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It starts with a question, small and seemingly harmless. The question confuses Vi, because she’s never heard it in her life. No one in Zaun ever has, things like this don’t exist in a place like Zaun, where family is so fleeting that holding ties to them seems like wasted time and wasted emotions.
“What’s your last name?”
He asks it like he’s asking what color the sky is, a pen shaking back and forth in his hands, glowing contraptions illuminating the space behind him as people work out their luxury-softened bodies.
“My last name?” Vi intones, the words sounding foreign in her mouth.
For the first time since she walked in, he looks up at her like maybe she’s not just another resident of Piltover. In a place like a gym, seeing chest wraps and tight black shorts as the only thing a person is wearing is not uncommon, so it’s not her outfit that singles her out this time. But it’s always something.
She swallows down the pitiful embarrassment rising like lava when it digests plastic— something that is decidedly not supposed to be in lava— and rubs the back of her neck hotly as he continues to stare.
“Listen, dude, I just want a gym membership, and my name is Vi,” she repeats, shifting back and forth on her feet. “Violet, if you guys need… more.”
He blinks again. “First name, Vi. Last name, O’Let?”
Vi gapes. She knew people in Piltover were a bit airheaded but this was something else entirely. “What the fu- no? Violet! It’s all one goddamn name!”
He jumps, actually jumps, and twirls the paperwork around to face her. “S-sorry, ma’am, but we legally require a last name to register someone as a member of the gym. Are you sure you don’t have a… last name?”
Vi groans, short and staccato. Formalities and all their fucking mumbo jumbo, no one had ever given a damn about a last name in Zaun; Vi’s not even sure what the significance of one is other than banding together groups of people as families.
So, yeah, it slips her attention completely that last names can be taken through marriage too.
“I live with the Kirammans, so, you can just use that,” Vi finally says with nothing short of a huff. She really hopes Caitlyn’s mother won’t give her shit for using her name at something as pedestrian as a gym, because as she’s learned— even Piltover has its hierarchies.
The boy, whose name tag says Henry, jolts to attention at the name, and Vi just rolls her eyes. She’s used to this kind of reception as soon as someone realizes she’s under the care and protection of a founding House.
“Oh, oh! Are you Miss Kiramman’s… partner?” Henry asks tentatively, an entertained little smile parting his lips.
Vi shrugs, the sentiment falling short on her, the implication missing her ears. She’s been called Caitlyn’s partner before, ever since the woman had forsaken the title of Enforcer and become somewhat of a freelance agent for investigative works with Vi in both Piltover and Zaun; they were partners, it’s just how they worked.
Like how the sun grabbed the moon’s hand to catapult it into the sky at night, or how a rune would glow with the help of a HexCore— they were two parts of a whole.
Everyone knew that.
“Wow,” Henry grins, not in a sleazy way, but in a way that Vi knows it’s going to be his preferred topic of gossip for the next few days. God knows what’s so exciting about it, but hey, Piltover was weird about so many things— this was probably just another one of those things that Vi didn’t understand.
“Yeah,” she breathes out, thinking about midnight hair and small smiles and lean muscles that wrap around her at night. “Wow.”
&.
(They had talked about it once. Just, the vague notion of it, a wistful one day in the middle of the night.
The idea of being together.
Caitlyn’s head is tucked under Vi’s chin, despite being the taller one, their legs intertwined, warm and cozy. Light slats through the blinds that shutter the large bay window of Caitlyn’s room, moonlight makes everything easy— maybe it’s the silver light, a second place to gold. No pressure of being first, no embarrassment of being last.
Just easy.
“You know, you’re gonna dry up my marriage prospects,” Caitlyn mumbles into her collarbone, eyes shut. “Holding me like this, people might get the wrong idea.”
Vi chuckles. “Oh? Got someone special outside of me?”
“Bold of you to assume you’re special to me,” Caitlyn whispers through a grin that Vi can feel spreading against her skin, like Mother Nature feels a human’s fingertips running through grass.
“Oh, sorry, how presumptuous of me to think I’m special to the woman who cuddles me to sleep every night.”
