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Loid had always prided himself on being right, especially since being right meant missions accomplished. Lives saved. War averted.
Yet for the first time in his life, Loid didn’t want to be right. This time, he was right in guessing that he had gone too far and that was why Yor wouldn’t look at him. He replayed the scene in his mind, trying to figure out if it was the words he said or the way he said it.
Loid and Yor had been rushing home from the rain and stopped just inside the door to their flat. He immediately fetched some towels for them, one he draped over his head to blot his wet hair, the other he proffered to Yor. He offered to let her have the bathroom first, in case she wanted to bathe, but she didn’t respond. Instead, she lingered in the foyer, dripping onto the doormat and staring at him as if...as if she were enchanted by what she saw.
Loid shook his head. Maybe it was conceited of him, thinking that she saw him in that way. He had teased her about it, but if he was being honest with himself, a part of him wanted it to be true. He wanted to be seen as enchanting to her. He wanted to be as enchanting to her as she was to him.
Loid sighed. He couldn’t count the number of times she captivated him. Oftentimes, she would be doing something mundane: tidying up or brewing tea, but the grace of her movements spoke of a poise and elegance which would have gone unnoticed to the untrained eye. Indeed, watching her was like watching an exquisite and rarely-sighted bird moving through a flower garden without disturbing a single leaf or petal.
Yor was also an undisputed beauty, of course, but he was not sure if people realized that her beauty had several layers to it. For example, he wasn’t sure if people appreciated the beauty of Yor’s kindness. Or her humility. Or her strength.
Loid rubbed his chin, smiling ruefully at the memory of Yor kicking him after he had tried to honeytrap her. Clearly, her rejection was in no uncertain terms then. Had it changed now?
Yor, meanwhile, was doing her best to push the event out of her mind. Why had she stared at him like that? She had been looking at him every day for months. Why did seeing him draped with raindrops suddenly make him look so enthralling?
Yor couldn’t quite find the words for it, but if she had to describe it, she would say that it was the first time she saw him for the work of art that he was. It was similar to gazing at a painting that was finally seen in the right lighting. Not the harsh glare of daylight or the fuzzy dimness of evening, but in rain light , if there was such a thing. She remembered how the pale slate of the sky through the windows had cast his features into a soft-edged relief, the planes of his face highlighted by the raindrops still clinging to his skin.
Yor had never seen her husband this way before, and it was one of those moments where time dilated and raced in every direction, making room for her to study him in a way she never knew she could. She didn’t know how long she stood there, her eyes tracing the raindrops that were threading down his neck and disappearing into his open shirt...
Several moments passed before she realized he was calling her name.
“Did you...hear me?” he asked gently, more out of concern than impatience or irritation.
Loid had reached across the expanse between them and slipped a lock of her hair into his fingers. His face softened as his eyelids lowered. He lifted the lock of hair as if to kiss it. “Or maybe you couldn’t take your eyes off of me?” he asked, his words glistening like beads of crystallized honey as they fell from his lips.
His lips.
No, I mustn’t. Yor shook her head, dispelling the thought. This was what had gotten her into trouble in the first place. Now Loid thought that she was mesmerized by him. Never mind that it was true, it was still an inappropriate thing to think about one’s fake husband.
No, this would not do. If Yor were going to play the part of his fake wife, then she had better keep her emotions in check, and her eyes firmly off of him.
Which she did.
All too well.
And it was driving Loid crazy.
The best spy in Westalis didn’t think he could take another day of this. He had tried to apologize.
“I’m sorry about what I said the other day,” Loid told Yor when they were clearing away dinner one night. “When we came home that rainy day. I didn’t mean to make you feel self-conscious.”
“Oh no, n-not at all,” Yor stammered, stacking the dishes into a perfectly balanced tower of porcelain as she headed to the sink. “I was, erm, worried about you catching a cold, that’s all. I didn’t mean to stare at you.” She froze. “Not that I was staring!” Yor faltered and the stack lurched forward.
“Whoa! Easy there!” Loid thrust out a hand on either side of the stack and steadied it. For a brief moment, he saw a flash of ruby eyes peek around the stack and graze over his face, then they disappeared behind the tower of dishes again.
“Th-thank you, Loid. I’m sorry I’m so clumsy.”
