Chapter Text
The morning sunlight spilled gently through the blinds, casting pale golden stripes across the bedroom walls. Birds chirped outside, and the distant, lazy hum of Sunday morning traffic drifted up from the cobbled streets below.
Emily tossed and turned beneath the sheets before finally scrunching up her nose and cracking one eye open. She turned her head just enough to glance at the digital clock on her bedside table.
8:30 a.m. Far too bloody early for a proper Sunday.
Mumbling something thoroughly unladylike, she burrowed back into the duvet, instinctively reaching across the mattress to wrap an arm around her wife. Andy was still fast asleep, curled onto her side with her back facing Emily.
She looked impossibly peaceful.
Emily's heart gave a familiar, involuntary ache. There was something about watching Andy sleep that made it impossible to reconcile the soft, breathing woman beside her with the brutal, blood-soaked years of their separation. Here she was, safe and warm beneath their duvet, completely shielded from the violent underworld they had both left behind. Yet, even now, Emily's mind would occasionally drift to the phantom ghosts of those eight lost years, wondering where Andy was sleeping, whether she was warm, whether she had eaten, whether she was bleeding in some nameless gutter. The sheer terror of those unanswered questions had once been almost too heavy to bear.
Andy had once described her own body as a map. A living chronicle of everywhere she’d been, everything she’d survived. Her skin was a tapestry of scars and ink, each mark representing a chapter of a life Emily had missed. Sometimes, tracing those lines, Emily imagined her as a rogue sailor or a daring explorer who had braved treacherous storms and uncharted waters, carrying the phantom memory of home tucked safely against her ribs. And somehow, miraculously, every winding road had ultimately dragged Andy back to her.
Emily had spent the first weeks after their reunion rediscovering every inch of that map. Every pale ridge of scar tissue had demanded her attention, every tattoo had made her pause, breathless and humbled. She had been fascinated, shattered, and endlessly grateful all at once.
She remembered the exact night she’d finally worked up the courage to ask about them.
They had been tangled in the sheets, Andy’s head resting over Emily’s heartbeat, when Emily’s fingertips had brushed against a pale line near Andy’s ribs.
"Can you tell me about this one?" she had whispered into the dark.
Andy had looked down at her own hand before lifting her dark eyes to meet Emily’s, silently acknowledging the weight behind the question. Emily hadn't just wanted a history of skin and steel, she had wanted to know the jagged pieces of the world that had tried to break the woman she loved. She wanted to know the pain she hadn't been there to shield her from, because loving Andy meant loving the history that made her whole. To Emily, those marks weren't flaws, they were proof of stubborn survival.
On quiet mornings like this, when Emily woke first, she indulged in a sacred ritual of her own.
She pushed herself up against the pillows, careful not to disturb the sleeping woman beside her, and gently eased the duvet down to uncover Andy’s shoulder. Then, turning onto her side, she simply watched.
Oh, to wake up to this forever. To have Andy within arm's reach. To listen to her groggy, morning-brain complaints about the weather, to steal the first scalding sip of her drip coffee, to bicker over utterly pointless domestic nonsense before breakfast. To grow old, grey, and comfortably exasperated beside her.
A soft, rare smile touched Emily’s lips as she shuffled an inch closer, pressing her chest against Andy's back.
Then, with all the tenderness she so rarely knew how to translate into ordinary words, Emily began.
First, the little Aries symbol inked just above the jagged ridge near Andy's shoulder blade.
Emily traced its delicate, curling lines with the tip of her index finger, her touch featherlight against the warm skin of Andy's back, before bending her head to press a long, reverent kiss directly against the dark ink.
Andy had once told her this was the very first tattoo she'd ever gotten.
The scar beneath it was a brutal reminder of a close-quarters knife fight that had gone sideways in a nameless alley. Her target had sliced cleanly across her shoulder, splitting the skin wide and leaving a hot, shocking stream of blood soaking through her shirt. Too broke for a real hospital and too hunted to risk a clean clinic, she’d stitched it up herself with a sterile needle and nylon thread purchased from a twenty-four-hour bodega, hissing through her teeth under the harsh glare of a flickering motel fluorescent bulb.