Caitlyn’s hands slide under her tank top, cold fingers pressing into her warm skin, like a soft reminder. Sometimes jokes can get too heavy, even if they’re light; they’ve spent so long learning each other, it can’t be underestimated even in jest.
“You’re always freezing,” Vi hisses, but doesn’t pull away. She wraps tighter around Caitlyn, holds her close. Take it, her embrace says, take my fire if you need it to warm you.
“You’re always burning up,” Caitlyn counters softly.
“Then I guess we make a good team, huh?” Vi whispers, so soft that even the air can’t hear her— but Caitlyn does. Caitlyn always does.
Caitlyn’s nails dig into her back, little crescent indents, oh- the moon and her lover. They don’t say the words out loud, they’ve never even kissed, but it’s there. It’s always there, right between them, unspoken but heavy.
“I think… I think I was made for you,” she says, lips charting the words across Vi’s skin. Whispering it into her soul.
“Oh, baby,” Vi says, lips against Caitlyn’s hairline. Soft, so soft. “I’ve never been more sure of something in my life. You’re mine. And I’m yours. It really is as simple as that.”
Silence transcends words sometimes for them, Vi keeps holding Caitlyn and Caitlyn’s trembling breaths fan across her sternum. Oh, truths can be so inviting in the dead of night; there are no reflections to catch sight of your exposed self, no way to know just how vulnerable you’re making yourself.
“Do you think we’ll… spend the rest of our lives…” Caitlyn begins, toeing the line of that terrifying looking thought— that long idea of commitment that scares even the most stable of people.
Vi hears the end of her question even though she doesn’t say it: together?
So, she capitalizes on the night, on its ability to make the truth seem less scary than it is, and says, “I’ll be here as long as you want me.”
Caitlyn laughs, low and sparkling. “Forever, then.”
Vi smiles, warmth flooding her, holding her hostage. She’s the one with her arms around Caitlyn, but Caitlyn has her soft finger’s around Vi’s very soul.
“Okay,” she nods. “Forever it is.”)
&.
“Violet, please tell me why Councilor Hoskel thinks we’re married,” is the first thing Caitlyn says when Vi vaults through her window— and Vi has half a mind to vault right back out.
“Um,” Vi blinks, a little stupefied. “Because I’m hot and it was inevitable that you would fall for my charm and wiles?”
Caitlyn’s mouth pinches. “We have an invitation next week. To a party. To celebrate our wedding.”
Oh, fate and it’s fickle little games. All Vi had wanted was a gym membership, and somehow she ends up with a wife and a party and probably the whole of Piltover’s eyes on her back. Something tickles the base of her feet, tingling in her fingers, spreading fire through her lungs— she’s fairly sure she’ll cough up smoke if she opens her mouth right now.
“Oh,” is all she can seem to say when the idea of being anywhere but this room is so inviting.
“Yeah,” Caitlyn agrees, falling back in the bed. “Oh.”
Vi stays right where she is, fingers twitching, not moving towards the bed or away from it. The idea of forever had seemed so promising all those nights ago, with Caitlyn tucked under her chin— but now it feels like a mockery.
“The guys at the gym,” she starts lamely, staring at the floor beneath her feet. “They needed a last name. I don’t have one.”
There’s shuffling, and somehow without even looking up, Vi knows Caitlyn’s staring at her. Probably with those wide, pitiful, puppy eyes that Vi has only ever been on the receiving end of a handful of times.
“So you gave them mine?” Caitlyn whispers, not harshly, not unkindly, but incredulously; as if such a mistake would not be made by any other person.
Vi’s fingers curl into fists. “I didn’t know. I- we don’t have last names in the undercity— not by marriage nor anything else.”
Caitlyn’s shoulders unfurl, and Vi is still standing there, right by her window, tense like a sailors knot— and maybe she is about to set sail, she certainly feels like turning heel and running. But there are cities which have seen her flee, sidewalks which have felt her abandonment with each pounding step. She doesn’t want to splatter those emotions across Caitlyn’s clean marble floors— she wants to stay for Caitlyn.
“Oh, love,” Caitlyn whispers, the picture of sweeping lands, caressing the air with large stalks of corn. “That’s alright, I’m not… mad. Amused, sure, but not mad.”
