Chapter Text
He touches her differently now.
Before Starcourt, before Russia, before everything went to shit, he was careful about the when and how. More often than not he’d wait for her to initiate contact.
Now that they’ve found each other again, it’s like a switch has been flipped. He’s constantly touching her, reaching for her hand or wrapping an arm around her shoulders. She’d be more surprised by the change if she wasn’t just as bad. Now that she has him back, panic spikes in her chest when he’s out of her line of sight, and she can tell he feels the same by the way his eyes soften with relief every time he sees her.
She kisses him in an abandoned church, desperate and a little unpracticed, and for the few seconds they’re wrapped up in each other, his fingers tangled in her hair, she feels safe.
There’s no pretence between them, not anymore. She touches him and he melts into it, where before he would have tried to play it off. They both know how the other feels; there’s no point in acting like this thing between them is anything else.
In the dark of a ragged motel room, he pulls her to him, a hand cradling the back of her head. She shuts her eyes, listens for his heartbeat, tries to match her breathing to it. Proof of life. She runs her hand along his back, carefully tracing the scars she finds there. His breath catches, and she presses her lips to his collarbone, letting him tug her closer. She falls asleep curled against his chest, and spends the entire plane ride to Indiana the next morning clutching his hand because now that the adrenaline’s worn off she’s just plain fucking terrified of losing him again.
The kids notice, of course they do. Once the initial shock has dissipated, she watches her boys clock the touches. They don’t say anything, but she knows they’re perceptive. She’ll tell them soon, when everything’s a little less volatile. For now, there’s a part of her that wants to keep this close.
The second night back, when he wakes up screaming from whatever horror his mind has conjured, he flinches away from her touch. Something inside her breaks, but she forces herself to stay back, knots her fingers into the sheets and waits for him to come back to himself. Once his breathing slows, he stands and pulls on a discarded flannel shirt from the floor, disappearing down the hall. When she hears the back door open and close, she puts a hand to her mouth and cries. She’s angry, so fucking angry, at the bastards who put him through this, at herself for putting him there in the first place.
(She’s also a little hurt that he didn’t want her to touch him. She understands, of course she does, but it still sparks an ache in her chest.)
She’s on the verge of sleep when he returns, but she sits up the second she hears the door open. The mattress dips as he sits down, and she wipes at her eyes, waiting. He reaches back, feels around for her hand, and she chokes back the sob in her throat, curling her fingers around his and holding tight. He moves then, turning fully to face her, and her breath hitches at the look in his eyes; shaken, scared, resigned, but soft, like he still can’t believe she’s real. He lifts a hand to her cheek, exhaling at the contact, and presses his forehead to hers. He smells like cigarette smoke and cold night air, and she leans into him, reaching up to cover his hand with hers. They stay like that for a moment, breathing each other in. At some point she realizes she’s crying again, and it doesn’t matter because he’s crying too, and she tucks her face against his shoulder and holds on to him. His arms come up around her, hands warm and solid against her back, and she can feel his tears on her cheek.
Later, he leans back against the pillows, gently pulling her with him. She shifts so her back is to his chest, and he loops an arm around her waist, pressing a kiss to her hair. When she wakes the next morning to pale sunlight filtering through the worn curtains, he hasn’t moved, still wrapped around her like ivy. She settles into it, letting herself be held.
It’s safe, this little life they build. There’s danger and horror practically on their doorstep, hell pressing up from under the ground, but here they can find safety in each other, gather their children close and hold onto the moments of quiet. And she’s scared, how could she be anything else, but he’s right there with her, hands linked, an anchor.
Together, against all odds.
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What did my fingers do before they held him? What did my heart do, with its love?