[maidstone] objects in space { phillip }

He squeezed her when she shivered, and she wanted to do it again immediately just to get the same reaction. It was so stupid of her to be sitting here like this, curling into him like this. But she felt better here than over there — and it didn’t matter unless, until, he stopped her. It didn’t matter unless it mattered to him, which was sort of the crux of it all, wasn’t it? She'd never been as good as him at saying what she wanted. She was a little better at it tonight, maybe.

I miss you, too, he’d said.

“Yeah.” She breathed the word against his neck, responding distantly to the drunk comment, but thinking about the other words instead.

Billie’s heart was still racing, but she was pretty sure it was just because of the alcohol. Well, that and the proximity now, but she didn’t think it could go much faster than this. Even when her imagination started sparking off, conjuring all kinds of things that she probably shouldn’t allow herself to think about. She thought she could feel his pulse through his neck, but she wasn’t sure because it might have just been her own echoing in her ears.

After a short, tense, silence, the blonde turned her head slightly, trying to hear if his heart was really beating that quickly, or if it was just hers after all. It felt so good, though, to be skin-to-skin that it really did feel like her heartbeat pulsed a little quicker just then, too.

Or maybe that was his.

Her arms and legs had goosebumps now, but she was having some difficulty understanding how cold or warm she was. Her fingers ached a little, maybe from the cold. She felt tense, either in the shivery, cold sort of way or just the tension of being wrapped up in him— him, his presence, his arms, his smell, his neck right by her lips, specifically. She plucked very lightly, absentmindedly, at the button on his jacket pocket.

The closer Billie was, the less Phillip remembered why she was here in the first place. The why mattered less and less because she wasn't having a panic attack anymore, and she didn't seem terribly drunk anymore, and mostly because her face was so close to his, it was the only thing he could think about. Billie's skin against his, her breath on his neck, the closeness of it all; it crowded his mind and pushed out every other thought. He was entirely distracted by it and oh so aware of every little movement that she made.

Billie's fingers plucking at his jacket buttons sent little ripples of something through Phillip. It was cute, like the little absentminded things she used to do when they would sit together for hours, sometimes saying absolutely nothing. The tiny movements reminded him of easier times, peace. And there was a sort of longing nostalgia that came wrapped up in that. Memories that him in waves, but he couldn't quite pinpoint one thing. This moment didn't remind him of one other specific moment but rather of the way Billie had always made him feel. Safe and comfortable. He could be himself around her, unjudged and accepted. More than anything, Billie was home.

Phillip didn't say a thing, not for a while, but he didn't move away either. Aside from his thumb tracing small circles on her, Phillip was quite still, afraid that if he moved too much, she might move away and yet hesitant to admit he liked her being this close again. For as many reasons why it felt wrong, it also felt so right, and Phillip didn't want to fight that right now. Not when he knew this moment was going to slip away, it wouldn't last. He figured he'd wake up tomorrow, and nothing would have changed. They would still be broken up, his life would still suck, so why not have this tiny moment of peace? Why not?

With her head on his shoulder, his neck an inch away from the tip of her nose, Billie could feel her own warm breath on her cheeks. She was tucked into him, safe, just like she'd imagined a million times in the past few months. Close, just like she'd missed. The tension of it all was tingling on the back of her neck, like she was sensing some kind of inevitability here. Maybe she was. Was it inevitability of her own bad decision making, though? Or fate? It seemed impossible to know until something happened. 

Phillip hadn't stopped drawing little circles on her body. She hadn't stopped imagining him doing more.

She really could just lean in so slightly and press her lips right there, if she wanted to. And really, was there anything else she wanted more, at this very moment? There were butterflies in her tummy, and it felt like they were fluttering all over her skin, too. The alcohol had done a neat job of fading everything that existed outside of her immediate sphere into a forgettable blur. It had done a good job of making it even harder to tell what she should or shouldn't do.

Feather-light, she pressed her lips to his skin and felt a frisson of pleasure rippled over her. She paused, her breath hot against his skin. She waited for him to say something, or move away. When he didn’t stop her, she tilted her chin up and kissed him again, just below his ear, a little more decisively this time.

