Part 30: link
“Drag! Open the bloody door!” Merlin pounds on the door to Arthur’s flat, trying to yell over the blast of The Sex Pistols. He pounds again, still nothing. “Sod it all,” he says, trying the knob.
The door opens, and Merlin walks into the dark of the room. He is immediately assaulted by Iggy, who slams him with his giant ginger body. Merlin absently bends and gives the cat a friendly pat and walks to the stereo, flipping it off.
“Hey!” Arthur yells, looking up from his spot slouched on the sofa.
“Drag, mate, I’m here to yank you bodily over to Gwen’s flat.”
“She won’t listen to me.”
“Have you tried?”
“No,” he admits sullenly.
Merlin rolls his eyes and looks around, now that his eyes have adjusted to the dim light. The flat is plastered with drawings. Every flat surface has paper strewn on it, every paper bearing a sketch. Sketches of Gwen.
“Arthur…” Merlin says reproachfully, picking up the drawing nearest him. He glances at it and immediately drops it face down on the table, blushing slightly. There was a little too much of her on that one.
“What?” he says irritably.
“You are a man possessed. Is this what you’ve been doing? Drawing her for four days?”
“Yeah,” he sulks, tossing the stub of his pencil onto the coffee table. Iggy pounces on it and bats it to the floor.
“Not healthy, mate. You need to go talk to her. Apologize to her.”
“She won’t—”
“You don’t know unless you try, Cabbage Head. Stop being a stubborn prat and go see her.” He shoves the side of Arthur’s head, and Arthur swats his hand away.
“But—”
“Shut up and put some shoes on.”
“Now?” he asks, standing.
“Phew!” Merlin exclaims. “Maybe not now. Go take a shower first; you stink.”
“Do I?” he lifts his arm and sniffs.
“Yes. If you show up at her place smelling – and looking – like that, she definitely won’t take you back.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Drag,” he says again, gesturing around the room, “are you really going to continue living like this? In a sea of sketches when you could have the real thing?”
Arthur says nothing; he just stares longingly at a sketch he’s just done of her face.
“Clean your foul self up. I’ll wait.”
“You can go.”
“I don’t trust you. I’ll wait.”
“Jerk.”
“Yes. Go shower, Fuckhead.”
Arthur trudges away and Merlin looks around. Iggy meows up at him, and he looks down at the cat. “I know. He’s a mess.”
While he waits, Merlin tidies up a bit, picking up bottles and wrappers, sorting through the drawings, sneaking another peek at the one he hurriedly set down earlier. Wow. No wonder he’s miserable. Feeling guilty for peeking, he tucks it away, stacking it with other similar sketches.
These are really good. And he drew them all from memory, which always bloody amazes me.
Arthur emerges ten minutes later, dressed in a plain t-shirt and jeans, hair damp and hanging over to one side, socks in his hand.
“You still look like shit, but at least you smell better,” Merlin says, appraising him from his spot on the sofa.
“You cleaned.”
“Of course I did. You know I can’t help it. Your trash bin is heaping with bottles now, too. What happened to the lamp?”
“It lost a fight with my boot. What did you do with my sketches?” he asks, sitting to pull his socks and boots on.
“I sorted them and stacked them neatly over there,” he points at the table.
“You sorted them? So you looked at them?”
“Well, obviously.”
“All of them?” he raises an eyebrow.
“I may have only glanced at several of them. That stack is the one that’s face-down, by the way,” Merlin says, studying the fibers of the carpet between the toes of his boots.
“Pervert.”
“Hey, you drew them.”
“She’s my girl.”
Merlin looks up at him.
“At least she was,” Arthur amends sadly.
“And she still will be,” Merlin says, standing, “if you don’t screw it up again. Come on.”
He grabs Arthur’s shoulder and yanks him to his feet.
“I don’t need an escort, Merlin,” he says, drawing his friend’s name out as he reaches for the keys to his motorcycle.
“Perhaps it escaped your attention that it is raining out, Drag,” Merlin says.
He looks up to the window, but he can only see blackness. “What time is it?”
Merlin rolls his eyes. “Half nine. Let’s go; I’ll drive you.”
“What are you going to do, wait around?” Arthur asks, shutting the door of Merlin’s dilapidated car against the rain.
“No, I’m dropping your ass off. If it goes well and you don’t act like Arthur Pendickhead, then I’m sure you’ll stay the night. If you screw it up, you deserve to walk home in the rain,” Merlin says, pulling away from the curb.
He’s right.
“Hello, Arthur,” Gwen says simply after opening the door for him, finding him huddled against the building, trying to keep out of the rain. She steps aside to let him in and closes the door.
They look at each other a moment, assessing each other. He looks like hell. And I didn’t even know he owned a green t-shirt. When is the last time he slept? Or had a proper meal?
She looks like she feels as good as I do. But yet she’s still gorgeous. She is wearing a lavender nightie, sleeveless, ending just above her knees. Arthur looks down at her bare feet with their painted pink toenails and has to resist the urge to fall to the floor and start kissing them.
Finally he looks up at her face again, to find it sad, unbelievably sad, but patient. She’s waiting.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Guinevere,” he says simply.
“And?”
“Um, I was a prat. A total arse. I let my jealousy take off with my logic. I should have listened to you.”
“Yes, you should have,” she says coolly, walking away from him and sitting in a chair.
“Guinevere,” he pleads, following her.
“Boots.”
“Shit.” He bends and unties his wet boots, pulling them off and setting them by the door.
