A Topsy Turvy World Chapter 5
Title: A Topsy-Turvy World
By: Nicolina
Fandom: The Devil Wears Prada
Pairing: Andrea/Miranda, Andrea/OC, Miranda/Stephan
Archive: Please do, but send me a message and tell me!
Rating: R (I think, but I'm kinda fuzzy on ratings)
Disclaimer: I own nothing that you recognize, which belongs to a variety of people including the screen-writers of the DWTP as well as Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway. Credit for the inspiration behind the plotline goes to mirandyscrow , and credit also goes to my beta amelie_n . So in other words, I don’t own anything except Gregory and Arthur.
Warning: AU, Future slash fiction (f,f)
A/N: I know this is late (by about four days) but first LJ was down on Tuesday, then on Wednesday I fell ill as well as having to leave for a trip to Jakarta. I'm still ill (down with strep throat) but I managed to sneak onto a computer to upload this chapter. No idea when the next one will be hope, but I'm hoping by next weekend.
Chapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5 Chapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Chapter 10
Chapter 5
Miranda finished scribbling her last comment and stuck it on the page. Her lips pursed. They had another two weeks before this edition had to go to print, but it was nowhere near ready. She rolled her stiff neck, closing her eyes as she heard her spine crack. She glanced at her watch. It was eleven o’clock and Stephan still wasn’t back yet. His plane was due in nearly three hours ago and he hadn’t even called. She stretched out her hand for her phone, planning to call Emily and demanding that she find out where he was. She paused. No, she couldn’t. Her, admittedly not overwhelmingly bright, assistant might put the pieces of the puzzle together and realize that Miranda’s marital problems were serious. Her hand fell back to the Book in her lap.
Miranda considered heading up to bed, her lips pursing. If Stephan wasn’t going to even call, she had no reason to wait up for him. Even if she had been hoping that maybe they could try to patch their marriage back together tonight. She closed the Book with a snap and tossed it onto the table beside the armchair. She stood up with a faint groan, her hand going to her lower back. Her face tightened, a scowl briefly marring her forehead as she snatched her hand away immediately. She was Miranda Priestly, she did not suffer from back aches caused by all the sitting at her desk.
Her phone, sitting on the table, began to ring. She eyed it. Stephan, perhaps? With yet another excuse? She felt her lip curl into a sneer. She picked it up after a long moment, and glanced at the screen. Instantly, her bad mood was forgotten. The familiar ball of anticipation and adrenalin thrummed in her veins. “Yes?”
“You asked me to call you as soon as I could,” a tenor male voice said.
“Mm,” Miranda rolled her neck again, preparing for what was to come. She was silent for several moments as she sank back into the chair. Come into my lair, said the spider to the fly. “You used to work in McDonalds, didn’t you John? Before I found you.” At least, that’s what the fact sheet that Emily had pulled together said.
“Ye-es,” John agreed uncertainly.
“Did you like it?”
John laughed awkwardly. “Well it, um, it paid the rent.”
“Mm.” She paused again. “Do you regret becoming a photographer?”
“No!” John sounded shocked and horrified. “Of course not. I love what I do, Miranda. Before this, I was nothing.”
Miranda was pleased. “So really, I gave you everything, didn’t I? I made you who you are today.” Maybe she was being a little too obvious, but John wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, even if he was one of the best photographers in the business.
“Yes,” his voice was puzzled, clearly not understanding where she was headed.
That was fine with her, Miranda mused. In fact, it was all the better if he didn’t. She let the silence drag on, making him wait. “So if I were to …leave Runway,” she began, hearing his breath catch in his throat, “you would follow me to a new magazine?”
“You’re leaving?” John choked out.
Miranda said nothing.
“You can’t leave,” he protested. “You are Runway. It’ll fail without you.”
Miranda smirked but didn’t let it show in her voice. “Perhaps,” she kept her voice light.
“I’m serious, Miranda. You can’t leave Runway,” John was getting excited and his voice was rising.
If it were any other occasion, Miranda would hang up the phone before his voice got any louder. But she didn’t have what she wanted yet. “I have no plans to leave Runway,” she conceded. “I know that it will not survive without me. But there are others who will not admit that.” She hated having to reveal any sort of weakness, but there was no other way to elicit the promise that she wanted, needed really, from him.
“They’re forcing you to resign?” John gasped. “No!”
Miranda waited again, letting his imagination do her work for her.
“I’ll resign first!” he declared seconds later. “I refuse to work for a second-rate fashion magazine! I’ll follow you, where ever you go.”
Miranda smirked, a glow of self-satisfaction warming her. That made seventeen promises. “I won’t forget that, John.” Abruptly, she heard a creak on the floorboards of the hallway. One of the girls must’ve gotten up to get a drink. “Come to my office tomorrow. I have a new project for next month’s issue that I think you’ll like.”
“All right,” John agreed instantly.
Miranda rolled her eyes as she hung up the phone. Sometimes she couldn’t believe how easy it was to manipulate people. She’d played on his gratitude for discovering him and the awe that he felt for her, but other people had been even simpler to deal with. The reminder that a new editor was hardly going to feel comfortable giving good assignments to an ex-editor’s favorites was enough to convince them to back her. Or a warning that Jacqueline Follet might bring her staff from French Runway with her…which probably wasn’t true but had served her purposes well enough.
Standing up again, she made her way into the corridor to find out which twin had snuck out of bed. She froze in the doorway, staring.
Stephan turned around from hanging up his coat in the closet. “Hi, Mira.”
“Stephan.” Miranda took a step forward, and then stopped. “I thought your flight got in two hours ago.”
“It did,” he admitted sheepishly.