Having Billie this close, after so long, was dangerous, and Phillip was all too aware of it. He knew he should have pulled away or returned her to whatever the hell was going on back at Maidstone, but he was selfish, and he didn’t care, and he had no plans to do either. Even though it wasn’t wise to hold her close, Phillip didn’t want to do anything else. He wasn’t smart, and he knew it would make everything worse tomorrow, but all he could think about was the closeness—her head on his shoulder, so close to him, her lips. There was electricity in the air around them, and Phillip could feel it like the moments before a storm. Everything grew quiet, and his heart thumped in his chest, and Billie moved.

And Phillip held his breath as her lips pressed against his neck. All the things he “should” do were gone from his mind, swept aside and replaced by thoughts of her. The wizard grew still, afraid if he moved, she would stop, or he’d wake up. But Billie didn’t stop; she paused and then kissed him again, close to his ear, and his breath caught in his throat. Phillip had dreamt about this for months. He’d missed her so much he thought he might break in two. The teenager had read stories about broken hearts, he’d witness (and avoided) the crying witches in the halls after a breakup, but he’d never imaged it would happen to him. And he certainly hadn’t thought it’d be Billie who would destroy him.

And no matter how much loss he had already suffered, nothing could have prepared him for this. He was powerless against the hallow, broken, hopeless feeling of losing the most important person in the world. And Phillip hadn’t just lost her, she had betrayed him, and that was so much worse. And despite that, it was so easy to brush all of that aside right now. To forget everything he was mad about, even if just for a little bit because her lips against his skin felt so good. Billie in his arms again felt like home, and he was desperate to go back there, even if it broke him tomorrow.

Phillip said nothing as his arm around her back pulled her closer to him, like an unspoken cue not to stop. He wondered what it might feel like to kiss her properly again, to lift her chin toward him and look into her sea-green eyes like he used to, but he was afraid to move—terrified that he might remind her of anything that would stop her from kissing him again.

Though her actions were painfully, painfully slow, it felt like there was so much movement in the stillness. Her skin was tingling, her lips were tingling, she was so tense everytime she paused, scared that he’d stop her, or speak, or that the tension itself would somehow just pull her into pieces. That really felt like something that could happen at this very moment, as silly as it might sound. Everything was heightened because she was drunk, or because she'd fantasised about kissing him so much that she was taken aback by the sharpness of each real sensation.

None of those things happened, and the butterflies and swoops inside her continued on.

Her lips just under his earlobe. Her lips along his jaw. She kept her eyes firmly shut, too nervous to let anything but instinct and muscle memory guide her right now. She couldn’t hear or feel his pulse now, but his breathing was uneven and Billie felt a rush as she noted the fact. She did that. Being close like this affected him just like it affected her. She hesitated a beat as she reached his lips, but not because she wanted to stop, or wanted him to do so, simply because she was used to kissing him a certain way, with a certain rhythm.

She felt his arm around her tighten a little — just enough pressure on her back to feel like wanting. Her hesitation disappeared and she pressed her lips to his.

Merlin, she’d missed him. Billie’s hands slid up his chest, and she tilted her head, deepening the kiss. His arm was around her back now properly now, pulling her body up against his, but the way they were sitting — side by side — was frustratingly awkward. Her neck hurt, and she wanted more. Billie’s hands slid up to the tops of his shoulders, then the sides of his neck, the tips of her fingers criss-crossing at his hairline on the back of his neck. She brought one knee awkwardly up onto the bench, then pushed up so he could pull her into his lap, her knees on either side of his thighs.

Her dress rode up a bit, of course, but she barely noted the fact. She kissed him fervently, like she’d been imagining this exact moment for months and rehearsing in her head whenever she was too tired to defend against the fantasy. Her eyes were squeezed shut the whole time, her hands messing up his hair as she slid her fingers through it. She had goosebumps from her ears down to her knees.