He walks back over to her and kneels on the floor in front of her, wishing she had sat on the sofa but knowing exactly why she didn’t.
“I… I have no excuse for my jealousy, my…”
“Possessiveness. Insanity. Childishness,” she supplies.
“Yes,” he says, dropping his forehead against her knee. She lifts her hand to place it on his head, to stroke his hair, for once not plastered straight up, but stubbornly puts it back on the arm of the chair.
“It’s just that,” he turns his head, kissing the side of her knee, “I never had a mother, and even before my father disowned me he wasn’t exactly…” he gropes for the word, “supportive. Affectionate. So when I find someone special,” his hand drifts down, resting on top of her foot, “I tend to get a little possessive. Overprotective.”
“A little?” she asks, her voice thick and quavering.
He lifts his head and looks up at her to see silent tears streaming down her face.
“Apparently I haven’t learned yet that by trying to keep those… those I…” he swallows, “love… so close to me, I’m really pushing them away.”
Did he say love? She touches his cheek, and he closes his eyes, exhaling shakily.
“I can’t promise I won’t be jealous, Guinevere. All I can promise is that I will try to not lose my mind when a strange man talks to you. Or looks at you. Or touches you.” His eyes grow stormy again.
“Arthur,” she finally speaks, bringing him back to earth.
“Sorry. I’m so sorry, Guinevere. I do trust you. I always have. It’s just…” he trails off, his thumb stroking the skin on the top of her foot.
“Him you didn’t trust.”
“Right,” he exhales, thinking he’s making headway.
“Yet you took it out on me anyway,” she says, sniffling.
Guess not. He drops his head back down to her knee. “I know. You were right. I behaved like a child. I wouldn’t listen.”
“Four days, Arthur,” she says quietly. “You waited four bloody days before you decided to apologize.”
“I…”
“And even then Merlin had to drag your sorry backside out.”
“How did you…?” he looks up at her, and decides that that is a question for later. “I didn’t think you would see me. That you would hear my apology.”
“You thought me that cold?”
“No!” he exclaims, his hand on her knee now. “In my anger and… stupidity, I guess I forgot that you were you.”
“Stupidity is a good word for it,” she says.
“Guinevere…” he says, pressing his face into her lap. She allows her hand to fall to his head, fingers threading through his hair, amazed at its softness, its silken texture.
“Please forgive me,” he whispers, turning his head to the side, pressing his cheek against her legs. She can feel the warm moisture from his tears falling into her lap.
“Do you want to know why I was having lunch with Lance?” she asks, wiping her face with her free hand.
He sighs and sniffs. Her fingers feel so good in my hair. He nods, afraid to speak for fear his voice will come out strange, choked with emotion.
“Lance owns an art gallery.”
Arthur presses his face into her lap again, feeling about two inches high. She was doing something for me, and I acted like a stupid fuck. I don’t deserve her.
“He wants to give you a show.”
He groans. This just keeps getting worse.
“He thinks you’re brilliant.”
“Stop…” he moans, “I already feel terrible, now you’re making me feel worse.”
“Oh?”
He looks at her. “You’re doing this intentionally, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” she meets his gaze with her own, her eyes red.
They regard each other a minute, and finally she says, “You look like shit.”
“You look beautiful.”
“I look like shit, too.”
“No,” he says, lifting up onto his knees, winding his arms around her waist, “you are gorgeous.” He buries his head in her lap, pressing it into her stomach.
“I love you, Guinevere. Please say you forgive me.”
She reaches down and lifts his head, gently pulling his face to hers, kissing him softly, just once. “I love you, Arthur. I do forgive you.”
He leans up and kisses her, hands clutching the material of her nightie. “Thank you,” he breathes.
“Arthur?” she says, tracing his jaw with her finger, feeling four days’ worth of stubble scratching her fingertip.
“Hmm?”
“Just don’t do it again.” Her voice is deadly serious.
He squeezes her, pulling her down to him, into his lap on the floor. “I won’t. I mean, I’ll try not to,” he says, leaning in to kiss her.
She evades him, raising an eyebrow at him.
“I won’t,” he says, nuzzling her nose with his.
She lets him get within a centimeter of her lips before pulling back again.
“I promise,” he whispers huskily, lunging quickly forward to capture her lips before she can pull away again.
“I promise,” he repeats, tucking his face into her neck as he holds her to him tightly, vowing to never let her go again.
Arthur pulls them to their feet, wrapping his arms around her small body. His body surrounds hers, yet he feels that she is all around him, that she is encompassing his entire being.
“Thank you,” he repeats, whispering against her hair. “You are absolutely everything to me.”
She just squeezes him tighter, and he can feel her breathing go ragged.
“Are you crying again?” he asks, leaning back and looking down at her.
“No,” she lies, pressing her face into his shirt, using it to dry her disobedient tears.
“Guinevere,” he says tenderly, pulling her to the couch with him, “don’t cry. I can’t bear it any more.”
“Sorry. These are happy tears, Arthur. I think. My emotions are all over the place right now,” she says, reaching for a tissue and wiping her face again. “Might be PMS,” she adds with a laugh.
“Well, that’s fantastic,” he says wryly, and as she snorts a laugh, a clear bubble of snot suddenly protrudes from one nostril.
Gwen quickly clamps the tissue over her face, horrified. Slowly she lifts her eyes to Arthur’s face.
He is bright red and positively shaking with the laughter that he is valiantly trying to hold in. She purses her lips seeing him, trying not to laugh herself now.