It hadn't been anything extraordinary. Just another night of survival. Another injury wrapped in gauze while she sat alone in the dark, cleaning blood off her skin and telling herself the throbbing pain was nothing worth a second thought. Yet, there had been moments, while dabbing antiseptic over raw flesh or struggling to manoeuvre a bandage around the awkward angle of her own shoulder, when her mind had drifted somewhere it had no business going.
To Emily. To fiery copper hair, sharp blue eyes, the sleek sheen of tactical leather, and a crude silver ring that had promised her a forever she wasn't sure she'd live to see.
The wound eventually closed, leaving behind an uneven, puckered scar. For months, Andy had caught herself staring at it in the mirror, tracing its jagged edges whenever the silence in her safe houses grew too loud. Its shape was asymmetrical, but if she tilted her head and squinted just enough, she could almost make out the letter V. And then, one afternoon, when the ache of missing Emily had become a physical weight in her chest, she decided she was done looking at a map of her own pain. She didn't want to erase the past, she refused to pretend she hadn't endured it, but she wanted to claim it. She wanted to turn the mark of a near-miss into something that belonged to home.
An Aries symbol, she'd decided. Emily was an Aries, after all. A little ball of fire, impatient and occasionally unforgiving, with a temper that could scorch anyone foolish enough to provoke her. But beneath all that sharpness was a fierce, unwavering devotion to the people she loved. Emily would risk everything for them without a second thought, meeting danger with her chin lifted and her eyes blazing. She could be ruthless when the situation called for it, but with Andy, she had always possessed a softness that seemed almost impossible to reconcile with the woman the rest of the world knew.
Andy had loved both halves of her. The fire and the warmth. The claws and the gentle hands. The woman who could freeze an entire syndicate with a single level stare, and the woman who would silently drape a blanket over Andy’s shoulders when she fell asleep exhausted on the sofa.
Carrying Emily's zodiac sign beneath her skin had felt like carrying a shield. On nights when the world outside was biting and cold, knowing a piece of Emily was pressed against her heart made the dark just a little easier to bear.
Emily’s thumb lingered over the inked curves, her throat tightening until it ached. God, Andy.
She wished she could tear through the fabric of time and find her. She wanted to march into that wretched motel room, scold her for being reckless, take the needle from her hand, and kiss the furrow between her brows while Emily took care of her the way she always should have. Instead, all she could do was press her lips to a tattoo born of a loneliness she had inadvertently caused. So she kissed it once more, lingering, before sliding her hand downward.
Next came the intricate botanical design on Andy's outer thigh, dark, twisting vines and delicate blossoms weaving around a pale, lightning-bolt scar.
Emily followed the ink slowly, mapping every petal and tendril as if committing the art to memory all over again. Another soft, unhurried kiss pressed into the centre of the flowers.
The scar beneath it had been earned during a fire Andy had barely managed to claw her way out of. A stray explosive round had torn through her gear, exposing her skin just long enough for the flames to lick across her thigh. She had made it out alive, as she always did, but survival was a butcher that never let anyone leave without a piece of them.
For a long time, Andy had simply lived with the stark, bleached patch of skin interrupting the landscape of her body. Then, weary of being greeted by the memory of smoke every time she dressed, she decided to turn the ruin into a garden.
She had explained the vision to an underground tattoo artist in Prague: twisting vines that wound around the damage rather than trying to hide it. Something layered, delicate, and dangerous. Something like Emily.
Emily had always been a masterclass in contradiction. Aloof and impenetrable on the outside, with a core far warmer than she would ever confess. Stubborn as stone, yet endlessly patient with Andy's chaos. Lethal in the field, but capable of cupping Andy's face in her calloused palms with a tenderness that made the rest of the universe fade away. There were so many layers to her.
Even now, after all their years together, Andy still found hidden layers, fleeting, private smiles, quiet acts of care that Emily would vehemently deny if accused. She was terrifying and beautiful all at once, like a rare flower with thorns wrapped around the stem.
Woven invisibly into the heart of the vines was a calligraphic letter E. Emily. Always Emily. A permanent compass pointing home when everything else was just a blur of nameless faces and forgotten cities.
Emily’s fingertips brushed a delicate petal. She remembered the first time she had seen the finished piece, tracing its complex geometry with breathless awe. She hadn't known the origin story back then. Now that she did, it was both breathtaking and agonising. Her wife had taken an injury meant to break her and transformed it into a monument of survival and love. And Emily hadn't even been there to hold her hand through the healing.