Billie trailed a line of kisses along his neck, his jaw, and then paused, and that tiny break felt so heavy to Phillip. So full of some undefinable thing, like gravity pushing him toward her. It was like an unstoppable force reminding him how much he needed her, wanted her. And sensing that she wanted to keep kissing him was unbearable. Phillip returned the kiss eagerly, his free hand moving to cup her cheek. He tried to make up for all the time they had lost and show her just how much he had missed her, but some voice inside kept him from moving too quickly. Her hands moved on his chest, and the tempo was so familiar that Phillip felt instantly transported to the summer. It reminded him of the hot nights they'd spend kissing goodbye on her porch in Craven. Of the feeling of her fingers tangling up in his hair and his hands on her waist. It returned him to when things were easy, and the rhythm was natural.

He leaned into the nostalgia of it, and it consumed him. Phillip forgot about everything else and just kissed her back. He moved his hand from her face and pulled her toward him with the other arm. Billie moved, and Phillip pulled her into his lap. His breathing was uneven by now, and he felt like he'd swap breathing for kissing her without a single complaint. He'd do just about anything to have her again. His eyes closed tight; Phillip desperately wished that he could erase the last four months. Phillip's hands moved down her back and side until they came to rest on the tops of her thighs —oh — he'd forgotten about her dress until that moment, and it was like a jolt of lightning as he remembered. His palms against her bare skin electrified him, and Phillip sat forward. His chest rose quickly, and the teenager kissed her more intently than before.

All hesitation was gone, Phillip's fingers brushed under the hem of her dress, and he loved the feeling. A wave of warmth rushed over him. Despite the weather, his lack of jacket, and her cold skin under his palms. "I love this dress," He breathed, words whispered in between kisses so that the pauses confused his intentions. I love—this dress.

Billie felt tired, wired, nervous and wanting. Her movements were needy and feverish; she had no idea when or if he’d stop her, and she didn’t want to waste a second of it before he remembered that he actually hated her and didn’t want any of this (her) at all. He moved his hands to the tops of her legs and she tensed, inhaled a sharp breath through her nose, but didn’t stop kissing him. He whispered words in between kisses and she made her way down his other cheek, pressing her lips to his ear, his neck.

“I—” Billie immediately swallowed down an I love you too as he finished his sentence, and then she came back to his lips and kissed him extra hard. She pressed herself closer and slid her hands through his hair, pulling him firmly against her, to make him forget she’d spoken at all.

A distant part of her understood she was too drunk, too messy, for him to let her push it too far. She was too drunk, he was too responsible — at least, he always had been when it came to her — and the whole situation was too chaotic and unexpected and impulsive for it not to immediately burn itself up. Whether he hated her or not. Whether he wanted her or not. If Billie wasn’t absolutely certain that stopping right now would really just mean stopping forever, she might ask him to take her somewhere else. She didn’t pause to think that there wasn’t really anywhere he could take her; to Billie, the only barrier worthy of consideration was the possibility of rejection, and she was trying hard to let herself think about anything else right now.

As Billie moved faster, Phillip reciprocated. Matching her pace, her need. For months he had longed to be close to her again, and now that he was, Phillip was terrified it would end. He knew his brain eventually would catch up, and his thoughts would ruin everything. He'd question what they were doing, and he'd be remiss to stop, but even now, in the middle of this moment, completely caught up in Billie, Phillip already knew it would be him who stopped them. She was a bit drunk still; he could taste it on her lips, and he just knew it would have to be him. And he didn't want it to be. More than anything, Phillip wanted to be irresponsible right now. To make all the wrong choices so at least he'd have something tangible to regret in the morning, instead of the mounting questions and what-ifs.

She pulled him closer, and like gravity, he couldn't resist it. The way she pressed herself against him made his heart race, and Phillip closed his eyes again. He kissed her back more passionately than before, and his hands gripped her thighs, squeezing tightly. He moved fast, some part of him convinced he could kiss away the responsible thoughts. They fought to reach the surface, but he pushed them to the back of his mind as he deepened the kiss. As if he could live in this pretend world for a bit longer. Phillip's head tilted slightly, and he knew just how badly he wanted this moment. More than anything, Phillip just wanted to exist here. To cross this line instead of drawing it.