“It took you two hours to get here?” Miranda felt irritation begin to bubble up inside her again.
“No.” Stephan crossed the wooden floor to stand in front of her. “I stopped off along the way to get you something.”
“Oh?” Miranda arched an eyebrow.
He pulled his left hand out from behind his back and held out a small black box.
Miranda eyed the box in surprise. It had been nearly a year since he’d bought her as much as flowers, and now he was giving her jewelry. Just like he had when they first started dating. She couldn’t stop the little jump that her heart gave. She still loved him, even if he frustrated her all the time and they fought more than anything else these days.
She took the box from him and opened it. Tiny, delicate flowers made from sapphires and diamonds were suspended from a three chain necklace. It was very pretty, if not precisely her style. She looked up at him.
“I don’t want to fight anymore, Mira,” he said quietly. He reached for her, and she went willingly into his arms. His hands tightened around her waist and he kissed her. Warm, familiar lips moved over hers, and then a tongue nudged between them. She wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her mouth to deepen the kiss. His tongue stole through her mouth and she closed her eyes to hide the fact that it did nothing for her. Stephan trailed kisses across her jaw and down her neck, and his hands cupped her ass, grinding her body into his. She could feel the slowly growing erection in the front of his pants.
He pulled back and then backed towards the staircase. “Bed?” He tugged on her hands.
This was as good a time as any to start mending their relationship, she supposed, even if it was in the bedroom. “Yes.” Miranda followed him up the stairs. They slipped past the girls’ bedroom and into the master bedroom at the far end of the hall. The door shut behind them.
He kissed her again as his roving hands began to unbutton her shirt. She tilted her head to give him access to her neck and sighed. Seconds later, her shirt was on the floor and he was bending to suckle at her breasts through her bra. She buried her hands in his hair and made an appropriate moan.
As he snapped open her bra and tossed that across the room, she glanced at the clock on the wall. Eleven forty-five. Maybe they’d be done by midnight? She slid her hands up his front and unbuttoned his shirt. He let go of her long enough to slide it off his arms, but then returned his attention to her breasts. She kicked off her heels. He moved upwards again, catching her lips with his own.
As he pressed her onto her back on the bed, she closed her eyes and faked a gasp. He continued, oblivious to her pretense. But then, she’d had plenty of practice at faking it. Sex with Stephan had stopped being exciting for her more than a year before. As they drifted apart and fought more and more, this had been one way to connect. At least when they were making love, he wasn’t shouting at her or ignoring her. And even sex had been in short supply for the past couple of months. If he was interested in bedding her again, it might save her marriage and she wasn’t going to object. It was time to lie back and think of England.
As Stephan rolled off her with a grunt, she glanced at the clock. She’d been right. It was two minutes to midnight. She sank back into the pillows, wincing at the pain between her legs: Stephan was a big man, a fact only compounded by Miranda’s distinct lack of arousal. She felt sweaty and tired. It had been a long day.
“So, I heard that James Holt is going to take his business global?”
She stiffened. “What?” How come she hadn’t been told?
Stephan sat up, frowning down at her. “You didn’t know?”
“No,” Miranda’s voice was icy as she took refuge in the surge of anger rolling through her. She’d had lunch with James the day before, and he’d said absolutely nothing to her. Did he not know what she could do to him? He dared to cross her?
Stephan looked bewildered. “Really?”
Miranda raised an eyebrow at him, ignoring the fact that she was naked and her hair was undoubtedly a mess. “Really.” Her thoughts began to whirl. James was expanding his line, taking it global. So he’d need a partner. Someone with all the contacts and experience. Someone like Jacqueline.
Miranda rolled out of bed, pulling her La Perla dressing gown over her naked body. It would take her a few weeks to get everything sorted out, but she thought she just might have solved the problem of what to do with the French Runway editor.
“Mira? Where are you going?” Stephan asked.
“I have to work.”
“But Mira, I just got back,” Stephan complained.
She pushed down a surge of irritation. “I know. And now you’re going to roll over and go back to sleep.” Like he always did.
“I wanted to fall asleep with you,” he reached for her hand. “Come on, come back to bed.”
“No,” she said firmly. If she wanted to get this in motion she had to start as soon as possible.
“You didn’t even listen to that conversation last week,” Stephan accused. “You’re not even trying to change. You’re still a self-centered, arrogant, workaholic bitch.”
Miranda froze, her spine stiffening. She thought he had said he didn’t want to fight anymore. She didn’t turn around. “Have you been drinking again Stephan?”
“It’s no wonder this marriage is tanking. You don’t give a fuck about anyone but yourself and your precious magazine,” Stephan continued. “Sometimes I wonder if you even care about your daughters, because you sure as hell don’t care about me or our marriage.”
She whirled. “How dare you!” Miranda’s eyes narrowed, cold fury radiating from every pore. “Never, ever, question my love for my daughters. Now get out of my bedroom.” Her voice could have frozen molten lava.
“Why not? You’re never home for dinner. You leave before they wake in the morning. When was the last time you had an actual conversation with either one?” he demanded.
“Are you deaf? I said, get out,” Miranda hissed, hiding the pain that his all too accurate jabs caused.
“Whatever.” Stephan snatched up his discarded pants and jerked his shirt over his head. He glared at her and for the second time in as many weeks, he stormed out of the room.
She listened to his footsteps as he stomped his way down the stairs. The front door slammed. Despite herself, Miranda felt tears gather in her eyes and the fury drained away. She shouldn’t have driven him away like that. She was supposed to be putting her marriage back together tonight, not ripping it further apart. “But it takes two to make a marriage work,” she whispered, eyes fixed on the opposite wall.