Swallowing the lump in her throat, Emily shifted her weight, sliding her hand beneath Andy’s sleep shirt to rest against her ribs. Right where the fine-line silhouette of Emily’s own face was permanently etched into her wife's skin.
That one always felt like a physical blow.
The scar itself had come from another knife attack. It hadn't been deep enough to threaten Andy's life, and she'd been able to clean and dress it herself, alone in the dark with nothing but the fragile glow of a bedside lamp to keep her company.
Emily could picture it all too easily. Andy sitting on the edge of an unfamiliar bed, her first-aid kit open beside her. The quiet rustle of gauze. The sharp, involuntary hitch of her breath as she pressed a cotton ball against the wound. The way she would have gritted her teeth and carried on, because there had been no one else to do it for her. No one to tell her to be careful. No one to take the antiseptic from her hands when they began to shake. No one to kiss her forehead afterward and promise that she was safe.
Emily's hand stilled against her wife's ribs. She hated how easily her mind could conjure these scenes. Hated how vividly she could imagine the pain, the loneliness, the determination with which Andy must have carried on with her life, even when there had been no one waiting for her at the end of the day. And yet, she knew she could never truly understand what those years had been like. She could only imagine.
Andy had gotten the tattoo on their sixth dating anniversary. An anniversary they had spent three thousand miles apart.
Emily hadn't learned that detail until long after their reunion. Andy had mentioned it almost casually, as though tattooing your estranged fiancée's profile onto your ribs on a day meant for celebration was standard Wednesday behaviour.
On that particular anniversary, Andy hadn't wanted to drown in the grief of what she’d lost. Instead, she had sat down with a piece of scrap paper and a pencil, closing her eyes to reconstruct Emily entirely from memory. As best as she could, anyway.
She'd remembered those long, dark eyelashes, the ones that fluttered shut whenever Andy leaned in to kiss her. The delicate slope of her nose, which scrunched adorably whenever Emily pretended to be annoyed, and even more adorably whenever Andy kissed its tip, prompting her to try very, very hard not to blush. She'd remembered the shape of Emily's lips, usually pressed into a stern, uncompromising line on missions, but so quick to soften whenever they were alone. The way they would curve at the corners when Andy whispered something ridiculous in her ear, or when she offered a compliment that Emily pretended not to hear. The way a kiss against the corner of her mouth could coax a smile out of her, and how that smile would grow, little by little, until it became a full-blown grin. A grin brighter than the sun. Brighter than a garden in full bloom. Brighter than anything Andy could remember seeing in all those years away from her.
She'd wanted to remember every detail. Every little thing that made Emily Emily. And when her drawing was finally finished, she'd taken it to a tattoo artist and asked them to put it on her skin. Thin lines. Delicate strokes. Nothing too elaborate. Just Emily.
She'd had the outline etched along her ribs, close to her heart, where it would rest over the very place that had continued to hold her long after the rest of the world had moved on without her.
Now, years later, Emily traced the clean, minimalist lines of her own cheekbone with her thumb. Then, pressing her forehead against Andy's side, she kissed the ink.
Her eyes stung hot and sharp. She wondered what Andy had felt while the needle buzzed against her ribs that day, if she had been crying, or smiling, or simply desperate to tether herself to the only piece of home she had left.
"I'm sorry," Emily whispered into the quiet room.
She knew it wasn't her fault, she knew neither of them had chosen the chasm that separated them. But knowing the logic didn't stop the ache. She wished she could go back and absorb every lonely night, every phantom anniversary, every silent tear. Wishing, most of all, that Andy had never had to turn her own flesh into a museum of the woman she was missing. Yet, there it was. Three tattoos. Three chapters of a love story written in ink and scar tissue, carried through the fire by a woman who refused to stop loving her.
Andy had carried the weight of the dark for nearly a decade. And now, at long last, Emily was here to carry it with her.
Pulling herself upward, Emily slipped her arm back around Andy's waist, drawing her warm, sleeping body flush against her own. She pressed one final, lingering kiss to the back of Andy's shoulder, right above the little Aries symbol, and let the morning hold them both.
And then, finally, there was the newest addition. The one they had carved into their skin together, only recently, binding them in ink where gold and silver had once been enough.
