be like to kiss her, but in his head it was nothing like this, nothing like the fierce pressing of her against him, the heat, the windswept breaths escaping her. His blood races, inflamed, and things begin to blur when his fingers tangle in her hair and hers wrench at the buttons on his shirt.
The fall is short, immediate, a backward tumble onto the forest green quilt, a rough wresting of limbs in a tussle for control. To his amazement he wins, and is rewarded with the expanse of heartbreakingly warm flesh revealed as she sheds her shirt like skin.
Her fingers claw into his back, into the abraded skin and it should hurt, but it doesn’t. His teeth catch on the sharp line of her collarbone, tripping down, down the axis of her body, until her spine bends like young willow and her hands drag him back to her by his hair.
The remaining layers of clothing between them are lost to the darkened room, falling where they land on the far reaches of the bed, the floor beside it. He has barely a moment to marvel at the sunset colours of her skin and the flowing shapes of her beneath him, before he finds himself crushed against her, and all thought, rational or otherwise, deserts him.
The bed quakes like a ship at sea, his brain seems to swell with the sounds coming from her mouth, and it is a relentless climb toward something inexorable and indescribable in ordinary words. Her teeth sink into his shoulder and this time he feels the short burst of pain, but it’s not hardly enough to distract him from the way it feels to be moving within her, and the way it feels as she begins to shudder beneath him. She arches, claws, cries out, and in the midst of it he hears his name, half-lost to the rush of breath escaping her.
There is nothing more, nothing between them now behind which to hide, so he surrenders, completely, losing himself inside her, and a fog of darkness blackens his mind.
It’s a long, sightless, breathless moment, before some semblance of sentience returns to him, waking him from the very dead. Her eyes are closed, lashes fanned against flushed skin, but she must sense him, somehow, because the slowest smile he’s ever seen moves across her face like sunrise. She stretches up, kisses him softly, says his name again, all without opening her eyes. He kisses her back, knowing he won’t be able to stop kissing her now, ever, and allows the spent muscles in his arms to collapse.
She curls loose-limbed around him, softer and more comforting than the mattress or the down pillows beneath them. Sleep lures him, or perhaps it is total physical shutdown, brought on by exhaustion, by depletion and elation. He finds the tumbling silk of her hair again, presses his face to it, and lets his eyes fall shut.
He wakes once, in the night, convinced she will be gone, no longer there or never there at all, but she has barely moved from where they fell together, hours before. He watches her, marvelling again, then fits himself to the curve of her back, unconsciousness dissolving her name, the last waking thought to pass through his mind before sleep reigns once more.
*
Character/s: Alex, Tony
Spoilers: For everything, specifically the events of 6.04.
Rating: R
Word Count: 1650
Summary: After Michael’s death, Alex whisks Tony out of Bradfield and up into the Highlands.
A/N: I’ve been meaning to write this particular scene forever. It’s kind of rather special to me.
*
The house is silent, around them.
She hasn’t spoken, not since he asked her if she was alright to drive, and that was hours ago.
He follows her tiptoeing feet down halls she walked as a child, and if he weren’t so utterly exhausted he could imagine her, a long-haired firebrand at eight, or eleven, chasing her brother over the old polished wood floors.
He follows her, and she leads him into a parlour room lit with a dying fire. She closes the door behind him, and even though this brings her close enough to brush against his arm as she passes, she doesn’t meet his eye. His own throat feels hoarse, and he doesn’t know what to say, anyway.
The fire revives a little as she tends to it, the room brightening as she finds an old library lamp on a side table. It’s a handsome room, like he’s quite sure the entire house must be; a faded map framed along one wall, a scrolled desk bare and dusty in one far corner. It’s only when he turns to scan around that he realises it isn’t a parlour at all.
An enormous, clearly antique bed made with a quilt in shades of green lies beneath one high window, through which the mountains are visible as dark lines against the night. Moonlight clear as water spills through the glass and across her face as she moves to reveal another door, turning on the light in a small ensuite bathroom with walls tiled the yellow of church candles.
She turns back to look at him from feet away, and finally she speaks.
“Get cleaned up. There’s towels, everything you need in there.” She tilts her head toward the ensuite, and her hair swings like a pendulum with the movement. Her voice begins to catch, and fade.
“If you need help with your injuries…”
Something bristles within him. “I’m fine.”
He moves past her, suddenly livid with an inexplicable aggression. She’s ordering him around, as if he were a child, irresponsible and a nuisance. The door is heavier than he expects, and he hears her startled gasp as it slams into place with a finality he hadn't intended.
The pipes groan, but the water is scalding and it shocks the grazes and scrapes along his back and shoulders, reminding him of the movement of the van, of the force of Michael’s hands around his throat. A black wave of nausea rises, and he doubles over, retching.
He stays under the water a long time, long enough for him to be uncertain whether she’ll still be there, in the room, when he returns.
She is.
He can see her spine, a straight ridge like the mountains outside, a dividing range between the narrow lines of her shoulders. It’s a silly thing to wish, but it occurs to him that if she would just turn around, just look at him instead of ducking her eyes away like she’s afraid of him, then things would begin to be okay. She doesn’t move, so he dresses quickly in the warmest clothes he brought, and scours his brain for some words which might make a difference.
