Chapter Text
Ava squinted at the empty bed lit by the dim moonlight as if she could stare at it long enough to manifest Beatrice snuggled up inside of it. It was her first night back after being unceremoniously ejected from Reya’s realm. Her first actual sleep since leaving Beatrice behind.
Her memories of Reya’s realm flittered through her mind, never sticking long enough to form into something tangible. She remembered Reya’s smile as she healed her, no sleep, no food, endless sand, then Cat’s Cradle blinking back into her view. This had frustrated Mother Superion and the rest of the sisters to no end. She had no details that she could recall about the Holy War or what they would be facing. Her jaw clenched in frustration. Even Beatrice hadn’t met her eyes during that meeting. She must be disappointed in her for not remembering.
That would be the best-case scenario. That was the only scenario Ava was allowing herself to believe right now. She couldn’t stomach the thought that Beatrice might be avoiding her because of the kiss or the “I love you” or the stupid way she had decided to secretly self-sacrifice. Beatrice could be mad at her for not remembering. But if it was anything else, Ava didn’t even know how to begin to apologize.
After a day of their incessant questioning, the sisters had begrudgingly agreed with Beatrice’s request to let Ava get some sleep. Her heart had soared at the other girl’s intervention on her behalf. But still Beatrice hadn’t met her eyes, and filed out of the room without a glance backward.
Which left her here, alone in a dark room with a bed that was starting to look more and more like an enemy. She poked the bed frame with her toe as if to threaten it into submission. She had splattered an interdimensional being into oblivion by summoning deadly demons. An empty bed could not defeat her. She was the motherfucking Warrior Nun.
The Warrior Nun who needed a cup of tea to lull her into a sleepy enough state before she would attempt to face the empty bed.
With a defeated sigh, she turned around and yanked open the door to her room. In doing so, she nearly collided with Beatrice ( Beatrice! ) who was standing at her doorway, hand raised to knock.
“Ava,” Beatrice sputtered at the same time that Ava said her name.
They stood awkwardly for half a second, before they both tried to speak again.
“I was just—” Beatrice began.
“What are you—” Ava stopped her sentence and laughed, “Why don’t you go first?”
Beatrice was here. Beatrice was looking at her. Beatrice wanted to talk to her. It was all she could do to not bounce on the balls of her feet.
“I wanted to,” Beatrice started then looked down at the ground, fiddling with the hem of her shirt. She let out a shaky breath. “Could I sleep here tonight?”
In that moment, Ava forgot everything she had learned about the Catholic Church because she was certain God was real and had been answering her prayers. She took a huge step back and swung her arm to gesture Beatrice in.
“Always,” Ava said as Beatrice walked past her. “I wasn’t sure if I would be able to sleep without you here.”
Beatrice sat on the edge of the bed and looked up at her. Her eyes glinted with tears in the moonlight. Ava walked to her and placed her hand gently on her cheek, wiping away one of the tears that had escaped. Beatrice closed her eyes and leaned into her touch for a brief moment before pulling away.
“I’m not a nun anymore,” she said quietly, stating the obvious, as if Ava hadn’t immediately noticed that she hadn’t been in her wimple when all the other sisters had been.
Ava dropped her hand and simply nodded, waiting for Beatrice to say more.
“But I don’t want to…,” Beatrice continued, tears reforming in her eyes. “I just want to sleep. Is that okay?”
“Yeah, of course, obviously,” Ava said, her face flushed at the implication of what Beatrice was saying she didn’t want to do. “It’ll be just like old times.”
Beatrice tilted her head to the side before peeling back the blankets and sliding in the bed. Ava moved quickly to join her, heart pounding. Her whole body was pulsing with the energy of being so close to Beatrice.
“It’s not like old times though,” Beatrice said quietly after Ava had settled in next to her. She rolled over to face Ava.
Ava felt her breath hitch when Beatrice met her eyes. Her hands itched to hold her, to meld her body into hers. Her lips ached at the memory of what it felt like to be pressed against Beatrice’s. But she stopped herself. Beatrice had said she just wanted to sleep. Ava could control herself. Ava would control herself. Even when she was lying in bed with the hottest ex-nun on the planet.