Phillip's lips moved away from her, greedily covering her jaw and neck with more kisses until he paused for a breath, and the walls came crumbling down around him. "Billie," he murmured against her neck, his breath hot and his breathing ragged. They should stop, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to pull away from her, or do the right thing, or be responsible. All he wanted was her, so he kissed her again.

Eyes still shut, Billie leaned her body back just enough to run her palms clumsily down his shoulders, down his arms over the sleeves of his jacket until her hands were on top of his. Billie squeezed his hands, pressed his fingertips into her skin, halfway between a request and a demand. He squeezed and Billie made a sound into their kiss. She wished he would take her cardigan off, or his jacket, or that he’d slide his hands up a bit further. Her imagination was getting away from her, but it didn’t feel so profane now, with his hands on her as they were. It didn’t feel so wrong to imagine more, when more was actually happening. She was being reckless — so uncharacteristically reckless — but she'd be thrice as reckless if it meant he'd keep kissing her like he'd never want another girl in his life.

Billie.

He whispered her name against her neck and she had to resist shying away from the sensation. It tickled; she could feel it right through her, and there were new goosebumps rippling from the spot his lips had brushed to all over her shoulders and back. Billie couldn’t quite tell if it was an encouragement, or the beginning of him verbalising some of the (very understandable, rational) reasons that they shouldn’t be doing this. Was he saying it like he’d missed this? Billie — like he’d been thinking about it as much as she had? Was he going to tell her to stop? Chastise her? She shook her head slightly at her thoughts, at herself, and shifted to press her lips to his again. His breathing was ragged. Billie felt high on the idea that he still wanted her enough that he'd kissed her until he was breathless.

The line had just been begging to be crossed, and she'd done it now; she was savouring the feeling, losing her head in both the physical high and the emotional swell. She squeezed his hands again, kissed him harder.

Billie's hands pressed into his was exhilarating, and Phillip acquiesced without hesitation. Her movements felt like she was asking him to go further, and coming from Billie, who never asked for anything, it was impossible to resist. An intoxicating request that Phillip was all too eager to fulfill. He squeezed her thighs, and his hands moved further up her legs, underneath the fabric of her dress, and he sucked in a breath at the warmth of her skin. He'd said something and meant to say more, but everything was a blur now. All Phillip heard was her breathing and the rapid thrumming of his heartbeat in his ears. Everything was as it was before, and he knew it was a lie, but he didn't care. The world slipped away again, and it was just them. Just Billie and Phillip. No Hogwarts nonsense, no drama, and no one named Sybil.

For a while, longer than he'd planned, but not nearly as much as he wanted to, Phillip kissed her. His hands were pushing; further, his thumbs pressed into the inside of her thighs, and his lips roaming over every bit of skin he could find. Wishing she'd worn dresses like this when they were together and then dismissing the thought before it could catch fire and remind him that they were not, in fact, together anymore. It was the most exciting highwire Phillip had ever traversed, letting his thoughts wander along with his hands but managing not to think about anything for too long. Not to let his mind catch up, yet, not to stop them, yet.

But just like everything good, eventually, it had to come to an end. The trance broke, and he realized how close he was to begging her to go somewhere else with him. How desperate he was to keep kissing her. And that he could still taste the alcohol on her breath. Everything hit him all at once. This was wrong, they were going too far, too fast, and he had to stop them. He pulled away, he had to stop kissing her, but his hands refused to let go of her skin. "Wait, wait," he barely managed, Phillip's voice hoarse and his lips swollen. Phillip's forehead leaned against hers, he was out of breath and this moment was out of time. ".... wait," They had to stop—press pause. Take a breath. Right?

She made a small sound when he pulled back, a sound of protest this time. Following him in, she leaned forward to kiss the corner of his lips, even as he started speaking. Billie intended on marking a trail of kisses from there to his collarbone, but she paused as soon as she understood what he was saying. Wait wasn’t ambiguous like Billie was; she stilled before she’d even properly processed that he was asking her to stop.