He starts, like always, with her name.
“Alex?”
She doesn’t turn, but a tremor runs through her limbs. The moon has gone, hidden behind cloud or perhaps the craggy horizon. The fire has dimmed again, the last embers glowing dull ochre. He moves toward her, and his legs feel like stone as he crouches by her feet.
Even without the silver of moonlight the sharp lines of tears are bright, obvious, running down her face. His anger is gone, as if it never was there to begin with.
“Alex.”
He’s seen her like this, defeated, but it’s never been his fault before. Her hands are cold, and he winds his fingers through hers, an attempt to infuse her with heat from his shower, his blood. She makes a broken noise that stabs inside his chest. She draws in a ragged breath, digs her fingernails into the palms of his hands.
“I should’ve been there.”
Words he’s heard before, and it’s like everything is on repeat, but he’s never been in this room, never knelt at her feet in this house, in the dark. He tells her the same thing he did forever ago, when it was Ben.
“No.”
“I should’ve been there, if I’d been there-”
“If you’d been there, Michael probably would’ve gone after you as well. Don’t make me imagine that, Alex.”
Finally, she looks him in the eye.
Her devastation is so complete, so horrific to look upon that tears spring from his own eyes, stinging against his tired skin. He manages to move, to sit beside her and pull her into a half-embrace. She crumbles like a wall against him.
He can feel her eyelashes against his neck, feel her tears pressing wetly into the collar of his shirt. He holds her as best he can, given the ache in his arms and the way it always hurts when she gets close, and breathes the scent of her hair, momentarily perplexed as to whether the fragrance is sandalwood or cedar. He whispers against the softness of it.
“I’m sorry.”
Her reply is gently muffled by his shirt.
“What for?”
A swirl of laughter moves within him, hysterical, perhaps, but doesn’t escape.
“For everything, always. For making you upset.”
She shifts, lifts her head, looks right into him. She’s so close, close enough for him to make out each sweeping, dew-wet eyelash, every miniscule freckle across the bridge of her nose. It’s easier to study her, to catalogue the things which make her herself than it is to look back at her, but there’s a new determination in her now, a steeliness he recognises well.
The still-cool fingers of her right hand curl around his cheek, slip behind his neck, gentler than anything he’s ever felt in his life. His eyes close, and when they open again her forehead is pressed to his, her breath moving against his mouth.
It’s too much, but he can’t seem to move, pinned like something helpless beneath her hands.
He finds her eyes in the dark.
He’s imagined it before, of course, what it might be like to kiss her, but in his head it was nothing like this, nothing like the fierce pressing of her against him, the heat, the windswept breaths escaping her. His blood races, inflamed, and things begin to blur when his fingers tangle in her hair and hers wrench at the buttons on his shirt.
The fall is short, immediate, a backward tumble onto the forest green quilt, a rough wresting of limbs in a tussle for control. To his amazement he wins, and is rewarded with the expanse of heartbreakingly warm flesh revealed as she sheds her shirt like skin.
Her fingers claw into his back, into the abraded skin and it should hurt, but it doesn’t. His teeth catch on the sharp line of her collarbone, tripping down, down the axis of her body, until her spine bends like young willow and her hands drag him back to her by his hair.
The remaining layers of clothing between them are lost to the darkened room, falling where they land on the far reaches of the bed, the floor beside it. He has barely a moment to marvel at the sunset colours of her skin and the flowing shapes of her beneath him, before he finds himself crushed against her, and all thought, rational or otherwise, deserts him.
The bed quakes like a ship at sea, his brain seems to swell with the sounds coming from her mouth, and it is a relentless climb toward something inexorable and indescribable in ordinary words. Her teeth sink into his shoulder and this time he feels the short burst of pain, but it’s not hardly enough to distract him from the way it feels to be moving within her, and the way it feels as she begins to shudder beneath him. She arches, claws, cries out, and in the midst of it he hears his name, half-lost to the rush of breath escaping her.
There is nothing more, nothing between them now behind which to hide, so he surrenders, completely, losing himself inside her, and a fog of darkness blackens his mind.
It’s a long, sightless, breathless moment, before some semblance of sentience returns to him, waking him from the very dead. Her eyes are closed, lashes fanned against flushed skin, but she must sense him, somehow, because the slowest smile he’s ever seen moves across her face like sunrise. She stretches up, kisses him softly, says his name again, all without opening her eyes. He kisses her back, knowing he won’t be able to stop kissing her now, ever, and allows the spent muscles in his arms to collapse.
She curls loose-limbed around him, softer and more comforting than the mattress or the down pillows beneath them. Sleep lures him, or perhaps it is total physical shutdown, brought on by exhaustion, by depletion and elation. He finds the tumbling silk of her hair again, presses his face to it, and lets his eyes fall shut.
He wakes once, in the night, convinced she will be gone, no longer there or never there at all, but she has barely moved from where they fell together, hours before. He watches her, marvelling again, then fits himself to the curve of her back, unconsciousness dissolving her name, the last waking thought to pass through his mind before sleep reigns once more.
*