“It’s all right. I’m just glad you’re—”
Yor rushed past him and plopped the dishes into the basin. Snatching up the sponge, she squirted way too much dish detergent onto it, then began scrubbing the dishes with vigor, her long hair falling forward to obscure her face.
“...okay,” Loid finished uneasily.
Well, that was fine. Loid would find other ways. He was a spy after all and spies could think up hundreds of ways to get something done. If an apology didn’t work, then there would be something else that could make Yor look at him again. He just had to find out what.
At first, it was subtle changes. He started to dress in clothes that he suspected Yor liked: warm hues and thick, soft fabrics (it just so happened that the clothes that were also form-fitting). He made sure his grooming was impeccable, his colors coordinated, and his movements around her to be deliberate and smooth, allowing the tiniest peek of usually-covered up skin right at the corner of her vision.
Of course, Loid knew that getting Yor to pay attention to him would require more than just how he presented himself. It would require actions, too, and from his years as spy, he knew how little changes could add up to big impacts.
Loid started asking for her help more often. Inquired about her opinion on what to cook for dinner. Suggested that they go over the finances together. Asked for advice on parenting or communication or what to wear for certain work functions.
All of these efforts were not lost on Yor. If anything, it made it even harder for Yor to keep her resolve, and being around Loid turned into its own form of exquisite torture. However, Yor remembered the embarrassment of that day in the rain, and she knew that if she gave in to these strange new impulses...who knows what would happen?
One good thing did come out of this, however. Yor became extremely adept in sneaking glances at Loid out the corner of her eye. As an assassin, she had been well trained to be aware of all that was going on around her and these skills came in handy here as well. Now whenever she was around him, her senses peaked so they could pick up whatever morsel of him that she could, catalyzing their interactions into a deliciously distracting dance. In a way, it excited her, having this new kind of secret which she relished and agonized over in her quiet moments alone.
One night, Loid decided to try a different tactic. Instead of meticulously styling his hair or coordinating his clothes, he went for laid-back instead. Leaving his hair in its natural, messy state, he dressed in a simple t-shirt and dark trousers, donning his slippers instead of the usual dress shoes.
After putting Anya to bed, he wandered into the living room and casually sat next to Yor while she was watching television, making sure to put the perfect amount of distance in between them. Not so far away that it felt like he was being distant but not close enough to make her uncomfortable.
Naturally, Loid’s proximity made Yor’s senses kick into high gear. She couldn’t concentrate anymore, her brain furiously warring with itself on how long she should sit there before getting up. On one hand, if she rose and went to bed too soon, Loid would think that he had chased her away.
That, and she didn’t really want to leave.
On the other hand, sitting there next to him while pretending to watch television was its own form of agony. For one thing, she wasn’t very good at remaining still, especially when so many emotions were churning through her. However, she didn’t want to fidget and give away her nervousness, either.
Loid, for his part, did his best to look and act casual, only periodically stretching in a way that showed off the rippling of his lean muscles under his slightly-too-tight t-shirt.
Yor squirmed. Please stop , she pleaded, although she wasn’t sure if she was silently begging Loid or herself. Seriously, who gave him permission to sit there looking so sexy with his messy hair and his snug shirt and his long, long legs stretched out in front of him? And did he really have to smell so good too?!
Finally, when Yor was unable to take it anymore, she snatched the blanket draped over her lap and threw it over Loid, covering him in a flutter of soft downy fabric.
“What the—?”
Loid sat there dumbfounded as he tried to process what happened.
One part of him panicked. Was it too much? Did he push it too far? Did she think he was disheveled? Overly messy? Had he gone too far off the deep end that now he looked like a slob instead of low-key attractive?
The other part of him—the part that kept stealing glances at his wife and wanting to scoot closer to her—that part broke down in relief. So much relief that he started laughing. Not just any kind of laughter, either. Huge, heaving belly laughs that shook his whole body.
It suddenly struck him how ridiculous this whole thing was. How ridiculous he was acting. How giddy and dumb and lightheaded Yor made him feel. And how he loved every second of it. How he loved every second with her . How he loved—
Loid heard a squeak and felt a weight lift from the other side of the couch.
By the time he pulled off the blanket, Yor had disappeared.
Damn. He had fouled it up again. Yet he couldn’t help but smile. There’s always tomorrow , he reminded himself as he turned off the television and headed to bed. Another day to seduce his wife into meeting his eyes again.
It would be another week before they finally looked at each other, although this time, it wasn’t planned at all.