Thinking was hard, but following instructions was always easy, for her.

“Sorry,” she breathed, the word slipping out automatically, as if he hadn’t been kissing her back a second ago. As if he didn’t still have his hands on her body.

She felt a little jittery as her mind was tugged reluctantly back up to the surface, back to reality, but the feeling faded a bit when he rested his head against hers. Merlin, it felt like the last four months hadn’t happened at all. With everything heightened as it was, Billie felt like there was no safer space in the world than right here. She let her eyelids open just a little, but couldn’t see anything in the dark besides her own blurry eyelashes. She closed them again.

Phillip wanted to stop — wanted her to stop. To wait. What did that mean, in the bigger sense? What did it even mean that he’d kissed her back at all? That he was here, with her? Billie’s brain conjured the questions, but nothing surfaced to answer them; instead of a clear path forward, there was just blankness, just a drunk haze.

(Just longing, just hurt, just guilt, just—)

After a moment sitting still like this, Billie let her head loll forward, her cheek brushing the side of his face, until her forehead was resting in the curve between his neck and shoulder. It felt safe here, and warm. She shivered again, but it felt distant; she still wasn’t really registering the cold. Her hands were still on his hands, and his thumbs were still drawing little circles on the insides of her thighs. Did he know how that felt, to her? Where her mind was, right now? She didn’t want to move an inch. She didn’t know how she felt, but she was definitely on the brink of all kinds of different things — hurt, rejection, soppy adoration, self-punishment and more.

“Mmm.” She made a sound into his neck. It was intended to be a complaining sort of groan but came out more like a longing sigh.

Even if she was scared he’d say something that would hurt her, deserved or not (deserved, probably), and even if she was scared he might be angry or hurt or dismissive, or any act other way that would make her anxious (like the last couple of times they’d spoken), Billie couldn’t do anything but trust him. She couldn’t. Even the parts that made her nervous still felt familiar and safe; she hadn’t been able to erode the sense that she belonged right here with him, even after nearly four months apart. It was impossible not to love him, still.

And he was still drawing little circles on her skin. “I... don’t want to stop,” she confessed, murmuring the words into his neck.

” I don’t want to,” Billie had answered, and Phillip felt like every inch of his body was fighting to agree with her. To go back to two minutes ago when none of the past mattered, and he was home again with her in his arms. Stopping them was the last thing Phillip wanted to do, and because of that, it was the one thing he had to do. His hands on her thighs, her lips on his skin, it all felt so right, but deep down, he knew it wasn’t. He couldn’t pretend the last four months hadn’t happened, or the years before that when she’d been lying and hiding things from him. Phillip wished he could, though, just for a little bit longer.

Finally, he’d asked her to stop, and while Billie had paused, she’d moved toward his neck again, and his skin felt like it was on fire again. Even just her breath on his skin sent little ripples of electricity through his body, and he tensed. If she kissed him again, he knew he wouldn’t want to stop her. “Me either,” he admitted, but it had to happen. It had to, right? Phillip’s words said one thing, but his thumbs moving in small circles on the inside of her thighs said something else entirely. “But we have to….” Phillip was looking for any excuse to keep going. Some reason for this to be alright, but he kept coming up short.

Having her so close, after so long, was a powerful motivator, but for whatever reason, tonight, he couldn’t be selfish. At least not in this way. The teenager sighed quietly, and the following inhale brought waves of Billie’s shampoo and another round of nostalgia with it. He imagined days spent sitting together on the little two-seater on the back porch of Maidstone, and he remembered her stories about homemade soap. He listened, but Phillip hadn’t been paying close attention to the intricacies of soap-making back then. He’d been so much more concerned with when he could kiss her next. And now, he longed for those little moments just as much as he wanted to kiss her again. And knowing he couldn’t have either was painful.

"We have to."