Vi blinks. “You’re… you’re not?”
“Why would I be?” Caitlyn asks, sounding just as confused, and then her mouth curls softly into a grim. “Besides, you know I look for any reason to give my mother a heart attack.”
A laugh dislodges from Vi’s throat, soft and unexpected. “You’re exploiting my emotions for a revenge plot against your mother?”
Caitlyn crosses her arms, acting put upon. “You exploited my last name for a gym membership first.”
“Fair enough,” Vi acquiesces, flexing her shoulders back and finally letting the tension roll away like water off a duck's back. “But… What are we going to do about the party? And the rumor?”
Caitlyn shrugs, rolling onto her side and propping an arm under her head as she watches Vi shed her shoes by the window. “Mother will handle it. She’s probably damage controlling as we speak, seeing as how an alliance like this to the Undercity would probably cause a lot of questions in the council.”
“I would imagine so,” Vi grumbles, becoming aware not for the first time that any kind of relationship with Caitlyn could and would be used as leverage between the two nations.
“Hey,” Caitlyn says, soft with a pout. “Don’t worry about it, okay? Just get over here,” she spreads her arms wide, wiggling her fingers enticingly. “I’ve missed you.”
And like the moon calling to the tide, water rising to the occasion, and like gravity calling to every single thing on earth, Vi all but scrambles towards Caitlyn, slipping under the covers and tucking herself under Caitlyn’s chin.
Caitlyn takes a deep, billowing breath when Vi settles into her arm, like she’d been waiting all day for this— and perhaps she had. The longer the two started to stick together, spend time together— the more apparent it was becoming just how much they depended on each other just to get through the day. With slow, viscous pressure, Vi can feel the cementing of Caitlyn in her fucking soul which is even more terrifying than if Caitlyn just outright hated her or kicked her to the curb after they’d met.
Because this— this can go wrong.
With Vi’s arms wrapped securely around Caitlyn’s waist, and her nose buried in the hollow of Caitlyn’s throat, she knows the one thing sitting between them like the swell of a pregnant belly.
They’ve never kissed, nor have they ever touched— in the way that people with such intense feelings for each other usually do.
And all this talk of marriage and togetherness over the last few days, it’s ought to make something boil over; ought to make a mountain out of a molehill, because people are people and they never know what’s good for them.
So when Caitlyn releases one hand to cup under Vi’s jaw, tilting her head up until their noses are brushing— she knows this is where they’re going to meet their destiny: on a path forked like a snake’s tongue. For better or for worse.
“Why have we never kissed?” Caitlyn asks, mouths so close that Vi can feel her words.
Vi’s fist tightens on her back, crumpling the material of her tank top in it. “Because we shouldn’t.”
“But,” Caitlyn huffs, and she leans down, pressing their foreheads together. Oh, you would never be able to tell that anyone existed outside of them if you were in this room. As if no one else could simply even hold half the importance that they did to each other. “But we’re something, aren’t we? You’re- you’re mine, and I’m yours.”
“Can’t it stay that way?” Vi whispers, pleads, a note of desperation in her voice. “Kissing and commitment… It complicates things. It feels like-”
A cage.
The words die on Vi’s lips the second they rise because she knows this is the wrong thing to say— it’s not even what she really means to say, because loving Caitlyn could never be a cage— but Caitlyn hears it nonetheless.
Her grip slackens, pulling away a little, and it’s all Vi can do not to reach out and grab at her. No, she wants to say, stay, please. I didn’t mean it, I just don’t know how to do this— how to be yours.
“I see,” Caitlyn says, voice clipped and cold.
“Wait, I didn’t-” Vi starts, but Caitlyn is already turning away, already putting an ocean of distance between them. “Baby, please.”
Caitlyn’s back tenses, Vi can count each vertebrae snapping to attention on their own through her skin. “Don’t. You don’t get to call me that— not right now.”
And Vi’s hand falters, falling into the newly evacuated space between them— a chasm of all their woes. Her palm lays flat in it, as if it’s enough to bridge the distance, enough to be anything.
“I’m sorry,” Vi whispers, and even though it’s quiet, she knows Caitlyn hears it, because it runs through her body like electricity, making her twitch slightly.
