Confidants
Title: Confidants
Author: wrldpossibility
Characters: Sara Tancredi, Michael Scofield
Word Count: 2750
Rating: R-NC-17
Spoilers: Through 4.05
Summary: In the day, every day, the pressure builds upon itself like a living thing...At night, they try to relieve the pressure as best they can.
Author's Note: This fic takes place directly after 4.05, with references to all of S4. Due to the wonky timeline so thoughtfully provided to us by TPTB, for the purpose of this fic, I’m going to go ahead and put this in the same universe as my other S4 fics, just to make it make sense. So if you’ve read Of Ghosts and Saints, III and Signature Moves, that will help, but not be crucial. And even though it makes for about a 50 hour day, what the hell...I’m going to assume 4.04 and 4.05 occur during the same day. Thank you to scribblecat for the early read through and guidance while I grouched. *g*
One day? One day.
In the day, every day, the pressure builds upon itself like a living thing, like a pot boiling, steam rising, contents overflowing. It can’t be helped; they’re always scrambling, running, racing against clocks and covert schemes as they act and react, as they plan and problem solve and prepare for the worst. At night, they try to relieve the pressure as best they can.
That’s hard to do when the heat is still turned up so high.
They’ve had four nights together, the sun now setting on their fifth, and each one has been an entirely new experience from the last, embarked upon with no script, no mutual agreement, no idea what the other will want or need at any given turn of the tide or fall of the dice. So much remains ambiguous.
So much remains unsaid.
Her need for him makes her constantly restless, the tension crackling between them whether they’re in separate rooms or separate parts of the city…whether they’re stealing a spare moment alone, or catching each other’s gaze from across the crowded conference table. She reaches out for him as the opportunities present themselves, as he passes by or as he exits or as he sits with her, hoping that through her touch, some small measure of this longing will be relieved, passed selfishly from her to him like water siphoned from a dam.
He receives her touch eagerly, knowing that with every brush of her fingers, the small shock of electricity that passes between them will say what he cannot…not in the daylight, not surrounded by criminals and ex-rogue lawmen. It’s not adequate. He finds himself starting sentences he cannot finish and instigating caresses he cannot conclude to any sort of satisfaction for either of them. He finds himself hyper-aware of her movements through the warehouse, as though some sixth sense has kindled to life within him…she’s by the bulletin board, slipping past him with the faintest trail of her fingers across his back…she’s on the steps of the boat, watching him…she’s gone, out in the city somewhere, and dammit, he needs to know where she is before he can hope to concentrate.
Her pulse quickens at the oddest moments, and at the predictable ones as well; when she steps through the warehouse door to see his face collapse in relief, when she lays it all out on the line--bars and booze and broken pasts--and his eyes never waver from her own.
*****
On that first night, they had been of one accord. Of one desperate, thankful, grappling, tearstained, hasty, tender, lustful accord. He had been sure of what they both wanted the second she slipped into the circle of his arms, and he‘d given her all he could in the short hours that were theirs.
On the second night, he had been hurting; he wore his pain quite literally like a cloak, smarting with the all-encompassing burn left in the wake of the laser, his past decisions--his past plans--finally removed, and she had had so much empathy for such a painstaking process that her own eyes had stung on his behalf and she had spent the night awake, listening to his restless groans on the narrow cot beside her, changing dressings once, feeling blindly through a travel-sized medical kit twice for painkillers.
On the third, she had shut him out. Not cruelly, he knew, but deliberately all the same, gently dismissing him from the deck of the boat he had claimed for her after talking quietly of Homer and his father and sacrifice as the sun slid below the bay of windows outside and darkness slowly fell over the cavernous interior of their new warehouse home. He had let her go, and then had lain awake for hours after, watching the shadows creep slowly across the unfamiliar walls, conjuring up demon after demon in his mind as he tortured himself with thoughts of what she must be dispelling, night after night.