Emily’s gaze drifted down to Andy’s left hand, resting loosely against the rumpled pillow. Circling her wife’s ring finger was a thin, unbroken line of solid black ink. Simple, stark, and utterly unadorned. No intricate vines, no secret symbols, no hidden meanings to decipher. Just a clean, continuous band wrapping around her skin, echoing the physical weight of the wedding ring she had worn for years.
Emily vividly remembered the evening they decided to get them.
They had been curled together on the sofa, a peaceful evening stretching out before them without threat or emergency. Andy had taken Emily’s hand, turning it over in her palm, her thumb idly stroking over the battered silver fork-ring Emily had never taken off. She had been silent for a long moment before murmuring about permanence, about wanting a vow etched so deep into their bodies that even if the world burned down around them again, even if jewellery was lost or stolen in the middle of the night, the mark of each other would stay.
Emily hadn't hesitated for a single second.
They had gone together on a Tuesday afternoon, sitting side-by-side in a sunlit parlour while the artist’s needle hummed a steady, rhythmic tune against their skin. Emily remembered glancing over halfway through and catching Andy looking at her with that small private smile that belonged to no one else on earth.
It was such a simple thing, really. Just a line of ink, circling a finger. Yet Emily thought there was something rather beautiful about that. A circle had no beginning and no end. It simply continued, returning to itself, over and over again. Much like them, perhaps. No matter how far they'd strayed, no matter how many years had passed between them, somehow, impossibly, they had found their way back to one another.
Emily lifted Andy's hand carefully, mindful not to wake her, and pressed a kiss to the inked band. Her wedding ring had always been a promise. This was, too. Only now, the promise was quite literally a part of them.
As she traced the delicate line of ink, Emily’s chest tightened, and she couldn’t help but wonder, if she had to live a thousand different lifetimes, lifetimes where they met, lifetimes where they tore each other apart, lifetimes where the dark swallowed them whole, she would choose this woman through every single rotation of the earth. She would find her in the smoke, she would pull her back from the edge, and she would choose her until there were no lifetimes left to cross.
Emily lowered Andy's hand gently back onto the pillow, then curled her own fingers around it, their matching bands resting against each other. A small, deeply contented smile tugged at the corner of Emily’s mouth as she closed her eyes. There. Every scar mapped, every hidden piece unlocked, every promise fulfilled. Her wife. Her home. Her forever.
Emily tugged Andy a little closer, her arm slipping more securely around her waist.
The movement was enough to stir her wife from her sleep. Andy shifted with a soft, sleepy murmur, her brow furrowing momentarily before she rolled over to face Emily. Her eyes remained half-lidded, still heavy with sleep, but her arms found Emily almost instinctively, reaching around her and drawing her close until there was barely any space left between them.
“Hey, baby,” Andy mumbled, her voice thick and deliciously raspy with sleep. “You're up already?”
Emily smiled, her fingers gently brushing a dark, stray lock of hair away from Andy's forehead. “Yes.”
“Mm. Unacceptable.” Andy leaned forward, her eyes closing as she pressed a soft, warm kiss to the tip of Emily's nose.
Emily scrunched it reflexively, a purely subconscious reaction that earned an amused chuckle from her wife, before settling deeper into the pillow.
“There she is,” Andy murmured fondly, her thumb sweeping over the high plane of Emily's cheekbone. “My pretty girl.”
Emily rolled her eyes, though the soft, radiant smile tugging at her lips betrayed her entirely.
Andy watched her for another moment, seemingly content simply to hold her, warm, safe, and breathing in her arms. Then, a lazy little smirk began to curve her lips. “So, what have you been doing up here, hmm?”
“Nothing much.” Emily nestled closer, resting her forehead against Andy's. “Just admiring you all over again.”
Andy's dark eyebrows shot up. “Oh, yeah?” A proud, thoroughly delighted smile spread across her face. “Admiring what, exactly? Me sleeping? How ridiculously attractive I am?”
Emily huffed a laugh. “God, you're insufferable.”
“And yet, you married me.”
“Unfortunately.”
“Twice, if you count all the opportunities you've had to walk away and haven't,” Andy grinned, looking far too pleased with herself.
Emily gave her a playful shove against her shoulder, an attack Andy promptly ignored, tightening her grip around Emily’s waist instead. “Now, come on, sweetheart. Enlighten me.” Andy tilted her chin up, presenting herself with the exaggerated dignity of a woman awaiting a well-deserved portrait. “What specific aspect of my person has you so utterly captivated this morning?”