“Don’t hold it in Sweet, or the other nostril may join in as well,” he says, suddenly busting out, falling over on the couch. “God, that was brilliant,” he gasps, “do it again…”
“You can just piss right off,” she shoves him, but she is laughing now, too. She stands and stalks to the bathroom, closing the door behind her.
He follows and presses his ear to the door, laughing again as he hears just what he expected to hear: she’s gone in there to blow her nose in privacy.
“I can hear you out there, Pendragon,” her voice wafts through the bathroom door.
“And I can hear you blowing that adorable nose in there, Degrance,” he calls back, leaning against the frame of the bathroom door, blocking the opening with his body so she has no choice but to deal with him when she opens the door.
“Oh!” she exclaims, jumping when she opens the door to discover he is right there.
He chuckles, dropping his hands down to her waist.
Gwen looks up at him and puts her hand to his cheek, saying, “When was the last time you had a decent meal?”
“What?” She’s thinking about food?
“You look like you’ve eaten nothing but junk for four days.”
“That’s because I have,” he admits, squeezing her waist in his hands. “You’ve skipped a meal or two yourself, there, miss.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, trying to duck past him now.
“Oh, no you don’t,” he grabs her, quick as lightning, pulling her against him and kissing her deeply, longingly, gratefully.
“I missed you so much, Sweet,” he mutters as he moves down to her neck, “and I’m sorry I didn’t say it sooner.”
“What?” she whispers, her hand holding his head, fingers threading through his hair.
“I wanted to,” he says, his voice still a quiet rumble, “I came close a couple times…”
“Oh,” she says, understanding now. She realizes her feet have been moving when she finds herself on her bed with him suddenly over her.
“I’ve known it since the second day I knew you,” he admits, sliding his tongue down the side of her neck.
“Arthur,” she breathes, sliding her hands up beneath his shirt, and he whips it off, tossing it carelessly aside before dropping back down over her. Gwen’s hands return to his chest immediately, tracing the dragon on his shoulder with her fingertips.
She doesn’t need to say anything else as they gaze into each other’s eyes. Her fingers are light and delicate on his skin, his hands caress her face, her side.
Arthur’s hand at her side travels lower, down to her thigh, where her nightie has shifted, bunching almost to her hips. She squirms deliciously under his touch as he scoots the thin garment higher, his palm skimming over her stomach and her breasts before she finally has to lift her shoulders to pull it off over her head. This, too, goes sailing through the air.
Gwen’s hands are unfastening his jeans now, her fingers trembling slightly, almost like she hasn’t done this many times already, but she is successful, opening them and sliding her hands inside, shoving the denim down as she does so.
Arthur groans and rolls to the side, pulling the jeans off completely, followed by his socks. He sees the wound on the sole of his foot from the lamp for the first time finally, but still pays little heed to it.
More important things to attend right now. He rolls back over, close beside her, hooking his leg over hers, mingling the warmth of her body with his.
“I missed you so much, Arthur,” she turns into him and whispers against his throat. “I was mad at you, but I missed you still.” His arms close around her, holding her against him, tenderly, softly, but with an urgency. A desperation, almost.
He kisses the top of her head, inhaling the lilacs there as he closes his eyes. Slowly they begin to move again, her hand sliding around his ribcage, his hand sliding down to rest on her hip, his fingers picking at the waistband of her knickers before slipping underneath.
Gwen slips a foot between his calves, and Arthur lifts her face to his, leaning down to kiss her lips softly yet passionately, a series of small, nibbling kisses that gradually build into deep, hungry kisses until they are both breathless.
“Guinevere,” he sighs her name as he removes the last tiny stitch of clothing between them, gliding his hand back up her leg once she’s kicked them away to the floor.
He starts to lean over her, but she presses back, pushing him down against the pillows, ravishing his lips with hers, suddenly urgent, climbing over him, straddling his stomach.
She sits back and stares down at him a moment, her eyes dark with passion but overflowing with love; an expression mirrored back at her from his eyes.
Arthur reaches his hands up and closes them over her breasts, marveling once again at how they fit so perfectly into his hands, how her body seems built for him alone. Gwen sighs contentedly at his touch, her eyes fluttering closed. She places her hands over his, then slides them down, over his arms and up to his shoulders, leaning forward again to close her lips over his.
She kisses his jaw, over to his ear, where she nibbles a bit and teases him with her tongue until he shivers. Then down his neck, scooting her body lower as she dots kisses on his shoulders, his chest, licking and biting one of his nipples.
He grunts hoarsely, his hands clutching her shoulders, her hair. Unable to take any more, he flips her over suddenly, drawing a giggling yelp from her as her head once again hits the pillow and she is beneath him again, lifting her face to his.
Arthur kisses her ardently, his hands on either side of her face holding her gently, like a precious jewel.
He pulls away slowly, sucking her lower lip softly between his as he lifts his head. She whimpers quietly as he leaves her lips but sighs happily as he kisses a trail down her neck to her breasts, sucking one dark nipple into his mouth to flick at it with his tongue.
Gwen moves her legs, sliding the insides of her thighs against his hips, her feet against his legs. Arthur takes the hint and reaches down, finally touching her, groaning against her breasts as he feels how slick and warm she is. He slides two fingers into her and she moans his name. He slips them out and runs them around her most sensitive spot and she cries out and grips his head.
Arthur tries to move lower, wanting to kiss her below, wanting to worship every inch of her, make her feel nothing but pleasure after causing her so much pain. She senses his intended destination and pulls his head back up to hers.
“No… I want you inside me…” she purrs in his ear, biting it.