He’d pulled back abruptly enough that she hadn’t had a chance to catch her breath. her breathing sounded loud now, in the warm little pocket she’d made in the curve between his neck and shoulder. He was having trouble catching his breath, too; his chest rose and fell unevenly under her. She took a little too much enjoyment in that fact.

Slouched forward as she was, Billie’s arms were a little uncomfortable, folded at her elbows. She was nervous to move, though, worried that he’d stop doing what he was doing, worried that he’d move his hands away. After a moment of silence, and so slowly, she relaxed her fingers where they were curled around his. Then she slid her palms up just a little, so they rested upon his wrists, then his forearms instead. Still hovering, still urging him not to withdraw, just a little more comfy for her. He didn’t move; she felt relieved.

Me either.

His words dinged some kind of alarm bells on the way in, like her brain was trying to notify her that she’d want to hold onto them, but she didn’t quite have the awareness to work out why. He didn't want to stop. He didn’t want to stop? Then... Why were they stopping? She stayed very still, listening to both of them inhale and exhale out of sync. A breeze rustling leaves behind her somewhere. Me either. She wanted to believe him — couldn't think of many reasons he'd say it if he didn't mean it, either — but it didn't quite stick. Whatever he did or didn't want, he'd stopped kissing her. So.

An uncharacteristic voice in her head reminded her that he’d said wait, rather than stop, but she wasn’t stupid enough to hope he’d chosen the word for its literal meaning. She was stupid enough to hope he didn’t mean either of them, though. Maybe that should have triggered some kind of alarm, too, but it didn’t.

Briefly, she wondered if she should move, but then thought better of it — she didn’t want to be apart, didn’t want to have to face that distance again, unless he asked her to. Instead, Billie slid her hands further up his arms, over his sleeves, one hand coming up to rest very lightly on his collarbone on the opposite side. Gently, she stroked the side of his neck with her thumb, mirroring his similar motion against her, hoping he could feel it stir right through him, just like she could. Hoping that that small action was okay.

Billie still hadn’t caught her breath, still felt like she was in some kind of limbo, still waited exactly as she’d been told to — and, of course, still didn’t want to.

We have to, he said, for the second time. She wondered why he’d said it twice.

The do we? was on the tip of her tongue, challenging and daring, but even emboldened as she was, even wanting so badly, it was difficult for her to be that particular brand of direct. “Yeah,” she said, even though she didn’t really agree. “I just... don’t want to,” she murmured softly. She didn’t move, though. Didn’t move away, or try to kiss him. She felt frozen, reluctant to do anything.

Billie moved her hands from on top of his, and Phillip’s breath caught in his throat as he dared to imagine what she might do next. Her fingers slid up his wrists to rest on his forearms, and for a second, Phillip thought she might urge him to move further. She was a little too drunk; he knew it. And she was entirely more confident kissing him first than he had ever seen her, and it was going to drive him insane. They had to stop, but Phillip had lost grasp of any good reason why. Her hands moved to his neck, and he felt a frisson of sensation as her fingers ran along his collarbone. He wondered when she had gotten so good at this and lost himself in the thought.

There were probably a million reasons why they should stop, and ideally, he’d have listed them off right now, but Phillip was useless with Billie this close to him. The wizard had spent the last four months battling dreams of moments like this. Whispers of memories that crept in late at night, when he was too tired, and it was quiet, and missed her the most. A part of him was desperate to convince himself that this was a good idea, but he knew it wasn’t. Just because it felt good didn’t make it right, and Phillip knew that too.

It wasn’t like he wanted to go back to talking about things they’d probably never be able to fix. And he certainly had no plans to bring her back to whatever the hell was happening at the Maidstone house. Of the three, kissing her even when he knew he shouldn’t do feel like the least complicated thing they could do. Phillip was at least good at that. Her plea, and the noise she made against his neck, only convinced him further. She didn’t want to. “But if we don’t stop, then….” Phillip wasn’t entirely sure where he was headed with the sentence, so he left it unended. His words were fading off as he looked past her toward the tree that was swaying in the distance.

Every time her thumb passed over his collarbone, he felt that much closer to ignoring the alarms going off in his head. It was utterly unfair of her to be wearing this dress and kissing him like that, and he didn’t want to be responsible.