But Caitlyn doesn’t move, doesn’t turn to face her, and Vi crumples into herself.
For the first time since they started sharing a bed, they go to sleep cold and alone.
&.
The rumor is dispelled quickly and easily— most people are eager to believe that Caitlyn, possibly the future of the Kiramman council seat, wouldn’t be so quick to act on her feelings anyways, and the others really don’t care much. Marriage happens all the time in Piltover, they’re quickly followed by divorces, too. It’s not a big deal.
But Councilor Hoskel keeps the party.
Oh, we’ll make it a celebration of something else! he says with a hearty laugh that makes everything in his body shake with the force of it. There are always things to celebrate! Maybe I’ll get married instead!
Vi ducks her head thinking about it now, smile warping the edges of her mouth. She’d never thought she’d find Hoskel, of all people, funny.
There are a lot of things in Piltover that she hadn’t expected to enjoy.
Such as the girl, still carefully maintaining her distance, sitting by the piano and letting her soft fingers drift over the keys. She looks so lost in her world that Vi almost doesn’t want to interrupt, but there are things to be done, conversations to be had. Words to be said; words that can’t be left for a one day because Vi knows from experience how costly not telling your loved ones you love them can be.
“Cait,” Vi calls, soft and careful not to startle.
Caitlyn stiffens, and the illusion of any ground covered since their last argument— if it could even be called that— falls away. “Vi.”
Not one to be deterred by iciness and rigid shoulders, Vi strides forward, straddling the piano bench and facing Caitlyn’s side profile. From here, she can see the tense clench of her jaw, the slight tremor in her hands, the nervous flicker of her eyes between the keys as if she’s doing everything in her power to keep from looking at Vi.
“Did you hear about Hoskel keeping the party?” Vi begins, tentative. There’s a goal she has in mind, a destination to reach by the end of this conversation, but it all rides on how willing Caitlyn is to forgive her— to see her side of things.
“Yes,” Caitlyn nods. “A little stupid if you ask me, I mean— it was meant to be our party, but whatever. Topside isn’t going to let a little change of occasion stop them from partying.”
“Right, well,” and here’s where Vi takes a deep breath, prays to whatever god is out there that Caitlyn doesn’t stomp her heels on her toes and leave when the words leave her mouth. “Did you want to go… with me?”
She doesn’t stomp her heels on Vi’s toes, but she looks damn near close.
“With you,” she intones, not a question, a statement.
Vi rubs the back of her neck nervously. “Yeah. I mean, we- we are… I mean- you- unless there was someone else you wanted to-”
Caitlyn turns away, shielding her face with a curtain of hair that cuts them apart. “I have received… offers.”
A movie reel screeches to a halt, a camera gets stuck half-click, a dog is cut off mid-bark— because that’s what this feels like; like everything in the universe that is supposed to keep spinning, that is never supposed to stop happening, has come to an abrupt and violent end.
Vi pales. “Oh.”
The most damning word in any language: oh.
“I’m sorry, Vi,” she whispers, voice breaking on her name. “You said we weren’t together. So I-”
“No, that’s fine!” Vi says, scrambling off the chair, voice too high, too stretched thin, too strung out. They both know nothing about this is fine. “You- you’re allowed to do whatever you want, go to the ball with whoever, that’s- that’s fine.”
Caitlyn shudders, eyes turning to her, wide with some emotion Vi doesn’t have the energy to place.
“That’s totally… totally fine,” she grits out, having stumbled halfway to the door, head spinning a mile a minute. There are glowing tracks, ones only she can see, that lead all the way back to the bedroom— their bedroom— and out the window; down, down, down all the way to the undercity. Where she should be. Where she and Caitlyn can’t hurt each other any further.
She thinks she hears Caitlyn call gently behind her, a soft whisper of her name, but it’s lost when she vaults out of her home.
Anywhere, anywhere else is better than here.
&.
(“You’re not allowed to leave, okay?” Caitlyn says, and though it’s in jest, said light-heartedly as she clips her hair into place and smooths out her outfit, Vi can hear the insecurity underneath it. The need to be attached to something stable.