“But…”
“You can do it later. I want you, now.” She reaches down for him, sliding her palm on him a few times before guiding him into her with a long moan.
“Oh, Guinevere,” he whispers hoarsely into her neck as he pushes into her, her familiar warmth surrounding him. This is where I belong, he finds himself thinking, and he starts to move his hips, thrusting, finding their rhythm again.
Gwen’s hands are everywhere. His face, his shoulders, his chest, his buttocks, his back. She can’t seem to settle on one location, and the friction of her slender fingers all over Arthur’s body is making him tingle.
He opens his eyes to look at her, watching her head toss, her lips part just before she bites her lower lip and whimpers, her fingers gripping his shoulders now.
Arthur moves faster, plunges deeper, harder, and drops his head to kiss her again, their tongues mingling and playing.
“I love you so much, Arthur,” Gwen gasps, pulling her lips away, and then she is tumbling, plummeting into a sea of unbearable sensation, digging her nails hard into his shoulders and crying out.
“Oh…” Arthur groans, burying his face into her neck and thrusts deeply, falling right along with her, panting and sweating and just happy.
“And I love you,” he whispers in her ear after a moment, once his brain is able to function again, once his heartbeat and breathing slow a bit.
“So how many women have you alienated in your quest for ultimate alpha-male dominance?” Gwen asks later, curled into his side, her head on his shoulder.
“Ha,” he laughs. “More than you want to know about, probably. There were two that lasted longest, though, before I was unceremoniously tossed on my ear. Sophia, the summer before I went to University, was the first. She lasted two whole months before she gave me my walking papers.”
“What did you do?”
“Oh, so you automatically assume it was my fault?” he asks, smirking.
“Obviously.”
“Okay, so it was. I was a possessive bastard, what else? Wouldn’t so much as let her speak to another man,” he admits, looking away, ashamed of his past behavior. “It got to the point where I was ordering for her at restaurants and stalking the store where she was had a summer job.”
“Arthur, really,” she chides.
“I know, I know, you don’t need to yell at me. I do like to think that I’ve grown since then.”
“You have,” she says, kissing his shoulder. “Some.”
“Hey!”
“Just because I’ve forgiven you and we’ve made up quite, um, thoroughly,” she says, looping her leg over his, “doesn’t mean I won’t be giving you shit about this for a while.”
“Point taken.”
“So who was the other?”
“Elana. That was at Uni. Month and a half, only. Walked in on her hugging some strange bloke, and I yanked him away from her and punched him.”
“Arthur!”
“Turned out he was her cousin that she hadn’t seen in three years.”
She just looks at him. “Gee, he jumps to the wrong conclusion, who would have thought?”
“Guinevere…”
“I know, I know, sorry. But I did warn you.”
“Yes, and I do deserve it. For the record, storming into your flat and searching for a hidden lover was a first for me.”
“Noted.”
“Oh, and my failed relationships have not been all my fault,” he says, brightening up some.
“Do tell,” she says, turning slightly and leaning on her elbow to look down at him.
First he lifts his head and kisses her again. Then again, and yet again, momentarily distracted.
“Arthur,” she reminds him.
“Right,” he drops his head back to the pillow, his hands resting on her lower back now. “Vivian. Also at University. Before Elana. She was willing to put up with anything I did. Completely happy to be possessed by me.”
“Nutter.”
“Totally and completely barmy,” he confirms. “Girl was obsessed. I think she was worse than me on the possessiveness scale.”
“So what happened?”
“I tried to break it off. She was getting too intense. I wasn’t ready for that level of deep commitment at that time,” he pauses, and the phrase at that time resonates through Gwen’s mind.
“Luckily her father found out about us. Didn’t approve of me at all. So he made her transfer schools to one back home in Stockholm.”
“Wow, he made her?”
“Her father is Olaf Jorgensen. He can bloody well do as he pleases, you know?”
“Yes, sort of the Uther Pendragon of Sweden,” she chuckles.
“Right. Plus he was footing the bill for her education, so…”
“And there we have it.”
“For all I know, she’s up there pining away for me still,” he says, looking just a tiny bit smug about this possibility.
“Poor girl,” Gwen teases, sticking a pin right into that bubble.
“So tell me about this Lance,” he says, changing the subject as he toys idly with her hair.
“Lancelot. We dated at University for about half a year.”
“Long time.”
“Yeah. He was a year older, and was set to graduate while I had one year left. He was in Arts Management, and wanted to go to Paris after graduation. Absorb the artistic ambience, sort of thing. Plus his parents were from France.”
“Were?”
“Well, his father’s passed now, but his mother is back there. She’s actually from Chile, but she’s in Nice now,” she says, sounding a bit sad. Arthur doesn’t ask.
“So he left,” he says simply.
“Yep, up and left. Didn’t ask me to follow, didn’t so much as ask me to wait or even write.”
“Strange.”
“I know. I was heartbroken and confused. But I found out later through a mutual friend that he didn’t think he should ask those things of me. Didn’t think it would be fair of him.”
“He should have told you that.”
“Exactly. So I moved on. Sort of. Concentrated on my studies that last year, and since then I’ve dated some, but never more than two dates with the same guy.”
Arthur is quiet a minute. “So… was this Lance-a-lot the one who never…” his eyes drift down below her waist.
“Drank like a hummingbird at the flower of my womanhood?” she asks.
“What?” he laughs.
“Romance novels, sorry. But yes. He was the one.”
“Well, then, you’re better off without him,” he declares.