On the fourth, she had invited him in…tentatively, with a self-conscious joke and an uncertain smile that she could see both unnerved him and emboldened him. In the boat, she had still been reeling from their latest close call as he touched her and kissed her, the feel of cuffs still weighing heavy upon her wrists as they undressed. The mission had not been aborted, Michael was here, not in a jail cell awaiting a long sentence, and they had both felt nearly drunk with gratitude and luck and a newfound sense that maybe this thing was actually going to go right. She had seized the day, or the night, as the second second chance it was.
He had been hoping it would set a precedent, and based on the look of subtle longing she had cast him before retreating to the boat tonight, he‘s fairly sure she has the same pattern of sleeping arrangements in mind. He won’t pretend he’s not relieved; they both could use a little continuity in this new life of ups and down and sharp left turns.
They’ve had four nights together, the sun now setting to awaken their fifth, and she wonders if he’s keeping count as well.
They’ve had four nights together, and as he sits across Sucre and Roland, pouring over printouts on Laos as the midnight oil burns, he’s counting the minutes before he can excuse himself and climb the steps to the tiny landlocked boat.
*****
It‘s not one day, anymore. It‘s today.
In the hour since she left the group for the sanctuary of the boat, she’s lain awake in one of the two narrow bunks, telling herself a dozen times that if he doesn’t come to join her as he had the night before, it means only that he’s allowing her her rest, or that there’s matters he simply cannot turn his back on even to sleep, or both. She’s just decided she’s made her peace with it when she hears soft footfalls on the steps outside and the latch on the cabin door turning and her heart starts sprinting in her chest. She rolls over in the dark to face the narrow entry and smiles at this mockery of her self--preservation. So much for bracing for disappointment.
She can just make out his outline as he turns to re-latch the door, locking it from the inside, then pads to her bedside in two cautious strides. It occurs to her that he thinks she‘s asleep. “Hey,” she offers softly.
He pauses. “You’re awake.”
He’s pleased, and she smiles to herself again as he sits down on the edge of the bed. Due to the darkness, she doesn’t see his hand reach out toward her until his fingers are trailing over her head and shoulder in a welcome greeting. She sighs. So does he.
“We never got that dinner,” he notes.
A less-than-generous retort flashes across her mind; she almost lets it pass, but if they can‘t jest with one another by this point, when can they? She offers him a tired grin. “Or the last one you promised me, for that matter.”
She catches the surprised amusement flit across his face only because she’s waiting for it, her eyes straining to study him through the heavy shadows. “True,” he concedes, one finger raised in what has become a familiar gesture of confession. She laughs softly in return, but sobers almost immediately. His own smile had faded too quickly.
“What?” she asks.
He gropes under the sheet for her hand. Threading his fingers through hers, he peers down at her earnestly, his pupils the tiniest, most unwavering of pinpricks as they burrow into her own. “I don’t mind being in your debt.”
She shakes her head, but forces her voice to remain light. “We’ve stopped keeping track of that, remember?”
He pauses only momentarily, then must decide to mirror her mood. He raises an eyebrow. “You’re the one keeping tabs on my dating faux pas.”
She smiles again, and is about to say something about his dismal track record when his mouth dips to cover hers, smothering her reply. She‘s not sure if it‘s a strategic move on his part or not, but she doesn‘t care. She opens her mouth to him, tugging gently on his hand, her voice dropping to a whisper now that his ear is a matter of inches from her lips. “Come into bed.”
*****
He doesn’t need to be told twice. Her breath is still warm on his cheek, her invitation still in the air between them as he straightens, pulling his shirt up and over his head in one swift motion. He feels her watching him as he undresses on the edge of the bunk, tugging first at his belt and then the button of his pants. Her hand snakes around his waist and his spine instantly tingles with a rush of warmth before running cold at her next words.
“Are you feeling ok? Does it bother you?”
His hand flies to his face, but there’s no warm ooze of blood to betray him. He turns to eye her guardedly, but her face is placid. He belatedly notes her hand is now running in soft strokes over his back--she’s referring to his recently laser-treated skin, of course.
He wills his expression to relax even as her words, uttered with determination only hours before, spring unbidden to his mind. I want you to know I won’t ever lie to you. But he’s not lying, is he? She asked a question, and he will answer it.