Yor was dusting around the house while Loid sat in the armchair pretending to read the paper. In actuality, he was admiring the curve of Yor’s back. It wasn’t the first time he indulged in this understated and alluring section his wife didn’t cover up. That and her shoulders.
His eyes were drifting up to that aforementioned part when he noticed the button on the back of her sweater coming undone. Yor was standing on her tiptoes to put away something when her stretching strained the poor button a bit too much and...
“Yor!”
Loid was by her side in an instant, his fingers closing on the button before it could escape. His touch caused Yor to whip around in fright, but once she turned to face him, all thought and sound died away.
Oh no.
Now Yor was looking— really, truly looking— which made it impossible to do anything else.
Yor had never been good at being subtle. Everything she thought and felt could easily be gleaned from watching her. Her sorrows, her joys, her confusion, all of it, worn on her sleeve and written on her face. Like that time she had looked at Loid in the rain light. Except it wasn’t raining now. They were inside and completely dry. Yet Yor's face felt very, very wet.
Loid, for his part, had always been good at being subtle. At lying. At evasion. However, he wasn’t being quite so subtle now. How could he when Yor was looking at him like that?
His insides weren’t being so subtle, either.
Internally, he was quietly crumbling. His heart crumbled under the weight of unfulfilled longing. His ribs ached from the pressure of an expanding warmth. His entire body was being drawn in by the magnetic gravity of Yor’s gaze. Why, oh, why had he foolishly yearned for something so fantastically forbidden?
Yor’s voice broke through his thoughts.
“How do you do that?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
“Do...what?” asked Loid, slowly, carefully.
“Mesmerize me simply by looking at me.”
“I...mesmerize you?”
Yor could only nod.
“I don’t mean to,” he said. “I didn’t even know I could.”
“I think you do know,” Yor said, sounding small and vulnerable. Loid realized she was shaking underneath his fingertips. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have said what you said.”
“You mean the time we came in from the rain?”
Yor nodded, finally able to tear her gaze away as she cast her eyes downward.
“Yor. Yor, look at me. Please.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because then you’ll tease me again.”
“Yor, I’m sorry for what I said that time.” He paused. “The truth is...” Loid stopped. “The truth is...”
Why couldn’t he say it?! Before he could overthink it, his words came out in a rush.
“I want you to look at me. I like looking at you. I like our eyes meeting. It’s been so long since I’ve seen your eyes that I’ve forgotten...”
I’ve forgotten all the things they could do to me , he thought.
“You’ve forgotten...?” Yor prompted.
Loid shook himself. “I’ve forgotten what I was going to say,” he lied. He leaned in, slowly as not to startle her, his other arm draping around the back of her neck. Yor turned away, expecting the worst, but Loid’s next words surprised her.
“Your button’s come completely loose from your sweater. If you’ll stay here, I’ll fetch you a pin.”
Yor blinked. So that's why he had jumped on her? The realization hit her like a freight train. He wasn't trying to make a move on her! He saw that her sweater was coming apart and he was trying to help her! To save her from embarrassment! Somehow, this realization made her even more embarrassed. How could she ever think that he saw her in that way?
"Yor?" Loid prompted. "Yor, is everything okay?"
Yor could only nod numbly. "I'll...I'll stay here," she finally managed; her voice sounded far away, like it was someone else was speaking. "I'll wait for you to come back."
Loid could feel her neck heating up underneath his fingertips, but he decided not to comment on it. Once he was gone, she spent the next several moments desperately trying to corral her abject humiliation. When Loid returned, he pinned Yor’s sweater together until Yor could get to her room.
Once in her room, however, Yor didn’t change out of the sweater at all. She crawled under the covers and hugged a pillow to herself, rocking back and forth as the incident played over and over in her mind.
I shouldn't have said that! she berated herself. How can I face him after this? What if I avoided him? Yes, that’s the ticket. I’ll avoid him from now on.
Then reality hit her. But we live together! A part of her wailed. And we’re supposed to be a loving couple! Yor lamented. How do I get around this?
She continued rocking and bewailing her fate until she fell asleep. It wasn’t until Loid called her for dinner that Yor roused.
“Um, I’m not feeling well!” Yor lied through the door. “I think I’ll skip dinner and get some sleep.”
“Are you sure, Yor? You haven’t eaten anything since breakfast.”