Part 32: link
“Drag! Open the bloody door!” Merlin pounds on the door to Arthur’s flat, trying to yell over the blast of The Sex Pistols. He pounds again, still nothing. “Sod it all,” he says, trying the knob.
The door opens, and Merlin walks into the dark of the room. He is immediately assaulted by Iggy, who slams him with his giant ginger body. Merlin absently bends and gives the cat a friendly pat and walks to the stereo, flipping it off.
“Hey!” Arthur yells, looking up from his spot slouched on the sofa.
“Drag, mate, I’m here to yank you bodily over to Gwen’s flat.”
“She won’t listen to me.”
“Have you tried?”
“No,” he admits sullenly.
Merlin rolls his eyes and looks around, now that his eyes have adjusted to the dim light. The flat is plastered with drawings. Every flat surface has paper strewn on it, every paper bearing a sketch. Sketches of Gwen.
“Arthur…” Merlin says reproachfully, picking up the drawing nearest him. He glances at it and immediately drops it face down on the table, blushing slightly. There was a little too much of her on that one.
“What?” he says irritably.
“You are a man possessed. Is this what you’ve been doing? Drawing her for four days?”
“Yeah,” he sulks, tossing the stub of his pencil onto the coffee table. Iggy pounces on it and bats it to the floor.
“Not healthy, mate. You need to go talk to her. Apologize to her.”
“She won’t—”
“You don’t know unless you try, Cabbage Head. Stop being a stubborn prat and go see her.” He shoves the side of Arthur’s head, and Arthur swats his hand away.
“But—”
“Shut up and put some shoes on.”
“Now?” he asks, standing.
“Phew!” Merlin exclaims. “Maybe not now. Go take a shower first; you stink.”
“Do I?” he lifts his arm and sniffs.
“Yes. If you show up at her place smelling – and looking – like that, she definitely won’t take you back.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Drag,” he says again, gesturing around the room, “are you really going to continue living like this? In a sea of sketches when you could have the real thing?”
Arthur says nothing; he just stares longingly at a sketch he’s just done of her face.
“Clean your foul self up. I’ll wait.”
“You can go.”
“I don’t trust you. I’ll wait.”
“Jerk.”
“Yes. Go shower, Fuckhead.”
Arthur trudges away and Merlin looks around. Iggy meows up at him, and he looks down at the cat. “I know. He’s a mess.”
While he waits, Merlin tidies up a bit, picking up bottles and wrappers, sorting through the drawings, sneaking another peek at the one he hurriedly set down earlier. Wow. No wonder he’s miserable. Feeling guilty for peeking, he tucks it away, stacking it with other similar sketches.
These are really good. And he drew them all from memory, which always bloody amazes me.
Arthur emerges ten minutes later, dressed in a plain t-shirt and jeans, hair damp and hanging over to one side, socks in his hand.
“You still look like shit, but at least you smell better,” Merlin says, appraising him from his spot on the sofa.
“You cleaned.”
“Of course I did. You know I can’t help it. Your trash bin is heaping with bottles now, too. What happened to the lamp?”
“It lost a fight with my boot. What did you do with my sketches?” he asks, sitting to pull his socks and boots on.
“I sorted them and stacked them neatly over there,” he points at the table.
“You sorted them? So you looked at them?”
“Well, obviously.”
“All of them?” he raises an eyebrow.
“I may have only glanced at several of them. That stack is the one that’s face-down, by the way,” Merlin says, studying the fibers of the carpet between the toes of his boots.
“Pervert.”
“Hey, you drew them.”
“She’s my girl.”
Merlin looks up at him.
“At least she was,” Arthur amends sadly.
“And she still will be,” Merlin says, standing, “if you don’t screw it up again. Come on.”
He grabs Arthur’s shoulder and yanks him to his feet.
“I don’t need an escort, Merlin,” he says, drawing his friend’s name out as he reaches for the keys to his motorcycle.
“Perhaps it escaped your attention that it is raining out, Drag,” Merlin says.
He looks up to the window, but he can only see blackness. “What time is it?”
Merlin rolls his eyes. “Half nine. Let’s go; I’ll drive you.”
“What are you going to do, wait around?” Arthur asks, shutting the door of Merlin’s dilapidated car against the rain.
“No, I’m dropping your ass off. If it goes well and you don’t act like Arthur Pendickhead, then I’m sure you’ll stay the night. If you screw it up, you deserve to walk home in the rain,” Merlin says, pulling away from the curb.
He’s right.
“Hello, Arthur,” Gwen says simply after opening the door for him, finding him huddled against the building, trying to keep out of the rain. She steps aside to let him in and closes the door.
They look at each other a moment, assessing each other. He looks like hell. And I didn’t even know he owned a green t-shirt. When is the last time he slept? Or had a proper meal?
She looks like she feels as good as I do. But yet she’s still gorgeous. She is wearing a lavender nightie, sleeveless, ending just above her knees. Arthur looks down at her bare feet with their painted pink toenails and has to resist the urge to fall to the floor and start kissing them.
Finally he looks up at her face again, to find it sad, unbelievably sad, but patient. She’s waiting.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Guinevere,” he says simply.
“And?”
“Um, I was a prat. A total arse. I let my jealousy take off with my logic. I should have listened to you.”
“Yes, you should have,” she says coolly, walking away from him and sitting in a chair.
“Guinevere,” he pleads, following her.
“Boots.”
“Shit.” He bends and unties his wet boots, pulling them off and setting them by the door.
