Work Text:
Please.
This isn't what you'd planned, heading home from idle wandering. When you'd decided you'd be leaving if it meant making things easier for everyone involved.
The wind had picked up a chill, unexpected for the season, that had shaken through the tree tops and the ends of your hair alike, the swishing of high branches warning of incoming unpleasantness; close the windows, bring in the washing, a storm's upon its way.
Ed and Warren had skipped past no doubt off to secure the marina should the winds threat come to fruition, a rushed greeting a polite afterthought you're sure only offered because of your companion; the priests status demanding a little more courtesy than a simple old friend like yourself despite his attempts at jovial familiarity he one day hopes will lead to his congregation being more at ease in his company.
He'd found you out by the Millers barn, both walking the same trail you'd often travelled together and he'd clung to your side since, steps falling in sync crunching along the gravel as he talked of everything and nothing just to keep you next to him all the way through the trees and along the cobbles leading down toward the rectory exactly where you'd wanted to avoid when you'd made your cowards plan.
When you had realised that you loved him for that very first time and your response had been flight; quick run away, leave, before it's too painful.
He had known of something, of course he'd known. He'd felt you pull away from him. Hide yourself in excuses "Not today Father, I'm busy." Father. Father. A name you'd abandoned months ago returning with a lashing sting.
So Father Paul had chased you, from the library to the general store. Erins doorstep to your own. Invites of tea and of moonlight and all the things you no longer shared for reasons completely lost on him.
The rain had come quickly and soaked you both to the bone and his chasing still hadn't ceased even with you dripping on his flooring, excuses to leave ignored in favour of a tartan bathrobe and boiling kettle as he nip nip nipped at your ankles like a little lost terrier. " Stay, until the rain stops." "Until your clothes are dry." on your heels right from one doorway to the next, perching on the end of his bed when you emerged, changed, from the bathroom with offers of tea and maybe sandwiches and would you like a blanket? until it had all been too much, until he had been too much.
Then the deluge.
"It hurts." You tell him. "Because it hurts. " The way it fills up your belly and claws its way up inside you, threatening to erupt into sobs at every Sunday mass. How your pillows are stained with tears and you have prayed, finally prayed! and to his god no less. Isn't it ironic that it would be to rid this feeling from you?
"Tell me what to do." He'd said "What can I do?"
The answer's nothing and you'd told him so, stood between his parted legs as close as you'd dare standing "There's nothing you can do, it's unstoppable, this feeling I have." and then you'd apologised. "I never meant to cause you trouble."
A tug is all it had taken. One rebellious and emboldened move of his hand to pull the belt between his finger to allow the soft cotton of his bathrobe to fall open down your front then with little encouragement slip slowly from your shoulders; a pool of discarded comfort swimming around your feet.
An exhale of wonder, a shy lingering hand reaching toward you, glassy pleading eyes. "May I?"
Please you want to beg, Please. It's all you've wanted for such a long time; to cross that line drawn ever so carefully with boundaries of familiarity and make-play at friendship. You're own eyes must say it, because his hands reach your skin then, the first touch of smooth fingers known only for turning pages and leafing papers warm and soft against your hip as he pulls you closer to lay a cheek against your stomach then encircling you with his arms, clinging tightly, large palms splayed across your back and damp tears against your middle.
Seas catching fire or something like it comes to mind as he follows bravely his own longing but he doesn't utter it despite finally being truthful to himself in your presence, afraid his words won't do justice to the swelling in his chest.
He has never been a man of poetry, of prose or rhyme that might be recited by lovers, testaments of affection delivered in hushed whispers or thunderous declaration. Scripture is easy, the word of god flows from him with little effort but the words he seeks to offer you have already been written by men far more eloquent than he so he hopes that he can show you his meanings with trembling hands and gentle lips.
He hopes that he is enough, that he is able in his clumsy inelegance and unpractised ministrations, to convince you of his consecration. He hopes his actions will call loudly the words he fails to find.
He wants to recite pledges from the hearts and minds of men more capable, he yearns to blanket you in Keats, a drowning of Neruda and Cummings but he struggles just to breath when he holds you beneath his fingers so he'll deliver his verse in soft caresses where his palms encase your hips and draw out odes of promise and dedication with his tongue against your ribs.
Open mouthed wet kisses write a sonnet across your flesh from your navel to your throat where his teeth graze lines unspoken and when he reaches your mouth and your tongues meet, "Don't leave" is all he says with his hands tangled in your hair.
His belt clinks and jangles and paired with the absence of his hands you know what comes next. It's thrilling, the fresh hurry in his movements, the rush that tells you he is as eager as you are to leap into this newness, the something else you both thought forbidden. When he falls back and drags you with him, jeans and belt around his knees, you take your place across his thighs first and push up his shirt to marvel at the glory, taught stomach muscles and a trail of dark hair leading downward to where he stands erect and weeping in anticipation of your attention.
"Are you sure?" You ask, voice breaking.
"More than I've ever been." His reply while he rises to meet your lips, strong arms pulling you closer, over him, on top of him, warm and welcoming as he pushes softly into you.
He wonders briefly if he should have waited until he'd found all the words he'd wished to say but you'd been so close to leaving he has to show you he'll never be able to let you, so he allows his fingers to dig into your thighs instead as you rise and fall above him letting the rhythm of his movements compose a ballad for your taking.
This is sin in its purest form and if this is what damns him he will gladly accept it. There is no shame in the beauty of this transgression, no offence requiring repentance. This is sin and this is holy.
Back before, before , when his days were plagued with confusion and his nights lonesome despair, John Pruitt had doubted and fretted and mourned a life not lived. Perhaps the second chance he'd been granted had nothing to do with angels at all.
Perhaps later he'll pen a sermon, a living eulogy of veneration in your honour. Compose a rousing homily, a commentary of his devotion in the only way he's familiar. For now he'll clutch at your flesh, fists full of adoration, pink and red fingerprints marks of his reverence and hungry nails leaving passionate crescent moon smiles, and let you quell your own tears from where you move above him hoping that his fervour, for now, is worship enough.
When your eyes flutter and your breath shakes. When your own hands become needy. When he feels you quiver and clench around him, he sees himself in your rapture.
When he flips you to the mattress, his weight against your chest, he captures your pleasure with echoing eyes; swaths of deep brown between black frames of lashes. When his long fingers find your throat and he pants heavy against your lips, "Don't leave me, don't leave me, don't leave me" is the only poem he recites as he spills himself inside you.
Afterwards. After. In the stillness and the quiet. "No more tears." he smiles.
"No more tears."
Outside it stops raining.