[ he strikes at the heart of the matter. and he does it with affection, tilting so near that she can smell the booze off him. rum! and peggy isn't surprised. rum carries a kind of miserable stench; it sets this bender apart from nights where they simply indulge too much together.
no matter how gently he touches her face, she sucks in a breath. as though jolted, burned, electrified. peggy sways a moment, leaning in his direction, but stops just short of folding herself into his arms. but, oh, she wants to. it ought to be easy. but she has let herself become too accustomed to defying him in every granular detail. especially -- especially! -- when he sinks his eyeteeth into her regrets. he knows just what vein to tap. but only, peggy thinks, because she's allowed him to learn it. ]
It's not a choice. [ she acknowledges in a quiet voice. peggy might whisper, but there's nothing vulnerable left in her delivery. she might speak low and measured, but in the few second between when their foreheads touching and when rip issues his well-meant warning, her intentions snap neatly into place. ] Nor a game. Nor a dalliance, really. Not for some time, now.
[ they both know it to be true -- even if he's been the one doing her a kindness by not saying so aloud. not until now. equally, she knows what she wants. she's known for a while, now, even if she's long since protected herself from thinking of it in anything but the above-whispered terms. and she wishes she was telling him sober, but suggesting that they wait even a quarter hour more might invite regret, that exact demon he rightly recognizes as one she should avoid. beyond that, she doesn't want to say it simply because her hand feels forced -- not by rip, rather, but by someone else's arrival.
circumstances are not ideal. then again, when are they ever? if she waits around for what's ideal, she'll only be recreating old mistakes. reliving history. standing with empty hands and too full heart.
peggy turns her head. she doesn't kiss his cheek but rather presses her mouth, her face, against the plane of his jaw. rip is achingly familiar to her when she breathes him in -- himself, still, beneath the rum. here's a man to whom she might confess lots. she could confess everything because she knows he would keep her secrets. she knows he could keep her on her toes. and all he wants, all he asks for, is perhaps the most challenging confession of all.
three inch heels make this moment a bit easier. she drags a faint smudge of lipstick from his cheek to his ear so she can say, very softly, something she prays she won't regret saying. ]
I think I love you too.
[ because she won't lie to him. not about this -- and the truth is simple, if unromantic. if only she could have taken a few more days, weeks, months to test the mettle of these emotions. but she's only ever been able to identify her love after losing the objects of it. love, to her heart, has always been an aching absence. it's a shadow she feels long after love has been yanked out.
but, with rip, she has a chance to get out ahead of that pain. it's got her scared witless. so scared that she stays there, mouth to his ear, without saying another word. frozen and on highest alert. ]
no subject
no matter how gently he touches her face, she sucks in a breath. as though jolted, burned, electrified. peggy sways a moment, leaning in his direction, but stops just short of folding herself into his arms. but, oh, she wants to. it ought to be easy. but she has let herself become too accustomed to defying him in every granular detail. especially -- especially! -- when he sinks his eyeteeth into her regrets. he knows just what vein to tap. but only, peggy thinks, because she's allowed him to learn it. ]
It's not a choice. [ she acknowledges in a quiet voice. peggy might whisper, but there's nothing vulnerable left in her delivery. she might speak low and measured, but in the few second between when their foreheads touching and when rip issues his well-meant warning, her intentions snap neatly into place. ] Nor a game. Nor a dalliance, really. Not for some time, now.
[ they both know it to be true -- even if he's been the one doing her a kindness by not saying so aloud. not until now. equally, she knows what she wants. she's known for a while, now, even if she's long since protected herself from thinking of it in anything but the above-whispered terms. and she wishes she was telling him sober, but suggesting that they wait even a quarter hour more might invite regret, that exact demon he rightly recognizes as one she should avoid. beyond that, she doesn't want to say it simply because her hand feels forced -- not by rip, rather, but by someone else's arrival.
circumstances are not ideal. then again, when are they ever? if she waits around for what's ideal, she'll only be recreating old mistakes. reliving history. standing with empty hands and too full heart.
peggy turns her head. she doesn't kiss his cheek but rather presses her mouth, her face, against the plane of his jaw. rip is achingly familiar to her when she breathes him in -- himself, still, beneath the rum. here's a man to whom she might confess lots. she could confess everything because she knows he would keep her secrets. she knows he could keep her on her toes. and all he wants, all he asks for, is perhaps the most challenging confession of all.
three inch heels make this moment a bit easier. she drags a faint smudge of lipstick from his cheek to his ear so she can say, very softly, something she prays she won't regret saying. ]
I think I love you too.
[ because she won't lie to him. not about this -- and the truth is simple, if unromantic. if only she could have taken a few more days, weeks, months to test the mettle of these emotions. but she's only ever been able to identify her love after losing the objects of it. love, to her heart, has always been an aching absence. it's a shadow she feels long after love has been yanked out.
but, with rip, she has a chance to get out ahead of that pain. it's got her scared witless. so scared that she stays there, mouth to his ear, without saying another word. frozen and on highest alert. ]