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Jack has known Samira since he’d started working with her at a little family-run coffee shop in Pittsburgh three years ago, and they’d been moved in together for the best part of two years to save on rent. Samira doesn’t know it yet, but somewhere between that first and second year Jack had fallen head over heels in love with her.
So that’s why when they wind up curled up on their couch together on a Saturday night, Samira burying muffled sobs into his shoulder over her most recent breakup, he wonders for probably the millionth time what he’s doing wrong.
He gently pries her phone out of her fingers from where her hands rest in his lap, placing it face-down on the coffee table and barely letting ten seconds pass because his warm hands are cradling hers in an attempt to reassure her.
“You always run so cold,” he mumbles halfheartedly, which earns a breathy snort against his tear-stained shoulder. “I’m not convinced you aren’t actually a vampire.”
“Says you, human furnace,” Samira counters softly, sniffling. “I’m always grateful our heating bills are low because of you, and this is the thanks I get?”
She’s trying to find humour in the situation, he can tell, but she’s always been terrible at hiding how she truly feels. Especially when she’s this broken. He hadn’t bothered learning much about her most recent boyfriend, he’d never liked him anyway—some tool who would only ever come in to flirt with her, but he would always end up getting her in trouble. Samira would act like she didn’t mind, but Jack always noticed. More often than not, ended up stepping in to bear the brunt of the manager’s scolding by playing it off as his own fault.
But in the end, that guy was just like the others, even if he lasted the longest.
He wanted her to be happy, of course he did, but with each terrible boyfriend choice it made him wonder more and more if she saw an issue with the guy who was right in front of her, always there for her, day after day.
“It’s not your fault, y’know,” Jack speaks up finally after a few long moments of silence, filled only by her sobs and sniffles. “He was a total jackass, but I kind of kept my mouth shut because it seemed like he made you happy.” One of his arms shifts, sliding around her body to pull her in against his side so he can turn his head to bury his nose into her her. The scent of her fresh shampoo—honey and macadamia—assaults his senses, but he finds he doesn’t mind it all that much. He’d miss it much more if it was gone.
Samira doesn’t answer straight away. Just nestles in closer, and fuck does that make his heart hurt. His left hand subsconsciously squeezes hers as he wonders if she can hear just how hard his heart is pounding in his chest having her this close.
“You should have told me,” she eventually whispers. There’s another moment of quiet, the stupid kids’ cartoon they’d put on the TV to fill the silence causing a rather tone-deaf interlude. Inappropriate maybe, but it makes the ghost of a smile appear on her face and she looks so goddamn beautiful that he’s cursing any bastard that would dare hurt her feelings all over again.
He thinks he’s okay, thinks he’s managing, until suddenly that gorgeous face is looking at him, totally open and earnest. His jaw hangs open a little. “Maybe if you’d told me, I wouldn’t have gone and gotten my heart broken,” she continues, still not realising just how much psychic damage she’s actually causing him right now.
“I, uh,” Jack clears his throat, the hand cradling her waist subconsciously squeezing. “Yeah, I’m sorry, Mira. If I’d have known how much of a dick he’d be to you, I totally would have said my piece from the start.”
And if I knew whether you felt the same. That would change a lot… hopefully then it would all be okay.
But this is a terrible time. Surely she’s not ready, surely it would be unfair or taking advantage to tell her how he felt now, in this moment specifically. He wouldn’t want to muddle her mind like that.
Honestly, Jack isn’t sure he’s ever given this much thought to his relationship with a woman. Typically flirting came naturally to him, and of course he made sure to always be a gentleman, but there was something completely different about Samira that just rendered his mind at a standstill. One look from her and he was a total sap that couldn’t think straight.
Before he’s even done gathering his thoughts back up again she’s shifting against him, adjusting her position so her head is resting in his lap and curls splayed out against his legs. Except instead of looking at the TV screen like he expected, those big brown eyes are looking right up at him.
Suddenly it’s very difficult to breathe again.
“It’s okay,” she tells him. “No matter what happens in my shitty love life, Jack, you’ll always be my constant.” She’s about to reach a hand up to wipe her tears, but Jack beats her to it—he carefully nudges her hand aside with his own and tenderly brushes her tears away from beneath her eyes with his thumb, hazel eyes focused as he watches her face through his lashes.
Now, Jack. If you’re gonna tell her, now is as good a time as any.
“Actually, I…” Jack hadn’t noticed it until now, but somehow their hands had found each other again, their fingers entangled and holding onto each other like lifelines. Fuck. Words aren’t working. His thoughts are failing him. She’s too pretty—
Without thinking, he’s already leaning down to chase after her lips, and instinctively she leans up to meet it. He’d always heard and read about first kisses feeling like fireworks but he’d never paid any merit to it until this very moment, where his eyes flutter shut and he totally loses himself in the explosive taste of her. His hand moves up to gently cradle her face, not even needing to guide her movements because it’s like their bodies know exactly what to do, and where they’ll go next.
“You have no idea how perfect I think you are, Samira,” he breathes against her lips, and he can feel her smiling before she shuts him up by pressing her mouth into his for another kiss. “I’ll be your constant. I’ll always be that for you.”
It takes three years of knowing each other and two years of living together for Samira and Jack to realise that they were exactly what the other person was missing in their lives—but it only took one kiss for them to decide that nobody else on earth would ever compare.