Forseen

Wow what details the mind can come up with when reality is... disappointing.
Real people; fake situation. No stealing.

* * * * *

She couldn't believe it. Her mind wouldn't let her believe it. "Oh, who are you kidding?" Her mind said again, just as it had a thousand times before. "He's not coming back to you, so you have to be dreaming." But nope, she wasn't dreaming. This she figured out as the room swam around her. No, that's not quite right either. The room wasn't quite swimming around her, it's him. A minute ago she was sitting on a sofa in her living room re-reading the first book in one of her favorite trilogies, daydreaming, when someone had rang the doorbell. So now, after opening the door with her usual carelessness, she found herself wide eyed and slightly slack jawed staring at someone she had convinced herself that she was never going to see again.

"Hello." He had said, as she opened the door, which explained why he was now asking; "may I come in?"

Her mind still reeling from his very existence, she finds herself completely unable to form words, instead only leaving the door open as she goes to resume her seat on the sofa, pulling herself back together with a little difficulty as the thought "well, at least he's not a vampire. You would've had to invite him in," runs randomly through her mind triggered by the sounds of him opening and closing the screen door followed by his boots on the floor as he comes inside.

"Nice place. Better than the last few." He says, looking around the spacious and tidy front room approvingly.

"Yeah, four incomes help. We worked out a few arrangements." She says, wondering whether or not to ask the question burning in her mind.

"We?" He asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Kyle, Aaron, Melissa and I." She says automatically. "Gods, how long it's been!" She thinks as her mind calls up images of him to compare to reality. His dark blonde hair was shorter, of course, he'd picked up a bit of a tan, and he might've somehow become more muscular without getting bigger or smaller, but he had those same green eyes, - the ones she remembered taking her virginity, the ones that had haunted her for the past year in every quiet, undistracted moment, - the same perfect, full mouth and the same careful baritone that could always raise the hairs on the back of her neck emanating from that lovely mouth. "Why are you here?" She asks, realizing as she said it that she should've worded it better, but then brushing it off since he had seemed to have no problem killing her.

"I - " He said, caught in a loss for words. He had thought it fairly obvious. He was here because -

"It's not because you love me. I figured that out a while ago." She says, as tears spring to his eyes at her suddenly mean tone. "When you wrote John and not me."

How was he supposed to talk to her? Had his decision to put some space between them for a while to get his life together really made her this bitter? Was this just a wall she was using because her leaving had caused her that much pain? It was true that he hadn't written to her. Well... hadn't sent anything to her. He never really figured out what to say, so instead resolved himself to giving her what she wanted; him home. How was he supposed to convince her that he still loved her? "I thought... that... its what you wanted. That a letter would... would only depress you." He says softly as memories run through both their minds of the last week they had spent together.

"Funny. You couldn't have taken that into consideration sooner?" She says with no trace of humor as she remembers the feeling of his had stroking her hair as she laid next to him, her head resting on his bare chest as she cried.

"I'm sorry..." He says, remembering the beginning of a late night drive - the last night he was going to see her, at least for a while, - and the words she had used to kick off that trip.

"Are you? How can you be, without the slightest inkling of what I've been feeling?" She demands, tears running down her cheeks - making him want to do nothing more than to hold her and kiss her and tell her everything was going to be okay, that he was there now and that's what mattered, knowing that he'd have to leave again in about two weeks, - as her sadness evaporated into anger. "For weeks after you left I found myself crying whenever it was quiet and I was alone, for months I would nearly cry at the slightest reminder of you. I finally get to the point where I can think about you - alone, in silence, - without tearing up, and then you show up! And claiming to be sorry, nonetheless!"

"I was never trying to make you sad, or angry." He started, fear tingeing his voice as more tears slid down her face unnoticed.

"You didn't intend to, that I know, but I don't think you really took me into account either. If you had, you might've realized that I'd been fighting for you behind your back, - only to salvage your pride, - but if you had made the slightest concession I might've never gotten to that dead-end point that brings out the ultimatums. You still don't get it, though. Do you?"

"No, I don't."

"If I wasn't in love with you, I wouldn't have cared. This just wouldn't have effected me... but I am, so we've got some work to do. Every one wants to feel needed. I need you, and always have, more than you need me, so naturally it bothers me more when we're apart. All I ever wanted, though... more than anything... more than, than kisses and hugs and you along with everyone else saying that it'd be okay, more than a piece of paper saying that the government couldn't separate us. All I wanted was an honest to Powers promise that you'd be back because you love me. Then you didn't even say good-bye. Not a "hey, see you in a few months," or a "'bye, hope you have a nice life". What was I supposed to think?"

"Maybe you were supposed to think that you could trust me? When I said it would be okay, I meant it. I would've sent you a hundred letters, but I didn't want to risk losing you. I didn't say good-bye for the same reason. I love you whether you want to believe it or not, and I know you. With both of us so confused, you would've picked a fight with me at one point or another. I didn't want you to have that opportunity, so I passed messages through John and Justin, hoping that you'd understand." He was taking her hands in his since they had turned to directly face one another as they both sat on the couch.

More tears slip from underneath her closed eyelids as she bows her head against his logic, wishing she hadn't tied her long thick hair back today that she might have a shiny blonde curtain to hide behind. "That method doesn't work. If you knew I was going to pick a fight, you should've just let me and not taken the bait. I love you too much to let you go..."

