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Inebriation undoubtedly led to it.
It’s a party, of all things. You’re entitled to some R&R after the harrowing however-long escapade you had with the wormhole. This is the first time the crew members have had some time to let loose, have fun.
But, you think, as you perched on the arm of the sofa, looking down at your head engineer comfortably sat on the couch cushions, smiling idly at anything and everything, it was very hard to resist in the first place.
You twist in your spot, feet perched between the armrest and Mark, and stare at him. The alcohol thrums through your veins, warms your being, fills your head with cotton, droops your eyes, sways your body in place. You gnaw at your lower lip, finding it numb, and you wonder what it’d be like to have his beard rasp against it, just so you could feel the friction. Your hands move of their own accord towards his face, and you gently tilt it up to face you, his cheeks secure in your palms. You squish them, giddy.
“Captain?” he murmurs, eyes wide. His mouth parts open slightly, plush and pink. It’s inviting.
A hiccup—where did it come from—you?—makes you jerk back. You hadn’t realized you were leaning in so close. “Ohhhhh my goddddddd…” you slurred quietly, swaying forward. “How.”
“How what?”
“How are you so…” you close your eyes briefly. “So…”
Under your palms, he smiles. Your eyelashes flutter open to catch his affectionate gaze, his lips upturned, and your already warm face gets hotter.
His voice is gentle. “So what, Captain?”
He looks handsome like this, eyes glassy and face flushed and jaw slack. You’ve always resisted kissing him in any capacity whatsoever (you also didn’t know if he’d let you), but it feels like the gods are testing your impulse control right now.
“Mark,” you say seriously. “Do you have any idea… any idea… how you…” Damn your thick tongue. You should be able to say what’s on your mind right now.
He’s patient, though. A small mercy for you.
“How you look,” your tongue finally rolls out. “You’re so…” What did you say before? “Handsome.” Yes. But— “Attractive.” Hmm. “Gorgeous.” Your palms squeeze imperceptibly, and his lips jut out just a smidge. “I can’t stop looking at you.”
It’s pretty, the way he blinks, how his already wide eyes got even bigger. His pupils dilate in the time you’ve been talking.
“You can’t just look like—” you detract one of your hands and wave it down the length of his figure, to emphasize your point— “that and expect me to be normal about it.”
That gets a laugh out of him. “Captain—”
“And you are just. So kissable,” you move forward, inches from his lips. “Every time you start talking about the ship. The different functions of every single area on board. How you know how to fix literally everything. How you won’t give up even when shit gets rough. You get so excited and passionate and I just. I can’t stop looking at you.”
His gaze softens, and his fingers wrap around your wrist. They’re large and thick and it brands your skin.
Your voice simmers down to a whisper. “You shine so bright. All the time.”
You can smell the alcohol on his breath, the way the puffs of air crawl around your lips, but something passes behind his eyes, and he glances behind you, causing you to look over your shoulder. There’s no one there.
“’S no one there,” you pout, facing him fully. “Who’re you lookin’ for?”
His eyes crinkle with affection, “Not looking for anyone. Just making sure we were alone.”
Ah. That word. It pulls down on your brows. “Alone…I was alone for a long time.”
He raises a brow in confusion. You sniffle. “I spent a long time wandering a lot of universes. A long time trying to find you.” Your palms squeeze imperceptibly, and his lips jut out just a smidge. “It was so hard. I found all of these Marks who didn’t even know who I was. Not a single one of them was the one I was looking for.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, hooded eyes growing somber. “I didn’t mean for you to be alone for that long.”
“You were alone too,” you sighed. “I just didn’t find you in time.”
A bittersweet smile. “Well, we found each other, didn’t we?”
“We did,” you swipe your thumbs on his cheeks. Foreheads rest against each other, and he brings the other hand up to wrap around your other wrist, and you’d be surprised if you don’t have marks as soon as he pulls away. “I think we always will, no matter what.”
He squeezes, and it grounds you back to Earth. Contact with him makes your blood sing and your skin ring with life. You want to feel him all and over and around you, to bury yourself within him, to nestle yourself in his heart and fill the void with your space. The cheeks rise under your palms again, and you realize that he’s smiling, and his eyes nearly disappear under them. But the look is tender and affectionate and you already feel yourself drowning.
“No matter what,” he agrees, but his tone is somber, and you don’t want to hear him sound that sad ever again.
So you tip forward.
The kiss is tentative. A simple press. It’s a little wet.
But when you pull back, Mark’s eyes flutter open, lips following yours, and he stares at them like there’s nothing he’d like more to keep doing.
“Is—” your tongue darts out to swipe along your bottom lip, and his dilated pupils track the moment. “Is this okay?”
“Yeah,” he says, gruff and low, and you barely register the thrill it sends down your spine when he pulls you closer, tugging you onto his lap and leaning back on the couch, and you wrap your arms behind his neck and the grip on your hips is tight, and there is nothing else that matters, not even if any of your crew leads walk in and see you tangling your fingers in your head engineer’s hair, kissing him like he’s your first breath of fresh air.
When you do part, he directs his kisses to your neck, and your keens are high and loud and needy, and you think he would have sucked a litter of hickies had it not been for the loud noise from just outside the room.
The two of you break apart, eyes wide and lips red and wet and kiss-bitten, but no one comes in, and a few terse seconds pass before he sags against you, face buried in the crook of your neck. You huff out a laugh, carding your fingers through his thick locks, and your skin absorbs the rumble of his laughs, arms wrapping tight around your waist.
“We can continue this somewhere else,” you offer, resting your cheek on the crown of his head.
He kisses the hollow of your throat. “I wouldn’t mind that.”
“Mine or yours?”
“Yours is closer.”
And the two of you sneak out of the party like lovesick teenagers, Mark’s hand gripping yours tight, and once you hit the hallway, you break out into a run, your giggles echoing all the way down to your room.
Inebriation led to it, yes. But you think, as Mark presses you against the door to your quarters, one hand blindly slapping against the scanner to let the two of you through, you’ve never felt more clear-headed than you have at this moment with your head engineer in your arms, kissing you senseless and setting your nerves alight.