Emily opened her mouth to deliver a sharp, sarcastic retort, but her gaze happened to wander downward. Andy's sleep shirt had ridden up slightly during their minor scuffle, gathering just beneath her ribs. A prominent, familiar stretch of toned stomach and cut abs peeked out from underneath the rumpled cotton.
Andy followed her gaze down.
A heavy pause settled over the bed.
Slowly, Andy looked back up at Emily, a wicked, knowing smirk creeping across her face. “Oh?”
Emily recognised that look instantly. She had seen it a thousand times over the years, usually right before Andy uttered something so shameless it made Emily question the wisdom of tying her life to a former midwestern disaster.
Andy's hand drifted lazily to the hem of her shirt. “My abs?”
Emily let out a startled, incredulous laugh. “Oh, for God's sake!”
“What?” Andy asked, the picture of innocence as she lifted the fabric a fraction higher. “You were looking.”
“I have eyes, darling. Observing reality is hardly a crime.”
“Never said it was.” Andy's grin widened. “Just pleased to know I've still got your full attention.”
“You've always had my attention.” The confession slipped out before Emily could think better of it.
For a fleeting second, Andy's teasing bravado melted away. Something warm and achingly tender flickered behind her dark eyes, the kind of look that could still completely undo Emily with nothing more than a glance.
Then, naturally, she ruined it. “Well, that's reassuring.” Andy gave her own stomach a little confident pat. “I do put in the work, you know.”
Emily burst out laughing, burying her face into the crook of Andy's neck. “You are absolutely ridiculous.”
“And handsome.”
“Debatable.”
“Beautiful?”
“Don't push your luck.”
“Devastatingly attractive?”
Emily lifted her head, fixing her with a flat, icy stare that did absolutely nothing to dampen Andy's smug expression. “Are you quite finished?”
“Not even remotely, darling.”
Emily shook her head, a smile breaking through her stern facade. “That too, actually.”
Andy blinked, caught off guard. “What?”
“Your abs,” Emily clarified, extending a hand to give Andy's stomach a light, almost absent-minded pat. “They're lovely. Very impressive. Congratulations on your continued dedication to being a show-off.”
Andy stared at her for a beat, stunned, before breaking into a triumphant, delighted grin. “Oh! You think they're lovely?”
“Do not make me regret complimenting you, Andrea.”
“Too late. I am engraving this moment into my memory for the rest of my life.”
“Andy.”
“I might get a fifth tattoo. 'My wife thinks I'm hot.'”
Emily groaned, reaching up to slam her palm directly over Andy's mouth. Andy didn't even flinch, she simply kissed the centre of Emily's palm. Emily's heart performed that ridiculous, somersaulting flip it had been doing since she was twenty-something, terrified, and hopelessly in love with this chaotic woman. Some things, apparently, were immortal.
Emily lowered her hand, her gaze softening as it drifted over Andy's features, taking in the sleepy crease pressed into her cheek, her messy brown hair, the soft curve of her lips.
“But,” Emily added softly, her voice dropping an octave, “I was mostly admiring your tattoos.”
Andy's expression shifted. The smugness evaporated, replaced by a gentle lift of her brows and a soft, reverent smile. “Ah.” She shifted slightly against the sheets, turning onto her back and glancing down at her shoulder, then toward her outer thigh where the hem of her shirt exposed a hint of dark ink against pale skin. “Those.”
“Those,” Emily echoed softly.
Andy looked back at her, her eyes shining in the morning light. “Every single one of them practically screaming your name?”
Emily felt a sudden, lovely warmth flush her cheeks.
Andy let out a thoughtful hum. “Yeah,” she murmured, her voice stripped of all joke and posture. “I love them too.”
There was no boastfulness in her voice now, no teasing bravado. Just uncomplicated affection, as if the tattoos were old friends she had grown accustomed to carrying around. As if she had long since made peace with the memories beneath them, and could finally look at them without feeling quite so alone.
Emily’s thumb brushed over the Aries symbol near Andy's shoulder. “I know.”
Andy’s dark eyes followed the movement. “Do you?”
Emily nodded, her heart full. “I do.”