“I feel fine.” A surge of guilt consumes him, but he only amends his statement slightly. “I feel better.”
She still looks at him questioningly, and oh. That trust. It positively slays him. That open invitation she puts forth is both a confidant and a challenge, and it’s enough to coax almost anything out of him. He’s had to physically turn away from it more than once--more than twice--and now, he realizes he‘s no more immune than he ever was. He reaches for her; it’s on the tip of his tongue to tell her everything, but instead, maybe just to buy some time, to postpone the inevitable or soften the blow, he plies a kiss to her neck, and then her cheek, and then before he knows it, he’s sinking down beside her, tipping her head back to taste her mouth over and over and telling himself that their time is now, that this is their today, and he will give her this vitality within him instead of any dreary medical history he could recite. That this answer will be the kinder version of the truth.
After a short while, he feels her relax, and then re-amp with an entirely new sort of coiled energy, the same that’s running with the intensity of an electrical current through his own veins, and he genuinely forgets about the thick flow of blood that did not come to pass…this time. Instead, they’re soon tangled in the thin sheets of the bunk, and just as the night before, there’s way too little room to maneuver, a fact that deters neither of them. He touches her everywhere he can reach, thrilling at every smile against his skin, every swift intake of breath that follows a kiss, a caress, a shift of weight from hip to hip. When he peels her shirt off her body, she helps him, and his lips quirk as the upward movement entraps her arms above her head in the tight space. With a grin, he covers her body completely with his own, running his hands upward, over her biceps and forearms until his fingers are encircling her wrists. He feels her still. There’s another gasp, but this one is different. This one is all wrong.
He releases her instantly, rolling toward the wall. The sloped side of the hull scrapes across his tender skin unpleasantly, and he flinches, but not because of the pain. “I’m sorry.”
She’s still catching her breath, but not at all in the way he’d intended. “Not your fault,” she answers swiftly. Through the dark, he can see her head shaking. Her voice sounds somehow off-key in the quiet of the cabin.
He hears her take a breath…a deep one this time, and then roll to her side to face him. She looks calmer than he feels she should. More so, she looks determined. She offers a smile, and then her hand, curving it softly around his jaw. “Where were we?”
He covers her hand with his. “Sara. We don’t have to…we can talk instead.” Tell me. Tell me, tell me, tell me.
She doesn’t. He tries again. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
When she smiles again, it’s no longer forced. “I think I do,” she teases, then rises over him in one swift motion, pressing his shoulders into the mattress. Suddenly, she’s straddling him. Despite whatever better judgment is filling his brain, he feels his body instantly respond to her. She does, too. “But maybe you’ll enjoy it just as much in the reverse?”
Maybe? Still, he hesitates, regarding her for a long moment. Her hair is falling down around her, clouding her face, but it can’t hide either the fear or the stubborn pride rising in equal measure in her eyes. Looking up at her, he realizes he has no desire to challenge either one.
Instead, he lets her lead. She bends to him, kissing him, her bare breasts grazing his chest, and as her fingers slide over his skin to seek the curve of his skull, suddenly, her ability to heal takes on new meaning. The ache of his head and the steady sting of his skin fades, and as he reaches for her hips, guiding her, he feels only her, surrounding him, warming him, encompassing him. His hands rise to her back, drawing her closer as he sees her eyes close, and then his fingertips are following the path of the largest of her scars as she moves against him. He still wants her to tell him how they got there. He wants her to whisper her secrets until she’s poured them all out, because surely he can help. Surely that’s preferable to this self-preserving silence that he knows is tearing her down from the inside-out, but even as he thinks it, he‘s biting back his own confessions. He moves within her instead, meeting her stroke for stroke, pulling her down flush against him and letting his hands slide upward from her torn back to the smooth skin of her neck and shoulders. Maybe tonight, she has as great a need to feel vital as he does. Maybe every night, she needs to feel whole, and needs for him to perceive her that way, as well.
He doesn’t know what tomorrow will bring, but tonight, her secrets are safe with him.
