Four letter word just to get me along
Jul. 18th, 2010 10:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impersona injury – minor | soulbonding | shopping | neck kisses | bad day |
cloud watching | honeymoon | nuzzling | anniversary | |
first fight – making up | first holiday together | WILD CARD | candles | anniversary – miles apart |
kidfic – bedtime | kidfic – first injury | kidfic – vacation | baby – adoption | making out |
karaoke | bedtime rituals | birthday – surprise party | sick in bed | hot cocoa |
Candlelight Dinner
Deon hurried up the street, ducking his head against the drizzling rain and protecting a large paper bag with his body. On a street otherwise dominated by streetlamps and brightly-lit homes, he was nothing but relieved about walking into the only massive, looming house with no lights on. He turned the knob loose, and shoved the door open with his shoulder.
The inside of the Fortress was nearly pitch-black except for the warm glow of candle fire coming out of the living room. It was no later than eight in the evening, but the heavy storm cover rolling in had eliminated the sky's light, and the loss of electricity did the rest. The juice had been dead since that morning, before he left for work. Deon's best guess was that the house was too old to handle all of the stress a revolving door of renters and crashers would put on it, and that it needed more attention than anyone in the house could have bothered to give it.
He came upon the living room as his eyes were getting used to the dim light, enough to see Mara lounging on one of the couches. Candles as thick as fists took up most of the space on the coffee table, but he found a decent area for the bag of Chinese food. It was a generous offering, and he figured he shouldn't do it too often, or she'd start to develop expectations.
Not like he got, you know, any gratitude from the present gesture. Mara didn't look up from her book. "The men of the house went to get a generator."
He didn't rise to the bait. "This man brought home food. Lo mein, beef or chicken. Whatever you take, I'll eat the other."
Once Deon turned away to shrug off his jacket, she started to pawing through the bags and removed each container and utensil, thoroughly suspicious of his offering, even checking some boxes with the pen flashlight she used to read. Anything she didn't buy herself was subject to this kind of search, as if she thought he'd get food at a place that fried cockroaches instead of noodles. In the meantime he raided the powered-down refrigerator, and found some lukewarm beer to wash it all down with. One beer went on the coffee table by her, another by his, and the rest would have to wait under the table.
She inspected the open boxes of beef and chicken, going between each, clearly having made no choice between them yet. So Deon reached into the biggest bag, then tossed the cellophane-wrapped fortune cookie at her. His shot in the dark wasn't great, since the package hit her shoulder, then dropped to her lap.
"Eat that first."
She tossed the fortune back. "That's dessert, stupid."
Deon grabbed it mid-air and threw the cookie back at her - she caught it the second time. "You have to eat it before the meal, Mara. It's tradition."
"Whose?"
"Come on." Deon pinched the cellophane packet open with a pop. "Amuse me."
He snapped his cookie in half, ate the two sides, and only after did he read the paper fortune. He looked across the table and saw Mara didn't eat her cookie, but she was reading the fortune, which was the part that really mattered.
"Well," she said, eyeing him, "that was stupid."
"Hey." He leaned forward, his elbow propped upon the coffee table as he smiled at her. "You know what else you do with fortunes?"
"What?"
"Read it again, but try adding 'in bed' to the end of it."
Mara tilted her chin back up, and Deon found himself on the receiving end of her blank stare.
He lifted his fortune, pointed to it, and then read from the paper. "Your skill will match what the force of many cannot. In bed." He set the fortune down in front of her, so she could read it for herself if she liked. He was sure she wouldn't. "Pretty good example, you think?"
Must have been, cause she sputtered on her drink so violently that one of the candles sizzled out. She drew her sleeve across her lips, and glared at him when she was done. "Didn't have to spell it out like that."
His expression was relaxed, and much too benevolent. "What's yours?"
"It was stupid, it's-" But then she hesitated, looking from the fortune back to him, and then fiercely over her shoulder.
"It's...?" he prompted, but she wouldn't so much as look at him. He leaned forward out of his couch. "You have to tell me, Mara."
She wasn't sporting enough to give him a word of it, though. Furthermore, it wasn't his fault that she held the fortune so carelessly in her hand. He reached for the slip of paper, missed, snatched again and missed that attempt too. Mara sunk into the back of her couch and held the fortune in the air, and he all but threw himself forward to try to get her. He only ended up bumping the coffee table, jostling the candles. The fires were too close to burning his arms anyway, so he moved onto the end of Mara's couch instead.
"Come on," he said gently, attempting to coax her out of it. "It's just payback for the dinner I brought for you."
"Where's the payback for all the pizza you've eaten? The sandwiches? The beer?" She clenched her fist hard around the fortune to protect it, but that didn't deter Deon. His hand dove past her ear, to her hand again, and he was kicked as she scrambled backwards against the arm of the sofa. "Stop that!"
"It has to be good if you're hiding it." he said, persisting in his attack. Deon lifted himself so that he partly loomed over her, reaching until he nearly snatched her wrist. "If you don't like in bed, change it to on the couch, in the backseat-"
Her palm struck his chest, knocking him back and taking the breath right out him. In the time before he could recover, Mara hastily stuffed the fortune down her shirt, tucked into her bra.
He set his elbow over the side of the couch, got so close that his knees touched the side of her thigh. He leaned into her space, so terribly close, but she didn't hit him again. The candlelight, and the shift in mood as he drew his attention from her chest to her face, made the area stifling hot. "That supposed to make me stop searching?"
Between them, the air had stilled completely. "Deon-"
He ducked close, put his hand on her knee, and kissed her cheek. A sweet, brief peck. Nothing more.
"I'm starving." He slid off of her couch, and grabbed a box of white rice on his leisurely swagger back to his seat. He broke his chopsticks apart with a sharp snap. "So. Chicken or beef, Mara?"
She hesitated a moment, then snatched at the box closest to her and tore into it, nearly savage-like, trying too hard at pretending he wasn't there at all. He watched her, fascinated by her reaction and most of all by her angry red blush, and he only realized he was staring when she turned her shoulder to him. How interesting to know her for a year now and still be figuring out what embarrassed her and what didn't. He put his feet up on the coffee table and looked at the flickering candles as he ate, working to keep his glances to her only out of the corner of his eye.
Later on, Mara threw the little, crumbled wad of paper onto the table. His hand went for it.
"A thrilling time is in your immediate future," she said, before he had the chance to pick it up.
Deon drew back, and smiled broadly. "In bed."
"Idiot."
HOLY CRAP I FINISHED A FIC *FLAIL*
First full week of work this week. I'm dedicating myself to not killing myself over this job like I did the last one, which means actually taking my breaks and walking a bit slower in the stock room and hydrating myself waaaaaaaay more often.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 04:08 am (UTC)