He walks back over to her and kneels on the floor in front of her, wishing she had sat on the sofa but knowing exactly why she didn’t.
“I… I have no excuse for my jealousy, my…”
“Possessiveness. Insanity. Childishness,” she supplies.
“Yes,” he says, dropping his forehead against her knee. She lifts her hand to place it on his head, to stroke his hair, for once not plastered straight up, but stubbornly puts it back on the arm of the chair.
“It’s just that,” he turns his head, kissing the side of her knee, “I never had a mother, and even before my father disowned me he wasn’t exactly…” he gropes for the word, “supportive. Affectionate. So when I find someone special,” his hand drifts down, resting on top of her foot, “I tend to get a little possessive. Overprotective.”
“A little?” she asks, her voice thick and quavering.
He lifts his head and looks up at her to see silent tears streaming down her face.
“Apparently I haven’t learned yet that by trying to keep those… those I…” he swallows, “love… so close to me, I’m really pushing them away.”
Did he say love? She touches his cheek, and he closes his eyes, exhaling shakily.
“I can’t promise I won’t be jealous, Guinevere. All I can promise is that I will try to not lose my mind when a strange man talks to you. Or looks at you. Or touches you.” His eyes grow stormy again.
“Arthur,” she finally speaks, bringing him back to earth.
“Sorry. I’m so sorry, Guinevere. I do trust you. I always have. It’s just…” he trails off, his thumb stroking the skin on the top of her foot.
“Him you didn’t trust.”
“Right,” he exhales, thinking he’s making headway.
“Yet you took it out on me anyway,” she says, sniffling.
Guess not. He drops his head back down to her knee. “I know. You were right. I behaved like a child. I wouldn’t listen.”
“Four days, Arthur,” she says quietly. “You waited four bloody days before you decided to apologize.”
“I…”
“And even then Merlin had to drag your sorry backside out.”
“How did you…?” he looks up at her, and decides that that is a question for later. “I didn’t think you would see me. That you would hear my apology.”
“You thought me that cold?”
“No!” he exclaims, his hand on her knee now. “In my anger and… stupidity, I guess I forgot that you were you.”
“Stupidity is a good word for it,” she says.
“Guinevere…” he says, pressing his face into her lap. She allows her hand to fall to his head, fingers threading through his hair, amazed at its softness, its silken texture.
“Please forgive me,” he whispers, turning his head to the side, pressing his cheek against her legs. She can feel the warm moisture from his tears falling into her lap.
“Do you want to know why I was having lunch with Lance?” she asks, wiping her face with her free hand.
He sighs and sniffs. Her fingers feel so good in my hair. He nods, afraid to speak for fear his voice will come out strange, choked with emotion.
“Lance owns an art gallery.”
Arthur presses his face into her lap again, feeling about two inches high. She was doing something for me, and I acted like a stupid fuck. I don’t deserve her.
“He wants to give you a show.”
He groans. This just keeps getting worse.
“He thinks you’re brilliant.”
“Stop…” he moans, “I already feel terrible, now you’re making me feel worse.”
“Oh?”
He looks at her. “You’re doing this intentionally, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” she meets his gaze with her own, her eyes red.
They regard each other a minute, and finally she says, “You look like shit.”
“You look beautiful.”
“I look like shit, too.”
“No,” he says, lifting up onto his knees, winding his arms around her waist, “you are gorgeous.” He buries his head in her lap, pressing it into her stomach.
“I love you, Guinevere. Please say you forgive me.”
She reaches down and lifts his head, gently pulling his face to hers, kissing him softly, just once. “I love you, Arthur. I do forgive you.”
He leans up and kisses her, hands clutching the material of her nightie. “Thank you,” he breathes.
“Arthur?” she says, tracing his jaw with her finger, feeling four days’ worth of stubble scratching her fingertip.
“Hmm?”
“Just don’t do it again.” Her voice is deadly serious.
He squeezes her, pulling her down to him, into his lap on the floor. “I won’t. I mean, I’ll try not to,” he says, leaning in to kiss her.
She evades him, raising an eyebrow at him.
“I won’t,” he says, nuzzling her nose with his.
She lets him get within a centimeter of her lips before pulling back again.
“I promise,” he whispers huskily, lunging quickly forward to capture her lips before she can pull away again.
“I promise,” he repeats, tucking his face into her neck as he holds her to him tightly, vowing to never let her go again.
Arthur pulls them to their feet, wrapping his arms around her small body. His body surrounds hers, yet he feels that she is all around him, that she is encompassing his entire being.
“Thank you,” he repeats, whispering against her hair. “You are absolutely everything to me.”
She just squeezes him tighter, and he can feel her breathing go ragged.
“Are you crying again?” he asks, leaning back and looking down at her.
“No,” she lies, pressing her face into his shirt, using it to dry her disobedient tears.
“Guinevere,” he says tenderly, pulling her to the couch with him, “don’t cry. I can’t bear it any more.”
“Sorry. These are happy tears, Arthur. I think. My emotions are all over the place right now,” she says, reaching for a tissue and wiping her face again. “Might be PMS,” she adds with a laugh.
“Well, that’s fantastic,” he says wryly, and as she snorts a laugh, a clear bubble of snot suddenly protrudes from one nostril.
Gwen quickly clamps the tissue over her face, horrified. Slowly she lifts her eyes to Arthur’s face.
He is bright red and positively shaking with the laughter that he is valiantly trying to hold in. She purses her lips seeing him, trying not to laugh herself now.