Author: wrldpossibility
Characters: Sara Tancredi, Michael Scofield
Word Count: 2750
Rating: R-NC-17
Spoilers: Through 4.05
Summary: In the day, every day, the pressure builds upon itself like a living thing...At night, they try to relieve the pressure as best they can.
Author's Note: This fic takes place directly after 4.05, with references to all of S4. Due to the wonky timeline so thoughtfully provided to us by TPTB, for the purpose of this fic, I’m going to go ahead and put this in the same universe as my other S4 fics, just to make it make sense. So if you’ve read Of Ghosts and Saints, III and Signature Moves, that will help, but not be crucial. And even though it makes for about a 50 hour day, what the hell...I’m going to assume 4.04 and 4.05 occur during the same day. Thank you to scribblecat for the early read through and guidance while I grouched. *g*
One day? One day.
In the day, every day, the pressure builds upon itself like a living thing, like a pot boiling, steam rising, contents overflowing. It can’t be helped; they’re always scrambling, running, racing against clocks and covert schemes as they act and react, as they plan and problem solve and prepare for the worst. At night, they try to relieve the pressure as best they can.
That’s hard to do when the heat is still turned up so high.
They’ve had four nights together, the sun now setting on their fifth, and each one has been an entirely new experience from the last, embarked upon with no script, no mutual agreement, no idea what the other will want or need at any given turn of the tide or fall of the dice. So much remains ambiguous.
So much remains unsaid.
Her need for him makes her constantly restless, the tension crackling between them whether they’re in separate rooms or separate parts of the city…whether they’re stealing a spare moment alone, or catching each other’s gaze from across the crowded conference table. She reaches out for him as the opportunities present themselves, as he passes by or as he exits or as he sits with her, hoping that through her touch, some small measure of this longing will be relieved, passed selfishly from her to him like water siphoned from a dam.
He receives her touch eagerly, knowing that with every brush of her fingers, the small shock of electricity that passes between them will say what he cannot…not in the daylight, not surrounded by criminals and ex-rogue lawmen. It’s not adequate. He finds himself starting sentences he cannot finish and instigating caresses he cannot conclude to any sort of satisfaction for either of them. He finds himself hyper-aware of her movements through the warehouse, as though some sixth sense has kindled to life within him…she’s by the bulletin board, slipping past him with the faintest trail of her fingers across his back…she’s on the steps of the boat, watching him…she’s gone, out in the city somewhere, and dammit, he needs to know where she is before he can hope to concentrate.
Her pulse quickens at the oddest moments, and at the predictable ones as well; when she steps through the warehouse door to see his face collapse in relief, when she lays it all out on the line--bars and booze and broken pasts--and his eyes never waver from her own.
*****
On that first night, they had been of one accord. Of one desperate, thankful, grappling, tearstained, hasty, tender, lustful accord. He had been sure of what they both wanted the second she slipped into the circle of his arms, and he‘d given her all he could in the short hours that were theirs.
On the second night, he had been hurting; he wore his pain quite literally like a cloak, smarting with the all-encompassing burn left in the wake of the laser, his past decisions--his past plans--finally removed, and she had had so much empathy for such a painstaking process that her own eyes had stung on his behalf and she had spent the night awake, listening to his restless groans on the narrow cot beside her, changing dressings once, feeling blindly through a travel-sized medical kit twice for painkillers.
On the third, she had shut him out. Not cruelly, he knew, but deliberately all the same, gently dismissing him from the deck of the boat he had claimed for her after talking quietly of Homer and his father and sacrifice as the sun slid below the bay of windows outside and darkness slowly fell over the cavernous interior of their new warehouse home. He had let her go, and then had lain awake for hours after, watching the shadows creep slowly across the unfamiliar walls, conjuring up demon after demon in his mind as he tortured himself with thoughts of what she must be dispelling, night after night.