For a long moment, the bedroom fell silent, save for the distant chirping of birds outside. Andy watched her, her fingers drawing slow, soothing circles against Emily's hip.
Then Emily bit her lower lip. It was a tiny, fleeting habit, but Andy knew her wife far too well to miss it. Her dark eyes narrowed with immediate interest.
“Oh, what's that face for?”
“What face?”
“That face.” Andy grinned, leaning in. “The one you make when you're thinking something scandalous and debating whether your British sensibilities will allow you to say it out loud.”
Emily looked positively affronted. “I do not have a face for that!”
“Darling, you have a whole catalog.”
“Andrea.”
“There's the 'I'm above your midwestern nonsense' face, the 'I am contemplating your murder' face, and then—”
“Well,” Emily cut in smoothly, deliberately smoothing a hand over Andy's stomach, “I think they're bloody hot, too.”
Andy stopped speaking. Completely. Emily watched the realisation hit, enjoying the monumental, once-in-a-lifetime satisfaction of rendering Andrea Sachs utterly speechless.
It lasted precisely two seconds.
“I'm sorry,” Andy said, sitting up straighter against the headboard, her eyes wide. “Could you repeat that for the record?”
Emily’s smile turned wicked. “No.”
“Emily.”
“You'll have to take it up with my solicitor.”
“Baby.” Andy snatched Emily's hand, bringing her knuckles to her lips for a fervent kiss. “Sweetheart. Love of my life. Most stunning creature ever to grace this planet.”
Emily laughed out loud. “Oh, now you remember your manners!”
“I have always possessed exquisite manners!”
“You once told a waiter his soup tasted like a wet envelope!”
“It did!”
“And you tried to fight a parking meter in London!”
“It took my coin and didn't give me a ticket! It started it!”
Emily dissolved into helpless, breathless laughter. Andy stared down at her, her dark eyes filled with a look that suggested that sound alone was worth every war she had ever fought.
Then Andy gently pulled her up, pressing their foreheads together. “So,” her smile returning as she murmured, her breath warm against Emily's lips. “You think I'm hot?”
Emily’s eyes flicked down to Andy's mouth, then back to her eyes. “I'm afraid so.”
“Even first thing in the morning?”
“Tragically.”
“With severe bed hair?”
“Especially with bed hair.”
“And my abs?”
Emily sighed dramatically. “Yes, darling. Your abs, too.”
Andy beamed, radiant and unrestrained. “God, I love being married to you.”
Emily leaned in and kissed her, effectively smothering the next ridiculous comment before it could leave Andy's mouth. Andy melted instantly, one hand cupping the back of Emily's head, the other settling firmly around her waist.
The kiss was soft and unhurried, still warm with sleep, with the familiar ease of two people who had spent so long missing one another that sometimes they still seemed a little astonished to find themselves here. Together.
When Emily finally pulled back, Andy chased her lips for one last, lingering kiss before pulling Emily flush against her chest and hauling the duvet up over their shoulders. “Right,” she announced, closing her eyes again. “Now that we've officially established that I'm gorgeous, we are going back to sleep.”
Emily snorted against her collarbone. “You were fast asleep ten minutes ago!”
“And I was rudely woken by a woman who apparently cannot keep her hands off my body.”
“Oh, the unbearable cruelty you endure.”
“You have no idea.”
Emily settled deeply against her, her cheek resting directly over the steady, rhythmic beat of Andy's heart. Beneath the thin fabric of her shirt, she listened to the peaceful rise and fall of her wife's breathing. Slipping her hand down, Emily laced her fingers through Andy's, her thumb gently tracing the simple, continuous black band inked around her ring finger.
Andy noticed immediately. Without opening her eyes, Andy lifted their joined hands, pressed a soft kiss to Emily's knuckles, and lowered them back onto the pillow, their matching inked lines resting side by side against the white linen.
“Love you,” Andy murmured, her voice trailing off into sleep.
Emily smiled, shifting so her back was pressed flush against the warm curve of Andy's body. “Love you more.”
“Impossible.”
“Go to sleep, you menace.”
Andy chuckled softly, her arms tightening their hold. Emily closed her eyes, letting the golden sunlight wash over them both. There would be plenty of time to admire her wife later. Though, if she were being truly honest with herself, she suspected a thousand lifetimes wouldn't be nearly enough.