Control. Control. Control. She repeated to herself even as Beatrice reached up with her hand and ghosted her fingertips across Ava’s cheek. Her heart was pounding so loud that she was certain Beatrice could hear it. Whether or not she was aware of the effect she was having on Ava, Beatrice continued to trace her fingers across Ava’s skin. She trailed down her jaw line to the tip of her chin. The pad of her thumb came to rest on Ava’s bottom lip. And Ava didn’t pull it into her mouth, despite how much she wanted to.
“Bea?” she asked quietly.
Beatrice snapped her hand away, “Sorry, Ava. I don’t know what came over me.”
Ava immediately missed her. Her face burned it had been touched. Had she truly ever had feeling in her face before this moment? Her body felt alive, craving Beatrice’s skin on hers.
She scooted towards Beatrice half an inch, “It’s okay. I like when you touch me. You can always touch me.”
“Ava…” Beatrice sighed, her hands had balled into little fists between them. Ava glanced down at them and marveled at how such deadly things could look so cute and so absolutely squishable.
“I’m just saying, Bea,” she tried at nonchalance. “Don’t stop on my account.”
Beatrice rolled her face into her pillow, “I don’t know how to do this, Ava.”
Do what? Ava wanted to ask, but she knew. They both knew. Maybe they had always known. Ever since that first night they shared in Switzerland where Ava crawled into Beatrice’s open arms and they both pretended they were asleep.
“I mean, I don’t either, for the record. If anyone’s keeping record. What does that saying even mean? Are people just walking around keeping records of everything that other people are saying? Awfully Big Brother of them if so.” Ava said, earning a small chuckle from Beatrice.
Beatrice peeked one eye out from her pillow, “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a 1984 reader.”
Oh you can peg me any time. Ava’s unhelpful mind chimed, but thankfully she had learned enough of a filter to suppress that horny comment.
“Why is everyone always surprised when I know books? Do I give off that much of a himbo energy?”
At that, Beatrice let out a sharp laugh and emerged from her pillow entirely. “You think you have ‘himbo energy’?”
“Well first of all, himbo sounds adorable in your accent and far too refined for what it is. But second of all, yeah, that’s part of my charm, right? I’m just a dashing golden retriever that people can trust. Nothing too deep here, nothing to be concerned about.”
Beatrice rolled her eyes, “There’s more to you than that. There’s always more.”
“You always could see through my act,” Ava said softly. The urge to touch Beatrice’s face was literally gnawing at her skin.
“Not well enough, not enough to have saved you.”
“You did save me,” Ava countered immediately. “I would be dead if not for you.”
The tears came back to Beatrice’s eyes. “You did die, though. You were gone and I didn’t know when or if you could come back. Losing you, it almost killed me, Ava.”
“I’m here now. You don’t have to worry. I love you, and I’m not going anywhere.”
Beatrice dropped her eyes, and Ava felt her heart sink. Nice going Silva, just had bring out the L word again.
“Maybe you should go. You’d be better off.”
Ava’s mind short circuited. “No offense, Bea, but that’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever said. Meeting you, having you in my life, that’s the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. Why would I be better off without you?”
“And what if I can’t give you what you want? I told you. I don’t know how to do this. I don’t even know if I can do this.”
“I just want you, Bea. Here in my bed, by my side throughout the day. I just want to wake up and see you next to me. To go to sleep and know I’m not alone.” Ava managed through a sob, desperation building. She could feel Beatrice slipping away.
Beatrice stared at her for a long time then sighed. She reached out and gingerly placed a hand on Ava’s neck. Her thumb gently stroked her jaw line and Ava had to tamp down a moan.
“I think we both know that you want more than that,” Beatrice said as if she could read the dirtiest thoughts that had flickered through Ava’s mind.
“And you don’t?” Ava asked before she could stop herself. Beatrice had kissed her back. Beatrice had placed her hand on her neck and pulled her in when she had tried to break their kiss.
