Work Text:
Lidia opened her kitchen cabinet, putting the plates back in their place after the delicious chicken dinner Ruhn made for them. She began to close the cabinet when she noticed a small, yellow piece of paper flying down to the countertop. Picking it up, she read:
Love, that is day and night. Love, that is sun and moon and stars. Love, that is crimson, sumptuous, sick with perfume. No other words but those of love. No other thought but love.
- Ruhn :)
Lidia felt she had no choice but to roll her eyes at that cheesy poem, despite a smile quickly blooming over her face. Ruhn had started this charade a few weeks ago, putting love quotes on yellow sticky notes and hiding them around the house, in reaction to one of her particularly difficult nightmares.
After she doubted whether she deserved this life at all.
Ruhn, despite all his charming flaws, kept surprising her in the ways he showed how much he loved her. Creative ways that showed Lidia she was just as important to him, and he was to her. Reading over the sticky note again, Lidia’s gaze fixed to those few words, Day and Night. As dark as her past had been, it still surprised her that it was the night that saved her.
It was her Ruhn that gave her the safety to work through her past. Ruhn had created a space, a home, for them, despite all the ways she felt like broken shards of glass, ready to hurt the ones she loved. And yet, these seemingly small sticky notes were a testament that Ruhn was not afraid of her. That her mate had seen her at her worst, suffered at her hand, and still chose to love her.
The day needs the night for regrowth. Lidia needed Ruhn like the rest that happens during the darkest part of the 24-hour cycle.
Lidia often doubted if this abundance of joy was real; if it was hers to keep. When she was working for the Asteri, she put one foot in front of the other out of necessity, out of survival. Lidia believed life was to be endured; a painful shitshow you trudged through. Historically, Lidia had been right. She kept her sorrow and despair as close friends, not daring to dream of something better.
Then she met Ruhn on the damned mind bridge.
Even that first interaction gave her the hope she needed after evading her for so long. She had chalked all that hope up to be from the resistance gaining enough momentum to potentially overthrow the Asteri.
The hope for a better world, but not necessarily her world.
Lidia never thought any guiding forces that watched over the happenings of the universe would be kind enough to grant her her own happiness. She was too small, too unimportant in this vast universe for anything to care about whether she had hope or not.
And yet, here she was, happy as a messenger otter.
Hope had entered her life in the form of Ruhn. Or, as she knew then, Agent Night. As that hope grew into feelings just as dangerous for Agent Night, Lidia began to fight for the male she loved. And she did fight, no matter how dirty.
And it had been worth it. Worth every moment of misery she felt if it allowed her to keep her current life; her current joy. Gripping the sticky note between her fingers, she sent up a silent thank you to the cosmic intervention that gave her this gift that was her life.
It wasn’t until the tears began to blot the note that Lidia noticed she was crying. How could this tiny piece of paper with Lunathian’s cheesiest love poem jotted down suddenly hold so much of her heart?
Looking at the note, lost in thought, Lidia felt Ruhn’s presence as he wrapped his arms around her middle and placed his head on her shoulder, enveloping her. Lidia welcomed her mate’s touch.
“Ah,” Ruhn said, noticing the sticky note that had halted her movements. “You found another one.”
Lidia couldn’t help but smile at the reminder that this male had made not one, not two, but a seemingly endless number of sticky notes to remind her how important she was to him. Not finding the words to express such, she just nodded.
They stayed like that, wrapped in each other's arms, for a while. Letting the beat of their hearts sway them back and forth, ever so gently.
Breaking the spell, Lidia placed that yellow sticky note on the counter and turned around to face Ruhn. She circled her arms around him and asked with a smirk, “Did you get this quote off the internet?”
“Guilty,” Ruhn said, smiling down at his mate.
“Was it from the-world-most-sappy-love-quotes.com?” Lidia crooned.
Ruhn, smiling ear to ear, just rolled his eyes.
Lidia’s heart too full, too grateful for her mate, placed her forehead against his and said, “Thank you.”
“I love you, too, Agent Day,” Ruhn said. “And I’m never going to let you forget it.”
Later, Lidia would tell Ruhn about where her mind went and why it brought her to tears. Which, in turn, would lead Ruhn to frame that specific sticky note and hang it above their kitchen sink. His love for her literally on display.
Eventually, that constant, soft reminder would make Lidia believe she deserved this life, her life, after all.