"Maybe that was my mistake, then." He says wondering if this sad, bitter thing would ever again be the woman he loves. "But what makes you think that I love you any less than you love me?"

"Because you ran away." She says, her voice finally cracking under the stress. "You said you'd been doing the whole apartment search, job hunt thing for two years before, that you were tired of it, but you failed to add into the equation the one thing that had changed. I was trying to make our lives easier, not just my own. I was trying to do it even before we got out of Job Corps, - not that you'd acknowledge it. I was always just along for the ride. But the minute things started looking really difficult you headed for the nearest escape hatch. Not necessarily out of the relationship, just the situation. You didn't even give me an opportunity to try and help."

"You're right." He says quietly, after a long moments pause in which they stare at their intertwined hands between them. She looks up into his eyes, hers full of shock, and he scoots closer to pull her into a prolonged hug. "I'm so sorry, I had no idea." He whispers, wiping the tears from her face, naturally unable to keep up with the fresh ones that fall as she leans forward to sob softly on his shoulder. He kisses her gently on the forehead in an attempt to calm her as he strokes her back. "Shhh, I'm here now." He whispers.

"Are you?" She says hoarsely, looking up hopefully. "You can't be done yet?"

"I'm going to be here for you. No more not talking, and if I thought I could get away with not going back I'd stay, but life's hard enough." He says as she hesitates, screwing up his courage to say what he wanted to say next. "Of course, I don't know whether or not you want to pick out your own ring..."

"Don't tease me now."

"I'm not." He says as she tries half heartedly to get some distance between them. "It will be a long engagement, you understand, but I love you, and if something this easy keeps you from being miserable, - particularly since it's something that was coming anyway..."

"I'll wait the whole five years. Just don't do anything stupid like not talk to me, okay?" She says, standing, - still holding one of his hands, - and tugging him gently to encourage him off of the couch.

"Is that a yes?" He asks, allowing himself to be led out of the living room, up a flight of stairs, and finally into a bedroom holding a surprising amount of very familiar furniture. She's grinning as she turns back to him, sadness still in her eyes as she reaches up to pull him in gently for a kiss full of urgency, fear, and hunger.

He looks for the changes in her as they part. He notices that the full length of her hair is the same strawberry blonde and longer, - possibly fuller... but no, that was just the waves, - though softer than he remembered. Her eyes were a new shade of bluish gray, though she still wasn't wearing contacts, and it seemed like her body was firmer, more tone as she pressed against him, running her hands through his hair as he holds her tight in his arms.

He's just noticing that the door's closed as she unbuckles his pants and belt. She kisses him again as he starts to ask her if she really wanted to do this, as she lets his pants fall to his feet. His question is utter obliterated as her hand finds his cock and begins stroking him. He sighs with pleasure as he hardens and she moves to kiss a trail down his neck, still stroking him until her kisses are interrupted by his shirt.

She looks down approvingly at the one aspect that she knew wouldn't have changed as she strips off his shirt, sits him down on the edge of the bed so that he could remove his shoes, socks, and free himself from his pants, and pulls off her own blouse and jeans, marveling at the twitch of biology that would make it possible for her to take all of his rather average sized dick into her without the slightest suggestion of pain. She resumes her kisses, wrapping her arms around him, making a straight line for is left nipple. Her mouth closes around it gently, tongue quickly outlining the nub to make sure her teeth are careful as they graze his flesh. She brings her mouth away to blow slowly, gently, across the wet, heated nipple, drawing delight from his gasp, and moving to do the same to the other as he takes off her bra, but never getting that far as he picks her up. She brings one thigh up as high as she can towards his hip - given the difference of nearly a foot in height, - encouraging him to get her off the ground. Encouragement that he doesn't really need since the feeling of her firm, somehow fuller breasts pressed up against his chest in combination with her smooth soft inner thigh against his left had nearly killed him, but she raises her other thigh to match, opening herself to him fully and taking him into her with a smooth thrust of her hips towards his.

She clamps everything she has down on his dick as he penetrates her, sending a pleasant shock through both of them, not even really paying attention when he laid her down on the bed, still inside of her. The only thing that matters being him slowly moving in and out of her, building that old rhythm, reaching for the old depth. She gasps as he glides in and out of her, each thrust more powerful and quicker than the last, her hands idly tracing the defined lines of his biceps and chest. He considers giving in to her half hearted attempts to pull him closer, more truly on top of her as that pressure builds in intensity and her moans get louder.

Moans of pleasure turn into cries of ecstasy and encouragement. He hears his own moans as the perfection of the moment realizes itself. He cries her name, spilling everything he has into her in one last great powerful thrust, as she screams some affirmation upon realizing the sudden added pressure from the gush of his semen into her.

They rest there, panting, shaking, before he collapses forward on top of her to claim her mouth once more in a deep kiss, allowing her to wrap her arms around him once again. The realization that they were still intimately entwined came as the desire to stay close and warm - despite the thin film of sweat covering him, - was inconvenienced by the discomfort of being on the edge of the bed. Wordlessly, he lifts her as he climbs onto the bed, situating her comfortably beside him as he lays them both down.

"I love you." She whispers, cuddling up to his chest, smiling as he holds her a bit closer.

"I love you, too." He says, smiling as he strokes her kitten-soft hair, lulling them both to sleep, both knowing that all is right with the Multiverse because the other is close.