“I’m sure,” Yor said, squeezing her eyes shut and placing a hand against the door. He was so close, just on the other side of it, yet he felt so far away. And it was all due to her own cowardice.
The next words came from someone much, much smaller than Loid and Yor, and yet it was much, much louder.
“I HAVE HAD IT WITH YOU TWO! MAMA, YOU COME OUT HERE RIGHT NOW AND FACE PAPA! YOU CAN’T HIDE FROM HIM FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE! PAPA’S BEEN WORRYING ABOUT YOU ALL DAY AND HE WON’T STOP UNTIL YOU COME OUT AND FACE HIM!”
A strangled noise could be heard next to Anya, but this did nothing to interrupt her tirade. “AND HE MISSES YOU! AND I MISS YOU! AND...AND...” here the voice petered out, followed by a sob. “And we’re supposed to be a fam—”
Anya never got to finish because the door flew open and she was scooped up into the strong arms of her mother.
“You’re right,” Yor said, sobbing into Anya’s tiny form. “I shouldn’t hide from my problems. I shouldn't be hiding at all. What kind of example is that to set for you?”
Anya pulled back from her mother, her tears drying as a look of confusion crossed her face. “But Papa isn’t a problem.”
“No, no he isn’t. Your Papa is wonderful. It’s only...I have a hard time around him.”
“Why?” Anya twisted to glare at her Papa standing a few feet away, a parade of emotions vaunting across his face. “What did you do to Mama?”
“Nothing!” Loid said defensively, throwing up his hands. “I only...Well, I teased her once when she looked at me and...and now she refuses to look at me at all.”
“That’s dumb,” Anya stated flatly, though neither adult knew if she was referring to the teasing or to Yor’s reaction to it.
Anya wriggled out of her mother’s arms. She stationed herself between her parents and pointed at each of them. “You two are the grown-ups here. If you can’t even look at each other, how are we going to be a family, huh?”
When neither of them could answer her, Anya threw her arms into the air. “PLEASE figure it out soon. Dinner’s getting cold,” she stated, stalking away into the dining room. “And I don’t want to eat it by myself.”
Loid sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Their daughter was right. They needed to resolve this and they needed to do it soon, but...how to even begin? What if they waited until after din—?
“Do you want to eat dinner first?” asked Yor.
“An excellent idea,” said Loid. “I find that I always think better on a full stomach.” He jerked his head in the direction of the dining room. “Shall we?”
Yor nodded and followed him to where their daughter was waiting.
“Finally,” said Anya. “A family dinner.”
Although everyone was seated and eating, it didn’t feel like one of their usual family dinners. Loid and Yor were still dancing around each other and any attempt at conversation was stilted and awkward.
The one saving grace was Bond. He appeared to have picked up on everyone’s anxiety and circled the table several times, approaching each family member and rubbing his head comfortingly against them.
At first, Loid thought Bond was begging for scraps, but the dog didn’t even look interested in food. When Loid put out his hand in the “Stay” command, Bond stayed, but also placed his head in Loid’s lap, his tail swishing slowly back and forth.
“So you feel the tension too, huh?” asked Loid, stroking Bond’s head.
“Worf,” Bond said quietly, his tail flickering once.
When the dog got to Yor, she wholeheartedly hugged him. “Oh Bond. I’m sorry for all the mess I’ve caused. I’ll fix it, I promise. Then we can go back to being a family again.”
“Yor, it’s not a mess,” Loid reassured her. “I think it’s just a misunderstanding and it’s nothing we can’t clear up.”
“I hope so,” Yor said uncertainly. She couldn’t see how it wasn’t her fault, but Loid’s warm smile allayed her fears somewhat.
When dinner was finished, Anya stood up on her chair. “Now you two work out whatever it is you need to work out. Come on, Bond. Let’s get ready for bed.”
Yor and Loid could only stare in wonder as their daughter hopped off her chair and took her dishes to the sink.
“Would you like help with your bedtime routine?” asked Yor, a little surprised.
Anya looked at her mother over one shoulder. The expression on her face reminded Yor of the look Loid wore when he was being serious about something. “I’m a big girl now, Mama. I can do it on my own. It’s time for you to be a big girl, too.”
With that, she turned heel and headed off to other side of the flat, Bond in tow.
Yor and Loid looked at each other. When had their little girl become the grown up in the house?
Loid coughed. “Since Anya no longer needs us for the evening, how about I help you clean up and then we can talk?”