“As if I’d ever leave a woman like you, cupcake,” Vi says, swinging her feet back and forth on the bed. She’d been ready since morning, running laps around Piltover, learning the area— learning its secrets and hidden gems.
Caitlyn turns on her heel, an eyebrow raised. “I mean it. We’re like— an investigative duo now. I’m the brains, you’re the brawn. Two halves of a whole, okay?”
Vi’s grin splits the world in half, forms a crater in the moon, rips a new space in the fabric of reality. “I think your mother would have some words about me being one half of your whole.”
“Good thing I don’t need her approval then.”
Vi groans, burying her face in the silk sheets that always smell comfortingly of Caitlyn. “God, you’re hot.”
Caitlyn laughs, low and sonorous. “Try not to bust on my sheets, I just got them cleaned yesterday.”
“No promises, sweetheart, I’m pretty close.”
The air grows heavy with implication, with want, with need. The burdensome fist of desire has its fingers on their necks, forcing Caitlyn’s gaze to meet Vi’s in the mirror— a plethora of things hang between them, not the least of which is how desperately they want to rip each other’s clothes off.
The time isn’t right— not yet. They’ve got too much to figure out, too many demons to unburden themselves of, too many nights spent alone to make up for, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for something.
Vi swallows hard, clears her throat. “I won’t leave. This- this is my home now.”
Caitlyn’s tension melts into a smile. A flower blooms by her feet from the runoff of her emotions. It erupts through the whole room, cushions Vi in it.
“Good.”)
&.
Vi spends three days in the Undercity before the cruel embrace of a stranger’s smile or their crooked teeth begin to remind her painfully of Caitlyn’s warm giggles and precious gap toothed grin.
She doesn’t sleep, doesn’t eat much, just wanders and wonders and aches to go back home.
It takes another few hours for her to find her way back to Caitlyn; until the sun begins to dip and the sharp edges of moonlight cutting corners of buildings slice roads in half and clears a path for Vi all the way back to the Kiramman Estate. She follows it almost in a daze, delirious and touch-starved and peeved by the remnants of Shimmer-infested areas in dark corners.
The high stucco walls and gold railings of Caitlyn’s house are a relief to see, and Vi wonders just when she’d become so comfortable with this life.
She launches herself up over the balcony, fully prepared to spend the night out in the cold until Caitlyn wakes in the morning to find her slumped against the railing— when she realizes that the window is open.
Fear capsizes Vi for the quickest of moments. Her body moves before she can think about it, barrelling through the open window— Caitlyn never leaves the window open at night, it’s a safety concern, and Vi’s heart is in her throat because if Caitlyn’s been hurt while she was too busy brooding—
But there’s no one.
The curtain flutters uselessly by her side when she tumbles in, and the room is silent, save for the mindless chattering of teeth.
Vi blinks, and registers three things at once:
One, it’s cold— freezing— in the room, and it shouldn’t be, because Caitlyn has never been able to handle a cold bedroom; the thermostat always hovering above seventy-five degrees even with blankets and Vi’s arms wrapped around her.
Two, the pieces of Vi’s life seemed to still be scattered around Caitlyn’s room, in a good way. A quick survey is all she needs to deduce that, with her shirt still hung over a bedpost and her roll of arm bandages left haphazard on the dressing table— her life is still here, waiting for her to come back, and that’s without even considering the girl in the bed.
Which brings her to three: Caitlyn, shivering violently in the bed, the sound of teeth chattering coming undeniably from her.
Vi drops any pretense of lingering anger or hurt she might have been harboring, stumbling towards Caitlyn with only one determination.
“Cait- Caitlyn, babe,” Vi whispers in low and urgent tones, hands sliding over her bare arms, finding the skin so cold to the touch it reminds her of how parents’ skin had felt under her fingers all those years ago with a lurching clarity.
Caitlyn groans, eyes fluttering open. “Vi?”
“Yeah, yeah, it’s me,” Vi assures, rubbing her nose against the frosty trail of Caitlyn’s jaw. Every part of her is warm, ready to make sure Caitlyn is never this cold ever again— not as long as Vi lives. Two halves of a whole.