“Don’t hold it in Sweet, or the other nostril may join in as well,” he says, suddenly busting out, falling over on the couch. “God, that was brilliant,” he gasps, “do it again…”
“You can just piss right off,” she shoves him, but she is laughing now, too. She stands and stalks to the bathroom, closing the door behind her.
He follows and presses his ear to the door, laughing again as he hears just what he expected to hear: she’s gone in there to blow her nose in privacy.
“I can hear you out there, Pendragon,” her voice wafts through the bathroom door.
“And I can hear you blowing that adorable nose in there, Degrance,” he calls back, leaning against the frame of the bathroom door, blocking the opening with his body so she has no choice but to deal with him when she opens the door.
“Oh!” she exclaims, jumping when she opens the door to discover he is right there.
He chuckles, dropping his hands down to her waist.
Gwen looks up at him and puts her hand to his cheek, saying, “When was the last time you had a decent meal?”
“What?” She’s thinking about food?
“You look like you’ve eaten nothing but junk for four days.”
“That’s because I have,” he admits, squeezing her waist in his hands. “You’ve skipped a meal or two yourself, there, miss.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, trying to duck past him now.
“Oh, no you don’t,” he grabs her, quick as lightning, pulling her against him and kissing her deeply, longingly, gratefully.
“I missed you so much, Sweet,” he mutters as he moves down to her neck, “and I’m sorry I didn’t say it sooner.”
“What?” she whispers, her hand holding his head, fingers threading through his hair.
“I wanted to,” he says, his voice still a quiet rumble, “I came close a couple times…”
“Oh,” she says, understanding now. She realizes her feet have been moving when she finds herself on her bed with him suddenly over her.
“I’ve known it since the second day I knew you,” he admits, sliding his tongue down the side of her neck.
“Arthur,” she breathes, sliding her hands up beneath his shirt, and he whips it off, tossing it carelessly aside before dropping back down over her. Gwen’s hands return to his chest immediately, tracing the dragon on his shoulder with her fingertips.
She doesn’t need to say anything else as they gaze into each other’s eyes. Her fingers are light and delicate on his skin, his hands caress her face, her side.
Arthur’s hand at her side travels lower, down to her thigh, where her nightie has shifted, bunching almost to her hips. She squirms deliciously under his touch as he scoots the thin garment higher, his palm skimming over her stomach and her breasts before she finally has to lift her shoulders to pull it off over her head. This, too, goes sailing through the air.
Gwen’s hands are unfastening his jeans now, her fingers trembling slightly, almost like she hasn’t done this many times already, but she is successful, opening them and sliding her hands inside, shoving the denim down as she does so.
Arthur groans and rolls to the side, pulling the jeans off completely, followed by his socks. He sees the wound on the sole of his foot from the lamp for the first time finally, but still pays little heed to it.
More important things to attend right now. He rolls back over, close beside her, hooking his leg over hers, mingling the warmth of her body with his.
“I missed you so much, Arthur,” she turns into him and whispers against his throat. “I was mad at you, but I missed you still.” His arms close around her, holding her against him, tenderly, softly, but with an urgency. A desperation, almost.
He kisses the top of her head, inhaling the lilacs there as he closes his eyes. Slowly they begin to move again, her hand sliding around his ribcage, his hand sliding down to rest on her hip, his fingers picking at the waistband of her knickers before slipping underneath.
Gwen slips a foot between his calves, and Arthur lifts her face to his, leaning down to kiss her lips softly yet passionately, a series of small, nibbling kisses that gradually build into deep, hungry kisses until they are both breathless.
“Guinevere,” he sighs her name as he removes the last tiny stitch of clothing between them, gliding his hand back up her leg once she’s kicked them away to the floor.
He starts to lean over her, but she presses back, pushing him down against the pillows, ravishing his lips with hers, suddenly urgent, climbing over him, straddling his stomach.
She sits back and stares down at him a moment, her eyes dark with passion but overflowing with love; an expression mirrored back at her from his eyes.
Arthur reaches his hands up and closes them over her breasts, marveling once again at how they fit so perfectly into his hands, how her body seems built for him alone. Gwen sighs contentedly at his touch, her eyes fluttering closed. She places her hands over his, then slides them down, over his arms and up to his shoulders, leaning forward again to close her lips over his.
She kisses his jaw, over to his ear, where she nibbles a bit and teases him with her tongue until he shivers. Then down his neck, scooting her body lower as she dots kisses on his shoulders, his chest, licking and biting one of his nipples.
He grunts hoarsely, his hands clutching her shoulders, her hair. Unable to take any more, he flips her over suddenly, drawing a giggling yelp from her as her head once again hits the pillow and she is beneath him again, lifting her face to his.
Arthur kisses her ardently, his hands on either side of her face holding her gently, like a precious jewel.
He pulls away slowly, sucking her lower lip softly between his as he lifts his head. She whimpers quietly as he leaves her lips but sighs happily as he kisses a trail down her neck to her breasts, sucking one dark nipple into his mouth to flick at it with his tongue.
Gwen moves her legs, sliding the insides of her thighs against his hips, her feet against his legs. Arthur takes the hint and reaches down, finally touching her, groaning against her breasts as he feels how slick and warm she is. He slides two fingers into her and she moans his name. He slips them out and runs them around her most sensitive spot and she cries out and grips his head.
Arthur tries to move lower, wanting to kiss her below, wanting to worship every inch of her, make her feel nothing but pleasure after causing her so much pain. She senses his intended destination and pulls his head back up to hers.
“No… I want you inside me…” she purrs in his ear, biting it.