Beatrice’s brow furrowed, and her eyes grew distant. Ava wanted to ask where her mind had gone. Wanted to ask her to take her with her. Wanted to fight whatever demons were plaguing her mind. But she stayed silent, not daring to push the issue further than she already had.
“When my father found out what I was, he couldn’t even look at me,” Beatrice said slowly. “I was used to him not really paying attention to me. Him only noticing me if I won something or got the best grades at school. I didn’t realize he had the capacity to care less about me until that moment. All I ever wanted was for him to love me, to be proud of me, and he couldn’t even look at me.”
Beatrice choked back a sob, and Ava had to clench both of her hands into fists to stop herself from barreling forward and wrapping Beatrice into a tight hug.
“I know it probably seems strange or pathetic, but I think there’s still a part of me that wants to be the person he raised me to be. Despite all the pain he’s caused me and how much time it’s been, I still want him to be proud of me. To love me. And I know he cannot love me if I want you.”
She took a deep sigh then continued, “But I do want you, Ava. Desperately. Shamefully. So much that I knew I could no longer call myself a nun. I just don’t know if my mind will let me. Already I feel the panic building even as we lie here. I see his eyes darting away from mine, refusing to acknowledge me. He hates what I am, and maybe I do too.”
Ava opened her mouth to speak, but Beatrice just placed a finger to her lips. She brushed her thumb across her chin before cupping Ava’s cheek in her hand. Ava turned her head slightly and pressed a small kiss into the palm of her hand. Beatrice’s breath stuttered and she closed her eyes. But she didn’t move her hand. Instead, she pushed further to meet Ava’s kiss.
“I am trying to work on that though. It just might take me a lifetime to untangle all the hateful things I was raised to believe. And I don’t want that for you. You deserve someone who can just give you what you want.”
Ava nestled her cheek in Beatrice’s hand, “It wouldn’t mean anything to me if it wasn’t you.”
Beatrice had the audacity to roll her eyes at that, and Ava scoffed.
“I’m not lying, it’s true. I could have sex with a thousand people and it wouldn’t come close to how it feels to lie here with your hand on my cheek.”
“I think you have a self-sacrificing impulse that makes you think that’s true. You don’t have to be miserable just because I’m too fucked up to be able to have sex,” Beatrice choked on that last word.
“Beatrice,” Ava said sternly. “It is not self-sacrificing for me to want to be with you. I want to be in a relationship with you. That involves a lot more than just sex.”
“But you want to have sex,” Beatrice pointed out and pulled her hand away.
“I want a lot of things! I want to climb every mountain. Ford every stream. Follow every rainbow. That doesn’t mean I have to have all of those things. I can want something and not have it.”
“Did you just quote The Sound of Music?”
“Maybe? Probably? I can’t help it; it’s been on my mind since you said you stopped being a nun. But that’s not the point I’m trying to make here. Don’t I get to decide what I want? If I wanted to eat peanut butter, but you were deathly allergic to it. I would simply not eat peanut butter. I wouldn’t say we can’t be in a relationship because you can’t eat it.”
“Sex is not like eating peanut butter,” Beatrice said flatly.
A million dirty jokes about sex and eating flickered through Ava’s mind in an instant before she responded, “Well, I’ve actually had sex, so as the resident expert I think you’ll have to defer to me here.”
Beatrice raised an eyebrow, “Oh you’re the sexpert, are you? What makes you think I haven’t?”
Ava’s mind was still internally laughing about Beatrice saying sexpert that it took her far too long to process her second sentence.
“Wait, what?”
Beatrice chuckled, “Really Ava, you make it far too easy. They would not have let me be a nun if I had.”
Ava narrowed her eyes, “Hey now, deflecting from emotional conversations with humor is my thing. You’re not allowed to do that.”
“Says who?” Beatrice huffed in mock frustration, but she still reached to trace her fingertips on Ava’s hand.
God those fingertips. What they do to me, what they could do to me.
“It’s just true; I don’t make the rules. We all have to follow them though.” Ava said with a shrug and took Beatrice’s hand in her own. The humor immediately faded between them. Beatrice’s breath hitched at the contact, but she didn’t pull away.