“Oh, Vi, I’m so- so sorry,” Caitlyn gets out before Vi can say her piece, say anything. The words tumble out of her, like she’d been holding it all in a pressurized tank and the lids just popped off. “I- I didn’t- I shouldn’t have s-said the things I did-”
Her teeth chatter violently through her words and Vi shakes her head on each beat. “Hey, slow down, slow-”
“No, I- I need to say-”
“I’m here,” Vi pushes, warm palm finding the cold plane of Caitlyn’s hard stomach. “I’m not going anywhere, okay? Let’s warm you up first,” and then, to ease the tension: “I can barely even hear your apology through the chattering of your teeth.”
Caitlyn laughs, small and broken, but nods, relenting.
Vi pushes her back, rolling her until their bodies can slot together with Vi on top, covering most of her, face tucked in the crook of Caitlyn’s neck, fanning warm breaths across the length of the shoulder— take it, take all of it, all of my warmth is for you.
“Why did you leave the goddamn window open?” Vi whispers, heart breaking so loudly in her chest that it reverberates out, manifesting as a physical break of her voice. “You- you’re fucking cold, holy shit. You could have gotten sick.”
Caitlyn trembles, shivers making a home in her body. “I- I didn’t know when you’d come back. I kept the window open because I know you don’t like coming through the front door.”
“For three days?” Vi asks, incredulous, and absolutely terrified that Caitlyn would go to these lengths for her. Sure, she’s not jumping off a cliff or into a burning building— but it wasn’t even those big gestures that mattered. It was in these little ones, the ones that could so go easily unnoticed, trampled underfoot like grass on any normal day, that really mattered. Acts of kindness done with no expectation of a reward.
“For as long as it took for you to come back,” Caitlyn breathes out, a last, violent, shudder racking her body before she burrows into Vi fully.
Vi huffs. “Stupid.”
Caitlyn hums. “Maybe so.”
“Don’t ever do shit like this again, please,” Vi begs, holding her closer, deeper, pushing until she can prove to the universe, to herself, that Caitlyn is a part of her very soul.
“Shh,” Caitlyn shushes, fingers now gently combing through Vi’s hair, scratching the shorn side with utmost care. Vi melts into the gesture, the exhaustion of being on the streets for the last few days finally getting to her. “It’s okay, Vi. It’s okay.”
Somewhere outside, a bird trills, and it rings so clear and true through the room that Vi knows she’s home now. She’s heard this bird before, singing its song, sometimes in the morning when Caitlyn is rolling out of bed— sleep addled and soft, and sometimes at night, right before bed, when exalting conversations become soft murmurs giving way to the pull of sleep. This is Vi’s home, she had been so stupid to ever think she could go away.
Stupider, still, to think that holding Caitlyn at arms length would ever do them any good.
“I’m sorry,” Vi finally says, pulling away, falling to her side but leaving their legs twined together. As close as two people can be without being one.
Caitlyn thumbs over her lips. “Wait. Can I- I need to apologize, can I go first?”
Vi shudders with an amused laugh. “Always trying to one-up me, huh, Kiramman?”
“Please,” she breathes, eyes so wide and puppy-like that Vi couldn’t dream of holding out against her. “Um. I’m sorry about what I said before you left. I was just… trying to get a rise out of you, I suppose. I didn’t understand— why you said what you said. I thought, maybe, if you saw me with someone else it would push you to realize that we- we won’t change if we take the next step. The only thing that could change us is not being together. But I didn’t… I didn’t expect—”
She chokes on something like a sob, head tilting inwards towards Vi, and Vi presses her lips to Caitlyn’s forehead. Oh, simple human failings and how they’re capable of breaking even the most iron-willed of humans. Emotions and their capability to bring metal to its knees.
“I didn’t expect you to leave,” Caitlyn finally gets out on an exhale, the whole world silent around them. “You promised you’d never leave.”
“I know,” Vi whispers, hand sliding around to the back of Caitlyn’s neck, thumbing at the baby hairs of her nape. “I’m so sorry, Caitlyn. I- I just freaked, I thought— this is it, this is what I’ve been so afraid of. We broached the subject one night and then the next fucking day you- you were talking about having offers and I- fuck- I don’t know, it felt like it confirmed every single one of my fears.”