“But…”
“You can do it later. I want you, now.” She reaches down for him, sliding her palm on him a few times before guiding him into her with a long moan.
“Oh, Guinevere,” he whispers hoarsely into her neck as he pushes into her, her familiar warmth surrounding him. This is where I belong, he finds himself thinking, and he starts to move his hips, thrusting, finding their rhythm again.
Gwen’s hands are everywhere. His face, his shoulders, his chest, his buttocks, his back. She can’t seem to settle on one location, and the friction of her slender fingers all over Arthur’s body is making him tingle.
He opens his eyes to look at her, watching her head toss, her lips part just before she bites her lower lip and whimpers, her fingers gripping his shoulders now.
Arthur moves faster, plunges deeper, harder, and drops his head to kiss her again, their tongues mingling and playing.
“I love you so much, Arthur,” Gwen gasps, pulling her lips away, and then she is tumbling, plummeting into a sea of unbearable sensation, digging her nails hard into his shoulders and crying out.
“Oh…” Arthur groans, burying his face into her neck and thrusts deeply, falling right along with her, panting and sweating and just happy.
“And I love you,” he whispers in her ear after a moment, once his brain is able to function again, once his heartbeat and breathing slow a bit.
“So how many women have you alienated in your quest for ultimate alpha-male dominance?” Gwen asks later, curled into his side, her head on his shoulder.
“Ha,” he laughs. “More than you want to know about, probably. There were two that lasted longest, though, before I was unceremoniously tossed on my ear. Sophia, the summer before I went to University, was the first. She lasted two whole months before she gave me my walking papers.”
“What did you do?”
“Oh, so you automatically assume it was my fault?” he asks, smirking.
“Obviously.”
“Okay, so it was. I was a possessive bastard, what else? Wouldn’t so much as let her speak to another man,” he admits, looking away, ashamed of his past behavior. “It got to the point where I was ordering for her at restaurants and stalking the store where she was had a summer job.”
“Arthur, really,” she chides.
“I know, I know, you don’t need to yell at me. I do like to think that I’ve grown since then.”
“You have,” she says, kissing his shoulder. “Some.”
“Hey!”
“Just because I’ve forgiven you and we’ve made up quite, um, thoroughly,” she says, looping her leg over his, “doesn’t mean I won’t be giving you shit about this for a while.”
“Point taken.”
“So who was the other?”
“Elana. That was at Uni. Month and a half, only. Walked in on her hugging some strange bloke, and I yanked him away from her and punched him.”
“Arthur!”
“Turned out he was her cousin that she hadn’t seen in three years.”
She just looks at him. “Gee, he jumps to the wrong conclusion, who would have thought?”
“Guinevere…”
“I know, I know, sorry. But I did warn you.”
“Yes, and I do deserve it. For the record, storming into your flat and searching for a hidden lover was a first for me.”
“Noted.”
“Oh, and my failed relationships have not been all my fault,” he says, brightening up some.
“Do tell,” she says, turning slightly and leaning on her elbow to look down at him.
First he lifts his head and kisses her again. Then again, and yet again, momentarily distracted.
“Arthur,” she reminds him.
“Right,” he drops his head back to the pillow, his hands resting on her lower back now. “Vivian. Also at University. Before Elana. She was willing to put up with anything I did. Completely happy to be possessed by me.”
“Nutter.”
“Totally and completely barmy,” he confirms. “Girl was obsessed. I think she was worse than me on the possessiveness scale.”
“So what happened?”
“I tried to break it off. She was getting too intense. I wasn’t ready for that level of deep commitment at that time,” he pauses, and the phrase at that time resonates through Gwen’s mind.
“Luckily her father found out about us. Didn’t approve of me at all. So he made her transfer schools to one back home in Stockholm.”
“Wow, he made her?”
“Her father is Olaf Jorgensen. He can bloody well do as he pleases, you know?”
“Yes, sort of the Uther Pendragon of Sweden,” she chuckles.
“Right. Plus he was footing the bill for her education, so…”
“And there we have it.”
“For all I know, she’s up there pining away for me still,” he says, looking just a tiny bit smug about this possibility.
“Poor girl,” Gwen teases, sticking a pin right into that bubble.
“So tell me about this Lance,” he says, changing the subject as he toys idly with her hair.
“Lancelot. We dated at University for about half a year.”
“Long time.”
“Yeah. He was a year older, and was set to graduate while I had one year left. He was in Arts Management, and wanted to go to Paris after graduation. Absorb the artistic ambience, sort of thing. Plus his parents were from France.”
“Were?”
“Well, his father’s passed now, but his mother is back there. She’s actually from Chile, but she’s in Nice now,” she says, sounding a bit sad. Arthur doesn’t ask.
“So he left,” he says simply.
“Yep, up and left. Didn’t ask me to follow, didn’t so much as ask me to wait or even write.”
“Strange.”
“I know. I was heartbroken and confused. But I found out later through a mutual friend that he didn’t think he should ask those things of me. Didn’t think it would be fair of him.”
“He should have told you that.”
“Exactly. So I moved on. Sort of. Concentrated on my studies that last year, and since then I’ve dated some, but never more than two dates with the same guy.”
Arthur is quiet a minute. “So… was this Lance-a-lot the one who never…” his eyes drift down below her waist.
“Drank like a hummingbird at the flower of my womanhood?” she asks.
“What?” he laughs.
“Romance novels, sorry. But yes. He was the one.”
“Well, then, you’re better off without him,” he declares.
Part 32: link