Yor nodded. They went through the washing up, splitting up the last chores of the evening. Once Loid had put away all of the glasses, he braced himself to broach the subject, but Yor beat him to it.
“Loid?”
The man in question perked up. His wife was standing before him, her hands clasped and her face repentant. “I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting. It’s childish of me, taking something so seriously. Anya is right. I should act like an adult and get over my fears of...whatever this is.”
“What is it?”
“Hmm?”
“You said ‘whatever this is.’ What do you think it is?”
Yor’s face puckered in concentration. “It’s hard to explain. The best way I have to describe it is...every time I look at you, it makes it hard to think. It makes it hard to breathe. It makes it hard to do anything. It's like every time I look at you, I want to reach out and touch you.”
Yor stiffened. “Please forget I said that last part!”
“Why?” Loid asked. “I don’t see anything wrong with it.” He held out his hand. “You can touch me.”
Hesitantly, Yor reached out her fingers. Once she laid them into Loid’s palm, he closed over them gently and pulled her toward him.
“Come here,” he said, his voice a quiet, irresistible command.
In spite of Yor’s internal resistance, she found herself moving forward, her footsteps echoing faintly in her mind as she let herself be drawn into this man she had married for convenience. Was this convenient anymore? For her cover, yes. For her heart?
Yor didn’t want to think about that yet. All she wanted right now was to follow his voice as he guided her into him. As soon as she was close enough, Loid closed his other arm around her, cradling the back of her head and pressing it into him. He bent his head and rested it on her hair, sighing with his whole body as he eased her into his embrace.
Oh. OH. OH DEAR.
They stood that way for who knows how long, Yor rubbing her head into Loid’s shirt and Loid rubbing comforting circles into her back. Her bare back.
For once, it felt good for someone to be touching her bare skin. Yor usually shrank away from things like this, but now that she was opening herself up to it, she found it...strangely soothing. And addictive.
When Loid stopped his motions, she pulled back to look at him, almost to ask why he stopped, but the expression on his face made her breath catch in her throat. She had never seen him look so intense and so soft at the same time. It was almost as if he wanted to...
“Why were you afraid to touch me?” he asked suddenly.
Yor averted her eyes. “I was afraid that if I started touching you, then I’ll get the urge to...to touch you everywhere and...and without this ,” Yor said, choking on the last word.
“This?” Loid asked, perplexed. In response, Yor only glanced down at what was bunched in her hands.
Loid followed her gaze and found that she was clinging to his shirt, the fabric bundled in her shaking fingers.
“Oh.” Then her meaning dawned on him. “OH.” A broad grin spread across his face. “You know...we can make that happen.”
“But I don’t know how to do things like that.”
“Things like what?”
“Being intimate.”
Loid smirked. “Well, you’re in luck,” he whispered next to the curve of her ear. “I happen to have experience in that area...”
Yor squirmed again. He was too close and it was too much for her. Yor wanted to hit him and run away. She wanted to bury herself in a hole somewhere, drag a rock on top of it, and never come out again. She wanted to grab him, to envelope him, but also to push him away and never see him again.
Was this what the girls at work were talking about? Was this what it felt like to...to want someone?
In the end, Yor chose a third option. It was an impulse, and an odd one at that, but he was right there and it was the first thing she could think to do. She turned and kissed his ear.
Loid convulsed, the tender kiss provoking such a reaction that waves of heat broke out all over his body and rolled over his taut, strained muscles. “Oh my, I think we...better take this into the bedroom.”
Yor blinked up at him. “Why? What’s in the bedroom?”
“The...bed.”
“Well...yeah, that’s why it’s called a bedroom. Is there something else special in there?”
Loid quirked an eyebrow. Then he dipped down and hoisted her into his arms. Yor yelped and clung to him.
“Why don’t I...show you personally?” Loid said, purring seductively.
“O...okay,” Yor said, burying her face into the valley between his chest and bicep. She didn’t know exactly what laid in store but the way Loid was speaking to her was enough to send all kinds of sensual feelings sizzling down her spine.
More than that, Yor felt safe with him. She trusted him. Especially now that it was okay to look at him again, to touch him, to really be herself with him, Yor felt that there was no one better to teach her the ways of intimacy.
That night was the first time Yor let herself go and allowed someone else in, someone to guide her and hold her and take care of her for once.
And that felt the best of all.
THE END