“Baby,” Caitlyn coaxes, nose bumping against Vi’s, oh— it’s here, the inevitable one day. It’s sitting between them, a burden on their chests, a bird willing to fly away as soon as they let it. “There is no one else. It’s been you since day one.”
Vi sighs, insecurity like a monster, a demon, the thing that goes bump in the night. “I bet the girls here aren’t scared of commitment or change or any of those other stupid things.”
Caitlyn smiles softly, one crooked finger slipping under Vi’s chin to tilt her head up. “They’re also not you.”
Vi lets out a humorless laugh. An empty scoff. “Some might consider that a positive.”
“Good thing I’m not some, huh?”
The sentence digs deep, burrows deep under Vi’s rib. It’s a year of partnership, two of simply knowing each other; it’s love and lust and desire, they’ve been dancing around this— and each other— for as long as their feet let them. Something is bound to break, or bruise, to become soft under their fingers. Everything has an expiration date, everything. Maybe that’s why Vi doesn’t want to make this— them— a thing, she’s too scared that it’ll come with an expiration date.
But what is a person without love? Without having something to lose? What is a person who cannot let weakness be their greatest strength, when it comes with the crutch of another person’s hand?
“I love you,” Vi whispers out, wobbling on the sentence, walking a tightrope, bridging the distance between her and Caitlyn. “I love you so much it terrifies me.”
Caitlyn’s eyes shine, their secrets filling the room to the brim. “Say it again.”
“I love you.”
She dips her head, mouth ghosting against Vi’s. “Again.”
“I think you have to say it back at some point,” Vi whispers, but acquiesces. “I love you.”
“Oh, god,” Caitlyn laughs, and then bends in, pressing a chaste kiss to Vi’s jaw. “I love you, I love you.”
Vi’s eyes slide shut, let’s the idea settle in the air around them— love, oh, she’s felt it before, has been wrapped in its molten embrace that leaves its red imprints on your arms; but she’s never felt it like this before. Love that feels like a contradiction: both the eye of a storm and the peace of silence.
“I want to kiss you,” Caitlyn whispers, knocking their foreheads together once, and then again. “But not if you’re not okay with it.”
Vi’s chest makes an impact, meat against ribs, bone against throbbing flesh, flesh against veins— it goes on forever, infinitely many collisions in her body that only want one true collision: mouth against mouth. Caitlyn’s against hers.
“You promise it’s not going to change anything between us?” Vi murmurs, though she’s made up her mind.
Caitlyn hums, eyes already settled on Vi’s lips. “I won’t let it.”
“Caitlyn,” Vi breathes, they’re less than a millimeter apart now, deep in each others’ space. “Promise me.”
Blood thrums uselessly beneath their lips, their throats, their hearts. “I promise, Vi.”
Suddenly, it’s Caitlyn everywhere— Caitlyn pushing her back into the bed, Caitlyn’s hair curtaining around them, Caitlyn’s mouth drawing a loud sigh out of Vi— finally, finally, it’s teeth and tongue and warm lips. Vi whines, sliding her hands on either side of Caitlyn’s face, thumbs pressing into the divots of her jaw; stay here, don’t go, I’m yours. As if either of them could ever leave, as if they haven’t been strung together by some upper deity right from the start.
Caitlyn coaxes her head back, tilts it up, drags her mouth sinfully down, over her chin— leaving a trail of love and bites down Vi’s throat.
“You have no idea how hard it’s been to not do this for the last few weeks,” Caitlyn whispers, low and throaty, and Vi’s hips jerk.
“Tell me,” she whimpers, suddenly too understimulated, too empty— needing more. “Or show me, fuck, anything.”
Caitlyn dips her head, smirk blazing an insignia into the night. “Your wish is my command.”
And when her tongue slides into Vi less than five minutes later, all Vi can think about are midnight strands wrapped around bruised knuckles and diamond rings on pale fingers— one day.
&.
More, more, please, is all Vi can say, on her knees, face pressed into the pillow.
Fuck, Caitlyn whispers behind her, bent over Vi, one hand circling Vi’s clit, the other pounding away inside of her. I could wait a hundred years to do this— to feel you. You feel so good.