“Is this okay?”
Beatrice interlaced her fingers with Ava’s and nodded. In the darkness of the room, Ava could barely make out the gesture.
“It’s okay if it’s not,” Ava said, moving to pull her hand away. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”
Beatrice squeezed her hand to keep it in place but didn’t say anything. She just stared down at their hands linked together. They fell silent for a while. Ava’s mind racing, trying to figure out how to make sure Beatrice didn’t retreat fully into herself. She had so much she still wanted to talk about, so much to say, so much to apologize for.
“Bea?” She said tugging lightly on Beatrice’s hand. Beatrice looked up at her, and for a moment Ava forgot how to breathe.
Composing herself and mentally chiding herself (again) for being a hopeless touch starved bisexual, Ava continued, “I’m sorry for kissing you. I shouldn’t have done that. Not without asking first.”
“It’s okay,” Beatrice said and shifted a little closer to Ava. She was so close now, close enough that Ava could feel her breathing on her face.
“It is?” She asked, her heart fluttering.
Beatrice placed a hand on her shoulder, “I wanted you to. Even if I didn’t know how to tell you.”
“Do you still want me to?” Ava asked quickly, her whole body screaming with desire.
“Of course, I do,” Beatrice said. “But I don’t think it would be fair to you. For all the reasons we’ve talked about.”
“Well how about this? You just do what you want, and I get to decide what’s fair to me. Can we at least try that?”
“And what if I don’t want to you to have to deal with my mess?”
“ Beatrice, ” Ava groaned. “You are being very stubborn right now, and I think it might actually kill me if you don’t stop.
“Well,” Beatrice said slowly, drawing impossibly closer. “I don’t want to be the death of you.”
“Maybe a little death?” Ava said, then instantly cursed at herself for not keeping that innuendo to herself.
But Beatrice just chuckled and rested her forehead on Ava’s. Her hand moved from Ava’s shoulder and ran down the length of her arm. It traced its way along Ava’s neck down to her collarbone. Then it was traveling lower, skirting along her rib cage until it reached a sliver of skin from where her t-shirt was slightly pulled up. It stopped here and Beatrice nuzzled her head against Ava’s. She brushed her thumb along the divot of Ava’s hip, and Ava’s body felt like it was on fire.
“You can breathe, Ava,” Beatrice said, like a hypocrite as if she hadn’t been holding her breath too.
Ava let out a shaky breath and pressed her forehead into Beatrice’s. She licked her lips and nudged Beatrice’s nose with her own. Beatrice let out a murmur and pulled her hand from Ava’s hip. Before Ava could protest the lack of contact, her hand was being tugged up to Beatrice’s face. She pulled back slightly to watch as Beatrice moved their hands to guide Ava to areas where she felt comfortable being touched.
Ever the quick learner, Ava watched closely, memorizing every inch that Beatrice offered to her, marking the ones that were to be avoided. They ended their lesson with Ava’s hand resting on the small of Beatrice’s back. Their bodies were nearly flush by this point.
Hardly room for Jesus, sorry God. Your ex-wife is hot. Good thing you’re not real so you can’t kill me. I bet I could take—oh!
Ava’s attention quickly snapped back into focus when she felt Beatrice press her hand between her shoulder blades. With one small push, Beatrice closed the distance between their bodies and nestled her face into Ava’s neck.
“Ava?” Beatrice said, her hot breath tickling Ava’s skin and sending tingles of desire shooting through her.
“Yeah, Bea?” Ava answered as casually as she could.
“Thank you for tonight. I really missed you. And I love you.”
“I love you too,” Ava said in a rush, relief flooding her. They were going to be okay. They were going to work this out.
“I want to go to sleep now, okay?” Beatrice said with a small yawn that was possibly the most adorable sound Ava had ever heard in her life.
“We’ve been through this, Bea. You can do whatever you want. You just have to keep talking to me. Everything else we can figure out together.”
That comment awarded her a little squeeze, and they fell silent. Sleep came quickly, as it always did when the two were curled up together in bed.