If they didn’t what? Stop?

Frustration wasn’t particularly present in Billie’s roster of common emotions, and especially not like this. In most situations, she tended towards anxiety rather than frustration, and if the feeling was aimed at someone else or someone else’s actions, then it would shift into something that better resembled guilt, or self-chastising instead. Because feeling frustrated towards other people was untoward, and didn’t suit her one bit.

But.

The blonde breathed in through her nose, then exhaled a slow sigh. Her heartbeat had calmed a touch, but it was still thudding away uncomfortably fast in her chest. She should focus on catching her breath, she thought, but the thought was vague at best.

She couldn’t read him especially well right now, and didn’t really have the capacity for sitting here and analysing every little movement or word until she’d tied herself up in knots. Unlike frustration, overthinking was exceptionally common for her — to the point of being more of a default state of being than an activity to partake in, often. So it was pretty strange to be free of it, right now.

To be completely fair, it wasn’t really him that she was frustrated with. And it wasn’t as if the presence of frustration, and lack of overthinking, ruled out any of the other things; she still felt anxious, for example. It had just settled into a dull, ever present sort of buzz in the back of her mind, instead of shaping every little thing that was coming into her brain.

Billie opened her eyes, feeling her eyelashes flutter against the side of his neck. She blinked once or twice instinctively as she waited for her vision to clear; she’d had her eyes closed for what felt like a very long time. On the other side of his neck, she hadn’t stopped drawing slow little circles. If she stretched her thumb high enough, she could feel a little stubble. It was inconsequential, but made her feel nostalgic in such an acute way, for no logical reason. She did it now, running her thumb up to just underneath his chin.

Could she keep telling him that she didn’t want to stop doing this? Did it come off as petulant, maybe? She didn’t particularly care about that, but it was occurring to her slowly that he was actually being pretty clear about what he wanted. So she should really pull herself away from him, let him take her back to the party. The idea made her want to curl up. She wished, suddenly, that instead of straddling him, she was sitting in a way that would make it easier for him to hold her — maybe with her legs to one side, or something. She imagined him stroking her hair. She wanted to kiss him, wanted to do more, but those kinds of things were never the most important parts. She just wanted to be close.

So if she was wishing for things, she thought, then changing the way she was sitting would dissolve into the back of her mind, making space for more important wishes. And that thought made her feel nostalgic, too. Nostalgic and emotional. It all hurt, of course but the hurting was comforting, in a way. She’d rather be hurting with him than without him. Would rather be here than anywhere else and that was true — newly, maybe temporarily — whether he wanted her here or not.

With a little effort, Billie straightened up, pulling back so she could look at him properly. He hadn’t said anything more, and he was still even as she shifted, so she rested her hands on either side of his neck. She slid the cold tips of her thumbs just underneath the collar of his shirt. She'd do anything he wanted, but god she'd give nearly anything to have him want her.

Billie had her eyes shut the whole time they’d been kissing, and as her gaze met his now, she was especially unguarded. Her body felt heavy, and it wasn’t difficult — especially eye to eye, like this — to imagine the heaviness was something more than just alcohol and whatever-hour-of-the-night-it-was (she had no idea, but it was after her usual bedtime, especially these days). She recalled, vaguely, that she’d spent the start of their encounter avoiding his gaze. It seemed so silly now that they were sitting so close, his lips kiss-swollen and his eyes fixed so intently on hers. As if he couldn’t even imagine looking anywhere else. As if he couldn’t imagine wanting to.

Behind her, the leaves of the willow tree fluttered and swayed in the gentle breeze. The wind picked up stray strands of her hair, too. Billie shivered, still only half registering just how cold it was. She exhaled a heavy breath again.

“Then?” she prompted gently. Her tongue felt heavy too. She was sure she’d had more to say, and was sure that it wouldn’t be long before more came, but being eye-to-eye right now felt, to Billie, a little more like being soul-to-soul. It was like the weight had crushed out any other thing she could have said.