On the fourth, she had invited him in…tentatively, with a self-conscious joke and an uncertain smile that she could see both unnerved him and emboldened him. In the boat, she had still been reeling from their latest close call as he touched her and kissed her, the feel of cuffs still weighing heavy upon her wrists as they undressed. The mission had not been aborted, Michael was here, not in a jail cell awaiting a long sentence, and they had both felt nearly drunk with gratitude and luck and a newfound sense that maybe this thing was actually going to go right. She had seized the day, or the night, as the second second chance it was.
He had been hoping it would set a precedent, and based on the look of subtle longing she had cast him before retreating to the boat tonight, he‘s fairly sure she has the same pattern of sleeping arrangements in mind. He won’t pretend he’s not relieved; they both could use a little continuity in this new life of ups and down and sharp left turns.
They’ve had four nights together, the sun now setting to awaken their fifth, and she wonders if he’s keeping count as well.
They’ve had four nights together, and as he sits across Sucre and Roland, pouring over printouts on Laos as the midnight oil burns, he’s counting the minutes before he can excuse himself and climb the steps to the tiny landlocked boat.
*****
It‘s not one day, anymore. It‘s today.
In the hour since she left the group for the sanctuary of the boat, she’s lain awake in one of the two narrow bunks, telling herself a dozen times that if he doesn’t come to join her as he had the night before, it means only that he’s allowing her her rest, or that there’s matters he simply cannot turn his back on even to sleep, or both. She’s just decided she’s made her peace with it when she hears soft footfalls on the steps outside and the latch on the cabin door turning and her heart starts sprinting in her chest. She rolls over in the dark to face the narrow entry and smiles at this mockery of her self--preservation. So much for bracing for disappointment.
She can just make out his outline as he turns to re-latch the door, locking it from the inside, then pads to her bedside in two cautious strides. It occurs to her that he thinks she‘s asleep. “Hey,” she offers softly.
He pauses. “You’re awake.”
He’s pleased, and she smiles to herself again as he sits down on the edge of the bed. Due to the darkness, she doesn’t see his hand reach out toward her until his fingers are trailing over her head and shoulder in a welcome greeting. She sighs. So does he.
“We never got that dinner,” he notes.
A less-than-generous retort flashes across her mind; she almost lets it pass, but if they can‘t jest with one another by this point, when can they? She offers him a tired grin. “Or the last one you promised me, for that matter.”
She catches the surprised amusement flit across his face only because she’s waiting for it, her eyes straining to study him through the heavy shadows. “True,” he concedes, one finger raised in what has become a familiar gesture of confession. She laughs softly in return, but sobers almost immediately. His own smile had faded too quickly.
“What?” she asks.
He gropes under the sheet for her hand. Threading his fingers through hers, he peers down at her earnestly, his pupils the tiniest, most unwavering of pinpricks as they burrow into her own. “I don’t mind being in your debt.”
She shakes her head, but forces her voice to remain light. “We’ve stopped keeping track of that, remember?”
He pauses only momentarily, then must decide to mirror her mood. He raises an eyebrow. “You’re the one keeping tabs on my dating faux pas.”
She smiles again, and is about to say something about his dismal track record when his mouth dips to cover hers, smothering her reply. She‘s not sure if it‘s a strategic move on his part or not, but she doesn‘t care. She opens her mouth to him, tugging gently on his hand, her voice dropping to a whisper now that his ear is a matter of inches from her lips. “Come into bed.”
*****
He doesn’t need to be told twice. Her breath is still warm on his cheek, her invitation still in the air between them as he straightens, pulling his shirt up and over his head in one swift motion. He feels her watching him as he undresses on the edge of the bunk, tugging first at his belt and then the button of his pants. Her hand snakes around his waist and his spine instantly tingles with a rush of warmth before running cold at her next words.
“Are you feeling ok? Does it bother you?”
His hand flies to his face, but there’s no warm ooze of blood to betray him. He turns to eye her guardedly, but her face is placid. He belatedly notes her hand is now running in soft strokes over his back--she’s referring to his recently laser-treated skin, of course.
He wills his expression to relax even as her words, uttered with determination only hours before, spring unbidden to his mind. I want you to know I won’t ever lie to you. But he’s not lying, is he? She asked a question, and he will answer it.