No more waiting, Vi gasps into the material. She’s close, so close, she’s been here for years, building to the edge, and now Caitlyn’s got her there, pulling whines and moans out of her very soul. Please. I need you.
Yes, Caitlyn purrs, sucks a bruise on her neck. Purpled and bitten and kissed and licked, a sign of affection. You are so needy.
Vi learns then, that bruises can be lovely, too.
&.
Councilor Hoskel’s party is a swanky affair, with large red drapes hanging from stone pillars, and marbled floors swept clean till you could see the imperfections on your own face in the reflection. Caitlyn can tell where the banners used to hold the Kiramman emblem— a tribute for her ‘marriage’— now painted over with some random designs.
It’s a beautiful set up, and she’s come with a beautiful woman on her arm.
“So… you and Vi didn’t start dating until after the marriage rumor?” Mel blinks, champagne flute in one hand, the other curled interestedly over her hip. “Well. That is certainly a story to be told.”
Caitlyn shrugs, smile curling the corner of her mouth as she watches Vi hover by the bar on the far side of the ballroom. “I guess. It feels rather silly to recount it now, though.”
“Oh,” Mel sighs, looking at Caitlyn like she’s inches away from unearthing some godly truth. “The best stories are the ones that feel silly to recount.”
When Vi comes back, some clear drink in hand because I can’t drink this rich people shit, let me hit up the bar, see if they have the good stuff, Caitlyn is waiting for her alone. Mel is gone already, having absorbed as much of the gossip as she came for before making herself scarce— Caitlyn always did like her, admired her, even.
“What’s a pretty girl like you doing all by yourself?” Vi asks, a knowing grin adorning her face as she clinks her glass lightly against Caitlyn’s before leaning in for a kiss.
Caitlyn obliges, tracing Vi’s jaw with gentle fingers as their lips meet. “Waiting for someone to come and join me.”
“Oh just anyone?” Vi asks, an eyebrow raised as she settles into Caitlyn’s side. “That’s a shame, you should have higher standards.”
“I do,” Caitlyn responds, faux-haughtily, as she points at a tall woman in the corner. She’s cracking nearly six-feet with the help of heels from Vi can tell, and her long blonde hair flows wildly over her back. Even without seeing her face, Vi knows she’s something of a sight. “That’s the woman who asked for my hand a few days ago, when someone was too busy wallowing in her own emotions.”
“Holy shit,” Vi breathes, not insecure— they’re too in love for that, too head over heels, too secure in their relationship. That’s what a relationship is about, isn’t it? Being able to joke about the things that make others bristle. “If you don’t want her, I’ll take her.”
“Take her where?” Caitlyn asks, cocking an eyebrow. “We share a bed.”
Vi’s facade begins to crack, light shining through. “You can watch.”
Caitlyn minds the public setting, but curls inconspicuous fingers around Vi’s jaw, tugging her close, watching blue eyes flash dangerously. “If anyone’s watching anything, it’s going to be you watching me as I fuck you.”
Vi hisses through her teeth. “God. How long do we have to be here?”
Caitlyn laughs, desire evaporating as quick as it had come. She wraps a long arm around Vi’s waist, rubbing her fingers into the opposite hip. “Long enough. We just got here, sweetheart. Really, appearances must be kept. They’re all going to know what we’re leaving for if we leave this early.”
Vi grumbles, but lets her head rest gingerly against Caitlyn’s shoulder. “Appearances schmappearances, maybe I want them all to know I’m going to fuck my hot girlfriend tonight.”
Caitlyn presses a kiss into Vi’s hair, here’s a memory that’s being made: of gold and pink and red and all the colors mixing together. They’ll see it all again in a few years, clad in wedding dresses with the Kiramman crest emblazoned in it, they’ll see it again and remember it and think of naivety and commitment and how stupid it had been to pretend that they’d ever end up differently.
“I love you,” Caitlyn whispers into her hair, Vi preening at the affection. “So much.”
Vi smiles at her, soft and silly, and whispers it back I love you, like the ghost of a confession that could have once hurt— but it doesn’t. It blossoms and spreads and covers gold in the viscous red of their hearts— and it doesn't hurt.