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You knew early on it was going to be one of those days. One where nothing wanted to go right and everything seemed set on blowing up in your face. Every task undertaken was arduous and infuriating despite your best efforts. Every sound and interaction grating unreasonably at your nerves.
Even something as simple as sweeping found a way to be obnoxious. Not even the task itself either. It happened the moment you gathered everything in the dust pan. The instant your work was all but finished, the broom slipped through your fingers and slammed onto the pan… sending the contents flying in all directions.
Something inside you frayed so thin it nearly snapped.
You stared down at the mess with trembling fingers and blazing eyes, reminding yourself why it wasn’t worth the anger roiling in your gut. Why it would be silly to do anything other than clean the mess or walk away. Yet there were other, less welcome reminders bouncing around in your head as well. Thoughts of all the other mishaps of the day that kept adding to your fury. That frayed your last, clinging nerve towards the point of no return.
Memories of moments best left in the past. Harmless enough on their own, but together a volatile and maddening mess.
The broken coffee mug that had slipped off the counter even though you’d swear it was too far from the edge. The twinge in your ankle from tripping down the two steps leading to the backyard, even though you’d taken them a hundred times. The three jagged lines on your chest from the cat freaking out over a sudden noise while he’d been lounging across your shoulder…
You grit your teeth and looked away from the pile, catching movement out the corner of your eye as you turned.
It didn’t surprise you to find Issho there. Nor did the frown he wore as he stood in the doorway. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t see you: he could always tell when something was wrong. You didn’t even have to speak for him to know.
Maybe he could hear it in the way your pulse raced as you tried to contain your emotions, or the shallowness of your breath from the anger held tight inside your chest. Perhaps he even sensed the tense coil of your limbs as you fought to hold yourself in check.
He stepped into the room without a word, moving towards you as you stood there torn between the heavy weight of your fury and the calm shroud of his presence. He took a seat on the floor beside you, still managing to be gigantic even sitting down. On his feet he was twice your size. On the ground he was level with your face as he settled himself in with nary a sound.
He reached for you still without a word. His arm snagging your hips with a gentle firmness as he guided you into his embrace. You felt his fingers slip beneath the edge of your shirt and the calloused touch, so warm and strong just like the rest of him, left shivers in its wake.
You buried your face in his throat, relishing every wondrous aspect of his closeness. The warmth of him that seemed to sink beneath your skin. The easy calm coupled with his soft, doting affection that soothed you in ways nothing else could…
Weary and worn from the trials of the day you could no longer hold yourself together, you didn’t even have it in you to try. You slumped forward, falling deeper into his embrace.
He seemed to move with your body rather than in response to it. Lifting you into his arms so that you were cradled against his chest, wrapped up in his tranquil warmth. The tired calm that had settled over you melting into a sort of giddy disbelief at how easily he could make everything better.
You kissed the underside of his jaw while nuzzling closer; finding yet another measure of comfort in the scratchy itch of his beard against your lips. He tilted his head to kiss your cheek, resting there for a long moment that could never have been long enough.
Yet when he moved again it was not away.
His lips traveled down the side of your face. A path of sweet, unhurried kisses that left your own lips tingling in anticipation. He sought your mouth slowly, but with focused determination, as though he had all the time in the world and nothing else worth spending it on. As if he could spend every moment of forever kissing you.
It was enough to make your heart ache, to leave it fit to burst just from how much you loved him.
He must have sensed this too, as he was smiling when he finally reached your mouth. You felt it as he kissed the corners of your lips, first one side and then the other, before canting his head to kiss you in earnest.
Everything about his touch was soft and soothing. He moved as if you were fragile: something precious and easily broken.
You’d certainly been teetering on the edge of breaking. Crumbling under the combined weight of all the things that made you angry; ready to shatter until he came along to make it all vanish. To make anger so utterly unnecessary it was all but forgotten.
His embrace was a safe-haven; his lips a cure to everything that ailed you.
And you never had to ask for either, because he always knew.
“I love you.” You spoke softly, reverently, pouring everything you felt into three words.
He held you tighter suddenly, kissed you firmer, and confirmed what you already knew with every fiber of your being. “I love you too.”