“I feel fine.” A surge of guilt consumes him, but he only amends his statement slightly. “I feel better.”
She still looks at him questioningly, and oh. That trust. It positively slays him. That open invitation she puts forth is both a confidant and a challenge, and it’s enough to coax almost anything out of him. He’s had to physically turn away from it more than once--more than twice--and now, he realizes he‘s no more immune than he ever was. He reaches for her; it’s on the tip of his tongue to tell her everything, but instead, maybe just to buy some time, to postpone the inevitable or soften the blow, he plies a kiss to her neck, and then her cheek, and then before he knows it, he’s sinking down beside her, tipping her head back to taste her mouth over and over and telling himself that their time is now, that this is their today, and he will give her this vitality within him instead of any dreary medical history he could recite. That this answer will be the kinder version of the truth.
After a short while, he feels her relax, and then re-amp with an entirely new sort of coiled energy, the same that’s running with the intensity of an electrical current through his own veins, and he genuinely forgets about the thick flow of blood that did not come to pass…this time. Instead, they’re soon tangled in the thin sheets of the bunk, and just as the night before, there’s way too little room to maneuver, a fact that deters neither of them. He touches her everywhere he can reach, thrilling at every smile against his skin, every swift intake of breath that follows a kiss, a caress, a shift of weight from hip to hip. When he peels her shirt off her body, she helps him, and his lips quirk as the upward movement entraps her arms above her head in the tight space. With a grin, he covers her body completely with his own, running his hands upward, over her biceps and forearms until his fingers are encircling her wrists. He feels her still. There’s another gasp, but this one is different. This one is all wrong.
He releases her instantly, rolling toward the wall. The sloped side of the hull scrapes across his tender skin unpleasantly, and he flinches, but not because of the pain. “I’m sorry.”
She’s still catching her breath, but not at all in the way he’d intended. “Not your fault,” she answers swiftly. Through the dark, he can see her head shaking. Her voice sounds somehow off-key in the quiet of the cabin.
He hears her take a breath…a deep one this time, and then roll to her side to face him. She looks calmer than he feels she should. More so, she looks determined. She offers a smile, and then her hand, curving it softly around his jaw. “Where were we?”
He covers her hand with his. “Sara. We don’t have to…we can talk instead.” Tell me. Tell me, tell me, tell me.
She doesn’t. He tries again. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
When she smiles again, it’s no longer forced. “I think I do,” she teases, then rises over him in one swift motion, pressing his shoulders into the mattress. Suddenly, she’s straddling him. Despite whatever better judgment is filling his brain, he feels his body instantly respond to her. She does, too. “But maybe you’ll enjoy it just as much in the reverse?”
Maybe? Still, he hesitates, regarding her for a long moment. Her hair is falling down around her, clouding her face, but it can’t hide either the fear or the stubborn pride rising in equal measure in her eyes. Looking up at her, he realizes he has no desire to challenge either one.
Instead, he lets her lead. She bends to him, kissing him, her bare breasts grazing his chest, and as her fingers slide over his skin to seek the curve of his skull, suddenly, her ability to heal takes on new meaning. The ache of his head and the steady sting of his skin fades, and as he reaches for her hips, guiding her, he feels only her, surrounding him, warming him, encompassing him. His hands rise to her back, drawing her closer as he sees her eyes close, and then his fingertips are following the path of the largest of her scars as she moves against him. He still wants her to tell him how they got there. He wants her to whisper her secrets until she’s poured them all out, because surely he can help. Surely that’s preferable to this self-preserving silence that he knows is tearing her down from the inside-out, but even as he thinks it, he‘s biting back his own confessions. He moves within her instead, meeting her stroke for stroke, pulling her down flush against him and letting his hands slide upward from her torn back to the smooth skin of her neck and shoulders. Maybe tonight, she has as great a need to feel vital as he does. Maybe every night, she needs to feel whole, and needs for him to perceive her that way, as well.
He doesn’t know what tomorrow will bring, but tonight, her secrets are safe with him.